Naruto: Tales of a Ninja Magician
by Captain Claymore
Summary: A story of an alternate world where small changes long long ago made a Ninja World of a different history and different people, different heroes and different villains. Meet a young girl that tries to live a life as a ninja with a completely different set of ideals from the cruel world that surrounds her, trying to remain unchanged. Cover by: Cgonza15
1. Tale Begins: Enter Nakotsumi Mana!

**Some say that whenever one makes a choice there is another world that coexists where one chooses differently. When one follows this confusing thread, far in the reaches of the void that separates them, one can find a world very different from the one they know. A world which is inhabited with different people, world that is defined by a different history created by countless choices differing from any other world like it. This is a story of such a world!**

A young girl was standing on a cardboard box with some trash in it, one not unlike many more that could've been found across Konohagakure, especially in the spring season when people were tidying up and throwing out the trash that they had as leftovers from winter. The substance and contents of said box mattered little to the twelve year old girl, only its location in the central district of the village. The actions she performed on said box were quite unlike what any common villagers had seen before causing crowds that couldn't have been called as small to gather around the child and observe her peculiar behavior.

Konohagakure was a ninja village through and through, people that lived in it may have lived under the illusion that it was no militaristic establishment however they weren't quite right. The village made its due from ninja performing missions for both its villagers and the village itself, most of the time ninja faced off against other ninja and no place, that benefits from violence and conflict can be called non-militaristic. As many rights these villagers enjoyed, as believable as this illusion of peace was – they lived in the village of hired muscle that did not shy away from killing. Perhaps that was why this girl proved to be so interesting to the audience.

The girl with slightly tanned skin and dark hair, tied behind her back with a forehead protector with the Leaf's mark carved into it, flowery black dress and sandals was performing tricks for the audience's amusement. Her performance consisted of tricks both simple and utilizing ninja techniques, something that not that many people have seen before. Ninja techniques were made to be tools of murder and stealth, tools of accomplishing the task at hand and this child was using them for amusement of the audience, making harmless but highly visually appealing sparks, using her natural affinity for sleight of hand as a kunoichi to quickly hide and reveal objects. The public ate the little girl up…

The girl opened her eyes in the morning as Sun felt its need to blast all of its luminescence into her closed eyes slightly earlier than the young genin would've loved it to. She scratched her tired eyes and sat up looking around the bright room, her somewhat annoyed and tired eyes slipped back to the piece of cloth illustrating one of her favorite books that was hanging on her window, acting as a cover, as a mean to protect her from the light. The girl's hand reached up and tore it off with a quick pull, "Thanks, I'll remember this, Shikio-kun…" she thought sarcastically thanking the character who was depicted on the cloth. The illustration was one of his iconic battles with the Kirigakure ninja when in reality he failed his duty to protect a young girl from sunlight in the morning. Life was truly unlike fiction…

"Mana, when will you get down!? You don't want to be late for your "One-Time-Thank-You-Tour", do you?" father's voice echoed from below. The man was a Chuunin of Konohagakure and had quite the powerful voice, he was more of the intellectual type so he had that certain shade of confidence and strength to his voice without making it sound too husky and dark. He had the perfect voice for a teacher but he used it to berate the opponents that fell into the traps of "Konoha's Great Trapster", as he was known, instead. The only reason why Mana knew all of this was because sometimes father's friends gathered and they kept telling the girl all of the stories, always sounding so proud of all the violence, always making her doubt just how much of it was true. Surely Hibiki-san couldn't jump fifteen meters in the air to catch the scroll they were supposed to retrieve, right?

Mana jumped out of the bed and slipped into a white shirt, buttoning it lazily and making the bed. This day was actually a special one and that meant something having in mind the fact that she just graduated from the Ninja Academy three days ago. Today was not supposed to be the day of her life as a ninja however, this was more of a day for magic! The girl had a strange little hobby for a kunoichi, she performed magic tricks on a cardboard box full of trash for everyone to see. It was a strange thing to do for those who did not understand the deep hidden meaning of Mana's behavior.

This girl with messy dark hair that was all over the place and skin that was several shades short of making everyone think she was from Kumogakure was actually a very peaceful and kind soul, she despised the notion that ninjutsu was an art for killing. To Nakotsumi Mana all life was sacred and magical, ninjutsu was a part of life so it was just a special kind of magic, magic that was meant to protect the source of all magic – life. Because Mana believed that ninjutsu was magic which was meant to protect the stronger magic she had to express that belief, she had to show everyone that ninjutsu was not meant for killing but rather it could be given any number of meanings depending on the person that used it.

The hunched and sleepy figure slothfully stumbled down the stairs from her room into the kitchen where mother had already made her some pancakes, Mana's mother worked in a café further into the village center called "Nakotsumi Café", she knew all sorts of weird dishes and beverages. She knew how to make that weird "coffee" drink, a lot of villagers came to her home for a visit just to try it, for some reason mother wanted Mana to keep away from it, maybe it was some sort of alcohol or something? The girl slumped down on the chair and started stuffing her lovely little cheeks with the breakfast. A kitchen knife flew and dug right into the column of pancakes that were stacked in the center of the table.

"I hope you're not going to thank Mr. Hanada like that, you do realize he sponsored your act, right?" mother spoke, the woman was a kind one but had a rather feisty character, she was also the only one in the family with the darker skin making Mana somehow wonder if she wasn't the one whom the little ninja-magician inherited it from. "I'm going to dress up and do my hair later, mom, I want to spend as little time in that uniform as possible." The girl replied after swallowing the breakfast, by now the knife flinging did not bother her one bit. "Excuse me?!" mother yelled out with a smile in a funny tone "We made that uniform together, you know? Put it together from scraps of cloth". The family shared a laugh.

"Hanada is a crook though." father spoke, he had his chuunin vest on, most likely he was supposed to run off into an assignment pretty soon. "Yeah, somehow doesn't feel too great knowing that my daughter's act took off because of a person with such a reputation…" mother scratched her forehead as she was still working the pan with the reinforcements to the pile that was currently on the table. "Well, he may be a slimy bastard but I guess he's an admirer of art… Let's just hope it's his artistic side that is interested in Mana and not the one I'd be glad to pound." father concluded the topic and finished his tea. "Well, I'm off, tell me how it went." he said his farewells and dashed off as Mana and mother waved him away.

One day, not too long ago, Mana was doing her casual thing, working on those little magic tricks she did and a man in a fancy attire approached her and after the little show was over offered to sponsor the first year of her performances in a village hall in the northern district of the village just in case if she was willing to take it further. The hall was mostly used by actors who kept playing the same stories over and over again: "Adventures of Shikio", "Stories from the Great Shinobi Wars", "Tales of a Gutsy Ninja" which, to be entirely honest, to Mana looked pretty much like a hentai-story from little she had seen.

Naturally the young magician felt much obliged to reward the man in some way, she decided to give him a show for free, show him what he was financing, luckily enough his son's birthday was just around the corner so he felt very happy about all of that. Children did comprise the vast majority of Mana's audience anyways, they also were quite firm supporters of her craft which in terms made the mature villagers look at her with the "she's not hurting anyone anyways" stares and smile as they passed by the cardboard box that Mana performed on. That was the plan for today, later she'd have to train for a little bit because father told her that soon she should receive a letter about the meeting of her team. That was just the way things went in the village – genin worked in teams, not that the girl wasn't excited about meeting them.

After the breakfast the young magician rushed to get a shower and to dress up, the magician uniform did look weird but it was fun in a way – she looked like a little monkey in it and it was tight, not a thing Mana would've loved to be caught in a fight wearing but she looked like a fancy lady-man in it which amused her somewhat. The young kunoichi was one of those girls that didn't mind looking cute, obviously she was instructed about the practical attires in the Academy but during her days off she didn't mind looking silly just for the sake of it. Her attitude towards outfits matched one towards ninjutsu, if one wanted they could've just had some fun with it and not cared about the consequences. Father also looked pretty happy about the uniform, he also gifted the girl with a seal in her round top hat that could've been used to seal things into it and unseal them, sadly enough Mana wasn't skilled enough to use it yet but father said it's a gift for the future anyways.

After slipping on her magician's uniform and fitting it with all the card decks and tools she used for simple hide and reveal tricks like spring devices that could've been loaded with light objects and then just shoot them out when flicked for a visual effect, the girl admired herself in the mirror for a couple of seconds before giving herself a playful smile and dashing down the stairs and rushing off after waving her mother goodbye. With a slow and confident step Mana was heading off into the large western district of the village which was all just large mansions and big houses that made the small home of Nakotsumi family blush like a schoolgirl being complimented.

Feeling a bit nervous the magician pressed a button which in term made a light flicker making some hired security gather up near the entrance to check her. These men weren't ninja, they were all mercenaries however a lot of the mercenaries started as ninja before mucking something up or they lived outside the village walls and grew up in an adapt of perish kind of environment making them just as strong as a ninja and much more crafty. Picking a fight with them wouldn't be good in any way and annoying them would be a poor demonstration of Mana's manners. The men stared the weird looking kid down and let her through with a smile. They also were kind enough to lead the magician into the mansion and handed her over to Hanada Katsuo himself. The man was a tycoon who built his fortune on combination of "business" and "lucky breaks of right people disappearing at the right time", being in his presence wasn't pleasant to the girl in any way but he was her sponsor and she couldn't help it but accept his small donations just for as long as her shows take off.

The man was a tall and well-built gentleman, he wore a rather fancy attire comprising of a white silk shirt and a vest, his overflowing golden hair and gentle facial features combined with what looked like eyeliner and make up made him look a little too feminine for Mana's comfort but his strange looks wasn't the most uncomfortable thing about this man. Being an advocate of justice and peace, and a kunoichi of Konoha, the girl suspected she'd have to take this man down when he becomes too ambitious and makes a mistake but for now she was wise to stay on his right side. "I'm quite glad that you decided to accept my offer to bring your art to the stage instead of… Cardboard boxes… I understand that you may be too young to understand this, Mana-chan, but… Art is a business and your art is so exotic and strange, its meaning is so yet unseen that an artist like me cannot stay neutral in its presence. My son Koji is right there, he and his friends cannot wait to witness what you do. I must compliment your attire, it's rather classical, as you might see if you look around, I am a man that sees the value in the classical…"

The man made a gesture for Mana to look around and witness the countless statues and art that was everywhere in his home. Somehow this just made the girl feel less comfortable as she felt like she was not unlike this poor busted up statue of a naked lady. Petrified and put on display, her arms broken so she cannot resist because her art somewhat depends on her benefactor…

"No way! Guys, it's Konoha's Sorceress!" the teenager on the expensive looking armchair yelled out and jumped up pointing at Mana as she and Katsuo entered the room. "Konoha's Sorceress?" Mana looked at Katsuo, he shrugged and smiled like a litterer would smile being caught red-handed. "I thought of it, has a certain ring to it, all good artists have stage-names, you know… Use it at your discretion, or don't if you don't like it." he laughed out before turning around, wishing Mana good luck and leaving. Mana looked over the kids and teenagers that were staring at her expecting to see a miracle. When she was performing on a cardboard box without a care in the world it felt so different, now she was… Almost stage-frightened. "Okay, you might want to move now!" Mana ordered herself when the pause became a bit too uncomfortably long as the girl extended her arms.

"Alright, who wants to see a magic trick?" Mana smiled through her newly discovered stage-fright she was starting to get used to just for her audience to cheer on. People in a militaristic ninja village rarely got to have some fun, art was supposed to change all of that and Mana's art was quite unlike anything anyone may have seen. Maybe that was why she was starting to pick up some popularity around the village…


	2. Revolt? Hanada Estate Under Attack!

The "stage" magic that Mana performed was unique, it, obviously enough, wasn't actual magic but it was the closest it got to the real thing. How did one define what is magical? Was it something that could not be explained? Life had many mysteries, probably less was known of it than unknown and people seemed to be strangely more attracted to learning of how to take it away than to understand what it actually was. With that in mind one wouldn't have to twist their mind around too much to empathize with Mana's peaceful point of view.

What the young kunoichi did when she performed was a combination of both simple practical magic but she most of all preferred ninjutsu. After all the point of her magic was to show ninjutsu as something other than a tool to claim lives or to ruin them. Instead of cutting people to pieces or burning them alive, Mana preferred that her techniques looked impressive to provide a certain spark of joy for her audience. The girl took great pride in the preparation work she did before each performance, she always grinded her magic to perfection.

For that simple reason the audience of teens and children just couple of years shy from being qualified as teens looked like they were colored impressed. The very first thing that Mana did was weave a single handseal and force a small and harmless current of wind chakra out of her sleeve, then flick the device around her wrist hidden behind her sleeve that shot out the deck of cards she had hidden. The combination was an impressive display of cards twisting around in a horizontal and round twister. With swift movements of hands Mana caught each and every card and started shuffling the deck.

"So does anyone want to volunteer? I promise not to turn you into things or hypnotize you or anything." Mana smiled when a kid jumped up and ran up to her, his face didn't look like it belonged to a fan, he looked eager to make a fool out of Mana and to bust her act. Reading faces to some extent was something that was taught in the Academy, for a ninja it was essential to identify the dangerous faces from the harmless ones in a large crowd sometimes, sensei probably had no idea that Mana would use it for magic shows…

"Thank you, now if you could please pick a card we can finally see some magic." the young ninja magician smiled as she quickly shuffled through the deck gesturing with her chin for the teen who looked like he was just slightly older than her to pick a card. With a rather rude and powerful movement the teen drew a card out of the bunch and the raven haired magician grinned with a half of her mouth – he played right into it. "I think someone has the King of Hearts." Mana declared as the kid showed it to the audience.

This wasn't the sort of trick to represent Mana's arsenal of stage magic, this was just a warm up trick that used a very intricate and psychological tricks rather than sleight of hand. The trick was to remember the card she caught that she wanted the audience member to draw, to know exactly where it was in the deck, and to flick it open to him several times during shuffling. The teen's mind perceived that card as special and subconsciously chose it most of the time, had he not chosen the card Mana had several backup plans how to develop the trick further but for now this part had to end.

"That's pretty cheap, show us more tricks like that flying cards bit!" the volunteer decided to heckle for some reason. Mana didn't really want to overexert herself with chakra usage, she usually did three to four ninjutsu or genjutsu tricks per show and those were the only things she knew. All of her ninjutsu or genjutsu techniques were harmless techniques made for magic shows and all of them were made by Mana herself. Truth be told if she did not possess precise enough chakra control to train genjutsu and the ability to invent her own impressive visually but ultimately harmless techniques she'd have not passed the Academy test.

One thing that was odd about Mana was her refusal to use jutsu that were not invented by her. As an artist she felt very uneasy about ripping off other artists which proved to be difficult in the Academy because it was all centered around learning the generic Academy techniques. By no means were they any easier to learn than Mana's own techniques, most of them had tricks and practical uses to them unlike the jutsu that Mana used but that was not the obstacle that prevented Mana from using them – it was her hesitance to use the techniques she didn't invent.

"Shut the hell up, Shinjiro, I'm enjoying the show." Koji, the son of Mana's sponsor, replied. The magician was glad to hear that for the time being at least Hanada's son was entertained. Still, artist's honor demanded her to step her game up and entertain everyone. "Well, I suppose I could show you a more appealing trick, I always appreciate a demanding audience, keeps me on the top of my game." Mana smiled gently as she quickly weaved some handseals looking right in the eyes of her volunteer. Suddenly the boy crouched down and started acting like he was a monkey, letting off strange yelling sounds, jumping around on all fours and butting his head into the furniture.

The kids that were circled around couldn't keep it in, they couldn't have been any happier than they were at that moment, in a way this was also part a psychological trick combined with some harmless genjutsu. The genjutsu technique in question was one of Mana's favorite – "Polymorphy Jutsu", however if it was used on a different audience member it may have annoyed the kids, the exchange of dialogue between Koji and his friend who was now looking in the cupboard for bananas suggested that this Shinjiro kid was the pretentious kind and everyone wanted to see him being taught a lesson.

Without letting the genjutsu eat up too much of her chakra as her reserves were already almost half empty Mana let go of the audience member who instantly started yelling at her, "You promised you won't hypnotize me!", Mana made an innocent face and slapped her own cheek, "I did? Oh my, I guess you'd have been wise not to trust a magician. Artists these days do all sorts of things for a cheap laugh…" Mana finished that part of the show and was getting ready to move it to the main part when she realized that her show was all going to blow up in her face.

A loud bang came from behind the magician and loud yelling broke into the room, multiple loud voices started coming in and out of the house, they started spreading to every room and probably even every floor, there must've been a party for adults going on as loud shrieks of women came in from the floor above – Hanada Estate was under attack. Before the kids and their entertainer recovered from shock the door that lead to their room burst open and four mercenaries rushed in, seeing how they were all wearing the clothes that Hanada's guards were wearing. The kids had all calmed down but something was wrong – they rushed up to Shinjiro, who was now back to normal, and Mana and put their hands behind the kids backs and commanded them to kneel down on the floor.

"Wh…What in the world is going on?! Junjo, what are you doing? What's going on?!" Koji started freaking out as the men he thought were supposed to protect him were now tying up his hands and feet. "Just keep your mouth shut, kid, this doesn't concern you, it's between us and your backstabbing father." one of the muscle-heads replied. The guards offered no more words, they just picked the kids up and started taking them upstairs to a room that reminded Mana of an attic. The kind of an attic rich people have, mind you, but an attic filled with art and expensive furniture was still an attic.

The mercenaries put the kids down and left one of the mercs to watch the kids while the others left the room without even bothering to lock it. After all, the people there were just kids, what could they do against a grown and trained mercenary? This wasn't a good situation to be in, Mana never thought this day would require combat expertise so she left her ninja tools at home, all she had with her was this quite uncomfortable uniform and all the practical magic tools like fake flowers, decks of cards and the sort. Mana never was any good in the Academy with the physical arts anyways, she lacked any notable skill in weaponry combat, her aim was one of the worst in the class and her taijutsu skills placed her in the one of the lower quarters of the class.

Koji yelled out at the mercenary, "You betrayed my dad! He should've never hired a shit-head like you, you mercenaries are just backstabbing snakes!" The man calmly approached Koji and kneeled up so that his blocky head could reach the boy's level. This was good! Koji was getting the mercenary to keep his eyes away from the kids and focusing on him, he probably didn't know that Mana was a ninja but this was still better than nothing for a start. The best option would've been to just play the scared little girl and let the events go as they did, Mana was under no mission, no orders, no assignment. To sit still while people got hurt was not her style, however.

Mana had the gift of ninjutsu in her, the gift that most people lacked, her magic of life was more powerful than that of everyone else in this house and that gave her the responsibility to use that magic to protect everyone! Even if that meant placing her own life on the line, even if that meant getting hurt and risking this by entering a combat situation clearly unprepared. At least the girl had decency to wear sandals and not those shoes that mom suggested, they looked nice but no fighting ever could be done in them.

"The real snake is your slimy daddy, brat. Do you even know why we're doing this? Haven't you ever wondered why so often mercenaries attack the mansion? Well once we did, we didn't submit one for the Konohagakure Police Force and questioned him ourselves, turns out they worked for your father, just like us. When time to pay up came your father just gave them up for Police Force and paid those dirtbags to stick some crimes up on their files. We decided to teach your daddy a lesson before he screws us over like he did every other mercs he hired."

So that was it? Finally Hanada's own greed was catching up to him, on any other day Mana would've loved to see his own slimy affairs explode in Hanada Katsuo's face but… These men meant business, they probably wanted to hurt or kill the man, that's what mercenaries do, they have little restraint, if any. They follow their own sick and twisted code of honor and if they feel like their payment is threatened they will most likely not stop at just quitting the job, they'll feel as if they have to pay Katsuo back and that Mana and her own moral code could not allow.

There was an easy way to escape these restraints, this was a simple rope knot so the basic Academy Rope Escape Jutsu would've sufficed but that really was not Mana. She never used a technique that she didn't invent in public, only by herself and only on special occasions, her getting through Academy with this silly rule was a story all of itself, story for another time. "Sir, I don't know if you know me but I'm a magician, I have bunch of pointy tools on me and the way you put me down made one dig into my side and it really hurts, maybe you could flip me over?" Mana asked attracting the guard's attention. Before that she used her natural sleight of hand to escape the binds on her arms, being a stage magician offered some more skill in escaping binds as one did that for fun every Tuesday.

The brute approached Mana and bent over to flip her on the other side, "Whatever you say, Konoha's Sorceress…" the man grunted out using that ridiculous stage name with the most condescending tone imaginable. Swiftly as the man's arms went under her side to push her the girl shot her elbow straight into the man's eye and jumped up driving her palm into the man's face. Mana had a pretty puny punch, just barely strong enough to make her graduate the Academy but the man staggered back and hit the wall making all sorts of statues and ancient clocks fall on his head and knock him out.

The magician proceeded to untie her legs and then went over to Koji's binds, then everyone else's. Everyone looked at her funny, they were impressed up to an extent but also they realized they've underestimated Mana, that was what they all did, that was why she succeeded when she did. She may not have been the most amazing prodigy or had the most impressive bloodline or come from some ancient clan of ninja but everyone always looked down on her. It was a good decision to leave her headband at home, otherwise these mercenaries would've made sure to keep her better contained…

Mana's eyes slipped up on Koji and saw him lifting a heavy head of some statue above the head of the mercenary, she silently let out an alert for him to stop. "I know you're angry, I know you feel betrayed but don't kill them. I saved you, you owe me, if you just look the other way and escape the mansion I'll consider the debt paid." Koji looked at her with a berating and enraged look, he probably couldn't believe it – a ninja that refused to let the enemy die? This must've been the dumbest thing the teen had ever heard but Mana considered all life sacred and would have never let anyone die. That was her ninja way.

"Whatever… Go save my dad, I'll go get some REAL ninja here." Koji grunted out and gestured for the other teens to follow him as he followed Mana who slowly opened the attic door and looked down. Of course she'll try her best to save Hanada, she may not have liked the guy at all, the genin may have just a little bit been on the side of the mercenaries but… This wasn't the way, hurting people and possibly killing them for something they haven't even done yet. The magician took off the blazer that was obstructing her movements and waved for the kids to move, if they were silent enough they'll pass right through.

There was some amount of activity, sounds of pounding, painful grunts and women crying, excessive cursing, those were all over the house. The kunoichi wasn't sure exactly how many mercenaries did Katsuo hire for protection, still, it would've been best to not directly fight any of them. Mana's legs felt tired from all the time they've been tied together so the exhaustion made her sit down on the stairs, this was a bad plan, she couldn't take these men on, not alone. She may have been a kunoichi of Konoha but her arsenal of techniques was just lightshows and useless visual illusions, even more some of her chakra was spent in that magic show previously.

Loud shout of pain, coming without a doubt from Hanada came Mana's way forcing the girl to jump up. Even if she's taken out, even if these men beat her, every second she fights them saves Hanada some suffering, she was given the control of ninjutsu and chakra manipulation by fate for a reason, if she just whined over how unfair the world was on the stairs she wouldn't deserve this gift she was given and if she died fighting these men that meant that she didn't prove herself worthy of those gifts and wasted them. Mana was burning with fire that made her wish to prove that wasn't true. A fire that burnt away all the fear, all the stress and all the shock and forced her to go save a life!

"Wait, you shouldn't be here…" a voice came at Mana's side as a mercenary was standing on the lower side of the steps, this one looked slimmer, he most likely slacked off his training hours. The mercenary didn't speak loud enough for the others in the shut room to hear, it took yelling of a man in pain for it to be heard all the way here. Through sheer instinct the kunoichi's hand reached for whatever she could find, flicking the switch that shot her cards out of the device and making the man flinch in surprise of bunch of cards being shot in his face, as he recovered Mana's kick had already reached his face, he was stunned and the magician couldn't stop for a second because that would mean she lost – she had the advantage and the kunoichi couldn't waste it! One punch after the other from her palm came at the man's chest and his face before the magician found a hard object – a vase on the table to knock him out with.

She could already hear a commotion and loud yells in the room at the western part of the building, the doors opening and some men confused by all the noise leaving – it had finally begun. It was time for Mana to prove her worth, to prove that the man that signed her Academy graduation papers was right to put the trust of the village on her. The magician glanced behind her only to witness the kids leave through the front door, she quickly jumped to hide behind one of those ancient couches getting ready for her first actual fight.

"Shit, the kids escaped!" one mercenary yelled out as several of them filled the room and started looking around. It was only a manner of time before the kids reach a ninja, a "real" ninja not a newbie disgrace like Mana… She may not have been willing to kill but she was ready to put her life on the line to protect a man she would've liked to slap with a wet cloth on a spare day. Life as a ninja was strange…


	3. Big Boss Bakku, Rumble Concludes at Last

There were three mercenaries roaming the one of many living rooms of the mansion. This was a problematic situation as the two were back to back and were scanning the area quite thoroughly while heading towards the door. Right as the magician felt like she was getting the basic idea of the situation one of the men separated and went through the door on the northern side of the room – completely in the opposite direction to both the exit where the kids went and the room where Hanada was held in. What could he have been up to? What exactly could've been the big plan of these men?

There were so many unknowns in this situation, Mana didn't know the degree of preparation that these men had, the very fact that they decided to pull something like this inside one of the most powerful ninja villages of the world was mind blowing by itself. They most likely planned to teach Hanada a lesson leaving him dead or heavily injured, rob his home leaving the man without as much as a ryo in his pocket and just disappear in the Fire Country forests, maybe move to another Country to live their days as newly made men.

Even with all the newfound heroism the genin felt quite hesitant to face off against the mercenaries, even one of them proved to be tough enough to barely be hurt by her blows, she needed to utilize heavy objects and play dirty if she was to take them down, fighting against even one of them was a gamble and those guys were as close to each other as husband and wife. If Mana as far as peeked to attack one of them from behind trying to utilize her element of surprise the other one would spot her near instantly.

"What was that sound? Is that Zanmaru? Holy shit, what happened, did ninja already find us out?" one of the mercenaries shouted out finally spotting his knocked out ally for the day. Mercenaries had no sense of loyalty, they weren't friends, they were just in it for the money and one wouldn't have been wrong to assume that these men had no sadness to spare for what happened to their friend. Growing up and learning to survive outside the village walls makes one only look out for themselves, adapt and survive, bonds to these men were a weakness, the only occasion for them to work together is when they need to satisfy their hunting instinct by hunting for money in a pack.

"No, no way, Bakku said that unless we make it publically known that shit is going down here no ninja will notice, no one should've noticed anything until we set this thing on fire, this has to be one of the kids… Still, how the hell…" the other one still tried to wrap his head around just how some kids managed to knock out a skilled mercenary. "Kids are scared little buggers, they probably ran off the first chance they got after taking out Zan, damn that guy, I'm almost tempted to draw something on his face right now…" the first mercenary replied crouching down to his downed fellow.

Mana slowly creeped around the couch, letting herself remain unseen as she observed the scene, the slim and puny hand of the girl reached up to remove a bust of the owner of the house that was located on the table. It was about time that the self-adoration of Hanada Katsuo finally served a noble purpose… Mana was careful to remain unseen as she tossed the stone head at one of the mercenaries, sadly her horrible aim let itself be known, instead of hitting the man in the head the stone hit him in the upper back making a painful wound but probably not a very effective one. The man cursed and fell on the floor, scratching the aching area and cursing profanities the likes of which the young magician had never heard before.

"You little brat!" the friend of the injured merc shouted out while charging at Mana, this was bad, situation like this called for the genin to use some more chakra because there was no way to get out of this unscathed otherwise. Luckily enough the girl's hands were quick enough to weave some seals before the brute got too close, she managed to make the seals, the man pulled out a knife. The blade of the damned thing was amazing, possibly large enough to cut entire limbs off with just a swipe, certainly very unlike the light and shallow cutting kunai that ninja used.

Mana struggled to get eye contact with the bandit, she needed that to set off her technique, the man jumped forward thrusting with the knife as if it was a longsword. Honestly he couldn't be blamed for such a lackluster knife-fighting style, his range was still superior to that of the unarmed girl, he was quite enraged and willing to kill. The man's knife impaled the young magician and the brute kept running with the powerless body of the girl for a while slamming her lifeless body to the wall. He lost control as he started punching her and laughing to himself.

That was the version of events that the man saw, luckily enough the genin managed to get eye contact with him in time and move to the side, had the man retained all of his awareness he may have tried to swipe sideways but now he just kept running forward believing to have impaled his enemy. "Hey, what the hell are you doing, she's right behind you, you idiot!" the still incapacitated mercenary yelled out to his friend, to be honest, the two were quite justified in not seeing genjutsu coming – it was a rare craft for someone to wield and even rarer to be inside a genin's arsenal.

Genjutsu were complicated techniques, they took a lot of chakra and they took the magician her entire, yet at the moment quite short, lifetime to make. Coming up with ideas was difficult enough, researching textbooks about human brain to know the centers which needed to be affected by chakra only added to it. They may have been a surprise weapon, they may have been effective techniques but… A single genjutsu technique drained almost half of the usable chakra that Mana had at that moment, the girl was already breathing heavily and her movements started feeling slower and sloppy, it felt like she just ran several laps in seconds. Single technique giving her just mere moments strained her body so much.

The kunoichi didn't wait too long for the merc to recover from the illusion, he may have seen what he saw and heard what he heard but he must've heard his buddy's reaction, Mana's foot was quick enough to target the back of the man's knee forcing him on the knees and her arms quickly slammed the man's head into the wall he was so kind to get close to. She tried her best but she wasn't sure if she knocked the man out – she may have been trained for almost five years to be efficient in combat and stealth but she still was just a teenage girl. Despite the fears of the magician the man looked like he was out cold, Mana looked at the downed mercenary, he struggled to move but it didn't look like he could – maybe she hit a sensitive spot in his back. The genin almost instantly started to feel bad, she didn't want to injure these men so much, what if she incapacitated the man for life?

Loud yells of Hanada from the other room signaled to the girl that this was no time at all to wonder about those things. She had to get in there and save Hanada even if she was quite tempted to hit him with something for what he brought on his family. His child, his wife, the friends of his family could've been killed because he was too greedy to pay some mercenaries that always took things too seriously. The girl's chest inflated as she drew a deep breath – she was still afraid and tired but she had to move, she had to go in there, what if the men inside the room had heard what happened here and became desperate to finish their job quickly? Mana had no luxury of time, ironic when luxury was all that surrounded her at that moment…

Slowly, still with shaking hands the kid opened the door and finally got to see the situation in the room. Good news were that Hanada, while messed up and tied to a chair, was alive and in a pretty good condition, there was also just one man inside the room which meant that Mana had to only get lucky one more time, that wasn't too much to ask for, right? The bad part was that the man who had his foot up on Hanada's chest as he kicked the chair down and held a knife up in the air was one of the biggest and coolest looking guys that Mana had ever seen. He had short and greasy dark hair that were messy enough to make his gas mask covered face look scary. The man wore a similar vest to that of a Konohagakure ninja but if Mana's memory from the Academy days served it was that of a Kumogakure ninja but no band suggested that this man looted it off of one or bought it from the black market.

"Well, girl, you have newfound respect from my side, taking on big boys like us requires balls. Now just be a good girl and bugger off." the man spoke to Mana without bothering to even look at her, he kept his gasmask googles focused on Hanada's beaten face and kept a firm grip on that knife, ready to plunge it wherever it needed to go to cause the man pain. Once more the girl breathed in and out, not being considered worthy to be even looked at by one's enemy felt degrading. "I'm about to risk my life to save a man who I shall strangle myself later. Well done, you…" she spoke to herself under her own nose as she took one more step forward.

Almost instantly, the very same moment her foot was set down forward the gigantic leader of the mercenary pack threw the knife at her, he wasn't fast enough for Mana not to lean to the side but he followed up his throw with a rush at her, the girl had no other option but to jump over some furniture and roll sideways, she wanted to counterattack but the momentum that the man forced her to build up with a double attack didn't give her that option. The only thing left for Mana to do was to stand back up as the man pulled his knife out of the wall. The blade went in deep, maybe all the way through the wooden wall but the tip looked bent somewhat. That gave Mana an idea about how to bring this goliath down.

"I suppose letting me punch Hanada-san is out of the…" the genin opened her mouth again as the man turned sideways and tossed the knife again, that was what she wanted this time. With full knowledge of the man's follow up attack and the bent tip of the knife, the girl didn't follow up the same course of action, she leapt sideways with a small hop and watched as the knife didn't cut into the wall, but instead bounced off of the small stone surface of the western wall of the room. This time it was Mana's own hand that caught the knife and swung it at the lower side of the man's leg as he passed by her, ducking to dodge his punch that would've probably killed her outright.

A powerful resistance of the man's muscular leg suggested that Mana's attack was successful, some blood shot out as a deep gash opened on the man's leg however he didn't even flinch, instead the back of his hand slapped Mana back, the girl was too surprised by lack of reaction from the man's side to duck, plus the size of the man's palm was just too big to dodge in such short span of time. The genin's body was flung backwards by the force, she actually hit a couch and flipped over with it, it somewhat softened the impact, had the kunoichi hit a wall she may have been out and probably would've never woken up. Mana's head lifted up spontaneously to observe the man's follow up attack.

Instead of rushing at her or trying to toss the knife again he was looking at the crumbling blade of the tool – the force of impact from before as it hit the wall caused the knife a lot of shock and the follow up cut must've added up to it, also, who knew what kind of battles the weapon had already been through. The man's refusal to gloat or speak sort of scared the magician, he tossed the knife aside and instead decided to walk up to the girl and to just punch her out himself. He didn't take too much time, he obviously was not enjoying this and wanted it over with. Had Mana seen the man's eyes any better her impression would've been strengthened – it was obvious that he had seen many battles and murdering his enemies was a routine to him before he started working as a bodyguard.

The man approached Mana but then stopped in shock – he didn't notice the katana in the girl's hand before he already was too close. It was a weapon which was on Hanada's wall and was forced down by all the ruckus, the genin just happened to find it on accident. The fact that he was so close to being killed forced the mercenary leader to freeze – this was supposed to be it, Mana could've just made a strong cutting motion holding the handle and forced the sheathe off, it was just matter of time from there… But that was not Mana's way. The girl did not remove the sheathe, she just swung the whole thing targeting the injured leg of the mercenary, as the tough oaken sheathe with cold steel inside collided with the man's bone it wasn't even close to being a fair match.

The merc yelled out loud as he fell on one knee, Mana quickly jumped up and started hitting him in his mask from both left and right, not stopping because stopping meant dying and letting Hanada die. The hits really let the boss of the mercs feel it, his mask tore, his googles almost exploded from the pressure and for the first time the magician got to see the man's eyes. Suddenly the worst happened – the sheathe broke revealing the steel inside and Mana hesitated to swing it, just for a mere moment, just long enough for her to turn the blade and to try to continue her onslaught of attacks with the blunt side but… It was all that the mercenary needed, he thrust his palm forward into Mana's chest pushing her into the wooden wall. The girl grunted out from the pain of hitting the wall as all air she had up to that moment, the little that was from all the exhaustion and swinging the sheathe blindly, went out forcing her to gasp for air, to try and catch any of it just to not let herself pass out because that meant Hanada's death.

The man picked up the sword, it didn't look like he had the same amount of hesitation to kill that Mana had, he started to approach her. This was it, Mana's hand to hand was pathetic, not even enough to outmatch a simple blockhead guy with more muscles than brain. Why didn't he talk? Why didn't he gloat? Why didn't he laugh from her? Did her life not matter to him?! Mana suddenly got furious, her life mattered, she was the only thing right now protecting Hanada so she mattered, she couldn't let herself die! Quickly the girl made two more handseals and shot her hands forward yelling as she felt the last of her usable chakra leave her hands in the shape of harmless sparks.

"Magical Spark Jutsu" may have been harmless but it was useful because it was visually impressive and the amount of spark in kept bombarding the enemy with was enough for them to be stunned for a brief moment, the man's arms were occupied with holding the sword so he couldn't shield his eyes using his hands for a moment, before he started covering them with his arms, lowering the blade and moving back, his eyes that were now exposed as his googles were broken by Mana's ruthless bashing before. The mercenary was giving in to the pressure, no that wasn't it, he figured out the weakness of Mana's jutsu, it had a very short range and the sparks got weaker as they hit him further, the barrage was less intense and it didn't feel nearly as unpleasant. What he didn't take into consideration was the couch that he stepped into and fumbled backwards, trying his best not to fall down but stumbling further and further into the room in the process.

Mana's hands weighed down – she just had barely enough chakra not to pass out but… Her enemy found himself in quite the conundrum – he fumbled back and hit the impressive deer horn that was hung on the wall, probably one hunted by Hanada Katsuo himself. The place where the man was bleeding from, however, made Mana lift her palm through the pain and to grunt out. "Please don't move, if you do you'll open the wound and bleed out almost instantly, shoulder is a dangerous place to be impaled in…" Mana huffed out and she was right – the man was only bleeding a little bit right now but he could've hit a pretty sensitive spot, had he moved around too much he risked dying in mere seconds from bleeding out if he hit an artery.

The mercenary roared out with voice powerful enough to make Mana pout. She felt a slight relief however as the roar ended abruptly it forced fear to return as she looked at what made the man stop being enraged, she saw his eyes strangely excited… As if he was… Smiling under that mask… Suddenly Mana realized – she missed one mercenary, back when three of them walked out, one of them left through the northern door, he must've wandered back having found nothing. However as she realized that it was already too late. The girl heard loud whistling noise in the air, similar to steel cutting through air itself…

A loud crumbling noise of shifting rock and breaking wood came her way instead of pain of being stabbed – confused Mana looked back only to see the mercenary completely pinned down by pillars of rock that closed him by tightly shooting up crushing through the wooden tiles of the floor. "Nice work here, kid, but you missed one." a friendly voice reached Mana's ear as she saw a man in a jounin west with a bandana and geeky looking glasses grinning at her as he held a thumb up. "A young man bumped into me and said that a weakling ninja needed help, I suppose you did alright but you were a bit sloppy – you forgot to knock out that guy back there, you forgot this guy behind you… Other than that… Good job" he laughed.

A short while later ninja were swarming the area taking the beaten mercenaries out for questioning in the Konohagakure Police Force HQ. Mana decided that her job here was done, she went upstairs to pick her blazer up and as she went back to the first floor the geeky jounin stopped her. "You're a genin, right?" he asked and after Mana nodded he grinned "I hope you get assigned to my squad, nice work here." he finished, the magician thanked him for the praise, this guy happened to be different from all the other jounin she met – he was strangely kind and unaffected by difficult ninja life.

On her way out the Hanada Estate door Mana heard Hanada's voice directed at her, "So, Mana-chan, the show is Friday, don't forget…" he said only for the girl to turn around a bow slightly, she had a slightly swollen eye from the powerful slap she got before so she must've looked funny, "Right… Friday!" she replied as if nothing had happened here today, explaining her swollen eye to her parents will be a doozy…


	4. A Gentle Womanizer and an Otaku?

The week after the event at Hanada Estate was different from the kind of life Mana was used to, despite that it was still relatively peaceful. Parents were quite nervous and worried about the girl's injury, her eye and the entire right side of her face was pretty swollen and looked funny for a couple of days after. Ninja had unnaturally amazing recovery rate compared to ordinary villagers, chakra manipulation required complete mastery of one's body which also unlocked new levels of body recovery speed, still, it hurt and Mana was ashamed to look just like she was punched in the face, ironically enough that was pretty much what happened...

Despite that unpleasant experience things went quite smoothly, she got a little closer with her parents, father told Mana the story of his own first mission to oversee a construction being finished and having to protect the object from vandals that kept trying to spray paint on it to leave their mark on the world. One couldn't really blame people like them, both young and old wanted to be remembered, to feel like their life mattered and in the world where life is thrown away casually such feelings were only multiplied hundredfold.

According to father, one day the construction workers were working on the upper floor and his team had to oversee the work being completed, unfortunately no one noticed the nest of hornets swarming up in the trashed rotten wood that was used for the construction so within seconds the entire floor was flooding with angered hornets. The man claimed to have been stung so many times that he fell down through the unfinished floor right to the first floor and as he tried to stop his fall he cut his arm on a steel beam leaving a giant gash on his arm. He must've told the truth because the man actually showed Mana the scar.

The point of this story was lost to the young genin, however. Of course there were many thoughts that Mana had about the story, perhaps father wanted that she didn't feel bad about having been marked in her first real combat encounter, maybe he just wanted her to know that his first job was even worse, maybe he wanted her to know that even the most trivial and simple assignments could go wrong and cause injuries worse than actual fighting scars? Either way, when the time for Mana's big performance on stage came her face looked pretty much alright, just a slight black mark on her cheek that could've been wiped out by make-up. The young magician wanted to look her best for the occasion after all!

Mana's Friday show went great, the hall wasn't really full or anything, out of several hundred seats in the great hall about forty were filled and for a first show the manager was impressed. Of course the girl had some prior experience and some people knew her already from the time she performed on cardboard boxes, that must've been the reason why she attracted some people – they were just people that occasionally checked her out when her shows were free. A part of the girl felt bad for charging money for the shows, her shows started as an idea, idea that ninjutsu was not a tool of death, it was not something that defined a person but rather was defined by the person that used it.

When the young one brought this question up to the manager of the hall he just shrugged, "Don't worry, kid, money ain't the problem here. Your prices are half the price of the plays people watch here, I wasn't sure how to promote your stuff because no one did crazy stuff like that. That probably was why so few people checked you out the first time – they didn't know what the hell they were getting into, now that voices will spread people will start to come." The manager was named Hiro, he was a nice short and elderly fellow, his eyes were always squinted and his hair was already grey, his face was filled with wrinkles and he always wore that weird flowery orange shirt. He couldn't have been older than late forties, maybe it was what the stress of managing all of Konoha's artistic and entertainment environment did to people.

Just to feel better Mana asked Mr. Hiro if she could let in people for free some time, the man just waved his hand and laughed. "You're the boss of your own shows, I just own the hall you're renting so as long as the rent is paid, do whatever you want. I'm telling you though, you're gonna be big when people get used to this, don't waste the chance by giving people free stuff." Apparently Mr. Hiro had a nasty reputation about him with the common folk, not like they hated him or anything but he had the rep of being quite the old skinflint and made money from everything he had the chance to. It wasn't the bad kind of rep, more like something people always made fun of and pointed fingers at, but then waved their hands and left the hall with a "Classic Hiro…" in their lips.

Having moderate success with her magic shows made Mana more excited about her ninja life, she started to train more, exercise both her physical state and meditate to improve her mental state and to better understand her body. The magician was a prodigy at meditation, ever since her mind managed to defeat her own sickness from back when Mana was even younger. From what the girl had heard her mother say, mother was not from Konoha originally, so when she settled down with dad and when Mana was born the two were crushed when they found out their baby had a rare mental disorder.

As a young child the Nakotsumi kid had the disorder that prevented her from understanding facts and relating them to a process. She could see the stars in the sky but she could never understand how they work even if she was directly told that, the kid just couldn't relate the explanation with the actual process being explained. It was a disorder that made people into outcasts and they lived short lives as they had few friends and failure to understand basic everyday science made them extremely prone to unfortunate accidents. The parents did their best to help Mana, they weren't too rich or anything so they could only talk to the kid and try to make it easier for her but nothing really worked.

One day the two spat out whatever they were drinking when they heard the girl playing with toys and other children outside, they ran out to ask Mana how was that possible because usually those plagued by the disorder could not play with toys and imitate real life scenarios because they simply lacked understanding how they worked which made it difficult and the girl just told them that she knew how things worked – magic made everything work. As the girl then spoke with her peers she was told of ninja, people that risked their life to protect lives of everyone and someone everyone admired. To the four year old Mana these ninja were champions of magic, enforcers of magical will. Mana herself wanted to be a ninja but her mental disorder made it impossible.

Despite their best attempts to talk Mana out of the idea to be a ninja her parents still enrolled her into the Academy when she was six, they figured that eventually their daughter would quit when she found her dream life to be unattainable. They were right – Mana absolutely bombed every test and failed at everything, her sensei in the Academy however took a liking for her, he wondered if this was Mana's lack of skill or her disorder that prevented her from succeeding and he taught the kid how to meditate, focus on one's own mind and work things out when they became too confusing. That was the breakthrough the kid needed, just couple of years later Mana managed to completely overcome her mental disorder and for the first time managed to think like an ordinary kid, she still kept clinging to her ideals of all life being magical but she did finally realize that magic didn't exist, she made it up to explain things she didn't understand.

Still, magic made everything so beautiful, so perfect, considering all life magical made the kid appreciate it more, knowing how it works sort of made Mana feel empty and feel like life was pointless. So just for respect for her old ways the girl still upheld her beliefs of magic being sacred, chakra being magical in nature and that those with exceptional gift to manipulate chakra were champions of magic with the duty to protect those that could not. After all of that, the young Mana managed to graduate Academy with average grades, the test she took was weird due to her refusing to use any Academy techniques because they "weren't hers". That story was for another day as the magician kept pushing those memories away.

Finally after a short while meditating and training every day the moment that the girl waited for came – the Nakotsumi household received a letter which informed Mana that her team was assembled and that all the newly made genin were to be sorted out into teams the next day. The letter had in it the time and place where the girl needed to come, it didn't really tell her about who exactly were in her team. Not that the girl would've known those people if she was told that, she wasn't too popular in the Academy because most kids considered her "weird" and since she rarely got a perfect grade she wasn't one of those "cool kids" that aced everything from calculation classes to physical exercise.

Sleeping was hard for the young lady, she kept recalling the events at Hanada Estate as that was her only experience with actual ninja life. Will all missions be crazy like that? She would have died in there if that Jounin didn't bail her out, what if in the actual battlefield there'll be no one to watch her back, what if she'll hesitate to hurt an enemy again and she'll get killed? Now that she herself was a ninja, now that she had some experience over the whole thing the magician understood her father's work a lot better, he left to missions all the time and Mana for some reason was rarely worried. Somehow she just always assumed that he'd be back in one place, she took his return for granted. It was decided, tomorrow she'll smother the life out of her old man and there was nothing he could have done to help it.

The next morning, after scaring the hell out of her father by hugging him for an extended period of time and having breakfast Mana ran off to the Academy, the sorting process was supposed to take place in the large classroom that could contain all of the students inside. It needed not to be said that the girl was excited and worried at the same time, there was a certain shade of unknown about how things will go, what her teammates will be like and what her sensei will be like and how will she handle life as a ninja. By now the kunoichi had at the very least accepted that she'll be made fun of for her beliefs and desire to never take a life. That was not a great mindset for a ninja to have after all, even when she told that her Academy sensei he just laughed it off and told her that a lot of kids babble about that but they always "grow out of such nonsense", according to "real ninja" lives had to be taken, the justifications of their casual murder were quite different, sometimes they killed out of fear, fear that their enemies would hurt their loved ones, sometimes it was just rage, to some it just felt good to show off all of their power and crush their enemies…

The classroom was full when Mana came in and no one really noticed or said anything about her entering and finding a seat in the right side of the classroom, further away from the window. Some kids near to where Mana sat down congratulated her on her shows taking off and told her that they will never miss a single magic show, that made the girl feel a bit better, after all she finally was acknowledged for something she did, her magic and using ninjutsu just for entertainment no longer looked "weird" to some, there were people that actually enjoyed that sort of thing.

One by one each team was picked off, a Jounin entered the classroom and read names off a sheet of paper to pick up their students and upon being called out the kids just stood up and ran towards their sensei, running off to bond and train with their team. After an entire hour of sitting around listening to names of other people and seeing their joy of finally being real ninja, Mana found that she was left sitting with two other boys in the classroom with no one coming in to read their names. What did all of that mean? Did that mean that nobody wanted her and those two other genin? Was she back at Academy now? The girl's little heart started jumping despite her desperate attempts to calm down.

"Don't worry, that bastard is just late…" Mana heard beside her as the boy who said it – one of the two that were left together with Mana in the classroom, placed his hand on her shoulder. His voice was strange, it was already starting to get more mature and strong but it was also pretty soft, most likely because the boy deliberately tried to restrain it and soften it to sound nicer. "I mean we already got our photos taken, graduated the Academy and got all the paperwork done, Hokage would be pissed if he had to do all that paperwork again to write us back into the Academy list…" the boy just smiled with a thumb up. His strange nice behavior made Mana smile a little herself.

The kid was a rather tall individual with crazy white hair, he wore glasses and rather formal-looking for a ninja attire, the other one sitting in the middle row was the complete opposite – small and slim in build, had black hair and wore some weird earing. "You better be right, future rival, otherwise I'll be pretty pissed for wasting my time sitting here doing nothing… I've got manga to read back home." the short boy grunted out, his voice was much more husky. "Future rival?" the tall white headed one asked curiously as he didn't leave Mana's side. "Yeah, that's how teams work in all the manga, the guys are always rivals with each other, whether they want it or not…" the boy replied as he relaxed and kicked back pulling out a small magazine out of his book filled with black and white pictures as his eyes started wandering around.

"Huh… He's a weirdo… Anyways, I'm Shimo, maybe you wanna go somewhere after this meeting is over with?" the boy asked as he leaned curiously by Mana's side making her feel a bit uncomfortable. The slim one cracked a grin, "I see, so you're the pervert type, I mean you gotta be the generic manga pervert because you'd have to be one to be in such a rush…" Shimo then dashed up to him and started angrily but without trying to hurt the boy just lightly rub his knuckle into the otaku's head. "What was that?! You're calling ME weird!?" this reaction made Mana genuinely amused as she covered her mouth and laughed out a bit. Maybe these two will be fun after all…

Suddenly the door burst open directing everyone's eyes at it, everyone expected the sensei to finally come pick them up. To everyone's surprise and much confusion it wasn't a Jounin that entered but the Fourth Hokage. The man's white Hokage cloak and the hat that he always wore behind his back hanging around, reminding everyone of his status could not be confused, just like his shoulder length grey hair, it was a very unique color because the man was probably just in his mid-thirties and his head already looked grey. As the man burst into the room he started huffing heavily making everyone even more confused.

"Sorry, guys, your sensei is a real jerk, I just met him hanging out and doing nothing which made me suspicious so I forced him to come pick you guys up, just wanted you to not leave without meeting up with him, jeez that guy… Sorry again, I hope he'll make it up to you… Though knowing him… Probably not…" the man scratched the side of his hairy head and laughed uncomfortably, he then just turned around and left as if nothing had ever happened. The three genin were pretty confused when they didn't know anything of the team's status, they were confused even more when they saw the Fourth, now when they realized that the Hokage just dropped by to tell them to keep waiting it all seemed even weirder.

Mana kept looking at the door, expecting it to open any moment, at some moment she even got over the small brawl and then making up of her teammates as the two were now just slobbering over a dirty manga, apparently dirty manga had something that appealed to both perverts and otaku so their interests finally came to one. These two now seemed pretty tight, the magician wondered if she will ever find something to talk about with those two, she didn't read manga that much or went on dates. She wasn't really an unattractive girl, just a little young and her slightly darker skin tone and wild curly dark hair required an observer of much more exotic tastes. Plus she always was a bit weird…

Just as Mana kept wondering if she'll be getting along with these two goofballs the door burst open and a man in an unzipped jounin vest and black cloak, similar to one Hokage wore just without the village insignia entered. He had shoulder length brownish hair that had some shades of red in them, his eyes were pretty rough looking as they didn't suggest the man being too nice of a guy. He just opened his eyes forcing Shimo to jump up and the otaku boy to drop his manga on the ground. Mana had to say she was pretty intimidated by the man's look alone too.

"You guys, come with me…" was all he said as he turned around and started walking into the corridor in quite a pace, without even slowing down to wait for the kids to make it down the classroom and out the door. This was one fellow that didn't fool around!


	5. Ruthless Sannin Tanshu!

The three kids rushed out of the classroom, doing their best so that they didn't fall behind their sensei. Having his behavior in mind, how he decided to not even show up to pick them up until Hokage himself forced him to, he wasn't likely to be the nice kind of guy that waits for his team. Something about his intimidating stature and squinting eyes just freaked Mana out and from the looks of her teammates – she wasn't the only one utterly scared of the man. He just had that certain kind of feeling coming off of him.

Even following him from behind, looking at his flowing dark cape and messy hair from behind him, being too far to even see him in much detail instilled fear, something made the magician wish to stay at such range and not get any closer. Out of nowhere the man stopped and turned sideways at them, his angry and freaky stare made the three almost stop in their tracks. One could've only speculated what this incredible energy coming out of the man was, strangely enough Mana was the most bold and came up to speaking distance the first, the boys followed her shortly.

After the team finally gathered in close enough range to each other to be associated with the others the man simply turned around again without any words and started walking, this time a little bit slower. "T…This aura…" Mana wondered looking at the man's back, strangely enough the magician hadn't noticed a symbol of some sort on the back of sensei's cloak. It looked like it meant something, perhaps sort of reminded Mana of a hieroglyph of some sort but it wasn't any language she could identify. The girl was a self-made prodigy at history as she loved to read historic books and legends as a child and continued to do so throughout her life.

"You've got to be kidding me… This is… Uzumaki Tanshu, one of the Konohagakure Sannin…" Shimo, the lady-loving teammate uttered, he obviously attempted to only let the other two teammates know but something told Mana that their sensei must've heard it as well. If he was at all the ninja his incredible presence implied him to be, he would've been aware of everything going on in the same room as he was, the fact that Shimo could identify the man however was quite interesting. Mana didn't know about the most famous and the strongest ninja in the village, she wasn't one that engaged in gossip or dreamed over their pictures in the textbooks, she only could identify some by their key features.

The man then pushed the Academy door and left into the yard, the three quickly rushed after him and left through the door before it closed. After sitting so long in a closed room, waiting for their sensei to come pick them up, Mana appreciated a breath of fresh air and some sunlight. The man then started moving at an incredible pace, as if he wanted to get somewhere in the village but he only moved around the Academy building, then jumped and his feet stuck onto the wall of the Academy building. Shimo jumped quickly to follow him, Mana and the otaku boy who was yet to introduce himself remained on the ground. The boy sighed and jumped onto the wall as well, scaling it as quickly as he could and trying not to fall too far behind.

This situation annoyed Mana because she didn't want to use the ordinary Tree Climbing Jutsu that the Academy taught the students. It was a basic technique that also served as a tool to train one's chakra control, it was useful but Mana was not the one to invent it and that was enough of an obstacle to make the girl wonder how she'd scale the wall. The girl ran to the side a little bit further and found a backdoor entrance, she instead decided to use the stairs up to the exit to a balcony. After leaving to the balcony the magician observed her team stopping at an upper balcony as she quickly made some handseals and jumped straight at the wall, then kicking off of it to gain some altitude as a small gust of wind propelled her higher.

The jutsu was a simple invention of Mana's, the girl called it the "Mystical Wings Technique" despite the fact that it didn't actually serve the same purpose. It didn't allow the magician to fly, it just made a single powerful wind current below her and propelled her upwards for just a moment, it barely only made those directly below the current flinch so the only uses there were for such a technique were to get small boosts of altitude or breaking one's fall quickly. Mana managed to grab the ledge with her arms as she pulled herself up and got into the same balcony that her sensei stopped to wait for his team.

The man's eyes looked like the man really hated Mana, not in a deep and personal way, she just annoyed him by wasting his time and he obviously didn't care that much about her to begin with. The man only grunted out a simple but effective "You're slow" as the only scolding that the girl ever needed. The otaku boy was also annoyed, "Ugh, I guess you'll be the weak and useless member of the team, every team in manga has one, our enemies will have to take you out fast to establish that threat is serious…" he started his tirade before being interrupted by Shimo's "You're amazing, Mana-chan, I remember that technique from your show!" the boy yelled out.

It was quite clear that the only reason why Shimo even liked Mana's performance was because she was a girl, the technique wasn't really that impressive visually or efficient. She wasn't sure which reaction hurt more: the genuine annoyance of her sensei, the deep rooting dislike of all female beings that otaku had and their trait to see everything as one cliché or the other or being praised just because of something that had nothing to do with anything. Now that it was out of the way the previously identified Konoha Sannin spoke up, "I'd like the three of you to tell me something about your personalities, don't get any ideas, I don't care too much so don't go too deep into it. It's just that I'm unlike my idiot colleagues, I understand that personalities and goals matter because they let me understand how you use your combat abilities."

He then took out a small file out of his coat's pocket and flipped it through, "You three were put in team to balance out the grades, the teams were built to have one great student, one with horrible grades and an average one, the Hokage wanted to make all teams balanced and have an equal beginning." Despite Mana's genuine hope that the man won't go too deep into their grades his sharp and long finger shot forward at Shimo, then proceeded to point at her other teammate and then at Mana. "You, white haired boy, your grades were really good, you were the fourth top student in the entire year, you, weasel-looking guy, yours were second worst from everyone that graduated… You, girl, contrary to what your magic shows make people believe your grades didn't stand out in either direction, you're average in every way."

Being average offended Mana the most, she could've handled being called the worst because for some reason being worst was still special, being average wasn't anything, it was just sort of there. "Since in the Ninja World leaders always get all the responsibility and all the fame, the one with the good grades will start." the man spoke again, his tone was rough and it didn't look like he was asking them to do something, he was pretty much ordering it. Every moment of his presence radiated that impossibly thick and cold air, only him being there made all three of the kids feel uneasy.

Shimo sat onto the edge of the balcony and began after fixing his glasses. "My name is Yuki Shimo, my parents moved out of Kirigakure several years ago with their business and moved to Konohagakure. They had to do it because the Mizukage was getting crazy according to them and started ordering having his own villagers murdered…" the boy's head slightly went down, it was a topic that summoned a reaction in him despite the fact that his family avoided the cruelty which was interesting. "I don't really care about the Mizukage or Kirigakure, honestly, I don't really remember it and Konoha is my real home, it's just that I want to make sure that scum that order their own comrades to die would never come to power in Konoha and I'll fight such a person if I have to!"

After a brief moment of silence the boy sighed and looked at Mana to continue. Him being a descendant of a rich family that had some sort of business inside Konoha would've explained his interesting attire, his clan was also quite a rare one and the magician only barely remembered it from being taught about them in the Academy. It was interesting how being both rich, successful and being an heir of a rare ninja clan did not make this youth arrogant and prone to bragging about his life. He was very different to Mana in terms of his origins but he was not so different from her in terms of personality.

Mana got a strand of hair out of her face and moved it past her ear, her hair was curly and rather wild so the girl usually wore a hat, this day was the kind when she really wanted to wear one. "I am Nakotsumi Mana, some people know me as "Konoha's Sorceress" from all the posters in the northern districts and the magic show that I started recently. It's not ACTUAL magic, I just use ninjutsu that I learn for different purposes because I believe that lives of every person in this world are magical and sacred and that ninjutsu is a tool to preserve it, not to take it."

Sensei sighed, he obviously disagreed with that but so far he didn't let the girl know that, or at least didn't tell her anything because his face pretty much spoiled it all. It was impressive how much Mana managed to piss him off because usually whatever thoughts he had remained secret as his face was quite strict and static, now his emotions were incredibly clear. Why did he hate her ideals? Will it be a problem? Maybe he was the kind of person who killed a lot and ninjutsu was his tool to accomplish that? The man could've felt offended by existence of a youngling like Mana.

It was then that the otaku boy spoke up, still reading his manga and not bothering to put his eyes up. "My name is… Nara Sugemi…" the boy spoke in pauses as his eyes were still running through the letters and pictures of his magazine and his brain was struggling with multi-tasking. "I don't really know why I became a ninja, I like manga about ninja and I love action, to read about it at least… I want to be able to do cool things like Rock Lee from that manga one day, if I can be as cool as the guys I read about, if I can inspire my own epic manga, that is all I need!" the boy spoke as he flipped the page and finished his introduction at the same time.

Sensei took a deep breath and massaged his tired eyes. "I'd imagine you yelling "Sensei" all the time would be annoying so I'll introduce myself at least, as rich-boy here got right earlier, I am Uzumaki Tanshu – one of Konohagakure Sannin. You have no business or interest knowing my personality, I am more than capable to handle myself and watch over you guys for as long as we'll be working together. Now that I got to know the mental part, I'll need to see your actual abilities, follow me to the Training Grounds, I'll give my final impressions about you guys after the test. Just know that I am allowed to send the lot of you back to the Academy until we complete our first mission so don't mess it up!" the man exclaimed after leaping off of the building and starting to slowly walk towards the Training Grounds.

At least this time the kids knew the destination so they didn't have to keep following their sensei's back. Also, now sensei's weird shade of red in his brown hair made sense – Uzumaki were known for their amazing vitality and flowing red hair. The kids rushed up to and descended the stairs, using the more conventional means to gain access to the village streets leading up to the Training Grounds. As they finally accessed the streets Mana asked her teammates something, "Say, guys, sensei seems to be really proud of his rank but I've never heard of a rank of "Sannin", isn't "Jounin" the highest rank in the village?"

Shimo looked quite happy about his chance to talk to Mana and to show off his brain a bit more, "Yes and no. "Sannin" isn't an official rank, not really, it is a rank that is passed through word, officially Jounin is still the highest rank but if one becomes so much more powerful than a Jounin, so much so that they surpass any common classifications of ninja they are declared a "Sannin" by the respective Kage. Each village has three of them, they are easily the most powerful ninja in the village, being a Sannin also grants you a certain amount of diplomatic freedom, for example a Jounin being in another village is weird and suspicious but Sannin commonly travel around and they are usually respected everywhere for their power and achievements. Also only the Great Villages are allowed to have Sannin, so there are twelve in total around the world, Sand Village used to have them too but they lack high ranking ninja to select theirs so they haven't had one for ages…"

Sugemi closed his manga and put it into his small backpack, "Maybe if I become a Sannin by killing sensei one day they'll make a manga about me…" he wondered out loud scratching his chin as if he was actually considering it. "That's not how it works, Sugemi, there is no single right way of becoming a Sannin, in a way it is similar as it is with Kage – there needs to be a vacant spot and you need to be way above everyone else in terms of skill and achievements. Sannin have been beaten and killed before but that didn't really make people rise in ranks, in fact, if rumors are true, Tanshu-sensei once beat a Sannin in his teen years, he didn't even have a ninja rank, stories say that he may have been a nukenin at some point…"

Finally all the talking had to cease as the three reached the astonishingly beautiful patch of nature surrounded by a fence with a sign "Training Grounds" with a number on them. Teams used "Training Grounds No 3" all the time so that was where the three went, the other grounds had different purposes, No 1 was made for sparring, No 2 was for physical training as it had a lot of dummies to punch, No 3 to 5 were for teams, No 6 to 8 were for ninjutsu training as they were pretty much battlefields, they were always decimated and blown up by one technique or another and had to be fixed all the time. Someone took the time to rebuild the rock formations and plant the trees, a lot of Doton users and Senju must've been occupied with keeping those grounds in check. Mana had never visited No 8 to 12, but there were twelve grounds in total.

Sensei was already waiting for the three. His hands went through a couple of handseals and an identical copy appeared out of the lake nearby. The man looked at his clone and grinned with half of his mouth, "This is a clone of mine, he is many times inferior to the original, I'd say my own physical abilities are twice as great as this clone's and this clone has ten times less chakra than me, if the three of you are able to kill it – I'll promise you guys that I won't send you back, if you mess up, I'll make no such promises. If you annoy me, if one day I'll feel like you guys aren't worth the hassle, I'll just send the three of you back, it could happen at any time so you better win. Don't worry, I'll just be standing here."

As the man signaled the three to begin all three of them did the same thing, dashed towards the nearest bush throwing a barrage of shuriken at the clone, Mana was too busy rushing for a safe hiding spot to see how the clone did with such an overwhelming barrage of shuriken, loud and deafening clanking of steel suggested that he deflected all of them somehow using a weapon of his own. As the darkness of the thick trees planted one by the other surrounded Mana she carefully peeked at the clone – the weapon he used was a katana in its arm, sensei must've been a masterful swordsman so it may not have been too hard for him to deal with these shuriken.

Mana started weighing down her options, her ninjutsu was nothing too impressive, mostly they were relatively harmless techniques that looked pretty so that they could be used for her magic shows. She also did not like that she had no contact or mean to communicate with her teammates, there was no way to coordinate their assault, they may have hidden from the clone but they also hid from each other. Both other boys had very effective clans to set up a diversion: Nara had amazing abilities using their shadows and from what the girl could remember they had awesome displacement abilities, Yuki used the Ice Style just like their name suggested. The young kunoichi realized that her best option was to wait for a diversion and then try to follow it up. Maybe eventually the three will get the feel of the abilities of each other and start to work together well!

Either way, when their opponent was a man who was rumored to have beaten a Sannin in his teenage years, likely being just a bit older than Mana was now, nothing could've been taken for certain…


	6. You Lose! Mana VS Tanshu Clash of Ideals

Mana just kept waiting for Sugemi to make the first move, after all, wasn't his clan so famous for their ability to make complicated plans and being so incredible at enemy displacement and battlefield control? At least such traits were typically given to Nara as the kunoichi could remember a lot about them being told in the Academy. Shimo must've been waiting for Sugemi's move as well as the boy remained still in hiding and did not take any action, most likely thinking similarly to Mana. Despite that, Sugemi not only didn't make any moves but he also remained outside everyone's vision.

That was not what both Mana and Shimo did, the smart boy managed to leave a slightly frosted leaf which alerted the most perceptive ninja to his location, the frosted white leaf could not have been seen from the degree of vision where the clone was situated in however Mana could see it. The magician also left a clue about her location by removing a poster that was on a tree near the bush, also visible only from the side but not from upfront, where sensei's clone was. This was a rather drastic mean of telling teammate of her location as it could've been picked up by the enemy too, Mana could've just as easily left a carving on the tree bark but she wasn't as fast, by the time she got to the location the clone had already dealt with the projectiles so she had to improvise.

The clue that Sugemi left either did not exist or couldn't be picked up by Mana, whether he forgot to leave one deciding to act solo or made it indistinguishable was equally as bad. Now the two that did have general understanding of each other's locations had no idea where Sugemi was or what he was going to do. To make matters worse, sensei's clone started moving rather fast to the thick area full of trees making it only a matter of time when one of the three would have been sighted. The clone was rushing but not in a way that made the impression of it being reckless or using too much effort. Just in case Mana's grip on a kunai she held tightened as she got tenser in order to better perceive the clone's movements.

Much to the surprise of the magician, lurking a moderate distance further from the clone's left side, and most likely, to Shimo's as well, Sugemi decided to rush at sensei's clone by jumping out at him after the clone got close. The girl was surprised at how fast the clone moved and how close it got to Sugemi's actual location, almost as if it could accurately sense where Sugemi was. It wasn't like the clone showed much effort at telling the exact location, it just started heading at the specific direction and probably pressured the boy into attacking as it got too close.

Right as Sugemi leapt at the clone with a kunai in his arm and swung it to leave a wide gash, aiming at its chest the clone swiftly moved out of harm's way. He wasted no moves as he positioned himself right behind the boy, quickly grabbing the boy's wrist with one arm and his head with the other and then lifting his arm in the air applying pressure while slamming the boy's head to the ground. "Your movements were so loud that I got an audible clue as to where you hid yourself, where your teammates tried to move fast but also silently, you just ran rustling every patch of grass and breaking all the twigs around, you didn't leave any clues for your team to your location either despite having most time to do so since you didn't bother about being silent."

Tanshu-sensei's voice was angry and annoyed, it wasn't that Sugemi's mistake was such a simple one, Mana herself was never a prodigy in stealthy movement and was just as stealthy as anyone else in her class were. It didn't look like Shimo was any more of a stealthy fellow as his clue was currently quite visible from the clone's current location so he was likely to be the clone's second target. Sugemi yelled out in pain as he made a handseal, "Shadow Tendril Technique!" he yelled out as an appendage shot out from under his jacket and went after the clone, this was not a Nara technique that Mana had ever seen before – that shadow didn't come out from the shadow on the ground but it came from inside his jacket. This was quite a revelation how inventive true masters of clan techniques become compared to common knowledge about them.

Sugemi's attack was quite effective too, it would've forced the clone to let go of the boy buying him time or doing some amount of damage if it hit. Unluckily for him, sensei did not let go of his arm, his clone just leapt sideways doing a flip to the side to avoid the tendril. Sugemi shouted out wildly – clone's movement must've done something with his arm, it could've dislocated a shoulder or messed it up pretty bad but the boy was definitely out. This clone was brutal, it barely pulled any punches and it fought to incapacitate, there wasn't a lesson to be learnt, no hidden point of the training – the clone was just out of their blood.

Mana couldn't stand around, she threw the kunai at the clone without waiting to see what he'd do with the injured boy, the genin rushed recklessly at the clone trying to get to her enemy faster than the kunai that she threw, obviously unsuccessfully but she didn't want to waste time. After getting to the man the girl observed him deflect her kunai with the side of his palm - she probably threw it incorrectly due to stress and concern over her teammate's well-being.

Mana didn't even attempt to fight the clone up close, back at Hanada estate she struggled to keep up with casual mercenaries that were swarming the woods outside the village walls, there was no way she'd keep up with the clone. The genin simply jumped onto his raised arm and using his wrist as a platform leapt over the man throwing an explosive kunai into his back, one advantage of fighting a clone was that she didn't have to worry over the clone's life. The clone caught the kunai, why? Didn't he see the tag on it? Either way, Mana made the handseal and tried to set it off.

Nothing happened… How? Why? Mana could set off tags easily, it was one of few common techniques that she used, it wasn't an actual jutsu to Mana, but just a way to use her tools so even to her twisted wish to only use techniques she herself invented it was fair game. The clone looked annoyed, maybe it did something? What sort of a trick could he have pulled? How could he just negate Mana's technique like that? Even worse, the girl felt that her chakra was reduced, she clearly set it off properly but nothing happened. This clone apparently was strong enough to use techniques, but this was not like any technique that Mana had seen.

At least the magician bought her comrade some time to escape – even with his injured arm, Sugemi was nowhere to be seen. Tanshu grunted out, "Well well, I didn't really want to use it like that. That's right, your gut is telling you the truth, I negated your technique. All those stories of me beating a Sannin in my teen years are true and this is how I did it – a seal of my own invention that negates ninjutsu techniques and special abilities by interrupting the user's chakra flow, it's sort of a mixture of genjutsu and ninjutsu. You weren't supposed to see it as I don't usually honor kids like you by showing it."

Now it made sense, a lot of things did, the Sannin that Tanshu must've faced as a teenager must've relied heavily on some sort of ability, sensei must've just used his seal and negated it bringing the two ninja to equal ground by forcing them both to fight physically, Tanshu was just a superior kenjutsu or taijutsu user… Still, Mana was just like that Sannin in his past, she relied incredibly on her techniques, genjutsu and ninjutsu. Now like this her only hope of beating the clone was destroyed. Tanshu-sensei's clone stretched out and pulled out his katana again…

"Truth be told, I expected this, YOU of all people ruining your team's chances to victory…" the man spoke up as he took a fighting stance. Mana was too intimidated to take a defensive stance or prepare a weapon to try and fight back – this was over, even if he only used the technique out of instinct for that one moment… The fact that such a technique existed at all made the girl lose all her wish to fight, still, she didn't understand what the man meant so she looked at him with a confused and scared look, the way that a child who doesn't know any better looks at their parents when they do something stupid and make fools of themselves in public.

"I attacked that idiot-otaku on purpose, don't you get it yet?" Tanshu smiled as he jumped forward thrusting the handle of his katana hitting Mana in the solar plexus, the girl coughed up and collapsed, the clone was so incredibly fast! And the real sensei claimed that this was only a fraction of his true physical abilities, so that was how Uzumaki Tanshu fought, he negated any special abilities of his enemies and kept the fight purely physical and built his body to be the best physical body of any ninja automatically granting him victory over any kind of opponent.

Even worse – Mana understood now, she understood what he meant and she wanted to yell it out, to alert Shimo but she couldn't because the attack left her without an ounce of oxygen and she struggled to catch a breath just to keep conscious on the ground. Tanshu attacked Sugemi first because he knew of Mana's ideals – to protect all life, he knew that if he hurt Sugemi rough enough she'd jump out at him and he also knew somehow of Shimo's obsession with girls, maybe he observed the kids before Hokage showed up, maybe he read it from Shimo's Academy reports. Now he had all three kids, all of them attacked him and all he had to do was take them out.

"YOU BASTARD LEAVE MANA-CHAN ALONE!" the voice of comrade that anyone would normally be pleased to hear came from the woods as a barrage of shuriken flew Tanshu, the man's katana swung in a circle to deflect all of them, then the barrage intensified, "Multi-Shuriken Technique!" Shimo yelled out as the shuriken he quickly emptied his pouch by throwing shuriken at incredible rates, still, Tanshu deflected them near effortlessly. A loud "Heh" came from the boy as he made another handseal. "Glaciation Technique!" he yelled out as a small puddle which Tanshu's leg was in instantly froze leaving his shoe entombed in it.

"Multi-Kunai Technique!" Shimo yelled as he emptied his kunai as well, Mana knew he planned to mix in some explosive ones too and set them off when deflected because it only made sense. Shimo was the smartest kid out of the three, he knew that if shuriken barrage made little difference to Tanshu, so would've kunai, even with this small entrapment he devised using his Yuki technique. Either way, the kunai didn't set off, sensei's clone must've used that chakra disrupting seal again. It was still unclear how it worked but it completely blew into both Mana's and Shimo's faces.

Within a fraction of a moment sensei's clone jumped right up to Shimo's face, forcing his leg out of the shoe that was frozen in the small puddle, and thrust at his throat using the side of his palm. The boy fell down on the ground struggling with breath, sensei then quickly turned and threw his katana at a tree, a loud thud was heard and Sugemi's shout of pain came moments later. The boy tried to use the wire to climb up the tree using just one arm that he had working, sensei used the katana to cut that wire and made Sugemi fall down and injure himself even more. The clone stood by the tree and relaxed, locking his arms around his chest as the real sensei walked up to the beaten kids. Out of all people he stood by Mana, he was right, it was all her fault.

"People like you are not suitable to be ninja, ninjutsu is an art to kill, jutsu are tools of death. Using your techniques for laughs and entertainment is pathetic. Going easy on your enemies because you're afraid to kill them is even more pathetic." the man spoke in a condescending tone looking at Mana as she struggled to get back at her feet from above. The magician picked herself up and looked sensei in the eyes, with just a short distance separating them. "I don't care, ninjutsu is a gift that I am given, it is up to me how I use it…" she moaned out through pain. The real sensei punched her in the stomach with his palm making the kid fall down again.

"You should be glad that you're hearing this from me, I am saving your life by making you quit, most fools hear it from their opponent's blades as they go through their hearts or even worse – hearts of their comrades. Right now, there is nothing stopping me from killing your friends and it would all be YOUR fault because they lost because of YOUR inability to act calm and rationally." the man spoke as the clone picked up Shimo's weightless body and placed a kunai to his throat. "People like you are a danger to themselves and their friends, a danger to loyal and skilled ninja that are an asset of the village, out of all ninja, I hate ninja like you the most. Luckily enough I have the means to stop you from becoming a ninja before you make a mistake like this in the field…"

After letting this be known Tanshu started walking back to the field of grass, most likely intending to head to the village. If the three of them lost, that meant that he had the right to return all three of them to the Academy at any point, meaning even right now if he felt like it! "To be fair, I never intended to stick with you guys, you're always a pain in my side, you'd always be. I'll save your lives by returning you back the moment I have the right to, just like I planned to all along." their sensei said as a final farewell before Mana finally managed to pick herself up on her feet again.

"Stoooop! I'm up! We didn't lose yet!" she shouted out, "Sure maybe this is my fault, maybe you modeled this fight after focusing on me as the weak link… But if I can get stronger… I can stop this from happening, I can protect my teammates and my enemies, defeat my enemies without killing them, no matter the means…" another painful impulse forced the girl down on her back, she couldn't open her eyes because they were full of tears. She could feel a sharp kick in her side, then another, sensei wasn't really trying to hurt her, he was trying to make it so painful that Mana would shut up. Still, he had strong morals and upheld the rules that he made, he didn't just declare their loss and leave, he wanted to actually win, make his opponents acknowledge it. That in itself was admirable.

"That's what every stupid brat thinks, that they're some legendary hero who can make every enemy into their friend, that the world is about holding hands and singing songs but the truth is – world is about killing your enemy before they get the chance to hurt someone you care about, before they burn your village down and kill the people inside. That's my ninja way, the ONLY ninja way. World out there is kill or be killed, until you don't accept that I won't accept you as my student." the man stopped kicking and turned around again, Mana coughed up some blood and started slowly rising again. This wasn't a fight, this was sensei trying to test how hard Mana stood by her beliefs, she wasn't going to stop, she'd rather die!

"I know the enemy wants to kill me, all the time…" sensei kicked her back down again, "But I don't care… I'll fight them but won't kill them…" Mana grunted out through pain as the man kept kicking, he wasn't using his real strength, the clone stroke much harder than this before. "Wait, you're fighting Mana-chan, not the clone! That means we won! You said you wouldn't interfere!" Shimo yelled out of the top of his lungs, somehow managing to stand up while this little chat took place. Tanshu slapped his forehead with his palm, "Shit… You got me… Damn, this girl is kinda smart, how much of this did you plan ahead?" the man asked as Shimo smiled and jumped up and down couple of times "I bet Mana-chan was planning it all along, since the "Life is magical" speech!" he added.

Mana stood up and fixed her clothes that were now all dirty and messed up, "I planned none of this, I really meant what I said about life, every word of it and it just sort of happened…" the girl could feel pain all over her back and chest. Tanshu turned around and shouted out in pure misery, "Shit, I'm stuck with you losers… Now I'll have to torture you guys until you quit yourselves, you just made it worse for yourselves…" the man said as he started heading for the village again. A loud laugh came from somewhere in the bushes, where Sugemi was down for the count.

Mana could barely remember how she got home, the three all helped each other and all three of them needed a checkup, luckily enough Mana's father was a ninja and knew how to do some basic field treatment. "So Tanshu-san is your sensei?" he asked later that evening as he was patching daughter's injuries, her whole body was covered with blunt traumas and bruises. "Yeah, you know him?" Mana asked as her father rarely used honorifics especially the respectful ones. "Worked with him couple of times… He's a piece of work but he always gets his team home, at the very least your mother and I will always know you'll be back alive." the man laughed. The magician just sighed, still, she was quite excited about her team – stronger pressure from her superior only means she'll grow up to be that much stronger!

 **Next time: First Missions!**

 **Feedback greatly appreciated. Rate of new chapters may vary but I'll try to release them every couple of days or so! Thank you for reading!**


	7. Who Will Become No 1 At Dishes?

A couple of days had passed since the brutal test that the team went through. The time between then and now was not spent in vain, Mana strained herself, while still recovering, to somehow become both a stronger ninja and a better stage magician. The girl kept both training her physical shape, doing so by jogging in the mornings, beating on the dummies in the training grounds, and mental and spiritual side by meditating. To a ninja one's mind and spirit was just as important as muscles. Chakra was just as important and chakra manipulation depended heavily on mastery over emotions, sometimes when Mana was under stress she wasted loads of chakra on techniques that were seemingly simple.

Over time the girl discovered a new trait about herself, more specifically, about the body of a ninja. Whenever a body used chakra it had a tiny fraction of it stuck in the system, normally that wouldn't be worth noticing but apparently body gained certain memory of techniques one used and automatically adjusted one's chakra levels. What this meant was that after one's chakra control improved significantly they had loads of chakra left over in their system being wasted. What the girl imagined was that with enough of a push she could force that chakra out, it would be stressful for her body as it wasn't used to larger than usual amounts of chakra but in time it could be tricked by making it believe that the amount of chakra was natural, achieving higher chakra level as a result.

One day the kunoichi tried this, she sat down and concentrated hard, allowed her mind to slip away into a meditational stage of complete awareness of her own body. That was how the genin managed to overcome her mental condition as a child – by meditating and reaching a stage of complete awareness of her own condition. With a slight nudge and communication with one's own body, a lot of problems could be fixed, obviously the girl's mastery of this sort of meditation was not yet great enough to overcome poisons and diseases, but perhaps one day even such amazing feats would be possible through meditation alone!

The only reason why Mana trained so incredibly hard was because she felt she had the responsibility to do so. She wished to preserve all life, even that of her enemies, because of that she was weaker than her peers, the girl understood that. For that reason she had a disadvantage, to catch up to her peers she had to train harder, to become so much stronger that her kindness doesn't hold her back. To become so strong that next time someone tries to hurt her friends by exploiting that – she'd be able to surprise them. It may have been viewed as a disadvantage in combat but to Mana it was a necessary one, she'll always love life and wish to preserve it, try to avoid violence and fighting when possible.

All that training did not go to waste, the kunoichi could feel that she's gotten stronger, not by a significant margin but if she kept up the pace, one day she'll get there! She may never reach a level of Tanshu-sensei, but she didn't want to, Mana didn't want to be the strongest or the best ninja ever. All that she wanted to do was to preserve life so that maybe one day people around her no longer laughed from this ideal but joined in on it, to do everything so that when Mana died she'd have left a better world than she found, one where people's lives did not go to waste, one where a life meant something.

Over the several days of training Mana learned another thing – Mr. Hiro, the owner of the stage she was renting for her magic shows, was right – once the word of her shows started spreading more and more people started coming, suddenly empty seats no longer poked Mana's eyes so hard and the little money that she charged for entrance started to make more than she needed to pay the rent, the bonus she'd be getting as a ninja would add to it even more… The downside was that for the first time in her life Mana was getting short on time, her life as a ninja and her life as a stage magician did not clash directly just yet, but eventually they might.

Finally after long several days a letter came, it was from the Hokage Administration and it described the four as "Team Oak" and told them to come to the Administration building for a briefing for their mission. This was exciting but also a bit scary, on one hand Mana would get to see Shimo and Sugemi again, on the other the mission might get crazy and all of them may get hurt again. Recovering from those bruises and traumas even with advanced ninja recovery rate wasn't fun. Also, due to her recent success in magic shows people started to recognize her on the streets more. Usually villagers sort of knew each other and a weird girl like Mana was bound to stand out, since lives were lost so often in this world people kept tight bonds with each other, especially if their friend was a ninja because killing another ninja was not only normal but also an honor. This was only one of the things that Mana desired would change over her lifetime…

When the day of briefing came the girl got an unexpected knock on the door, neither father nor mother were home: father was out on a mission and mother was working early in the café. Father used to tell stories to Mana when she was younger about how her mother was from a tribe of wandering ninja that had a knack for entertainment but also making money. Maybe that's why mother was so successful in her small business, maybe some of those genes helped the girl out with her own shows too, maybe it was all her legacy. No! Mana didn't want to only be good because some part of her is a descendant of some weird group of travelers that made money, Mana wanted to earn money and love of the villagers using her own charm and skills. But what really was that? How could she know what was actually her and what's her legacy from that bedtime story group? It was possible that the tribe was made up, father never told Mana much more about it anyways…

Behind the door stood Shimo, he looked alright and pretty happy, had a wide grin on his face and after fixing his glasses he asked Mana for the pleasure to walk her to the Administration building. To some girls such behavior would look weird, it'd raise suspicion that the boy might be into them but Mana saw Shimo for over five years in the Academy, he was like this to most girls all the time. He may have been super weird now, but that was only because he only had one girl around to be weird with. Mana took her jacket with her and rushed out with her teammate to the location. It wouldn't have been decent to be late for their mission briefing even if their sensei would be the one to do the talking.

"I hope you don't feel too bad about that training?" Shimo asked on the way, he was strangely talkative today. "I think sensei was just mean and said what he said because he didn't like you, but I was just as much to blame for our butts being kicked as you were, you may have cared about Sugemi's life but I was too concerned over yours, my love for the ladies is just as bad as your wish to save lives…" it was strange how more excited and even possibly stronger Shimo looked, it was just like several days ago Mana and her teammates were children but now they didn't really look like children. In a world where children were hired to kill other children that got in the way of the mission, they looked like warriors if anything, Mana probably couldn't look like a killer even if she put on a creepy festival mask and wielded a scythe…

"Thanks for the concern but… I'd never blame something for what I did and say. I walked by the path I set for myself as a ninja, I just wish that I would be just the same no matter how rough things got." Mana replied smiling back at her teammate. At that moment she could see it, getting close to these guys, just like her father casually meets his old friends from his old days as a ninja as well as new ones. Drinking and talking about old days… It all seemed like it was going to happen one day and they didn't even start working yet. It was strange thinking of how things would end before they even begun.

Shimo was surprised by how many people recognized Mana, there were even a couple of children that stopped by and spoke to her, cheered her on and asked when the next show would be. "That's really awesome" he said, "but don't you think this will get in the way, I mean if everyone around the village knows your face? Won't it make working as a ninja harder?" Mana thought for a moment, Shimo raised a valid point, ninja were supposed to be stealthy and hidden, having her face known around the place would make it hard to work in Konoha, if her fame ever spread beyond the village it'd be really hard to work outside the village too. People wouldn't take her seriously and think that she's less of a ninja just because she's a little star of the entertainment world…

Before the girl got her chance to answer however the Administration building came into view, Shimo didn't look as interested in getting his answer as he wanted to get inside and he rushed at the building. It didn't need any saying that he had to open the door for Mana and then several more ladies that came after her and hold it for every lady passing through. While it was kind of cute, the two could have been late so the magician gently took Shimo by his elbow and dragged him to the fourth floor where the Hokage's office was. Sugemi was nowhere to be seen but Tanshu-sensei was waiting on a small seat near the office.

"Good, you got here, where's the otaku-guy?" he asked, it was quite likely that he'll never learn their names, but then he nodded at the kunoichi and pointed at her with his chin, "You OK, Mana? You're Tsukumo's kid, aren't you?" after the magician nodded the man scratched his forehead, "Too bad, your father has to be the best Chuunin I know, I thought he deserved a less stubborn and stupid brat." Shimo laughed out, "You must really secretly like her, you just called Mana-chan by her name!" It didn't look like sensei was too pleased by this observation, or to be honest, any observation Shimo had made, as it was because of his observation that he got stuck with them to begin with but the fact that he called the genin by her name suggested that he may have cared enough to memorize their names, he just rarely used them.

Finally Sugemi came, just several minutes late but in no rush whatsoever, still reading his manga but it really was no surprise at this point. His arm was probably stuck in a book holding position as he slept… "Well, time for our grinding chores before we are trusted by the village to do actual missions, can't wait for one of them to go wrong or secretly be a ruse so that we can show the village how cool we are…" Sugemi spoke in a dull tone with a dreamy smile over his manga, he didn't even look at his teammates. Truth be told, he looked pretty good for a guy that had his arm messed up just several days ago. Even for a ninja healing a broken or dislocated bone in several days was quite impressive.

Tanshu grunted something out and entered first, leaving the door open for the rest to come through. Shimo didn't disappoint and gestured that Mana walked in first as he held the door. Had the magician not seen this behavior for years in the Academy it would've been getting annoying at this point. Just as expected – Sugemi didn't even look at the Hokage, he just kept eating up his manga with his eyes. For a moment it seemed like Hokage was confused by it but then he just let go of it, children that are taught to kill silently in their early years often end up a little weird and to be honest this whole team was a team of weirdos…

"I hope you guys aren't expecting to save the world just yet… These will be your jobs for today." Hokage said as he pushed a bunch of files forward on the table. He looked at Tanshu-sensei with a confusing stare as if encouraging him to pick them up but the man instead just walked up to them and read them, he looked annoyed but then again – he always did. "You won't be taking the files with you?" Hokage asked when sensei replied rudely, "I've got better things to do than carry a bunch of papers with chores in them, it's because I owe you that I got into this mess, Howoku." It was really rude to address Hokage by his name, without even a single honorific, his assistant looked really shocked and almost dropped his own share of files and his glasses. Hokage laughed out and let them go, Shimo did pick up the files just in case.

Inside the files were a bunch of chores: gardening, cleaning dishes at Ichiraku Ramen, doing some tax and finance paper work for some shop, sorting out tools and weapons in the weapon shop, filing all the confiscated illegal objects in Police Force building. Sugemi didn't seem too happy about it, he had every reason to, for a boy who put so much love into his manga he even bothered to read the files and didn't see anything to his fancy, "What the hell?! At this rate I'll never have a manga written about me!" he yelled out, "What's the point of those useless missions! No one remembers or cares about people that clean dishes!" he shouted out in a questioning tone at sensei, expecting without a doubt a nugget of wisdom from his superior. Tanshu shrugged.

"No point at all…" Shimo and Mana couldn't hold a laugh inside of them, these jobs really didn't annoy the girl at all, she was used to small errands like this to make her childish money as a kid while she was in the Academy, this was just the same except these will go to her dossier as a ninja. While it didn't help her own dream of making her appreciation of life and love around the world, it was however certainly a useful bunch of errands, helping people was something that the magician was always willing to do. "Come on, Shimo, let's go home! This is stupid!" Sugemi grunted out throwing one of the files on the ground, only for the white haired Yuki boy to pick it up. "Nah, we need to get through those to become real ninja." Shimo answered placing the file in between two others.

"Out of all people I expected the richboy and the starlet to wish to do those jobs the least… This could be pretty interesting." Sensei grinned. He was sort of right, one would think that the son to a rare and powerful clan, an heir to two separate businesses in the village and a girl that was a rising star in village entertainment would be the first ones to complain about washing the damned dishes. At least sensei found his own sick way of enjoying this, if he was happy he was less likely to get into clash of ideals with Mana. Sugemi kicked a can and yelled out, still a bit embarrassed of his words. "All right, new plan! I'll be so good at washing those dishes that they'll make a dish-washing manga about me, then I can realize my nindo first and laugh from you all from the top! Let's go you two, you won't get in the way of my dish-washing manga!" Sugemi yelled out looking back at Mana and Shimo as the two nodded and followed him.

"Wait… You guys can't be serious… Excited over some errands…" Tanshu-sensei laughed out and fastened the pace as Ichiraku Ramen was just by the corner. The owner looked really excited, the place was a famous fast food place in the village and it got a lot of greasy dishes accumulating and the owner's daughter couldn't really handle them alone. Everyone knew that Ichiraku Ramen commonly hired young ninja to do their dishes but this time it was bad – apparently the ninja that were supposed to do these dishes were sent back to Academy so now even more dishes piled up. After seeing the endless columns Sugemi moaned out, "Wow, with that amount of dishes you'd think they'd bump up the rank of the mission! How is this D-Rank?!" Shimo mockingly smiled "What's the matter? I thought you'll have a manga written about your mad dish washing skills, won't work if I wash more! I guess I'll be the one getting manga!"

"Shut up, you womanizing-bastard! Don't you dare take from my pile, mine is this one and that one and that one, all plates on the ground are MINE!" Sugemi yelled out grabbing every plate and swiping it with unseen devotion. Mana had to hand it to Shimo – he really was a genius and he wasn't even the Nara on the team. Tanshu relaxed by the wall and smiled, one wouldn't have believed that he was annoyed at this very moment at all – "Well well, I guess you losers will be pretty fun after all…" he spoke silently.


	8. Misfortune Strikes Low, Bells of War!

The three kids were panting, Mana was just barely on her feet, bent over and breathing heavily, still wondering how her feet held her mostly upright. Shimo was sitting by a wall and his head has sunken down, he could've passed out from all the pressure for all everyone else knew and Sugemi was just down on a small chair. The team had just finished their last chore of a mission. By the time the kids were done with cleaning the dishes they were already exhausted so it was pretty good that most other jobs were filing or sorting jobs.

"Did I win? What were we competing for anyway?" Sugemi softly let out still trying to sit up straight in the chair. "Well, you did clean most of the dishes, I don't remember much else of what we did…" Mana replied still huffing and struggling for air. She was yet to make her decision about which was worse: a mission that threatened her life or bunch of simple and non-dangerous missions like this that just drained her life essence completely. Sensei was the only person who looked like he was in any way ready for a walk home.

"You did good today, I'll do you guys a favor and report to the Hokage without you, go hit the beds." Tanshu-sensei spoke, his voice was a bit different from the usual tone. He still sounded strict and his requests sounded like orders but this time he somehow seemed softer. Maybe watching the guys work on filing and doing the dishes helped him remember something from his past? His own old days? Well if all the rumors were to be believed it was unlikely that sensei was ever on a team, he was supposed to have been a nukenin, his progression through the ranks may have differed from the normal one.

Mana finally could stand up straight, she looked at Sugemi with a begging look and nodded at Shimo who looked like he had passed out. "Can you help me with this?" the kid squirmed for a little but then he helped the magician pick their friend up and walked out of the Police Force building with him. One Police Force lady was really concerned over Shimo but after she checked his condition quickly she said that he'd be OK and let the kids go. "Where does he live anyways?" Sugemi wondered and it was a fair point, neither of the three were too familiar with each other yet anyways. "Let's bring him to his father's workplace, maybe there'll be someone that'll know." Mana replied and the two started making their way through the village with their passed out friend.

Konoha was beautiful at night, so quiet but bright, there were several stages of nocturnal Konoha: one was from late evening to early night, when all the lights and lanterns were glowing brightly and people were all over the village, there were plenty of gambling houses and various entertainments for to occupy their free time, but then there was this other stage that started really late at night, one that has not yet come when the village is completely quiet and there's not a soul to be seen. Night really was an astounding time of day to be outside in Konohagakure. Several times Mana did stay a little bit up late after the shows having to leave the stage as she found it after it and always being the last person leaving the hall.

As usual people recognized Mana on the streets, they ran up and said hello, they asked questions about what happened with the boy and when they heard that he was OK but he needed rest they left her be. Talking with the villagers was fun, the young genin wished that she had more time for it because she loved her village and its people, she will have to go home right after taking Shimo back and parting with Sugemi, it was getting pretty late. Sensei looked happy about their performance, finishing all the mission in one day was not a necessity but it was the optimal way to do things and they did it, they performed the best that was expected of them. That made all the training worthwhile even if Mana didn't even get to make a single handseal filing those sheets of paper and washing the dishes.

"This guy… He's pretty heavy…" Sugemi complained, Shimo was not chubby and while being the tallest of the three, not much taller than the others so it didn't really make much sense for him to be that heavy. It must've been just the tired friend complaining, an elderly man with grey hair was passing by the workplace of Shimo's father, the place was pretty well known around the village due to how successful it was so it was no surprise that both Mana and Sugemi knew where it was. The man waved at them after noticing Shimo passed out and ran up to them. "Wow, you guys worked hard, Shimo passed out, he'll be really ashamed…"

Mana smiled and looked at her peaceful friend, handing him to his father. "No surprise, he tried to keep up with Sugemi-kun at washing the most dishes, despite Sugemi-kun being an idiot!" she looked at him trying to get a reaction. She was right to be a little bit angry at him, the boy really took the thing way too seriously and by being so into the dishes he made Shimo try even harder and forced both boys to overexert themselves. Mana wasn't that physically strong and durable, despite her training so she got tired even doing it at her casual pace. She did catch up to the boys in the end though, after they got tired their pace really slowed down and started crawling, letting Mana who was going at a more stable pace to catch up.

"Whatever… No one writes manga about dish-washers anyway, I'll try harder tomorrow, maybe we'll get actual assignments." the Nara boy shrugged as he walked away after fulfilling his obligation to help his teammate. To be honest, Mana was impressed that he agreed to help, over his obsession with manga one couldn't have been sure that he'll really help. Mana watched her teammate and a father carrying her other teammate fade away into the darkness of the night and then turned home herself. This was a tough day and it was just one day of countless more…

After getting home the girl sighed, she was so tired, the kunoichi slowly opened the door and went inside gently flicking the light on. It was strange that it was off, or that no one was home. Usually at this time at least mother is back from her job, father often went on missions for a couple of days but after those harder missions he stayed home longer. Maybe it was just one of those missions and mother was working overtime because it ended up being a busy day… It was still weird, no day was usually this busy, it was way past mother's working hours. Mana saw a note on the table, it must've had an explanation in it why her home was so empty…

After letting her eyes skim through the contents of the note they shot open in shock, Mana would've normally been impressed by her body managing to actually be shocked at such a moment, usually being afraid and surprised required a certain amount of energy which currently the magician doubted she had. In a rush the girl ran out again, running towards the western district of the village and finding the Konohagakure Hospital building, usually at this time the patients were given rest but now the building had some lights and the whole ground floor was buzzing.

It didn't took too long to rush up to the fourth floor and find mother resting in the waiting room. The woman was one of the most energetic people Mana had ever met but was currently completely wrecked by what had happened. When she saw the girl enter she slowly walked up and hugged Mana, the girl could feel her mother's tears falling down on her head and on her back making her feel uneasy but reminding her that this was no dream. "What happened?" Mana asked knowing well that she'd hate the answer.

"Your father's squad got ambushed, they say those were Kirigakure ninja but they were acting inside Fire Country. Everyone's really shaken and the families of everyone in Tsukumo's squad are here… Out of everyone your father was hurt the least, everyone else are struggling with their lives which is why this gloomy mood is around, your father was just injured on his arms." as the two sat down in the waiting room and started waiting to hear about how father was doing mother told Mana all about what happened.

Father's squad was on a mission, there was a small struggle between nukenin and Konohagakure ninja. They say that a squad carrying an important scroll with information was paid off to betray their village by Kirigakure but they were stopped by an early response squad of Konoha. After the fight only corpses remained but the sensitive information within the scroll needed to be brought back to the village, secondary objective was to identify the traitors and attempt to find any proof of Kirigakure's involvement. That would've made it easy to proof that Mizukage was unstable, threatened peace and needed to be removed in a Summit.

Sadly Kirigakure ninja got to the corpses at the same time, they were likely to have already be positioned near the borders to lead the traitors back home, after hearing the news of them being intercepted they dared to enter the Fire Country territory and they clashed with Konoha ninja. Fire Country was Konohagakure's jurisdiction and foreign ninja could not do their missions here without Hokage's permission. Because they knew that they were in the wrong the Kirigakure ninja attempted to kill all witnesses and recover the scroll for themselves and another battle ensued. The Kirigakure ninja were all killed but there were a lot of casualties and even more injured on Konoha's side as well.

Mana really failed to comprehend the meaning of all of those events, this incident may as well have started a war between Konoha and Kirigakure. So many deaths for a piece of information… It was yet to be seen how badly her father was injured. What if another war starts? It will be Mana's responsibility to stop it as one that has placed the responsibility of protecting innocent lives and changing the world but… What could she do? She was still weak… Mother couldn't understand the way that her child was feeling, she hugged Mana again and tried to calm her down telling her that it will all be OK, that father will definitely live but that was just a part of the girl's problems.

She just started out, her team just finished their first missions today and to be involved in a war would be… Not an ideal start for a ninja career and most likely a swift end. There were countless tales of past wars and how many children not unlike Mana and her team died in those wars doing simple dirty work. She couldn't die trying to dig a trench for a bunker for the intelligence unit to settle in! She had to be strong to stop such wars from happening! Her ninja career had just begun and she was already failing at her nindo. What if father is rendered unable to work as a ninja after all of this? It'd be crushing to see father crippled.

A medical ninja walked out of the ward and gestured for the two females that he could give them some information. The brief opening of the ward allowed smell of burning come out, just what was the extent of father's injuries? "First of all, we just saved the life of a hero – his device shielded his squad from a huge combined Lightning Release technique. But… His arms are severely burnt, we'll be able to somewhat salvage them, we'll heal his arms and we have a plan about getting him a new skin for his arms, he'll be mostly the same but… It's really unlikely that he'll ever be able to work as a ninja, he was called Konoha's Great Trapster for his precision and amazing tools built to trap his enemies and surprise them, capture them alive. He won't have any precision with his arms and he'll be in pain if he strains them. Burns are painful, you may want to consider that we remove his arms just to save him from the pain, you must understand Kei-san, pain changes people."

Mother tried to walk Mana away from the conversation but the girl slipped out of her grip quickly and looked at mother angrily. The woman wiped her hair off her face and looked with an empty stare at the wall thinking for just a moment before giving an answer. "Save his arms, Tsukumo can handle pain, he lives in the same household as I do and I've never seen him complain once about getting hit with a pan for refusing to wash the dishes. If there's one man that can handle it, it's my husband!" Mana had never seen mother speak in that firm and strong tone. She was usually easygoing and vibrant, always making jokes and bullying the two around the house with heavy or sharp objects but all for good fun. This Nakotsumi Kei was determined and strong. Mana wanted to be like that some day, to speak in such a tone and look so strong in the face of disaster.

"Very well, it is not a wrong choice by any means, just had to let you know. Now about our plan. Guru Ayushi is coming for his yearly lecture in Konohagakure, you may not know but Ayushi-sama was once a great ninja from the Senju clan, his longevity is a testament of that and his medical skills and the techniques he carries inside that body of his might prove to be the thing that saves your husband's arms. If we can ask Ayushi-sama to give us a tiny bit of his cells, we can cultivate self-regenerating tissue and apply it on Tsukumo-san's arms making them look and work just like any other arms, the muscles however will still be damaged so his arms will not be the same, in other words, he'll have enough functionality to go by in day to day life and perform simple tasks but straining them or trying to be too precise will make the pain return temporarily."

Mana has heard of this Guru Ayushi person before. Was he really that amazing that only a bit of his cells could actually cure her father's arms? Well, to some extent at least… Even his cells couldn't make her father be like he was before. In moments like this childhood ends. When the child realizes that things changed for the worse and that they will never be the same again, no matter how hard you cry. Those moments were the worst, having just experienced one Mana could tell. Mother cracked a knuckle, "The old geezer will give us the cells, I'll make him bleed if I'll have to!" Sometimes mother scared Mana…

Finally father's condition stabilized and the mother and her child were sent home to have some rest. Mana had to get some sleep for the busy and just as tough day coming up tomorrow. Maybe the next day after completing so many chores the Hokage will actually give them a chance at an actual mission. With the color of the sky turning back into its morning colors Mana's first day as a ninja was ending and what a day it has been: shadows of war, her father's injury… It was an overwhelming thing to have in one's life, much more so when one knew that things were only supposed to get harder from this point on.

Despite her genuine efforts Mana had trouble sleeping, she couldn't get over the things that happened, what if there actually will be a war? How the hell does that work? No. The Fourth was a peaceful man, some of his deeds always were inspiring for Mana as someone who also craved only peace and well-being for everyone, but Hokage was always just and rightful. What if his sense of justice demands for those responsible to pay, Hokage was a man of justice, despite his wish to preserve peace he would go to war if that meant putting those responsible for injustice to right.

The girl also could not stop thinking about what the medical ninja said of her father, that he was a hero. Father was always a notable but average ninja, everyone knew who he was around the ninja circles because he has been working for a long time but he was never quite impactful enough to be promoted to Jounin. He was the best of the average. Now after his heroic deed everyone in the hospital wanted to promote him to Jounin for the heroic deed just symbolically even if he won't be there to work as a Jounin. Mana decided – people gather around heroes, the only way for her to change the world, to make it a world where life is appreciated and preserved and where there is less violence is by becoming a hero.

That was Mana's new goal – to become a hero so that people gathered behind her and that her ideals are no longer a joke that older ninja laugh at. When the magician becomes a hero like her father no one will laugh and say that she'll "grow out of such foolishness" but they will follow her and appreciate life. There will be no violence. Though ultimately… One could not succeed at such a goal, if Mana keeps up such pace of fulfilling this goal she'll die before it becomes a reality. No! She wanted to face death, only by defying death and laughing it in the face, only by saving everyone from it can she become a hero!

Mana will train even harder, she'll push her body until it can no longer be pushed, she'll do all the chores, she'll gain Hokage's trust for actual missions. She had no time to rise in ranks together with Sugemi and Shimo, if she was to become a hero and stop this war, if she was to fulfill her nindo she had to blow them away and leave them behind. The girl got out of bed and sat in a meditating position, she had to train her chakra, try that thing she thought of earlier, concentrate and increase her chakra levels. She can sleep all she wants when she fails in her goal and dies, until then – she'll be training her butt off!


	9. Pain That Bonds a Family! A Real Mission

Despite an incredibly difficult and depressing start of her ninja life Mana found the next two weeks to be extremely boring and monotonous. They were filled with one minor errand after the other and only her training allowed the young lady to get some variety, of course there were always her shows to clear out the boredom as those were finally really starting to pick up. Her success with magic shows was so prevalent that Mana was finally moved up to what Mr. Hiro called "prime-time", that wasn't really that much to the magician's liking because while she did get some real attention, after the show and some encores she got back home well past her bed time.

Where initially the girl only feared her life as a magician and her life as a ninja clashing, it was somewhere in the horizon, after those two weeks Mana realized that it was very much a reality. She was commonly found sleepy and tired in her missions from the shows and training taking all of her free time and Hiro always spoke how Mana was not using all of her potential as she could perform multiple times a day or even tour the other countries. Of course he advised to wait until Konoha and Kirigakure settled their recent tension before going to another country.

Mana's suspicion was true, Hokage called for a Kage Summit to be hosted six months later. There was no official reason why it must've happened so late but many people speculated that there were matters where Hokage wanted the three Sannin to look at, gathering enough evidence of Kirigakure's activities so that the Kage Council had no doubt that Mizukage was unstable. Obviously he couldn't be blamed, things like that needed to be done right or not at all. A simple mistake could've ruined a political meeting of such grandeur and it wouldn't have been right. That was one of those reasons why Mana hated politics.

The accident changed father so much, while Guru Ayushi had not yet arrived at the village and had not yet donated his cells for his artificial skin his burns had to be covered with bandages and those had to be changed often. The man tried to appear unchanged but it was obvious that this wasn't even true. Often after trying to lift something heavy or do some house chore the man started grunting in pain and had to sit down. The medical ninja gave him all the painkilling medical herbs but what sort of medicine could ever ease such pain?

On the bright side Mana's training with her chakra was really giving results, the girl found a way to move her chakra levels past that of what a normal genin would have. If every time she used a technique a small fraction of chakra she couldn't properly control was left over in her system she could accelerate that process - every day Mana left to the Training Grounds to fire off her techniques randomly without any target or purpose. She ran out of chakra quickly but the purpose of this training was to gather a lot of leftover chakra in her system, then every week or so the girl just intentionally bombarded the chakra system points that had the masses of chakra lurking in and let the chakra loose. It hurt a little bit and her body acted weird while overflowing with chakra but at some point it learned to adapt and work more intensely, Mana's body was fooled by thinking that this increased level of chakra was actually her natural one and started working overtime to constantly keep this level up. The magician was proud to have invented such an amazing way to train...

Finally one day her exhaustion had caught up with her, while working with sorting out the products into their separate sections at Ichiraku Ramen Mana passed out, just like Shimo had before. From what Sugemi and Shimo told her the next day - Shimo carried her home the whole way and , surprisingly to no one, a lot of time waiting for her to recover. Only when Mana's parents asked him to go home already did he decide to leave. The magician was obviously embarrassed about this event and started acting a bit strange when Shimo was around. At some point his obsession should've started look creepy even for his womanizing ways and for Mana that point was carrying her tired body home and watching her while she's out. Obviously for Sugemi it was a ton of fun, he couldn't help but laugh his butt off every time Mana refused to work at the same room as Shimo did or when she kicked him in the shin when he held door for her or playfully smacked him in the head when he was acting too nice.

"Well... I suppose two weeks of missions are more than enough, you guys each got about forty D rank missions in your record, I suppose giving you something more interesting wouldn't be too bad at this point..." Hokage one day finally got the clue. He passed a single file, Tanshu-sensei didn't look too impressed by it, but then again, he never was. Shimo looked really hyped, "C-Rank?! Hell yeah!" he shouted out loud finally letting the kunoichi read the file. As usual Sugemi never read the files, he was too into his manga. By now the magician had noticed that at times he read the same issues of manga which confused her a bit. Why would he ever read something he's read before?

The mission was quite simple but also pretty difficult for a C rank, it was almost pushing the boundaries of a C-Rank mission. Further from the Training Grounds there was a very special training ground - Forest of Death. It was filled with creatures and dangers that well justified its name. Apparently an archeologist wandering the area once found a hidden archive, he didn't have the proper gear with him to get all the scrolls back home so he just marked the spot on the map, the problem was that he was no explorer so his coordinates were all over the place. The genin squad had to go there and retrieve as many scrolls as possible from the archive before it collapsed, these historic scrolls were pretty useful for the Konohagakure Museum after all!

"This mission ain't like the others... You guys better go home and prepare, we'll meet near the village gate leading to the training grounds at sunrise. In the meanwhile read up on the animals and plants living inside the Forest of Death. It won't be your usual dogs and rodents in there." Sensei instructed the three, as the kids headed home, he stopped Mana and asked about how her father was doing. By now the magician almost forgot these two knew each other, Tanshu-sensei never came to visit like father's other friends, never played with her as a kid and never told stories over beer with other friends. Maybe he was just a loner...

"Well he's in pain but mostly OK, we're still waiting for Guru Ayushi to show to ask him for some cells for the artificial skin." Tanshu looked pretty relieved, which was surprising because he showed genuine interest in someone's wellbeing for the first time in a long while. "Well that's OK, I once had a whole muscle grown from Ayushi-san's cells, he really doesn't like giving his cells, says he left his ninja days behind and now helps through ramblings of peace, you two should talk, you'd find a lot in common, both of you are equally crazy..." he smiled at Mana, this was the first time that sensei let her ideals off as a trait and wasn't offended by them. Not knowing what to respond the girl just smiled for the man and nodded, then ran off home.

"Ahhh... Forest of Death... A pretty nasty place..." father said upon being asked about it, after Mana told him of her first C-Rank mission. "Just stay out of the water, trust me, also keep some of the explosive tags ready at all times. Don't get into sight of anyone bigger than you and don't get your guts eaten. Don't worry, Mana, you'll be fine, you've grown a lot and trained hard, you can handle it." Mana smiled and shook her head, "I'm not worried about that, I'm more worried you'll try to open the pickle jar again..." Father looked at her and it wasn't clear if he was angry at her for reminding of that painful time or if he was keeping laughter in. "Well don't worry about your old man, I served my time, now it's your generation's turn..." the man sighed, he looked really sad...

Mana didn't want to sadden father any more, she went upstairs to train and get ready. She had to pack a backpack with the most essential survival stuff and to fill her ninja tool pouch. She barely even used those in all those chores. There was that one time the team had to catch a prankster that was drawing graffiti around Konoha, cutting up people's laundry and all sorts of weird stuff, she did use a kunai to stick the buster to a wall. To be honest, Mana was more scared than the prankster - her aim was horrible so she could've easily poked an eye, even Tanshu-sensei was surprised and complimented her for not blowing it back then...

"I don't need sake, Kei! I need a medical ninja, I need painkillers!" an incredibly loud shout reached Mana from downstairs - father did something that made his arms hurt again. The girl slowly shoved her unpacked backpack and went down. She looked at mother furiously cutting cucumbers in the kitchen and father angrily wrapping his own bandages - anyone that tried to bandage their own arms with injured arms knew how pathetic it looked. The girl's face twisted with sadness. Her family used to be so happy, of course mother was a constant danger to be around with her vitality and energy and dad was complete opposite of her but...

Slowly the young magician walked down the stairs and went up to father trying to help him with his bandages but he pulled his hands from her. "Don't you have things to pack?!" he cut back at her rudely. "Dad... Stop doing this, let me help." She spoke softly but tried to sound a bit colder so that father knew how dumb he was being by closing all this pain in himself. The man sighed and let her take over, the girl gulped as looking at those burns wasn't an easy thing and she was pretty young, she hasn't seen too much messed up stuff even if she was a ninja and was bound to one day.

"What happened..." she asked as she applied the medicine on the bandages and gently rubbed it on his burnt arms letting the medicine seep in before she started bandaging the limbs. "I tried to read a newspaper... A goddamn newspaper!" father yelled out, it was obvious that pain was hurting him. "It's okay, next time I can help you with that, now sit still." Mana replied trying to focus as hard as she could on bandaging. The man sighed, it would've been a welcome change of pace if he calmed down. He obviously already pissed mother off and when she was angry she always let the person know unless it was her family - then she let the vegetables and the fish know.

"You know... Me and mom are always here, this is as much our injury as it is yours, stop bottling it all inside and then spilling it out, just listen to those slashing noises, mother is murdering the dead fish..." Mana said casually. Father's eyes sparked with anger, angered fueled by pain without a doubt but... They calmed down. "It's just... Just all new to me." Mana smiled a little, "It's okay, you'll get used to it." She tried to calm father down but with every word she said he looked more and more angry. Now he tried to move his arms around and shouted out in pain forcing the magician to remind him that she's not done yet.

"It's not that! It's when I dream I always see my arms being normal, even in my nightmares and then I wake up into an even worse version of my nightmares - my reality is more painful than my worst nightmare." Father grunted out through anger and pain, Mana had to hand it to him, he was quite honest right now, that was what she wanted from him, to share the pain. Mother burst in from the kitchen luckily she didn't have any pans of sharp objects. "So we're just a part of your worst nightmare now!?" she yelled out, father started weeping, at least Mana managed to finish the bandaging before his weeping, if she hadn't he'd be in more pain from all the shaking.

"It's not that... It's just that I don't want to talk to you guys about it, Mana is doing so great, she's pretty famous now and is going to be more famous, she's sweeping one mission after the other... You're gonna beat your old man, kid..." Mana had honestly never seen father crying, he was always her model of masculinity and seeing that model being weak actually made tears gather up in her eyes. "So... I'm to blame for that? Because your pain is growing, because you're bottling it all inside?" she uttered out with her shaking childish voice. Mana felt mother's arms around her neck and then turning her face at mother's, mother's eyes were also teary but strong. She had that certain fire that even tears couldn't remove. "Your father didn't mean it, you know he didn't, he can't think straight with all that pain and once he gets used to it I'm gonna smack him pretty good for what he said."

Father put his hand on Mana's head and stroke her hair gently, his movements were pretty sloppy and limited by what pain let him do, still it meant everything in the world, it was the best hair stroke Mana had ever had. "You know that's not what I meant, it's just that I used to be a ninja, I may not have been that awesome at it but I had fun... Now I'm just a useless loser who has to cheer on you from home, obviously that's not that bad, it's just new for me - feeling useless and broken." Mana stood up and let her father's arm slip from her head, she placed her forehead up to father's and looked him in the eyes.

"You need to find another thing that defines you, you can't live with pain being the new you, it's not who you are, it's just a part of you. You need to find another thing to call your own, something that beats the pain." Father's head started sinking down but Mana tensed her neck to hold the pressure. "And don't say that we are everything you need, that's not even true. You had your family with you this whole time and pain still torments you, you need something else." Father grunted, "I used to tinker pretty damn good... Big fat nothing that's gonna do to me now..." he said. Mana stood up and showed him her arms.

"You still have the brain, I can be your arms. When I get back from the missions you can start tinkering on all sorts of deathtraps and I'll try to escape them on the stage. It'll give you purpose and something to occupy your mind with. It'll also make a... Different part of the show..." Father stood up and hugged Mana, he then gently pushed her away and sat back down, "Alright, now go finish packing your things, you've got a big day tomorrow." Mana didn't need to be told that twice, the girl rushed up the stairs into her room and started packing again. At least for once she acted like a real daughter and helped her father out, of course changing the direction of her shows from using ninjutsu to escaping death traps she herself builds under her father's instructions is going to be weird, maybe she shouldn't change all of it and just use it as a part of her show. After all if she let ninjutsu part slip her magic would lose its point.

Next day came unexpectedly, Mana was woken up by mother gently as the woman was getting ready to go to work herself. Mother was working more hours now that father was injured and won't be working, she just hoped that Mana's double income as well as those few extra customers that visited the café in those extra hours would compensate father's part of the income. Mana didn't really know how well she did, mother kept all of her finances in her own pocket, father always joked how that was for the better - mother's fairytale native tribe was apparently pretty good with the money. That was father's excuse with everything that concerned mother - her heritage.

After the entire tirade of morning activities Mana threw on some simpler clothes, choosing to wear a simple t-shirt and a jacket on top and much more casual jeans, clothes she wasn't afraid to tear or fall in a swamp with but something that allowed her a lot of freedom of movement. The girl rushed out to the gates, luckily there weren't that many people wishing to greet her and cheer on her in the streets yet, that helped the girl get to the gate faster yet still she was the last person to get there. It was quite surprising because this was the first time that Sugemi actually earlier than he had to yet from his appearance it didn't look like he slept at all.

"Wow, all three of you look like you guys are going farming." Tanshu joked as he was wearing the same outfit he always wore. The three finally head out to the Forest of Death - to Team Oak's first C-Rank mission!


	10. I'm gonna be Hokage! Shimo's Decision

After a short stroll lasting about a good half an hour Team Oak finally reached the fenced off training grounds with the unfortunate name of "Forest of Death". As far as first impressions were concerned to Mana the name may not have been too far off - the whole place looked like this thick and dark clump with trees growing so large and thick that inside the area there must've been little to no sunlight. There were strange sounds and smells coming off of the place, the whole grounds were surrounded by a large fence with warning signs and Mana could already see guards standing around and protecting the area.

Seeing the Forest of Death made the little magician draw a comparison between the environment found inside and the world outside the village. From what was seen so far Forest of Death was a place where the weak got no sunlight and therefore died, in addition, seeing how only the tallest and the largest got any sunlight at all it forced the trees to either grow in strength and size or perish, just like in the ninja world. The animals inside must've functioned similarly, living in survival of the fittest kind of environment. Out of everything that could've been found inside that iron cage, Mana was afraid of exposure to that sort of life the most.

"Don't worry, Mana-chan, I'll watch your back, just don't move far from me!" Shimo spoke up in a fake heroic tone, the one you heard coming from over glorified patriotic figures in historic plays. Mana's right eye twitched, she wasn't a violent girl but sometimes she just wanted to let her fists loose. She knew that outbursts of this strange gentleman behavior were common to Shimo but she still couldn't help but get annoyed every time he did it. Still, he couldn't really have been blamed - Mana's worry over the kind of harsh rules she'd see inside must've translated to him as overall fear of entry.

As Tanshu-sensei went on to speak with the guard and introduce them to the Hokage order to grant them entry, Mana thought to herself, the conclusion that she's drawn was that she wasn't afraid of entering - quite the opposite. She was excited, excited about getting to show off once in a while, excited about the chance to protect the animals from the rules of nature they lived by. After all, if she can protect a small-scale version of the world as she imagined it, wouldn't that make protecting the actual world much easier? Depending on how this would go Mana would see how she'd fare on the outside world the way she was and that excited her. Even if she failed, knowledge of failure and why it happened to her was better than no knowledge at all.

The guard of the place looked a bit strange, she wore pretty thick glasses, a baggy hat and that strange cloak that covered half of her shoulders. Observing Mana's interest in the guard Shimo once again butted in, "I think that's the protection from insect swarms or something... I guess being so close to the forest in the evenings got to be cruel - mosquitoes are probably everywhere." "Or the weaker species, insects are light and travel in packs, if they get pushed out of their habitat a fence won't stop them from leaving the Forest in search of a new spot to live in, if that happens it would suck to be in their way..." Mana replied. That did help her get to a new question - did the animals ever escape? From all the stories everyone told about this place it seemed weird that just a thick and tall fence was enough to keep them all in...

"Well, I've got entry permission. Let's just hope we don't have to stay overnight, the lady said that mosquitoes are horrible this time of year, specially round those parts." Tanshu-sensei spoke as he came back and showed them a small stamp of approved entry. The four of them all gathered around tightly and entered through the open gate. Almost the instant that the gate closed behind them total darkness enveloped everything. "Dang it, can't read anything like this..." Sugemi said, pulling out a flashlight from his backpack and turning it on in order to read the manga.

Shimo apparently got a peek into the boy's bag, "What the hell, Sugemi!? That bag is filled with manga? You brought a flashlight?! Did you bring water? Clothes? Something to make fire with?!" The Nara kept reading his magazine completely ignoring his friend, responding with ignorance and completely nonchalantly. "Nah, I figured you guys would take care of it, I just brought bunch of manga and a flashlight... I was really smart to take a flashlight, didn't really know I'd need it but I had a feeling, I guess I'm just smart up here..." Sugemi replied tapping his head several times. Mana's puny knuckle smacked him in the head, "The hell you are!" she grunted out.

Tanshu interrupted their small fight, "No, the flashlight is actually great, we can keep track of the map at all times like this." The man slid the old and torn up map onto the upper corner of Sugemi's manga and asked the boy to keep them updated, just in case he showed them where the entrance is and where they are now, right by it. Then Tanshu explained where the archive was supposed to be. "You can read your stupid manga, just keep us updated once in a while." Tanshu instructed, this behavior was strange, Mana would have never taken Tanshu-sensei as the compromising type of person. Why was her ideal the only one he couldn't compromise with?

Sugemi nodded and pointed at the direction they had to go, the three started walking that direction. The forest was incredibly hot, all those trees provided constant shade but somehow they also kept the little warm air it got inside circulating. Within the same hour they entered Mana could already smell their sweat breaking through, the problem was that Mana's nose wasn't really that sharp which meant that the animals definitely could smell it. Be it wolves, snakes, bears or whatever lived here - the four were an open menu for them and with a guide that was interested in his manga more than the marked animal migration and mating zones and river passes they could've been in trouble.

It was incredibly strange that no animals attacked them, as the squad kept walking on there was not a single animal in sight, even more - they actively tried to hide from the squad. Why was this place even called Forest of Death anyways? Once Mana looked straight up and saw a gigantic boa slithering the hell away from the four, one the size easily letting him break the bones of all four of them, the girl finally got the clue. "It's you, Tanshu-sensei, isn't it? We felt that strange killing intent first time we met you but up to now we've been around you for so long that we barely notice it. These animals however are scared of their lives and that's why no one attacks us..."

The man grinned slightly, Shimo looked really amazed, "Wow, how could one get this kind of feeling to their chakra?! I want animals and people to be crapping their pants just out of mere sight of me too, then no one will be oppressing anyone while I'm around!" the boy shot a knuckle into the sky. That was right, Shimo's objective was to become strong, strong enough so that no one oppressed people, like the Mizukage oppressed his family when he was a child, while he was around, he wanted to prevent stories like that of his family where entire families had to flee in fear of their life. In a way his objective was very much like Mana's except his objective actually had a possibility of being achieved...

"There's no way to get it, you just have to be cool, that's it..." Tanshu replied with a cocky look. "I'll let you in on a secret that'll help you get there - you actually have to visualize yourself killing the person that you're looking at, that'll give you the killer's eyes. People think that they only see what they see, but never met a man that doesn't know when I'm not itching to murder him when I am. It'll protect a lot more lives like this than stupid "care for your enemy" attitude." Tanshu also found an opportunity to bite Mana too. From Shimo's weird faces whole way since then, Mana just took that he was actually practicing the killer's stare...

Finally the four reached a pretty wide river, Sugemi barely even noticed it so he just started walking straight into it as Tanshu's strong arm gripped him by his collar and dragged his lazy butt back. The man without saying a word pulled a bag of unprepared meat using his sword and put it into water, removing it within a second only to reveal it being covered with leeches that quickly fell off. "This meat has no blood circulation but those leeches still grab onto it, at this point it's surprising how they haven't leeched off each other. Getting in there is to actively commit suicide, you'd get drained of blood in minutes." Now Mana realized father's advice of keeping out of water.

It took the squad quite some time to find a small pass, the pass in question also was several wooden boards tossed over the river, making the heart of the girl jump in her chest with every step. Tanshu-sensei of course just had to taunt them by jumping over the river. He did it with such ease that to Mana it seemed apparent that he could've simply jumped over several times carrying them on his back with just as little problem. He must've really enjoyed the fear in genin's faces as they crossed the slow streaming river begging whatever forces above that the puny boards don't break.

"We've reached the area." Sugemi unexpectedly declared after walking for just little bit more from the river. The exact location of the archive was not marked which meant that they had to explore the whole area and to find the entrance to the archive, apparently it was supposed to be a small pyramid around two or three meters tall, made from old mossy stone and strange hieroglyphs all over it. Tanshu-sensei scratched his head and had a pretty strange look on his face, "I think it'd be better if we split up, if each of us went to check one quarter of the area we'd find the place faster, I really don't plan of sharing my blood with mosquitoes at night, we'll have to finish our mission before sunset which means we got couple of hours at best."

Mana couldn't believe it, what kind of plan was that? Splitting up in a place like this? That's basically same as suicide! Sensei then made a handseal and made three clones. "These will follow you wherever you go, they'll scare the animals away so you can stop acting like scaredy-cats now." Despite the fact that Tanshu made all of those clones, the idea still seemed incredibly stupid and it appeared like sensei wanted to get them killed. Shimo looked just as displeased, Sugemi was the only one who apparently didn't care but that was most likely because he didn't understand a word sensei said over his manga. The fact that he was slobbering indicated it must've been something dirty.

"No. We can do it." Mana unexpectedly turned around on her thoughts, Shimo looked at her strange, the magician went on to explain. "We've got nothing to lose - if we find the place we find it faster than we'd do moving together, if we don't and get attacked - we'll be out of our comfort zone and have to push our abilities to survive, the thing is that it's the point of those simple missions. We need to be ready for this sort of thing. We need to be strong in order to fulfil our dreams: I need to be able to protect sensei's clone and myself if I can ever hope to protect the whole world and change it for the better, Shimo needs to be at least strong enough to fend off from some animals to see to it that the weak aren't oppressed, Sugemi, what better way is there for your manga to be written than if you tell the tale of a huge scuffle with a gigantic animal in the Forest of Death?"

Shimo grinned with full teeth and raised his fist in the air, "I get it, survival drill!" Sugemi put his manga back to his backpack and nodded. "I'm never gonna stop trying to make my chance at a manga! That is my ninja way!" Shimo turned around and looked at the western part of the forest, "Only now did I realize how dumb my goal is." he said, "If Mana-chan is there to protect the weak, of course they won't be oppressed by the strong... Then again, how can I know for sure that the people won't be oppressed by the strong, unless I'm the strong one handing out justice? From this day on, I declare my dream to be to become Hokage. I won't trust this position to anyone else but myself! Becoming Hokage is the prime way to ensure that the Kage don't oppress the people!" he declared and dashed forward into the western part of the forest after giving his team a huge confident smile with a wink.

Mana giggled, she was glad to see her teammates so inspired. She herself also headed to the one of the two directions left to cover. She wanted this - a chance to show her growth, to prove to sensei that she wasn't just a silly kid, talking about her dreams while having no strength to back it up. Deep inside the magician also knew that her teammates were the same, sure, hearing Shimo deciding to become Hokage was cheesy, every kid in the Academy had that very same dream, Sugemi's quest of getting his own manga was really silly, he kept mentioning characters from manga which Mana didn't even know existed, at least she never found them in the manga shops she checked just out of curiosity. Still, those were her teammates' silly dreams and she was going to stand with them every step of the way!

"You gotta teach me how to do that, make them do things you want them to do..." Tanshu-sensei's clone spoke from behind Mana, having followed her and kept up to her elevated pace. It was quite impressive how even his clones, after splitting sensei's chakra in several parts had that same vibe of absolute death behind them. That told a lot about sensei's strength. Mana grinned back, "It's called motivating people, all you have to do is tell them you believe in them, it helps when you actually believe in their dreams." Tanshu's clone laughed, "I do believe. I believe that Shimo might become Hokage one day, after all I was told that Fourth was just the same kind of snotty brat in the Academy, I believe Sugemi can have his own manga, if he had any actual brain in that Nara head of his he'd write one himself... What I don't believe is your dream, you're going to die or you're going to change."

This personal problem with Mana's dream confused her, why was sensei so obsessed with people that wanted to prevent death and that wanted to make people value life? Why was giving life worth some sort of heresy that needed to be changed with such rage and distrust? Maybe sensei just had someone in his life, someone who was like Mana and died before they could realize their dream. "Say... Tanshu-sensei... Why are you so angry at me? Did you have someone in your life that thought like me? Is it perso..." Mana turned back only to see that sensei was no longer there. "nal..." she finished the word as she realized how screwed she was.

Why would sensei leave her? A loud yell echoed through the forest, it didn't worry Mana because it was an intelligible "Oy" coming from the west - Shimo's location and the sound matched his voice. Sensei must've ordered his clones to abandon them, did he want them to die?! Just as Mana wondered what she was to do she heard a loud rustle, suddenly the ground itself started to bump with the smaller pebbles being thrown up just an inch and the leaves getting picked up. It was a fast and continuous burst of tremors - like a machine-gun. After just a mere moment the nearest young birch broke in half revealing a gigantic centipede behind it, it had to be at least three times Mana's size.

Somewhere west, a loud roar caught Shimo by surprise, the boy pulled a kunai out of his pouch and readied himself for a battle - the future Hokage couldn't be stopped here after all! Luckily the kunai was placed in the boy's hand just in time as a tiger far too large to be your ordinary tiger jumped out. The animal had to be the biggest species of tiger to survive in this environment and soon the big cat would test its mettle against a young ninja of Konohagakure.

To the east of Shimo's location, Sugemi kept frantically turning his flashlight around examining the floor for remnants of stone floor. His quest was cut short by a large tail wrapping around his waist and pulling him up into the tree. The Nara couldn't really tell what it was but that thing was crushing his chest and he had to escape in order to survive. Yes! This animal was just big enough to grant him enough glory for his own personal manga! This was the fight Sugemi wanted. As the large mouth of a boa appeared out of the cover of the leaves it didn't see a scared boy, it saw a genin itching for a fight with a creature that was as large as possible.

Sensei wanted to test them, they wouldn't deserve the rank of a ninja if they let their mission end here! Team Oak got ready to face their challenges!


	11. We're no longer children! We are Ninja!

The boa tried to bite Sugemi, it was really strong and without a doubt could've crushed the body of not only a young ninja but also a strong and adult one. Luckily enough this was the kind of constrictor that applied force over time, if the snake had crushed the boy outright it would've spent more energy than he'd have gained eating that boy, surviving in such an environment was all about economy, granted, different kind of economy but pretty important one nonetheless. Being well versed in this economy the snake continued to slowly suffocate the boy instead of instantly killing him.

The boa must've also been quite hungry because it targeted Sugemi with a bite, it wasn't likely that this sort of snake would be poisonous but it wanted to draw blood so that the boy lost energy and stopped resisting faster. It was out of sheer luck that Sugemi had one of his hands free, opposing that, it was talent that had him know the art of single hand handseals. With just few quick motions, predicting the bite, Sugemi managed to pull off his "Shadow Tendrils" technique that tied around the boa's mouth with multiple tendrils while several more pushed its head into the tree.

The shock of having one's head slammed into the tree forced the snake's grip to loosen for just a second, that second however was quite enough for Sugemi to slip out of the snake's grasp. The boy quickly leapt down to the ground level using multiple branches as halfway points down. Sugemi pulled out a kunai and started carefully observing the branches above, it was quite likely that the snake had superior speed and would draw blood or capture him again but he was ready for that, the boy was already calculating his own response to an attack faster than he could see.

To the west of where Sugemi was fighting the snake, Shimo and the great tiger were circling around each other. The beast being lead by instinct and hunger instead of logic made the first leap which Shimo dodged and weaved a handseal. The powerful claws of the great cat left a scratch on Shimo's shoulder and a smaller one on his back, it didn't interrupt Shimo's jutsu however as the muddy sludge where the tiger landed turned into ice making the cat slip around powerless. Shimo leapt back and tossed a couple of kunai, he didn't really want to kill the tiger since he was so majestic and great, the boy figured that a couple of injuries would force it to flee.

As the few knives dug into the tiger's back the beast roared in pain, as it was still unable to deal with the ice it just rolled to the side several times until it got to the solid ground, the dirt and rocks on the surface he was rolling on left some more dirty and bloody marks on the tiger's large and powerful body. Unfortunately it never intended to back up. It stood right where it was, it must've been really hungry and this hunt was do or die for it. The beast had already decided to either die or follow this boy until the end of the Earth and Shimo was just to blame for falling in its sight.

Further on, Mana tossed a couple of knives at the giant centipede, trying to see just how tough its armor was and she was unpleasantly surprised - the projectiles easily bounced off of the centipede's armor and fell down on the ground. The insect started rushing at her, it was surprising how fast it was, its mandibles moved to the side, no doubt it wanted to crush Mana's body at the waist and finish her quick. The girl jumped up and weaved some handseals sending her slightly up in the air using her "Mystical Wings" technique, she landed straight on the insect's forehead and made another combination of handseals trying to send a genjutsu at the centipede's way.

If Mana was to protect her enemy by beating them without killing them she had to start with this centipede. In a path of a hero there was no next time so the girl was genuinely ready to die before killing this thing. That was Mana's way, her conviction. Sadly it appeared that a giant centipede lacked the brain centers needed to be affected by Mana's "Scary Trick Jutsu", the genjutsu in question showed the opponent a different version of events, one where Mana died, allowing the girl a quick counterattack or escape. The centipede simply cocked its head backwards hitting the magician with its horn and sending her back off its head, tumbling back on its body, then on the ground.

Mana recovered just in time to avoid an endless barrage of the centipede's feet. He didn't have a hundred of them like the common myth along children went, still, they were tough enough to leave holes in the ground and were coated with the same material that the centipede's tough skull was, had they hit her they'd have impaled her like a blade which wasn't Mana's plan at all. Despite impending death and having to fight for her life, this mission still beat washing dishes and filing... The magician rolled below the centipede to avoid the endless barrage of feet trying to crush her.

Sugemi meanwhile was getting knocked around by the constrictor, the snake decided to play with its prey and bash it around with its head, trying to knock the boy out instead of both instantly crushing it or trying to constrict him. Sugemi was quite decent at taijutsu, something most of Nara peers of his age lacked. After coughing up some blood after being tossed around the Nara pulled out an explosive note and decided to use a trick that he taught himself, used when confronting a stronger but brutish foe. As the snake's giant forehead closed in on Nara he trust his palm with an explosive note forward, relaxing the arm right at the end and letting the snake's head to transfer its force into his palm and spin him around instead of having his tense palm collide with the superior strike. There was no contest of force, just a complete transfer as the force snake gave the Nara threw him to the side helping him dodge.

Before he even got up, the Nara made a simple handseal detonating the seal. As the smoke cleared the damage became apparent, it wasn't as extensive as the boy had wanted - the snake was just a little smoky and completely dazed and confused, but very much intact. The Nara didn't want to strain his chakra reserves anymore but he had to. Just one last attack, one strong do or die. The Nara made the handseals, building up chakra inside of his body with no visual indication to it. Luckily his opponent was just going to take anything he'd throw head on, the attack wasn't something that was easy to land after all...

Shimo was barely tracking the tiger's leaps, he was using two kunai but he didn't have time to inflict any damage. He had a certain degree of bukijutsu mastery and that helped him to perfectly block every leap and paw strike that the tiger threw, sadly he couldn't counter because his hands were completely full trying to defend himself from any further injuries. There was still much that Shimo could've learned in terms of move economy, he still spent too much breath in his moves, too many unnecessary movements and that showed as he spent all of his effort just to keep himself alive.

As good as the boy was, the tiger still found many gaps in the boy's defenses, Shimo was covered with scratches and very shallow teeth marks where the tiger's bites just almost caught the boy. Any of his teammates in his place would've died but Shimo was relentlessly blocking every attack - his kunai knives were covered with scratches, the tiger was strong enough to leave scratches on steel with repeated slashes. Being so overwhelmed was really not where Shimo wanted to be, it was time that he stopped feeling sorry for this tiger. As much as the boy respected Mana's ideals (and wanted to show off to her just to be on her good side), Tanshu-sensei was right - the enemy won't feel sorry for you, you had to finish them off.

Shimo roared loudly as he allowed the tiger's claws to leave more marks but instead he dug his knives in the side of tiger's head. The spot where the tiger was aiming was non-lethal, Shimo's stabs would've been if only... If only the kunai had more reach, more powerful penetration! Now they were stuck in the muscle and barely reached the tiger's blood vessels needed to be cut. Shimo leapt in the air and performed a dropkick aiming at the kunai, the tiger roared and was sent back, not by force but by pain. Still... The beast was bleeding but it was standing. The desired blood vessels were injured but the knives were blocking the blood, they needed to be pulled out. There was no way with his injuries that Shimo could come up with that amount of strength, it would've needed a superhuman to pull those out of the tiger's steel tough muscle tissue. This was it - time to go all out and take this beast down. Shimo weaved a couple of handseals and shot his arms forward as cold icy wind blew at the tiger's direction...

The centipede was doing its best trying to get Mana out from under it - it was turning around frantically trying to leave her exposed and its fears were well justified. Its bottom spot was the soft one, Mana could already make it out that the bottom part of the centipede was unprotected and if she stabbed it with an explosive kunai she'd leave a gigantic hole in the insect's body for its primitive organs to fall out. That wasn't Mana's style. She'll find another way! With all of her puny strength the girl shot an elbow into the centipede's bottom part, it wriggled around. Strange, in the plays when heroes fought giant instects they always made the insects shriek in pain, roar or make a sound, there was none of that.

Mana quickly dived out from under the insect, threw some explosive notes in the air and made a handseal. "Friendly Gust Jutsu!" she yelled as a gust of wind drove all of the explosive notes at the insect. She activated the tags causing a chain reaction of explosions, each of which left powerful dents in the insect's body, it seemed like an explosion was the only concussive force strong enough to leave a dent in that shell. The centipede's armor cracked in many spots, there was some sort of gooey and disgusting liquid coming out of them. The centipede was wriggling around, still refusing to make a sound, it fell down on one side and wriggled around, writhed on the ground as more gooey liquid shot out. Mana was careful not to touch that, not only did she find that thing to be completely icky, but it also could've been acidic, she's read that some larger insects had acidic blood in them and acid burns were deep down in her list of things she needed in her life.

The girl sat by a tree and breathed in and out. This fight was something, she could've used sensei's help but she was a bit proud of herself. The centipede came back to life again and jumped around, trying desperately to stand up. Mana stood up and looked back at it, a true warrior would've killed it... She was told so many times that she was a disgrace and not true warrior, not a true ninja. Perhaps since she was not given the honor of being called a real ninja, she had no obligation to act like one. The magician simply walked away leaving the creature struggling to contain its own leaking goo.

Sugemi leapt forward, a hardly visible black chakra aura appeared around his body, stemming from his shadow. The technique was supposed to be a transfer of force from his Shadow Tendril technique into his body, focusing it all into a taijutsu attack, it was a bit telegraphed and couldn't be pulled out of nowhere but it pretty much doubled his striking power, it was almost like punching someone and using Shadow Tendril to hit them at the same time. The boy shouted out in pain as the strain on his body from using a large amount of chakra came to him. The Nara thrust his fist forward as it dug deep into the snake's face, stronger even than an explosive tag because the force was concentrated to one point instead of being spread in a shockwave.

The first blow was a rising strike, after the snake's head shot up in the air and started falling down, Sugemi was worried that he may not have delivered enough of a punch, he re-sparked his chakra using the same technique again, when used in combination his technique didn't cost twice that amount of chakra, since his body was still recovering from using it once it came off easier, there were still leftovers from the chakra he used before. Sugemi's fist shot forward, enhanced by his Shadow Tendril Technique. "FOR MY OWN MANGA! SHADOW FIST JUTSU!" he shouted as his last remnant of chakra blew into the snake's sensitive nostril sending it back crashing into the tree. For effect the Nara would've loved the tree to go down but nothing of the sort happened. The snake didn't rise up, the boy rushed back - he failed to find any remnants of the archive and sensei was no longer here, there was no point to hang around here any longer, especially now that his chakra reserves were almost empty.

In Shimo's front the wind circulated and formed a smaller and smaller vortex. The boy struggled to finish building up the technique but his success was moderate - the technique was really difficult as he had to use his clan's signature Ice Release but also manipulate the shape of the vortex. It didn't really work - the technique just tightened into a beam-like vortex that fired right at the tiger. Normally, the way that Shimo's brother did the technique it was supposed to completely freeze the opponent but Shimo's imperfect version only dug multiple large ice shards and either froze them onto their skin or straight out violently drove them into the enemy as knives. "Ice Wolf Technique!" Shimo roared wildly as the vortex left the tiger into an injured and whining shell of the majestic beast it once was.

It probably would've still gotten in a fighting shape. As Shimo's hands lowered he looked at the tiger, he felt really sorry about what he did to such an amazing animal... The boy walked up to it as the tiger looked at him with sorry eyes. Shimo pulled out a kunai and looked back into the tree branches, he wondered if sensei's clone was watching. "You seeing this?! We're no longer kids! We're ninja!" he yelled out and walked away. The animal should've known by the time it recovers that this was one fight that wasn't worth it. The boy just hoped that Mana or the others found the archive because his region appeared to be empty.

Mana was looking around, she had very few chances to properly explore the place since she was too interested in sensei's obsession with hating her ideals and fighting that centipede. It didn't appear like the archive was there, she figured that turning around was her best choice. It was then that she saw it - another centipede's head staring at her from the bush, no way, she had no time nor the means to fight it. She still had some chakra as her extended resources came in handy but she didn't have a technique hitting hard enough. The girl's hands quickly went through handseals forming a mass of crackling lightning above an area in front of her as the centipede tried to crush her like its predecessor lightning rods shot out of the mass and went through the centipede shocking it giving Mana enough time to bolt.

This was bad - Mana's "Magic Skewer Jutsu" was mostly harmless as it only shocked the person causing pain and left them briefly stunned in place out of sheer surprise and pain but she did literally no damage. Even more, she was running the opposite direction to where her team was, the centipede was blocking her off and forcing her to run deeper into the forest. If she kept running she'd get lost, that's even if she's lucky enough to escape this thing! Mana kept running, she heard rumbling sounds, those same almost automated thuds hitting the ground, they were getting closer and closer, that thing was about to hit her, the magician kept running forward, she had to close her eyes and clutch herself to force herself to keep running. She was almost ready for those mandibles to catch her at any moment. Except...

Her sandals met a tough ground, suddenly she heard a deafening thud and some crashing rocks, sand and dust fell on the girl's messy hair as she stroke over it several times to move it aside. Mana's curious eyes turned back only to see the centipede having his its head into an entrance of some sort - she was standing right in the archive she wanted to find! The bug was too into its chase to notice the small building that the girl ended up in and it seemed to have only one entrance which also served as an exit, the only path left not blocked with stone and centipede head was to go deeper into the underground archive. Mana sighed. At least she'll finish her mission by packing the scrolls... She's in an ancient library with all the time in the world, she was fortunate enough to love reading at least...


	12. You're Not Perfect! Hurry to the Rescue

Mana sighed, she was sitting on the stairs leading down to the main hall of the archives. Normally she should've went on down, taken all the scrolls and looked for a way out but she already knew there couldn't have been one. The whole place was simplistic with its architecture and the only entrance, also the only exit, was currently blocked and while she had some more explosive notes left from her last battle, those that she kept in another pouch, those could've actually taken the whole place down on her.

Currently the genin was wondering if sensei was going to help her out, after all, his clone did follow her and most likely had seen the battle. It also could've seen her moving away and then being attacked by another centipede and then entering this archive by accident. Her theory was supported by the fact that "Shadow Clone Jutsu" split ones chakra in parts, it would've been a foolishness to let the clones disappear after making them for show - there had to be another meaning to them. Tanshu-sensei must've been ready to help them out in a pinch but not before he was absolutely sure of their incoming demise. That was just the kind of man Tanshu-sensei was.

Sadly it appeared that no one was coming to rescue her. That didn't make Mana sad, it made her furious that she was about to do all the work for herself, it was a good kind of anger however. The kind of anger when mother and father don't do their own dishes and Mana has to do all of them, on one side it's annoying but on the other hand all the dishes get done anyways. The girl stood up and looked at the gigantic head blocking her exit one last time before heading downstairs into the main hall of the archive.

The stairs were pretty long, they were straight and lead anyone heading straight down, the stairs were just few degrees off of being horizontal so it took some time before they helped the explorer descend to the archive level. The whole place was just how one would imagine an ancient archive or a tomb to look, the stones were mossy and old, many bricks were loose and several fell out from behind Mana's feet when she stepped on the step. The girl was happy that the place was relatively dark, that way she had no chance of seeing the kind of insects that must've loved it here. Being not unlike other girls of her age Mana was not too fond of insects, especially ones that lived in tombs and caves, for now, it was better if they remained unseen.

Why didn't they come for her? Did something happen? What if Shimo and Sugemi got attacked too? What if one of them got hurt? Mana was a little worried about her friends even she was clearly the one in a tighter spot - this place could've been closed out from any air supplies, there was little to eat or drink except the stuff that the magician had with her. No. Mana won't rely on her team to come and bail her out, she'll go and complete her mission and if needed she'll try and blow a hole out somewhere and leave when she gets really desperate and the risk of everything falling on her head is well worth it.

Mana entered the great hall of the archive after a long and boring walk. It looked so forgotten but also so fantastic, it resembled much more of a library but whereas libraries were filled with books, this place was filled with all sorts of colorful scrolls. Some of them had insignia on them, some of the signs looked like animals or drawings or symbols, some of them looked like hieroglyphs or letters of some ancient language. Mana removed all food and water from her backpack and started loading all of the scrolls but then she thought - how does she know which scrolls to load? Normally the four of them would've had enough space to carry all the scrolls, they each had tubes that had incredible amount of space in them and each tube could carry around fifty scrolls, problem was with Mana being here alone with no hope of being saved - she'll need to be picky and pick the most worthy scrolls being moved. Obviously they can return here at any time later with Mana knowing the location but for now she'll have to at least peek into the content of the scrolls.

She had all the time in the world, last she saw the Sun was setting which meant that night was approaching. Nights in the Forest of Death were incredibly dangerous, all ninja, even higher ranking ones were advised to leave the Forest at night, because whatever creatures may have attacked them during the day, at night they were ready to feed, there were more of them and they were more dangerous. Also night wasn't ideal for most people to defend themselves in. It was well within reason that Tanshu-sensei wanted to leave before night comes, now with lower chakra reserves the Jounin will call for the team moving out, leaving Mana behind - that was the most logical solution and sensei wasn't against leaving people behind.

Imagining herself tired and hungry, low on chakra and bit bruised in a forest filled with thing wanting to kill her wasn't fun in the slightest, it may have been a smart idea to sit tight and carefully select the scrolls she'd move over the night, then move in the morning. She could spare one sleepless night... "I always wanted to have a sleepover..." the girl thought to herself ironically since she didn't have too many friends to have a sleepover with. Moving in the morning would've been way better, she may not have had Sugemi's map but finding her way in the morning beat wandering at night without competition. And so as the decision was made the young kunoichi started checking the scrolls one after the other to choose the ones she could seal and ones better left behind for a later pickup. The place could have went down during Mana's escape, if that happened the scrolls she left behind would've been lost so she had to do her best at choosing the most valuable ones. If she succeeded the mission would still be completed, after all the objective did state "as many as possible"...

There was a problem that the kunoichi didn't understand what was written in some of the scrolls, she automatically left some of the ones containing legends behind, she considered actual historic sources more important. It was quite difficult telling history from the legend, often the girl had to sit down and read everything in that scroll to better understand what was written in it. Luckily enough Mana was pretty good with history that was taught in the Academy, she also did some extra reading so placing some of those into history wasn't that hard. Some of those that the magician chose were actually legends, but those she recognized as really important as they were considered lost in time but influential to historic figures and ideas. Mana was the best person that could've possibly wandered into this archive as she was most likely the best out of her squad in history department, of course she didn't know Tanshu's degree of mastery over history but something told her that something as useless practically as history wouldn't have been much to sensei's fancy.

Then an idea came to Mana's mind - her father's top hat... If she wore her magician's uniform she could've used her father's seal to seal some more scrolls. Sadly she chose a more practical attire and while the combat situation proved that to be the right decision, now she sort of wanted to have chosen her fancy attire just so she could have saved some more scrolls. Some of the scrolls had some sort of jutsu formula inside them, they only needed one to have the scroll unsealed and making the handseals with the scroll providing a one-time use of the jutsu. Most of them were high ranking techniques, Mana wouldn't have had any chakra for them anyways even with her larger than usual reserves. "Shadow Clone Jutsu..." Mana ran through one of the scrolls, it described the process of the technique and its different variations, sadly, if the girl used even the most simple version she'd die of exhaustion shortly afterwards...

This was the most painful realization - knowing that not everything could be saved, that Mana wasn't perfect, that somewhere along the road she made the wrong choices and now she had to leave bunch of scrolls to rot here and risk having them permanently lost in time. Maybe... Maybe Tanshu-sensei wanted her here? Wanted her to know how real missions work, that she can't possibly be almighty enough to save everyone, that sometimes people have to be left behind? Except of course, the realization would be made through scrolls...

"NO!" Mana almost broke out with emotions, being closed in a relatively dark space with only her own artificial light stick she took from home to illuminate her surroundings did horrors to one's condition. "I have to... I have to save everything..." Mana grabbed her face to keep herself from crying. She had to do it, she had to at least try to do it perfectly... The magician weaved the handseal and uttered... "Shadow Clone Jutsu!" just as the scroll described. Concentrating an equal part of chakra and splitting it off of her own, making just one clone shouldn't kill her but it'll be close! With a loud poof of smoke a clone appeared, suddenly Mana felt an impulse of pain in her chest as the clone puffed into smoke again, just like it once appeared. The magician fell on the ground, she felt blood pressure around her eyes as her vision blurred and her chest was pounding trying to contain the strain from exploding her chest into a pool of blood. Mana fell on the ground, she tried to reach for the scroll extending her arm towards it, a sad and sorry "No..." came out of her before the girl passed out.

Somewhere farther away, the boys had returned to the rendezvous point and met up with Tanshu-sensei. Shimo was really angry, "What the hell, sensei!? You left us alone! We could've died!" Sugemi grinned "What's wrong? Future Hokage had trouble with some forest animals?" teasing Shimo. Tanshu looked into the leaf layer covering the sky, "It's bad, it's getting late, we got to move back, maybe we'll make it to the exit before nightfall..." Shimo and Sugemi looked around, "Where's Mana-chan? Maybe she got attacked too, maybe she's hurt?" Shimo got worried and looked at the direction where Mana headed off to when they separated. "Nope, she won her fight, she did better than the two of you did, she's actually in the archive right now which is the best place for her to be in, with a little luck she'll seal some of the scrolls and find us in the morning, we are NOT wandering this place looking for her at night." Tanshu decided and pointed at a direction that headed back to where they entered.

"Heroes from manga don't leave their friends behind." Sugemi said as he turned around and started moving towards Mana's direction. A burst of chakra came from Tanshu's direction, suddenly the air became chilling cold, both boys froze in place in fear from the sheer strength and killing intent coming off of the man. "We are heading that way." he said pointing at the entrance once more as the two boys turned around without questions and headed to where Tanshu pointed, "Yes, Sir." Sugemi added. Spirit of manga faded in the cold grip of Tanshu's killing intent.

"Man... This sucks... What if Mana-chan is hurt?" Shimo slightly peeked back at the direction he imagined the girl would be in. "It would be the most gentleman thing to do to help her out..." he added, Sugemi kept rushing through the trees, moving at a speed completely different from one they moved to the location in. Even when the boys were low on chakra sensei's orders didn't let them let up, both of them were sweating heavily and barely keeping up with their sensei and huffing heavily. It seemed that all that Tanshu was worried about was getting out of the forest until the night comes, in the forest it looked like every moment of day was night, that was one of the most scary things about this place - night just crept up on you and all sorts of creatures started hunting on you at night...

"Nah, didn't you hear what sensei said? Mana is in the archive, it's a bit weird that she went in alone but if she was in danger Tanshu-sensei would do something, the Golden Oak of Konoha the Forth Hokage would never be friends with a person who is actually a dick, right? Tanshu-sensei didn't leave us alone, from how certain he was of Mana's location and condition it seemed like he tracked us the whole way, it is possible that his clone is still watching her... Let's just wait till morning, then we can go look for her, if we die now you won't become Hokage and I won't have a manga written of my adventures, even more, Mana will be pissed at us for dying while looking for her. We'll also blow her dream away, have you forgotten? Mana's dream is to protect everyone, always."

Shimo just shut up and kept moving where sensei led the way. It took three times less the time they took to get to the river pass to get back to the entrance. The last kilometer was full of clouds of insects buzzing and trying to feast on the blood of the ninja that were foolish enough to stay in the place for so long. In addition there were strange sounds all over the place, sounds like roaring and whining, sounds of natural fight for survival going on all around them, it was clear that had Tanshu-sensei and his insane killing aura had been around to repel wild animals the boys would've long since been food. It took them their best techniques to defend against a single animal each, more than half of their chakra reserves just to fight a single hungry and desperate animal. One could not begin to imagine fighting multiple or entire packs of animals. There was howling, roaring, trees tumbling down all around the place.

Also, Tanshu's chakra, and his aura, was greatly weakened. Even with his full reserve there must've been animals brave enough to challenge even him, now when he made multiple shadow clones and kept up such inhuman pace of running for so long leading the way his chakra reserves could've been as low as being halved, if that was true that meant even more danger for the kids and himself. It didn't took a genius to realize that sensei's call was actually the right one, Shimo just hoped deep inside that if Mana is alright in there somewhere she also understands the situation and doesn't hold it against them. She was amazing enough to win against the animals of the forest and find the archive, she was smart enough to stay inside and wait overnight. She'll be OK... She must be!

The three ninja approached the exit and Tanshu banged on the gate hard. It took several minutes but finally the gate was open, there were multiple guards watching it so that no beast escaped the area. "You guys were pushing it, several more minutes and I'd have kept the door shut." the lady that let them in initially said, "Weren't there four of you? Did something happen?" she asked signaling the men to wait, "Do you need an extraction squad to go in there?" she added. Tanshu shook his head, "I've got the best man possible watching my student - myself, we'll go back in in the morning, I hope you guys have nothing against us setting up camp here till the morning?" the lady laughed, "How can I refuse you and that crazy feeling you got..." the team started putting up their tents. No one spoke too much, Sugemi and Shimo were working on the map, planning where they'd go so that they waste no time, theorizing where exactly the archive was. After a couple of hours they went to bed, sleep was integral for recovering at least some of their chakra overnight...

Next morning came almost lightning fast, the boys barely had any time to sleep. Tanshu rudely woke them up by knocking on their tents and with extreme force clashing two kunai against one another. The sound of steel clashing forced the boys awake, none of them complained, all of them felt responsible for what happened but more so about extracting their teammate they had to leave behind overnight in one of the most dangerous places in Fire Country. Sugemi whispered "If Mana is OK, I think we're good for the Chuunin exams. I mean, I heard they have a round in here, after missions like this we're ready for everything." Shimo didn't reply, this wasn't time for goofing around or small talk. The three stretched out, wasting no time and bolting forward with all the speed they as ninja could come up with right as the gate opened. Back into the Forest of Death, hoping only that the place didn't live up to its name. Tanshu-sensei looked adamant and relatively calm, the boys were quite surprised how much so.

No one doubted if he wanted to pull Mana out of this at all, both boys understood that sensei held himself responsible for their well-being, he just showed it in unique ways. "Sensei..." Shimo tried to calm him down, "It's not your fault, I know that you just tried to test us, to put us in life-threatening situation to make us grow stronger and learn, you're just that sort of a teacher." Tanshu-sensei looked back at Shimo with a rude and cold look, "Why would I be to blame? Everything is under control, as much of an idiot your teammate was, she lucked out and ended up in the best place for her to be. If she's as smart as she's shown herself to be up to now she'll have finished sealing her share of the scrolls before going to sleep last night and will be waiting for us."

Sensei was moving insanely fast - he knew exactly where the archive was because his clone followed Mana who found it yesterday. It was just as if they were racing with imaginary embodiment of death itself. "Please be OK, Mana-chan." Shimo thought to himself as the three kept moving forward.


	13. Story of Satsuhimasa the Spruce Princess

Small rays of light sparingly entered Mana's field of vision as her eyes slightly opened, the light from the lightstick she borrowed from her father was still barely emanating, the girl wondered just how long she could've been passed out for. This was reckless and irresponsible of her to do - to try and use such an advanced and seemingly impossible technique. Shadow Clone jutsu was classified as a B rank technique, however very few B rank shinobi used it, it simply required too much chakra. For her, a lousy genin with average skills at best to try it... She was an idiot.

Mana stroke her hair and rubbed her aching forehead, her head was pulsing with pain and she could feel exhaustion all over her body. This wasn't good, she didn't know exactly what time it could've been outside, she didn't know exactly how long she'd been passed out for. The kunoichi tried to guess, looking at how traumatized her body was, the fact that she woke up at all suggested that she just approached the limit of usable chakra, she didn't yet cross it. The genin didn't feel like her chakra had increased at all which meant that less than ten hours had passed, usually some of her chakra recovered overnight, she couldn't have been passed out for more than a couple of hours, four at the most.

The magician's hand unwillingly was raised to her mouth to contain her yawn - she was tired, her biological clock must've told her to go to sleep. No. It could've meant a great many things, maybe she's running low on air to breathe and her body was becoming desperate, Mana opened her backpack and cracked another lightstick, she had twelve of those because she assumed she'd be in total darkness in this forest the entire time, one should've worked for three to four hours, the fact that her old one was just now going dim helped the girl time her brief passing out a bit better.

As far as she could remember when she passed out it was the beginning of the night. Nights in the Forest of Death were nasty, she was probably too deep to hear any battles of animals fighting each other from down there. Mana sighed and continued her quest to read over scrolls to better evaluate them. This one looked weird, it was covered with very dull greyish shade of green, the kind of paint used was strange and had an even stranger smell to it - it must've been ancient because the paint used was natural and had a peculiar dung smell to it. Such time placement of the scroll would've proved enough for the magician to automatically consider the scroll worth saving but the girl had other ideas.

She had all the time in the world, she went through almost half of the scrolls of this place in just three to four hours. As the girl munched on a rice cake she took out of the backpack she thought - why doesn't she read anything more accurately, educate herself? After all, the scrolls were meant for the museum so they didn't have any classified information, she could have saved a couple of ryo she'd have spent for the museum ticket if she read some of those right now. She always was into history and lore and legends, maybe this was the time to enjoy this occasion and make it into an actual hobby of hers. When else will she have the time to read up? Back home she had her ninja missions, her magic shows to prepare for, she had training and tinkering with dad so that he had something to distract him from the pain. History and cooking were the two hobbies that Mana had abandoned since she started studying really hard in the Academy.

The genin finished her rice cake and cleaned her hands, she took the ancient scroll she was about to put into the sealing tube and opened it up. The smell of old paper and ink spread throughout the archive, it was amazing how this scroll avoided being munched on by rats or ruined by insects. The story inside the scroll was written very weirdly, it was written in a language that Mana could understand but it used strange endings to words that at times needed to be dropped. It took a little practice to read the story fluently but it was indeed rewarding, after peeking inside the scroll Mana realized that this scroll was from times more ancient than she initially thought - before even formation of ninja villages. With a little practice of reading the strange historic text the girl began to read.

"Back before the times when all Great Tribes united themselves under the Wood Clan's rule, before the formation of the Konohagakure or in fact any other inferior village, there were two Great Clans competing with each other. The historian would like to correct himself, there were great many clans competing but all of them were weaklings and insignificant specks of dust compared to the mighty Senju and the Garuru clans, even the highly praised Uchiha clan did not come into prominence until after Garuru clan was wiped out by the Great Vengeful One's wrath, the Uchiha clan struggled with survival as they were located deep inside Garuru lands, with every step they took the Garuru constantly attacked and raided any settlements that the Uchiha tried to make, keeping the Raven Haired Ones as wandering tribesmen with no place to call home. Had the Garuru not existed, it indeed would have been the Uchiha that would've competed with the unchallenged might of the Wood Users.

As it is known, the times were hard, the ninja preferred to wander the endless forests and wilderness as settling down meant that one was open to their rivals to invade, the clans were constantly on the move, training and honing their skill as skill literally meant survival. Strength was and is everything and the historian would like to remind that strength is still essential even at this time of Great Settlements. It is in such hardship that amazing strength was bred, strength as that of Great Princess Satsuhimasa and her beloved Omaru. Their love was as great as their power as no blade could rival the strength of Great Princess' Spruce Wood Release and Omaru's Black Wood Release.

It is a very well-known fact which the historian would like to hammer home, Princess Satsuhimasa was the most beautiful maiden of all that have been, are and indeed will be. Her beauty made every man lose their cool and, in fact, many clans were tempted to even breed with the Fairest Princess, even if she was not of their blood, just because her beauty and strength was so superior to everything else in comparison that her children were supposed to be children of Gods themselves. Many fools lost their lives trying to prove themselves to the Mighty but Gorgeous Satsuhimasa, many more got lost and died as the Great Princess of the Spruce left her signature Spruce Mokuton that spread illusions of such strength that even men that realized they were being Princess' playthings could not dispel the illusions because they lacked the power to break them, doomed eternally to wander the dreams given to them by the Princess they were instead.

Only one man was powerful enough to avoid being trapped in inescapable illusions of the Amazing Princess. The man was smart for he knew perfectly that if the White Spruce Princess would have wished, that if he fell for her illusions for just a moment he'd be standing there dazed until his demise. He'd have been dead, he knew that she was well aware of his venture and perhaps smitten by his own looks in a moment of weakness or his amazing power that rivaled that of Black Senju Omaru himself. It could've been that the heir of the Garuru clan - Maramo was that powerful as to avoid being charmed by the endless spruce forests, perhaps the Princess was merciful on him herself, and so the heir of the Pitiful Wolves ended up right at Senju tribe's doorstep and in the night kidnapped the Mighty Princess.

Perhaps this historian is foolish to call that kidnapping for the Princess could have hung the Despicable Maramo's guts all over her forest dyeing her spruces blood red had she wanted, it must've been truly a moment of charmed weakness as the Princess did not oppose Maramo's attempts who kidnapped her from Omaru. He brought her to his home - the Garuru caves where the two lived for a while surrounded by the Savage Garuru clansmen. The Gorgeous Sovereign of the Trees decided to build a superior home for the savages and made a gigantic spruce tree that split their cave and formed a fort of wood and stone, a real place that the Garuru could call home. Many rival weakling clans tried to set it ablaze, destroy it with any pitiful means they knew but Satsuhimasa's spruce was inflammable and immune to any sort of known destruction. She truly was the greatest.

It is argued whether Princess was charmed or forced, some say she never loved her cousin Omaru at all and truly loved the Garuru Spawn Maramo those "scholars" this historian would like to put on a pike. The fact was that the Princess lived seemingly happy with the Savage Garuru and helped them grow stronger and wiser, making them for the first time able to truly compete with the Almighty Senju. Their foolish luck however was not infinite as the Just Omaru finally caught up to the Garuru clan and slaughtered every single one of the Great Pathetic Savages Inferior to The Mighty Senju in Every Way Imaginable. The true desires of Satsuhimasa remain unknown for the Princess was under a vow to never harm her own people, for that reason she aided no side in this war, it is unknown which side the Princess considered her people (but this historian is pretty sure it's the Best Ever Senju, for sure!).

What followed next must've been another act of brief madness, as the Mighty and Beautiful Satsuhimasa appeared to be stricken with grief and declared that Senju were no longer her people. Seeing as her sons from living with the Garuru were spared, she ordered her sons to wipe the Earth clean of the tyrannical Senju. Her sons with the aid of her Mightiest mother killed every Senju present in the war, only those weak and sickly left behind survived Satsuhimasa's wrath. The Princess cut off Omaru's head and heads of each of his generals herself, defeating all of them together herself and buried them into the ground, crushing them herself, she then ordered her son to burn this ground until nothing can grow there for a million centuries. It was on that day that the wasteland later to become Lightning Country appeared from the forest that covered the entire land. It seemed as if Earth itself began to cry as around that land it started to snow eternally, this historian is sure that it is snowing even now around the wasteland this transpired in.

The Powerful but Merciful Princess returned to the Senju and gave them a choice - live under her Merciful and Loving wing as her children or to meet the fate of their warriors, Senju demonstrated their eternal wisdom by joining the Princess and becoming her children. Princess continued to make more children by killing any warriors that came to conquer the "weakened" Senju and making them her children as well, it was then that the mighty White Spruce Princess of the World became a Queen. Satsuhimasa began building an actual settlement in a place she found warm and welcoming, murdering any clans that tried to raze that "village" she was building or forcing them to join her as her children. Even the Uchiha and their mightiest Yosuke proved to be no match to the mighty Satsuhimasa and decided to retreat from the Spruce Queen's land and settle in the rocky wasteland on the graves of the old Senju and Garuru."

Mana closed the scroll as that was where it ended. It was apparently describing events transpiring in the pre-village period. It was quite clear that the historian describing the events was a Senju or at least wrote under their command or rule and he did appear a bit biased towards them. The girl couldn't help but admire some of the Princess Satsuhimasa's work and feats, some of the things she did were really cruel though. She must've been a lot like Mana at some point. There was a lot that the kunoichi could take from this historic woman but... If Mana's ideals belonged to Satsuhimasa the girl would've failed - Satsuhimasa dealt with her enemies with cruelty and had her own kind of justice. And yet she was the person that history praised as an icon of strength, beauty and justice. Princess lived in immeasurably more cruel times than Mana did but if she had to resort to such means to achieve peace that meant that Mana really was as foolish as Tanshu made her out to be, her real fate really was to fail... Either by dying while trying to keep peace or by killing someone and forsaking her ideals.

It was clear that this wasn't the end of the story, the story described the end of the Great Wandering Period and the beginning of the Settlement period, the events described could've transpired as much as five hundred if not more years ago, it spoke of clans like the Uchiha who were incredibly rare these days, if they lost the war against Satsuhimasa it'd explain why, and Garuru that were long since dead. The Garuru clan was a clan of wandering warriors that lived by their fists and swords and built their small camps from what they looted and plundered. Had they existed today they'd have been Mana's prime opponents purely due to their ways as compared to her nindo. The magician desperately tried to find the scroll that spoke of later events, she needed to know about Satsuhimasa more, the young one had to know how the Princess lived her later life, if she achieved true eternal peace and if she changed at all after finding the village. The First Hokage was not Satsuhimasa so the magician was very interested to know why and why she was forgotten and no one ever taught about the woman in the Academy.

It took a while to find the right scroll, one that had similar smell and look to it, this one was purple, purple was a regal color. Maybe the scroll was written by the orders of a person in charge. Maybe it was only accessible to noble and rich people, from what the kunoichi knew of history that was and to some extent is the case, only ninja, samurai or Daimyo themselves cared enough to educate themselves of history, ordinary people just tried to get by and cared much more of the world there and then. Mana wondered if the scrolls were maybe fictional, containing a legend or a myth that explained how things came to be but the period described was too recent for it to be a myth. It had to be either true, or at least the version that the officials wanted everyone to know and there was no way to know any other versions form where Mana was stuck in at the moment.

The girl finished sealing the scrolls, keeping that specific scroll on the top of the tube, putting many more inside of her clothes, taking off her jacket and forming an improvised bag to put a lot more scrolls into it. She saved as many as twice the amount one person could save. There were no false hopes - if someone tried to move that centipede near the entrance the chances were that the archive would collapse on itself, it was fragile to begin with and it was a miracle that it didn't collapse when the damned thing headbutted the place to begin with. This was as good as she could save, she'll have to finish reading the story on her way home. The girl's strained and tired eyes were shooting off tears as she yawned and tossed her jacket-bag over her shoulder. She still had to figure out how to get out herself. The rice cakes she ate in the morning over the story were her last. Mana would rather get squished by a rock than eat a giant cockroach or a rat, especially since she had very limited ways of preparing them, she had no way of making a fire so she'd be eating them raw. Even the idea of that almost made the girl puke, in addition to that water was running low after just one night too.

Mana ascended the stairs, she fell down and bumped the knee a couple of times, the scrolls were really heavy and she was really tired from collapsing last night and not getting proper sleep. The kunoichi approached the giant centipede head that was blocking the exit, when she was reading the story an idea kept squirming around her head but the girl was very hesitant to try it, knowing what it was, no one could blame her. Mana took one of the few remaining note tags from her pocket and stuck it on the center of the crack in the centipede's head shell, then another, then the third. This was going to be disgusting... After getting clear and asking whatever supernatural force was watching over her that this whole place didn't go down on her, the girl made a handseal and heard a myriad of sounds: a crack of the armored shell, sound of crumbling rocks and the sound she wanted to hear the most - centipede goo falling on the floor.

Mana raced upstairs with all the additional scrolls on her shoulder, falling once again only to stand up, the whole place was slowly coming down, not the hall but just the entrance and the staircase, so far only few rocks fell down but after it loosened the magician suspected the rest to follow! Without stopping to even question what she was doing the girl leapt inside the hole in the centipede's head. Warm and icky centipede goo greeted her trying to get inside every orifice she had. Mana literally almost swam forward, the goo was too thick to swim in but when she kicked around she could still move forward. The magician tried to dig her way to the right, the centipede fell to the side after bumping so right was where she knew there was a weak spot, with a swift slash with her kunai the spot opened.

Almost instantly the shot of insect guts and goo shot out throwing Mana out through the side on the grass, the girl coughed up and then threw up - this was the worst idea she had ever had. Mana wiped her eyes and peeked over the jacket-bag, her jacket was ruined forever but she was lucky that the goo wasn't acidic as she had suspected before, while her jacket was indeed ruined the scrolls were just barely wet and could've still been saved to be of reading condition. It was only then when Mana noticed three surprised faces staring at her, even Tanshu-sensei who was usually quite composed now couldn't contain his surprise.

"Mana-chan... That... Was... Awesome!" Shimo yelled out overcoming his surprise. Mana stroke her hair removing more goo off of it, "You're not the one stuck with centipede goo all over you with no water source around that isn't filled with life threatening amount of leeches." Mana replied spitting some of the goo out and blowing some out of her nose.


	14. Mysterious Power - Samsara!

After catching up with the situation, both briefing her team about what happened and getting briefed by what they were doing it was time to think of what to do further. There were still a lot of scrolls inside the archive, Mana barely moved half of them out and while the mission was completed in theory it would've been nice to salvage everything. Tanshu kneeled on the ground and placed his hand on it, his eyes closed and he concentrated hard. Moments later his eyes shot open and he stood up, "The archive room is blocked off, the whole corridor is covered with stone blocks, if we tried to dig our way into the archive itself we'd risk to cave it in as well, our mission here is done, extracting those other scrolls requires ninja that specialize in salvaging. It might even prove to be a B rank mission... It's above our paygrade, let's go home."

"That was impressive, sensei, how did you do it?" Shimo inquired, Tanshu started slowly moving towards the entrance and at the same time the exit from the forest, "It's an Earth Release technique, I'm sure the specifics would bore you, it's useful when your enemy is hiding underground or looking for bunkers or something." The man's answer was short and swift to cut the chat down as an axe. Mana was really uncomfortable with moving covered with gooey slime and centipede innards, Sugemi giggled into his fist, "Don't worry, you can wash in the training grounds after we leave the forest, getting into the leech infested waters isn't worth it."

It didn't take much time for the team to seal the scrolls Mana salvaged into their own sealing tubes. The magician unsealed some of the tubes she had because she sealed above the recommended limit and didn't want for them to suffer any damage, she also gave her team the gooey scrolls she salvaged from the archive, the three cleaned them up a bit using cloth and their own clothes and then sealed them with the others. It was almost miraculous how well the scrolls took a dip into centipede goo. Finally it was time to move out with their first C-Rank mission being completed. It definitely felt like a real mission, thanks to Tanshu-sensei who decided to test them in the middle of the mission...

Obviously he meant well, a mission such as this one could've been failed, it was just a simple C-Rank mission so he wasn't too wrong to use it as another training drill. It still would've been nice for him to ask for their opinion or warn the three before just leaving them alone in the wild to fight off various creatures that lived here, that was the part of the Chuunin exam, there was a fair chance that they would've failed having just finished Academy weeks ago. The trip back to the entrance was going way faster than the first trip from the entrance to the archive, no one stopped to rest, everyone just kept moving. They must've felt bad for Mana and wanted her to get a chance to wash the goo off as fast as possible.

Mana looked at Tanshu-sensei and caught up to him, doing so was not easy as sensei's speed was incredible. "Sensei... I found a scroll in there, I'd like to finish reading it before I seal it, is that OK?" Tanshu grunted, "Fine, as long as you don't fall behind too much, do whatever you want." It was quite obvious that he didn't care. The girl slowed down a little to remove the scroll she kept under her clothes, as close to her skin as she could because she wanted to save it the goo treatment most of all. It was another scroll, one containing another story of Princess Satsuhimasa, one that let Mana know just how the whole thing went and what kind of life the Princess led later on. The scroll did not follow up on the first one, it took place many years later, right after the village was built so it could've been close to fifty if not a full century later. The magician opened the scroll, reading it was troublesome because she still had to watch out for obstacles with her quick pace, it took a bit longer to read than the other one but at least this time she had a bit more light...

"After the Gigantic Battle against the Moon Clan, the planet itself was injured, eternal rains and meteor showers were constant, it rained acid itself and the sky was black. Princess Satsuhimasa was injured, furthermore, it pained her heart that a simple proposal from King of the Moon devolved to a battle that put the fate of the entire world at risk. Great sickness plagued her heart, seeing the results of her battle, the countless deaths of her people and pain in the hearts of her children poisoned her every day as the Princess' condition deteriorated rapidly. Something had to be done, even the strongest medical ninja, even those tutored by Satsuhimasa herself could not cure her sadness and sickness as it appeared one was the reason of the other. And so the child of Yosuke Uchiha and Satsuhimasa - Satsumaru decided to leave the village and cure his mother's condition.

There were many difficulties in the path of the young one, namely his own youth and inexperience, while Son of the Spruce Queen was one of the most powerful people in the world, truly worth his title of "Demigod of Ninja" he acquired by simply being born, he was silly and naïve. The poor boy did not understand his mother's condition, he did not understand that it was not caused by her injuries fighting the Moon People but instead by the destruction and death of her own children. And so the child left to find "Samsara" - the mystical force of rebirth that could aid his mother and bring her back to life. Knowing little of the true problem that ailed his mother, knowing even less of the fact that "Samsara" was just a tale his mother told him before bed. The boy believed that "Samsara" must've existed and that it was the only thing to help his mother.

The cause of the cataclysms that slowly destroyed the planet was of course the destruction of the Moon People's home. This historian would like to remind the reader that in order to overcome the overwhelming force of the Moon People, Merciful Satsuhimasa had to use her indestructible Spruce Wood Release to shatter the Moon itself to small bits, it appeared that it was the Moon itself that was showering the Earth causing destruction to the world, even more, even in her deathbed Satsuhimasa had gathered many foes, even the Uchiha that fought beside her that governed the Lightning Country, even the Sabaku clan that governed the Wind Country and all the others that fought beside the Merciful one to repel the invasion of the Moon People now craved her death. They took the ailment of the Great One as a chance to finally get rid of one that had beaten every single one of them before as well as with her overwhelming power had achieved World Peace threatening with destruction of the ones that broke it.

Wandering the inhospitable lands of the world Satsumaru survived the meteor showers, the magma gazers and even the poisonous air as he was indeed his mother's son of incredible vitality. Once his journeys brought him to the Lightning Country he overheard the plot to kill his mother and was forced to return back home to Konohagakure without "Samsara", the stress and grief over his mother's illness caused a new power to awaken inside of the boy, one of his father's Crimson Eyes. As much as the boy tried to use this power to save his mother's life, they were only good for destruction, the complete opposite of what his Senju inheritance was.

Enraged by everyone turning on his mother Satsumaru and his father moved the Sick Princess outside the village, wandering the Fire Country trying to figure out just what "Samsara" exactly was. On their way the family wandered into the Fire Temple where the monks resided, the monks were a peaceful kind however they refused to let the family in, claiming instead that it was Satsuhimasa herself who was to blame for this. The monks revealed to the family an ancient pact made by the ancestors of not only all ninja, but all people in general. Pact that was supposed to establish peace between the Sky Clan and the Earth Clan - the descendants of the First People and fathers of all other clans. A whole new place to call home - the Moon was created by the last descendant of the First People. The Sky Clan was given Moon to rule and live on as they please, the Earth Clan was left on Earth and as assurance that the pact was not broken a law was established inside of a seal - ones could not exist without the others, without Earth the Moon would've been flung to oblivion inside Eternal Darkness killing every single one of the Sky Clan, if the Moon was destroyed the World would've been thrown off balance by eliminating seals placed inside the Moon, unsealing the terrifying power of the First People which would eventually kill all Earth Clan people as well.

That revelation was what the family needed, Satsuhimasa rose from her deathbed and raised her hands at the sky. Blood shot out from her eyes - bloody tears of grief of what she had done, blood shot out of her nose - payment for the poisonous air she caused everyone to breathe, blood shot out of her mouth - punishment for the words she spoke when she made the Spruce that split the sky. As the Princess shouted in pain - giant roots reached up to one another and put the shattered Moon together. It seemed that Princess endless lifeforce flowed through the wood of her Spruce creating a new Moon, held together by her grief, by her penance and love. As this final action was over, the hearts of the monks softened - they let the family in. Little too late, sadly, as right after the jutsu ended Satsuhimasa fell down dead in an expression of endless bliss and love - she fixed the mistake her rage and violence caused and saved everyone.

Satsumaru was overcome with rage and grief, the boy fell on his knees yelling in pain as the tension and blood pumping through his steel-hard veins burst not unlike that of his mother's before. However his blood was different, not blood of penance and death but blood of justice and rebirth - Samsara itself flowed through the boy's eyes as by extending his hand over his mother a hellish spawn appeared behind her, a Gate of Samsara itself, opening his mouth and releasing her soul which he had claimed and returning the woman to life. Not only that, as another pact of peace, the son returned to life every Moon Clan who died in the war against the Shinobi Alliance, sadly he could not bring back the people of Earth that died in the war. It was a testament of the Moon Clan respecting and fearing the power of Spruce Queen and her son that they did not invade again up to this day, respecting the terms of Satsumaru's Peace and having been reminded of the meaning behind the pact that the First People made.

Despite a happy ending, Konohagakure did not see it that way, while the people praised Satsuhimasa for her accomplishment in fixing faults her own violence had caused, many people died in the cataclysms that followed the Sky-Land War after Satsuhimasa destroyed the Moon. People also did not understand why the Son of the Queen raised the Moon People back from the dead and not their own. She was not even considered for the title of the First Shadow of the Fire - the First Hokage, also people were angry and afraid that a colossal Spruce Tree still connected Earth and Moon as they were afraid that the Moon Clan will invade again using it as a bridge between worlds. Having been recently revived by the Samsara that flowed through her son's eyes, Satsuhimasa was far too weak to fix the tree so her husband Yosuke decided to seal the tree of pure chakra that connected Moon and Earth into an animal - a protector of this world, inheritor of their will. Sadly the power of the World Spruce was too great for one animal, creating the monstrous Ten Tails as the chakra of the Worlds' tree overtook the beast and shifted it into the twisted form of the Ten Tails, it was said to be so horrible that common people that saw the beast in the distance went blind and that its existence itself was causing the planet as much harm as the cataclysms from breaking the will of the First People caused before.

Yosuke then split the Ten Tails into nine beasts, something that proved to be just as wrong as the beasts started rampaging over the ninja villages. It took the combined might of all three: resurrected Satsuhimasa, Yosuke Uchiha and Satsumaru to defeat all nine and seal them into people they deemed powerful enough to restrain the powers of the beasts but also righteous enough to resist their tempting influence as the beasts wished every moment to break loose and rampage. It is unknown why the Tailed Beasts are so violent, maybe they are sad that they no longer connect Moon and Earth, being confined to only one and long the other, maybe Yosuke's seal instilled inside of them some of the disgusting Uchiha malice. This historian cannot tell, but this is the nature upon which the beasts and their carriers, the Jinchuuriki came to be. Satsuhimasa and her family left the village after seeing the villagers treat the Jinchuuriki, the bridges that connect Earth and Moon, the will of their son Satsumaru of the Samsara, with fear, disrespect and spite, as if they embodied the destruction which the Moon Clan brought upon this world, as if they caused the cataclysms that claimed millions of lives, as if they embodied the rampages and destruction caused by the Juubi and the Tailed Beasts. It is unknown what happened to the Spruce Queen and her family, where they went or what they did, soon enough history forgot them which was why this scroll was written, so that their story is never forgotten."

And so the story ended, the last and final scroll of the Satsuhimasa and her family. There were so many new things which Mana did not understand: the eyes of Uchiha clan, the mysterious Samsara, the Tailed Beasts and the Jinchuuriki that carried them inside of them. The team finally arrived near the exit from the Forest of Death and as the gates opened letting the team through Mana handed the scroll silently to Tanshu. The man gently pushed it against the open tube as the chakra consumed and sealed it inside just like the other scrolls. "Oh, thank God you are OK!" the woman guard rejoiced seeing Mana, the woman then looked at the goo which the girl was soaking with and pinched her nose.

As the girl rushed to the training grounds it was revealed that they were all occupied making it impossible for Mana to bathe in there. Tanshu grunted and took a towel out of his backpack surprising all of the team. "You had a towel? All this time?!" Shimo yelled out, "I didn't want it messed up by the goo if Mana could bathe after leaving the Forest, I took it because I was certain that Sugemi would jump in the water and get leeched out in which case I'd need to carry him around but also he'd need a towel..." the man shrugged. Sugemi looked almost offended for a moment but then looking at his teammates he realized that Tanshu's prediction wasn't that far off.

With all being said, Mana took the towel and wiped as much goo as she could, Tanshu-sensei refused to have the towel back. It was understandable. "Consider it a gift, if you can wash it afterwards that is..." the man grunted. After the problem of Mana's condition was dealt with the team headed towards the village gate, the guards smiled looking at Mana still smelly and looking pretty funny, the girl had to note that usually people came to talk to her because of her fame as a magician, speak to her or cheer on her, now they clearly wanted to but then reconsidered halfway and turned around. The girl just sighed, it couldn't be helped really having her smell and funny look in mind, one couldn't just wash swimming in centipede guts away. Knowing her mother she'll be laughed at whole week...

"I'm going to give the debriefing to the Hokage, you guys can run off home, it was a pretty crazy couple of days." Tanshu spoke as Shimo and Sugemi said their "See you tomorrows" and ran off. As Mana turned around to head home she felt Tanshu's hand on her shoulder. "Your will to stand by your nindo is strong. I'll give you a chance and cut you some slack, I've told you many times that you'll fail, I'll just leave it up to you to realize it yourself one day, hopefully not before your untimely death, you're a good kid." The man spoke after turning around and heading home, after a couple of steps the man raised two fingers into the sky "You see what you three are doing? Making me soft here... Whatever." He said as the man slowly walked away and disappeared into the crowd. Mana's shocked face quickly changed into a smile that kept growing wider and wider and wider and then burst into a soft and gentle laughter before the girl also turned around and ran off home.

The very first moment she entered home she heard her parents rushing to welcome her before her mother got to see her. The woman's cheeks inflated as she tried to contain laughter, Mana's mood quickly turned sour, "Centipede goo?" her father asked while smiling, Mana nodded feeling a bit confused, Mana's mother finally couldn't help it and burst into a fit of laughter, just after finally regaining control of herself the woman added, "Like father, like daughter..." implying that father also had something similar happen to him. That was a story for another time however as Mana had to hurry up to finally get a bath. That was the most refreshing and pleasing baths the girl has ever had. After she washed the smell of the forest away and changed clothes the magician rushed to the living room and dropped onto the couch,

"So what was that with father and centipede goo?!"


	15. Konoha's Sorceress

The first week after the mission was completely free of missions, not even the usual D-rank chore-missions were anywhere to be heard of. It seemed as if like the Hokage gave the team some time to recover from the mission and to train a little bit. Given the mission debriefing it wasn't too tough to see why, all three of the genin had some minor scratches and injuries from fighting off animals that were meant to test genin worth becoming chūnin, obviously those guys fought the animals off in greater quantities but Team Oak lacked the battlefield experience that their examined counterparts had.

One morning Mana received a letter, one that she simply assumed that her teammates also got at about the same time as she did. It was from Tanshu-sensei and it instructed that they met up that very same day, it was strange that the meeting time was so late, luckily the magician had her magic show last night so entertaining time won't clash with her training. She did promise father to finish working on that spiked coffin device that day, that'd have had to wait until at least later that evening. It was alright, father wasn't the type of man that went to bed early. Mana had been doing plenty of her own training as well, she kept meditating and trying to improve her chakra levels, she kept trying to improve her physical condition and become more agile as well.

One thing that the genin tried to achieve with her training was to become more nimble and to improve her reaction time. Being able to be in complete control of the attacks of her enemies and to be able to dodge them since she served the role of a glass cannon in her team. She was supposed to be the main secret weapon using genjutsu and ninjutsu of not one but two elemental natures which was rare among genin, that being said, it wasn't like her ninjutsu was particularly powerful either... There were so many things to improve and Tanshu-sensei was going to notice all of them in the evening. He most likely was going to ask Hokage for another C-rank mission which was why he wanted to meet up and train the team a bit more.

The last mission to find the hidden ancient archive helped Mana to remind herself of her passion for history and lore. The magician started reading out in the Konohagakure Library every week, finding time between training and magic shows was not easy but once in a while an occasion revealed itself and Mana could enjoy a couple of hours reading about history. There were a lot of interesting things to be discovered, names and the abilities of all the past Hokage, tales of mystical ancient items that were hidden all around the world, stories of legendary ninja and their mythical deeds and achievements. Mana was too shy to even dream of ever being described in books and scrolls similar to those she read...

The magician spent the entire first half of the day training, focusing her chakra control and meditating, also working out. She knew it was hopeless having her goal to impress sensei in mind, Tanshu was a strict teacher, despite how much she would train he'd still find things of hers to exploit and scold her for, even if he did promise to give her a shot with her nindo and stopped trying to change it so actively. Her performance in the last mission must've convinced the man that she was every bit an equal of her two teammates, even Shimo who received astounding grades and recommendations in the Academy despite looking or acting nothing like the typical perfect grader. Shimo wasn't arrogant or even that awkward socially, quite the opposite he was pretty energetic and headstrong, it took a headstrong person to declare that he'd become Hokage one day.

Sugemi also proved to be different than the first impressions would make one believe, he was goofy and kept messing around with his manga, talking some strange nonsensical things about everything being manga clichés and even referencing manga that Mana was sure didn't even exist. But when he stopped loafing around he was a pretty strong and kind fellow with a big dream, in a way his dream could be described as a wish of being acknowledged, the desire to be noted as important, to prove one's existence and earn respect. This was a noble dream, one Mana was ready to support, in a world where people's lives were considered expendable.

As the evening approached, Mana head out to the Academy, sensei asked the team to meet by the entrance to the Academy which was an odd spot to ask for a meeting. Maybe he wanted to do some more bonding exercises? Ask some questions or something? Maybe he got fond of the three brats and decided to tell them something about his past? Who was Mana kidding, that'd never happen, Tanshu was secretly a good-willed person but he never showed that side of him because that side was irrelevant to him, all he wanted himself and everyone else to see was the ninja, the undefeatable warrior that could take lives faster and more efficiently than everybody around him. That was who he was, Tanshu, or as father at times called him "Red Dog Tanshu", Mana wasn't sure where that nickname came from, must've been something from when her father worked with the man...

People spotted her from over the other side of the path and walked up to greet her, must've been because of her attire, having once found herself without her hat which had her father's seal in it, Mana tried to incorporate it into even her combat attire. She didn't have to try too hard, just modify the materials of her magician's uniform to make it a bit less stretchy and more comfortable, she was in luck that mother was such a good sewing teacher. That way she could have one super uncomfortable but fancy looking version and one more simple and less impressive albeit much more stretchy. It was obvious that she was overdressing but Mana was that kind of person, it was important for her to look good as often as she could because she was an artist and had to uphold an image of an artist, it was really shameful for her to run around covered with centipede goo for that very reason. Even the final result was not as good of an attire as an actually comfortable combat attire would've been, that was irrelevant, in terms of physical combat Mana was already barely keeping up with her peers, if fighting ever got up close she'd go down even with the most comfortable clothes in the known universe if she barely had enough skills to keep up with genin level taijutsu. At least next time she'll need to seal something into her hat or keep some item safe she'll have the solution on her head. Father's seal cost a lot of chakra to use but it was better than having nothing at all.

Tanshu sensei was waiting alone, it proved pretty weird to Mana as she was late over all the people that came up to talk to her and ask when the next show was going to be. She really had to reserve some more time, stage magic was an unusual thing in Konoha and the Shinobi World, there were more and more people that got charmed by how silly and unusual using ninjutsu for stage magic and cheap tricks was. Mana was growing in popularity, she was probably the first ninja in the world whose face was known, the young kunoichi was also the first that didn't kill. Most people just took it as something proving the girl's lack of skill or her childish naivete. No one yet saw it as evolution of what being ninja truly meant, that was something Mana had to change in people, to prove her own point.

"Good evening, where is everybody? Am I THAT late that everyone went home already?" Mana asked trying to alleviate her terrible sense of time with an even more terrible joke, Tanshu sighed and shook his head. "Nope, I gave each of you different times because I wanted to work with each of you individually. I'll be leaving pretty soon and you guys will have a C-Rank mission on your hands without my supervision, it'll be a chance to truly prove yourselves and if you do I'll recommend you guys for Chuunin exams, you'll have your butts kicked but it'll be a good experience, losing always teaches a lot of things." Mana smiled, "Have you ever lost, sensei?" Tanshu pouted almost like a child but then looked up into the sky, as if remembering good times of his past, "Yeah, once, it was the thing that taught me the most in my life and I've been through some crazy things." he answered and then stood up from the stairs he'd been sitting on. "Let's move to the training grounds then..." he said calmly.

Walking through the village with Tanshu-sensei was weird, true, significantly less now that he didn't act like he would've liked to strangle her with her own guts but still, pretty weird. He was a very chill and anti-social kind of person, he constantly looked angry and disappointed in everything, always bored by everything that surrounded him and had that unimpressed look on his face so it was hard to talk to him about anything. Mana was a kind girl so she would still always try... "So... Is it OK if I asked where you'll be leaving? Is it some high ranking mission?" she asked with some amount of fear behind her voice, she expected Tanshu to rudely beat her down vocally saying it was none of her business or something like that but he sighed and scratched the back of his head. "Five Kage Summit. It's about that Kirigakure situation, about all those ninja of ours that disappeared around Kirigakure borders and the ambush of the squad your father was in near our own borders. Howoku rushed the process and called everyone early - he'll ask the Five Kage Council to remove the Mizukage and change him with a successor."

Mana stayed silent for a while, she expected the Summit to come in six months, just like the rumors said but it seemed like the Hokage was in a mood to get his justice done faster. Hokage Howoku was well known throughout the world, he was just a middle aged man but he managed to gain trust of the entire village and even the entire Konohagakure council, he was young for a leader and had new and revolutionary ideas of peace and lived under the ideal that the Ninja Countries could live in harmony and maintain peace. He was not entirely a pacifist, he was quite energetic and in a hurry to punish any wrongdoings of any missing ninja or other ninja villages. Once he himself left to pursue a missing ninja that killed a genin just outside the village borders, it was said that the Fourth killed the missing ninja himself. He had many titles but one that Mana liked the most was the White Star of Konoha. She didn't know what it meant but names like that had different meanings to everyone that heard it. To Mana it meant just what it sounded like - a star in the sky, an obelisk of light to look up to and a powerful source of light and justice that incinerates any evil.

After Mana and Tanshu arrived to the training ground the man took a couple of steps back and placed his hand on the handle of his katana, a sword that Mana had not yet even seen sensei draw despite having it most of the time with him. "Attack me, know that I will defend myself and punish foolishness." Sensei said, Mana was not sure what it meant. If he was going to leave soon then why was he so desperate to train her? Was he going to train her overnight? Why would he choose such a light training routine, it was the sort of training one would choose if they had plenty of time. Mana's hands went through handseals, her familiarity with handseals over the magic shows where she used ninjutsu allowed the speed of her hands to transcend any genin and rival even that of ninja from higher ranks, Mana's sleight of hand was an advantage when things came down to handseal speed. The girl opened her eyes and looked right at sensei's eyes... He wasn't there.

Suddenly sharp pain pulsed all through Mana's body as she saw sensei standing right in front of her with his fist having already punched her in the gut. The magician fell down. "That wasn't bad, you knew of my superior physical and every other kind of strength, knowing of my superior skill you chose the path that granted you advantage if it connected - genjutsu. Genjutsu is the perfect tool to use if you're unlucky enough to fight a superior opponent. You knew that I had the mean to interrupt your genjutsu with my signature seal however you trained your speed and had a mean of surprising me with the speed at which you performed the technique, that also was pretty impressive. I'd like you to train the speed of your hands even further, you've got a talent for it..."

As the girl tried desperately to pick herself up Tanshu jumped couple of dashes backward. "However... Your genjutsu is flawed, all of your techniques were made by you, that is both good and bad. You will always surprise your opponent with jutsu you yourself invented unless they fight you for the second time. The problem is that it's clear you invented these techniques as a child reading a genjutsu textbook, they are all pretty much the same: make handseals, achieve eye contact, fool your opponent with a visual illusion. That is just a scratch of the surface of what genjutsu can do, you've got a knack for it which is a reason enough even I can be jealous of you for. Genjutsu can play with sense of balance, smell, hearing, it can do wonders with the body of your opponent, branch out, stop sleeping on the same techniques you invented as a child and make up some new ones!"

Mana picked herself up, her hat was on the ground and her wild hair were all over the place, she charged forward with a punch, "Useless..." Tanshu replied catching it with the least amount of effort a ninja would ever have to use, "What are you going to do with that? You suck at weapons and taijutsu, stop using it!" sensei yelled out as he noticed Mana's hand in the weapon's pouch and punched her in the cheek drawing blood. The girl turned back with a smile. Obviously if Tanshu meant it with the punch she'd be knocked out dead but he didn't and now he was hers! "How?!" Tanshu jumped back, Mana's illusion was broken but her sensei had to use his seal which was his signature ability, one he liked bragging about never having to use.

Mana pulled out her arm from the pouch, still stuck in the same handseal position. "You... Learned to do handseals with one hand by seeing Sugemi do it?" Tanshu looked impressed. "Only the seals I saw him do, I had to read up on the others... They're a bit different from the casual handseals" Mana replied by wiping blood from her lip, sensei's punch forced her teeth right into her cheek making blood run pretty wild from her mouth. Her head also felt dizzy. Tanshu laughed out, "Now I see why they call you Konoha's Sorceress, you're just as crafty on the Field as you are on the stage, pulling illusions out of illusions, you made an impression of attacking me physically forcing me to lower my guard, forcing me to underestimate you and then you placed your hand into the pouch and made the handseals inside of it, I looked you right in the eyes because I never expected an illusion, if you were fighting anyone without my ability you would've had them..."

After finishing those words Tanshu-sensei stood normally, moving himself out of his fighting stance and removing his hand from the handle of his blade. "The purpose of this training was to give you three assignments, things to work on while I'm gone and also something that would define your fighting styles, I think I like your decision to utilize the skillset of a stage magician, to use cheap tricks and play with your opponent's mind as a tool in setting your illusions off, however I'd recommend you work on things I told you to work on. I'm afraid genjutsu is an area you are entirely alone in, I know very little about the subject and there are even fewer masters of the Field in this village, you may ask around however... Well, see you after I'm back, Mana." Tanshu spoke and then disappeared in a poof leaving only a large cloud of smoke. The genin sighed, her head was dizzy and she was still bleeding a bit from her cheek but it felt great - for the first time someone acknowledged her skill as a ninja. That never happened...

Ever since she started training in ninjutsu she was always underestimated because she wasn't from some fancy clan, told she was a loser because of her silly and naïve nindo, made fun of and told to quit the path of a ninja before it was too late. Even after she graduated people always only noted her skills as a magician on the stage, they always viewed Mana as a magician first and those that knew she was also a ninja saw it as some sort of publicity stuff, almost like a celebrity entering a ring to fight a big time champion of taijutsu who was paid off to fight like a wimp. All those words affected Mana, they were painful blows but none of them kept her down, they only made her work harder because she was that kind of an idiot. And it all lead up to this moment - a man called by some the most powerful shinobi in the world recognized that she had talent, that she was on the right path. Even if she didn't even land a blow, even if she couldn't have been further away from it - Mana was happy!

The girl couldn't help but run back home with a smile and tears of joy in her face. Acknowledgment would only make her work even harder!


	16. Mana's Bad Day

Sometimes, when a very special event is transpiring before one's eyes, one often knows that things won't be the same as they were anymore. Such was the feeling when the village saw the Fourth Hokage surrounded by four of his most trusted and most powerful ninja in the village head out. Surely something revolutionary was going to happen, a historic flip-the-table moment which would change everything, allies and enemies will be made and a clash was unavoidable now. Some people fooled themselves thinking that this was going to be just another Five Kage Summit but one should've known better.

To Mana it was almost apparent that something bad will happen, there will be no peaceful resolution to this, otherwise why would Hokage choose to take four of the most amazing ninja with him? He only took two of the Sannin though, the third Sannin was away on another mission. From the rumors that were going around it seemed like she was in Kirigakure which put her life in extreme danger. If something awful transpires at the Kage Summit she will suddenly find herself to be the most wanted dead person around. Maybe it was for that reason that Hokage took so many not only strong but wise people, trying to solve any possible conflicts through intimidation of power and inevitable destruction if someone decides to become an enemy of Konohagakure.

Seeing Hokage and his four guards leave through the village gate made that sad and depressing atmosphere, the feeling of uncertainty was everywhere, the eternal and immovable peace that the Fourth had achieved was now trembling like a wobbly leg of a kitchen table. Just one wrong rude move will send all of the food crumbling down on the floor, reverting the families sitting around it to savages that either eat off of the floor or go to bed hungry. That was not even the worst part, the worst part was that everyone accepted it, just sighed and went back home, such wide accepting of the fact that conflict and war was almost inevitable was what made Mana's heart hurt the most.

These couple of days from her training with Tanshu-sensei and the day when she received the letter to come pick up a mission Mana did her best to buff up the amount of magic shows she did. The people of Konohagakure could've used some entertainment to turn their minds away from war. Some could've said that Mana was an awful girl for making double the amounts of shows, after all people were shaken by the events and very unsure of their futures. All she had to do was show off and she'd have swayed them to her side, that was true, she saw a lot of new faces coming at her shows, far more matured people and far less children. Slowly she would become Konohagakure's mainstream source of entertainment, perhaps that was her calling, not being a ninja?

After all, Mana was not part of a clan, not some super amazing genius ninja that had mad skills and always made perfect choices, she often failed and struggled immensely in her ninja work, working out her physical shape felt like literally killing herself. Still, she was thinking a lot on what Tanshu-sensei told her – she had an entirely different mindset from a common ninja. Her unique ideals combined with her background and experience of being a stage magician – prodigy at creating illusions and playing with audience's mind made her a very different kind of ninja. All those shows could've just been viewed as Mana's own kind of training, she was sharpening her mind and making new ways to deceive her opponent in the battlefield, after all, having no set of fancy eyes, no special unbeatable techniques made her have to rely on her skill in deceit and lies. Was that the skillset of a true hero? Probably not… Just one more thing to make the girl feel like she's failing her dream, as small as insignificant as such thoughts were.

Finally the magician got another letter instructing that she had to come to the Konohagakure Administration with her team and that they would be getting a mission assigned. No Hokage, no sensei. Somehow it felt like they were just playing ninja at this point and with no figures of authority in the village it seemed like nothing was right anymore, everything just invited more and more questions. Nights of peaceful and long refreshing sleep were few and getting even fewer, training was the thing that often helped exhausting both Mana's body and her spirit. Still, often the girl found herself waking up and wandering around the house, looking at the dark night sky and thinking what's ahead. Things like war and changing the world were not something a twelve year old girl should worry herself about but it was too late. She entered the ranks of people considered murderers and tools, thinking of anything less than that would've been a mistake.

Mana was surprised to see her teammates the next morning, she met them by the entrance to the Konohagakure Administration. Shimo wore a small blade behind his back, Sugemi wore a different attire choosing to wear more flexible and fitting for taijutsu attire, both of the boys also allowed their hair to grow messier longer which signaled that they may have been training pretty intensely since graduating. Did Mana fall behind after devoting most of her time to shows? Was she ever on their level to begin with? Just how well did they do in their training? Maybe the two actually gave sensei trouble and Mana just got special treatment from him because she was just a puny kid with pink cotton candy on her mind? No. Tanshu-sensei was not the kind of person to smile and say that everything was alright when it wasn't, that was one of the reasons why he was a person whom Mana respected a lot. If she would've been a useless link of the team he'd have told her that.

Shimo looked confident, he smiled with a full teeth smile and ran up to Mana first. "Hey, Mana-chan, don't really see what sensei told you during the training. I suppose you won't tell me how you did either?" Sugemi grunted, Mana was genuinely surprised he was not consumed by his manga and acted so smug, almost like Tanshu-sensei. "It's her attire, Shimo, she tried to dress more comfortably for missions but it seems like now she doesn't care about it anymore, whatever sensei told Mana, it helped her gain confidence and realize her role in the team. Then again, judging from the number of shows she had this week I'd say she is planning to quit being a ninja…" Mana walked past the two without saying a word. She just slowly turned back with a slight smile and looked at them rushing them to come with her. The boys picked themselves up and entered the building with her.

Differently from before, the missions were being handed out in four separate offices by one of Hokage's assistants. Assistants were mostly lower ranking ninja anyways that excelled in office duties, they were not the first choice to protect the Hokage but they were more than competent to fulfil his duties of administration work during his absence. In fact, there were less people around the offices which suggested that the four of them were doing way better than Hokage was doing alone with their aid. One of the assistants invited the four into his office and handed the file forward, he waited for a moment as there was no leader to come pick the file up, sensei was gone…

Mana looked around with a bored look as her two teammates kept stepping forward slightly but after seeing the other trying to take a step stopped and backed down from taking the leadership. "Oh for God's sake!" she laughed out and stepped forward to take the file. There was tension between the two boys for some reason, it was quite natural, this was the first time they had the chance to butt heads, they had to choose a leader and that made the wonder about who was stronger, more competent to take temporary command. They both trained incredibly hard, they each were the strongest people in the world in their own minds right now because that was often the case after training. Training required challenge to follow just so one had a clear image of where they were on the feeding chain.

"What's the mission?" Shimo asked curiously leaning over Mana's shoulder as she opened the file after leaving the office. It was a relatively simple C-Rank job for a team of genin but the administration had to hand them one – their team was incomplete. While normally sensei did nothing anyways but his presence was the greatest asset the three could have, just the thought that at any time he could be turned at for help or an advice was the best thing ever. Now he was away and they had to handle it for themselves. It would've been better if Shimo and Sugemi didn't act so weird with each other and didn't want to show off each other's fruits of training and just what sensei told them.

The mission was to scare off or beat up some thugs that were bullying people around the entertainment hall where Mana hosted magic shows. Apparently the group of bandits targeted villagers that came to see shows and plays and they were quite bold. Such boldness inside one of the most powerful ninja villages could only be described as stupidity and the three genin would've easily handled a couple of untrained bandits, even if they weren't at the moment the most functional team ever. Shimo and Sugemi barely even spoke, not only to each other but also with Mana, the girl had plenty of possible ideas what could've caused this but… She had to know!

"Okay, what the hell is this? Why aren't we talking?" she asked, this wasn't the usual soft and kind tone she used, Mana was really quite annoyed by this situation as the two boys were her friends, probably some of her only relevant friends at the moment as she had no other friends just fans of her shows. Sugemi pouted and turned away, Shimo looked annoyed but at least he spoke up, "We're just… A bit tense that's all." Mana kept looking him in the eyes, almost forcing him to continue. The fact that he spoke up at all signaled to her that Shimo was at least willing to talk about what was going on, was it something sensei told them? Was it something they told each other while waiting for Mana? Was it something she did?

"Well… You did most of the work last time, we were just there, sure we got to fight some animals but you saved all of the scrolls. Tanshu-sensei told both of us that, that we fought pretty good but fighting isn't what it's all about and that you were right in that mission to put the objective first. That doesn't bother us but… Both me and Sugemi trained hard because we don't want to fall behind, we want to be strong and able to complete the mission by ourselves too if it came to us." Mana shook her head, she still couldn't understand what the hell this was about, "So what? It's my fault that I happened to stumble into the archive and got stuck in there because that stupid bug had the whole place fall down on him?" Shimo looked away, "So are you really quitting being a ninja like Sugemi said?" Mana almost yelled out "No! Sugemi is an otaku, he keeps talking about manga characters or events that probably don't even exist and he thinks everything around him is just a manga story waiting to be written. He's my friend but he's the last person I'd trust to make deductions like that." Sugemi's voice broke out "I'm… Right here… Guys."

At least talking about it for a little helped the boys ease up a bit and they started talking to each other again. It must've been nothing else but a strong sense of responsibility, they had mistaken Mana's luck for skill and wanted to keep ahead, truth was that luck was a skill which couldn't be matched. It wasn't even good luck to be honest, how can one possibly call getting chased by a hungry centipede and getting stuck in an ancient unstable library and then having to escape its fall by digging through centipede guts good luck? It wasn't skill, it wasn't luck, it just happened… At least the magician knew that the boys trained hard, she still felt guilty for taking sensei's word for granted and working on her mindset the most instead of training her body or trying to learn new techniques.

"We can wait here" Mana said "Usually there's this group of actors doing historic plays until about midday." Sugemi and Shimo nodded, "It's good to have someone who knows the place and what's going on here." Shimo said. "We can wait in the alleyway and take those guys down quick and pretty after they show themselves. If it's just a small group we can handle them, I trained my taijutsu so I can do it alone, they'll make a manga about it and call it "World's Most Handsome Crimefighter and the other guys"" the Nara exclaimed as he rushed to the alleyway. Despite hating conflict in general Mana had to admit – she was quite curious to see how much stronger her friends had gotten. She only worked on her chakra and only kept up her physical condition, most work went into her magic shows and mastering sleight of hand.

This was going too easy, just as people started to leave the three noticed a group of four following a pair of young men. Shimo and Sugemi took double time to get into positions – they wanted to show off and take those guys out in one swoop which pissed the magician off. Safety of the villagers was all that mattered! Mana shouted "Get away!" and charged forward. One of the bandits didn't have enough time to react and the girl simply leapt past him leaving a slash in his chest using her kunai, the man fell down on the floor yelling in pain and shock of it. Mana tried her best to take on all three of the bandits but the best option would've been to be defensive – that was not an option, she had to get in between the victims and the bandits so she leapt forward and while dodging two blows and kicking one of the bandits aside leapt forward placing her kunai up to the other's throat. She turned her eyes away instructing the victims to leave. That was her mistake.

As her attention returned Mana felt a sharp blow in her cheek and her light body got thrown back, just barely the magician held her balance. "Just great, another bruise…" she thought as suddenly the bandit's face got twisted in pain. Shimo was on the ground right behind him – he flashed behind his back so fast! The bandit fell down on the floor, the two others tried to run but Sugemi's body landed right on top of one and hit the other. The body of one of the bandits made a lot of scary cracking sounds and the man yelled out quite loud. He must've been in pain. Shimo approached the magician and looked at the bruise on her cheek and her cut lip. "You OK?" he asked gently as she turned around and kneeled by the injured bandit.

"You two… I can't believe it! Can you stop doing this bullshit and focus for one moment?! While you were aligning yourselves for a "cool strike" these people could've been injured! I don't care which one of you is stronger, you can play Rock-Paper-Scissors to settle it for all I care… These are actual people at stake!" she kept complaining while she improvised a tourniquet for the man's open fractured leg. Sugemi's attack looked cool but he was way too rough. Their objective was to intimidate the thugs if possible, while they did not back off after Mana's warning that was no excuse to cause that sort of injury just to look cool. "You mean like Kakashi and Guy from that manga?" Sugemi smiled arrogantly, he still thought that he was right and proud of his awesome jump.

"None of those are a) real people, b) fictional characters, at this point I'm sure you're making up names!" Shimo yelled out, he knew manga better than Mana so he could at least argue with him about those things, none of that mattered to the magician. She breathed out lightly as she managed to somehow control the man's bleeding, at least until medical ninja would show up. Mana stood up and looked at the villagers that were still waiting around the corner just to see how it'd play out. "Could you please find some ninja patrolling and see to it that these men get help? We have a mission debriefing to do." she tried to ask softly. "Wait… You're Konoha's Sorceress right? Are you working with ninja now?" one of them asked, "I am a ninja. I am both a ninja and I do magic shows." Mana replied. "No offense, but you're not that good, you should ask your friends to teach you how to fight…" the other one butt in.

Mana got annoyed and backed off, she sat by the wall and gently stroke her forehead with her fingers, trying to calm down. This day was annoying her immensely with her friends acting like bunch of brats that wanted only to look cool and didn't care about people and the people she was supposed to be helping valued their violence over her worries over their safety. "Whatever, I'm off…" Mana thought standing up and heading towards the Administration building when Sugemi stopped her. "Hey… Ummm… I was thinking. These men… They had to work for someone right? Like… A big bad crime guy right? Like in all the manga all criminals work for bad people that have bunch of art and cats and stroke the cats while looking at art. How about we beat that guy up and take him in too?" the boy came open with his idea making the magician suddenly prefer silent treatment over his ideas getting vocalized.


	17. Going Underneath the Underneath

Mana was absolutely stumped after hearing Sugemi's suggestion. Was he actually suggesting going above and beyond their mission and taking down some bigshot crime lord that may not even exist? How would they go on and do it, by trashing through the village and then attacking the man they pinned down as being guilty? That's how ninja became nukenin. The magician wanted nothing to do with that, Mana started walking away at a faster pace but she heard Sugemi coming after her. "And how would you begin your "investigation", where would you start?" Mana asked trying to make Sugemi bug off, she spent some time with the two boys and she knew a lot about them. Sugemi often had grand ideas but always got hesitant when people started asking about how he'd go on with realizing them.

"Well… We could interrogate the guy with the broken leg." The boy scratched the back of his head, the fact that he didn't back down after Mana asked him about him realizing his idea was bad – he really believed in what he said. Shimo crept up to Mana and placed his hand on her shoulder, gently stopping her. His face looked kind and soft – he really wanted to get Mana along with the ride but how on Earth did he and Sugemi manage to agree on an idea? "I think it's a good idea, Mana-chan." Shimo said slowly and quietly, as if he felt that what he was saying was stupid.

"Think about it, a shinobi is supposed to be the person that goes underneath the underneath, that's what they tried to bash into our heads in the Academy, right? Well isn't this going underneath our mission? Isn't this actually making a difference? Sugemi wants to get a manga written about him, well if he does heroic things like this he'll have it, I want to become Hokage and the first step is to go beyond my mission objective and make a difference. I know you want to become a hero – to protect the people around you and change the world… Well after we did what we did just now nothing changed – tomorrow there'll be other bandits taking money from the same people. If we took down the whole thing it'd be much more of a protection, don't you think? You'd protect the people that come to see your shows, you OWE them this much, Mana-chan."

Sugemi butt in, he saw Mana's eyes change, he saw hesitation and he decided to exploit it. "We need this, guys, I want to become strong, that's the only way to become strong. Taking down crime rings is what higher ranking ninja do: chuunin and even jounin… I want to see how well I rank against that. I know that Shimo wants that too but you Mana… I know you're different, you don't care about measuring your strength but the thing is that… You want to protect everyone, right? Well there's a war about to break out, we're just kids, there's no way they'll let ordinary kids on the battlefield which means you'll be unable to even try and fulfil your goal. You need to hurry up, you need big feats like this to get your promotion in time, if they see how cool we are, maybe the Administration will finally stop looking at us as if we're children, maybe we'll be given a shot at the Chuunin Exams even this year, think about it…"

Mana stopped and clenched her fists. She knew that she wanted to do that, she didn't care about authority, she couldn't have cared less if she'd be branded a nukenin or given some sort of dishonorable mention on her bio. She didn't care if she got hurt or even died, all she wanted to do was to change the world, to make life valuable and not some dirty cloth to be tossed around freely. Ideally she would've liked to do something like this by herself, this was her dream, her nindo and Sugemi with Shimo had nothing to do with it. They didn't need to get into trouble for this or get hurt in a battle. Mana sighed, "Fine, but if I see as much as a wink to torture that guy I'll make you two think you're worms and wriggle in the dirt for an hour. We'll do this peacefully, no torture, if we find out that there's something big in play we try and solve it nicely and only take them down hard if they resist. And for God's sake let's not blow anything up, we'll get in trouble for this as it is…" Mana gave in.

Shimo raised his palm to his head and saluted her, "Yes, ma'am!" he yelled out before winking at her. Sugemi shrugged, "You took the file, I suppose me and Shimo would keep stepping on each other's toes if we were allowed to take charge so… Lead on…" Truth be told the magician didn't really know that much about criminal investigations, her first idea would've been to question the guy that Sugemi hurt too. Thing was that she knew perfectly how it'd go: Mana was a twelve year old girl who was known around the village as a stage magician – it doesn't get any less intimidating than that, the guy would say something rude to her, Shimo and Sugemi would only get annoyed and resort to torture ignoring what she said. They were eager to prove themselves now and Mana wouldn't have been able to stop them, she had to play them differently, try and avoid any sort of opportunity for them to want to show off.

Sadly that meant that she would have to approach and ask for a favor of a man she really didn't want to see in her life any more than was necessary. She already was indebted to the man, he paid the rent for her shoes until the end of the year. He was pretty much the most influential "thief within law" in Konohagakure, Mana was absolutely sure that if he was not behind this scheme he at the very least knew the name, address and shoe size of the man who was. He was the end of every conspiracy theory in the village, nothing transpired here where he wouldn't have had something to gain from it. Truth be told, Mana wasn't really sure how this would work out…

She lead the way to the Hanada Estate, walking this path made her feel quite nostalgic for the days when she started out even if they weren't that long ago. What happened in that mansion was her personal cold shower baptism into the ninja world. How would Hanada even look at her? Would he feel indebted that she saved his life, his and his family's or would he just let it down as her paying the debt for him sponsoring her magic shows? If she will be indebted to the man just what sort of price will he name? Mana would've rather died than dishonored herself and become his mercenary, then again, the man had a talent at making things look different than they were. He'd make her feel like anything but his own personal toy, he'd word it quite differently and make it look like she was actually protecting him or something…

When the kids approached the gate the two guards looked at them with condescending looks, one of them gestured for them to turn around and go away, "I think you kids are lost." he said. It was sheer luck that the second guy was one that Mana knew quite well. "Hey… You're… Sorceress-chan!" the man said, he was one of the mercenaries that betrayed Hanada before, it seemed like he was allowed to work for the man after all was over. "Hello, I see you were allowed to stay… Good to see." The girl twisted her heel at the ground with her eyes shyly looking down, she was quite embarrassed to be talking to the man she beat up, he probably didn't like her too much…

"Yep, I'm pretty glad you beat me up, if you hadn't we'd have hurt Hanada-san and I'd still be a mercenary doing whatever people pay me for, killing, stealing and bringing shame to myself but now… I acted nice for a while and they let me go, Hanada-san even forgave me, he pays me less than the other guys but I get along, I'm even starting a family, c'mon let them in. Sorceress-chan is welcome in Hanada-san's home any time. Forgive him, he started working last week…" the mercenary laughed out, Mana didn't quite get his fond behavior but she was a bit happy that he ended up alright after the pretty nasty battle that happened here. "Well, I don't know… He was pretty rude… Not letting Mana in…" Sugemi pouted making an aristocratic and smug face, Mana couldn't help but chuckle before gesturing that it was alright.

The mercenary left his colleague standing watching the gate while he lead Mana and the others to the mansion. He asked them to wait in the waiting room while he went to tell Hanada that he was here. Shimo looked surprised, "You know Hanada Katsuo, Mana-chan? That's… Something…" he looked like he just exposed the girl for being a criminal herself, Sugemi looked impressed by entirely different things, "You had missions before we were a team?! How come?" Mana shrugged, "It wasn't a mission, Hanada is paying for my rent because he likes my magic shows and I wanted to thank him with a show, things just happened pretty fast and I had to fight his mercs… Well… Word "fight" is a bit wrong in this context, more like "lucked out consecutively"…"

Before Mana could explain Hanada Katsuo walked out in a fancy and without a doubt expensive pearl color suit and even more expensive hairdo for his knee long blonde hair. The man looked like an actor and his emotions really did seem acted, "Mana-chan, I'm so glad to see you! I only wonder what made you and… Your friends come here? Is there a problem with our business proposition, do you wish to discuss my sponsorship or something? Oh, this boy, you're Shimo, right? Your father and I had business when you were younger…" Mana was glad that Shimo didn't reply, it was quite clear from Shimo's eyes that he was not fond of the man as he must've clearly known Hanada's reputation.

"Hanada-san, I am very thankful for your sponsorship and I intend to allow you to finish your part of the deal, I was just wondering if you could help us out with something, seeing how I well…" Hanada smiled, Mana knew that he instantly realized what was her deal was. "Saved my life, there is no shame in admitting that, quite the honor honestly… Anyways, I suppose you need a consultation of some sort? What area, art, perhaps?" Hanada spoke, the magician stood there silent. How was she supposed to tell him that she wanted his criminal experience? She was just so bad at that sort of conversations! Shimo spoke up, Mana wanted to smother the guts out of him for saving her honor, "No, Hanada-san, BUSSINESS, we believe that we are after some of your competitors so it would be beneficial of you to help us by letting us know just who exactly is controlling the… Public relations… In the area around Hiro's hall."

Hanada turned around and stroke his chin, he understood what Shimo meant, Mana was surprised that he knew the "thief within law" jargon to be honest. Maybe his father was like Katsuo? No, that couldn't have been the case, it was much more likely that Shimo's father interacted with the likes of Hanada Katsuo often so both the father and the son knew their manners of speech, "public relations" must've meant whatever those bandits were doing. Hanada turned around and sighed, "My, my… What a conundrum I have here… I usually don't discuss business with children but I suppose in Mana-chan's case I can make an exception… I suppose you are here with official Konohagakure administration business? A mission?" Sugemi shook his head, "Let's call it "private investigation"." Hanada looked really pleased with that revelation, Mana didn't really know why the Nara chose to come into the clear with that information though.

"Ahhh… Well then… I suppose "private investigations" have the advantage of not restricting one's actions, I should point more young "private investigators" towards my competitors, that way I'd have less problems. Well then… This is business and I'm afraid, Mana-chan, this isn't how this kind of business is done. You see what you are asking of me is to snitch a man like me, that could potentially expose me as an honorless businessman if this conversation ever went public. This kind of risk requires a proper deal, quid pro quo… You understand?" Mana instantly started regretting this conversation but she had no choice, she couldn't let Sugemi and Shimo torture a man, she was ready to at least hear Hanada out, there could've been no harm in that, right?

"I don't think I have much to offer, Hanada-san, if there is a particular thing you want, I'm afraid you'll have to make it clear, this is the first and the last talk of this nature we will have." Mana tried to be brave but her voice was shaking a bit, she knew the kind of deals that Hanada usually made. Shimo looked annoyed, his gentleman side was offended by how uncomfortable this conversation made Mana feel, he must've realized that she never wanted this and must've started to put together her reasons for choosing this deal over interrogation. He was one of the smartest ninja of his generation after all. "Wait, Katsuo-san, are you sure you're being reasonable here? Mana-chan saved your life, yours and that of your family from what I've heard, surely that amounts to some sort of leniency towards business?"

Hanada fixed his tie, "Yes, Mana-chan saved lives of me and my family, she also helped capture and put most of those responsible for threatening it to Konoha Strict Correctional Facility. That is what amounts to you even being let into my home and for me having this conversation with bunch of children that have no official reason to be here or talk to me about business at all, truth be told, it takes a bit more than saving my life to be shown this much sympathy, boy. As of what I would suggest you give, Mana-chan, is your magic. Give me the ownership of Konoha's Sorceress as a brand, allow me to manage your shows and get the same amount of profit that I get now until you decide you no longer want to do this. That is my deal, information for Konoha's Sorceress, I'll give in someone else's business and get a business in return, only seems fair…"

Mana almost started trembling, her mind screamed into her ear that she couldn't do this! She knew quite well of Hanada's interest in buying up most of Konohagakure's entertainment industry as well as art. He knew the power of entertainment, he knew how much people were into plays, music and things like Mana's magic shows but she also has heard stories of what that sort of life was like. She'd basically be his minion, perform whenever Hanada tells her, wherever he tells her and charge however much he asks her to, he'd be in complete creative control of her shows. If he tells her that her father's tools and her escape tricks are not profitable he'd be in the right to order her to remove that. What he was asking for didn't sound like much to anyone else but to Mana it was surrendering half of her life. Suddenly she had to weigh what she was fighting for, was the information worth it?

Hanada smiled, he felt Mana's weakness and decided to exploit it, "Well, I suppose if you add ten percent extra of all that you earn I can send my own men to take them out, I can see from your cheek that you have still things to learn in terms of dealing with that kind of men and it is in my best interests as your sponsor to see to it that my little magician girl looks the best she can, you take pride in that don't you? You're the esthetic kind of artist after all…" Hanada's speech was cut short, Shimo's short blade was pointed right at his face. "If you ever talk to Mana like that again I will attack you! Attack you like I should've when you asked my father to convince mother to sell her gallery to you!" Hanada shrugged "I am well within my bounds to speak to Mana-chan however I want, I am her sponsor after all, I own Konoha's Sorceress for one more yea…" Hanada stopped in his tracks and started shaking, trembling not unlike Mana has been before. Mana didn't notice her hand weaving the handseal in rage, she didn't notice casting that genjutsu as anger blinded her and she released it that same instant.

"I'm sorry, Hanada-san… But you do not own me, I am quite capable of paying my rent right now without your help, if you feel like cutting this deal off I'll understand. To tell you my answer – I will never be a bird you can lock in a cage and show your guests, that's not what Konoha's Sorceress stands for, if I sold that symbol to you I'd be forced to stop doing magic altogether and I won't sell my magic to you." Hanada stood right back up and fixed his suit from the mess that he made trying to shake off the genjutsu that he saw. "Hmm… I wonder, Mana-chan, I wonder if you can pay your rent with the state that your father is in… I'm not sure if disabled people make the same wage if anything at…" Sugemi's punch aimed at the gut silenced the man.

"I don't like you, I didn't like you to begin with but at this point you're useless to us which means you're standing in the way of me getting my manga done, furthermore, you're pissing off my friends which means they won't be at their best when time to work for what makes up my manga comes." Sugemi turned around and left, Mana and Shimo followed – this was major! Hanada was an incredibly dangerous man, how could this go wrong so fast!? Mana placed him in a genjutsu and Sugemi punched him! He had people disappear for less, after the man straightened out he smiled, he managed to deliver his final words before the three left the room. "I am sad that we couldn't come to a deal. Perhaps another time…" his polite end to the conversation made Mana even less certain of what future had. Now with the master of entire criminal world of Konoha after the three it would this mission only got more difficult instead of this talk helping them find the man responsible for robbing people.


	18. A Mysterious Tip? Interrupt the Deal!

A tall man in shades and a dark long coat walked up to Hanada as the man observed the kids leaving. This visit was not a pleasant one for the man, his displeasure with it and anger should've been postponed until after no one saw him however. The magician kid made him money, supporting and sponsoring her as well as some other acts in the village opened doors to Katsuo, he could speak to any partners in Kirigakure and Kumogakure or any other village and reference his sponsored acts as a symbol of his influence and success expecting to be taken more seriously as a result. Him having the Sorceress under his wing would help both promoting the kid worldwide and using her fame to find more partners and spread his influence where her fame makes its steps.

"These kids are looking for Ooguchi's crew right? They'll wonder around through a lot of alleyways, probably until late time at night, that's a dangerous time for kids to be out at…" the tall man fixed his shades as he leaned over his boss' shoulder to affirm that was what boss had in mind. Hanada lowered his head, "No, these guys are just kids, I don't like holding grudges against kids, they'll have to grow a bit older until they learn that actions have consequences but this will not go forgotten… I'd like for Ooguchi to receive a "tip" from a "kind willed colleague" about them, make sure the girl lives and is able to perform, don't let them harm her face and hands. She may not pay me herself but her name alone is bringing me increasing amounts of benefit. Soon she may actually be worth keeping around paying for with no obligations from her part."

The man in shades nodded and disappeared. He was a professional and his efficiency was needed, it was not known what exactly the plans of the children were, if they had any tips. Boss' orders required of him to tip Ooguchi faster than he would know of the kids himself which was not that easy. More so, Ooguchi was an idiot, he was the first man to send his men out to the open to take out his competitors so Hanada-san didn't predict a long and prosperous future for him. The idiot was already making deals with some people from Kirigakure. Everyone knew Kirigakure was bad business, if they didn't kill you themselves they were still the enemy of the village so any ties with that village was punished with utmost severity by the Fourth's administration. Regardless of the difficulty of the orders or stupidity of the recipient, the man in shades will complete his assignment…

Mana sighed, "Sorry guys, I thought that we could've figured something out without torture and interrogation…" Shimo tried to smile but it was clear that his mood was spoiled by the encounter with a man he was not fond of. "You don't need to apologize, just… Don't go to that man for help again, Mana-san, don't give him the satisfaction of having you in debt to him." It wasn't that hard to understand Shimo's hatred towards Hanada – the man was everything that Shimo hated after all: rich, powerful and influential and acquired his wealth by oppressing those weaker than him. Perhaps Hanada most clearly illustrated the kind of man that the Mizukage that Shimo's family fled from was like…

"Seriously? Torture? Did you really think that we couldn't keep our cools? Hotheaded people are always secondary characters and comic relief and I must be the protagonist of my manga!" Sugemi exclaimed raising his fist in the air with certain dedication and strength to his words and the tone upon which they were spoken. Shimo sighed, "Oh well, I guess we should apologize to you, Mana-chan… Our stupid tenseness and rivalry made you plan around us and forced you to go to that man, I guess we should've been better than that." After apologizing for something he probably had no reason to apologize for, the young Yuki raised a fist and gave it for Sugemi to bump, the Nara raised his and the two bumped their fists. "We can stop being rivals if you agree to be the supporting protagonist in my manga, I guess…" Sugemi smiled. "Eh, good enough…" Shimo replied to that. For once this day started looking like less of a trainwreck.

"So… What now? We have absolutely no leads on the mystery crime man." Sugemi scratched the back of his head, "Maybe we should find that guy in Konohagakure hospital and ask him who is in charge?" the Nara boy raised a good point. By choosing one source of information over the other they lost the one they did not choose. It was most likely that the man Sugemi injured was already in hospital by now and his fracture was being looked at. Mana honestly had no idea about what to do, Hanada's behavior however seemed to lean towards there being some sort of "business" partner behind it so now she herself had a direct passion to solve this. "Do not turn around…" the three heard a voice behind them, it was a silent but clear voice, almost instantly cold air filled their lungs. It was a similar killing intent to Tanshu-sensei's but it felt so very different, Tanshu's was more searing hot burning all the air from one's lungs making one struggle to breathe, so hot it was cold… This one felt cold and damp, just this man being around them made one feel like drowning.

"I noticed that you are interested in the man behind the muggings near the Hiro's hall, correct? I see you three are ninja so the information I can provide would be in good hands. This isn't just common mugging, it's much worse, it's a racketeering scheme – people pay additional "safety tax" to these men in order to walk around that area. The man behind this is known to his partners only as "Ooguchi". You will find him in the southern district of the village where the warehouses are, there will be a small district of homes, rotten and ruined pissholes. Ooguchi owns them all and that is where you'll find him. I'd suggest moving fast, something interesting will be going on there today…" And just like that the cold atmosphere around this mystery informant disappeared as if it was never even there. The three genin simultaneously turned around but there was nothing there.

"Well… That was convenient…" Sugemi mumbled out, he looked so innocent and so unsuspecting of how dirty all of this sounded. Shimo looked completely different – he looked angry, this kind of thing like the trick that this Ooguchi has been pulling pissed him off. That was why he was blind about how suspicious it all was. Mana's head sunk down, this was so weird and… She didn't like it. At all. But she had no proof and couldn't even begin to solve this knot of people and who stood where in all this. Hanada wanted this Ooguchi safe but was willing to sell him out, this Ooguchi guy was some sort of fool that was trying to establish a racketeering scheme in a ninja village using the opportunity that the village is occupied with larger problems, a short sighted idea at best… Who was this mysterious informant, what side was he on? Why did he gave them this information instead of taking action himself? He did feel like an incredibly strong fellow, maybe not on Tanshu's level but his strength could have been felt by three inexperienced ninja, not just strength, his killing intent itself. That man was trouble, must've been!

"I don't know guys, this man… This information is just too suspicious." Mana voiced her concern, she didn't like how her voice sounded weak and unsure but to be honest it mirrored how she felt about all of this. They got into something they shouldn't have. "Yeah, I hear you. But what other options do we have? I guess we could just report this to the Administration…" Shimo hesitated himself for a moment. "Wait, you don't think on bailing out right? I mean, my manga is on the balance! This is just huge enough to make the first chapter!" Sugemi got pretty enraged by the hesitance of the two. Mana turned her eyes to the side, she didn't want this, any of this but… "We have to go…" she spoke without even believing the fact she said it and genuinely felt like it.

"If we don't go and report this, it's fine. But people will get hurt in the meantime. Tomorrow and the day after, all the way until they are taken down people will suffer and be threatened by this Ooguchi's men. If there's any chance of stopping that I'm willing to risk my life, plus, the informant did say that there's something going on there today. If it's useful to Ooguchi it is trouble for everyone else, we must at the very least stop that." the magician explained trying to voice her feelings clearly, as a hero that she wanted to be she had to go and would go even if Shimo and Sugemi didn't. She owed it to the people of the village that lacked the power to manipulate chakra, that had their magic of life treated as dirt by those men every day, to people that loved her magic shows and believed in ninjutsu being more than a tool of murder!

"Well what kind of gentleman would let Mana-chan go there alone, or with an idiot like Sugemi at that…" Shimo sighed and stroke his neck, it was clear that he didn't like it, it must've been his logical side that finally overcame his first reaction of rage. His rage worked differently from any other form of rage the girl has ever seen, he was angry so he wanted Ooguchi to be stopped but he wanted it to be done right – his rage justified reporting it to the authorities and leaving it up to them. Mana's feelings were different, she had to put a stop to it because she had a responsibility to act, she couldn't trust other ninja to not kill anyone. If the administration sends out stronger ninja they will without a doubt make a bloodbath out of scumbags that dared to pull this on Konohagakure soil…

"YES! Let's go!" Sugemi yelled out, "Wait what did you just say!?" his slower brain finally got the clue of Shimo's previous words. Mana sometimes couldn't understand how Sugemi's mind worked, he lived in a world where only his manga mattered, he never weighed pros and cons of anything, he just did whatever could grant him the fame to have his manga written about him and that was so incredibly weird. He never looked deeper, never analyzed anything just asked the question if it helped his cause. Being the kind of person to tolerate and consider any points of view Mana started to empathize a little with that sort of mindset. Perhaps if she adopted a little more of it she'd be more efficient in saving people, less concerned of the fallout and more reckless, less analyzing what something meant and only caring about if it helped her cause of changing the world, of proving that ninjutsu was something that each wielder defined and not something that defined its wielder.

The three rushed off into the distance observing the day reaching its peak, if they were lucky they'd arrive at early evening hours. That would be beneficial in scoping the area and at least trying to spot the trap if there was one. Just like expected the three arrived at about the beginning of the later hours of the day, the Sun was just about starting to set Mana crouched down and hid behind a wall, behind that wall was a large complex of multiple homes built of scrap and what almost looked like cardboard, almost like the entire homes were built from what these men found in the scrapyard. "Ewww… What kind of crime lord is this Ooguchi guy? I bet he doesn't even own a cat! Can we beat up that Hanada guy again instead? He makes for a much better villain!"

Shimo shushed the boy down and Mana angrily whispered back, "When your manga is being written just ask the editor to change some things up, you already made enough trouble with Hanada-san as it is… We're punishing only the guy that's to blame for all this mess." Shimo nodded, "I've got a plan, wait here…" he said and bolted off, Mana couldn't believe this, obviously she couldn't object since she wasn't officially the team's leader but she sort of expected being allowed to lead this little "private investigation", everyone acting for themselves was a dangerous thing to do in this kind of assignment. Shimo returned shortly with a guy that had ice around his mouth and arms and had blood on his forehead. The boy dragged the man up to the fence and rest him towards the fence.

"Talk, where's Ooguchi, what's going on here?" Shimo spoke after making a handseal and letting the ice dissolve into a small puddle. Mana had to hand it to the boy, it was a simplistic technique but it was an efficient one, Shimo's clan was truly spectacular and she wished to see some more of his Ice Release. "Forget it, brats, I ain't talking!" the man mumbled out, Mana's nightmare scenario was playing out in front of her, Shimo kicked the man but he only laughed, "That all you got?" Shimo moved to the side and looked at Sugemi, "You kick him, you're stronger, make sure it hurts!" The man laughed and reached for his rags, he lifted them up and showed a wound to the three kids.

"Forget it, brats, look at these burns. I'm used to pain, there's nothing your kiddy minds can do to me that I ain't seen before. Got this in a fire when Ooguchi-sama's previous boss kidnapped this murderous bitch kunoichi, she blew the whole warehouse district and gave most of us a beating of our lives and we got burns from that fire. What can the three of you do to that? I was tortured by a Yoruma once…" the man laughed out spitting some blood out of his mouth. Shimo looked really taken back by this, Mana got interested, "Yoruma?" "It's a clan of messed up assassins, they're bloodthirsty and they're some of the best swordfighters and torturers in the village, if even an infant Yoruma sadist couldn't get this guy to talk we may as well not bother and go in blind…"

Mana leant up to the man and placed her hand on his shoulder, "Please, sir, can you help us by telling us the information we need? Ooguchi is making a lot of people fear and suffer, he's also clearly doing something shady too… A lot of people will get hurt." The man spat at Mana's face but surprisingly enough missed. "What the fuck do I care?! Those people don't care about us! They're paying you ninja lot all the good money leaving all the nasty dirt work to us, normal folk who can't spit fucking fireballs out of their mouths. How the hell is a weak guy supposed to make money to feed his family if not by crime? Your kind MADE Ooguchi and our crew so it's time you got the credit for it…" Mana's arms weaved an illusion by themselves, this man was so angry and spiteful but she had no time to deal with his hatred and his feeling of being wronged right now, she had to know whatever Ooguchi had planned first.

The man looked around his body identifying Mana's "Scary Trick Jutsu", "Cockroaches? Really? Do you think someone who lives in the goddamn junkyard has never slept covered in all pathetic kind of parasite there is!?" the man raged out, the genjutsu was completely ineffective against him. "Wait… Those tricks, you're… Konoha's Sorceress? That magician girl that's doing her shows in the Hiro's hall, right?" the man suddenly recognized Mana forcing her to rub her eyes in annoyance.

"Yes." She admitted, the man's face changed, within just a mere second his face changed from that of an angered and hurt man to that of a man that is asking for his life. "My little girl she's… She wanted a long time to see your show and… I don't make enough money to… Maybe if you let her see it, I'd tell a thing or two…" he started almost begging Mana, "Also, please make sure she's not around when you take Ooguchi down." Mana stood up, "Fine, I'll get her here before we go talk to Ooguchi, and I'll let her see all the shows she wants, just please help us." the girl almost begged, it was a unique talent to beg while standing tall and looking person in the eyes, luckily over her career as a stage magician Mana gathered some acting skills. She wasn't lying about her promise though…

The man sighed, "Well, Ooguchi is in the house with that milk ad poster stuck on the roof, he's meeting this guy from Kirigakure today to exchange something but he's too much of a scaredy cat to meet the man himself, don't know what that deal is but boss says it's huge. That exchange will happen in the smaller house built out of cardboard entirely, the one that looks like a large farm toilet to the left of boss' place, there's one house with the working chimney, the one that's smoking, that's where you'll find the thing that the Kirigakure guy wants, Ooguchi's making a fool of him and will try to kill the bastard, he's got the goods in that smoking house. My house is the third house on the left right after entering the district."

Shimo stood up and looked at Mana and then at the guy that spilled the beans. "Alright you two, I'll bust the deal and prevent the Kirigakure guy from getting murdered, he may be a Kirigakure bastard but if he gets killed here it means war for sure. Sugemi go and take the goods, it might be something of value to help village compensate the people robbed by these people, it doesn't belong to these men anyways. Mana, you go get the girl to safety, I know you want to, then you have one shot to work your magic with this Ooguchi guy, if he doesn't listen we're kicking his butt and taking him in."

Mana fixed her gloves, "If he doesn't listen I'll make him try to make a wormhole through the floor with his face myself". Shimo nodded with a smile "Don't play heroes, if you're having trouble retreat and go right to the Konohagakure Police Force and the Administration." he added. The three nodded to each other in agreement, Mana looked at the bleeding man for the last time before heading out. "Sir, it'd be best if you stayed here, if we get caught act like we took you out and you didn't tell us anything, we'll act the same."

The three genin dashed through over the wall, scaling it up in just moments and then leaping over it and heading towards the direction of their objectives.


	19. Trouble in the Junkyard District!

Mana carefully navigated the poor district. To be entirely honest she had never even seen it being built here. This whole district of warehouses and storage places was supposed to be more of an industrial place, how in the world these people moved in here was beyond her. A man wondered down the alley, clearly drunk, Mana let him pass without showing herself to him, someone looking like her would've stood out in the district plus she couldn't risk being recognized. The kunoichi had to move fast if she was to make it to both lead the girl to safety and confront this Ooguchi guy.

Something worried Mana as she kept moving, slowly but silently and still unnoticed, the man she let pass kept stumbling forward and dived nose first into a bunch of trash cans – he was drunker than anyone could describe. The girl wanted to help him but she couldn't afford a distraction, it was quite likely that this soft and warm sleeping place was the safest place in the district for a while. What kept that small amount of fear rustling in her heart like a little tongue of flame was Ooguchi himself.

These people that gathered here were not a clan, they were not friends, they were a community, one with incredibly powerful bonds that no amount of torture could break. Mana had not yet seen the might of this Yoruma torture herself but if it was enough to make Shimo instantly dismiss torture as a viable option it must've been impressive. What kind of man gathers such amount of loyalty, even more so, does so doing crazy things like occupying a village district and doing crimes right under Hokage's nose, working with Kirigakure that had less of an approval rating in Konoha than Death God himself. He must've been a man of ideals, almost a cult-like leader, an icon to these people…

"Your mother wasn't from Konoha…" father's voice echoed in Mana's ear. She tried to resist the urge to sink in the memories of her father describing the wandering tribe that he met Mana's mother in, she had no time for that now. Either way, was her mother's tribe of people wandering from village to village similar to Ooguchi's crew? Mana didn't want to make any judgments before she met the man but what if they were the villains here by separating a community of poor people that have nowhere to go and no ideal to live up to, people that literally have nothing, people that were risking their lives and betraying their ideals just to make sure that their children are happy for one moment in their lives… That kind of person cannot possibly be bad. Inevitably Mana, Shimo and Sugemi will not face off against bandits or animals trying to kill them but people, people with families that want their families to live in happiness…

Mana banged loud on the scrap door, a lady opened it – she wore rags and stank worse than Mana did when she was covered with centipede innards. "Excuse me, your husband sent me, he wanted to make sure you leave this district, it's going to go down today." the woman didn't look that sad or didn't even question Mana's words, she seemed to have a pack already ready to go, she gestured for the visitor magician to walk in and went to call her little girl. Mere moments later the little kid ran up to Mana with an actual piece of clothing which was a rarity – a raincoat and still held some sewn dolls. "Hey… You're…" Mana smiled and kneeled up to the kid so that she didn't have to look up all the time, "I'm Konoha's Sorceress and your daddy and I made a deal – you can see my show anytime you want and you won't have to pay anything, you can even bring your mom and dad if you want. Just please let's hurry…"

The kid looked ecstatic, this was probably the first time Mana saw someone love her shows that much, usually the public enjoyment was there but she never saw someone's eyes literally light up as if they were specks of stardust fallen to Earth. "Yay, I knew you're a nice person, Sorceress, when I find my third job I promise I'll buy my tickets like everyone else!" the kid shouted out. Mana's mouth opened to reply to that peculiar sentence and the horrible implications it had but she realized that she was literally wasting time here. "We'll talk later, please move to the gate, your husband is there waiting for you." Mana took some of her allowance money and handed it to the woman, "Rent a room in the village, sleep it over, we'll see how this goes. It'd be great if you went to the Administration and told them about this place and your situation in the morning."

Mana rushed out of the house with the woman following shortly and moving the opposite direction. This meeting made everything even more confusing, so people knew that their leader will eventually cause a downfall of this whole district they built here? Of course they should've known, this whole idea of building a community inside a ninja village and living their own lives and expecting it all to be swell was stupid. Of course the woman was smart and probably not even the only person here with a packed bag… This place started to make Mana sick, a place where even children had to work in several jobs and still didn't make enough money for basic survival needs. Just what kind of community this Ooguchi guy had here? Mana wasn't so sure she even wanted to resolve this peacefully anymore, she wanted that guy to say something, she was begging him to give her the option of fighting him and bringing him down. The genin quickly made way for the home where the man told her that Ooguchi was in.

Shimo tried to hold back a little bit, he needed to compensate for the time that Mana would take to move the kid out of the district. It was likely that no danger would even come to her but if such was the will of the man and that was the deal that Mana made with him… It was important to Mana that everyone was safe, she was lucky to have Shimo as her teammate. Most ninja would find such desire for heroism and making sure that absolutely everyone from common villagers to even the enemies were alright absolutely annoying. Sugemi didn't care about anything but getting a manga made about him so… She'd be lucky to stay in team with them forever, otherwise she'd have more conflict on her hands than she deserves.

The boy moved in and stood back to the wall of the house he needed to enter. His was probably the most dangerous of the tasks – it was likely that the Kirigakure man was a ninja and a skilled one. Usually only mercenaries, ninja or people employing mercs or ninja moved from one village to another. If that man was here it meant he knew how to defend himself or run away when things got hot. It was unfortunate that the Hokage had already left, if this man was captured he'd be a good proof of Kirigakure's dark involvement in Konoha's criminal underworld. Then again, the only reason why this deal was taking place at all was because the Hokage and "Red Dog" Tanshu and "Vapor" Miso were no longer here. It might have been a good idea to set up a diversion in this situation, make those guys believe that things were worse than they actually were… Either way, he won't achieve anything in here. Shimo moved in to a side "window", silently tapping the surfaces and checking which layer was supposed to be removed and worked as a window space.

Shimo gently removed the large piece of cardboard and placed it on the floor inside, he leapt inside and rolled to stand up – he couldn't waste time being seen between the house and interior. As Shimo's head lifted off the ground his eye almost got a senbon lodged into it – a tall woman was standing with her hand pointed at him with four senbons between her fingers, Shimo almost rolled into her taunting stance. "What do you know… The anonymous tip was right, Konohagakure actually does know about the deal." the woman spoke with an arrogant tone using her other hand to stroke her shoulder long dark hair. Her eyes met with those of the boy, "You messed up, this is how little ninja die…" the woman said and thrust her arm forward…

Sugemi kept running on forward to the place he was assigned to, why the hell did he listen to Shimo anyways? That idiot was in the way of his manga, what was his assignment anyways? To move the luggage with the money that Ooguchi was supposed to pay? That's repossession man's work, repossession men didn't get their own stories, no one wants to read about a repossession man. That asshole Shimo must want to interrupt the deal and get his own manga first, he just says that Hokage bullshit to others, just to move their attention away from the real goal. Even Mana got two jobs, how come she always got to do most of all in the missions? Just like in the Forest of Death when she got to do all of the actual work…

Then again, this wasn't a mission, money was important for the village, maybe he actually will get a pretty good word from the village to his manga publisher when he'll pitch the idea. After all, he will be the guy that recovers all of the money stolen from the people, he will be as much of a hero as it gets, he may even give everyone's money back to them personally! This was awesome! Shimo may have been trying to snag his dream but he'll end up snagging Mana's to fulfil his, that didn't really feel right, Mana was a pretty nice person, she didn't really deserve to get this shit pulled on her but it's all Shimo's fault anyways! Sugemi giggled to his own palm as he thought about it, the boy didn't bother to be too discrete – Sugemi thrust his punch to the scrap layer that served as a door.

"Ohhh, a little powerhouse… Isn't that cute?" Sugemi jumped backwards to avoid a pillar of solid rock shooting out of the ground, the amount of force behind that thing shook the whole scrap house. A man with rugged cape and a bandana and shades was inside with a cocky smile, what did this mean, no one was supposed to be inside! Did the guard play a trick with Mana? Did he lie about the actual locations? Mana was such a stupid idiot! She and her stupid belief that everyone was her friend, it'll get her killed one day and even worse – it'll get HIM killed once, maybe it's even in the process of getting him killed right goddamn now!

"Splitting your efforts to accomplish most assignments possible, or at least taking the money was a smart idea, we were fortunate to receive the anonymous tip…" the man spoke and made a handseal that made the rock structure disappear. Slowly, one step after another the man walked outside. "Oh no you won't!" Sugemi shouted leaping forward with a handseal charging up chakra and wrapping his Shadow Tendrils around his fist "Shadow Fist Technique!" Sugemi shouted leaping forward as fast as he could and punching the man right to the face. The force of his blow sent the man backwards right through multiple layers of scrap – Sugemi had to keep it contained, the man had some sort of Earth Release style that was dangerous to use inside such a house, by keeping it contained Sugemi might stand more of a chance and keep it more quiet.

The man's forehead cracked, then his entire body started to crack as if it was just a cocoon. The entire body crumbled revealing an identical copy inside. Sugemi's eyes were open wide – he had never seen anything like that, this was not someone of his level would use, his technique had the serious ability to break some bones, to soak all of it up was some pretty nice defensive armor. The layer of the man's armor that collapsed changed into dirt, the man smiled, "Nice technique, as you can see I have some of my own…" His half-exposed grin made Sugemi sick, he wanted to keep punching this guy but he shouldn't overdo it, one Shadow Fist used to take a lot of his chakra and while he has refined his mastery over the technique somewhat it still was easily his most costly jutsu. It'd be nice to finish it soon and without having to use it again, maybe two or three times if need be…

Mana opened the door, slowly she proceeded to walk inside, this house was by far the largest. Even if they didn't get their tip from the gate guard they'd have still been able to somehow figure out that the largest house made entirely of large ad posters stuck onto the usual junk materials was the most important place in here. It was strange to not be able to hear anything. One step after another Mana kept walking forward, gently peeking after the corner and doing her best to spot the danger before it spotted her. The rooms were pretty dark – there was little to no sunlight getting in there from the outside seeing how it was covered blind. One room however had light coming from there, Mana bet that would be where this Ooguchi guy was.

The girl tossed a smoke bomb into the room. She leapt at the first person that was closest to her having pinpointed his location almost instantly before using her tool. Using her kunai Mana smacked him at the back of his neck. She then acted through hearing and seeing mere shadows of the people inside the smoke alone, Mana lunged forward and rolled to avoid the blow of a man targeting her as his friends were still trying to understand what happened. The magician cut the man at the back of his leg and punched him with her palm. Mana knew perfectly how long her smokebombs lasted, she used plenty of those on stage, usually to announce her arrival. By then it was clear that these men were no mercenaries and definitely no ninja, they were just poor people to whom guarding Ooguchi was just one of their numerous jobs. That made the magician even more sick of it all so she started weaving handseals near instantly after taking out the last guy.

Mana pointed forward with two of her fingers sending a long string of channeled beam of wind chakra, it worked similarly to a blade, it was just much less piercing and efficient so it had no way of killing her enemy. Violence was a perfectly acceptable last resort kind of mean of achieving her ends but killing was out of the question for Mana. The sharp gust dug deep into the man's knee and he fell on the ground yelling, Mana tried to kick him in the face to finish him but he caught her leg and lifted it sending her down. He tried to crawl onto her but the kunoichi kicked him in the face. This was the second time that day she didn't perform as well as she could've in taijutsu – she needed to brush it up a bit, maybe invent her own style or something.

Mana's head turned up, her rough head count when she moved out to use the smoke bomb suggested that there was supposed to be another man there but no one tried to take her out while she was down. The wandering eyes caught a quite grotesque sight to behold, a morbidly obese man sitting on a collection of large pillows. He had an extremely overweight body but his arms looked pretty muscular and quite able to do some damage, his legs however looked miniscule and definitely undersized for the man. His head was the worst, it was easily the largest part of his body with his chin being almost half the size of his entire torso. Someone like that had to be the most important guy in the room. Mana rolled onto her chest and stood up, fixing her hair. "I can't goddamn believe it, Sugemi was right, this does feel like a goddamn manga at this point…" she thought as her eyes met those of Ooguchi.

"We need to talk, about all of this." she calmly stated as the man flapped his lips and licked them with his tongue, his miniscule legs moved just slightly pushing his body forward as he fell down on all fours with his bulky hands keeping up the weight. "I'd have liked to see your show, you're that magician right? That or you just dress like a magician which would be quite retarded… I just don't leave the district too much, people tend to point fingers and laugh at me all the time." the man spoke as he flicked his head to the side to get his dreadlocks off of his face. "You are insufferable, Ooguchi-san… You found those poor people and gave them hope gathered them together into a solid community, then you made them build you a home, not just a house but a whole village inside of a village and then you made them work for you, employing them into multiple "jobs", even children, using them like nothing else but a cheap workforce… I wanted to talk to you initially, see if we could find a compromise, maybe you could have still called off your men from their "jobs" and cancelled this deal… I'm sorry, Ooguchi-san, there is nothing to talk about with a person like you. This district will go down, its people will be free and will join the other villagers in an actual community, they will not be fueled by need to survive but need to live better than they already do. And most definitely, YOU will go down and into Correctional Facility" Mana said with her anger coming up inside of her, her heart slowly growing hotter and hotter before her entire body was tensed and ready to take this man down, him and his entire… Whatever this madness was.

Ooguchi's body shook as the man laughed, then all of a sudden his hands tensed up, the immense arms pushed the large corpus of the man off the ground lunging into Mana, Ooguchi's mouth opened revealing blunt teeth – what a peculiar method of attack… The girl tried to make handseals but it was too late – the man's teeth drove into her body causing grievous injuries, her head was barely even hanging on a small thread of muscle that the man's teeth did not tear apart, her body was almost cut in half from the lower jaw slamming into her gut… Or at least that was what Ooguchi saw as Mana's illusion connected first and she managed to roll under the man's colossal figure. Mana thrust her palms repeatedly, slapping Ooguchi again and again, driving her palms into his back, making her rage drive her strikes, punching again and again using her palms until she was too tired and stumbled back. "Is that it, magician girl? I didn't feel any of it, I'm a pretty thick man you see…" Ooguchi mumbled as he turned around with a despicable smile that would make the devil himself claw his eyes out. Mana's face twisted in disgust as she lifted two fingers into the air and made a handseal moving it up to her chest, "You WILL feel this though…" Mana spoke as the man noticed his back and shoulders being full of explosive tags.

"I don't think I can punch you out, I'm not the kind of girl that would kill either but this would not kill you, as you said, you're a thick man, you have a layer of both fat and muscle that my punches sized up quite well, this wouldn't kill you but your life would not be comfortable from that point on… Seeing how we're sort of stuck in a deadlocke, Ooguchi-san, let's talk…" Mana explained her intentions calmly, Ooguchi would have never listened to her before, now that she had his utmost attention and controlled the situation he'd be more talkative and willing to reach a consensus.


	20. Gate of Opening! Enemy is Jounin!

For a moment there Shimo just stood there, stood there watching and sizing his opponent up. She was a relatively short and not by any means a muscularly built lady, she had well shortened hair so trying to exploit that wouldn't have been a viable option. She used senbon, that much was for sure which meant she knew the anatomy of the body and had a pretty good aim. Wherever she planned to hit the genin, she'd hit him if given the chance, she wore a long black dress, an outfit very unlike the people living in the area. This would be an exchange of decisions, if Shimo lost the battle would've been over, if he won he'd be able to fight her for a bit longer – options weren't too much in his favor.

There it was, woman's arm twitched, her exposed shoulder muscles tensed up telegraphing her next attack. Shimo used a short blade – as a close range shinobi he must've had a certain degree of perception and ability to properly anticipate his opponent's moves and respond with optimal response from himself. The boy dashed back weaving handseals using his hands, his handseals were nowhere near the speed that Mana had, a strange thing having his amazing bloodline ability in mind… One would think he'd be a bit faster at that but with little luck the seals might just come out fast enough.

"Ice Plate Jutsu!" Shimo yelled out, he would've preferred to have some sort of water source to use in conjunction but unfortunately he had to settle for freezing air vapor for his techniques for now, at least until he gets smart enough to carry some water around or use a water technique to set his battles up. His female opponent used senbon, she tossed them forward with a straightforward attack but her tools bounced off of Shimo's defensive plates of ice – the two plates of ice that the boy created weren't large, but the size of a buckler but they were enough to deflect the senbon aimed at his gut. "She's aiming to incapacitate?" Shimo thought as he heard the needles clinging down onto the floor.

"An impressive display" the woman complimented, "An Ice Release technique, huh? You're skilled enough to freeze the water particles in air too but it doesn't seem too strong. Just how strong is it? As strong as glass?" the woman taunted Shimo. The genin was alarmed at how much she knew of his techniques, she either was a good warrior who had fought Yuki clansmen in the past or she knew about Water Release and its variations which meant she was a ninja and didn't just use tools. "She knew where she was targeting but she didn't want to kill me because if she did she'd have aimed elsewhere – senbon in the gut would've made it excruciatingly painful to move so I'd be down but not out… What is her goal here? Who even is this woman?" Shimo wondered as his opponent reached for her senbon, now that she knew the strength of his Ice Release she'd not play around. A ninja of her level would simply attack strong enough to both break his ice and take the opponent down.

The woman breathed in, the boy kept on guard but he knew that a ninjutsu technique was coming, so she was actually a ninja! The kunoichi of the Junk District quickly went through couple of handseals and spat a bunch of water out, Shimo leapt sideways to avoid it – that was good, she just made a source of water for him to work with! The woman breathed in again, proceeding to spit another mass of water right at Shimo, the boy slapped his hands together forming a handseal as the water she spat out before formed a flat and strong ice wall. This one was strong enough to withstand ninjutsu up to certain rank, Shimo kept it relatively small though – just large enough to block the assault with no damage to it but also left some space up and to the sides for him to pass.

He was surprised to be greeted not by shouts of frustration but… Laughter! The water that slammed into his ice wall didn't fall to the ground, it splashed up making bunch of smaller masses of water that stayed in the air shortly, they then transformed into needles, needles as large as senbon. "Water Senbon Technique!" Shimo heard the woman yell as the water needles bombarded the genin's body inflicting multiple cuts, moving in through the several spaces he had left for his own attack. The pain was unlike anything that the young shinobi has ever experienced, the pain of small pieces of water drilling through his flesh up to bone and then dissolving as it left marks on his bones in so many places at once – it felt like being shredded to bits!

The boy's injured body was drawn down to the ground, Shimo's hand shot forward to keep his body from slamming the floor like a sack of potatoes. "Are you… The Kirigakure ninja?" Shimo uttered some words, trying desperately to make the woman talk, just give him some time to get his pathetic ass off the ground and back into fighting shape. Shimo knew he could take this, all of what this woman had and more. All he needed was just a short break, just catch his breath and keep swinging back. She was clearly more skilled at ninjutsu, there was no use fighting her that way – anyone with the ability to shape elemental chakra into such complex shapes and at such numbers should've been beyond even Chuunin level.

Shimo's wall melted into a large puddle of water, the woman must've hit his chakra point which forced him to release any active techniques like this ice wall. The woman looked at the side, she was concerned about something, what could've been so important to her?! Never mind her concerns, Shimo got his chance to attack, gathering what he still had of his strength the boy leapt forward charging at the woman using all of his speed, that was what he trained all this time – his speed. That was what Tanshu-sensei told him, he spoke in what sounded like a riddle, he said that Shimo had the lock to his power-up already in his palm and that speed was the key. The genin figured that sensei meant that his body had the speed needed to impress sensei but he still needed to train it to achieve that speed so he spent those days running and pushing his body and ability to spend a great amount of force into quick leaps. Just focusing his chakra into the right muscles, making it work for him to transcend what even peak human condition could offer, all ninja were at peak human condition, it took a very special one to break that wall!

Shimo slipped and fell on the ground, that was impossible, his feet weren't even touching the ground! As the boy looked at what happened he saw water wrapping around his leg as if it was some kind of a whip or something. "Enough of this, kid, I'm not your enemy." The woman spoke, she was still looking at some point at the wall, her full attention was still somewhere else and she managed to counter Shimo's last resort attack? Just how strong was this woman? Finally her cold gaze returned to the genin laying on the ground, breathing heavily as the hard fall reminded him of all of his injuries from before. He quickly started forcing his body to lift off of the wet floor – she completely embarrassed him but he won't give this woman the satisfaction, he won't follow his own advice, he won't run! This woman must've had her eyes set on Mana's or Sugemi's location, she must've been a sensor and wanted to go. Shimo will keep her here, she won't get to where she wants to nor will she get the pleasure of dominating him, he will fight her as an equal to the end!

"I said enough, I'm a jounin of Konohagakure…" she nonchalantly added as the woman's eyes returned to wherever they were before. "W-What?" Shimo grunted out, still affected by the pain. How could this make any sense? Why would she be fighting him in that case, did she know about the Kirigakure deal? What was going on? "Me and my partner were both undercover here, we were on a mission to find out just what and how much of it was this district pulling in terms of criminal activities. Today was when we decided to blow our cover and take it all down – we couldn't allow this Kirigakure deal to go as planned but the man was close, I didn't want to tip him off and so me and my partner volunteered to keep you guys occupied and act like we're killing you when we got the tip from Hanada that you'd be coming. Going to that guy for help was a REALLY bad idea…"

Finally all of this started to make a little bit more sense to the genin. So this woman and whoever she was working with were already on Ooguchi's track and working on taking him down. Team Oak was given the low ranking mission of busting one crime, to just win a battle while this squad was working with winning the whole war! They really must've made all of this difficult for the two by getting involved… Shimo looked away, he was really ashamed of himself and that he got involved, also disappointed that he was so weak and didn't give this woman a good fight at the very least, he wasn't an asset in this mission of these two high ranking ninja at all, just a kid that was in the way… "I'm… Sorry…" he uttered, the woman tsked with her tongue.

"It's alright, I couldn't tip off the Kiri guy so that he doesn't get away, I had to play tough. He was in this house but when the end of the fight was clear he left, I can sense him moving to Ooguchi's place. He was a weird guy, wanted to make the deal only with the fat guy himself. I can sense that there's a friend of yours there, a small chakra signature, larger than yours." Shimo nodded, "Mana-chan…" he uttered, "We've got to go, if this Kirigakure ninja gets there Mana-chan will be in danger!" The woman scratched her head, "Yeah, the chakra of that Kirigakure guy is crazy, he'd probably give both me and my partner trouble, sadly Ooguchi's house isn't our first stop, we need to let my partner know that the rules changed too – without him we won't beat the Kiri ninja if he starts fighting us and he'd kill your other friend fighting him in the meantime. I just hope your friend can stall for time."

Shimo grunted and punched the ground, he was torn as both of his teammates needed help. "How about if I went to help Mana hold the guy off and you went to pick your partner up and then rejoined us. I'm sort of a gentleman, I can't leave Mana-chan in danger again, she always tends to get in trouble and do things by herself, I want to be with her this time!" the woman shrugged "Do what you want, I'm going to pick Dorimi up." she replied without a care in the world and dashed to the side, kicking out a cardboard layer while not losing pace and moving to the eastern side of the district – where both Mana and Sugemi were.

"I'm coming, Mana-chan!" Shimo uttered to himself as he jumped out the same hole and forced his body to move the best he could towards the place where Ooguchi's house was supposed to be.

Sugemi kept throwing punches at the man's general direction, they've been exchanging blows for a while now and he was holding the genin off, even more – he was returning more than he was taking. So far, for entire couple of minutes of non-stop exchanges of blows Sugemi managed to resist the temptation to use any ninjutsu but he had to. This guy already gave him a swollen black eye that will probably look like a second face in the morning, he also must've broken some ribs at least. At the current pace Sugemi might stall the guy but not knock him out. His dream of manga was floating away slowly and this was was all that stood in the way!

"You're pretty impressive, you're a genin right and yet you're giving me trouble at taijutsu. Granted it was never a field I excelled at or trained. I hope you understand that I'm beating you at the game rules of which you set up… That is unfortunate but the difference in strength is apparent!" the man shrugged, his voice, the words he spoke, it all made Sugemi more and more angry. Sugemi crouched up and started yelling loud, he was doing just like sensei showed him, letting his anger flow through his body while his motivation of manga was threatened, it was now that Sugemi was at his angriest and at his strongest, just like sensei said, however, anger made him slower and reckless so his strength was worth nothing!

"First Gate: Gate of Opening… OPEN!" Sugemi yelled as chakra burst out of his body for a brief moment. This was not something he did in battle, only something he trained with. So far Sugemi had never used this in combat but when he was training this technique let him train at least five times more efficiently which meant five times more gain for same amount of training. Still, the technique was not something he could allow to last, it also wore down his own body and his body wasn't tough enough to stand even one gate for too long. "Eight Gates?!" his opponent exclaimed surprised as Sugemi used all of his briefly unlocked speed and the strength of his rage and desire to destroy this man, he slapped his hands together to form a handseal and yelled out in pain and rage, "Shadow Tendril Barrage!" as tendrils of chakra shot out of multiple pockets of his own body – Sugemi's own Nara technique tied around his body, striking his opponent repeatedly from any source of shadow in his body.

The technique connected, the surprise of seeing the Eight Gates being used by his opponent seemed to open up the man's guard and allow Sugemi to catch him unprepared, the fists pummeled his opponent and the Nara gave him no chance to recover, he went all out allowing his chakra to continuously burst prolonging both his One Gate and his Shadow Tendril variant. It was such an exhausting technique that Sugemi needed mastery over his own body to perform it and not collapse, only while using the First Gate could the boy manage to pull Shadow Tendril Barrage off even if theoretically it was just multiple quick succession strikes of a Shadow Tendril technique that he used quite casually.

"No!" Sugemi shouted in his own mind, he could feel pain and exhaustion in his arms, his actual body was crumbling on using so much chakra and the strain of the gates. Sugemi's body was still quite puny, he wasn't used to it being pushed too far so even the First Gate was straining enough to be the boy's limit. No! No more limits! Just one more! "Shadow FIIIIST!" Sugemi yelled as the multiple Shadow Tendrils quickly wrapped around his arm forming a bigger version of his fist. His punch hit the man in the jaw, the boy felt a rush, he felt like he still had something in him and that if he didn't use that last amount of force his opponent will stand up, him standing meant Sugemi's defeat and death, death meant no manga for him, that was unacceptable! The boy roared as he pushed his fist to fling his opponent back using all of his force.

Just as the woman in a black dress settled on a small wall, built entirely out of discarded household things like ovens and washing machines she looked at the home – she still couldn't quite understand what was going on, her partner was in there, right? Why did he make that boy's chakra dip so much? It was like he was getting closer and closer to death but at the same time – Dorimi was struggling as well, his chakra took some dips too meaning he must've used a technique of some sort to defend but… His flow was calmer which meant he was in no danger of…

The entire damn scrap house collapsed as the side wall burst open with her partner flying out through it! The woman even jumped out of surprise, what kind of force can cause something like that? That wasn't the amount of force a genin should be capable of putting out. A boy walked out through the hole just before the whole thing went down, no, he just barely stumbled out – his body was strained, just like his teammate this kid was giving his all, did he even know he was fighting a Jounin? Then again, it didn't seem like Dorimi was doing much more than defending… The man that was flung out by something the genin did stood up, his Earth Armor collapsed! No. That wasn't even it, the man wiped blood coming out of his lip that was open, he spat some to the side – this kid caused Dorimi damage!

The kid fell down, just like that other one that faced the woman, he used all of his remaining force to keep his body at least on his knees with just one arm to keep him from kissing dirt. He was huffing heavily and sweating profusely – he was in no fighting condition but… This kid… He'd go places if he didn't die a youngling. "Hey! Stop playing, let's go, the cover's blown, let's proceed with takedown." the woman yelled from atop a barrier of junk.

"I see…" Dorimi spoke, he then quickly stomped the ground shooting multiple rock pillars that surrounded Sugemi and pressed against his body – an efficient way to keep him from making more trouble. Now that the man could safely use his Earth Release he settled this in just an instant! "You're a fool, stay here so that you don't hurt yourself any more than you already have. You pack a punch though, well done." the man replied as he picked up his bandana off the ground and tossed his broken shades away revealing warm and funny green eyes. "Let's go, Shibari-chan…" the man addressed the woman on the fence, "I assume you will now put on your glasses in that case? Your aim is horrible without them?" he smiled as the woman pulled out a pair from behind and put them on. "Yes, sadly it is, barely can see a thing without them, having to aim using sensory alone is weird, fighting genin like that doesn't bother me but that Kirigakure ninja will be trouble."

The two ninja head out their way, leaving Sugemi struggle and kick around trying to break out of the improvised prison he was left in. The head was the only thing he could use so the Nara kept trying to break the stone with it, however nothing was achieved but drawing his own blood. Sadly using the gates made his body more vulnerable after use too…


	21. The Demon of Kirigakure

By the time that the brief scuffle in Ooguchi's house resolved and the magician got the man where she wanted him to be the Sun had already almost set. There were only the small light sources that were coming from the room – small candle like lights placed in various spots of the room. They were artificial, mechanical but they tried to imitate the real thing and only glowed like the real thing, dimly as no doubt was the intention of their maker. Mana had never seen such objects, people in Ooguchi's little "community" were amazing and crafty people, they had to be to survive…

"So… What do you want to talk about then?" the man asked the young kunoichi finally breaking the silence. Mana's eyes switched back to those filled with spite and rage, she usually was a peaceful soul but right now she was blazing inside and had no tolerance for men like Ooguchi. There was a part of her that wanted to activate the tags on his back and make him suffer. She extended her hand forward, still holding her hand in the handseal position as if to remind him that she has Ooguchi in her complete control. "There is not that much that I want you to do. We will be taking these people over from you, if you have any wisdom in there at all you'll leave this country and will never be seen again."

Ooguchi's fat body twitched, Mana knew what that meant, she did not activate the tags though, this was an attack made out of desperation and it posed no danger to her. The young genin lifted her leg up with a kick to meet the man's face, the silly chubby tried to literally bite the girl's arm off but Mana's arm was not where his oversized jaw chomped, instead her boot kicked right into the outside of the man's jaw. Ooguchi rolled back on the floor, whining in pain, the man spat out two gigantic for a human being teeth, they looked like they were tools of death, they had to be at least the size of a brick. "Did you just try to bite my arm off?" Mana asked completely confused? Why would anyone do that? That was not an attempt to kill, that was an attempt to injure her – even if Ooguchi had succeeded Mana would've still been able to activate the tags with just one arm. He was just insane…

"You can forget it…" a loud, artificial voice echoed throughout the room Mana was in making both the girl and the man she was fighting jump up in surprise. The voice had no man to claim ownership of it, it was just a sound that came from one of the multiple areas in the room that were pitch black from the absolute darkness and as the Sun went down and the artificial lights were not powered up the darkness was slowly increasing in size. Within just ten minutes of the magician being in the room the area corrupted by complete darkness grew from nothingness to at least one fifth of the total size of the room.

"After all, Ooguchi is a slimy snake, if you let him go he'd just climb back to where he is now." the almost cybernetic in nature voice came from the darkness again, this time followed by a loud whistling noise. Mana's hand shot forward to try and intercept it but… A blade hooked to a chain dug deep into Ooguchi's flesh. The man seemed to barely even notice it until he turned around and saw it, then he started shouting into the darkness completely ignoring Mana. "No… Wait… I'll, I'll pay… Come on… It was a joke…" he then turned to Mana and started crawling towards her with teary eyes. "Come on… Girl… He's lying, you're kind, you'll help me, right? I'll disappear just like you told me to…" the second blade on a chain dug into the man's back, completely ignored by the large figure of Ooguchi.

"Begging her will do you no good. She'll be dead too by the time you'll be found. She and her stupid friends actually served me well. I was wondering how to pull off this perfect crime – kill a Konohagakure businessman and disappear without a trace… Just like sensei taught me." Two more blades flew at the colossal man and wrapped around him instead of having the blades dig into his body. The chains were then pulled back resulting in Ooguchi being completely bound by the steel chains. "Did you know, girl, that tags can be set off not only by the user's chakra but also by any source of fire chakra?" the creepy voice came again as flames erupted briefly illuminating a man standing in one of the corners, hiding on a wooden beam right near the roof.

Mana knew what he meant by that, right after his words reached her she dashed back – she wanted to save Ooguchi but… She wouldn't have even gotten to the chains before the whole place would've went up in flames. A gigantic explosion went off, Ooguchi's tags were detonated by the man's Fire Release technique, Mana didn't make it in time – the explosion caught her and tossed her right through the scrap door, she was supposed to feel lucky. The crippling pain reminded her that she was still alive and the crumbling noise of falling debris suggested that the entire house was blown the hell up. Mana felt pain everywhere, she felt warm streams of blood going down her back, some areas of her body that were cut by the scrap wall she flew through. Her entire face was burning – it must've been cut in multiple places… So much for her performances for a couple of months…

Hair… So much hair was in her way… Mana peeled her head off the ground and looked at what used to be Ooguchi's home. No trace of it remained, no trace of Ooguchi himself, no trace of his assassin. That person, who was it? The guard mentioned that Ooguchi was having some sort of a deal with someone from Kiri, someone who obviously should've been a pretty powerful guy to move between villages with less than stellar relationship and working so deep underground. So maybe this assassin was him? The Kirigakure ninja that was having the deal with Ooguchi, and since Shimo went to intercept the deal… Oh God! Did that mean that Shimo died!? No… That couldn't have been true! Mana shouted out in pain as her entire body felt like it was covered with fire as it stood up. She tore off what little remained of her jacket, her uniform was completely messed up, just enough remained to keep her dignity intact…

Such powerful devastation, the man must've killed himself too, what the hell was that all about? He couldn't possibly have ran away, he had to hold the chains… A figure walked through the flames, since the house was mostly built out of junk and scrap it must've been Ooguchi's gigantic carcass that was fueling the flame. "Just a clone, magician girl, I very much plan to live through this." the artificial voice spoke again. Only now the magician had a brief chance to get a look at the man, he was dressed just like a ninja that clung to shadows would've been dressed like – a black but slick armor. It must've been made from some sort of cloth but some areas like the face and chest had tougher protection, made from steel or other protective layer. The armor was decorated, the whole cloth part looked like the skin, the protective parts tried to emulate human skeleton with his face being most over the top of all – even with miniature couple of fingers sized demon horns at the end. His whole body was wrapped in chains, those were without a doubt his main long range weapon.

"You may want me to kill you and be over with it. That'll have to wait for one second. I sadly have a fatal flaw, I really love to tell people things, sensei says one day that'll kill me so he keeps beating me half to death every time I try to explain my victim how I got them and how I'll kill them. Sensei tells me I am a prodigy, a genius even and as such I want my mind to be understood, I want my victims to know just how good their killer is." He started talking with that annoying voice again. Mana wasn't sure if it was something that he needed to breathe, like a breathing apparatus inside that ridiculous outfit of his or maybe just so his voice isn't recognized, he pressed something at the side of his neck and the artificial voice stopped. When he spoke Mana's body shook in anger and shock.

"You may recognize my voice. Yes, I am the guy that gave you the tip in the first place. You see this mission is sort of an initiation ritual, initiation into being an elite assassin. I was given the task to kill a man in Konohagakure, an influential man no less. Assassins always have to raise as little noise as possible, then again, I am also a perfectionist so I wanted my presence to not even be known. Then I heard you three talking about Ooguchi's thing, imagine my surprise, three young weakling ninja looking for the man I am trying to find ways of killing silently… Your expression betrays you, girl. You get it, don't you?" the man spoke with pride behind his voice, he was PROUD of having just killed a man, he was proud of what he was about to do too. He was proud of it all.

He was right, Mana knew what he did, he planted them, played them so that they got to Ooguchi so that then this guy kills them and Ooguchi and puts it on their heads. He framed their names, he was going to kill Mana, Shimo and Sugemi, no, he was doing more than that. On top of their deaths he will also mix their memories with dirt, their names will go down in history as names of murderers, ninja that one day just decided to kill a man inside their own village. Man loved by the people that the same man secretly enslaved… Mana was so stupid, why did she get involved? Now she brought shame to her entire family, she burned down every bit of fame her father worked for, she would be the person that ruins the family name that father made from nothing. All that her father did, she would undo… Mana's merciful heart filled with rage once again. She couldn't keep it in anymore, if she would die today she'd go fighting.

Mana shouted out, that was her roar of pride and rage, she charged forward at the man who obviously was not expecting it, probably wasn't even done talking yet. Her first kick surprised the assailant and it landed right onto his cheek just like the girl had intended it to go. Mana always wanted to make an improvised style of martial arts, one focused on kicking just so she could reach further, keep people away for her actual strategy to be used on them more efficiently. She may as well play with what she'll never get to anyways… Mana's kick seemed to hurt the man, what the magician girl perceived as armor barely absorbed the shock and it cocked the man's head to the side. This was her chance, she got the hit in, she dazed the man, she may as well make him work for that kill! Mana's legs danced gracefully as she kicked wherever she could find an opening in, the head, the chest, wherever she saw none of that ridiculous skeleton-like protection of armor her feet went for. As one leg got tired of attacking, the kunoichi switched to the other. She must've kicked him so many times but the man just stood there and took it, he didn't stumble back, he didn't fall… This was bad.

Both of her legs got tired, Mana was grunting and huffing openly as her relentless barrage of kicks made her defeat herself by exhausting her. NO! This was absolutely not the time to give up, she would fight with all she had, if she would die in the end she'd make the man lose more than couple of teeth from getting kicked in the jaw. The young genin dashed backwards tossing explosive tags in the air, just in time as the man had planned to counter her kick with a punch of his own which would've sent Mana down, kicking made one only have one leg of footing which was not a solid ground, one simple hit would've sent her down. Now the assassin dove right into the cloud of papers, the last of Mana's explosive tags went into the air. The magician made handseals and shouted out proudly "Friendly Gust Jutsu!" usually the technique was used to deliver the tags from one point to the other with a gust of wind – this time it was just to faze her opponent so that he stood still while she detonated the tags.

Mana made the seal, at that moment she did not think if the tags would kill the man or not, she just went all out, ridding herself of both most of her chakra and all of her regrets. As the chain of explosions riddled the area Mana's hands weighed down and her body hunched a little. Never has the dirt looked more comfortable and cozy than at that moment. Mana felt pulsing around her eyes and in her head, she knew this feeling, the feeling of being almost out of chakra. Her recent experience with this helped her better understand her limits, had she not spent too much in the archive in Forest of Death she may have spent too much here, tried to follow up this technique with something else… No, her "Magical Explosive Combo" was complete. As Mana breathed more and more heavily she wondered if the man had died.

Sharp pain – her opponent flashed out of nowhere with the kind of speed that would've probably made Tanshu-sensei proud. He dodged that combination with so little time to react! And yet… This was not the speed of a Jounin, in fact Mana saw that same kind of speed from Shimo. Could this man have been a genin?! A genin trained by the elite assassins so much that he transcended the lines of ranks? His body was trained just as much as Shimo's he must've been of around the same age. Mana's body stumbled backwards, at this point the girl almost felt no pain, adrenalin flooded all over her body. She heard the man's cloth rustle in the cold night's wind, "MOVE!" she ordered herself inside of her mind but her body froze. The man's arms worked like a machinegun, he attacked using his palms, just like Mana used to, the difference was that this man was much stronger and much better trained. He punched so fast, just as pain of one strike reached the magician's brain he was hitting in multiple other areas. And yet… He was not perfect, all this disguise of him being a Demon of Kirigakure and he still was breathing heavily.

The man jumped backwards flipping his legs and finishing his combination of blows with a backflip kick right in Mana's chin. The magician could've sworn that she lifted off the ground. Everything was white, was she dead? No… There were some loud voices all around her, buzzing inside of her head and then they all went away just as spontaneously as they came to be… She was alive. Mana could feel the pain of being alive, the reality that felt worse than dying at that moment. Pain all over, the bleeding cuts all over her body made her hair that were all over the ground feel sticky. She heard the man huffing! He was getting tired of annihilating Mana. That was just what the girl needed, a sign that all of this struggling was not in vain… What was she talking about? Of course it was not in vain, she was Nakotsumi Mana, the young woman that one day would change the world! Make human life be worth of something, this goal could not possibly be a vain one! Mana's eyes turned at her opponent, he jerked his hands to the side as blade claws shot out of his fingertips. "Don't worry, magician girl…" the man said while huffing, he finally then realized his mistake, revealing to his victim that he too was human, the assassin quickly flicked his cyber voice back on.

"These claws going through your neck will not hurt one bit, it'll end it all fast, you've fought valiantly, maybe even valiantly enough for me to care to get your name before I end this." the self-appointed demon spoke. The girl closed her eyes, the man took it as a sign she was giving up, truth be told – Mana was ordering her body one last move. The man's arm shot forward, his claws dug deep into the girl's neck, but something was wrong, in a poof of smoke her body disappeared and a piece of scrap iron was there in her place. "Substitution?" the cybernetic voice spoke to himself, a punch to the jaw silenced him. "My name… Is Nakotsumi Mana!" Mana shouted out as she started punching wildly, she was just as skilled at close range combat as a genin that did not specialize in it, that often got underrated, she certainly enough was no match for this man but… She'd make him sweat for his victory!

The two opponents started exchanging blows, Mana kept striking but her attacks were blocked one after the other. This man felt like he was impossible to hit, her every punch, every kick he pushed away with a simple flick of his wrist, it looked almost like he was resting throughout this entire struggle! His move economy was impossible, not a single movement was unnecessary. Mana had had enough of that brief exchange of blows to know where this struggle would lead her, she needed a ninjutsu technique but could she afford it? At her current exhausted state she'd have to be pretty cheap and use some of her weaker ones and that was never something the kunoichi liked to do. The young one kicked the man with all her might as he effortlessly blocked it with both of his hands, slightly slipping backwards, giving Mana that distance she so desperately needed as the girl weaved the handseals and…

The Demon's elbow dug deep into her gut. Mana just let out a single gasp of pain and surprise. Her mind turned off… She couldn't remember anything from that point as everything blurred and went white. There was just her weightlessness and her body hitting the ground but it no longer mattered… The assassin flicked his hand again getting his claws out, his last set was discarded as they were bent up and dulled from hitting solid scrap. "And that is how the magician dies…" he spoke thrusting his arm aiming at the girl's neck!

A loud clang broke the assassin out of his ecstasy – Shimo's wakizashi clashed with the man's claws sending a barrage of sparks out in the air! Mana was lucky not to have seen the face of her friend, this Shimo was smiling and enjoying the fact that he was about to be in a fight for his life. How could he not? He was looking for a chance like this whole day! "Who on Earth are you!?" the Demon grunted, trying to win the clash against Shimo's blade and cut Mana's arteries open, but Shimo's wicked bloodthirsty smile only grew wider. "Mana-chan is out, good, means I don't have to hold back, she won't be mad at me for kicking your butt with all I've got!" he grunted back at the assassin.


	22. Blizzard Cut VS Infernal Chains

Shimo and the assassin struggled with their clash, each trying to push the other away with the assassin still trying to dig his claws into Mana's neck. Shimo smiled, something that the man facing off against him found annoying, "What's so funny?" he asked, "You need a break? You look like you're just coming from a beating of your life…" the assassin tried to regain his intimidation factor by noting the injuries all over Shimo's body from his encounter with the jounin earlier. "It's funny…" Shimo spoke still holding the clash of his blade with the assassin's claws firmly, "Mana-chan always believed that no person is ever unnecessary, that all life is sacred… I think right now I am bound to agree with her." Shimo spoke.

"What the hell are you on about? She got beaten by her own idiocy, she was so careful and foolish to try and set a trap for Ooguchi that she did most damage to herself when it blew into her face. She is a failure and she deserves the shame her death will bring to her." the Demon pushed his claws, trying to win the clash but unsuccessfully. Shimo just chuckled and shouted out loud as he shoved his blade with the last of his strength, the assassin's claws broke off of the device that held them to his fingertips, using this victory to its fullest the Yuki kicked right into the assassin's armor sending him sliding through the mud several feet back. Loud cracks started erupting all over the protective surface of the man's fancy outfit as the night-black protection of the tough material that absorbed blows to his chest and head crumbled. Suddenly the Demon of Kirigakure found himself standing with just a black jumpsuit and a simple black cloth mask covering his face.

"You had a pretty fancy outfit, protected in several areas making it hard to near impossible for a blade to land a solid hit. I'm not sure what Mana-chan's intentions were fighting you, she's a peaceful girl that hates fighting but… It's entirely possible that she wanted to make it easy for me and Sugemi to take you out by leaving you exposed. Cloth offers less resistance to cold steel than whatever you had on there, also now that stupid voice of yours shuts up!" Shimo swung his wakizashi to the side and stood back into the fighting stance, spreading his legs wide to have better solid footing, lifting his blade into the air and ready to strike. "Plus, it looks like she gave you some trouble, even if she didn't want to fight you to begin with…" Shimo never dropped his wicked smile for a bit, it felt great finally facing an opponent closer to his level, whatever that jounin meant by this guy being troublesome, he had this in the bag!

"I see… You believe that you are in some sort of advantage over me because your friend who is unconscious in the mud just waiting to be finished off removed my armor and made me huff a bit? My skin may be exposed now…" the assassin's body suddenly disappeared, within just a blink of an eye he closed the distance to Shimo, the boy swung his blade trying to hit the man's eyes with a slash, blinding him for life, it took the Demon a simple ducking motion to avoid the blade as his palm was thrusted right into the boy's body – opening it up for a combination of blows. "But feeling cloth rubbing against my skin…" punch to the gut, "Or cold night's breeze sending chills through it…" diagonal upwards blow to the jaw, "Or there being no protection on my chest making it hard to breathe…" downwards kick to the side of the neck with the shin, "No tough plastic to get in the way of my muscles tensing…" double punch to the nose, "It only makes my body more primal… Faster, stronger…" a combination of crushing blows to the chest leaving no air in the boy's lungs, "More ruthless" a blow from the side of his arm covering all the way from his chest to the face, sending the boy down to the dirt with his friend, where he belongs.

The Demon was surprised to see that his relentless combination of blows did not keep the already beaten up boy down, instead of staying down the little swordsman used the momentum from him being blown back to roll back right on his feet and stay on his knees at the very least. Shimo clenched his nose, it spat out some blood, he could taste blood in his mouth and breathing hurt just the same as getting punched. This man seemed to favor quantity of blows over strength, he attacked a lot of times, covered many areas but he never really packed a lot of force behind single blow. Still, if Shimo lets him up close again and wastes his reach advantage that the wakizashi grants him he's as good as done. Nothing would stop the man from snapping his neck if he wanted to… Shit. This had to be it – Shimo had to go all out but could he? Could he use THAT in his current condition? Could he be fast enough? There was only one way to find out, the boy smiled and laughed out raising his blade up and taking a defensive fighting stance.

"You know… Not long ago, before leaving, sensei gave each of us a training session, one on one, told us bunch of stuff, where we were strong, where we needed training, mostly how stupid and hopeless we were…" Shimo spoke as he threw his wakizashi into the air with all of his might and made some handseals. "I am Shimo Yuki, of the Yuki clan, I can use the famous Ice Release and am the only active ninja in Konoha with this ability." The boy kept speaking, his opponent did not attack, he was now on the defense, it was obvious that he didn't want to be up close to the boy when he uses his ace technique. Shimo's wakizashi slammed into the mud and stayed driven into the ground handle up. "Do you know what the most astounding advantage for a swordsman is? Speed. Good old raw speed… Do you know how to achieve speed? Speed is very relative, you can become faster… Or you can make your opponent slower… Do you know what cold does to your body?" Shimo smiled as a powerful chilling gust rose up making it impossible for anyone to move around.

The boy's technique drew water out of the air and froze it, he created a small artificial blizzard around the area making it hard to see, hard to move around and for those that did not share his bloodline and weren't used to this technique it slowed down their reaction time and their movement. Shimo smiled as he reduced the blizzard to one compact twister around his opponent, it did no damage to the enemy and barely threatened his life, but it weakened his body which in terms made Shimo look fast. "Blizzard Cut – Two Slashes!" Shimo whispered to himself as he dashed forward with all of his speed that training bukijutsu helped him gain. "Too slow!" the assassin shouted out trying to outshout the howling gale of a blizzard but he felt sharp pain and warm stream of blood shooting out. A tap of Shimo's foot alarmed him that the child swordsman was already behind him, the assassin tried to turn around but he dashed through again. The blizzard stopped after the second slash as Shimo sheathed his short blade.

"Sure to you I seemed slow…" Shimo spoke with certain spark of arrogance in his voice, this was something sensei had told him back then that helped him make this technique, no this style – using Yuki Ice Release to make his enemies slower, to distract them and ruin their chances to dodge or counter. "Your trained eyes saw me move from a mile away, ordering your trained body to counter but the problem was you were in shock, you were freezing, your trained body was just too slow to respond." Blood shot out of the assassin's body as Shimo's blade cut his flesh and left cuts in his clothes and his body instead of damaging his Demon's armor. The man was breathing heavily on his knees, he was injured and bleeding, he was moderately tired. "You little pests!" he yelled out from sheer rage, his body disappeared again, only to reappear right in front of Shimo.

The man's elbow quickly dug right into the boy's cheek, this attack was different, he put actual effort behind this one hit, he was slower but stronger! "Why do you stupid kids have to make this all so difficult!?" he yelled while kicking Shimo in the chest and reaching behind his back. "Weapon?" the genin instantly recognized the danger and tensed his body for a response. "Just stop trying to cause me trouble and die like good little Konoha weaklings!" the assassin shouted out grabbing two of his chain blades and using them like swords, Shimo's wakizashi just barely got in time to block them. The Demon's knee pushed the boy away, he already knew enough of the boy's physical strength not to contend with him in a clash. Seeing how the chains were already in his hands the Demon tossed both of the blades right at the boy. "Shit!" Shimo cursed swinging his blade to deflect the projectiles. Sharp pain came from his side as well as a warm torrent of blood went down and started dropping on the dirt.

Shimo managed to deflect one of the two chain-blades but one of them went right into his side. They weren't too large, just about as large as a small knife so they posed no immediate threat from a single stab but it was what the assassin was going to do with this successful hit that intimidated Shimo. "One, huh?" the opponent grunted with certain amount of disappointment and grabbed the chain that held the blade with his arm, pulling Shimo in at close distance. The chain blade ripped out of the boy's body but the force still pulled him in, the boy already knew he'd be dead if the man got his hands on him, he wasn't going to give him the chance, this was his fight! He was going to win! Shimo didn't resist the pull and the momentum, he used it by jumping into the air and dropkicking the man making his wound shoot blood like crazy. The boy loudly grunted from the pain but quickly jumped back on his feet and swung his wakizashi aiming at the man's throat. As much as Shimo wanted to respect Mana's beliefs, the girl was goddamn crazy if she wanted to take this guy in alive…

A loud clang echoed throughout the alleyway that the genin was fighting in as another set of Demon's claws blocked the swing. Shimo yelled out from pure rage and turned around kicking right to the assassin's chin sending him down on the ground. He was injured, he was tired, his reaction time wasn't that great. The fact that the Demon took this kick made Shimo believe in his victory again. The boy dashed backwards clenching to the wound that the chain-blade left on his side, a hand proved to be a poor barrier for blood, Shimo felt the weakness all over his body already. He had to end this soon or he risked just collapsing from his bleeding. The boy made some handseals again, "Ice Wolf Jutsu!" he yelled out making a cold gust of wind, unlike the one he used in the Forest of Death this one was twisting around himself with a head of the wolf shaping just couple of feet above Shimo's head. The boy's feet kicked his body out forward in a dash, it was pretty lucky that he could use a wakizashi with just one hand while clenching his wound with the other.

The boy dashed right through his opponent slashing him with the blade, a loud clang echoed as his blade was blocked with the claws again but this was not just another slash. Shimo finally recovered from his dash and sheathed his blade again with a smile just barely distinguishable from the pain. "White Wolf Slash" Shimo whispered under his own nose as blood shot out of the Demon's shoulders. This was Shimo's strongest combination, if this didn't keep the Demon down he'd be left with very few options. Shimo's brother who used to be a ninja in Kirigakure but was not allowed to be one in Konoha used "Ice Wolf" as a projectile of Ice Release, Shimo made the technique his. If his opponent blocks Shimo's swing, there was still the gust above his head cutting with multiple shards of ice to deal with, eight gashes to deal with – it was almost like an actual wolf was on the boy's back attacking his enemy together.

"A sneaky technique…" the voice of his rising enemy made Shimo afraid, "But the slash of the icy slicing winds is much less dangerous than your blade, the icicles were not as sharp, not as strong. Your exhaustion betrays you." The Demon definitely looked more demonic with each injury he received, his top was torn up by cuts and gashes, his mask had small holes and was covered with blood but… Somehow revelation of his humanity behind this nameless symbol of a demon only made him look that more supernatural. "He's just a man, you just messed up your cut… It's you… Not him…" Shimo tried desperately to convince himself this was his fault, that he just slipped up because no one had the strength to take his "White Wolf Slash", only Tanshu sensei withstood it but only with a kenjutsu technique of his own – "Red Cerberus Draw" a triple cut technique that makes the user draw and sheathe in rapid succession three times, doing it so incredibly fast that it looks like one slash from different angles. Even against such a technique… "White Wolf" cut through one of Tanshu-sensei's draws, Tanshu-sensei only won the clash because his technique was composed of three strikes so the two other strikes hit the boy knocking him out…

"Now it's just a matter of time…" the Demon lifted his body up, his hands were still weighed down and he was breathing heavily but he was clearly doing better than Shimo who probably was about to go down any time soon. The two charged at each other, it was blades against claws again as each one of the two swung their weapon trying to cut the other, the assassin's moves were predictable, had they not been, Shimo may have skipped a couple of strikes but the way things went – the two were absolutely equal. They clashed with every strike, it seemed like the man's injuries compensated Shimo's own exhaustion. The two kept trying to find openings, switching their attacking sides, attacking high and low, left and right, diagonally, upwards and downwards and nothing worked, every time one cut, the other blocked it and responded with a thrust or slash of their own. Obviously the Kirigakure Demon was the more masterful combatant – his weapon had a couple of times shorter range compared to Shimo's blade but mastery and skill had no role to play here, this was a brutal exchange of blows, mastery and precision was long since forgotten, this was just two young men trying to kill each other.

Shimo roared loud trying to lob his opponent's head off or just open his throat but the Demon thrust both his hands forward launching a flock of sparks and pushing both men down on the dirt. The two crawled backwards and stood back up, both of them were struggling to breathe, desperately trying not to collapse. Shimo's wound was still spitting up blood in weak but relentless torrents but the Kirigakure assassin must've had more wounds to worry about. The assassin laughed and clenched his ribs that may have been injured. Blood was hard to see in all of that black cloth. "You know… My official rank is… Genin!" the man kept on laughing. "That is the difference between our villages, in my village a prodigy genin is capable of passing through your stupid defenses, one of me is enough to kill all of your stupid generation… Come, send all of your genin my way, send chuunin or jounin… You will only honor me more! There is no greater honor for a Kirigakure assassin than to die against many more skilled opponents after a successful kill!" Shimo slapped his dizzy head with his palm, "Gosh you sound like the darn Yoruma so much… I hate those guys…"

"I may be from the Yoruma clan, a clan of proud and unstoppable assassins or I may not be – you will never know because I have no history, no name, no face… I am a mystery to you and your pathetic village." the demon removed his mask and showed his true face – a face of a young man, perhaps sixteen years of age, not more, covered with scars and one that clearly has taken a beating or two in his life, his black messy and greasy hair went all over his pale face, he reminded a madman, a berserker much more than a Demon now. "Even when you see my face, even if you have my body you'd see but a void, there is no name to tag to that face, no meaning, no man. What is a letter to a man who cannot read?!" Both of the men simultaneously made handseals, the assassin spat out a small fireball, Shimo rolled out of its way and set out another small blizzard – this was the last of his chakra. This had to do! Both the assassin and Shimo dashed at each other, "Blizzard Cut!" Shimo shouted out loud aiming at the assassin's body that was shivering from the sudden cold around him as the Demon of Kirigakure swung at Shimo with two more chain-blades in his hand, using them as knives. Unfortunately the blades of the two clashed, the clash shot out such blinding sparks and the noise was so loud that the two youths were temporarily deafened and blinded, or maybe that was not the bright sparks, but a figment of their burning souls, maybe it was not the deafening clang of steel clashing, but a small demonstration of their prideful roars of rage, but their own exhaustion…

The two ran past each other, the Demon dashed out of the small area of the artificial blizzard and Shimo's body slid through the mud. Both of the men fell down on their knees. Tearing sounds came from the assassin's side, the man straightened his body out and tore his cloth off, revealing his bare cut up muscular chest, it was hard to tell which of his scars he earned this day, which ones were from his gruesome training. Shimo coughed up, he fell on the ground. The Demon looked at his enemy, "You cut me first, my blade barely scrapped you and yet you collapsed… It seems that Galateia, the Goddess of War is in my favor." The assassin spoke to an empty street, he wanted to peel his body off of his knees, lift his chain-blades, walk up to Shimo and kill him, then proceed with his magician friend… He couldn't… He was just too tired. The man closed his eyes and put his black dirty mask back on, the mask that only showed his brown eyes. "Sensei… I will not fail you, I will not shame you any more than I've shamed you while fighting enemies of my rank and not finishing them off immediately." The Demon mumbled under his nose and stood up, creeping up to Shimo. The chains were too heavy, he let them slip off of his body and down to the dirt. He'll do it the old fashion way – with his own shaking exhausted and bleeding hands.

His hands wrapped around the magician girl's neck, she passed out first – she'd come back first as well. The man applied pressure, strangling an unconscious body was weird, it offered no resistance, how was he supposed to know when she was dead? Suddenly a loud rumbling noise alerted the young man making him jump backwards from the girl's body and just in time to dodge a giant rock flying his way. The rock flew past into the distance and took down a small scrap iron home. The boy's tired half naked and bleeding body turned at his new opponent's – a man with a bandana and a pair of shades and a woman with a black dress and glasses. "Is this a bad time?" the lady asked, mocking him. "Come! I am the Demon of Kirigakure, I will tear you down with my bare hands!" the young man's body tensed up as he shouted loud at the duo.

"Well then… Shall we?" the man fixed his shades.


	23. Night of the Demon Ends! Resolution

Without hesitation, the young now unmasked and injured assassin charged at his two opponents. Dorimi, the male jounin with shades weaved a single handseal and slammed his foot to the ground, a large pillar of rock shot up blocking the assassin's path. However the Demon of Kirigakure was nimble, his foot quickly rose as he stood on his toes and his entire body twisted around the rising pillar. He thought to continue his charge but then froze and his body was thrown backwards as Shibari's senbon hit him right in the chest and his shoulders. The young man rolled on the dirt and grunted in pain before slowly getting up and removing them.

"We weren't done talking yet." Dorimi remarked nonchalantly, "What did you mean before, saying this little brat could give us trouble, Shibari-chan?" The woman's eyes closed, judging from the assassin's eyes he would've loved to exploit this opportunity but with all of his injuries and exhaustion he was now almost glued low to the dirt. "The Sorceress kid is alive, her chakra is slowly going down which means she's in danger of dying eventually. Strangely enough the Yuki swordsman's chakra is on the verge of death but it is not too excited over crossing this boundary, he is in much worse condition than his teammate but she is in more danger as her condition worsens slowly while that of the Yuki does not. I'd say we have five to ten minutes to deal with this, the girl might slip into coma within half an hour or so with the rate her chakra is dropping. Be careful, your body seems hurt too, your chakra has taken a large dip too, fighting that youngster tired you out, close range combatants naturally trouble me so… We'll win, for sure, but this won't be pretty."

The young man rose from the dirt and wiped the mud off of his bleeding wounds. He laughed maniacally before his face froze in cold expression. "I've never killed jounin before but I enjoy when my opponents act cocky, I love to see that cockiness leave their face, is that the expression you will make?" he asked looking at the two jounin. He was confused that the woman in the black dress did not attempt to hide that her partner was injured and tired, why would she not be afraid to expose the weakness of her team? If such was the extent of the Konoha jounin stupidity, the Demon will grant them their deaths by rubbing that very same idiocy into their faces. He's beaten two genin already, they were pitiful and weak, how much stronger can jounin of such weak village be? Zero multiplied by any number is still zero. The young assassin believed in his training that his sensei granted him, this knowledge, this skill, this abuse and pain that made him grow strong. It will not bring shame to his village!

Dorimi made one more handseal raising four more pillars from the ground. "I don't believe you know who you are facing off against. I am Dorimi – the jounin of Konoha. My ability to manipulate the battlefield is without equal as I believe that battlefield advantage makes a won battle." Shibari fixed her glasses, she was annoyed by her partner's theatrics, "For example, my partner Shibari is one of the best Water Release users in the village but Water Release users are weaker without a source of water, sure, they can usually use the water from their own bodies or the air but their potency with an active water source nearby is multiplied tenfold." Dorimi leapt back onto one of his pillars as the four rock formations started to spin around and close in on each other, quickly grinding an open hole into the ground. Dorimi leapt into the air and weaved more handseals, "Water Style: Great Waterfall!" he yelled out spitting a large amount of water from his mouth onto the newly generated hole creating a pool of water.

"These so called jounin are fools! They give me intel on their abilities. Normally I'd be honored to die fighting them after a completed job but… This information would be useful for Mizukage-sama and more importantly – sensei!" the assassin thought to himself. The body of the young man rose up, he overpowered his own bodily limits. How could he not? He now got another purpose, another assignment – survive and deliver this intelligence to sensei. Dorimi – the battlefield ninja who can shape the battlefield for a strategic advantage and Shibari, a mysterious woman with Water Release techniques said to be the strongest of her elemental affinity. It'd have been even more ideal if the young man scoped their abilities, found weaknesses, all of this was going to be integral during the war!

Suddenly Dorimi's hands were slammed together as the rock he was standing on disappeared in the mud. The demon closed his eyes and reached for the ground, he was trained to fight after losing all of his senses, most genjutsu users were frail and weak when their opponent closed their eyes and shut off their vision. The young assassin felt the vibrations of the dirt and jumped sideways to avoid each of the rock pillars. "Such weakness… It would be a sin to let them…" unfortunately the boy did not finish his thoughts as a sharp kick hit him in the back sending him slamming right into the rock, breaking it into pieces. "Don't get cocky boy." Shibari spoke. The rock pillars were weak, most likely because the ground was so soft, they crumbled after just one hit but the young man felt the impact all over his body – his body had taken so much punishment and was literally breaking, collapsing after being able to take no more. Luckily the Demon knew how to fight with his bones broken, all he needed was to adapt, stop using movements that hurt the bones that were broken!

The assassin of the Mist removed his boots and closed his eyes. He needed to feel the movement of the earth while listening to the best of his abilities for the attacks of the woman – these two jounin worked quite well in tandem, they must've been a team that went through many hardships. That gave him an idea. What if the two were bonded? What if they were friends? Naturally working alone the Demon had no friends and no bonds but he knew that such a thing existed, despite being located in the body of his enemy these feelings were his friends, no, his tools to exploit. The Demon lunged forward, he heard rumbling of the ground and the man's fist hitting the rock, he was throwing a rocky projectile at the Demon, the young man rolled forward right under the rock, no, a small edge of the rock cut the assassin bruising his back, it hurt, pain did not matter. In the middle of his role the assassin pushed his body up using his arms and spread his legs wide spinning using his arms and kicking the Battlefield Ninja using his feet and knees repeatedly. The youth could hear the body of the man cracking, he could hear him grunting – the man really was injured and tired!

The Demon thrust his arm forward, aiming a rock-hard punch right to the man's neck, his fist would've broken the man's throat, made him unable to breathe and incapacitated, the Demon would then kill his first jounin and bring his head to his sensei! "No!" the mind of the assassin yelled inside his own head and stopped his arm in mid-air, sensing something around the man, something like an armor, something that'd hurt his arm without a doubt if struck the wrong way. It was then that the boy heard something, a rising gurgling sound – the woman in black! The youth rolled to the side as he heard sounds of crashing water. "Your Water Spout Jutsu missed? I thought your aim was spot-on?" Dorimi asked confused. Shibari fixed her glasses, "I wasn't aiming, I was watching your back." "I see…" the other jounin smiled as took off his shades and threw them away. Shibari laughed, "So you finally removed them? Gonna fight seriously?" Dorimi smiled "You do realize shades don't help you see in the dark, right? Actually they hinder my vision quite a bit…"

The Demon could not believe this, were these people making jokes? What was this? Were they not serious? Their lives were on the line! Not that the lives of the Battlefield Ninja and the woman in black mattered in the grand scale but to them it must've. The assassin lunged forward again, rising up from the dirt trying to attack the man with a combination of taijutsu blows. This time he decided to use his palms, thrust them to make impulses and shockwaves through the man's armor of dirt and shatter it, then finish it! Sharp strikes were the way against meat and bones, blunt blows and throws helped against armor and barriers. The man didn't even protect himself, not until the first blow of the Demon shattered the armor, strangely enough the woman did not aid the Battlefield Ninja, she just stood calmly and kept breathing calm, the assassin could've sworn that she even laughed out at some point. Were these two not friends and comrades, not even a bit in love perhaps? Had they no bonds like the Demon thought previously?

With a lock around the man's throat the young man drove the jounin to the ground and started suffocating him. The woman still did not interfere. Suddenly the boy felt his body being lifted off by something – a rocky platform? How could he not hear it? Then the young assassin's eyes shot wide open, only to see the Battlefield ninja wearing rock like a glove, trying to slam the assassin between the two rocks. A crushing shockwave emanated through the district as the assassin's body was crushed and then poofed into smoke, the youth managed to replace his body using "Substitution" with a scrap piece of junk at the last moment and was breathing heavily further away. This jounin was smart, he moved the pillar incredibly slow, so slow that it only sent such small shocks to the ground around it that even with his entire body on the dirt the young man couldn't feel it. Had he not moved fast enough he'd be crushed by two rocks, even he couldn't have survived that impact, these jounin fought to kill…

"Is this hatchling giving you trouble?" the woman mocked her colleague, something that the man found annoying, "I let him get to me, I wanted him to grab me!" he yelled waving his arms like an idiot. These "jounin" of Konoha were pathetic, they did not behave like killers at all, it appeared that they were just playing a game. Such lightheadedness pissed the Demon off most of all. The youth weaved handseals and yelled out "Fire Style: Rooster's Tongue!" as he spat a giant spreading wave of flames. There it was! The two idiots were dead, they had to have been, the man was too busy bickering with his wench partner, both of them were deader than dead! The roar of flames was soon overcome by the roar of crashing water and the boy was washed back away by the flood. He slammed into the rumble of Ooguchi's house as the whole thing was washed away. It was that woman…

Pain was all over the assassin's body, the water he coughed up came together with pools of blood and his whole body was cracking and twisting as he tried to stand up. He was close to dying, this was his cue to try to escape. Make the two fools believe that the water killed him and just get away with the intel. These jounin were fools but they were still jounin and certainly too powerful for the young assassin in his current state. The youth started to crawl away, slowly and quietly, the woman may have been a sensor but she had to concentrate to sense chakra, plus his body was so mangled and beaten that she may not have even picked up his signature at all. That was the first thing sensei taught him, to only lose when he died. Keep moving, stay conscious unless he was dead. That took years of beatings and injuries and experiences to learn. "Oh shit…" was all that the Demon had the chance to think as the water wrapped around his leg and lifted him up into the air and slammed down into the dirt on the other side where he was trying to crawl. The heel of the woman called Shibari then dug sharp into his forehead, yet the assassin did not shame his sensei and his peers, he did not scream in pain!

It seemed like the water itself wrapped around the body of the assassin and the woman's fist then closed, "Water Bondage Jutsu!" she uttered as the pressure of the water pressed tight and broke his body. The assassin could not remember anything past that point. Dorimi scratched his head and looked at his partner, "Did you kill him?" Shibari coughed and then took off her glasses, "Don't joke around, he's a little bag of intelligence gold. I look forward to seeing how he responds to water filling his lungs only to retreat and then fill them again… His dark purplish hair… Might be a Yoruma, it'll be fun to torture the torturer for once." The woman winked at her partner. "Jeez you are cruel though, Shibari-chan, that technique was a bit too much for the boy." The woman turned around and formed a rope of water that she wrapped around her arm and the other end around the unconscious assassin, as she walked backwards the body of her prisoner got dragged together with her. "You're carrying Sorceress, Yuki and the Nara we left behind…" she casually finished the talk.

Mana's eyes slowly peeled open. Just as they opened to a certain degree sunlight instantly burst into her eyes. The girl tried to roll to the side but pain took over her body stopping that from happening. Her muscles felt like they were completely disabled and unused for days if not weeks. It took some getting used to, slowly, one by one the magician got the feel of her every limb. What happened? Was she still alive? The pain all over suggested that this couldn't have been the Afterlife, plus what did she do to deserve it yet? The growing feeling that she was alive begged another question – how did she survive? Did Shimo or Sugemi help her? That had to be it. The girl sat back up letting her feet dangle just an inch from the mat on the floor. Then came the painful part of standing up and stretching out.

Mana descended down the stairs, mother was busy in the kitchen, father was toying around looking over the death traps that the two were building before that last mission. Father looked at Mana with angry eyes, "Morning." he said and kept on looking at the trap, his movements were rough, but also precise, it took precision to know just how precise his movements could be before pain took over his arms. Mother didn't say anything, the chopping of the octopus in the kitchen intensified hundredfold though – it was obvious that the woman was angry. There was a huge "talk" brewing in the future, Mana's head dipped down, she messed up big time. Something wrapped around her, the girl lifted her head letting her dark locks slip to the side as she saw mother's arms around her.

"You could've died…" was all that she said. "Your mother's right, what you and your teammates did was irresponsible and stupid, you're lucky that Hokage-sama is away, he'd have taken your licenses away and you would've never went on another mission for a hundred years. The guy's an icon of peace but he's strict on stupid suicidal genin." Father was still angry, angrier than he could successfuly try to hide, he let the anger take him over completely but he couldn't have been blamed – he had his own pain to deal with as well of stupidity of his own daughter. "I'm sorry." Mana said, her eyes lifted to meet those of mother's "But… We had to do what we did, we didn't know that Ooguchi-san was being investigated when we started, we had to take him down, he was forcing people to work while keeping them in poverty."

Mother's eyes changed, she turned around and walked to the kitchen to continue chopping that octopus with as much force as her body could handle. "Well, you'd be glad to know that the district was completely taken down and reshaped by Dorimi-senpai, the people in the district will be given temporary places to live until they decide what they want to do – move or start making a living here. From what I've heard most of them were people from other villages and countries. There was this family that came to see you, wanted to let you know they're alright but… You were out at the time, apparently being able to manage three jobs made the family a lot of money and they've bought their first small home from their first pay. All of Ooguchi's wealth was also split for the people he kept under his watch so that'll help them settle in too." Father spoke while trying to do his thing adding up to the device. Mana smiled, she looked outside through the window and saw the Sun shining brightly. This was great, things worked out well, she was glad to hear that the family she went out of her way to help was OK.

"So… The secretary at the Administration was at your ward when we picked you up from the Hospital, she said your team won't be given missions until Hokage returns from the Summit, what'll you do in the meantime?" Father asked. Mana sat down near him, "Help you finish this, then I've got to learn how to throw a kick." The magician looked at the metal contraption of death and spikes, she had so much training to do. Fighting that assassin helped her understand just how much she still had to learn and just how powerless she was. That man was the exact antithesis of what she stood for – man that used ninjutsu for killing, a man who held life at no regard and threw it away casually for his own ends. Next time she meets a man like that, Mana needs to be able to fight them, to defend and stand up for her own beliefs even if she doesn't want to fight or hurt anyone. She needs to become strong, to become able to crush her opponents that wish to discard innocent lives with overwhelming force so that she can show them that their way is evening Mana started training using her father's dummies. "Okay, I dunno how to actually train my taijutsu, I guess I'll start by just kicking this thing until I can't kick anymore, then in the morning I'll find someone to teach me… I'll also need to keep meditating and performing… Vacation has never felt more busy." Mana thought as her leg lifted into the air and slammed into the dummy making it shake. Noises of thumping and crashing could've been heard from the magician's room throughout the night.

 **Wow, so the first arc of the story is finally completed but it's definitely not over here, in fact it didn't even scratch the surface of it! Thank you all who are reading the story, it's approaching 1000 views and it's really hard for me to believe! As always, feedback and criticism is appreciated. Also if you think something makes no sense in the story or if you have any questions or suggestions don't be afraid to PM me or voice your thoughts in a review. I know that a story solely about OCs is a tough sell which is why the views and feedback that I get are so precious to me. Thanks for reading my story, can't wait to get to the further arcs and really get the story going, it's going to get really weird and wild from here, trust me :)**

 **P.S. Thank you for reading!**


	24. Tanshu's Story: Hell is where Katei is!

A small boy, couldn't have been more than six years of age, was observing his parents that were preparing for leaving. The boy's feelings were mixed, there was a certain amount of pride in his eyes but his face was as long as that of a horse. Despite being proud of his parents – the brave and strong Konohagakure chuunin little Tanshu could not stop crying. The sides of the boy's eyes started bleeding when the boy instinctually wiped his tears with the rough sleeve of his pajamas, the boy's mother saw the boy and slowly walked up to the little one sitting on top of the stairs and watching his parents through the space between the handle bars.

"Hey, what are you doing there? Go to bed you little rascal. Grandma said she'll be here in the morning so you won't be feeling lonely while we're gone." Mother said while wrapping her headband around her hair, letting just one lock fall over it so that they are not tied too tight. Father came up to the mother calming down her young boy and silently wrapped his arms around his wife. "Don't worry, son, it's just another big brawl, mother and I will be back in no time. We've got three candidates for the Sannin spot coming with us, they'll be eager to show themselves off for that title so they probably won't even leave any action for us. I'm actually jealous of you, your week with grandparents will at least be somewhat exciting, your mother and I will be stuck watching those guys plowing through the bad guys."

Little Tanshu smiled a little, father was always such a goofball saying the dumbest things. How could his parents have a boring time? They were going to war after all, just a battle of a war but it was a long and dragged out war with many battles like this and his parents were in multiple already. Tanshu read all about war, that glorious place where strong ninja earn their name by killing the other bad ninja. It was the direct path to respect and adoration, other kids in the Academy keep looking at Tanshu with those jealous eyes because his parents are fighting in the war together with the likes of Misu of the Vapor and Chestnut Hanasaku and Howoku the Star of Hope – the three Konohagakure's top ninja that were told to soon succeed their elders in taking the title of Sannin. Tanshu didn't want that honor, he didn't want sensei in the Academy praising his family just if father and mother wouldn't have to leave.

Tanshu was a smart boy, he was able to see through what sensei and the books and every grownup told him. He knew what war was – father and mother would be fighting the bad ninja from the other villages. Even worse, ninja of the whole world were involved in the war. From what grandpa spoke last week the village of Sunagakure was sacked and torn down to the ground, now it's just a large sack of tents in the endless desert. The Kazekage was killed, most of Sunagakure ninja died in the battle as well, all four other ninja villages just attacked Sunagakure and tore the village down. Everyone said it was a great victory but truth be told it was just a bunch of vultures descending on the weak. Three villages against one. Sunagakure against all the other villages that at the same time were fighting each other as well because with every ninja of another village they kill they withhold more loot from falling into the hands of that village. After that battle Sunagakure was completely ruined and had to withdraw from the war, it was lucky that they were still allowed to exist. Sensei was confident that Iwagakure will be the next one to go through this scenario. What if soon comes Konoha's turn?

No! Father and mother were heroes, they left and fought for their country, they were ninja of Konoha, Konoha may have fought alongside Kirigakure and Kumogakure and Iwagakure to tear Sunagakure down but… They were different, they had to be! Konoha couldn't have been just a vulture feasting on the dying weak village, they were different, they had to be, they were… Konoha was Tanshu's home, they couldn't have been bad. Mother and father were supposed to be the heroes, fighting against the other villages defending Konoha so that Konoha is not the one to fall. As mother and father finally prepared themselves Tanshu thought he finally understood. Konoha had to be ruthless, had to be cruel, had to be evil and tear Sunagakure down together with their enemies but only to defend themselves. In order to avoid dying they had to kill, in order not to burn they had to burn down the others. That was how life truly worked. Strongest survive, no, not really, strength alerted the prey and made them gang up on you, strength was irrelevant, only the cold calculating mind mattered.

Tanshu knew what had to happen in order for his parents to return to him, they had to slay the wicked by being more wicked than those they were slaying. Such was the natural order, the boy looked his father in the eyes, the boy's eyes were cold, exploding with rage and desire to kill those that would soon wish harm upon his parents whom he loved the most. "Father, I will pray that you slay everyone, that there is not a single enemy alive to cause harm to you or mother!" he yelled out through tears and anger. Mother's face was pale, she wrapped her hands and pressed little Tanshu against her body hard, the boy could feel tears falling down on his little head and going down his hair onto his back, then the warm teardrops disappeared somewhere below. Why was mother crying? Was she that proud of him?! She had to be! Tanshu made mother proud! Tanshu's head looked at his mother, he tried to catch her eyes that were filled with sadness but he saw father standing behind her looking right at Tanshu down her shoulder.

"It's not about just killing the others, Tanshu. That's not what Konoha fights for, that's not why we are leaving to battle." Father spoke, his voice was strict, little Tanshu shook and forcefully escaped his mother's grasp, he was confused. How could his father possibly have been mad at him, now of all times, now that he understood what it all meant? Fighting was necessary to prevent fighting, it made no sense but it was the natural order. "Then why?! Why are you leaving me!" Tanshu yelled out right into father's face, he saw mother's arm lifting to smack him but father caught it and shook his head, he kneeled down and looked his child into the eyes. "It's about protecting your home, protecting your "katei"." Father's voice spoke softly, now he wasn't really angry, didn't sound like he was. Mother wiped her tears too.

"Katei?" Tanshu repeated the word, he knew what it meant, it was pretty simply but why did his father make it sound like it had some other meaning? "Katei isn't just home, this house isn't your "katei", Tanshu. Katei is where your family is, where the people you love are, where happiness and serenity is, where you feel calm and bliss and as long as you're there you'll never feel differently. Katei of your mother's and mine is this place, where you are and we go to war not to kill the people we are told to kill but to protect our "katei". Promise me you'll protect your "katei" while we are gone." Tanshu's head sunk down, so this word did have a special meaning, this "katei" he had to protect wasn't just "home" but it was where Tanshu is the happiest. The boy's hands clenched a knife in his hands, "I can't fulfil that duty, father, wherever you two are is my "katei", that means I must go to war with you two!" the boy yelled out with anger and certain bravery in his voice.

Father laughed, "Your moment for war will come, there will be wars as long as we live but this one is not yours. You need to trust this war to me and your mother. You can protect your "katei" after the battle is over but while you are, do not go to battle, that's your father's word." Mother kneeled down and hugged Tanshu gently and softly stroking his wild reddishly-brown hair. "That's right, Tanshu, you must protect your "katei", but you are grounded until the war is over for talking like you spoke before, that's the word of your parents." Tanshu nodded and hugged his mother back. After that father gently flicked him on the head and hugged him, before stroking his hair and leaving. The two just walked out into the rainy night, disappearing and giving birth to that certain feeling inside Tanshu's heart, that feeling that life just won't be the same anymore…

The battle that little Tanshu's parents left for was for a small speck of land inside the Fire Country. It was right past the neutral port that set sail ships that went to the Water Country, it was right in the middle between the access to the port and to the Snow Country – the road to Kumogakure to the north and to the Kirigakure. It was important because it provided access to all three currently relevant warring countries. Now that Iwagakure was less relevant, growing weaker and weaker with every battle yet, continuing to strain itself to try and fight with the stronger rivals, and Sunagakure had dropped out of the equation whoever controlled this invaluable land had access to the other countries. If the controller wanted they could easily assault Snow Village and block off Kumogakure from the rest of the world or they could take over the neutral port and block off Kirigakure from anything but what the ocean provides. Ocean's provisions would've also been contended for by the other island villages and countries around Kirigakure like the other islands in Land of Water. It might have caused a small Civil War inside the Water Country if so the controller of those lands pleased.

Seeing how Kirigakure wasn't pleased with this possible scenario as the Mizukage had plenty of reasons to fear the uprising of the smaller isles he desperately wanted to keep the land out of the grasp of his opponents. Even more, the man would've loved to make the land Kirigakure's bridge on land, from there his mighty village may have started to take over smaller lands and transcended its island roots, perhaps move into the Land of Waves which Kirigakure so desperately wanted for itself, the small neutral village would've made a wondrous industrial district for the Kirigakure so that those hideous industrial districts could've been moved from the main island and stopped making the environment so bleak and depressing. Mizukage was an oppressive fellow so he needed some desperate "happiness points" to keep his island village and the smaller islands around it from getting any bright ideas of change. His predecessor was assassinated by some rebellious black ops after all…

Kumogakure wanted it mostly to ensure safety for Snow Village, the small village was a neutral shopping and rest town that had all sorts of winter resort activities in it, plus the vast white hills of Snow Country land were filled with natural resources and made plenty of money for the Snow Village that was an ally of Kumogakure. In order to maintain the steady and generous flow of natural resources like minerals and metals used for military purposes Kumogakure had to assure Snow Village safety and keep those bleak allies happy to the best of their ability as they were an invaluable ally. It was understandable that one of the warring Countries having the land in their control would threaten Snow Village's safety which the Cloud Village could simply never allow.

Most importantly of all, this was Fire Country land from the time that the Great Satsuhimasa won them over, all the way back from the days when the Garuru clan was still a thing, from the Heaven-Earth war days. Such land was a part of Fire Country's cultural legacy, it was a beautiful and warm forest land with lakes and rivers that had plenty of small settlements of farmers all around it. To Konoha it was all about protecting their land, their interest, that which had belonged to them since times unknown, since before people counted time even, since before there were actual countries and villages, since the clans of descendants of the First People roamed the Earth looking for a better life. Konoha could not afford to lose this lovely and integral piece of land… Needless to say, all the countries went all-in to claim this land!

The battle waged for many days, entire two weeks passed before word of the results of the battle came back. The battle was won by Konohagakure but by a very small margin and as the result of the battle the land became useless. Every side lost pretty much all of their ninja, one Kirigakure Sannin died in the battle and two of Kumogakure Sannin had perished as well. Just like that two of Konohagakure Sannin perished too with the third wishing to leave her title behind and pass it over. To make the victory even more Pyrrhic, the land that everyone was contending for became tainted by the dead bodies and covered with dust of bones and ashes of the dead, it became a wasteland of death, it constantly emitted noxious fumes making the stench almost too difficult to take for any human being, the land transformed into a wicked swamp that would've swallowed any attempt to use the land for industrial or military uses or transferring any goods, moving ninja through there would've been impossible! Everyone died and did so for absolutely nothing.

The village was completely crushed, in just several days they lost all of their strongest ninja with the young-bloods being injured and unable to assist them in multiple future battles to follow. The land was claimed by no one. All three countries exchanged letters of apology, grief and sorrow with every other country admitting that this war was looking more and more pointless. Even more, every other warring country promised to never threaten this land again with the bones and ash of their dead as well as their unburied bodies around the dark swamp to remind them of the worst of days. The day when everyone lost their heads out of fear that the enemy would threaten them making them do the things they were afraid the enemy would do. Even Kirigakure promised to never contend for that land again and Konoha answered with a promise to never use that land for any strategic war-related purposes. That land was sacred sanctuary for those that died for this country and fighting in this war.

Little Tanshu was playing with his friends in the house, training and sparring with them for tomorrow's test in the Academy that would determine if he finally became a true ninja like his parents. It was then that grandpa entered his room and asked for his friends to leave. The kids' heads were down to the ground, the room was suddenly surrounded by this dark gloom that would never leave it. The old man looked at Tanshu, breathed in and out, in and out again trying to make it easier for himself to say those words. "Little Tanshu… Mother and father won't be back… Ever…" he said, he was a veteran ninja so he knew little of how to comfortably deliver such news, he was rude and just said things like they were.

Tears filled little Tanshu's eyes as he shook his head. He roared out in pain and grief, charging for the door and pushing his grandfather away violently, the old man fell down on the floor and grunted in pain, yelling for the little boy to wait. It was to no avail, the young one kept running and running, past these endless houses this wretched village of liars and murderers that mother and father died fighting for, NO! They didn't die fighting for this village, Tanshu refused to believe it, they died protecting their "katei", just like father had told him before leaving! The child ran past the gate guards that didn't even notice the child running outside the village walls. Tanshu just kept running, into the wild, past the trees. He knew where he wanted to be – where his mother and father laid down their lives because without them his home was not his "katei". His "katei" was now that battlefield, where his mother and father were laying dead. That was where his "katei" was.

The boy kept running until he just got exhausted and collapsed. Initially he thought that his life now had no point, what did he have to look forward to? What did he possibly had there to comfort him? Was he supposed to look forward to becoming a ninja too, perhaps fighting in these stupid wars for nothing?! For some stupid land that would switch its owner after the next battle only to be regained and then lost again later. No! To Hell with that bullshit! As the boy woke up the next morning, hungry, cold and exhausted, he thought long and hard about his life and what it even meant anymore. His life was meaningless and he was the only one left to give it meaning anymore. Slowly, one step at a time, through pain, hunger and exhaustion, covered with bruises and blunt traumas and his own blood from continuously tripping over and wounding himself little Tanshu kept walking forward.

He was a different young boy now, he killed small and large animals to survive, he kept training for hours on end during the night. He would find his "katei" again and he would protect it until the end just like he promised his father! That was the new purpose of his life that the boy had given to himself. Tanshu would wage war against anyone that threatened his "katei". Finally the ground become black and sticky, filled with bodies and bones and ashes of dead people. The boy leaned over a rock and threw up, so that was the smell of death? It did not matter! It was the smell of his new "katei", his happiness and bliss. The boy kept walking forward, trying to find his father and mother or at least some sign that they were there before they died. He would protect his "katei" and he swore it to his father and mother, now he had to swear it to their graves as well. The boy kept drinking just to have some liquid to throw up, he had to get used to this putrid smell of guts and death, this smell of burning and no one knew what else. If there was Hell, Tanshu was there, not only that, Hell was where he wanted to be, Hell was his only and true "katei"…


	25. Tanshu's Story: He with the Eyes of God

A band of men was marching through a nasty landscape filled with downed and rotten trees and skeletons all around them. While skeletons were certainly a poor company for traveling group of moderately armed men that was not what intimidated the group – that would have been the ground in the swampy wasteland of death. The ground everywhere was black like the eternal void of death that the place reeked off. One could not know when the ground would open, when the black dirt would become a pure sludge of lethal stench that eats one up in seconds and when it would be sharpened coal-like surface that is able to cut through shoes and legs like sandals.

Many people disappeared around those parts, no one ever went to that place which was why this ragtag team of bandits had decided to settle down there and make that place their headquarters, the place where they return to after every big job to settle for their share of the loot and party until the morning. Morning of course was a relative term there, the clouds were always gloomy and the Sun never showed its face, sometimes the marshlands and the swamps ignited and started flaming and that made even the late nights bright but gloomy – it was literally impossible to tell when it was night and when it was day in this cruel birthplace of death itself.

The criminals advanced slowly, helping out their friend that got into trouble by getting into the black sludge up to his knees or fending off the few animals that wandered to those parts. The stench here was impossible to stand, every couple of minutes one of the bandits threw up on the black gooey dirt surface, the men literally had to keep drinking so that their constant vomiting from the stench and lack of fresh air did not kill them. This place reeked of sulfur and despite this place having its battle concluded three years ago, it still reeked of rotting human waste. Perhaps it was the flesh and bones of the curious or daring travelers that passed through this place that still kept the stench going?

"This is a bad fucking idea…" one of the men spoke up finally as he waved the stick to hit a vulture spinning around his head as his body dug deep into sludge again. He was pulled out by his friends, one of them spoke up as well, "Everything's a bad fucking idea with you. Remember when we wanted to raid that caravan near the Konohagakure gate? You said that was a bad fucking idea too." The man took off his boots and shook black slimy dirt off of his shoe, then cursed and yelled out loud as the ground cut his feet opening up a gruesome wound. It was almost like he stepped on edges of multiple blades. "That was the WORST fucking idea, Higumo, Shoji, Mangoku and Okumo died!" the man replied and bandaged his foot. "Details… We escaped with plenty of food and loot" someone from the group replied.

"May I remind you gents that it is because of that fucking raid that we are here to begin with!?" the bandit spoke up as he approached the man leading the party. "Had we not raided that caravan and didn't attract attention of ninja we wouldn't have needed to hide here, just when we took those damn bags from the cart those fuckers just started chasing us like crazy!" The man in front kept walking forward silently, he was a nasty looking fellow with a certain "cool" charm to him, he looked just like one would've imagined a bandit to look like – rag clothes, a dirty cape that looked like somebody's curtain or dirty sheet stolen from the laundry bag, a giant scar all over his face as well as an eyepatch. The man's eyes were always angry and looking cruel, always ready to incinerate anyone he sees with his eyesight alone.

The man turned around and slapped his comrade, the man fell onto the ground and screamed in pain as more wounds opened up on his body after getting cut by the now rock solid ground. "Shut the fuck up, you loser! Konoha ninja ran like dirty dogs because they follow an agreement to not have any military forces in this ground ever, a group of five or more qualifies as "military force" in the agreement and they didn't want to send less than five ninja of average rank into this place. It's perfect for bandits to hide, I've no idea why no other bands ever grouped up here. This place is amazing!" the man shouted out, his voice echoed through the wasteland of death. Some people who have visited this place and lived to tell the tale had described it as "Hell on Earth" and it was quite apparent that they weren't too far off.

"Jeez, it's getting dark here!" another bandit shouted out, "It's always fucking dark and gloomy here, on top of it all it stinks like your dead mother's diaper!" yet another replied. The group kept walking, they weren't yet sure where exactly they were heading, they had to find some materials for their base, all they had were some clothes and bunch of bones lying around. It didn't quite make good bunch of things to build a solid base from. "Why didn't we stop, yet, boss? What are we waiting for?" one of the closer to their leader bandits asked, the man grunted and grumbled under his nose but didn't reply a thing. "We need to walk far away from the border of this place, I'm worried that entire armies of bandits might come here and realize just how perfect this place is for hideouts." the man then replied after a long enough pause to make no one expect a reply any longer.

A loud shout of pain came up as a man disappeared from the group, only his closest comrade saw him fly off into the darkness. He shouted out some unintelligible babbling, then just pointed at the direction he disappeared in. "We keep going" the leader ordered with an angry tone. "I've heard there was a battle here three years ago, I bet that the spirits are still goddamn furious that they died so they killed your pal" one of the dumber sounding bandits laughed out holding his stomach as he laughed. "Have some shame, fucker, Chucho saved your ass today, did you forget how he deflected that arrow for you?" the bandit that saw his friend fly off into the dark gloomy shade yelled out. A loud scream of a man dying interrupted the bandit group, that convinced the leader to keep moving faster, he ordered the men to keep watch. "Yeah, cause that idiot found a coin and ducked to pick it up, when he stood back up the arrow hit his damn helm… AAAAAGH!" the bandit tried to reply but was interrupted by an unseen force that dragged him outside the perimeter into the gloomy darkness.

The men started losing their cool and freaking out, losing and meeting new people of their crew was nothing new to them, comrades died and new friends were made each day. What worried the men was that they did not see their slayer and were worried that they'd be next. Usually any danger can be evaded by just running really damned fast – now there was nowhere to run. For kilometers around this place there was only deadly Hell of a battlefield surrounding them, hungry for victims to swallow whole or bloodthirsty and wishing to cut them as deep and as many times as humanly possible. Then again, even if they did run and get lucky, what would've stopped this demon of the gloomy night from catching them completely off guard? The men were absolutely terrified.

Suddenly the leader stopped in his feet making the men behind him bump into the back of their leader. A dark and short figure stood in the gloomy shadows, completely invisible beyond just recognizing the basic humanoid shape, this could've been a spirit, a mad psycho killer or a demon of this swampy gooey Hell for all they knew. "You are in my katei, leave now and you'll be spared, continue to desecrate it and I will kill you" a grumpy yet almost childish voice came their way. A bandit yelled out and gasped in fear, "It's a demonic spirit of the child that had his parents sneak him into a battlefield and then he died!", his friend to the side slapped the back of his head, "You dumbass, who'd sneak their child into a battlefield, parents keep children away from battle!"

The leader of the bandits drew his curved sword and took a step forward. "I am the new owner of this wasteland and I claim it as my home! Be you just a child, a spirit or a demon, I spit at you and I will be the one killing you…" suddenly the man stopped in his tracks, only then did the bandits notice a young child behind him with an exposed blade. It was a short blade, the likes of which inexperienced ninja carried, the blade was cracked and chipped in multiple places. The boy himself was short and looked like a little jungle boy with his reddish brown hair flowing freely over his shoulders and his face being completely pummeled and bandaged and his body covered with scars. "You're in my katei, leave now!" the child spoke again as the boss of the bandits collapsed having blood spray from his chest. The black slimy ground started to slowly consume the man's body. The bandits all drew their swords and took their staffs and improvised weaponry. The boy yelled out loud to express his discontent at this decision and charged forward at the group of bandits.

It would've been an incredibly odd sight to behold to see this battle transpire from the side, one would've had to come extremely close through the noxious gases that erupted from the ground and through all the perils that the place had. The boy's cracked blade continued to dance over the bodies of the men that have entered his sacred space, the boy was not a demon, just a young man and he constantly slipped up and got punched or struck with a weapon opening up wounds. Not that it mattered for this boy truly acted like a demon, his endless dance with his blade continued and would've never stopped until he or the men he was facing off against had died. To this boy this space was sacred and no other man or woman or child had the right to be present in his "katei" or else they be killed. Many times Senju shinobi from the Leaf have come to this place to try and fix it, make a forest of trees using their Wood Release and then use Earth Release and Water Release to fix this landscape but… All of them caught only their deaths, all of them died and while each of them injured young Tanshu, each injury taught him yet another lesson. Made him stronger and faster and smarter and the fact that in order to honor their agreement with the other countries only less than five ninja could've entered this ground at once helped him not to get overwhelmed and captured throughout the three years he lived here.

Tanshu's sword went through the throat of the last bandit. The man coughed up and fell having been cut down by the rampaging demon of this hellhole, no, Tanshu was no demon, not yet, he still felt pain, he still got hit, a demon was perfect, a demon made no mistakes and killed without any warnings, a true demon craved death and bloodshed which Tanshu did not. A fighting dog was what Tanshu was, fighting when his bowl of food is threatened. He warned these men, he wanted them to leave but they didn't, so he killed them just like his parents would've in order to protect their katei. Parents would've been so proud of him if they saw him! Tanshu wanted to believe that there was an Otherworld where they saw him from but… Seeing what he had seen through these three years, the worst that this world has to offer, bandits, thieves, murderers, arsonists and rapists fleeing to this ground to hide from justice. They were not welcome here! If someone wanted to take Tanshu's katei they were welcome to come and claim it.

As the boy tried to pull the blade out of the man's throat it broke off, it was inevitable that it would happen, the boy looted this sword from the first man he had killed in this place. He cursed as he looked around, he found the loot of these men and looked into the bags, they were full of food and medicine, bandages and the things that he so desperately needed. The boy sat down and started bandaging himself, all those endless gashes where he was cut by either the bandits or the ground he was sleeping on, he then ate and drank from those bags and took what was left with him, all that he could carry and what he couldn't the boy tipped with his foot into the sludge that soon devoured all of it. This loot was not his, he felt bad that he claimed it but… In order for the rightful owner to claim this loot they would've had to come into his katei and claim it, if that happened Tanshu would kill them defending his katei. He did not wish to do that, it would've been better off if there was no loot to begin with…

As the boy passed through the corpses he noticed that the bandit leader was carrying a larger katana, the boy dropped the loot down and bent down to see what it was about. As the young kid picked the sword up and checked its blade he cursed, the blade was dull as a chunk of steel – must've been one of those "non-lethal" sword junk. These were quite common, slave traders used those, people that just wandered the out of village areas that belonged to no country claiming villagers and travelers as well as other bandits as their slaves, "pacifistic" travelers also had those, Tanshu hated all of them. One group were just human filth that had it coming when the boy cut them down, the other were just fools that were lying to themselves. There was no place for not killing when wielding a sword, there was no other option than to kill when fighting. These fools were just easy food for slave traders and then to Tanshu – slave traders had a nasty habit to command all of their slaves to fight the boy before they themselves tried to. Because of that all peaceful idiots that refused to kill automatically associated with enemies to Tanshu, potential enemy was an enemy regardless. In the wild a potential enemy was even more dangerous as current enemy is fighting you right now while a potential enemy might attack you when you're unprepared.

Those were the times that Tanshu lived in, times where he killed whoever wandered into his katei with no mercy or reason other than that they were where they shouldn't have been. It all changed however, all changed just couple of weeks later from the day that Tanshu killed those bandits and changed his blade. Despite that the blade was dull, the boy still preferred longer reaching blades than the curved trash that those fools had, at least with the dull sword he could still thrust and stab someone, the boy already lacked range because of his short arms anyways, he couldn't afford to fight with a curved short sword. Still, the boy had decided to sharpen his sword one day as poking things he hunted or wanted to kill was just too difficult for him. Tanshu always preferred slashing over thrusting and he didn't feel like adapting his style. It was then that he heard a bunch of people walking up to him, how could they do that? Tanshu learned to feel the vibrations of the ground, he had traps and all sorts of alerts and impeccable hearing that alerted him when something was going on nearby. He controlled an area at least three kilometers in radius and only missed out on two or so by the edges of the wasteland, those that passed through there either got scared by the view of the place and the deadly stench and left, or went in deeper to where Tanshu saw them.

The boy didn't bother to lift his eyes at the passing by people, he kept sharpening his blade, only nonchalantly adding "You're in my katei, leave now or I will kill you." Someone of that group laughed out, a woman stepped out in front, she had creamy pink hair and deep green eyes, her voice was annoying as hell though. She was dressed pretty weird for such a place too, her white clothes would've gotten dirty with black goo from the dirt or her own blood when she cut herself on the rocks. Only her boots were pretty cool, they were large and thick, maybe Tanshu should loot them off of her body? He wouldn't have to worry about getting cut in his feet ever again! "So what if we're in your home, brat, scram out of here and maybe WE won't kill YOU!" she spat out with her stupid annoying whiny voice. That voice pissed Tanshu off and he stood up, the boy easily swung the sword around his head and then put it into his sheathe and then stood into a drawing stance.

A man with a black round hat stepped in, he had his entire face and body covered with a huge coat and the lower part of his face as well as everything below wrapped in bandages. "Halt, Hana" he lifted his eyes at the boy, his eyes were so strange, they looked like pure silver but had strange circles all around it, only looking at them was scary! "It appears like this boy is a swordsman, he may be worth his words and if he is he'd be worth to be my beloved apostle, if he is not… Well… A swordsman should always die by the hand of another swordsman, isn't that right?" the man looked at Tanshu and slammed his staff into the ground, drawing an oodachi from it, revealing the gigantic staff to be just a sheathe for his blade.

"Let us fight, if you impress that with the eyes of God, he will allow you to join his ranks. If not, you will get an honorable death as one who is smitten by that with eyes of God has no place in Hell!" the man spoke. His weird manner of speaking addressing himself in the third person annoyed Tanshu even more than his female friend. His voice sounded cool but a bit forced as he clearly had to use moderate effort to lift his own sword.

"You refused to leave my katei, all four of you will now die!" Tanshu replied looking angrily at the man and his three companions. The man traveled with the strangest of companies: besides the bubble gum color haired girl with the white dress there was a man in a completely black jumpsuit with chains around his body and with a blue oni mask and a swordswoman with a kimono and strangely large white irides with no pupils. Tanshu tied his sword to his belt and stood in a taijutsu stance, changing his stance and weapon of choice was a good idea – the man's blade was impossibly large so it must've been troublesome for him to keep up with a fast fighter, hand to hand will destroy this man and when he can't lift his sword at all because of his broken ribs – one quick strike would finish it all!

One with the eyes of God was about to close those eyes forever…


	26. Tanshu's Story: Red Dog VS Rinnegan!

The face of little Tanshu twisted with anger, it was a clear telegraph of his attack but it mattered little to the boy. He would unleash all of his anger at this man and destroy him! The boy's foot just gently tapped at the ground after a small hop tossing him forward, his fist tightened and his arm went back, Tanshu's foot shot forward right onto the closest solid piece of dirt he could see and within an instant a full powered punch using not only his natural strength but also the ground itself as a balance point. Sadly Tanshu's opponent was no longer where the boy saw him just mere moments prior to his attack, Tanshu was fast, this man was even faster!

"Was that supposed to hit One with Eyes of God?" the man asked mockingly as his own arm blurred. Tanshu wasn't going to take this simple attack standing up, within an instant the boy repositioned his balance and leaped into the air, as the man's arm appeared at a downwards diagonal position after the blow was completed, Tanshu was already rolling over the man's shoulder and back to get behind his opponent. That darned bandaged man! Right as Tanshu's feet landed solidly on the ground the boy heard a whistling noise – it was slow but that was what scared him. Just barely Tanshu managed to duck and avoid having his body cut in half by the man's colossal blade. This won't work, the man was too fast, the young warrior drew his own blade and met the top-hat swordsman's force with that of his own. Obviously Tanshu was not stupid enough to clash with him, the boy simply pointed and gently poked the giant blade to push and mislead it away from where the boy's flesh was.

This impressive and lightning fast dance continued for quite a while, the man with the weird silver circled eyes kept slashing and thrusting only for Tanshu's own blade to gently push the sword to the other side using the man's own strength. Sometimes the man's effort was great enough to overcome Tanshu's speed of redirection but the boy was always in time to duck, at times the boy found himself in a favorable position for a quick thrust or a slash but the man avoided it as well. This was a match of two incredibly skilled nukenin, had Tanshu had the time to be impressed he most certainly would've been. This man was by far the closest one to become one to survive an encounter with the Black Fighting Dog of the battlefield. The man swung aiming at Tanshu's neck – there it was, the boy's chance!

Tanshu's blade drilled through the air decimating its puny resistance, this had to be it! This had to hit, Tanshu just knew it! With a loud scratch and a nasty sound of blade piercing flesh the boy realized he was right – a small squirt of blood landed on his face as the man's belly was slightly scratched, sadly he moved almost in time and only received a minimal injury, one only potent enough to annoy him with a sting and small bleeding wound. A powerful kick followed, landing right onto Tanshu's face and sending the boy rolling away. It didn't matter – Tanshu drew the first blood, that meant he had not only the advantage in this battle but also in a one on one swordfight he could've overpowered the man. It was unfortunate that once the black goo started enveloping the boy's body he realized just how screwed he may have been – he fell into the liquid gooey peril, quickly the boy flipped his body on his belly and swam onto solid ground, tumbling to stand back up onto the sharp black coal surface and cutting himself multiple times.

The boy roared out into the air as he leaped forward, the man did not expect such aggression, such amazing skill of recovering from a kick to the face and the boy's recovery from the black goo pit. What did he expect? Tanshu lived there for years, he fell into this stupid annoying trap millions of times and almost died several times but after all those terrifying experiences he learned to quickly swim out of the goo. The goo was stupid, weak, it was literally impossible to drown in it unless one struggled for too long and kicked themselves into a grave of their own foolish making, if one just calmly swam out they could've gotten out no problem and Tanshu was the world's best conqueror of this barren wasteland's petty traps!

Tanshu's fast swipe cut the man's bandages on his face, revealing skin under them. The man managed to twist his face in time to avoid severe disfigurement or having Tanshu's blade pierce his forehead. The boy didn't want to lose his advantage, he kept cutting and cutting, attacking relentlessly with slashes, cuts, thrusts, spins and flips giving the man absolutely no time to respond. The injuries of this God-Eyed man were numerous but none of them were solid, they were just scratches and cuts as the man avoided everything or blocked it, still – Tanshu was slowly dictating his dominance over the man. "You're… In… My… Katei!" the boy whom some currently dead bandit named the "Black Fighting Dog" yelled out as he landed a solid cut onto the man's chest and face. Tanshu then leaped forward with a downward diagonal slash, "GET OUT!" he shouted after flashing down and rolling further away from the man. A loud clang of the last cut, the one that was supposed to be lethal, signaled that the man survived this combination.

Tanshu was breathing heavily, huffing and panting, down on his knees as he turned at his opponent. One with Eyes of a God was holding the bandages on his face – his clothes were cut up into pieces and his hat had fallen off, the bandages on his chest and all over his body had scratches and damage that would've made it get in his way. Tanshu was getting tired sure but this man was about to start tripping on his own bandages. "What?" Tanshu's eyes shot open as he saw the skin and face of the man as he straightened out. The man's skin was not burned or injured or had at least a single scar on it in fact – the bandages were just for show! What was the meaning of this? The man with those weird eyes stood straight and his head was up high, was he not afraid of death at all?

"Having trouble, God-Eyes?" the other guy with the oni mask and the black jumpsuit asked mockingly. Was this man not the boss of the group? Why was this man so indifferent and mocking towards his leader? "I see… You are indeed a talented young man, normally One with Eyes of God would have invited you to his ranks after this clash. Think carefully, you've now seen the skin and the face of a God, if you refuse One with Eyes of God will have to kill you! One cannot have people walking around telling other people how beautiful and divine One with Eyes of God is… Divine beauty and absolute awesomeness is not for the eyes of mere mortals, for that reason, so that your puny mortal eyes are not bothered by my divine appearance He wears these bandages and these excessive black clothes." The more this "God-Eyes" spoke, the more Tanshu despised him, why was he still so cocky? Did he not realize that Tanshu was more skilled yet? Surely he had to!

"Go eat donkey droppings, then again, you won't have the chance, I'll kill you here and now…" Tanshu replied standing back up and standing back in dueling stance. Tanshu was an aggressive swordsman and his style relied on overwhelming his opponent and his stance would've shown it. There was no chance in hell some half-baked cocky fool like this guy stood a chance! Even without his sword, Tanshu was just as skilled with just his fists and feet. Killing people with fists just felt… Odd and somehow uncivilized… God-Eyes looked pretty annoyed by the boy's display of rudeness. He grabbed his own face with his palm and squeezed it hard trying to hide his displeasure as his crazy silver circle eyes pulsed. What was this chakra right now? It felt like… Something that invited fear even in Tanshu's brave heart. "That is unfortunate, One with Eyes of God will have to kill you in that case…" God-Eyes shouted out in an angry and insane voice.

The bubble gum hair lady that the weird swordsman was traveling with turned at the Demon with the oni mask. "Hey… Achima, maybe we should go, I mean this kid does look like he's stronger than One with Eyes of God", the man called Achima laughed out openly and loudly. "Truly you do not believe that was all of God-Eyes' power? Trust me, he might be a punk born from the right loins and too lucky with the eyes he was given but… If that would've been all the power he had I'd have killed him when we first met in Kirigakure… Just shut up and watch, the show is about to get really interesting." As the two spoke, Tanshu being the sensory prodigy that he was could hear everything. What did this mean? Did this "God-Eyes" have some amazing ability? What was this "born from the right loins" thing this oni mask man was talking about?

Suddenly God-Eyes' arm shot forward revealing an open palm. A powerful force hit Tanshu from behind taking the young swordsman by surprise and throwing him towards his enemy. No! He was pulled by some amazing force towards his enemy, what the hell was this? Some sort of bloodline, Tanshu had never heard of such bloodline in the Academy. "Attraction Cut!" God-Eyes shouted out as he slashed with his blade in a wide arc, Tanshu managed to thrust his blade into the dirt, pushing him up and helping him fly over the man instead of right into his lethal slash. Tanshu tried to cut back, counterattack and then get some distance but God-Eyes leaned back and shot his hand up to his face again. "Universal Push!" he shouted but Tanshu was no longer there. The jutsu that the man just used was incredible, it lifted bunch of sludge and rocks and dirt and tossed it forward… No. It pushed and repelled everything in front of the man and behind him, forming a bubble of gravity around him… What sort of technique was that?!

Tanshu grunted angrily, he was still trying to understand what kind of technique he was attacked with but this didn't look good. If the man used this "Attraction Blade" or "Universal Pull" during their first clash Tanshu would've been in trouble. The realization that his enemy was holding back made Tanshu even angrier, it was like his entire body was flaming up from sheer anger. Tanshu shouted out in pure rage as his sword ignited, this was the first time that this had happened and Tanshu was just as surprised as his opponent and his henchmen. "A chakra conductive blade… Hmmm, you were lucky to stumble into someone with such an expensive treasure, a Fire Release ninja, huh? The folk call you Black Fighting Dog outside this place for your ferocity but… The name Red Dog describes you better now…" God-Eyes spoke with a playful smile, the bastard was excited about this new ability of his opponent. Very well, if he enjoyed being cut to pieces Tanshu would give him something to be happy about!

The boy leaped forward, he didn't care if his opponent would hit him with his stupid gravity manipulation, all that Tanshu wanted was to cut this man down! The speed of the boy was incredible, he made all this distance within mere moments and made the first fiery cut with no effort at all. God-Eyes grunted in pain as a new wound opened on his chest, he responded to the following outrage of the boy, the two continued to clash with their blades. "Amazing, utterly astonishing! Your Fire Release cauterizes the wound it opens but the pain it causes by opening it is like Hellfire itself! Show One more, Red Dog, show One with Eyes of God more!" God-Eyes shouted as the two continued to try and land a cut on the other. Tanshu tried to remove the filthy head of the man but he leaned back and thrust his hand forward, the boy tossed his sword forward and made a handseal…

"Universal Push!"

A giant lump of coal was broken into small pieces and pushed away at least two hundred meters – Tanshu's opponent had such amazing force of gravity under his command. Luckily enough the young swordsman managed to substitute himself with the giant rock in time. It was good that he knew his environment and remembered the location of the big lump. The two leaped at each other again, slashing swords and clashing several more times, Tanshu pushed the giant blade to the side using his full force – it was apparent that God-Eyes was getting tired swinging it, the force of impact was just a small piece of what it was before. Using the momentum of spinning his own body like the spinning toys that the kids used Tanshu tried to leave a giant gash at the man's side, God-Eyes tried to jump back but was still cut. The boy spat to the side, he was pissed that he didn't finish sharpening his blade before, had he finished it this cut may have been more dangerous than it ended up to be!

"Well, this was fun, but I'm afraid a God can only afford a useless pawn that does not intend to serve him only so much time…" God-Eyes sighed, still clenching his side, he suddenly thrust his bloody arm forward as Tanshu felt the attraction force hitting him again. The boy cursed as he didn't have any other objects to substitute with or any other hidden tricks, he had to think of something! Tanshu's handle of his giant sword drove right into the boy's stomach, the boy could've sworn that he blacked out for a moment there, driven by instinct alone he blocked the downwards slash, the weight of the giant sword drove Tanshu to his knees and his blade started cracking. Once again God-Eyes charged in close and drove his handle into Tanshu's chin sending him upwards, as the boy's body landed on the floor it was stopped by God-Eyes' knee, sharp pain to the back alerted the boy that an elbow sent him down.

Tanshu's eyes were closed. He couldn't believe that this was it, that he would die right there against a man of no skill, just some stupid set of eyes. What was the point of this fight? What was the point of his life if he died like this?! The little Tanshu cursed as his eyes were forced open by him just in time to see his opponent effortlessly floating in the air. His sword was sheathed, it seemed like they both knew this fight was over. Tanshu had no more strength to move, he had some chakra but his body felt broken. Thinking back on all the fighting, all the bloodshed, what did his lifelong goal of protecting his katei amount to? He killed bunch of people, defended his home which would now fall into the hands of this man who will kill him… His life was pointless, his death was made pointless and by itself made lives of all those he had killed pointless… Maybe there's no point to anything anyway? Tanshu relaxed and accepted his punishment.

"UNIVERSAL PUSH!"

An awesome force hit Tanshu's body, he felt pain just for a mere moment before blacking out. God-Eyes slowly landed on the ground, huffing heavily. He had no more force left to execute this cocky youngling, the man kneeled and picked up Tanshu's own sword, it was cracked and damaged beyond being useful but maybe it had one more cut in it. "Stop!" a loud voice stopped Tanshu as his arm met strong resistance before it could do its swinging motion. "What is the meaning of this!? You stop the hand of God, Demon? After he intentionally holds back so that One does not injure his followers?!" God-Eyes asked looking straight into the black void where the holes in the oni mask for eyes were. "Don't make me into a fool! I know that after using a push of this power you lose the gravitational ability for at least three minutes so for three minutes I am your God. I could snap your neck with one quick motion before you could possibly respond." God-Eyes appeared annoyed by the insubordination of his henchman but he tossed the cracked blade away and turned at him.

"Speak your mind, One with Eyes of God shall decide how to deal with this insolence later." It was impossible to say just exactly what sort of history these two had, how come Demon had the guts to talk like this to the one possessing the divine Rinnegan or why One with Eyes of God did not execute him right after getting his ability back. "Let's take this kid with us. I always wanted to open a school, breed Demonlings that would make not only this generation of ninja afraid of Demons but also the next. I shall make him into an assassin, just imagine a young swordsman with a Fire Release to enforce his image of a Demon! I could not ask for a better pupil. I shall make him void of emotion, void of sympathy, desiring only happiness for his head Demon, I will be the Devil and this boy and his peers will be my Demons… And of course we will serve the One with Eyes of God, without question."

The swordsman scratched his chin, his eyes closed and he sunk deep in thought, after a mere moment his eyes opened again. "Very well, One with Eyes of God shall allow this Red Dog to live, make him into your infernal subordinate, but know that you are responsible for him. That includes carrying him. One with Eyes of God has spoken!" the oni masked man calling himself "Demon" picked Tanshu's unconscious broken body and put it onto his shoulder. "I have an idea, this boy is a great defender of this place, let us build our temple of bones here and we will not have to do anything to brainwash this boy, he will work for us without question because he will still be watching his katei." God-Eyes nodded and pointed at the pink haired girl, "Heal him, I shall begin building our temple of bones once he wakes and I get my ability back…"

The pink haired lady bowed and dragged the boy further, tearing his clothes off and placing her arms on his chest. Emerald green light started emanating from her hands, the only beacon of light in the gloom of this cursed swamp.


	27. Tanshu's Story: Power Born from Pain

Tanshu woke up in a dark room, to be entirely honest, it was quite difficult for the boy to even properly identify that he had even woken up since the room was so incredibly dark that he barely saw his own body. The feeling of waking up inside a pitch black room was weird, the boy was obviously confused. How could he have ended up here? What was going on? For a moment Tanshu had settled on the thought that his opponent had crushed his body so hard with his repulsion jutsu that he had destroyed the boy's eyes. Still, weak and lingering reflections of his own body somewhat ruined that theory.

"Is someone here?" the boy murmured under his own nose, then after he braved up a bit once again. Out of nowhere a blue oni mask lit up in the corner, maybe it was just the distinctive color of the mask combined with the fact that the boy's eyes were getting quite used to the darkness that this mask could even be identified. It was the same mask of that man who was with the God-Eyed swordsman, it made Tanshu even more confused as to why he was kept alive. His enemy was not supposed to show him mercy. "What is this? Why am I here? Where are we?" questions spilled like beans from a bucket.

"As far as you need to know… You're still protecting your katei, boy." oni mask replied, it was incredible how the man's dark jumpsuit completely made his entire body disappear in the darkness, only his mask was left visible which would've been quite frightening had Tanshu not seen the man in the gloom of the wasteland. The young swordsman stood up and felt his sword being hung by his side, why would the man leave his sword just hanging? Within an instant the boy rushed towards the masked man drawing his sword and slashing the mask in two. The mask fell on the floor as it was split in two, eight more lit up taking its place. This had to be an illusion of some sort! Tanshu turned back and grunted angrily. He may have lost against the leader but there was no way in Hell a mere henchman will best him.

"If I were you I'd hear me out, I'm the sole reason you are alive after all…" oni-mask's voice echoed throughout the room again. Tanshu lunged forward cutting all of the masks in pieces with multiple slashes. Right after he did so, dozens of strikes hit him in his back in multiple areas. Tanshu roared in pain as he collapsed onto the soft wooden floor. "As you are right now you are too weak to protect your katei, there are people in this world that are both stronger than God-Eyes and wish your capture. If God-Eyes was to clash with any of the higher ranking Konoha ninja, most of whom still are looking for you because you're a nukenin, he'd die. He may not admit it but that's the reason why he had aligned himself with a still active Kirigakure jounin and two Sunagakure ninja."

Tanshu's sword slashed backwards, the mask collapsed revealing behind it a busted and disfigured face, it was hard to tell this in the dark but its general shape made it look like it had melted off its owner's facial area at some point but instead of falling off it just stuck and kept looking like mashed fruits. "I warn you boy, your next strike will be your last." The voice came right from the fact as its lips moved slightly, the fact that this figure even had lips that could even move was miraculous by itself. The face slowly disappeared in the shadows and the entire room sank into darkness, now there wasn't even a single mask or any clue that anyone was even there. "I asked God-Eyes to leave you alive because you can be helpful to him, despite what that arrogant brat might think, and he may be beneficial to you. What I offer you is power, the only thing that matters, the strength to crush those that threaten your katei and all I ask in return is that you allow us to help you protect it."

Tanshu scratched his head, he had never considered if he wanted another family after the death of his parents. "That being said… I know it's hard, but remember what went through your head at the moment when you were down, I'm no psychic but I've seen that face before, the "my life was useless and I'm about to die and it won't matter for shit" face. Well, with us by your side you can make your life and your death amount to something. With us you could be a part of a bigger achievement without having to do anything you wouldn't normally do." Tanshu looked somewhere off into the darkness, "OK, even if I'm interested, I'd like to know my new "family" better."

Suddenly a wire tightly constricted around little Tanshu's neck and someone pulled it dropping the boy on the ground. The little nukenin felt his neck bleed, had the man wanted he could've beheaded him like this, this man had more physical strength than Tanshu and despite the boy being just a bratty kid this was still a feat he had never seen during his days in the wasteland. "Don't get cocky, kid, call us a family and I'll kill you right then and there. I will train you but there will be none of that fucking marshmallow nonsense. I am the Devil and you will be my Demon, in order for a Demon to be born, a man must be broken down and burnt in the flame the Demon comes from. Plus, God-Eyes has problems with his daddy and mommy despite his eyes being entirely the result of who those two were, I wouldn't mention "family" around him anytime soon." Tanshu breathed out and pulled on the newly formed space of the wire getting out of it, the boy then stood up still clenching his neck where the blood was coming from.

"God-Eyes is a renegade, he comes from a faraway place you need not care about built long ago by you don't need to care who. He spits some bullshit about reincarnation or something like that, wouldn't listen too close to what he spouts out of that cocky mouth of his. His goal is to take over the world – all of the villages because his grand…grand…grand… whatever once controlled it. Then at some point he just lost it and started talking of himself as God and now having the world is his right as a God… Anyways, he is an idiot and he'll catch his death one day by a ninja that is actually worth his mettle." Tanshu sat down and felt his neck again, he tore off the sleeve of kimono he was wearing and tightly tied it around his neck. It didn't look like any vitals were cut, had it been so he'd have died momentarily.

"He established his "temple" here, calls it Tower of Bones or whatever because he believes that his grand…grand… whatever once knew how to manipulate her bones or something. He likes symbolism, that God-Eyes… Either way, once he fails and is killed I'll kill his other "apostles" and grant you his eyes, then you will become the true Demon, ironically enough you will be the angel of a God that has fallen, doesn't get any more demonic, don't you think?" the man laughed out somewhere in the darkness. Tanshu stood up and tightened his look trying to see the figure of the man with the oni mask somewhere, spotting his humanoid twisted and slim figure in a faraway corner of the room. "So you are the one secretly calling the shots?" Tanshu asked, a powerful laugh met his question. "No, not really, even if God-Eyes fought me here, where I'm strongest, he'd probably win. I'm just one of the apostles with the weakest link to God-Eyes, you see, unlike Vashia and Hana I am still an active ninja, I am here with the mission from Kirigakure to train an order of young assassins, a brood of demons if you will. That is why I am mostly on your side and if God-Eyes died I wouldn't shed a single tear about it. So, what do you think? Are you ready to let the Red Dog die and be reborn into the Red Demon?"

The rest of the four years, after he had accepted the deal, were difficult for Tanshu to remember clearly. After his small talk with the Oni mask man, who surprisingly didn't go by any names, everyone just referred to him as they pleased, he was introduced to the rest of the apostles. Each of the apostles had a room assigned to them, so that in case of attack each of them fought the ninja one on one until one reached the final floor. Each of the rooms were quite compact making a larger brawl impossible, it was simply most efficient to fight each apostle one on one and the groups of ninja that came only came in groups of five at best. As the apostles would've been beaten the attackers would've advanced one floor further until they reached God-Eyes at the final floor. In order to advance a floor the attacker needed to get a key from the apostle inside that floor, they could've tried to use ninjutsu on those bones but apparently Hana, one of God-Eyes' apostles, was some sort of sealing prodigy and left protection seals all over them.

Strangely throughout all of the four years of Tanshu's demonic training the tower was only attacked once by Konoha, by a party of Chuunin that were scouting the area looking for Tanshu who was still regarded as a nukenin. The four had found the tower and decided to investigate, they never advanced further first floor where the man with the oni mask lurked. After that day many more bandits came trying to take the tower for themselves but none of them ever even left a scratch on the man with oni mask. Strangely enough only the bandits attacked all at once and got in each other's way, from what the man had told Tanshu during training the ninja actually followed his advice to fight him one on one with the rest waiting outside. They still would've needed the key to the other floor anyways.

The apostles themselves were all quite strange people, throughout his four years of training with them Tanshu rarely ever met with God-Eyes again and when he did the man didn't even bother to talk to him or even acknowledge his existence. He was still acting high and mighty and in control when often it was the Demon actually calling the shots and giving the best advice. It was clear that without support of Kirigakure this man wouldn't have advanced too far with his plot to take over the world. Why would Kirigakure even support such a man was a question to Tanshu and one that Demon never answered to him, it must've been the fact that God-Eyes was targeting Konoha first, after all, Kirigakure had significant influence over God-Eyes through Demon anyways.

The girl called Vashia was a kind and a nice girl, that being said she was always very shut in her own inner world and rarely left her floor. It was said by the Demon that her floor was modeled after a typical dojo, one that her family had and where she was raised as a child which made the boy believe that Vashia actually was longing for her previous life in Sunagakure. The girl had raven dark hair and always wore a sword by her side, actually that was all that Tanshu even knew about her, whenever he tried to ask her something or talk to her she politely and very directly answered his question leaving him no openings to know anything more. She was really skilled in avoiding all conversation and stroke the boy as a somewhat shy girl. Why such a person was on the group trying to take down all of the ninja villages and take over the world was beyond Tanshu, she acted and looked most like an actual honorable kunoichi out of the entire group.

On the other hand, the girl called Hana was really just as spoiled as God-Eyes was, sure, she never spoke of herself in third person or called herself a God but she was arrogant and bratty in her own way. Her floor was located right after Demon's but she always tried to get a higher floor for herself since she disliked fighting. From what Tanshu gathered about her she wasn't even that much of a fighter, more of a supportive role that could do anything anyone wanted her to: she was a sensor, she knew how to heal people using ninjutsu and she was a great cook, she was one of the best seal users in Sunagakure according to the Demon. Still, she always enforced her image of bubble-gum haired diva, she always dressed too pompously for a kunoichi and always ate only candy, popcorn and fries as far as Tanshu could remember. She also always acted most childish out of the group making God-Eyes often quite annoyed by her but he had a sweet spot for her so he more often submitted to her will and gave her the final chip in the bag or the bigger ryo split or that lovely puppy left over by the Inuzuka who had died fighting Demon whenever she threw a fit.

The training that Demon was giving Tanshu was odd, the oni mask man always asked Tanshu to take some pills, from what the boy understood they messed with his mind for the duration of the training. That meant both good and bad things – for one the boy lost his sense of pain which was for the best, oni mask often beat Tanshu down beyond recognition during training, also his fatigue was always absent when Tanshu woke up making the boy ready for more training next day even if his body was pushed to its limits. On the other hand it made the boy's body and mind function on sort of an auto-pilot mode, also it made him completely forget anything that happened during the training sessions when under influence of the pills. From what oni mask man told him, it was because Demon didn't want Tanshu training people the same way when one day Tanshu becomes the strongest Demon there was. Apparently despite Tanshu being a nukenin and his apprentice the Demon still treated him as Konoha ninja as opposed to him being from Kirigakure.

God-Eyes found quite the army of bandits and thugs during the four years, just the promise to freely hide in the wasteland and the fact that Konoha could not legally pursue them in there was all that entire bands needed to swear allegiance to One with Eyes of God, apparently Demon called those eyes "Rinnegan", Tanshu liked that name better than "Eyes of God". Also he started referring to God-Eyes as God-Eyes which somewhat irritated the man, he always forced his underling bandits address him as "One with Eyes of God" instead of the more rude "God-Eyes", even Vashia and Hana did not address him as Demon and Tanshu did but since Tanshu was Demon's little protégé something let the boy get away with it. Still, the young nukenin had to respect the amount of power that God-Eyes had gathered in only four years, he was almost ready to attack Konoha with that amount of bandits as far as Tanshu's perception was concerned but Demon desperately tried to talk God-Eyes out of it.

"Konoha has bunch of seals on its gates those cheap tricks will shave off a fair amount of those losers. While you might beat them with sheer numbers and these men are thousands of times the killers that the people in the Leaf Village are but… Sannin alone could blow your army away in just five minutes, we need more ninja that are on their level, even if you…" that was the only moment when Tanshu saw God-Eyes lash out and blow Demon away with his repulsion technique. It didn't even seem like the man had a good reason to, he just hated to be reminded that he lacked the ways to deal with the Sannin of Konohagakure and the Hokage if he needed to. It was true, as numerous as his numbers were, God-Eyes still lacked the appropriate ninja of high level to deal with the Sannin. His four apostles according to Demon only could hold the Sannin back and prove a worthy distraction to them. It was then that Tanshu started to develop a technique in secret to his sensei. Demon-sensei taught him many things, he taught him every little thing that a powerful ninja needed to know about how chakra worked and how appropriate techniques worked, he gave Tanshu many tools but he never asked the boy to use those tools. Demon only wanted to shape the boy the way he saw him fit but Tanshu wanted to be his own man.

For a moment, right before the end of those four years of his training, right before Tanshu started feeling like a challenge to any powerful ninja he saw, before he started appreciating this power he had gained and these new people he had met… This life started to feel good. The boy started to actually feel somewhat happy – the feeling that he had thought he'd never feel and he'd forgotten since his parents had died. Still, something was missing, while Tanshu viewed these people as his family they never really shared his belief. Every time Tanshu wanted to talk to any of the apostles they shunned him: Vashia despite obviously hating her own approach turned away and walked to her own floor, Demon-sensei always tried to kill Tanshu when he tried to even address him as Demon-sensei but times when Demon could even do that had long since passed and Tanshu always survived, Hana always felt like an older sister to Tanshu. The two always fought each other and bickered like two siblings and it appeared that inside only Tanshu really cared for the other where Hana actually may have hated him.

It was that one day that everything changed and Tanshu was finally shaped into the man he had finally become. That time when four shadows appeared in the distance on the top of the crater that God-Eyes built his tower in one that served as a testament of the power inside his eyes but one that did not intimidate the two men and two women on that slope one little bit. For they were the Sannin: Misu of the Vapor, Howoku the Star of Hope, Chestnut Hanasaku and the transcended Sannin of the past generation, survivor of the great battle that gave birth to this wasteland – Sorano the Raijin's Prophet!


	28. Tanshu's Story: Sannin Enter the Battle

The four people standing on top of the edge of a gigantic crater continued to look down on the Tower of Bones that was just standing there – a giant obstacle in the path of the village they all came from. These bandits were a threat to not only the world peace that finally settled down after the Second Great Shinobi War ended but they also had the guts to kill Konoha ninja. Exploit Konoha's international promises as if making fun of the Great Village. It was as if the bandits openly taunted the Leaf village by posing a question: asking which was more precious to it, the village's honor and its promises or their own well-being and the short term peace they've established.

"Let us not be hasty, Howoku-chan has a lot at stake here. After the Third had passed he is one of the names thrown around by the council after all, a success of such level would basically guarantee him the spot" an elderly lady spoke up. The violent wasteland winds picked up and thrown her silver hair around forcing the lady to restrain them. The Sannin of the last generation and the sole survivor of the great battle that made this wasteland it was difficult to understand what drove the retired lady ninja to return to active duty. She was known as Raijin's Prophet – Sorano, her name coming from the great staff hanging on her back which was said to have been one of the legendary weapons of Gods themselves. Right now the woman struggled to hide from the chill of the place in her blue coat, tightening up the belt and buttoning the top two buttons.

"I could not care any less about the title of Hokage. These criminals threaten the peace your generation fought so hard to bring, Sorano-san, that is a transgression I cannot allow to go unpunished!" one of the three current Sannin, Star of Hope – Howoku spoke. He was the man who would soon become the Fourth Hokage but at that moment in time he was but a young shinobi who was in his early twenties but already a jounin declared a Sannin by the village. He was known around the world as one of the greatest defenders of peace and a great orator as well as an amazing ninja who has never taken a life in battle, his blunt-edged sword on his back was the greatest testament of that achievement. Having all that in mind, to a neutral eye Howoku may have looked like a rather puny and geeky man, being quite tall but slim and having curly and messy hair and still needing his glasses. This goofy exterior hid inside a powerhouse for the village like none other, underestimating the Star of Hope would've been a fatal and the last mistake one could make.

"Eh, who the Hell are you kidding, you and your softcore ways… Howoku. Either way, it was pretty cool of the village to authorize this mission. These limitations with them being unable to send more than five people made this really interesting, eh?" the third ninja asked, standing tall and proud over the horizon and observing the tower from the perfect place to sightsee. It was Misu of the Vapor, the past teammate of Howoku and the third Sannin – Hanasaku. The man renowned for his tricky fighting style, unmatched speed and a strategy of fighting that made him one of the least likely people to get hurt, seeing Misu being tagged or injured was indeed a rarity on the battlefield and he was also one of the best swordsmen shinobi that Konohagakure had, a man whom many placed on the level of the Kumogakure swordsmen or even the Iron Country samurai who were previously considered dominant in this area. Misu was a quite attractive young man, often he showed off his bare chest by thrusting it forward and letting his kimono slip off of his shoulders or stroking his wild hair. That being said Misu's vanity was vain by itself, there was no single woman he tried to impress, he just liked showing off.

"I'm really glad you let me tag along! I can't believe the village wanted to keep me contained, it makes me pretty angry, when are we gonna get to fight someone already!" the third Sannin – Hanasaku shouted out. The woman was by far the most tomboyish of the group often seen in male clothes she was also a halfway decent medical ninja and surprisingly enough the physically strongest and most durable ninja of the village. Normally lethal injuries like getting impaled many times over barely seemed to bother Hanasaku to the point where many may have suggested she's enjoying getting injured. Either way, out of the three Sannin even as children she was often put in tongue and cheek as compared to more gentle and soft Howoku, many spoke how the personalities of the two should've been reversed as Hanasaku often acted most macho out of the three. Konoha's "Gentle" Chestnut as she was called came both from her "tough as nuts" attitude and her chestnut colored wild hair. When Hanasaku rampaged through the battlefield often chestnut brown flash of her hair was all that her enemies saw before being brutally taken down.

"Patience, my dear." Sorano uttered before letting her voice suddenly turn wild, "Is what I'd normally say, but an occasion like this: a retired Sannin of the past and all three of the current Sannin is not something that should be put to waste. Allow me to smite those scum using the chakra I've stored up in Raijin's staff during all those years!" the old lady yelled out loud and swung her staff sending a wild gust of wind. For a brief moment there was absolutely nothing, a silence that suggested that there was nothing to the staff but then a gigantic thunderbolt split the sky in two, cutting through the impossibly thick dark clouds of the location as if it was butter giving in to a hot knife. The bolt of lightning was as wide as a vortex of pure lightning, the sound and the amount of light it made forced everyone, even the great Sannin to turn back and cover their eyes. Such power would've truly only been accessible to those wielding the power of Raijin himself as this lightning bolt could've easily caused yet another crater of same magnitude if not greater.

"DAMN IT, OLD LADY! SHOULD'VE WARNED US!" Hanasaku yelled out as her ears were still overwhelmed by the impossible amount of noise coming from the lightning bolt. Howoku removed his glasses and blew into them, "Well now you've done it, Sorano-san, I've finally gone completely blind…" he joked as he scratched his eyes massaging them carefully and waiting for his eyesight to return. It must not have been the first time that Sorano's lightning prowess caused this much displeasure for the young man as he was reacting to this loss of sight quite calmly. It appeared that Misu was the only one barely affected by the lightning. Then again, the man was quite indifferent even to opponent's attacks so something like excessive sound and light would've barely proved to be an annoyance to the Sannin. "That was amazing, Sorano-san! It seems that you've still got it!" he shouted as the staff of the old woman hit the back of his head. Strangely enough this weak attack actually hurt the man and he started scratching the aching spot and whining.

As the smoke and the leftovers of light from the lightning strike cleared and everyone affected by it regained their sight an incredible sight greet their eyes – the Tower of Bones was not damaged by the slightest. Sorano looked at a point somewhere on the roof of the tower spotting a single man, "Damn that Rinnegan user, he has already learned to absorb ninjutsu then… It is good we've come for him now before he had mastered Samsara as well." Right after Sorano's statement, noting that God-Eyes somehow managed to absorb the entirety of Raijin's fury charged for seven years straight, men started flooding from the tower filling up the battlefield in the crater, the four Sannin all shared a collective smile and jumped off of the edge right into the fray of the battle.

Raijin's Prophet Sorano danced across the battlefield like a Goddess of war, suddenly the memories of the Second Great Shinobi War made the old lady to feel right at home as she effortlessly wielded her Raijin's staff just efficiently enough to deflect all of incoming attacks. Sometimes it had appeared like she would be hit, but some astonishing chakra would leak out from the Staff expelling powerful and violent gusts of wind and pushing all the attackers away. When things got particularly difficult Sorano just pointed her staff at the enemies she wanted gone shooting off lightning bolts from her staff without ever needing to use handseals. Sorano's mastery over this lightning was unlike anything anyone had seen, not only she didn't need handseals to use Lightning Release but also the jutsu she used with the staff's aid appeared to come out effortlessly and in many various shapes: channeled beams of lightning, chains of lightning dancing and passing through all the enemies in the line, powerful lightning bolts coming from the sky or even lightning pulses running through the ground or barrage of small lightning spheres. Sorano truly earned her name as Raijin's Prophet and hundreds of bandits fell under her feet burnt and defeated by this incredible woman. Bandits that were supposed to be able to lay siege on Konohagakure itself were rendered powerless against a single woman just like the man with the oni mask had predicted.

Needless to say, other Sannin did not stand around doing nothing. Howoku graciously fought using his sword, he was more than a match for any casual swordsman so he was right at home fighting bunch of ragtag self-trained criminals. To tell the truth Howoku struggled much more than Sorano but his blunt sword found its target and the few injuries that the young man had sustained were not threatening to neither his life nor his future fighting potential. If anything else the pain had drawn out Howoku's anger, hidden will and power to fight like the man named by the council as prime candidate to become Hokage. Strangely enough just swinging his blunt sword was all that Howoku seemed to show these bandits keeping his true power to himself, whenever the situation got too difficult Howoku simply took couple of steps back letting Hanasaku or Misu take care of the situation instead of revealing all of his cards. One wouldn't have been wrong to say that the Star of Hope Howoku did not enjoy battling but still, his reluctance to fight at full strength did not mean weakness by any means.

Where Howoku held back against mere bandits worth the attention of average chuunin, Misu of the Vapor was scooting all around the battlefield. It looked like his legs had blurred and become a stream of vapor and when he got hit the man's body simply dissolved into vapor that then heated up and punished the aggressive attacker with Misu appearing behind them and cutting them down. This was the only way of fighting that the man was known to use – Vapor Mode, the mysterious and unstoppable strategy that no other ninja ever seemed to understand. Whenever the man got hit he simply dissolved into vapor like a clone, becoming just a cloud of heated vapor with the real Misu striking from an open spot. Often Misu used this quick one slash kills even without his Vapor Mode, he called the style "Deceitful Blade" with his body avoiding a strike and counterattacking quickly and pinpoint to the enemy's opening. The combination of his mysterious vapor clone technique and "Deceitful Blade" was the fantastic and awesome "Vapor Mode" that has never found a situation it could not overcome. It was said that no one had ever figured out Misu's weakness ever since he invented this "Vapor Mode"

Where her teammates were subtle, striking like scalpel or a gentle fish gutting knife, Hanasaku was like a rocket launcher. The wild woman leapt around the battlefield wildly throwing mad combinations of blows or simply leapt hundreds of feet into the air and creating mad earthquakes after landing. Out of the four Hanasaku took the most damage as she barely bothered to defend herself, the woman was not distracted by an enemy striking from behind, she always just kept punching and dashing around forward destroying the enemy ranks effortlessly. Her single punch was enough to destroy any man, even the largest ones that probably ate elephants for breakfast fell like autumnal leaves after just a single flick of the woman. Once Hanasaku bet against the village's strongest taijutsu ninja that no amount of Inner Gates would keep up with her, it was unknown how that bet went but from the tales of the ninja himself the woman could easily keep up with first four gates and to bump it up was useless because the technique actually hurt him more than a successful blow to Hanasaku seemed to do as nothing kept her down for long. After the battle was over the woman was covered with bruises and blunt traumas and had multiple swords stuck in her front and back to the point where she looked like a pin cushion. Just another mission for Hanasaku the Chestnut. That being said, the woman had the largest pile of broken bandits beneath her feet, even if she did cry like a little girl on a dentist's chair when Howoku angrily pulled out all the weapons stuck in her body and scolded her.

"Is it OK to go on? Hanasaku-chan seems injured." Sorano asked looking questioningly at Misu, the man just shrugged. "I dunno, she's always like that. Just give her five to ten minutes of rest and she'll heal herself up no problem." Howoku still did not look happy, "You'll exhaust your chakra fighting these goons, who are you trying to show up getting hurt so much?!" he yelled at the silly young woman, "That's right!" Sorano got surprised as if she just remembered something, "Every supernatural physical feat uses chakra manipulation, right? Won't Hanasaku-chan tire out?" The brown haired wonder looked at the old lady and gave her a thumb up, "Don't worry, I'm not like the other ninja, my body doesn't use chakra to maintain superhuman strength, I'm just strong cause I train a lot!" while the old lady didn't buy this Misu waved at her to let it go.

"Howoku was not referring to chakra used with physical prowess but her mediocre healing skills. Hanasaku isn't like the other physical ninja, usually there are two ways to become like her. One is to make up some sort of jutsu like imbue your entire body with chakra and give it some sort of supernatural feature native to that Elemental Release, like lightning fast reflexes using Lightning Release etc. The other is to train one's body to become strong, to find the bodily limit and keep training to break it. The problem with this method is that it'll never give you the amount of strength that the first method gives, the user of the second method will always be weaker than a user of a jutsu that enhances strength. Strangely enough Hanasaku is an exception to that rule, she trains not her body itself but her overall chakra level, seeing how physical energy of our body is an element of chakra her physical prowess seems to increase together with her chakra level. That being said, it is only because she's a silly idiot that this even worked, I don't think anyone else could pull such ridiculous concept off like increasing one's physical strength by only increasing one's chakra level. If any of us were sensors Hanasaku's chakra would feel like a Sun compared to small fires of normal ninja that is why she's such a freak." Misu explained observing the tower for any surprise developments.

As Howoku was carefully tending to Hanasaku's wounds, removing any weapons stuck in her or giving the woman a description which wounds she'll have to heal up with her mediocre medical ninjutsu skills, there was something that bothered the man. "Sorano-san, how about you? You've blasted so many people with your staff, surely wielding it tires you out, right? Lightning Release is quite a difficult Elemental Release on chakra control seeing how unstable it is. Are you going to be OK?" the young man inquired, he obviously intended to add her age into the mix but remembering how violently the woman lashed out on Misu before the clever Sannin kept it inside, just letting it float in the air and letting the woman catch the idea if she was perceptive enough but without proof of Howoku's intention of bringing it up.

"My staff of Raijin works differently. It costs chakra to use, yes, but it is a steady flow of chakra, it tires me consistently to use it unsealed, not to use techniques. Its concept is very peculiar and difficult to understand and use efficiently which is why it is likely that there will be no one to use it after my passing… Which will be in a million years! Anyways, whenever I swing my staff it generates charges of electricity somewhere inside of it, the stronger and faster the swing – the more it builds up, if it comes into contact with another body or weapon it builds up even more. It is that built up charge that is used in staff's Lightning and Wind Releases." Howoku sighed, "In other words, you do not use Lightning Release at all, you use the force built up inside of the staff but it feeds off of your chakra. Interesting. Wait… Wind Release?" the young man got curious when the woman nodded, "Yes, I can also generate weaker gusts using the same energy built up inside it, but same energy charges are used in both lightning and wind releases so it is often a strategic decision how to use the staff. It takes much more time to learn to properly use it than it takes to gain enough chakra to use it…" the old lady laughed.

With the last knife being pulled out of Hanasaku's shoulder, Howoku stood up and sighed, turning at the Tower of Bones and tightening his gloves. "Well, I think if we let Hanasaku-chan rest for the first couple of fights we can go in!" Misu and Sorano joined Howoku and once the chestnut color haired woman joined the squad of past and present Sannin the four all collectively entered the building. The figures of the four disappeared in the darkness of the Tower of Bones that no one has ever conquered before. The fight was about to get started for real with One's with the Eyes of God apostles facing off against the Sannin!


	29. Tanshu's Story: Battle in Total Darkness

Darkness was the first thing that greet the Sannin as they entered the Tower of Bones. The whole place was very briefly lit by torches but those only demonstrated where the walls that they were hung on were. It was not easy finding the staircase, it only took a couple of minutes of wandering before Hanasaku got a bit impatient. "This is stupid, let's just bust through!" the woman yelled out. Sorano's lifted up palm stopped the impatient Sannin in her path. "Even if we tried it'd be of no use, if the protective seals that protect this thing can make it withstand my strongest lightning bolt I've ever cast it can without a doubt take anything we throw – playing by the rules is the only way we'll get anywhere."

"Stop, you've wandered enough, Sannin, please follow me!" Tanshu shouted to direct the attention of his guests at him. "Finally, some direction, some thugs these days can't even be bothered to show us around…" Misu shrugged with a smug face. Howoku however was much more dumbfounded, "You're… Black Dog Tanshu, the boy that ran away from the village seven years ago, so you survived this long by joining with One with the Eyes of God?" he asked. Howoku's tone was quite interesting, usually when a high ranking ninja addressed a nukenin they had a certain shade of disrespect, resentment towards the peer that dared to betray the village, Howoku had none of that. He was respectful to the end.

"Well, boy, the man with Rinnegan is going down today, it's still not too late to switch sides. We can write your nukenin story down to you escaping when you were far too young to understand your actions. We've done something similar before." Sorano spoke softly trying to lure the boy back to Konoha's side but Tanshu's face did not falter for a moment. These were the people that got his parents involved in a useless war, this very old lady was a survivor of the war where his parents died. She, an old hag who survived while young parents died, has no right to speak to him. "The purpose of my life no longer lies with that place, it is where my katei is. Make no mistake, you are standing in my katei and disgracing it with your filth, if Oni Mask sensei doesn't kill you I will do it myself. By the way, I go by Red Dog now… Follow me." Tanshu's voice was full of anger and rage towards these ninja, all of them were in the war and yet none of them did anything to save his parents, they all looked like they lost nothing in that war at all. They were just in it for the glory, they didn't care about who lived or died out there and such filthy humans had no right to draw breath, not in his katei!

"Awww… He's so cuuute! Can we keep him?" Hanasaku shrieked as she ran up to Tanshu pinching his cheeks, for a moment the boy could not believe what this woman was doing. She crossed all the lines, he'd kill her right then and there, who cared what Demon sensei and God-Eyes told him?! Tanshu's arm caught the woman's and pressed it hard. Usually that'd be enough to break anyone's arm and the woman's bone cracked but… She didn't even flinch, Tanshu threw an elbow at her face to break her nose but she simply clashed with the elbow of her own sending a gust of wind through the room as the two powerhouses hit each other. "You can be my little brother!" Hanasaku smiled as she didn't care about the injury to her arm at all.

Tanshu released the clash and turned around, all he had to do was to lead these idiots to sensei's room. Then again, the woman was supposed to be the strongest of all the ninja, Tanshu felt like if that strike of hers was all she had he could've given her a good fight, were these Sannin really that strong? There it was, oni-mask's room, Tanshu stopped by the room and turned back at the Sannin explaining the rules to them. Misu cracked a grin after the boy finished his speech, "So… What's stopping us from attacking the guy in full force and killing him together?" he asked, Tanshu shook his head and opened the door revealing sensei's dark room, the one where Tanshu woke up in after his fight with God-Eyes. "If you feel that's what you want to do, by all means, attack Oni Mask sensei all at once…" Howoku seemed to be the smarter one, he instantly understood the condition of the room they entered. "No, we will follow the rules and fight one on one, these rooms don't look like they'd let us let loose, plus our abilities are wide scale, we'd risk hitting each other if we fought here and would constantly get in each other's way."

Sensei's mask lit up and appeared out of the absolute darkness of the room. "Hello there, Konohagakure Sannin and retired Sannin, my name is… Well, Demons don't go by names, you can call me whatever you like. Which one of you will go first? I warn you, I am going to definitely kill the first one to fight me, my odds will of course decrease once the fights stack up, but the first one to fight me has 0% odds to survive. I'd suggest the old lady, she must have already finished all her things she wanted to do in life…" Hanasaku cracked her fists and entered, yelling out "I'll fight!" but then Sorano's gentle hand pushed her back softly. "No, dear, you've still not recovered from your reckless battle outside, let this be your lesson to be more careful next time." Just like that the first battle for the key to the next floor begun – Sorano the Raijin's Prophet, retired Sannin against the man with no name, Oni Mask!

Out of nowhere the oni mask started moving up closer to the woman, she slammed her staff to the ground lighting the room up for a mere moment and then blocking the strike the of the man. The man with oni mask continued to strike but Sorano's strategy of using one end of the stick to spark some light and using the other to deflect assassin's lethal blows seemed to work perfectly as all of Oni Mask's blows were deflected or blocked by the staff. The man pulled some impressive moves, jumping around and kicking, flipping and vaulting around, using both floor and ceiling for footing and using ground and aerial as well as low attacks but using her staff Sorano always knew they were coming and was in time to react to them despite being an old lady.

"Impressive, Old Hag's amazing!" Hanasaku yelled out loud impressed by how fast the old lady managed to respond to the attacks, Howoku nodded, "The man has a very interesting approach to fighting – he lives in a very dark room with the room being tuned to his outfit which makes his attire invisible, it is impossible to tell if he is coming and where from, what kind of attack he is using without a source of light. Actually, out of us all only Sorano-san and I could beat him." Misu looked displeased by this conclusion, probably because he wasn't included in the list of names. Tanshu barely managed to contain his laughter, how did these fools plan to beat sensei? The Red Dog himself could beat sensei in theory but not in this room, in this room, sensei was God, not God-Eyes.

Suddenly Oni Mask's speed picked up, he landed a couple of nicks on Sorano and what was even more impressive – his blows were cutting like knives, the scratches that Oni Mask's strikes left on the old lady were like she was cut by blades. It was becoming apparent that the lady could not keep up with the same two point strategy she was using before with this increase of speed and Tanshu could tell – sensei was not fighting at his top speed. As expected, even the mighty Sannin could not keep up with sensei in this room. Vashia and Hana and even Oni Mask himself were not up to Sannin level but in this room, right here, they could win! A loud grunt echoed, one coming from Oni Mask as a loud flesh cutting sound echoed. Tanshu could see it – the old lady's heart was pierced with sensei's hand – it was over! The quickest Sannin death ever. As always sensei's strength that helped him hit like a sharp weapon was impressive! A loud poof echoed through the dark room and a sound of wood hitting the ground came – it appeared that the woman managed to substitute herself with a wooden floor tile at the last second.

"As expected from a retired Sannin, to make a fool of me with such a basic technique…" Oni Mask applauded the old woman, Sorano however did not return the honor of talking to her opponent. She was focused completely on the battle as she just witnessed how making a single mistake may have caused the ex-Sannin her life. Then the woman shouted out as she forced her body to swing the staff around her body and then drove it into the ground. The entire room lit up with lightning as impulses of electricity went through the floor and erupted violently focusing on the man that the woman was fighting. The amount of Lightning Release that the woman could whip up impressed Tanshu, judging from how stressed out Oni Mask was to pull off his quick side vault dodges it could've been told that he did not expect such violent attack as well. "Wow. Old Lady gathered so much charge into her staff from such a brief exchange of blows?! That staff is impressive" Hanasaku once more shrieked out like a little girl.

Oni Mask was panting pretty hard, he clearly did have to use a moderate amount of effort to dodge that attack, but now this stupid young woman with chestnut colored hair told him the secret of the old woman – the staff was what used the lightning techniques and not the lady herself. The Oni Mask charged at the woman with all of his speed that he could muster up in his tired state, if what this silly young woman said was true, it meant that the old woman had no more juice in her staff which meant he had to exploit the opportunity! Right as the man closed up with his thrust of the palm aiming to once again impale the woman, the old lady drove her staff into the ground and leaped over her opponent, then she proceeded to avoid his attacks using the same strategy as before. Oni Mask may have had the advantage of speed before but his current worn out state quickly wasted that advantage. Sorano quickly thrust her staff forward shooting off a bolt of lightning but Oni Mask leaned to the side avoiding it. Minor branches of electricity gently separated from the bolt burning the man up a bit and revealing some of his skin. Now Oni Mask was not completely invisible in the darkness as some of his burnt flesh was well visible.

Tanshu was surprised by how well his mentor took those lightning burns, it was no secret that his sensei's body under those clothes was covered with burns, for a burned skin to be hit by more minor lightning branches and to keep its owner completely unfazed was impressive. Sensei must've had tremendous pain tolerance, had he not drugged Tanshu when training him the boy suspected he'd have just the same kind of tolerance too. The ex-Sannin and the Oni Mask clashed again, as much as the man tried to break the staff using his near superhuman strength he could not do it, as much as the woman tried to land a single blow on the man using her staff she also couldn't do it. It was evident by now that the battle would be decided not by who was more skilled but who could catch their opponent off guard with a more powerful technique. Having realized this both fighters leaped back.

"This fight sucks, I can't see a thing." Misu sniffed angrily, Howoku did not move his eyes from the battle. "That's because you do not use perception in your battles, your Vapor Mode protects you from every attack your opponent makes which makes you careless. If you knew how to pick up and interpret sounds, if you could see the entire situation in those brief moments of light that Sorano-san gives herself, if you had any imagination and perception skills at all you'd be able to see it." Hanasaku showed Misu her tongue and pointed at the boy, "Look, even my little brother can follow the battle clearly, jeez you're such a loser, Misu!" she laughed out. Misu sniffed again and looked at his friend, "You're as careless as I am if not more, I bet you can't follow it either…" Hanasaku's head dipped to the ground, she looked like she was about to cry, "I can pick up bits and pieces… I'm missing so much of such an awesome battle!"

"Well then, we've danced long enough, lady, let us proceed to finishing touches then." Oni Mask huffed out, without replying a single word Sorano swung her staff and pointed it at her opponent shooting off a bolt of lightning. The lightning bolt seemed to keep going and the wall behind Oni Mask. Sorano was thrown off guard by the fact that the glowing in the dark oni mask at that moment wasn't even on the face of her opponent but actually on something else. It was too late however as every observer could hear only loud thuds and the grunt of the woman before Oni Mask's demonic voice returned. "Demon Kenpo" he said naming his style of quick succession strikes that hit the woman's body. In some ways Oni Mask was the perfect ninja as he represented all that ninja stood for, he deceived his opponent, threw them off guard and then took them out quickly while being completely invisible to his victim. Even the mighty retired Sannin was now dead laying on the floor…

"Not bad, for the both of us to use the same technique to trick their opponent." Sorano's voice echoed from some other corner of the room. "String Reeling technique to hang the most visible object in front, making the enemy believe that their opponent was standing still. It seems I've gotten used to the dark already just as you are." Oni Mask lifted off the coat of Sorano that he tore up using his quick thrusts strong enough to stab a human being with his own hand before laughing out and tossing it aside. "It is true, I suppose I am as blind in this darkness as you are, Sorano-san" Oni Mask nodded as he turned around to face the old woman in the corner where she has hidden. Tanshu was completely confused, when did this woman pull this trick off? When did she have the time to do that? He had to hand it to this woman, even if he did hate her, she was resourceful. How in the world could she and sensei have the same idea at the same time to trick their opponent?! Tanshu refused to place this woman on sensei's level of smarts, that was impossible.

The two leaped at each other, exchanging blows with each powerful strike being blocked by the other. Oni Mask's thrusts managed to deflect Sorano's staff just as easily as her staff deflected his fists and thrusts. Knowing that Oni Mask trained his fists punching steel and stone it was to no surprise. Then something happened, the whole room illuminated as Sorano just became lightning shaped and dissolved appearing behind her opponent, Oni Mask tried to react but quick and precise blows from her staff stopped him in his tracks. The woman worked the staff very well, spinning it around to confuse the man and charging it up with lightning chakra to make a stronger blow. She tore up the man's jumpsuit even more making it even harder for him to properly conceal his body in the dark as his purplish dark burnt skin was quite standing out compared to the darkness around him to a trained eye. The woman tried to finish it all by driving her staff to Oni Mask's head, an impact like that would've knocked him out for sure. With a loud clang the staff shot up in the air as the Demon deflected it with his arm thrust.

Having found his new opening the man did not hesitate, his balance and speed was thrown off, he kept punching the old lady but his strikes did not kill her, just open cuts and bruises, broke her teeth and cut her lip, made her body swell but did not outright impale her. It was apparent that sensei's "Demon Kenpo" needed some preparation and concentration time but it didn't matter – sensei was fighting a Sannin one on one, he was returning her the blows he took and that was satisfactory. Even if the idea of a Sannin matching sensei in his dark room was scary, at least it provided some comfort as sensei was not entirely over his head. Sensei's arms weighed down, he was breathing heavily, the woman took this time to recover and started striking back herself, charging her staff up even more, giving the man no time to respond or defend. This was no longer perfect chain of blocks or a match of skill, this was two people desperately trying to kill each other! Sorano slammed her staff right into Oni Mask's head, sensei's head let out a disgusting and alarming sound – something told Tanshu that it'd be a very disgusting display if this darkness wasn't here to conceal it.

"Demon Kenpo!" Oni Mask yelled out of nowhere right as a combination of stabbing-like sounds broke to Tanshu's ears. He got her! Tanshu could smell the blood, he could feel it that both combatants were injured but did sensei hit the woman in her vitals? He could have hit her many times but if no vitals were hit any ninja could keep going even after being impaled by his strikes multiple times. Tanshu was hit by that many times when sensei wasn't planning to kill him and he always could take multiple of those. The woman grunted in pain but kept swinging her staff. Suddenly her staff lit up with sheer lightning chakra, she was going to use all that she had accumulated revealing just how much damage each fighter has taken with the light from the charging up lightning. Sensei's head was split open, it was hard to determine just how much damage he had taken since his face was disfigured but it was bleeding quite heavily, the woman also was bleeding out as she evidently took multiple stabs from sensei's strikes. A powerful beam illuminated the room making each ninja inside cover their eyes and ears from the deafening sound. A powerful lightning wave blew covering most of the room as the woman yelled out "Heavenly Punishment Jutsu!"

It would not have taken a genius to know that if that technique had landed on sensei he would've been disintegrated… Tanshu couldn't see how things happened but he knew that this was the woman's plan all along – to quickly gather up charges in ugly one on one clashes and use this. All of this darkness worked in her favor, contrast of absolute light breaking absolute darkness forced even the other Sannin to flinch in place. Nothing could have survived this inhuman jutsu. And yet… Tanshu knew not to count sensei as being dead before he saw the pile of his ashes. All the ninja in this room, both the fighting ones and the ones waiting for their turn stood silently waiting for the conclusion to this battle in darkness that was approaching and seemed to be getting closer and closer every second! Every blow could've concluded the battle now.


	30. Tanshu's Story: Howoku's Starlight!

After the aftermath of Sorano's technique there was a brief moment of illumination even after it had resolved, such "afterlight" effect was not something that was common to many techniques. Also there were countless of lightning sparks crackling in the air, even the aftermath of the technique was violent enough. The retired Sannin was breathing heavily and clenching one of many wounds inflicted by her opponent with small drops of blood ticking down on the floor once in a while. As the afterlight cleared the result of her technique was apparent, then slowly the surrounding dimmed away into gloom. Loud grunts and whining could've been heard in the darkness.

"Your leg is quite messed up, perhaps it'd be for the best to grant us passage and let us go?" Sorano taunted the opponent whom she saw to be alive. "You've got to be kidding…" Tanshu thought, he noticed from sensei's stance that he used his "Demon Kick" technique charging his body with Lightning Release chakra and kicking transferring all of the force into this one kick, such kick was swift, silent and was strong enough to cut people in two, even more, the Lightning Release nature of the technique would've been enough to absorb the technique while sensei's other leg would've grounded it. And yet… Oni Mask's leg looked like a lump of coal, it was black and barely resembled a human appendage, just how powerful was this technique that this retired Sannin used? This strength was beginning to defy even the ninja limits, these Sannin were not superhuman, they were superninja.

Sorano grunted again as she spun her staff and pointed it to where Oni Mask last was when light illuminated the room, a powerful and unstable lightning bolt shot out, as the room was lit up it revealed Oni Mask standing right up to Sorano and having ducked right to the ground. "Demon Kenpo" he shouted thrusting his hand right to the woman's heart, as the body was penetrated it dissolved into pure lightning chakra and lit the room again revealing Oni Mask grunting and falling to his knees, "Lightning Clone!?" he shouted out in frustration. A loud thud echoed, then the thud repeated, then again, and again, and again, and again. The thuds started echoing around like a machinegun, it was tough for Tanshu to keep his ears open – the two were exchanging blows again in total darkness, using just perception and imagination of their opponent's position and predicting their movements with complete precision, as Sorano's staff grinded against the floor it shot out lightning sparks that briefly lit the room. It was a glorious dance of light and violence. It made Tanshu almost beg for another peek just to see these two amazing ninja clash again.

A flash of light lit the next exchange, the woman's palm was shooting straight at the mess that was Oni Mask's face, there it was – the opening. The arms of the assassin shot backwards like he was winding up to push the woman away, he then just shot them both forward at the same time. "Twin Demon Kenpo!" he grunted as another flesh tearing sound reached everyone's ears. Then it started sounding like someone was spilling a bucket of water on the floor, as the lightning lit everything up again it was revealed that one palm penetrated Sorano's gut, this was major, with so many injuries and her elderly body there was only that much that the woman could do, this battle was wrapping up. Sorano tried to use her chance to hit Oni Mask's exposed head but she couldn't, pain made her slower, exhaustion made her even slower. She shot all of her lightning out already from her staff, if she hadn't she'd have used staff's own abilities and not her own "Lightning Clone Jutsu" moments before to avoid death.

Once again loud clangs echoed through the room, again and again, Tanshu could not believe for how long these two were dancing together, for how long they could keep this race of mind, will and determination up, for how long they could both fight to the best of their abilities without slowing down. Sensei was being pushed, according to Tanshu's calculations he only had one last technique and no chance to use it – the All Speed. As the name suggests it is the entirety of sensei's potential speed and strength but… It couldn't just have been thrown out like that, especially not when sensei was this hurt, his eyes were flooding with blood coming from his forehead and his body was tired at this point of the fight, Tanshu had expected the jutsu to come in early to gain advantage but why was sensei keeping it for last? Having its drawbacks in mind…

A loud clang, louder than the thousands before interrupted the boy's thoughts as a powerful gust of wind made him cover his face. For the first time the room lit up not because of the lightning but because of the actual sparks from sensei's "Demon Kenpo" clashing with Raijin's staff. The woman's staff was first to attack, Oni Mask could not react in time and got a couple of blows, the woman aimed for the head – she knew that if she hit hard enough she'd break the man's skull at some point, if it wasn't broken yet… Oni Mask was flung around mercilessly as Sorano's staff hit him again and again, the man tried to block using just his arms but without chakra enhancements of "Demon Kenpo" he was unable to keep up with the staff's strength, it was simply flesh against ancient steel.

With a powerful swing hitting Oni Mask's cheek and lighting it up just for that extra strength and flare, sending most of his teeth to the floor, Sorano sent the man down. Her staff started crackling with lightning – she was charging up another attack! She probably had enough for a lethal thunderbolt strike which made Tanshu worried – sensei just kept twitching on his knees, was he down and out? Sorano pointed her staff right at his bleeding head, at this rate… Wait… What if he wasn't still affected by the blows, what if he was… For the last time Sorano's staff lit up with powerful impulses of electricity as a ball formed on the tip. The room lit up, so brightly that everyone had to cover their eyes. It was over, but the sight that greet everyone when they turned back surprised everyone.

The spot where Sorano aimed her lightning bolt was flaming, her lightning bolt had missed and hit the floor! Oni Mask was right below the woman, his legs were stretched out to the human limit as he ducked his frontal body to avoid the blast, his back was still smoking from the side burns of the bolt of electricity. Sorano's body twitched a couple of times – Oni Mask's arm was dug right through her chest. There it was, All Speed. Oni Mask channelled all of his remaining chakra into lightning impulses that enhanced his bodily reaction time and movements to superhuman levels. However using his All Speed required charge up time, appropriate to how exhausted the user's body was, also it fatigued the body and basically burned the muscles up. Tanshu understood what this meant, both short term and long term implications. Oni Mask straightened out as he held the old lady's body, gently placing it on the ground and closing her eyes with his soft stroke of hand.

"You BASTARD!" Howoku yelled out, at that same moment his body lit up, it was like chakra was simply leaking out of his pores, like some sort of white divine-like light was leaking from his body. The man charged forward, Tanshu could follow the man's movement but it was incredibly fast, just how could this wimp have pulled this off? Oni Mask obviously could not move in time, Tanshu had already predicted that using All Speed so late in the fight would pretty much kill his chances of movement afterwards. A sphere of light of the same nature shaped itself in the palm of Howoku's hand as his arm shot forward hitting Oni Mask's chest. "Starlight Sphere!" Howoku yelled out thrusting his hand forward and throwing his opponent back like a ragdoll as the sphere of light violently dissolved. Oni Mask yelled out loudly, flying backwards and hitting the wall, after Oni Mask's body hit the wall behind him it collapsed with the lifeless body flying right out. Light seeped through into the room, it was symbolic that as Oni Mask died so did the darkness in the room… Tanshu blinked and it was over – to think that the power of this wimp could break even Hana's seal, sure, it was weakened by the old lady's most powerful lightning bolt but the boy had to know.

"This light… This chakra, it's a Kekkei Genkai, correct? May I know what kind?" Tanshu asked looking at Howoku, the man's eyes changed, this was no longer the stare of a noble and kind soul, this was a stare of a bloodthirsty fighter. "This man was your sensei, correct? Don't you wish revenge for his death?" the man replied, his voice was rude and strong, no longer the gentle and soft tone he had when he came. Tanshu looked down, "To tell you the truth I think sensei wanted me to kill him at some point, just to finish his training. I did like him as a mentor but in this world people die, I've already lost any grip with reality, death of people dear to me no longer bring up any emotion. Neither this floor, nor the one above it is my floor to fight. Now answer my question, Star of Hope, Howoku!"

Howoku turned around and drew his blunt blade, slowly the man stroke his hand by the blade, normally it would've opened up a grievous wound but the blunt steel was made more for bashing than slashing. With a swift and precise movement of his hand Howoku threw the blunt sword like a spear aiming at Oni Mask's body lying outside on the black rough ground. Just mere moments before the sword went on its trajectory outside and impaled the body of his sensei Tanshu's wrist wrapped around its handle catching it in mid-air. "I no longer want that title or this blade that cannot take lives!" Howoku yelled out in rage, "I held myself back, restrained my Starlight Release and used a blunt blade, I believed that if I fought with peaceful intentions in heart that the world would change, that it'd pull its punches on me as well! Curse you, Red Dog Tanshu, go to Hell for catching this blade, from now on I live by a new ideal – evil people that threaten peace deserve absolute death, Iron Country samurai call it "Aku-Soku-Zan!" Tanshu threw the useless junk weapon to the side, this blunt sword that could not kill anyone did not deserve to be held by him.

"Starlight Release… Huh?" Tanshu spoke under his own nose as he boldly stepped forward walking up to Howoku who seemed to be going through a crisis of ideals. After the young ninja passed by the saddened Sannin he turned to the side, "There is no need to attack corpses, even for one who follows "Aku-Soku-Zan", I'm not nearly patient enough to check if sensei is dead or not, all I know that no one can live through a battle like this, even if Sorano-san had survived this battle she'd have collapsed not too long afterwards, sensei cannot be beaten one on one in this room and his purpose to God-Eyes is now fulfilled, I no longer care what happens to him and if you do you're just an angry child fixed on revenge. If you keep me waiting and standing here wasting time I'll kill all three of you, now let's move to the next floor." he said showing to Howoku the key. Hanasaku jumped up, "Wait, did you have all the keys this whole time!?" Tanshu kept on walking, he just waved his arm and carelessly replied "You did not bother to properly answer my question, I don't owe you the explanation of this situation as well."

As the boy started walking up the stairs he heard the Sannin catching up, Howoku then spoke. "Starlight Release is a Kekkei Genkai I awakened during my teenage years, I have no idea where it comes from or why I have it but I'm the only person in the world with it. It's a form of combination of Fire and Lightning Releases, it creates a plasma-like substance that is said to be as hot in its core as the surface of the Sun. I didn't like to use it because it usually either hurts people very badly or outright disintegrates them if I hit them head-on, such extraordinary power needs to be restrained, used carefully… Or so I thought, now I don't care about the lives of scum that threaten peace. Please tell me about the keys now, Tanshu." For a moment Tanshu just kept walking up the stairs contemplating on what Howoku just said, "Starlight Release", so that was the kind of ability that the Sannin used, superheated gas that can be used to absolutely decimate even Hana's seals. Even God-Eyes' most powerful Universal Push lacked the strength to do that, that was how this crater was formed this deep in the first place, the one God-Eyes made when fighting Tanshu wasn't even one tenth the strength of this one.

"Well, I guess now I can tell you the truth, now that you broke Hana's seal there is no use in this whole key thing, this key doesn't unlock anything, it's my key from my floor. You can just bust the door down, there are no longer any protections to this tower, you can even go as far as to break the rules and attack God-Eyes right now." After Tanshu finished talking Howoku nodded angrily, his cold and scary look started giving even Tanshu the creeps. And yet… A man who cared so deeply about his comrades, a man who was able to change his entire life worth of beliefs to better respect the memory of a dead comrade. The boy felt it inside – he wanted to be this man's comrade now, if he died while being Howoku's friend this man would avenge Tanshu and protect his katei for him even if someone powerful killed the young man… His life would finally have meaning.

"Nah, screw that, let's play by the rules. I'm really getting into this." Misu spoke as Tanshu's fist flew straight into the man's face sending him tumbling couple of steps backward. Apparently even the Sannin did not expect this blow as his face did not dissolve into vapour after getting hit. "You bastard, Sorano-san died! How can you just play by the scumbag's rules after he had Sorano-san killed! How can we return to the village having lost someone like Sorano-san! The village will never wipe away the tears!" the man was literally shaking as he yelled it out. Hanasaku's hand reached over Howoku's shoulder. "No, I believe what Misu said is what is best" for the first time in a while the young woman spoke in a very calm and assured tone, "Didn't you see it yet? These nukenin are able to kill us, they're just as strong as we are and when I clashed with Little Bro here I felt it – he'd kick me in the butt a couple of times and it'd definitely be tough to fight him. If we split up and fight everyone at once we won't be able to assist each other if needed assistance. What if you or Misu or me needs help and the others are fighting somewhere else? More people will die and you will blame yourself even more, Howoku-kun. Please stop and calm down, we'll play this how Little Bro wants."

Tanshu was truly annoyed by being called "Little Bro", who did this lady think she was? If memory served well the next in line would be Vashia… It was really hard for Tanshu to kick down the door, not because it was hard, the door itself was just a wooden construction and a simple shoulder push could've taken it out when the seal was broken. The hard part was the emotional part. Vashia was a nice girl, Tanshu knew it. She was silent, closed in and didn't wish harm upon anyone else. But if she was told to fight she would fight until the end because she was devoted to the cause, deep inside the Red Dog knew that she thought of them like a little family, just like he did. "Is something wrong, Little Bro?" Hanasaku laughed out and tried to stroke his hair, with a rough blow Tanshu pushed her hand away. "Shut up, I'm just thinking…" As the door fell out and the Red Dog started leading the three he noticed something wrong, this was not Vashia's floor, it couldn't have been. Hana and Vashia must've switched floors, it was most likely God-Eyes who ordered this – still, the purpose of this switch remained known only to him. In the manner of a true God he was unpredictable till the end. The walls were covered with some stupid graffiti-like paintings done with simple red and purple paint. The whole place was well lit and had multiple cushions thrown around randomly on the floor. As the boy opened the door he already knew the face that'd greet them inside. "This is Hana, she's the one that placed all those seals on the Tower. Please gang up on her and kill her quickly before she speaks." Tanshu facepalmed.

"Shut up you loser! Why didn't you help Oni Mask fight?! Maybe you sided with the Konoha trash then? Come on, I'll take you on too you twerp!" the lady broke out spitting filth. The young nukenin sighed in frustration and stood to a wall gesturing that it was now OK to challenge her. Hanasaku jumped forward and cracked her knuckles, "OK, my turn!" she shouted out but Howoku was already standing in front of the young woman. "HOWOKU-KUN!" she whined out comically but it appeared like the Sannin couldn't hear the voice of his companion anymore. He just pointed his fist at the young lady, "Your boss is threatening the peace and is responsible for the death of a retired Sannin, give your key up and I will let you live." His voice sounded husky and angry but Hana didn't get the clue. She just made a comic grimace and showed her tongue and her middle finger. "You'll get rabbit poop, ya loser!" the girl removed a small piece of bubble gum from her purse and put it into her mouth.

"She had bubble gum in her ninja tool pouch?" Hanasaku's mouth opened in shock, "Shit, how come I didn't think of that!? I can carry food in there!" Howoku's head sunk down and then lifted back up as the man fixed his glasses. "Then I shall remove you from the equation, as a threat to peace you must be destroyed!" the man shouted out, despite the fact that he looked calmed down after the death of his comrade he still acted like this new "Aku-Soku-Zan" version of the man he once was. Tanshu didn't complain, at least he'd use his Starlight Release and shut that annoying mouth of Hana's up. Meanwhile he could think of some way to prevent Vashia's death, maybe he could somehow lead them over her floor right to God-Eyes! No. That wouldn't work, the construction of the floor was pretty simplistic and it only had one pathway, from down to up. Maybe he could talk to the girl? No, Vashia had a strong sense of honor, she wouldn't budge even if the enemy is a Sannin. Stupid God-Eyes, he should've fought these people himself, now he's counting on his apostles to wear them out so that he can finish them himself. What a despicable guy!

Hana and Howoku leaped at each other, preparing for a clash. The fight on the second floor was about to begin!


	31. Tanshu's Story: Another Battle Stolen

The two opponents just continued to stare each other down. Tanshu knew that making a move first and taking the offensive approach was simply not Hana's style, especially when taking on a Konohagakure Sannin like Howoku. On the other hand, Tanshu was afraid of Howoku's silent and cool stare, while he may have spoken a lot of trash about Hana he still sort of cared about her. He was like an older abusive sister to him, on a day to day basis he may have hated the girl's guts but when the choice of life and death was given, it wasn't truly a choice at all.

Chestnut Hanasaku looked at Tanshu curiously, "Say, Little Bro, what's this Hana chick like anyways?" Tanshu pouted angrily and yelled back in a rude manner, "I told you to stop calling me that! It ain't any of your business, Sannin!" Hanasaku just smiled and then looked back at the two opponents that just kept looking at each other. Hana shot her palm forward as if she was a queen issuing an order to her subordinates. "Don't you dare say another word, loser! Your tongue won't do me justice! I am Hana of the Sand Village, the most handy right hand person to have by one's side!" the girl spoke in a rather arrogant tone. It was obvious that the young lady had great pride in her abilities. All of a sudden Howoku's body started leaking Stardust Release chakra as the man disappeared from where he was standing.

An elbow strike connected to Hana's face almost instantly after everyone noticed that the man disappeared, then another blow to her middle body area, Howoku punched and kicked again and again in a combination before finishing his ruthless attack with a knee to the girl's stomach and a finishing downward strike from his elbow. Hanasaku yelled out in frustration, "Oy, Howoku, that's rude to do to a lady! You should stop playing around and just take her out quick!" Tanshu's face did not flinch, actually Howoku's approach was the right one – hit Hana fast and take her out, don't give her a chance to do anything before she uses one of her crazy tricks. His only mistake was to stop hitting her once she was down. Howoku's ruthless eyes looked back at his two teammates, "I don't care if she's male or female, she became an enemy to be taken down the moment she acted against us. She chose this world of violence and death and brought this onto herself. She or anyone else in that matter has no right to complain about any of this!" he grunted out angrily starting to leak Starlight Release chakra from his body.

This attack was different! The amount of chakra that Howoku sent out was insane! Why would any technique make one leak such overwhelming amounts of chakra, maybe this was a proof of this man's lack of chakra control, he must've been so hesitant to use these destructive Starlight techniques that he had no control over them. Howoku's arms shot forward as he roared loudly in pain and effort that it took to keep this impressive display up. All of the star-white chakra gathered outside of his body and just started making the man glow and shimmer. "Starlight Bridge Jutsu!" Howoku shouted out as the chakra violently shot forward in a powerful slightly arching beam shaped right like the user's body. This was without a doubt an attack to completely disintegrate the opponent.

As the overflowing light of Howoku's Starlight Release filled the room everyone had to cover their eyes. Tanshu tried to duck and bolt out of the room as a technique of such caliber expelling so much heat would've completely eradicated the entire room making the whole building collapse in the process. "This is useless, I won't move in time… This intense heat!" Tanshu thought to himself feeling just how hot it was being in the same room where Howoku used his Starlight Release. Hana would've been dead in moments… Then suddenly a realization hit the young boy – this wasn't so bad. For a technique that was as hot as the surface of the Sun this wasn't half bad… Stumped Tanshu opened his eyes and saw Hana standing still with her own hands thrust forward with a big black insignia formed from her chakra in the air. The girl grinned with a cocky and mocking smile and then made a nasty grimace, showing the Sannin her middle finger.

"I told you loser, I'm the handiest ninja in the world! I possess the power to use amazing sealing techniques like this "Black Hieroglyph Seal" I used to seal away your "Starlight Bridge Jutsu". Also I am a sensor so I can feel just how much your chakra levels dropped. Come on, big man, fire some more of those, I'll just drain you out in seconds. Or maybe you want to punch me some more? Well you should know that I'm a medical ninja too so whatever punch you throw I'll return with six times your strength – you have no options against me!" Hana spread her arms opening up her body as if taunting Howoku to try his best shot. The man's cold and ruthless eyes did not falter for a moment, he didn't even look surprised that his powerful Starlight Bridge Jutsu was absorbed.

"You cocky little brat…" Howoku spoke lunging forward with an onslaught of taijutsu techniques. The man just punched again and again, kicked and flipped to punch from the other side while Hana effortlessly dodged or blocked his attacks. Medical ninja were hard to hit in close distance because they trained day and night to properly evade and Hana was just like that. She was training to dodge, sometimes when Tanshu came to Oni Mask's room in the morning for training he found Hana training to dodge Oni Mask's attacks in absolute darkness using just her sensory alone. This woman was impossible to land a solid hit on when she was pumped up. Tanshu observed carefully to see how this Sannin would deal with the situation, it may have been that in the end he'd see another Sannin die that day. Before he hit her when using his Starlight chakra boost and while Hana wasn't expecting it, now he couldn't even land a single blow on her.

With a powerful clash of kunai the two leaped off of one another making some distance, both of them were huffing a little bit, Howoku was obviously the worst of the two tired combatants – that Starlight Release he used on Oni Mask and right here was already catching up with him and here he was fighting a perfect evader up close where, Tanshu could easily tell, he did not exceed in. "He should not have dropped his sword, I can see from his style that he has only above average skills with taijutsu, I assume that he was a better swordsman?" the boy asked looking at Howoku's fellow Sannin. Misu of the Vapor cracked an evil grin, "Nah, he sucked at it, the idiot just fought with a dull blade because he considered fist-fighting "uncivilized"." Tanshu's eyes shot wide open, these Sannin were weird people. They purposefully restricted their abilities in battle to have a more satisfying fight? What crazy fools!

Hana once again shot her finger forward with a cocky smile, "So, what's it gonna be? Ready to surrender? Maybe if you say "Hana-sama, you're so amazing and beautiful and all-around a perfect lady I'll let you go… If you also give me something nice to hang on those walls… And maybe kiss my ring while kneeling in front of me!" Howoku smiled as his eyes calmed down, Tanshu was starting to get scared by the man's ruthless eyes but now that they returned to calmness they also seemed to calm him down. This man had a weird feeling to him. The boy was starting to somewhat understand why Oni Mask said he was called "Star of Hope", whatever he felt, the people around him felt too. When he was grieving everyone else couldn't help but feel sad just looking at him, when he was feeling hopeful he also brought hope in the eyes of others.

"Girl, you're truly a remarkable ninja. I must say, however, I figured out your thing so if you continue fighting me I'll have to show you just what the true difference between a remarkable ninja and a Sannin is. Please turn back and leave this tower, go back to your village. Abandon this hopeless man who uses his friends like pawns just to keep the enemy away from him." Hana yelled out in frustration some unintelligible nonsense and leapt forward with a chakra enhanced punch, throwing it straight at Howoku's face. Before it landed, Howoku's body lit up with Starlight chakra and with a tap he gently pushed the woman's punch away and gave her one of his own, with overwhelming force he pushed the young lady back crashing into the bone wall, he did not stop however as Howoku jumped right next to her and started punching her again, now that the first impact fazed her Hana was not nearly as good at evading the strikes. "This Starlight Release chakra seems to enhance his physical abilities somewhat…" Tanshu noted to himself but overall even in this shining new mode Howoku was not too impressive of a physical force for the young boy.

With a powerful finishing blow Howoku sent Hana to the ground and turned around, nonchalantly walking away from her without looking back at her. As far as he was concerned the battle was over. Howoku did not see Hana get up from the ground, trembling and covered with slight burns and bruises from his barrage of blows, spitting out blood but with a powerful glow of green chakra she started wiping all of those injuries away. "Don't you dare walk away! You cocky shining bastard!" she yelled out at Howoku stopping the man in his tracks. Howoku turned his head back at her halfway and mumbled in a cold and careless manner. "You're a sensor ninja, no, you're what we call "an Advanced Sensor", normal sensors can sense chakra from certain distance, sense as if in they can confirm the presence of chakra. They are incapable of telling that much about the details of the chakra, their use of sensory is also a bit limited in battle."

After a brief pause Howoku turned back from Hana and took several more steps back towards the exit from the room. "What we call "Advanced Sensors" use some sort of sensory enhancement, like Earth Release users sensing vibrations coming off of the ground or in your case… Lightning Release users sensing nerve signals and being able to use it in tandem with your normal sensory. With enough training you learn to react to sensing the signal incredibly fast and you make your opponent believe that you predicted their moves because of how effortlessly you evade their attack. That being said, I've shown to you that this ability won't change the outcome of this battle, you are simply outmatched here and even your Advanced Sensory won't make the difference between us stop mattering. In ten or so years you may have beaten me easily but you lack training and discipline, now get out of my sight. You keep calling people "cocky" when in fact you yourself are nothing but that. I have no time for talented people that get in over their heads thinking they don't need to work hard as well…" Howoku grunted.

It appeared that the man's words have broken Hana down. She dropped down on her knees and started pounding the ground and shouting in rage and frustration, Tanshu had never seen the young woman so psyched out, she was really unstable now and could've lashed out pretty quickly. Had he cared at all if any of these Sannin lived or died he'd have warned them, his predictions just happened to be correct, Hana roared out into the air for one more time before slamming a smoke bomb into the ground with all of her strength. The smoke filled the room making it impossible to see a thing inside.

"Disappear without a trace, you filthy Sannin! Oracle Shot Jutsu!" Hana shouted out with a very uncommon for her enraged tone as she shot her hands forward firing off a wild bolt of lightning at a random direction. Tanshu knew this technique, it once hit him when he pissed Hana off and burned him severely as well as stopped his heart, it took Oni Mask to threaten to kill Hana for hurting his only apprentice for her to heal him. She popped the smoke bomb to reduce the visibility to zero, she then used her "Advanced Sensory" as Howoku called it to take proper aim at her target leaving them no chance or time to properly respond as they didn't know what was coming at them.

As the smoke cleared Tanshu couldn't see Howoku anywhere, only a black burning spot where Hana's "Oracle Shot" hit the ground. Only in several moments could he locate Howoku hanging on the ceiling of the small room looking at his opponent with already finished handseals. Hana's eyes and mouth shot open in surprise as she took a couple of steps backwards in fear. Howoku angrily taunted her, "What's wrong? You're a medical ninja, right? You can take it and get yourself back to fighting shape in no time… For your sake though… Don't." the mad leaking Starlight Release chakra formed four basketball sized spheres of Starlight chakra, Howoku thrust his arms forward shouting "Star Chart Strike!" as the four spheres went on to strike the area where Hana was erupting in a powerful and wild explosion as all four spheres violently exploded upon impact with the floor or the walls.

When the destructive explosion resolved Tanshu saw the extent of the damage, nearly half of the Tower of Bones was blown to bits. It was really unstable now and it couldn't have taken much more to make the whole roof just slide down to the ground below. Hana was down on her knees with her white dress torn up and burnt and her pink hair now flowing wildly instead of being set in her stupid girly hairdo of twisted braids. "Im…Possible… I absorbed it… I had to…" she uttered coughing up blood and dust. Howoku landed back down on the floor and breathed out, he obviously strained himself more than he needed to in this battle but that was how one had to fight a medical ninja, explode quickly right into their faces with all or nothing assaults because medical ninja would eventually heal back from any weaker attacks and simply outlast even much stronger opponents.

The girl once again started healing herself when Howoku turned around and returned to his friends, turning at Hana for one more time. "Your absorption seal doesn't seem to handle barrage techniques that well, you only absorbed some of my technique, maybe one third of it at least… You should invent a new seal for continuous or barrage ninjutsu techniques, there are plenty of ninja in the world that use those kind of techniques, if your will to become a powerful ninja one day isn't broken, that is…" Howoku smiled back at Hana. Tanshu could not believe, was this really the same man that broke down in rage over the death of his comrade not too long ago? Did he forget his oath to kill anyone that threatened peace? Or maybe in his eyes this girl was no longer a threat to peace, it was God-Eyes that was the big threat…

Tears burst from Hana's eyes as she rushed forward, Howoku leaned back and forth to evade her blind chakra enhanced strikes. This time even the girl's own tears of shame seemed to prevent her from punching straight. Howoku thrust his knee into Hana's central body area and as she staggered back he dashed right behind her and punched her in the back of her neck with a powerful but restrained blow. Hana's eyes rolled back as she tried desperately to catch some air and to retain her consciousness but she collapsed on the floor powerless and defeated. Tanshu sighed, "You should take away any sharp tools from her, she will most likely just commit seppuku once she wakes up. Old sis doesn't handle shame that well…"

Howoku looked back at the unconscious girl and picked her up into his arms. "There's no shame in losing to a Sannin, she had the potential of surpassing me but she wasted it by treating her amazing talents at ninjutsu and sealing techniques as if they compensate hard work. She's a lot like Misu that way… Anyways, I'll go take her outside, if this tower collapses she'll die in the rubble, I'll go find a safe place for her where the ground is more stable." Misu was really annoyed by Howoku's expression but then his friend just played it as a joke and went off to find a safe place for Hana. Chestnut Sannin smiled ironically at Tanshu, "What did you just called her? "Old sis"?" the young woman burst into laughter as Tanshu desperately tried to shut her up. "Anyways, I won't let you stall this and give that Starlight guy time to recover, let's move on without him." Tanshu said quickly dashing up the stairs into the next room. The young man stopped and looked down shyly when he approached the door, he stepped back for one of the Sannin to break down the door.

Hanasaku stepped forward and flicked the door making a powerful shockwave emanate making the door crumble down in multiple pieces. Tanshu looked back and then to the side, "Ummm… Maybe… You could not kill the next opponent? She's a really nice girl but she is really loyal to God-Eyes so she'll say anything to make you believe otherwise…" Hanasaku cracked her knuckles and nodded energetically, giving Tanshu a powerful thumb up right after. "Sure! I won't hurt her too bad, don't worry!" Hanasaku smiled. "Wait… Where's Misu? THAT BASTARD! HE BETTER NOT BE TAKING MY FIGHT!" Hanasaku yelled out as she started dashing up the stairs. Tanshu only then realized what was going on – this Misu guy disappeared while Tanshu was acting the shy little brother to fight Vashia and that dumb idiot Hanasaku was dashing right towards God-Eyes' room! Talk about a conundrum! "Ugh, I'll just have to trust that Misu guy's integrity to not kill Vashia-chan… WAIT UP YOU STUPID IDIOT! That's the wrong way!" he followed the incredibly fast Sannin that was bolting upstairs right to his room!


	32. Tanshu's Story: Two Clashes!

With a silent tap of his feet to the stone hard and edgy floor Howoku landed onto the wasteland ground. It'd have been problematic had the man landed on the mushy slime and started sinking, he'd have had to use more of Starlight Burst to escape by simply dashing out of the sinking death. Gently Howoku placed the pink haired girl onto the ground and looked at her. Since she had no life-threatening injuries the man followed Tanshu's advice and removed her pouch, placing it around his other leg which didn't have a ninja kit on it. Then Howoku's attention turned at the half busted tower. For how long would this shaky construction hold? If the battles turned too hectic it'd inevitably go down...

Misu was not the one that worried Howoku, the man was incredibly powerful but his fighting style was very small scale and self-contained. He knew quite well how not to make a fuss out of things and was the last one to leave a blazing trail of destruction behind. Hanasaku on the other hand... She's a rampaging beast of destruction, if she got into her fight she'd take the tower down with a single blow. That much was for certain. Howoku closed his eyes, breathed in and out, trying to balance his tired body out, regain at least some stamina so that his body calmed down. He would need some more strength in the future, he'd be the one fighting One with the Eyes of God, that much Howoku knew for certain. With a slow and confident step the Star of Hope went up to the entrance of the tower, he still had to carry out Sorano's body and bring her back home as well...

Tanshu rushed desperately trying to catch up to the stupid young woman that was running ahead of him. Her speed was ridiculous, everything about this woman defied logic: her mindset, her abilities and the extent of them. It was like the world itself had gone insane to match the insanity of this woman. "Wait up, you stupid broad!" Tanshu yelled out in frustration but a powerful blow shook the tower. The young man struggled to keep his balance on the steps as he reached for the wall. It was of no use, the walls themselves trembled and for a moment it appeared that even the bone walls were crumbling down but somehow they held it together. This woman was a walking calamity. "Damn you!" he yelled as Tanshu charged forward dashing into the room which the woman broke into.

Inside was a room of black tiles on the floor, walls and the ceiling. The room was not completely dark like the one where Oni Mask always fought, this one was quite well illuminated, it was just covered with black accessories and had one red hieroglyphic symbol on each of the walls, the ceiling and the floor. The symbols were pulsing with chakra, with each pulse the symbol started glowing even more intensely as Tanshu entered the room the glow went insane. Within that same instant the boy felt his chakra leaving his body - his seals started working. The woman's eyes and mouth shot open, it was like she couldn't believe her feeling, with a look of surprise, fear and desperation she turned at Tanshu. "W...What is this room?" she uttered as Tanshu's eyes closed and his face turned away.

"This is the room where Red Dog Tanshu fights people that invade his katei - the Demonic Pentalimbo" the boy replied drawing out his sword from behind him. The woman started shaking, she must've felt the effect of this room, the effect of the seal which Tanshu had invented as an ultimate fruit of his training. "You... What have you done?" her eyes looked like those of a cornered animal. "Oni Mask-sensei taught me many things, he taught me how to be a true demon. He however did not notice just how strong I've become, even more, he constantly tried to deceive me about the level of my abilities. His silly attempts were to no avail, I've discovered a hidden talent inside of me, I've drawn out this power and created bunch of seals. I've finally created an ultimate technique and sealed it within the very walls of this room, it is set in motion and the seals are undone the moment I step inside, it is active as long as I'm here to feed it chakra and it is automatically sealed inside again when I leave. You feel it, don't you?" Tanshu took a step towards the woman and pointed his blade at her. "Demonic Pentalimbo Seal is a perfect version of my technique, a seal that allows me to reduce chakra of a person I am fighting to the level of an ordinary human, normally I can place the seal into people as a genjutsu but in this room... I don't have to, I don't have to touch them, I don't have to place the seal into their chakra system as a genjutsu, I just have to be inside..."

Tanshu's eyes opened, they were burning with incredible passion and desire to kill this woman, then her friends after they come inside. Howoku's Starlight Release wouldn't work here, Misu's ability would not work here. In this room Tanshu could have killed God-Eyes himself, then again, God-Eyes stopped being an obstacle long ago, in his eyes God-Eyes was just a pesky roommate that lived in the same tower as Tanshu did, he provided a roof over the youth's head and for that he was allowed to draw breath inside Tanshu's katei, everyone else had to die! "Konohagakure Sannin, Chestnut Hanasaku, you have entered my katei. Leave it or I will kill you!" Tanshu shouted angrily, he still had hope that this woman would see how outmatched she is here, honestly though, who did he think Chestnut was? "I can't do that, I need to pass this room to get to that God-Eyed guy. Once I punch him in the face a couple of times we can leave... As sister and her silly little brother." Hanasaku broke through the fear of losing her chakra control. She stood into a fighting pose. Was this woman not intimidated she just lost most of her chakra? Was this woman not afraid to die? Was this woman an idiot!?

One floor below a sliding door opened and a young swordsman entered a dojo-like room. A young lady was sitting in a meditating position facing the wall. "Please take off your shoes, Sir." she asked with a gentle but strong tone. Misu kicked his sandals off and continued to stare at the young lady. She turned around, "I apologize I greeted you with my back turned" the young lady bowed gently putting her head to the ground, she then stood up and looked the man straight into his eyes. "My name is Hyuuga Vashia of the Sand Village, however now I am in debt to One with the Eyes of God, the descendant of both that of the Moon and that of Earth. Please state your business but now that I am ready to fight for my master until my debt is paid." Misu stared the young lady down. She was young, probably in her late teens or early twenties, she looked frail but had a katana by her side and wore a flowery kimono, strong suggestions of the classical style of swordsmanship, that combined with her Byakugan eyes could be troublesome...

"I am Misu of the Vapor, Konohagakure Sannin and before this turns unpleasant, I wouldn't mind to hear just what you owe this "One with Eyes of God"." Misu spoke, still standing firm on his two feet and not even hinting at reaching for his own sword. This would be a battle of swordsmen but the man felt confident in his victory, he was simply lead by curiosity in his inquiry. Vashia smiled gently and closed her eyes lowering her head and letting strands of hair fall on her face. "Right now! This is my chance, cut her down... Damn... I really want to know though..." Misu wandered as his eyes switched from those of a manslayer to those of a gentle visitor of this young lady's abode within mere moments, switching between light and shadow came particularly easy for Misu of the Vapor. "I do not wish to burden you with my story, Sir, let us just say that God-Eyes saved me from a situation where my village condemned me to death, now until I save his life by beating someone aiming at his life I am in his debt. Sadly I have never had my chance to repay my debt, the Sir with the Oni Mask killed everyone before they got to my room."

Misu took a sword drawing stance by reaching behind his back and slightly ducking his legs to increase the strength of his balance. "I apologize in that case, you must feel quite excited about an opportunity to repay your debt and you will fail the one and only chance you get. Sadly I am but a lowly ninja, I have no honor and won't be bothered by ruining a lady's debt. I will only do what I have to and not bother my head with the alternatives." Misu smiled. Vashia also took a fighting stance and gently nodded, "That is a pity but I understand. Let us settle this then..." she said. While the young woman did her best to act indifferent her eyes were shining with happiness, she was so excited to finally be able to repay her debt, to finally be free to live her life and abandon the path of a mercenary, to finally stop bringing shame to her family and her clan, not to mention her own lowly self.

With his right arm Misu made a handseal and felt chakra seeping slowly from his body, evaporating just like he would if he gets hit. Then with a powerful pulse of chakra, completely invisible to the enemy unless she was a sensor his flawless "Vapor Mode" was set up. Just as the handseal was completed the woman's eyes shot open, the blood vessels around her eyes stretched and her Byakugan became apparent - she activated her bloodline! A smile covered her face, she must've seen it through! Misu's Vapor! Within the same moment the man stopped his Vapor Mode. The young lady spoke, "What is the matter, Sir, do you not wish to settle this anymore?" the man shook his head, "No, by all means, please, ladies first, I just reconsidered my strategy..." Right after those words Vashia charged forward drawing her blade and slashing with a straight cut. Evading such a simple attack was as simple as leaping backwards.

"Curse this young brat and her stupid eyes!" Misu thought "Misu of the Vapor didn't have to dodge for quite a while, I can't use my Vapor Mode because she'll see through it and then my secret will stop being a secret... Unless..." the man desperately tried to figure his actions out as his opponent stopped in her tracks again. "Please, Sir, do not shame me by being elsewhere in your mind, would you please fight me seriously." she asked with a soft but demanding tone breaking her stance. This was just another chance for Misu and this time he would exploit it, with a downward slashing motion the man drew his sword cutting through the young woman's kimono and leaving a very small slash on her bandaged chest, just deep enough to get through her skin and bandages. Obviously he had to follow up such a good and early first blood attack, the man slashed again and again, the woman happened to be more skilled than he thought before as she evaded his attacks with some effort. This was strange, Misu was barely holding back at all...

A powerful shout coming out of the depth on the young lady's lungs alerted of an incoming attack, Misu turned sideways to avoid her thrust. He responded by cutting, striking faster and stronger than the last time and landing a couple of cuts onto the young warrior's body. She was indeed a worthy opponent but when Misu used all of his speed and ingenuity, all of his experience as a swordsman he outmatched her and landed a new cut on her with each couple of strikes she managed to block or evade. He was a better basic swordsman, no, they were equal in sheer skill, he just had more experience with pressuring and killing people that were just as good as he was. Misu's sword style was fluid, like the water, it adapted perfectly and slashed calmly, actually he was quite slow, but that lack of speed was something the enemy couldn't predict. Vashia saw his attacks from a mile away, then she predicted his next one and moved her blade from the block of the first, but as that rhythm was set into motion, Misu's first attack only landed at the moment when she was readying for the next attack - his style was a very nasty one to face.

Misu's arm made the handseal again, he acted out of sheer instinct using his "Vapor Mode" again as white blinding water vapor covered the room. This was different from the technique Misu ordinarily used but this would prove great against this young woman - the vapor was chakra, every water particle inside that cloud was controlled by chakra so it's pretty much a Byakugan smokescreen. Just as expected the young woman was completely overwhelmed by the technique and dashed back, too late. Misu appeared from the vapor cutting her in the arm, then quickly dashing to the other side shooting off streams of vapor from his feet to propel him like a jet as he spun his body around slashing continuously with the sword. As the Sannin passed through the woman's body spinning with his sword and stopped he sheathed his sword again. "Vapor Cut - Double Strike!" he uttered under his own nose as blood shot out of the young lady's body. She was in over her head, she wasn't like that previous brat, this one was just a naïve young girl who believed in a code of honor, that there was some debt she had to pay. Misu hated fools like that most of all, this young lady had to be taught a lesson...

The woman coughed up some blood as she was just barely standing on her knee by using her sword as a support. Blood slowly leaked from multiple cuts over her body and she without a doubt was in quite a lot of pain. Misu grinned, "Do you know why they call me Misu of the Vapor? Not just because I use the Vapor Release Bloodline, the combination of Water and Fire Releases, it is because I am slippy and fluid like the water vapor. I am everywhere and nowhere at the same time. I can cut you from all the angles, my reach is as wide as that of the expanding gas whereas you cannot hit me because vapor also protects me. The young lady jumped forward, without any warning of words offered clenching her blade. Misu grinned with arrogance, did this youth get that desperate? To charge at him so blindly... The Sannin drew his blade slashing downwards and crushing the wooden tiles beneath him but... The blade just passed through the young woman as she disappeared. It was some sort of afterimage attack. Misu knew where she'd be, she dashed forward leaving an afterimage so she had to be behind him, such a simplistic technique if only he could get there in time... He didn't

A powerful thrust of two fingers hit him in the center of his skull sending him back a couple of steps and the woman then tried to cut him right after. Luckily Misu recovered in time to jump back and only get a small scratch on his chest. This was the first scratch he got in forever, this was all because he was too careless and worried to reveal his cards to this girl! He didn't set up his Vapor Clone and replace himself with it in time... No more, the kid gloves were off. Misu then stumbled back and coughed - something was wrong with his body, he couldn't feel his chakra flow like usual. "Wh...What did you do?" he shouted. Vashia moved her blade onto her shoulder and looked at him with careless eyes of a true swordswoman. "Hyuuga are famous for their Gentle Fist style, I put my own spin to it - I use it with my katana creating my own style - thrusting my sword at a chakra point closing it forever - the Gentle Sword Style"

Misu smiled as blood broke out from his nose, leaking up from somewhere this woman had struck - she was too slow to swing a sword at him but she wasn't too slow to strike his head with her darned Gentle Fist that all Hyuuga used then. This young woman was quite skilled. Misu sheathed his sword and prepared to draw again, "Show it to me then, your Gentle Sword Style..." he said as he weaved a handseal activating his Vapor Mode combination of jutsu. He did not care if the young lady would see his hidden style, even if she would, she deserved it. Vashia dashed forward with her Byakugan open slashing at Misu but his Vapor Clone dissolved. The girl knew it wasn't real, she had to see the clone through, still, she may have seen real Misu coming out of nowhere but she wasn't fast enough to respond. Another crimson gash covered the young woman's chest as she stumbled back and coughed blood up. "Vapor Cut" Misu uttered sheathing his sword again. Vashia leaped at him again, cutting through Misu's clone and the man appeared behind her back, he knew she'd just be moments late to turn around and block - instead she reached with her sword over her back and blocked his slash!

"Rotation!" she shouted as she spun incredibly fast striking Misu with a blast of chakra and knocking him back, the young lady then thrusted her sword as if it was an automated rifle piercing through the man's body in several spots and landing a couple of shallow stabs before he replaced himself with a clone as he usually did and dashed backwards. This girl was learning as she fought him - one could not use the same technique against her and now she closed multiple of his chakra points, if her statement was correct his chakra was decreased forever! This girl just made him weaker permanently! She had the ability to completely normalize one's chakra, make someone's chakra manipulation ability null! That Misu could not allow, she had no right to take his power away from him. He sheathed his blade.

"I will show you something interesting. You've seen through my Vapor Mode and now know its secret. I shall show you my Secret Technique!" Misu lightly jumped up, tapping his foot as he propelled his body forward, shooting off a stream of vapor to propel his body forward even faster. He appeared close to the young lady almost instantly. There came his secret ingredient! His sword was actually chakra conductive, the Sannin shot his strongest stream of vapor that added to his natural strength and speed of the draw propelling the sword from his sheathe!

"Vapor Style Secret Technique: Misty Flash Murder!" the man uttered.

A powerful impact emanated throughout the entire tower shaking it from its basis to the roof, the pointy classical roof of the tower collapsed in on itself falling down onto roof before being propelled out by a bubble of gravitational push. Howoku looked up - that was where God-Eyes was and there was no better time to confront the man than now! The man's body stuck onto the wall and the Sannin started his wild dash to the exposed final floor. The man only took a moment to wander just what caused this mad shockwave...


	33. Tanshu's Story: Gentle Hyuuga of Sand

The blinding combination of smoke and vapor cleared from the air. Misu grunted clenching aching spots on his arm, as the smoke cleared he finally saw just what the sword landed on as a powerful rotating shield of chakra was where Vashia was before. Right below the sword there was a large hole that went down a couple of floors right to the first floor. It seemed that Misu's sword was deflected by the rotating chakra shield and redirected at a different spot causing shockwaves and cracks on the tiles and the walls. The tower was in a critical condition, Misu would've appreciated if this scuffle ended before the whole construction collapsed, then again, if God-Eyes was the one who built it he must've had some sort of tricks to keep it standing…

The rotation of the young woman stopped as Vashia's injured and bleeding, breathing heavily body appeared from the fading shield of chakra. "You can use your rotation technique with a sword too then? It'd be certain death of anyone caught in it…" Misu grunted lifting his arm and sheathing his sword, then gently massaging the aching parts. That deflection and the force of his Secret Technique clashing with this rotating Hyuuga jutsu really injured his arm a lot, there were most likely numerous bone fractures as only thinking about moving that arm hurt. Vashia straightened her body, taking tremendous effort to stand tall and proud against her opponent. "I would've loved to pull this as an ace in the end. Sadly that technique was simply too much for me, I could not allow you use it again. I apologize if my defense caused any long term damage to your arm…" the young lady replied with a slight bow of her head.

The young swordswoman drew her blade and stood in a thrusting position, her blood vessels around the woman's eyes tensed again as she activated her "Byakugan", something very interesting was coming and Misu knew it. "When this battle started the difference between us was too much to ignore, I took many injuries that would without a doubt lower my lifespan even if I healed them. Even now they hurt so much and tempt my body to fall down and to not get up. However I have greatly reduced your chakra as well, also I've disabled your drawing arm decreasing your potency, right now you are less than one fourth of the man that started fighting me like this – I CAN WIN!" Vashia exclaimed charging forward as intense chakra formed around her katana while she thrust it forward. "Chakra Dragon!" she shouted but Misu managed to leap sideways. What the Sannin did not expect was such quick recovery from Vashia's jutsu, she cancelled this "Chakra Dragon" almost instantly swiping sideways. With his weaker right arm Misu managed to block her slash and use the momentum from her force to let himself get pushed further back from her.

The woman leapt forward, striking with her "Chakra Dragon" again but Misu just jumped in the air and pushed his blade horizontally against the katana's tip sending the thrust down to the floor that let out a shockwave that crumbled bunch of more floor tiles. Misu's body split into vapor and as the cloud passed through the young lady two more gashes appeared on her back. She admitted that these small injuries were taking a toll on her. Misu was confident that he would win and he just wanted to see how strong the will of this young swordswoman was. That Tanshu boy wouldn't have liked his torturous approach, he appeared to be very fond of this girl but… That brat wasn't here, was he? Misu was free to win this fight the way he wanted it to be won. With a powerful shout of anger and rage Vashia lunged forward, "Gentle Sword Style!" she shouted thrusting again and again at what her Byakugan showed as Misu's vital chakra points but even at his weakened state the Sannin managed to deflect the attacks.

Something was wrong, the young lady thrust her foot forward far too much – something big was coming and Misu prepared to block it. The man opened his eyes and watched the girl's movements carefully. Suddenly two thrusts hit him, one went right after the other and one hit Misu right in his chakra point. "Two Thrusts!" Vashia yelled as she turned around and thrusted her katana in impossible to defend against speed again. This time Misu was ready as he had already activated his Vapor Mode. "Four Thrusts – Eight Thrusts – Sixteen Thrusts – Thirty Two Thrusts – Gentle Fist Style – Sixty Four Thrusts!" Vashia kept bombarding Misu's Vapor version with thrusts that were impossible to defend against. Had Misu not escaped his condition would've been pathetic – with sixty four holes to bleed from and most of his chakra points completely closed.

"You were very skillful to manage to use your Vapor Mode in time, Sir. This technique is special, each thrust hitting a chakra node closes it forever, combined with injuries from this technique as well as shock of getting this many chakra points closed – the body gets overly protective of one's chakra, as one's life directly depends on it, and seals itself from using it ever again subconsciously. You'd be just as strong, just as fast as any normal civilian and unable to manipulate your chakra." Vashia explained as she sheathed her sword and stood in a drawing position again. This young girl drew her katana from the side where Misu drew it from up on his shoulder, swinging his way down. He actually had an advantage, the girl was faster but she was faster to reach his non-vital spots whereas Misu would reach straight her head. It was get maimed but kill your opponent type of situation, obviously that'd have been if only their drawing potentials were compared…

The two charged at each other, drawing their katana together. Misu almost expected this girl to make the mistake that he had predicted but… His clash was greeted by her block. She sacrificed her speed but managed to block his draw in time, when she was using casual swordfighting before she was not able to properly intercept him in time but when she added the speed of sword drawing she managed that just fine… Or maybe it was just those hits she landed earlier with her "Gentle Fist Style" kicking in already. One's physical and spiritual abilities directly depended on one's chakra level, when one's chakra level was decreased forever so did their abilities, their natural speed and strength. This was not good. The two clashed their swords a couple more times, jumping around and sensing just where their opponent was at that point of battle. Vashia was slowly bleeding out, at this time it was only her willpower that kept her standing, Misu was now unable to dominate her like before – his chakra got slightly decreased, his right arm got injured so that he was unable to use it efficiently. They were almost on equal grounds now…

As the two finished their clash and backed up Vashia sheathed her blade and moved it back on her kimono belt. It was obvious that she wanted a time out of sorts – maybe she had something to say? "I've figured out your Vapor Mode, Sir, if I figured it out correctly and you use it again I'd kill you, if I was wrong you'd kill me. Such fifty-fifty outcome is not fitting for a swordfight of skill, perhaps we can make a deal, I describe it to you and if I'm right you promise me not to use it anymore and if I'm wrong you can use it all you like. This way it will be our perception and skill that decides the battle, not random chance." She spoke looking at Misu with those same soft and childish yet also determined and ridden by pain eyes. This young lady wanted to return her debt but she wanted to do it with her own strength and skill, not out of luck. Misu nodded.

"So to begin with you create a small cloud of Vapor Release so that it would be harder to spot your trick, that was why it took me a bit longer than usual to spot it. You then create a version of Shadow Clone using your Vapor Release, a Vapor Clone that stays behind you and hides, once you are about to get injured you simply replace yourself with it and then use a ninjutsu that reflects all light falling onto you and you make yourself invisible. Your clone fights in your place and when it'd be beaten you simply add in chakra and do not disperse it. It is costly in terms of chakra but effective. You can cancel your invisibility technique and appear behind me at any point, you can do it even easier if I am engaged in one on one combat with your clone and am distracted. Well, was I right?" Misu smiled and closed his eyes, he looked down and shook his head. "No." he exclaimed.

"I see… Well then, feel free to use your Vapor Mode." Vashia looked disappointed as she looked at the decimated dojo room around her. "Just how stupid is this kid? She hit the nail on the head but she is ready to believe me if I tell her she's wrong?" Misu wondered as he also took a fighting stance. Still, he decided not to use his Vapor Mode, after all, if she saw it again she may have seen it through. There was only one outcome to this battle. He had to go all out and attack her with his second most powerful technique right now and end it. "Since I agreed to your deal I'll ask you to do the same, come at me with your most powerful technique right now and I will clash at it with my own. Let us use our strongest kenjutsu techniques to decide this." Misu spoke as he drew his sword and took it into his right arm. Ironically his right arm was the only arm capable of using this technique, it required certain amount of control and his left arm was only able to exert violent outbursts of force… The Sannin ducked down pointing the blade of his sword at Vashia while his left arm remained down like a sack of dead weight. Misu's right arm tensed up, the muscles blew up like balloons as he prepared to lunge forward. His entire katana got covered in a twisting vortex of vapor. It was as if steel itself was evaporating instead of air particles around him.

Vashia straightened her body, placing her right and left legs parallel, then she stretched them further one to another while placing none of them forward. The young lady bent her body forward placing the hand with the katana forward while she raised the other in the air behind her. This was such an incredibly odd stance but it did intimidate the Sannin a bit, this young lady has proven herself to be capable so this unusual stance may just have been a sign of another incredible technique. A tile loosened up and fell from the ceiling, just as it hit the ground both swordfighters leaped forward. Each of them ready to use their most powerful techniques. Suddenly Vashia's position changed, she stood just like she did when using her "64 Thrusts" jutsu but… She changed stance so incredibly far away from Misu…

The man suddenly thrust his vaporing sword forward shooting off a rotating dragon shaped whirlwind at Vashia, its point had incredible concussive force and when the man added the speed of his sword thrusting to the speed of the technique's natural speed the force became impossible to overcome by any sword technique. It was a sword shattering technique, even if Vashia used chakra to enhance her blade it'd shatter without failure. Still, Misu sort of cheated as this wasn't really a kenjutsu technique, more like combination of kenjutsu and ninjutsu but honor had no place in a battle where ninja fought. The dragon shaped whirlwind rushed forward opening its jaws to crush the young lady. Her own technique was just as surprising.

Just as the dragon came to the middle of the total distance the girl thrust twice with her blade creating two dragon shaped beams of chakra – she literally combined her "Chakra Dragon technique" with "Gentle Fist Style: Sixty Four Thrusts". So she was also not entirely honest about kenjutsu, she also used a combination of ninjutsu and kenjutsu even if her technique was much closer to ordinary kenjutsu than Misu's. "Vapor Style: Vapor Dragon Jutsu" Misu shouted out right as his opponent yelled "Two Chakra Dragons!" The two techniques clashed in mid distance. Vashia's "Chakra Dragons" held Misu's dragon in its path, the girl continued to send more forward, with each dragon fading more heads joined its place! "Four Dragons – Eight Dragons – Sixteen Dragons – Thirty Two Dragons – Gentle Sword Style: Sixty Four Chakra Dragons!" This technique would've completely obliterated Misu if not for the hidden factor of his Vapor Dragon – it was supposed to take everything that the opponent threw at it, it was the perfect clashing technique. As Vashia's strikes hammered at the dragon slightly budging it back at Misu, it ended right before it could completely overpower him and the dragon simply shot forward hitting the young lady tearing her kimono apart and damaging her bandages that covered most of her body as well as opening new wounds all over the body, her body was pushed forward and slammed violently at the back wall.

It was over… Misu walked up to the young lady and observed pool of blood gathering around her heavily breathing body. She's reached the point where her body simply could no longer move. She was lucky that the dragon was a concussive and not a piercing technique or she'd have been dead for sure. The girl coughed up blood and raised her head looking at the feet of her opponent. "To think that you had such a technique… Even if I'd have used my "Rotation: Sword Variant" it'd have waited out until it was over and then finished me off… That was a perfect clashing technique so your deal was with a hundred percent success rate." Misu raised his sword and placed it on his shoulder. The muscles on his right arm were pulsing intensely and he'd have been unable to fight back if the girl had survived this shock. "So it's that phase, huh? It'll be you telling me how dirty I played? Grow up, kid, in the world of ninja there is no honor or "foul-play". All that matters is who lives and who dies. By the way, you were also spot on with my "Vapor Mode", I lied…" the man spoke up as he raised his sword into the air.

"One young boy asked me really nicely not to hurt you, sadly I cannot allow a person that knows my Vapor Mode live, if that information fell into the hands of the enemy it would be a risk to the village's safety, as the Sannin of Konoha I'd be unable to defend my home anymore so I must kill you." Misu grunted out, his voice didn't tremble one little bit. Suddenly his young opponent surprised Misu as through pain and sheer willpower Vashia got up on her knees and looked to the side to see the shattered pieces of her katana. She looked Misu in the eyes and smiled, "I see… That is too bad. I did know that Tanshu-kun liked me for some reason but even so such a request was awfully nice of him, it's a shame I won't be able to thank him… Showing you how an honorable woman dies is the best I can do now." Vashia spoke as her eyes teared up, still, even through tears she was crying as she spread her arms to the side. Inside the girl understood why it had to be done, she understood the Sannin's logic, if she was captured or tortured out of this information it would fall into very wrong arms and God-Eyes' organization was already too much involved with Kirigakure…

Misu wandered through the floor, walking up and down various staircases and trying to discover just which one lead to the floor above. Judging from the number of floors that Tanshu guy and the God-Eyes guy were the only guys left. Killing that girl felt really strange, truth be told Misu always intended to not leave her alive, she was a criminal but she also was one of those "honor-bound" people that kept pissing him off with talks about lines that ninja must not cross and how he should behave. Ninja were tools, they did the job that was assigned and there were no lines, there were just two separate ends to it: success or failure. People that went on about lines and morals and ethics of killing other people were idiots, honestly they were tainting this world. The kid realizing the secret behind "Vapor Mode" was just something he used for the victim herself to justify why she had to die. Everyone tend to misunderstand him all the time and explaining it to that kid would've been incredibly difficult and Misu had neither the time nor the patience.

A ray of light came from one of the staircases, Misu looked up and started rushing up. That had to be the floor where Hanasaku was, only then it occurred to him. Why was he so into it, this foolish search? Misu turned around and rushed back to the room with the hole in the wall, then leaped outside. Strangely he could not see Howoku, only the body of the other girl. This one was useful, he wanted to kill her too but her skillset may have proved useful, maybe ANBU could brainwash her and use her for the sake of the village like God-Eyes brainwashed her and took her in from the Sand Village. How did Sunagakure even produce such a handy and rare talented kunoichi in the first place? Any chick could learn to swing a sword but someone with both potential for seals and medical ninjutsu as well as sensory… Maybe Sunagakure was regaining its military potential, in that case ANBU definitely needed to know. Several subtle political assassinations may have been in order to keen Sunagakure in check… Misu looked at the crumbled rooftop and realized that was where Howoku would be, without rushing too much the Sannin stepped onto the wall and started slowly scaling it up to the top.


	34. Tanshu's Story: Tower of Bones Falls!

Tanshu had never seen similar behavior to that of Hanasaku, most people when confronted with his "leave my katei or die" proposition either left because they were afraid of the general concept of their own death or fought him because they believed they could beat him. This woman was afraid, her eyes revealed her to be almost crippled with fear but… She did not move a single inch backwards. She was petrified by the power of Demonic Pentalimbo seals but she did not let this fear make her move back. Tanshu sheathed his blade and prepared to strike, he took the woman's refusal to move as a sign that she won't.

With a single powerful leap Tanshu closed the distance and slashed at the woman, channeling his fiery chakra through the blade. The woman did not attempt to defend or block it, she just took the slash as it went – straight through half of her face and her chest. Luckily for her, her body was strong enough to prevent Tanshu's blade digging deep enough to cut through something vital and his Fire Chakra cauterized her cut. Despite the fact that the cut was not dangerous fire amplified the pain tenfold, and yet this woman did not whimper or moan, it was like the pain did not affect her at all. Tanshu leaped backwards. "Are you not afraid of death at all!? Don't you get it yet? In this room you cannot heal yourself! These injuries will kill you!" he shouted at the woman but she just stood like she was standing this whole time, no, her eyes changed.

Hanasaku's eyes became different, she was not afraid anymore but she was just looking at Tanshu as if she was sorry for him. "You don't have a sword, cutting you to pieces won't feel fair…" Tanshu murmured to himself as he tossed the seal straight into the wall. The katana bounced off the wall and landed somewhere further in the room. The young man raised his fists. "So… You want to fight me? You'd honestly kill your Older Sis?" Hanasaku spoke as her eyes became the combination of her previous expression and the changed one. "Don't joke with me! As if that's what was scaring you! This room bumps your chakra down to the level you need to survive, in here you are literally just another person, there is no need for your idiotic act! It's OK to fear for your life now!" Tanshu shouted out. Hanasaku kept looking at him with those same eyes, it was obvious that losing all that made her special did not matter to her. Perhaps it wasn't her abilities that made her special but her personality and her mind!?

"So… Your parents died in the war and you decided to forever protect their graves?" Hanasaku spoke up again. Did this woman not intend to fight him? Was she stupid? Of course she was, she was Chestnut Hanasaku after all… "Yes, I must protect the place where I am the happiest, my katei. The place where my happiness and those dear to me are…" Tanshu replied. "I know you love those people, that pink haired girl, that other one you spoke of to Misu, but we will catch them and move them to Konoha, they will be put in prison for their crimes. Unlike you they have a history of some pretty nasty crimes. How will you protect Hana-chan and that girl you asked Misu not to hurt from here?" Hanasaku asked. "My bonds with Konoha died the day when my parents were sent to war to die, my purpose now lies with protecting my katei – their resting place!" Tanshu repeated. Hanasaku raised her fist and tightened her glove.

"You retarded brat! What kind of nonsense is that!? Your parents would be ashamed of you knowing that you have thrown your life away to watch over the place where they died. This place means nothing, they've moved on to the Afterlife by now, this is just a dirty wasteland and a young man throwing his life away for it. There is no greater shame for a parent to see than their child being miserable. I shall bring you back to Konoha as my Little Bro, I shall bring smile back to your family's face!" Hanasaku yelled out loud with so much conviction and volume that Tanshu's body almost trembled. The woman then lunged forward, did she intend to actually fight? How? Tanshu reduced all of his opponents to just their physical bodies and he trained his body to be naturally superior to any people that enhanced their bodies using chakra. Where most people worked to increase their chakra level to increase physical strength which was the element of chakra Tanshu just trained his physical strength, completely ignoring his spiritual side and therefore not increasing his chakra. Without their chakra control most ninja were average physical combatants, Tanshu was peak human condition one. With a thrust of his palm Tanshu pushed Hanasaku's fist away and headbutted her back.

"You have no right to talk of my parents!" Tanshu shouted leaping forward and starting to pummel Hanasaku, throwing his fists out of instinct, rage and frustration just like Oni Mask sensei taught him. This woman was on that battlefield, she deserved having Tanshu's rage directed at her! The young man shouted that out as he pummeled the woman with his combination of punches, the force behind them made it feel like the woman's body broke with each punch, each strike blew her body away, throwing it up or further where he tried to push her. And yet not a single sound of pain came out from the woman's lips. A powerful thrust of her elbow sent Tanshu back, stumbling into the wall. This woman was fighting back, it was true – losing her abilities did not trouble her at all, she did not hesitate, it was like power to her was not a factor, as if she was too dumb to consider strengths of her own and her opponent before fighting.

"No, Little Bro, I deserve to take all of your rage not because I was on the battlefield that day. I shall take your every blow, I shall shoulder all of your rage because I am your older sister and that's what family does. I am happy that you took my healing away, now I can truly earn your trust and love and crush your rage and darkness with my body alone. So come at me! Attack me with every bad emotion in mind, show me what troubles my little brother!" Hanasaku yelled out again as Tanshu's mouth opened. This stupid lady really believed that he was her family despite meeting him just recently, just couple of hours ago. This woman was unbelievable. "No! Don't just take my punches, punch back… I lost many friends today, it might be that I will lose Vashia and God-Eyes too just like I've lost my parents. While I do want to punch something because I'm angry…" Hanasaku leaped towards Tanshu and punched him in the face, stepping forward and pushing her fist towards his face, throwing Tanshu like a ragdoll. This was taijutsu prowess, she was a good martial artist and wasn't just insanely strong, she could compete with a stronger and faster opponent using just her skill and experience alone just like Sorano did with Oni Mask, just like Howoku did with Hana, just like Misu would have to do if he was to beat Vashia… These Sannin did not fight with power, they fought with their experiences and their emotions. That was what made them so strong!

Tanshu recovered throwing punches at Hanasaku wildly, he was by no means a lousy taijutsu user, Oni Mask perfected Tanshu's taijutsu but Hanasaku blew both of them away, she dodged those blows almost effortlessly and tried to return some. She moved without wasting a single movement, without any difficulty, her body was her best friend, her strongest tool, not an obstacle. Hanasaku's foot rose to the position of an upward kick, Tanshu leaned under it and quickly moved to the other side, kicking the woman as a counterattack while she was open. The impossibly powerful kick made Hanasaku's face swell and made her bleed from her lips and nose. Tanshu did not stop, but not because he wanted to kill this woman, he believed she could and wanted to take it all, he trusted her as his Older Sis. He decided to return her feelings for once. With a combination of blows Tanshu sent the woman down again. Without a doubt these blows would've broken some bones…

Bleeding and broken Hanasaku rose on her feet, she didn't do it effortlessly, she huffed and struggled, she did not moan out of pain but out of sheer force to keep her body up. "I can only promise you one thing. If you die here with that God-Eyed guy, your life will feel pointless. You will die thinking that you have thrown your life away watching a bunch of rocks. If you return with your sister home… You will be like me, like Sorano-san, you won't be afraid to lose your life because you will know one thing – you did not live in vain. Instead of regret your mind will be full of joyful memories of times with those you love, those very same memories will help you stand when some punk takes you down, those memories will help you bust through the wall of any amount of pain!" the woman muffled out through her swollen face. The two jumped forward and started exchanging blows again. The woman was incredible at redirecting Tanshu's nearly superhuman amount of strength to the side while attacking and not opening herself up too much. She was the best taijutsu user in Konoha, she had to be! Better expertise in the field could simply not exist, her movements were already flawless and not a single move was wasted. Did she fight like that when she had her full strength too or was this her Plan B?

Tanshu leaped forward, thrusting his foot and aiming at Hanasaku's chest. This kick was able to stop one's heart but inside of his own heart the boy knew that his "sister" could take it, no… He believed she could. She wanted him to express all of his darkness, all of his anger and he'd be damned if he didn't. Hanasaku moved to the side and tipped her foot to break Tanshu's balance in the air. With a powerful thrust, moving his imbalanced body with her arms straight into her own knee with a powerful grab she roared out expressing rage of her own. Tanshu yelled out, he felt great shock going through his spine but miraculously it held. For a moment he envisioned his spine snapping, him dying in the arms of this woman and it didn't scare him! He'd die having discovered the true way of life – moving past all the darkness and enjoying life with those one loved, letting those wonderful memories guide him happily to the Afterlife when the time came.

Tanshu struggled to get up, "Leaf Whirlwind!" Hanasaku shouted out with three powerful twisting kicks pummeling Tanshu's chest, the boy flew back into the wall with so much force that he bounced off of it. "Sis… I'm finally… I think… I'm finally… Almost rid of it! My darkness!" he grunted as through willpower he forced his body back up, huffing and grunting in pain and due to the tremendous effort spent to get up. The woman smiled, or at least tried – her face looked like she went on a date with a bee hive. "Let it all out – now!" she yelled out as Tanshu leaped forward, he stretched his fingers and then bent them bursting his body with violent flames that burned his torn top off. Roaring from chest the boy thrust his palm forward, striking the woman three times while doing it so fast that it appeared he had only punched once – this was his Secret Sword Technique re-enacted with a palm.

"Fire Style: Red Cerberus Bite!" Tanshu yelled as the force and flame tossed the woman's body back through the entrance door smashing out of the Pentalimbo room. Tanshu collapsed on his knees, smiled and laughed out. He won! He wasn't exactly fighting Chestnut Hanasaku, he was fighting his own inner darkness and his own despair but… He obliterated it, he could feel it! The boy fell down on his back and breathed heavily. Suddenly he heard Hanasaku standing up. He lifted his head and looked at her, green light started emanating from outside the Pentalimbo room. "Are we done yet?" he asked, "Yeah, there's no reason for us to fight now, I give up…" Hanasaku mumbled out in a much better sounding voice – slowly she was putting her body back into shape. "Thing is, I wanted to fight whole day but those douchebags didn't let me! Thanks, Tanshu!" she smiled at him as the green light illuminated the most beautiful smile of anyone Tanshu had ever seen. Most beautiful not because this woman was incredibly beautiful, but because his sister was smiling, she was happy! "So, did you find your new katei?" she asked, Tanshu lifted his fist into the air. "Screw that, now I'll fight for whatever I want to fight for, there will be no person or place that binds me to fight. If I don't like someone I'll deck them in the face, it's as simple as that…" Tanshu replied. Silence dominated the room from that point on up until Hanasaku finally stood on her legs and entered the room again, she helped Tanshu get up and hugged him. "That being said… There's one guy I wanna deck right now." Hanasaku spoke, Tanshu nodded and the two bumped their fists and left the room.

Howoku was huffing as he made his way up to the top floor of the tower. With a powerful leap he jumped up to the final floor that had the roof tiles still all over it with one man sitting bored in a giant throne-like chair. "One with the Eyes of God?" Howoku asked looking him right in the eyes before pointing at him with a finger. The man stood up and tossed his coat aside revealing a muscular, bandaged up to his nose build. God-Eyes took his great sword from the side of his throne and tossed it onto his shoulder bringing his palm up forward to face Howoku and prepare an immediate "Universal Push" if this Sannin decided to attack him too fast. "You have done well, Sannin of Konoha, bringing my plans back at least several more years but now that you stand against He who possesses the eyes of a God… You stand bare and naked, not a Sannin but a mere man for One with the Eyes of God to do as He pleases with."

Howoku breathed out, he was a bit tired from his previous two encounters and it was quite likely that Misu and Hanasaku may not have been in much better condition. This man however was not only completely fresh but also had those troublesome eyes – the Rinnegan. "You are not a God, God-Eyes. You are just a fruit of a forbidden union of two people who should not have been together, your very existence would threaten all of our villages if your ancestors knew that you are alive. You are also a terrorist plotting to overthrow Konoha and later other Ninja Villages, as a threat to peace I shall kill you." Howoku said with a calm tone. He had a little bit of rest and caught his breath but he was far from fresh entering this fight, still he was probably the most lucky one with the injuries he had sustained, or rather, not sustained.

"To address me thusly… For that I shall destroy you!" God-Eyes shouted visibly getting angry and attacking Howoku with a swing of his giant sword, slamming it into the ground. The tower shook from the weight of the sword and the force with which it was slammed into the ground but only because of how damaged it already was. Howoku punched, successfully, the man continued to strike again and again, the man's blade was too heavy to defend in time and Howoku's punches were too powerful to give the man breathing room and readjust his stance. The Sannin kicked at God-Eyes' chest and leaped backwards, bursting with Starlight Release chakra his hands started glowing. The man thrust his palms forward sending a barrage of small spheres of chakra bombarding the ruined tower. "Starbright Jutsu!" Howoku yelled. The man could not see what was happening, suddenly everything shook and a loud popping sound emanated. Something cracked incredibly loud – as if the ground itself was opening and the tower started to sink down.

Howoku started descending as well but he would've died had he fallen right down, he had to burst his body with Starlight chakra at the last moment and spend some of it to kick off of air itself breaking his fall. That was easier said than done… "You heathen!" Howoku heard a voice behind him as a powerful kick made him grunt in pain. God-Eyes bombarded Howoku with kicks, sending his crashing down with a final finishing kick. Howoku felt so weightless as he went down… He couldn't even begin to think about activating his Starlight right now, he was too hurt and couldn't concentrate properly. "Darn it! The Sannin of Konoha cannot die falling down from a tower he himself finished off!" Howoku cursed as he felt something bump into him hard. As Howoku snapped out of it he saw the face of Misu holding him. "Well well… Brought the whole damned tower down, didn't you… I was running on it you know…" he spoke up. Misu looked really injured. "Where's Hanasaku?" Howoku grunted looking at the rubble of the tower still falling down while the whole construction sank into the goo of the wasteland leaving just oversized blocks of bone structure around the place.

God-Eyes descended slowly – using his weird gravitational jutsu. "Your fellow Sannin are dead… And soon I shall finish you two off as well!" God-Eyes spoke pointing his sword at Misu and Howoku, Misu placed Howoku on his own feet and shrugged. "Nah, I'll pass, I'm pretty cut up, you can have him, Howoku, I'll let you be the next Hokage in return." Misu laughed out. A loud and powerful bang shocked the earth behind God-Eyes as the bony rubble shot up into the sky, flung by a powerful force of nature. "GOD-EYEEEEES!" Hanasaku roared out as she leaped out from under the goo, holding Tanshu by the boy's collar. She looked banged up too – she must've been hit by some of the rubble on her way out but she looked pissed and ready to pound someone. Even One with the Eyes of God looked quite worried and just for a moment – fear found its way in the heart of a God.


	35. Tanshu's Memories End! Kage Summit Ahead

For a brief moment all three Sannin proceeded to stare God-Eyes down. Despite the fact that Vapor Misu had already declared his decision to let Howoku, Hanasaku and Tanshu handle it, he was still not out of the equation and looked quite capable to still at least fend off for himself. Hanasaku and Tanshu looked pretty banged up, it was still a mystery as to why those two took so long to leave the tower or what exactly had happened between them to the other Sannin but God-Eyes must've known he was betrayed by the last of his apostles. His condescending sight betrayed that. He simply extended his arm forward, "Come then, I shall destroy all of you for you are just speck of dust against a God!" he spoke.

All three: Tanshu, Hanasaku and Howoku leaped forward, surprisingly enough Misu also dashed towards the man. Tanshu and Hanasaku threw their most powerful punches, Howoku tried to kick the man in the face after jumping up, Misu tried one of his simpler sword drawing slashes. It was almost like time itself had stopped around God-Eyes as two words were muttered from his lips, escaping them just mere parts of a second before the group collided with him mashing him into dirt. "Universal Push!" he mumbled as an incredible and awesomely powerful bubble of gravitational force formed around the criminal swordsman sending his opponents crashing back into rocks or debris of the tower of bones. This shockwave was so powerful! After hitting the bones Tanshu didn't feel like he had what it took to stand up, even below the man there was a crater that he made around himself, grinding and crushing the bones beneath him.

Howoku flipped onto his belly and his arms shoved his body onto his knees. Hanasaku just grunted and rolled around, still trying to overcome her injuries and pain. That falling tower did a number on both Hanasaku and Tanshu as the two had to not only escape the tower by Hanasaku busting through one of the walls, but also escape the Pentalimbo walls that sealed Hanasaku's power. That extra time caused them to get hit by quite some rubble and in terms made them less effective in this scuffle. Misu also looked pretty banged up, Tanshu yelled out directing it at Misu, "You! Vapor guy! What happened between you and Vashia, you're pretty banged up so there was a fight, right?" Tanshu's voice sounded pretty desperate and quivering from the pain and exhaustion. "Yeah… Kinda… She flew out through the wall, I think she may have escaped before the tower went down, spoke something about some debt being returned or something too." Misu lied. God-Eyes was breathing heavily and did not move out of his crater to finish his opponents off. It was clear that the repulsion technique of this calibre tired him out greatly.

Howoku stood up, he was still staggering, the man tore off his orange jumpsuit and slipped his green coat back to remind more of a cape so that it didn't restrict his movements. "Howoku…" Hanasaku grunted as she reached towards her wounds, a strong green light started bursting from her hands as she started treating her own injuries, Howoku thrust his palm at her signalling her to stay down. "Sorry, Hana-chan, this is something I have to do as the one who will become the next Hokage!" the green light coming off of her hands stopped as the woman just laid down and relaxed. "Do what you want, I won't heal myself because if I'd be up and in fighting shape I'd kick that guy's butt without being able to control myself. I'll just play too weak to stand up. Kick his butt Older Bro!" she yelled lifting her fist into the air. Howoku laughed briefly as God-Eyes levitated out of the crater landing gently nearby. "Hokage? So that's how hopeless fools croak before I squash them with my divine power…" he spoke with a strong and confident tone.

"Yes. Before I didn't really want the big chair, nor did Hanasaku-chan or Misu… That made a big power vacuum causing the poor Sandaime-san stay in the big chair for longer than he had to… Now I think the title of Hokage is the best for a man like me: it is a title of hope for world peace that I shall establish, it is also a title of despair for those that wish to threaten that peace. Those like you, One with Eyes of God! I shall crush you and demonstrate that I am capable of carrying the responsibility of crushing all that oppose my peaceful ideals!" Howoku yelled out. The man with the Rinnegan extended his arms towards Howoku and pressed one of them into a fist. "Come for me then, pathetic man! Struggle before you start boring me and I decide to crush you." He arrogantly replied.

Howoku leaped forward, he did not enhance his body with Starlight Release, he had used it so much already so he must've been saving his strength. Howoku's roaring fist hit right into God-Eyes's jaw and the man placed his foot forward using it as a balance point to shove his fist so hard that he threw his opponent forward. God-Eyes must've overestimated his own power, after using his "Universal Push" before he must've still been unable to use it, that jutsu had a great cooldown period and now Howoku saw that. With a relentless barrage of punches Howoku kept throwing the man off his feet, God-Eyes drew his great sword swinging it around but the one that declared to be the next Hokage avoided the colossal tool of murder without much trouble. Howoku tried to throw another punch to take his opponent down off of his feet but God-Eyes' slash opened a gash on his arm. The Star of Hope shouted in pain and dashed back to recover.

Starlight chakra started bursting from Howoku's body, God-Eyes leaped forward driving his sword where the man was standing but Howoku was no longer there. The Rinnegan user thrust his arm forward, ready to use his powerful version of "Universal Push" to grind Howoku's bones to dust which was right what the future Hokage was waiting for. Howoku's shine became brighter and brighter before it exploded in a violent beam that collided with the gravitational force bubble. With a powerful roar, naming his technique – "Starlight Bridge Jutsu", Howoku's Starlight Beam burst through "Universal Push" pushing and burning One with the Eyes of God up, sending him almost tumbling down back into the crater of his own making. The man's body after the collision of techniques was burnt up and shaking, the color of his skin was much redder as if he spent long time burning up under intensive sunlight and multiple spots of his body were bleeding – his own Rinnegan technique held off a significant portion of Howoku's Starlight. Shaking, cursing and spitting out blood God-Eyes stood up.

"Impossible… Only a Rinnegan technique can match Rinnegan techniques, you cannot be of Godly Origins!" he coughed and cursed at Howoku again and again. Misu grinned, "Actually I was always wondering about that, I think this numbwit actually has some Moon people blood somewhere in him, Starlight Release was described being used in the War of the Moon and the Earth. That'd explain why it can match up to Rinnegan's stupid ninjutsu absorption and "Universal Push"." Tanshu looked at stumbling and panting Howoku confused. This man had some remnants of Moon people blood in him? That is to say a distant relative of his must've been one of the people that were later settled on Moon which meant that during War of the Moon and the Earth Moon Clan procreated with the Earth Clan, giving birth to both abominations of sheer luck like God-Eyes but also people that used their power to inspire hope. People like Howoku.

"I couldn't care less who my distant relatives were, maybe my grand grand grandpa was of the Moon Clan or whatever… All I care about is killing those that threaten my vision of peace!" Howoku shouted putting a stop to this discussion of his origins. But then if Howoku was a descendant of both Moon and Earth Clans, did that not mean he also had to have the Rinnegan like God-Eyes? Maybe Rinnegan was obtained differently then… Tanshu wanted to ask around these Sannin for what exactly God-Eyes was so that a man like him never again appeared. Then again, killing such men when they raised their heads had to do for the teenager. "So what if you can clash with my Rinnegan with that ability of yours!?" God-Eyes yelled out charging forward with a powerful swing of his blade, with a stumble to the side Howoku's tired body avoided it. God-Eyes' sword kept swinging around, Howoku's arms deflected each slash, thrusting his palms at the blunt side of the blade, sometimes receiving minor cuts, also the fists of the future Hokage found their way through the defences of the Rinnegan user as well landing on his face and beaten up and sensitive body. With a powerful clash of their elbows the two separated dashing to the sides.

God-Eyes' arm unexpectedly shot forward attracting Howoku to him, the man had never yet encountered this attraction technique so he fell right for it! "Attraction Cut!" God-Eyes shouted as his body left a powerful gash on Howoku's body. Because of the extensive damage on God-Eyes' body however the sword swing was half-baked and only capable of dealing intensive injury but not completely severing the man's body in two. Howoku huffed on his knees clenching for his spilling blood. God-Eyes lifted his blade to smash Howoku when Tanshu's arms caught it in mid-air, getting only minor cuts on his palms with the blood gently tapping on the black wasteland dirt. "Shut up about this macho-Hokage bullshit! You've got me and Sis-chan here to help, don't be an idiot, no one wants to have to elect the Fifth Hokage right after the Fourth!" Tanshu grunted as Hanasaku's tired body dragged Howoku away and started treating his gut injury. The Rinnegan user swung his sword around with Tanshu easily dodging his swipes. Fire chakra blazed on the teen's palm as he thrust it towards God-Eyes' blade breaking it in two. "Fire Style: Red Dog's Bite!" he yelled as steel bent and broke from his force and blazing chakra.

God-Eyes pulled a kunai out, swiping right at Tanshu and opening up a painful and deep wound on the boy's chest but he kept on clashing with the man. Pulling out a kunai of his own the two clashed for the second time, again and again this new and trained Tanshu cut open God-Eyes' body but this incredibly arrogant fool did not surrender. "Give up, Blood Zebra…" Tanshu grunted making fun of his cut up opponent, pointing the blade of his kunai right at God-Eyes' face, he's bested the One with Eyes of God in sheer swordsmanship even before Demon's training, now he completely dwarfed God-Eyes in that department! God-Eyes' body lifted into the air as he extended his arms and legs to the sides, as if reaching for the whole world. "You fools! You stupid worms squirming under the boot of a God!" he shouted like a madman as powerful and tense chakra erupted from his body, one did not have to be a sensor to feel it! "After this I may not be able to use my gravity controlling jutsu for a while… But if that is the cost of smiting you heathens that will be fine! Ultimate Universal Push!" a loud screech echoed through the location. Complete silence… And then… Destruction.

Tanshu couldn't understand what had happened, he was certain he was supposed to die but… He felt someone holding him in his arms gently. When Tanshu's eyes finally understood what he was seeing his mouth opened wide. "What's this?" he wondered out loud, Hanasaku was holding both him and Howoku in her arms, she was in terms covered by gooey and dripping body of Misu of the Vapor. "Do you know what happens when you exert great pressure on vapor? It becomes water." Misu spoke as his vapor clone collapsed into a puddle of water running down Hanasaku's shoulders and hair and head, dripping all over Howoku and Tanshu too. This… This was how quick on their feet and amazing Konoha Sannin were… God-Eyes slowly descended from the sky, he was breathing heavily and had large black bags under his eyes, his muscles were twitching and his body was no longer straight but instead hunched from the exhaustion.

Howoku stood up and gently pushed Hanasaku away, "Thanks, Hanasaku-chan and thanks to you too, Tanshu, for occupying One with Eyes of God while I was out. I do believe that this match is mine though." He spoke in that heroic and confident tone. "You pathetic, insignificant scum! I keep showing how insignificant you are and yet you still struggle!" God-Eyes roared out of sheer rage dashing forward and thrusting his kunai forward at Howoku which the man dodged, throwing a kick into the opponent's gut making God-Eyes throw up blood – it appeared like the body of "God" was finally broken. The two exchanged fists again, with Howoku blocking God-Eyes' arms from bending in a way that'd have made him cut Howoku with his kunai. Both were injured and exhausted, it was an exchange of willpower, not fists! With a powerful kick God-Eyes sent Howoku backwards a great distance and thrust his arm forward.

"What? But…" Howoku couldn't believe the attraction force that was pulling him in again, how was this possible? Was God-Eyes unwillingly breaking the limits of his own body? Just to kill him? It didn't matter! Howoku's arm pressed hard into a fist, then opened up as a powerful burst of Starlight chakra formed a small sphere in Howoku's arm. Using the attracting force of God-Eyes' "Attraction Blade" technique to his advantage Howoku leaped in with his sphere and drove it right into God-Eyes' gut, the sphere went all the way in and expanded making Starlight chakra burst from God-Eyes' wounds and his orifices. "Starlight Sphere… Into… OVERHOPE!" he yelled changing the intensity of his technique and shoving God-Eyes' powerless body with a powerful wave right into the crater where his "Starlight Sphere jutsu" expanded fiftyfold into a gigantic sphere making the crater twice the original size as the "Overhope" sphere completely destroyed God-Eyes.

Howoku fell on his back and huffed heavily into the air – the fight finally was over… To think that this man and his followers prove themselves capable enough to pose such a challenge for Konohagakure Sannin… "Well, I suppose this may as well be your field promotion to Hokage… You do need to rename that big sphere, no way you're gonna use "Overhope" as the official name…" Misu said smugly as he looked at Howoku from a sitting position from somewhere further away. Hanasaku crept up to Howoku and started healing his injuries, "You guys owe me… You snagged all of my fights…" she grunted before turning her smile at Tanshu. "This guy is Little Bro by the way, he beat me up so I guess it's OK if we take him back to the village… I think he's gonna make a fine Sannin sometime soon! With Howoku-kun becoming Hokage and the spot being vacant and all…" Misu and Howoku smiled too. "Welcome to the "Familia" kid. For the record, don't feel bad because you got into it against your will – we pretty much all did…" Misu spoke at Tanshu as the teen laughed out.

"Vashia…" he thought looking at the distance… "I wonder where you went, what you're doing and what you plan to do… I wish we could've went to Konoha together, got to know each other…" he thought before falling down on his back and stretching out. He looked into the clouds that were starting to part away – could it have been due to the colossal battle that transpired here? Then again, Tanshu himself was so similar to this place – he too once was full of despair and darkness but got all of it cleansed away by someone much dumber but stronger and a more amazing person than him. "So… Uhm… I guess since I ran away right after Academy…" Tanshu opened up the speech before Howoku nodded, "Yeah, you'll have to go the distance all the way, don't worry, with your power you'll climb it in no time… It's a pretty sweet deal if you can handle most of your peers being chuunin already."

Many years later, even more miles further from the wasteland where Tanshu returned back to his life as a Konoha ninja, Howoku the Fourth Hokage with Misu of the Vapor and Red Dog Tanshu by his side looked at a giant system of buildings. This was the building where the Kage Summit was supposed to take place and it was in neutral territory, set in an ancient system of temples of people that worshipped a mystical being that was told to be sealed in the moon. This cult was long extinct and the location was mostly used for political meetings of international scale just like this Kage Summit. Misu looked at Tanshu, "What the hell were you thinking about all this time? It was like you were somewhere else entirely…" he asked his friend, Tanshu's head sunk down letting his shoulder length hair flow over his eyes, only his nostalgic smile was visible. "It doesn't matter… I was just thinking of an old friend and where she's now…" the man replied.

Howoku turned her head, "Don't worry, she wouldn't be ashamed of you knowing you're protecting the Fourth Hokage and are standing by his side as his trusted advisor in a Kage Summit…" Tanshu laughed out loud, "I don't know, that's just the sort of thing she hated – politics, I tried everything from politics to fighting but she just wasn't interested in anything… "Politics has no honor in it, it's not up to my tastes" she used to say…" Misu looked confused, "You look strangely cheerful today, everything's alright with you?" he inquired and right after Tanshu's eyes returned back to their ordinary state – cold and careless with his insane killing intent filling the air. The bunch of samurai that let the Konoha delegation of Hokage, his two advisors and bunch of bodyguards through shook in fear of it, making the iron constructions of their armor clang out loud. "Don't worry, I'm not gonna go soft on those Kirigakure scum, they'll answer for every bullshit thing they've pulled, one magician in Konoha wouldn't forgive us if we screwed up and they were left without a punishment for what they did to her father…" he angrily replied looking at the open doors leading to a hall that lead to a chain of halls leading to other halls, somewhere down the line there was the place where the Summit was to be hosted. This was going to be big!

 **NEXT: KAGE SUMMIT BEGINS!**


	36. Kage Summit Begins, Mysterious Mizukage!

The group comprised of Howoku – the Fourth Hokage and his two Sannin: Tanshu and Misu advanced through the countless large halls. Howoku occasionally turned and commanded some of his men to guard the halls, it appeared like this decision was by no means a unique one as many more ninja were standing around watching the halls as well as the samurai of the Iron Country. "What are the samurai doing here?" Misu asked silently so that only the trio from Konoha would hear it. "I asked Haoru-san to moderate the Kage Summit" Howoku replied, Misu's eyes shot wide open in surprise, then he adjusted his shocked expression so that he didn't appear caught out of his comfort zone to the ninja around.

"I guess there is no better man than one of the legendary samurai wielding one of the God Sword techniques to observe the order and protect us…" he added his conclusion when Howoku gently shook his head. "No. That is not why I invited Haoru-san, I am well aware that he and his insane kenjutsu prowess can best any ninja on the battlefield but I am more interested in his personality. He hates all ninja and thinks them arrogant of their own power and irrelevant, he believes that they are a sick mutation of noble warriors like the samurai and that they not only have outlived their purpose, they never had one in his eyes to begin with." Tanshu scratched his wild brown hair and looked at Howoku questioningly, "I haven't seen that guy but… Is he really that strong? He doesn't really sound like the guy that'd be fitting to moderate ninja villages' petty squabbles." Howoku smiled, "Exactly, he won't tolerate Mizukage's dragging political bullshit, he'll force us to go straight to the point, he won't be afraid to ask the tough questions and offend us on a deeply personal level and people like the Mizukage cannot stand that, they'll be exposed, they'll be stripped and if we're lucky… Removed from their post…" Both Sannin following the Hokage looked at each other, none of them really thought it was a good idea to invite such a man to see over this event.

As the group entered to the second hall leading up to the hall surrounding the main meeting hall Tanshu looked around. Something looked very suspicious to him and he just couldn't understand it. "What's with all those men in hoods? Those steel masks on their faces, who are they?" he grunted as he felt a bit on edge around people concealing their bodies and faces. He wouldn't have minded if they pulled something funny, that'd have given him the excuse to take them out. "They're Kirigakure Barrier Corps, they serve a similar function to Konoha's Barrier Corps – they're the protection team whose main purpose is to create and observe the village protection system, notice barrier breaches, close the threat inside and take it out." Misu replied. "You know a lot about Kirigakure to identify those guys from their uniforms…" Tanshu looked at his comrade with surprise. Misu smiled "I've been to Kirigakure many times on missions, so has Hanasaku, you're the only one who avoids missions there." Howoku scratched his chin, the fact that there were so many Barrier corps ninja in here alerted him.

"I feel you, Howoku, it's unusual for Barrier ninja to even leave their own village. Once they complete their exams they stay inside their village and protect it from threats, their presence in such numbers is something to bring up during the Summit, huh?" Tanshu spoke out nervously reacting to nervousness of Howoku. The Hokage ordered all of his remaining men to stay in that hall, a secretary bowed and gestured that the men entered the main hall and took their seats. As Howoku and Misu entered Tanshu looked back and observed all the ninja he could identify before turning back and following Howoku and Misu inside. "I don't like this, I would have thought that Mizukage would bring his dogs but… I see none of them." Howoku nodded as he moved his large chair and sat down, Tanshu and Misu followed sitting down on smaller chairs from both sides of Hokage. "Yeah, the fact that the one being blamed does not bring the men whose actions he is blamed for… It's either very arrogant or very ignorant, either way it's suspicious…" Howoku closed his eyes and looked at the other end of the long oval table.

Door at the other end of the hall opened and a bunch of samurai clanged inside running in a slow jog, a bulky but short figure entered, a man with messy dark hair and a ponytail, face covered with scars and several small patches of burns and wearing a rugged brown coat. The coated man removed his cloak revealing his muscular build, wearing a white kimono that had its sleeves removed just to expose the man's incredibly thick and strong arms, this was not just any samurai, someone with this muscular structure could cut just about anything given a proper blade. The man opened his eyes and stared at the Hokage sitting at the other end of the table, Howoku slightly nodded his head, "Hello, Haoru-san" he dropped with a small smile. The man's eyes shot open and his grin turned sideways, "Yo, Howoku-ninja!" he replied with a strange manner of speech for a samurai, especially as respected as the famed God Sword user Haoru.

"The others appear to be late then?" Howoku asked cutting it right to the point, Haoru didn't drop his smile, he stared down at the doors and empty seats and squinted a bit. "I thought they'd be late too, they all arrived at the same time which seemed odd to me, Howoku-ninja, I swear to God if those disgraceful ninja plan something I'll cut all of them down!" the man grunted while still not shaking his smile off, the prospect of killing all of the Kage as they gathered in the same room must've really appealed to him. Howoku just laughed it off and looked at each of the doors, "Indeed, all of the Kage arriving at the same time appears to be odd… I don't believe that has happened in the history of Kage Summits." All of those signs being present just rubbed Tanshu off in the wrong way, something was bound to go wrong but to do something stupid in such a place was to court war with all of the other countries.

One may have assumed that peace worked well with all the Great Ninja Countries that was not entirely right. They were all just acting according to the deals they've made in many conflicts in the past. Some countries hated war, Tsuchigakure and Sunagakure wanted nothing more but to prove to the other countries that they've recovered from the conflicts that have almost eradicated them in the past, they wanted to prove that they were now an economic and political and military force to be reckoned with and deserved to be dealt with under equal terms with the other villages. Now the big three that have signed the peace treaty of the Second Great Ninja War: Kumogakure, Kirigakure and Konoha were the "Great Ninja Villages" that got more liberties and overall better rep in all the relationship with the other villages. That was something the smaller villages couldn't have despised more.

That being said, some if not most villages actually wanted war, they were living in peaceful times when in reality they were all breeding soldiers. Soldiers all needed action. Most villages lived on a standby mode, ready to charge at the first village that broke the international treaties. To do something stupid in such an event would've justified all military action to be taken against the village and with the bloodthirst of about twenty years in the stomachs of each village a conflict would very unlikely stop at just beating a village. The scapegoat would be decimated like numerous others. Third Great Ninja War would be the most devastating and claiming most lives of them all, everyone knew it and for that reason even the most tyrannical Kage upheld the international law. As powerful as the greater villages were, none were strong enough to withstand even a single battle against the rest of the world. It was act civilized or be destroyed – a world that Howoku the Star of Hope helped create, he was a coauthor of many of the treaties in question and always strived to create such status quo.

The door busted open, then another, all of them opened within a short period of time from each other and four people walked inside, surrounded by several guards. As the participants of this Kage Summit looked at each other they noticed something wrong with Kirigakure party. Instead of the Mizukage some strange blonde woman in a black dress entered, surrounded by Barrier Corps ninja that Tanshu saw before. All of the Kage sat down and stared down at each other, as the awkward pause continued Haoru slammed his palm into the oval table. "WHAT THE HELL IS THIS BULLSHIT!" he yelled angrily grasping the sheath of his sword with one hand while his other one was shaking on the table. "Where is Mizukage-ninja!? Is he too important to attend the Kage Summit!? Shall I tell the other Kage-ninja to just march into Kirigakure and burn it down! They'd have the full support of the Iron Country samurai, that I can assure you!"

The woman opened her seductive eyes and placed her finger up on her blood red lips, silencing the samurai and then she placed the hand on her chest, making a very sorry face. "I apologize, everybody, it appears that the news didn't reach every corner of the world yet… I assumed that your intelligence was better than this and that your spies would whisper all about this situation so I didn't even bother to send a proper declaration…" the woman spoke in a very strange, almost acted apologetic tone. She was incredibly attractive and her voice just added to that image. Haoru was still shaking in rage as the woman spoke, "Will you get to the point, woman-ninja! Where is Mizukage-ninja!?" he yelled as the woman smiled and moved her finger shyly to her lips. "I am the new Mizukage, we've removed Daikon-san from the big chair. I believe you are all well familiar with my predecessor and do not need any reasons as to why a coup was necessary? As the leader of the Barrier Corps and the woman who has protected the village many times while our leader sat in his room munching his steaks while his people were slaughtered, often observing said slaughter from his balcony, I Namikaze Shirona have been elected by the council to succeed my incapable predecessor."

"Namikaze?" Tanshu whispered at his party when Misu replied, "Yeah, a branch family of the Senju, they don't really possess the Senju bloodline or any other exceptional abilities, except of their elite heritage they aren't really that interesting…" Howoku jumped up from his seat. "How could the other Kage sit so calm!?" Howoku shouted. "What is this game, Mizukage? The purpose of this Summit is to punish the Mizukage for his deeds and questionable decisions, his continuous abuse of both his own people and his power and complete disregard of other villages. I have plenty of proof against Daikon, the previous Mizukage. It is clear that this move is just a cheap shot at avoiding responsibility. The other Kage, that were still wearing their signature cloaks and hats just nodded and mumbled something inconclusively making Tanshu even more suspicious of what was going on. Haoru slammed his sheathed sword on the table and relaxed into his chair, breathing out and sighing, trying to calm down. "Fine, it is decided, I am not a man who likes to have his time wasted. Let us carry on with the Summit and if the charges brought by Hokage-ninja are sufficient we can make Mizukage-ninja responsible for her predecessor's actions. Her irresponsible behavior and failure to inform us of these developments in the already extremely secretive village serve as a weighty stone on the scale supporting my decision."

Haoru then angrily glared at the other Kage and grunted, "What kind of man sits near a table and discusses business with a hat!? Remove your hats, Kage-ninja!" he instructed angrily as the three reached for their hats. A young woman, in her early forties removed her hat revealing bright murky cerulean hair, she had peculiar eyelashes that matched her hair, also her skin was of much darker shade than that of the rest, even darker than Mana's by many shades to the point where Mana looked like she had a permanent tan where this woman looked like she was from an exotic faraway land. Her strange looks had some mystic charm to it. This woman was Samaya Imasu – the Fifth Raikage.

A tall man in his middle forties removed his hat and placed it on the oval table as well. He sighed shaking his wild long white hair. His face made the man instantly identifiable as one of the Kaguya clan as he had all the traits of the typical Kaguya: his flowing white hair, the red line below his eyes and the typical Kaguya marking on his forehead. After placing his hat on the table the man did not utter a word, just like his fellow Kage to the right, it was quite strange as the Tsuchikage – Kaguya Yaban was not one to stay silent for too long. Another man, by far the tallest out of all in the room as he may have been more than two meters tall removed his hat putting it onto the table. He had relatively casual dark red hair that had two extremely long braids going down his shoulders almost reaching his belt. The Kazekage was a strange looking fellow, no one who has ever seen Akasuna Mugao would have thought he looked any odder than the time they have seen him.

Haoru sighed and then sat straight, gesturing at Howoku, "Now that Kirigakure's pathetic attempt to hinder or postpone this meeting is dealt with, please, Howoku-ninja, bring up your accusations and state your facts and proof. The council of Five Kage will decide how to deal with the Mizukage, having in mind that she is merely a successor of the man responsible. Just for clarity sake… I'll assume you've disposed of Daikon-ninja, as is the Bloody Mist's way?" Shirona – the Mizukage smiled with a pleasant but having the context in mind somewhat scary smile. "But of course, it was fitting to allow the villagers that he had oppressed and tortured with his bloody ways for so long to finally have their justice with the man…" Judging from the smile of the attractive blonde it remained completely clear that she did not regret anything that had transpired that day. Perhaps it was for the better that Konoha and the other villages did not know of this for the details may have been too shocking and disgusting even for those who've seen their fair share of revolutions to hear. What was even more troubling to hear was that the woman did not even react to her village being called "Bloody Mist", which was an ancient nickname given to it. Even more, judging from the crimson crescent of her smile – she took pride in it…

Howoku stood up and cleaned his throat. "I need no proof for the first accusation – it is something that every of you know about – Kirigakure had ninja acting in Konohagakure soil, ninja that interrupted a mission transpiring in Konohagakure's jurisdiction and took over a scroll from the team sent to take the scroll over by a client that asked Konohagakure to have the scroll taken. By interrupting with this mission and slaughtering the squad sent to take the scroll you have brought shame to the Fire Lord in the name of Water Lord, also, you have killed Konohagakure ninja on neutral soil, not only that, it was the soil in which the climactic battle of Second Great Ninja War occurred over twenty years ago, one that signaled the nations to end the war. That land was sacred and no village had the right to move military force comprising of more than five individuals inside of it. It is a land that reminds us all of how greedy and bloodthirsty we can get during times of war, it reminds us of the worst in us all. It appears that your predecessor had not learned his lesson and broke multiple treaties he himself has signed. He is responsible for breaking multiple peace treaties and deaths of many Konoha ninja, also his orders cost the career of some very prized and important ninja to the village like Konoha's Great Trapster - Tsukumo Nakotsumi who assisted all of the villages by dismantling the wandering showman ninja clan early in his career. Such losses are not the kind of accusation just switching the person in charge fixes, Konohagakure will need some serious satisfaction for the damage caused and the lives lost, needless to say, our diplomatic ties will suffer either way, no amount of money or other political settlement can replace the value of human lives."

Howoku sat down, Misu remained cold and static, staring at the blonde woman who has remained completely still and cool throughout the entire speech. Haoru grinned and pointed at the Mizukage, "Those are some serious claims and accusations. The incident brought up is indeed public enough to need no further proof and its details are well known even to a politically neutral country like the Iron Country. What will you have to say for yourself, Mizukage-ninja?" Haoru asked looking curiously at the woman. Misu couldn't help but whisper to Howoku, "Something about her strikes me as odd… I'm gonna return in a moment" he said as he lifted his hand "I'm going to excuse myself for a moment, I need to issue orders for some ninja waiting outside, Hokage-sama forgot to tell them to take relaxed positions and they may be taking it the wrong way. May I temporarily leave to clear it out for the ninja outside?" Misu made up a ridiculous excuse, Haoru lifted his arm and waved it ignorantly, "Your presence here isn't needed unless you are a witness, Sannin-ninja, you can come and go as you please if your Hokage is not inconvenienced." he replied. Howoku looked confused but Misu rushed out of the room.

"Now, let us return to the matters at hand, Mizukage-ninja, may you address Hokage-ninja's accusations or do you admit having broken the mentioned treaties?" Haoru asked looking at the still calm and scarily smiling Mizukage.


	37. Who is Namikaze Shirona?

The woman who had declared herself as the new Mizukage closed her eyes and grinned with a cruel smile, it was quite clear that she was just hardly restraining a full on fit of laughter. She then once again switched into her acting mode, placing her hand on her chest and looking almost like she was about to cry. "Honestly, I don't really see your point. I agree with all of the charges and admit that Daikon did all of that, I cannot prove that he did it, most of his documents were burnt during the coup so it will be years before we finally untangle all that he had done throughout the years as the Third Mizukage but…"

Tsuchikage interrupted the woman. The Kaguya shook his head and replied in an annoyed mood, "While it is unfortunate that you did not inform us of this change as it starts feeling like we are just chasing shadows here… Judging from what Fourth has said… The thing is that all of those charges only improve her position. You've brought up the charges against Daikon-san but he has already been removed. This meeting has no point anymore and I cannot believe that a respectable man like Haoru-san is still taking this matter further." Haoru stood up, "What are you implying, Tsuchikage-ninja?! That I am in kahoots with the Hokage-ninja?! My job is to make sure that justice is done in this meeting of liars and murderers, truth be told all of you are despicable to me and I'd rather see all of you executed than listen to one minute more of your intrigues and lies. I am well aware of Mizukage-ninja's point but I see her own political game in that and letting it pass is something I'd never allow as a man and as a samurai. Mark my words, ninja snakes, justice will be done here today and none of you will leave until you all put all of your cards on the table and all matters are resolved."

Tanshu grunted, "Now I see why you chose this guy… He's something else, it'd all fall flat, of course, if he couldn't back his talk up…" Howoku shook his head, "Konoha withdraws all charges brought up and agrees that justice has been done to Daikon-san even if it was rude and abrupt and secretive justice…" he said quickly sitting down. Tanshu shook his shoulder angrily, "Hey, what the hell?" he whispered to the man right at his ear, the man had absolutely no respect of boundaries as Tanshu treated his Hokage just like he'd treat an old friend. "What the hell did you just do? How am I supposed to look my student in the eye and tell that her father's injury…" "Stop, Tanshu-san!" Howoku raised his voice, even the other Kage sitting around the table could hear it. After the Kage settled down and silence once again took the room over Howoku turned at Tanshu angrily.

"Our charges have been turned against us… I can't believe I'm saying this but our work is all burnt down to nothingness… This woman…" Howoku grunted looking at Shirona – the Fourth Mizukage angrily. "The more we blame Daikon, the more she benefits from our charges – she's the one who removed him after all. As his successor she benefits from all filth we spill on the state of her village in the past. We've got nothing to bring on her and even Haoru-san sees this. This meeting is as good as pointless, she's won. Our attempts to beat her by bringing up the sins of her village's past only makes her look that much stronger in the eyes of the other Kage." Shirona finally saw that she was in the right and her face took the triumphant look, it was then that Howoku stood up again.

"That matter being settled, we've still got the glaring issue at hand – Lady Fourth has not informed the others of the sweeping changes in her village that has slipped the rug from under the entire meeting. She's done so during the interval that was given to us as preparation as the letter sent as agreement to attend the Summit came from Daikon-san, which means that Lady Shirona must've known of the incoming Summit as his successor and purposefully withheld this information during preparation period. This still is a serious issue which is a big stain on Lady Shirona's sheet, enough of a stain to maybe consider her removal from the chair as well." Howoku's speech surprised all of the Kage. His quick adaptation to the surprising changes in situation must've pleasantly surprised even Haoru as well who openly expressed his disgust for the filthy politics going on in this meeting.

Haoru cleared his throat and looked at Mizukage who was unpleasantly squirming in her chair. "That is true, if Hokage-ninja wants to abandon the previous charge and focus on this one that is fine, what do you have to say for yourself, Mizukage-ninja, I have here Daikon-ninja's letter of agreeing to participate in the Summit so which was it: did you purposefully withheld information of Daikon's change during the preparation period, knowing of the Summit as it was public news to every common villager reading the papers or did you fake Daikon-ninja's credentials?" both of the answers would've meant pretty much the same – either a very big stain on the Fourth's reputation or her removal from the post depending on the strictness of the judgment.

"Well, well… I suppose you got me, I did withhold information. I am a woman raised in the world of intrigue and political moves, Kirigakure under Daikon's rule was a cruel place and my mind genuinely thought that the other villages had enough spies in our rotten Daikon's dumphole of a village that they'd know all about the change. I did withhold the information on purpose, I suppose but only as a result of my own origins and mindset." The woman bowed her head to the other Kage, "For that I beg your consideration and hopefully forgiveness!" she added. Haoru scratched his oversized chin. "That is a serious offense, Mizukage-ninja, even if your confession does make me rather hesitant to remove you from the post… What say you, Kage-ninja?" Howoku nodded angrily, "True, Lady Shirona's removal would serve no good for her violence ridden and broken village, her people need a leader, a good one, that can bring their village back from the image of the "Bloody Mist" and yet I doubt if Lady Shirona is the person willing to do so… I say that each other ninja village are allowed to have a member in Kirigakure council to regulate and oversee its matters for three years. This punishment seems fitting enough to Konoha…"

"Well, I really don't care, doesn't seem like much of a crime to me…" Tsuchikage shrugged, "Even if Kirigakure has demonstrated extreme cruelty in their dealings with enemy spies… We must admit our intelligence in this matter was also lackluster…" Raikage spoke up. "I personally do not see the point of pursuing punishment." Kazekage added. Haoru grunted, "Seriously sometimes I don't get you ninja, a woman plays all of you for fools and you just shrug her off…" his eyes shot open and he jumped up leaping quickly on the table and swinging his sheathed sword at Raikage, the young lady jumped back out of fear and fell down off of her chair. Haoru grinned and laughed arrogantly.

"I don't know who this young chick is, but she is most certainly not Samaya Imasu, I myself taught the young girl swordsmanship and I know her speech mannerism too well. This person is a fraud which makes me assume the rest of you runts are too…" Haoru said out loud still standing on the table and pointing his sheathed katana straight at the nose of the young Raikage who was angrily shooting stares back at him. Within a single moment Raikage, Tsuchikage and Kazekage leaped out of their seats rushing at Haoru, the man drew his sword from his sheathe making a powerful and violent gale that blew the Kage back crashing into the stone wall. In a loud poof the "Kage" de-transformed back into ninja with Kirigakure headbands.

"Executioner of the Clouds, Wakashi Moya and his Executioner Blade and the rest of Kirigakure Sannin… I'd have imagined you to pose more of a challenge!" Haoru grinned and laughed out madly, enjoying his brief chance to fight a ninja and get back at them. "Oni Mask-sensei!?" Tanshu suddenly shouted out having recognized one of the men transformed into Kage to sabotage the Kage Summit. The man wore a different shaded Oni Mask and the same sleeveless kimono outfit, one of his legs looked like it was just a piece of iron and plastic – this would've fit Oni Mask's injury in the battle against Sorano twenty years ago… Then again, Kirigakure had numerous Demon assassins of varied strength, it could've just as easily been just a diversion.

Howoku jumped out of his chair and slammed the table, shouting loudly at the Mizukage, "Shirona, what is the meaning of this!? What have you done with the other Kage?!" for a moment there the man started to believe that the others may have been dead by now. Shirona giggled into her palm and made an arrogant and victorious face, "Who knows… Maybe they're all dead, maybe they're still fending off the entire Kirigakure military force that I've mobilized for this "peaceful" meeting…" the woman replied mocking the word "peaceful" as much as humanly possible. So this was her game? Mobilize all of her forces, drain her village of resources and manpower right after it has rid of the worst Kage in history… All just to mess with Konoha?! This woman was mad. Just as mad as Daikon… No. Even Daikon wasn't dumb enough to attack the Kage by himself. Even if it was the entire military force the Kage likely moved with sufficient support that they would be able to fend off, they were the three most powerful ninja in the world after all.

"Why? Why would you hurt your village and rob your people of peace?" Howoku grunted out, at this moment he hated this woman most of all in the world. He wanted to strike her, to beat her until she was one with the dirt but even dirt was not worth of accepting her corpse. Shirona stood up, she leapt on the table and charged right at Howoku, in mid charge she was interrupted by Haoru who blocked her attack, his sword clashed with an orange chakra barrier similar to that which Barrier Corps used. The barrier that Shirona used was covered with hieroglyphs of unknown origin or meaning. It must've been a higher tier jutsu compared to the casual barriers to successfully clash with Haoru and withstand the clash without the barrier shattering. The woman withdrew and dashed back as her barrier stayed until she dashed back and then disintegrated into small cubes that dispersed into smaller particles and disappeared in thin air.

"Because… You spoke of reputation of ninja in general. What is that reputation worth when weakling scum like you are in charge? How is a client to ask a slothful imbecile who rambles about peace to assassinate someone? What do you know of war, of combat? Peace has made your mind narrow, you and your pathetic peers didn't even consider the possibility of being attacked with full military force – your time slobbering over peace and political alliances made you drop your guard too often. Your predecessors would have never allowed another village to intercept their mission because they were powerful men of war. They were men that were worthy of being rivals to Kirigakure but people like you make me sick. Within just one day I will take everything from you and the other Kage, I will kill them and then manipulate my way onto ruling everything just like I manipulated you shallow minded fools in this Summit. There will be no more villages, just ninja and a single Queen of all ninja, the mightiest and most cunning of them all. That is what Daikon wanted to achieve but he was too scared to ever set any of his plans in motion, instead he got his kicks out of torturing common villagers. I on the other hand am a youthful woman full of youthful enthusiasm and ready to act upon my desires, take what I want. That makes me different and superior to Daikon, the true successor of his title! Now just…"

Before she could finish her title Haoru charged forward thrusting with his katana to impale the woman. He was a man that hated ninja after all and he had heard enough of this woman's ramblings for a decade. All that the man's impressive charge met was another barrier that was as large as the hall room, effectively splitting the room in two. Shirona waved for her henchmen that have impersonated the Kage to follow her as she turned around and started making her way towards the door that Haoru has entered through. "Now that this part of the plan is complete, set out and assist the squads, make sure that the other Kage are dead and under no circumstances let them come here…" she commanded them as the team disappeared in the darkness of the corridor. Haoru started striking the barrier madly, again and again and initially it seemed like his attacks only damaged his own blade.

"You arrogant youthful ninja bitch!" Haoru yelled out, however he was not angry, he was excited. His entire life this samurai just wanted to kill ninja, he despised them but as one of the four best swordsmen who wielded the Four God Sword techniques he had to behave and submit to the world order. No more, this young and ambitious woman stepped out of the world order and entered the pecking order the caliber of which she could not possibly imagine, Haoru stood leaps above all else in that order. "You just made this Summit really damn interestin', I'm gonna love to cut you and your lackeys down! Stop hiding!" Haoru roared as he wildly cut at the barrier that was starting to crack. Tanshu looked at Howoku, "This guy is starting to scare me a bit…" Howoku looked back, "Good, if Haoru the God Sword does not scare you, you've no idea of the battle you've gotten into. It is said that ninja cannot beat samurai in an open field on a one on one match… Well Haoru is a monster that surpasses even the level of samurai. He genuinely hates ninja too… Lady Shirona was more foolish to piss him off than to make enemies of all of the ninja villages." After replying Howoku tried to desperately decide on what to do.

Leaving right now would've proved to be quite counterproductive, going around the room would've taken enough time for the woman to make her escape – if that was her intention to begin with… If she wanted Howoku's death why did she wish to leave the building so much? Perhaps Howoku was supposed to die with the building, she probably had something very destructive in mind… "Tanshu, that man might be your sensei, you sure I can count on you with this?" Howoku asked looking at his old friend Sannin, Tanshu nodded, "Oh yeah, let's rampage like old times. She's probably brought everyone here, the jounin, the Water Temple monks, her own henchmen – the Barrier Corps. Let's kill them all." The barrier shattered and only Haoru's afterimage remained as the man had long since disappeared and was dashing right at the Mizukage. Howoku pointed back, "Let's regroup with our men, Haoru will cause enough of a destructive diversion for us to regroup and then attack Shirona's whole group with our whole group, that way we'll stand more of a chance at survival." Tanshu grinned and turned around, "The lady was right, you are pretty soft, we could take care of the situation solo but you just want to make sure no one of your men dies… Nothing wrong with that I suppose. Lead on." Tanshu smiled with an angry look on his face.

This Summit actually turned out just the way that Tanshu wanted it – he was sure that if he returned and told Mana that her father was avenged by imposing some political sanction upon the nation, as peaceful as she was Tanshu would've felt sick and as if he's betrayed himself saying it. Now he could really dish out a form of justice he could understand and it still will be right, technically he was doing it defending his Hokage and himself, defending his comrades when in reality he'll be killing these Kirigakure scum not because of that, not primarily, he'll do it because they are insanely cocky bastards and he wanted to teach them a lesson. After pulling a dick move like this they really deserved to be burnt down and beaten to the level of just primal existence just like Sunagakure was during the Second Great Ninja War.

Mizukage Shirona and her three assistants that were impersonating the Kage were fleeing through the hall. "Mizukage-sama? Why must we fight someone like the Kage? Can we really do it?" one of her assistants asked, the woman gently stroke his cheek and slowed her pace. "Of course, they are currently facing military force, they will be tired, weakened, do you not wish the title of the man who has killed a Kage? That'd bring you straight up to the ranks of Sannin and not only Sannin of Kirigakure like you are now, you'd be a Sannin of the entire world!" The man with the Executioner's blade looked back, "I sense someone coming, he's pretty loud, are you sure you're OK, Lady Shirona? What do you plan to do?" he asked her. The woman just smiled, "I'm alright, you guys go, I'll handle this joker and then I'll disintegrate this whole building with the Hokage and his Sannin inside. I've got many aces in my sleeves, even if THAT doesn't work, I still have some nasty tricks for that man. I am completely certain that he will not survive this day." The Sannin with the Oni Mask lowered his head and turned around, "Lady Mizukage, please be careful, do not underestimate Red Dog Tanshu, he is considered one of the strongest ninja alive for a reason." The woman turned around to look at the empty darkness of the corridor behind her. "I am well aware, I have plans to deal with him as well, now go." Her Sannin disappeared in a loud poof of air as instructed.

Moments later with a loud tap of wooden sandals hitting the floor a short but muscular samurai descended to face the Mizukage, he drew his sword and leaned back into two hands thrusting position. His smile betrayed how much he enjoyed the prospect of killing a ninja. "My my how I love killing young ninja who underestimate me…" Haoru said in an excited and upbeat tone. The woman lifted her arm into the air and placed it in front, letting her relaxed palm form a round imaginary circle in the air. "To face a Kage is to court one's own destruction, even for you…" Shirona replied "I have no time for you, I have everything to destroy, so I shall kill you quickly."


	38. Mizukage Shirona's Scary Strength

Haoru stood still in his battle stance. This ducking and widespread balance point position was perfect for him, within an instant he could throw a quick thrust of his blade at any point, even more, he could enhance his blade with his Wind Release chakra making it able to shoot near invisible cutting and piercing currents of wind. However the man called the world's strongest samurai remained still, his style depended on his opponent making a mistake and she's made plenty: pissing Haoru of the Iron Country off, fighting him one on one on a battlefield. Such a narrow walled corridor would've served perfectly to Haoru's thrusting techniques. Surely this woman should've been worth her mettle, she's seen him effortlessly toy around with her trusted Sannin did she not?

Shirona's face pouted, this obstacle in her path was clearly annoying her, she slipped her palm through the air as a round barrier, similar to a small buckler, covered with hieroglyphs and ancient symbols formed around her palm. The woman threw the barrier as a disc, spinning right at Haoru but the man's katana blade thrust forward busting it into pieces. The Mizukage was not where he last saw her after Haoru recovered however – she was right in his face with similar cutting barriers around her palms. The woman thrust them forward, trying to slam them into the man's body again and again but Haoru just moved to the side and backwards repeatedly, dodging her assaults almost effortlessly. Why did this woman struggle? Against the man called the strongest samurai she could only accept her own destruction… Shirona's arms shot forward forming a combined shield-like round barrier and thrusting it right at Haoru. It merely hit an afterimage. Shirona's eyes were shocked, instinctively, just following her intuition she formed a barrier above her head and made it as strong as she could.

A powerful clang echoed sending gusts of winds as shockwaves as the barrier and Haoru's katana collided. The man grunted as he pressed the blade forward, breaking Shirona's barrier and thrusting it forward using gravity and his own weight to cut the woman in two. That was not what happened, however, the blade just got stuck on the woman's dress and tore a piece of cloth which remained hanging on the big golden rings holding the shoulder pieces of her dress together and preventing the dress from falling off. Haoru was confused for a moment, he looked at his katana which was cracked and completely unusable. "Those barriers… How tough are they? I have no problem cutting steel but these barriers ruined my Yama no Perun – a blade that has been by my side since I was a young man…" the samurai asked spitting to the side.

Shirona formed more round barriers around her palms and stood in a defensive stance showing off her glowing and colorful orange barriers and the impressive markings on them. "Before I became the Fourth Mizukage I was the head of Kirigakure Barrier Corps. Limits and barriers, whatever concerns these two things - I can do it. While my good looks has aided me plenty in my quest to obtain everything imaginable, my ability to do with barrier ninjutsu what no one has ever seen before helped with those persistent men that were impossible to reach a compromise with. Now without your sword you are nothing, bow before me, lowly samurai and swear allegiance or get swept aside by my crashing wave of change!" the woman ordered lifting her chin up arrogantly. Haoru laughed out, his laugh was deep and genuine, not an acted one – almost like the man has not had that much fun in ages. "You seem to believe that my sword is unusable now? As expected, a woman knows nothing of a fine blade, even if my edge is cracked all I need is to focus my Wind chakra more and make the blade even sharper. Still, I haven't done this in a long time, not since the war I was challenged to channel my chakra this intensely and cut this deep…"

With a smile just as smug as that of the woman's opposing him Haoru's blade lit up with greyish chakra which soon turned cerulean blue, before the chakra around the blade looked more like an aura, now it was basically a raging wildfire, ready to cut through and destroy anything in its path. Haoru lunged forward in his thrusting stance and thrust his blade, Shirona clashed her own barriers together to form a triple large shielding wall of barriers. She was lucky to instinctively move out of the way – Haoru's sword went through the barriers with moderate difficulty. The Mizukage was surprised, this man was proving to be quite the challenge for her for a samurai, granted, samurai were told to be superior to ninja in pure one on one battle, only in tricks, stealth and assassination could a ninja best a samurai but Shirona Namikaze was no ordinary ninja. The woman made couple of handseals making countless barriers around her. "Barrier Ninjutsu: Guanyin's Protection!" she chanted as seemingly hundreds if not a whole thousand of similar barrier bucklers started floating like satellites around their planet which, in this case, was Shirona.

Numerous barriers cut Haoru, they were as sharp as disc saws and upon cutting the man they also inflicted some sort of chakra burns. Not that Haoru could not handle pain, only the initial performance of the technique even fazed him as he quickly started wildly slashing and thrusting, destroying each and every barrier while Shirona jumped on a larger platforming round barrier and floated back. The Mizukage was in awe of Haoru's speed and strength, his hands and blade were but a blur as he cut through each and every of her thousand disc barriers. After the first couple of scratches not a single barrier even touched Haoru, now she was starting to understand the danger this man posed to her plans – he was certainly the most skilled, swift and strong swordsmen that Shirona has seen. If such a man was not hers to play with, he was to be no one's.

"What a woman… Beautiful, smart, ambitious and strong…" Haoru sighed as he swiped his sword to the side as if he was shaking off blood off of it and stood in his signature stance with the same confident smile. "Oh, I had forgotten, you have your women stay at home, maybe that is why Iron Country is such an irrelevant little dump in the world's grand plan…" Shirona replied forming two more barriers around her palms. Haoru laughed out loud deeply again, "I'm almost tempted to let you cut me down so that you may know my wife's wrath. Iron Country men are so strong and able that women need not concern with their lowly matters." Haoru replied as both combatants charged at each other. Shirona grunted throwing her barriers forward, "Barrier Ninjutsu: Barrier Multiplication!" she yelled as the two barriers she had around her arms became eight, all of them stacked on each other to form a stronger protective wall. "Windcutter Style: Power Cut!" Haoru yelled out striking with both his arms from above down. A powerful flash of light blinded both competitors as the barriers and Haoru's strength guided sword clashed. As Shirona struggled with her blindness Haoru's blade cut her figure in two, his blade pierced her flesh as if it was as easy as cutting air. After the swing was made Shirona's body became as thin as paper and a transparent barrier shined around the deceptive figure as the barrier's upper side slid down being cut in two.

"Barrier Style: Barrier Mirror Mirage!" Shirona chanted from further away, forming more barriers around her palms again. Haoru was open – this was her chance! "Barrier Style: Koho!" she fired the barrier hitting Haoru straight in his bulky and muscular chest, the man staggered back as the barrier shattered on impact from the force it packed. "Barrier Style: Baikoho!" she shouted sending two more barriers crashing and shattering into the man's body. Haoru kept stumbling back and grunting from the force, "Now get out of my way!" Shirona ordered sending the final small barrier hitting straight into Haoru's jaw from the side sending him crashing into the wall and leaving a small crack in it. "Insects need to be stepped on with force…" the woman mumbled arrogantly to herself looking at the man's body on the ground – an impact like that third one would've been more than enough to break a man's neck and the barrier's speed hitting from the side would've been enough to snap it as well. "Agreed… Wait, are we discussing insects now?" a grumpy voice of the samurai reached Shirona's ears as the woman took a couple of steps backwards in surprise.

"I've grown bored discussing your ogre wife." Shirona cursed angered by the man's persistence. It appeared like he barely took any damage at all, the man nonchalantly spat out several teeth to the side and smiled with his disgusting half-complete smile. "Shouldn't have played that card, lady-ninja…" Haoru cracked a somewhat annoyed grin as he sheathed his sword, a weak current of air started twisting around the man's frame lifting off dust and small pebbles alerting Shirona of his concentration of chakra, could Haoru only have been playing up to then? With a single handseal the woman's arms shot forward, four square barriers formed into a cube. Mizukage mumbled "Barrier Style:…", as the samurai leaped at her the woman thrust her barrier cube forward. Haoru's foot thumped right before Shirona's feet breaking the stone below it as the man's voice roared loud enough for the Gods themselves to hear. "Windcutter Style Secret Technique: Zephirus Dragon Draw!" he spoke right at the same time as Shirona thrust her cube to block Haoru's blade, finishing the name of her technique – "Shibaikoho Cube!"

A powerful current of wind rose, roaring in the air as the wind howled, it was coming from Haoru's blade. While Shirona's technique managed to block most of the force and prevent the woman's death, the sheer power of Haoru's blade tossed her backwards while the dragon shaped projectile coming out of all the Wind Release chakra stored in Haoru's katana surrounded the woman's body cutting it up as her body was thrown around by the violent twister as she hit the wall, the violent winds then seemingly crushed her body with absolute force drilling it into the wall. Haoru looked at his bare blade, now absent of any chakra enhancements and sheathed it. "You've done good over the years, Yama no Perun-chan… But now, against this woman-ninja, you've done goofed…" he mumbled in a comedic tone to himself.

"The insolence…" Shirona's hurt and angered tone echoed through the corridor. Haoru looked at her body curiously as the woman's body stood up, covered with small cuts that looked like they were made with tree branches not a cutting gale of wind, her black intricate and expensive silk dress was all cut up and her hairdo was messed up to the point where her wild blonde hair now flowed everywhere as the woman's scorned and injured body pushed itself off the ground. "Those barriers' o yours are somethin' else, Mizukage-ninja. You've made so many around you – shielded yourself from most of the damage and prevented your body from being cut up and drilled into stone." As Haoru spoke Shirona's crimson red lips twisted into a sick smile as she predicted a compliment coming her way. Haoru drew his katana and tapped its blunt side on his shoulder as he looked at her with an unimpressed face, "Truth be told it just tells me your body is as fragile as a daisy, I for one wouldn't have bothered shielding my body' cause I ain't afraid of such injuries…" the man replied sending Shirona into a mad fit of rage.

"Barrier Style…" the woman mumbled as Haoru comically reached for his ear, "What was that, you said something? That wind was really loud ya know…" The woman's palms were raised forward as countless small round barriers shot out of her hands. "Guanyin's Thousand Arms of Judgment!" the woman straight out screamed in frustration and rage as the barriers started flying at Haoru like machine-guns, the swordsman leaped backwards shouting "Whoa, whoa, whoa!" in shock and seemingly childish fear as his hands blurred with his sword deflecting all of the barriers flung his way, every single barrier was deflected and kept flying further past Haoru slamming through to the main Summit hall where it crashed randomly leaving a hole in stone. Haoru leaped forward deflecting some more barriers right at the same moment as Shirona's technique ended. The samurai placed his blade in a thrusting pose, aiming to pierce the woman's stomach so that she bled out on the stone cold floor thinking about the foolishness she'd pulled.

"Koho!" Shirona shouted as her raging barrage of barriers continued, a powerful rectangular wall slammed into Haoru's face and sent him tumbling backwards, slowly the woman started walking forward, "Koho!" she chanted again sending another barrier right into the man's face and making him tumble backwards, then again and again! "Make a joke out of me, will you!" she shouted angrily as she sent another "Koho" barrier wall the samurai's way as the orange wall sent the man slamming right into the heavy gate that separated the corridor from the main hall. The woman's palms shot forward, "Barrier Style: Shibaikoho!" she chanted sending four simultaneous walls of barriers slamming and stacking one on another and pressing Haoru's body into the steel gate, crushing it like an insect between a foot and pavement. The man's body fell onto his knees, his face was swollen like he had hit a mountain flying at the speed of sound. "Jokers like you are not even worth licking dirt off my sandals, Koho!" she shouted sending one final Koho barrier that hit Haoru so hard that he crashed through the steel gate busting it down as the man's heavy and bulky body rolled into the busted up hall.

Shirona looked at the man's body for a moment before turning around, then as she finally congratulated herself on an obstacle removed… Some stones shifted and something cracked in the main hall. Horrified Shirona turned around and witnessed Haoru standing up from under the stone table, pushing the stone off of himself and dusting the half of his kimono that wasn't ripped. "Darn, Rudoviga-chan cleaned these trousers for me this morning… Now they're all ripped up and… Oh well, serves me right for making fun of a lady, I s'pose…" Haoru examined his torn up white trousers as his attention turned back at the woman who beat him around for a while.

"Well, Mizukage-ninja, that was fun, but now I'll have to kill you…" he smiled with a certain shade of confidence as his red swollen face started to regain the normal color. This samurai was hit in the face so much that torn blood vessels stopped leaking almost instantly now, that being said his face still looked rather funny… "You… Insolent… Old Geezer!" Shirona roared into the hall making her feminine powerful shout of rage echo through the room as she put her palms together in front of her chest. "I have no time to beat you around, I've no time to play ragdoll with a lowly samurai! I've got to destroy this whole building and the darned Hokage with it!" she shouted out as another cube of barriers shaped around her arms. Haoru looked around searching for his sword, he dug around the pile of table rubbles and removed the sheath and unsheathed it taking his defensive stance. "I mean, your plan sounds alright for a twisted lady… If you want to kill Hokage that works but you'd be killing your own men in this building too, even if you do have the jutsu to tear it down." Haoru spoke getting ready, he knew how to kill this woman – he'd see her technique and wait for an opening when she uses it – all ninjutsu have openings. Then his blurring blade will find her heart before she can as much as take a breath. He killed countless ninja this way and had he not enjoyed this brawl with the Mizukage so much he'd have done so to her as well. "Ninja are but tools, if the owner wishes they are free to throw them away." The blonde replied with a dark and husky tone.

Shirona shot her palms forward letting the cube of barriers fly slowly forward, Haoru broke his stance as he took one of his hands off the handle of his katana to scratch his head. "Ain't this a bit slow, Mizukage-ninja? I think Hokage-ninja will kill all of your guys and get here before this gets to me…" he taunted her as Shirona swiftly made a handseal. "Barrier Style: Barrier Multiplication Jutsu!" she said as the cube started glowing faintly with the shade of mixture of azure blue and white light. Haoru stepped back a bit as he didn't quite understand it, now the cube was standing completely still! "Do you know what my Barrier Multiplication technique does? Even your small samurai brain should comprehend the concept… Do you know my barriers have a certain amount of mass, yes, they weight approximately sixteen kilograms each, without the aid of my chakra to move them they'd be quite a shield… Do you know that when an object of certain mass multiplies, their total mass increases accordingly?" Haoru started frantically scratching his head. "Darn it, Mizukage-ninja, are you pulling some of your stupid ninja witchcraft again?"

Shirona smiled as her wild hair covered her eyes that were emanating certain triumphant glow from them. "You fool, how many times do you think I must multiply my barriers before they become too much for the fabric of reality itself to handle?" she mumbled as suddenly the barrier started quaking from pressure and sending ripples through the walls and the floor of the room, the ceiling and the entire roof of the temple started to collapse on the room's walls and floating to the barrier combination, Shirona made a handseal. "Barrier Style Combo Technique: Infinite Mass Configuration!" she uttered as a loud shriek coming from the barriers took the hall over, overwhelming all of the sound anywhere close. Haoru grunted as the immensely powerful gravity started attracting him to the technique, his own body started to crack and stretch from the pressure as he could swear his bones broke in multiple places and his muscles and joints were torn apart by the immense pressure of gravity. An incredible amount of debris also gathered around the cube making a large mess out of the hall. The whole main hall formed a sphere of debris around where the cube was.

Shirona was huffing heavily, still in the corridor behind the hall, she could not believe she was pushed to this, no way she can use the larger version she intended to use to destroy the temple now… Plan A was ruined now, she had nowhere to rush. "Well…" the woman panted, "I suppose now I'll have to kill Howoku myself…" she finished her own sentence barely as the woman spat up some blood on the cracked stone floor observing the destruction in the main hall. This insolent man and his refusal to just bend over and die made her plans more difficult, she could use her "Infinite Mass Configuration" multiple times if it was just room scale but expanding the scale of her combination required immensely greater proportions of chakra, one temple sized configuration would've taken everything she's had and she's spent so much already that there was no doubt – she'd have to rest and kill Howoku herself by other means.


	39. Chasing Evil

Tanshu and Howoku rushed one hall back from the main hall where the Kage Summit was taking place. The two ninja looked around witnessing a gruesome sight – the Kirigakure Barrier Corps were nowhere to be seen while their own ninja laid there knocked out without any signs of life. "No blood, no signs of battle… These men were some of my most trusted ones, they also were quite high ranked… They must've been taken down in a sneak attack." The Hokage uttered confirming what both men already knew inside. They were now on their own. There was no more reason looking for their men as the cunning Mizukage had made sure that they'd be all alone. She's thought of everything. It was a good thing that Howoku picked up those extra men from outside the village after leaving and didn't arrive with just the few guards he left with, otherwise those barrier ninja may have caught him and Tanshu unprepared.

Tanshu cursed, "Damn that Misu, didn't he leave the room to make sure that everything's OK with the men? Where the hell did he go off to?" Howoku looked at the Sannin questioningly, "Do you think Misu's out too?" he asked as his tone descended. Tanshu kicked down a chair and flipped a wooden table over just trying to let all of his anger out, "Nah, that bastard's too tough even for Kirigakure sneak attacks, he spent entire year in that pisshole, if there's anyone knowing a Kiri scheme coming, it's him." Howoku turned around looking at the main hall. "We've got to go back, maybe we can still catch Mizukage and have her answer for all of this?" "Too late for that, Haoru probably already caught up to her and he didn't strike me as a guy who would've appreciated the help of ninja, we turned back to find our men, may as well look for Misu or confirm that there are no more surprises coming our way." Tanshu replied. Howoku nodded, "True, Haoru-san is not the kind of man who likes ninja butting into his fights." The two men started moving towards the exit from the temple they entered through.

As they entered the next room the trio saw bunch of Konoha ninja on the ground just like in the last room, this time however their assassins actually were present in the room. Within an instant Tanshu's body instinctively dashed towards one of the barrier ninja driving his elbow into the ninja's gut and then again into his neck. The barrier ninja fell lifeless. "T… This is Red Dog Tanshu… Fall back!" the barrier ninja yelled as several of them fired moving barrier walls at Tanshu as the man tried to strike them down as well, the barriers pushed Tanshu back to the other end of the room. Tanshu made several handseals and charged towards the barrier, thrusting his palms at them as they flamed up, "Fire Style: Red Cerberus Rampage!" Tanshu shouted out as his palms started shooting wildly busting through the barriers near effortlessly with his flaming barrage of blows, the man then proceeded to jump amongst the enemy ranks and take them all out with quick and precise blows and kicks. It only took one blow to their necks for the ninja to fall, it only took mere kicks from Tanshu to break their bodies and cripple them for life or outright kill them. It was quite a while before Tanshu got serious…

"Die, Hokage!" bunch of barrier ninja yelled leaping from a balcony and shooting off some walls of barriers trying to crush Howoku from below, after weaving just a single handseal Howoku's arm lit up with bright light that was his Starlight Release and the man swiped it sideways sending a powerful scythe-like projectile incinerating all of the barrier ninja assailants while cutting right through their barriers as if they weren't even an obstacle. The man fighting now was not the young and hopeful Howoku but the one that followed the belief that all that stepped out of line had to be destroyed and Kirigakure had long since threw rotten fruits at Konoha from over the line. Just about long enough… More Barrier Corps ninja flowed the halls, Tanshu and Howoku leaped at them, carefully dodging their assaults and offensive use of barriers by maneuvering around them and striking all of them down. After the last of the Barrier ninja fell the two once again reunited.

"I think wearing us down is Mizukage's intention, I certainly hope that you're not feeling worn out just yet, Tanshu." Howoku said as Tanshu showed the man his fist, "Not even close, I could beat losers like this around whole day" he replied confidently. As the exchange of lines went the ground rumbled. Deafening quakes echoed all through the temple as the sound of debris and shrieking of some sort of supernatural origin made Tanshu and Howoku cover their ears and fall on their knees, they had to find cover for support as the roof in their room also dropped several fist sized stones. This entire place was very ancient and even more unstable, just what kind of nonsense were the Mizukage and Haoru engaged in? As the sound stopped Tanshu looked at Howoku questioningly and the two took off and dashed back to the main hall. All this time they assumed that Mizukage had already taken off but this sound suggested she may have been closer than they've imagined. If these barrier ninja were all that Misu had to look out for he was safe.

"Haoru, one of the four God Sword Jutsu wielders… I thought he had an advantage against any ninja, he usually cut the enemy down before they could weave a single handseal." Howoku grunted as he was genuinely worried about what exactly had transpired in the main hall. Tanshu coughed up as clouds of dust cleared up, "Not necessarily, a very skilled barrier ninja could excel at keeping a distance or protecting themselves as the enemy tried to take them out with their half-baked attempts to intercept their seals." Either way, these were just speculations, finally the main hall was in sight. As the two men entered the destroyed landscape they couldn't stop themselves from looking around in awe – the entire room was disassembled and it appeared like all of that part of the building had centered and piled up on one place – the center. "That's… Like… God-Eyes' power…" Tanshu grunted, he had already seen Oni Mask that day, was it possible that God-Eyes was also alive?! "No, that cannot be, we've all seen him disintegrate after being hit by my Starlight Release jutsu, he cannot possibly be alive nor can there be another Rinnegan user. Someone did this without Rinnegan and that is possibly even more scary…"

At that moment the gigantic pile of rubble shook and rumbled, loud muffled grunts came from under and then a great gale of wind gusts blew all of the destroyed hall off of the central area where it had formed a crushing sphere. "DON'T BURY ME YET, DAMN IT!" Haoru shouted as he burst from the rubble. His kimono and trousers were torn up and covered with his own blood, his body was covered with bruises and injuries and his hair was set loose and was flowing wildly as some superhuman chakra pulsing off of him floated it in the air. Haoru pulled cuts of his kimono from under the rubble and tied his hair back into the ponytail, he then started wildly throwing the smaller rocks aside while pushing the larger ones with his unnatural strength. Howoku and Tanshu were both astounded and couldn't believe. "You were… Under that pile?" Howoku spoke first. Haoru looked back at the man for a brief moment and showed him a thumb up before continuing to dig around for something. "This is nothing, I've fought in several wars, a moment of larger than life injury cannot bring down a man who has been cut up by swords for entire days on end…" he grunted as with a powerful push he flipped over what looked like a rumbled pillar that held the roof. "There you are, honey!" he shrieked like a little girl and pulled his sheathed sword from under the rubble, checking on it for damage and then tying it up to his belt.

"Well, I'm set to go! Let's get that woman!" he energetically raised his fist into the sky. Tanshu scratched his head, "Wait a moment, old timer, first you should tell us what the hell happened here, I think we need to know just what kind of ability this woman used because we're sure if we'd get hit by something strong enough to do this – we'd die instantly…" Haoru laughed up and then comically grabbed his injured ribs, they must've been broken but it didn't seem to bother the man except the occasional fits of pain. "Well, she can make pretty tough barriers, she can also multiply them seemingly infinitely to where they weigh enough to rip holes in reality leaving a dent in it that causes everything in that place to be sucked into the rip. Luckily I used my Hurricane Draw jutsu to not get made into a spaghetti and keep myself far away from the tear by giving him my wind to eat up instead of me. All I had to do was survive the hall crushing me into a big pancake!" the man laughed at it as if it was something funny.

Howoku sighed as he looked on ahead, the spring breeze picked up and rustled his hair. "If Mizukage can use that kind of jutsu it's troubling, I've never heard of a ninja who could legitimately kick your butt, Haoru-san. Still, to make a barrier so heavy it'd tear away reality surely sounds like a tiring concept, she must've used her barrier multiplication technique many times in rapid succession and that's something that tires a person out. Good to know we are not the only ones to get chips on our armor…" Howoku said. Tanshu curiously stared Haoru down, "Can you go on ahead, old timer?" he asked, "Sure, I may have bunch of my bones broken but when you've been battered, burnt and zapped as many times as I have it stops bothering you until you die. I may move slower but I'm sure I'll still beat you shadow humpers…" Howoko smiled, "If you can still make fun of ninja you'll be fine, let's catch Mizukage and take her out." The three men dashed with all of their speed onward, entering through a hole left in the temple when the main hall was disassembled and mushed up on one place.

As the three were rushing past the corridor Howoku pouted and turned his head at Haoru, "Haoru-san, did Mizukage tell you what her actual plan is? I mean she told us that she's planning to crush all the Kage and take everything over, that much is for certain, she believes that she's the only competent enough person to control the entire ninja population, that being said, what was her plan here?" Haoru grinned, "She planned to leave the building and then use a larger scale of that thing she used against me on the whole building killing everyone inside. I think now she's unable to do so, if pulling those glowing cubes came easy to her she'd just have done so from the start, it was more of a last resort to her so now she'll try to take you guys by other means. I'm wondering just how well her effort to hold the other Kage off with her military is going, surely Kage is a ninja much stronger than any number of usual ninja?" Tanshu nodded, "True, at some point, when talking about Sannin and Kage, the number of opponents is irrelevant, someone like the Mizukage could take out an entire army by just using that reality tearing jutsu on them. The highest ranked ninja need to be taken out by equally high ranking ninja, no number of chuunin or genin can outmatch them…"

The three ninja dashed out of the overly drawn out short corridor into a cage-like hall. The structure had rotating staircase with countless openings where windows were supposed to be, instead of glass there were bars for protection. This location must've been built way before glass was even a thing. "Where to now?" Howoku wondered, Haoru pointed right in front at a door that must've lead onwards. "If we are to assume that she still wants to leave, there, that way is the straightest path outside while the staircases lead to various other corridors to other halls." Two figures landed right in front of the trio – both of the men looked very similar yet each looked also different from the other. "Water Temple monks." Haoru smiled as he drew his blade, "What did that lady do to make you guys sell out and join her pack?" he taunted the duo. One of the monks got visibly annoyed and outraged, he almost charged at the swordsman when the smaller one held him. Both men were wearing the typical black and white rag monk attire, they each had some strange face paintings, the larger one was bald and the smaller one had excessive dark facial hair and wore a bandana which barely helped contain his long hair.

"Mizukage-sama did nothing, we've joined her cause by our own choosing, the Water Temple agrees with her ideas, each temples worship different divinities, they each are lead by different ideals and the world needs not such confusion. There must be one temple, one ninja establishment so that there is no conflict to be made. Such eternal lasting peace and prosperity justifies one giant slaughter to end all slaughters" the smaller one replied as he moved his hand away from his bigger friend's chest and took a fighting stance. Howoku turned to the side and looked at Haoru. "Haoru-san, please remain uninvolved. You need to gather your strength and let your body recover somewhat, we cannot afford letting you die in a middle of battle unaware of how critical your condition is, even if you have overcome your bodily limits, that does not make you immortal." Haoru was very visibly not pleased with this suggestion but he stepped back and sat down to the wall. "Fine, don't like killing monks anyways, would much rather cut down ninja…" he grumped out crossing his arms on his chest. Tanshu tossed him a small bag, "Take care of your bruises and injuries while we fight, these men are pretty tough if they are monks but it shouldn't take too long…" he confidently declared. He then jumped up grabbing onto the second floor staircase and pulled his body up, dashing madly to the upper floors, the larger monk followed. Tanshu's goal was to separate the two monks, it was likely that the monks were trained to work together and while they normally could've both ganged up on Howoku their goal to keep the two away from Mizukage made it difficult to ignore Tanshu's movement.

The monk appeared right in front of Tanshu, dashing several floors up and then making a mad rush downstairs, throwing a wild punch at Tanshu's face. The Sannin ducked under it only to receive a kick into his chest that sent him tumbling one floor down before he pushed his body up with his hand and backflipped into a balanced stance. Tanshu was impressed by the speed, strength and precision of the man's moves – he was very clearly a taijutsu user so he may have been troublesome to someone who specialized in negating opponent's ninjutsu and genjutsu, either way it made no difference, whatever the playing field was - Sannin surpassed all ninja.

The smaller monk dashed and threw a punch at Howoku as well, the Hokage leaned his head to the side and tried throwing a punch of his own only for the man's other hand to catch it, the two kicked their knees forward at the same time only for them to clash, the two exchanged several blows and then dashed back to get some distance. At this point they were just checking each other out but Howoku was feeling the pain where he clashed or blocked the monk's blows but it didn't look like it bothered the monk that much – his face remained stone cold. Howoku clenched his fist as it lit up with Starlight Release chakra, the Hokage leaped forward throwing a fist charged up with enough chakra to disintegrate the area it connected to, the monk leaned out of its way as the punch dispersed, the heat from the punch did seem to bother him as he lost his footing for a moment. Howoku tried to throw a combination of blows to the man's abdomen and his face but the monk managed to respond in time by blocking all of the blows and tapping his foot at Howoku's chest and pushing his own body away instead of using it to kick. The Hokage had never seen such strange taijutsu moves before, it made a lot of sense – the monks had very secretive and amazing taijutsu styles of their own with each temple developing their techniques incredibly differently from the other.

Many floors higher Tanshu's fist finally connected to the larger monk's face, the large man stumbled back, tripping on the stairs and having to use one hand for support, as Tanshu prepared to exploit this opening the man shifted his balance using the hand as balance point and pushing his body into the air while kicking the air wildly using his long legs. Tanshu leaped into the air and stuck to the wall just in time to not get kicked down the stairs again. The Red Dog quickly made some handseals breathing in deep and then releasing all of that air at once – "Fire Style: Red Dog Bark!" he shouted spitting out a mass of flames at the monk who just covered up as they devoured his body. The technique wasn't lethal as it sacrificed density and power for speed and versatility but any damage he could land could still quickly establish his dominance. As the monk moved his smoking and damaged by slight burns hands to the side his monk attire was scorched off and his whole body was smoking and covered with small patches of burns. He cursed loud as the monk got up from the staircase and finally got on his feet, taking a fighting stance and readied himself to keep fighting. He needed to hold this man here for as long as he could, every second he struggled Mizukage regained her strength and the Water Temple monks were not the kind to let down the Mizukage!


	40. Ambition

**ONE MONTH AGO:**

A cold evening breeze blew rustling the numerous small ponds in the Water Temple yard. Usually during the mornings the monks exercised together in a coordinated fashion, honing their fluid and fast movements, striking hard and moving fluently like the water itself. The Temple was on a small island, in fact there was a beach nearby the temple and elder monks often ran to dip their bodies into cold ocean waves in the early morning. This was no small feat as there have been accounts of people actually dying of hypothermia trying to reach the Temple from a neighboring island. Then there was the matter of elderly hearts, monks were men who have pushed their bodies to the limits their entire life, a simple dip in cold foams of the crashing ocean waves could've easily stopped their hearts. There were many who also fell victim to the water taking them down their feet and dragging them further into the ocean, taking all air out of their chests and leaving them unable to swim back. Even such primitive training routines were incredibly dangerous.

Of course, there was no training exercise more dangerous and perilous than the body strengthening training of standing in front of violent crashing waves during a storm. Each and every monk hardened their body by allowing powerful force of water bash mercilessly at their mere human flesh and bones. None withstood the wave their first time, very few could even stand up after their first time training. Youngsters have had their ribs and even skulls broken by the violent movement of water, crashing waves were not a thing to be taken lightly after all. The results of this training however couldn't be argued against – a monk's body became as tough as a rock, no – tougher! Even rocks were susceptible to being broken off of their formations, shattered and washed away, men of the Water Temple stood still and took everything the cruel ocean had to throw at them. As much as they trained their martial arts and strength, water was their greatest tool of training.

This cold breeze of salty oceanic air was different from yesterday's however as a woman in a black coat had landed on the shores of the Island of Isolation, where the Water Temple was. There were women amongst the monks, very few as their bodies were much tougher to get past the initial training stages, women had a much steeper curve and often gave up on their choice of isolation and firm suffering in order to strengthen their bodies. Because of their initial frailty it took them much more pain and willpower to match their peers, not that it never happened – it did, but it wasn't as common as it was with men. This lady was not interested in joining the temple however – she came her with far more destructive motives and a suggestion that was, to be entirely honest, crazy. Even with Mizukage Daikon in power, such suggestion would've been ridiculous, even merciless and crazy Daikon didn't have the guts to talk to Water Temple monks this way! This woman was evidently more ambitious than her predecessor, much more willing. This woman's willpower and ambition surpassed that of all those that have died trying to become monks.

"Return in the morning, this is time of peace and head monk is resting after his training." A young monk spoke up pointing at the woman ordering her to return to the small boat that has carried her there. "I insist that I must talk to him. If I put matters bluntly I am sure even you would see the mutual benefit in my suggestion, boy." The woman spoke up taunting the young monk for his youth at the end. It was not just a matter of age, this hooded lady couldn't have been a decade older than this youth but it was experience and mindset that set them so much apart. "Oh yeah, and what is that offer, lady? Before I bother head monk I must know if it's worth it!?" the young monk yelled back at the woman clearly annoyed by her insolence. The long sleeve of the woman's coat raised up in the air and gently slipped off revealing her crimson red dyed nails and two fingers being shown, the top of her hood slipped up gently revealing her blood red lips smiling and moving softly. "I need two monks, give me the support of the Water Temple and two monks in my guard as a testament of your support and I will not sink this salt-stinking island beneath not only the waves but the scorching magma beneath the bottom of the ocean itself. I can't stand salty smell…" she said as the boy was starting to annoy her too.

The inexperienced monk leaped right at the woman, his body flowed like the water, he did not tense his body but moved relaxed – perfectly managing the sensitive balance between strict tenseness of the body that hardened it and the relaxation that made it move more swiftly and fluently. One of the woman's companions just blurred as a moment later he was already standing five meters further with the unconscious monk helplessly collapsed on his firm arm. The man swiped his palm to the side as brief sparks of lightning chakra ran down his arm and the blood of the monks faintly colored the salty and mossed rocks near the beach. "Big mistake, kid." the man said with his husky and low pitched voice, it was unknown who he was talking to as it most certainly was not the unconscious monk who had his eyes rolled up to the point where his pupils weren't even visible. He may even have been dead but none of the hooded figures really cared too much. Suddenly black flashes danced lit only by the pale moonlight, all of them trying to impale one of the figures with at least eight men devoted to a single figure.

The one who had knocked the young monk out responded in time, carefully his body deflected every blade pushing every one handed sabre away from his body while his leg blocked the swipes completely. However as the sabre hit the man's appendage it did not spill blood – a loud clang echoed as half of the blade was sent flying off into the distance and etched into the beach sand. The man's cloak hood slipped off revealing a blue oni mask on the man's face. He looked around staring each of the monks down, even if his eyes were not really visible over the oni mask it was evident that he was sizing each man up for their coffins. He just had that feeling of a merciless killer around him and it was apparent to absolutely everyone that this man had killed countless people in his days, even before his leg became this strange metallic abomination of nature.

Another figure just moved their arm to the back of their heads, reaching up for a handle. The motion happened so incredibly fast that his hood slipped off revealing large and spiky golden hairdo. The man did something, in the darkness of the forest it was absolutely invisible but all of the monks screamed out in pain and fell on the sand as blood shot from their gruesome wounds. As grievous as the men's wounds were, they were still non-lethal and it was clear such was the man's intention. After all of his opponents were cut down the man kept his arm on the oversized sword handle which hid some sort of a weapon under his cloak. Judging from how totally deep and battle ending the wounds on the men's bodies were it was clear that the blonde swordsman had quite the oversized tool on his back!

Powerful streams of water shot breaking through the ground of the third figure, each of the aquatic appendages grabbed hold of the attacking monk's faces and held them up in the air forming a large sphere of water around them. Each of the monks were tied up and could only struggle trying to break free from their terrible fate of drowning in a beach surrounded by nothing but sand for about three hundred square meters. The man released his hand seal at the same time as he leaped on his arm and kicked around, spinning on his arm to deliver a spinning kick to the gut of each monk which caused every single one of the locked down monks to grunt out and start drowning right before being released. As the attacking monks fell powerless on the ground coughing the man looked at each of them from above, as if judging the monks who had fell victim to his superior talent and skill.

The monks attacking the crimson lipped lady did not get too far, each of them slammed into an invisible wall and dashed backwards, cursing and swiping their blades, then tossing them at the woman in frustration. Nothing even left the faintest of marks on the woman or even got through her invisible walls. The monks then stopped their completely fruitless attempts at attacking these cloaked figures and just helped their injured ones get back at their feet as reinforcements gathered on top of the hill. The hooded figure who almost drowned his opponents smiled and spoke up, trying to act intimidated even deep in his heart he was impressed. "Hoh, these fellows are different from those youngster monks. If they all attack we may be in trouble, Lady Mizukage. I sense their chakra signatures to be at least Special Jounin level each."

"Enough!" an elder man shouted out and landed in front of all four cloaked figures with the fifth still watching from the boat. The head monk was tall and had that strange shaped round head, his facial features were not attractive as it just happened that the man was not overly gifted by nature, he did not have any facial hair which was odd for a head monk, however. "May I know what your business is, mysterious visitors?" he spoke up, the man was taller than all but the Water Release ninja with whom the monk was equal in height. As the cloaked lady walked up in front and removed her hood revealing her flowing tied up blond hair the man crossed his frail elderly arms on his chest. Water Temple monks practiced fluidity and endurance, strong defense over everything else in their fighting styles. It was uncommon for them to have too bulky builds even with their barbaric training methods. It only made sense for the head monk to follow this mantra to the extremes.

"Nothing much. Before I state my business I'd like you to welcome us like proper guests. I believe that the Mizukage deserves a proper welcome, no?" the woman asked with a playful tone. The old man mumbled something under his own nose and turned around, nervously shooting his palm up in the air, the monks turned around. The cloaked figures heard bunch of clinging noises which were revealed to be monks hiding in bushes with bows and arrows. "I was almost excited to see the infamous "Water Temple archery", it is said that a monk archer's arrow can pierce the ocean all the way to its bottom…" the blonde with an oversized sword politely joked, the monks did not honor the man with a response. The head monk lead the entire party of monks and the cloaked figures into the shrine where the head monk sat on one side of an altar with an ancient scroll placed on it and gestured the woman to sit on the other as the monks made several circles around them. The lady nodded and kneeled by the altar, sitting on her knees and getting to an eye-to-eye level with the head monk.

"So… What business brought our late night guests at such a time of night in a matter of utmost importance which could not wait until the morning?" the head monk asked. A loud laughter pierced the silence that dominated afterwards as the monks all stopped rustling and talking. "Well… Not that it's that urgent, there is still a month till the Kage Summit, I am a woman who likes to do all her work upfront and rest after, anyways." The head monk scratched his head, it was clear that he wanted to ask a question but was too shy to do so. "Ummm, please do not get offended but… Who exactly… Are you?" he uttered at last as Shirona started giggling from top of her lungs. "It's too bad that I don't carry Daikon's head around, that thing started to smell so awfully after the first couple of days. People don't take "I'm the Mizukage" as seriously as they used to these days… How could I ever convince you…" the woman acted as if she was genuinely troubled by her own thoughts but the head monk just waved his arms. "No no no, it is just fine… Any woman who would enlist all three Kirigakure Sannin to her side is either a very good courtesan or a woman of very high political power." "Or both…" Shirona giggled, then angrily looked at the monk who at first did not follow her joke, the man nervously faked a laugh.

"Anyways, here I was wandering around my land, informing all those who were troubled by Daikon's rule and I thought for a moment… Why don't I fix the relationship with all of those little insolent countries: Land of Waves, Island of Isolation, all those other islands of varied importance. So here I am… Interested in forming a pact with the Water Temple, decided to fix our relationship, so to speak, I'm sure Daikon did his best to piss you people off…" the head monk scratched his head, obviously he and the past Mizukage had a history that was not entirely pleasant. "Anyways, whatever taxes you paid Daikon so that he did not tear this place down are no longer imposed, feel free to practice your thing here freely… In fact, I'd love to hear all about your religion and your interpretations of it, I've heard that all temples worship different divinities and that somehow influences the art they create, both martial and the exquisite kind of art."

The head monk looked back at his fellow monks, to the man it became obvious that they were just as troubled by this woman and, in a way, afraid of her as he was. "Well… We technically do not worship a divinity, our martial art is based on a legend and we craft our faith and model our lives around the ideals it represents. According to the said legend there is a being so powerful and large sleeping deep in the oceans in between Kirigakure and the other islands that even a sight of it would drive a man mad. If the legend is true, when this beast awakens it will inevitably destroy all that we know – sink all of our islands and return back to sleep. It does not necessarily mean that we are living in fear of a giant monster wiping us from existence, what is to be taken from this story is that our lives are temporary. We must all strive to be as kind to those in our lives as we can, we must constantly strive to improve ourselves because we are remembered for the people that we were in our lives that could end at any time."

"Just lovely… Well, if our ultimate fate is to be decimated by some sleeping ocean monster, may as well do the most of it – I'll get to business. I'd love to set my sympathy for this little island in stone, it will only take two of your best men to aid me in the Kage Summit." Head monk was visibly intimidated now that he saw Mizukage's political play being very much involved with this visit. "What exactly do you have in mind, Lady?" the man asked carefully. "Well, I sort of wondered just how successful your existence was? I mean your ideals and morals and lessons sound great, your men are powerful because they follow those beliefs faithfully but… I can't help but feel that other Temples are in your way, I mean Fire Temple and their thousand armed Gods of murder… It's boring… I plan to wipe all other villages off the map and make all of the world into my own empire, then there will be no competition between ninja and all clients and all of the Lords will only hire one village, there'll be no bloodshed, no wars for dominance, only… Ninja. Cold, efficient and simple. In return for helping me realize this dream I'd be willing to give Water Temple the chance to make more temples worldwide, exclusive right in fact. Think about it, you could tell the tale of your scary sea God for all to hear and then if it actually awakens – survive his rampage somewhere deep in the oasis of the Land of Lightning's deserts."

"With all due respect, Lady Mizukage… That sounds terrible, you're asking us to be a part of your suicidal attempt to slaughter countless people just to satisfy lust for power. It has nothing to do with anything that Water Temple stands for, no temple in the world has ever involved itself with ninja affairs and we will not become the first, especially not over such pitiful motive as one woman's ambition." The monks all looked petrified, they were literally shaking in their boots because they knew that when you refused someone who wielded infinite power over an entire village with only a slothful and incompetent Lord to answer to… Saying they don't usually take it well would have been an understatement. "Oh well… That's too bad…" Mizukage shrugged as she stood up, the monks couldn't believe it she'd let it go so easily, didn't this woman just declared war on all the ninja villages? Was unifying all the villages under her rule as Ninja Empress not her ambition?

As she passed by the monks, Shirona slowly walked up through all of them, giving each of them those playful glares, checking their eyes out, looking for that particular emotion. There it was… Ambition… One young monk lowered his head in shyness, he wanted power, he wanted to fight for a chance to be someone more than just a monk, he didn't want to die with lungs full of sea water in his late nineties unable to withstand crushing ocean wave pressure. He did not want to be a statistical victim of the current Mizukage's crazy regime, he didn't want to be part of a temple washed away on a mad woman's whim. He had the eyes of a King, more importantly he had the eyes of a traitor! Gracefully the woman stroke his cheek and looked him deep in the eyes, gently she moved her finger from his cheek to his lips and then walked away as if nothing had happened. "Oh… I sense a storm incoming, would it be fine for me and my Sannin to stay camped in your beach for the night? Perhaps you will still reconsider my offer?" the Mizukage asked curiously looking at the head monk. With his head as heavy as ever the man nodded, of course he agreed, when refusing the most powerful woman in this part of the world and having been granted forgiveness, one did not refuse her second request. This man was too easy to play with.

"There will be no storm, Mizukage-sama, why are we staying?" one of the Sannin asked while the woman smiled, "I feel the wind picking up, trust me, my dear, there will be storm. A storm of changes… Now if one of you would be so lovely as to build us all a camp…" the woman playfully spoke. It felt so great to be right, it felt so great when one set up all of her pieces of the board perfectly for a winning move. That feeling when you are just superior to everyone else was unmatched by anything else in the world… Surprisingly enough, an actual storm came, right out of the blue clear sky suddenly storm clouds gathered and it started pouring as if the hungry sea God of destruction had woken up just as those monks fear. Soon. Soon it will rain blood.

The woman never went to sleep that night, she sat waiting, waiting for that sound of betrayal and lo and behold! Screams and shouts and lonely lights lit up the bland stormy night sky.

Once the woman and her party got to the Temple grounds they were stopped, as the Sannin stared the monks that dared stand in their way down and they moved aside the woman finally saw what she came here to see – a trial in process. "Mizukage-sama, please, this is internal Water Temple matter, this man killed our head monk in his sleep, he said he wanted to bring you his head and be one of the two monks to accompany you!" the monk giving the trial speech shouted right as he saw the woman. Shirona grinned, "This man is the new head monk. That's how the world works now, that's how it will work when my new ninja establishment is complete – he killed a man therefore he gains all that his inferior had in his life, namely his title."

The monks stepped up and started making a noise. "IF NOT!" Mizukage's voice outshouted all of their voices. "I will kill as many monks as it is needed for this man to be the most viable contender for the spot. I am a very favorable woman to those that seek my approval, my allies will always get what they want as long as they are my allies, this man seeks my favor and he is the new head monk." The traitor stood from his knees, struggling out of the hold that his peers had him in as they cursed out loud into the sky. "For my first decision as head monk – two of our top monks will join her guard and follow her to the Kage Summit, disobedience means expulsion from the temple!" he ordered with his still childish voice. As two monks stepped up to the Mizukage's party and joined her cloaked men the woman nodded and thanked her "ally", she then turned around and stated to be busy and left for the boat. "So… What does this mean? Do you think this boy will hold power for long?" one of the Sannin asked.

"God no! He will get murdered on this same night, his is an empty title, without me here to uphold my own law it is but a word. These monks are all idealistic fools but their purpose is served. I don't care about the chaos that will take this place over now." Shirona turned at the two monks behind her, "Mark my words, you two will still thank me for removing you from this island. The previous head monk should've known that even his temple order was temporary, had he learned nothing from his tales of slumbering ocean Gods?" The lonely boat set out into the nightly stormy sky, somewhere further in the horizon lightning cracked temporarily lighting the sky up and then letting it sink back into darkness.


	41. Starlight Sword - Pleiades!

Tanshu let out a sound of frustration as he lunged forward to once again try and land a blow on the injured monk. Even with burns covering his skin this man did not show any amount of pain after clashing with Tanshu which was something that the Red Dog has never seen before. He was supposed to be second best ninja in terms of pure physical prowess, second only to Chestnut Hanasaku who was a monster to whom rules of nature apparently did not apply. It appeared that the legends about the bodies of monks from Water Temple were not exaggerated. People spoke of how apparently they trained by allowing crashing waves of stormy nights hammering their bodies and after seeing the amount of toughness and willpower that these men showed Tanshu was not feeling any doubt in those tales. Truth be told they'd explain just how in the world these men managed to become so durable.

Tanshu desperately tried to find an opening in his opponent's defenses, he attacked high and low with both direct strikes and fluid but misleading thrusts of his palm trying both striking with fists, tips of his fingers and his palms to see what sort of impact would do the most damage to these immovable monsters. It appeared that all of it was in vain. The few blows that the monk's martial art prowess did not block or deflect just hit the man's body with a thud but not even an eye twitch came from the man to suggest a painful reaction. The Sannin was certain he was doing damage but his opponent just did not show it, he did not waver of flinch. That worked as both strength and a weakness. Carefully Tanshu retreated some distance back, blocking the blows and kicks that the monk decided to return after Tanshu's offensive ended. "This is really embarrassing…" Tanshu panted out as he needed to make some things clear to his opponent while catching his breath. His opponent remained still and just observed his opponent with a blank stare.

"Monks working with ninja, men of faith and discipline working side by side with a tyrant to reach the goal of an over-glorified assassin." The Sannin spoke with appropriate amount of discontent for the matter he spoke of. The monk jumped forward swiping his fist to the side, using more his strength but not his skill. "So you believe Fire Temple's approach is better?" he yelled as his fist dug into the brick wall sending dust and specks of stone into Tanshu's eye. "Completely isolating oneself from world's problems, caring only for one's own?!" he shouted as Tanshu leaned backwards and jumped back to avoid being struck, his speed gave him enough distance to dodge even with his troubled eyes as the Sannin carefully removed all the dust within mere moments. The monk was gone! "Sitting still and doing nothing while people die and then acting high and mighty because you were not the one who made mistakes!" a loud shout came from Tanshu's back as the man felt tremendous force hitting him and sending him crashing into the stone stairs. With a forceful push from his arms Tanshu avoided breaking his bones into the stairs and leapt up higher.

"Whenever a schism occurs one must make a decision, place themselves on one of the two sides." The monk tried to catch Tanshu from behind again but the Jounin was smarter this time. The Uzumaki leapt backwards with a backflip letting the monk charge through him while Tanshu got behind the monk. A loud crashing wave of air emanated through the higher floors of the hall as Tanshu's elbow clashed with that of the monk's. "And if you remain indifferent!" the monk shouted punching Tanshu in the face from the left, "You dismiss both sides!" he punched his enemy from the right, "And if anyone dies you are to blame for all of the deaths!" the man punched from the left again, "And you are to blame for everything bad that the conflict brings because you deemed yourself too good to get your hands dirty, you were above all that!" the monk outright roared as his punch flew directly to the center of Tanshu's face where it stopped with a deafening thud.

The monk's will shook for a moment as the Red Dog's body did not fall nor did it move, the Sannin just stood there as his face barely moved back after getting hit by the oversized punch this time. "You're right." Tanshu said nonchalantly before thrusting his face forward and pushing the monk's entire punching arm backwards making himself an opening. The man's arms blurred in the air, his opponent could barely discern what was happening, it was a combination of his opponent's natural speed and his skill in taijutsu. With a powerful elbow strike to the face the Sannin sent the monk rolling down the stairs down. "But if you intentionally choose the side of the killers just for the sake of choosing a side you lose the right to use this argument. You're just as much of a trash as one who chooses no sides." the Sannin spoke staring at his opponent struggling to get off the stairs and wiping the blood leaking from their broken nose.

Below Howoku attacked his opponent with a flurry of hits, one just as impressive as Tanshu did in the upper floors. The fist of the Fourth Hokage burst with Starlight chakra as the man thrust it forward but he only managed to hit a head of a statue placed in an occasional hole in a wall which the monk substituted himself with. As the small gargoyle stone piece of art disintegrated into dust the monk's figure appeared out of the dust trying to pummel his opponent into dust that matched the kind made by his own jutsu. "Lightning Style: Safety Fuse!" Howoku yelled spreading his arms to the sides and shooting off miniature strings of lightning chakra in a small radius around himself, the monk got in too close, invested too much into his attack. The attire of the monk Howoku was fighting was set ablaze from the immense heat and strength of the Hokage's lightning technique so the holy man tore it off taking a fighting stance again. Then the monk suddenly changed his stance, standing up straight and placing his arms to his belly and raising one above his head as if he was praying. "Ninja Monk Style: Inshirrinbu Seal!" the monk shouted out as bright blueish glow shot out from somewhere behind him. It was almost mystical in nature as it appeared like the monk was standing in front of a light source. As Howoku clutched to keep as much of his ability to perceive the battlefield as he could, he had to step back and cover his eyes. Suddenly he felt a powerful clutch and as he opened his eyes he realized to his horror that he was trapped!

From whatever the source of the monk's mystical lightshow was hailed transparent blue constructs of chakra shaped almost like tentacles of an octopus, some of them were humongous and barely fit in the room but the ones that tied Howoku were significantly smaller. "Ninja Monk Style: Inshirrinbu's Wrath" the monk chanted out as if he was praying, the tightly tied chakra tentacles dragged Howoku towards the monk who delivered a crushing blow to Howoku's abdomen. The Hokage felt the taste of blood in his mouth and whited out for a moment before the whistling wind awakened him – he was flying backwards out of the hall the two were fighting in and he was about to crash into a stone wall. "Starlight Style: Bright Wing!" Howoku shouted as he swiped his arm to the side and made a crescent projectile just in time – the monk leaped behind him attempting to punch Howoku's back and break the man's spine instead of letting him crash into the wall. The monk's fist struggled with Howoku's quick and unfocused Starlight technique before it violently dissolved in a blaze of blinding white flames sending Howoku backwards and crushing the monk between the eruption of the jutsu's inner heat and the stone wall.

Howoku coughed up blood and breathed in – it hurt him to do so as the punch he had taken was quite a powerful one, nevertheless, his opponent must've taken some damage as well. The monk's burnt up and ravaged figure appeared from the smoke, the arm which collided with Howoku's Starlight jutsu looked charred up and had excessive amounts of blood on the floor below, luckily for the man the immense heat burnt every injury that it caused as well or he'd be dead, either way, even with his strange ninja monk style jutsu he took much more damage in that clash than Howoku did. He probably intended it to be that way and that was what intimidated the Hokage – by now it was clear that Tanshu and Howoku would come out on top, the thing was that these monks tried their hardest to inflict excessive damage on the both of them so that Howoku could not compete with Mizukage later if that clash ever occurred. Howoku could not allow that, he had to end it quicker than he sustains any more damage but it'd be better if he also didn't overuse his Starlight Release since it did exhaust him more than any other technique he may have used.

The monk dashed up right to Howoku, "Water Temple Taijutsu Combo: Rising Tide!" he yelled as the man punched from below aiming to land an uppercut at Howoku's chin, the technique was fast but the man only had one arm to perform it with, had he had both, he may have been significantly more dangerous even to Howoku. The Fourth Hokage leaned back and avoided the blow, the arm then descended as an elbow strike only to be blocked by Howoku's own elbow. The Hokage let out a grunt in pain as it hurt his flesh and bones to clash with such tremendous amount of physical force but it appeared like once again, even with his injuries, the monk did not even flinch. The monk tried to drive a knee into Howoku's abdomen and the Hokage decided to take that trade – he had more usable limbs and was in a hurry after all! Howoku took the knee but traded that blow for a free elbow strike to his opponent's face at the same time as he got hit, both men stumbled backwards clenching their injuries.

"You do not have to fight for Mizukage with such devotion, if she has you here by force then just let us pass and we'll tell her we beat you. This does not have to end in death…" Howoku tried to both reason and confirm one thing. It was not when the monk told Howoku his answer that it became clear but when he moved his healthy arm away from clutching his charred one and took a one-armed version of his fighting stance. "I apologize but I believe in what Mizukage is trying to accomplish, I did not do so from the beginning, I must admit but… There is truth in the words that she speaks – ninja kill each other and each other's children because they compete for territory and jurisdiction like children. If a singular entity of ninja would be established, a ninja empire… Then such petty squabbles for meaningless things would stop, after this bloodshed there'd be none more and no more blood of children being spilled… That is a cause worth dying for." Howoku's face twisted in anger. Mizukage Shirona must've been a master of manipulation to have even ninja monks twisted around her ideals like this.

"In that case…" tiny shining sparks, reminding of miniature glittering stars broke off of Tanshu's golden aura as a gigantic blade of pure Starlight Release chakra formed in his hand which the man gripped and swiped to the side leaving a trail of shining falling little stars of light. Almost like snowflakes, like little souls falling down from the heavenly shine above. "As an opponent of peace I worked so hard to establish over the years, I shall destroy you!" Howoku yelled out, he saw already that this man was beyond saving, this manipulation of men to do her bidding was Shirona's greatest sin, not murder. A murderer leaves only bodies whereas a manipulating monster like Shirona only twists one's friends forcing friends to kill each other instead. In the end she kills not only the victim of her manipulations but also she kills the person who sees their friend being played like a card in a game and then has to kill that friend. Any man who must kill their friend out of mercy of what he had become dies inside every time it happens. Even if Shirona would not achieve her goal that day and did succeed with killing Howoku, she'd have killed a part of him either way…

The monk shouted out charging at Howoku but with a slow and painful swipe the man's body lit up with Starlight chakra bursting out of the gash left by the man's technique. "Starlight Release: Pleiades" he whispered quietly as Howoku's arm swiped again and again, the blade never really made contact with the monk's body but the pulsing heat from it cut the man's body open as if it had with chakra bursting from each gash until the man had been cut seven times. Howoku's sword of Starlight chakra burst into small shining sparks and fell to the stone floor. There was no blood, the monk's body was slowly falling apart, burning up like a piece of paper with the burnt parts flying off in glittering shimmer mist. And yet… The monk was still standing. "I used to be a fool like you, monk-san…" Howoku spoke up as two little stars lit up under his own eyes, no, just small tears that reflected the pain and sadness that the man's shimmering body emanated. "I believed that maybe this one more bloodshed could end all bloodsheds, that maybe one day the killing would stop. Then one day my eyes opened. That is impossible, even if ninja will not kill each other for one reason – they'll find another. In the end there'll be just you and the deeds that you've done to get to that point, you'll be just a manslayer who has created a world that changed nothing from the world he tried to change, in other words… Just a manslayer."

A powerful sphere of chakra lit up in Howoku's arm as he pushed it into monk's body, the sphere carried monk's unconscious body away before expanding and disintegrating the man's body in a giant sphere of bursting light. "Overhope…" Howoku uttered silently as he turned away and started walking back to the hall where he originally started fighting. What Mizukage has done with the lives of the people she played with casually was unforgivable, she preyed on their dreams for peace to achieve her own ends. She was far worse than the likes of Daikon – the Third Mizukage. Daikon was a tyrant, plain and simple, he killed people because he was a sick individual who enjoyed that sort of thing, he tortured and killed people from other villages and when he got bored – those of his own. It mattered not to him who he was torturing as long as his sick ears heard the screams he yearned for so much. Shirona on the other hand… She had her own goals but she went around achieving them by using other people like tools, to her it meant nothing to make fun of people and make them only a mean to her end. What a despicable existence, Daikon was despicable but Shirona… This woman wasn't satisfied with just that, she decided to ruin lives of honorable people by making them just as despicable as she was.

This woman decided that it was up to her to completely ruin everything that the people that fought for her lived for. She just made their entire lives mean nothing by making them commit atrocities for her under the illusion of peace. She made them believe that they were achieving the ultimate goal but really they were just destroying and burning up their own legacies. Haoru peeked from the hole in stone and then looked at the busted out door, then stared Howoku down. "Now who needs some rest and medical assistance, Howoku-ninja? You ain't beatin' Mizukage-ninja with those injuries, here, this ointment helps internal injuries a lot, I wonder where Tanshu got it…" the samurai handed a small bag to Howoku who looked at it with nostalgic eyes. "A young Hyuuga woman he loved as a young man gave it to him, he never got injured enough in a battle to ever use it but he figured that young Vashia's will would've been to save lives, to make him happy so he gives this bag to his friends so that our injuries do not keep him down. If his friends die, Tanshu would fret, drink and beat himself over it and young Vashia's memory would be tarnished. That is the story of this bag."

Haoru looked up where Tanshu must've been fighting with the monk. He breathed in and out and stretched his body out, he moved with no stuttering, no obstacles – he felt no more pain. "Well, young Vashia-ninja has my gratitude, wherever she is…" Haoru leaped up and down quickly to feel his regenerated body. The medicine was no miracle but it helped as much as it was possible. It healed no bones but at least it made it easier for them to heal in the future while removing the pain from moving with broken bones. "I've no idea, all I know is that he talks about her every time he gets drunk…" Howoku smiled as he gently applied some ointment to his abdomen where he was struck, then wrapped the bandage around the spot. Haoru grinned as if he had not a care in the world and kept staring up to the staircase as loud crashes and thuds kept echoing and reaching their ears. "What a drunk man speaks of is what truly is in his heart. That is why young samurai feel so compelled to drink – they need aid to learn the ways of truthfulness, a lying sword will always be shattered by an honest one!" the man laughed out.


	42. Echoes of Day that Will Never Be

Tanshu and the monk huffed heavily, both men had their upper bodies dragged to the ground but only through sheer willpower did they resist the temptation to fall down and pass out. Tanshu's face was red in multiple spots, beaten and bruised and the monk's body was covered with burns and black marks. The Red Dog took a brief moment to look down the stairs to multiple floors below witnessing Howoku and Haoru standing around and treating each other's injuries. His comrades were safe, they'll get to return to their katei, Tanshu will defend his own, baby gloves could've been taken off, there were no more concerns in Tanshu's mind. The monk leaped forward, he smelled blood and knew that there was a chance that he'd be the one to outlast his opponent. A direct blow right to the monk's face sending him crashing into the staircase and making bricks and stone fly out of the construction convinced him otherwise.

"Your speed picked up…" the monk huffed out spitting several teeth out and wiping blood from his broken face, after getting pounded again and again this man's balanced flow of chakra was interrupted. His mastery over chakra control to enhance his physical abilities now mattered less than it did ever before as it now didn't feel like Tanshu was punching a steel barrier covering a stone wall – it felt like a mace hammering away at soft flesh and bone. "Hokage finished his fight, I've no more concerns over anyone else, nothing on my mind to keep me away from this battle." "You mean you didn't mean this whole fight?! You were somewhere else in your mind the entire time?" the monk shouted out in frustration, Tanshu's arm disappeared in his messy brown hair as he scratched the back of his head. "Kind of… That's why I didn't use my sword, if I swung it when I don't look at what I'm doing I can cut my own limb off by accident, I'm really clumsy when I'm thinking about something else entirely…" the Sannin laughed out admitting to his opponent that he never had any hopes of winning to begin with.

"So you're a swordsman then?" the monk asked, Tanshu took a taijutsu stance and shook his head. "My sensei taught me how to use a sword in my childhood but… I wouldn't say that I am." Tanshu replied. The monk charged forward, with near perfect precision the Sannin leaned out of every blow, effortlessly pushed away every kick, ducked and leaped over every attack before moving away untouched. The monk fell on his knees. He had trouble breathing, it was more than likely that broken ribs added to the shortage of air by making inhalation painful. "I'd give you five minutes to recover normally but… We sort of are in a rush, if you'd feel better I can think about something else again so we can fight as somewhat equals again. Make your last fight an honorable and good one. No one will notice my own wandering thoughts anyways…" Tanshu spoke, he really wanted to be done with this and go after the Mizukage but this man was a strong and disciplined one, he deserved an honorable warrior's death in combat, not to get completely trashed around by an opponent who wouldn't even break a sweat against him.

"I cannot ask you that. You have your goals, I have mine. Asking for you to hold back would be selfish." the monk sighed and stood back on his feet. Tanshu smiled for a second, he couldn't actually satisfy his opponent's desire. When he remembered the story of his own swordsmanship memories flooded back by themselves and the Red Dog found his own mind wandering again. "I'm sorry, monk, I won't be fighting you at full strength for just a little while longer." He thought to himself as the two clashed again. His opponent must've felt this, Tanshu's strength reducing, his speed dropping, the man's breathing becoming irregular and amateurish at best. It couldn't be helped, a man with such painful and long history of countless battles like Tanshu had many memories that flooded back once in a while…

Little Tanshu approached Oni Mask, he was hesitant to ask his sensei about something, usually the boy had no fear to ask anything but… This topic was different, it concerned feelings and communication - social skills. Something that sensei told him was irrelevant for a ninja and even more so for a demon. After all – a demon is what Oni Mask trained Tanshu to become. Had little Tanshu been a bad student perhaps Oni Mask wouldn't have tried so hard but Tanshu was a talented and incredibly powerful student, the best one that the old wolf could've wanted. The old man had said many times that he'd train legions of demons and yet both he and Tanshu knew that none would surpass his original student.

"Speak up, boy. If you won't it'll keep you back in training and this day will be wasted, even more, I may end up killing you and wasting my precious little demon. I wouldn't want that…" Oni Mask grunted out angrily after noticing the boy's distress. At that point he must've already analyzed the boy's feelings: Tanshu had no reservations about anything, he shared everything with his sensei and so it had to have been something that Oni Mask had forbidden him to talk about. The boy wanted to talk about "family" of "feelings" of some sort and while Oni Mask hated those things – if he didn't help boy out he would not be the best little demon he could be that day and the training would have been useless. If you're not risking your own body and life when training then may as well not train at all…

"Well…" young Tanshu stuttered, "My katei is my best motivator, when I fight to protect it I am at my strongest. You once said that if you faced someone in this room of darkness you'd be able to kill anyone, when I fight to protect my katei I feel the same way and… I know that you told me to abandon those feelings but… That would mean spitting at what makes me the strongest." The shining Oni Mask twisted around ninety degrees, after several creepy moments it returned back to its original state. "No… That is good. If you just did what I told you you'd never surpass me, you'd just be a slightly inferior version of me. That's no good at all. To ever surpass the devil a demon needs his own source of power, he needs to fly with his own set of wings and not use those given to him by his overlord." Sensei's voice sounded strangely dull and uninterested, usually he kicked Tanshu's butt whenever the boy brought family and friends up. "Go on…" he added.

"Well, I spoke with Hanasaku and Vashia… I thought that maybe we could be comrades, maybe we could develop some sort of stronger bonds with each other so that my feelings for my katei are stronger and I can fight to protect it even harder but…" Tanshu's head sunk down, his tone of voice shifted to incredibly sad. "Bubblegum-head keeps cursing me and punching and kicking me when I try to talk to her, Vashia won't even talk to me at all. Why is that? Why am I the one no one talks to? Why am I the untouchable one!?" Tanshu yelled the last sentences out in pure rage. Oni Mask moved up, the lights coming off of the mask's eyes just made a path of light rays where the little points went as the mask flipped over and went up to the ceiling. Suddenly the mask appeared right in front of Tanshu's face and the boy felt sharp pain in his gut – it felt almost like sensei's leg dug deep enough to bypass his innards and reach the boy's spine. The boy fell down on the floor and writhed around for a while. Sensei spoke up again.

"Forget talking to Hanasaku. She is a hopeless person who has nothing for her in this world – she is an arrogant person, the worst kind in fact. Under normal circumstances she always deems herself correct and the strongest, most beautiful and most talented out of all the people in the room. I'm sure that deep in her heart she even thinks herself superior to God-Eyes…" sensei's attacks kept coming but Tanshu leapt back up, following the sound of his rustling fabric he avoided his sensei's lethal blows while still getting hit a couple of times – in that room such injuries were unavoidable. "The only way to get to her is to beat her – prove that she is not better than you but… If you did that the little brat would kill herself – it is imperative for her to be the best in this world, else why bother breathing? That is why she is the absolute worst person with no hope to improve – she never assumes "what if I'm wrong", she'd rather die than be wrong and that's why she'll never grow. She'll always remain the "bubblegum girl"… Give up on her."

Tanshu and Oni Mask exchanged blows again. The boy landed several blows on his sensei by imagining his sensei's body based on the picture provided by his other senses – his hearing, his smell and touch, by seeing his sensei's mask and its position he could better draw an outline of where his sensei was and what the position of his body was. "As far as Vashia goes… Well… She's different. She grew up in a family of samurai, the only speech she understands is that of swordsmanship, you cannot bond with her with your tongue, you need to clash swords with her in order to reach out to her." Tanshu leaped backwards and wiped blood off of his lips. That night he thought a lot about what his sensei had told him, it wasn't common that sensei even spoke to him about such things so every word he was told was precious. Next morning Tanshu showed a sword to Oni Mask sensei, not the one he used to have but another one he claimed from God-Eyes' bandit he had beaten down earlier that day. "Teach me swordsmanship, Demon-sensei, so that I could reach out to Vashia and understand her heart, so that I would think of her as my friend and think more of my katei… So that I would fight more ruthlessly to defend it and become a true demon!" he grunted out. A sound of sword being drawn from the sheath lit up the total darkness. "Defend yourself" was all that Tanshu heard before getting cut. It did not matter – he was learning swordsmanship, one day he would become better than Vashia and clash with her to understand her heart. After that day maybe he'll have family again, maybe his katei will grow, as will his strength!

Tanshu's mind returned back to his body, right on time to deliver a powerful kick to the monk's chest and end their overdrawn clash of fists and kicks. Tanshu's thoughts were now crystal clear and even if he was still waiting for the day when he'd clash with Vashia, now was not the time to think about that day. Remembering that he still had that on the schedule helped him clear his thoughts though, a flurry of punches and kicks sent the monk down again only for him to crawl a bit higher up and stand back up after taking a brief moment to recover. Tanshu bit his finger and slammed his hand to the staircase "Summoning Jutsu: Fighting Dog Pack!" he chanted as three average sized dogs appeared in a cloud of smoke. Tanshu never wasted chakra on summoning dogs unless he planned using THAT later on that day so his companions knew perfectly what to do. Tanshu slammed his hands together as if he was praying, the dogs leaned forward shouted out in unison – "Fire Style: Dog Pack Bark!" letting out three conjoined heat waves at the monk.

Monk slammed his fist to the floor. His body lit up with blue light emanating from behind him "Ninja Monk Style: Ishirrinbu Defense!" powerful tentacle shaped constructs of chakra surrounded the monk in a cocoon like construction as the triple Fire Style hit him blowing the part of staircase up. After a moment the monk's body flew out of the smoke cloud heading head first to the ground floor – his impressive ninja monk technique blocked most of the damage but he still took some as his body was now burned up even more and the force that destroyed the staircase beneath his feet sent him crashing down. The dogs leaped after the monk, the unconscious monk got back into consciousness at the last moment. "Ninja Monk Style: Ishirrinbu Offense!" he chanted as his body lit up again and the same gigantic tentacle constructs pushed his body upward from the ground he would've snapped his neck crashing into. "Water Temple Taijutsu Combo: Rising Tide!" the monk shouted out as his fists dug into the bodies of the dogs and sent the canines flying up in the air where the monk's onslaught of punching the ninja animals continued. After the monk's beatdown reached its highest point the monk his elbows into two of the dogs sending them crashing down instead. The two dogs that slammed into the ground disappeared in a poof of smoke leaving only one dog that landed to Tanshu's side. The man stopped standing in his peculiar stance, his partner turned back and barked out "Already finished?" Tanshu shook his head "No problem, I will need it later on anyways, I wouldn't use that on someone like this monk." Red Dog replied.

The dog barked out and disappeared in a poof of smoke and Tanshu's body lit up in a brief flash of red light. The monk landed on the continuation of the staircase that was not broken, "What did that dog give to you?" he asked before charging forward. "That does not concern you…" Tanshu replied casually and leaped up to clash his own elbow with that of the oversized monk's. The two exchanged some blows before both of them landed on their respective platforms of the staircase that were still hanging and not blown down. The monk slapped his arms together "Ninja Monk Style: Ishirrinbu Onslaught!" he shouted out as his body bulked up, his blood vessels shot out and some must've ruptured – this technique strained his body immensely and Tanshu decided not to risk getting hit by it. An endless swarm of tentacle constructs of chakra rushed at where Tanshu was slamming into the staircase blowing it down, the monk did not end his rampage as more and more tentacles shot out from behind him and blew more and more platforms of the staircase until none of it was intact, only the couple more platforms that lead to the top floor with no way to get to them from below. And yet… Tanshu's body was nowhere to be seen.

"Fire Style: Two Headed Dog Red Bark!" Tanshu chanted shooting off double version of his Red Dog Bark jutsu of Fire Release towards his monk opponent. The ninja monk leaped up dodging it by moving in between the two masses of fire and then sticking to the wall using his ninjutsu and chakra control. Tanshu did the same. The monk roared out and lunged forward slamming his arms together "Ninja Monk Style: Ishirrinbu Drill!" he shouted out thrusting his head together as a shape of a gigantic squid construct formed around him. Tanshu leaped forward to meet the force of his opponent – this fight had gone for long enough and the Red Dog wanted to end it. A silent sound of steel rubbing against Tanshu's sheathe reached the monk's ears and as crimson red flashed in the monk's eyes he knew it was all over! Tanshu's sword re-entered the sheath as the Sannin finished his technique. "Red Dog Twin Slash!" he whispered to himself as an "X" shaped gash opened on the monk's chest and his lifeless body fell to the ground. Tanshu leaped off the wall and landed on what little remained of the staircase sliding down the stone remains and then the wall down to the ground floor.

Howoku had already finished with his wounds, Haoru looked like had done it long ago. The Fourth pouted a little, "You took extra time and you're almost without a scratch, if you had no trouble why did you take so long?" he complained after Tanshu stretched out. "I remembered something I still have to do…" the Sannin replied. Haoru and Howoku stood up from the stone floor and the three picked up their pace heading towards the next hallway. It was entirely possible that this was not the last obstacle that the Mizukage had in their way. They were lucky to avoid significant injuries even if Howoku didn't look like he escaped the battle unscathed, his breathing was more intense. Tanshu considered stopping for some more rest he remembered that he had already given him enough time by taking extra time to dispose of that monk.

Many kilometers away from the temple an intense battle was taking place. One similar to two more battles further to the south. A white haired woman was dashing around the battlefield and cutting cloaked men down, ninja with black shirts and white vests, wearing Kumogakure headbands were accompanying her by facing off against the cloaked men. Many of the ordinary ninja fell, even if the Kirigakure demons were completely out of their comfort zone in an open battlefield they still managed to draw blood from both the Raikage and her most trusted ninja. The woman's body was riddled with small scratches and cuts but it was to be expected when fighting an army of elite assassins. It appeared like the battle was just about reaching its peak though.

To the south a giant set of armor similar to that worn by samurai generals was swinging his gigantic blade around swatting endless hordes of cloaked assassins like insects. It would've been unknown to any ordinary passer by just who this colossal figure of cold steel was and where exactly the Kazekage was hidden seeing how his own men were fighting alongside this giant walking set of armor. The desert warriors of Sunagakure were not entirely in their native field as they were fighting in a rocky wasteland but these assassins they were fighting against weren't even native to any battlefield. Their hands were swift to cut, precise to aim for the vital blood vessels but still they lacked sheer force and battlefield experience. Also the Sunagakure legion had that giant set of armor laying rampage across the unarmored forces of the Kirigakure demons. In addition it had to be noted that Sunagakure forces were excited – they wanted to prove to both Kirigakure and other "Great" ninja villages that the Sand was now back and recovered after the extensive damage done to it after the Second War. Sunagakure wanted to yell out their claim to be declared the next "Great Ninja Village" and no army of cloaked Kirigakure elites was going to stop them!

Further to the south giant earthquakes flipped the tables of the battlefield, the Kirigakure demons were all running for their lives as loud cracks and rumbles intimidated even the most devoted to their cause. Giant boulders were flying around, some white flashes of light lit up and in its wake followed destruction. It was like a God of War had entered the Iwagakure's ranks and assisted the Tsuchikage as that battlefield was an absolute curbstomp. Not even a single scratch was placed on Tsuchikage's bare chest, his white hair flowed like those of a silver haired banshee devouring its victims as none squad of assassins he had set his eyes on survived even a single moment of his rampage. At some point his entire army just stood back as none in their ranks could even properly support such an invulnerable powerhouse monster that was Kaguya Yaban.

The other Kage were just about to begin their final marathon towards the Kage Summit!


	43. A Village on the Path to Greatness

A desert lizard crawled by a desolated rocky wasteland path. The little creature sensed loud and strong vibrations of the ground so it decided to get to a cover of some rocky structures on the other side while the large group that was incoming passed by. The creatures that appeared from the horizon and soon flooded the place were ones that the lizard only saw rarely in these parts, they were people. To a more intelligent observer this large party of men may not have appeared to be dressed accordingly to the climate – the men wore long sleeved black tops and wide and loose trousers, they also wore head gears that looked like turbans and some sort of flak jackets. Truly these people with peculiar headbands on their foreheads must've been sweating profusely. Little would the observer have known that these men were quite adapted to desert-like conditions as this party marching on was none other but the Sunagakure delegation moving to the Kage Summit.

It has been a while since Sunagakure took part in any political meeting. The village has been looked down on for a while and no one really bothered to invite their parties to the Kage Summits that had taken place between this one and after the Second Great Ninja War. Naturally as one appointed as the Wind Shadow the Kazekage had the right to appear in the Kage Summits even uninvited, still, since no one ever would have listened to the opinion of a leader of an unimportant in the grand political scheme village the Kazekage did not even bother with it. This time however was different – Hokage Howoku invited leaders of every village and since Howoku was a man who had protected all peace – the state of Sunagakure included, the Kazekage decided to respond in kind. Had it not been for Howoku's excessive worries of countless peace treaties between all of the villages Sunagakure would've been erased from the map, his peaceful lockdown status quo had helped the village recover and regain power which made it much more of a player on the map. Kazekage headed to the Summit to make a statement – he was sick of Kirigakure and their arrogant and elitist behavior for a long time, it was time that those cocky bastards saw that Sunagakure was back in power and was powerful enough to judge the Mist as equals.

A man walked up to the hulking figure of Kazekage, most Sunagakure ninja were rather short, Kazekage was well over two meters tall so the natural shortage of his men stood out in comparison even more. "Kazekage-sama, there are people ahead, I sense a large concentration of humidity increase in the air up ahead." Kazekage stopped and looked up ahead, "You are an Advanced Sensor, correct?" he asked his man, Kazekage already knew the answer but he wanted to be sure. "Yes, Sir!" the man nodded, "I am a sensor with the additional advanced ability to sense humidity of air and sense its alterations – that makes my sensory more acute and lengthens its range!" Kazekage scratched his chin and ordered his men to take a round defensive formation placing his Wind Release users on the outside where they could've crafted powerful gusts to defend everyone on the inside. Sunagakure had very few types of ninja: Wind Release users, Puppet users, Weaponry jutsu users and Sealing jutsu users and Sand Release users. While such unimpressive assortment of skillsets may have made Sunagakure military predictable, it also helped each leader craft battlefield strategies much more successfully and easily.

The party advanced forward, there was no way that the Kazekage would allow an opportunity to declare the rising back of their village be burnt down to nothingness just because he got afraid of an ambush. He'd crush those insolent fools who thought they could bully the Sunagakure around, these fools apparently forgot the times they lived in and had to be educated that this was no longer the post-Second Great War period. Iwagakure and Sunagakure were powerful villages to be placed among the Great Ninja Villages – Kirigakure, Kumogakure and Konohagakure. The Great Three had to move aside and make place for the returning villages or be swept aside by the winds of change. The Kazekage very much planned to make an example out of those men planning to assault him and his men.

"Akasuna Mugao, by the orders of the Mizukage Namikaze Shirona I sentence you to death." a voice spoke right behind the Kazekage. "Shit… How did he get there!?" the large man wondered right before his throat was opened by the assassin. However it was not blood that shot out of his neck – it was sand as the Kazekage's bulking figure collapsed into a vortex of sand that surrounded the assassin. A young man stepped up and thrust his fist forward. "Sand Coffin! Sand Funeral!" the young man chanted energetically as the assassin's body was crushed by the sand and collapsed lifelessly onto the ground in the shape of water. "A water clone trying to assassinate a sand clone… Interesting!" a cloaked figure further back declared out loud as the real Kazekage removed his cloak and threw it aside. "Well done, Guuma, I'll take it from here." The Kazekage observed his attackers – up on the twin rocky fields up ahead stood two squads of cloaked men with blue Oni Masks – the Kirigakure Demon Corps. Most elite assassins throughout the entire Ninja World and yet… The size of the squad suggested to the Kazekage that these men must've not been the most elite Demons, they were but trainees, even more – an assassin had no chance against a warrior on the battlefield. These men came to this wasteland to die!

"Men! What we have here is a free chance to kick some Great Ninja Village butt and be in the right, let us not waste this chance!" the Kazekage shouted out vibrantly as his voice let the men know just how excited their leader was to kill some Kirigakure Demons. Kazekage Mugao removed a large staff from behind his back as the Demons jumped down and attacked his men. The large hulking brute swung it around swatting several men aside – the Demons stood back up and continued attacking him and his men. With a simple flick of his finger the Kazekage transformed his staff into a scythe. Now these Demons would not just ignore his blows, the Kazekage clashed with one of the Demons, the brute just thrust and pulled the scythe to him disarming the assassin and swung his scythe around. The man that Mugao was attacking leaped back into the fray of his folk with a powerful backflip but several more Demons found the battlefield to be too stuffed with men to dodge the wide reaching weapon and fell to the rocky ground to never stand up again.

A painful sensation alerted the Kazekage of an attacker from behind. Several swipes of a knife opened some painful wounds – the assassin then tried to stab the kunai right into the man's neck but the knife got stuck into something metal. Kazekage turned around only for his body to be met by kicks and a backflip hiding the Demon once again in the fray of battle. The man grunted as he felt warm streams of blood run down his back and softly tapping onto the rocky wasteland – these Demons meant business, they were silent, quick and agile. Trained in arts of wielding a kunai and how to remain silent and unnoticed until the knife was already plunged. If Mugao held back or underestimated these men he'd really die in here. "Kazekage-sama!" someone alerted the man of another assassin, Kazekage ducked and saw a knife flash above him aiming for the man's neck. The giant turned around and swiped his scythe upwards cutting one assassin down, another one jumped in out of nowhere and cut Mugao in the leg, slowing the man down. These men were so numerous and so fast that they easily compensated their lack of high hitting destructive power potential. They fought like bees against a hornet – all swarmed up on one, everyone died but left their impact. Kazekage slammed his scythe down and grabbed one man who had injured him by his face, "If you're trying to kill a man, at least have the decency to look him in the eyes, Demon!" he roared as Mugao slammed the man's puny head against his own shattering the demon mask and spilling excessive amounts of assassin blood on his face.

The man then lifted the unconscious but very much alive Demon and showed him to his men. "See, men?! These are not Demons, these are boys who have peed in their beds until yesterday! Let's send them back home to their mothers and their cups of milk!" The Kazekage picked his scythe back up and swung it around, clashing with the demon's knives, defending against the endless onslaughts of the enemy and drastically reducing their rank with each swipe. "This is stupid…" the brute wondered to himself "I only took five hundred men, just enough to demonstrate Sunagakure's rising military potential but… This is a full military squad, Kirigakure intends to destroy us! This is one fourth of an actual army… Wait a second… No… They wouldn't do something like that…" Kazekage wondered to himself as he sent more and more assassins down on the rocky dirt. Two assassins swiped at the Kazekage's eyes trying to blind the man, Mugao dashed by them avoiding the attack and gently tapped their backs. "Human Puppet Jutsu!" he shouted controlling the assassins like his own puppets and sending them after their own.

The Kazekage's puppets cut down several more assassins, someone tried to cut the strings much to the Mugao's enjoyment. One could not cut a puppeteer's strings without a chakra conductive weapon of certain controlled flow. These boys clearly had never faced a puppeteer, it took several dozens of men to finally stop their own human puppets and even then – they only struck down their own comrades! Kazekage tossed his scythe forward and his fingers twitched revealing a slight chakra glow on strings attached to the scythe. "Puppetry Style: Phantom Weapon Jutsu!" he yelled out controlling his scythe as if an invisible ghost was wielding it, as if the scythe had a mind of its own cutting down countless assassins and troubling countless more. Still, this battle was not going well – Mugao kept hearing desperate cries of pain from his own men behind him, occasionally his own body lit up with pain as more of his blood colored the rocks of this cursed wasteland. If he did not end this quick it'd be ended for them! Furiously the giant roared with a battle cry slashing wildly, taking on many assassins and angrily trying to compensate the extreme difference in numbers. He clashed with tens of assassins at the same time by himself, trying desperately to keep these men focused on cutting him down, getting hit many times in the process but saving many times more lives. Mugao's men saw the devotion of their leader and it inspired them to fight that much harder, faced with overwhelming military power they fought back like beasts, no, like true Demons educating these fakes of the true meaning of the word. Even when they fell, each Sunagakure ninja took ten if not more assassins with them. These kids cut to maim – Suna ninja cut to kill.

"End this now!" someone commanded the army as the assassins dashed back forming a large circle and started madly weaving seals. The Sunagakure ninja tried to intercept but as they dropped their guards heading for the distraction they were cut down. The ranks of Mugao's men were now incredibly rare. "DARN IT, THIS WILL NOT HAPPEN AGAIN!" Mugao roared leaping towards one part of the circle aiming to cut them all down but being confronted by the assassins protecting the circle ninja. "Water Style: Water Dragon Jutsu!" each and every assassin in the circle chanted spitting out masses of water that took the shape of dragons and lunged towards Mugao – such an overwhelming combination of Water Dragons would've crushed the man's body and stripped his flesh from bone from the sheer pressure.

The loud roaring water dragons all slammed where Mugao stood forming a powerful flood, violent crashing waves flushed Sungakure ninja away momentarily but the violent water didn't let the Kirigakure Demons proceed to go for the kill, they'd have to pick out the remaining ninja after the water calmed down. Finally the water settled down and ran into fissures and small holes everywhere in the wasteland, washing the bodies of the fallen away. As the battlefield was cleaned up the Demons tried to confirm the death of Akasuna Mugao – the Fourth Kazekage but… There was no body! Where Mugao stood and was supposed to be crushed by the water stood only a giant set of armor – one reminding the samurai of the past, no, reminding a general of those samurai. There was one man in the Iron Country who was like the Kage of the samurai called Iron Shogun. This fancy and edgy colossus of steel reminded most of the armor that the Iron Shogun wore. From inside the puppet a cybernetic voice came, similar to the voice enhancers that the Demons themselves used – maybe even taken from a dead Demon Corps member infiltrating Sunagakure when the armor was built.

"Puppetry Style: Iron Shogun!" the cyber voice of Mugao declared reaching for his back and pulling a giant sword and swinging it around swiping the worn out bodies of the assassins aside. The Kirigakure Demon circle of Water Dragons was no more with a single swipe of Iron Shogun's blade! This was the true power of Akasuna Mugao, the inheritor of the ancient art of puppetry and master of the little known internal puppetry. The art where instead exposing themselves the puppetmaster was hiding inside the puppet they were controlling and so to get to the puppeteer one must have penetrated the alloy of the puppet. Seeing how the Iron Shogun was barely bent by the onslaught of the Water Dragon techniques such penetration was highly unlikely. The assassins all charged at the Iron Shogun at the same time, thrusting their knives and trying to find gaps in the armor but even as they found them their blades could not reach the soft skin of the man inside. With a powerful shake the puppet armor shook all of the assassins aside and with a swipe of his blade finished them off while they were down.

With an excessive attack the likes of which no one had ever seen before the Shogun dashed forward as his feet shot out flames moving the whole giant structure forward. With powerful and fast swings of his sword the shogun finished off the last of the Kirigakure military force sent to dispose of the Kazekage. After the last assassin hit the ground the Iron Shogun's chest opened up and Mugao leaped out of the armor with it transforming into an exoskeleton like construction which the giant put on like a backpack. The man's tired and sad face turned at his men – observing only less than twenty survivors and a clean battlefield. It is unknown where the tide had washed away both the Demons that were treated like throwaway tools and those unfortunate enough to get killed as a result of an order made by a sick tyrant. "Aaaaaaaargh!" Mugao shouted out angrily as he punched the rocky ground opening up wounds in his knuckles. Just like that his country was reminded of the times when they were ravaged down to near-extinction by war.

"I'm sorry, men…" Mugao spoke up to the survivors, "I wanted so hard to enter that league of champions again, to have our village be placed among the Greats but… I think I may have forgotten what that meant. Before we had the benefit of their pity, we were not attacked from behind, we were always protected by those stronger than us but the moment we walked out of Konohagakure's shadow we must fend off by ourselves. You must understand that this will be the norm now, we'll have to fight every enemy dumb enough to wish to bring us down by ourselves with no one to help us." "Kazekage-sama…" some surviving men tried to calm the grieving man down but the giant just looked at them. "You know what? Fuck their pity, they can pity the men we send to the Afterlife and pity their own filthy selves for ever daring to pull sick shit like this. Now let's go to the Summit and kick Mizukage's ass!" the brute yelled out inspiring courage into the hearts of his devoted surviving men.

"Well… I wouldn't be in such a rush, Kazekage." a low pitched husky voice spoke up from the same rock where armies of assassins were located previously, the Kazekage and his men looked up in horror and saw a man in a black jumpsuit and a blue sleeveless ninja outfit like those worn by Kirigakure ninja. And yet the most scary accessory of them all was his white with blue strips Oni Mask. The man jumped down and stared at the Kazekage, only when the hulking brute returned the Demon's stare did he notice the steel leg appendage that the man wore – this must've been a much older and much more experienced Demon. While the Kazekage wondered just how much functionality did the man have with that metallic leg something suggested that he shouldn't have underestimated the man – he must've seen the Iron Shogun and still revealed himself after all. Either this Oni Mask man believed that he could take the Iron Shogun out or he was just devoted to his Mizukage until the end.

"Back up, I have lost enough men today as it is and I am not losing anyone else, if I fall that means I was unworthy of the title of Kazekage – retreat and elect a new one! Remember the meaning of our actions, bring our village forward to the ranks of the Greats!" Kazekage ordered and his men obediently backed up. "Kazekage-sama…" they almost teared up by the devotion to the village that this large man had. "You do not need to bother, Mizukage Shirona will take over as the Ninja Empress, there will be no more meaning to the useless title of Kage." The man wearing the Oni Mask put a lot of faith in his master. Kazekage broke out a grin – "So old man Daikon finally lost his grip, huh? New butt on the chair, same bullshit…" he cursed at the Oni Mask as the men prepared for an inevitable fight that would break out.


	44. Kazekage VS Oni Mask!

The two men continued to stare each other down. Each of them was competent in close range fighting techniques so it was important for them to properly assess the situation, observe the opponent's stance and find any openings they could exploit. A weak breeze sent tumbleweed rolling around but the wandering plant did not distract the two shinobi who continued to stare each other down. Kazekage's eyes were full of determination to destroy this high ranking member of the Kirigakure Demon Corps, a man who was in high position of the order that killed so many of his trusted men that day. It was impossible to clearly say what exactly Oni Mask's eyes looked like, his demonic mask removed any signs of the man being human and with each battle and lost limb he reminded less and less of a man and became much more of a demonic ideal he strived to be.

"I wonder…" one of the ninja who survived the scuffle with the assassins mumbled but only his closest friends heard him. They curiously looked at their troubled comrade with questioning glares.

"This man, he clearly is a high ranking Demon… What if he is THE Demon? Kirigakure's Legendary Demon who survived a battle with Star of Hope Howoku and killed Raijin's Prophet Sorano twenty years ago." The shinobi finished his chain of thought as his comrades looked at the assailant with newly found fear in their eyes.

"You mean the man who then got promoted to Kirigakure Sannin by the Water Lord after a suggestion from Third Mizukage, tyrant Daikon himself?" someone in the group of survivors shouted out in surprise. The fact that all Demons concealed most of their bodies: their faces and every trace of their skin made identifying the specific Demon near impossible. This man could've been whichever one of the Demons, he could've been THE Demon and no one would have known. In some ways the Kirigakure Demons were perfect ninja as no one knew their identities, no one could even pin a specific person to a battle or event because of how secretive and utterly badass these men were.

"Yeah… Rumor says that the particular Demon can only be identified by one feature – he is missing a leg. This man seems to wear some sort of metallic leg which makes one wonder: is he the real deal or if he is just messing with everyone taking other Demons' names…" the Sunagakure ninja concluded as the group continued to stare the nameless Demon down. This man definitely did his homework if he was impersonating the real Oni Mask as his body build and height was identical, he was missing the same leg that Raijin's Prophet Sorano annihilated. It would've taken some effort to properly identify and confirm the man's identity but it didn't appear like the Kazekage even cared about that.

Suddenly the Demon just dashed forward leaning his head up front and shooting at the speed of an arrow cutting through the air. His arm lit up with lightning sparks as the man thrust it forward cutting through air, the Kazekage leaned to the side avoiding the thrust. Oni Mask leaped into the air swinging his metallic leg in an impressive jump kick but Mugao once again outmatched his opponent by leaning below the kick and avoiding it. Utilizing the momentum of his jump kick Oni Mask spun around and thrust his other leg down in a vertical kick. Mugao's iron staff blocked the strike, the man flicked a switch on the weapon and blades shot out of the scythe. A silver flash lit the air up and the Demon leaped backwards covering a wide gash on his chest, Mugao decided to keep going he tossed the scythe forward twitching his fingers to activate his puppetry technique. "Puppetry Style: Phantom Weapon Jutsu!" he chanted sending the scythe cutting like a disc saw. The Demon's speed was impressive as he quickly avoided certain death ranging the puppet strings out but he still got cut in his mask, he had to thrust his metallic leg forward and damage it as well so that his fleshy bits didn't get amputated in an instant.

"Look at his chest! It's burnt up, he has to be THE Demon from twenty years ago! So this bastard survived!" the Sunagakure ninja shouted out having witnessed the man's uniform tear up and reveal his burnt skin underneath.

"So this is the man who worked with two infamous Sunagakure nukenin: Hana and Vashia…" his comrade exclaimed angrily to himself before raising his voice, "Kazekage-sama, let's retreat! Fighting such a man after a lengthy battle may be dangerous, we have no reason to fight a man who has already killed one Sannin and survived the fury of another!"

"Don't make me laugh!" Mugao shouted back at his subordinate. "What we have here is a chance for me to prove to these people that Sunagakure is powerful once again, what is a Kage worth if he cannot best a Sannin?" the puppeteer lashed out.

A loud laughter echoed through the wasteland, one that reached even the dead or still dying bodies washed away from Kirigakure's previous assault. Not that they even understood the significance of this laughter. "It is you who makes me laugh, Kazekage, how dare you even wear that name when Sunagakure had not had a Sannin level ninja recognized by all countries in over twenty years? Yours is an empty title, only a Sannin is worthy of ascending to Kage and you're just mocking your title, you just sit in the big chair because you are the strongest in a country of barely breathing weaklings. You're the strongest of "get-byers", master of the average league." Oni Mask spoke up at last "Shirona-sama is right to eliminate shameful jokers like you."

After finishing his speech Oni Mask once again tensed his muscles up and leaned back making his body shoot forward at incredibly speed, his muscles lit up with passing through lightning sparks and the man thrust his arm forward impaling Mugao through the chest. "Even in her late passing years, way past her prime, Lady Sorano gave me more of a challenge than you, pathetic!" the Demon declared after his eyes opening up wider under the mask in shock. A part of Kazekage's face fell off and slammed onto the rocky floor making a wooden sound, as the impaled man's head lifted up making his black long locks move out of the way of his face the Oni Mask was revealed cartoonish round eyes and a wide clown-like smile on the face of the man he just "killed". A loud wind cutting swipe whistled in the air, blood covered the rocks as the Demon stumbled forward and fell on his knees with another gash on his back.

"It's a shame that my scythe seems to have gotten dull after cutting down so many of you Demons…" Kazekage Mugao taunted his injured opponent from behind. The man replaced his body with one of his puppets and did it so incredibly skillfully and fast that even the extremely powerful and experienced opponent like Oni Mask was fooled by it. "Had it not dulled so much it'd have cut you right in two…" the man finished his thought, however he did not count on his opponent to retaliate so fast.

With a loud deafening roar of anger the Demon jumped up and turned around, it was like pain and bleeding did not even matter to this man. "I seem to have underestimated you, Mugao!" Oni Mask shouted out as his kick from his metallic leg connected to Kazekage's chest making the man spit up blood from somewhere in his chest. A powerful punch dug deep into the Kazekage's face sending the man stumbling back, as large as Mugao was even he felt the damage that Demon's inhuman strength did, or perhaps it was callback from his endless previous battle with the young Demons? No, it was the combination of the two, this strongest of Demons was smart, he purposefully planned all of this, he must've known Mugao's personality and that proving the worth of his village was more important to him than anything.

"Then again… You know as they say, the sharpness of one's weapon only depends on the spirit of the user!" the Demon taunted his opponent as lightning emanated through his body and the man thrust his elbow forward right into Mugao's chest. "Demon Kenpo!" Oni Mask chanted as his gigantic opponent gurgled up blood and fell onto the ground with a giant gaping wound on his chest.

"You bastard!" two Sunagakure ninja shouted out as they charged at the Demon angered by the fact that their opponent held his own against the Kazekage himself. With a simple and effortless move Demon opened up the weapon user's defense and with a pinch at the man's throat the brave Sunagakure shinobi fell down on the floor lifeless. The Demon then leaned to the sides avoiding the onslaught of Sand Release techniques as if they were nothing, as hard as the young Jounin tried to tag the Demon he had no luck.

"Ahh, the famous Sand Release, a combination of Wind and Earth Releases only found in Sunagakure… What a pathetic piece of junk." Oni Mask taunted his younger and inexperienced opponent by thrusting his elbow covered with lightning chakra right through the tightest sand defense that the young Jounin could put up. "Taste the strike that killed your master! Demon Kenpo!" Oni Mask spoke driving his elbow into the young man's chest and almost cutting him in two as well. The arrogant Demon's head cocked back and twisted to the side creepily, the effect and creepiness of the man's twitching motion was only made stronger by his lifeless and scary mask that he wore. The infamous Oni Mask Demon was tough enough to instill fear even in the middle of the day outside his room of darkness.

"Well… Aren't you a medical ninja?" the man addressed a young woman with a ribbon on her right arm. "Go ahead, help your friends. Or do your best trying to avenge them… It'll be fun seeing which one is more important to…"

The man's speech was cut short by a headbutt that sent him flying back, with a powerful roar and a burst of chakra that made the smaller pebbles around the Kazekage spin around in a mad twister Akasuna Mugao was back on his feet ready to rampage again. "I already did help Kazekage-sama!" the lady medical ninja shouted out in desperation hoping her hardest that the flying Demon heard her. Oni Mask's sight quickly focused on the shining trail of sand that the young Sand Release user had set up previously and its slight greenish glow. "So the woman transferred her chakra through the sand that the young Sand Release user missed… No, he was targeting the Kazekage the entire time… I was played." Oni Mask realized as his body hit the ground breaking something out loud.

Demon's body twitched and the man shouted out in pain, but he was still moving, it was only a matter of time before he stood again and killed every single one of these Sunagakure ninja! "Hmph!" the Kazekage grunted arrogantly as he tossed his giant scythe forward. "Puppetry Style: Fisher Combo!" he shouted as the scythe dug deep into Demon's metallic leg, with a powerful pull the Kazekage dragged the Demon up close to him again and then dashed forward pushing his shoulder forward and clotheslining the man right back down.

"Kazekage-sama is winning!" the Sungakure ninja cheered on their leader but Mugao's face remained calm and observed his seemingly lifeless opponent who didn't even more for some time.

"I don't get it, why isn't Kazekage-sama finishing that bastard off? Just stomp his head and crush him into the rocks! He and his men killed so many of ours, he deserves no mercy!" the medical ninja shouted before she herself heard her own words, gently shutting her own mouth and covering it with her palm.

"It isn't that easy…" a fellow Sunagakure ninja spoke occupying the young lady's attention. "You see the Fourth knows that his opponent is still alive and conscious, in fact, it's entirely possible that the Demon is ready to counter attack the moment that Kazekage opens his guard for a finishing blow. Since Mugao-sama is well educated in close range fighting he can see that if he opens up he's as good as dead so he is waiting for his opponent to make a mistake again instead. In this situation being patient is the way to survive." the man explained to his comrade. Mugao's eyes did not move from the seemingly lifeless body of the Demon, desperately waiting for the man's counter attack so that he can drop him again, hopefully this time for good!

Suddenly blinding light flashed making the Kazekage cover his eyes, the unexpected flashbang even forced the Sunagakure ninja cover their eyes as well. "Flashing Demon Kenpo!" a loud triumphant shout reached the ears of all who were covering in fear of the Demon. A terrifying flesh cutting sound alerted everyone that once they opened their eyes a very cruel slap from reality will bring them back from an idealistic dream to the cruel world that they lived in. Kazekage opened his eyes first, he looked at his own bare bulky chest and was surprised that he was OK, the man then turned to his right witnessing the cruel twist – the Demon chose to kill the young medic instead of him.

"W-Why?!" Mugao shouted out, his voice twisted by pain of endless loss and grief. These people here were his most trusted men and women and most of them won't be coming back home. That was the reality of war, no, reality of peace. How could the reality be so cruel when the countries were no longer in war? What was the point of all this meaningless murder in that case? Was this their own fault for dealing peacefully with cruel madmen who only wanted the world to turn back into the primal warring state it was in since its conception? Oni Mask pulled his arm out of the medic's chest as the woman collapsed lifeless. It was clear that she died before realizing what had happened.

"What do you mean? If I chose to kill you she'd have brought you back again, when you punch a barrier and it doesn't break, it's just plain stupid to punch it again, you just kill the person holding the barrier. That is the path of a Demon, the path of an assassin. Shinobi are assassins so if you cannot handle these truths you have no place in this world. The fact that you weep over loss of one ninja just proves to me that Shirona-sama was right, the current generation of Kage have all forgotten the ninja way." Oni Mask spoke as the Sunagakure ninja around him cowered and fell back on their backs, crawling back like worms running for their life. Hiding and squirming so that this man, no, this Demon didn't choose their own life to claim next.

"See? They're all running away. This is the reality that you and Fourth Hokage cannot grasp, no matter how they all talk, no matter what ideals you put in their heads, inside their feeble hearts people will remain people. They will praise and cheer you when you are succeeding but the moment you get stabbed they'll just drive another knife into your back and twist it to stay alive. That is the cruel reality. Peace cannot exist in a world of violence, the very idea of peace is sick in itself. You believe me to be insane? No. It is you who is insane, Kazekage Mugao, you and the other Kage are the real madmen. We are ninja, our function is to kill the people the Lords point at, we have no morals and no place in our hearts for humanity. No. There can be no place for humanity in hearts of killers and deceivers. Humanity needs to be abandoned to leave only a Demon inside. That is how true ninja are made, that is how Demons of the Demon Corps are made."

A man crawled out from the safety of a rock and stood up, his hands were down and his face was covered with tears. "Kazekage-sama!" he cheered out.

A woman walked out from under a rock that was on another rock covering her position and providing shade, she was holding another injured man who thrust his fist into the sky. "Kazekage-sama!" they both cheered at the same time.

A man who remained crying over the young medic's body lifted his bloody forehead, covered with the blood of the young woman who was struck down, the man wiped the blood off his eyes and glared angrily at the Demon, then turned at Kazekage Mugao. "Kazekage-sama!" he spoke quietly with only his shaking pale lips to help put his words together from unintelligible banter of a man taken over by sadness and grief.

"Hm…" the Demon almost broke into a brief laugh as he looked at the injured and saddened ninja who all walked out of their covers and stood back on their feet, no matter in how much pain they were, no matter how injured they were. "KAZEKAGE-SAMA!" they all shouted into the air deafening all other sounds in the wasteland, even the vultures waiting on top of a big rocky mountain until the scuffle ends and their endless feast begins leaped off and flew away. The prophets of death and the cruel reality of a battlefield were scared away by the determination and will of the brave Sunagakure ninja.

"You seem to believe me to be wrong?" the Demon concluded looking at Kazekage's furious and cold eyes. "The truth is that people like these fools exist but they are not an exception to the cruel reality of life. That is because…" another flash blinded the people as the Demon repeated his murderous offense aiming at another brave ninja. "They all die in the end so they cannot be counted as true reflection of people!" the Demon concluded thrusting his arm towards another ninja.

A powerful clang echoed through the wasteland and a shockwave shook the ground below the ground of all the temporarily blinded ninja. After the flash bomb's effect cleared the Oni Mask stood clashing against the Kazekage's scythe, the man's eyes were closed – he moved following his other senses and intercepted Oni Mask's lethal thrust in time with his scythe.

"There are no fools among the people I care about!" Kazekage replied with a cold and angry voice.


	45. Iron Shogun Hits the Field

The two men continued to push their weapons at each other, it was surprising to see Oni Mask's body holding completely still against a physically superior opponent. Kazekage was a towering and bulky man. He completely blew away the image of all puppet users being puny and having to use puppets to protect themselves. Even so Oni Mask managed to hold his own and not get completely blown away in a struggle of physical strength, this spoke volumes of the physical prowess of Tanshu's sensei. Finally Mugao decided to end this struggle, quickly he cancelled all of his efforts to push the clash of the weapons back at his opponent making Oni Mask slightly stumble forward losing his balance.

The brute then leaped into the air flipping over as if air itself was a surface for him to roll around, his scythe extended forward held by the man's puppet strings and spinning forward in a mad vertical spin. Oni Mask had little time or ability to evade the technique. The man turned around and raised his metallic leg to his chest to block the scythe. Blood shot out of Oni Mask's body covering the cut up rocky floor which now had a giant fissure right in its center where Mugao's spinning technique cut the rock in two. "Puppetry Style: Desert Wind" Kazekage exclaimed calmly pulling his scythe back to his hand. The great weapon had penetrated right through the artificial leg and dug deep into Oni Mask's chest, it didn't seem to have hit any vitals but the man was still kept on his knees and didn't look in much of fighting condition.

"He's won!" someone in the ranks of the Sunagakure ninja cheered out and someone else raised their hand to calm them down.

"It ain't that simple, we've seen this Demon act like dying and counterattack like crazy before. The vitality of those Demons is incredible, unless he quite literally stops breathing it is useless to call it a fight…" the ninja said angrily. He was right, the Demon was halfway down but he was still huffing and if anything his life threatening injury just seemed to piss him off more.

"Give up." Mugao asked his opponent, "This is pointless, even if you do kill me you'll never beat my men in this condition, whatever the outcome of our battle is – it's over for you with that injury." Kazekage grunted out, anger did cloud his judgment, he wanted to just skip the reasoning part and keep pounding the face of this man until that fancy mask he wore was in pieces but… Reason was what made him different from the people he fought, he wasn't a blind murderer who killed everyone in sight. He was not above killing and was capable of murder but that didn't mean that such punishment needed to be abused without reason.

Demon stood back up, he no longer laughed or threatened, he just stood back up and took a fighting stance – now it was serious for him. "Don't joke with me, killing you was always my intention and my orders, even if I kill you and your men kill me afterwards my orders will be fulfilled and that is all that matters." Oni Mask replied. He was quite obviously lying, dying while following orders was never his intention and while he knew that even if he beat the Kazekage he'd never beat the rest of his men afterwards he was confident that he'd manage to escape them. What was another diversion or a smoke bomb if it meant his own escape. They would just all clutch and protect each other and gather around watching the backs of each other, too busy to be worried over their own throats to chase him.

Oni Mask leaped forward, so did Mugao. The Demon put both of his palms together and shaped his hands as if they were a jaw, running lightning chakra through it. Mugao slashed from the side when the Kirigakure Sannin thrust his hands forward. "Demon Kenpo: Nasty Bite!" he named his technique as it clashed with Mugao's long end of the scythe. This did not end this exchange of attacks however as Oni kept pressing harder and pushing his hands forward further. Loud cracks came from the center of Mugao's scythe as the thrust cut it in two leaving the shattered chunks of steel all over the rocky wasteland. His arms also hit Mugao's chest but the Lightning Release chakra had already went out by that time and it barely even affected the Kazekage.

The hulking puppeteer swung both his scythe and its other broken end of it as a blunt weapon, with a leap clenching his bleeding chest wound Oni Mask flipped over his opponent avoiding this attack. Oni Mask then thrust his arms backwards to his sides, "Demon Kenpo Secret Technique…" he chanted striking his opponent in the back as his arms pierced through his opponent's body like butter. "Demon Claw!" the Demon finished naming and casting his technique as the lightning chakra around his body calmed down and settled. Kazekage's body collapsed into wooden pieces and parts, Demon quickly leaped backwards hearing some sort of sizzling sound before the entire puppet replacement exploded with dozens of more explosive tags spilling into the air and exploding in a chain reaction. It was only due to his agility and natural speed that Oni Mask managed to get back. His wound spat up more blood.

"You don't have much time…" Mugao stated standing at the side and declaring his observation nonchalantly. The arms of the Demon once again lit up with Lightning Release chakra. "Demon Kenpo: Nasty Bite" he shouted out thrusting his palms into his own chest. Mugao jumped up and shouted in shock – within moments the bleeding wound cauterized itself even if Demon's body twitched and shook violently – it was clear that such treatment of one's own injuries was painful. An elderly woman shook her head in disbelief, a young man close to her looked at his fellow comrade and asked her what was wrong. The elderly woman pointed at the Demon, her eyes were sad and depressed as if she was… Pitying the man.

"Can't you see it now? The origins of all those burns? His body is the way it is now because he kept cauterizing it himself this same way… With the extent of them he must've been cut and stabbed in every part of his body at some point." The woman explained.

"That's right…" Oni Mask exclaimed grunting out in pain, his voice was twisted and in much higher tone. The pain clearly was too much for him to completely ignore and block out as he was cauterizing an already burnt area of his body. "I was the very first Demon that Kirigakure created. The original program that was supposed to create a Demon was so intense that I needed a technique like this or I would have died instantly, even up to today I am the only survivor of that program and it was heavily modified after that generation all died out. Whatever injuries you inflict on me, I took ten times that during my first day of training… There is nothing you can do to a Demon's body that scares him. After becoming a Demon one is completely immune to torture or fear of injury and death because they've been through it countless times already and left unimpressed."

Mugao's eyes squinted as he looked at the Demon with eyes of sadness and pity as well. "After we take your master out… We'll fix that hellhole of a village, I promise you that much, Demon. No other child will have to go through what you went through." The man spoke in a tone that infuriate Oni Mask. Without replying a word the man jumped forward thrusting his palms behind and getting ready to strike his opponent. This was a total offensive stance – it was near impossible to counter or defend in that manner of attack so his attack must've been something to leave the enemy no chance at striking back, Mugao prepared his response, he thrust his now significantly shorter scythe forward slashing downwards trying to cut the Demon down, timing the attack just right. In an impressive leap over the scythe and his tall opponent Oni Mask landed behind Mugao.

Oni Mask's fingers twitched revealing string wrapped around them, the man violently jerked his hands forward stretching the strings out and revealing a loop on Mugao's neck that now cut tight into it and was strangling the man. Mugao tried to pull the steel string more at his side so that Oni Mask moved in closer and the grip of the wire loosened up a bit, it would've been quite useful in keeping his head on his shoulders too as the steel wire pulled at the extent of strength that Oni Mask did was quite capable of taking an entire limb off – luckily enough Mugao had the strength to keep that from happening.

"What speed… What variety of attacks and ways to kill an opponent. Kirigakure may have created the most dangerous human weapon alive…" the Sunagakure ninja wanted to step in to help but Kazekage's arm shot up to stop them. They were an absolute non-factor in this battle. All the more experienced ninja stood down, a single youngster turned around and started scolding his superiors.

"What are you doing? We must help Kazekage-sama! For how long you think he can keep this up!?" he shouted out when another Sunagakure ninja appeared behind him and placed him in an arm lock.

"It is true that we are all strong ninja, however at some point in one's experience it stops mattering just how many less skilled opponents come at you – it makes no difference. There is a level of experience when only a superior opponent can beat you and no number of even slightly weaker opponents can overcome. Even if we fought together with Kazekage we'd just get in his way – he'd have to incorporate us into his plans and strategies, inform us and coordinate his actions with ours – that'd keep him back. We've trusted Fourth to get this far, let's trust him to finish what he started as well." The shinobi said and released the youngster who looked at the battle taking place.

Blades shot out from under Kazekage's cloak, the blades wrapped around his chest making a skeletal structure – almost like a ribcage, then more and more shot out when one pair of blades cut the steel wire. Oni Mask instantly dashed back making some space. More and more constructions appeared from under Kazekage's cloak, it was like all of his puppets were now disassembled and being reassembled into a combined armor structure. One puppet became sort of like a puppet control panel and stuck onto the front, some more formed platforms that reminded of legs, some more formed into arms, other stretched out into a gigantic sword. With one last puppet forming into a helmet the entire armor construction was complete – a puppet fusion Iron Shogun was once again rebuilt.

"You must've really gotten desperate to use this." Oni Mask spoke up.

"What makes you think I didn't just now stop underestimating you, maybe I could've used this the entire time?" Kazekage taunted his opponent from inside the colossal Iron Shogun that was at least six times the size of the Demon.

"I was wondering why you didn't pull this out from the get-go, I think now that I've seen how it is built I understand…" Oni Mask smiled under his mask making it slightly shift forward and almost slip off by stretching out the rubber that held it tightly on the face.

The Iron Shogun didn't let Oni Mask talk, the giant armor lifted the sword up and thrust it forward cutting into the rock and opening up another fissure, also sending a crashing gust of wind at his opponent that cut through the rocky floor it passed and even cut every rock it passed through, with a roll to the side the Demon avoided it.

"A puppeteer uses chakra to control their puppets, more accurately – controlling each puppet is like a continuous technique of its own. When I saw the sheer number of puppets it took to build this… I'd say you have to strain yourself quite extensively to keep it up, manipulating such a complex structure must be difficult too, it must be a pain in the butt to use. It's not hard to put together that I just have to keep dodging your attacks and eventually you'd die of your own exhaustion, shall we try it, slowpoke?" Oni Mask taunted the giant set of armor, Iron Shogun leaped forward as flames shot out its feet propelling it like small rockets, Oni Mask rolled below the sideways slash of the giant blade and then unleashed his counter attack.

Lightning chakra passed through the man's palms as he bombarded the structure with strikes, using just his two fingers to penetrate the steel armor, the Demon leaped onto the construction and ran up it using chakra to keep his feet stuck on it. The Iron Shogun tried to catch the man but his speed by far surpassed it, Oni Mask got to the helmet, leaped into the air and stomped it a couple of times before landing behind the armor after kicking off of its head. The Demon then backflipped a couple of times in rapid succession to safe distance from the colossal set of moving armor.

"It is true that normally no blunt force could penetrate this chakra infused alloy of yours but… That's how force works – if I hit you strong enough covering a precise small area and don't let the force evenly distribute throughout your armor I can easily cut inside it, too bad my fingers aren't long enough to reach you in there…" Oni Mask spoke up as he stood back up. Iron Shogun also stretched out and took fighting stance. It was quite obvious that the large hulking armor was at a disadvantage – Oni Mask was fast enough to keep the armor in a safe range and just poke it away until he hit something that caused it to stop functioning or Mugao timed out and died of exhaustion.

The Iron Shogun turned his sword around and cut air again sending a projectile of cutting wind, Oni Mask once again avoided it and leaped forward. "Demon Kenpo!" he shouted striking the armor several more times but not even leaving a dent in it. Iron Shogun tried to swat the Demon aside but the Sannin just ran up the Demon's arm and leaped down on the other side over his shoulder within just couple of seconds. "It seems he can reinforce his armor with some additional puppets…" Oni Mask thought to himself leaping back a couple of more meters just to get some more safe distance from the Iron Shogun whom he had clearly underestimated.

A loud clanging echoed through the wasteland as the armor's gears turned again as it slashed to the side once again, this time however some more puppets shot out from the Shogun's back forming into spear-like projectiles handled by bunch of steel wire. Oni Mask was already in the air avoiding the wind projectile, once again having underestimated the Iron Shogun's offensive capabilities. The spears penetrated Oni Mask's body right through and tied him up after leaving it, the Iron Shogun swung his opponent around before slamming him into the rocky ground head first. The body that hit the floor dispersed into a puddle of water making the Iron Shogun angrily trample the ground in frustration.

"I don't think this armor is effective against me, it is a tool of outlasting your opponent, tanking any blow they throw but you are the one short on time. Leave this armor at once and give me an honorable victory, it's not as fun seeing you die slowly of exhaustion nor is it as easy for you as I can make it." Oni Mask suggested but he just heard a brief laughter that sounded so strange coming through the cybernetic voice amplifier. All of a sudden the rock beneath Oni Mask started feeling so light – the man's body started sinking in it as if it was…

"Sand?!" the Demon shouted out in surprise as his body sunk deeper and deeper underground.

"I may have anger issues but I wouldn't have stomped the ground unless I wanted to grind the rock into dust using the pulsing shockwave puppet units in my feet. They generate a chakra shield-like pulse within anything I stomp and utterly crush it, when they are not part of my feet I use them as shields as they can deflect a lot of attacks and break most weapons. If it can smite steel rock is a poor comparison…" the cybernetic voice coming from the Iron Shogun explained as the man once again stomped the ground sending another powerful pulsing shockwave through the rocks turning it into dust and putting tremendous kinetic shock on Oni Mask's body. "If he's hit by it most of his bones should be broken. Capturing someone like him would be pretty cool, I bet no other village has captured a Kirigakure Demon alive yet…" Mugao thought to himself.

All of a sudden an arm burst out of the grinded to dust stone. The Iron Shogun took a couple of steps back in shock. The arm then started digging the dust away and made the body almost swim out of the dust. The Demon couldn't stop shouting as his body stood – he was experiencing immense pain by using bones that were broken and that was pretty much all of them.

"This man can move even with most of his bones broken!? Can nothing stop him!?" one Sunagakure ninja shouted out in fear as he stepped back several steps.

Oni Mask collapsed onto his knees, then hit the ground. His pain ended just as suddenly as it erupted from the ground. Mugao kicked the chest of Iron Shogun out and leaped out from the puppet. He looked at the few of his ninja, one of them closed their eyes and concentrated on the collapsed man. "His chakra is… Weak… He's alive but he's shaving at the edge, if he'd be able to throw a punch at this state I'll eat my own tool pouch" the sensor replied.

Mugao fell onto his back, breathed in and out, he had never believed he'd met an opponent like this. He somehow thought so highly of himself this whole time that he believed that his own power placed Sunagakure among the other villages, after all – how could one best HIM? This fight showed him that the ninja world was vast and that it had all kinds of people. But most of all it made him love his fellow ninja even more. Mugao felt a cold refreshing wave of chakra pass through his body, there was still someone with the ability to heal among the survivors… Good.

"What will we do after this?" the man heard a voice of a friend, "Head straight for the Kage Summit, I want to see the face of this "Shirona" when she sees me bust down the door." Mugao laughed out before clenching to his painful ribs. It'll take an hour or two for this inexperienced medic to heal him at this rate but even the fact that he had someone like that in the first rate made him appreciate his people even more. They trusted him and they assisted him every step of the way – placing their lives on the line when needed, bringing him back from the jaws of death when they were needed, helping him right now. He was the leader of the best village in the world with the kindest and the strongest ninja, no young brat Mizukage has the right to try to take that away from him!

A crushed and grinded in the dust Oni Mask was blown away by a gust of wind, spinning around as the wind carried the dust away and spread it around.

 **UPDATE: The story recently hit 2000 views. I wish to thank everyone who took their time to check the story out. I never really expected for it to receive any attention but it's really awesome to see it being viewed by so many people. Thank you very much, everyone!**


	46. The Modest Supersonic Warrior!

A cold howling breeze picked up a bunch of snowflakes from the ground and mixed them up into the fray of those that were already coming down. The clouds in the sky made the edge of the Land of Snow where the Kumogakure delegation was coming from extremely gloomy and dark. It almost looked like the place was on a completely different time zone, as if it was early morning hours in the Land of Snow where it was actually slightly past the midday. The constant blizzards and snowing that have pelted relentlessly at the faces and the very souls of the travelers have calmed way down compared to the degree they were terrorizing the delegation in the Land of Snow before. Still, the fact that snow was endlessly shaving off the last remnants of the shinobi patience made them happy to finally be close to leaving the accursed desert of endless snow and ice.

It was hard to tell clearly one ninja from another – all of them wore ponchos or hooded cloaks to shield them from both the cold and the snow. One of the hooded figures turned at another – a short feminine figure whose murky blue hair were visible even from the large hood she was wearing. "Raikage-sama, it seems like the worst is over. I still do not understand why we had to travel on foot? Locals make insane profits from caravanning people from one side of the Land of Snow to another. That's pretty much their most profitable profession…"

The woman's fingers emerged from under her poncho and she reached for the veil that protected her face from snow bashing into it. With a graceful movement the woman removed it and took in some fresh winter air and sighed. "Unfortunately you chose to accompany this lowly swordswoman to her goal, that you did. The likes of this lowly swordswoman do not deserve to traverse using the aid of caravans, that they don't. Disgraced swordsmen like this lowly one must walk their own cold broken roads with their own bleeding feet, I am very sorry that you had no choice but to follow me on that journey, that you did." Samaya Imasu was a very attractive young woman, possibly the youngest of all the Raikage and maybe even all Kage in general.

"I still don't quite understand what is so lowly about you, my lady, you are a great hero who was chosen by our people to lead after you took out a truly disgraced and lowly Raikage. Truly you should have more faith in yourself…" the cloaked bodyguard shrugged still looking curiously at Imasu. The woman was only the Raikage for over three months and she already made vast improvements to the way that the previous Raikage ruled. The Fourth Raikage – Afolabi Kimya was a promising leader. The boy was a ninja who basically raced through the ranks and entered the Kumogakure Spec Ops by the time he reached fifteen years of age. However when he was given absolute power he sort of caved in on the pressure and constantly abused his power, Afolabi constantly disappeared from the meetings and Summits only to be found ordering his villagers and entertainers around to "dance" for him or "give him all the food" off of their stalls. He was a boy that had far too much power and thought himself above everyone else because of it. For that reason when he discredited Kumogakure during the greatest Summit of all in recent times, after a blunder that nearly cost the peace of the entire Shinobi World and the unique relationship between Kumo and Land of Snow, Imasu herself drove her blade through the boy's heart.

Many people still felt like Imasu was a very controversial figure to be placed in the big chair but she was the best candidate. Afolabi almost cost the Country their peace openly offending every other Kage in the Summit and he played a dangerous game by outright demanding the friendly objects of peaceful offerings that Kumogakure and Land of Snow exchanged for generations as part of their numerous gentlemen agreements. Behavior like that could've cost far too much, the moment when Mizukage stood up to declare war Imasu plunged her blade through the boy's heart and fell to the ground begging the tyrant of the Mist to reconsider. It was only through sheer luck that blood of Afolabi pleased the tyrannical Daikon and a war was avoided… After that followed multiple years of trying to find the right candidate, while Imasu did the right thing ultimately in the eyes of the world she was very affected by the fact that she betrayed the man she swore to protect by killing him from behind. Her personality would've never allowed herself to become the next Raikage and it took long years of convincing for it to happen. So far the woman had been performing exceptionally well.

"Don't even bother… It's said that Lady Imasu has been raised and trained by Haoru-san of the Iron Country samurai – one of the swordsmen who wield the impossible God Sword jutsu. It is said that the man's training was so rough on the little girl that she grew up into the woman she is today… Just go with it." A man from the side spoke out loud, even Raikage herself heard it and she just giggled to her palm before gently rubbing her hands at each other to warm them up a bit.

"True… Master Haoru was a rather strict man but one has to be strict to educate a lowly loser like this one, that one does." Imasu replied looking at her men that surrounded her shielding the woman with their bodies just in case something went wrong.

Expected by no one white figures burst from the hiding of snow that perfectly concealed their white cloaks, men tossed a flock of kunai at every figure in the delegation which only had about fifty men plus the Raikage herself. Some of the men made it in time to react, some only blinked witnessing the kunai pop right before their faces before the assumed end. A couple of them didn't even notice the attack to begin with but this did not speak of their inexperience – all of these were most trusted men and some of Kumogakure's strongest ninja. If anything it spoke to the credit of the swift and stealthy Kirigakure Demons. They dove out of their holes and fired with pinpoint precision all at the same time – it was a perfect ambush, the infamous Blitzkrieg Assassination plan.

A loud chain of clangs echoed through the fields, then a sound of flapping poncho and light footsteps reaching the ground reached everyone's ears.

"My my… What a lowly failure, that I am…" Raikage spoke up spinning multiple kunai at her fingertips right in front of her men. "This lowly self only managed to pin some of the kunai and had to deflect the others, that she did… To think that this one had a whole second to react, that she had… Master Haoru would hit this lowly swordswoman's head into a tree stump and stomp it a couple of times, that he would." Imasu mumbled out in a tone only intelligible to herself and couple of men close to her. A younger ninja shook so hard in her shoes that her cloak slipped off of her shoulders.

"She caught most of the kunai and deflected all of the others using just her bare hands… I didn't even see her move!" the youngling kept shaking. Another Kumogakure jounin close to her laughed out and gave the young woman a thumb up.

"Never worked with Raikage-sama? This is her not even being serious… I don't know who these guys are but they are in a world of trouble." the man couldn't hide his own excitement. It was almost like he desired to see Raikage fight because it was a sight to behold.

The white cloaked and white masked assassins pulled out their kunai and took an offensive stance. "Fifth Raikage – Samaya Imasu, by the orders of Mizukage Shirona-sama you are to be executed. You may choose to surrender and have your men be spared if they swear loyalty to Shirona-sama – the soon to be Ninja Empress." One of the Demon's spoke up in a cybernetic altered voice which was supposed to further dehumanize the human weapons. The Raikage took several graceful steps forward and pulled her blade out showing her sheathed katana to her enemies by lifting her hand holding it to the eye level.

"There it is, Raikage's true strength!" one of the Kumogakure ninja shook with excitement and tried his best to keep his eyes on his idol, he knew it'd be to no avail – no one could ever see Imasu move, it was said by drunk story weavers that even Haoru blocked her attacks only by predicting them and not actually seeing them coming. Her speed surpassed even the eyes of world's strongest swordsmen. She was the pride of ninja – a kunoichi trained by samurai who surpassed her mentors even though her pride and ambition still needed work. At times it appeared like Imasu couldn't fathom her own strength herself.

Suddenly the woman plunged to the ground dropping her sword in front of her and pounding her head to the snow. "This lowly one surrenders, this one knows the Fourth Raikage had offended Kirigakure and if this lousy loser's life is the price we must pay for peace this one shall gladly surrender it but spare my men, that please do!" the woman kept bashing her head at the snow and ice beneath so strong that blood broke through and covered her lovely face. Ashamed and blushed her guard walked up to her and forcefully put Imaya on her legs and pointed at the assassins

"They're not here for that, Lady Raikage! They are here because Mizukage Daikon was succeeded by some other crazy tyrant! Please defeat them and let us move on to the Summit, Raikage-sama, we're already late because you decided to walk the whole time!" the shinobi pleaded, however as their attention turned to Imaya's blade it was no longer there, the back rows of the Demons were already passing it around. All of a sudden the Demons just leaped forward dashing towards the Raikage and her men. The Kumogakure ninja engaged the Demons and a violent clash erupted. Kumogakure was known for the strongest military in the ninja world but they were severely outnumbered in there. Even if the Kumogakure ninja were all experienced warriors fighting bunch of assassins on a battlefield of warriors, even if a single Kumo jounin surpassed a single Demon in sheer fighting prowess it did not matter having the difference of numbers in mind as none of the Kumo jounin had yet reached the stage where mere numbers didn't matter.

"Keep the sword away from the Raikage – she is a famed swordswoman so she must not get her blade!" the altered voices of the Demons spread throughout the bloody battlefield as the sword was passed backwards again and again.

"I see… So that is your plan then…" Imaya jumped around in place a couple of times as her katana was once again in her hands despite her not even appearing to have moved at all.

The Demons were absolutely stunned and overwhelmed by the woman's speed, "H-How fast… Is she?" one Demon stuttered before being cut down with a powerful gash opening up on his chest. Then another. All of this happened while the Raikage was absolutely invisible, this time it didn't look like she was standing still – she simply disappeared momentarily before a single Demon was effortlessly cut down and colored the snow with their blood.

"All Demons, focus on the Raikage, at this rate she'll pick us off in seconds!" a Demon commanded as all of the men started retreating from their murderous rampage slaughtering the Kumogakure men and all lunged at the Raikage at the same time. A powerful shockwave erupted as a deafening sound of steel clashing took the hearing away from every ninja on the field. Most of the Demons were shouting into their speakers asking what had happened but none of them could hear it. After a brief moment and more cloaked Demons joining the ranks of the beaten down on the snow with a strong beeping noise everyone's hearing returned.

"Was that some sort of a jutsu?!" a shinobi asked his comrade who looked at the cerulean haired swordswoman in a poncho and shook his head.

"No… Imaya-sama just clashed with every single Demon who attacked her and blocked the blows of all of them at the same time…" it looked like his friend struggled with believing such a statement but then after being reminded of just how fast the Raikage leaped around the battlefield dispatching of numerous assassins suddenly he found her clashing with each assassin momentarily after another much easier to believe. The assassins once again switched their targets and tried to cut down as many of the Kumogakure men as possible but… Somehow each time they tried to backstab the ninja their blade just hit an invisible wall – the Raikage made it in time to protect every single one of her subordinates in time. It was like she was omni-present and omniscient. It was like when the Raikage moved the time around her stopped.

That being said – this sort of fighting had its toll on the Raikage as she was seen breathing heavily and barely even lifting her sword off the ground for moments after moving. She barely had the time to counterattack the assassin's advances and only defended her own men. Raikage herself was supporting her men and not taking the center stage which was slowly becoming troublesome as none of her men managed to openly compete with the highly trained elite Demon Corps.

"Damn it, Raikage-sama! Stop protecting us and start cutting those bastards down!" one of the ninja yelled out after seeing what his leader was doing.

"But… This lowly self must protect those that she holds dear, that she does!" Imaya huffed out.

"Then cut all of them down so fast that we don't have time to get hurt!" another jounin challenged the woman, "If you cannot then you are a loser unworthy of your title!" it appeared like the man knew of the woman's personality and played his cards right. It was almost like at the very same moment three streaks of light lit up and set several assassins on fire on their bodies. As the Raikage's figure appeared behind the entire squad of assassins many of them fell down to the ground bleeding and covered with some sort of white fire that was crackling like lightning taking them over. "Light Step Style: Thunder Cat Paw!" Raikage mumbled to herself as she sheathed her sword and turned back seeing a significant majority of the men fall down on the floor covered with glowing white crackling light cuts that burned out like flame without air and left just the cut on the body of the men cut down.

"S-She's moving at lightspeed?" one of the Demon grunted out intimidated by the name of the technique.

"Don't fool around, no ninja can possibly be THAT fast. That is impossible! She's just really damn fast…" another assassin shouted out so most of his comrades could hear.

Imasu smiled, her body flashed almost instantly to the bodies of other Demons and she only appeared for a brief moment before drawing her sword and cutting them down so fast that it was questionable if by the time she appeared she was even there. More and more Demons fell down. "It's true! She does move at lightspeed!" as the ranks of the white cloaked assassins reduced they became visibly more intimidated.

"This? This isn't "Light Step Style", this is just "Quickdraw", this lowly self just runs really fast for a moment, that she does…" Raikage smiled more Demons tried to attack her but only hit an afterimage as the real Raikage barely even had to spend any effort to avoid the attackers' techniques. One by one more Demons fell as Imasu kept showing off what she called her "Quickdraw". Then suddenly she stopped.

"You see, this one trained with Master Haoru her entire life and only managed to master "The Three Steps", that she did. Step one is – Quickdraw Step, that it is." Raikage disappeared again appearing before an assassin momentarily before her hand blurred and the assassin fell down, this repeated in rapid succession multiple times as when the assassins tried to counterattack the woman simply wasn't there anymore. Then the Raikage reappeared where she stood when she explained her First Step.

"When this lowly swordswoman uses the Quickdraw Step, she moves so fast that while most trained ninja can follow her movement no body with some special technique can respond in time, that they cannot. In other words, you see this one but cannot respond. Then, there is Third Step, strangely enough while this one learned last, it is less useful than Second Step – Sound Step, that it is"

After the woman finished her speech the Demons weren't about to take the woman's assault, they quickly formed into a wall and made handseals in fast coordinated fashion "Water Style: Water Dragon Jutsu!" all of them shouted out in synchronized fashion sending countless dragon shaped waves of water towards where the Raikage was. The projectiles slammed into the spot completely decimating it and drilling through. All of a sudden the water that was made by the technique froze almost instantly. The assassins believing in their success just stood there and continued to wait to see Raikage's crushed body, their eyes could only feast on an empty decimated block of unsteady ice however.

"At this step as you probably have guessed – this one moves at the speed of light, that she does." A voice reached the Demon Corps as they turned around and it appeared like the embodiments of fear – the Demons were starting to understand fear themselves. Blood freezing screams of pain echoed through the field as numerous assassins fell down on the ground having been cut down in pretty much no time at all.

"It's a very flawed Step, that it is. The way Master Haoru sees it – this lowly loser moves so fast that for a brief moment – time stops, making this one move instantly. However when someone is as lowly as me and moves so fast, they are affected by very large increase of their own body mass which I have to compensate for by spending monstrous amount of chakra to keep my body moving. Also... I just like Second Step better, that I do." The woman kept talking, explaining her entire skillset to bunch of dead men, or at least so the Demons had thought. Imasu was not a woman who cared too greatly of the secret of her ability, she had no problem just telling people how it worked.

"Why! Why would you tell us all this!?" a Demon shouted out angrily, at this point he felt like a cornered animal who was ready to do something stupid because of how hopeless his situation was. Imasu smiled.

"It is simple, this lowly swordswoman has no problem about letting people know of her ability, that she does not. This one feels so miserable for killing one she swore to protect that this one deserves death, please! This one wishes you to challenge me and kill me so this one can die in peace and be redeemed of what this one did, that she does!" Raikage bowed her head slightly as her subordinates started yelling at her that this was not the time for that sort of sentiment.

"Flee!" the Demon grunted out angrily "We did not expect Raikage to be this powerful, if we keep fighting here we'll just die needlessly and if we join Mizukage-sama we can assist her in bringing this woman down!" the man ordered as the squad of Demons started to slowly retreat. Imasu took a Battojutsu stance and dashed forward. "Sound Step Style: Supersonic Draw!" she uttered under her own nose.

A powerful round burst of air roared and exploded violently sending the snow, ice and several trees forward at immense speed and grinding them into dust as the woman's impressive charge and drawing of her blade broke the sound barrier wiping not only the remainder of the Demon Corps out but also decimating the battlefield. Imasu breathed out heavily as she sheathed her blade. "W-What… The…" one Demon was still breathing and talking but it came out of immense effort and willpower. The cerulean haired beauty turned at the man.

"This is the Second Step – Sound Step, that it is!" Imasu smiled.

"She… Moved… At the speed of sound as if it was nothing!" a Kumogakure ninja shouted out in disbelief, another ninja shook his head.

"No. Her body only moved at half the speed of sound, she then suddenly stopped and transferred her force into her dominant drawing hand. It was the speed of her drawing the blade that broke the sound barrier which she further enhanced using chakra – she used a natural occurrence and kicked it up to a different level. It's easy to see why Raikage-sama favors this step – it makes her move much slower but it annihilates everything in her way, she doesn't even have to cut anyone, it's just the sound barrier being busted that crushes everyone close to her. That is the scary woman that is Amaya Imasu, the Fifth Raikage!"

Further away a blond man admired the destruction from afar. He reached for the blade on his back – the Executioner blade and looked at it. "Yes… This woman will do fine, she's just right to challenge us, under this kind of pressure we shall excel!" the man shouted out in excitement. Another Sannin was about to challenge a Kage!

 **Yo! It's Captain Claymore again, I'm sorry to inform you guys but it is quite likely that once September starts the rate at which new chapters are published will go down to one in three days. On one hand, I'd love to give you a new chapter every day, on the other I suppose it'll help people catch up faster as daily chapters might be tough to keep up with.**

 **So sorry to those that will hate it and your welcome to those that will love it!**

 **Much love 3**


	47. Imasu's Pinch? Silent Killing Unleashed

The Fifth Raikage looked around examining the losses. Having the might and numbers of the attacking force in mind they were few, there were several casualties and multiple more injured but the injured ones were being taken care of. From the process of healing it appeared that the medical ninja had started treatment well during the battle - their trust for their Lady Raikage was that great that they were willing to leave their backs exposed. Imasu drew her katana and drove it to the ground kneeling by it as it tore through into the snow and ice. Wet and cold chills passed down the woman's body as the water soaked through her trousers and her poncho.

"This lowly swordswoman is sorry for all the casualties, that she is!" Imasu shouted out. Her heart was quite literally eating itself over every life lost. She was trained by some of the world's most potent masters and there she was letting someone die. That was unacceptable, how could these people even tolerate a woman like her as their leader was a complete mystery for the Raikage. A Kumogakure ninja stood up and walked up to the kneeling woman and patted her on the shoulder, "We'll forgive you this but just this once, now get up and do your job, Raikage-sama!" he gently replied. The man knew well that this woman needed to be spoken with differently, she always degraded herself and needed to be berated even more to get anything done. Such was the trauma on her feeble mind that training with Haoru - one of the four swordsmen wielding the God Sword techniques forged. A lifetime of traumatic experiences was not easily broken, still, seeing how she was the Raikage even as one handled Imasu the way she needed to be handled she still had to be respected which constantly made insults sound rather weird.

"Water Style: Water Trinity Jutsu!" a loud and low pitched strong male voice reached everyone's ears. Those that had enough time to look up and notice a bulky male in the sky falling down with his hands raised and a gigantic sphere of water above his head would've seen one of the three Kirigakure Sannin - Wakashi Moya also known as "Executioner of the Clouds". The man was called that because of his strong lower body and his style of combat which involved high and powerful leaps, acrobatic flips and having his gigantic Executioner's Sword in mind - he always cut people down from high above. The man was a handsome and well-built one - his body perfectly suited his great blade and he was a bit taller than the average individual which helped his muscle even up throughout his body. He had wild blonde hair and wore strange ragged clothes that gave him that certain "bad boy" vibe that most women loved, still, only the dumber and inexperienced ladies messed with this man when they saw him at the bar due to his wild reputation.

As the water sphere slammed into the area it exploded into countless bursting streams of water that soon formed crashing waves and flushed every tree and everything that wasn't deeply rooted into the ground. After the destruction ended the entire battlefield was covered with an even thicker surface of ice once again, this one by far surpassed the previous one that covered the ground due to the collective Water Dragon jutsu hitting the field. Strangely enough not a single person was hurt. All of them were tossed down rather rudely onto a higher hill where the destruction was less severe. It seemed that even the impossibly fast Raikage had trouble this time - while she didn't leave anyone behind she got her poncho damaged, the people were scattered around suggesting extreme haste and she was not even able to stand tall and was on her knees breathing heavily in front of the attacker.

"Samaya Imasu, I am the Kirigakure Sannin - Wakashi Moya and I intend to destroy you!" the man spoke with serious eyes but his lips couldn't help but twist slightly suggesting that the man was a bit excited.

"Is it because of this woman's - Shirona's orders? May this one perhaps at least know what this one had done to her to deserve her hatred? This one would like to know if there is something this one could do to perhaps fix that, that she would." Imasu asked before she finally broke through the fatigue and stood up clenching the handle of her katana and taking a fighting stance preparing to fight this man.

"Initially my orders were to kill you but even Shirona-sama seemed to have miscalculated your abilities. None of our soldiers even came remotely close to matching you and so the best course of action, having my orders in mind, would've been to rejoin with the Mizukage-sama and assist her in taking you down instead. However after seeing your power, Samaya Imasu... I see that you are an amazing woman and I am one who wanders through the bars every night looking for a good brawl. Not to fight you would be completely dismissing my ideals and that I could not forgive myself, your men can stay calm, I don't give a shit about weaklings like they are, you are all I want and I want you to just focus on me and not bother defending them!" Moya shouted out removing his Executioner's Blade and taking an offensive stance.

"You bastard, you keep talking about pride and wanting to challenge our Raikage but she just fought an entire army of elite Demon assassins!" one of the Kumogakure ninja shouted out waving their fist at the Sannin.

"You retards, those trash weren't the real Demon Corps. Had they been you'd all have been dead, they were normal soldiers dressed as the assassins in order to properly utilize their reputation, to instill fear into your hearts. Kirigakure doesn't throw their Demons around, you know, a single operative is worth more than an entire squad of ordinary ninja." the Executioner replied with a cruel smile.

"This one sees, that she does. Then it is alright. This one shall fight you, that she will!" Imasu responded.

Right as the words left her mouth the Executioner of the Clouds charged forward, swinging his gigantic blade. As fast and powerful as he was, by the time his swing was completed the Raikage was right below him having ducked under his blade and drew her sword cutting deep into the man's flesh and sending him upwards into the air. Just before the man fell down the Raikage sheathed her blade and drew once again from an upwards position slashing in an arc-like motion to crush her opponent's body into the ground. With a powerful shockwave emanating through the ice and the ice shattering making cold water cover the battlefield the Executioner was sent underwater. This must've been some cold shower for the man in both literal and figurative of meanings.

With a wild roar the man burst from the ice and charged at the Raikage kicking off of one of the floating ice platforms - he was incredibly fast for a man wielding the blade of that size. Imasu was completely caught by surprise by how fast the man had recovered and she used some of her speed to try and dodge the attacks but she slipped and fell into the water just barely avoiding getting hit. Moya laughed out and jumped back onto his platform.

"Be careful, Raikage-sama! Your speed might not be suitable for slippy surfaces like solid ice!" he shouted into the depths of cold water. The woman's hand shot out of the water and caught onto the icy platform dragging her tired and freezing body onto the surface. The woman removed her poncho as it slightly got in her way.

"Your skin... What was that when this one cut you? It was like it turned black and spikes emerged from it, that it did?" Imasu asked reminiscing a moment just before when two of her cuts hit the man but his skin hardened making him avoid getting cut and just getting thrown around by the force of the swing.

Moya turned his head to the side and spat out some cold water and then smiled at the Raikage, "That's for you to find out" he added as he leaped at the woman again. This time the Raikage had learned her lesson and didn't use any of her steps, she simply twisted her body sideways to avoid the crashing of the sword and while using the momentum of her movement drew her blade jumping up and cutting all the way from the man's groin through his stomach and deep into his chin. Only sparks flew out as the Kirigakure Sannin's skin once again dyed black and some weird spikes shot out from it, the sheer force of the blow still tossed the man's body up into the air.

The man recovered from the hit faster than the Raikage could follow her attack up as he swung his blade diagonally, the Raikage just barely avoided getting cleaved in half by flipping her body sideways. Then Moya slammed his sword downwards as if he was crushing the woman with a heavy object, while the Raikage's blade lit up with chakra and managed not to break her body was once again sent violently crashing through the ice into the manmade icy lake below. The water started washing the icy platforms away and they started crashing into the shores. The Raikage once again barely dragged her beaten and tired body onto the icy platform and started crawling further where there was no water. She was freezing and was beaten around so hard that it reminded her of the times when she trained with Haoru. While she was fast it didn't matter if she couldn't properly use that speed on ice, while her speed was an amazing way to easily cut people it didn't matter if her cuts didn't count and just slammed into whatever armor that man had on him.

"Step of Sound: Sonic Boom!" the woman shouted out as her voice revealed to anyone that heard it just how hurt and afraid she was. It took her only one strong and impossibly fast step, accelerating from nothing to half the speed of sound and then drawing the blade transferring the force. This technique was different than "Supersonic Draw", it did not involve the breaking of the sound barrier and enhancing that shockwave, instead it focused drawing the sword so fast that the air particles were pushed to fly faster than the speed of sound forming an actual sonic boom projectile - it traveled far and hit hard. The cannon of air shot forward violently tearing through the ice and throwing the water to the side splitting the whole lake and making the water leak outside its borders. Now the whole place again reminded of the desolated wasteland of ice and snow - the water and the solid ice surface was now gone!

Moya covered his body and bent his knees, his body once again dyed black but as the cannon wave of air hit him he realized that it won't help - his armor started cracking, as the air became so think that the armor couldn't even keep him on his feet the man's body was tossed around like a ragdoll and shot into a small hill and bashed into the rock. Any man would've been killed by such brute force, their skin and flesh would've been torn off from their bodies from the intense air pressure and yet... When the smoke and the whirlwinds of snow cleaned up a giant sphere reminding Imasu of a turtle being wrapped in its shell was etched into the icy hill. The woman slowly made her way forward - the strenuous workout from using her technique heated up her muscles a little bit and she could at least act like she's ignoring the effects of the cold.

A large armored tentacle shot out from the armored sphere and bashed into the hill sending the shell forward, in mid-air the shell reformed into the man that made it and that man mercilessly swung his sword - the woman tried to step backwards but the sheer size of the sword left its mark as a giant scratch from her left shoulder to her hip made her white out for a moment. Warm blood shot out from the wound but it somehow felt good, the pain didn't feel nearly as bad as it normally would have but to Imasu... It all just felt nostalgic! The man tried to follow up his attack by swinging again and again but the woman's incredible agility made her body blur even in his eyes as she near effortlessly evaded every strike while looking the man right into his eyes angrily. Her stare secretly made Moya's heart freeze, it couldn't just have been the cold. Such terrifying killing intent!? Where could this woman have learned something like that?! What sort of monstrous power could those eyes restrain?

The man spun around quickly trying to cut the woman in half at her torso but her blade clashed with that of his own! How was this possible?! How could she so easily compensate the immense strength and size difference? "She leaped back and then charged forward converting her speed into force!" the Sannin realized thinking to himself of the woman's secret as his body was pushed back with immense force and his balance broke, the man's body once again turned into a giant rolling black turtle shell and rolled backwards before another tentacle shot out stopping it instantly in its path further from the woman. The shell reformed into a man and he charged to cut her again but then suddenly the man just stopped and dashed back as his heart filled with doubt - he didn't feel like his full potential was behind that strike! This killing intent of Imasu Samaya was inhuman!

"What's the matter? This one was preparing to respond, that she was, you broke this one's rhythm, that you did." Imasu's cold and bland voice reached the man's ears, it wasn't like before, it now reminded him of THAT man. Haoru of the Iron Country samurai who without breaking a sweat fought off all of the Kirigakure Sannin and proceeded to challenge the Mizukage! What could the Raikage have in common with that man? Wait... He said something back then...

 _"I don't know who this young chick is, but she is most certainly not Samaya Imasu, I myself taught the young girl swordsmanship and I know her speech mannerism too well. This person is a fraud which makes me assume the rest of you runts are too..."_

Moya's memory flashed back to the Kage Summit hall. So this woman was taught by him, he was her sensei? How that possible? Didn't samurai hate ninja and refuse to involve themselves into ninja matters? Why would someone like Haoru even teach this woman? Moya had to know that, he sheathed his sword and straightened his body. "Hey! Please reveal to me why Haoru of the Iron Country samurai trained you? I can see a lot of his dark deadly feeling inside of you. You reek of the same sort of killing intent as he did."

Imasu stood into a drawing stance, her cold eyes looked into those of the Kirigakure Sannin's. "Your power brought back the memories of those days to this lowly swordswoman, that they did! I cannot allow those precious days to sink away so I'll be short. This one's parents died during the Second Great Ninja War, this one left the village to find a death of her own and this one would have since she wondered into the Iron Country by accident, that she did. Master Haoru thought that "this one had balls to waltz into this country" and said that "this one's hairy eyelashes amused him" so Master Haoru took this one under his wing as a student, that he did. This one was an experiment if a ninja could be taught the Bushido ways, that she was. This one has told you all there is to tell, that she has, let us finish this so that this one can settle matters with Shirona-sama and crush her hatred for this one. This one wants to fight her the most, that she does, so draw your sword!" Imasu shouted out.

The tone of this Imasu was different, it was not confident but it was loud, while she still spoke with the same tone and had the same strange speech pattern she had a certain shade of imposed aggression in her voice. Moya smiled and weaved multiple handseals. Suddenly a thick mist started to cover the surrounding. "Hidden Mist Jutsu!" the man's voice reached every ear in the surrounding area. The man's figure completely disappeared into the mist, not even his footsteps could have been heard and having the man's speed in mind he could close distance incredibly fast. A wild swing of the blade appeared right in front of Imasu's eyes but it only hit the mist and then the ground making icy rubble shoot out from where she stood moments ago. The Raikage had dodged the stealthy assault even if she had mere moments to react.

"This is the ancient secret art, a style of combat only taught in Kirigakure called "Silent Killing". It involves the hidden technique of "Hidden Mist Jutsu" as well as strenuous training to make one's footsteps completely disappear into the mist, you cannot hear me, you cannot see me, you cannot feel me or taste me - as far as your perception is concerned I do not exist until I wish for me to exist!" a voice with only an implied owner and no clear direction as to where it came from echoed through the mist inspiring fear in many hearts.

"But you can't see this one either, that you cannot!" Imasu responded to which only a laughter came as a response. The woman instinctively jumped forward avoiding getting cut in two but a wide cut opened in her back tearing through her leather jacket. It appeared that the woman's reaction allowed her to react and dodge while she was hit - the moment that the opponent's blade touched her skin cutting into it she dashed away drastically reducing the degree of injury. This was impossible not only for ninja, parents never dared even weave stories of such reaction time in their tales but it didn't came easy for the Raikage - she had to stand still and concentrate into her perception completely, center around a single sense of touch and react to the slightest impulse of pain.

"While I do not exist to you, your existence is as clear as if it'd have been mapped out to me: your heartbeats, your breathing, the mist that you disrupt when you move around - a master of "Silent Killing" senses ALL of those things. They manage to focus on the other senses just as you've felt with your skin that my sword was coming from behind. That being said, for how long can you keep yourself from dying, avoiding my blows in the nick of time? Let us see how many times you must be cut before you break!" Moya shouted out, each sentence came from a different place in the mist making Imasu more and more desperate and confused. If she didn't come up with a solution fast she may actually have died in that mist!


	48. Roar of the Three Tails!

The cold winter breeze that was around to deepen the cold and send it seemingly straight into one's soul was no longer around. The nature itself appeared to favor the Silent Killing user by making everything around the battlefield completely calm, not even a single breeze blew their way to assist by dispelling the fog. Imasu however actually preferred the calmer weather – she was soaked right down to her boots in chilling icy water and every breeze only reminded her that she desperately needs to push her muscles to their limits so that the risk of losing her limbs decreased.

"Did you know that one's speed and reaction time decreases when one is freezing? Do you feel it yet? How long do you think it's gonna be until the cold sets in?" Moya taunted the Raikage, the woman tensed her entire body to make the muscles keep the bloodflow going and shouted into the cold winter air. "Shut up and fight, that you must!" Right after loudly exclaiming her anger the woman dashed forward and drew her blade cutting into the fog only to hit absolutely nothing, the only thing that she cut was the mist itself disturbing the air. A loud laughter echoed from the mist.

"This is bad, speed is Raikage-sama's forte, without it she doesn't have much, her body is rather frail for a ninja of her level so if pressed hard she might just go down…" a Kumogakure ninja grunted out preparing a blade.

"Don't" another placed a hand on the shoulder of the other. "This man seems to value his one on one fair matchup, he believes that Raikage-sama can challenge him and he even holds himself back from attacking us so that Raikage-sama focuses on fighting him. If we attack and most likely fail to find him in all that mist… There's no telling what this man will think of, he may start cutting us down, he may feel cheated and just proceed to kill all of us. Let us trust Lady Imasu and stand down until we know that her loss is certain."

The other ninja looked angry that he was calmed down but it was quite apparent that he could see the reasoning behind the man's words and agreed to stand down. The ninja who were moved out of harm's way before and saved many times during the battle against the Kirigakure military force by the Raikage herself decided to place all of their trust in their leader. They knew that she had the means to beat this gust of wind. "What are you waiting for, Raikage-sama!? You're disgracing all of us, step up your lowly swordsmanship at once!" several ninja started hurling insulting cheers but everyone knew that this was the way to inspire their leader.

"This is bad, that it is… I could blow this gust away using the Step of Sound under normal circumstances but my muscles feel stiff from the cold and I'm not sure I can even pull it off…" Imasu thought to herself, suddenly she felt pain in her side, her reaction time and movement speed slowed down, she could no longer avoid strikes while taking minimal damage by moving away when the sword breaks her skin using her Steps. This was different, Raikage drew her blade and tried to push it into the way of the Executioner's blade. While she did take another nasty wound that spilled blood from her back, it also slightly warmed up the area that her blood bathed in. For just a moment Imasu could feel the muscles in her back – this was a chance. The woman dashed forward sheathing her blade and grabbing the handle strongly.

"Quickdraw Step!"

The woman dashed to the place she imagined the Sannin to be right after the strike had concluded, she even saw his figure, his shadow shining through the white mist. Using all of her momentary speed recovery that her own warm blood granted her the woman drew her sword using all of her strength and speed trying to cut the man down. Her body blurred and it would've been impossible for the man to respond even having his own impressive speed and abilities in mind. Useless… Only mist was cut and the smoky gas passed through the woman's katana getting sliced like a piece of paper. Another painful gash, this time in the front of her body – the man's figure was manipulated by the mist. What Imasu saw was just an optical illusion and when she missed her cut the man decided to use all of his power to quickly respond. Injured and breathing heavily Imasu staggered back, the woman moaned in pain and fell onto her knees with only her sword driven into snow holding her frame from falling down.

The young woman desperately clung to the gash that spat out more blood all over her body, her vision was starting to blur but… For this moment she felt warmer than ever before, she had only a couple of seconds before her blood cooled down and started feeling just as freezing as the air around her. She had to utilize it, she had no time to bleed out down on her knees while this man cut her down. Master Haoru would have never accepted such a disgraceful end for his only student. Imasu's leg shot forward, breaking through the snow and ice in sheer force and speed of her step, the woman's brave and powerful voice cut through the mist and reached even the ninja cheering on her from the sidelines.

"Sound Step Style: Supersonic Draw!"

A powerful shockwave blasted through the fog, like a much tinier scaled planetary bubble with lightning crackling all over it as it burst. A grunting shout followed right after the sound barrier was shattered and electrified as a male figure flew out of the mist and slammed into another icy hill busting it down and equaling it to the ground, then flying through multiple other hills. The Raikage sheathed her sword and breathed out, she looked at the man and tried to determine just how far he had been tossed away, she looked back at her comrades.

"This lowly one… Needs help… That she does…" she mumbled out and then fell on her knees, then face into the snow. Multiple medical ninja rushed to the young woman and started treating the cuts on her body. She had lost a lot of blood and had quite nasty injuries.

"Wow… Those wounds aren't even… What are those other scars!? They're horrible!" a medical ninja shouted as his colleague silenced him

"Focus, we may not have much time until that man recovers! The sensor said she could still sense his chakra!" she yelled out.

"Yes, ma'am." The younger medical ninja nodded and his glow intensified. "We need to do something about her hypothermia."

"Please do not bother, that you don't" Raikage grunted out through pain, "This one channeled Lightning Release chakra into that last technique, the sheer intensity of that technique will have to keep this one going for a while, that it will. This one plans to finish it soon before the cold kicks in, that she does. Please be fast and then move away from danger, that please do!" the woman ordered, no, her tone sounded more like a request than an order. Samaya Imasu's ordering tone still needed work. Loud footsteps through cracking ice alerted the medical squad of the Sannin making his way back to the battlefield, each of them reported when they finished their work and bolted before the fight reignited again.

The woman stood up and sheathed her blade, she was far from being completely patched up, this was just the essential field medical work that was needed so that she did not die in the middle of the battle. Imasu had already started to feel her life slowly fading away after that last charge, after her training days with Haoru she had never used so many of her "Steps" in such rapid and constant succession. She was really exhausting herself here, just how much more her body had was unknown. The Raikage pressed harder a black round pill in her hand and tossed it into her mouth chewing it quickly, the bitter and pepper-like taste made her frown but she felt some of her chakra bumping up. The medical ninja used these food pills, apparently a body never used all of the chakra it potentially could, some was still left over in one's system but it was essentially useless. With a little push it could have been expelled to temporarily boost one's chakra reserves. This pill that one of the medical ninja slipped into her palm was a life saver, she could now use her "Steps" several more times and be confident that she won't pass out.

"I see, you're using emergency tactics, medical ninja and food pills…" Moya noted swinging his giant Executioner's blade around his head and placing it on his shoulder.

"You've used help of another this whole fight, this one did nothing that dishonored her, that she did not!" the woman responded by standing in an offensive battojutsu stance.

A loud almost manic laughter echoed through the icy ruined battlefield. "I see, so you've figured me out, huh? Perhaps I shouldn't hold it back in that case?"

Imasu's hand shot forward, her eyes were filled with panic fear, "You fool, stop, that you must! You'll kill everyone, that you will!" she yelled out at Moya who just laughed out.

"Don't worry, I'm not that stupid, although if you kill me you do know what'll happen, right? Even if you knock me unconscious… That thing starts acting up on its own, I swear to God…" Moya laughed out again. He seemed to enjoy the fact that the swordswoman had figured out what he had inside of his body this entire time.

"That is good for this one, that it is. After this one killed the Young Lord this one doesn't like killing all that much, that she does not. This one will just have to take the risk and knock you out, that she will!" Raikage shouted out as she charged forward. "Quickdraw Step!" she chanted out as her sword clashed with that of Moya's but her sheer speed that transferred into the katana at the point of impact made a powerful shockwave that pushed the gigantic blade back, unable to keep its weight the Sannin had to let go of it as his own body slammed into the blunt side of his Executioner's Blade.

"Light Step Style: Instant Murder!" Imasu shouted out as time itself froze for a moment. Moya had nowhere to go – his back was against his blade that was etched into ice and he was open for striking. After just a moment of frozen time the man just coughed up as seven deep gashes opened on his body, his eyes rolled back and the force of Imasu's seven light fast battojutsu slashes, that all happened in an instant while to everyone else the time appeared to have frozen still, sent the Sannin crashing through his own blade that got cut in two. As the man's body lifelessly hit the snow the steel of the blade clung together and repaired his blade.

"S-She… Killed the Sannin…" Kumogakure ninja started mumbling around as Imasu sheathed her sword. "No! Lady Raikage only kills when there is no other choice, I don't really know what they were talking about previously but she clearly didn't want to kill him, she struck all non-vital areas but she still knocked the man out…" another Kumogakure ninja replied as he kept his eyes peeled and watching the battlefield since he himself still could not believe in what was happening.

All of a sudden crimson bubbling chakra started erupting from the man's body, the man's fingers elongated and his skin started darkening, spikes started growing in random spots of his body – the Three Tails inside of him was starting to take control of the man's unconscious body!

"So you decided to come, that you did…" Imasu sighed as she prepared to attempt to fight off the awakened Jinchuuriki who was completely taken over by his beast. "The Three Tailed Turtle... Come." she finished her taunt as the man's long fingers started clawing at his own stomach tearing his leathery outfit apart and leaving the man topless. The red chakra cloak formed into the shape of a round sphere that was surrounded by tentacles, it appeared that despite using partial transformation in a midst of battle this man had not yet mastered his relationship with the beast and after his defeat the beast only awakened halfway.

"This is… An awakened Jinchuuriki!" everyone started panicking and everyone started looking for safe spots, only few remained where they stood and continued to observe the battle below – against a man carrying a Tailed Beast inside of him there was no safe place to hide oneself in. The man roared loudly into the air with a demonic and beastly voice as tight aerial shockwaves ruptured the ice and made the Raikage slide and stumble back shocked by the sheer pressure of the air around the awakened Jinchuuriki. The beast's lifeless white eyes looked at the woman in front of him and… It disappeared.

Within less than a second the Jinchuuriki reappeared right in front of Raikage's face clashing its chakra tentacle with her blade. Had the Raikage not covered her blade with thick and controlled stream of chakra with every cut her katana would've shattered without any contest. This chakra was immense! The awakened cloaked Jinchuuriki disappeared again, with a loud roar it appeared right behind the woman making a giant aerial shockwave that combined the force of its movement after instantly stopping and the force of its roar sending the woman flying. Suddenly the chakra tentacle flew right at Imasu, with a draw of her blade the woman deflected it and pushed it to the side. Then the tentacle hit again, and again, more and more of chakra appendages started erupting from the Jinchuuriki's cloak as they continued to try and break the Raikage's guard and overwhelm her with these intense blasts that started to approach the speed and intensity of an automated weapon.

The woman's hands blurred as well, she was deflecting each and every blow and doing so successfully, skipping none of them because skipping even one may have meant death. The cloaked enemy tired itself out just as suddenly as it exploded into its rampage and the barrage of chakra tentacles stopped, Raikage's body landed on the ice and her hands instantly dropped the blade and weighed her body down. The woman was breathing heavily. The beast roared loudly into the air, now the Raikage's figure completely vanished into thin air and reappeared several meters further from the Jinchuuriki. The woman sheathed her naked blade and turned around, "Light Step Style: Lightray" she chanted right at the same time as the Jinchuuriki's cloak lit up with a powerful shockwave and blood shot out from the Jinchuuriki's body and the entire body got sent down.

It took the beast a couple of moments to stand up and after it did the Raikage witnessed that the giant cut mark that she left on the man's stomach was completely healed up. The healing looked strange, it appeared like the man's injury got burned up as his skin tore off and it looked like it got healed with heat of some sort since the edges of the wound looked burnt up. The cloaked monster roared loud into the air and started thrusting its tentacles once more at the same speed as it did before, now as the tentacles passed through the ground they left awesome craters and completely demolished the icy hills that they hit, however with a flash of bright light the woman avoided each strike, it seemed like the beast was only cutting at an illusion, a figure that burst into blinding light after getting struck. Not a single tentacle once again touched the Raikage. The woman's figure appeared in the air, the beast cocked its hand backwards to crush the woman with another chakra tentacle.

"Light Step Style: Lightray Crash!" the woman's voice shouted out as her body was already behind the monster as another injury lit up and spat out more blood, the force of the impact of the blade passing through was so intense that it not only cut through the chakra cloak and opened a giant gash but also turned the body of the awakened Jinchuuriki around, the beast raised two tentacles and their chakra conjoined together forming a giant mace-like structure of crimson chakra that hit the ground, still it only crushed ice sending shards of ice around but the woman was too fast for the enraged and mindless beast to even land a blow on.

"Light Step Style: Lightray Flicker!" another sword technique came at the Jinchuuriki as the Raikage's body flashed through it flying incredibly low and almost touching the snow on the ground, the intense speed of her movement sent the snow to the sides as the woman dashed through leaving a giant wound in the back of both of the Jinchuuriki's legs. The sheer power of the fast movement also made the beast lift up into the air and spin fast in place. Imasu's body appeared right in front of it in an instant, "Quickdraw!" she chanted again by drawing her blade and crushing the Jinchuuriki's body right back into the snow. The beast only roared out a pitiful cough of pain as blood shot from its mouth and its opened wounds.

The crimson chakra cloak withdrew inside of the Jinchuuriki's body, that must've been all of the power that the Three Tails would bother to lend him in the man's weakened state. Imasu sighed and sheathed her blade collapsing on her back, "That food pill saved my life…" she thought to herself as medical ninja once again flocked around her and started healing her up.

"This one must have words with this Lady Shirona, that she does!" Imasu spoke with a painful tone, several younger ninja laughed out. The incredible strength of this woman prevented many casualties and only several ninja died while facing an entire squad of Kirigakure military. Such outcome was nothing short of miraculous and the amazing skills of this woman were to thank for this miracle!


	49. Kirigakure Military Crushed!

Powerful and confident steps tore through the overgrown parts of the Kusagakure forests. Men and women of Iwagakure were quite firm, strict and always to the point. Usually they took no luxury of enjoying their surrounding especially now that the surrounding was so completely different from their home. Iwagakure was a place where winds from the mountains carried rains of small rocks, a rocky country founded in a sweet spot surrounded by mountain ranges that provided natural protection. This ancient strategy of finding a safe place to live in an eye of stormy and sky high mountains worked – even the Lightning Lord found his safe-house in the surroundings of the Inari mountain range in the Lightning Country desert.

The lands of the Grass village were completely overgrown, once in a while the thick and endless forests ended but only to reveal a giant ravine. For a first time traveler the entire landscape would've probably started to remind more of "land of ravines" or "land of bridges" as grass was a rather unimpressive detail to make a name out of. The dense forests that one wouldn't have been wrong to call a jungle were unrivaled by any other country. Still, the bare-chested figure of a middle aged man with overflowing white hair and blood red facial tattoos encouraged his men to walk faster and make wider and more confident steps the more the jungles of Kusagakure resisted. It seemed like no tree branches and no insects even hurt the man or bothered him at the very least. His step remained firm and strong no matter for how long he walked.

That would've been the man's downfall as with one loud slurping and breaking sound he stepped into some strange stony construction built from rotten wood. The Kaguya man curiously stared at the round hive that he had stepped into as his men lost all of their cool.

"Oh no, run, Tsuchikage-sama! These are the infamous Kusagakure killer hornets!" the men started shouting as swarms of the insects covered the already brief patches of visible sky and made the entire forest area black. Their buzzing sounded almost like some sort of intricate machinery working at full power. These were the killer insects that a clan of insect using mercenaries had discovered and used to their full extent during the war. While their usage of these hornets was relatively successful the insects were rather uncontrollable even using their own pheromones and were known to rebel and attack even their own masters. Iwagakure had enough trouble in the war as it was, the last thing they needed was a clan of idiots sending hornets that were just as likely to attack their own men as it attacked the enemy… That period was shameful to Iwagakure history as it was back then during the warring days that the country slipped into hardships.

The hornets kept trying to sting the Tsuchikage, thousands of the hand sized insects trying to penetrate his skin. None of them prevailed, with each bite the insect just fell powerless to the ground as their own mandibles gave in and shattered. The man known as the Tsuchikage just arrogantly watched as the problem of the overly aggressive swarm of killer hornets just killed themselves trying to leave a dent in the man's skin. While his clothes did give in and the insects left many holes not even a scratch remained on his skin, it was almost like an autumn leaf had fell on the man's skin – it felt like a tickle if anything else. "Well… I guess the stories of these insects were widely exaggerated, let's go men, it's safe now." the Kaguya turned back at his men who kept staring at the man.

Despite the men having endless opportunities to know the man's seemingly infinite strength and durability they ended up surprised each time. In so many years of this man's presence in the leading position not a single time he felt challenged by anything – the knives of the assassins broke when plunged into his chest, the man won every wrestling tournament of many that he himself organized to improve the bombing Iwagakure economy. At some point those tournaments just ended up being "who can last the longest against the Tsuchikage" sort of competitions as no wanderer from any country managed to challenge the man properly.

Kaguya Yaban seemed to be the perfect leader for the sinking ninja village. During the war Iwagakure initially seemed as sort of a top dog, over the times of peace they have assembled a powerful military and kept sending overpowering numbers of ninja into each battle. They also did not lack skill – their men were toughened by living in the mountains where the air was scarce and rains of rocks were constant. Even the housewives of Iwagakure could've won some of the battles. The problems started when Iwagakure sensed their success – they started overextending and abusing their early successes. The overzealous country sent immense military force to compete for even the least important patches of territory and least strategically important military objects. While Iwagakure scored many successes, the Third Tsuchikage did not put into consideration what toll his extensive military exploits had on the economy.

Iwagakure was a country that lived off of natural resources as the mountains were not the best soil for farming. Their entire income came from what they could find in numerous mines and what they won in the war, also tributes from weaker villages nearby like the Kusagakure where the delegation was now travelling to the Kage Summit. When Iwagakure started to feel arrogant and wanting to feel the thrill of victory in every battle they managed to piss off every country, suddenly Iwagakure troops started appearing even in petty battles against two other villages. The villages started increasing their production of military technology as well and then Iwagakure started struggling to keep up. They also overextended and exhausted their mines draining them empty of iron and other minerals, even more, Iwagakure's infinite supply of gold no longer mattered because no country felt like trading with the arrogant war dog that felt obliged to involve themselves in every battle.

As the war progressed Iwagakure found itself more and more reliant on the gold they mined from their mines, countless accidents made even that exploit increasingly difficult – cave ins happened day after day as with the increasing digging quotas came lack of basic carefulness, endless gas leaks happened choking down every miner in the section, as quotas increased explosives started getting used for mining gold and sadly greedy ninja were not the best handlers of hazardous and subtle tools like explosives. Soon Iwagakure closed off their last veins of gold under endless rocky chambers of gas and vast layers of varied minerals and rocks piled on them. It would've taken too much to dig the obstacles out of the way and Iwagakure lacked both the manpower and resources to fund such a project – the war started choking the village and soon the entire Earth Country down. Not to mention that when devoting one's entire manpower to war not that many miners remained, while Iwagakure treated every loss of countless miners in careless accidents as "nothing to worry about" they started running out of human resources very soon. Luckily the Earth Lord withdrew from the war before the Tsuchikage would employ children and women in the mines. The terms of peace treaties were even crueler, like countless daggers all striking at one's side at once, bleeding the arrogant country out.

After the death of the Third Tsuchikage the current one stepped into his place – a confident young ninja who was too young as a chuunin to be employed in the war so he lead the mines. As the incredibly strong ninja and a great patriot Kaguya Yaban saved many ordinary men from the mines and earned the love and adoration of all: men for being such a great symbol of manliness, women for being such a model beefcake and bringing their husbands home, children for being an icon of heroism and being the man who brought their fathers back home and also worked his oversized muscles off to gather enough gold so that their parents had enough to buy bread for dinner. He was the hero of the people so if the already hated Ninja Council decided to elect another there'd have undoubtedly had been a revolution. Unlike Kumogakure, Iwagakure never had to regret such a hasty decision to choose a young and powerful ninja as the successor of leadership – Kaguya Yaban was the perfect Kage.

"I don't get it… Why didncha cut those buggies down with yer bones, Tsuchikage-sama!?" a chuunin scratched his head making his bandana slip off, the man just cursed and picked it up carelessly slapping it back onto his head.

Yaban started sulking and turned away curling close to the nearby tree. A fellow ninja that knew the Tsuchikage since the mining days punched the back of the chuunin's head making his bandana slip off again and forcing the ninja pick it up and put it on again. "Ye fool, Tsuchikage-sama may be a Kaguya but he doesn't possess the Shikotsumyaku bloodline, that's like… Most of the clan's members that don't, why did you think he had that ability anyways?" the man asked his comrade who just laughed out and scratched the back of his head.

"Oh… Sorry, sorry… I just… You know… Thought since Yaban-sama is the Raikage… And a Kaguya… Well…" the white haired hunk stood up and looked back at his subordinate, he no longer looked that depressed after being reminded that he did not possess the bloodline, he just gestured that the men kept on moving.

"Tsuchikage is a bit depressed about subject, he always felt like he was a loser for not inheriting the bloodline. That's why he worked extra hard, that's why the guys back during the mining days during the Second Great War looked up to him – he had the ancient heritage of the Moon People but he was just the same as you and I and he achieved everything he did not because of some bones shooting outta his body but because he just worked the hardest out of all."

The Tsuchikage looked back angrily and once again encouraged his men to keep on walking. Right after that another ravine opened up – larger than the others before this one. The men couldn't help but sigh as walking over those ancient bridges every time felt like they were gambling with their lives. The men stepped onto the bridge and kept walking – this bridge was also the firmest of all they stepped onto before, probably because it covered the longest ravine so it had to be the greatest and the best in terms of construction. As the men made their way to the halfway of the bridge a loud blast echoed, the ninja looked back to the beginning of the bridge, then to the end and witnessed the most horrific thing – the start and the end of the bridge blew up, with an immense shaking the bridge started plummeting down to the abyssal ravine the end of which was completely invisible from the top.

As the bridge disappeared down into the endless hole, ninja gathered around the each end of the bridge, they wore camouflaging cloaks and Kirigakure headbands and looked down. One of them reached to his ear and contacted someone using his earset, "Please tell Mizukage-sama that it is done – Tsuchikage and his delegation are disposed of! So strange, this was just too easy… Wait a sec." he spoke as a loud rumble alerted the ninja, they looked down into the bottom of the abyss and noticed an unintelligible shadow below that was quickly approaching them. As it quickly dashed through them the men all stumbled backwards, what appeared from the end of the abyssal fall was… The entire bridge that had plummeted down with one man seemingly levitating and holding the bridge with the men from below. "Weightless Boulder Jutsu…" the Tsuchikage spoke as it didn't seem like this bridge at all troubled him, the men all leaped from the bridge to confront their attackers to the other side where the end of the bridge was. As the Iwagakure delegation engaged one half of the military force the Tsuchikage just tossed the entire bridge at the other crushing that entire part and making large chunks of the entire rocky forest to plummet down below. He then turned around and focused his attention on the Kirigakure military.

"Men, scatter! I'll take care of them all." he said as the men all dashed backwards concealing themselves in the forest. The Tsuchikage kicked his body off of the air and dashed forward diving into the entire squad of ninja. One brave Kirigakure shinobi jumped off and decided to punch the Tsuchikage right in the face as he dashed at them seeing how the Kaguya was wide open. As the man's fist collided with the Tsuchikage's face a loud cracking sound made everyone around that area pout in disgust, the man screamed pathetically as he fell to the ground clutching his shattered arm. The Kaguya stomped the ground sending powerful shockwave and making the entire area start slide to the abyss below. Quite a lot of Kirigakure ninja fell to the ground crying out in pain as their leg bones were busted by the impulse that passed through the dirt being transferred into their lower bodies as it passed through. Those ninja all started falling into the abyss below, many others retreated further into the forest.

The Tsuchikage moved incredibly fast dashing through the forest and appearing near several ninja running in pairs and knocking them out just by slamming into them. Then the white haired hero slammed the ground a couple of more times sending shockwaves and opening up fissures that swallowed smaller squads whole and knocked even more ninja down busting their legs. Two powerhouses of the Kirigakure military dashed up to the Kaguya who avoided their punches and then grabbed their arms lifting the men into the air as if they weighed nothing, he then swung them around as he jumped up and drove his knees into both of their backs finishing the men off instantly as they fell lifeless to the ground.

"What incredible strength!" a Tsuchigakure ninja gulped in awe, "So this is the strength that Tsuchikage acquired mining in the great gold mines?" he asked a fellow shinobi who just shook his head.

"What you see here isn't just physical strength. Yaban-sama was not only missing his clan's signature bloodline, he was also very bad at ninjutsu. That did not stop him though, he trained hard and increased his chakra pushing his body and powering his physical state as well." The man began explaining, as he did the Tsuchikage kept flashing through the battlefield knocking out one small squad of Kirigakure ninja after the other without even breaking a sweat just by dashing into them.

"So Tsuchikage-sama is like Chestnut Hanasaku of Konoha then? Has he somehow figured out her secret? After all even if one enhances one's physical attributes by just increasing their chakra level there's a heavy limit to everything, one that uses a jutsu to enhance their physical abilities will always best one that strengthened them naturally by increasing their overall chakra levels, right?" the first one asked still cheering on his Kage who got hit to the face with a katana only for the chakra enhanced blade to shatter into smallest bits. Many more ninja tried to punch and kick Yaban but all of them collapsed to the ground rolling on the floor with broken bones. Even those that became powerful taijutsu specialists by training their chakra and increasing their physical limits to new heights couldn't handle hitting Yaban, leave alone being hit by him.

"No… Yaban-sama realized that this method that is common among taijutsu users will only take him this far. He went against his genes and started busting his body by training the secret Tsuchikage technique of boulder weight manipulation. All the leaders of the village were masters of this technique, all of them brought something new to the mix, Yaban-sama didn't want to become the leader – he just wanted to master the technique because it was in his way. After all, if he mastered what he was born without the ability to use that meant he could also break the known limits of the primitive strength boosting methods… While he did not realize his goals and break the chakra level strength boosting limits, he did raise the Weightless Boulder Technique to new heights. What you see before you is… A man who had combined natural strength and the ability to change an object's mass in mere moments. He can fly by making himself weightless, he can lift a mountain if he wants to by making the mountain weigh nothing and then undo his own technique after tossing it. It is safe to say that Kaguya Yaban became the strongest man alive…"

As the two ninja exchanged their admiration for the Tsuchikage the man just about finished up with the entire squadron of Kirigakure shinobi. The man dashed around the battlefield beating the men up, sending them flying with mere flicks and sometimes restraining his punches and just unleashing flurries of blurring punching combinations onto one man completely overwhelming them. The man's strength was not what was impressive, it was his perfect absolute control over his ability – one moment he could punch as strong as a hammer, the next one he could punch the man so high that he reached the sky and disappeared in the clouds. The Kirigakure ninja started retreating but none of them really stood a chance, Kaguya Yaban was just faster, stronger and in control of the battle the entire time. Had Mizukage Shirona decided to send the entire Kirigakure military at him he'd have likely destroyed it all. And yet still, as completely overwhelming as Kaguya Yaban was… He was holding back and it was evident.

Finally with the final dash close to the last enemy shinobi the Kaguya left the man spinning around from the intense speed that the Tsuchikage used to fly past him. Then the man simply landed from above pounding the man into the head and driving him deep into the Kusagakure soil leaving just a black hole as no one really knew where the shinobi ended up in. The entire Kirigakure military force sent after the Tsuchikage was destroyed! Suddenly a brown and golden flash blurred through the dark thickness of the Kusagakure forests. A man in a brown trenchcoat and shoulderlength golden hair appeared right in front of Kaguya Yaban cocking his hand backwards for a punch.

"I've got you, Tsuchikage bastard!" the man with a black watch cap yelled out enthusiastically thrusting his powerful hand forward aiming right at Tsuchikage's face.


	50. I Can Lift Any Weight

As fist of the mysterious attacked collided with Yaban's forehead a powerful shockwave made the grass bend down and tore leaves off of the trees around, any Iwagakure ninja that were close to the vicinity of the impact were tossed backwards from the sheer force of impact. The others nearby just stood there shocked and overtaken by awe, both feeling threatened by the unexpected appearance and incredible power of this man and also shocked that the Tsuchikage was hit point blank with such an impact. This was no sword or an assassin's knife, this hit would've made a small mountain crumble, it was enough to crush rocks with.

The man who threw the awesome punch just stood there and laughed at himself, his strange cocky facial expression combined with his somewhat rugged and bratty attire and haircut as well as his lazy stubble made the man look like some sort of village drunkard. As the man opened his mouth it still sort of reeked of alcohol but it felt more like an after effect which only made it smell a thousand times worse. Only after a couple of moments did the man's coat finally catch up to his static state and the back end of it finally touched the ground. The blond haired assailant just kept staring at the Tsuchikage waiting for the man to flip over and die from getting his by his fist right at the center of his skull. 

"Well..." suddenly the Tsuchikage spoke up, his tone implied that he was questioning the man's actions, "I keep waiting for you to finish your attack but you're just standing there and laughing like an idiot... Am I to take this is it then?" Yaban asked politely wiping the cocky smile off of the assailant's face as he dashed backwards and cracked his knuckles. 

"Darn it! I thought I had you this time..." the Kirigakure attacked smiled and wiped his nose playfully with his thumb.

"I must say your punch improved in those four years, perhaps now I can attack you without feeling bad. You look like you've toughened up, I'm sure you can take it..." Yaban replied straightening his body up and answering the assailant's cocky stare with a cold one of his own. 

"This will be nothing like back then during my Ninja Tribunal! This time I'll leave you beaten up and bruised in a pool of your own slobber!" the man shouted out thrusting his fist at the Tsuchikage who did not even honor this claim with a reply. 

"Am I missing something? Who is this man?" an Iwagakure ninja asked his colleague who just raised his finger up to his lips and silenced his friend whispering back his answer. 

"This is Namikaze Joki, a Kirigakure Sannin, the only Sannin in the history to have a Ninja Tribunal case against him during his time as a Sannin and the only one to have spent time in prison. Tsuchikage-sama took part in his Tribunal session himself and Joki tried to escape the Tribunal by attacking the Council of Ninja that were judging him, Tsuchikage-sama brutally beat the man down and left him completely broken. Still, for someone to survive being punched and tossed around by Tsuchikage is an impressive feat." 

A black flash blurred as the Tsuchikage lunged forward at his opponent having decreased his weight to make it easier for him to move faster. The man threw a punch only for the Sannin to dodge it completely, then the Tsuchikage followed up with another blurred combination of punches and kicks, each of them packed so much force that even as they missed the air that Yaban's attacks split hit the Sannin's clothes and pushed him backwards, only because of his strong body did the blonde manage to stay on his feet during this attack. Joki never even tried to block a single hit, he knew better than that, must've been experience speaking. 

"You picked up your speed as well old man... Gonna teach me how to do that?" Joki taunted his opponent as he threw another powerful and focused punch. Tsuchikage did not even try to move out of its way and let it just hit his nose. The man's feet dug deep into the dirt as Yaban's body got buried into the soil halfway throwing dirt and tree roots away as rubble. A slight stream of blood ran down Yaban's nose - this man managed to somehow pass through Tsuchikage's impenetrable body. The white haired powerhouse just grinned with half of his lips. 

"It's simple, speed increases your weight - the faster you move the more your body technically weighs, some ninja compensate this by intensifying the flow of their chakra to "armor up" their bodies and protect their bones from being crushed, I just decrease my own weight using the "Lightweight Boulder Technique"." Tsuchikage's legs burst out of the dirt as the man dragged himself out from the ground and landed further away. He still had that confident smile that his opponent had as well, at that early point of their meeting both combatants equally believed in their chances of success. 

"Quid pro quo, could you tell me how exactly you've powered up this much? Last time we "fought" you were just slightly stronger than your usual Jounin and to top it off you had no ninjutsu potential whatsoever. Now you're like a completely different person, I actually felt that punch, then again, I only barely boosted my own weight." Tsuchikage asked. His opponent took off his cap and tossed it aside letting his shoulder-length golden hair flow freely. 

"When you left me I was battered and broken, I had more bones that were grinded to dust than solid ones and that was just from one thrust of your palm. Naturally that was not a good state to be sent to prison in... You've no idea how much I suffered. I was beaten and kicked around many more times in there. I saw the lowest of the low, the worst of the worst and had to get my feet deep into shit to finally kick myself off and start swimming up. You ask me how I managed this? Simple. Kirigakure Correctional Facility is called "The Zone", it has that certain tradition - inmates fight until the warden says he's satisfied. For exchange they lose some time off of their punishments." 

Tsuchikage closed his eyes and turned away, then breathed in heavily and opened his eyes, "Don't they seal your chakra in prisons?" he asked. Joki's fist shot out in front of the man's ripped black shirt. 

"That's right, they do. That's the catch - no one can keep a streak going, the one who loses gets the years that are "shaved off" of the winner. Since no one can use chakra it's just pure fisticuffs where only talent and skill matters." 

"In other words, not a world you would do well in..." Tsuchikage smiled. 

"Yeah, that's right, laugh it up! Then again, you're right. I got my butt kicked over and over again, I got sent into that joint for four years and I ended up accumulating sixteen hundred years in total. I couldn't believe it, I was a shinobi, a Sannin! And there they were, those mercenaries and bandits were constantly kicking my butt... Do you know why? Because they live like that, that's just the way they fight in freedom as well! They're trained to fight ninja using just their bare hands and they can take a ninja without chakra manipulation ability down easily. It's incredible how rusty chakra makes one in hand to hand, who cares if you're a master martial artist if your punch can bust mountains, right? Well in "The Zone" no one can punch through mountains, it took me weeks to learn how to punch a man and not break my own hand." 

Tsuchikage looked around, "That is something that your comrades here could've benefited from, so were you able to master it?" 

Joki nodded "Yeah, after every battle I trained, studied how to fight from my cellmates in exchange for my food, when I won I lifted my weights five hundred times, when I lost I lifted them five thousand times. I became stronger than I have ever been and beat every dog in the house using my own prowess. Then the warden gave me an offer I could not refuse - fight him in exchange for complete freedom, if I lost I would've stayed there forever - become the "Scapegoat". Scapegoats get half of the punishments of every loser, if a loser gets two extra years, he actually gets one while his scapegoat gets one. I would've been the Scapegoat not of one person but of the entire prison... It's basically life sentence with no hope for escape. Warden was actually a ninja, a Special Jounin, he also tried to cheat by bringing weapons into the fight but I busted his face in. Left him for the other inmates to deal with like they deal with all cheaters while I walked out through the gates. I thought that I'd never get work but things changed - Shirona-sama took me in, unlocked my chakra again and made me more powerful than I've ever been, she also returned my position back. All just for killing you... I told her... "Lady, I'd do it for fun."..." 

After Joki finished his story and awkward silence set in. Every Iwagakure ninja looked at him with different eyes - they felt bad for the man. This young man was not a villain, he was a victim of the village that gave birth to him. A baby born in the family of killers and deceivers who was told that killing and deceiving was a way to be successful. A boy who rose through the ranks by killing those that thought similarly to him but were slightly weaker, slower, less intelligent or even a bit less lucky. A ninja who followed every dirty order he was given to the final letter and got in trouble because of it taking the arrow for his village and being the scapegoat of the tyrannical Daikon's reputation. A Sannin who lost his entire lifetime of achievements and was continuously beaten and kicked around by everyone else. A free man who was given a chance to redeem himself and stay relevant in his shithole of a village if he agreed to fight Kaguya Yaban, one of the strongest ninja alive. Namikaze Joki was just a plaything of his superiors, always a scapegoat his entire life... 

"Well, I'm glad it all worked out for you in the end... Anyways, if this is your solution you stand no chance at all, leave and become a Missing Nin or just disappear and return once I kick your Lady out of her seat and reform her village with my own bare hands. Kirigakure is crying the same bloody tears that my own village once shed, if you stand in my way I shall crush you with my full force and flush you aside, the way you are you cannot beat me..." Yaban finally spoke after the long silence and started calmly walking forward. The ground beneath his feet and the light footsteps suggested that he didn't even bump up his weight and just decided to ignore and pass through Joki. 

"DON'T IGNORE ME AGAIN, YABAAAAAN!" Joki shouted out like a lunatic into the sky raising his fists up and tensing his body up, his pupils completely faded and slobber started shooting out from the man's mouth as four years of channeled rage and suffering converted into strength made its release making a powerful crater and pushing the Tsuchikage back with just the force of Joki's chakra bursting from his body. Whoever this man standing against the Tsuchikage was it was no longer a man who listened to reason or could properly evaluate difference in strength, the man jumped forward and threw a fist right into Yaban's face, as hard as the Tsuchikage tensed his jaw his head was still turned to the side but quickly recovered. 

Joki threw a punch after another with each punch making thundering and deafening boom and sending blasts of air from the point of impact but they barely even hurt the Tsuchikage. "You were just a man who brawled your entire life, you just fought everyone all the time and increased your physical strength that way - by increasing your chakra level and becoming strong. Eventually you hit the same limit everyone else hits and you thought that was it, then your chakra was taken away and you felt again what it meant to be weak. You worked hard to regain that power and in the end your power doubled with the power of your suffering adding to that of your success... But Joki-san... MY HARD WORK EXCEEDS YOURS!" Tsuchikage shouted throwing a powerful punch right into the young man's chest and sending him up into the sky crashing through the thick tree branches above. 

Yaban released his weight and jumped up soaring through the sky, as he dashed up to his insane opponent he once again bumped up his weight at the last second before his fist collided with the man's chest sending him further up, then he lightened himself and dashed to the man again, punch from the side sending him soaring forward through the sky. Tsuchikage kept dashing to his helpless opponent and kept punching him sending him flying beyond his vision again and again with every punch Joki screamed and spat out blood - his defenses were destroyed after the first punch thrown. After one dash up to the golden haired rebel Tsuchikage concentrated even more into his fist and dug it deep into the man's back sending him all the way back, right to where he weightlessly dashed through the air and hit the flying by figure of the Sannin with his elbow sending him crashing down into the forest ground shattering it and sending the entire forest platform down into the abyss that ended with a river below. Just barely did the Iwagakure ninja manage to avoid this absolute destruction by dashing through the trees further away than the destruction could reach. 

Yaban breathed out and descended onto the edge of the stable platform. He felt sorry for this man, he was just a puppet of all the right emotions and feelings who was used by the world's craftiest puppet master. The Kaguya had never met this woman, this Shirona but... He already didn't like her at all. He intended to kick her butt and demote her from her position as Mizukage, then reform her village himself. Luckily enough a Kage Summit was already called - a perfect opportunity for this decision and now he will have proof to the other Kage that this needs to be done. 

Joki's mad face appeared again in front of Yaban, a powerful fist hit the Tsuchikage into his chest when the man was unprepared busting some ribs. Luckily enough the man managed to harden up just in time for the following combination. "Kirigakure Taijutsu Style: Jailbreaker!" the man yelled out sending sixteen full powered fists right into Tsuchikage's chest. Yaban lifted off the ground and fell onto the ground again, this was the first time that his men saw their leader get knocked off his feet. Joki's face was bleeding, it was cracked open in multiple places, his chest was torn as well, his coat was torn off and now his injured chest and arms were revealed, his jeans were ripped up from falling down and hitting the rocks as he was going down. His nails were bleeding from climbing all the way back up through solid rock. Yaban stood back on his feet and wiped the blood from his nose and his mouth. 

Yaban charged up to his opponent to finish this, just stop holding back, cease making it easy for his opponent. First punch missed, Joki just leaned out of it and followed it up with a blow of his own that Yaban caught. With a confident smile Yaban crushed the man's fist and pushed his opponent onto his knees. The loud cracking sound of the man's knuckle and splashing blood from his bones emerging from under the skin made the ninja observing the battle clench and turn away from the cruel sight of the battle. Tsuchikage threw another punch at his kneeling opponent but Yaban jumped backwards kicking out of the Kaguya's hold of his fist. Then the golden haired brawler dove forward trying to tackle the Tsuchikage with his shoulder and send him down, the Kaguya remained standing still, the shoulder that dug into his stomach barely even pushed him back. 

"Weightless Boulder Style: Stratosphere Punch!" Kaguya yelled throwing an upwards fist, Joki responded with two handed slam that clashed with the Tsuchikage's fist and was blown backwards from the force of impact. Tsuchikage charged up to his opponent and started punching again and again, shoving his opponent through the soil, the rocky lower layers of dirt, at some point the Kaguya punched his opponent through into the water below and continued to punch sending Joki further and deeper until he hit the bottom, even then the Kaguya continued to punch again and again digging his mad opponent even deeper into the dirt until something hot shot out at which point the Kaguya dashed madly up to his platform. At this point he had widened the ravine several tens of times over its previous state. 

Joki's arm burst through and grabbed onto the edge of the dirty platform and dragged his tired burnt up body that still had leaking masses of hot red mass on his shoulders. The man's chakra burst tossing the heated red mass aside, after this however his defense lowered. It was evident that the man was at his last breaths. Yaban crossed his hands on his chest.

"You've done well to use your chakra to avoid significant injury this far, intensifying your flow to harden your body and all that but to withstand my punches takes a lot more chakra than you can spend. You're just about to bleed dry out of it. Accept the truth, I am the strongest ninja alive, Raikage Imasu is the fastest ninja alive, Kazekage Mugao is the craftiest, Hokage Howoku is the smartest and the best diplomat. We are the Strongest Generation of Ninja and all of us are in our prime. With us training and working as hard as we can you will never catch up."

"Shut uuuup!" Joki yelled out charging up to Yaban and punching him in the face with the punch bouncing off, the man continued to punch again and again until both of his knuckles dyed red and started pulsing with pain and spitting out blood. "Your chakra is at its lowest, your punches no longer bother me, if I hit you you'd probably punch the very atoms out of you. Surrender now, please, return and challenge me again when you grow even stronger. This is over..." the Tsuchikage repeated again. "The man who... Lifted a mountain... My ass..." Joki started spitting out some mad words in a creepy tone and ran away, for a moment there the Tsuchikage thought this was over, the man relaxed and turned back but then he saw... 

Joki leaped over the divide and grabbed hold of the entire forest island that was floating on the ocean below, trying to rip it all out of the water and fling it at the Tsuchikage. The man wanted to prove to Yaban that he could lift something greater than a mountain but... The man's nails started to bleed, the blood vessels in Joki's eyes burst as he desperately tried to lift the island but it didn't even budge, he just ripped chunks of rocks and dirt. It was then that the Tsuchikage realized - this man was manipulated to such extent that he would never stop! He was torturing and injuring himself trying to match to an unmatchable ideal. He wasn't like Yaban, he didn't just work hard, he tossed himself at the hardest challenges hoping to survive them and when he lost he kept killing himself trying to do it again. The Mizukage implanted the belief that this man could win and by doing that with such success she destined this man to suffering and death. 

"Give up!" Yaban yelled out and without waiting for an answer jumped down into the abyss below. The Iwagakure shinobi continued to watch and wait, did the Tsuchikage kill himself? Did he realize that his opponent would never give up until he was dead and wanted to finish this by committing suicide? That was impossible, that was not the kind of man that Tsuchikage was... 

Suddenly Joki shook in his boots, he fell onto the ground and grabbed hold to a barely intact tree. The entire island shot up into the air right in front of the unbelieving eyes of the Iwagakure ninja. 

"I can lift... Any weight... I need to... To help my people... I can make any hardship weigh nothing." 

With those words the Tsuchikage hurled the island to the side having it slam into the abyss of water below upside down. It wouldn't have taken long before the island crushed Joki to the bottom of the ocean. Yaban descended onto the ground and started walking to the Summit again. Everyone knew even someone as tenacious as Joki would never return after having an entire island thrown at them... 

"Are you alright, Tsuchikage-sama?" one ninja asked rushing up closer to his leader. 

"Let's just get to the Summit, there are words I need to have with this new Mizukage..." Yaban replied.


	51. Loop Tightens!

Tanshu, Howoku and Haoru were dashing through numerous halls trying to catch up with the Mizukage who had gained significant distance over them. Each of them had different thoughts on the matter, each of them harboured quite different feelings but were somewhat unified with the desire to stop that woman and while none of them exactly knew what she had planned, having her goals in mind it couldn't have been good. A hall just like countless others flashed through the eyes of the rushing men, they took no time to examine those halls or marvel at their well-preserved beauty having the age of the structure in mind.

Howoku was kept moving just by his desire to eliminate Mizukage Shirona. She was a woman who not only threatened his established status quo of peace between the five villages but also she loved the idea that she did. She was a woman who thought that nations were supposed to be fighting and that such was their natural state as villages training ninja. Howoku had met many people like that, people who thought that the only way for ninja villages to stay relevant was to stay in warring state with all the other villages. Those people had an ounce of truth in their beliefs, ninja were warriors, assassins who should have always stayed ready for combat. Still, these people sentenced many young and unprepared ninja to death, ninja who could've grown up and excelled in their fields. Flowers that had not yet bloomed had no meaning in their wilting.

Tanshu wanted to stop Shirona but he had quite different much more simpler motives. She was a woman who stepped out of line, she dragged all of the other ninja villages by their hair and pissed them off. If she did not bite the dust that meant that any arrogant idiot with followers could do as they pleased. Shirona was a lot like God-Eyes, a figure from his past. A person who had a lot of influence and power that they couldn't really back up, pathetic figures of war who were just icons and had no purpose or right to exist. Even more, she had indirectly hurt his friend who was also a parent of his student's. Tanshu owed it to Mana and her father to stick it to the lady. Also he had to admit, he was a bit worried for the well-being of Misu. He just upped and disappeared in the middle of the Summit, guys like him couldn't have died against just Barrier Corps, what was he doing? Where was he?

To Haoru this was as simple as it ever got – he just had a justification to break lose and kill some ninja and be in the right. The old man never really liked the kind, they acted like they were all that just because they had no moral codes and because the Lords liked them more. Of course Lords would have preferred ninja over samurai, samurai had rules, they had standards and principles. Samurai would've never stricken down a child, an unarmed person or a woman who was not a warrior, they would've never raised their swords against anyone who was not a threat to their Lord. Ninja were beyond all that and Shirona of all people was a living embodiment of that. She was a woman who knew what she wanted and had the nerve to step over everyone else and reach out for it. Warriors had no right to be ambitious, they surrendered their ambition to their Lords after accepting servitude. Haoru just wanted to cut that bitch down. It may have been a brutal and rude way of saying it but that was the kind of man Haoru was – primal and rude but to the point.

Finally they entered the hall where on a platform on the third floor stood their blond, well-endowed nemesis. The woman spread her arms and smiled arrogantly, her face did not twitch nor did it display any emotion or fear. She just merely welcomed them in catching up to her.

"Let's get her talking, catch our breaths before we engage her, survey our surroundings. She lured us into here so she has an ace she is willing to throw down at the last second." Tanshu whispered and the two men to the side nodded.

"We're here, Shirona-san, there's no need to run, there's no need for any more words. We shall settle it all here but before we do I want to know… What did you do it for and was it worth it? You killed many men in preparation for this, you had to piss all of us off to have this Summit called, you played all of us making us think we were in control, you killed even more in this Summit, good men and women and good ninja. Good and loyal ninja you as potential Ninja Empress lost. So I ask you, Shirona, was it worth it?" Howoku started his attempt to get Shirona talking. The woman crossed her arms around her chest.

"Was it worth it…?" as she opened her mouth to speak Haoru was already up in her face with a wide smile that almost looked like it was about to tear his face apart. He thrusted his sword forward only for it to freeze up and slam into a barrier halfway. Haoru's eyes twitched in surprise as a large man appeared in front of him and drove his palm right into Haoru, a palm that managed to cover the entire body of the samurai and send him crashing back into the mossy rock below. Four ninja stood nearby Shirona, four ninja with Kirigakure headbands and vests. The Mizukage laughed out and spread her arms wide again as if showing her men off.

"These are the four currently active Jounin of Kirigakure, the strongest I must add. Once you die here or beat them while barely breathing you can advance, I shall be waiting." Shirona spoke with an arrogant tone and turned around, Howoku yelled out in frustration.

"Damn it, Shirona! How many people will have to fight and spill their blood for you? How many lives will we have to end? Just come and fight us now yourself! Spare yourself and your men the trouble!" he shouted out. Tanshu looked at his friend and he started to feel a bit worried. Howoku was getting emotional, he was ready to break loose and wasn't completely objective in this situation. He was more likely to make a mistake – overuse his Starlight release and exhaust himself, kill people he didn't have to kill or the other way around – leave alive and kicking people that were indoctrinated too deeply. Shirona just turned her head back and glanced at the Hokage for just a second, just enough to reply and then left as the rocky door slammed behind her.

"Make no mistake, Howoku, my game is to kill you and I will use as many loyal ninja as it takes to kill you or wear you out and then I'll finish you myself."

"SHIRONA!" Howoku yelled out with his powerful enraged voice penetrating the rocky door and briefly making the Mizukage glance at the door and shiver. The woman had to double check that it closed and that she was alone in the corridor. With a loud clacking of her sandals the blonde quickly made her way along the corridor as a blue shining oni mask appeared out of nowhere and the blue on the mask lit up. The mask was busted up, cracked and dirtied. From the looks of it the Sunagakure front didn't go too well.

"I'm sorry, Mizukage-sama, Kazekage beat through our troops and beat me. I managed to give him the slip though at the last moment using Demon Body Replacement Jutsu." The man reported, small torrents of blood flooded from the location of the mask and dripping noises suggested that he just barely escaped with his life and yet he was reporting it like it was just another day on the watch. Shirona's face disappeared in her wild blond hair, the woman was thinking, Kazekage's survival was unexpected and very troublesome. Based on her information Mugao was the weakest of the Kage who was famous not for his strength but his craftiness, if he survived it was likely that the others would too.

"I'd appreciate if you did not kill me for my failure. I believe I can still be of use." Oni Mask added as the emotional weight of the operation on the woman's shoulders became apparent.

"Just because I am Daikon's successor does not mean I use his idiotic methods. I am glad that you survived, please return to the village and recover, before that, however I'd like to know a couple of things: who did you use as your replacement, what state is the Kazekage in, have you any news from the other battlefields, how long until Kazekage delegation gets here?" she replied with a shaking tone. This was the first sign of things not going as planned and having the grandeur of the operation it was of no surprise. Oni Mask would hate it to be in this woman's shoes, she now had the crosshairs of the entire world aimed at her head after the brave actions she pulled off and all with "patriotism" in mind. Oni Mask himself did not believe in those pathetic things, that was why he was still alive and he suspected that these feelings for her village may just end up being Shirona's downfall.

"My substitute is of no importance, just a victim on the battlefield though I believe they may be onto me at the moment. I placed a Transformation Seal on him, I didn't have too much chakra to use so it lasted about an hour. I moved using a Transportation Jutsu used by someone from Barrier Corps here who got my message, I'd say the delegation is about an hour and a bit away from here. So far I've got no messages from the other Sannin, they are all likely either still fighting or all dead. Kazekage is injured and exhausted, the military force managed to kill off majority of his men and injure him, I put even more work on him. If you fought him it'd take you approximately four to six minutes to finish the job. He uses Puppetry techniques on his scythe and then has some sort of "puppet armor", I poked it for weak spots, the only ones I could find are around the shoulders, still, it'd be best to time it out as using that armor costs Mugao chakra. That is all I discovered." Oni Mask concluded his report.

"Thank you, you are the best subordinate one could have," Shirona gently stroke Oni Mask's mask telling him to stand up as the mask's glowing eyes evened up with those of the woman. "Now, please come with me so that I can have one of my Barrier Corps transport you home and you can recover. It goes without saying that once our plan is completed I'll give you full control over the Water Lord's region, you'll have all the children for your "Demon Programme" you'll want."

Oni Mask did not say anything, just bowed his head and followed Lady Mizukage to where she meant to go. He could've sworn that he heard loud incomprehensible sounds from the room behind blocked by thick stone blocks that were supposed to act as door.

Inside a wild battle was raging. A silver haired woman threw a punch aiming at Haoru's chest, her hand had that strange near invisible mist like aura around it. Right at the same moment that Haoru dodged the first blow an obese ninja appeared behind him with the speed matching that of a significantly more athletic ninja. The man thrust his arm forward slamming it into the rock making the rocky floor crumble and shoot out debris of rocks to the side. Haoru took couple of faster than eye can follow swings of his katana to block each and every stone tossed at him, differently from most swordsmen of his level he did not rely so much on drawing techniques but instead chose the "naked blade" approach where his blade usually only entered the sheath when he meant to use a drawing technique or when the battle was over.

The obese Kirigakure ninja leaped forward thrusting his palms in a mad flurry of strikes reminding of a sumo wrestler, Haoru leaped backwards just the right length to avoid his strikes but also just close enough to make the sumo ninja believe that he was going to hit the man. Suddenly water shot out from two smaller gourds around the sumo ninja's side and coated his palms as upon touching the ninja's palms the water expanded in size as well. "Water Style: Ogre Push!" the man chanted driving his watery palm forward and shooting a mad vortex of water as the masses of water around his palms exploded into wild whirlwinds. After the water calmed down the sumo ninja took a moment to locate Haoru sticking himself onto the ceiling and the other two jumping onto walls.

"I shall take the silver haired Yuki lady and the Onimoui sumo-bastard, split the others and move them away from here, I'm gonna break loose and I don't wanna cut you hatchlings!" Haorus laughed out madly as he took his wide spread legs and sword over his head stance while upside down and prepared to attack. The silver haired woman toyed with her hair.

"Oh, impressive, you analysed our clans and abilities with just one attack." the Yuki woman commended the elder samurai who just spat to the side forgetting that he was hanging upside down which caused a very strange trajectory of his spit making him have to lean his own head to avoid spitting on his own head. The sumo ninja rubbed the back of his head with his finger.

"Is this guy really the Haoru with the God Sword technique?" he mumbled out.

Without replying Haoru jumped down appearing close to the sumo ninja and slashing at his general direction. The sword just bounced off of the man's skin as the samurai laughed out even louder from the depth of his lungs and then took his defensive stance again. "Just as I suspected - an Onimoui, most of your kin wear thick armor to strengthen their natural impenetrable skin, you on the other hand wear nothing but your trousers."

The sumo ninja slapped his cheeks making his tattooed face flab around for a moment before the flesh settled down. "Yes, my weakling kin wear armor on top of their stone hard skins, I however chose to abandon armor, I trained at the Water Temple, slapping tsunami waves to the side like water spouts, toughening my skin to the point where armor is of no use to me – the person with chakra control and precision to enhance their weapon to be sharp enough to cut me will never be born. Even the great God Sword Jutsu users cannot cut my skin!" the sumo chubby slapped his belly again making it flab around for a while. Haoru laughed out from the depth of his lungs. This elder was having a time of his life.

"I dunno, chubby, with my last cut I haven't enhanced my blade with chakra at all…" he added ominously. The Onimoui clansman swiped his arm to the side and shouted out "Liar, no one can cut that strong and deep without any chakra at all." Haoru's blade flashed through the air, the chubby ninja stumbled back a couple of steps and clenched a shallow cut on the thickest spot of his belly. He was too surprised to even talk properly. "T-This is… It… Can't… Be… What kind… of a… Monster… Are you?!" the chubby yelled out, his partner clenched her fists tighter making small blinking snowflakes fly out.

"Don't underestimate your enemy, you fool" she taunted her partner who got back up on his feet. "Right" the sumo ninja just added and wiped his running nose and stood back into an offensive stance.

"Don't feel discouraged, I aimed to cut you in two…" Haoru laughed with a demonic look in his eyes that made the two Jounin sweat. Such was the intimidation and power of presence of one of the most powerful samurai in the world. This man wasn't the one overestimating himself when he took on two of the Kirigakure jounin, it was them who were unlucky to face off against him. The woman leapt forward, Haoru's blade didn't even more, or at least it didn't appear to move but her body separated into two parts and fell to the floor. Instead of blood however water burst out as her water clone collapsed.

The silver haired Yuki appeared from behind the swordsman thrusting her palms with sharp icicles on her lower parts of the palms. Blood squirt out but the samurai barely even let the woman know that he felt the hit, her body just split into twelve parts again as if it went through some shredding machine but it once again collapsed into a dissolving water clone. The woman was just poking at him, seeing the way he fought and how he dealt with attackers. So far the results were scary – he was able to cut anything or anyone into dozens of pieces without even a sign that his blade moved. It would've taken the eye of a master swordsman to properly even see the blur, it would've taken an equally as skilled swordsman to be able to block these attacks, not by reaction but by instinct – the only way to defend against such an offensive.

From nowhere combinations of blows pummelled Haoru and with a crushing strike of water enhanced palm strike he was sent back and slammed into the rocky walls, bouncing off of the first and hitting the wall on the other side. Anyone would have long since died after being hit by such an attack but Haoru stood up and dusted off his torn trousers and his muscular chest and once again took his famous defensive stance. This was Haoru – the user of one of the four God Sword techniques, a man whom even a battlefield of the war could not claim, how were young children of peaceful times ever hope to step up to the challenge?

Further away, one hall back Howoku was fighting his opponent on one side of the hall and Tanshu was facing off against his on the other. Such splitting of the teams was so that neither of the trio got into the way of the other, apparently the Kirigakure jounin did not care how they would fight – all that mattered to them was that they killed or wore out their opponents for their beloved Mizukage Shirona – the mistress of manipulation and intrigue to take down. The two halls were divided into three battlefields and a fierce scuffle was about to begin, the last obstacle in the way of the trio before they face Shirona, the penultimate step of the ladder!

 **P.S: Credit for the Onimoui clan goes to Jordan Patterson, a reader who was kind enough to give some suggestions and ideas about characters and clans I can use in future stories.**


	52. Barrier Buster and the Monkey Woman

The man in front of Tanshu wore a dark cloak and a white mask with black lenses. It reminded the Sannin a lot of the attire that the Kirigakure Barrier Corps wore but this mask looked a bit fancier, this man must've been a captain of a Barrier Corps squad or something like that, Jounin usually didn't make commanders of the entire Corps, that seat was usually reserved for Sannin or Kage themselves. Tanshu pulled out a kunai and twisted it around his finger then snapped his hand lock shut and placed the kunai in front of his body raising it up to the face level, he was ready to defend himself against this man.

The cloaked figure leaped forward throwing a fist with glowing yellow chakra emanating faintly around it. Tanshu swiped his kunai at the man's mask but he did not move. The kunai made sparks burst as it collided with the steel mask and sent it off of the man's face clanging further to the side into the darker areas of the room. The man's fist hit Tanshu right into the chest knocking the Sannin back. Grunting from the pain the Red Dog quickly got back on his feet coughing up blood. The taste of blood in his mouth was something that brought the mindless instinctual fighter in him but it was something he didn't want right now. Howoku was going to make a mistake, Shirona was working her magic on him and Tanshu needed to be there and make sure that his Hokage didn't mess up, he needed all of his brain in the game.

The cloaked figure quickly advanced to press his advantage, the cloak rustled as the man moved revealing his rather ordinary looking face, if it wasn't for the diagonal scar spanning from forehead to chin, that is. The yellow chakra started glowing yet again from the man's arms as he slammed both of them from the side trying to crush Tanshu's skull but the Sannin ducked under it and with the aid of his arm pushed his body off of the ground thrusting both of his feet into the man's body, sending him tumbling back and shouting in pain. Tanshu straightened out and spat some blood out, the fact that a punch from a ninja made him bleed that badly alerted him, it was certainly unusual as he trained his body to the peak that training one's chakra might result in. He was at the peak ninja limit of physicality and no Barrier Corps punch could bust through his tough muscles that easily.

"What the hell was that?" Tanshu asked observing his opponent as he stood up, it was obvious that his opponent had taken some damage as it took him some time to get back on his feet. "I thought you Barrier Corps folk actually bothered to block attacks, I wasn't really hitting you at my top speed and yet you took it. Are you just a weakling or was there a reason for that?"

"I'm not a Barrier Ninja." The scarred man replied with a low and husky voice. Judging from how growling he sounded it was quite obvious that he did not speak often, when people don't speak a lot their voices grow husky and they need to clean their throats to speak more clearly. Tanshu's eyebrow shot up, this man clearly wore a Barrier Corps outfit, why would he do so if he wasn't a barrier ninja? Even more, Tanshu clearly saw the man conjuring a barrier to protect the Mizukage before. Truth be told, Haoru's sword was frozen before it was blocked which meant that the barrier wouldn't have blocked it as it was coated with chakra. That Yuki woman coated Haoru's blade in Ice Release chakra so that the basic barrier could block it as the ice reduced its sharpness and focus of the chakra. That meant that the man's barriers were not all that much more than those of normal Barrier Corps ninja.

"I am a Barrier Buster" the man concluded as his fist lit up with yellow chakra again. So that was it? In the Barrier Corps there were not only ninja that could create barrier using barrier ninjutsu but also ninja who could break through most common barriers by using some sort of special combination of ninjutsu and taijutsu. Barrier ninja would've worked well as a defensive force while Barrier Busters would've fit for the offensive – just to break the defensive of the enemy. Konohagakure didn't really have an official Barrier Corps for a while, most of their ninja capable of barrier ninjutsu just worked in the village's Protective Service which was an order of ninja loyal only to the Hokage who did their best to contain, dismantle and crush any threats to the village with little to no villager casualties. Tanshu took his offensive stance again and prepared an attack.

The man's body just leaned forward with all of his muscles tensing before it lost balance and slammed into the ground like a bag of potatoes. This was an impressive display of muscle mastery with the ninja being able to relax and tense their muscles with great ease making them incredibly aware of their body and able to utilize their own natural speed and strength perfectly. Tanshu covered the small distance between the fighters within mere moments throwing multiple punches, the man shot his hands forward with the yellow glow of his chakra forming an improvised barrier but Tanshu's strength tore right through them. The first batch of blows stopped right after breaking the barrier but the Red Dog soon adjusted to the strength and kept on his barrage of blows breaking more and more of the man's bones. After his hands grew weaker, the Sannin switched to his legs but that let the Barrier Buster adjust his strategy and strengthen his barriers – it was like Tanshu hit rocky walls as his legs busted through the strengthened barriers but stopped right afterwards.

Tanshu breathed in and out heavily as he used a couple of back handspring jumps to gain some distance. His maximum force could bust this man's barriers but did nothing more, he needed more than just brute force to get him out of that one…

Howoku continued to stare at the middle aged woman he was supposed to beat to advance to where the Mizukage decided to hide. This woman wore several steel belts wrapped around her body as armor and had flexible shoulder armor. Such protective attire was not really common for ninja as they strived to be as quick and as stealthy as possible. Even more, the woman's goofy smile continued to throw Howoku a bit off balance as she seemed to be enjoying the fact that she'll be fighting against the Fourth Hokage. All of her armor mostly appeared to protect her upper body as she wore baggy trousers with knee pads below so Howoku questioned the effectiveness of half-baked armor approach.

Such goofiness and carefree approach annoyed him, Howoku had no time to waste on henchmen! The man shot forward with a charge, he did not even use his Starlight Release as he intended to save his chakra for when he needed it – against Shirona. The woman leaned backwards and jumped back, using her hands to spring her body back forward and thrusting her legs into Howoku's chest making the man tumble back, she then bit her finger and made a couple of handseals summoning a large iron staff. "Tee hee…" she laughed out goofily making Howoku even more annoyed. He was not a taijutsu prodigy and this woman seemed to be quite flexible and strong, from her choice of weapon one would've assumed she knew how to handle her staff too. It couldn't have been helped – Howoku needed his Starlight Release to win.

"May I ask you to step aside, there is no need for us to fight, you are in the way of me taking out a threat to my village and that is something I punish with death. I know Shirona indoctrinated you deep and that you are most likely not a bad person, please reconsider this fight, lady." Howoku angrily spoke up to which the woman just smiled and rubbed her nose.

"Ease up a bit, stiffypants. I just wanna fight, I don't care bout that politics thing. That's what Shirona told me she'd give and that's what she gave me so let's not bother about our villages and just fight." The woman spoke in a very strange manner and she used no honorifics when talking about her Kage. This one seemed much more like the "Hanasaku-type" to Howoku, a lovable idiot who only had their own motivations and were mostly harmless.

"I'm sorry, I cannot do that when people I strive to protect are in danger. I see now that you wish my village no ill and are just acting upon your instinct to fight, I shall not kill you but I will not hold back." Howoku replied.

Suddenly the woman appeared right behind him with a crazy smile, "Why would you do THAT, silly?" was all that Howoku heard before her heavy staff drove into his back sending forward. Had Howoku not broken his flight by thrusting his arms to the floor and flipping himself on his feet he'd have slammed into the wall. That impact… Howoku felt his chakra straining and fading inside. Chakra worked in a rotation-like process – like a high intensity engine. It flowed inside one's body and could be borrowed for various techniques and ways of use. Most skilled ninja however could manipulate not only chakra itself but its flow process, make it more intense to withstand blows that would kill normal people, temporarily increase their strength to punch out trained warriors with one blow. The likes of Tanshu could intensify it to such extent that it made his chakra leak out creating that "killing intent-like" aura around him sensible even to non-sensor ninja.

Such use of chakra was dangerous – there was a reason why a body had a slow and steady chakra flow. Intensifying it just for a moment would've meant that for that brief moment one stressed their body out making it use up much more chakra. Normally just going around normal everyday activities cost inconsequential amounts of chakra but boosting the flow to extreme extents like needed in order not to die after being hit like that made that inconsequential amount feel almost like one used a jutsu of some sort. The body just burned up chakra for that one moment and the natural loss of chakra from the chakra flow going its way had to be readjusted in time, messing with the body's natural processes was not something one should have abused. Howoku decided to try and avoid getting hit by such an impact again and not lose such amounts of chakra and stress his body out too much.

The woman appeared behind him again but this time Howoku predicted her attack, his body dropped down to the floor and flipped over on his back. The Hokage's hands stretched to the side of his head and thrust his feet up shooting his body upwards and kicking the woman in the chin. Howoku made a handseal and made a shadow clone that leaped up and stroke her in the chin again before disappearing in a cloud of smoke. Howoku tossed a couple of kunai at the woman trying to utilize that brief instant of smoke cloud, he heard a couple of clangs and saw the kunai fall down. Howoku cursed, that armor deflected basic ninja tools apparently. Finally the woman landed from the cloud and laughed out with a wild grin.

"I initially thought you were just a weakling, I guess a Hokage can't really be a weakling, huh? Sorry for looking down on you." Her laugh and mannerism seemed almost monkey-like. The woman's eyes blinked and when they opened again her pupils had changed into a much more wild state. It was then that Howoku realized what was going on – this woman was the Four Tails Jinchuuriki. Seeing how she was a Jounin it was quite likely that she was able to use Chakra Cloak Awakening if needed and that was something that Howoku didn't really need. The decision to not kill her was also the correct one – the thing he needed the least was a Tailed Beast rampaging in this place.

Haoru's wild smile intimidated the Onimoui sumo ninja, the silver haired Yuki seemed to be quite content and cool with her approach to the battle. The elder samurai himself decided to finally show these ninja just a tiny fraction of his strength. He leaned on his right leg harder and twisted his left foot to the side as the grip around his sword visibly hardened. Suddenly the chakra and air pressure around him became more intense and even the non-sensor ninja could see the fluctuations of transparent air around him. The man's right foot lifted off as he thrust his sword cutting down through the air.

"Windcutter Style: Sword Gust Jutsu"

He chanted sending an invisible vortex of air that quickly gathered dust and became a larger and grey twister. The Yuki woman disappeared in an icy mist while the chubby ninja leaped to the side at the last moment avoiding the wild gust of wind. The icy mist intensified at a certain area from which the Ice Release user appeared again, "For a moment there I thought we were screwed…" she mumbled to herself.

"A sword slash so intense and powerful that it can create small vortexes of air. Impressive, samurai!" the Onimoui laughed out. The Yuki lunged at him with icicles once again shooting out from her palm trying to slash at Haoru's eyes, the samurai leaned backwards, a crimson stream of blood shot out of the woman's chest and she quickly dashed back clenching the open wound on her chest.

"What the hell was that!?" the sumo ninja shouted out at his partner. "I thought we already established that this guy's sword moves faster than we can see!? Did you really expect to get him with a simple attack like that?" he scolded the woman.

"I tried to use my Frost Armor Jutsu to protect myself, I thought I could initiate it in an instant so his sword would've slid away from my body and crashed into the floor instead but… He cut even faster than that…" she explained her mistake.

"You're next, Sumo-Ninja!" Haoru laughed out and charged at the obese Onimoui slashing his sword upwards while leaping into the air himself. The sumo couldn't react in time, he just stepped backwards as another shallow cut appeared on his body, it was strange how the Onimoui skin which was one of the toughest defenses in the Shinobi World was penetrated by Haoru's near lethal slashes even if the cuts he left were quite shallow and unimpressive. The samurai quickly followed up on his slash by cutting from the air at the tumbling giant chubby hitting various areas of his body and opening more and more shallow cuts all over. The samurai sheathed his blade and then drew it all in one instant, by that time he was way too high in the air to even hit the sumo ninja with his drawing slash which confused the chubby shinobi.

"Windcutter Style: Heavenly Wind Draw!" Haoru chanted as he drew his blade and stopped it dead center aiming at the chubby, there were good two or three meters between the two. All of the sudden three vortexes of air shout out of the man's blade and collided into one large one that crashed into the sumo ninja driving him into the ground as the super vortex mercilessly kept drilling through the sumo's body. For a moment it appeared like that would have been enough to kill the man outright. The Yuki woman leaped back in time to avoid being too close to the impact point, by that point she must've already seen just how hard they would have to work to win this battle.

Surprisingly enough the Onimoui chubby leaped up quite fast and jumped into the air to hit his opponent before he could even land. The sumo ninja launched a flurry of hand thrusts "Water Thrust Barrage!" he yelled out as his palms got covered in water that gathered from the previous water that he had used around his palms in small tunnel-like streams. One could not even see Haoru's blade move as it near effortlessly kept up with the strikes of the sumo ninja however with each deflected thrust slowed down a little to the point where his defenses became blurry but visible at the end. "Water Shotgun Thrust!" the sumo ninja shouted thrusting both of his palms coated with water forward, however as he cocked his hands back to prepare the thrust Haoru was already behind him and landed on the ground taking his defensive stance. "Windcutter Style: Spring Breeze Cut!" he mumbled as sumo ninja's offensive was broken and the chubby's body flipped over in the air several times before slamming hard into the rocky floor.

This time the large frame of the Kirigakure Jounin took significantly longer to stand up – his body was covered with shallow cuts as if he ran through a very thick spiky bush and cut himself all over with the spikes. He was breathing heavily and it barely looked like Haoru even broke a sweat while taking on two of the Jounin.

"This is ridiculous… We can't possibly win against this guy…" the Onimoui grunted out rudely looking at his injured partner who shook her head.

"No. He is definitely tired and injured, his body just does not show it. He is the kind of ninja who just goes at full strength and then when his body hits the limit he just dies. I've seen many ninja like that, most of them are old timers of war. They don't really communicate with their bodies, they have no alarm signals that they are injured which works both to their favor and their disadvantage. I think if we press him hard enough he'll fold with time." The woman concluded, the sumo just slammed his fist into his other hand and then raised it to his face yelling at Haoru.

"Alright you samurai-bastard, here we come then!" Haoru just leaned back harder, never dropping his smile of excitement.

"Well, come at me then!" he replied vibrantly.

 **Hey there, just wanted to let you know that from this chapter on the school year schedule sets in which means that I'll have a chapter done every three days. Since this one's supposed to have been posted yesterday but the site was acting weird, the next chapter's coming on Friday. Thanks for reading the story and have a fruitful and wonderful school year (to those that this concerns :3)**


	53. Tanshu's Mysterious Strategy

Tanshu stayed still, analyzing his situation and the possible options he had. Truth be told, this battle didn't really trouble or confuse him. The Red Dog was quite certain that if he stopped holding back for just a moment he'd destroy this Barrier Buster in one attack, the problem was the future battles. If he used too much chakra in this battle can he be counted on in the future, for example if Howoku lost to Shirona? Tanshu was certain he had seen Oni Mask previously, what if Tanshu had to fight his old sensei at some point? There were just too many questions, too many dangers in the future and all of those factors needed to be considered and properly analyzed. The Barrier Buster had no such problem, sadly.

The man lunged forward, Tanshu tried to intercept the lackluster offensive with a straight punch but the man flipped over and rolled on the Sannin's arm, kicking off in the air with another flip and driving his glowing with golden chakra arms right into Tanshu's skull. The man's reddish brown hair flowed wildly all over Sannin's face covering up the blood that shot out from Tanshu's nose and mouth from the sheer pressure his skull was hit by. Barrier Buster's legs locked onto Tanshu's neck and slammed the man into the ground, the jounin stood up and examined the Sannin's neck. The Kirigakure jounin had snapped many necks with this drop, there was no way that the famous Konoha's Red Dog – Uzumaki Tanshu was still alive. He turned around and started walking at his female partner, who was busy with the Fourth Hokage, with the intention of supporting her.

"Is that it? Are you giving up already?"

The Barrier Buster shinobi stopped in his tracks as a creepy but firm and manly voice alerted him of his opponent's survival. Tanshu stood back on his feet wiping his hair to the side and the blood off of his nose and his mouth. The Barrier Ninja shook once in a wild uncontrollable signal of fear. "I have to say, your Barrier Busting Jutsu packs a punch, then again, that's the only way for me to even feel your puny blows. If you don't want to embarrass yourself I suggest you keep em coming…" Tanshu grunted out with a rough tone, almost like a bulldog intimidating a traveler who was passing by his master's yard with a bark.

"Who do you think you're kidding? You're intensifying your chakra flow for just a second when you're hit, that's why your body manages to withstand these blows, it's a textbook technique. You're wasting your chakra, when do you think you'll run out of steam, Konoha's Red Dog?" Tanshu's opponent taunted to which only a calm laugh intimidated the man even more. Tanshu's finger rose up to the man's mouth and the Sannin sunk his teeth into his own finger, then he flashed some hand seals and slammed his palm into the ground making a wild circle of seals appear and a powerful cloud of smoke appear with a loud poof.

"Summoning Jutsu: Red Poochy"

A small dog with red colored fur, not taller than one's knees as hard as it tried to stand on two appeared in front of the man as the smoke cleared. The little dog barked up with a high pitched bark more common among the younger dogs. "I've got no need to preserve chakra, I've got another trick up my sleeve for your mistress, not that it's any business of a pitiful lapdog like you." Tanshu replied pointing at the man with his arm as the dog leaped at his opponent with a violent growl and a very underwhelming bark of a young small dog. The Barrier Buster's leg shot up into the air kicking the dog away and preventing it from biting him. The dog lit up with reddish chakra as it landed on its feet and shook on its tiny little legs to recover itself from the impact.

"You know what to do, Poochy" Tanshu mumbled silently so that only the dog and he could hear it. The young dog nodded and the red glow of chakra around him intensified. This barely visible red glow interested the Barrier Buster ninja, most of all it intimidated him because he had no idea what sort of technique it was. From the report of the Barrier Corps ninja that placed special recording barriers in the room where Tanshu fought the monks the Sannin also used something similar letting his dogs charge some sort of mysterious chakra and then disappear transferring it all to Tanshu. Just what sort of technique was it? As famous as the Red Dog was he had never demonstrated this technique before in any high profile battles which meant that either it was something he kept at great secrecy or it killed literally everyone who saw the technique, leaving no one to tell the tale.

The Barrier Ninja bit his finger and made some handseals swinging his bleeding finger around in the air and leaving a small trail of blood from the squirt of blood that came out. It appeared that the Barrier Buster's technique kept it afloat and stuck in the air. "There is a downside to any technique, no matter how powerful. One of the more popular downsides is that it is very easily avoidable, after all – most jutsu are just projectiles of chakra that can be leaped over or stepped aside from. That is why the most elite Barrier Ninja and Barrier Busters can do this!" the Barrier Buster slammed his hands together forming transparent barriers around Tanshu. They formed and stuck together so that they formed a tunnel-like structure.

"Now you can't avoid my technique! Lightning Style: Restriction Beam Jutsu!" the Barrier Ninja shouted out as a powerful and incredibly loud beam of lightning chakra erupted from his handseal filling the entire barrier tunnel and slamming into Tanshu. Only as the technique exploded did the tunnel of barriers break. The explosion and the intensity of the beam looked like it was a thousand times hotter and more intense than a bolt of lightning, there would have been absolutely no way for a normal man or even a normal ninja to survive. The Barrier Buster breathed heavily with his hands weighed down and shaking from the strain that the technique placed on his body, the Red Poochy stood calmly besides the barrier as he was not included in the narrow target zone of the barrier tunnel.

"Why on Earth would anyone waste their time dodging this?" a loud and rudely toned reply came from still clearing smoke and rubble. The Barrier Ninja jumped up and rubbed his eyes, he started grinding his teeth in frustration. He knew of two ways for a ninja to survive a hit like that, one was to use the textbook technique of spending immense amounts of chakra and interrupting one's own natural flow by kickstarting it and intensifying it to incredible rate – such technique would've provided a natural "armor" for the user but in cost of a disrupted chakra flow until the natural flow returned. One would've only used anything like that in an emergency, when no other way to survive was possible. Especially someone like Red Dog Tanshu – someone who took great pride in their physical strength which, if it was achieved with chakra level being increased would've made his physical stats plummet.

The other way was to counteract it with a Lightning Release technique of same or greater strength. This was a common way for one Lightning Release user to counteract and redirect powerful Lightning Release jutsu by grounding them, because one's own body was using the technique and immune from being shocked one could easily have absorbed the weaker charge and redirected it to the ground or even back at the opponent. Thing was that based on the information that floated around it was unlikely that Tanshu was a Lightning Release user. Based on the most common information Tanshu only used Fire Release and while a previously undiscovered secondary nature was possible something made the Barrier Buster suspect that the Red Dog actually used the first way.

"What's your game, Red Dog? Why are you interrupting your own chakra flow so wildly? Why do you care so little of your own chakra right after telling me how important the future battles are for you?" the Barrier Ninja yelled out thrusting his fist at Tanshu and waving it wildly to which the Sannin only laughed. The man enjoyed seeing his opponent grind their teeth in frustration as they struggled to wrap their heads around his plans that weren't even meant for them anyways. With a careless glance Tanshu looked at his summoned partner who looked back at Tanshu and nodded. The dog then wildly charged forward, as the dog jumped up to dig its teeth into the Barrier Buster's face the jounin tried to move back.

The image of the dog that leaped for the face blurred and disappeared, the Barrier Buster felt sharp pain in his leg as he saw the little dog digging his teeth into the lower parts of his leg with blood squirting out from the pressure that the little bugger managed to put out. The jounin tried to shake the little pest off but then an elbow dug deep into his chest breaking multiple ribs in the process. The little dog working together with his owner leaped and dug its fangs deep into the Barrier Buster's face and while the jounin tried shaking it off Tanshu's strike hit him deep into his solar plexus making the jounin drop like a sack. With his face and his leg bleeding the Barrier Buster rolled around on the floor writhing in pain before standing up. He then charged with a kunai at the little dog before stopping in mid charge – the little pet was no longer glowing, it was just a little dog with a red fur and no more chakra glow… What did that mean? Did Tanshu cancel his strange technique? The man restarted his assault and lunged at the little dog kicking him up to stab it but after a single kick it poofed into smoke.

The Barrier Buster was absolutely stunned. Nothing annoyed him more than his opponent being steps ahead of him and him being absolutely oblivious to it with no way of pinning down just what the hell it was.

Not too further away Haoru was still entertaining himself with two Kirigakure jounin. The enraged but re-inspired with fake hope sumo ninja leaped at him, coating his palms with water that seeped up to his hand off of the floor and formed a water padding the man started thrusting his palms fast and strong. The impact of the thrusts must've been immense as only thrusting the palms above the rocky floor made the rocks below crumble and rise up being flung in the general direction of the sumo ninja's attack with each thrust making that cruel water splashing sound, sort of like that when one jumps off of a bridge into the water landing on their belly just multiplied numerous times. Both Haoru's chakra coated blade and the Onimoui's palm thrusts clashed with each other and while the sumo ninja appeared to have some trouble keeping his attacks up, Haoru's smile made it look all too easy.

All of a sudden the silver haired Yuki woman appeared behind Haoru driving her leg right into the elder samurai's back. Haoru stumbled forward but still kept up with his clash with the woman's partner. In fact, the sumo gave in first as his hands just weighed down pulsing with blood passing through the vessels inside his palms as if he was slapping a brick wall for the past minute. The Yuki woman kept kicking the stumbling samurai's back, she had caught him unprepared and his blade was busy elsewhere, now she had to exploit the advantage! Suddenly after a combination of kicks the woman's body split in two and collapsed in pieces onto the ground only for it to dissolve into snow. With a wild breeze the woman's remains were carried in front of the samurai and she thrust two spikes of ice right into Haoru's shoulders. Then with she planted the heel of her sandal right into the man's face making him tumble back.

The woman laughed out triumphantly and her partner joined her after a brief moment of heavy panting. Much to their surprise Haoru rose from the floor momentarily. "I see, so this was all a genjutsu, huh? You activated it and then leaped onto your partner's back, the genjutsu rendered the real you invisible replacing you with a snow clone of sorts while my body believed me to be hit from behind…" The Yuki woman thrust her index finger forward arrogantly as if signaling the samurai to bow to her to earn her mercy.

"That's right, samurai, and now as you have these icicles in your shoulder blood vessels you need my mercy to keep them from melting and opening the blood flow. If those blood vessels open up – you'll die in seconds!" the woman replied with a high and mighty tone to which she was only replied with laughter.

"Well… I would've been done in, had I not tensed my muscles up and blocked your stab." the samurai laughed out, the Yuki woman squinted in suspicion, "What do you mean? I stabbed you in the shoulders, I know my anatomy just fine, don't play games with me, old man!"

The samurai laughed again, "Go ahead then, young lady, melt your ice toothpicks, the moment that you do, however, my arms are free to move three hundred and sixty degrees, you better believe I'll be hungry for blood!" the man shouted out swinging his sword and then comically jumping up in pain as with the icicles stuck in his body the man had trouble properly moving his hand around. The sumo ninja looked at his partner with a worried look.

"Umm… Maybe you should… You know… Keep the icicles solid… I mean… Just in case…" he started uttering words one after another trying to calm his partner down. The woman started grinding her teeth heavily trying to decide on her course of actions. Seeing his partner's hesitation and realizing the fact that it meant great restriction of movement to his opponent the sumo ninja leaped forward grabbing the samurai by the face and slamming him into the floor and then leaping up and landing with his bottom straight onto the man's face. As blood started leaking from the cracked forehead of the elder samurai the woman finally braved up and made a handseal dissolving the icicles.

That same moment that the icicles disappeared a powerful shock hit the sumo ninja right into the center of his belly sending the chubby shinobi rolling back. Just like that Haoru was back onto his feet with his sword raised above his head. "I must thank you for calling my bluff, the cold from your ice allowed my injured blood vessels to heal up. After a lifetime of battlefield experience one finds their body healing up quite fast and if you'd have dissolved them earlier I'd have been in quite some trouble." Haoru smiled with a cruel twist of his lips.

The Yuki woman pouted as her body started sweating in fear – she wasted her chance to kill this man and this was all because of this godly intimidation that this man kept up. She believed his every lie just because he threatened her life and with that impossibly thick murdering atmosphere coming off of the samurai warrior she had no choice but to let him control the battlefield. To think that the man played her like that – made her make her icicles freeze the same wounds that she opened while his body's own natural freak battlefield regeneration ability allowed his vessels to heal within just several minutes. Even with his life in danger this man's face did not change, so this was what it meant to be a veteran of countless wars and claiming the heads of many times more ninja.

The woman just let her intimidated and afraid voice run wild. "Aren't you at all worried if you live or die? I could've easily killed you then and there!" she yelled out, her voice was flooded with fear over her own life and regret that she let him recover. Haoru's sword swung through the empty air, cutting so fast that one moment it was above his head while another it was already touching the floor. "Windcutter Style: Sword Gust Jutsu!" the samurai chanted as a powerful vortex of wind from the air literally being cut apart picked the giant sumo ninja up and tossed him around in the air leaving countless scratches and cuts as well. Within literally moments after the previous technique concluded Haoru appeared in front of the man jumping into the air with an upwards slash making the sumo ninja's body fly up stuck onto the blade that cut him. After reaching the highest point up in the air the samurai slashed downwards sending the chubby's body slamming into the ground while he himself landed gracefully nearby. The Onimoui ninja just laid there with his eyes rolled back with no signs of life.

"It is the first lesson a samurai learns during their young days: "Go to a battle afraid of dying and definitely you will die, go there with a clear mind and maybe you will live!" that is how a true samurai fights, that is why a samurai will always best a ninja in a fight!" Haoru shouted out madly finally dropping his smile. As the woman stumbled back, trying her best to fight the instinct to run for her life the samurai slowly walked towards her. The eyes of the Yuki that previously were so cold and analytical and so recently had the shade of victory and arrogance were now terrified of the concept of her own death. The woman stepped back and tripped over a rock, she fell onto the ground and tore her dress. As the pain revived her brain reminding it that this was real and actually happening she jumped up. "Stay back!" she screamed out.

Haoru didn't even stop for a moment, his pace didn't even slow down. The Yuki thrust her palms forward as cold winter winds howled around her picking up snow "I said stay back! Icicle Barrage Jutsu!" she screamed out again shooting a mad flurry of icicle projectiles all of which bounced off Haoru's blade that moved in a blur deflecting each and every projectile. It was like this samurai didn't even try to deflect the projectiles of such speed, his hand worked almost entirely out of instinct and muscle memory. Such was the strength of one possessing a God Sword technique in their arsenal. The Yuki woman's hands shot forward as the winds howled again. "STAY BAAAACK!" she screamed as Haoru's chest thumped right into her thrust forward hands that finished their handseals just at the same moment.

"Ice Style: Absolute Zero Storm Jutsu!" the woman screamed in panic as the winds focused into a single direction blowing straight into Haoru and pelting him with snow at such speed that the snowflakes managed to cut into his skin and leave cuts. Within mere moments the man disappeared in a wild and uncontrollable mess of snow, howling winter winds and ice. The technique was so immense that Howoku and Tanshu stopped for a moment to look at it and even had to evaluate if it won't be a threat to them. Fortunately for them the technique was very contained, that was why it was so powerful. The Yuki woman dashed back, her shaking knees finally gave in as the woman collapsed onto the ground and grabbed her head with her shaking hands. "I hit him… I hit him head on… He's got to be dead… Frozen still and torn apart… One with the snowflakes… He is now just a bunch of snowflakes… Then why… WHY DO I STILL FEEL THIS PRESSURE!?" she screamed out into the air absolutely terrified of the terrible atmosphere around the samurai that didn't waver for a moment.

"That was some technique, Yuki-ninja." The voice echoed from the large pillar of freezing and rampaging blizzard. "Had I not used my sword to make a vortex of wind equally as strong to contain the blizzard within it I would've actually died…" a wild laughter came out of the tornado of blizzard that then wildly split in half at the center and ended just as suddenly as it started, the wild but static snowflakes now fell from the air as it started to snow around the area where Haoru, the one with God Sword, stood. He was no longer smiling however, maybe because he felt the strain on his body from all this mad fighting he had done that day, maybe because he stopped enjoying himself and grew bored, wishing instead to end it all with one strike!


	54. Opponents but no longer Enemies

Howoku tried to come up with a proper plan to respond to pretty much any attack, any possible outcome. The Four Tails Jinchuuriki were known for their Lava Release ability, Howoku already knew that his Starlight Release could most likely properly counteract it, then again, he still didn't know the amount of mastery that this woman had over her beast. Was she able to awaken it? Was she able to use the chakra cloak at the very least? So far she barely even mentioned it, it was only due to the immense chakra burst and the wild change in her eyes that Howoku even got the clue of her ability.

The woman leaped forward with a wild slam of her iron staff, Howoku stepped to the side but the rubble that the slam raised hit him in the face opening minor bruises and making him flinch. The woman flipped back with a kick at Howoku's chest, after landing on her feet she charged forward with her staff resting on her back, the woman's fists hurt immensely. Howoku was forced to once again interrupt and boost his chakra flow just so she didn't do too much damage on him. Fighting with the idea of an upcoming much larger fight was troublesome indeed. The woman's elbow sent Howoku flying a couple of meters forward. There was no grace or fanciness in him getting up, just a man picking his injured body and peeling it off the floor.

"My name is Howoku, the Fourth Hokage, may I know your name and also just how much mastery you have over the Four Tails? Do you plan on bringing it out at any point?" Howoku roughed out after picking himself up and wiping the blood off of his nose. The woman just smiled back playfully, while her eyes still looked like those of a mad wild monkey and her chakra leaked so intensely that the red glow was visible even to the human eye she appeared to be in complete control.

"Why would I let Son Goku have all the fun? We had a game of Rock-Paper-Scissors to decide who would get this fight, he looked a bit upset that he won't have a go so I let him boost my abilities but if he ever tried to slip out he'd be grounded for a year! This is my fight, Goku doesn't interrupt my fights, I don't interrupt his. Also, my name is Surawu" the woman explained calmly, Howoku looked surprised. This Jinchuuriki was in complete control of her Tailed Beast! She could even keep it down and restrained if she needed to and gambled by playing games with it, games rules of which the beast upheld. This woman was dangerous!

The extensive mastery over her beast brought another problem to Howoku, he had to decide if he wanted to let the woman live. She was a dangerous asset for Kirigakure and if he was to take Shirona down and place a replacement in her place, the loyalists of the woman could always use this Jinchuuriki by tricking her and promising her awesome fights. Someone with so much power but little restraint of her actions had no place in a world of intrigue, if one was stupid enough to become this strong they had to have the brain to use that power responsibly and at the very least the judgment who to lend it to. It would not have been too tough for Howoku to defeat a Tailed Beast if he just let all of his power out in one burst, he'd be exhausted but… Tanshu could beat Shirona, could he not? There were so many questions that kept the Hokage from fighting at full strength.

"No! If I let this continue I'll get killed, I need to beat this woman first, then to consider all the moral implications!" Howoku thought to himself as he charged forward, kicking with a spinning kick right into the woman's block, then repositioning his weight and leaping up to kick with the other foot pushing her block away. Howoku's punches then had an open hunting season all over the woman's dropped defenses and he decided to exploit it. He was not the best of taijutsu users but he knew enough. He just kept punching with the hope that one of those punches would take her down, he did not stop for a moment because stopping would have meant her having a chance to respond. Howoku leaped onto her shoulders, then over her and kicked off the back of her head. The man slammed his hands forward shooting off shimmering Starlight Release chakra out of his body.

"Starlight Style: Nova Rush!" Howoku shouted leaping with a tackle at the woman as the chakra around his body expanded into an ellipse making Howoku's body appear like a comet shooting horizontally right at his target. A deafening explosion echoed and wild shrapnel of heated and molten rock from both the collapsing roof and the floor started shooting off at random directions making everyone put a temporary stop in their fights and worry about avoiding this immense backlash of a jutsu. The area where the explosion went off around the centre was completely obliterated, there was a huge crater that reached well into the soil completely disintegrating even the ancient mossy rock that covered the floor, the entire roof construction was completely blown off and disintegrated into dust. Only Howoku stood in the centre of the explosion right in the crater breathing heavily standing by the unconscious body of Surawu – the Four Tails Jinchuuriki.

"Now… I can think what to do…" he thought to himself stroking his own hair to put out a small tongue of flame on his head. This was a bit excessive, he once destroyed an entire assaulting party that tried to invade his village with this technique and he held it back a bit this time, he was using it on a single target in an area where his allies still were after all. Still, Howoku was a bit surprised that the woman only suffered slight burns in some areas and while her armor got completely annihilated, she was supposed to be disintegrated but the Hokage knew that the woman would've done something to survive. He actually counted on her tagging out and letting the Tailed Beast take the blast, in that case he would've let it have it all and taken it down. Nova Rush Jutsu was powerful enough to severely kick the Tailed Beast in the teeth, it was made for inhuman encounters, those like ones with a Tailed Beast or a Lesser Demon.

A powerful shock caught Howoku unprepared, something steel hard drove into his face in an instant – it was the woman's staff! The woman's injured body leaped up so fast that he couldn't even track her movements, she spun the staff around wildly letting its weight pummel Howoku, the hits were not as focused and crushing as single strikes but the numbers of impacts let her really get into it. Howoku was completely at her mercy for those several combinations of blows. She hit with spins, both left and right, lower and higher areas finishing the combination with a powerful slam into his face sending Howoku out of the crater and onto the floor. The man's glasses were shattered all over the area from the damage they took.

Clumsily the woman climbed out of the crater, huffing and panting, murmuring something under her own nose. "Wow that attack was amazing! I really felt that!" she complimented the downed opponent of hers by patting her torn up clothes and examining the burns all over her body. Howoku raised his head and started slowly getting up, his vision was blurry and the sides of his body started aching, this degree of damage was something that even Vashia's ointment would not have completely helped with. He sustained permanent damage in this battle, something he wouldn't be able to completely heal even in the future, and that was something that severely lowered his chances against Shirona. Howoku felt warm torrents of blood running down all over his body in multiple areas. If this woman focused her strength into a single strike she may even have killed him!

"You mean… You took all of it?!" Howoku asked wiping the blood out of his eyes and tearing off the sleeve of his jumpsuit. The man tied it onto his forehead to stop the bleeding all over his face, that would have gotten into his way. "I actually counted that you would bring your Beast out, I planned for it to take the blast and get taken out…" the man admitted to which Surawu really got mad.

"I told you this was MY fight! Don't fight Son Goku you stupid twit! Fight ME! Get serious or I'll pummel you real bad! Well… Then again, we sort of shared chakra in that moment, I wouldn't have taken the blast if he didn't help me, heh heh…" her emotions switched completely erratically. One moment this woman was furious that she was not the main target, the next she laughed herself off just because she used the chakra of the Tailed Beast to survive the impact. So these two had perfect coordination – the beast could lend his chakra instantly without questioning his Jinchuuriki's judgment, she could incorporate the Beast's chakra into her flow and use it as her own effortlessly. These two worked in perfect sync.

Howoku had to stall, he needed time to start regaining full control of his body as his ribs and his chest hurt too much to keep fighting. He coughed heavily from some sort of liquid in his lungs – he may have been bleeding internally. "This sync… You also named your Tailed Beast… Just what sort of relationship do the two of you have with each other?" Howoku wondered out loud. Surawu stood straight, her eyes changed into more serious eyes and they wondered down onto the ravaged rocky floor.

"I didn't name Son Goku, that's his real name. That's what he told me when we became good friends. That wasn't the case initially. When I was a little girl I hated him, he made me stronger, more durable and he indirectly helped me to train harder. The stamina of a Jinchuuriki is fifty times that of a ninja without one, even when the two have had no contact with each other. I always thought I was some sort of a freak – I could've trained for weeks without rest and so I've become really strong unaware of his existence. Other kids thought of me as a freak, so did the grown-ups but they didn't hate me because of Son Goku, they hated me because I was strong, because I made it all look too easy and because that made them look bad. When a kid appears to barely be trying to complete the tasks that they would fail at even if they trained for a hundred years… People say "Thank you" but they actually hate you deep inside because you illustrate their flaws, you remind them that they are flawed themselves. They think that you're full of yourself even if you never take pride in your strength. Honestly they didn't really care about Son Goku, they only hated me because I was better than them while still being innocent and stupid – they thought it all came on a platter for me and that became my curse. I dealt with that hate and cruelty by transferring all of it on Son Goku…"

The woman's eyes suddenly became sad as she looked down. Howoku's body started feeling better, he once again felt his arms and legs, some of his wounds didn't appear to bleed remotely as profusely as he applied other pieces of his jumpsuit as bandage on the wounds that needed attention. All of a sudden Howoku didn't want to kill this woman at all, even more, he could identify some of himself in her, empathize with her. He knew the social rejection of a genius, he knew all too well of the hatred that people had for people that were inherently better than them. They never even bothered to see these geniuses being arrogant, they never bothered to even question if their skill was even the point of the conversation – a genius was better than them, he illustrated all the flaws they had by contrast and so they had to disappear. They had to be punished for being so good at something somehow, by rejecting a genius people executed their own "social justice".

Howoku's eyes raised up and met those of the monkey woman. He saw from her own eyes that she noticed Howoku's own experience being related to hers, she knew that he understood her own pain perfectly.

"It's funny, usually the one who doesn't want to communicate is the Tailed Beast, I've met some other Jinchuuriki as they were supposed to tutor me of the easier ways to master one's abilities as well as teach me responsibility of having a Tailed Beast inside. Son Goku wanted to play with me and talk from the very beginning, it was my own hatred that rejected him. Son Goku kept asking me to play with him, talk to him and I yelled at him that I hated him. Told him that if I ever played with him I'd vomit until I died and if I died I'd be happy because I would no longer have to share a body with him, Goku was really crushed by those words. He stopped talking to me, stopped lending me his chakra. I was happy for a year or two, tried to gain friends, I thought that if I changed for my friends that they'd accept me but while I changed for them they couldn't have cared less. It's actually ironic that I wanted recognition, I wanted friends when I had one all along and I pushed him away by being mean to him for people who weren't even friendly but recognition of which I craved most of all… It was then that I felt truly alone for the first time."

The story of the woman he never asked for but just couldn't force himself to tell her to stop reminded Howoku of his own past. With him bearing the heritage of the Moon People, being a descendant of a descendant of some other line of descendants, and possessing their unparalleled power he also was rejected as a child. He was smart because he worked hard, he was strong because he obliterated every obstacle in his way by disintegrating them, he possessed Fire and Lightning Releases from his earliest days surpassing the other genin who barely could use one. To him things always came easy but he never wanted strength, he never wanted to beat his enemies – he wanted to make them understand him, he wanted for everyone in the world to just get along. Ironically enough no one ever bothered to empathize with him or get along with him so how could a man with no friends or empathizers make the entire world feel for itself? It only changed for the better after he met Misu and Hanasaku, Hanasaku was a bit like him – she was crazy strong and always took all the punches smiling but she didn't care about anything. She taught him that ignorance was bliss, she taught him that the last thing he should cry about was how everyone else perceived him, that he shouldn't change for their approval, he should reveal his true colours and have people either approve of him or go to hell. Misu showed Howoku that peace and friendship wasn't always going to cut it, that sometimes one needed to get their hands into the mess, that turning the other cheek after getting slapped only lead to being slapped again, sometimes peace needed to be forced… The three of them were the best of friends and nothing else mattered, meeting them helped Howoku bloom into the man he was today – the Fourth Hokage!

"So how did you two make up?" Howoku asked Surawu encouraging her to finish the story. This was a unique experience, two opponents of each other feeling for one another, being opponents but not enemies. Fighting only because they ended up on the two sides of the same bridge and one of them had to get wet so that the other could pass.

"I always thought that Son Goku was angry at me and that he hated me after I lashed out at him. Turns out that was not the case – he was just hiding because he wanted me to be happy. He thought that maybe once I was happy that I would stop being so angry and hating the world and him by extension. He is a weird creature, he isn't violent or inherently evil like people portray the Tailed Beasts to be. He's actually a lot like me – simple minded. He just wants to play around but sometimes he gets a bit destructive with his games so over the years he started to feel really happy being sealed into a human – where his games hurt no one else, there are no villages to destroy in one's body, no volcanoes there to erupt, just a black void to play with one's friend until one gets bored. I confronted him after realizing that, it took me some time but… When I did, I've never seen anyone be as happy as Son Goku was at that moment. My inhuman strength and endurance returned after he started sharing chakra again but it didn't matter, instead of supressing myself I let myself bloom and I couldn't have cared less about what other people thought, I had the only friend I would ever need inside my own body, as close as close gets…"

Surawu gently touched her exposed belly where a complicated sign of a seal was. That gentle touch must've meant a lot, it communicated so many feelings at once. While Howoku was not a Jinchuuriki but he could understand the woman perfectly. "Very well, Surawu-san. I shall honor you by going all out and fighting you without thinking of Fou… Son Goku, or the Mizukage. Initially I was afraid of your mastery and coordination with Son Goku but… I guess I'm getting old and soft, I really have no wish to kill you now so you better find an answer to every attack I throw because if you die on me I won't forgive you!" Howoku explained taking an offensive stance. The two charged at each other and Howoku's body lit up with Starlight Release chakra as the two started exchanging punches. Even without using the Tailed Beast chakra Surawu was incredibly strong and fast and a very skilled taijutsu user. If it was not for Howoku's Starlight chakra that made his body much hotter leaving severe burns on any area he touched and burning the fist or knee that hit him slightly, this woman wouldn't have fought him on such equal scales as she did now.

The two leaped around each other, Surawu avoided every blow, she couldn't block any attacks without taking some damage and now her body was already battered by Howoku's previous explosion of excess. The woman made quick and lacking force strikes to hit the man, just land a quick jab, just to leave a mark but not put too much force so that she didn't contact the heated up chakra for too long. The man's glowing bursts of chakra were so hot that they didn't even feel hot – they just burned whatever they touched so Surawu had additional trouble avoiding taking more damage than she would have liked taking. Eventually the woman just flipped over Howoku and kicked off of his shoulders to make some distance between the two – fighting him up close was too much trouble for her.

"Not that I'm complaining but… Aren't Son Goku's Jinchuuriki supposed to be able to use Lava Release? Why aren't you using it?" Howoku asked politely panting after this intense exchange of blows with the woman.

"Well, technically Son Goku can teach you that and while one has him in them they have the capacity but… I'm sort of really bad at it so I stopped bothering with it, is there a problem with that?" Surawu replied.

Howoku laughed out loud from the bottom of his heart. "No. Your reply reminds me of a friend I know though."

The two prepared to settle their fight finally.


	55. Final Confrontation Imminent!

Surawu leaped forward winding up with her staff for a hit. Howoku swiped both of his hands to the side forming a rod out of Starlight chakra that blocked the blow. The slam of her staff only seemed to be the distraction for her main attack as the Jinchuuriki of the Four Tails backflipped and drove her fingers together into a clone technique seal.

"Shadow Clone Jutsu!" she said as a loud poof with a cloud of smoke that silenced any words she may have said afterwards. Five clones of the woman leaped out of the smoke cloud, Howoku stepped to the side to avoid the blow aimed by one of them and thrust his knee into her stomach making the clone poof away. The second clone's staff drove into Howoku's back but it didn't hurt like the real thing, the Hokage soon recovered from the shock and the pain and thrust his right leg backwards into the clone's chest dispelling it as well. Noticing the black staff of the third clone Howoku rolled forward stopping his body with his arm and pushing it off the ground while thrusting both of his feet at the clone kicking her in the chin and sending her into the air where it dispelled as well.

With a powerful swing of his elbow Howoku dispatched of the other clone and then leaped into the air and dispelled the last one with his kick. All of this seemed weird, Shadow Clone technique was an incredibly costly technique, a young genin in Tanshu's team was mentioned to have used the technique and passed out, this woman split her chakra into five parts essentially. Only then did the Fourth notice Surawu rapidly spinning her staff around her head and standing further away. "Sorry, Fourth, this is my special technique and it needs time to charge up, I had to throw those weaklings at you..." the woman giggled with a weird smile reminding that of a playful monkey.

The staff started glowing with a reddish glow before red lightning started bursting out of it covering the entire staff in a cloak of red chakra that shot off violent lightning-like bursts. Surawu then placed the staff in front of her holding it on one end while she pointed the other end at Howoku as if she was wielding a katana. The chakra around the staff intensified and the strain on the woman's body was evident as she started shouting out of pain and exhaustion, "Monkey Destruction Cannon Jutsu!" she yelled out as the violent burst of chakra separated into a wide and swift beam of destructive chakra attack. Just barely did Howoku manage to leap to the side and avoid the beam, Surawu tried to hit him with it again by adjusting her staff and turning herself with the beam around but Howoku managed to vault over the beam every time. It was unfortunate that this frantic dodging tired him out too much to exploit the moment of weakness after the woman's technique ended.

"Wow... You're pretty good, from the rumors people say that physical stuff comes hard for you but you matched me hand to hand and managed to dodge my beam as well as kept up with my clones, even if they were severely weaker versions of me... I'm really impressed." Surawu showed Howoku her tongue and laughed out like a monkey again, it seemed like the beast that she carried within somewhat affected her personality and mannerisms.

Howoku wanted to adjust his glasses that he still believed to be there but then his fingers only touched thin air and his own nose, his vision blurred again for a moment as he remembered losing them. "Truth be told, Surawu-san, it is my weakest side by far. That is simply the real difference between us, the wedge between a Jounin and a Hokage that separates us. I felt like I really connected with you, now I cannot kill you even if I wanted to. That being said I have responsibilities and I can entertain you and Son Goku no longer. I shall end it all with this final attack, when you train and grow stronger and when your connection with Son Goku grows to be even more powerful I'd gladly fight you again..."

Surawu furiously shook her head. "What are you talking about!? Do you mean you've been holding back this whole time!? Well... That makes me really pissed, you know! Stop playing around and show me this "wedge" of which you speak of!" the woman shouted out and leaped forward with a strike of her staff that burst with the reddish lightning chakra. It appeared that Son Goku was lending the woman chakra which she used to enhance her strength and endurance by injecting it forcefully into her chakra flow and accelerating it. While Howoku understood the basic concept because of his vast experience on the battlefield he could not understand why would the woman have chosen to do so - it basically had the same effects as the casual textbook chakra flow manipulation to achieve chakra augmentation.

The staff, bursting with crackling red lightning chakra, flew through the air cutting through it but then it stopped after hitting something really hard and strong. Surawu's head peeked to the side and then her mouth shot open in surprise as well as her eyes that widened to almost comedic extent. Howoku had raised his hand into the air and held it as if he had a sword in his hand and then a burst of Starlight Release formed a blade in his hands that was several times larger than her staff.

"Starlight Release: Pleiades!" he mumbled under his own nose as he pushed her staff back effortlessly by swinging his Starlight blade of chakra. Two wide slashes that formed an X shape covered Surawu's body before her gentle and swift feet even touched the ground making the woman lose her balance and stagger back, wild bursts of burning-like reaction to the chakra cut was glowing out of her wounds. On one hand it cauterized all of her burns but it also incinerated the areas around the cuts as well as deeper inside her body, Surawu coughed up blood but then regained her balance, her wild monkey-like eyes returned and dyed red, they were now enraged to the point where she now reminded more of a monkey than a human.

The Jinchuuriki's fist tightened as she cocked it back preparing a powerful punch, a cloak of red chakra covered her entire body with three tails growing out of her bottom shaped out of chakra. She was letting Son Goku give her more and more chakra to the point where his chakra dwarfed that of her own, it was starting to take her over. Suddenly the woman's fist shot out that very same crimson lightning that her staff was emanating before, just incalculably more dense and concentrated and supersized, her fist reminded more of a large ball similar to those that children played on the streets. Howoku's hand changed from a clenched hand that held his Starlight Blade to an open palm as the Starlight Chakra got reabsorbed into his body - while the man could not refund his own chakra that he had spent on his Starlight techniques he could change one to another quickly if he needed to. The concept was similar to reaching for water from a pond - one reached down and took some water in their hands and then raised it intending to wash their face. In the middle of that action they may have realized they were pretty thirsty so they completed the action by drinking the water instead of washing their face, that being said the amount of water in the pond was still reduced.

As Surawu prepared to charge at Howoku the gigantic ball of chakra around her arm that was an even more intense shade of crimson red that the cloak of chakra around her shaped into a gigantic fist. The Jinchuuriki roared wildly, reminding more of a roar of a wild ape than a roar of a furious woman which was troubling to hear. A powerful light emanated from Howoku's chest as he leaped forward to meet the woman's attack. Surawu roared again after thrusting her wild construct of crimson lightning chakra forward.

"Monkey Fist Jutsu!" she shouted out in a voice that barely reminded that of her own, all of a sudden, before the fist construct collided with his body Howoku's lips moved just barely - "Starlight Nova!" he uttered as the small ball of Starlight glow in his chest expanded into a gigantic all covering sphere that disintegrated the entire half of the room that those two were, deepening the crater that his previous outburst of power had made. Now the wing of the temple that the Hokage's group was in was no longer even connected to the main building. Howoku looked into the sky only to see wild raindrops falling onto his face, the man observed the dark clouds in the sky before his eyes briefly slipped onto burnt up and unconscious young woman beside him. The Fourth took a couple of deep breaths before falling onto his knees and having to stop for a moment. This was getting out of control, he was tired and wanted to stop all this fighting.

"Just one more fight... One more fight to end them all." Howoku whispered to himself as he decided to get out of the crater where the water was filling up moving his beaten opponent out of the crater as well.

Meanwhile slightly further down the room in the part that was yet undestroyed by Howoku's Starlight techniques Tanshu continuously tried to break through the barriers of the Barrier Buster of the Kirigakure Barrier Corps. Breaking a barrier was simple, the Sannin could bust a barrier with a single punch but his opponent kept crafting more and more endlessly, with each swipe of his arm while his other arm held the hand seal another barrier rose up.

"Your punches are weaker, you're getting slower, finally your own stupidity is catching up to you! Your chakra is slowly fading away, soon you won't even be able to punch through a single barrier!" the Barrier Buster laughed out as he started to believe in his hopes of victory. However no matter how the man tried to taunt the Konohagakure Sannin it invited no reaction. The man just leaped backwards and then lunged forward, his intense chakra started building up - something big was coming and it didn't took a sensor to feel it. The Barrier Buster thrust both of his hands forward forming as powerful of a barrier as he could but Tanshu's kick just kicked him up into the air as no barrier formed.

"Grgh... Impossible..." the Barrier Buster grunted in pain as Tanshu confidently wiped his nose with flick and jumped up.

"Leaf Whirlwind!" the Sannin yelled out as his continuous kicks bombarded the man's chest sending him crashing into the ground. It was not a powerful technique but when performed by a powerful ninja the power of the taijutsu technique mattered little, only the strength and speed of the user.

The Barrier Buster tried to form more barriers around him madly inside the cloud of dust that his body formed when it slammed into the ground but unsuccessfully - Tanshu's knee collided with the man's belly making him throw up blood. With a calm dash backwards Tanshu built up some space between the two and gave the opponent some time to recover.

"I can negate any ninjutsu or genjutsu technique you can throw at me, it's a combination of a sealing technique and genjutsu that enters your body like an illusion but then instead of putting you in a genjutsu places a seal that stops your technique by messing up your chakra flow. Stop even bothering with your stupid barriers..." Tanshu replied as he breathed out, he had to admit - the man was right, his strange strategy of wasting chakra really was getting the better of him at the moment but he was preparing his body for something special, to use THAT he needed to get rid of as much of his own chakra as he could because he hasn't mastered that technique that well, normally it was a combination of chakra collected by one's summoned animals and one's own but Tanshu just couldn't do it, he had to get rid of as much of his chakra as possible without passing out so that the process came easier...

The man jumped up on his feet and thrust his arm forward shooting off a wild and weak barrier that pushed Tanshu away slightly, the man then started thrusting his arms forward wildly reminding, ironically enough, of a sumo wrestler.

"Barrier Style: Thousand Barrier Barrage!" he shouted as his barriers started flying at Tanshu at great speed intending to crash into him and possibly leave some broken bones. The Sannin flashed through his handseals after biting his thumb and slammed his palm to the ground, a powerful explosion sent multiple mad clouds of smoke all around and then the barriers crashed into his location. After the technique ended and the Barrier Buster lowered his fatigued hands he could only curse - a giant three headed dog stood where Tanshu once was with the Sannin standing on the nose of the central head. Seeing how Howoku had blown the roof off before this at least fifty feet tall dog could fit easily inside the building seeing as the hall was quite wide but only couple of floors tall. Tanshu looked at the dog's eyes as the central head nodded letting the Sannin slip off of its nose.

"You know what to do!" Tanshu ordered as the giant Cerberus lit up with crimson glow of chakra just like the little pooch did before. Tanshu, however, had other plans. He charged right at his opponent attacking the man with a quick and powerful punch to the face, as the Barrier Buster tried to counterattack with his own glowing with chakra fist the Tanshu only dissolved into harmless red flames. The man then grunted in pain as the real Tanshu appeared behind him and drove his elbow right into the Barrier Buster's spine. The Kirigakure Jounin thrust his elbow hitting Tanshu right in the face but the Sannin recovered quickly and started punching madly with incredible speed. The Barrier Buster did his best to block as many blows as he could but he only blocked some of them - Tanshu's offensive was ruthless and brutal and would soon tear him down if this went on like that. Another "Leaf Whirlwind" sent the Kirigakure Jounin down only for him to barely pick himself up again.

The man then turned at the dog who despite his threatening size only stood there gathering some strange sort of chakra. The Barrier Buster thrust his arms forward attempting to form barriers around the dog and blow him away. "I don't know what your game is but I'm not letting it happen!" the man mumbled out through blood and slobber than was running down his mouth and nose as the battle had taken an incredible toll on him and his wearing down was quite visible. "Lightning Style: Restriction Beam Jutsu!" he shouted out but neither his barriers nor his beam shot out. The Cerberus thrust his giant claws at the man who just barely managed to leap aside and avoid being cut to shreds, the left head then leaned forward to get a good bite out of the man but he managed to leap aside and avoid that as well.

"You bloody fool, Tanshu-san just explained it all to you! Your stupid tricks won't work, if you want me gone you'll have to do it with your own two hands!" the dog growled angrily as the three heads spoke at the same time with its incredibly loud voice reaching even the farthest corners of the temple. Tanshu's body dove down from above with an elbow strike that connected right with the Barrier Buster's head, a mad flurry of punches sent the man down. Tanshu glared at the Red Cerberus angrily with a squint, "Is it done yet!? This one's just about reached his limit..." the man asked his summon angrily. The Red Cerberus visibly got scared of his master's fury and started explaining itself in a hilarious fashion where each head started telling a different excuse making none of them intelligible in the end.

"Whatever, hurry up, I'm just about done with this weakling." Tanshu replied angrily. He leaped back onto the head of the dog and pointed at the direction of the Barrier Buster who was writhing on the ground. It was then that a powerful explosion shook the ground directing the Cerberus' attention and cancelling its charge up of chakra. The Red Dog glared angrily at his partner again to which the giant dog only barked an apology. "It appears that Howoku's already done with his fight, let's wrap this up too." The Sannin encouraged his dog again and all the three heads spat out a mad jet of flames that united in a colossal fireball in the center of where they crossed right on top of the Barrier Buster ninja. The wild firestorm raged for a moment before Tanshu threw an explosive kunai at the explosion to reignite it and make the total explosion destroy the second half of the hall they were in.

"Are the two of ye crazy!?" Haoru's mad voice shouted through the blazing inferno as the man's mad and muscular body broke through the raging flames as if they were nothing. "This is a protected cultural treasure, some idiots worshipped their deadbeat gods here!" the elder samurai shouted out. The head of the sumo ninja he was facing off against dug deep into Haoru's side sending him crashing into a wall to the side.

"Focus your attention on our fight, damn it!" the sumo ninja shouted out. The attention of the Sannin and the Cerberus turned at the smoldering cloak that once belonged to the Barrier Buster. Before the two of them could breathe easier a powerful impact sent the Red Cerberus to the ground, Tanshu had to leap off of the dog because of how violently the dog's body was shaken and crushed to the ground. Burnt up and injured Barrier Buster was still alive, he must've avoided the firestorm because no one could've survived something like that.

"You thought that was it? Mizukage Shirona entrusted to us the glorious mission, this majestic purpose of..." a powerful and loud splat echoed through the hall as the Cerberus' paw crushed the little yelling man to the floor. Tanshu angrily stared at his partner. The arm of the Jounin just twitched from under the furry paw that slammed him to the ground.

"I was hoping to finish charging it up before the next fight, you know... Whatever, give me however much you've got." The man grunted out angrily making his summon look at him with the sorry eyes that only a canine was able to make. The dog Cerberus barked angrily and disappeared in a loud poof of smoke making the blood red chakra that it had gathered cover Tanshu's body and be absorbed by the man. Tanshu stretched out a bit and smiled. "Heh, almost done... Not bad."

Haoru rolled out of the hole in the wall that he had left as the entire construction went down. His sides were actually starting to ache, it was entirely possible that even his monstrous body was reaching its limits. Then again, he was fooling around far too much, it was just about time he showed these two twerps why he was such a legend. Haoru's body leaned back and his muscles tensed up to the point where his blood vessels shot out madly, small pebbles and slightly larger rubble around the man started moving around frantically and shaking as the immense gusts of wind gathered around his body blowing even large chunks of debris away. Haoru expelled a powerful kiai shout as mad projectiles of wind shot out cutting up the rubble around him, even the largest stones fell to pieces like falling leaves.

"Godly Sword: Susanoo!" he chanted out leaping forward in a flash appearing right beside the incredibly obese sumo ninja. For a moment the Onimoui ninja wondered what sort of technique this famous "Godly Sword" was - Haoru's sword was not sheathed but close to the sheath so it wasn't a sword drawing technique. With a swift and blurry motion Haoru's arm sheathed his blade, as the blade entered the sheathe inhumanly fast it generated powerful gusts of wind that blew from behind the sumo ninja drawing him in at Haoru, the elder samurai shot his foot forward and turned his entire body around a full circle while drawing his sword. The gusts of wind blowing at the samurai made it impossible to dodge the drawing slash, the sword of the famous "God Sword" Haoru passed even through the immensely hard Onimoui skin and flesh like butter. The poor chubby met the ground in two pieces.

The Yuki woman stood there speechless for a moment before trying to utter a statement of the fact that her comrade was dead. Haoru leaped around and stretched his tired muscles out, using the Godly Sword technique tired his muscles out a lot.

"Y-You... K-Killed him... W-With one cut..." the woman still couldn't believe it, she raised her hands and placed them on her chest as if they could've shielded her from the wrath of the rampaging war hero samurai. The woman fell onto the ground hopelessly, it was very clear - that exact moment when all hope left her and she accepted her own death. Instead of a sword severing her lowered head however a mad laugh met her still stunned and unbelieving ears.

"I dunno, I can still hear his heart pounding, those Onimoui sure are lively... A medical ninja could still put him together." he laughed out looking at the unconscious chubby. Hearing the man's words the Yuki woman's eyes quickly lifted up and met the top piece of her comrade, madly she crawled up to her friend and went through a series of handseals placing her arms in front. "Ice Style: Jack Frost Jutsu!" she uttered as a stream of ice shot out from her hands covering the wound of the chubby and closing it from bleeding. The woman was shaking in rage.

"Y-You bastard! Toying around with us like this... Unforgivable!" she yelled out forming some more handseals and pointing her hands at the samurai. A mad barrage of icicles shot out all of which bounced off of the samurai's body as they were deflected by his sword that moved faster than the eye could see.

"Didn't your mommy tell you a lousy ninja can never face a samurai in an open battle? Honestly, what sort of outcome did you expect?" Haoru shrugged, the Yuki woman grabbed her partner and started running to the stone door through which the Mizukage left. Haoru's blurry sword swung a circle in the air that made a tunnel of howling winds.

"Wind Cutter Style: Vacuum Prison" he chanted as a bubble of air formed around the woman and her unconscious chubby friend. The samurai's blade lit up with blinding white chakra and he made a handseal slashing with the other hand madly. "Wind Cutter Style: Wind Blade Barrage!" he shouted out as each slash fired off a projectile of wind chakra that cut the woman and her friend down bursting the bubble of air they were incased in and making them fall lifelessly onto the ground.

"Weren't you too cruel, Haoru-san? The woman was running, she was no longer fighting." He asked. Haoru just laughed and sheathed his sword.

"Actually I feel sort of soft right now, had I let her escape her mistress would've killed her without a doubt for abandoning her post. I on the other hand just injured her severely, it is more than likely that someone will tend to her wounds, also even if Mizukage wins she has no reason to punish any of those two - they fought till the end for all she knows." Haoru sat on the floor and covered his face. Tanshu and Howoku started walking forward to the stone door, with a single kick the Red Dog sent the stone door crumbling down.

"It'd be better if you stayed here, samurai." Tanshu said with a rude tone, "The fatso and the woman were right - your own body doesn't know how severely it's wounded, you've been fighting whole day today, even fought the Mizukage herself and on top of that you just used a God Sword technique, if you just died on the battlefield you'd get in our way."

Haoru laughed out madly and sat to the wall in a meditating position. "You ungrateful little runt! You think I don't know my own limits? Mizukage-ninja's technique hit me pretty hard, plus my body ain't what it was in the war. Even in this state I could sever her head with a single swipe... I'll just choose not to cause she is a problem for you ninja, if you guys win she'll get hers, if you guys die to her she'll kill more ninja than I could've ever hoped to so in the end I'll win either way. Her puny men bore me anyways. Just make sure someone tells me when either she or you guys are dead, I'd hate to sit here forever." the elder samurai grunted and crossed his bulky arms on his buff chest relaxing and closing his eyes.

As Howoku and Tanshu made their way through the corridor rushing for whichever room Shirona ended up in the Sannin looked at his partner, "You think Haoru's full of shit or is he actually that weird?" Howoku laughed, "Honestly, both are quite likely, I've never met a man who hates ninja quite like he does but he has taken a lot of damage. He may be too worn out to move but it's equally as likely that he actually intended to let us kill each other in the end like he said he did..." Howoku saw the blonde hair of the Mizukage flow far away in the distance and her black dress. The two men burst into a square room with a platform up where observers would have stood and watched whatever insane ancient rituals transpired below. Behind Shirona stood a bare chested statue of a bearded old man with a staff that had several oak leaves on it from the side. The great divinity crafted out of bronze stood there with a bolt of lightning in one hand aiming to smite those that stood below it - this place was likely a sacrificial altar.

"I've been waiting for you two, it's sad that Haoru couldn't join us, I would've loved to kill all three of you off, I'm a busy woman after all, about to get much busier. I'll have little time to chase timed samurai around." Shirona smiled welcoming the two who have come to their final goal. This was the end of both of their paths - Tanshu and Howoku wanted to apprehend or kill Shirona, Shirona wanted them dead so this was their final trial. No more lapdogs, no more traps or games, just ninja doing what ninja were always meant to do. Ambition for endless war clashing with the ambition of endless world peace.


	56. Backstabbed!

Tanshu and Howoku continued to stare their opponent down, the two men had worked alongside each other before so it would've taken them little trouble to crush even a Kage level opponent. Then again, Shirona was someone who had faced off against Haoru and survived which was not something easily dismissed. The woman gently raised her hand into the air and swiped it back down, Tanshu's body instinctively turned to the side. A powerful noise of rumbling greet the three as the stone structures behind the Sannin separated after being cut in two by an edge of a barrier sent by the woman, she was someone who has managed to make barriers into a tool of both perfect offense and defense.

Tanshu's body disappeared and in a blink appeared right in front of Shirona, a powerful punch flew her way that collided with a barrier in mid-flight. The Sannin's punch didn't even inflict that much damage upon the woman and it could've been said judging from her face that blocking his blows didn't come too hard for the Mizukage or strained her at all as she was just playfully smiling behind the barrier. "You'll have to forgive me, it's an old habit to dispatch of irrelevant dogs early. I suppose we've both underestimated each other..." the woman shrugged acting like the situation at hand was not at all troubling her. What truly transpired in the heart of the world's most ambitious lady was a mystery as it often is with women.

"You should hurry back to your master, dog, he may need your help soon." Shirona laughed out when Howoku dashed sideways tossing some kunai and shuriken her way when Tanshu was attacking from another side. The Hokage tried to test a theory that Shirona could only place a barrier at one place at once, something that was quickly ruined when she managed to make a bent barrier that blocked both corners. Tanshu looked at Howoku questioningly wondering what the woman may have meant, Howoku just shrugged. What transpired next took only a couple of blinks for it to be missed: a white flash flew straight at the Fourth Hokage only for the figure's blade to collide with that of Tanshu's. When the dust settled down the Konohagakure Sannin found himself staring at Misu of the Vapor - his brother in arms.

"I always thought you were an idiot but I've never taken your aim to be that far off!" Tanshu cracked a grin as he struggled to keep the hold, he couldn't have been too forceful with his clash as his kunai when blocking Misu's blade could've cracked and broken off quite easily if too much force was placed on it.

"I'll leave you two to catch up, leave mommy and daddy to their differences alone, boys..." Shirona yawned by raising her arm that caused the ground beneath the two Sannin to shift - a barrier of solid chakra below the rocks acted like a platform that lifted the entire floor beneath the two and shot it up to the ceiling. Tanshu and Misu held their clash to the final moment, they only parted and leaped to the sides right before the rock slammed into the ceiling, something that would've crushed them and grinded them with the rocks above. The Red Dog and Misu landed on the opposite sides of the observer's area.

"I'll give you until I go for the kill to explain yourself, if you die before you prove your point it'll be on you!" Tanshu angrily yelled out going through a couple of handseals and spitting out a bursting wave of flames at his friend. Misu went through a bunch of his own seals and spat out a dragon shaped water projectile to counteract Tanshu's jutsu. The Red Dog's injured and tired body burst from the smoke with a roaring fist that was just barely blocked in time with Misu's blade, Tanshu angrily breathed in and thrust his fist forward breaking Misu's steel and making his fist collide with the body of his friend that then burst into white vapor. Knowing full well about how his friend could use that vapor by heating it up Tanshu leaped back out of it. The fight between Howoku and Shirona below no longer mattered to those two.

"I don't need to explain anything, I have my own views about how the world of shinobi should be and the lady is just a better leader in such a world than Howoku, it's simple politics, he may still be my friend but he no longer has my vote." Misu replied drawing another katana out of his set of two tied to his waist. The last one was cracked and worn down even before he confronted one of the strongest ninja alive so it was of no surprise that it cracked under pressure.

"You've cut down so many that your own sword was weeping to be broken, whatever vision of the world you have doesn't interest me, I'll just get you out of my way and go crush Shirona to rub salt onto your bleeding wounds!" Tanshu shouted out enraged as he thrust his fist forward, Misu's body once again dissolved into vapor. Tanshu had seen the Vapor Mode used a lot during his times working with the other Sannin, he had never seen the mystery of it cracked nor has he wondered about it himself, the idea of fighting a friend had just never dawned on him. Not that it mattered or Tanshu was afraid of it.

Misu's blade cut through the vapor that he had made, a blinding cloud of smoke-like substance that was deadly similar to the infamous "Hidden Mist Technique" of the Kirigakure ninja. The blade was caught by Tanshu's arms and pushed to the side, as the Sannin tried to capitalize on the opening he himself made the figure of the man only faded back into the cloud of vapor around him. "Stop running and fight me!" Tanshu yelled out angrily taken by the ridiculousness of the situation of having to fight a friend he was worrying over for so long when it turned out that his friend was busy cutting down his other friends.

"Oh you'd love that huh? You made the enemy out of me so easily, perhaps Shirona's views are also more fitting for you than Howoku's delusions of peace amongst countries of warriors and killers?" Misu's voice echoed from everywhere, it was almost like his voice separated and came from multiple areas inside the fog at once.

"There's nothing complicated about me kicking your ass, you've sold out for the enemy, it's as easy as that." Tanshu shouted out again blocking swings of Misu's blade that seemed to come from random directions. The bastard was utilizing the cloud of vapor that he was continuously emitting to deceive Tanshu and try and land a cut on him from somewhere he didn't see it coming from. Luckily enough Tanshu's sharpened senses allowed him to hear the blade cut through the vapor just in time for him to react, it was a superhuman feat all by itself but such was simply Tanshu's life. He broke the conventional rules of how ninja worked to do his job properly.

"The world where one country is the enemy and another one is a friend, the ideal world where you know who your enemies are... Such a delusional world doesn't exist, Tanshu, you're just as naïve as you were to leave the faith of your little wet dream to a man you just met!" Misu's voice came from various directions again. "Do you think Shirona is an enemy because she is from Kirigakure? Do you think Kirigakure is an enemy? Do you think Shirona is your enemy? False knowledge of who is an enemy and who is your friend leads to generalization which leads to death of innocents. For all the bullshit talk Howoku spouts out about peace he doesn't know crap about it, he thinks that just pointing at one country and blaming it for the world's problems will solve everything, he just mistakes it to be that easy and that's why he isn't fit to be in charge. Truth be told, he never was..."

Tanshu closed his eyes and avoided several more strikes, sharp pain and warm sensation of blood squirting onto his back alerted him that he may not have been as perfect at avoiding all of the slashes as he may have thought. The Red Dog had spent so long getting rid of his chakra and exhausting himself, charging up the chakra that his summons gave him instead, he planned to use THAT on Shirona but... He will have to dispatch of Misu with it. For that to happen he still would need some more time however, some more time when he couldn't afford to die!

"Wait... Wet dream? Do you mean Vashia? What do you mean by that?" Tanshu caught onto a detail in all that manifesto of madness that Misu was spitting out. He was just an apologist of Shirona's actions because those actions allowed him to be a wild animal and kill whoever he wanted to kill. Misu always was a little bit scary and ruthless, they should've gotten the clue when he started leaving for missions in Water Country a bit too often...

"What do you think I did? She was a Hyuuga with those cursed eyes, she saw through my Vapor Mode, she had the information about my abilities which she could sell to the enemy at any moment - I killed her!" Misu replied cold and simple as if he was describing a meal that he had yesterday. Tanshu's teeth dug deep into his own lip making blood squirt out, his hands furiously flashed through some handseals and slammed into the platform they were standing on.

"Double Summoning Jutsu: Baby Heaven and Earth!" Tanshu chanted out as the two dogs burst with the same crimson chakra that the Red Cerberus and the Poochy before charged up for him. The two leaped inside the vapor using their incredibly sensitive noses to sniff the bastard out. The two dogs weren't too large or powerful, they were just a duo of shepherd-like dogs with black uniforms that had two symbols on their backs reading "Heaven" and "Earth" respectively. The two dogs whined in pain telling Tanshu of the location of the man he was gunning for, without second questioning his thoughts the man burst forward with all of his speed. As the two dogs whined again in pain Tanshu felt their chakra enter his system - they were dispatched off.

The man leaped into the cloud where Misu was supposed to be and started attacking in wide swings and kicks trying desperately to hit the man. He wanted to punch him until only a stain remained, no more respect, no more kinship, no more tolerance for the life of this man remained - he killed Vashia! Truth be told he may have had his reasons, his responsibility altering reasons to justify him but to Tanshu it didn't matter, for the death of the young woman he wanted to know, to clash blades with to understand her heart, Misu of the Vapor had to die.

Tanshu's wide swings only hit vapor, the man felt the gas heating up around him and he leaped up sticking onto the wall and ran up to the ceiling. Tanshu leaped down with a straight kick that separated the vapor mist in two from the intensity of it, it crashed through the platform sending debris crashing below, making the Sannin backflip to land on more solid ground.

"Oh? Did that hit a nerve? I didn't know if she was actually a sweetheart of yours, or what, you were always so silent about her and so shy, like a schoolboy, honestly." Misu taunted once again from the cloud of vapor. "Maybe had you told me back then that you loved her, had the almighty icon of coolness "Red Dog Tanshu" acted like a man around the woman he loved, I would've had a clue and wouldn't have killed her... Although not quite, you were still a criminal back then after all, what did it matter who you loved or hated?"

Tanshu roared madly into the air with a proud shout that was just supposed to let his emotions out. Wild fiery chakra shot out from his body pushing the cloud of vapor away, the fire started enveloping his entire body, Tanshu stood in a wild rotating and rampaging firestorm of wildfire and he didn't even shake. Misu stepped back intimidated by the display of Tanshu's fury, he questioned just what exactly this new technique was, the color of the flame reminded him of the color of chakra that burst from those dogs, could this have been the true purpose of Tanshu's strange way of fighting using his summons as martyrs? Misu let more vapor gas shoot out from under his sleeves as he hid inside the cloud, the ongoing mad outburst of chakra and flames and Tanshu's relative calmness made him very careful about his approach.

"Y-You should just give up, whatever you do is pointless, you'll never even land a single hit in my mist, I guess you could say Vashia's death wasn't pointless, my secret was preserved and came to bite you in the ass. She is the one you should blame for your own death by my hands, it's because she wasn't strong enough to live and tell you my secret that you die today!" Misu tried to taunt Tanshu, the wild burst of flaming chakra formed a sphere of wild flames around Tanshu, the figure that emerged from inside those wild flames was something else. It was a combination of a man and a dog - a bipedal figure with dog's paws and feet, body half covered with red fur with the muscles breaking through the fur and being just pale skin, the man's face had the typical snout of a dog and Tanshu's pupils looked like there was still some of the literal fire inside of them as they blazed around the minus shaped iris. Erect canine ears broke through from Tanshu's wild shoulder-length locks and powerful and threatening fangs were shown when the man growled angrily, ready to tear into the man who had killed the woman wanted to meet again at some point, the man who had betrayed his friends and his country for his own desire to kill anyone he pleased at any time. Fangs piercing the throat of such a man brought no blame onto their owner!

"What the... Is that?" Misu shook lowering his blade inside the vapor mist.

"It's the ultimate combination of a summoner and trust of his partners - the perfect coordination technique between man and animal, had you not been so happy to take life you'd have known that each life form has vastly different kinds of chakra. This is the result of training that combines the unique chakra of two vastly different beings, the symphony of trust between a beast and a man, originally aimed to crush Shirona but I guess you will have to do. My rage of loss combined with burning passion to kill you creating a technique previously unheard of - Sage Mode!" Tanshu growled out in a voice that belonged more to an animal than to a man.

"What did you do, Shirona?" Howoku grunted out leaping towards the woman kicking at her only for his blow to be blocked by her. "What did you do to Misu, why is he fighting against us!?" the man lost any semblance of control. When faced with a woman who manipulated people and wasted their lives to satisfy her goals, someone who has turned one of his best friends into someone that wanted to kill him into his enemy, could he truly be blamed for loss of any remnants of composure he may have had previously. This battle was the culmination of this entire day, the most insane day of his life, he had no composure to spare for this woman.

"Ah, yes, isn't it so easy to think that I did something to him? Sure, blame me, hate me and never for a moment wonder that perhaps you never truly knew the man you called your best friend. With all your mad barrage of peace treaties, tangling the world around you in strings you thought you were pulling but actually were tangled in yourself, have you ever consulted with your friends? Because when I first met a young Sannin walking around my village I sure did, I took my time getting to know him, without the labels of villages, we weren't a Kirigakure ninja talking with a Konoha ninja. We were a man and a woman exchanging ideals and dreams, coincidentally enough our visions for this world were similar and while our means of achieving it were different with a little... Convincing, he decided that means did not matter, only the point they were leading to." Shirona answered, she was no longer smiling, no longer making fun of Howoku or shoving her superiority in his face, she was looking with those angry and burning eyes that looked almost like she was blaming him.

"Shironaaaa!" Howoku yelled out madly punching and kicking, losing any semblance of cool he may have once had with the woman stopping to even use barriers, she simply leaned to the sides, ducked and leaped over his attacks. This blonde was not a physically dominating ninja but at that moment in time she was physically dominating Howoku. The woman leaped into the air and kicked off of the Hokage's chest backflipping gracefully further away, gaining some distance.

"Oh, so we've moved past the "village" part, Kirigakure no longer equals evil in your eyes? You seem to now think it's not Kirigakure that's a "nest of tripping snakes, etching to swallow one another" but you think me to be mad? That's an improvement, yes, Hokage, it's not countries that are evil, or rather, different from your point of view, but people. Do not blame my village for my actions, one of us shall live, it is important that he or she does not hold any grudge towards those that were not involved." Shirona's eyes looked completely different, almost... Worried. Almost... Afraid. Finally the woman behind the manipulative façade appeared, or at least another mask changed its predecessor.

"I will not let you twist this world again, perversely crush the legacy of me and my predecessors! I won't let you twist this world into war!" Howoku spoke, calmly this time as he started regaining his composure, started dealing with the situation where one of his best friends was a traitor who just tried to cut him down from behind working with the woman who stood against everything he stood for.

"It is you who twists the world, war is its natural state, it can be no other way when warriors and assassins are who inhabit it. You are just an actor with a mask, forcing same masks onto the entire world to wear." Shirona replied sending a straight barrier at Howoku that crashed into the man shattering upon impact, the woman turned around herself and sent some more barriers his way from which Howoku rolled to the side. The man was breathing rapidly on his knees, desperately trying to regain his fighting condition which he wasted on the woman's minions and puppets she used as means to her end.


	57. For Vashia! Roar Sage Mode

Shocked by this new technique that Tanshu had displayed Misu clenched his blade harder. He never was too fond of this youngster, he always thought that everyone was too soft on this kid who spent almost half his life as a criminal. He couldn't stand his stupid act of a tortured soul. Still, he had to hand it to the fool that he was skilled, had Misu not had his Vapor mode at his disposal the Red Dog would have required some additional planning to take out. Misu wouldn't have felt nearly as brave just jumping into the fight with him, he would've asked someone to assist him or that the Mizukage spared him some secret weapon in Kirigakure's disposal. The country spent the better part of its history plotting destruction of Konoha, surely they must have had something to take this cocky idiot down.

"Calm down, this changes nothing - it must be just a combination transformation of some sort, there is absolutely no way that he can sense the secret of my Vapor mode. He may be faster, stronger or whatever but it doesn't matter if he can't get his hands on me..." the Sannin kept calming his racing heart down. The world as he saw it - enveloped in war, a cruel vortex of flames and death, the state that keeps the skill of every ninja sharp, makes them grow and evolve constantly or get swiped aside by the twister of history was at the palm of his hand. No man-dog creature could stop that.

Tanshu's hand reached to the side and grabbed a handle of a staircase, the Sage Mode user gripped the handle tighter and it melted where his grip was situated leaving a spiky iron bar in the man's hand. The flow of chakra from the body of Tanshu was so immense that when it touched any other substance it rubbed against it so hard that it heated it up. It may have taken the Red Dog the better part of the day to charge up this technique for use but it seemed to be quite the ace in his sleeve. Misu leaped forward winding his sword backwards and then thrusting its point at the Sage. "Vapor Style: Vapor Dragon Jutsu!" Misu roared out as a powerful gust of wind forced the wild and constant flow of water vapor from his body accumulate into a giant shape of the gapping jaws of a gigantic dragon. Tanshu's arms lifted up and got placed into a handseal.

"Sage Art: Cerberus Howl!" the man growled out sending a powerful heating shockwave at the concentration of the vapor dragon tearing it to bits and proceeding to incinerate and utterly disintegrate the man in the center of the cloud using the technique. Sage chakra completely dominated any other kind of chakra, Vapor Dragon Jutsu was supposed to be the perfect clashing technique - stand still and absorb any answers that the opponent throws and then lash out violently devouring the target in a wild rush of vapor that simultaneously and wildly changed its temperature and density constantly. It was a living hell for those that got hit by it, still it was absolutely no match for the Sage chakra of Tanshu.

"You fool!" Misu's voice yelled laughing maniacally from the shooting cloud of vapor as his fist appeared out of nowhere aimed right at Tanshu's face. The Sage just leaned his head to the side effortlessly avoiding the blow as if he was expecting it, no, as if he knew where it was coming from perfectly. Tanshu's fist tore through the Vapor clone and disintegrated Misu's shape once again. The flaring eyes turned and stared at a random point in the cloud of vapor that constantly grew, no, the point was anything but random - the eyes were staring right into the eyes of the real Misu.

"NO! Impossible! How could he know!? Tanshu isn't a sensor nor does he possess Byakugan or a similar technique!" Misu thought to himself as he quickly leaped to the side to relocate. His feet moved quietly but swiftly, the Sannin couldn't believe that Tanshu saw through it all. How could he have known that the Vapor mode was a simple use of Vapor clones combined with the Substitution Jutsu, using the constant upkeep of the Vapor mist that helped him confuse his enemies and conceal the trickery. Obviously someone who could track chakra would see right through it but... Tanshu wasn't supposed to be able to do that!

Sage Tanshu appeared right in front of where Misu was headed - his speed was incredible, incomparable not only to that of a normal ninja but even to his own. Even Tanshu's own league was completely outclassed by this display. The dog-man figure just growled angrily.

"Sage Art Taijutsu: Dog Bullet" he chanted out as his wild barrage of punches bombarded Misu's body tearing through it like hot steel cutting through butter, still, instead of blood and guts only more vapor shot out from the Sannin's body. Tanshu's eyes took only mere moments to track the real Misu again.

"This was the last clone, you've got no one to substitute with anymore, run, make more clones, embarrass yourself more." Tanshu almost barked out as the wild transformation that the technique brought caused his voice to be a combination of both man and a beast. Misu shouted out angrily into the air lunging at Tanshu and drawing his sword, Tanshu leaped forward slashing with his bar of iron that he held in his hand, a deafening clang echoed as Misu's sword cut right through the iron bar but met Tanshu's wild heated up hand that caught the blade right up to his chest.

"You can't melt my blade, no matter how much you focus your chakra, it's chakra conductive you fool!" Misu grunted. Tanshu smiled. "I wonder about that..." as the flow of Sage chakra from his hand intensified a bright flash covered the top floor of the temple, swallowing both men in it.

"This is stupid. I don't need summons!" a much younger Tanshu yelled out after Hanasaku showed him the forest where the ninja hounds resided in. After the young woman helped him in the Tower of Bones and they all kicked God-Eyes' ass he had great respect for her and her level of strength but still he felt like she underestimated him all the time. He had to listen to her, he had to do everything she did and train with her like her apprentice, those were the conditions upon which Howoku and he agreed to. Tanshu trained with Hanasaku and in return he will climb through the ranks accordingly to his level of promise and strength that he showed.

Hanasaku pounded Tanshu into the ground, as violent as that looked she held back the greater part of her wild strength. "Yes you do! You can't just dismiss an entire field of expertise just because you're good at another. If you had the ability to summon back when you fought God-Eyes the first time you may have beaten him. Ninja dogs can be used for displacing your opponent, damaging them, they're also loyal companions and friends." Tanshu pulled his head out of the dirt and locked his hands around his chest while pouting and looking away. He had nothing against training with Hanasaku but having to train with and acquire trust of someone else was stupid, especially if this someone was someone of no use to him. Why would he kneel for an animal that was weaker to him?

"Alpha-san!" Hanasaku kneeled on her right knee and placed her palm on her right shoulder, bowing her head. She then angrily dragged the young companion of her down with her as well. The giant dog growled and upon being given a signal Hanasaku stood up.

"This young man wants to train with you guys and acquire your trust, he's a great pain in the butt but I hope that having in mind that he is my friend you will find it in you to forgive his great stupidity." the gigantic white shepherd, covered with black stripes in some areas of his body lowered its head to the level of the little man and sniffed him.

"Fine" Tanshu murmured under his nose, "This big guy looks like I could maybe use him to dispatch of any underlings of my enemies... I guess I'll let you be my comrade." The boy angrily spoke, the canine in front of him barked angrily sending a powerful shockwave that pushed the youth back several dozens of meters making him clench and cover his head to stay on his feet. Hanasaku sighed, she gently touched the forehead of the colossal dog and let his silver colored glowing chakra flow through her until her body went through a transformation, the woman changed right in front of the eyes of the young man. Her body then flashed in an instant implanting her elbow into his belly. Tanshu fell unconscious in a single hit.

When the young man woke up it was a late evening, Hanasaku was right by his side, the woman noticed him waking up almost immediately. She sighed and leaned up to him checking his body for any greater injuries. "What was that, back then?" Tanshu asked. Hanasaku smiled.

"Ninja dogs are a very special sort of species of ninja animals. They take great amount of loyalty and respect towards a ninja to become partners, it took me almost ten years to gain enough mutual respect for them to even let me sign their contract and let me use them in battle. However that is great because in this world there is a technique that requires a summon and a ninja to be in perfect harmony - Sage Mode. Usually one acquires summons easily and then after gaining several members of their species completely forgets about it, focuses on other skills. Very few have ever achieved this jutsu, no one had ever mastered it. The thing is that once dogs finally trust and respect you - you're incredibly close to that bond being strong enough to learn this technique. Ninja hounds are the best species to train this technique with as you will learn it the most easily with them. I'll leave you here and come back once in a while to oversee your progress, your training will move on once you learn this technique or if I'll see there's no hope for you to learn it."

Hanasaku stood up and moved towards the door silently, she barely even looked back at the boy. Tanshu clenched his fists together and yelled out angrily, his bandaged head that he hurt when he fell after passing out started pulsing with pain almost instantly. "That power you had, it was amazing! I'll bend my knee as many times as I need, I'll eat shit if I have to but I'll learn this technique! I need it! I need it to protect my Katei!" Hanasaku turned her head back at him, just half of her face was seen in the moonlight as she showed him a thumb up and disappeared into the night. Tanshu got up and started moving towards the light in the distance, where bunch of ninja dogs were playing cards by the fire. They carried their cards in their teeth and just flipped them face down, pushing them around using their paws.

"Hey look, it's the human. Sorry, we ate everything, Alpha-san eats like a beast, we eat what's left. You eat what's left after us."

"Hey... You got thumbs, can you maybe hold our cards and play them as we tell you? Tell you what, you play my cards and scratch my back and I'll let you play with me in the morning." A tiny dog mumbled out in a drunk tone, accelerating the flow of his words and slowing it down to a crawl at random intervals.

"Yeah, I can do that." Tanshu sat down and took the wet and covered in slobber cards from the dog's teeth, then picked some up from the ground and showed them to him, letting the dog pick the cards to be played. The game went on great, soon every dog playing wanted Tanshu's help and started offering him things for the use of his thumbs to play card games. Still, Tanshu remembered what Hanasaku had told him - dogs were a species that valued loyalty and respect so he never switched his "card master", he let the tiny dog use him every time.

"You're alright, Tanshu. Tell ya what, I'll arrange it with Alpha-san that you get to sign the contract with us, I'll lend you my fangs just like you lend me your thumbs every evening. Name's Poochy by the way."

Several years later a much older Tanshu stood by a pack of crimson dogs, all of whom he had trained with, respect and loyalty of whom he had earned over the years by hunting with them like an animal. Using his own punches and kicks and teeth to take down the prey to honor their ways. It was a real bummer that Alpha, the leader of the Ninja hounds had sworn loyalty to Hanasaku, had it not been so he may have even snagged the big guy's services at some point as the two often sparred just for fun and over the several years have learned to respect one another a great deal. Hanasaku came every three months to observe his progress, by the time she came the first time he already had the contract signed and several dogs he had befriended and able to summon in a fight. Now she was standing proudly and observing his final steps towards becoming a true Sage.

"So did you get that, Tanshu-san? That's how it's done, each species on Earth has a different kind of chakra and when they mix it up it usually ain't too good, you need great mastery over your own body and your own chakra control to pull it off. You let your summon concentrate all of their chakra, build up insane amounts of it and transfer it to you, then you adapt it and match your own chakra up to it, you don't let it take over yours nor do you let yours take it over - you create a unique mixture of the two that is neither human nor animal. That is how a Sage is born - it's the ultimate combination of trust and respect between the summoned and the summoner."

Tanshu slapped his hands together and started building his chakra up, the four dogs around him also started howling as their chakra flows intensified and they started glow blood red from the immense chakra that they emanated from their bodies. The strands of chakra from Tanshu touched up with the chakras of the summoned dogs and as each dog collapsed they transferred great amounts of their chakra to Tanshu. The young man's chakra changed colors a couple of times, the crimson chakra that the dogs sent over mixing with the brownish color of his own to create the vibrant orange glow. A wild burst of flames emanated through the grasslands setting the patches of grass on fire, in the center of the mad burst of chakra stood Tanshu - now a combination of a dog and a man.

Hanasaku slapped her face with her palm. "What's wrong?" Tanshu growled out, "I feel amazing, with this technique I feel like I could beat anyone alive!" Hanasaku shrugged and crossed her arms around her chest.

"You're just as bad as I am at this. Normally the true Sage Mode shows no physical signs of transformation except the vibrant changes in chakra color and the blazing chakra nature colored eyes with the weird pupils. In your case you've failed to properly balance out the chakra, you've made it more dog than man and so you've went through a physical transformation. That is what Alpha-san called "the Imperfect Sage Mode" when he saw me doing it."

Tanshu sighed, he leaped around a couple of times and threw a couple of lightning fast punches. "Alright, so how does it work? What are the drawbacks and how do I make it end?" he asked.

Hanasaku chuckled, "In theory you could just rebuild your chakra by expelling all the traces of the Sage chakra you've formed, however I've never successfully done it. The technique ends when you use out all of the Sage chakra you've made using the transformation." In a wild blaze of orange flames the technique ended and Tanshu returned to normal. "Usually the first time your Sage chakra is impure and sloppily made, also you make very small quantities of it so it ends fast. The quality of the chakra and the amount you can generate will improve with each transformation."

Tanshu stretched out, he looked really pleased with this amazing new technique but it appeared like Hanasaku had not finished talking yet. "Before you go out there you have to know something. Because we are able of only achieving Imperfect Sage Mode it'll take great amounts of time to achieve the amount of Sage chakra needed to transform. Look at it like this, let's say you need a glass of concentrated orange juice to make you strong, thing is that you can't make concentrated orange juice and you can only make about 20-30%, which means you'll need four or five glasses of it, identically you'll need four or five times more time to reach the amount you need to use the Sage Mode, also you'll use up that many times more of it when using Sage techniques. At least that's how Howoku explained it to me after seeing it... The good part of it is that your physical attributes, depending on the species of the summon that grants you their chakra, will be enhanced beyond belief, you'll be able to sense all non-Sage chakra around you as long as you're transformed and you will also be able to put the Sage chakra into your ordinary jutsu to make unique Sage Style techniques, since the Sage chakra is so special they ignore any chakra nature comparisons and they beat any other chakra nature."

"I may have trained with you for too long as I care little for your explanations and just want to use it soon!" Tanshu laughed out, Hanasaku shook her head, "Don't rely on it too much, if your mixture of summon chakra and your own chakra is not pitch perfect, even for your Imperfect version, you can become the animal you're trying to sync with. That happened to me once, it takes a ritual of the contract species to reverse and it's not guaranteed to work, if you mess it up you may stay as a dog for the rest of your life." Tanshu scratched his head, he just realized he spent several years of his life perfecting a technique like this, a technique he could only use at a wildly imperfect version and could only use in a pinch. Still, the rush of feeling in complete sync with the Ninja Dogs was incredible. The amount at which it increased his strength and his speed was beyond astonishing.

"You said that each species have their own unique Sage Mode, what does that mean?" Tanshu asked as the thought just popped into his head. Hanasaku went through some handseals and summoned a dog and asked him to start channeling chakra. She gently tapped the head of her partner and then looked Tanshu in the eyes and nodded. "Yes, that is true, while each Sage Mode enhances one's physical abilities it does so to a certain extent. For example the speed of a Ninja Turtle Sage Mode user might even be less than that of the user before they went through the transformation, on the other hand their physical endurance would be incredibly high. As far as Dog Sage Mode is concerned, you get a vast increase in speed and a slight increase in physical strength, it isn't too much but you also get another ability, just like a dog can bite..." finally Hanasaku's partner finished channeling its chakra and in a flash of white flames the woman transformed as well, looking more like a dog on two feet than a woman.

Hanasaku leaned her arm back and then thrusted it to the earth opening up a fissure that quickly split the field in two, she Sannin then raised her hand and showed her palm to Tanshu. There was some sort of wild flow of chakra from her palm and her fingers that all came together, almost like... Jaws of a dog. "That's right, you can destroy things with your grip like a dog can tear them to shreds with its bite. While Dog Sage has only slight increase in physical strength, its grip strength is boosted to ridiculous extent, you can press things so hard that their particles get rubbed so hard that they melt. You can tear even ground itself to shreds with it.

As powerful as the transformation was Tanshu could still see its downsides, he needed to use as much of his own chakra as possible for the transformation to be easier. Which meant that once the Sage Mode ended he was left tired and completely beaten, able to only use his own natural physical strength. It was a last resort technique, plus his partners probably didn't like being used as chakra channelers, that would've also hurt their mutual trust and respect which meant that if he used them as tools to acquire Sage Mode it could've been locked down from him as his trust would've soon become not nearly as strong as it once was, as it was needed to sync up with his partners perfectly...

"I know your secret, Misu. Just try and kill me like you killed Vashia... Just TRY IT!" Tanshu roared out loud into the air sending powerful heated shockwaves as his Sage chakra flowed freely from his body, his enraged state no longer controlled the flow of chakra which meant he lost more and more Sage chakra with each second, it didn't matter, Tanshu didn't need that much time to end the killer of the woman he wanted to get to know.

P.S. I know that my version of Sage Mode differs from the original one but it was an intentional change. I just liked this idea better so I decided to change it up a bit. Sorry if you were a fan of the original "nature chakra" thing :)


	58. Reality in Shatters? Howoku VS Shirona

Even though their encounter and scuffle had been quite brief up to that moment in time, Howoku was a bit intimidated by Shirona's abilities so far. Despite her general skillset and her managing position in the Barrier Corps making her a Barrier Ninja she was not to be written down as just that. When she moved and when she weaved hand seals, whenever a barrier ninjutsu technique was made, it came with such mastery and effortless finesse that the Hokage instantly understood that what most Barrier Ninja defined as their limits in the field was only the cover page for Shirona. It was just her opening hand, a ruler for measuring her opponent's abilities, a shoto to measure the distance between her and the enemy before she drew her real blade.

The woman cocked her head back letting her messy blonde hair fall gracefully behind her back, she also stroked them with her hand putting them in order. They did not seem to get in her way at all, or rather she had chosen a fighting style that did not really make the hair getting in her way a major flaw as it offered few openings if any. Her barriers were built effortlessly and were quite capable of walling any ability, even that on Howoku's level, even if Howoku had not used any of his strongest techniques on the woman yet, he had no doubt she could stone wall them.

Then there was the fatigue and injury from his previous fights. At his current stage which was just the opening steps of their dance Howoku was already feeling at his limit, every step of the way further down the line, every technique and every punch he threw in this fight was only done so because Howoku's mind commanded his beaten and exhausted body. This woman was so cunning, planning this entire day like this… Howoku hoped that Tanshu could handle himself but honestly he wasn't sure if he could handle Shirona all by himself. Then again, if there ever was a person who could figure out Misu's fearsome ability or take him out – it was Tanshu. Even with his title as the Fourth Hokage, Howoku always knew Tanshu was the strongest ninja in the village, if not one of the strongest in the entire world…

"Well, now that we have our attention set on each other, perhaps I can proceed with a more intricate number?" Shirona smiled as her hands quickly moved through hand seals, Howoku just continued to analyze and observe. The speed of her seals was certainly impressive but Howoku was sure he could match that, even when tired and when every ounce of air in his lungs counted he could keep up with her in terms of hand seals. The man slapped his hands together trying to make a hand seal of his own when Shirona's palm shot forward.

"Too late!" she exclaimed as Tanshu's figure became just a reflection on the barrier she formed around him. With a slow and sultry walk Shirona walked up to the barrier. "Isn't it a wonderful technique? Ability to seal a person into the barrier that they touch, forever kept in a static reflection, until of course…" Shirona's arm burst with golden coloured chakra as she shoved her barrier busting technique enhanced fist through the barrier crushing it into pieces. "I break it!" she finished the train of thought seeing bits and pieces of the barrier shattering on the ground before disappearing, disintegrating into the air like dust, just like snowflakes that get into a warm home. Just like that whatever was sealed into the barrier would've disappeared in time and space forever.

A powerful explosion blew from above as Howoku crashed into the ground, having successfully replaced himself with his own clone he made above himself at the last moment. That barrier sealing technique without a doubt was impressive but it was not something that one catches a Kage off guard with. It was more something that a ninja uses on an insolent and inferior opponent, like a lowlife bandit challenging them to a battle. Howoku's own arm burst with Starlight chakra creating "Starlight Sphere" technique, a miniature version of his massive "Overhope" jutsu, this one was much more compact but also much weaker. Shirona slid away from the cloud of dust and smoke and stopped herself by driving a kunai into the ground, for a barrier ninja she had the reflexes of a taijutsu expert even if her dodging could've used a bit more technical skill.

Shirona patted the lower areas of her impressive black dress that was torn up by rocky shrapnel that Howoku's brutal technique threw away, just being close to the technique burnt some areas of Shirona's dress and some of her skin, her body had several minor cuts and bruises. Such was the price of just narrowly avoiding Howoku's technique, normally this would mean a shift in momentum of the battle but now it meant literally nothing. Not with Howoku's exhausted state, not killing Shirona with this technique was not worth the chakra it cost him. Even the weakest of his Starlight techniques taxed his body, soon he'd be entering the emergency supplies of his chakra and at some point, if it goes on as it has up to now he may enter even his vital supply. The Fourth had to hope it wouldn't come to that though…

"It's so like you, Mizukage, toying with people's lives." Howoku leaped forward with a fist, he already knew that a barrier would be placed in front of him, Starlight chakra burst from his body as the man was already behind his opponent before the barrier was even placed. His fist hit the woman straight in the face, she stumbled back and swiped her hair away from her face, grinning with a full teeth smile. Howoku's burst of Starlight chakra became gigantic, it expanded into a sphere and the Fourth Hokage went through several hand seals thrusting his hands forward after it. "I will make you disappear so that you cannot use people as your pawns ever again. Starlight Style: Bifrost" Howoku shouted out as a wild beam of energy, spanning entire meters in its covering radius blasted through the temple room.

Stone and steel offered no resistance and the woman's frail physique paled in comparison with the destruction that went on, soon her black shade faded in the overpowering white that blinded temporarily all that would've looked at it. Howoku closed and covered up his eyes knowing this blinding effect full well, his eyes bled for five minutes and he thought he'd gone blind the first time he used the technique. The Hokage's technique tore through the entire building, it was impossible to tell just how far it went but there was a great hole in the interior and the other halls, the beam just entered and left the appropriate halls and corridors disintegrating all matter it came in contact with up until an unconfirmed point in the horizon.

After the destruction finally settled down Howoku's eyes shot wide in surprise, a single mirror like barrier was right in front of him with Shirona's arrogant posture engraved in it – she sealed herself into her own barrier as she had done with his clone previously. The barrier then burst with Shirona's figure being the only thing that left it, while the woman's body was hunched over and her hands were weighed down and she was hyperventilating, the fact that she didn't take any damage at all just put the D in the "Doom" that Howoku was spelling out for himself in his mind. He could not afford just miss his moves like that, not the moves that cost him so dearly! Not the moves that were literally chipping away at his own life force. Powerful black bags appeared below Howoku's eyes and the man's vision blurred – he knew the symptoms, he was overusing his chakra reserves by a wide margin.

It was only due to sheer luck alone that Shirona seemed to also be worn out by her solution to the predicament, the barrier somehow managed to withstand all of Howoku's blast and to make such a powerful wall Shirona must've spent a great deal of chakra as well, now with her being tired and stressed from the strain, Howoku had some brief moments to deal with his own exhaustion. It was like mana from the Heavens to have this moment of short bliss, Howoku could feel his body thanking him for not moving even if something told him that his body would've refused to move in those brief moments even if he commanded it to anyways…

"What you see as "using", I see as "ruling", we are the people put in power by the trust of our own people. They gave us their permission to rule over them, they gave us their trust to do with them as we see fit as long as we fix the pathetic state they were in before us. If you cannot see that I pity your people. You are no leader, you've not transcended the "ninja" part, even as the head of your village you remain a servant. Just a servant of a nonexistent master, the most pathetic kind of servant there can be." The woman shouted out swiping away with her hand in anger as her body stood straight and proud, this alerted Howoku that she had recovered from her situation and that he needed to prepare for a fight soon. Howoku's arm shot to the side as his "Starlight Sphere" technique formed in his left hand.

"I see it clearly now, Shirona, you are not a woman plagued by her own ambition, you are a woman plagued by the pressure of ruling. Your people imposed unfair expectations putting you there to fix what Daikon had done, then they criticized you when you did not deliver immediate results so you decided to do something drastic, something to prove you can be an effective leader, one who brings results. While I do pity you, I still have to take you down, I guess in that you shall find freedom from your duty…" Howoku spoke up, his voice no longer had traces of anger, for the first time in this battle he was controlling his actions and chakra clearly, using none more than it was needed to. He just prayed to whatever was listening that it would be enough not to die of exhaustion…

Howoku's body shot forward, he charged at the woman driving his hand forward attempting to slam his Starlight Sphere into her central body area but Shirona shoved her own hand forward with a powerful barrier. A violent explosion erupted throwing both Kage aside, both Howoku and Shirona thrown off their feet and dragged through the rocky ground but their bodies were not like those of Haoru or Tanshu, they were quite human and so were their wounds. Painful gashing bruises that left blood all over the floor, cuts and burning pain was all they could feel for a moment before the two leaped up on their feet. Howoku's eye bags got deeper, his tense muscle tonus now changed out for a flabby and forcefully dead muscle. Pain and fatigue met his every move.

Another "Starlight Sphere" formed in Howoku's arm, this time the man drove all of his chakra into it. All of his desire to free his comrade from the responsibility that dragged her into the grave, the pressure of being the Kage she could not handle. The delusion that she could abuse her own people for her own purposes, this cruel idiocy of exacting revenge upon the people that gave her their trust but then disregarded her by using them as her pawns in her own attempt to pull something drastic. "Tell me one thing, Shirona. How will you manage the entire world as the "Ninja Empress" if you struggle so with the pressure of being just Mizukage? Do you not see you're trying to shoulder too much responsibility and hate?" The blonde stayed quiet, she just moved her hands to her chest focusing them into four interconnected barriers that she then let go off, the barriers expanded tremendously after leaving her hands but them contracted again and started pulsing with chakra.

"This is it then? The "infinite mass technique" that Haoru was talking about? Well it's do or die then…" Howoku thought as his body just drove him forward at the expanding cube that was starting to gain so much mass that it started attracting nearby objects. Shirona thrust her hands again.

"It seems it will be you who shall disappear, your people will have to suffer your delusions of peace and shackles of treaties no more. Barrier Style Combo Technique! Infinite Mass Configuration!" she yelled out as the shriek coming from the barrier gaining mass by multiplying the number of barriers several times every moment became too loud for comfort. Howoku didn't care about if he was doing a sound thing, he was faced with a jutsu that tore through reality itself, he just flung his arm forward chanting out the name of the jutsu that had triumphed against odds of similar caliber. Truth be told he was a bit worried about if he could handle something reality itself couldn't. Strange things started happening, rocks both large and small started flying at him but they didn't smash into him, not yet anyways. Howoku realized that all time had slowed down to a crawl.

The Fourth wondered if that was how Haoru felt as well, how exactly did he fight against that technique? How in the world is anyone supposed to fight it? Howoku force shoved his hand with the sphere of bursting Starlight chakra into the cube and it just disappeared, together with Howoku's arm, for a moment there the Hokage felt terrified, did his entire arm just got transported into a tear of fabric of reality? The stones started flying at him at higher speeds and then it happened – a violent explosion as the Hokage's voice finally pronounced "Overhope" in the real world time, not the one diluted by the technique. The violent expanding sphere of explosion of Starlight chakra tossed Howoku aside, away from the crushing void of the tear of reality itself, the man's body got shot through every single rock, and wall that was attracted to it, pieces of metal and bronze, even the statue in the room got torn to shreds and attracted to the cube in bits, the shards of the statue cut Howoku's body as it was tossed through them. As the Starlight chakra expanded, desperately trying to catch Howoku but failing to incinerate him, it took all of the debris and destroyed it instead.

Shirona was breathing heavily, she was tired and she had just destroyed the icon of historic legacy. She made her place in history by utterly disintegrating the historic temple of gatherings of many generations of Kage and the Lords. The place of many Summits was now just a pile of rubble, most of it stuck in an undetermined void in between reality and everything that was not it. Shirona kept looking at Howoku's unconscious body, or at least she took it for an unconscious body but she was too tired to check. Also the Hokage may as well have been toying with her, luring her in to exploit the opening.

Shirona glanced above, observing as the fight between Tanshu and Misu had moved from taking place on the higher floor platforms meant for observers of the rituals that used to transpire in this room, chanting religious babble as blood was spilt without a doubt, as was the case with those ancient religions, to the treetops and what remained of the rubble forming artificial tall platforms that stood alongside the trees around the temple. The woman reached for her backpack and removed a kunai, playing with it in her hands before starting to slowly and carefully approach her knocked out opponent. The Fourth looked so beaten and powerless, he was completely at her mercy. Still… Something felt wrong with just driving the knife in between his eyes or ribs like this. No. She wanted to beat him clean, actually crush him and his ideals because she wanted clarification that her ideals were right.

After all only in a battle can a matter be solved, there were no truths, only artificial delusions of truth based upon one's own individual understanding of things. One person experienced one thing one way, the other could've had completely different experiences and understandings of the very same thing as each person had different backgrounds. There was no one absolute truth, no catharsis of justice being served, just an ideal triumphing over another as natural selection deemed one person survivor and another a fatality of war. Such was the cruel inescapable law of this time and world. In a world of liars and killers, there was no truth or justice, the only truth and justice was what the strongest believed in. The will of the strongest was the only absolute.

"You were a remarkable ninja, Howoku. Descendant of the Moon People, God of whom were praised in this very temple. As ironic it would be for your life to crumble together with the temple which was the legacy of the foolish praise of some beast sealed in the Moon… This cannot be it, you cannot be dead, right? I wondered why the mass of the technique didn't just crush you outright, it was because you used that bloody technique to create a tunnel in the crushing weight of the mass. Your Starlight chakra, no, your conviction in your belief drove through infinite mass, you drove away the point upon only the monsters aren't crushed to but dust by just moving on, thrusting your heart and ideals that your "Overheart" symbolized forward, caring not of the end."

Shirona kicked Howoku's body so that it flipped over and leaned over his neck with her knife in her hand, placing it to his throat. "So hear this, Howoku, the Fourth Hokage. If you do not stand now and fight me to the end I shall deem myself the victor, I, Shirona, the Fourth Mizukage will have triumphed over you. My ideals will be deemed superior by natural selection. What say you, Fourth? Speak now or stay forever silenced!" the woman yelled out. A powerful punch silenced her sending her body rolling forward, with a proud roar Howoku's injured and barechested figure jumped up, his pupils were completely white and it appeared that the man now fought completely out of instinct.

Howoku's shouting body leaped forward, kicking the Mizukage to keep rolling on the dirt and stone rubble before weaving a hand seal and making a shadow clone appear that punched the woman up in the air with an uppercut. The Hokage's mindless body leaped into the air and together with his clone the two kicked the woman in the head sending her crashing down. The clone then disappeared in a poof of smoke as Howoku's eyes once again returned to normal after his feet touched the ground.

"It appears you've been right, Shirona. My Starlight chakra made a tunnel of air that was free of crushing might upon which reality itself folded. Rest assure, all of that power, the strength and ability to drive through the force that bends reality itself will now come right at you!"

A cruel smile dyed Shirona's face as she stood up placing her torn dress back on her shoulder and wiping the hair off her face and the blood off of her lip. "Come!" she shouted out. This was what she wanted – fate itself deciding over which Kage was right.

 **Author's Note: Sorry for the unstable schedule and failing to keep up with the 3 day chapter posting promise. Things have been pretty hectic and busy in my academic life but I still have time during the weekends. I am seriously planning to making the series a weekly 5000 word thing. I just want to only write when I know I can deliver, because I feel my readers deserve the best I can give them so at times I can skip my schedule. At no point it will go worse than one chapter per week though so I guess things aren't really that bad :D. Anyways, hope you enjoy the series so far, I'll try to get the next chapter out on Friday for you guys!**


	59. Price of Love, Sage Mode Ends

A powerful shock shook the platform on which Tanshu and Misu were fighting. Misu managed to realize what was going on after he noticed the black cube below that was sucking in chunks of rock and debris and reducing the entire room to rubble, increasing in size and strength with each passing moment. "Damn, Shirona must be pushed really hard to use that on such a scale, she's gonna blow the whole place to bits..." the Sannin thought to himself as he gracefully leaped from one chunk of rocky wall and ceiling to another as they were rotating and being pulled towards the cube.

Tanshu seemed to also realize the danger of Shirona's technique, unlike Misu however he didn't trouble himself with the thoughts of how his partner was doing. The Sannin knew full well of Howoku's abilities, the man was not put onto his seat of Hokage for nothing. Then there was the fact that Tanshu's Sage Mode sensory allowed him to track not only Misu's movements but also the battle below. While Howoku's chakra was in the red zone for certain, Tanshu was confident that the man could pull it out in the end. Howoku was a man who lived his life holding himself back, restraining his abilities from incinerating and disintegrating everything around him. If anyone knew how to restrain and control the level of strength he puts out - it was the Fourth.

Tanshu could feel the immense power of the cube dragging him towards it as well, Misu happened to avoid that power by hiding behind the surface of the rubble he leaped on, he always stuck to the side that was not exposed to the cube's gravity and so overcoming the pressure and great attraction came easier for the man. Still, it was not enough even for him, Tanshu could feel the Sannin's chakra decreasing rapidly as Misu kept making new clones further away and replacing himself with them, letting the clones get dispelled and leave a cloud of vapor that also got caught in the gravitational pull. It formed an impressive twister of a black cube in the center, vapor clouds around it and large chunks of the torn apart temple rotating around the cube. The construction was almost poetic in its beauty.

And then it all just blew up, luckily enough Tanshu and Misu had moved up onto the cover of trees above, they were quite far away from the battle between the Kage and the Sage could no longer sense Howoku's or Shirona's chakra. It could've meant a great many things. It could've meant that both of them died in that violent explosion, it could've meant that their chakra were so weak now that even Tanshu's Sage Mode couldn't pick them up, the simplest and by far the most positive explanation was that Tanshu simply leaped out of the range of his sensory. After a brief look back at the decimated temple Misu grinned and clenched his sword more tightly letting his chakra flow through it.

"So... How long does your mode last? I bet you can't just use it as often as you want, having in mind that we worked plenty of times together and I never saw you use it." Vashia's killer tried to keep Tanshu talking. The Sage spread his legs and evened his balance slowly positioning his arms in a jaw-like position up front. A wild burst of the Sage chakra concentrated on the center, lighting up both hands and forming a more clear jaw-shaped construct out of pure chakra.

"I never found a situation where I would need it. Make no mistake you're not a special case, Shirona should've been, I just spent so much chakra preparing it that now I'll just have to crush you with it instead. Don't get delusional and think for a moment that you can just stall the battle and have my Sage Mode time out. I have more than enough time I need to beat you." Tanshu's chakra burst more violently as rage itself made the Sannin force his chakra out in much larger quantities and higher density than it needed to be. Tanshu purposefully supercharged his technique.

"Sage Art: Hellhound Crunch Jutsu" Tanshu mumbled to himself as his body simply disappeared, aiming not for the Misu's figure that was standing right in front of him but instead at the one above and behind him - the real Misu, not one of his Vapor clones. Tanshu moved faster than Misu could even perceive him and replace himself with the clone, or maybe the Sannin just used too much chakra making the clones and having his body replace itself with them, spreading those vapor clouds and all that and now his tired body could no longer keep up with the reflexes.

The Red Dog's tight grip locked into Misu's shoulder making blood shoot out from the wound. The overflowing with chakra grip tore right through bone and flesh with no resistance at all, it tore the chunk of flesh and cauterized the wound with intense flow of Tanshu's Sage Chakra so fast that Misu didn't even feel the pain, he just lost his balance and tumbled down with his right shoulder looking like a mashed mess - his flesh was torn out and then molten into some sort of mass that stuck back to the spot where it was torn from. It was usually a wound that'd kill a person outright, even if there was no bleeding - a major blood vessel was now missing from the vital circle of blood flow. Misu however defied reason and stood back up, spitting out blood from his mouth signaling some sort of irregularity in the way his blood flowed.

Blood broke through Misu's nasty wound and started dripping onto the grass, that shouldn't have happened - the place hit by Tanshu's technique was completely dead meat. He wasn't supposed to be able to bleed from it or even stand back up or live for that matter. Within seconds the Red Dog realized the solution. Chakra was a combination of a person's physical and spiritual sides, its flow could've been used for various purposes - to strengthen one's physical abilities or make one survive blows one shouldn't have. Misu's chakra control went a bit beyond that - the Sannin was temporarily sustaining himself by using chakra to redirect his blood flow. It was a pathetic final solution but it kept Misu alive at least, it was killing him but much slower than it should've. It was a desperation move.

Three Misu vapor clones appeared out of nowhere swinging their copied swords at Tanshu trying to cut him down. The real Misu below also weaved a hand seal. "Vapor Style: Deceitful Blade Jutsu!" he shouted out in pain with more blood shooting out from his mouth as he forced air out of his lungs. Misu's body dissolved into a figure of gaseous state water and shot towards Tanshu, the Red Dog knew that technique well, he had seen Misu use it plenty of times. The Sannin would harden his body and normalize it right at the last moment to deliver the cut, then quickly replace himself with one of the clones to avoid a counterattack. Tanshu leaped forward standing up upside down using one of his hand and spreading and twisting his body to avoid every single cut from Misu's clones. The Sage then pushed his body up using all of his strength in that one hand making the branch break off and crumble down but also propelling himself upwards and landing on a higher branch.

The Sage then leaped forward diving down and landing onto the solid branch where the clones were at striking rapidly and precisely to dispatch of them, they may have dissolved into move vapor upon being taken down but at least Misu would have to trouble himself making more clones and using chakra if he wanted to replace himself with them using his Vapor Mode. A painful shock woke Tanshu up out of his fit of rage he was fighting in - Misu managed to land a cut onto his back, instinctively the Sage leaned forward and avoided what would've been a beheading blow and then tried to roll to the side but got another deep cut right on his back. Tanshu had to hand it, Misu was giving him a fight, while on a one on one fight Sage Mode would blow the Sannin away, his opponent was playing it smart - using cheap hit and run tactics to wear him down. While Tanshu still had plenty of Sage Chakra in his system those injuries made him worry about his physical state. If he gets hurt too much he'll need to start spending chakra to keep himself standing and if that happened... Senjutsu chakra was the only kind of chakra he had to spend.

Tanshu leaped forward cutting through the vapor with his right hook, connecting to Misu's painful messed up wound and making the man shout in pain with the most horrible voice that Tanshu had ever heard. Even having the fact that Misu was the man who killed Vashia in mind - that shout almost made him feel sorry for the man... Almost. Another punch missed its mark but the Red Dog saw that his opponent was opened, he was dodging out of sheer instinct and not plan. With a powerful uppercut he sent his opponent flying, Tanshu hoped that Misu would hit a really thick branch and open his skull killing him instantly, sadly he only flew through smaller branches and eventually landed on one of them that stopped his fall.

"Got no more clones to substitute with? So now perhaps you realize how Vashia felt? Overwhelmed, fighting an opponent she had no chance to beat but having pissed that opponent off to the point where they would have never let her go alive. Do you feel it now? The kind of fear of inevitable doom, the kind of helplessness that she felt at her last moments?!" Tanshu shouted it out. Misu stood up, he was huffing and grunting, throwing up blood but for some reason he still stood up. The Sage smiled as he realized what it was that kept the man standing up.

"I know what your game is, why you told me what you've done to Vashia. I've been thinking about it for a while, Misu. You were fighting one of the most powerful ninja in the world so why tell him something like that? Why piss them off? Now I know, you wanted for it to be personal, you wanted it because you knew that if this was strictly business I'd kill you in a couple of seconds and never worry about it. You made sure that I'd do everything in my power to prolong your death, this way you'll get maximum chances to outlast me seeing how I've already fought several powerful ninja today. You always were a snake, Misu, but to me snakes are just pests, things to crush with my boot!" Tanshu's half canine form growled out angrily.

Even when his strategy was revealed to be known Misu didn't react significantly, his eyes did display a certain distaste of his plan being known but he just gulped that despair down and kept fighting. He must've known that the fact that Tanshu finally caught up to what Misu had been doing meant nothing. Just acknowledging someone's feelings didn't make one feel differently, even if Tanshu knew of Misu's strategy he'd still try and make the Sannin die as painfully as possible. Even with the Red Dog's knowledge being there - ultimately nothing changed.

Misu sheathed his blade and focused immense amounts of chakra into his feet, vapor shot out from below and formed streams of gas that rotated around the man. The ninja swordsman leaped at Tanshu diving at the Sage with great speed, the Sannin shot his strongest stream of vapor through his sword right at the bottom of his sheath that added to his natural strength and speed of the draw propelling the sword from his sheath. With a powerful drawing and swinging motion Misu intended to cut his Sage opponent down. "Vapor Style Secret Technique: Misty Flash Murder!" the Sannin grunted out through sheer pain and exhaustion. Overpowering death just to kill his opponent before he eventually kicks it himself.

Tanshu looked at his opponent triumphantly from the side - he had dodged the swing and the compressed jet of vapor that shot out after it was over. With a strong punch the Sannin sent his opponent down. The Red Dog thrust his arm forward slamming his palm into Misu's stomach making the man shout in pain once again as his palm drove deep into Misu's body. Something was wrong, that punch should've definitely killed him... Unless Tanshu's Sage chakra was actually weakening, could he have been spending it in his blows unintentionally this whole time? Enhancing his every blow without his mind agreeing to it? In that case Tanshu needed to end it all, the Sage let his Sage chakra burst wild and slammed the branch with his palm again making the entire tree fall down cut in half.

Misu managed to slip off of the branch and swing onto another tree. The Sage tried to balance out his breathing, he was starting to feel the pain in his back from before, he was starting to feel the edge of his abilities - the limit of his Sage chakra that he spent so much time storing up. Even after all this time he couldn't properly control this state, he couldn't fully control how much chakra he was spending, or maybe this was just his unstable emotional state? Rage dictating his actions and making him foolishly enhance every strike. Make every blow hit like it was meant to move the world and crumble mountains. Misu jumped up from below with an upwards slash, Tanshu stepped back losing his balance and backflipping onto another branch. The Sage felt a warm drop of blood run down his forehead as Misu's hit didn't entirely miss its mark.

There he was - Misu dove right after Tanshu, the Sannin made a couple of hand seals and shot his arms forward channelling his chakra through them. "Sage Art: Cerberus Howl!" Tanshu shouted as his body got enveloped in a powerful stream of chakra that quickly shaped a sphere around him that dissolved blowing Misu away. This wasn't Tanshu's technique however, this was the natural occurrence of his Sage Mode ending. The last of his Sage chakra left his body in a blast of force that wasn't that powerful but at least it kept Misu off his back.

Misu laughed out loudly landing on a branch and wiping blood off of his face. "All this arrogance, all those big words and swearing you'd avenge your sweetheart!" he yelled out. The bastard couldn't stop laughing his ass off. "I guess you really did love her, how else could you have gotten played like that? Even after realizing my game you kept on doing it, getting angry and empowering your strikes. All it took was conserving my chakra at the last moments, using it to withstand your onslaughts and then see your beloved Sage Mode end. That's why I always hated you, it's only fitting that your cockiness made you fall hard. Well, on the plus side - you'll get to meet your Vashia pretty soon!"

Tanshu stretched his neck out. This really did suck, how could he have overlooked something like that? Of course ninja's emotional state influenced how they used their chakra, an angry ninja worried less about conserving it, their chakra mastery was impaired and imperfect. Imperfection of his chakra mastery added to his already imperfect Sage Mode made it all just a one big balloon that couldn't wait to blow up in his face. An angry ninja unintentionally enhances their blows with chakra, Tanshu got played like a fool. Had he known how to simultaneously control both his Sage chakra and his own chakra, using his own chakra for enhancement of his blows and using his Sage chakra for blowing Misu away... Oh well, it was too late for that. That darned back hurt so much!

Misu leaned forward and once again sheathed his sword. Jets of vapor once again shot out from his body and started rotating around in a wild twister as Misu prepared to use his ultimate killing technique. "Or maybe... You won't. She was so young and innocent that she couldn't have went to the same afterlife we'll go. After all, skilled ninja like you and me have so many dark spots in their files that they couldn't possible go anywhere else but hell. It's going to suck having to share an afterlife with a cocky bastard like you but if that's the price of Shirona's plan coming to fruition and her perfect world being born, I suppose it'd be worth it."

Tanshu sighed and stood tall. Almost like he wasn't going to even fight it anymore. His chakra was at an alarming state and he probably didn't have it in him for any jutsu. He made sure to use all of his own chakra that he didn't need to stay alive before using his Sage Mode so that he didn't mess it up and now he'll pay the price for it. "Well you're right about one thing, sharing an afterlife with you really would suck. But the thing you're wrong about is that you're forgetting one thing..." Misu's body leaped forward, closing the distance between Tanshu and Misu almost instantly and drawing his sword using jets of vapor that shot right at the end of his scabbard driving his sword out of the sheath.

That nasty flesh cutting sound echoed through the forests around what used to be the temple where the Summit was supposed to be taking place. A loud sound of dripping blood, hitting the wood like raindrops from the sky could've been picked up by anyone close by, the crimson fluid of life flowed freely through the branches, down onto the leaves and then hit the floor below colouring the puddles of water blood red. A sound of flesh hitting the ground and tumbling to the ground below right into one of those puddles followed, the man that fell down had their life leave their eyes long before hitting the ground below. Even Shirona and Howoku must've felt that wild burst of chakra, that fateful moment that decided the man chosen for victory by fate itself, leaving the other one in pieces. Then again, in a battle between monsters like that there could've been no victor. The sky itself started to cry, rain broke out with a strong gust of wind driving it into the faces of whoever was still alive to feel its cold embrace.

The bloody puddles coloured with the blood and guts of the loser were quickly about to be washed away by a wild flow of water. The fresh tears of mother nature were about to clean the impure signs of death and destruction that man had created that day.


	60. When the Skies Cry Blood

Howoku's eyes were wild, the man felt blood pumping into the bags below them, his entire body has been pushed now more than it had ever been. Judging from the state of his opponent it was evident that challenging another Kage after previous great fights that tired him out was a foolish move. Shirona's body also displayed some signs of fatigue and injury but it was more on the level of someone being after a bothersome jog, she wasn't really struggling with just standing upright. Howoku clenched his fist feeling blood dripping from his fist, his body was now so tired that an entirely different effect from chakra enhancement of durability was evident.

Enhancing one's body was almost like making it like stone, when one used chakra to augment their physical abilities or to improve their chances of surviving one or another attack it interfered with the flow. When one did so many times during a short period of time it was entirely possible to not only mess up one's chakra flow but achieve an opposite effect – body started breaking down. Puniest of blows opened up wounds, scratches felt like slashes from a sword, getting punched felt like an elephant stepped on you. To Howoku this had never happened but he heard from both Hanasaku and Tanshu that such effect was quite possible.

Tanshu's palm opened up as Starlight chakra erupted from it, the Starlight Sphere jutsu that he formed now was different, smaller, blinking in and out of existence constantly. It wasn't even perfectly shaped like a sphere too, the shape was imperfect suggesting that troubles with chakra control made Howoku struggle with shape manipulation. The man leaped forward trying to punch Shirona with his fist, then open it up and slam the Starlight Sphere right into her face. The Mizukage gracefully leaped back slamming her palms together. "Barrier Style: Barrier Multi-Image Mirage!" she chanted as countless barriers appeared around her and then within moments shuffled all around the area. Howoku's fist drove into a barrier image busting it down. The Hokage roared out of wild outburst of pain as the bones in his knuckles cracked loud and blood splattered onto the ruined barrier.

In a fit of rage and desperation Howoku leaped forward driving the Starlight Sphere into another barrier making it blow into bits. "Overhope!" Howoku yelled out shooting a wild burst of chakra into his technique that erupted into a powerful sphere that started tearing trees down and drilling into the stone forming a powerful crater. Now Howoku was tapping into his vital supply of chakra, he wasn't sure just how much more he could last, he wasn't sure of the effects of such desperation but he didn't care. He was fighting for his ideals, fighting to protect his village and nothing more mattered. If Shirona survived now she could've easily torn Konoha and the other villages down, even if Konoha was the only village to fall to her hands it'd disrupt the sensitive power balance making Kirigakure the most capable force in an all-out war.

Barriers burst into shatters one by one, all and every one of them, even Shirona's incredibly hard barriers got crushed when hit by the strength of Howoku's own life force. Shirona shrieked in pain as the barrier she was hiding behind burst sending her crashing into a tree, the woman just barely managed to roll to the side in time. Her hair, skin and dress were burnt up severely, Shirona's pale skin now had numerous patches of pink burns that needed attention, face had streams of blood that spread from the wound on her head caused by the impact into the tree. Her dress only held on a pathetic rag, she had pieces of tree still sticking out of her, the heat of battle made her not even feel the pain of having those enter her body, they were just bleeding, weakly but relentlessly chipping away at the woman's life. This was no longer a battle of care and planning, this was one ambition crashing into another, only the final person standing mattered in the waves of history. Whoever would have stood would've been seen as right, whoever would've went down would've been the final relic of the old order.

Shirona and Howoku leaped at each other shouting wildly. At this point even the Mizukage used no barriers, the two were so wildly taken over by their berserk rage of battle that they just dove into one another swinging with fists and kicks. To an eye that would've observed the two from afar, if said eye had the capacity to ignore the vast amounts of blood, devastation and moans of pain, it may have appeared that the two were engaged into some sort of sick and twisted dance. A tango of pain, a polka of devastation, a flamenco of cold and absolute death. These two were not physical combatants, weren't known for it anyways, despite that fact their bodies disappeared in a flurry of Howoku's bleeding fists and his feet, Shirona's palm or two finger point strikes and broken heels swinging around. Each strike was blocked by another point of another's body, punches and kicks were blocked by shins, blocks from elbows and knees. Almost like in a lethal game of twister. The bodies of two contorted in manners that ordinary people would have never thought being possible. With a double punch out the two backed away, staggering from one another but still holding on their feet.

Having exhausted the supply of punches, kicks, lunges and thrusts from her elbows and knees, Shirona decided to attack using her tongue instead. "I heard Hanasaku and her team of genin are currently in Water Country? Are you worried that if I survive I'll place bounties on their heads? Imagine the kind of sick and twisted bastards roaming this world that would go after your precious childhood friend and her little kids. Is that how you imagine me and my country?"

Howoku wiped blood and slobber off of his mouth and stared back at Shirona trying desperately to get back some air into his aching lungs. "You're a woman of plans and endless ambition, the only reason you'd be telling me that would be if you have an ace on your sleeve. So tell me, are they here? Do you plan to shield yourself with their bodies sealed into barriers at the last second? Both of us know that Chestnut Hanasaku is beyond the mettle of any Hunter ninja, Land of Fire or Water…"

Shirona straightened her body out, her muscles were twitching as they have been pushed and exhausted to an enormous extent. Wiping her hair out of her face the woman calmly breathed out, she seemed to have gotten the hang of her breathing. "No. I thought about it for a moment there but… They have been spotted in an island in Land of Water. It would've been really easy to declare open season on them or maybe try and capture them myself but that's beyond the point. I just wanted to know if you're worried about them, if ever during that Summit you figured to ask me. Were you worried that I may not already know of their presence close to my own village? Perhaps you were conflicted between asking me to leave them alone, maybe even threatening me and just staying silent and trusting your lifelong friend. She's an idiot, it isn't in her capacity to stay hidden. She drowned an island sending it to the bottom of the ocean the first day in Water Country, sensor ninja tend to notice an entire island disappearing off the map."

Howoku stretched out and took his fighting stance, "It's indeed unfortunate that they left to that mission before all this mess started, we tried to contact her informing her of the new conditions but… Either she chose to ignore our messages or she was too thick to even notice them. To answer your question – yes, yes I cared about the lives of Hanasaku and her students greatly. I was in the predicament like the one you described. Although I don't see the point in your question."

Shirona smugly grinned, "Can't you? Allow me to reveal it to you, you were worried about tools of your Lord. The only one with the use in such feelings is the Fire Lord for he is the one losing worthy assets, to you they are just numbers on a paper, should be anyways. Can't you see how unfit and twisted this world is to maintain ninja? It needs another war, it needs people living in fear, I want people dying less than you do but I want what makes people into people and what makes ninja into ninja preserved. Right now we are hugging our neighbor without a worry if he is armed or not, often times we embrace them even if they ARE armed. Response of kindness to violence is not healthy human behavior, we've long since lost our way."

Howoku leaped forward with a punch, "I thought we've established that we will disagree with each other for as long as we draw breath." The punch missed Shirona who thrust her palm into Howoku's arm making something snap, she then punched him in the face a couple of times. Howoku regained his consciousness from fading away quickly, "Why should I care of how you justify your delusion?" he finished his thought trying desperately to land a punch but failing. His chakra no longer could augment his physical abilities as that would've literally killed him. Shirona still had some chakra to spare for augmentation of her reaction time and her agility so she gracefully and easily leaned out of the way thrusting a knee into Howoku's stomach. She then weaved a handseal and spread her arms as four barriers formed around Howoku with the fifth forming right above him.

"Barrier Style: Empress' Embrace!" she mumbled as the barriers slammed together breaking multiple of Howoku's bones as they busted out of sheer pressure of the woman's push. She realized how much weaker her barriers had gotten since the beginning of battle, had she caught the Fourth with such a jutsu early on she'd have crushed him into a red minced mass, now the barriers folded and shattered from their own force. Howoku's lifeless body slammed to the center of the crater his own technique dug up. For a moment Shirona had to regain her freedom of movement as her fatigue was making her more and more tired but she'd do so in a moment – the important fact was that she finally did it, she won a satisfying one on one fight against her nemesis – fate justified her actions at last!

Further away, in the thickness of the woods Tanshu's tired body slammed against the tree bark and slid down. The rough surface of the bark rubbed against his skin leaving gashing bruises. Blood shot out from the man's gut which was quickly but momentarily contained by Tanshu tying a cloth around it and pressing against it hard. "You forgot one thing, Misu… That Sage Mode or not… I am still Red Dog Tanshu – Konohagakure Sannin…" he heavily mumbled out seemingly to himself as he remembered that fateful fraction of a second that determined which one of them fell down below in pieces and which one was left to reminisce about the experience.

Howling sound of vapor hitting the scabbard, Misu's hand gripping the hilt and drawing it from the sheath enhancing the driving force and speed of the technique. Tanshu's own iron grip locking around Misu's hand right before the blade contacted with the Sannin's body with the other hand pushing his body up in the air from Misu's own shoulder. The hand that managed to grab hold of Misu's slashing hand wasn't foolish enough to try and resist it but instead kept on driving the cut forward, full circle around the spot where he intended to cut – right through its master's own body making the real Misu hit the dirt below in two. It was pretty dumb of Tanshu to land so soon onto the other side – the compressed vapor shooting off of Misu's blade cut him in the gut pretty deep. Now he had to force his consciousness to stay intact, to literally keep himself from dying.

"Who could've thought that a weak little fucker like Misu would've… Driven me to this…" Tanshu coughed up some blood. His eyes were starting to feel really heavy, the Sannin almost considered singing with that legendary voice of a Sannin that couldn't sing to save a life. His voice was said by many Jounin and his Sannin peers to be so horrible that it would've kept a dying man awake. "Time to test that theory, huh? Nah, it ain't worth it… Shit… Bet those three are gonna slack off while I'll be away." Tanshu thought to himself. The dying man looked up into the sky, feeling the cold and cleansing droplets of rain running down his own face. Now that the man recalled on his life it sort of sucked: his parents died early, he was lost and controlled by any idiot with enough force to impress him for so long, his first love died by his friend's hand before the young Tanshu even fully realized what love for a woman meant. Although now that he tried to generalize it all – it didn't feel that bad. There were some fun moments that made the general disaster that was his life feel great…

A voice of a young girl echoed in his ears, Tanshu could've sworn he was delusional at this point: "If I can get stronger… I can stop this from happening, I can protect my teammates and my enemies, defeat my enemies without killing them, no matter the means…". Suddenly Tanshu remembered the team of brats he left in the village with instructions on how to further train their abilities before his return. Yes, Mana – the dumb young idealist who thought that world was something she could fix without killing, Shimo the one of hundreds young brats that dreamed to be Hokage, Sugemi, the rivaling Mana in dumbness kid who didn't care about anything else but getting his non-existing feats recorded and acknowledged in a manga.

Tanshu's lazy hand wiped rain off of his face, his shoulder length hair started sticking to his face and feel real sticky. If it just wasn't for that head splitting migraine that getting cut up like this called up he could've at least thought straight… "Shimo… You weren't that bad, you just really hated that bastard Mizukage Daikon and you wanted to make it so that no one would have to live in a village controlled by a guy like that. Nothing really wrong with that, I guess. Just keep training that sword hand, keep making your chakra control better, if you need it ask Mana to teach you how to use it better… I wonder what you would've said if you met that bitch Shirona, which one would've seemed worse to you, heh?" Tanshu thought to himself scratching the back of his head. The rain started soaking his clothes, the fresh cold made his wound hurt less, or maybe it was just his impending loss of consciousness.

"Sugemi… I've just no words bout you. You're a lot like my idiot sister, I guess, too dumb to know where your limits are. A young stud like you learning the Gates… Maybe sister will see your potential and train you, she'd see a lot of herself in you, kid. And for God's sake find a better goal than having a fucking manga written about you…" Tanshu growled, at this point he almost believed that his students back home could hear him somehow. Maybe they really could, maybe the world really was as dumb and pink and magical as Mana wanted to make it out to be, maybe some magical force would transfer his words to the ears of his students so that they didn't have to be completely lost and useless.

Sugemi's dumb face popped into Tanshu's memory, his soapy dumb face yelling loudly that he'd beat everyone else at doing dishes. Tanshu's body twitched in laughter. "This ain't tears runnin down… It's this stupid rain…" the man grunted out to himself as his tired hand covered up his wet eyes. It wasn't that the total mass of his life was that worth living or that good, his life was so depressing that instead of living it he endlessly pursued strength. Almost became Oni Mask's Demon apprentice, trained with Hanasaku, killed countless of bandits and ninja roaming the wilderness that were looking for either him or a free buck. However there were those few in between moments that somehow reminded him what it was to actually live…

"Mana…" Tanshu mumbled, "I was the strictest on you, partly because you were stupid and childish and naïve but… I guess partly also because you reminded me of Vashia and because somewhere deep I knew she may have died somewhere, else she'd have contacted me, I would've heard from her, at least one word about her from someone… I knew that she was shy and kind and honor driven and I saw some of that in you. This world is cruel for people like you two, it takes lives way too quickly and because of that people stop appreciating just how precious hopeful and childish people like you two are. Everyone forgets how much we need them in this gloomy world of fear and conflict. Just as I have forgotten and so you probably thought I was just being mean to you for the kicks. Truth be told that's how people will treat you, that is the life of being an idealist, people will make fun of you, call you out forgetting that ideas inspire change…"

The Sannin wiped his tears off using his wet sleeve, blood started breaking through his cheap attempt at containing his wound. At least he was spared from the fate of having his guts fall out. "I wish you were never told about the real world, the world that showed itself right here. I wish no one told you I died fighting a man I always thought of as a douchebag but my friend, who turns out killed a friend, whom I, it turns out, loved. I wish you didn't have to know that friends can turn on you, that your hope and happiness can be snuffed out as easily as snapping a finger. Strong and weak both are equal in front of death, no one is strong enough to eliminate it or defy it. Stop chasing strength to protect the people you love, you'll just kill yourself in the process and make those people sad, failing your mission in the end. I don't really know what kind of person Vashia was, understanding her was something I wanted to do before I died, I just feel like she was so similar to you and for that I've been unfair towards you, for that I apologize, Mana… There, I'm not apologizing to anyone else!" Tanshu grunted out angrily as his body no longer responded to commands and just laid down on the branch he was on.

"We've tore through every bastard in our way, punched every bad guy in the face once or twice, some of them quite a lot of times… Ain't too bad of a way to go, I suppose…" Tanshu's eyes weighed down and closed. It did not move until twenty minutes later when a party of people in hoods found the man's body and after examining it moved on forward. One of the cloaked white haired figures that had their silver locks flow wildly in and out their hood stopped and summoned a pigeon, quickly scribbled a message finishing it with a line "…To Guru Ayushi" and let the pigeon fly free towards Konoha where the recipient of this message was going.

"Who's this "Mana" and those other names you've mentioned?" another hooded figure asked to which the man just firmly replied, "I've managed to hear this man's speech from a long enough distance, I've been living and working in the mines for a long time where hearing is essential, mine has improved beyond that of even the most acute ninja. This man's final words must not be lost, he is a damn hero. Now let's move on, I've words for this Shirona."

A bulkier figure just laughed out, "Heh, I have more than words for her!" he added as the shadowy figures departed, any clearer details were hidden from any observers that may have seen them by the setting Sun. The white haired hooded figure sealed Tanshu's body into a large scroll and put it onto his belt, the three then departed heading towards the ruins of the temple.

Howoku's body just rose from the floor, it lacked any pupils or signs of life, it appeared to move just out of sheer combat instinct and a wild desire to win. The man lunged forward with a punch, hitting the female opponent of his who was really surprised by her opponent's miraculous revival onto their feet. "Curse you, Howoku, you and your inhuman Moon people heritage!" she shouted out as she gracefully leaped out of the way of each and every following blow of the Kage, she tried to respond with one of her own but her opponent managed to jump back, had he not planned this movement beforehand he'd not have been fast enough as indeed he could no longer augment his speed and strength using chakra.

The man's arm rose to the side with an open palm, a reddish almost fiery like Starlight chakra burst from his body forming a chakra sword. This was it – this was Howoku's lifeline as he was giving his core and his very being away, all throughout his life he cared little of what he inherited from his elders. Now he was thankful for that heritage, he was glad that his distant relatives gave him enough inhuman endurance and this amazing chakra to save the world once more. "Nova Style: Pleiades!" Howoku shouted out as his Pleiades started looking more and more like just a blade of pure flames. This was Starlight Release in its purest form, this was the essence of Howoku's life imbued into a jutsu. Howoku swung the sword sending a shockwave with a heating projectile forward.

Shirona leaped out of its path and lunged forward, avoiding another blow with a spinning sidestep the woman planted her kick into Howoku's side. Even if she heard something crack and her boot dug deep into the man's flesh he didn't even budge, just the force of her chakra augmented impact pushed him backwards slightly but it was almost like Howoku had no more pain to feel, on this day he had experienced all pain he was given to feel throughout his life and now he only lived to save his world. Howoku charged at his nemesis swinging his blade wildly, each strike sent a shockwave that incinerated and destroyed whatever it hit in its path, Shirona was too busy using all of her chakra to enhance her speed and not get hit, at this point even her barriers were far too weak to stop this rampage.

A flash of red! Shirona staggered back spitting out blood as a deep gash opened all over her body. The woman managed to spend more than half of her supply of chakra not to get cleaved in half but the wound was still emanating heat. Howoku started wildly swinging his great sword comprised completely out of chakra. With a final swing he put extra effort into he sent Shirona, who had coated herself in an immense amount of multiplying barriers back into the depth of the forest where Tanshu and Misu had been last seen clashing. The mindless shell of Howoku charged after his opponent, desperate to kill her before his own life faded away. Wild all incinerating slashes started carving the entire forest up, immense forest fires rose up and disappeared just as quickly as they started as the flame of the man's life was a dying one.

Finally Shirona's agility ended, one slash after another started cutting her body into countless pieces, there was no blood at all, just a white glow from where blood was supposed to spill from. It was almost like with this final technique, this final kill for peace Howoku had surpassed reality, as if he wasn't killing Shirona but… Erasing her. With a wild shout the man thrust his immense blade of chakra into the woman's cut up body and let it all go with a beam of chakra as the sword was dispelled. There it was. Howoku's eyes closed, his mind would've faded away had that not happened a while ago, his body hit the floor lifeless having no more pain to torment him, no more blood to bleed, nothing more to worry about. But this stalemated photo-finish was not how it was meant to be. A gravely silence took over what used to be a wild battlefield – a peaceful silence.

Then white cracks colored thin air, as if reality itself was just a sheet of paper, an image, a mirror that was now cracking. With a powerful explosion of sheer force of the chakra contained within Shirona erupted from the break within the tear in the reality that she had made, Howoku's body faded from the floor and then his still alive body reappeared before the reborn Shirona, still mindless but now more confused than enraged – his victory was stolen away from him, he was denied a triumphant death and the satisfaction of his world being saved. "Barrier Ninjutsu: Reality Break!"

"H…How!?" the mindless shell of Howoku spoke, "World's most powerful Barrier Buster ninja can break through any barrier, any limit, even that of reality itself…" Shirona huffed heavily. Something was wrong, her eyes were completely black and instead of her pupils there were just red spheres rotating in the black void of her gaze. "For a moment reality is in complete fritz before it rebuilds itself. It is up to the possessor of the power to break it to reshape it as they see fit, a dying body only has one desire – to live and so it happened. The fabric of reality somehow reversed your triumphant assault however I have now several more moments to make it all right before the reality returns to normal." Shirona extended her arm forward as Howoku realized that his own body was slowly disappearing, matter itself was detaching off of him in small chunks and fading into even smaller chunks.

"NO!" Howoku yelled out lunging forward with a powerful sphere in his arm. "Nova Style: Overhope!" he yelled out as his technique faded away and his body just collapsed. Shirona's eyes returned to normal. "So you chose to instead repeat your mistake and kill yourself again by using the last of your chakra then? Well whatever works for you…" she uttered to herself locking her arms around her aching chest. Now that reality had fixed itself Shirona was stuck living her life with all the pain that came after such a battle. To think that she had to damage the fabric of reality so extensively, she tore holes in it twice that day and once completely restarted it by shattering it to pieces. Just as the staggering tired figure of Shirona tried to find a quiet place to relax three hooded figures descended from above removing their clothes.

"I don't believe we've met, Mizukage Shirona, I am Akasuna Mugao the Fourth Kazekage. You've killed countless of my men today, for that, prepare to die!" a hulking giant removed his hood revealing his face and his dark red hair that had two long braids that flowed freely with the rest being trimmed to just rest on the man's shoulders.

"The man you've just killed is Howoku of Konoha – the Fourth Hokage, that he is! Following the ninja code any Kage who kills another Kage is demoted therefore there will be no punishment or demotion if this lowly one kills you, that there won't be." A woman also removed her cloak revealing her tanned skin and murky cerulean colored hair, this was Samaya Imasu – the Fifth Raikage.

"Your predecessor was a horrible man, Shirona, but even a tyrant like Daikon had lines that he would not cross. He may have entertained himself with his own cruelties but he would have never openly invoked war, not in his later years when he was shown his place. It appears that Kirigakure is beyond its own salvation. I – Kaguya Yaban therefore call for the decision of this Summit, one that shall elect a Mizukage who will rule under close watch of combined forces of all the other ninja villages. For a while he will be a puppet ruler but once Kirigakure proves to us that they can play by the rules and that Bloody Mist is out with its roots they can have their autonomy back." Yaban spoke up also removing his cloak, his eyes looked like they were ready to completely incinerate Shirona who was still shaking in front of the arrival of the other Kage.

The other Kage only slightly nodded expressing their agreement to the terms that Yaban set out. And so the Kage Summit was over – even with all the interruptions the proceedings transpired anyways and the fate of Kirigakure was decided.

"I disagree with that decision!" Shirona shouted out biting her thumb and summoning bunch of ninja in front of her: Oni Mask and the other Sannin of Kirigakure.

Imasu clenched her sheathed sword placing it up on the eye level of the summoned Sannin and the Mizukage. "It seems you didn't hear me the first time, that you did not. This lowly one said you were demoted from your status and no longer hold any power, we shall decide how to deal with you soon, that we will."

The Kage stared at the Sannin with enraged looks, each and every one of the Sannin had been beaten down by the Kage with the third Sannin still being missing, likely dead after Yaban threw an island at him. The Sannin looked hesitant to start the fighting again. Shirona stepped backwards as her voice suddenly got full of fear. "What are you doing!? Protect your Kage, hold them off while I regain my strength and crush all of them… ", her voice was silenced by a sound of steel piercing flesh. Shirona's shaking face stared down at her own chest witnessing a katana piercing through her from behind. Shirona's vision became blurry as she fell down and died on the spot.

As the woman's figure collapsed her killer was finally revealed – Haoru of the God Sword stood behind her looking over his cracked and damaged katana. "You bastards seem to have forgotten who the moderator of this Summit is. With this final judgment I deem Kirigakure guilty and Yaban's assessment of the situation fair. Now you can scatter, I believe this fateful day left us with a lot of corpses and even more paperwork, the balance of the world will change and all you idiots do is bicker. At least now you've seen that there are true warriors that are willing to clean out your mess if you find it too hard. Class dismissed, you petty ninja."

Imasu blushed and fell on her back with streams of blood shooting of her nose. "Senseeeei" she yelled out almost unintelligibly. The other Kage seemed confused but Haoru only graced his past pupil with one petty stare before setting out on his way back to Iron Country.

Far, far away Sun finally set, right before the cloudy skies cleared after the intense rain for the couple of final moments of shining Sun's embrace, sadly that embrace only lasted for several moments. And so the fateful Kage Summit was finally over! A couple of days later the entire delegation of living Kage and the current Sannin as well as the entire delegations of each Kage together with Shirona's few surviving ninja returned to the misty streets of Kirigakure. As the procession continued to walk down the fancy, combining both modern and the exquisite classic architecture, full of advertisements and various colorful posters and filled with palaces Kirigakure's central "Royal" district, a small young blond girl ran around peeking into the procession shouting "Mommy" once in a while. As her efforts proved fruitless the girl just fell on her knees and started to cry. At that moment Oni Mask happened to pass by the girl, he looked at her and while it was impossible to tell what exactly his lifeless eyes were saying to the kid as he wore a new mask, the villagers moved the girl away from him trying desperately to calm her cries.

"Come, Little Princess, let's take you back to the Mizukage Estate, shall we?" an elderly lady tried to fake a smile through her terrified of this procession face.

"But Mommy was the Queen, without her they won't let me in… I've got nowhere to go!" the kid kept on crying.

The old lady had no idea what to do with the child. Streets of Kirigakure were incredibly dangerous for a villager who had never wandered away from the "Royal" districts into the poor ones. One thing was for certain, change was in the air, both for this girl and the rest of Kirigakure…


	61. A New Chapter Begins

Troubled eyes were running over a short message. One that came right after the other one, it had reached its reader from a nearby corner of the world where the first one was sent from. The content of the two messages couldn't have been more different from one another. Even the technical level of encryption of the message used on both messages was like day and night different from each other. One came from one of Konohagakure's Sannin – Chestnut Hanasaku, the other one was from the Kage Summit and signed by all three remaining Kage. The first one was informing that all was going well, the other one informed of an event that changed everything, as the young folk often put events like this – "shit went down".

The reason for such a specific expression of words was selected for the reader of the messages to form the general image in his mind because the message from Hanasaku literally had that combination of words in it, which was in no way at all surprising having in mind the person who sent the message. Despite the fact that Hanasaku was a woman whose external image displayed great maturity as she reminded of a matured middle aged woman of great stature and presence, her behavior was that of a child and her intellect was literally that of a chestnut upon which her nickname was aptly chosen. That cover of the color of her hair being the reason must've just been what her friends told the silly minded Sannin.

The content of the message displayed a clear image that the woman was proceeding with her mission together with her squad of some of the village's most potent and experienced genin. Somehow the woman managed to so far avoid noticing the fact that Kirigakure's patrol forces increased tenfold and avoiding suspicion and being noticed had literally become impossible, somehow she had managed to avoid the fact that she may have been wanted with a bounty on her head for a while, she even managed to avoid the knowledge of the Kage Summit or the events that transpired there. That devilish woman just tore through everything in her sight, every single Kirigakure ninja, unable to destroy the bunker with the secret information before it was teleported to Kirigakure by a trap seal the woman just sunk the entire island. Such obvious denial of ninja tradition of subtlety and secrecy would've without a doubt invited an international scandal if one wouldn't have transpired right after, one to dwarf the other in its entirety.

The man reading the letter rubbed his tired eyes, the assistant of the man leaned up to receive instructions for his further course of actions. "Chestnut Hanasaku has informed us that she had destroyed the bunker and retrieved the information she needs and is returning home, one of her genin was severely injured and she admitted that she did not dare attempt treatment instead leaving it to her pupils." The chubby little man spoke to his assistant. The butler-like looking gentleman fixed his vest and cleared his throat.

"Perhaps lady Hanasaku is growing in wisdom? I'd assume knowing her impatient and… Highly destructive personality in mind it'd be very bad for her to attempt and perform basic first aid."

The chubby little man slapped his own bald forehead and moved his palm down accidentally striking his grey hair bun and then covered his mouth, then proceeded to rub his beard. "She's the only viable candidate for Kage at the moment, sadly we don't have any Jounin that are on the level of competence to just skip her. She may be an utter pain to manage but we'll have to put her on that chair if we want the village to be safe. Order the message to be sent to her informing her to accelerate her return and do it safely. Her return to the village is now another A-Rank mission for both her and her students. Those genin of hers will need to suffer her no longer, unbeknownst to them they have a future Kage in their care. Let's just hope she doesn't kill herself in her imbecile rampage."

The assistant wrote everything down, it proved slightly more difficult as the illumination was severely lacking, having to do everything under candlelight was quite difficult but the man was very skilled in the craft of simple butler work. Once the order was recorded the man's eyes lifted to the fancy dressed councilman again. "Anything else?" he asked the man.

"I'm afraid so, Assistant, I wouldn't have moved you from Kirigakure to Konoha if I didn't intend to use your skills. I'd like you to contact all the councilmembers and hold a meeting tomorrow evening, if possible we'll appoint Hanasaku as the new leader of our village as fast as possible. Some serious political balance shifting is about to take place and we have no luxury to be picky or to wait until Dorimi or Shibari reach the appropriate level of strength." The councilman rubbed his tired eyes continuously, he then stood up and moved to the door, leaving the room in a hurry. Assistant just appeared right beside him as if he had moved in an instant.

"Are you quite sure about your decision, Sir? You are aware of the technical level of Hanasaku-sama's letter?"

The councilman nodded "Yes, I know that Chestnut probably doesn't even know how to cypher the letter, she most likely gave it for her students to properly cypher, that's why it has several mistakes and was so tough to decode. Those kids had grown quite strong and competent having to put up with that woman's silliness."

Assistant's shadowy figure disappeared in a turn of a corridor, the councilman knew that the man would do his job. He'd be damned if the Assistant was not the best lapdog to bark orders at. An order from Kirigakure, custom bred and trained to follow orders and be the perfect assistants, that Kirigakure loyal elitist culture of their central districts really spoiled themselves but that trip to the Mist and the enormous pay to keep the Assistant around was worth it just for one of those guys all by itself… As the door leading the councilman to the outside of the Administration building opened up the man looked at the red sky and the departing signs of the setting Sun.

"The day we all have been afraid of, the day no one thought was possible had come… Chestnut Hanasaku will be in charge of us all, the era of the Star of Hope is over. Truly the end of days must be upon us. Still, we need a leader to call our shots for some parts of Kirigakure's autonomy, we need to establish connections, gain valuable intelligence on the village's deepest secrets. For that opportunity even handing HER the hat is worth the potential gain… I hope." The councilman pondered to himself thinking if he had just doomed everyone or just did the only reasonable thing to do.

A large foot of a middle aged man was set on the Land of Fire soil. Konohagakure was just about one day of travelling away, since the man did not intend to sleep the night but keep moving instead he'll be reaching it by early tomorrow morning. The man had been waiting for this trip for quite some time, recently he was spending a lot of time in various countries and so it had been a while since he visited his country of origin. The man's dark brown eyebrow raised curiously as he observed the newly built pathways and new erected vendors selling snacks and some emergency supplies any traveler might need having just crossed the country borders.

His presence without a doubt had been picked up by the ninja surveilling the area. His iconic monk outfit, his powerful build and status as a legendary ninja makes even the newbies recognize the man instantly. Upon picking up as much as a sight of the man's intricate and youthful bald head and his rock hard muscles the ninja would've dashed back to the village at the best of their ability. The man's eyes closed and the area around his eyes dyed in purple, he sensed so many youthful chakra, burning vibrantly, firing up in excitement and moving around like rabbits being disturbed by a passing by bear.

In his youth, and even now it'd be only a matter of time for him to catch up to those younglings. He may not have exactly felt like in his prime and he had abandoned the life of a ninja, that is to say the life of fighting, violence and murder, but Guru Ayushi still felt like he could keep up with the young ones. It was true that the current generation has bred some amazing ninja, just one sniff of Kaguya Yaban's chakra or that of Samaya Imasu of Kumogakure and even the peaceful Guru remembered the youthful days of excitement when faced against an overwhelming opponent on a battlefield. Finally the ninja monk's eyes had opened back up and all supernatural signs around them disappeared just as mysteriously as they've appeared.

A pigeon started slowly landing by the ninja making the man who was well familiar with the ninja equipment notice that he was carrying a message for him. It was quite strange, only the most important figures in the world dared contact him by pigeons, most ordinary people just waited for Gury Ayushi's arrival to their village, there were few ordinary villager pigeons that reached him but those were the exception and a rare one at that. For someone to use the ninja method of communication this must've been important, after all Guru Ayushi thought he'd made it clear that the topic of his days as a ninja was something he had left behind and only liked to reminisce in moderation. He had become an icon of peace now, he would not trouble himself with matters of ninja normally.

Guru picked up the message and read it, he placed two of his fingers on the sheet of paper and they lit up with his chakra, leaving a sign on the paper which was soon put back on the pigeon's leg and the bird was let free to return to his master. The request made by the Tsuchikage was something the great Guru couldn't deny, it didn't really deal with the life of ninja, it was a desire for a man's final will to be delivered to his pupils. Man's final words must never be lost, especially not those of a man like Red Dog Tanshu. Even the usually detached of all earthly matters heart of Ayushi was moved by the death of the young boy he had witnessed in his last visit in the Leaf. That young soul that was so tortured throughout his life and was quite fitting to become a wandering monk sharing his knowledge upon his retirement just like Ayushi, those that transcend all others in their generation often either follow Ayushi's path or continue doing their thing until they grow old and face against promising younglings passing on their status as the strongest as their bodies are left in their final battlefield.

Even now, with all that head start and all of the incredible speed of those Special Jounin watching the borders granted to their mastery over chakra augmenting their natural abilities Ayushi could catch them. But if that was the case he should've answered positively to the request of that young girl to kill Daikon back when he visited Kirigakure many years ago. What people failed to understand was that he moved on, left his old life behind. Helping ninja on one side would've made the other angry, violence upon one side does not eliminate the problem. Tyranny and conflict was like a static wheel, when a force like Guru Ayushi pushed the wheel by crushing the tyrant the wheel did not dissolve, it just turned again and again, it kept on turning, dropping off many pieces off of it until it settled down again. It might have settled down on another side, it might have settled on the same one but in the end – what difference did it make if the wheel remained the same.

Just like that if Ayushi would've chosen to interfere with any of those problems he was constantly begged to magically solve, another problem, with the added horror of angry vengeance for what happened to the first, would take over. From what little had Ayushi heard of the Kage Summit he was right – Daikon was just replaced by another tyrant, strangest part was that Ayushi had never seen the side of a tyrant in the young lady with the long curly blond hair he had seen in Kirigakure. It just showed him how little still he understood about this world despite wandering it for about a hundred years even after retiring his life as a ninja. Guru's sharp eyes pierced through the thick cover of the forest, he was moving to Konohagakure and while he was sorry for the events that took place in the Kage Summit, in one way such tragedy only made his presence more needed. He had to rid the people of their impure thoughts of revenge and war.

War was Shirona's agenda, if after Howoku's passing and stop of Shirona's plan his village would have only devolved into war anyways that would've completely ruined that man's peaceful and noble sacrifice. Even more, it'd have crushed the final will of the Red Dog as well. Ayushi's powerful bare feet continued to step over the hot gravel of the newly made pathway through the forest. He travelled the world giving lectures and teaching people, however it was during special times like this – after great battles or wars or political assassinations most heinous that he was needed the most. Guru observed the figure of the pigeon fly off into the sky above the forest, oh that wonderful illusion of the bird's freedom. Free to soar the sky, free to breathe the mystical air above but still being burdened by the duty to deliver the vital messages…

Mana moaned rising from bed. She had to grip tightly into the crutches to even stand straight. She was officially the dumbest girl ever – no one in the history of the world had ever trained so hard that they literally tore their body apart. Desperate to become stronger, to strengthen her body, her resolve and invent her own martial art based on kicking to keep her opponents at a distance Mana made her leg muscles ache so much that she couldn't walk for the whole week. It's only been a couple of months since the night when she and her team confronted the agent of Kirigakure who only identified himself as "the Demon". She only heard bits and pieces from his interrogation, just as much as all ninja in the village were allowed to know. Besides babble of his "Oni-sensei" and how he had failed him and brags of how his escape will be grand the youth offered few words.

Part of why Mana pushed herself so was because she was ashamed of herself, she felt bad that she was taken out so easily fighting him, that she'd have died and never had a shot at changing the world back then. That "Demon" boy from Kirigakure was just slightly older than she was as it turned out but he managed to resist torture from even the village's Yoruma ninja. The Yoruma clan was a nasty group of expert assassins, apart from slitting throats they also knew the human anatomy quite well and some of them were decent military strategists. Their knowledge of anatomy and sadistic nature made them unparalleled at the art of torture, they were so good in fact that the village purposefully kept them away from it usually. This time even their efforts proved to be vain – the young Demon resisted it all. What sort of training bred warriors like that?!

In a way Mana was jealous of that youth's skill, he was powerful enough to be on the level of a Chuunin, folding relatively easily only to Jounin taking him on. Also he had the skill to infiltrate another village and operate within it, he was not a man but a true shinobi, someone she was not. A real shinobi was not the person that they were, they were a tool, they didn't think of what to eat, where to sleep while in another village – they thought of whom they needed to talk to if they wanted this or that, they thought where they needed to poke to kill this person or that so that no one even noticed. Mana hated that concept but that one young man who followed it was so incredibly strong – one would say that the girl was intrigued by that strength and wanted an audience with him. Obviously such a thing was impossible, the young man was locked down in the Police Force headquarters…

The young magician crept downstairs and grabbed a couple of gyoza dumplings stuffing them into her mouth and then washing her hands. "You're leaving your hat at home?" father asked reading the paper. Mana sighed, "If that thing falls off again I'll never pick it up, not until my legs feel better…" the girl expressed her worry over her current state. She's been out of order for quite a long time and the village apparently needed the aid of Team Oak even with her impaired and… Sensei…

So far the village had no idea of what was going on. At least the ordinary villagers and the lower ranking ninja didn't. As far as Mana could've known the village may have known and have been discussing the results of that Summit behind everyone's backs. That vacation actually took a bit longer than Mana had predicted, it may take a week or so to travel to the location of the Summit if one moved really slowly, why would it have just went silent like that? Everyone felt a bit uneasy about that, everyone felt like there had been something that was going on and being hidden behind everyone's backs. The magician just sighed and kissed her father in the forehead slowly moving towards the door.

"Be careful, although I'm pretty sure the Administration has your health record, they wouldn't send you out in action. It's probably something you can do while sitting or just something simple…" father shared his worries. Or at least what Mana took as his worries, after his injury on the field he had trouble expressing his feelings, pain made people angry but over time both father started to better coping with the pain and Mana and mother learned to deal with his pain outrages. Maybe as time passes all will be alright… Maybe…

This would've finally been the day when Mana would've tried to instead of being totally locked down by her crutches moving with a cane. So far it seemed to work, her muscles still hurt with each step so she had to take it a bit slow but at least she wasn't completely off her feet. With a shamefully loud clacking of her steel cane the magician left out to the streets of her village. Her injury made her postpone countless magic shows, strangely enough the villagers treated her just the same – they came up to her with worried faces and kept asking her what happened. She lied to them. Mana didn't like to nor was she too good at it but… She didn't want to hear all those same morals all over again: "Don't overstretch yourself now!", "Be careful next time", "Well I suppose the art of knowing how to train comes with experience. Don't worry you'll get it soon!" Mana kept telling everyone she fell and got hurt like that. She had no bandages or anything like that so everyone must've known she was hiding something – her wounds were internal. Her muscles were burning up from being exhausted to the point where using them felt like being set on fire below the waist. It was getting better with every day but the process of recovery was slow, especially with Mana doing mental training while her physical body was injured…

Ironically enough she advanced much further in mental arts than she had in the physical. Mana started grasping the basic concept of her own martial art made of kicks, long reaching and stretched out ones to keep her opponent's at distance where she could dictate the terms of battle using ninjutsu and genjutsu… However after her injury made it quite impossible to train she started working on her chakra capacity and making advancement in her understanding of the human brain which helped her start working on improving her genjutsu. New concepts of new rough drafts of powerful techniques started appearing in the girl's mind but nothing specific was mastered yet. It was all just sharp blades that still needed hilts to be used properly…

Why was she so much weaker than everyone else? Even Shimo put up a fight, at least so she heard from all the official stories of the events. After she passed out the Demon proceeded to kill her but Shimo interrupted him and fought him valiantly, they were quite even as father's higher ranking ninja friends recounted. Why was she dispatched off so quickly and easily? She worked hard, she had a goal that kept her fighting, why was she neither on the league of Sugemi or Shimo nor the league of that Demon from Kirigakure? Mana desperately wanted to talk to that young man from the Mist in the darkest corners of her heart, know how true strength like his is acquired – strength to protect her friends and change the world.

Tanshu-sensei will hate her even more than he always did when he comes back knowing she went down so easily back then…


	62. Team Oak's Reunion!

A loud clang scared some birds that almost instantly darted off above the tree line. Another one soon followed. A blond girl sighed looking back at her sensei pulling out a kunai from her body. Sometimes it felt like her sensei was straight out immortal but she knew that the woman just had insane durability and a monstrous amount of chakra to heal herself up when she's been injured. Unless something killed Hanasaku instantly, chances were it barely even bothered the woman. Kiyomi had seen countless battles where sensei's body was completely riddled with injuries, swords and knives sticking out of her body, trying to just hit Hanasaku until she fell was a stupid idea.

"Sensei… I've been thinking…" a young male spoke up from behind Hanasaku, he was a young Inuzuka who had been assigned to Hanasaku's squad because of his bad grades. As per the usual tradition each squad had one member with some of the worst grades, then one with average and at least one with above average. Obviously not every squad could have a stellar performer but the better they chose the good grade ninja, the worse the fluke one was. For example the team that got the best grades having ninja also had to foster the one with the absolute worst. After being alerted to her pupil's words Hanasaku looked back at the boy after removing another knife and healing up her injury using medical ninjutsu.

"All of this… This mission, Yamashiro getting injured… I don't think I want to do this anymore. I mean… We could have died out there, I thought I could handle it but… I don't think I actually can, there's nothing like a guy sticking a knife into your friend's eye to alert you of that…" the experienced genin spoke of his troubles. That last mission was technically a success. The information was retrieved, all copies of it were destroyed. The enemy tried to prevent that extraction by setting off a bunch of timed teleportation seals that most scrolls with sensitive information had but Hanasaku sunk the entire island to prevent those seals from activating and salvaged them from the bottom of the ocean, withstanding even the water pressure of the deepest parts of the ocean that hosted the Water Country islands.

Training under Hanasaku was a unique experience. On one hand the woman was a Konohagakure Sannin so it was already a precious opportunity to learn from the best but… She was just so thick skulled and battle hungry, the woman never remembered any passwords she herself set up for the meetings to sniff out infiltrators, she never even bothered to learn message encryption and Kiyomi and Tetsuzuki had to do it all for her, message encryption was not something genin did, it was entirely possible that their messages weren't even properly understood. While there was always the idea that one of the strongest ninja in the world, one bested only by Red Dog Tanshu long ago in the post-Second Great War days, would always protect one in a mission, that was not always the case, apparently. This ninja deal always seemed so innocent, just bunch of kids and their teacher who slowly became their maternal figure making a difference in the world in the most dangerous missions that genin could even be let out on. The four of them had been at it for years and they even skipped a Chuunin Exam just because they were away on a big mission at that time, which also happened because Hanasaku didn't understand calendar properly and sometimes confused the dates.

Still, even with their unparalleled experience they were just children, the three got completely sure of that when they were captured after Hanasaku disappeared in the abyss of the ocean with that island. One thing one had to have mind was that not knowing Hanasaku's limits, the three students always believed that their sensei died whenever she dove into a volcano or was flung into space or crushed beneath the ocean floor by bunch of broken land mass. Every time she was stabbed through the heart the three always were worried that their sensei, who was almost like a member of their family now, had died. Yet she always just came back after a couple of minutes when all hope seemed lost and kicked everyone's butts. Not this time, this time sensei disappeared for quite a while and the three got captured, they were scared for information just because no one even bothered to torture bunch of "kids". Yamashiro was injured in the eye during their escape, added to that were many more injuries he'd sustained getting captured and while escaping and it was unclear if he'd even survive. Having a teammate lingering on the verge of death made one reconsider their life choices. Hanasaku used her medical skills to stabilize the boy's condition but he still remained unconscious and looked only barely alive.

Tetsuzuki's dog barked out loudly, the little pup had grown significantly throughout the years. Not that it even mattered. The young Inuzuka kneeled down and scratched the canine's neck. "I wonder what you'll do after we're done with this…" the boy gently whispered to his dog. "Don't start with that shit, Tetsu!" Kiyomi the young Yamanaka prodigy of the group shouted out. She was losing another teammate now, right after Yamashiro got injured, that day the entire status of the team flipped over. With that strange reply they've received that demanded the team to return and to protect Hanasaku's life at all costs… Kiyomi just sensed that her life was about to change and that she might be left all alone, for two years the three of them studied under Hanasaku surviving situations that would have qualified as battles of a war. For her friends to pull this on her with Yamashiro getting hurt, Tetsuzuki leaving and God knows what the deal with Hanasaku was.

Tetsuzuki placed the unconscious body of his friend onto his dog's back and secured it tightly, the dog was more than capable of carrying it. "It's just that, I've seen plenty of shit already, this life isn't what I signed up for. I've had more experience than I even need to be respected in my clan and I've got a royal position. If this happened to me my father would consider my claim at leadership of the clan hindered. Coma isn't the best status to add to royalty's life summary, you know… I decided that logistics and managing the clan might be for the best for me, what about you, Kiyomi? You're on a pretty high position too, right? Is ending up like Yamashiro even worth it?"

Kiyomi's eyes almost started filling with tears of rage, she was visibly getting angry that her teammates were scattering and that the team was falling apart. "Yamashiro was too arrogant, he thought that just because he's a fucking Uchiha he was entitled to win every fight, he thought that running away wasn't honorable enough. He got sloppy, we never did. You have no idea how much this stupid "royalty" bullshit is making me want to smack you right now!" the girl yelled out angrily, she ran up to Hanasaku who was ignoring the squabble and yelled it out into the woman's face. "SAY SOMETHING! Your team is falling apart!" Hanasaku sighed.

"It's fine, Yamashiro's injury is on me, if Tetsuzuki feels like I can no longer protect him under my wing, if he wants to be a leader of his clan at the end of the road then being taught by me is the wrong place to start from. Sannin are always sent on the most dangerous missions, I always long for a good fight so I ask for them to be even bigger. Just serving in my team for a while is a good thing to have in a clan leader's record, there's no need for him to end up like Yamashiro." Kiyomi jumped into the air with a kick that Hanasaku evaded, the girl followed it up with a straight jab that just bounced off the woman's thick skull, Kiyomi removed her aching knuckle that felt like she had hit a stone wall.

Hanasaku placed a hand on Kiyomi's shoulder. "Don't worry, I know that your friends and your team and this life means a lot to you, more than anything. The two of us can still work as usual, for the two of us nothing changes. If you ever want to see your friends at least you'll know they're safe in the village, isn't that what you want? For them to be happy and safe? This way everyone will be happy, sure I don't like losing students I've trained for years, you two were almost like my own family but… Times change. Ninja have to learn how to let people go, us most of all people, people die on every mission. I don't because I don't want to disappoint anyone, that's where I draw my strength from but if Tetsuzuki doesn't have that thing to draw inspiration from – he'll die on another mission like this. I'd rather lose him as a student than have him lose his life."

Tetsuzuki walked up in front and glared at Hanasaku's eyes angrily, inside of his heart he didn't like the woman too much. Despite her being incredibly powerful and seeming impossible to kill, he still blamed her for a lot of things going wrong, for selling their map for bunch of dumplings during their first mission, for breaking his arm during their first survival training, for accidentally splashing acid on his back when the idiot dove into an acidic lake that one time. She was a danger to society, usually natural selection makes people like this woman disappear but… Apparently some people just manage to evade fate by being really persistent. "Don't get me wrong, sensei, I do treasure all the memories but… I can't wait to sign those resignation papers and start working on another team until I get my promotion to Chuunin. From there on I can start taking the control of my clan over from my father. You've made us grow really strong, it was inevitable to survive your incompetence and even if we entered the Chuunin Exams last year we would've blown everyone away. At least for that much, I am grateful."

The team moved in close to Konohagakure gate, bunch of guards started swarming the area which alerted Kiyomi. Apparently Hanasaku's return was a huge deal, the blonde turned at her sensei "Sensei, what if we messed up and you're gonna get reported and they'll call the Ninja Tribunal on you again, last time you were just barely acquitted, just because the politican you killed turned out to be a leader of a criminal syndicate." Hanasaku shook her head. "No, if that was the case we'd have gotten arrested, the guards are keeping their distance as if… They're protecting us." Tetsuzuki smiled angrily, "Don't stretch your brain on this one, sensei, let's just move in and find out from the Administration what exactly do they want with you."

Mana's shoulder started to feel really numb, she wasn't used to using a cane to walk around, using a cane which supported just one side of her body when both of her legs were hurt wasn't the best of ideas but she at least could move around with minimal pain in her muscles. Was she never going to become strong? If she didn't overtrain she'd have fallen behind, if she did push her body to the limit she went overboard and burnt it up. Perhaps greatness wasn't her destiny, maybe fate told Mana to stay a nobody with the unimpressive legacy of not being a member of any clan that made a difference in the village. The closest resemblance of a clan was from her mother's side of the family and those guys weren't even ninja, just a bunch of greedy con artists that danced and pulled tricks off for food and payment. Traveling artists weren't known for their impressive combat capabilities.

"That's the most retarded thing I've heard ever!" a familiar voice reached Mana's ear coming from the street to the right that connected to the central street that lead right to the Administration building.

"Oh, excuse me, and what would YOUR plan be in case of the dead ninja rising from their graves to eat the living?" another familiar voice made the girl magician turn around and see her friends walking towards the Administration and quarreling. They seemed to be so consumed by their discussion that they didn't even notice Mana walking in front of them, even with her strange choice of apparel.

"I don't know, probably burning them to bits. That or chopping their legs off so that they can't move"

"That's even MORE retarded than my idea and my idea, I will remind you, was to breed a special breed of killer dolphins with chakra cannons on their back trained to track the dead and shoot them from the seas with tracking blasts of chakra lasers."

"Why is that? Your idea was right out of a manga book!"

"Well for one dead ninja can't die, loser, so you'll just have a burning zombie rampaging in the battlefield setting things on fire. Before you know it you're on fire and there you go, you're dead too!"

"Well dolphins aren't even land mammals, you twit!"

"That's why you'd make their chakra cannons track their targets from long distance so they can fire from the sea where the dead can't even hurt them… Mana?!" finally her teammate noticed the magician staring at them awkwardly right when they almost bumped into her.

Shimo rushed in to hug the girl to which Mana just grunted in pain as her leg muscle acted up again. "It's been so long, Mana-chan, where have you been!? We haven't seen you much around the training grounds and when we did you were just meditating on a log." Sugemi butted in "Well yeah and Shimo didn't know that you can't really move a person who is meditating or else they'll mind will become trapped in their own mind and they will always remain sleeping like that."

Mana blinked rapidly a couple of times. "That's… Not really true, you can talk to a meditating person, my parents often do alert me when the food is ready and all that. But yeah, I was training alone, got a bit overly invested into it too…" the girl nodded pointing at her cane. The two boys started asking questions which made Mana have to explain the entire situation in detail.

"A kick based martial art to keep opponents at range? That's a pretty good idea, did Tanshu-sensei suggest you that?" Shimo asked rubbing his chin after hearing the idea.

Mana shook her head. Sugemi yawned, "Yeah, we pretty much mastered his tips he gave us already, those two months that he had been gone were pretty useless, I mean we did make some progress initially but we sort of hit a wall. Progress without a mentor just becomes so slow and tedious, there has to be a special training method that helps you boost your progress, what's your secret?" he asked.

Mana got deep into thoughts observing the Administration building coming up in their sights. "Well there's this training drill that lets you increase your chakra. There is this stage of meditation called "Ego", it basically grants you total awareness of your own body, it shows the chakra nodes that are clogged up with unused chakra masses so with a burst of chakra to those spots you can unleash them and then adapt your flow to the larger mass of chakra being in your body which grows your chakra capacity in total. Then I've started to find this other stage of meditation entirely, you can learn to create scenarios in your mind and convince yourself that they are real, you can go through entire training regiments in your mind within just minutes and then convince your body it's real, the best part is that when you wake up, in an hour or two your body realizes it was all fake but you still keep the gain where your exhaustion is suddenly gone and the body realizes that it didn't even spend any chakra for real.

Shimo looked really impressed by Mana's methods but Sugemi looked pretty annoyed. "Darn it, it sounds pretty cool but… I'd never manage to learn meditation. It's too boring and weird for me." Shimo laughed out, "Yeah, Tanshu-sensei tried teaching it to me unsuccessfully too, it's useful for a swordsman to learn to adapt and change up their style and mental simulation is the best method for that, still, Mana-chan, Tanshu-sensei said it was a pretty advanced method and you've already reached that level of meditation mastery? That's pretty badass!" The magician just looked away, she was a little humbled by the compliment but there was that knowledge that despite her breakthrough in training methods she still considered her teammates above her. Shimo struggled against the Demon but he at least gave the youth a good fight, Sugemi fought an undercover Jounin and didn't get immediately taken out.

Finally the three entered the Administration building, it seemed to be especially buzzing and no one bothered to inform them of what exactly was going on. Everyone was just so angry and busy, almost like some big event was about to take place. Some people almost tripped Mana over and it took the attempts from both of the boys to catch her and keep her from falling down as smallest tension to her thighs made her muscles burn up and the pain made them to just give in to the pressure. "You sure you can do this, Mana-chan? I mean I am still on my training vacation and they called me so it seemed weird but you're straight out injured. Why would they pull something like this on us? They don't pull ninja out of their training vacation or injury unless it's a war situation or something, even then why would a challenge like that need the desperate aid of an injured genin and one that's not finished with their training yet?" Shimo wondered.

"Well a lot of my favorite manga are on break now so I actually enjoyed a little challenge." Sugemi cracked his fist in excitement. This was a strange change as usually it was the Nara who was the least excited about missions unless they sounded like good chapters for his imaginary future manga. "I'm fine, as long as I don't have to fight someone or move around a lot, I can probably even make hand seals if I really need to. I'll probably be a burden for your guys though, I'm sorry." The girl smiled with an apologetic smile, she really felt bad about this. Shimo laughed back at her, "You a burden? Forget it, you beat that Ooguchi guy into a pulp and wrecked that Demon's armor! I wouldn't have matched up to him as well as I had if it weren't for you. I bet even injured you could kick bunch of butt!" While his optimism was appreciated and recorded, Mana would've really enjoyed some more realism out of her friend right about now.

Finally the busy assistant of whoever was in charge now that the Fourth was out to the Summit invited the bunch of them inside. It was none other than one of the Councilmen inside! These guys were really important, they were high ranking politicans who were always included in all of the Ninja Tribunal sessions and their opinions were always consulted whenever Hokage made any important decisions. His presence only made this occasion more intimidating and the young magician found herself subconsciously stroking her aching thigh in worry. "Well, Team Oak, I assume. No offense but Mana is quite easy to recognize with her… Public status. Sometimes I call you guys "the Sorceress' team" because of how well known the girl is for her artistic activities…" the councilman finally addressed the three with a pleasant tone but his eyes looked tired and sad.

"Personally I'd have never allowed a girl with such a celebrity status in our village on the team but as long as her "fame" is contained within the village walls, I suppose she can play ninja for a while." Despite councilman's words stinging quite a bit, his tone sounded like his words weren't supposed to be taken as offensive, still, those politicans had a way with words. That was basically their entire job so who was Mana to judge them? Shimo cleared his throat, "While Mana-chan is the de facto leader of our team it's only because me and Sugemi butt heads too often for any of us to make a productive leader. What bothers us is that you called us in a middle of my training vacation and Mana's injury, each ninja is guaranteed at least three months of time to train each year to improve their overall condition and potency. It's a very desperate decision to call for a ninja during that time, the tradition forbids it."

The councilman fixed the messy collar of his kimono and tightened his fancy silk belt on his waist. Took a couple of deep breaths and finally opened his troubled eyes. "I am fully aware of your and Mana's condition, in fact, I was personally advised to NOT call Mana out of her resting time by the medical ninja who supervised her recovery. That being said there are some very… Troubling news I must deliver to you three, also there is a simple but important job I want you three to take care of. It will take only a day or two and the chance of a fighting scenario is almost zero. Despite that it's still a B-rank mission at least as it's quite iconic and very important to the village, I thought quite long about which team should get this "freebie" in their record and… Well since I had news for you three anyways and since you did exceptional work with that Kirigakure spy, I suppose you guys are granted that opportunity."

Sugemi raised an eyebrow, "What "troubling news" are we talking about? That "Demon" guy didn't escape, did he?!" he asked.

The councilman sighed. "There is no easy way of telling you this so I'll just break it down to you guys – the Fourth and Red Dog Tanshu, the Konohagakure Sannin and the supervisor of Team Oak were killed in action during the Kage Summit!"

 **P.S. Yamanaka Kiyomi is an OC made by Jordan Patterson, one of the readers of the story who was added to the story with his permission. All credit for that character goes to him, I just adapted the character to my story**


	63. The Fifth

As the councilman spoke those words it was almost like the world started shifting beneath Mana's feet. The young genin even took a small half of a step back right after the news were delivered. Her first reaction was to deny it all, just yell from the top of her lungs that this must've been a stupid joke or that the councilman didn't have all of the information. Who could ever have killed sensei? Even if sensei had his arms tied down he still could've competed with the best of the best, he did so even as a teen, didn't he? He was the strongest Konoha had to offer, he was immune to death, wasn't he!?

Sugemi beat Mana to her first sensitive and sentimental reaction. "How do you know that? Sensei was the strongest ninja I've ever known so unless you've got a solid reason as to why he could've died I'm gonna pound you hard, just know that before you answer!" fist of the Nara shot forward and then up trying to touch the ceiling, sadly the boy lacked the needed height by a wide margin. The councilman was obviously prepared for all those inevitable questions, he looked tired and quite busy but he still took the time to reply the questions replies to which he'd been working out since he first read those fateful two letters.

"Another Sannin – Misu of the Vapor had betrayed the Hokage and Tanshu, we don't know much details but apparently Tanshu killed Misu but collapsed to his own injuries, the Hokage was killed in a battle with the Mizukage. That is all I can comment on those news for now, at least for you, please understand - children have no place in these matters even if they are ninja."

Shimo's stare dug down into the ground, he also looked like he was going through the denial stage, Mana wanted to comfort him but… She kind of was a mess herself. An ally died and she not only wasn't strong enough – she had absolutely no chance of stopping it. She lacked the age, rank, strength so that she would have been there. It was safe to say that there was no conceivable way for her to prevent those deaths from happening. Lacking strength was not the painful part, one could always have grown stronger and smarter. Inevitability, being unable to change anything because things just happened sometimes was the most painful part. Even if she could travel at the speed of light and make the most powerful ninja explode upon impact she'd have been unable to save her sensei.

Mana turned around and started stumbling out of the office, she leaned onto her cane with all of her weight to the point where her shoulder just burnt up and her hand quickly started feeling numb. The emotional and psychological pain, combined with her own impairment almost made her let go of her cane, just slip and fall down, what did it even matter? If one was powerless to change all things, if one was unable to save their treasured ones from dying what did it matter? What was her life to the Universe if she just exploded right then and there into a wild mash of blood and guts? Tears started running down Mana's cheeks, the girl was afraid to admit it but those were very selfish tears.

This pain and misery in her heart was not because her sensei had died, it was because she just found out that her lifelong goal was pointless and completely out of reach, not only for her, it was out of bounds for anyone. Tanshu spent so much time telling Mana that it was all so pointless, that she could have never saved everyone and that heroes were just in fairytales, then perhaps this death of his was his final lesson – saving everyone was impossible, to have such a goal is to be doomed to fail. Now Mana finally realized that her nindo was literally rigged to blow up in her face upon her own death. Her entire life would just be hearing about people close to her slipping away without her having any chance to change anything. It would hurt even more since she had made it her lifelong goal to change something about that.

Mana carelessly wiped her premature tear away and postponed her mental breakdown, she was in a middle of a mission briefing after all, the magician turned around and crept back into the office. She noticed that Sugemi and Shimo were pretty angry about it too and that the councilman was waiting for the three of them to get over their first instincts. Apparently Mana's first instinct was grief and depression, her teammates had a shared one of anger. Almost instantly when Mana entered the office again the councilman jumped up from his chair gesturing that they can carry on. Obviously this was not over, the balance of power has shifted and people lost precious and loved icons. Why was no one informed of this? Why did people cheer on Mana passing by instead of crying that the Hokage has died?

Shimo interrupted that train of thought, his lowered and husky tone managed to slip in a question. "Can we know for certain that the information is correct? I mean it's Star of Hope, the Fourth Hokage and Tanshu-sensei we're talking about." Councilman nodded as he was stroking his beard, his eyes suggested genuine sadness, something very few politicians managed to convey in such situations.

"Sadly so. We've been informed by a signed letter from all the other Kage, we've lost not only Tanshu and the Fourth but also a lot of Fourth's trusted men he took to the Summit. Very few have survived and those few will undoubtedly be unable to fight or perform in missions. What nails the final nail into the coffin is the date of the letter – the other Kage would've wanted for Konoha to know of this as late as possible so that they cut the juiciest pieces of Kirigakure… Don't ask about that… It just makes all the sense. Too much so to doubt it."

Sugemi's fists tightened and as pieces of his sleeves got caught in his crushing grip a strange tearing sound came from his side. The boy's face was turned and twisted with his teeth in a wide grinding mimic of sadness and his hair covering his enraged eyes. "W-What's our mission about?" Mana asked the councilman trying to get this over with as fast as possible, the less time spent here and less time given for Sugemi to lash out the better. She was in no condition to get the Nara under control if he broke out and if Shimo clashed with him the rivalry of the two would fuel their fire into an endless twisting inferno.

The councilman cleared his throat, he visibly appreciated that the girl had changed the subject making him speak less and less about things he didn't want the kids to know. Based from what he said an intelligent listener would've already guessed that Mizukage had also perished in the Summit and now the dominating forces were cutting the village into pieces and while the concrete picture was still unknown it was likely that even more horrors would follow. A village which was ruled by tyrants, one worse than another, wouldn't have responded kindly to being split like a pie amongst the world's strongest. Which would of course lead to violence… At least war was postponed for several more years, Mana had some time to grow and develop and become strong enough to change it all one day or die trying. Knowing the inevitability of her failure did not shy her away from living that way, even if she would die failing to save her friends or even people she didn't know, such was the only way of life worth living.

The councilman confidently handed Mana the file which Shimo took from his hands because the girl was visibly struggling with maintaining her balance and reading the file. The councilman then decided to also talk about the mission out loud. "As you may know the famous Guru Ayushi will be finally arriving to Konoha, by our estimation he will reach the gates at least tomorrow morning. He is a famous ninja from a past era, some rumors claim that he had served our village under the Senju name long before the Second Great Ninja War, maybe even during the First one. He was the most famous medical ninja of his time, he could literally bring people back to life and he himself was considered to be immortal. Needless to say such a shinobi reached twice the age upon which ninja retire and decided to leave the life of a ninja behind."

Shimo quickly skimmed over the file, offering it to Mana after finishing it but when the girl gently shook her head in shame that it would've been too hard to read it by herself he kept it. "So why is protecting him a task for three genin, two of which shouldn't be on active duty?" the Yuki prodigy asked. He was glancing at Sugemi's raging and shaking figure with a corner of his eye, visibly he was as worried about his friend as Mana was before. Knowing Sugemi, if he didn't explode in a fit of rage instantly, he probably won't at all. He was just that kind of guy. The councilman sighed.

"I know you three are young and don't know much about someone like Guru Ayushi but he is a hero of even my grandparents. After saving many lives during the war and helping establish Konoha as one of the dominant powers in the Ninja World, he decided to leave his life as a ninja behind. He now travels the world giving seminars of peace and wisdom to the villages and smaller settlements in need. That being said, he is still an unparalleled icon in the world. Despite him refusing to fight, even his presence in a settlement scares bandits and nukenin away. Some things just aren't questioned, everyone's grandparents either idolized Ayushi and his teachings or owe him for saving their entire families during the war. There is no one dumb enough on this Earth to lay a hand on that man. For that reason protecting him is mostly a symbolic duty, but that of great honor. Despite him never needing actual protection, his protectors are usually graced with a great honor of having a record of having protected the great Guru Ayushi at some point in their lives."

As Mana's heart started jumping more intensely, namely because meeting this Guru Ayushi would've lead to saving her father from his pain, if only she can ask him nicely enough for the man to provide his cells for her father's treatment, she was soon beaten out of these happy thoughts. Sugemi walked up to Shimo and violently took the file from him flipping through it. He then tossed it onto the office table and turned around. "Fine, we'll protect your old man." his eyes then turned back and stared straight into those of the councilman right before he left the office. "I hope "great honor" includes being signed up for the Chuunin Exams, right?" The councilman slapped his forehead, he looked relieved as he thought that for a moment this child would have said something stupid and problematic. "Ah… I assume one of your clan is included in organizing that and spilled the beans, right? Well, yes, I suppose even if your sensei spot is currently… Vacant… I could in theory sign you guys up acting as a higher power to those in charge of the exam. Until this evening I can still do that sort of thing and something tells me that even after, the Fifth won't give a crap about who signs what under her nose…"

The three were completely silent their entire trip down the stairs. Just as they nearly approached the exit of the building they saw a very special trio entering the Administration building. One of them was a woman of average height, looking in her mid-thirties and wearing a tight murky orange jumpsuit with an unzipped jounin west. Her jumpsuit was torn and burnt off in places, her body still had signs of exhaustion and immense bruising and her arms below elbows were completely bandaged with her knuckles still soaking the bandage in red. The woman's wild brown hair, reminding almost of an autumnal chestnut was by far the most impressive feature of the woman, the flow of the brown ocean was only restrained by her blue forehead protector which she wore on the top of her head as a hairband.

Together with her came two teens that were visibly older than the three of Team Oak but not by that much, still their mental and physical maturity as well as their puberty having started and done their work on the teens it was quite apparent that the duo had seen much more in life than Mana, Shimo and Sugemi. The three just walked right up to the Hokage's office without registering or letting anyone know anything. The boy with the strange face markings and sharp fangs sticking from his mouth bumped his shoulder to Shimo, at least fate didn't make him bump into Sugemi. At this point the Nara would've picked a fight for sure.

"So… Chuunin Exams, huh?" Shimo tried to spark up a conversation, the three of them had a free midday to morning until they had to go greet Guru Ayushi by the village gates. Sugemi nodded and looked at his shaking clenched fist. "Yeah. We've had enough of this dish washing shit, maybe if we were given the real missions to start with we may have stood up to that Demon guy, maybe we would've been trustworthy enough to be by Hokage's side when he got murdered… We can pull it off, we're all strong enough. Those damn Kirigakure jerks. I hate them… As long as I remember all they did was abuse their people and pick on us, now this. Shimo was right all along, that shit can't be allowed to continue. Come on, you two, we've got business to take care of until the morning."

Shimo nodded, "I'm going to go keep my training up, you should go home and rest, Mana-chan, you've trained plenty already. What are you going to do, Sugemi?" The Nara looked at the Administration building and then at some unspecified point of the village. He could've been looking at the bakery that stood right where he was looking at but Mana could've sworn that it was more like some building further that direction. "Probably the same, for now." Sugemi added. Just like that the Nara just split off and started walking, not to the direction he was staring so intensely at but where his home was. Shimo started walking on forward but then looked back at Mana and walked back placing his hand onto hers on the cane.

"You gonna be OK?" he asked, "Maybe you want me to walk you home?"

"Nah, I'm fine" Mana looked somewhere to the side worried, "I'm just not sure about this whole Chuunin Exam thing. I mean are we really ready? We've trained plenty alone but we had very little team experience, Tanshu-sensei always split us up and tried to raise each of us individually. Honestly, it feels like there has never been a time when there was NOT a hedge between the three of us."

Shimo smiled and rushed back to where he was before he rushed back to Mana, he then turned back and showed her a thumb up with a confident smile. "You worry too much about too many things. I fought a giant tiger, Sugemi fought a snake, you beat not one but two giant centipedes and we all had our butts kicked by a spy, except Sugemi who got his beat by a guy with glasses. What is there for us to fear?" The genin's confident reply really did break a smile on Mana's face. Perhaps she was developing fears and worries far too fast. They may have never had real teamwork training but they were friends who knew each other for quite some time now, right?

Hanasaku and her two students entered the office without even knocking, the councilman stood up and walked up to the door leading the three to a hall much further down the corridor. He then looked at the woman's students and shook his head. "Oh, come on!" Kiyomi pouted but for the first time ever Hanasaku nodded and played by the rules, something in her guts told her that she may have known what all of this was about. "Kiyomi, Tetsuzuki, please go home now and rest. This meeting isn't for you." Tetsuzuki pouted a bit and acted up. "I still want to leave the team, you know!"

The councilman cleared his throat, "Well the meeting of village's officials and the entire council is no place to do that. Please file your papers on the first floor." The man's voice was clearly irritated, even the noisy Inuzuka decided to obey the man's will and he turned around and started quickly marching downstairs. Hanasaku gently stroke Kiyomi's head and then poked the girl's forehead, "Go home, I can handle this." Kiyomi still continued to be worried.

"You always fall asleep during meetings of politics and briefings" she exclaimed.

"That's exactly why I can handle this, what I can't hear doesn't bother me" Hanasaku smiled with a confident full grin. Finally even the second student relented and the girl turned around moving downstairs and passing through her teammate who was filing papers of his departure from the team. With a worried and sorry look she tried to give him one final reason to reconsider but her eyes did not meet a reply. Just like that, Team Petal was dissolved completely!

The councilman stood up and showed for Hanasaku where to sit, the woman just sat down and crossed her legs and arms closing her eyes. It wasn't that she was ignorant, it wasn't that she was disrespectful towards her basic suspicions. Howoku and Tanshu were dead, most likely Misu too. Only if all the other candidates for Kage would've died had the council approached her with this. She was pretty much the last person to be considered for this position. The councilman looked at her and asked for Hanasaku to pay attention but the woman kept her eyes closed, this time applying tension to that eye-lock. She somehow had to keep her tears inside, didn't she?

So what if that was Hanasaku's way of coping with loss? So what if she always made fun out of everything, so what if she always acted dumb and silly. So what if she always made people she liked hurt because she was clumsy and not too bright. But why did Howoku and Misu deserve to die? Why did her two brothers deserve to die alongside her younger brother? Why was her family now all alone again? Just like that time when her parents died, she's all alone. The more things change the more they stay the same. It's a definition of insanity to do the same thing again, expecting things to change and while Hanasaku was stupid and clumsy, insane was one thing she was not. Family was something she could not have. The greatest curse of surviving everything was that you got to see everyone you love die before you…

"And that is why we need a Hokage suddenly. There is hope that a new leader can perhaps still salvage the situation, obtain more reliable information on what happened in the Kage Summit and maybe even still get some good puppet politicians of ours into the newly elected Kirigakure council. Maybe we can still push some of our candidates for Mizukage as well, as dickish as the late news were, I'm sure that the other Kage wouldn't have elected another Kage without our knowledge…" the councilman went on and on. Hanasaku's eyes shot wide open letting her tears run free. Her body leaped up making all the ignorant councilmen shouting that this was insanity itself sit back down in fear. After all, whenever Chestnut Hanasaku did something, everything fell apart…

"Silence! I, Hanasaku Senju, otherwise known as Chestnut Hanasaku, using my Sannin priority status accept the suggested title as the Fifth Hokage until the situation is stable and a viable substitute can be placed in my seat." she spoke, for the first time what she said were not words that revealed her clumsiness of her foolishness. Those were words of a woman ready to accept power. Power of being able to find out what happened to her brothers and power to prevent something like that from happening again. Also possibly punching people responsible in the face… Preferably the last one.

Even the councilmen who were opposed to Hanasaku's candidature initially started hesitantly nodding their heads. They then caught themselves agreeing to Hanasaku being chosen as the next Hokage, successor to one titled the "Star of Hope" no less. One of the most questionable leaders in history following undoubtedly the greatest. One that made economy blossom from peace and peace from economy, one who found balance and coexistence in those things. It could all either go very well, or terribly wrong. Such decisions were best made when one had nothing at all to lose…


	64. Stages of Grief

Mana's slower pace did not reduce that feeling of ground shifting beneath her feet. Such feelings were natural after such an event, every time a great clash between two sides occurred there was to be a great aftereffect of that encounter. People crying and lamenting the deaths of their beloved, children left without homes and families, entire settlements and villages thinking how things would be now that their leaders had passed away. It is just human nature when all is perfectly well to expect that this would never change. Such was the case when the Star of Hope became Hokage. People just took that bliss of having such a competent and powerful iconic leader for granted expecting that this state would never change.

This time on her way back Mana noticed a significant change in people's moods. Women had teary eyes everywhere, the men looked like they've been told the worst news. Mana assumed that the news had already reached the public. After all, if the councilman thought bunch of kids should know it already that meant it was already on the papers that day. What some people couldn't find out about from the news, they heard about through hearsay or from their neighbors, nothing spreads quite like crushing news like those. In one violent swoop of history Konoha lost two of their Sannin and a Hokage with no known replacements for the Sannin lost and a very questionable choice for a Hokage.

Mana thought back on seeing that woman in the Administration, her brown hair… She must've been Chestnut Hanasaku, after all, as secretive as the council tried to be with their meeting to elect the new Hokage, their choice was made for them. There was really no one else there to choose. It was either choose Chestnut Hanasaku, the only surviving Sannin, or wait until a more appropriate candidate rises up to the occasion. It all depended on the situation the village was in and by seeing how rushed the decision to select the new Kage was Mana was starting to feel uneasy. Were things so bad that they needed the succeeding Kage right after the last one died? It was fruitless to think too hard about it without knowing much more, she was just a kid after all and didn't get much information about the more intricate village affairs.

Right after returning home Mana realized that her parents had already found out about the news. Father approached Mana and wanted to comfort her as he was comforting mother who was crying her heart out but he saw that his daughter was in a much calmer state. Mana was not crying or shaking or displaying any signs of losing her mind but… Father knew she was suffering inside, in fact, the invisible sadness was often the most dangerous. It was obvious that the man didn't really know how to help his kid. He just reached out and gently tapped her shoulder then drew Mana in for a hug.

"So you've heard, huh?" he asked.

"Yeah, the councilman told us…" was all that Mana could reply, her voice was deep but silent, her tone sounded so distant.

"Well they're really rushing this thing, they're having the funeral this evening and then the Fifth is going to be nominated tomorrow. Doesn't really help that they're rushing it so much…" father started babbling, trying to find a note that would open Mana up a bit so that she could let her feelings go and stop sealing them away. Having lived for so long as a ninja and lost many comrades father must've known that it wasn't really healthy to deal with it the way in which Mana was doing it.

"I'm… I'm probably gonna go to bed early today, I've got a mission tomorrow, it's nothing too big." Mana replied trying to free herself from father's arms. While she successfully escaped his embrace his hands held her by her arms quite firmly, having father's injury in mind.

"You should go to the funeral, death is something you want let out of your system and deal with immediately. Death is like an infestation of darkness, if you let it stick around for too long it'll grow out of control until no one will be able to tell the moss from the stone. You might not want to say goodbye just yet but… You'll feel better later if you do it now." Father explained letting go of the little magician right afterwards. Mana quietly stumbled back to her room, walking upstairs with a cane was a great pain in the butt.

Father was right, she kept telling herself internally that if she never saw Tanshu-sensei's body and never confronted the problem it just wouldn't exist anymore. Sure she'd never see or hear about Tanshu-sensei again but at least she'd never have to deal with the problem. For all the talk about being a hero and a savior and one who'd change the world, being an icon of hope for others to draw courage from she was a big coward. Slowly and having to force her body to move every inch Mana stood up from the bed and crept to the wardrobe pulling out her black dress. It was safe to say that neither Mana nor her parents ever hoped that the girl would ever have to wear that, it'd have been for the best if the girl just grew out of it and tossed it away without ever getting to put it on. Such was the case with most clothes meant specifically to be worn during a funeral.

Mana just laid back down and kept looking through the window at the Sun as it circled through the sky, hiding behind the dark clouds that were starting to accumulate. Autumn was a season of rain, while it wasn't really uncommon for it to rain during this time of the year, the girl wanted to believe that it was the Universe itself that was gifting this expression of sadness as if it was an apology of the sort. That was being hopeful, that's how Mana was ever since she was a kid, believing in nonsense like that… As the Sun finally started to set the girl changed into her dress, it felt so cold and uncomfortable, must've just been her mind associating the soft fabric with what it symbolized that made it so. Looking through the window Mana then took a black sweater with her in case if it started to rain. Mana loved the rain but she just wasn't in the mood to enjoy it now, she wasn't in the mood to enjoy anything really. While it sounded stupid for the girl, she felt like she'd never be able to enjoy anything ever again.

Mana looked around, pretty much everyone had gathered around the Hokage's grave. She was too far to see if there was even a body in the coffin. There was something of the sort, perhaps whoever was in the Summit managed to get Tanshu-sensei's and Fourth's bodies sealed and then sent the scroll to Konoha. There were just so many bodies piling up in these times that by now moving them was quite a simple deal, there must've been entire industries around it, people who specialized in sealing dead bodies. Mana turned at father, seeing her sad eyes father's arm wrapped around her shoulder as the head of the family gently hugged both Mana and mother.

"Dad, is there a special kind of ninja that deal with sealing bodies?" she asked.

"Yeah, several specializations actually. There are the ninja called "Shinigami", those guys seal the bodies into scrolls and have multitude of techniques related to protecting those scrolls and quickly transferring them. Bodies are a treasured thing for a village for a multitude of reasons so "Shinigami" are usually quite potent ninja capable of protecting them. Then there are "Sin Eaters", usually the bodies of a ninja contain various traces of how they died, sometimes seals that work like traps when allied ninja recover the body, it's the job of a "Sin Eater" to remove those or recover all they can about the death of a ninja. They're both investigators for hidden messages and signs but also supportive ninja, while both are quite powerful ordinary ninja don't really like them."

"Why not?" Mana asked slightly confused.

"Because of what they represent, they deal with dead bodies which means that they always follow death. It's not really their fault but… It can't be helped. That's why their kind is quite rare and not many younger ninja know about them, people tend not to talk about them too much except during occasions like this…" father replied trying to silence his voice a bit to the point where those around the family couldn't hear them.

"This is horrible… Howoku was the one who gave me the permission to stay in the village. He also was one of the only opponents of the council's decision to assassinate my tribe…" mother wept. Mana wanted to hear more about that but she figured that this may not have been the best occasion to do so. She'd have to just keep that in her mind and ask about it some other time. The girl's eyes unintentionally slipped onto Sugemi and Shimo, these two were standing on separate corners of the crowd, Shimo was surrounded by his family as well but Sugemi was standing further away from his. Also their emotions couldn't have differed more, Shimo was sad beyond comprehension – the Fourth was his hero, whereas Sugemi was… Angry. Mana couldn't really understand what her teammate was so furious about, maybe he still blamed himself for what happened, maybe he blamed someone else. Blame often sparks anger.

Mana slowly slipped out from her father's arm and then crept carefully to the young Nara. She tried to talk to him, greet him and ask if there was something on his mind but her teammate stayed quiet.

"You know, I wasn't originally going to come here, I thought to run away from it all and deal with it alone, or better yet not deal with it at all. If you have something weighing you down it'd be best if you shared it" she said trying to open her friend up a bit. Sugemi clenched his fists.

"They're all just crying, acting like this is no one's fault. We have the guy in our cells, we've got that "Demon", that Kirigakure scumbag. He should get the shit beaten out of him every day, I should've been there when you two fought him and beaten the shit out of him to begin with. Now I'm one beating behind schedule!" Sugemi shouted out, the surrounding people looked at the two youngsters and started slowly moving back forming a small circle around them. Mana slowly breathed in and out, this was a dangerous mindset that her friend had, he was about to do something stupid and she had to stop that. It was her responsibility as a friend.

"It's not "Demon's" fault, he didn't even see Tanshu or the Fourth, the three never even met for a moment. You're just pointing arrows because you're feeling dark and sad inside. I know that feeling because I have it in my heart as well, I don't know the good way to deal with it yet but… I know that yours is wrong." Mana scolded herself almost instantly after finishing her reply, she came off too hard on him. She should've said something else but… How was she supposed to react, her teammate was itching to hurt someone completely innocent just because he came from a country responsible for taking a life of their treasured teacher.

"No. You're the wrong one, that's what Tanshu-sensei kept telling you, even after his death you can't respect his will. Even after his death you keep on disappointing him. People like you always confuse everyone else with their stupid speeches, "It's not that guy's fault, it's nobody's fault". Nobody's fault my ass. It's Kirigakure's fault, we've been warring for years and Fourth was a fool to think for a moment that those deaths were forgotten, that this violence could ever be left behind. The Mizukage wanted war, well we should give him that."

"Sugemi, it's not Kirigakure or Kumogakure or whatever, it's a person that killed the Fourth and it's a completely another person who killed Tanshu-sensei. Didn't you hear it? Tanshu-sensei was killed by Misu-san – a Konohagakure Sannin. You can't just lash out and start beating up and killing people from another country because they hurt you, it wasn't Kirigakure's will this happened, it was the Mizukage's." Mana almost started shouting, the circle around the two grew wider with each passing moment.

Sugemi turned around and started walking away, bumping into Mana's shoulder. The girl moaned in pain and almost collapsed, just barely did she manage to keep on one knee when gripping her cane with all of her strength. "That's what I thought, you keep trying to make it more difficult than it actually is. We are allies, they are enemies. It's as simple as that. To them we are enemies as well so they'd do the same to us as they did to sensei and Hokage without blinking twice. I thought of you as a friend, Mana, I still do. I'll walk away before you tarnish that belief of mine by siding with them."

Some people came to help Mana get back on her feet, they kept cursing at Sugemi and his words but some actually agreed with him. There were too many voices for Mana to hear them all but… Some of them really did want war with Kirigakure, probably the majority of people around her wanted to start that cursed circle of violence all over again. Father helped Mana up and examined her. "Is everything OK? What happened?"

Mana forced a fake smile and nodded. "Yeah, I'm fine, just got dirt all over my dress. I uh, I felt a bit weak there for a moment and fell…" Mana heard Shimo behind her. She looked back and saw that same emotion in his eyes – rage. He must've seen everything that happened, he probably heard some of it. This wasn't good, right when Mana started dealing with one loss her life was starting to spiral down even more threatening to shake the balance of her team even more. With all of her speed that the girl could muster up she walked up to Shimo trying to catch up to him, he was slowly leaving the crowd.

"That bastard, I'm gonna kick his ass hard! He's got no right to act like a fucking drama queen here, we're all suffering!" Shimo was cursing really badly, Mana shouted for him to wait and her teammate listened stopping for a moment and waiting for her to catch up to him.

"Stop, it wasn't his fault, he always was the weird one and… It just hit him harder than everyone else. Although I do think he's about to pull something really stupid." Mana said.

"He knew that you would stand by your beliefs, he knew that people around him were easy to sway to the violent side. He made fun of you and publically mocked you. I'm gonna kick that fucker's ass, no matter what he decided to pull here!" Shimo shouted, he wasn't going to be reasoned with. Mana knew that the two were looking for an excuse to jump at each other for quite some time.

"Shimo, there's no time for your rivalry and stupid macho nonsense! I think Sugemi is going to break into the Police Force HQ and try to kill the "Demon". If he's caught we'll all be in trouble. We owe it to him to stop him as his friends." She explained. Shimo nodded.

"Fine but I won't do it softly, I'm still gonna kick his ass when we stop him." He pouted. "I think he went to his home, if he's going for it like you think he is, he'll need to gear up. I'm heading home as fast as I can and I'll pick up my blade and my tools, you go change too. Hopefully you won't need to jump in but… At least be there to stop me from beating him too hard."

After clearing things up and putting the plan together the two split and head back home. Sugemi was never the overly subtle one so if he decided to break into the Police Force building he'd either be found out or he'd leave way too many clues to suggest a break in. Mana tried to desperately race home, she was moving at a turtle's pace and her thighs hurt with each step more and more. A couple of times the girl almost fell down from her muscles just giving in and feeling weak almost making the entire leg give in. Luckily Mana managed to make it home and to the second floor where she changed into her uniform and filled all the hidden pockets with kunai and shuriken and her sleeves with knives. For some using a magician's uniform during battle would've sounded like a bad idea, truth was Mana knew that outfit inside out, she knew every hidden pocket and could slip knives out of her sleeve effortlessly and faster than even her peers that specialized in weaponry. That beat feeling slightly uncomfortably during sudden movements.

Mana met up with Shimo who was now wielding a katana, having finally acquired the skill to switch from a wakizashi to a longer blade, custom made no doubt. His family could definitely afford a custom order from one of the several blacksmith clans of the village. The magician nodded gesturing that she was ready and the two set out. Truth be told Mana felt really bad inside. Her friend was spiraling into madness and she couldn't help him. She'd probably mess things up even at her full strength and here she was injured and unable to move around fast. She'd just get in Shimo's way. Still, as a friend she owed it to Sugemi to be there, to try and talk him down from committing a professional suicide. If he was found sneaking into the Police Force it'd be Ninja Tribunal for him, if he gave up the part during torture where he intended to kill a treasured prisoner, a source of information he could be accused of treason even. That would mean crushed dreams of ever being a ninja or having his own manga, maybe even death. This was no longer a game or a joke.

The two stopped before the Police Force building. Shimo peeked from the corner. "The two guards are taken out. This is bad" he whispered. Mana couldn't believe it, "Wait, how did Sugemi took two Police Force guards out?"

Shimo grunted and shook in his hiding spot uncomfortably. "All the good ones must've left to the funeral, it's the really influential and powerful ones that knew Tanshu-sensei and the Fourth the best. They left the youngsters in charge for just one evening… Still, these might be genin level ninja, each and every one of them would be troublesome to face directly. Let's try to be sneaky, even Sugemi thought he should sneak around which means while he is a dick, he's not insane"

Mana and Shimo snuck up to the entry, the lock was still there, for some reason it wasn't a seal lock that needed injection of the right kind of chakra to be unlocked, it was just a good old steel lock. Mana bent over almost crying out in pain from her legs and pulled a pin from her hair letting it loose. She bent the pin and worked the lock. Shimo looked amazed. "Holy shit, where did you learn that? More so that fast!?" Mana blinked, trying to smile but unsuccessfully due to the severity of the situation. "I'm a stage magician, remember. I break locks before the coffin fills with water for fun. I could've broken it five different ways with no tools on me, it'd have taken me longer though."

"And everyone says being a famous magician is a bad career choice for a ninja…" Shimo smiled as the two snuck in leaving the door unlocked. They may need to quickly escape and hide, even if such was unlikely for Mana. If shit hit the fan she'd probably be captured as she was unable to move around too fast. Shimo looked around, the two could hear footsteps all around – Sugemi somehow snuck through these floors without alerting or taking out any guards. Mana took off her hat and made a hand seal, she then pushed her cane into her hat and it disappeared in a bright glow as the magician sealed the cane into the hat. It took some amount of chakra but finally Mana became skilled enough to use her father's seal.

"It'd make too much noise if I walked around with that…" the girl explained in whisper, weaving some more hand seals and using a small vortex of wind to elevate her several feet into the air. "Mystical Wings Jutsu" she whispered again as the air managed to hold her, she'd not be completely invisible with the gusts setting off dust but it's still more silent than cursing in pain with every step. Shimo nodded and started leading the way, Mana wasn't the best in ways of stealth so her friend had to guide her, tell her when to move and when to stop. Her technique improved from being just a gust of wind to propel her upwards though, still it wasn't by any means fast or efficient, this situation was just exceptional enough to make it look useful. Sneaking was a painful and scary process, it seemed as if it took the two hours to get to the third level where the "Demon" was kept. There it was… Traces with lying knocked out guards and a guard standing near a cell looking at the young man inside.

"Sugemi!" Mana shouted out, the "guard's" concentration broke and the transformation jutsu ended revealing Sugemi standing at the end of the hall. The boy looked even more furious than before, "Don't get in my way you two! I'm gonna kill this bastard for what his kind did to Tanshu-sensei." It was safe to say that things could no longer be taken under control.

"We'll take too much time trying to talk this drama queen down. I'll just quickly cut him down and we'll get him out of here where we can kick his butt for being such an idiot and talk him over. I'm sorry, Mana-chan" Shimo quickly mumbled out and leaped forward drawing his sword and trying to cut Sugemi down but the Nara just rolled over Shimo's shoulder and kicked off his back making the Yuki swordsman lose balance and fall on his knees. Sugemi then lunged at Mana but stopped at the final step with his fist right at her face. Having realized that Mana wasn't fighting him but just here to try and control the situation Sugemi stepped back and looked her in the eyes. His eyes weren't angry or sad or… There wasn't anything in them, his stare was just blank and emotionless. Sugemi then turned back at Shimo who was standing up looking pretty angry and ready to beat his friend down senseless.


	65. Shimo VS Sugemi!

Shimo and Sugemi kept looking at each other, trying to determine which one should make the first move. This was a complicated fight, they couldn't go too flashy or else the guards would pick up on the trouble brewing in the lower levels, at the same time they were each a capable genin able to provide a decent challenge for one another. Shimo may have expected an easy knockout but this first exchange of attacks proved to him that such would never happen. Sugemi was not only ready to fight his friends for this blind quest of vengeance but he also was well able to deliver on his big talk.

Shimo started the brawl, he kicked off of the ground leaping forward, one of his arms held his drawn blade whereas the other one was ready to defend against any counterattacks which the sword may not have been fast enough to intercept. This time Shimo invested far less weight into his attack, he learned of Sugemi's style and decided that if he got his attack redirected again he'd be wide open for a takedown and this time the Nara wouldn't fool around. This was a real fight with real stakes, in fact, when a life of a friend was at stake the stakes couldn't have been more real.

With a sharp and quick but unfocused kick Shimo tried to weigh and measure his opponent, see how he dealt with simple quick jabs, Sugemi's knee shot up kicking Shimo's leg way up where the Nara then swept the other leg. Shimo's body hit the ground hard but Sugemi wasn't done, he turned his body around with a second sweep to send Shimo's body slamming into the cell. A dirty and bruised arm grabbed Shimo's neck and started choking the boy out. The Yuki swordsman whispered something to his assailant and his grip loosened. The Demon must've been told that he was attacking his own saviour, without his tools, broken, tired and hungry even the Demon could not escape from this HQ at that moment.

Sugemi turned back at Mana with the same blank stare. "Well? Aren't you going to fight? If you're here you must support a side, with me or against me. There are no neutral grounds in life, all must pick a side, those that do not are treated as enemies to both sides." A handle of Shimo's sword silenced Sugemi as it drove deep into the boy's jaw sending the boy crashing into the stone wall picking up dust and cracking some bricks in it. Mana just barely managed to lean out of the way of her friend crashing into the wall, she couldn't keep her balance but at least she didn't get knocked out by her own friend crashing into her.

"Don't listen to him, Mana-chan. You don't have to pick any side, I'm sorry for doing this to you, I'm sorry that I forced you to watch friends fight but… Please just endure it a little bit longer. We'll go back home again and be friends, we'll be Team Oak like the old times. Isn't that right Sugemi? What happened to the Chuunin Exams? What happened to your manga?! Are you just spitting at all of your dreams just to express your feelings of anger towards an unarmed man?" Shimo yelled at Sugemi who picked himself back up and spat out some blood to the side.

Mana's body was almost shaking, she couldn't believe that she was seeing her friends fight like that, her best friends. When coming here she expected that they would be able to stop Sugemi by either talking him down or he'd get his mind back in order when the first blow would be thrown, seeing the madness behind it all. Now she witnessed that the boy wasn't like that at all, with each fist thrown his mind devolved more and more to the mad fighting animal which he held inside. "They don't write manga about spineless fools like Mana. They write them about brave and strong men who know where they stand and act upon their feelings. That is what it means to be a ninja and that is how I'll make my own history. If you feel obliged to fight me, I'll gladly kick your butt before I kick that of that Kirigakure bastard in the cell." Sugemi shouted out, his tone finally made it clear – he lost it completely.

"So you think you can take me?" Demon's confident and husky tone echoed through the entire room from his cell. "Come on, big guy, I'm right here. Open the cell door and we can go for it."

Shimo gave the inmate an angry stare, he was just making this whole madness worse. "Guys. Please. Stop!" Mana shouted out standing back up and using her "Mystical Wings" jutsu again to make her slightly levitate as she moved in closer to the two. A blow sent her back into the wall of the room, it wasn't a chakra augmented blow so Sugemi was holding back but he showed clearly that he was going to have none of it. He was so far beyond being talked down that Mana could barely believe it. If this was a mercenary or another ninja or some giant animal from the Forest of Death she'd have had no second thought about taking them out but… This was Sugemi. How could things have gone so far out of control?

Sugemi shouted out madly, such loud cries of battle must've been heard above but the guards probably just took it for normal shouts of desperate or drunk inmates. Sometimes when a ninja has had too many drinks they may have ended up contained in the Police Force HQ as well until the morning so some unusual noises wouldn't have been out of the ordinary in the slightest. The Nara leaped forward slamming his palms together as the shadows shot from the ground forming into fists, each of them started relentlessly striking at Shimo in a powerful barrage of strikes. "Shadow Tendril Barrage!" Sugemi yelled out.

Shimo's body moved to the side and dodged each of the strikes, Mana saw that his body moved far too fast, he must've been using chakra to make his movements faster. A genin may not have been able to augment their bodies' natural abilities too much but somehow Shimo managed to avoid each and every strike, with a graceful spin the swordsman appeared behind Sugemi and drove his sheathe right into the Nara's back sending him almost crashing into the cell. The bars of the Demon's cell were bent up, the inmate moved back because he believed that the strength upon which Sugemi was thrown into his cell would blow them out completely. The Demon just laughed out in amusement.

"This is great, you Konoha brats are so soft. Afraid to draw your blade against your own brother, I've been killing Kirigakure ninja since I was in the Academy. Your pitiful games bring shame to the craft of ninja."

Sugemi's body picked itself up and wiped slobber and blood that shot from his mouth from having a pointy end of the sheathe driven into his spine with all of Shimo's strength. Even now when their encounter had well kicked off they were playing with kid gloves. Even when it seemed apparent that they were fighting both Shimo and Sugemi held back significantly and that's why they were different from the Demon. "If you toy around I'm just gonna take you and Mana out and then proceed with my plan. Draw your damn sword when you hit me, Shimo!" Sugemi yelled out angrily. Truth being told even to Mana Shimo's approach of sheathing his sword when attacking and unsheathing it when the attack was over seemed silly. And yet… She was powerless to stop her friends from killing one another.

Shimo stood silently, his eyes were completely covered up by his hair that were greasy and covered with sweat from this encounter and all the previous months he had spent training. Sugemi angrily spat out some blood to the side, "Suit yourself!" he exclaimed as chakra erupted from his body and he lunged at Mana. The girl couldn't stop him, not in her injured state at least, her body was frozen, she was completely disabled by the thought of fighting her best friend. Her best friend wanted to harm her! Before Sugemi's fist drove into the girl's stomach punching her out of her consciousness however Shimo's naked blade shot up and to the side right across Sugemi's body, from one shoulder to his thigh.

"LEAVE MANA-CHAN OUT OF THIS!" Shimo roared out like a wild animal as he moved his arm making the blade cut instead of just pressing against Sugemi's body. The Nara's eyes whited out, overwhelmed by pain pulsing through his entire body, blood shot out from the wound splashing all over the walls of the room. The magician felt a warm splash of blood landing on her cheek, her body still shook in disbelief of what was happening, with each passing moment the situation was getting worse. At this point almost everything bad that could've happened did happen. Sugemi's body slammed onto the edgy stone floor, blood still ran wildly from the wound on his chest, his eyes now looked so innocent as the boy was temporarily cut down out of his consciousness. Moments later the boy's consciousness returned, he started writhing on the ground in pain.

"What… The…" a weak voice echoed to the side of where the girl was floating a foot into the air. One of the guards was getting over being knocked out. The girl didn't have time to think, her hands quickly went through some hand seals and activated a genjutsu. The guard's eyes opened wide in surprise, he started rolling around and scratching all over his body believing to be covered in cockroaches. He started writhing around, bashing his body into the stone walls until he hit his head and got back to being knocked out cold. Just great. Now Mana messed up too, now she's just as much of a criminal as Shimo and Sugemi were. The Demon just laughed out amused in his cell.

"Well well, I guess this girl isn't completely toothless…"

Shimo looked back with sorry eyes. "Mana…" he uttered. It was clear that he felt sorry that he dragged her into this with his aggressive approach. Sugemi got back onto his knees wiping the blood that he was throwing up. It appeared that the wound on his chest wasn't too deep or didn't cut through the bone. It must've been really painful to keep a fighting maniac like Sugemi down for so long. "Yeah… Be a dear and knock out everyone who gets in our way" the Nara huffed out. Shimo's hand rose up showing the edge of his sword to Sugemi.

"I'll take you out quick, we've already hurt Mana-chan enough by fighting, now because of my inaction she got involved into this… It's my mess to clean up!" he spoke quietly but firmly and with much confidence. Shimo then sheathed his sword and his hands went through three or four hand seals as a powerful gust of wind picked up, suddenly the humidity in the air was transformed into a strong blizzard and it was made even stronger by the fact that it was raging indoors in a contained environment. Mana shrieked out in pain as the force of the wind overwhelmed her levitation technique and she was sent back down to the ground. The Demon laughed out, his voice was muffled by the raging winds. "I see your chakra control improved while I was sitting here" he yelled out.

Shimo's body disappeared, flashing in on Sugemi as he drew his sword slicing at the center of the whirlwind that was throwing the pelting snow and icicles around. "Blizzard Cut – Three Slashes!" Shimo yelled out as a white blur flashed through the center of the blizzard cutting the whirlwind into four parts separating it in three spots where his blade cut through the whirlwind. Because of the overwhelming cold and strength of the wind there was no way for Sugemi to avoid it but the Nara kept on his feet, stumbling around as new deep wounds opened on his body but not once letting a part of his body above the knees hit the ground. Then the storm stopped as quickly as it began.

Shimo was not done, he saw that Sugemi was taking every blow so he continued his ruthless onslaught. After stopping from the last slash he made more hand seals and pointed his hands at his friend and rival. The storm picked up again right around Sugemi slamming powerful and large chunks of ice made from the humidity in the air right at the genin. Encasing Sugemi into a mausoleum of ice made out of huge messy blocks. Shimo breathed out and leaped forward, drawing his sword with all of his might. "Ice Style: Ice Cutter!" he shouted trying to cut the pile of ice blocks on top of Sugemi in half and taking the genin out with it. A powerful flash of chakra sent Shimo away slamming again into the Demon's cell, bending the bars furthermore. The chunks of ice got blown away, forming into smaller shrapnel that would've easily shred through the flesh of anyone who got too close.

"First Gate: Gate of Opening! OPEN!" Sugemi shouted out releasing a powerful burst of chakra from the opening gate which blew away Shimo's jutsu. Without hesitating even for a moment the Nara jumped at his friend. No. These two were no longer friends, they were two people trying to genuinely kill each other. They may have been friends at some point but now there was nothing but their battle. Shimo leaped forward, cutting madly with his sword, Sugemi pulled out a kunai as the two started to blur. Clashing with each other sending sparks and shockwaves, leaping on the walls, kicking off of the ceiling. Their eyes were completely white, absent were any traces of emotion or feeling. Just an automated bombardment of loud clangs and booms when these two clashed with one another trying to take each other down. This mad explosion of fury and killing intent must've alerted someone above, soundproofing could only protect from this much noise escaping…

Then in an instant the blurs appeared in their human shapes again, wild Nara shadows surrounded Sugemi as powerful tendrils shot from the ground trying to whip at Shimo "Shadow Tendril Jutsu!" Sugemi yelled out. The swordsman vaulted over them moving in to strike at the Nara from behind but the Nara was facing Shimo again by predicting the swordsman trying to move in from behind. "Shadow Push Jutsu!" Sugemi chanted out again as the shadows formed a big palm that slammed into Shimo's chest sending him rolling back and slamming into the wall. Shimo grunted out and quickly got back on his feet. His body was trembling in pain and exhaustion was starting to kick in. Shimo's breathing was irregular, that slamming shadow technique must've broken some ribs which made breathing difficult. Without his ability to breathe properly Shimo may not have had what it took to keep up with Sugemi's "First Gate".

First flock of guards broke in, these were the four that were supposed to check the situation. Mana realized that if the scouting party did not return the ones staying above were supposed to call for reinforcements, the problem was that in their maddened states Shimo and Sugemi may not have realized it. Both Shimo and Sugemi leaped at the guards. Sugemi moved so fast in his "First Gate" that he quickly took them out with strong strikes directed at the vital areas. Shimo was slightly softer with his strikes but he hit with every intention to knock them out instantly. If these guards were given proper chance to fight they may have proven troublesome to Shimo and Sugemi, the thing was that the two genin were already warmed up and in their most potent stages of combat, they also caught the guards unprepared and utilized the shock factor. Now it was just a matter of time before the guards return with reinforcements after the scouting party does not return. It didn't matter, Mana would stay with her friends, she'd stand with them even if now they were trying to kill each other.

After the final guard hit the floor after a mad blurring combination of blows from Sugemi his "First Gate" disappeared with a loud popping sound as the chakra bursting from his body dissolved. Almost at the same moment Sugemi collapsed onto his knees breathing heavily, this "First Gate" must've been really wearing his body out. Now was Shimo's chance to take his friend out cold and get the hell out of there. There was a slim chance that the three could still escape without being recognized, it was dark in the cellar and Shimo with Sugemi moved really fast, maybe their faces still weren't seen? Even Mana with her optimistic and naïve attitude realized she was being too hopeful.

Shimo rushed at Sugemi who was struggling to breathe properly, his arms decisively flashed driving the sword down and leaving a wide cut on Sugemi's chest. The heat emanating from Sugemi's body from the effort he had to put in to use the "First Gate" had already cauterized the previous cuts, this one was fresh, this one wasn't defended against in any way. It was a clean knockout slash. And yet… Sugemi stood up, stumbling back but he stood. Shimo shouted out like a madman, slicing right and left, waving his sword around in a mad fit of rage, opening new wounds, shallow but numerous, desperate to take his friend down but not out for good. Sugemi shouted in pain, he stumbled back with each successful strike but he didn't go down. He always jumped up from his knees to greet each successive strike. Then the unbelievable happened, Sugemi clenched his fist and shouted out "First Gate: OPEN!" again sending a powerful punch Shimo's way. It only dispelled an afterimage. The real Shimo was somewhere in the darkness of the room.

"Ice Style: Cold Air Mirage" a voice came from somewhere deeper in the room, somewhere in the darker corners.

"Ninja Style: Elimination Cut!" Shimo's voice came from right above Sugemi whose face shot up in disbelief, he was too late to stop it. Shimo's body dove down from the ceiling cutting Sugemi through the chest. A powerful finishing cut like that was supposed to end it all but Sugemi only stumbled back again. The bursting chakra which his Gate of Opening emitted protected him slightly making the cut just a little bit short from cutting through bone and into the vital organs. Still, it was apparent now that Shimo was no longer cutting to hurt, he was cutting to kill confident that his friend would survive his meanest kill-shots.

Once again Sugemi's body blurred and disappeared, so did Shimo. A multitude of exploding aerial shockwaves almost blew Mana off her feet again, she was now sitting with her back against the wall, her body and mind were completely broken to the point where she was just observing this madness which was happening there. Friend trying to kill another friend, when did her life end up like this, where was this all leading up to? If these two people fighting were anyone else… If only these weren't Sugemi and Shimo fighting. The gentleman who thought it was his noble duty to let each girl in the Academy into the canteen first and the otaku who brought a bag full of manga into the graduation exam instead his tools.

The two just kicked off of various surfaces: walls, ceiling, floor, passing through each other and clashing using their weapons. Sugemi's kunai got cut in two after two or three swipes but he quickly replaced them. Then it happened – Shimo's feet kicked strongly off of Demon's cell breaking the bars and blowing the door down. The Demon was unleashed again onto Konohagakure, the slow and hesitant steps tapped against the sharp edges of the rocky floor, an exhausted, tortured and broken youth walked out from his cell laughing madly. "Finally… I have escaped from my shackles… Oni-sensei, I've not disappointed you, I've obtained all the information I need and now I'll…" two fists silenced the tired, sick and delusional inmate. Sugemi's "First Gate" must've hit like a truck, that combined with Shimo's fist and then a follow up strike from the sword handle sent the Demon back into the cell passing out instantly.

"There… We've hurt him plenty. Let's go now…" Shimo huffed heavily looking at the unconscious inmate they've just punched out. Obviously had the Demon been anywhere close to his prime he'd have been much more troublesome to take out, still, Shimo and Sugemi were stronger than they were before when they investigated him and it showed. Sugemi's "First Gate" ended again, the boy fell onto his knee and started huffing grabbing his chest in pain. His entire body must've been shutting down from being pushed so much.

"No! This isn't enough. He deserves more for what they did to sensei and the Fourth! I need to punch him more, I need to crush his arms and legs and punch him until he's just a stain but still barely alive!" Sugemi yelled out. "Don't you think for a moment that I didn't notice what you did, you're still thinking about Mana, aren't you? You did this on purpose trying to calm me down, I'm not some idiot you can play with!" the Nara followed up as his body stood back up and straightened for the continuation of the battle.

Shimo looked at Mana with a sorry glare, "I'm sorry, Mana-chan, I did everything I can to do it peacefully, I restrained my cuts enough, I even appealed to his intentions and freed the damned prisoner. That's it, now I'm hitting you with my full strength!" the boy leaned forward widening his legs and bending them, taking a sword drawing stance and preparing to devastating his opponent with his secret technique. Sugemi's arms shot to his sides and then he also took his taijutsu stance preparing to continue the battle with all of the training wheels being off.

"Good. I also haven't showed you all results of my training as well…" Sugemi's arms once again moved to the side as he started to channel his chakra intensely, driving it all from his body in mad bursts. Sugemi's skin started blushing, dyeing in a shade of red and blood vessels started shooting out on his forehead. The chakra rushing from his body was no longer crystal clear, it was now completely blue and red with rotating streams and a green aura started briefly emanating from his body, present but still weak and transparent.

"Second Gate: Gate of Healing! OPEN!"


	66. Whoever Wins, Everyone Loses!

Shimo leaned back taking a stance that he favored when using quick sword drawing techniques. He planned to very much finish this fight with this technique, he had already gotten hit by a First Gate shadow ninjutsu technique and he undoubtedly could not keep up with First Gate for too long as a result, let alone the Second. Mana stood up and got back onto her air current, she wanted to interfere, this was clearly too much. Sugemi was using Second Gate which, based on the damage on his own body from the First was quite as likely to kill him as it could have killed Shimo. Shimo was clearly setting something big up too.

As a drop of sweat fell from Shimo's chin hitting the small puddle on the damp rocky floor the Yuki swordsman kicked off the ground sending his body to crash against his opponent who was still standing in his Second Gate opening stance, completely open to attacks. Shimo's hands went through a set of handseals sending a small scale twister of snow that formed an incomplete figure of a large wolf. The snowy avatar of Shimo's started to catch the gust of the blizzard winds and moved behind the Yuki who at that moment dashed forward using all of his speed and overflowing the chakra to augment his movement speed flashing right to Sugemi. The wolf of snow and ice swung his long reaching paw which was made of snow and sharp icicles made out of chakra. At the same moment Shimo drew his long sword to cut his opponent down on two fronts making a singular defensive tactic pointless.

"Ice Style: Wolf Blade Draw!" Shimo shouted out as his sword cut through the air, freezing small particles as it went along cutting the air, showing off the intensity, power and speed of the technique.

Sugemi's arms shot forward, an immense shockwave shielded him from Shimo's sword blowing Shimo back and disintegrating his ice wolf construct. Sugemi's irises were completely whited out from the intense pain and stress to his body that the technique provided, the body was stressing out so much that the heat from his muscles working overtime cauterized smaller wounds instantly and while that would've looked like a positive in the short run, it was hard to say what such abuse would do to one's body if used for a bit longer.

Sugemi's body disappeared, appearing right in front of Shimo and punching with such speed that his hand never even appeared to have moved. A powerful force sent Shimo right through the stone wall into another corridor of the lower levels. The entire building could not contain a battle of these two enraged genin who were now way past their friendship and just wanted to straight out murder one another. The only clear thing in this insanity was that if Shimo had not used chakra to augment his body's endurance his bones would've been grinded to dust in an instant. Now the Yuki managed to roll back and get back into the battle, letting his feet touch against the wall at the end of the other room.

Sugemi's body blurred and moved in an instant right into the next room, Mana followed levitating through the gap in the wall that was breaking down further. These two didn't even seem to be worried about being quiet, nothing but their fight made sense to them anymore. Sugemi jumped up in the air and flashed right up to Shimo who leaped at his opponent as the two passed one another. A small wound opened up on Sugemi's body as he got cut by the swordsman passing by whereas the taijutsu user slammed the ground with all of his Second Gate force opening up a great crater in the lowest level of the Police Force HQ causing the whole building to shake and rumble. The two were flashing around, trying to beat one another down, Mana couldn't even see them move most of the time as they moved in an instant, only returning to visible state as they wind up for a punch of a slash. Sugemi clearly had an upper hand.

Shimo's body was flung around, busted through the ceilings and walls blowing the stone away as if it was cardboard and it was apparent that the swordsman was taking damage even through his chakra augmentation. Using an intensified chakra flow as an armor was just that – an armor which was dependent on the level and size of one's total chakra level and the level of chakra invested into withstanding the blow. Shimo was putting everything he had into it, also speed to be able to at least fail keeping up with Sugemi by an acceptable margin, even more, he still returned some blows but his sword appeared to have gone dull as hits no longer cut Sugemi but hit him bluntly tossing the taijutsu user aside momentarily before he recovered to resume his rampage. Mana would've never imagined that her friends were capable of fighting on such a level even if such a battle was shaving at their own lives with each passing moment.

The young magician kept following the battle as it moved, with each floor it ascended or descended, to the southern wings and to the western. She could've tried to concentrate, control her chakra flow to see their movements more clearly and not just bunch of blurs and shockwaves busting down walls and destroying public property in their wake. But Mana didn't even want that, she didn't want to see her friends killing one another. "Stop it now!" she yelled out but no one heard it, maybe just a cowering guard who hid under a table as things started to blow up and bust around him.

"Don't you guys see it? It's no longer about saving Sugemi or avenging Tanshu-sensei. You're fighting because of your stupid pride, because you want to beat the other one who feels just the same and so you just… Won't… Stop… Fighting…" Mana tried to tell them as she followed the battle but she just couldn't. Finally the pace slowed up, Shimo's body was covered with bumps, bruises and his clothes were torn up from his body rubbing against rock. He had bleeding nasty gashes all over, his forehead had an especially nasty wound which he quickly temporarily mended by tying up his torn up sleeve as a headband as his own got lost somewhere in the debris of this battle.

"You can't fight me anymore" Sugemi spoke for the first time after opening his gates, it was the first intelligent sound he let, everything else was just cries of battle, grunts and shouts.

"It's true I cannot compete with your Second Gate. Regardless I've won already. If I get a lucky shot in and beat you quick you'll go down, if I drag this out you'll still go down because you cannot fight your own body for much longer either. It's only been a couple of minutes and you're already losing flare, you're barely keeping up with the demand of the technique. Show me your last flares before you pass out." Shimo grunted out angrily as blood made it impossible to see his enraged eyes from further away. "Don't worry, Mana-chan, I'll beat this fool senseless and we'll go back to being how we were…"

It looked like whatever damage Shimo's head took was getting to him, he clearly didn't see the damage he had caused to the building, he didn't see the damage the two have caused to one another and so he still believe there was a point of friendship that they could return to. In fact, getting imprisoned for this and having their ninja status taken away was the best option, them outright murdering one another was by far the worst but at the moment the most likely. If this didn't stop… Mana was desperate and prepared to stop them, she'll throw herself into this battle, maybe once they severely injure or kill her they'll snap the hell out of this.

"If only I had perfected that technique… I could stop them from right here…" the girl lamented that she invested so much time in training her physical stats instead of focusing on things she was actually good at like Tanshu-sensei suggested.

Sugemi's body disappeared, his fist shot right through Shimo's figure as the shockwave of drilling air currents around his immensely fast fist tore through the cold air mirage that the genin actually hit.

"Ice Style: Cold Mirage Double Team Jutsu!" Shimo's voice echoed through the wrecked office as a bunch of Shimo's mirages started floating around faking out an attack. Sugemi stood still, he must've believed that they were all fakes because he had already seen the technique twice now. If he opened himself up hitting a fake, he'd give Shimo a chance at a freebie and the Nara must've known that he could probably only take one or two blows at best without passing out. A loud bumping sound emanated from Sugemi's body as it was hit by two solid Shimo figures with his body being trapped in between two mad sword swings. Sugemi was lucky that Shimo's sword had dulled up and didn't outright slice him into pieces.

"These were… Real?" Sugemi coughed out some blood mumbling pathetically as his figure collapsed like a sack of potatoes on the ground with the jets of blue chakra ended. The second real Shimo collapsed into a puddle of water, it appeared that the Yuki had learned to make at least one Water Clone which he shuffled in with the mirages. Shimo looked below at the level in which they were supposed to be fighting in, the one where the Demon was still unconscious but free. He looked at Mana. "We need to get down there, I'm not confident about his containment with that guy being unshackled…" he said.

Mana smiled for the first time in a while, she was glad that the battle had concluded not in the way where it was heading to and that a decisive victor was found. She was starting to believe that without her sacrifice these two would never get back to reality. Mana could hear guards rushing in, she leaped into the large hole, letting the air currents soften her landing and keep her slightly afloat, upkeeping this continuous jutsu was strenuous, but not nearly so as these two had strained each other. Shimo picked Sugemi's unconscious body up and landed below with a jump as well.

"Oh… Good, he's still here, I thought he'd escape…" Shimo smiled looking at the unconscious frame of the Kirigakure prisoner.

"If he had…" Sugemi's barely recognizable voice echoed through the darkness of the room as he grabbed hold of Shimo's back and slipped from his grip, flipping his friend over his own shoulder and slamming him into the ground face first. "I'D HAVE KILLED YOU!" he shouted out madly looking at the pool of blood gathering on the stone floor from Shimo's broken nose and wounds on his face that were now open again. Any of those would've been a life ruining injury had Konoha not had the aid of medical ninjutsu and the ability to heal such battlefield injuries in mere hours. Still, if these two showed up in a hospital questions would've been asked and they've been recognized already. There's no escape from being prosecuted in the Ninja Tribunal for the three of them now. Mana started to feel more and more hopeless. Her hand slipped to behind her and into the tool pouch, Sugemi's body shot off mad jets of chakra rotating around his body and the green aura once again started glowing around his blushed skin.

"Stop it, Mana. You'd be able to take me out with your genjutsu in full strength but… I don't want to hurt you. Stay out of this." Sugemi's voice finally sounded somewhat intelligible and devoid of any anger or hatred. That was the worst part of this day – Mana finally realized that Sugemi wasn't just following his emotions blindly, this was his conscious decision to hurt or kill this prisoner for what happened to the Hokage and Tanshu.

"What choice do you leave…" Mana started talking when Sugemi instantly flashed up to her slamming her into a wall and driving his elbow at her neck. The sudden force of impact made the magician lose her kunai and her pouch. Mana's vision started to blur, she couldn't use her legs or float any longer because of the pain in her thigh muscles and she was slowly being choked out. Shimo was out cold. She had to make a decision, she wore that fancy uniform for moments like this… Mana moved her palm away from trying to force Sugemi's elbow from her throat and flicked her palm moving a steel edged card out of her sleeve. Mana swiftly swung her palm by Sugemi's eyes, she didn't intend to blind him but she'd have been able to if she wanted it – just leave a shallow cut and move him further from her.

Sugemi shouted out in pain as a mad torrent of blood ran down his face leaving a scar on his face going just a tip above his nose. She must've damaged one of his eyes at least as he was clenching it this whole time and yelling out like a madman. Shimo's elbow to the back sent Sugemi stumbling forward, Mana could've finished it all with a punch or a slash with her card again but she just moved to the side and let Sugemi hit the wall. Shaking the girl collapsed on her knees, losing all of her will to fight. She'd just hit her friend, probably blinded him in one eye… The magician just fell down on the floor and decided to stay down until a guard picked her up or if Sugemi decided he wanted to kill her as well.

A mad burst of chakra busted the wall where Sugemi slammed into, the Nara activated his Second Gate again and lunged right at Shimo.

"You bastard! Look at what you've done, you forced Mana-chan to hurt you!" Shimo yelled out when Sugemi's shadowy construct decked the swordsman right in the face, several teeth flew out and for a moment there Shimo lost consciousness – Second Gate seemed to enhance the strength of Sugemi's technique since they drew their strength from the willpower and concentration of the user. First Gate unlocked the complete control over one's body, 100% of muscular potential was used which meant that the Second Gate enhanced that furthermore, closing the strength to somewhere 120% percent of the body's potential.

"Shadow Tendril!" Sugemi yelled out following up his attack, then he made that same hand seal letting a second one shoot out, whipping Shimo at the chest and making his body bounce off the floor from the sheer force of it. "Shadow Tendril Jutsu!" he repeated as the tendril wrapped around Shimo's neck and then swung the boy's body around throwing him into the air. Sugemi used his shadow tendrils to throw his body up as well, the giant shadow construct wrapped around his entire body, hundreds of fists started forming as the entire construct now reminded of a tree of sorts.

"Nara Hijutsu Secret Technique: Shadow Yggdrasil Jutsu!" Sugemi yelled out as the fists started hammering at Shimo's general direction. Shimo regained his consciousness just in time, drawing his blade and drawing a circle with freezing blue circle forming around the area of the air that he had cut. "Ice Style: Cold Air Pillow!" Shimo chanted out as the fists started pounding on the pillow of air that worked almost like an invisible shield that softened up the blows. The Yuki's body was still sent up through multiple floors landing right on the first. The fists kept pounding relentlessly at the pillow of air making it lose air with each hit. Such a technique would've broken many bones undoubtedly, added bonus with Shimo's body being flung through multiple thin stone ceiling tiles would've broken his spine as well.

Finally Shimo's body landed on the first floor ground with the technique finally ending. Shimo was breathing heavily with his eyes closed, painful needles were emanating all through his body. Powerful flashes of light were popping in and out even if he had closed his eyes. Stupid Sugemi… Making such a huge deal from it all, now they're all screwed and will have their ninja licenses taken away, they'll be lucky if they avoid imprisonment in the Correctional Facility. That stupid bastard. Sugemi's loud roars of pain and him writhing around could've been heard further away. The boy kept rolling around on the floor in pain – this Second Gate must've really hurt for him plus a technique like that…

Countless guards started flooding the floor, this must've been every guard present at the HQ at that time, they kept asking those two questions. They must've still assumed that the two were on a mission just because they recognized the two. They saw these kids in the files when the Demon of Kirigakure was brought in for containment and daily interrogation attempts. That obviously meant Konohagakure Interrogation squad did their thing on the prisoner giving him minimal amounts of food and water, sometimes beating him up for refusing to cooperate. "What could've those kids been doing here", that's what must've been on all of those people's minds.

"Where's the Demon? What have you guys been doing?"

"Wait, I don't think these guys are supposed to be here now…"

"I've sent people to go check at the Administration, we'll get our response soon, for now let's just take these guys in, assuming they're going rogue on us."

"Guys, there's a girl on the third level, she's mostly OK but her eyes don't respond to stimuli, I think she's just really shocked or something"

"I think these three are the Sorceress' team that means all three of them are here. What were the three of you doing here!?"

The guards kept shooting questions at the two of them. A guard ran up the stairs with Mana in his arms. Some guards started trying to ask her some questions but Mana remained silent, her eyes still stared at some point of the room, completely distant from everything that was happening. Sensei was dead, the Fourth was dead, Shimo and Sugemi were just trying to kill each other. The world had gone insane and Mana was struggling to keep up with it. She had been insane once in her childhood and her mind was now wondering if she had not returned to that insanity. Her state was no different from when she failed to understand facts and relate them to specific things, she now failed to understand the world just the same.

A loud shout of four guards hitting the floor alerted everyone and the guard that carried her to the top level placed Mana by the wooden wall, her eyes sunk to the floor as her hair covered up her depressed and blank face. "What the… The Nara is resisting!" a guard yelled out when Sugemi's Second Gate shot open again. "Hold back, this is Konoha ninja, he might be on a mission we don't know about! Talk to us, Nara, damn it!" the guards stood no chance, they were almost equal if not stronger than Sugemi but they were confused, they were holding back and oblivious to Sugemi's killing intent. Police Force weren't ninja who fought ninja too often, they mostly dealt with either captured or contained ninja or just common villagers who were misbehaving. Fighting rampaging avengers was beyond their paygrade or experience.

Powerful currents of air and shockwaves from Sugemi's punches aimed at just blank air sent the guards down and crawling to cover. Further aside Shimo got back onto his feet, stumbled down onto his knees and then stood back up. Shimo took his sword drawing stance, making the hand seals for his "Ice Wolf Jutsu" as well forming a construct of ice shaped as a wolf behind the Yuki. Sugemi's shadows went mad forming countless tendrils and whipping the knocked out and injured guards out of the way.

"Everyone, hold them off for just a moment longer, Jounin are on route right now!" a guard read a note from a pigeon that was dropped as the bird flew by through a hole in the roof.

"They won't be here in time…" Mana realized as she finally had a first conscious and material thought about something in a while. Her blank eyes looked at her friends, they were struggling to even draw breath and they were preparing their strongest techniques. Ice Style: Wolf Blade Draw was about to clash against Sugemi's Shadow Yggdrasil and whoever lost would undoubtedly die. Mana stood back onto her feet, no air currents or anything, just her own burning feet. Every step made her want to shout in pain but the lives of her friends were in danger.

"It hurts. Hurts to walk!" Mana thought.

"Can I afford to stop? Stopping means one of them will die, no. No I cannot stop!" a thought followed.

"What will I do? I'm hurt, I can't fight them! No… I have to use that…" the girl desperately tried to come up with a proper response for the situation.

"But… It's incomplete, I can use too much chakra and die… What other choice do I have?" it was almost like Mana was fighting against her own instincts, her mind told the girl to just stay down, she had no obligation to kill herself to stop this madness but then a part of Mana realized that this was a moment like those she had been thinking about. Violence was in control of the world around her and death of her friend was about to happen, this was her chance to show to herself and Tanshu-sensei that she actually COULD be a hero. That she wasn't useless or toothless or whatever. Even if it would be her last deed on this cruel world where people dear to you died and then other people dear to you tried to kill each other as a result of that death. Mad world required even madder actions to take control of it!

"Ice Style: Wolf Blade Draw!" Shimo's body moved forward, completely oblivious of Mana's frame that entered into the center of their crossfire.

"Shadow Yggdrasil!" Sugemi shouted out leaping forward, he didn't care if his shadowy constructs break Mana's back or her neck or her own ribs pierce through her heart in the process – it was the girl's responsibility to consider her actions and his reaction. She made a choice to mess with his fight for justice, now she could die for all he cared.

Mana made a single handseal.

A gentle whistle killed the silence. A whistle of a lullaby that Mana had heard so many times as a little girl, one that her mother hummed to Mana so many times to put the girl to sleep. The ice wolf dissolved into snow and ice dust that quickly melted, Shimo dropped to the ground with his body completely paralyzed and his sword fell to the ground breaking in two from the abuse that the boy had put it through that day. Sugemi's shadows disappeared and faded in an instant and his body also hit the floor completely paralyzed and so did every guard within a circle around Mana, close enough to hear her whistling. Her lullaby.

"H…How…" Shimo grunted as he failed to move a single muscle. The melody then stopped and Mana fell on her knees.

"My stupid best friends… There are no winners in a fight between friends." she said as the guards finally stopped shaking and approached the three putting stickers with chakra seals around Sugemi and Shimo. One tried to put another one on Mana who was silently moaning in pain from abusing her legs too much after her body got used to not feeling a thing from when she levitated. A jounin stopped that guard as the entire cavalry arrived.

"Hold your horses for now. This girl just stopped the fight, she may not need that seal." Mana felt a hand softly pressing against her shoulder and someone's breath close to her ear. "I'm sorry, Sorceress-chan… You'll have to answer some questions, please understand, we will let you go after and we'll be very brief." Shimo grunted, desperately trying to move but being unable to. Another jounin bent down and tried dispelling the illusion but failing, she looked at Mana confused.

"I'm sorry, it's an experimental technique so… I messed plenty stuff up…" Mana whispered as her exhaustion from using way too much chakra in one go made her lose her ability to speak loudly. "It should time out shortly" she concluded.

Shimo tried to move but then he managed only to talk. "Guys, please let Mana-chan go home, she isn't to blame for all of this, we came here to stop Sugemi and she wanted to talk him down. I was the one who escalated this fight, I'll answer all the questions and take whatever punishment you have for me."

The head Jounin scratched his back pulling a smoke from his coat and lighting it up. "Fine, it's not like Konoha's Sorceress can run anywhere, her face is on the posters for her shows and all that, plus she doesn't look in any condition to be able to run either. Someone take her home."

It was going to be a long evening for Mana, an even longer one for Shimo, ironically enough Sugemi, the instigator of this huge scuffle, was completely out cold.


	67. The Fallout

Mana simply could not sleep. One couldn't have really blamed her – she was quickly brought to her room while the ninja carrying her decided to explain the situation to her parents. The girl's father used to be an average ranked ninja, despite his unimpressive rank and career cut short by an injury he was still very respected even among higher ranking ninja. He may not have been that powerful or amazing during his time but he worked with plenty impressive ninja like Tanshu and some jounin, he also displayed great potential to become a good leader in the future. It was sad that said future remained a speculation after his arms got burnt badly.

The little magician still shook in her bed. She couldn't believe what had happened, such was usually the case when events simply broke out of one's control. She genuinely intended to talk Sugemi down, then Shimo decided that beating him would've been much simpler… Everything that could have gone wrong did go wrong after that. Mana could still hear voices below, her parents kept asking questions and the ninja replied to the best of her abilities. A middle aged jounin woman carried Mana home, one she had never seen before that night. Judging from a rather tough tone of her fathers she and father shared no history also, but the respectful and soft tone of the woman revealed that she did indeed respect him enough to use such a manner of speaking.

The strange thing was that Mana didn't even know what was going on, nor did she wish to. Honestly it'd have been much better if the jounin lady just explained everything and left, explained enough that the young girl didn't have to explain the events to her parents. What was even worse was the possibility that Mana would have her status as a ninja stripped from her. Such events weren't that common, that happened when a ninja committed treason or dishonored their Feudal Lord so badly that they requested the ninja's status being stripped. Treason also had numerous degrees: one may have left the village and become a rogue, the status of a wandering samurai or a ronin was romanticized often in folk tales but wandering ninja were usually frowned upon and hunted down. A ninja with no village to swear allegiance to was basically open season to have things done to them according to the hunter's sick desires. There was only one limit to what couldn't have been done to such an individual and that limit was the imagination of their attacker.

Slowly Mana's eyes became heavier, the pain in her thighs was easing up a bit, most likely the result of her sleepiness with the body doing what it could to neutralize all obstacles in the way of her rest. The girl found herself having snoozed off for entire half an hour at a time as she peeked at the alarm clock on her table every time she woke up from such an occasion. After one such event the ninja magician realized that there was no one below talking anymore. Slowly and carefully so that her aching thighs weren't lit up with excruciating pain again the girl sat up and took her clothes off, trying to settle down for her rest. Only then did she remember that she had a mission tomorrow… Well, after this night that no longer mattered did it?

Sugemi's heavy head shot up as he found himself locked to a chair, the boy tried to build up his chakra trying to augment his strength and see if he could break out of the bindings. After all, if Mana could do it on the stage every other day it couldn't have been too hard, right? After several unsuccessful attempts to channel his chakra Sugemi found multiple stickers with strange hieroglyphs symbolizing seals on his body. These were applied to unconscious or submissive prisoners to take away their ability to use chakra as long as the seals were intact. It would've been a very handy tool if anyone could just slap a sticker and take one's chakra mastery away, however these seals started working when one's chakra was dormant beneath a very hard line to sink to. Usually it took a lot of beating to reduce one's chakra to that level, either that or conscious effort of the restrained person to not raise their chakra above it. For assassins like your average ninja either way worked…

A man entered the room, it was not the jounin with the overcoat and silly hat and the cigarette that Sugemi could vaguely remember from before. After Mana took both him and Shimo down the boy could remember his mind fading in and out, he saw plenty of people but trying to recall those events hurt his head. Just how on Earth could this have happened? Mana took both of them out as well as all the guards in a circle around her. The Nara had underestimated that girl, everyone seemingly did. They mistook her peaceful nature for weakness when, truth be told, it must've been one of her greatest strengths. She had absolutely no regard for her own life, no desire to be happy whatsoever, all that mattered to her was that everyone else was happy. Such a person either died very young or became a hero, then again, neither was a very attractive path. A hero was just one step away from being a martyr.

The man was really creeping Sugemi out, he was tall but incredibly slim, had wild black hair that flowed freely all over his face, he had those blank blue eyes with no actual visible pupils inside of them. Such a weird and scary guy… The creep just settled down on a chair in front of Sugemi and with tremendous effort raised his shoes on the edge of the chair wrapping his arms around his bent legs. Very creepily the man kept staring at Sugemi from above his bent knees. Almost as if he was peeking from a cover. The door then slammed open and a woman walked in – the very same woman that the three saw in the Administration building earlier.

The lady now looked a bit different, she still had that wild flowing brown hair, she still kept her height and build but now she wore a white coat, similar to that a Hokage wore. The only accessory missing from where Sugemi would've started making suggestions was the big red and white hat. "It's okay, M" the woman said looking at the creep sitting in front of Sugemi, "No need to do your thing, you're gonna stare a hole in him if you keep going. I can tell when a person is lying to me without your Yamanaka clan techniques, thank you" the woman gently placed her hand on the creep's shoulder making the man jump up in surprise.

The door opened again and another ninja peeked in, "Lady Hokage, could you please not touch M-san, he is very sensitive to social interaction and he once had a stroke when a girl touched him accidentally during an Academy student group tour in the interrogation facility. M-san, Lady Hokage does not require your expertise, please come with us… Ummm… Cookies and milk are in order, I believe." It appeared that the prospect of cookies and milk greatly motivated the creep, at least if by greatly motivated one meant him moving like a sloth to the door and leaving so slowly that Sugemi would never rid the feeling that he was still watching the man leave. His long fingers wrapped around the door and didn't disappear before it would've been dangerous for him to keep his hand on the closing door.

The woman sighed and slapped her forehead as she sat down. "First day as Hokage and I have to deal with this…" she moaned out in annoyance. It was clear that this was not a woman who concealed her emotions much.

Sugemi coughed out. "Wait… Hokage?" he asked to which the woman just nodded, stroking over her madly flowing long hair and pointed at herself using her thumb. "That's right, my name is Hanasaku Senju though I don't like using my clan name too much, people just call me…"

"Cut the crap! I know how they call you – Chestnut Hanasaku, you're a Sannin, everyone knows that even non-ninja." Sugemi was yelling out quite rudely and even louder than he was rude. The weight of the person in the room sitting in front must've not sank into his brain just yet. The woman stared into his eyes and the Nara kept on staring back, usually the eyes of a ninja would've broken down and sunk to the floor when meeting the gaze of a Hokage. Sugemi was either one with tremendous willpower or just as stupid as the lady in front of him was known to be.

"So they didn't even take an entire day to replace the Fourth, did they?" Sugemi grunted out angrily. He was still very much offended by everything that happened recently: death of the Hokage, death of his sensei, his own teammates trying to get in his way and him failing to take revenge on a man he pinned everything on without any reason to because a girl in his team kicked his butt with a simple genjutsu technique.

"Well they really would've let it sink in before appointing another Hokage, then there'd have been an inauguration ceremony, obviously enough, they wouldn't even have appointed a woman known for her tendencies to strategize in a battle by charging at everyone and looking like a pin-cushion after the battle. Sadly, time for formalities is a luxury we do not have. I have to read books with fancy words to improve my vocabulary, I have to review candidacies for my pick at Konohagakure's appointed representative in Kirigakure relationships since the Mizukage was removed and the Great Villages now own its autonomy. Up until today I didn't even know what "autonomy" meant."

The woman's body stood up and moved to Sugemi's in an instant, a gentle finger tap sent the boy's body through the room painfully bumping into the stone wall, the chair slid all the way to the other end of the room and it didn't appear that the woman even used that much effort to fling Sugemi around. She must've known that the boy couldn't mold chakra, he couldn't toughen his body up, he couldn't survive being crashed through stone walls anymore so she restrained herself to an extent that would've been impossible to restrain one's abilities to. It was not the amount of power the woman had that impressed the Nara clansman, it was the amount of restraint she could issue to that immeasurable strength. It didn't even appear she used any chakra at all, it was just her finger that pushed Sugemi's chair to the other end of the room.

"So you might see why I'd have no time to deal with little shits like you!" the woman roared out loud, this certainly was not the Fourth's manner of speech. Usually the Fourth spoke politely and never lost balance even when talking to his opponent. It would've taken a mass murderer to annoy that man and send him to a frenzy as fierce as this woman's, this lady just looked like she was ready to smash the restaurant that served her a soup with a hair in it.

"They don't care… They don't care about Fourth, they don't care about Tanshu-sensei, they don't care about you or me. They don't even want revenge, they just want more ASSETS. Three most powerful ninja in our village die in one day and the council only cares to establish people who could leak resources and intelligence from another village. I heard Mana speak of how little life was worth in this world but… Only now do I understand what she knew all along, she wants to change this world, she puts the weight onto her shoulders to change all of THIS? She's insane. Only now do I understand what Tanshu-sensei meant when he spoke to her. Only now do I understand how stupid she really was…"

"And yet…" Hanasaku rolled back her gigantic sleeves and wrapped her arms around her chest. "You talk of her when you're being interrogated, she stopped you and your comrade from killing each other for no reason. Perhaps this girl you speak of is closer to realizing her goal than you imagine, perhaps she was not as stupid as you and Bro think her to be."

Sugemi laughed out, "Only an idiot strives to change the world, only a sadomasochist wishes to understand, let alone start changing this piece of shit of a world we live in. I once wanted having my story serialized in a manga, I wanted that people appreciated my existence, I wanted to be known, I wanted to know that life mattered and that I was born for a reason. Maybe it was because in the end I knew just what kind of world I lived in, just like Mana, I wanted to prove it to be different. Unlike Mana however I seem to have grown out of such foolish dreams."

Hanasaku slowly walked up to Sugemi, the boy uncomfortably shook in his chair as she leaned up to him. Her strange hazelnut perfume reached his nose, her long wild hair touched his thighs as she leaned down to his eye level.

"And what is your dream now? Letting a Kirigakure Demon out of Police Force custody? Getting imprisoned yourself? Sounds like a sadomasochistic goal to me" the woman almost whispered out. Just Sugemi and her knew what she said, no gear, no sound transferring seals placed in the room could've transmitted that.

Sugemi jumped up trying to free his wrists. "What are you talking about? I wanted to kill him! I wanted to kill that Kirigakure scum, we are allies, they are the enemy, it's as easy as that. Fools like Mana keep wrapping everyone's head around with stupid confusions, they keep shifting blame around until it becomes no one's. I just have the guts to admit the truth. An enemy cannot stay silent until their enemy is destroyed, for that reason until the enemy disappears we will never know peace."

Hanasaku walked back to the center of the room and sat on the table crossing her legs. "Well spoken, you speak the words of Namikaze Shirona – the woman responsible for Howoku's and Bro's death as if you've heard them." The woman's retort utterly crushed Sugemi, his head weighed down and his eyes almost whited out like back then when he was knocked out. The utter shock that he may have been adopting the position of the person he wanted to kill the most of all was incinerating the boy's sanity.

"Yours is a toxic way of life, sadly, toxic people seem to be the majority these days, to be smart is to be like you. For that reason people choose to remain stupid and be happy, or at least make someone else happy. This Mana girl you spoke of, she is a person I could hang around with, a fool who dismisses their own happiness to make others happy is my kind of fool. Can you not realize that if everyone was like her the world would be a perfect place to live: everyone caring about others solely but remaining happy because there is someone close to them who only tends to their happiness. I'd much rather stick to this ideal than kill all I deem my enemy, that being said I don't possess the amount of patience for that belief."

Hanasaku turned around and stepped to the door when she was stopped by Sugemi's grunt. "Wait? You said "Let operative out", didn't you? We didn't let him out, we knocked him out." The boy spoke with a relative tone of surprise and sadness, the woman turned around with an expression of strictness and anger. "Well too bad, it seems you haven't been smart enough to realize you two were being played – the Demon slipped out during the ruckus, we don't know where he is now, it is highly likely that he escaped the village as his chakra level was low enough to not trigger any seals and since he was already captured he wasn't really wanted. By throwing it all away to kill him you set him free, well done "avenger"."

Sugemi yelled out loud like a madman as the heavy steel door closed. He didn't care if he was imprisoned or even executed. It usually took an extreme case of treason for a ninja to be executed so even his maddened mind didn't think it possible, either way his life had little attraction at that moment. He had become his own worst enemy and secretly a part of Sugemi wished himself death. A bunch of jounin surrounded the Lady Hokage leaving the room, she shook her head angrily and stopped them from entering.

"His mind is in shatters. We can't have that kind of madman running around on missions armed to the teeth, yet he's still young, feels wrong to have him in the Correctional Facility at this age, he is weak and confused, if we expose him to criminals like that we'll just doom his mind for good. Send him to one of the remote facilities and lock him up there in solitude, let him hang around alone and think about all of this for a couple of years, observe him and report on his condition yearly." The men seemed to obey the Hokage's orders without hesitation, they didn't care of the woman's reputation up to that moment. She took this responsibility seriously, her love and adoration to the men she had lost, her desire to continue and honor their legacy made her a serviceable leader at the very least.

A jounin appeared close by, the one who lead that charge previously, still smoking, even in a closed in place like the Police Force interrogation room. "I spoke to that Shimo guy, he seems a pretty decent lad, he just feels compelled to beat up any bad guy he sees and in his eye his friend looked pretty bad at that moment." The jounin spat out his smoke to the side and quickly lit up another, an annoyed Police Force officer picked it up and tossed it to the bin. He was impressed by the speed at which cigarettes were swapped and lit up, however.

"Doesn't matter, he cost us a valuable prisoner, he is temporarily relieved from duty. I'll review his case yearly and see if he can have his ninja status back but for now I'm tempted to throw him into a remote correctional facility as well" the tired Hokage scratched her worn out eyes as she grunted the words out. After finishing she yawned, it was tough break – she woke up that day somewhere in Fire Country with her students still a Sannin, now she was a full blown Hokage with so much to do on her hands, her life basically flipped over all on one day.

"You won't have to, this Shimo boy said he'll be leaving the village to think about what happened anyways, wander around until he's got his status back, he already knew you'd strip him of it. And what of this "Mana" girl?" the jounin asked.

"Well I've heard some interesting things about her, initially I wanted to strip her of her ninja status too, after all with her career as a magician she doesn't need it. Also magic is a poor tool for a ninja, ninja must use ninjutsu…"

"Lady Hokage, you do realize that's not REAL magic she's using, just stage tricks, right?" the jounin stressed out as he even took off his tight hat from the headache that the woman summoned in him.

"Well… I suppose in that case… I'd like to meet her, I'll tell her my decision personally then. Let's see that Shimo boy first though." Hanasaku decided as she turned around and started walking towards the exit. The jounin with the nasty smoking habit followed her, obviously his Hokage did not know where the girl lived or where Shimo was placed in, the woman was infamous for often forgetting where she herself lived after all. Despite Chestnut Hanasaku, no, the Fifth, displaying extraordinary leadership and wisdom on rare occasions when it counted, she was a total twit most of the time who couldn't have been trusted wandering around the village by herself.

A rough hand shook Mana's body from its sleep, it was father and while his manner of waking the little genin up was rude his face suggested that it wasn't intentional. After the injury he oftentimes had trouble of properly restraining and controlling his muscles. "Honey, the Hokage wants to see you, please get up" he whispered making Mana jump up in shock, almost instantly snapping her out from her slumber. The Hokage? What did he mean? Swiftly the girl stumbled to her drawer and pulled out her night gown and slipped into it. She managed to do it just in time as the woman in the white Hokage coat entered her room and sat right by the girl's bed.

Mana tried to kneel but the pain in her thigh made her drop on the ground like an idiot. The brown haired woman broke into uncontrollable laughter but then she restrained herself. "I'm sorry, I've heard a bit of your injury but I suppose slapstick appeals to the fools. I am Chestnut Hanasaku, the Fifth Hokage, pleased to meet you, Mana! Please don't bother with the kneeling, just settle down into your bed and sleep that nasty injury off." the woman looked really concerned for Mana's well-being. The girl sat back onto her bed looking pretty confused.

"It took great courage to do what you did, initially reading the report I was pretty stumped as to why you did what you did so late and why you didn't start fighting with your comrade from the get-go. All sorts of thoughts ran through my head, then I heard it from your father and Sugemi about what kind of girl you are and I understood. No. I perfectly understood your actions, it takes real heroism to oppose your friends like that, especially when the idea of your friends fighting each other crushes you completely inside, to move past that devastating inner defeat and settle it all saving both of your friends' lives like that… I think you'll want to know what my decision was…"

The woman didn't give Mana any chance to respond or recover from her confusion, this was the first time that the magician even saw this Fifth Hokage person, except that time in the Administration. There was no official declaration, no inauguration ceremony or a celebration, she was just appointed out of the blue and took over like that. Then she spoke as if she knew Mana, talking about how she knew just how difficult it was to hurt one's friends when one didn't even hurt their enemies all that much… Even if the woman went out of her way to confirm her knowledge of Mana's feelings somehow the girl wondered if the woman actually understood.

"I decided to imprison your friend Sugemi at a remote Fire Country facility, he'll be locked up with only the lake island he'll be in being accessible to think about what happened. I have little mercy for those who hurt their friends like he hurt you, both physically and internally. Your friend Shimo decided to leave the village on a journey of self-discovery himself, after talking to him and hearing about his dream of being the Hokage I sort of went back on my decision to strip his ninja status but he decided on it himself. I took his status away until he returns a new man from his wandering. As for you…" the woman stopped talking and sighed. Mana's little heart was pounding inside, with a single word this woman could've ruined the young magician's life beyond salvation.

Sun finally rose in the horizon, the guards stood awaiting the arrival of the famous around the entire world Guru Ayushi. Instead of the figure of the monk arriving from outside the gate, a figure of the young girl arrived from inside of it. She wore a peculiar magician's uniform with a fancy hat to top it off. It didn't look like she was ready to leave as she carried no supplies with her, she did have a weapon pouch on her leg however. The guards knew this girl – there was hardly a person in the village who hasn't heard of Nakotsumi Mana, Konoha's Sorceress, the little stage magician at least once.

The guards kept staring at the girl as she slowly stumbled to the gate, it was clear she had trouble walking straight as it appeared like each step made her bite her lip and breathe erratically but she didn't use any aid walking. Perhaps her condition improved over the days she was seen using walking aid…

"Isn't it a bit too early for your shows? Hanging posters for the new ones?" a guard asked politely. The girl turned at him and forced a genuine smile as her head was shaken playfully and as cute as a child breaking into teen years can.

"No. I'm waiting for my mission – my team was assigned to protect Guru Ayushi, there's no Team Oak anymore but the mission objective still stands."

"Oh…" the guard uttered with a certain shade of admiration for the girl's devotion to her job slightly. He had heard of the event last night, he wondered about the Guru's protection squad. Apparently having hardly any sleep last night didn't bother this girl too much, nor did her injured legs. "Well then, little lady, we won't get in your way. Make us proud!" the guards smiled as they relaxed and kept staring at the forest clearing outside waiting for Guru Ayushi's frame to finally appear.


	68. Story of a Man Born From an Arm

Mana kept tapping her foot impatiently at the ground. She was informed that Guru would arrive early that morning, now there was this weird mood in the air where one knew that the moment they were waiting for was just around the corner yet it didn't come. Almost like waking up five minutes before one's alarm clock went off, one knew that going back to sleep was useless but also they wanted to savor those last moments of peace and tranquility before the day began therefore staying in bed. Weirdest thoughts and metaphors of the sort ran through the girl's head as she impatiently waited for the great Guru to arrive.

She's been waiting for this man for so long, ever since her father's injury Mana kept scratching days off of a calendar with the chances of the man's arrival getting greater and greater every day he did not arrive. Guru Ayushi had no schedule, he wandered the world coming into a village he considered needing his help and support the most and left it when he deemed it no longer necessary. He was a man with all the time and freedom in the world. He was an ideal for all who desired freedom and wisdom at the same time.

Yet it wasn't entirely true that Mana was only so hyped about the Guru's arrival because of his legendary cells and healing prowess. The girl had read so much about him and heard about his words of wisdom in the Academy, he was like the spiritual leader of the entire world and that said a lot about a man when the world had no religion to blindly follow. Some deemed it too murderous and hopeless for a religion to sprout, others said that it was because your average schoolgirl could spit fire therefore no mysticism existed to base religions off of. It took an extraordinary miracle to be named as such when there were people strong enough to move the world itself on this planet. Witnessing a man so wise and legendary that every nation and every man and woman alive had nothing but love and adoration for him was a reward all by itself.

And then just like that the figure appeared out of the forest clearing, pushing the immense and thick cover of brushes aside, moving past the thickness of the Fire Country forests and heading towards Konoha. What an impressive man Guru Ayushi was: he was relatively tall for a grown man, at least twice taller than Mana was though the girl was a rather short and slim one even for her age, he was bulky and muscular and appeared to be in his mid-forties judging by his appearance alone. He wore the simple raggedy monk attire that consisted of absolutely bare feet, baggy white pants and a strange orange cloth wrapped around one side of his body while the left side remained exposed. The appearance of the famous Guru Ayushi truly left the magician stumped.

He looked so powerful and young and amazing, his long black beard shined as the early and puny rays of light reflected off of some drops of water lost in it from when the man washed his face that morning. His chest and muscles looked in prime condition and perfectly toned for a man who had abandoned the path of violence and combat, one would say that bandits would've thrived in an environment outside Konohagakure walls however no bandit in their right mind would have attacked Guru Ayushi. How could this have been? Wasn't this man supposed to be really old!? Mana didn't know how old exactly, some people claimed Ayushi was at least sixty when he retired, that'd have made him at the very least over a hundred years old.

Some claims and legends around the man were just straight out insane. Mana was a girl who excelled and loved reading about history after her encounter with the legend about princess Satsuhimasa back in the Forest of Death. She sometimes ventured into the Konohagakure archives to read all about history and myths and all kinds of stories, obviously when she found some time being both a ninja who often did chore missions with her now dissolved team and a stage magician who kept performing on the stage showing off a craft one couldn't have seen anywhere else in the world as some of her fans claimed. There were people who claimed that Guru Ayushi may have been there during the First Great Ninja war or even War of the Moon and the Earth. It was tough to know for certain what they meant as some wars throughout history had different names depending on who named them.

The very first great war that the history spoke of was the Original Great Ninja War, sometimes also called First Ninja World War or War of the Clans, as the name suggests it was the centuries long war before villages were built between all clans. It was often confused with the conflict that transpired almost a century ago also called First Great Ninja War, that was the first time after the villages were built that the entire world devolved into conflict but instead of clans being at war trying to contend as to which of their bloodlines were superior it was now between villages and countries. In this time of conflict when the world kept having these worldwide conflicts it was tough to list all the world covering wars that happened but those two were the most often confused. After the Original Great Ninja War there was another First Ninja World War, also called War of the Moon and the Earth to distinguish it. From Mana's guesses that was the war where Princess Satsuhimasa destroyed the Moon, recreating it using her immense skill and power not too long after. If Guru Ayushi was actually placed in any of those "First Great Ninja Wars" he would've been well over several hundred years old which was impossible even to ninja.

Usually ninja had the potential to live quite long, chakra manipulation granted them perfect mastery over their bodies allowing them to live well over a hundred years. The problem was the violent world they lived in. With the kind of conflicts that came with each mission ninja died even during their teen years, even a simple mission to catch a village prankster claimed lives recently when the prankster accidentally blew up a large gas canister using his amateur attempt at ninjutsu. That accident claimed two lives of young ninja, the deaths soon became so frequent that people stopped granting them so much significance. They became just statistic for that week.

As the Guru Ayushi approached the gate and spoke to the guards Mana approached him hesitantly and bowed respectfully, lowering her entire body above the waist instead of just her head as was usually the custom when speaking to respected individuals. This implied a great deal of respect, there was only one greater way of bowing which was used to suggest subordination. The Guru looked quite confused by such a gesture of respect. He looked at the girl examining her strange attire and looking around her.

"Guru Ayushi-san, my name is Nakotsumi Mana, I am the Konohagakure genin who was tasked with aiding you throughout your stay in our village. I will protect you with my life and you may ask me about anything you desire for comfort. It is a great pleasure to meet you and have you visiting our village."

The Guru kept looking behind Mana, expecting to see someone else, he then leaned back and scratched his beard.

"Strange, usually genin work in teams, I always told the Kage that such was an excessive gesture of respect when matters concern my protection. No one ever wishes me harm, has the Fifth finally listened to what I've been telling his predecessors?"

Mana smiled with a lovely smile and shook her head.

"It's "her", Chestnut Hanasaku was appointed as the Fifth Hokage after..." her pleasant smile soon disappeared as she remembered the events as they were continuously told and retold at the Kage Summit. Whoever asked whomever, each villager had a different version of the events as most thought that the official version was heavily edited to make the Fourth and Tanshu look more heroic. Mana had never seen the Fourth fight but she believed that Tanshu-sensei was every bit as heroic as he was described in the official version.

"Yes... So I've heard... You said your name was... Nakotsumi Mana? What a coincidence, I would have wished to stop by your place and two other individuals: Yuki Shimo and Sugemi Nara. This only reduces the amount of work I'll have to do here before settling down to prepare for my seminar later today. I have some words with the three of you"

Mana's eyes shot wide open, she then got even sadder and gently stroke her elbow using her other arm from behind, it was a peculiar gesture she did when she felt depressed about something.

"Sorry, Shimo and Sugemi were involved in a... Situation. They were my teammates but I was the only one of my team who was allowed to keep my ninja status. Shimo was temporarily suspended, he intended to leave on a journey to discover himself again, Sugemi is to be held in one of the island facilities of containment in Fire Country. If you wish to tell them something it will not be easy..."

Ayushi smiled, his beard stretched in a very funny way when he did so. It made his smile look that much more comic and cartoonish.

"I am a man who fought in multiple "First" Ninja Wars who were always supposed to be also "the Last", only for another "First and the Last" to follow as generations shifted. I'll handle some bureaucracy just fine, young lady."

Mana would've really been surprised by the man's incredible youthful appearance if he had fought in multiple "First" Ninja Wars. After all the timeframe between the most recent of the "Firsts" and the one before that was hundred and fifty years at the very least. If Guru actually fought in both of those conflicts during his days as a ninja he must've been at least two hundred years old! Still, the situation with her teammates being detained or leaving the village on a journey of self-discovery and her sensei dying was too depressing to think about those things too much.

"Well at the very least I am here, I was tasked to make your stay as comfortable as it can be. The last time you visited I don't believe I was even born yet so I'll do my best to make you wish to visit more often. If need be I'll get you to Sugemi and Shimo."

Guru smiled and nodded, the two moved past the guard outpost watching the gate and started moving further into the village.

"Young lady, you'd rather I'd not come any time during your lifetime, I visit a village only after a significant tragedy strikes or a war is imminent with wishes to help people deal with it or avoid it. It may seem a bit tragic of a fate to trap oneself in but it is the burden of being who I am. That being said... I'd rather keep the words I have for you, Nakotsumi Mana, for the last as I believe they are the most important. Plus if they affect you too heavily you might be unable to aid me in delivering the other messages."

Mana nodded. She didn't really understood what was the point of those mysterious "words" he had with her or Shimo and Sugemi. Truth be told she was a bit afraid to see them after last night again. Guru must've noticed that hesitance in her sad eyes.

"Young lady, are you not excited to see your ex-teammates? They must've been contained and locked up for so long, or what seems so long to a young one like you. I am one who had experienced the treasured days of working in a team of genin. Girls your age spend so much time around their friends that they usually fall in love with one of their teammates. In my experience I can say that most families of ninja involve people who had been in a team at one point or the other, so powerful are the bonds of people who fight alongside each other, save each other's lives and do chores of the village together, yet you look sad, why?"

Mana sighed.

"Well... When I last saw them I incapacitated both of them after they started fighting each other. That fight meant a lot to them because they've been butting heads with each other for some time now. Sugemi always wanted to be the best, to stand out so that he was acknowledged and had his efforts recorded, at some point Shimo acknowledged Sugemi's desire to be the best and started a friendly rivalry with him to push his friend higher than he could ever go without such a rivalry. Sadly it got too serious. Short version is - I'm afraid that after I got in their way they'll hate me for it and won't want to see me."

Guru scratched his beard and looked into the sky locking his hands behind his bald head. He kept observing the passing clouds for quite a while before glancing over at Mana.

"Well, if that's the case it'll be better if you hear it from them and be done with it. Even if they do hate you for something, at least you'll know it for certain and won't have to bother your head with such thoughts. Kids your age shouldn't worry about that kind of stuff, when I was your age all I cared about was impressing a girl, I didn't really have to think about if my friends hated me or not because most of the time I didn't care. You think far differently from a child your age. I suppose that's what ninja life does to a blossoming teen."

Mana's chest started aching, she suddenly realized that well before Ayushi's departure she had to ask him about offering his cells for the Konohagakure Hospital. Those cells could've healed her father's arms and stopped his pain, he would no longer be irritated and would no longer have to suffer just to perform daily chores. Mother and Mana would never have to think about how father used to be in comparison to how he was then, he could tinker by himself again instead of doing so using Mana as his "hands". The magician was not the best tinkerer and father often got a bit too mad at her for anyone's comfort when she failed at some simple task, eventually she got better but father never expressed being proud of her improvement, to him it was her advancing to an "acceptable" or "passable" stage of his craft.

The girl kept trying to devise ways to weave the conversation so that she could arrive at the point of suggesting doing that for the hospital, she tried to somehow find a more delicate and sensitive way of asking for Guru's help. She didn't want to make it too personal because she needed to get it done soon but she didn't want to make the visit too awkward if Ayushi refused her plead to help. Only one possible version of the conversation made sense so the girl decided to give it a shot.

"Ummm... I'll understand if you don't want to talk about it but... Why did you start doing what you do? I mean... We've read and heard all about the kind of ninja you were, you were and are still considered the very best medical ninja in existence, you've brought recently deceased people back to life in dozens, you've healed injuries that seemed impossible to heal. Our teacher in the Academy kept telling stories like that time you regrew a person from just his arm, we thought it was just a tale but even if one tenth of those stories were true you'd still be able to save many lives."

Guru's face didn't change, he didn't smile but he didn't really look offended or that sensitive about the topic, he must've really been asked that a lot. The man scratched his beard and then locked his arms on his massive half bare chest.

"Well... Yes, that is true, I did once regenerate a man from just his de-attached limb when the rest of his body was incinerated. I don't know up to now if that man was the same man or just a mad insanity, an abomination of chakra I've conjured and a crime against nature. At one point I was so good at it that I found myself able to end and create life at will but at no point it felt very right. I am no God nor do I wish to do God's work. Ninja are tools of war, ninjutsu is an art of murder or support of murder. Even the core essence of medical ninjutsu is to keep murderers alive long enough that they kill enough people to make them "efficient" to feed for a village. That was not the world I wanted to be a part of, I've long since paid my dues so I just retired at well over the age at which ninja usually retire. Many ninja these days retire in their thirties and that's understandable, the life expectancy of a ninja doesn't go too far over twenty. I was a force of good before, at least I hope I was, I just chose to be a different kind of good."

Mana sighed, just as the stories went Guru Ayushi didn't quite fancy life as a ninja. He was possibly even a bigger pacifist than Mana was and he didn't believe in fighting for the sake of peace. Asking such a person to devote his craft and return to his life as a ninja again would be to go against his own beliefs. Mana almost broke into tears from the pressure on her chest, on the one hand there was father who was in pain, on the other was his doctor who expected Mana to get those cells, then there was Ayushi who had abandoned and severed all his ties to the world of violence and would've never returned to it. Ayushi looked at her strange.

"What's wrong? It looks like you're about to burst into tears and one thing I hate in this world is children crying. Did I somehow make you sad? I'll pound myself pretty hard if I did!" Guru spoke with that strange warm tone, it was like he was a part of Mana's friend circle already even though they only spoke for a brief while.

"It's just... My father got injured on a mission, now he's suffering every day and... It's having an effect on him. The medical ninja..."

Ayushi raised his hand to stop Mana from saying another word. His body was literally shaking, his face looked infuriated and it was almost like all of his blood had centered in the upper area of his body. The blood vessels on his face shot out so immensely that at any moment the magician expected the man's face to just explode. Unwillingly her hand moved on her chest and she took a couple steps back. Did she mess it up? Did she offend Guru Ayushi to the point where his entire body tensed up, it looked like the man was about to kill someone, it really did. And to be entirely honest after everything that happened, with all the responsibility on her shoulders Mana would've accepted that death if she was to blame for his fury if only that'd have helped her mission.

"Those darned vultures!" he spat out an excess of slobber as he raged. "Preying on a child's hopes and dreams, on something as sacred as child's love for their parent... I can't imagine how you felt, hearing about me ditch the life of a ninja yet feeling responsible for acquiring my cells, right?"

Mana looked to the side and nodded so briefly that it was hardly even visible that she did so. Ayushi's face suddenly shifted into sadness that to match Mana's own.

"I'm sorry, child, your father cannot be helped. It's not that such power is beyond my abilities it's just... It's not the first time this happens, the village craves my cells thinking it to be a panacea of some sort, thinking it can heal any sickness just because I myself cannot be hurt. They think me immortal and therefore they believe that my cells can grant immortality."

The man reached over Mana's pocket and removed a card from it, the girl was impressed that he saw that her attire was filled with hidden pockets full of tools to help her in the time of need. The man then cut deep into his hand making blood wildly squirt out onto the floor. Within mere moments the injury closed up and the blood on the ground evaporated.

"It's a jutsu I discovered during my days of youth. It's a technique I no longer have any control over, whatever damage comes to my cells is immediately healed, I do not age, I cannot stay injured. I can die if death strikes me instantly but if there's a moment's delay I shall survive. I can also grant this sort of ability to another using my cells."

Mana was both impressed by that ability but also a bit confused, so far Ayushi had only been confirming the medical ninja theory that his cells could help Mana's father.

"The problem exists on two levels: ideological and material. Ideologically if I grant the ability for a village to heal any injuries, if I provide as much as a single cell for them to duplicate it'll completely imbalance the world's sensitive power balance. It'll mean invincible, immortal soldiers. Also what message will it send? Instead of dealing with one's injury and sickness, instead of growing stronger people will just go back and fix it all denying their chance of emotional and spiritual growth. What most do not understand that even terminal diseases make people grow as people, they are obviously a plague to humanity but to some it is a chance to appreciate life for the first time in their lives. To talk to their families for the first time instead being absorbed by their work all the time. Everything in this world happens for a reason and to go back on such events is to spit in the face of said reason. It is at the very least immature."

Mana just kept staring at the dirt completely embarrassed by herself, she did realize that Ayushi didn't really blame her for anything but she felt so stupid and immature. She felt so embarrassed that it was almost like she would just burn up at any moment into a pile of ashes.

"The material reason however is far more devastating... The reason why my cells work is because I'm... Well... Me. Every body has a limit as to how many cells can regenerate, if you abuse that limit... Well... Let me finish that story of a man regrown from an appendage. When that limit is passed the cells begin to mutate, they form rushed, sick and twisted, what is born is not a man, it is a pitiful creature of gore, puss and tumors. I would wish that your father was well but I am not willing to risk such abominations of nature, I will not risk putting your father or anyone else through that kind of risk. The regeneration that my conscious cells would provide would completely throw a body out of whack, all injuries would be regenerated in an instant but the cells would mutate and form a sickness like no other. Normal people just cannot deal with it, I've told those fools that many times before but they keep coming up with more immoral ways to ask me for my cells each time..."

An atmosphere of silence spread after Ayushi stopped talking. Mana covered her eyes with her sleeve trying to hide the fact that she was crying. So much hope, so much looking forward and hoping that her father would just magically get better with an injection of some cells... All of it for nothing. How immature, how naïve and childish she was for daring to hope that bad things could just be waved at with a magical wand and cured. How naïve indeed...

Mana felt a soft and relaxing tap on her puny shoulder coming from a man twice her size. Ayushi's humongous arms wrapped around her and pressed her to his own belly harder letting Mana's tears burst forth into his dirty cloth. It must've been a depressing but also touching moment - Guru Ayushi comforting a crying child. Sadly, people were so insensitive to such events by that time that no one even stopped for a moment to care. Why care that at that moment a child somewhere felt better if that same child's body will most likely be found in some ditch having perished on a mission.


	69. Solution to Violence

For a while the continuation of the walk was quite awkward. Just as Mana suspected, talking about the problem of her father's made it really uncomfortable for both of them. At least the magician herself was quite embarrassed that she was played by the medical ninja like that and had to make a fool of herself in front of one of the greatest heroes in the Ninja World. Guru coughed, quite badly attempting to fake a cough just somehow to kill this awkward silence.

"So... Konoha has changed quite a bit since I've last been here... I believe it was after the Second Great Ninja War."

Mana's sleeve once again rubbed at her eyes, luckily her blush of embarrassment did help conceal the natural red of one's face when one cries. Needless to say Guru noticed the girl's distress yet he chose to let her work it out by herself after suggesting the initial gesture of comfort and understanding. He had that great feeling to him that he perfectly understood the situation and almost like he had been through it himself, there was no sensible tension from his side, just the one that Mana herself has created and imposed onto the situation.

"First "Second" war, huh? I wonder what made the historians move past the "First" curse..." Mana spoke up. She did not expect the mad laughter from the side of her conversant. Ayushi was laughing it up holding his buff stomach with both of his arms as if protecting his intestines from falling out. The giant had bent over and almost fallen to the ground.

"Wow, I've never met a young lady with such knowledge of history? Do you aspire to be a historian? In that case I'll be the first one to say you've chosen the worst first steps for that profession!" the man finally managed to force some words through his mad laughter.

"No, just a hobby, one would think reading ancient language and dialects would be difficult enough, how is one supposed to time a scroll correctly when each of them speaks of different "First" war. I personally like Demaso's suggestion to name the wars: War of the Clans, War of the Earth and the Moon, the Wars of Establishment, War for the Greats, First and the Second Great Ninja Wars. Something in describing the purpose of a war just to help paint a better picture instead of just calling all of them "First" and then suddenly start numbering them..."

Ayushi finally straightened his body out, leaning back and to the side to stretch his bones out. Strangely enough they didn't crack, nor did he act like he was in too much pain which for a man of his age was quite impressive.

"You speak great truth, sadly the profession of a historian is as dangerous today as it was before: it requires devoting all of one's time to studying ancient texts, then it asks even more devotion wandering the No Man's Lands of each country, lands abandoned because of the battles that took place there that now shelter the worst kind of nightmarish people there are. One might ask what is worse profession than that of ninja, I'd answer any profession that requires one to survive hordes of murderous bandits with only a scroll and a pen in one's hand... For that reason each historian wishes significance with their work for that reason they each try to make their discoveries more important than they are, well, that and the danger makes the rushing or scared for their lives historians quite bad at their jobs..."

Mana looked at Guru Ayushi, only now did she realize just how insane this man's profession was, it wasn't even a profession as he did not accept any material goods from any village. The ninja villages were usually quite safe, they had the local crime underworlds, sure, but in a village filled with ninja those never got out of control, outside the village gate there were some ranges of relative "safe-zones" that very few bandits tread into because villages still often had patrols of chuunin or highly experienced genin wandering the places to watch the territory and locate and identify any threats to village security, notify the guards by the gate of what was going on near the village gate.

Then there were the vast territories outside the village. One would've travelled for days, maybe even weeks or months with ordinary pedestrian feet to find any change in scenery. There were just the vast and awe inspiring Fire Country forests where the trade route ended. It was the village gate, then the big Roiyaru Road that lead to a small pleasure town – Shukuba town. After leaving that town one would quickly enter the immense wilderness that took entire weeks to reach the port that sailed people through to the Water Country. Similarly those same woods would've lead to Land of Snow, then the colossal desert and rocky wastelands of the Lightning Country in the north or Lands of Wind and Earth to the west. Each of those paths were filled with bandits and thieves, villages never even let genin set foot in those areas beyond the "comfort zone". This man travelled the world since times unknown with not even a toothpick to defend himself with...

"I would like to see your friend Sugemi first, if he is to be transported to some remote location at some point it'd be for the best if we found him before that happens. This other friend of yours Shimo leaves on a journey of self-banishment, I'd assume he wouldn't leave without saying goodbye to you first, call it a hunch of an old man."

Mana nodded to Ayushi's suggestion. She did take a slight lead in order to show Guru the way to the Police Force HQ. The girl scratched the side of her head wondering if she could ask the man about his history, about how he survived so long having abandoned violence. After all, hers was the life of a young woman who wished to make the world peaceful, make it a better place by setting the right example. If she knew how a man can survive peacefully in the most violent and dangerous to one's neck areas maybe it'd give her a clue as to how she was to achieve her ideals.

"I see, you wish to ask me of something, young lady, go ahead. You've mentioned history was your hobby, I believe, I am full of history and quite willing to satisfy your hunger for knowledge. That is the least I can do after bursting the bubble of false hope that some despicable soul blew in your young heart."

Mana shook her head vibrantly and ran out in front of Guru Ayushi, her body was still fighting the instinct to ask him the questions that she wanted most to ask but her mind just having been encouraged by the man himself overruled her shyness and embarrassment by itself.

"Guru Ayushi-san! You've traveled the world for so long, yet you say you've abandoned all remnants of your old life, left all that violence behind. My nindo, my Ninja Way and lifelong dream is to make this world different, to become a hero, an icon of hope that could maybe stop all this senseless murder and destruction. Someone who could make life be worth something again like it was at some point before, I believe such a point in time existed, it had to! Please tell me – how did you manage that?"

Guru Ayushi sighed, he wasn't angry or mad, just slightly disappointed. Yet his eyes were so kind, so warm, he couldn't have been disappointed in Mana, it looked almost like he was instead disappointed in himself.

"It seems it is my curse to blow this young lady's dreams today, oh what a cruel star I've been born under... I'm sorry, young Mana, I'm afraid that the "solution of peace" you think I've discovered does not exist."

Suddenly a gale picked up, powerful gusts of wind started blowing Mana's way freezing the girl in spot. Several months back the Demon beat her around with inhuman strength, when that man's fists hit her they made the girl feel like she died every single time. This insane sensation, this powerful gust of wind that made Mana feel cold while she felt just the same as with the fists of the Demon. She heard violent wildfires rage around, feeling gusts of wind that picked up any stray leaves around and threw them around violently bashing them into windows and tearing them to shreds as they burned down ignited by what seemed like magic. Mana fell on her knees grasping at her chest as her lungs felt like she was drowning at the same time. She had never felt death knocking on so many doors at once, it felt so horrible that it was almost like her body just turned off and preferred death over that feeling for just one more moment.

"This is what some ninja call "Killing Intent", truly it is nothing more but a powerful ninja releasing their chakra, preparing for combat, alerting all around them that they are ready to murder them on levels they never even thought existed. Usually ninja of high caliber restrain their chakra, lock it down behind thousands of mental blocks, this is the result of all that chakra being set loose. To sensors it feels like being naked in the vacuum of space in front of a star, absolutely overwhelming, to ordinary ninja it feels like... Well... That which you felt just now."

Finally that nightmare stopped, Mana's lungs could draw air again, her ears no longer heard deafening infernos raging around her while her body froze to death from inside out. The girl lifted her arm right up to her eyes and it was shaking mad. Such was the aftershock of that experience, it was so similar to what Tanshu-sensei had. Mana remembered almost instantly a similar but weaker feeling coming from the Sannin, a feeling that her team quickly got used to. She remembered how the animals in the Forest of Death avoided that feeling, ran from Tanshu-sensei in circles.

"I... I s-see..." Mana uttered with shaking blue lips as her pale skin regained its exotic darkened tone combined with her childish blush. "So you did not achieve peace through some ideal solution. You achieved it by instilling fear into the hearts of everyone who wished to attack you..." the girl summarized her realization. Ayushi did not gesture to confirm it but he really didn't have to, most bandits worth their plundering mettle possessed the basic knowledge of ninja arts, sensing one hundredth of such overwhelming Killing Intent would've dissuaded anyone from taking any sort of action towards this man other than tipping one's hat as they passed by and wishing them to have a good day.

One would have thought that Mana should've learned her lesson already, after being informed about there being no "magical solution" to her problem once she assumed that there was one again. How could her naïve self not have realized that nothing in life was that simple, that situations could not have been solved by the right words being told or the right action being performed, that there was no solution to every problem in her life was beyond even Mana's limited childish understanding. The girl's puny fists closed up as she picked up a bunch of gravel from the ground, pressing it ever so hardly, as hard as her hand let her. Ayushi saw her frustration as the girl's raven black hair covered all over her face.

"Are you mad at me? If so I'd love to somehow make up for this frustration I've caused you. It really is unfortunate that I had to burst so many of your dreams..." the man scratched his beard.

Mana's little knuckles relaxed letting the bright powder slip from her fingers and fall down on the ground as her face finally lifted up and her lovely full smile met Ayushi's face.

"Nope, I'm just glad that you gave me the chance to find my own solution to the problem. If you told me how to make the world peaceful I would've felt like something was missing, a true hero finds their own solution." Mana kept on smiling. When she opened her eyes she saw a troubled face of Ayushi meeting her newly born attitude towards the world, one of a child who now knew that humanity had no answer to her question as one of the wisest people in the world didn't give one to her.

"I won't be the hero who achieves peace through fear like you, I won't achieve peace through some treaties or papers that limit freedom like the Fourth. I will make people see that peace and love are the true virtues of this world by example, then they will become better people by their own free choice. Peace achieved by violence or fear of violence or economic pressure is meaningless, peace achieved by shackles of one's freedom is equally worthless. Love for everything adopted by choice is the only ideal worth living for!" Mana kept on smiling as she delivered the declaration of her ideals, this clarification that Guru Ayushi helped her realize.

Guru squinted, his lips did twist a little to that which resembled a smile but he was very hesitant to finish that happy face.

"Young Mana, people often approach me begging me to fight for them, to beat this bad man who oppresses them, this band of bandits or this tyrant Kage who took power by force. I refuse their requests every time, do you know why?" the man asked, he expected the girl's smile to disappear but it didn't, it just slightly reduced and her eyes still shined with that childish glee.

"It is because of the circle of violence. Violence is a constant, crime is a constant, death is a constant. Once you mete out punishment for someone, once you cure one plague, another one takes its place, another sickness, far worse than one before arises. There is no end to this circle, the more you fight it the more people die in the end. Do not fall into this trap of idealism, I tell you this as a survivor as countless "wars to end all wars"."

Mana nodded.

"Yeah, "war to end all wars" does sound idiotic, that's how men become corrupted. In the beginning they are good, then they gain power through public trust, they are granted the ability to really change things but they take up too much pressure onto their shoulders. They decide to do "this one bad thing" as a mean to achieve "that really really good thing that will totally compensate the injustice caused by the means" but that ultimate goal never comes. Once they see where injustice is taking them, once they step into those shoes that grant the widest steps they keep walking until they realize their feet have rotten and that the ground no longer supports them and then they sink into the filth they themselves mashed their motherland into."

Guru kept curiously observing the girl, walking by her side observing her from behind her as she lead the way, witnessing as one man after another stopped to greet him and also greet the girl. This young lady appeared to be some sort of little celebrity around those parts as usually their protectors were completely overshadowed for people of the village even wave for them. People rushed at the Guru pushing everyone else out of the way because "their problems weighed the most" or "their joy burnt with the brightest flame". Not this young girl, passing by the village square Guru noticed several posters with this girl's gorgeous smile – "Konoha's Sorceress" she was called... People did focus their love and adoration on the Guru but the girl neither got ignored by them nor did she mind the love and adoration that the sage received. The man was becoming more and more interested with this child.

"I don't blame you for not helping people, Ayushi-san. You've left the world of fighting and violence behind and so your hands are tied, you can't fight the evil that harms this world. That is why I believe you invented this "circle of hate" idea. Sure, evil and sickness are eternal and me or you are not, obviously I am even less eternal than you are, but that doesn't matter. Even if one evil changes the other that is no excuse to not do anything, would you refuse a cure to a sick person just because you know that somewhere in the world a new sickness will rise? Be it one stronger and darker than the one you can cure?"

Mana confidently tipped her top hat for a passer-by and then moved it to shield her eyes from the Sun that was blasting into the face of the two as it finally rose from the horizon with its all might and glory.

"My ninja way is to help everyone and anyone and if a greater threat rises after it I shall keep helping everyone until I die! Any other life is not worth living!" Mana smiled as only her white teeth could be seen from the girl's covered up face that was protected from the wild sunlight by her wild dark as night hair and her elegant hat with her father's seal on the inside of its top.

Finally the two had arrived to the location – Mana and Ayushi stopped and glared over the Police Force HQ. The two guards tried to stop Mana from coming any closer as the place was seemingly still quite busy with the repairs from the immense damage caused by the two genin duking it out last night. After seeing Guru Ayushi by her side the guards lost all remnants of their confidence or their minds. The man simply walked forward opening the door and gesturing for Mana to follow. He looked at the two men, "We are here to visit a young gentleman named Sugemi Nara, you two gents would be of great help if you directed us to him and give us some information as to where he is as he is about to be moved as I was told and I have an important message he needs to hear first, it'd be a real pain to find him in one of those "remote facilities" you keep some prisoners in..."

The men just pointed their fingers at the direction, one of the guards just uttered "312" giving the famous Guru a number of the cell. The bearded giant smiled.

"Thank you so much, gentlemen, I'd love to tip a hat but unfortunately the young lady is the only one with a hat..." he said and his tall and bulky frame soon disappeared into the mazes of Konohagakure Police Force HQ. Mana smiled, barely containing her wish to laugh out she just tipped her own hat at the two and rushed to follow the man inside. She thought that the words that the Guru might have for Sugemi would have been personal, or even if they weren't, Mana would be the last person that her friend would want to hear them after what she did yesterday. The Nara pretty much made it clear that the girl was now his enemy, didn't he? All that talk about this whole "either you're with me or against me" attitude pretty much made it as clear as it could've been.

Mana looked around following Ayushi, the whole place was still a mess, there were Police Force ninja running around picking up sheets of papers from the ground and reading them. They probably just tried to identify if the papers were worth salvaging and being reworked or they could've been trashed. The girl had to hand it to the two combatants – they really did do a number to this place: walls busted down and through, stone and sheets of steel everywhere, Mana could have sworn that she still caught glimpses of smoke coming from somewhere too. There were several holes in the floor two, one of them lead straight to the room where the fight started in and the other lead to one or two floors below.

"So... Seeing how your teammates are being punished for something and the state of this place I'd guess that..." Ayushi started his question.

"Yeah, they fought each other down there." Mana replied without him having to finish by nodding at the deep hole that lead down to where the Demon was kept.

"Friends fighting one another, such a sad thing to witness yet it happens so often in this world... Was the cause worth it? Young love perhaps? Maybe that was why it took you so long to break them up..." Ayushi kept guessing something right while missing something else. "After all with two friends fighting I'd assume you were there too, in my mind the only reason why you wouldn't stop it immediately would be that you were in love with one of them or perhaps you didn't know which one..."

Mana shook her head. "I do love Shimo and Sugemi but... Not in that kind of way, slobbering while kissing is really gross. I assume since everyone chases that sort of love at some point it'll stop feeling that way. No. I love them as brothers and really good friends. I didn't interrupt because... Well... I couldn't believe what was happening, I was injured and unable to keep up with them and then I just..."

"Couldn't think about hurting a loved friend..." it seemed as if it was now Ayushi's turn of finishing Mana's sentences.

"Yeah, not much further now..." Mana pointed at the direction as they finally reached the cells numbered close to three hundred. Once again the awkward silence took over the two as they just continued to walk forward with only Ayushi's weird bare feet and Mana's sandals with slightly elevated heels tapping at the cold stone floor.


	70. A Broken Road Goodbye

A lone guard watched over the room where, apparently, Sugemi was held in. Ayushi stopped by the man and smiled at Mana. The man must've wanted the magician to do the talking which to Mana seemed quite strange. After all, was he not the famous authority figure around the world? The man called the "spiritual leader" of the Shinobi World? It was just really odd that he wanted Mana to talk with the man. The girl sighed and took several steps closer to the guard who instantly directed his eyes at her. The man must've known that she was there yesterday as he did indeed tense up as if preparing for an incoming attack from the magician's side.

"Umm… Guru Ayushi would like to see the young man kept in this room. It'd probably be best if you let him in, after all, what harm could Guru Ayushi, of all people, do?"

The guard didn't look too pleased. He snarled angrily at Mana and then at Ayushi. His hand moved behind his back slowly, he tried to move it so slowly that the two would not notice but Mana was no idiot. Having her hobby in mind she had to be not only perceptive enough herself but also know how to fool the eyes of a public.

"Is that it? So it's Guru Ayushi who wants to see this guy, huh? Aren't you this guy's teammate, girl? Which is more likely, that the world famous Guru Ayushi wants to see some edgy punk who messed up like a loser, or that you asked someone to use Transformation Jutsu and transform into Ayushi?"

Mana took a step back, she knew that this wouldn't work, why would it? She turned back at Ayushi who closed his eyes and sighed. Some odd feeling ignited inside Mana's chest, she turned back at the man and walked right up to him, her head was looking up straight into the man's eyes. It must've looked pretty ballsy to just waltz in front of a guard who was whole head taller than the girl and just stare him off.

"Sir, with all due respect, this is Guru Ayushi, the man who has fought the Uchiha, all four of the other Great Ninja Villages and was personally involved in two of them no longer being called "Great". He was a man who has seen battles that lasted for entire weeks, losing his allies and then bringing them back to life as he shaved at his own lifespan to do it, and yet he still lives for over a hundred years. The man who abandoned all of these horrors and now a Police Force guard in Konohagakure wants him to remember all of that which he had left behind and despised? I don't think you've thought this through, Sir."

Mana's voice was quiet but tough, cold and unwavering. It was not a tone usually attributed to her. The guard gulped and nodded. "Umm… Very well, I'll arrange a meeting immediately! Just please be brief, Ayushi-san, this young man is about to be transported in an hour or two, you'll be the last people seeing him."

Ayushi nodded and sat down by the wall on the stone floor. The monk closed his eyes, Mana would've mistaken his state for meditation had she not been such a prodigy in the field herself. No… Ayushi's eyes were moving sloppily, during the first state of meditation Mana remembered her eyes being quite static, during the secondary, more advanced stage they were all over the place. The girl walked up to the man and sat down on the cold stone floor beside him, she didn't care if she'd dirty up her skirt, she didn't care if the stone feel pretty damp and cold.

The man grumbled something, as if clearing his throat and then spoke up. "So… You really do want to see these two quite much. No girl would try so hard to get into a room if the person inside wasn't her friend or her beloved. I'll take your word for it that it was the first."

Mana closed her eyes as well. "Yeah. I do want to see Shimo and Sugemi before they leave. No, I will see them." Her voice continued to flow like a river stream in spring that had broken through the ice of winter past, just as firm and strong as it did before.

"Good, I'm glad to have been able to help you see your friends. At least once my words and intentions won't cause you pain, that much I owe you." Ayushi mumbled as it appeared he may have been snoozing. Then his eyes opened again and he turned at the girl.

"One thing though, one thing bothers me. You seemed pretty determined to get into that room, from what I've heard when arriving to the village from the guards you've also been pretty determined to stop your friends from killing each other, even going as far as to use an experimental genjutsu technique. You do know that sometimes unpolished illusions cause permanent brain damage to both the user and the receiver? Were you ignorant of this or did you wish to save their lives at that cost? What lines are you willing to cross when protecting life?"

Mana's eyes remained closed, she had never really thought about that. It was a very core shaking question indeed. Her entire life the magician wanted to save lives, to be the moral compass for the world, an example of a hero which would cause the world to change. She assumed that saving lives would always be the moral choice but sometimes it wasn't. She was aware of the possibility of permanent brain damage for either of them when using her early stage of an illusion, yet the girl could not remember that stopping her for a single moment. It was just something that ran through her head.

"I… I suppose any lines. I did know that possibility but I wasn't afraid of it, it seems that I am ready to choose life over death, no matter the moral implications of such decision. I'd save a man from death, even if it meant that he had to suffer for the rest of it. I believe that no life in this Universe is unnecessary and this belief is unwavering."

Guru closed his eyes again and returned to his state of slumber.

"That is a scary answer, young Mana, it is an answer that fanatics would give when asked about their beliefs. I'd wish to believe that you gave such an answer because you are still very young and have not yet encountered a truly gruesome situation where saving a life was to doom someone. Yet I've no reason to truly think so… But don't you think it is weird that you are afraid of hurting someone in that case? You don't wish to kill, that is fine, but tell me if you've ever frozen in place unable to fight off a threat? You said you were afraid to interfere in the fight between your teammates for a very long time, I'd imagine this was not the only time this happened to you, have you ever wavered before entering combat before? Don't you think it's hypocritical to restrain yourself from fighting when you say that no line is going to stop you from saving someone?"

Mana was shocked by those words, she looked at Ayushi who was playfully smiling with his beard and moustache being twisted. It was not a sadistic or bad kind of smile, it was a smile of a father who had just scared the dog off of the stairs letting his daughter out to play because the dog was barking and scaring the little child. Mana had that feeling of dread for violence this whole time when she didn't realize she may have been contradicting her own belief. Fighting was not wrong, not always, fighting to save someone she treasured, someone she loved was alright. She was not a pacifist, she couldn't be if she wanted to be who she was. All life was sacred, that did not mean that people who threatened it couldn't have been taken down, crippled or paralyzed. It may not have been morally correct but such were Mana's beliefs.

This Guru Ayushi was amazing, now the young magician understood why he was called "spiritual leader" and one of the wisest people alive. He just solved one of Mana's most painful problems for her with nothing but words, no, encouragement for the girl herself to come up with an answer. He never said anything, he just asked her questions and encouraged her to think for herself. This monk was truly something!

About twenty minutes had passed since the guard started arranging the meeting. In between then and now the guard had left the room and ran around setting up the meeting with his superiors. Apparently seals and restraints were in order to prevent the detained one from hurting the girl who detained him last night and also the visitor. While bored of waiting Mana turned at Ayushi. A question popped into her mind, something didn't add up but she didn't yet wish to accuse Ayushi of lying.

"You told me that ordinary humans could not make use of your regenerative cells, yet Tanshu-sensei claimed once that he had regrown an entire muscle out of them, why was that? Was he sick too, riddled with tumors like that man you told me about?"

Ayushi opened his eyes and smiled again, just mere moments later he broke into an uncontrollable laughter. After a while of letting his laughter go free the man finally wiped a tear off of his eye and decided to reply the girl to her question. Guru Ayushi looked like a man who was in no rush at any point, he acted like his entire life was still ahead of him.

"Actually there's an interesting story there… I remember meeting your sensei back during my last visit, no, it was a brief stop as I was heading for the Fire Temple and Konohagakure was just in the way and night sneaked up on me out of nowhere. Anyways, I wanted a drink so I went to the bar, my regenerative cells prevent me from ever getting drunk so I can enjoy my drinks indefinitely. So I sat down close to this young fellow, he looked pretty strong, back when I sniffed up his Killing Intent I knew he was someone amazing. We talked for a while and… He told me and showed me his arm – the entire muscle looked like some bastard tried to rip it out with its teeth, must've been a summoned animal or something."

Guru delved deeper and deeper into his thoughts. Mana hated when the man just stopped talking and drifted off like that but she did want to hear all of the story the way it happened and if that meant some breaks in between it did not matter. Guru finally seemed to have remembered the events and continued.

"So… The guy was pretty bold, he asked me of my cells almost instantly after the story, "Give me your cells, geezer" were his exact words. I explained to him just as politely as I did to you why it couldn't be done and then he challenged me, he claimed that he could drink me under the table and if he did he'd drag my body to the hospital and take those cells from me. Now there was a challenge I could not refuse – on one hand I couldn't possibly have lost such a challenge as I couldn't get drunk, on the other one if I did by any chance lose it I'd be helping a young man whose career was ruined…"

"I don't get it" Mana interrupted the story, "Why would your drunk cells work differently from your conscious cells?"

"Because you see, when my body is conscious my cells work impeccably, but when it is either comatose or passed out or… Well… Drunk they work at an incomparably weaker and slower rate. Rate that does not stress ordinary body nearly as much as my ordinary one. Normally that never happens – whatever damage I am dealt to my brain I heal almost instantly so I have not passed out enough times in my life to count them on my hand fingers. But that Tanshu was a very crafty kid, he had this strange seal ability to neutralize my jutsu without me even noticing and so I end up drunk in no time because without my ability I'm quite lightweight, despite my menacing size… I suppose now you can piece the rest of the story together…" Ayushi finished the story at last. Mana gently covered her mouth as she laughed out, it couldn't have been helped since the story was just really funny and weird.

As half an hour more passed the meeting was finally arranged and Ayushi and Mana were called up to Sugemi's cell room. The two entered and the man wasted no time walking up to the young man and sitting in front of him and Mana kept her distance by the door. She just felt that horrible feeling like Sugemi must've hated her for stopping him yesterday so she just stared at her feet which she kept rubbing at the stone floor shyly. Guru leaned back in his puny wooden chair making it creek for its life.

"Greetings, young man, news have reached me that you'd be sent away to a remote facility on one of Fire Country islands. Rest assured, the one you're sent to is only prison by name actually it is quite pleasant. You see there are three prisons in Fire Country: one of them is a prison called "Jigoku", it is a prison where the worst of the worst are held in the toughest security conditions and under constant surveillance, their chakra is kept sealed at all times and no one gets too worked up when a prisoner or two die in "accidents". The people there are considered rejects of society and very few of them have a chance to ever leave that place. "Jigoku" is located underground, somewhere in a remote location of the Fire Country."

Sugemi didn't seem very interested in the man's tale. He looked at Mana and interrupted the man's explanation which was supposed to calm him down and get him talking in the first place.

"Do you hate me, Mana? Why are you so distant? What happened?"

Ayushi's hand raised to stop Sugemi's interruption. "I will leave you two time for farewells, sadly the words I have for you outrank the importance of the farewell of two young friends who will be parted for a year or two. The words I have for you are the last words spoken by Red Dog - Uzumaki Tanshu before his passing that were overheard by the Tsuchikage and sent to me via message. Those words are meant for three people: Nara Sugemi, Yuki Shimo, Nakotsumi Mana. Please let me finish my explanation and get to my message, then I shall leave the two of you to say your temporary farewells."

Sugemi looked pretty surprised by the fact that someone overheard Tanshu's final words but then his surprise was quickly overwhelmed by annoyance that this man would insist to finish his speech before delivering them, he then settled down and gestured for the Guru to continue.

"Thank you, as I've said, the second prison is "Rengoku", it is the prison also known as the "Konohagakure Correctional Facility" located inside the village. It isn't anything too impressive, just your ordinary prison meant for perpetrators not tough enough or not evil enough or with hope for being adapted back into society after their redemption. The prison you are sent to is called "Eden", do you know why? Because technically it is not a prison, it is just a location where people of interest are detained. Currently all of Konohagakure Jinchuuriki are located there so that they do not escape or die and let their Tailed Beasts roam free. It is entirely possible that the Fifth will revise that decision and let those poor two go in the nearest future…"

Sugemi sighed, "Look, old man, I'm not worried about the whole containment situation, I don't care. Just give me the words Tanshu-sensei left us and get out."

Guru smiled and nodded. "Very well…"

"Tanshu believed that you were just as stupid as his sister, by which I believe he referred to Chestnut Hanasaku who had adopted him in his youth into her "family". The man wanted that Hanasaku would train you herself because the two of you were both too stupid to know where your limits were. He also expressed a belief that your goal of having a manga written about you was not that bright."

After Guru finished Sugemi asked if that was it to which the man nodded. "If it was any more personal than that I'd have asked the young lady to leave but I didn't believe it was." Guru added.

"Well, whatever, I don't want that woman training me. Plus even if I did I pissed her off enough for a lifetime, I'll do fine training in the containment facility with the two Jinchuuriki, I guess…" Sugemi shrugged, he then looked at Mana again. Mana's eyes raised up to meet those of her friend and she approached him and slowly hugged him.

After the girl backed off she desperately tried to fight tears off. "I'm sorry, Sugemi, I don't hate you. I just… I got in your way, I understand. But I couldn't let you kill that man, nor could I let you and Shimo kill each other."

Sugemi banged onto the steel table signaling that he was done with the meeting. "I know, Mana, I'm still gonna get that manga written about me, I'll just go about it differently. I'll change the world, just like you wanted it to but I'll go about it the entirely other way. Don't you get it? The hero who has no backing from the people around her will fail and die alone and people don't want peace. They want those who did fucked up things get fucked up things done to them. People are simple, I am going to get into their hearts by exploiting that and earn respect, that is how I will be immortalized in legends and get my own manga. We will clash again, Mana, it is inevitable. The one who wishes to kill all killers and the one who wants those killers to get "justice" by scolding them are bound to clash but I don't see you surviving that clash, people will always back the killer of killers because people want blood. For your sake, I hope one of us will die before that clash because one of us won't survive it if it happens and killing you would be too painful to me. Shimo was never my true rival, it was always you, Mana. It just was as Tanshu-sensei said, I was too dumb to get it."

The guards came to take Sugemi away and prepare him for being moved. As he was taken to the door the Nara gently wriggled out of the guards' hold and walked up to Mana placing his chin on her shoulder gently. "Goodbye, old friend, until we meet again…" was all he uttered. Mana and Guru observed Sugemi get taken away, the captain of the Police Force approached the two and stroke his brown thick moustache line.

"So you are seeking for Tanshu's students, Guru Ayushi-san? In that case you'd better rush to the Konohagakure gate. We've had reports that one of the students, the swordsman, was leaving and the guards tried to hold him, once he explains that his status as a ninja is suspended they'll have to let him go and if he leaves you'll miss him."

Mana and Ayushi started moving quickly towards the gate, the two ran up the stairs to the roof and left the building, moving quickly, dashing through the rooftops and wires, all the electric poles and the wires where the laundry was hung. Ninja travelled like that when they were on a mission, the rooftops were the playground of empowered criminals and ninja. Mana would've never guessed that Ayushi had retained so much of his past speed, she could barely keep up with him, several times she had to pop her "Mystical Wings" jutsu just to send the gust of wind to keep her from tumbling down when she missed a jump. The two were forced to move at such a pace that Mana almost twisted her neck several times.

Finally the gate was in sight, the two landed just in time to witness the figure of Shimo leaving. The boy was no longer wearing his formal and fancy clothes, instead choosing an attire more fitting for a homeless wanderer, which he was not. The boy wore a washed plain green kimono which would've soon get covered with dirt and get torn up in his travels. Right before he left Mana's voice reached his ears and he turned around. His innocent surprised eyes and jarring mouth when he recognized his friend would've made Mana laugh had the situation not been so desperate. Guru took several steps forward again, as usual he had to complete his own duty to an old friend, the only man to have ever drunken the famous and unbeatable in drinking Guru Ayushi under the table.

"Young man, please wait. I have words to tell you, words from your late sensei. After than I believe the young woman would also like to tell her farewells and it would be extremely rude to…"

"Deny a lady a chance at saying "Goodbye", I know my manners, old man!" Shimo finished the monk's sentence before the man could. Wasn't even that surprising, ever since he was a little kid, since the first day he entered through the Academy door wearing that comical suit with the world's biggest bowtie he acted like the world's most polite six year old gentleman. No one could've educated Yuki Shimo on manners when matters concerned women.

Guru coughed up and started fulfilling his duty. "Tanshu expressed extreme fondness of you, he admired your moral decision to despise a tyrant like Mizukage Daikon, he also expressed support for your goal to make it so that no one lived in tyranny again before his final moments. Tanshu hoped that you would train your swordsmanship and perhaps asked Mana-chan here to train you in chakra control one day. He also wondered sarcastically if you'd have liked the now deceased Mizukage Shirona over Daikon, the one who was responsible for the events of the Kage Summit."

Shimo smiled and nodded in confirmation that he heard the words meant for him, his smile was not a happy one, more like one that was almost lyrical. It was clear that the Yuki acknowledged the sadness in his sensei's passing but appreciated having heard his final words, at least as far as he was concerned. Once again, just like Sugemi, Shimo inquired if that was all to which Guru just nodded. "Well I guess sensei wasn't a man known for his words or his extreme skill with the tongue. Still, thanks for that, Guru Ayushi-san." the swordsman then turned to Mana and approached her.

"Heh, it feels pretty bad to make Tanshu-sensei wait before his final will is completed, I'll definitely ask you teach me when I'm back. I just don't want to draw my sword again before I understand who I am and where I stand. Nothing pulls the carpet from under you like raising a sword against your own brother in arms and being taken down by your own little sister…" Shimo hugged Mana gently, the girl once again just barely kept her tears in her. Shimo then moved back and laughed out as if he was going to say something really stupid.

"I really hope you didn't fall in love with me or anything, I'm not a guy worth swooning over neither am I a guy who ties himself with just one lady so I'd just break your heart…" Mana's fist bounced off Shimo's head from the sheer force of her pound. She was pretty angry that her silly teammate ruined the moment but it couldn't have been helped. Her friends were always sort of goofballs. Guru was smiling the whole time, after exchanging hugs and waving each other farewell the two parted, Mana followed Shimo's figure as it disappeared from her sight in the thickness of the forest outside the village gate.

"It may seem like the end of the world to you, young Mana, but as I've come to learn that people leave only to return. You will meet your friends again, in the meantime you'll make many new ones and while you won't be a team anymore bonds like that which you share are not easily broken. Just some distance and journey of self-discovery is powerless against that sort of friendship. Now all that's left is what was meant to be told to you…" Guru once again spoke wisdom. Mana didn't intend to keep the man from completing his debt, when she finally didn't feel Shimo's presence anywhere close the girl turned back at the Guru and walked up to him to hear Tanshu-sensei's final words meant for her.

Knowing her sensei it must've been something pretty mean so the girl's little heart was pounding relentlessly in her chest but she knew that sensei always meant well with his strict words. His insults made everyone work harder, his jokes always kicked them in the butt to move forward faster. Mana was ready, she just parted ways with her friends and in order to start a new chapter of her life she needed to tie all the knots from the old one.

"I'm ready" the girl uttered letting the Guru know to spill it out.


	71. Last Wishes

Guru scratched the top of his bald head. Apparently the message to Mana was either the most important, the longest one or at least it was the only one that could have waited. After all, both Sugemi and Shimo were just about to leave. The old man pointed for the Mana to follow him, he himself started walking, slowly picking up speed as he went along.

"Your sensei recognized the fact that he was strict on you in his final moments. He even went as far as to say that he may have been the strictest and hardest on you as compared with the others."

Mana's nose wiggled around, it was her trying desperately not to cry. She was strong, she had to be. Heroes didn't cry, they couldn't cry because they had to appear strong in front of the people they wanted to inspire. So the girl's lips kept pointing out, her nose wriggled around and sniffled like she was about to cry but she held her front admirably.

"He drew comparisons between you and a lady he had known in his youth, I am not entirely sure who this "Vashia" was, I have only been given a name in the Tsuchikage's message. The only thing that Tanshu had made clear was that this young woman was an honorable one and very similar to you. I believe that now that I've met you I understand what he meant."

Mana rubbed her wet eyes with her sleeve, she wasn't crying just yet so she tried to play it down like wind had carried dust into her eyes, which was actually a quite decent and often seen occurrence since Konohagakure streets were mostly gravel and dirt.

"Yeah, Tanshu-sensei didn't really like my ideals. He often criticized me because I wanted to save even my enemies which he couldn't understand. He said that people like me were a danger not only to their own lives but those of their friends too as they will not only die themselves, they'll doom their comrades too. Those were probably some of the most painful words I've heard in my life… But I really looked up to Tanshu-sensei, I liked him a lot, he was a good mentor even if we didn't see eye to eye."

Ayushi's thick and chest long beard was twisted around, it once again let the girl know that the man was smiling. His eyes were so soothing and calm…

"Well, Tanshu wanted to meet this Vashia woman again his whole life, he admitted in his final moments that he knew deep inside that she was dead. He most likely believed that it was her honorable and kind ways that caused her death and he only was so strict on you because he saw Vashia inside you. He wanted to protect you by being mean to you. He wanted that you either left the life of a ninja or changed your ways, he saw you as a second chance to protect the woman he loved."

Mana turned her eyes away, somehow she managed to swallow down a huge gulp of despair and sadness, the magician thought she had already dealt with the pain of losing an authority figure like Tanshu but she was wrong. Pain like that most likely never went away. Still, it'd have been best if she followed her own advice, one she gave father back then when he was struggling with his injury. Mana had to stop letting her pain control her, stop letting it shape who she was and choose an alternate identity. She had plenty to choose from, plenty ideals to strive to shape herself into. Only by stopping floating she would drown into pain and one thing Mana certainly was, was a floater and a fighter.

"Tanshu acknowledged that the world was the strictest on people like you, he also acknowledged the injustice of that, that the sweetest and kindest people were always the ones that paid the highest price in this world. He also loved that you were trying to change that, he acknowledged that people like you were needed, they were what would eventually change this world." Guru spoke once more after a moment of silence.

It appeared that the next few words were difficult on Guru himself, just for a mere second Mana forgot her own pain just because she was surprised to see Guru so stricken with emotions deep in his own chest.

"Tanshu wanted to let you know that he would have wanted that you would never leave the village, never found out about the real world out there, never found out about his death and the manner of it. He thought that living in a pink cocoon of cotton candy was for the best for you. I don't think he meant that you were weak and couldn't take it, I think he knew that you'd just blame yourself for everything you'd see, you'd put it onto your childish and puny shoulders to change it all, you'd suffer tremendously under such pressure and he didn't want you suffering, he wanted a happy life for you the most of all people. As his final words to you he… Apologized for the way he acted with you…"

A villager tried to approach Guru and Mana, Ayushi's large palm rose up alerting that it just wasn't the time. The old man whispered something into the villager's ear and the man nodded and rushed away. Mana tried her best not to collapse but she just couldn't handle it. A strong but soft hand pressed against her shoulder and led her to a bench. "Cry it out, kid, don't hold it inside. A world where people can't feel freely is a pathetic excuse of a world. I've got a seminar in an hour, we've got all the time in the world."

Mana sniffled "I just… Wish that at least one of Tanshu's final wishes came true, Sugemi won't train with Hanasaku, Shimo won't train with me, I actually did find out about his death and do very much plan to tackle every inch of darkness and hatred this world has…"

Ayushi remained silent.

Mana was observing the sage giving his seminar. There were more people than she could have ever imagined attracting. The girl's watchful eye found her manager, also the owner of the hall they were in, Mr. Hiro rubbing his hands. This was really profitable to him, Guru Ayushi was a major international figure of wisdom and spirituality. He always made people gather so densely that half of the public didn't mind listening to the man's powerful voice from outside.

As a bodyguard the magician was failing her client – she allowed people even behind the curtains, sitting in circles right around the great Guru. If they wanted to attack the man all of what some of them had to do was to just stand up. Guru was one of the most powerful ninja once but he had left that behind and wouldn't have used any of his skills even to protect himself. Granted killing the man would've been close to impossible but if someone was stupid and desperate enough to go after Ayushi they would've at least done their research on him and come up with a plan.

What was so different between Mana and Ayushi? Why did he constantly gather full crowds, crowds even from other countries that followed the news of his travels and came into the countries he visited only to listen to him? Why Mana only enjoyed moderate popularity if she actually spread the same message? Granted her crowd was steadily increasing and she gathered full halls more and more often but she wanted to know the secret of Ayushi's skill in inspiring people. Inspire people to change the world so that Mana left it better than she found it was her goal, learning to make people adore her was a major part of that goal.

Ayushi seemed to love contact with his crowd, he gave no speeches, no large monologues of his ideals nor did he hammer his messages in. For the man it was mostly crowd interaction over anything else, the leader let his crowd give him questions and suggestions for topics, he also always hugged whoever needed it and held hand of the people who suffered so apparently physical contact also played a great part. The two were completely different people: Ayushi inspired change through preaching and promoting peace and serenity of one's spirit by answering the questions to one's problems accordingly. Mana was an artist who tried to give the same message but using art as her tool instead of speeches and solutions to people's problems.

The councilman was right, usually when a figure of importance had such close contact with their audience they at least invited creepy fools that either wanted to kill them to make their mark in history or at least show that they could've killed them at any time. One such event happened to Mana too during the time she trained after Tanshu-sensei's departure when a fan climbed on stage and just stood there watching her escape a deathtrap. He probably could've just climbed on top of the box and held its top, making Mana drown in front of the public, it was transparent but the box withstood any attempts to break out from inside. The man never tried anything, he just stood there and watched from close up as if letting the girl know "I could've made this performance living hell for you but I didn't". Some people just loved feeding their superiority complexes…

Finally the seminar was over, it took good four hours to conclude and yet it didn't look like anyone in the audience was bored. Mana had noticed that as well, usually when people gave you morals one growed very bored in moments, Guru Ayushi had been doing nothing but moralizing and questioning her about her life and fixing her problems the whole morning and yet the magician had never even thought about being bored. Maybe it was just because he was always on point, always having the perfect words to say for every problem. Living over a hundred years, two hundred years, however long Ayushi had lived, made one really wise, able to pinpoint the exact problem and its solution easily. If Mana had to prove Ayushi's longevity she'd easily use that argument as a proof that needed no further argumentation. A man so precise and wise, a man able to pick any problem apart and recognize its solution in just a couple of sentences must've been around for a while to see a lot of said problems to begin with.

The monk approached Mana cleaning his sweat with a towel, he was quite energetic and at times loved to wave his arms around, also because of the overcrowded public the air inside was really stuffy, Mana had also removed her jacket and was holding it in her hands. She'd still need that shower later… "So, how was that?" Guru smiled as he approached his bodyguard. Mana gave the man a thumb up.

"The world is this much closer to being saved… And no one had to be beaten up to boot…"

Ayushi laughed out.

"Don't sweat about it, sometimes a problem can only be solved by beating someone up, even as a pacifist I acknowledge that. You can either be a pacifist who never fights and speaks of change or a kind hearted hero who fights for justice and those they love, also for those that cannot fight for themselves. You cannot be both. Both exist, both are needed. Wasn't it your idea that no person on this Earth is unnecessary?"

Mana pointed Ayushi to the exit, she was surprised that no one tried to catch up and talk to Ayushi off stage, usually people did chase her down for flowers or just a chat after the show. Maybe it was just that Ayushi didn't arrive often so he always made sure to leave everyone in the audience satisfied.

"For that to be true the world also needs bad people that exist solely to hurt other people…"

Ayushi laughed out and shrugged his giant hulking shoulders.

"True, still, that is never the problem, somehow those always rise up… Even so, how would we know a hero, how would we know what's right if there weren't bad people to challenge those beliefs? Good is molded by evil, given shape by it, one only knows good when they see evil, point at it with a finger and say "That is definitely wrong""

For a moment there Guru continued to stare at a fixed point somewhere, the magician and the sage left the building and Mana started leading Ayushi to the hotel where he was supposed to be housed in. Konohagakure hotels were nothing too special which must've come off as quite the embarrassment since sometimes some pretty important guests had to stay there. At least some hotels had the business feeling in them enough to modify their places to closer resemble the classic style and try and appear like the shabbiness of the places was intentional. Guru was housed at the very best hotel in Konoha but that didn't say a lot. The whole place was just a simple wooden construction built in the classic style, all those silk cloths, carpets and curtains were supposed to mask the lack of funds attributed to the field.

"Have you ever wondered, young Mana, if you were something extraordinary, something special? Like an heir to some ancient clan or maybe your parents adopted you from some elite clan of ninja like the Uchiha?" Guru smiled, his words may have been taken as rude by some people. Mana loved her parents and they very much loved her, to think that they may have adopted her at any point would've been at the very least offensive to them. The girl shook her head.

"We do have several hours to kill until the place gets dark, even then I wish nothing more than to see that glorious Konohagakure shine at night, to see all the street vendors and all the lights reflect from the Hokage monument playfully dancing in my eyes. It is one of my favorite experiences in Konohagakure, something I always look up to." the man's eyes wandered off onto the Hokage Monument – a giant structure of faces of all past Hokage carved into a mountain. It was an amazing monument but when one walked below it every day it often sank into oblivion and lost its primary charm. "I wonder when they will add Lady Hanasaku to the four faces…" Guru added.

Mana nodded, it was her mission to make sure that Ayushi has the most pleasant stay in Konohagakure. The girl took her mission objective quite seriously, if the great Guru wished to hang around and roam the village and talk about Mana's heritage it was more than fine with her.

"The reason why I say this about your heritage is that your skin color and your hair, your eyes and your entire face look slightly too exotic to be from around this place." Guru started describing his mighty theory, "I've travelled all around the world and I found out that people all around have different traits. People in the northern parts like the Snow Country or the northern Kumogakure wastelands, northern Earth Country especially tend to be very tall, bulky and strong. People from Kumogakure tend to have dark or darkened skins, they're either very bulky or very slim and lean. People from the Wind Country have slightly more squinted eyes, no doubt to better protect them from the constant raging sandstorms, they're also lean and smaller in size so that they didn't have to burn too much energy fighting the desert winds and storms."

Mana was interested in Guru Ayushi's suggestion that there was something more exotic about her origin. Other Academy students always did think she looked a bit weird and for children that meant that Mana was automatically out of the most popular circle, she still had friends and all, she just was rarely described as the etalon of beauty or attention. The girl was told by father that her mother was not from around and that was the cause of Mana's exotic looks but she never questioned that story at all or dug deeper into it. That was odd, it wasn't like Mana also despised her different heritage in any way…

"The thing is that if I had met you and had to guess, I couldn't even pin down an exact region you may be from. Your skin is of a darker shade than people from Konoha yet not dark enough to be from Kumo, not even if one of your parent was from Konohagakure. Your facial bone structure, namely your lips and cheeks also seem to be completely different from people of Kumogakure. You are also rather short and slim but not like people in the Earth Country. Your appearance is so strange to me that if I had to say I'd say you're descendant of one of the Sky Clans, just because you don't fit the description of any other clan I've seen…"

Mana got a little stumped by Ayushi description, normally a person would've been offended when they were put on a pedestal but the Guru did raise an interesting point and she was a bit curious as to what he exactly wanted to do with that theory.

"Wait? Sky Clans, you mean like the Fourth was the descendant of the Sky Clan? Can't I just be clanless?" Mana wondered, after all she belonged to no known clan which was a reason why very few people placed expectations on her in the Academy or outside. The thing was that all the best ninja were from one clan or the other, being a part of a clan granted one access to those crazy bloodline abilities or hidden technique only taught in those clans. Mana had none of those advantages so from her childhood she was looked at as cannon fodder, as a filler material in armies made to be led by someone from one of the elite clans.

The likes of Yamanaka had access to techniques that made one able to control one's mind, how was a genjutsu user supposed to compete with that? The Inuzuka clan and their kinship with ninja hounds made them become unmatched in terms of brute force, speed and sheer peeling power on the battlefield. The Aburame clan and their control of insects made them more amazing than most ordinary ninjutsu users could ever get as the insects were basically a living ninjutsu technique with a swarm mind of their own, fitting any use and capable of draining opponent of chakra completely. The Nara clan was able to completely lock any enemy strategies and were unmatched strategies, masters of displacement and diversions. The Hyuuga clan also made one impossible to compete with in terms of close quarter fighting.

One didn't even need to mention the likes of incredibly elite and rare clans like the Uchiha who were few and far in between each nation. A skilled Uchiha was more treasured and trained in a village than a Jinchuuriki carrying a Tailed Beast yet they were so rare that an Uchiha was usually too arrogant for their own good and died very early in their lives. The noble Kaguya who were all descendants of the Sky Clan, leftovers from the clansmen who moved back to the moon after the War of Earth and the Moon. The forbidden fruits of love based union between the Earth and the Moon people with abilities so amazing and fierce that they were treated as elite without even needing any training, just possessing their bloodline abilities. How could Mana, someone without a clan ever compete with all those families? While the girl did have complete and utter devotion to her cause, she never even for a moment placed herself amongst those elites nor did she even wish to, the title of "Strongest" was meaningless to her.

Guru shook his head in response to Mana's question. "Actually no ninja is completely clanless. Back when the First People split into groups and their society erupted into a civil war they each split into groups, each group grew with the bloodline of that group's patriarch, the strongest defined what that group's bloodline was, what blood their inheritors would carry. The First People split into clans, wandering the endless wilderness in a constant state of war against everything, eventually their elite and royal bloodline became less and less royal and elite and something happened, the First People changed and started becoming extinct, they were getting replaced by two lesser factions that they fathered – the Sky Clan and the Earth Clan. After the two were given the Earth and the Moon to watch over by the last of the First People, the Earth Clan still lived following the old ways, living in clans, only when the Settlement period began did the term "clanless" appear, a "clanless" person back then was someone with very vague family ties with some clan. In other words, even you have ties with a clan, just they may be traced very far back and the percentage of their bloodline in your blood is not enough for you to manifest it."

Mana thought for a while, did she really need that question answered? What did it matter if her ancestors were Yamanaka or Uchiha or whatever. She looked at Ayushi with a rather bland expression.

"I'm sorry, I just don't see the point of it all in that case, if solving this mystery would please you however, it is my mission to help you enjoy your stay. What do you have in mind in particular, how do you plan to find out about my heritage?" she asked.

Ayushi sighed, "Well, I used to have a technique to determine that, as a medical ninja I can diagnose irregularities in one's blood. Sometimes it helps one to determine the more extreme memberships of a clan, like the Kaguya have greater concentrations of iron in their blood, the Uchiha's blood structure is also very unique and they have an overdose of a certain protein. I really don't want to devolve into that however as I only use my old techniques if I have no other choice. You seem to be a girl who likes reading, else why would you know so much about history, what say you we hit the archives and check your heritage?" Ayushi grinned

Mana nodded, even if she still didn't understand why that interested Ayushi so much she went with it. Still, she had to admit that even the magician was getting a little curious about the entire thing. After all, what if she really did have ties with some weird clan way back, the little historian in her was a little excited. Not only because she was about to find out the truth behind her heritage, something that father and mother kept telling different stories about, but she also will get access to the Konohagakure archives that were usually pretty secretive about their information and only to be accessed by people with Hokage's permission, working there or people in a mission which requires information from them. Even so, who would ever deny someone like Guru Ayushi information? Mana followed the great Ayushi without uttering a word until they've come closer to the archive.

"So, what do you know about your origins? Maybe this whole little sidequest of ours is pointless?" Ayushi asked curiously.

"Well, father used to tell me that my mother had something to do with some traveling band of wandering ninja, that's pretty much as detailed as he got… Mother usually just said she was travelling around as a youth before settling down with father in Konoha, she never even mentioned the "wandering ninja" and seemed pretty sensitive about the subject, my mother is pretty hot-blooded and when she's sensitive about something everyone around her is in danger so I never poked any deeper… I just accepted that it's nothing special and moved on."

Ayushi carefully listened to young Mana's words and nodded, "Very well then, may this be my reward for refusing to help, or rather doom, your father and hurting your kind young heart. I shall find the secret of your origin for you and even if there's no secret to it. I could swear that you're so interesting, your hair are dark and messy enough to remind me of Uchiha yet you would've already woken up the Sharingan by now if you were, your skin suggests that you may be from one of Kumogakure's clans, Arashi perhaps? Let's just say you sparked the interest of the medical ninja in me…"

Mana shrugged, "As long as you don't start dissecting me, I'm up for some research" she joked hoping that Guru didn't take it as a suggestion.

Ayushi laughed out, "Truth be told had I been a medical ninja still that would've been what I'd have suggested. I can keep people sedated and alive during similar procedures and it had a perfect success ratio, also it wouldn't have even left a scar after… Sorry, old habits, back during the war they had me harvesting bloodlines so some of my jokes may be a bit dark" he returned the joke back.

Mana did start feeling a bit creeped out by the man but she realized that this was a man who had helped her out greatly and only had the kindest intentions in his heart, also a man who had been through a lot in his life and was a relic of times where things were greatly different and people didn't casually joke about dissecting other people.

"Well then I'm lucky that you left it all behind then…" the magician played it off as a joke as the two entered the archive building.

"Part of why I left it too, the more masterful you become at intricacies of surgery and the medical field the less ethical some of the practices look. Even when you extract sickness from a person on a cellular level it still feels horrible sometimes… Even now there are very few ethical lines for the medical ninja, something I was reminded of when those vultures asked you to talk to me about those cells." Ayushi's eyes changed to very serious and almost angry right before switching back to his usual carefree bliss.

"Now then, let's begin our search!" he clapped as he approached the ninja observing the entrants to the archive to have a talk with him.


	72. Where Magician Babies Come From

Mana could barely even believe what was going on, while the actual events and actions they were going to see and do were quite ordinary, at least for anyone with access to the archives, the goal of such discoveries and the prospect of them happening did continue to scare her. What if Guru found some impossible connection to some rare clan, what if she found out that she had some super amazing ability hidden inside of her, what if Mana would find out that she wasn't actually the child of her parents? That would undoubtedly have caused more pain, not made up for the pain caused by Ayushi's honesty previously.

"Hello there, young Sir." Ayushi spoke up interacting with the slightly aged gentleman in charge of watching the archives, the man looked like he could've used some sleep as his half greyed out hair were messy and his striped black and white shirt was covered with wrinkles and one of his suspenders was on the edge of slipping off.

"I'd argue about the "young" part but you're quite welcome to the archives if you have permission to be here, how can I help?" the man answered, he didn't appear to be affected by Ayushi's presence whatsoever, perhaps so because he too believed the man to be some prank pulling teen who transformed into a world known celebrity the picture of whom he found in some textbook of his.

"Well when you can recall the War of the Moon and the Earth going on when you were in your cradle with your mother covering your puny and weak baby body with her exhausted motherly figure so that the Moon which was about to crash into the Earth didn't crush you, you'd reevaluate that argument..." Ayushi joked grabbing his belly in laughter. Judging from the look of the archive worker, the man was beginning to piece things together.

"Wait... Did you say the War of the... Holy crap, you're actually him, aren't you!" the man exclaimed jumping up so quickly that his geeky glasses almost fell off. Ayushi giggled like a little girl into his fist.

"Sadly I am, I'd be someone else if given the choice and wouldn't have to shoulder all those desperate cries of people who refuse to rely on their own strength or strength of the new generation, asking that I solve all their problems instead... Sorry, I babble sometimes, yes, I am me, in that much I am sure, although now when I say that... Who am I as a person and who are you? How do we..."

Mana slowly crept up to the man and gently pulled on his rag. Ayushi got the clue and stopped talking giggling again into his fist. While the man appeared to be acting like a schoolgirl placed in an old man's body by some mind replacement jutsu, for a moment Mana did admire the size of his fist, the great Guru probably could've punched out a horse with that effortlessly...

The magician nodded her head with a respectful bow in front of the archive worker and gestured at Ayushi. "The great Guru Ayushi would like to explore the archives, there is a question that plagues his wise mind, one that could be answered if permission to enter the archives was granted" she explained.

The archive keeper didn't appear overly fond of the request. The man carelessly fixed his glasses and reached below the table, reaching for a weapon without a doubt. It didn't seem like he wished to start a fight, he must've just felt defensive when cornered by a ninja and someone posing, quite skillfully, as Guru Ayushi. No! The man lunged out leaping over the table slashing at Mana with giant scissors, he wielded two sets in each hand, one was sent Mana's way quite carelessly, just to cut her and show her that this was serious business, the other one opened up to straight up cut Ayushi's head off.

Mana leaped back avoiding the strike, she wasn't expecting it but the man didn't mean to hit her that hard so it helped. She removed a kunai knife from her weapon pouch and got ready to block any follow up attacks. The archive man's scissor blades snapped together driving the blades deep into Ayushi's neck and sending streams of blood down the man's neck. The girl was standing there speechless, as the blood of the holy man dripped on the ancient carpet she was shaking in disbelief. How the mission could have gone so wrong, how could she have failed it so badly? Where did this even come from!? The archive keeper just snapped out of nowhere!

"Who do you think you're kidding, Konoha's Sorceress, do you think I don't know of your team's stunt in the Police Force?" the keeper smiled sadistically at her as he clenched the blades again sending more blood from Ayushi's neck onto the floor. "After that thing the three of you delinquents pulled, did you honestly think I'd let you in with some loser? Do you even know what's contained within these walls? All the information on Konohagakure that one might need: names, addresses, histories, intel on all missions ever done in this village. You silly child, it was your head I should've snipped off!"

Ayushi smiled breaking the archive man's concentration.

"Please, this is all just a big misunderstanding" the man laughed out stuffing a fist into the end of the scissor blades and pushing it further, initially blood shot out from Ayushi's knuckle but then the scissor set just broke into two blades with a loud clang and the entire thing fell onto the floor. "I assumed you'd be this protective over the archive right after the Kage Summit but I hope you won't be mad for the carpet. I decided not to avoid your attack because it could not possibly hurt me, also it would undoubtedly convince you that I am the real thing."

The scissor wielding keeper backed off and walked right behind the counter. Mana was still shaking in shock and surprise but Ayushi gave her a thumb off, "Don't worry, young Mana, your mission is not affected by this at all, I've been cut and stabbed and burnt so many times that pain doesn't even affect me anymore, my satisfaction with my stay has not decreased in any way, not unless you want to call this sidequest of ours off, that is." As he spoke the giant wounds on his neck closed in almost instantly.

The young ninja magician tried her best to regain composure and nodded, the archive keeper sighed and put his signature on a permission to access the archive letting Ayushi and Mana in. As the two entered the first floor archive hall and witnessed the vast storage of scrolls inside the girl could feel Ayushi's breath by her ear, she gently leaned to his side.

"Did you see that?"

"Yes, I felt like killing myself in shame when you got hurt, please do not pull this ever again, Ayushi-san" Mana whispered slightly louder than she'd have wanted making the archive keeper bang on the glass of the door with his steel scissors again.

"Not that, I was talking about the reaction of the archive keeper, that was not the kind of reaction we got from the Police Force, was it?" the Guru reminded Mana of the difference in protection in the two buildings, after finally realizing just what the Guru meant the girl nodded.

"Why do you think that was?" Ayushi tried to provoke some strange process of thought within the girl, Mana scratched her cheek and wiped a strand of hair out of her way.

"Well, I think that the village values information more than people. After all, at this day and age leak of information would cause deaths of many, one escaped prisoner means little compared to that." Mana theorized.

"Correct, do you think that is right?" the man asked to which Mana reacted by violently shaking her head almost instantly.

"No! A person's life is worth an infinite number of scrolls with information for me, it is the most expensive thing in the world and I'd never choose any kind of information over a person's life."

"Even if it cost the lives of many? Say it was the password from the cell of a criminal who had the Tailed Beast sealed into him, escape of that man means an attack against Konoha by a Jinchuuriki and then a Tailed Beast being unleashed when he dies, what would your choice be then?" the Guru tried to provoke Mana again and again but the girl still shook her head, albeit in a much more controlled and restrained manner.

"Even still, I'd save the life of the person I'd be saving and then fight that criminal and the Tailed Beast myself, I'd sacrifice my life before I'd let anyone die. If that criminal killed anyone I'd just blame myself because it was my responsibility to stop him as the person who chose to protect the life instead of information."

Ayushi smiled and facepalmed himself, he wasn't disappointed or sad, his expression looked happy as he smiled with the full extent of his abilities.

"My, my, you're just a spectacular and unusual piece of work... You've almost sold me over to your cause with those speeches of yours, you know." The man complimented Mana's vocal abilities as the two proceeded to walk further down into the archive.

Ayushi was spending entire hours researching scrolls, Mana thought that she was a history fan but even she couldn't understand how he could just keep going like that. She even found some scrolls of herself to run through just to pass time. She kept in her mind about what she heard Ayushi say – he was just a child during the War of the Earth and Moon. That meant that he was alive when Princess Satsuhimasa destroyed the Moon, if that legend was true. He saw the Earth covered with whatever punishment the First People had in store for the clan that broke the peace between the two, he even grew up in those times, could that have been the secret behind the man's incredible vitality?

This was straight out insane! Why would a man like that, someone who lived in the period when the most powerful ninja could destroy and reshape entire moons as they saw fit, the period when the Tailed Beasts were created and tamed by ninja, be interested in her? Why would a man like that spend time researching the history of some nobody with no hopes of being somebody like Mana? Could he really have believed that Mana was ever destined for something more than nothing at all? What reasons did he have to believe that she had anything to claim from this world based on her legacy?

Mana's thoughts of self-doubt made her a little sad, she peeked at the man being completely absorbed into his research. Sometimes he turned back at her and asked her something like the names of her parents and things like that but some things even Mana herself could not tell. She didn't know the names of her grandparents, both father's and mother's side. She didn't know much about any other relatives besides her parents, she recalled father saying that his brother died early in his ninja life long ago, first mission outside the village, in fact.

No, Ayushi's research and his claims were preposterous, how could she, of all people have been someone special? An Uchiha or a Kaguya, her? No way! Mana was just Mana, she could never have been anything more than that. The girl stood up and slowly walked up to Ayushi, looking over his search. He was reading a scroll in some language she could barely even recognize, the whole world spoke one language – a heavily modified version of the language that the First People spoke in. There were different dialects of this language in between different historic periods and so sometimes it was almost impossible to read them without a translation scroll. This could've been one of those occasions but why was he reading into so long ago? Either her roots were so celestial that they reached into ages ago, or Ayushi couldn't find any clan roots in Mana even in that period, that last thought made Mana especially sad. One thing was being told she was nothing special, the entirely other was have it be confirmed that she was so much of nothing that one had to tread into the times of the First People to even grasp at straws of something special in her... This quest was a bad idea.

The girl crept back and dropped into her chair, she covered her head and let her wild hair flow freely covering her face in darkness. Poor Mana could hear her own troubled and sad breathing. What a foolish girl she was, ever thinking she could've been some princess or a descendant of some special clan or a family... Mana wanted to slap herself so hard that she'd return to reality, trying to force the violent and sad thoughts away the girl just returned to her scroll and started run over it one more time. Time just flew by like that...

"I think I've got the entire story..." Ayushi leaned back in his chair, he was really tired, it was seen in his face. Even his several ages old forty year old body looked wrinkled and worn out by all that running around looking for the right scroll, climbing the ladder to pick it up and all that reading. Mana slowly picked herself off the chair, whatever Ayushi would have said would've just crushed her dreams, both knowing that her parents adopted her and that she was just an ordinary good for nothing kid were equally depressing things to think about.

"Lay it on me, then, Ayushi-san" Mana uttered with a tired and still a little depressed voice.

The man looked pretty happy by his discovery, he laughed out and relaxed into his chair. "Well, I think it's the best answer for you, you'll really be most happy to hear it... First of all, you're the child of your parents, that much is for sure, you're not some princess or an heiress of a clan adopted into an ordinary family to learn humility, truth be told you have no royal blood in you whatsoever. Also, technically you are completely clanless, completely as if in one hundred percent."

Mana shook her head, her stare was both confused and a bit annoyed, "Wait a second, I thought that was impossible..." she grunted out in a voice completely taken over by exhaustion and irritation.

"So have I, apparently there is a way to be completely clanless, that's to be a descendant of a clan that is not technically a clan. When is a clan not a clan, young Mana?" Ayushi kept poking at Mana and trying to provoke her interest even if the whole time he was the only one excited by it all.

"When it completely rejects all the principles of a ninja clan: it does not cross-breed with the other branches of the clan or inbreed, it does not cultivate ninja, it does not teach them any secret techniques nor does it have any bloodlines, a clan one can be a part of not only by being born into it but also being accepted into it." Ayushi kept waving his arms like a child who had just been bought his favorite toy by his mother. He apparently made the discovery of the century and suddenly the historian within Mana's heart also started hammering at her indifferent and depressed façade with a pickaxe of emotion and confusion.

"Wait... What? There was a clan like that?" Mana asked in complete disbelief to which Ayushi energetically nodded in agreement.

"Just to be sure, could you tell me how you graduated the Academy?" Ayushi asked Mana, the girl sighed, she wasn't a fan of talking about that story, mostly she just remembered it and then just instantly placed it below layers of other memories.

"Well, as a little child... Fine... Even now, I really dislike using techniques that I did not invent myself. I dunno, it just feels like... Like I'm taking someone's heart away. Someone put parts of themselves, their own feelings and thoughts into those techniques, they told their own history about the friends they had, enemies they faced into those techniques and I could never even hope to understand those feelings, how could I ever use such techniques without understanding that sort of thing?" Ayushi shrieked like a little girl, honestly, seeing a grown man act like that shaking his hands and shrieking in joy made the magician laugh a little.

"So naturally this would've been a problem in the Academy, the graduation test and a very important part of the Academy's curriculum is mastering and using the textbook Academy techniques to their maximum potential. I just refused to do that, even during the early mock exams, so the other teachers said that I was a pathetic loser and a silly excuse of a ninja and that they'd fail me every time and that I should just give up..."

Mana scratched her eyes, she really thought that she'd cry at least a little having remembered all those memories, all those words and angry faces shouting at her. It definitely made her cry as a child, little Mana scratched her eyes until they started bleeding from wiping her childish tears. Father and mother kept telling her to just give up as well, they said that it wasn't wrong believing what Mana believed and that it was OK to not be a ninja because of those beliefs. Still, even knowing well she'd fail little Mana kept showing up in one mock exam after another, getting yelled at and having the other students laugh at her.

"One day the sensei in Academy found me meditating on the swings, just sitting on them in perfect balance, completely snoozed off. The man was really impressed by the spiritual depth of such powerful meditation mastery of a child of such a young age, he asked me to show some ninjutsu to him, any ninjutsu at all and so I showed him the techniques I invented myself as a kid. He was blown away knowing that a kid invented ninjutsu techniques all by herself even if they were pretty much harmless. He passed me during my exam just because I showed him any of the techniques I've invented. The only condition of his was that I'd actually learn the techniques I was meant to know, just in case I'd need them to save my life some day and if I'd reconsidered in that case."

Ayushi smiled, "I see" he noted. "This belief is native to a very special but also very... Ordinary clan of ninja – "the Wandering Ninja"."

"Wandering ninja?" Mana leaned her head to the side as the name confused her, all ninja had villages, there could've been no other kind of ninja. All samurai had masters, those without masters were known as Ronin, they were romanticized but usually not overly respected in a professional environment. Ninja without a village were just straight out rogues or nukenin. Rogues could've been killed by anyone at any moment, just being a rogue was a crime punishable by death. There could've never been such a thing as a "Wandering ninja", they would've automatically been labeled rogue and killed on the spot.

"Yes, they were descendants of the First Men just like all the other ninja but they never joined any of the ninja villages. You see, after the War of the Clans the people decided to settle down, live safer by living in a bunch sparking what was known as the Settlement period. That was the time when clans united and formed villages. Some ninja like the ancestors of the wandering ninja decided that uniting and the advantage of not being in a state of constant survival environment was just not worth total subjugation, they loved their freedom more than their lives."

The young magician still could not believe that, something like that sounded too crazy to have ever been true or taken as true by anyone. Someone like Guru Ayushi couldn't have possibly believed in that, right?

"Initially what happened mirrored your first thoughts of what'd happen, by refusing to ally with any of the villages these wandering ninja became enemies of all of the villages and have been hunted down for decades just like the rogues. Their ranks started to thin, the mass genocide of their kind proved as a further motivator for ninja to finally pick a side. Then the genius solution came for the wandering ninja – learn to entertain. And so the wandering ninja became perfect dancers, gamblers, salesmen, singers and entertainers of all kinds. They travelled the world visiting a village after village, some of them were just plain con artists, most were actually good entertainers with exceptional heart for business. Explains why your mother is so amazing at managing her café, even if she did trade the ragged clothes of a wanderer into a suit. Wandering ninja were roamers, they adapted and survived. That also explains your exceptional skill at stage magic that all those posters around the village praise so much." Ayushi finally concluded.

Mana wasn't sure about what to even think about it. She had heard some similar stories from her father, something about wandering tribes of ninja but it never went into too much detail. There must've been some painful stories about that. A smile covered Mana's pretty childish face for the first time in a while that day. Rain started pounding quietly but relentlessly into the windows from outside as the night caught the two unprepared. The girl stood up and made a small lap around the table she was sitting near.

"So... My people, can I maybe meet them some day?" she asked with excitement, Ayushi sighed.

"It's a long story but I'll try to sum it up soon. Your story about you being so original with your craft, it actually mirrors the beliefs of the people, your exotic skin and facial structure matches the story too – wandering ninja accepted people from all around into their midst, as long as they had dismissed all previous ties, the dark skinned giants of Kumo procreated with all sorts of people, even some Uchiha rejects which I why your hair looks so much like theirs, making a unique race with no bloodline, that's why you looked so unusual to me. You're not an alien or anything, you're just a mixture of what's best features of several people."

Mana shook her head energetically, "No, I don't care about that, tell me more about my people, where are they now!?" she yelled out, the archive keeper must've been long gone as he didn't really care about the noise she made.

"Well... There's really no other way, I'll tell the whole story to you, the whole story of your conception and the events that lead to it... So it all began from a visit, the Wandering ninja came to Konoha, the timing was a little odd as the Fire Lord himself appeared to have decided to visit his strongest land. Naturally there was tension between the Fire Lord and the Wandering ninja as they obeyed no master and the Feudal Lords are the masters of all ninja, even now. As the wandering ninja did their thing, played with the local kids, gambled, danced and sung in the streets the councilmen of Konoha decided to get onto the Fire Lord's good side... He decided to eliminate all of the Wandering ninja. He sent a young genin – a man who would eventually become your father to spy on them, they then staged a murder right in front of your father's eyes making him report that the Wandering ninja killed and robbed a villager of their money. With the Fire Lord already quite tense about those guys the decree was passed, no one really would've cared or missed ninja that belonged to no one..."

Mana kept listening, from Ayushi's tone she already knew that this was not a happy story, she already knew where it was headed just because the man was so persistent to tell her the whole story. She was visibly becoming sadder and sadder.

"Well the hit happened, all of the wandering ninja were slaughtered, they were great tricksters and entertainers but they fared not too well in combat against trained ninja who got the drop onto them. Only one young girl survived, that girl was taken into your father's family, the two then married. Since she adapted to the village life and never tried to recreate her old life, band the new wandering ninja, the village just left your mother alone. I believe you already know the remaining history, you lived it yourself..."

Mana and Ayushi stayed quiet. Knowing that she actually had special blood, blood of the wandering ninja, the world's most beloved entertainers, dancers and singers, the most freedom loving people in the world. That actually calmed Mana's heart, she was special, she was special because there was very little but her pride in her heritage that made her special. Her belief came from nowhere else but her heart, it wasn't her clan mentality that made Mana into who she was, it was her own free decision and maybe it was the blood of the wandering ninja speaking but... Mana loved that, that she was made and defined by that freedom, by being who she wanted to be, the magician actually honored the legacy of her people and with the blood still in her veins she had their legacy in her hands. Her people went extinct, sure, but they never were so much into being pure blood maniacs anyways. In a way Mana was still royalty, her mother's own little princess, the last survivor, last half-blood of her people who carried within them the blood of all the united countries of the world.

Mana's ancestors had no relation to a village, they went above that, ideals to them spoke higher and were more important than any village. A village was but an establishment and ideals went higher than that. Knowing her roots made many changes. All of a sudden knowing that there was nothing special about her but at the same time knowing that she was unique in her own beloved way made Mana feel greater than the village, greater than everyone else. Her children would be the inheritors of that will of freedom, that belief that one's own mind and decisions, one's freedom was above any authority and beyond their reach and for that the girl thanked her mother and her people. Even if they weren't any elites of the ninja world, more like the rejects, Mana still thought that they were the best tribe she could've hailed from, Ayushi was right – she really did get the best possible answer!

Guru looked outside and stood up, stretching his neck. "Well then, now that we've got that out of the way, I suppose we can head for the hotel? Tomorrow will be my final day here, the people aren't as affected by the death of the Kage as I've thought they were, now I am needed most in Kirigakure where the major reforms are taking place. You, young girl, were the only thing of interest in this village at the moment with the seminar out of the way." Ayushi's hand pet Mana, he tried not to come off as rude so he didn't keep his hand on the top of her head for too long. Mana put her jacket back on as well as her hat, the great Guru Ayushi turned off the lights as the two left the archives. After the two left the building Mana heard a large lock clanging signaling the archives being locked up.

Her origins were known now, it was a gift from Guru Ayushi and what a gift it was!


	73. Psychosis

The rain had already pretty much died out when Mana and Ayushi left into the streets of the village, leaving the archive behind. The magician wasn't sure if her guest felt the same way, but she definitely felt like she left the archive a much happier and more complete person than she entered. The prospect of being some long forgotten heir to some clan, having some amazing larger than life ability, maybe more exactly the knowledge that she couldn't be one of those people, the reminder of that fact was what plagued the girl when entering. Now all those thoughts were behind her.

Mana still felt some inferiority over that fact, the fact that most students in the Academy were special. Usually the people who enrolled to be ninja were the descendants of clan members, they really had very little choice in the matter. When one's father was a famed Inuzuka hound master, known for his prodigious skill in the clan's techniques it was pretty much expected for one to be able to follow up on one's parents' legacy. There was much pressure but also clarity and hope. While one was pressured into joining the Academy and becoming a ninja, because of their clan member status they were looked as if they were already elite in the making by default.

On the other hand the clanless children were looked down on, they had all the other jobs to choose from. They'd bring shame to no one if they chose the profession of a baker, florist, vendor owner etc. They could've made perfect janitors or caravan runners. The only place for a clanless ninja in the battlefield was to either make the casualty statistic, to make the bravery of the elite sound even greater and more built on blood and flesh than it actually was, or to become one of the countless filler ninja in the armies. Become a grey mouse, a page in a large novel, no, an entire address book. Pages to be torn away when a cruel reader became mad and started peeling away at their book, as the Feudal Lords sent their ninja to die on meaningless assignments.

To say that Mana had different treatment in the Academy was to flat out lie, no one ever expected great things from her, they didn't, nor do they have now, the reason to. She was born to a family of an average ninja, with greater than average reputation, and an owner of a café. Honestly her best bet for a profession would've been to inherit her mother's business, she had no place in the ninja world, then there were her magic shows in which it was safe to say the girl was largely successful in. What point was it for her to be a ninja, most kids and teachers looked at Mana as a showoff, as someone who would back out at the first sign of pain, trouble and blood in her sight. On the other hand that was what made the teachers praise her more when she actually did something right, when no one expected one to succeed, they were only more surprised when they actually did so.

"Fantastic, just outright spectacular, astonishing!" Guru Ayushi kept shouting out looking around at the glowing nocturnal Konoha. Neon signs were a rather recent invention, apparently there was a ninja somewhere in Kirigakure that could use some sort of poisonous gas that when ignited glowed at a very bright and visually appealing light. It was just what Mana always wanted to see, the amazing abilities of ninja put to other sort of use, ninjutsu couldn't have been purely a tool of murder, it was what the user made it do that defined it. Everyone's ninjutsu was different, different by the actions that were done using it.

Mana couldn't help but smile, on one hand she was admiring the remains of the intense rain on the ground and the raindrops barely hanging off of the various surfaces, on the other she couldn't have enough of Ayushi's reaction to things. He acted and looked like a child who had seen a train for the first time, so many things, so many gears, so many devices all working in unison. Similarly to that kid, Ayushi was impressed by so many different artificial lights brightening up the nocturnal village and making it look so majestic and almost divine, in a sense.

"So do you wish to walk around and buy something or do you wish to head back to the hotel? You've been so active today, Guru-san, I'm sure you wish to get some rest." Mana tried to keep up with the Guru who was just running around, people all parted to make space for the man but they always banded together when Mana had to pass making her need to excuse herself to pass every time.

Guru soon returned with numerous large flasks of sake and a lovely purple umbrella on a bamboo stick. It looked rather traditional and it couldn't have been too cheap, the strange thing was that Mana could have probably made one just like that herself if she had the appropriate cloth. These craftsmen must've been making a fortune in this world where all everyone knew how to do was fight, without these men this world would've been lost, all those simple pleasures of life would've been lost and even the meanest fighters had something they loved most of all and needed the craftsmen for: some loved smoking, that needed someone to make their cigarettes out of God knew what, also the various fancy lighters that most ninja used, some loved to just sit down and rest, they needed all sorts of bedroom things to enjoy that simple pleasure. Fighting was overrated, an ancient and needless, also very underpaid and risky craft. One could've made their life making umbrellas instead…

"I don't have too much money, I think I'll just make do with these! Come on, let's go back to the hotel!" he cheered after taking a sip from one of the flasks right on the street.

Mana tapped her leg angrily, "You shouldn't be drinking, you know, this is a public spot and drinking is one of the ninja vices…"

Guru laughed with a full mouth making some sake leak out all over his beard and down his hairy and bulky chest.

"Hah, that's the best part, I'm not a ninja anymore! I thought as a descendant of the most freedom loving people to ever walk this Earth you'd appreciate a man doing what he wants. Don't worry, I won't share any, you're WAY too young for that, what are you… Thirteen, fourteen?"

"Twelve and a half, doesn't matter, let's go to the hotel, it may not be best for you to be seen drinking like that!" Mana smiled dragging Ayushi gently by his elbow to the hotel room.

"Heh, girls always look older than they actually are, experience says… Anyways, it's fine, I told you I can't even get drunk, technically it's not even drinking, it's like I'd be sipping water…" Ayushi laughed out like a beast again, his laughter roaring wildly through the crowd. Mana had seen father and his friends drink before, they sipped that thing, just barely let it touch their lips, none of them usually finished more than two or three of those small cups.

"You're not sipping, you're gulping, quite intensively I must say." Mana tried to contain her laughter inside, Ayushi getting drunk worked so weird, he got drunk for just a single moment – his voice started dragging and slowed down, he became softer and his eyes closed up, his smile twisted his entire face and he blushed. Then it all went away in just a moment and his entire body returned to how it was. It looked just so silly and stupid, Ayushi must've only felt the dizziness for just a moment making him want to get drunk more and more just to experience that feeling. For a man who couldn't feel almost getting his head snipped off, Mana couldn't blame him for wanting to feel something…

"Let's go, it's not too far away." Mana kept calmly encouraging the drunk-then-not-drunk-anymore Ayushi to stagger-walk back to the hotel.

If Mana thought Ayushi's drinking habit was weird before, it really got out of control when he didn't need to worry about walking, the man just dropped onto his butt crossing his legs and started cleaning one flask after the other, tossing them aside and letting the small wooden containers roll further away. He must've really longed that feeling, the feeling of being vulnerable and dizzy, the feeling of some sort of happiness and carelessness. Mana wanted to be strict on his drinking but she just couldn't. This was a man who had the entire world asking him for answers, now that he had answered all he was asked, didn't he have the right to relax the way he saw fit?

"You know what…" Ayushi started slurring slightly, his speech dragged on, he started speaking slowly and omitting words. "I've lived for so long with little to no activity, always talking excuses and… Oh… Alright…" Ayushi's speech fixed itself from the last flask of sake being emptied. Any living man would've undoubtedly been either dead or about to be from the excessive amount of alcohol consumed in such a short span of time.

"I mean, so many people came to me for help, they kept begging me to kill this tyrant or do this heroic deed and I kept denying their requests, offer other kinds of help. Gather monetary support for their villages and offer spiritual guidance. Meeting you made me wonder… Maybe your way, the little more hands-on approach was actually better. What if instead of gifting monetary support, which got plundered by the same tyrant I tried to help them recover from anyways, I just stood by their side and used intimidation to repel his forces? What if instead of cowering behind my retirement I used my medical skills again to save lives, to create medication that'd eliminate and heal pain? What if I learned how to degenerate my own cells to the state where donating them could actually help people instead of killing them faster?"

Ayushi downed whole other flask of sake down his throat and tossed the flask aside. "Makes one wonder, huh?" he slurred out again.

Mana wasn't entirely sure just what Ayushi was getting to, just which part of this was his drunken delirium and what was actually his intention? Could her conviction to her cause actually cause the man to reconsider on his centuries old vow to remain passive and neutral and distant from all conflicts and problems of the world? How could it have been so? Mana wanted to tell him that he shouldn't take her ideas too seriously but… What if he did do what he spoke of? What if he did cure pain and sickness and people could get his cell treatment finally? What an amazing dream of a world would that be? Ayushi's authority could stop wars, his panaceas could cure sickness and unhappiness, his unseen prowess in the medical field could bring back the recently dead and even grant children for those who cannot conceive them. This man just wondered if he should make the world perfect and Mana was about to keep him wondering.

"I think it'd be selfish of you not to do so…" Mana uttered the words which she instantly regretted and slapped her own lips for uttering. The girl stood up and turned around, bolting out of the room and shutting the door, locking it behind herself. Her heart was thumping and her chest was jumping up and down from the intense and stressed breathing. How could she have said that? It was selfish of her to wish anything of the sort to be done. Mana slowly unlocked and entered the room, she was careful, a single word or a bad stare from Ayushi would've sent her back but he didn't do any of those things.

"So you've decided to watch over me while I rest? Thank you, young Mana, I will certainly feel safer this way. I think you're right, it would be selfish of me not to use all of my gifts to benefit humanity, the Guru Ayushi that will leave Konoha tomorrow will be a whole new Guru Ayushi. I shall create a better world encouraged by a brave and lovely young lady in Konoha. What a wonderful future for our world…" Ayushi slurred and then recovered again, sitting onto his bed and slipping his cloth off of his chest, the man kept his ragged pants on and fell asleep almost instantly. He must've been really tired with all those seminars and walking around the village and researching Mana's history after all…

Mana carefully settled down on the floor by the door, she made sure to shut the windows and set some wires, hooking them up to fragile objects. If anyone tried to apply pressure onto the window, the fragile objects would've fallen down and broken, something like that would wake Mana up. Wire trapping was quite common among ninja, it would've worked against the more common ways of entering through the closed window like cutting out the glass or trying to open it from the other side but if a strong wind blew against it nothing would've happened.

Slowly Mana blacked out and slipped to sleep, she was just as tired as Ayushi was, chasing after Sugemi last night and barely having any sleep at all after that. All the roaming and worrying over her friends and the Guru also tired her out. While Guru shouldn't have been in any danger she protected him like he needed constant surveillance her protection. Mana's standards were just that high, now that her team was disbanded she had to make sure to do her best, to prove to Hokage that the decision to not suspend or strip her rank of ninja away was the right one. Suddenly thoughts started feeling murky and the girl's mind drifted off into the black void of slumber…

Heat. Smoke. Mana's eyes shot wide open only to reveal her own worst nightmare realized. Guru Ayushi was covered in flames completely blacked out, the whole room was filled with smoke and she started coughing almost instantly after returning to consciousness. It took the magician a moment to realize that everything that she was seeing was actually real, that it wasn't a dream or an illusion but it was painfully real. She could feel her body starting to drift away and feel weak and sleepy from the smoke. The need to move hit her head in an instant, the pain in her thighs was meaningless, Mana fought through it forcing her body up. The girl weaved a couple of handseals shooting a burst of wind chakra from her palms shooting her body up onto the air, she stopped breathing – the highest parts of the floor were where the smoke was the thickest.

Mana leaped over the wall of flames, while in mid-air the ninja tossed a kunai knife to the side, she heard the window break and the wires pulling a vase down. That meant that the windows weren't trifled with, Mana had her back against the door and would've been woken up upon it being pushed, how could this have happened?! Mana shot more air currents from her palm to force the flames aside for just a moment in which she landed and grabbed onto Ayushi's ragged pants. Mana aimed her palms at the wall, she had just one try to make this jump just right, anything less than perfect will kill both her and Ayushi and she had no time to hesitate or do this any different way – the smoke was slowly killing her, she could feel it.

Mad burst of chakra sent air currents that bashed into both the bed and the wall, once again splitting the fire apart and shooting Mana's body off of where she and Ayushi were. The two were propelled to the window. The girl shouted out in pain as she felt painful sensations over multiple spots on her body – she didn't make it perfect enough, she and Ayushi still got cut up by some glass. Desperate not to lose consciousness Mana shot out the final gust of wind chakra to cushion their fall. She still hit the ground pretty hard, the girl heard her clothes tearing and felt some gravel and stone etching into her body, the cuts were bleeding and the dirt that got into those wounds burned. Still, pain was the only thing that reminded her that she was still alive, dead people felt no pain. The magician peeked at Ayushi, his body appeared to have no more flames on it after the secondary burst of wind from Mana, still, he looked bad. His body was almost completely charred. Mana messed up…

The girl kept scratching at her wounds angrily, as if she wanted to open them, wanted to punish herself and bleed out in the hospital waiting room. How could that have happened? The room was completely safe, everything was done according to the procedure as taught in the Academy, where could the fire have come from? There were no gas leaks, this was a classical hotel, it had no gas lines going through or below it. From what the magician had heard Ayushi's was the only room that was set ablaze. None of this made any sense whatsoever. She messed up, she's such a loser! The Fifth made a huge mistake, she should've kept Sugemi and Shimo but dismissed Mana. Ironically enough, as much of a crybaby as Mana was, she didn't cry a single tear. This was too absurd and she was too tired to even cry.

She was officially the worst ninja in existence, she wasn't sure who took the second place but she beat that person by a longshot. How could anyone come close to her idiocy, the world's most famous figure, loved by all, the world's spiritual leader almost died on her watch. The girl shouted out in frustration and punched the wall, she cried out in pain as she drove some small shards of glass deeper into her palm, crying from pain Mana removed them, the medical ninja that healed her before must've missed those. For all people to burn that night, it was Mana that should've burned, she felt so embarrassed that she was about to burst aflame at that moment.

Two ninja walked out, one of them must've been a student as he couldn't have been much older than in his mid-twenties, that was the age when medical ninja usually start working on actual surgeries and treating actual people. The other one looked like a seasoned medical ninja. The younger one walked up to Mana and shook his head.

"I'm sorry, Mana-chan, we did what we could but his body is burnt to the point where anyone else would have died. We kept him alive just to use parts of him as his cells, technically now his cells are damaged enough to use them to heal people successfully" he spoke sadly, scratching his neck. It was clear that he was ashamed of himself to talk about a living being that way.

"If you woke him up… What if he healed himself?" Mana wondered, she was talking nonsense, she was not herself, the stress and fear for that man's life made her almost lose it completely.

The older ninja stepped in, "That's possible, he is Guru Ayushi after all but that would cause him so much pain it is just as likely that he'd just pass out, either that or die from pain. Who knows, everything we do is uncharted waters with this man. Think about it, the way he is now we can heal everyone, we can cure incurable diseases using his damaged cells, we can even heal your father back to how he was, he may even be a ninja again…"

Mana closed her eyes and grabbed covered her face, her whole body was shaking in fear and the fact that she didn't know what to do. No. She knew perfectly, she was Nakotsumi Mana, Konoha's Sorceress and she had no right to accept that offer. She'd screw herself and the people she loved but she'd do the right thing, she'd save the man's life even if it would have meant dying. "No… We wake him up. He'll heal himself, I…. I believe that he will."

"That's just stupid, Mana-chan!" the younger medical ninja shouted out, once again stepping in. "We've got no reason to believe it'd work, we'd just be torturing him by waking him up, if we kept him sleeping we could heal hundreds of hopeless patients every day!"

"It… It wouldn't be right, save Ayushi-san's life. At least try to…" Mana spoke even if her tongue flipped on an autopilot, she was completely dazed off, it all felt like the worst dream she had in her life, she just rejected her father's salvation just to get a chance to save one man's life. This happened on the same day that she asked that man to save her father's life and he said he couldn't. Mana was the worst daughter in the universe... Arguments could've been made for being the worst person alive.

"This is stupid, I won't let some insane brat…" the younger medical ninja started talking trying to storm back into the ward but the older medical ninja stopped him.

"This is unethical, completely immoral and gambling on a man's life, you're asking us to destroy a panacea just to do something which can kill the man, just because it has a slight chance of saving him. It's disgraceful and despicable, I approve of it." Mana would've been completely taken aback by this expression of the old ninja's opinion but it appeared that the younger one actually beat the girl by one second.

"No! You can't seriously be…" the younger medical ninja tried to stop the older one who was about to enter the ward where the stench of burnt flesh was spreading from.

"This girl is the Guru's bodyguard, for the duration of his stay in the village she is in charge of decisions like this. She's got the balls and lack of moral sense to try something as mad as this, I can respect that." the older ninja disappeared into the ward, unwittingly the younger one followed. Mana sat back down, she was shaking. She just confirmed her own worst fears, there was no line she wouldn't cross to save a life. Even if the person begged her to kill them, even if they were doomed to a life of pain. Ayushi recognized that darkness in her heart long ago… A pitiful and selfish being like Mana shouldn't have ever been born…

A deafening shout of pain, one that froze entire bodies and hearts of everyone who could've heard it echoed through the entire hospital. Even Guru Ayushi who was hurt in every way possible shouted from pain. There was nothing to be done to help him. Mana grabbed hold to her ears and pressed her own hair so hard she thought she'd tear it off. All of a sudden the screams stopped, a minute later the completely shocked younger ninja walked out, he placed his hand on Mana's shoulder and gently tried to force her into the ward. The magician didn't even resist it, she despised herself more than anything in the world at that moment.

Mana closed her eyes, she was afraid to face what she had done, a gentle "It's okay, you can look" snapped her out from her despair. The body that greet Mana's eyes was a completely healthy and sleeping one. Guru Ayushi healed everything in an instant, his body healed itself subconsciously right when the body was woken up, Ayushi's new skin looked so pale and so soft. He had just grown it all from nothingness, strangely enough his whole build changed, the fire decimated his muscles and all the fat in his body. Now Ayushi looked slim, as if a baby who had just been born and has never trained a moment in his life. His body healed only the bare minimum of his muscular structure. This was a medical miracle, but the cost at which it was achieved scared the magician. She forced the man to be woken up, she didn't know nor did she ever assumed he'd be OK, she just wanted that his life would be saved. Somehow…

Ayushi peeled his eyes open, he smiled at Mana. "I believe a sign of gratitude is in order, you've just saved my life, young lady, while I've healed myself from much worse before, I needed my full consciousness to do so. I put myself to sleep consciously when the fire got really bad."

Mana looked the man right in the eyes, she was hit by a realization all of a sudden. There was no way for the fire to just happen out of nowhere, the windows were sealed, the doors were closed and Mana had all of the entries well protected. Furthermore no one in this world wanted to harm the man. Now that the girl finally saw the man's face without that fuzzy beard to cover him up, now that she saw his real face, all of his mimics. When she saw the man smile at her and speak to her… She realized something that made her doubt the reality of this dreamlike experience.

"You… You caused that fire, didn't you?" Mana uttered a single question.

Ayushi smiled and nodded. "I heard so much about your beliefs, I just wanted to see if what you told me is real, I wanted to see how deep your devotion to the ideals you spoke of went. If you were ready to cross the boundaries that no one else would cross, in other words, what were the limits of your conviction. Apparently there are none, that is good to know, I plan to embody your ideals and so not having any lines to get in the way will make me much more efficient at creating the perfect world. I can finally stop being selfish, just like you told me, young Mana."

Ayushi shrugged and pointed at all of the medical ninja, "Now, you can go home to your family, affirm your father that eventually I'll heal his injury, I'll heal all the injuries, all the sicknesses in the world, I'll even cure war. I'll relieve you of your duty, a duty which is unfit for such small shoulders of such a cute little girl. I'll fulfill your goal for you."

Mana walked up to Ayushi. "You could've killed both of us!" she told him staring the man right in the eyes.

"There was never such a danger, I could not have died even if the flames ran their course, eventually someone would've either cut off large enough chunks for me to grow myself from them anew, or would've woken me up, then I'd have reanimated you, success depending of course on how much time had passed…"

Mana staggered back, it was like she was talking to a whole another person. A person who adopted Mana's beliefs but just found out that there were no ethical or moral boundaries to stop them. Even worse, this man had so much power that he could have backed off his wild claims, unlike Mana to whom all of that was just a childish dream she swore her life to. The magician knew she'd fail eventually, that she'd die somewhere in the battlefield, alone and forgotten after failing to stop all war and violence. Ayushi could've actually made it happen. The magician's childish heart couldn't decide if she was supposed to be horrified or happy. At that moment she lingered on both. She wanted to shout out to Ayushi that all of it was just her stupid childish dream but she couldn't, she genuinely believed that naïve dream and she couldn't deny that even if she'd lie doing so.

The girl just collapsed on a chair nearby the man. He gently stroke her cheek with his new baby skin. "Oh, maybe it's too stuffy here, doctor, please open the window. Or better yet I should probably leave, after all, there's no point in me being here – I'm completely healed. Oh well, I'll leave in the morning."

The older medical ninja from before stepped closer to the Guru and objected.

"Silly doctor, you cannot stop me…" was Guru's only reply.


	74. Idiocy that'll Change the World

By the time Mana had woken up in the waiting room it was an early morning. She was surprised that she was allowed to just pass out waiting for a patient to recover like that. Almost instantly the magician jumped up and tried to peek into the ward where Ayushi was left in after the fire he had caused to test Mana. She had that silly reason in her mind even though she wasn't entirely sure why Ayushi had done that. He said that he wanted to make up for the pain that he had caused and yet he caused the most pain to her with that last stunt.

Truth be told, Mana was angry at Ayushi, not in a way that made her hate the man or anything, no blood vengeance was sworn, she was just very angry at him because he made her stress out so much, even more so because he made her deny her father treatment once again. Mana's mission was to protect Ayushi during his stay, make sure his stay was pleasant and yet the man seemed to have went out of his way to almost kill himself. If that would have happened there'd have been no life as a ninja for Mana. She'd have been eternally dishonored and would carry the stigma as the girl under whose watch Ayushi got hurt.

Thing with dishonor was that it was one of the worst marks for a ninja. Usually most cases of shame and dishonoring one's name or clan didn't make one lose their ninja status but it always carried a certain social stigma to it. If a person let a teammate die or killed them themselves, they'd have always had the name of a "comrade killer" and be treated as scum. At times even rogue ninja were treated with more respect than those with shame. Letting one of the most beloved icons of the ninja world get injured and stay in a comatose state would've made one of the worst social stigmas out there, there'd have been no comparison.

Mana was surprised to find different people in Ayushi's ward, even the monk's bed spot was filled by some old lady. The girl ran out to the bathroom and fixed her hair, washed her dirty hands and face and snapped out of her morning snooze, then she tried to find a medical ninja and ask them about what had happened. One was always walking around and it wasn't too tough of a task to fulfil. After walking just down the hall Mana ran into a group of two just walking to a ward near the one where Ayushi was yesterday. The kunoichi raised her hand and stopped them.

"Excuse me, Guru Ayushi was brought into the ward yesterday, right there, where is he now?" she asked "I am responsible for his well-being and I am working for the Konohagakure administration so I do have access to this information." The girl added that last bit just in case she was refused the information.

A medical ninja lady with short blond hair came up closer and explained the situation to Mana in half whispered speech.

"Yes, he was here however he had completely recovered after you asked for him to be woken up so we let him go. Well… Actually he just stood up and left, we couldn't really stop him or anything, technically there wasn't anything wrong with him after he completely healed himself so we had no authority to keep him here."

Her male colleague smiled to Mana, he seemed to know the girl from the situation that happened last night.

"Hey, you're that girl who saved his life, right? He was brought here all burnt to a crisp in a pretty much comatose state and you asked to have him woken up, letting his passive use medical jutsu kick in, right? That was some bold call, how did you know it'd work?"

Mana smiled unpleasantly, she quite honestly didn't, she was disgusted by her own behavior yesterday and just remembering the darkness in her heart made her puke. That dark gnawing at one's heart of failure, that terrifying prospect of seeing one's most loved people disappointed forced her hand, it was her own selfishness and desire to protect Ayushi's life at all costs, abiding no moral codes and seeing no ethical lines, that forced her to make that call.

"Lucky shot, I guess…" she tried to play it down but the medical ninja didn't have any of that, he almost started clapping to Mana.

"Lucky call my ass! You luck out when you win the lottery, to make a call like that, to wake up a barely alive man into a life of eternal incomparable pain and disgust of their own pitiful existence, you must've had really strong reasons for that! Ah, it's OK, I guess you're a magician and a hero, those don't often share their secrets. Anyways, Ayushi-san insisted that we let you sleep up, he said he'd be waiting for you by the gate once you wake up. Remembering your heroism yesterday and Ayushi-san's authority… Well the hospital was happy to oblige."

Mana just couldn't take it anymore, she couldn't stomach all that disgusting praise for her own selfishness, her desire to follow her ideals past the line of common sense. She hated her own guts at that moment, after being informed about Ayushi's intents the magician just waved goodbye and wished the medical ninja to have a good day and rushed off to the bathroom. Nausea took Mana over as she bent over the toilet but she couldn't even throw it all out, instead that sickness in her own self continued to plague her, burn her from inside. With the last resort attempt to push all anger for Ayushi's behavior away Mana breathed in and out and left the bathroom after one last wash of her face and hands, no matter how hard she rubbed, that feeling didn't wash off…

It wasn't really clear what exactly was that made the magician so angry at herself, maybe it wasn't the fact that she said all those things, asked burnt body of Ayushi to be forcefully woken up from his comatose state. Maybe it was because part of her actually felt alright about that? Some part of Mana felt like she had acted just how her ideals would've demanded, Mana just was herself, she ordered to save lives at any cost, that's who she was and what she did. It was just that before the question of was saving lives always moral never rose up to her. Not until Ayushi just flat out asked her yesterday, before deciding to test her answer.

Or maybe it was the fact that she herself denied her father the cure for his pain. She denied her father happiness and his chance to be a ninja, to tinker, to have those stars of hope and glee in his eyes. It was like Mana snuffed those sparks of happiness out herself by demanding Ayushi to be woken up, she didn't ask for his cells, even if the medical ninja suggested taking his cells. Obviously that would've taken time, researching and cultivating them, Ayushi would've remained comatose but he would've fulfilled his dream – he'd have cured every sickness and injury ever… Yet… That didn't feel right, keeping a man sleeping against his will, that's not what heroes did. Maybe if there was no hope for him at all but… Not like that. Mana covered her tired and teary eyes with the tips of her fingers. She wanted to pummel Ayushi so hard at that moment, for forcing her to do that, to say no to her family's happiness. For fueling that clash between her ideals and her own personal happiness and that of others.

No. Mana wasn't always moral, she didn't do the right thing all of the times and that was painful. Up until that moment the girl thought she was perfect, that good people always did good things and did so by their own free will, that bad people did bad things by their own free will. Good was good and bad was bad for no other reason than the way things were. In reality even good people apparently messed up, even good people did immoral things. Then again, did Mana even know what was moral anymore? After telling the medical ninja to wake a burnt man up under the conditions of equal chance that he died from the pain or healed himself before his heart exploded from the pressure.

There he was, the tall pale figure. Mana walked up to Ayushi and looked him in the eyes. There was this certain shade of anger and hatred in her eyes, not the malevolent kind, the kind that a teenager gets for their parents when they forbid them to leave and meet with their friends in the evening. Ayushi nodded his head and greeted Mana.

"Didn't exactly feel right to leave without saying my farewells, not to a girl who had changed my life." Ayushi started up the conversation. His tone was different, he was speaking faster, he thought less of what he was saying. Yesterday his tone was more like that of a person under certain substances, he was slurring and slow even before he got drunk, now Ayushi's tone and voice was clear and fast. Words came out so quickly that one used to the man's previous manner of speech had to readjust to the new Ayushi.

"I wouldn't have minded…" Mana shot back rudely.

"Would you not have?" Ayushi asked curiously.

"Yesterday when… When you did that thing… I almost died, YOU almost died, so many things could have gone wrong! If I missed the precision of my chakra control we could've had our throats opened by the glass, I did miss it, just not by that much. Then when they carried us to the hospital and took care of my wounds they asked me about your cells, they said that… That there was not much that could've been done but they suggested cultivating your cells."

"And you refused" Ayushi butt in, "It takes a great hero to refuse such temptation. You have been offered to make a great moral action – sign under permission for a panacea to be invented. What you did was the right thing – right thing which seemed grey to you, that thing which your own ideals gave you a suggestion to. Don't you know what I tried to teach you, young Mana? Your ideals are your moral compass, even mine now too! As long as you follow that path you cannot ever get lost." Ayushi was quite energetic with this speech. That wasn't entirely unlike the old Ayushi from yesterday.

"I had to… I had to say no to my father's cure, I had to do a thing so despicable that it made me hate myself." Mana almost broke down emotionally. She couldn't believe that Ayushi too thought of her having done the right thing, how could he? He was the one who almost died last night, he was the one who went through the absolute limit of pain that a human brain can go through. The only reason he survived was because of his unnatural pain tolerance of having been injured infinite amount of times during all those years and having grown accustomed to it.

"That's what being a hero is all about, you of all people should know that choosing this path is to choose the most difficult life for oneself. You'll be hated, publically made fun off and in the end you'll choose happiness for those people who scorned you instead of your own. That's the kind of person you are, that's the kind of person I shall try to be as well, from now on. I'll travel the world trying to become more like you, trying to obtain your spirit, your mentality, your personality. Join that with my own skills… I've experienced pain yesterday, yes, but that only made my hatred towards pain to burn even stronger. Instead of focusing my wrath on my own actions or, even more idiotically, you, I chose to focus my spite on pain. I've decided to make it my first target. I'll destroy the world's pain."

Ayushi's words sounded so mad, the world's spiritual leader, one of the most respected people on the planet got charmed by the ideals of a young girl in Konoha and decided to change to fit her way of life. That should've become the practical example of madness in the definition somewhere in some dictionary. Mana tried to reach out and stop Ayushi from leaving, to try and talk him over but the man turned around and started leaving through the gate, he slightly peeked back at Mana and smiled.

"I told you spiritual journeys of self-discovery were for the best, young Mana. I shall become a brother of your ideas, once I truly discover how to become more like you, once I learn to absolutely rely on that one ideal, once I start to truly treasure life... "No life is unnecessary" will be my one true mantra from now on!" Ayushi's last words echoed before he left into the thickness of the forest from where he appeared early yesterday morning. For a moment Mana just kept standing there, thinking and refusing to believe this insane visit. She just kept staring at the vastness of the forests and refused to move on.

A gentle hand reached over her shoulder, it was one of the guards of the village gate, the man smiled and gave the girl a thumb up. "Relax, Mana-chan, this is a mission completed for you" he reported but the magician still refused to believe it. Slowly she turned around and started making her way towards the Konohagakure administration building, she still had to report about the mission, then the painful part came, the part of going home and telling father and mother that she's the worst daughter to have ever been born in the history of time and space. Only an individual worth such a title wouldn't be able to step over oneself to cure the pain of their loved family member.

As the girl entered the building she couldn't help but let out a disappointing sigh. For the first time since probably ever her mind was completely empty, she was so weighed down by all that had happened that she couldn't even think or feel straight. People thought she was a hero of some sort, she hated herself for that same decision. Apparently moral sense was not some sort of absolute either, the more days Mana had spent in this life of hers, the more firmly she started to believe that moral things may have not been some sort of absolute and to be defined by the observer.

"Sorry, Kiyomi, I've got no viable team members for you at the moment. You're an experienced genin and I will grant you permission to work alone on missions but I cannot put you on a team." Mana overheard a heated conversation inside the Hokage's office. She decided to wait it out, the magician didn't really want to listen in on that but the two people that were talking pretty much forced everyone in the building to listen to them go on by yelling at each other.

"Then put me up for the Chuunin Exams!" the other, much younger voice yelled out angrily, it seemed to have been something that was repeated over and over again during the conversation as the young lady talking said those words in a rather monotonous but loud nevertheless tone.

"I told you, that's out of the question, Chuunin Exams are meant to be taken by teams of three. An essential part of the competition is to test the teamwork of the people taking it. Letting one person without a team take it would be unfair. More so, there's not enough time left for you to find one, the sign-ups will be over tomorrow at midnight. Even if you do find a team by then, you won't have a chance to bond and train with them, you will be taking a test of teamwork with people you don't know." At that moment Mana recognized the voice of the first woman, it was the Fifth Hokage. It wasn't that easy to identify the woman, after all, when she spoke to Mana she spoke in a much calmer and pleasant tone. Now the woman sounded like she was really getting annoyed.

Suddenly after a loud exclamation of frustration the blonde burst from the room, she was a girl of a similar age to Mana, perhaps a little bit older. Her hair was so blond that it was distracting and her eyes seemed to be completely light blue with little to no intelligible irises. A more experienced ninja, or just one who lived in Konoha could've easily identified the Yamanaka clan, the masters of illusions and mental abilities. Usually every genjutsu user wasn't too fond of those guys, to the Yamanaka the abilities to manipulate minds came almost as naturally as waving a hand whereas it took great mastery for a common ninja to learn that sort of ability. Yamanaka were the elites of illusions and mind reading and controlling, they also were unmatched in intelligence gathering and enemy displacement.

The significantly taller and more muscularly built girl just stood in front of Mana, who had not yet realized that she was blocking the young lady's path. For a moment it was clear that the Yamanaka girl wanted to shoot something offensive or just to bump into the young magician pushing her out of the way but she restrained herself. "Please get out of my way" was all that the girl said after walking around Mana and disappearing behind the corner leading to the stairs down and out of the building. The young kunoichi wondered what was that all about before remembering having seen this young lady before, in a much more battle hardened look, it was back when the Hokage returned with her students to the Administration building back when she, Shimo and Sugemi originally received the mission to protect Ayushi.

Mana sighed and entered the Hokage office. The Fifth looked extremely irritated so she just raised her palm to stop the entrant in her tracks, looking scared and confused. Hanasaku took a moment to rub her temples with her fingers to relax and then gestured with her hand to continue.

"My mission to watch over Guru Ayushi was… I guess successful…" Mana stuttered at the last and the most important part of her report. The Hokage's assistant placed the countless files he had on the table and crossed his hands on his chest.

"You guess?" he got annoyed.

"Well, he's alright, he seems pleased but…" Mana wanted to report the whole situation but the Fifth once again lifted her hand into the air.

"That's all we need to know. Ayushi-san is a strange individual, he says and does weird things to "cure" everyone. Things he does are also highly personal so you may not wish to share them. The fact that he is safe and that he is happy with his stay is enough, we'll report to Kirigakure that he's coming, thank you, Mana"

Mana shook and rubbed her foot onto the floor, she was a little hesitant to keep talking but she had to report on what happened.

"We do know of the situation with the fire and the whole hospital ordeal, you've encountered difficulties, you've moved past them and made the right call, congratulations, now go back to your recovery, Nakotsumi Mana." The assistant informed the girl after noticing her hesitation.

"Ummm… I'm not sure he's going straight to Kirigakure…" Mana let the bird out of the cage. Hanasaku's fist shot through the table leaving a large hole in the colossal pile of papers and the table but strangely enough it didn't collapse.

"WHAAAAAT!?" the woman straight out roared. Mana was a bit worried for her life but she actually sort of wanted to be beaten down and punished for what she pulled last night.

"He said that he wants to start using his medical abilities again to save lives and change the world, he said that meeting me opened his eyes or something…" Mana closed her eyes and clenched herself for impact that would've sent her flying through the wall. She waited, fearing but also wishing for her high flying death, whether she'd die instantly from the Hokage's furious fist or her neck would snap while flying or she'd crash and die that way… Nothing. Mana opened her eyes only to see Hanasaku smiling like a lovely old lady over a cup of coffee.

"Heh, you just can't help it, can you… Oh well, it's not like he has to do anything, he's retired anyways…" Hanasaku cracked a grin even if a vein was still pulsing on her forehead, though that was most likely present there from her meeting with her student before.

"B-But… Hokage-sama!" the assistant yelled out wanting to make a bigger deal from it, Hanasaku waved her hand.

"I said it's fine, whatever, the man does whatever he wants, he's a force of nature, thanks for letting us know, Mana. I saw your team's application for Chuunin exams, I don't think I need to explain it do I?" the Hokage brought another topic up, Mana's face turned to the floor as her hair weighed down and covered it. The girl's top hat almost fell off from her sad expression but it remained just barely on her head.

"Yeah, Chuunin exams are a test done by teams of three, part of the test is testing the teamwork and all that… I've heard it, I'm pretty sure everyone did…" Mana uttered with profound sadness and disappointment in how this whole situation went. It wasn't just the fact that she was denied her chance to grow in rank, it was also the fact that this denial also went out of its way to remind Mana of the fate of her disbanded team.

"I'm sorry, I'll be going through possible candidates to form a new team… For now though keep training, there'll be another exam in three years, you'll have your team formed and ready by then. I'll send you some easier missions to do in the meantime, after you recover from your training injury, of course. Now, if that's all, you're dismissed."

Mana dragged her sorry body out of the Hokage's office. Things really went bad, there was so much hope and expectation back when Tanshu-sensei last trained her, back when he promised to recommend them for the Chuunin exams to get that sweet battlefield experience. The magician sighed. After that things just all went downhill: Tanshu-sensei died, the team got disbanded, Ayushi-san got mad or something, now there'll be no Chuunin exams for at least three more years. Worst part of all was that she had to go back home and talk to her parents about those damned cells…

Mana went back home, her parents almost immediately picked up on her sad face. Mother hugged the girl and kept almost furiously stroking her hair. "Ayushi's cells won't work, they'd heal father but that'd cause another sickness that'd kill him really fast…" Mana said to her mother, the magician could feel her mother shaking in sadness. No. They had to know the whole story. Father entered the living room too, walking down the stairs and staring at Mana and mother expressing their sadness and support to one another.

"Oh well…" he said "I mean, that bastard took his sweet time to get here anyways, by now I'm almost used to it. Got the recipe for the new herbs and ointments, they help keep it manageable, I'll live" father replied and went up to Mana trying to express his approval by gently stroking her hair. "You did good, you were hurt, you had my unfair expectations and expectations of the whole village to make this work, even more we relied on you to do something stupid and impossible. Any sane person would've cursed this world to hell for that sort of responsibility and pressure. I'd rather completely lose my arms and legs than have my precious girl be blamed for that sort of bullshit, I kind of loved my life as a ninja but I love you much more."

Mana felt almost surprised and a bit relieved hearing it from her parents that they didn't blame her for anything. She was certain that they'd cave in but father was right, all this extra time it took for Ayushi to get here made him better at dealing with the pain himself. He was so much more mature than Mana, he didn't believe or need any miracle cures. He acknowledged that his life was in his hands and his hands alone and dealt with his pain, he learned to live with it and deal with it. He was a true hero, her true hero! Mana hugged father apologizing to him one more time. "There's one thing… Ayushi… He once fell into a coma and… There was a chance to cultivate his cells…"

Father put his finger on Mana's lips, the girl flinched in surprise.

"You did the right thing, kid. I'd rather live in pain than know it was healed by causing pain to someone else, I know you asked for his life to be saved, you're my little hero. I know you'll always do what's right, what you think seems right."

Back in Hokage's office the assistant angrily looked at the Hokage and tried to object to something she had said to Mana before her words broke and interrupted his speech before it even began.

"Before I and my students left to Kirigakure, not too long before Howoku and Tanshu left for the Summit, I met with Howoku, Misu and Tanshu over dinner, just to call back to the old times, we always do that sort of thing before big missions. Just to remember that moment in case our last hour comes in those missions, just to have a pleasant memory to grasp on to in case nothing else comes up, just to make that final journey into the void more pleasant."

Hokage's assistant walked up in front of the woman and found a seat, he put the files he had in his hands at that moment back onto one of countless more piles to the side.

"We spoke about our happiest moments, I of course kept going on about some big brawls I had, some of the fun tests I had with Kiyomi and the others, I kept abusing them and almost killing them and most of that wasn't even consensual, I was just an idiot who kept messing things up. Howoku spoke about how he loved sometimes leaving the office, walking through the street and admiring his peace, the smiles of the villagers and the children just playing in the street, the peace he had created from violent wars over those last fifteen years. Misu didn't talk much, he rarely did talk much… Lil' Bro, however… Tanshu, my little precious brother, usually just bashed how idiotic our happy thoughts were and how he's wasting his time, he didn't mean it but he always had to keep that façade up…"

The man fixed his glasses, Hokage's assistant was a very strict and to the point man, still, he appeared to be smiling and enjoying the story. Having one's job experience pile up by working for the Hokage meant having to listen to these kind of stories from time to time.

"That day Lil' Bro was different, he actually praised his students to us, he spoke about how they were bunch of losers but how they actually grew stronger under his guidance which he initially thought impossible… Then… That last couple of lines he said… He spoke about this lovely but stupid young girl who reminded him of a friend he once had. I think I may remember that friend of his, at least him talking about her from back when we sieged the Tower of Bones that one time. I thought, wow, a young girl who reminded Tanshu of a woman he once loved, that was amazing. I almost instantly wanted to meet that young girl who was so weird and stupid that she even made my Lil' Bro smile… Now when I saw her change both Lil' Bro and Guru Ayushi…"

Assistant stood up and took a bunch of files into his hands, slamming them in front of the Hokage's face. "That was a fun memory, you're not allowed to die yet so don't long for it. You have no right to die until you fix the Feudal Lord bingo evening budget."

It was a really lovely night outside. Mana kept breathing deep, observing it from her bed. Her childish chest kept lifting up and down from her heavy breathing. The young ninja carefully stroke her thighs, she didn't feel that much more pain left. Tomorrow she'll start training again, she'll be careful, she'll still keep training her kicking focused style of taijutsu she's trying to master but she'll put more focus on her chakra control. That technique, that illusion she casted on Sugemi and Shimo saved both of their lives. Mana was called Konoha's Sorceress as her stage name, that name has also been associated with her ninja abilities too. She was crafty and tricky, she always did the right thing, she always lucked out so far but she needed some powerful tool like that to stop relying on luck. Next time when innocent lives or lives or her friends will be in danger – she'll be ready for it.

Ayushi may have given her the cold shower about the moral implications of her ideals, how they may not always have been the right and moral thing to do. Either way, saving lives was what Mana did. What she wanted to do and how she wanted to change this world. Ayushi also taught her that fighting for her ideal, fighting to stop the bad people trying to hurt those she wanted to protect may have been OK sometimes. That if they chose the violent path, she should've not been so afraid to disable them if talking didn't work. Before she often found herself frozen in fear of hurting her enemy, Ayushi taught her that hurting the enemy wasn't the problem. She was the Konoha's Sorceress, she had it in her to find ways to beat the enemy without killing them and then leave it up to them to change. That was her nindo, her ninja way.


	75. Of Blue Eyes and Red Eyes

The day had already reached its prime. Children were playing in the street, the smaller ones were chasing rubber balls and the slightly older ones were tossing wooden ninja tools at each other and clashing with wooden swords. Playing ninja was one of the most popular past times for kids old enough to grasp the basic concept. It was more common amongst young boys, girls usually played a strange simulation game where they're just sitting around at home taking care of their dolls which were supposed to be their kids. It was quite usual for the two groups to play together and fuse their seemingly separate universes into one.

Each kid had their "family", a "wife" they left at home when they ran off with other boys to play a great war of ninjas. Girls liked being part of boys' group and their silly antics never interrupted their own game so they played along with this weird social contract. It was a small model of how society worked, the most common and simple particles of it, at least. There were some girls who didn't fancy just sitting at home feeding the dumplings that their mothers gave them for snacking to their dolls. They played alongside boys and went to war yet it never bothered either the boys or the girls. Girls accepted those other girls as part of their group, let them occasionally visit their "family" and boys treated them as their equal partners. If a girl was considered a weaker ninja of the group it wasn't because of her gender, it was because she wasn't creative enough to make a strong imaginary persona for herself and lacked the skills of imagination and quick decision making.

Maybe to some this would have seemed weird, those people would most likely not have experienced the world where spiritual and physical energy of one's body was able to augment one's abilities to compensate for natural shortcomings. Some people would have attributed this strange aura of equality that surrounded the children, usually the least likely group to behave appropriately and respect equality, to a certain amount of time having passed since the strongest and the leading ninja of the village was a respected woman, even more, one who could've shattered the dreams of any man trying to match her in physical strength department. Those people would not have known how things were before that woman took over from Star of Hope, Howoku, the Fourth Hokage.

Obviously in a world where people's lives were wasted left and right a woman's decision to devote her time to raising children was very much respected. No woman was scorned or scolded for choosing to devote their life to that goal, maybe even the opposite was the case, they were respected even more than an average ninja who devoted their life for their village would have. They enjoyed specific protection, a certain social elevation in their importance which was tough to explain but quite visible if one was to spend some time amongst the villagers.

A whole year had passed since Chestnut Hanasaku became the Fifth Hokage, her face was quickly added onto the monument amongst the other Hokage of the past. The village was living in some strange state of having frozen in time after the initial shock of having lost their Hokage and most of their Sannin. There was an obvious vacant gap left, for the first time in many years Konohagakure had no Sannin to be proud of: Misu and Tanshu had killed each other in their battle, Hanasaku left the spot open by becoming the Fifth Hokage. The council tried to raise some of their more prominent jounin to the rank but for one reason or another they were refused. Konoha had plenty of powerful jounin but they weren't quite on that level just yet. Knowing full well the amount of danger and respect that the rank granted Hanasaku rejected each candidacy, the woman simply didn't think any of them could have handled the fame and the desire of so many bounty hunters from the sides of both: rogue ninja or other villages to take them down and add their heads to their collections.

Konoha still didn't have people in Kirigakure to observe the village's political and administrational life. Despite being the primary motivation of Hanasaku's election to the great chair, the woman just said that she either needed most ninja selected for that role in the village and at her disposal or she simply didn't trust them enough. Little by little, people started talking that Chestnut Hanasaku had crumbled under the pressure, she made very few ballsy choices during her reign. Usually Hokage punished with severity, chased goals of great ambition, even questionable ventures. It seemed that Chestnut Hanasaku was so afraid to show off her stupidity and inexperience that she just froze all iffy matters in time and space. While the council and any political experts and journalists didn't enjoy that behavior, to the general public her safe approach to politics seemed rather pleasant as they had one shock too many recently. Ambitious ventures became associated with the name of Mizukage Shirona and left a bad bloody taste in everyone's mouths.

"Mana, dear, you're gonna be late!" mother's voice came from below alerting the girl to finish her gearing up quickly. The girl buttoned up her cufflink, secured and double checked her various hidden cards and sleeves. During that last year Mana had changed up her ninja tool arsenal a lot, moving much more towards the card and magician prop focused more innocent and tricky style. Instead of the usual kunai knives, shuriken and explosive tags Mana used much more deceiving and tricky tools like steel edged cards like the ones used to give Sugemi that nasty scar back then, steel rings and ropes of cloth, also cards with explosive seals on them that only used a small bit of chakra to set off. Finally the girl embraced her magician roots and her stage nickname of Konoha Sorceress, she tried to honor the will of her late sensei by doing so.

After securing her father's gifted hat and checking if she had the "package" sealed inside Mana ran down the stairs. She recalled how just a year ago using her father's seal sapped most of her chakra, a year of endless chakra level training allowed Mana's chakra to grow several times above her previous levels. If she pushed herself far enough she may have even been able to use the clone technique that once knocked her out cold before. Mana's bulkier and firmer thighs also were a testament of gruesome effort and training that she put into mastering her own style of taijutsu. As the girl ran down the stairs and gave a free hug to her father and mother before leaving through the door, she couldn't help but call back to all the days she spent practicing acrobatics and various stretching exercises to better control her body. Mana was almost confident that her kicks and flips were now fast enough to surprise even a more physical peer of her level, something she took great pride in.

Obviously her path had many training injuries and accidents, she burnt out just like before several times, also there was that time she broke her arm and her leg after falling pretty nastily in the training grounds. She continued to train even during injury which greatly annoyed the medical ninja. Having no fear to fight, no fear to hurt but never kill those that threatened her ideals and her loved ones made Mana much less afraid to train and grow strong. Her mind was completely free, absolutely clean of any doubts and fears. All she felt was curiosity and excitement, the girl was always a little bit on the geeky side and she viewed training and the subjects of genjutsu and ninjutsu techniques as another subject, a hobby with endless possibilities to be explored.

Even after a whole year Mana didn't manage to master that technique, it was only when she started delving more deeply into the subject of illusionary techniques that Mana found out just how reckless and stupid she was back then using that technique at such baby stages. Honoring the last words told to her by Tanshu-sensei during their training the magician delved deeper into the craft, trying to pick up more tricky and difficult subjects of the matter, such as sound based illusions and different mediums through which illusions could have been transferred. It was incredibly tough focusing on that specific craft. That was because of the nature of the specialty that Mana had chosen.

Genjutsu was the art of illusionary techniques. Illusions were fancy and often powerful, a good tool for diversion, displacement and various other versatile uses. However most ninja were too practical, they wanted to cause damage on the battlefield, cause some ruckus. Illusions never caused actual damage, they could've tricked one's mind with enough skill put into it to cause the body to damage itself but illusionary fire was always just that – a fancy vision. Also the art of genjutsu was incredibly despised and neglected among most ninja, very few even bothered picking it up because of its intricacy and very unrewarding nature. It required almost perfect chakra control, great concentration and skill as well as some imagination to be used effectively and even with all that effort it still dealt no direct physical damage to one's enemy. It wasn't hard to see why people were frustrated about it.

The thing was that because of the complete neglect of the craft that was barely even touched upon in the Academy made most people completely unable to defend against it. A surprising majority of ninja crumbled even under the most basic of illusions and incredibly skilled ninja could've even sunken those ninja under multiple layers of illusions, caused extreme confusion and made them believe that they were in an illusion when they may not have even been under one causing some terrible circumstances. There was this one story told in the Academy by the teacher, one that had a moral of never choosing to neglect any subject or craft completely.

The story was about this young and strong ninja who had a lot of potential, one who was all about physical and destructive power. That ninja focused exclusively on destructive techniques and strength overpowering all of their peers. One day they met a decently skilled genjutsu user who was actually a very unimpressive ninja otherwise and he chose to engage him. Apparently the illusion master caught that ninja into an illusion and convinced him to kill all of his comrades and give up all of the scrolls with vital information they were carrying. Then the genjutsu user delivered one final line: "I never even used genjutsu, it was all just the power of suggestion, you killed your friends because you believed I masked myself in their image, you gave me the scrolls because you folded under the belief that I had you in my control." Sensei in the Academy said that the ninja later committed suicide being unable to deal with the pressure of the situation and the shame.

That inability to deal with even the most basic illusions of most ninja out there gave an illusion user a slight advantage, however the idea that there were no skilled illusionary ninja in the village to train with brought that advantage down and dragged its face in the dirt. There were very few ninja who even dabbled in the illusionary arts, let alone skilled enough for Mana to ask advice or guidance when in a tough spot. Sure she still hadn't reached the level where she'd be the authority figure of genjutsu in the village but she was approaching that spot and that prospect scared her quite a lot.

Mana's amazing growth in strength and spirituality and mind wasn't the only pleasant news to happen during that year. Her magic shows pretty much became the biggest source of entertainment in the village, her strangely classy attire also helped create the illusion that it was a very high layered kind of entertainment, many rich and famous people started attending her shows bringing the owner of the hall, Mr. Hiro a terrible lot of money making him appreciate his newly found golden hen. Hiro insisted that Mana moved all of her performances to what he called "prime-time", he let her dictate the terms whenever she threatened to leave his care. Still, even with all that success the magician tried to not let it go over her head. She still tried to incorporate the lessons of public contact and certain closeness between an entertainer and their audience that she picked up from Guru Ayushi during his seminar. The price of her shows never rose beyond the price she charged at the beginning, her tremendous rise in profits was not due to increased prices but because of increase in people who bought the tickets.

Maybe that same success in terms of her being an amazing and unique sort of entertainer, seeing how stage magic was still something no other village had explored, was what made Mana so well known in the village. People approached her in larger masses, spoke to her more often and invaded her public privacy with every chance that they got. This newly acquired fame was both something the girl enjoyed and in a way wasn't overly fond of. She loved being appreciated, she loved that people acknowledged her art and the message that it carried along of ninjutsu being what the user used it for, not the predefined tool used for murder and nothing else. On the other hand, Mana hated being known just for her stage magic. Quite often when the girl did leave on some of the smaller missions she was recognized by both her mission targets and her fans, most people thought that she was only a ninja because of a publicity stunt and criminals she tried her best to apprehend always made sure to make fun of her for her child celebrity status when they were beaten.

Mana was just as much a kunoichi of the Leaf as much as she was a stage magician. She felt like people neglected and never appreciated the things she did as a ninja, they kept waving at those things and mentioning how cute they were and how she just "played ninja" and kept considering her mainly a magician and only cared about what she did as a magician. If only she could have done something amazing, something so incredible and heroic that she could've finally busted through that barrier of neglect and ignorance, if only she could have placed herself amongst the higher rated genin of the village, the kind that attracted people to the stadium when those genin sparred... Mana started craving to be strong, not because she wanted to be the best, not because she had a selfish power fantasy but because she wanted to be taken seriously, not as some silly girl playing ninja. There were plenty of times she could've died in the field and yet no one acknowledged that and thought she was still taking it easy. That hurt Mana a lot internally.

"Hey, it's Konoha's Sorceress! Hello, will you be performing today?" a lovely pair stopped Mana just to say hello and talk. Mana stopped and smiled to them despite still feeling hurt inside by her own feelings that she brought up.

"No, sadly I've been called to a mission, it's been a while since I went on a bigger mission and I was warned to cancel any shows I had today or in the nearest future, it may be something pretty grand." Mana scratched the back of her head only now realizing that she may have been leaving to her final mission, all of a sudden the girl started feeling like she may not have said her goodbyes fondly and softly enough. Each mission may have been one's last and should've been treated as such.

"Oh, that's too bad, we were really looking forward to it, be careful, Sorceress-chan!" the pair bowed their heads slightly suggesting respect despite still using the slightly demeaning honorific.

Hesitant to keep on walking Mana scratched her neck, maybe she should return and talk to her parents a little bit more, she had some time left to do that and... Whatever. Father knew what kind of thing these kind of missions were, he wouldn't have been too surprised if Mana got hurt. If all of those stories of mother being a descendant of the wandering ninja were correct she also had been on the outside of the village and had seen the world beyond the village walls. As much as the girl wanted to say her goodbyes as if they were her last she felt like her parents were tough enough to handle the tension.

Slowly the magician started walking towards the Konohagakure Administration to pick up her mission. If she was told that it'd take several days that'd have meant that Mana was supposed to leave beyond the village walls, right? But then why would she have been sent out like that alone? She still didn't have a team despite Hokage's most desperate attempts to find her one. Seeing how many high ranking ninja died in the Kage Summit many of the assembled teams were left without a sensei so there were many genin without a team. Even during the early stages some genin managed to get themselves killed already, right after leaving the Academy. There were vacant spots but as Tanshu-sensei said, there seemed to have been some special rules when putting teams together. What with all the one member being a genius, one average and one loser rule, for example.

After entering the Administration building Mana just went up to the floor where the Hokage office was situated. Some more manual labor kind of missions were handed out by simple office clerks but the kind that this mission apparently was were handed out by the Hokage and her assistant themselves. Mana walked up to the door and knocked, listening in and hearing a permission to enter. The girl opened the door hesitantly only to see the Hokage and her assistant in the building. The strange part was that they weren't the only people there. The Hokage gestured towards the blond Yamanaka girl that Mana had seen several times before, the one that used to be on the Fifth's team apparently at some point.

"It's good that you've come. I invited all three of you but for some reason the third one didn't come... Those guys are always a real pain in the ass." The Hokage scratched her forehead angrily trying to just rub her headache away.

Mana looked curiously at the other girl, she looked pretty tough but she was a pretty girl too. She had those deep light blue eyes that would've made her an ideal pop idol singer but her look was far too tough for that kind of profession. There was little innocence in this girl's eyes, she's seen the outside world, without a doubt. The Yamanaka suddenly turned making Mana jump up a bit, trying to act as if she wasn't staring. The magician was really interested in this girl, she was so pretty and looked so strong that Mana couldn't help but admire this girl.

"I'm Yamanaka Kiyomi, pleased to work with you, Mana." the girl said extending her hand forward. Mana did look a bit confused about how would the blonde know her name, after all the names or even the fact that they'd be working in a team was nowhere in the actual mission objective. Hesitantly the magician answered the gesture of greeting.

"Oh please, your name is all over the place, to be honest it's written in some really small letters, "Konoha's Sorceress on the other hand is really clearly spelled out. If it's an ego thing I can call you that, I guess." The Yamanaka girl explained without having to be asked.

"Was she reading my mind?" Mana wondered inside of her head, knowing the skills and the reputation of the Yamanaka clan members to be absolute masters of controlling and messing with their enemies' minds.

"No, I didn't read your mind, just because I'm a Yamanaka doesn't mean I read your mind all the time, you know..." Kiyomi leaned at Mana angrily placing her hands on her hips as if she was being placed into a stereotype, despite the magician never having said a thing.

"Ummm... Sorry, I guess..." Mana just let out turning away with a blush. She made a fool of herself in front of this really cool girl, she really wanted to fit in with this blonde who was a part of the Hokage's squad. Truth be told, part of Mana's wish to be approved by Kiyomi was because the magician was extremely jealous of the girl despite knowing so little about her.

Kiyomi was a member of a clan, a pretty well thought of and one held in very high regard at that. She must've been able to do all sorts of amazing things and she looked a year or two older than Mana which gave this young lady an experience advantage. Also Mana was still going through her puberty so to herself she looked kind of weird, where this Kiyomi girl was clearly a more attractive due to her age and completed process of puberty as well as probably a much stronger girl by a margin.

"Relax, I'm just messing with you" Kiyomi laughed out playfully punching Mana in the elbow. "That's just what most people tell me when they're socializing, I've got a system by which I classify people by what they tell me, it gets boring sometimes."

Mana smiled, she was still embarrassed and didn't feel too comfortable in the girl's company even if she had a genuine desire to feel that way around the Yamanaka. There was nothing really wrong with the blonde, her eyes were pretty kind and had no malice behind them, she had lost all the anger and irritation that the Yamanaka once had when the two bumped into each other in the hall last year. It was just that this new feeling of wanting to be acknowledged and looking up to someone was quite new and it didn't let the magician feel too comfortable around the girl. It was all about the new itchy experience that didn't let her relax.

"So... What's the mission, when do we leave?" Mana tried to change the topic for later hoping to avoid the awkwardness from having to socialize with a person she had strange sensations about which the young magician barely even understood.

"Not so fast, there's a third person you need to pick up, I'm not sure if she even plans to drop by anytime or if she's even coming, that one is a real loose cannon sometimes." Hanasaku growled irritated by the personality of the third one. Mana started both feeling curious about this third person but also feel slightly hesitant towards them and started to get a bad feeling about them.

This whole mission felt weird, usually team-based missions promoted teamwork between the three or more participants, now this was much different. The three teammates haven't met each other yet, they won't be a long term team, just work together on one mission, the three had no time to get to know each other, learn about the skills of each other or learn to cooperate. It was almost like Hansaku just tossed this mission and this team together randomly, organizational skills like that cause casualties. Mana felt like she's about to experience Fifth's lack of experience first-hand but she stayed quiet.

For a short while the two girls just stood quietly before the Hokage. The year was actually quite kind for the woman, her brown hair finally settled towards an acceptable and even somewhat regal hairdo, instead of flowing wildly all over the place in mad locks. Her eyes and her skin looked soft and had no bruises or blunt traumas that a ninja on active duty had their body full of. Even Mana had a couple of long term scars already, it wasn't to the point where the girl was shy to undress in front of a mirror but in a year or two it might get there. Truth of the matter was – Chestnut Hanasaku was looking much more ladylike and sported a more fitting look for a lady in charge of a village. Power didn't seem to corrupt this woman, it changed her for the better, taught her some experience. Still not enough, apparently.

"Enough!" Hanasaku shouted out slamming the table, this time the woman restrained herself perfectly, she also seemed to have learned restraint as breaking too many tables must've costed the Administration an arm and a leg. "If that girl doesn't feel like showing up to the briefing just wait for her near the gate until it becomes a bother, then ditch her. I swear to God!" Hanasaku yelled out angrily.

"It's fine, me and Mana here can handle it if the third one is a no-show" Kiyomi smiled confidently. Mana smiled back and nodded. She liked Kiyomi's confidence. Just one more feature to make this blonde be Mana's idol, the kind of ninja that the young one tried to be more like soon. It wasn't like Kiyomi was that much older to be her absolute hero or anything, it was more like a directional guideline, almost like an older sister for Mana to admire and try to imitate.

"That's a big no. Usually I'd send at least five genin to a mission like this, probably even a chuunin to lead the squad. A son of a rich perfume tycoon of Konohagakure was kidnapped. We don't know anything about who kidnapped him or why, they didn't send any requirements or demands or a reason as to why that was done. It is starting to seem that the son may not have been kidnapped for his father's funds which is beginning to scare me. You absolutely need to have a third member, your mission is to find out about the kidnapping and if possible reclaim the victim. Mission objective is information, secondary objective is the return of the victim safe to the village. If by any chance the third one doesn't show – hire some mercenaries outside the village walls. It's a dangerous gambit but a hundred times less dangerous than going in just the two of you."

Kiyomi nodded, Mana was about to kneel as per normal procedure when accepting a mission but seeing Kiyomi's ignorance the magician just awkwardly froze half-way and then straightened out, blushing to her ears about how dumb she must've looked.

"Yes ma'am!" Mana uttered shyly.

Kiyomi laughed out openly, seeing a hatchling ninja several years younger mess up continuously trying to look cool must've been hilarious to the Yamanaka. The two turned around and left the office. Both of them stood awkwardly for a moment in the corridor just looking around, each one of them was hesitant to take charge of the mission but eventually both of them started walking downstairs to the first floor complex of offices.

"So... Why are you alone? What happened to your team?" Kiyomi opened up the discussion first. "Usually genin are working in teams until they are promoted in the Chuunin Exams"

Mana's chin sunk down as she once again remembered the story of Team Oak. "Well, Tanshu-sensei died during the Kage Summit, one of my teammates messed up and left on a journey of self-discovery, the other tried to kill a prisoner we caught from Kirigakure and... Well he was sent away to a containment facility, Eden I believe"

Kiyomi whistled out in surprise. "Tanshu? As if in Red Dog Tanshu? Holy Hell! I thought you were just for show initially, no offense, all the fancy posters and all, sort of makes an impression of all those pop idol bubble gum girls, you know? Tanshu's hardcore, Hanasaku used to be my sensei, the two constantly hung out, the rep was that Tanshu was just insufferable. No matter how many beatings we took, how many times we got burnt or something blew up cause sensei was a loony, we always thought it could've been worse, we could've ended up under Tanshu's care... I mean, all the respect for the dead and all..."

Mana smiled, recalling the first meeting of the team and how Sugemi had his hand broken the first day. Then remembering how they were left to be animal food or get good and survive. From a neutral point of view that was brutal but... To them it felt nostalgic, they were afraid for their lives back then but it felt so silly and innocent. They were just children after all.

The two just started moving towards the Konohagakure gate, deciding to wait for their third team member there. Kiyomi didn't feel like letting go of Mana as she kept asking questions. "Hey, how old are you? Cause, no offence, but you look like a damn kid, you know? I mean we're all kind of still kids but... Ninja grow up fast, they pretty much have to."

"Almost fourteen" Mana replied, Kiyomi whistled in surprise once again.

"You've been through some badass shit and you're pretty young, I left the Academy almost three years ago at thirteen, not because I flunked a class but because I took a course in my clan's special class. It's something like intelligence gathering and that sort of thing. Everyone expects Yamanaka to be all about intelligence, you know, mind reading, spying, telepathic mental links and all that..."

Honestly all that talking was making Mana grow fond of Kiyomi, the worst thing she could've done was stay shut and not talk to Mana. The magician started to feel like she was viewed as somewhat of an equal so that made her warm up to her temporary teammate.

"So what happened to your team? Are you alone just because Fifth became the Hokage?" Mana finally gathered up the courage to ask something herself, Kiyomi just hissed, something about the Fifth rubbed the girl the wrong way, probably still an old wound about the Chuunin Exams...

"Nah, one of my teammates got cocky in a mission and got hurt, he was an Uchiha so he started showing off those stupid eyes of his and got careless. He lost his eyes. Fucking Uchiha... Hate those guys. The other guy left the team shortly afterwards, Hanasaku isn't the best of mentors, then again, look at me complaining to a student of Red Dog Tanshu..." Kiyomi laughed out. It appeared that it wasn't that much the Fifth herself that irritated Kiyomi but the history of her team. She must've still held a grudge towards the Uchiha boy and the one that left.

"And the worst thing is that they still didn't find me another team, I mean just slap the two of us together, give us a hot guy on our team and I'm as happy as it gets, we could take the damned Chuunin Exams, no problem. I swear to God if they make me skip another exam!" Kiyomi started angrily rubbing her fist and slamming it to her free hand and punching air. It didn't look like Kiyomi was a physical kind of ninja but she definitely threw a punch with free and fluid movements like a pro.

"You really think we'd make a good team?" Mana asked smiling.

"Hell yeah!" Kiyomi yelled out energetically, "If me and the red eyes doofus made it work between us without me strangling that cocky bastard, we could make do. All teams fight between each other, it's not the chemistry in the beginning of the road, it's the chemistry when it counts that matters!"

Mana smiled and nodded. Somehow talking to Kiyomi made her own worries and painful history feel a little bit lighter. Kiyomi was definitely a person that the magician wanted to be around more and maybe work with after this mission. If they even return from their mission, that is.


	76. The Third One

"So for how long are we going to wait?" Kiyomi pouted looking back at Mana who was patiently standing near the guard stand with her hands locked on her chest, staring at the village as if she still had hope that the third one would show up. After being asked the question the magician just sighed. "Don't know, you're the one with more experience, you take charge" she submitted all of the responsibility on Kiyomi's shoulders.

"Point taken, if I can choose between a ninja from our village and some mercenaries I'll choose a homie anytime. Don't really like those brutes anyway…" Kiyomi grunted out. The blonde didn't seem to be a very patient one but she appeared to at the very least be able to get over herself and wait if she needed to. Stepping over one's own character was a really good feature which the magician greatly liked in anyone she met. This Kiyomi girl just may have been a pleasant person to work with…

"You've had some bad experience with mercenaries?" Mana asked. She recalled her own experience dealing with the mercenaries that Hanada Katsuo hired to watch over his family. Based on that experience alone those guys weren't really trustworthy, yet that one guy who still worked for Katsuo seemed really happy to have moved past his mercenary days and settling down.

"Oh, come on, you don't have to have bad days with them to know they're trouble. Think about it, some ex-ninja and just all around brawlers, criminals and killers selling their services, wandering in bands and settling down in camps all over the world. Anyone who defies a village and isn't loyal to something, willing to sell themselves over a coin is a scumbag." Kiyomi laughed out sarcastically, she really used a lot of irony and disgust in her voice.

This special dislike for people who didn't obey a village and didn't devote themselves to an ideal sort of hurt Mana. The magician wanted to talk to Kiyomi about clans but then she realized that her own origins hailing from the Wandering Ninja would've come up. Wandering Ninja must've been just as shameful and hate-worthy to Kiyomi as mercenaries. Mana pouted and tightened her hand lock trying to close that part of herself from her temporary partner. Suddenly the magician stood straight and started moving out through the gate.

Kiyomi jumped up and started running after Mana. "Hey, wait up, what got into you!?" the blonde yelled out. The young magician really hoped that Kiyomi didn't read minds casually, that would've been an invasion of privacy but that wasn't the worst part, Mana just wanted to keep her origins secret from a person who was a patriot and devoted to their village without question. That wasn't an unusual trait, Kiyomi deserved no hatred or dislike for it. A lot of ninja were just like that. Mana just sighed realizing that once again she was the black sheep, she would've always chosen her own ideals and freedom over the orders from a village, she'd have been willing to die for her ideals or lose her title as a ninja. She wasn't that much different from the mercenaries, she just didn't sell her ideals out, the ideals themselves were the coins for the girl.

"Did I say something?" Kiyomi ran up to Mana looking at the girl curiously, this at the very least revealed that Kiyomi didn't just probe people's minds just because she could. That just made the younger kunoichi appreciate her superior a little bit more.

"No. I got sick of waiting, let's move." Mana cut the dialogue down, she was really hurt and shut inside, maybe most because she admired Kiyomi and wanted Kiyomi's approval and this revelation that Kiyomi was one of those loyalists of letter of law and absolute loyalty to the village made Mana feel like in the eyes of her superior which she wanted to befriend she'd have looked just like those mercenaries – just a scumbag.

"Okay, the road is long, are you gonna talk to me, or not? How about you? Have you had any experience with mercenaries?" Kiyomi asked with that same tone of curiosity in her voice. The blonde must've already picked up on something bugging Mana, she also appeared to have related that to something that she must've said and it was evident that Kiyomi tried to somehow find out about what exactly rubber her partner the wrong way without probing her mind.

"Yeah, I've had some. I fought them when they turned on a guy who paid them." Mana casually threw back. She didn't sound angry or anything, nothing in her voice implied any malicious and offensive feelings towards the Yamanaka but she still sounded sad. Almost like a person sounds when they knew they've been wrong and someone corrected them. A part of a person felt grateful for the person who did that but it still hurt deep inside.

"Oh… That's impressive, mercenaries are trained to face ninja, for a girl your age to hold your own, that's pretty cool, you must be really strong" Kiyomi tried to somehow repay her unclear offensive remark with some compliments. Mana didn't react to that in any way. "Did you beat them all by yourself?"

Mana suddenly started feeling even worse. The magician stopped letting Kiyomi catch up to her and then take lead. She then shook her head angrily but slowly. "No. This jounin named Dorimi saved me. I did knock out all but the leader, I hesitated to kill him and he flipped the table on me, next thing I know I was about to die…" Mana stopped talking trying to let her newly made friend know that she didn't take any pride of having to be saved. If actually offend her a little.

Kiyomi laughed out, "Really? Why would you hesitate to do something like that? You're just like my friend, not the Uchiha one, that guy was a real douchebag, he never hesitated, the other one, the one who quit. Initially he really was afraid to fight people, Hanasaku-sensei kept pummeling his face every time he refused to hurt someone because he was afraid to hurt them. "You don't have to kill, but you must not be afraid to fight! If they die while you're fighting it's on them, not on you. True student of mine must love fighting!"" Kiyomi did her best impression of the Fifth.

"Great, so on top of being a village loyalist Kiyomi is also a brawler with no reservations about killing…" Mana sighed after being laughed at. It wasn't an offensive laugh, more like the kind of laugh that a friend gives you when you tell them an embarrassing story from your youth. Mana lived a life of embarrassment and inner pain, she was always looked down on and laughed at whenever she voiced her ideals of peace and love being the ruling forces of the world. One of the most painful things to happen to her was when ninja she admired ditched her beliefs and laughed at them.

Tanshu-sensei wasn't a ninja Mana wanted to be like when she grew up, still, to her Tanshu-sensei was the best ninja in the world. When the world's strongest ninja tells you you're wrong there's a certain amount of pain and sadness one has to go through. Tanshu was supposed to know everything there was to know about being a ninja and he was pretty firm on that specific distaste of Mana's ideals. Now Kiyomi, a kunoichi whom Mana strived to be more like, someone she looked up to because of how cool, pretty and strong she was, also shared that same belief. The world didn't seem like it was about to give the magician a break.

"OK, wait, are you… Still… You know… Like that?" Kiyomi suddenly jumped up and shyly shouted out, having realized that she may have spouted out something offensive. Mana silently nodded.

"I am, I would never consciously take a life, I'd die before killing someone. I used to be a lot more peaceful but a wise man once taught me that in order to protect the people I want to protect, which is everyone, I need to fight sometimes. I realized that he was right, if an enemy of mine chooses to fight, it's his choice and I'll do my darned best to end that fight quickly. I won't shy away from doing whatever I can to them, I'll break their body and their mind until they can't fight but I'll never take their life." Mana silently explained, she could hear Kiyomi's step slow down a little and wriggle hesitantly further from her.

"Damn… That's pretty… You know…" Kiyomi let out, she wasn't disgusted or anything she just wanted to let Mana know what she thought.

"Stupid? Yeah, Tanshu-sensei let me know that every day…" Mana replied shutting inside even further.

"No… Dark and hardcore. I mean… I get it, you don't want to kill it's your ideal, your nindo and all that but… It's not by any means an idealistic pink shades ideal I've taken it for. You may just be darker inside than I am. Most ninja choose to kill other people over causing them too much pain, the whole point of ninjutsu is to eliminate the enemy so quickly that they don't even know what hit them, so fast that they don't even get a chance to feel any pain…" Kiyomi explained.

Mana didn't get any happier from that declaration of opinion but at least she knew now that Kiyomi didn't exactly think that Mana or her nindo was stupid. She just took a bit different stance on things and that was alright. That was why magic chose to let Kiyomi be born, she was that kind of person and people of every kind were necessary in this world for it to be rich and diverse and as magical as Mana took it to be.

"Look… If I said or did something that hurt you, you know I didn't…" Kiyomi started something that sounded like an apology, Mana shook her head and interrupted her newly met friend.

"No, it's my fault. Me getting worked up over you saying something about my views, which is also a testament of your views is the same thing as the thing I'm getting worked up for. I'm just… I get angry sometimes and sad and… I know it's wrong, I know I'm wrong but it doesn't help…" Mana almost grunted out her admittance of being wrong. She knew just how hypocritical getting offended for expression of opinion was, after all, she made a life of someone harder just because they let her know their opinion. In other words, she got pissy about someone's opinion because someone got pissy about hers. If there was anything wrong with the views of Kiyomi, Mana made something equally as wrong with hers when she took them too deep and shut in herself.

"It's called puberty, it'll pass…" Kiyomi smiled, Mana finally managed to crack a grin. "You should've seen me when I was your age, I was punching everyone, every time. Even Hanasaku-sensei got the sharp end of my wrath, I liked to punch her especially because she never got hurt from any of it…"

"I… I got angry initially because you said you disliked people who took their ideals over the authority of the village. I'm a half-blooded descendant of a tribe of wandering ninja entertainers, they valued freedom and making people laugh and enjoy their time most of all. They got slaughtered by the village because they defied its authority, I just felt like if you knew that you'd hate me just like you hated those mercenaries…" Mana admitted.

"That's stupid, why would anyone hate someone with those cute cheeks?" Kiyomi playfully pinched Mana. Being treated like a younger sister initially annoyed the magician but then she still couldn't keep her laugh inside. "So you're from a clan too? I've never heard about your clan, guess that makes you a little last princess, huh? Most girls would kill to be in your shoes" Kiyomi joked with some irony in her voice.

"It wasn't an actual clan, more like a tribe of people who shared their love for freedom and entertaining people for food and donations to get them through the life outside the village walls" Mana spoke "Plus, I'm not sure if I'm the "princess" of anything, I'm only half-blooded member of a tribe of ninja mutts with kind hearts. I just really like everything my ancestors stood for and I owe a lot, because of my own ideas, to what they did"

Kiyomi shrugged, "Nothing wrong with that. You're not selling your ideas and heart out for money like mercenaries, you have your own nindo which isn't that popular to begin with. It constantly clashes with the opinions of people around you and the popular opinion of your village. You're always forced to defend your views against parties much stronger, older and more respected than you and you're always looked down on and pushed around. You're strong, both inside and outside and that deserves nothing but respect"

Mana looked at Kiyomi for a moment and smiled, she just barely restrained her instinct to gleefully shriek like a little girl, her idol finally recognized her ideals and existence, she may not have actually agreed with Mana's views but at least she recognized that they were there and didn't just attack Mana for believing in such stupid childish things. That to the magician meant the whole world.

"So, how close are you to being "Princess Yamanaka"?" Mana asked trying to return the question and get to know a bit about Kiyomi in the process. The blonde smiled and sighed.

"Actually… I'm pretty much it, my father's brother is supposed to pass on the status of clan's head to his heir but he has no children. The main idea floating around is that once I get married my family will lead the clan" Kiyomi admitted slightly blushing.

"Why do you need to marry someone to lead a clan, also wouldn't that make you the queen? I mean wouldn't your husband rule the clan in that case?" Mana curiously blinked repeatedly. All those clan rules were so complicated and confusing but they were living tradition and history and Mana loved everything about history.

"Not if I marry another wife, I'm joking… I mean, whatever, the thing is that if I marry a Yamanaka like me, in that case yes, he'll get the wheel and I'll just be a cheerleader from the side but if I marry someone from another clan, they won't hand the rule over clan matters to some random guy so I'll still have the whole responsibility in my hands and my husband will be the cheerleader." Kiyomi explained. Mana almost felt bad that she didn't take a notebook to write all that stuff down, clan rules and traditions were pretty interesting but also confusing.

"Wow, I should've known earlier, I would've bowed to Your Majesty!" Mana smiled and bowed from the waist down as if she was meeting a Feudal Lord or something. Kiyomi just showed Mana her fist as her eyes flared as hotly as the red on the Yamanaka's cheeks. "I'm older than you by at least two years, I can still kick your butt, you know" the blonde let out a joking threat, at least it was supposed to be taken as that from the tone.

All of a sudden Mana's eyes shifted to a spot behind her, the girl leaped into the air and quickly made some hand seals, Mana thrust her legs forward, almost like as if she did a dropkick but instead of just kicking a powerful gust of air shot from her feet, it was a vertical "Mystical Wings" jutsu. The powerful gust of wind that would've normally propelled Mana into the sky or broken her fall now blew away multiple knives coming at the two girls. Kiyomi looked back and picked one of those knives up examining them.

"They're not just simple kunai, they're throwing knives but they're completely flat, they're meant to go in deep, not just puncture the flesh, this one can go through bone and even get into the body whole way in. Be careful" the blonde warned, she then lifted her head up and yelled out, "Come on out!" into the thickness of the forest. Nothing came from the blackness of the shadows formed by the thick line of trees. The assailant may have been anywhere.

"Damn it!" Kiyomi shouted out nervously throwing multiple kunai and shuriken into the depth of the shades, in multiple directions and multiple degrees of elevation just to see if she can get a read on the enemy's location. The correct course of action would've been to dive behind cover, trees could easily stop shuriken and kunai but these knives were so flat that they had the penetrative power to go through most trees and then still pierce into the flesh, staying hidden behind a cover would've just made the two static targets unaware of them being picked off.

A dark haired young woman leaped out from the cover deflecting the kunai and shuriken going her way as easily as eating a pie. She wielded twin short swords, they went just a bit past her elbow but they were definitely long enough to impale someone on them. They also looked a bit crooked and more of the slashing kind. The woman's face had a strange tattoo on the upper forehead and the cheek, they were some strange symbols, hieroglyphs used in the ancient times that Mana identified as being from the War of the Earth and the Moon times. The one on her forehead read "Kill", the one on her cheek meant an ancient praise of a single symbol "Galateia Be Praised", it was hard to know what exactly that name meant, it could've been the name of this young woman.

"Why you! Are you a mercenary?" Kiyomi wondered out loud but then she noticed a headband protector with the Konoha sign on it. The raven haired assailant was tall, she was no girl, she must've been either in her late teens or early twenties even as her body was completely formed, covered with scars and tattoos. She wore a simple darkened bronze ring armor which only covered her chest, her arms looked like the arms of a slim but athletic male. This was a woman capable of smothering the life out of a person if she got her hands on them. She had an extremely pale skin and oddly colored dark purple eyes with wide irises. That was too unique of a look not to be from some weird clan.

"Galateia, Goddess of War be praised with these two joining her fray!" the woman uttered playing and rubbing her swords at each other so strongly that they shot off sparks. She must've been able to coat the blades with chakra because usually swords dulled when similar misuse and tension was applied to them.

"What kind of retarded Goddess accepts one's own comrades as offering?" Kiyomi angrily grunted charging forward, the woman moved in an instant, passing right through her opponent. After this assailant appeared behind Kiyomi, the Yamanaka grunted in pain and fell on her knees, a small gash opened on her cheek but the girl appeared to be clenching her gut where she must've been hit with something dull as it didn't bleed. This woman was insanely fast! Way faster than any genin Mana had ever seen.

"Galateia, Goddess of War? That's the Goddess from the times of the Great Settlement period, worshipped by assassins and warriors like the Uchiha and Kaguya. Who are you?" Mana asked the attacking kunoichi openly but the young woman straightened out and prepared to attack again instead of answering Mana's question. Mana lunged forward, she couldn't let this woman attack Kiyomi, with a quick flick of her wrists she tossed several steel tipped cards that hit the swords in the lower section forcing some shock to be transferred into the woman's wrists, strong enough to disable those arms for a moment.

Mana leaped into the fray with a powerful spinning kick but her kick was blocked by the same manner of kick. Angered and irritated from being perfectly matched in term of kicking speed and power Mana kept sending more and more kicks, faster and faster, the woman matched Mana's speed but didn't surpass it, the two were locked in a clash of kicks, it was an endless dance of kick after kick, Mana's black sandals moving in a flurry, powerful booming sounds of muscle hitting muscle erupted every time the two clashed. As fast as Mana kicked, as fast as she linked her kicks together and switched her dominant leg letting out another kick the woman matched it perfectly, it was a very different style but it was equally fast and strong.

Mana did a cartwheel back to clear the area as a powerful explosion erupted coming from Kiyomi's explosive kunai but the woman just leaped out from the smoke moving in close to Mana, with her swords in the ready to cut the girl down. Mana gasped as that last exchange of kicks left her out of air and as fast as the girl's hand seals were they weren't fast enough to save her life. That was it! The woman grunted triumphant as her swords swung in a mad spinning slash but they only cut down a large log. Mana felt her being held by Kiyomi further away – the Yamanaka used substitution to replace Mana with a log that she had in her hands.

"Thanks" Mana thanked her friend feeling really bad about almost being killed. She trained so intensely that last year and all of it was for nothing, had she been alone she'd just have died for nothing. "Don't feel bad, no way she's a genin, we're as good as genin get, I would've aced those Chuunin Exams last year and I know a Chuunin when I see one." Kiyomi winked at Mana, "You've just clashed your super neat legs against those of a Chuunin and didn't get crushed, also you kept her from cutting me down so that's appreciated…" Kiyomi breathed out as she did seem a little worn.

The Yamanaka shoved her arms forward holding them in a peculiar hand seal. "Mind Body Switch Jutsu!" she shouted out, Mana's mouth opened wide from surprise when she saw some sort of transparent ghost-like figure shooting out from Kiyomi's hand seal heading towards the woman, with a graceful flip to the side using her one hand for support the woman evaded and lunged towards Kiyomi. Mana leaped back, knowing that the woman didn't attack fast enough for someone as tough as Kiyomi not to dodge it. The woman got closer and closer, time seemed to have stopped. Mana's arms went through a handseal. The woman's swords pierced Kiyomi's black grey top but then only cut through a log. Mana returned the favor by substituting herself and her friend.

"Thanks" Kiyomi smiled at Mana, "I am left wide open and can't move for a while after using that technique, I guess she's a bit too agile to just throw it around like that, sorry" the blonde laughed out as if her life wasn't on the line here. Mana smiled back, "Guess we're even then" she casually said without turning her eyes off the woman. Suddenly the woman leaped forward, reminding of one of those graceful jumps of ballet, as her dominant foot landed it redirected all of the force into a fierce skin, the swordswoman moved like a horizontal disc saw!

Kiyomi charged forward, somehow Mana knew just what her friend meant to do, it was like they were meant to be fighting together, almost like they needed no further training to understand one another. After getting dangerously close to the woman Kiyomi flipped acrobatically over the woman with an arabian flip. Since Kiyomi covered everything behind her with her body there was no way for the woman to see Mana's steel cards with explosive notes on them, a violent explosion erupted from the cards being deflected by the woman's mad spinning motion. Kiyomi and Mana were huffing and smiling at each other for their nice combination move. This fight was like their deadly playground to learn to work together. They'd need it later, if they survived this, that is.

The woman was huffing heavily on her knees to the side, her armor was completely busted and all over the ground, the bronze rings weren't that tough to shatter. She must've really strained her body hard and twisted her leg weird because she was sweating all over her forehead. Mana and Kiyomi attacked simultaneously, neither of them was able to match this woman up close alone but together they could just do that. Mana went in for a fierce and swift combo of kicks that was swiftly blocked, the magician felt Kiyomi's arms on her shoulders as the Yamanaka leaped over Mana with a powerful kick that planted right into the woman's face, making her stagger back with a bleeding nose. Mana rolled forward getting behind the woman and doing a backwards cartwheel to send her up in the air, then leaping up and wrapping her leg around the woman's neck. The assailant let out a powerful grunt as Mana's other foot kicked the woman straight into the top of her head sending her crashing down into the dirt.

Mana landed nearby and moved back in order to avoid any deceitful responses from her lying opponent. Kiyomi looked at Mana and nodded. "This woman can augment her moves, her endurance, her strength and speed using chakra, that's why she's still alive…" Mana concluded seeing the woman rising up from the ground, wiping blood off her nose and her lip which was busted. "This sort of augmentation is not something genin can do, not to such extent, this combo I hit her with was made to paralyze…" Mana huffed heavily.

"Well then it's official, we're facing a Chuunin, a Jounin would've already mopped the floor with us…" the blonde concluded.

"You little fancy dressing bitch!" the assailant yelled out, she appeared to have quite the potty-mouth and her voice fit that rough manner of speech perfectly.

"I just wanted to mess around with you two, now this is personal! I'll kill you both and then finish our mission by myself!" the woman swiped with her sword angrily taking a fighting stance again. Kiyomi and Mana both blinked rapidly as they realized that this woman in front of them was their third teammate.

The woman leaped forward swinging at both girls but Mana gave Kiyomi a boost to leap over the slash while she herself just dodged backwards just getting a small cut on her throat, any deeper and it may have really gotten nasty. Mana covered her neck trying to see if the bleeding was dangerous or not, it bled rather slowly but it was a very annoying and relentless bleeding, plus the magician preferred not to mess up her uniform if possible. Those required a lot of sewing and crafting to complete with all those hidden pockets and spring devices to boost the speed of the cards shooting out of her palms…

Kiyomi charged forward, the woman roared proudly raising her swords vertically and Mana observed much to her horror as her friend ended up hanging on the tips of those swords. At least Kiyomi managed to somewhat augment her endurance or else she'd have been impaled. With a swift kicked after removing the swords the woman sent Kiyomi rolling back grasping her small wound on her gut. Despite the gruesome look, her friend was lucky to toughen up just in time, she must've wasted a lot of chakra but at least she didn't die…

The raven haired psycho leaped at Kiyomi trying to decapitate her when Mana appeared in front of her pressing the buttons of her cufflinks, whole two decks of steel tipped cards shot out, the woman backflipped doing her best to deflect all of them, she skipped some, they left some nasty cuts, several etched into the woman's body but generally she received no fight ending wounds whereas Mana cleaned all of her reserves that were in her emergency spot near her wrists. The psycho swiped her sword and licked the blood off of the tip, leaving some to rub onto her cheek, she seemed to enjoy the blood of her injured comrade.

"I see, so that's why you dress like that, you hide those stupid cards in every pocket of that stupid uniform. No worry, auntie Hisako will strip you of it and force you to fight without it, I'll kill you slowly without your handy cards to bail you out. I'll bleed you out like a pig, then that older blonde will beg me not to kill her like you, maybe if I'll have had enough of your screams I'll slit her throat and be done with it…"

Kiyomi grunted out, her gut wound must've kept her down pretty badly. "That clears it out, she's a goddamn Yoruma…" the blonde said. Half of Mana's glance reached back at her friend, "Yoruma? I think I've heard that last name before…" Kiyomi nodded.

"Yeah, Yoruma are braindead psycho assassins, some of them are just bloodthirsty brawlers, some of them are cold and calculated psychopaths who love to torture people. I don't know why the village keeps them around but they do, probably cause Yoruma are decent at torture, assassination and strategy so the Council likes them... If you ever felt compelled to kill someone, this might be the right chance to think over your beliefs, knowing Yoruma mentality, she's not bluffing." Kiyomi grunted standing up. Mana took her fighting stance, she was ready to take this woman on, or at least hold her back before Kiyomi recovered.

"No. Even a woman like this deserves to live, somewhere, at some point she'll have a purpose to serve and I have no right to take her life. It's not for me to decide those things." Mana replied still very much determined to keep even this psycho alive. Hisako leaped forward swinging her sword, Mana tried to block it but the sword blurred and Mana couldn't catch the blade with her palms – it disappeared like a mirage! Then the mirage disappeared and the real Hisako appeared in its place, the first one was just an afterimage, the woman slashed making Mana scream in pain, she didn't cut to kill, she didn't intend for it to be that quick. Nor did the Yoruma wish to let the magician have it that easy, she playfully cut Mana again and again, rubbing her blade against Mana's skin just to open painful gashes but not to make them deep enough to kill her. This Hisako really was ready to fulfill her promise!

Finally after a powerful spinning motion after jumping up in the air, the swordswoman sent Mana down on the ground. The magician grunted pitifully but she crawled away further from her opponent just to stand up again. "What a fucking disgrace, a little pop idol girl who thinks she's a ninja yet refuses to kill. I'll do the world a favor and snuff you out right here and now, I don't plan on giving you an easy time either, it'll be a lesson to all those stupid idealistic little kids who think this is some cranberry pie day out here!" the woman shouted out.

"Stop! If you kill a comrade for no reason you'll go on Ninja Tribunal, you'll get executed or imprisoned for life!" Kiyomi tried to reason with the Yoruma. The woman turned back with a sadistic smile, "Do I look like the kind of a bitch that cares!?" she replied licking the blood off of her swords. Mana's foot planted deep into Hisako's gut while she was distracted, the woman flew backwards, her eyes looked completely whited out. Mana realized this was her final chance, with a swift roll she moved behind stumbling Hisako and locked her hands behind her, she locked them hard enough for the raven haired monster to drop her blades. Kiyomi placed her seals forward, "I'll kill this psycho right now…" she said angrily, the blonde's voice was enraged enough for Mana to believe it!

"No, please don't, just take her out, we'll find some mercenaries and ask them to patch us up. They've got medics amongst them too, maybe we'll pay them to detain her while we deal with the mission. Please…" Mana yelled out struggling to keep the hold.

"Mana… After all the pain she caused you, after she mocked your ideals and cut you up like that, after she tortured you… You still want her to live?" Kiyomi couldn't believe, her hand seal faltered and almost sunk down.

"Yes! Hurry up, please!" Mana shouted as Hisako started stomping Mana's foot and hammering the girl's sides with elbow strikes but Mana's hold held firmly. What the magician lacked in physical strength she compensated with sheer willpower.

"Mind Body Disturbance: Harakiri… Peaceful Version!" Kiyomi chanted firing off that same strange ghost from her hands that this time successfully entered Hisako's head, a strange howling sound let go as the woman just slipped out from Mana's arms and ran wildly like a maniac, controlled by Kiyomi's technique. She slammed her head right into the first tree in her way and passed out. Mana fell onto her knees clutching her cuts and wounds, she lifted her tired and beaten head and smiled for Kiyomi. "Thank you…" she was really grateful for her friend's decision to modify her kill technique to just disable just because Mana asked her to.

Mana took her top hat from somewhere on the ground and activated her father's seal removing a medical kit with bandages and some medical food pills. Mana tossed one for Kiyomi and ate one herself, after tying Hisako down she also gave Hisako one. The two girls just collapsed near the tree they held Hisako tied to and almost fell asleep.

"Now we definitely need to find those mercs, we need medical supplies…" Mana said, they had eaten all of their medical food pills and those provided only the most basic medical emergency aid like patching up small wounds and fixing broken bones or torn muscles. These were quite rare so it was unlikely for most genin to even have them, Mana accumulated three over several months of saving them in her missions… One psychotic young lady ruined all of that collecting, all of that wish to have them ready for a dark time, to save someone's life with them gone…

"I guess you're right…" Kiyomi nodded. The two looked at Hisako who was awake right after being given the pill and now kept staring at the two with the coldest and most emotionless stare ever seen on a person, it wasn't angry, it wasn't spiteful, it was just there…


	77. Sick World for Sick People

As the day was approaching its end, Mana and Kiyomi continued to wander forward through the Fire Country's forests. They had already passed the incredibly rich trade route that lead to Shukuba pleasure town, the three decided recently that staying there would be counterproductive. While both girls could've used a warm room and a bed, those simple pleasures had to be given up on when the two heard about the prices. It appeared that Hisako, the raven haired assassin from the Yoruma clan was to blame for all of the trio's troubles.

First of all, Mana and Kiyomi could've easily fit into a single room but the policy was that three people had to rent out two rooms. Even a single room would've drained the funds meant for hiring a mercenary, something that the magician and the Yamanaka would have to do, now that Hisako proved herself to be completely insane. Even more, with the black haired assailant being tied up she was moving at a turtle's pace, there was no malice from her side, she just couldn't move too fast as her legs were restrained and her hands were tied quite firmly. Mana knew which knots could've been escaped from and which couldn't, she's been doing it for the greater part of her life after all. Even the Academy "Rope Escape Jutsu" couldn't have helped Hisako with those knots.

And so since the funds needed to be conserved, their prisoner kept in their sight at all times, also the mission implied urgency needed, with the life of a youngster being in question, the three needed to pass right through the pleasure town. Kiyomi was quite rough on the young woman, the Yamanaka kept dragging the woman around like her dog and appeared to greatly enjoy this. Mana asked if it was her turn to keep Hisako on her check and the Yamanaka denied it multiple times. It was a chore to keep the woman on watch and drag her around, still, it was a chore that Kiyomi had taken great pleasure in doing. After almost getting impaled by the Chuunin and having to spend most of her chakra on that incomplete augmentation she must've been tired too...

To Mana such hate and severity towards a fellow ninja seemed excessive but the magician had decided to show respect towards Kiyomi's approach after the blonde showed so much respect towards Mana's by not killing the woman when she had the chance. The Yoruma was so quiet and submissive the whole way after her attack that Mana almost forgot that the woman had just tried to kill them. Well, technically, if her statement was to be trusted she just wanted to mess with her comrades but Mana's "rough" approach pissed her off. Apparently in Hisako's mind it was OK to almost kill her comrades but when they as much as touched her in defense they had to get tortured and killed...

"Can you believe those Yoruma?" Kiyomi grunted aggressively yanking Hisako's rope to the point where the rope had burned some nasty wounds on the woman's hands and body where it came in direct contact with the woman's skin. Even if those rope burns were supposed to hurt the woman didn't as much as moan, she just stayed completely quiet and didn't even flinch even when her wounds turned crimson red and were about to draw blood.

"I'm sorry, I am unfamiliar with the Yoruma except some small bits I've heard from my old team about Yoruma torture being the worst there is." Mana replied quietly, still wondering if she wouldn't have been out of line to ask Kiyomi take it a little easy on their prisoner. The magician wasn't even a fan of having her around, after all, if the mercenaries refuse to take Hisako in and deliver her to Konoha they'll have to go on a mission they have no hopes of completing with an offended Yoruma prisoner who was ready to slit their throats at the moment they make a mistake and let down their guard.

"I mean, they keep pulling shit like this off, once a Yoruma let his teammates die just to wait until the enemy set up camp and then they slowly tortured and killed every enemy in their own camp, the other time they joined the enemy side and killed their own comrades, then when the enemy let down their guards slaughtered them all too. They're skilled strategists but their strategies involve their comrades getting sacrificed like it's a game of goddamn shogi!" Kiyomi complained giving Hisako an angry stare and yanking her rope harder, finally the young assassin gave in and fell onto the dirt, Kiyomi walked up closer and stood by the woman giving her time to get up.

"But... Wouldn't someone do something about them if they were that bad? Why are they allowed to do things like this?" Mana wondered looking at the whole situation. Hisako wriggled on the ground in pain and Kiyomi softly kicked the woman to the side, not strong enough to hurt her but strong enough for it to hurt and for her irritation to be made apparent.

"That's the thing, every time they do crazy shit like that they complete the mission. The village Council loves them. The First Hokage once fought over the Council to banish them, the entire clan was nearly snuffed out under the Second but they really must like sex because they're duplicating like rabbits..." Mana giggled into her palm from Kiyomi's mention of procreating, for some reason to her dirty jokes seemed funny, even if they never did before.

"Every time the Fourth tried to raise the question of their blatant lack of any morals or ethics, the Council shot the Hokage down. The Yoruma complete their mission, they do everything they're told to do, why bother sending a Yamanaka to read someone's mind, you'd need to answer a bunch of questions, you'd need to capture the enemy alive and then the Yamanaka would know all the secrets you're conveying, they also are moral, they tend not to torture people needlessly. Yoruma can just delete them like that enemy was never born and they'll never wink twice about it or ask a bloody question, if one needs intel they'll torture it out from them with no moral code in their methods. For that reason the Council made them pretty much damned invincible in terms of responsibility. They do from time to time act out a Ninja Tribunal session but for some reason the Yoruma either get all charges dropped or just get placed in Eden, the softest of the Correctional Facilities." Kiyomi kicked softly at Hisako again to which the woman moaned but managed to pull herself off the ground.

Mana wanted to raise a point that Kiyomi's hatred seemed to be based somewhat on clan competition. There was a big tension between clans and the competitiveness of efficiency in terms of mission completion always made matters even more difficult. Yet the magician stayed silent, she had no clan so she couldn't understand those sort of matters. "I've met a young man who was too powerful for his rank too one day, he was trained in the Kirigakure Demon Corps and he was quite ruthless, I wonder if he's a Yoruma too..." Mana remembered the young Demon that they fought in the Junkyard district.

"Unlikely, those bastards are Konoha exclusive, as far as I know. Several villages want some of them for their services but the Council doesn't want to share and the Yoruma don't even care. As long as they have beer to drink, members of other or same sex to have fun with and throats to slit they're happy in Konoha." The Yamanaka grunted out annoyed. Obviously the matter of Yoruma was a painful and inviting a lot of hatred topic for the blonde so Mana wanted to drop it as fast as possible.

Finally as the sky turned dark the trio reached the mercenary camp that was wandering around close to Shukuba town and Konoha. This one was a particular and a special one, ninja sometimes used the services of mercenaries and this one was an exclusively that kind of a band. They hung around Konoha and offered their easily accessible services to the ninja of that village, other villages had similar bands as well. Mana and Kiyomi were hesitant to enter the camp. It was a large circle of tents with a colossal fire that lit up the night's sky. Some sort of a large animal was being roasted on a spear just above the fire.

"You can come in, girls!" a loud voice reached the ears of Mana and Kiyomi. It was cybernetic voice, similar to that of the same Demon that Mana had remembered fighting before. This mercenary must've used a cybernetic amplifier which made his voice unrecognizable too. The three slowly stepped into where the band could have seen them. These were a very brawny lot, armed to the teeth and armored. They looked like quite capable of doing most jobs requiring muscle but it was always a gamble with mercenaries as the three were just teenage girls entering their fray.

The owner of the strange cybernetic voice stepped into the light, revealing himself from the large circle and looking over the three. The giant was almost twice larger than any tall normal man. There were many ways in the ninja world to achieve such insane height and bulk but this certainly was not by any means achieved by natural means. The man may have been closing in on four meters in his size and he did not lack anything in the physical bulk department either. His group wore the usual chuunin vests that would have protected their vitals and their torso from most conventional weapons like swords and kunai knives or shuriken. This man however was too large for that, he just wore a white shirt and a black vest with shoulder guards to protect his oversized neck and shoulders.

"Well, come on, little ladies, won't you ask how I knew of your presence, if anything you were pretty much invisible, ain't that right, folks?" the giant turned at his group who all raised their beers in the air and yelled out with a deafening cry of joy and approval. Mana's heart was thudding like mad inside of her little chest, one couldn't have been too sure about how a bunch of mercenaries would react...

"OK, big guy, how did you know?" Kiyomi replied having decided to play by the leader's rules in case of them staying there.

The man suddenly reached onto his eye lid and peeled it up as if it was some sort of a zipper revealing a red glowing eye with some sort of yellow symbols and numbers running down his fake eye. "Those damned Iwagakure sensor eyes, best thing in the world, I swear, calculates distance between multiple points, senses body temperature and all that neat stuff. I don't know how those bastards rock miners did this but it's hot as hell!" the man shouted out in excitement.

Mana actually was quite interested in this strange eye of the mercenary boss. She had heard stories about technological breakthroughs happening all around the world. Konoha with its glowing gas for vendor ads and computers which could calculate really fast and store files, some people said it'd soon push the carrier pigeons and the Konohagakure Archive and its scissor-man owner out of business! Iwagakure with its sensory and radar technology, inventing radars that could sense veins of certain minerals underground and put the structure of the soil on display, Sunagakure with its amazing weather prediction system and its amazing solar power drawing devices. So far, Kirigakure was the only one lacking of technological advances as it very much dabbled in the old ways. They did use Sunagakure's solar power technology and started recently developing similar hydro power technology under the watch of the other villages...

"And what's that on your back? Is that a sensor too?" Hisako's voice came for the first time since she was captured. Kiyomi looked back at the woman angrily and was about to punch her but she decided not to, after all, showing violence in front of those guys may make them a bit annoyed.

"Nope!" the mercenary colossus removed his gigantic pole from his back. It looked like some sort of metallic column of some sort and it had bunch of weird numbers on it. "This is "Julie" the newest invention from Kumogakure, the world's leading inventors of kickass weapons. This baby converts chakra into pulsar blasts that blow shit up, no jutsu needed. You sort of need to know how to channel it into this baby so that sucks but so far this baby and me are engaged!"

Mana smiled back at Hisako, the woman seemed to know how to play this man, if he was pleased and talking he would've most likely have grown fond of the three and maybe helped them out. Then out of nowhere the giant mercenary leader recovered and pointed his gigantic finger at Hisako, seeing those fingers made Mana shake, the man would've been able to pop her head like a zit with two of those if he grabbed a hold on her...

"Why is that little hottie all tied up? We're all free men here, aren't we? Untie her the fuck up, come on, don't be such poor sports..." the man commanded.

Kiyomi stepped forward but Hisako leaped into her back pushing her forward, Mana realized what the young woman was doing so she covered her friend's mouth too.

"Ummm... My friend wanted to know which mercenary band this was, if we were to have business and untie this woman, we want to know at least if we're dealing with the right band..." Mana smiled and blushed as she just made that excuse up. She needed to buy time and play this right, hopefully Hisako got over her madness and started playing along, so far she seemed quite helpful and started making up for trying to kill the two. Not that saving their lives would make up for that but she was at least going the right direction.

"Right, well my name's Hachi, I'm the leader here 'cause I blew the last one the hell up. That dick tried to move this band away from Konoha, I didn't agree with that and I used all of my awesome gear that I've bought using my numerous payments, which other members of my... Group... Wasted on booze and... You know... Temporarily fun things." The giant explained. Mana didn't really like this man, not because of his "weapons of destruction are cool" attitude but because he had enough brain to use his funds for something like bartering for such weapons. Most mercenaries weren't so good at making investments for the long run because they had no long run, their life expectancy out here wasn't that great so they just drank and humped until they died in battle. This guy was different and something about it rubbed Mana the wrong way.

"Fine, we want to do business with you, Hachi" Kiyomi pulled the bag of coins that she was given by the Fifth as mission funds. "-san..." Mana added trying not to disrespect the man and desperately wanting not to pick a fight with this group. There may have been as many as twenty men and women here, most of them wore chuunin vests and how they earned them was quite shady, they may have been bought or looted from dead bodies and ninja tend not to sell their equipment to strangers unless they're greedy and the deal is good.

"Well then, why don't you settle down by the fire, young ladies, also untie the blackhead chick, even if she's your prisoner she's not running away from all of us." Hachi ordered.

"You'd be surprised..." Kiyomi started but then mercenaries surrounded Hisako and cut her ropes. "Or... You know... Do whatever the hell you want..." the blonde finished her thought having realized that all semblance of control had just been taken away and the table was officially flipped now. The rug couldn't have been more pulled. The mercenaries gently lead the girls around the fire as they settled down in front of it, on the other side Hachi dropped down shaking the ground under his giant rear cheeks. His size never ceased to impress, apparently his weight must've been matching the man's size as well.

"Well then, what do you need to do and what do you have to offer for it?" Hachi asked curiously placing his head onto his giant palm and looking at the three girls with genuine curiosity. The lack of malicious intent in his eyes was surprising but Mana had seen kind eyes change into malicious in a matter of moment. This situation was as close to sword of Damocles as possible.

Kiyomi peeled a chunk of meat from the giant animal roasting and stuffed her mouth after being gestured to eat. After swallowing the whole thing down she slammed her hand on the ground to try and gather some respect and authority. Mana also took a small bite of the meat, she wasn't much of an eater but if a host wanted one to eat, the worst thing to do was to dishonor them by refusing, especially if a host had a heat-seeking eye and a pulsar chakra blast launcher on his back as well as God knew what other enhancements... Hisako also sliced a piece with her knife. She had multiple belts of knives all around her body, as many actually as Mana had cards. For a moment this revelation of all the hidden sharp blades around Hisako's body made the magician feel happy that she recollected most of her cards she had tossed in their brief scuffle before.

"We have a hostage kidnapped and we need hands to rescue it. This woman here is Yoruma Hisako, she was supposed to be our teammate, a Chuunin no less, and she tried to kill us. Now we're short on competent hands and we need your help. All of the ryo here is all we have to offer, unless you're also charging us for the food..." Kiyomi explained their situation revealing the bag of coins on the dirt, it was picked up by a mercenary and brought to Hachi who counted the ryo and nodded.

"Fifty thousand ryo for an assignment like this? I assume you're paying for a single merc because one mercenary costs forty five thousand at the least, I price my own services in the ranges starting from a million ryo." the man rumbled out. Kiyomi looked really confused, she probably expected hiring the boss as a single mercenary may not have cut it in this assignment.

Hisako spat to the left, her spit landed alarmingly close to a near naked mercenary woman who was rubbing her body against her colleague. "Anyone told you you're a greedy bastard, Hachi?" she remarked, the mercenaries started shouting out in excitement as they felt like this woman had just challenged their leader.

Hachi laughed out, his laugh alone appeared to nearly put out the giant fire in the center of the camp.

"I mean a kunai with an explosive tag costs what... Eight hundred ryo? To have decent meal costs more like nine hundred, if we're talking Ichiraku Ramen it's five hundred or even three depending on the bowl of ramen. Now I haven't seen shit from you yet so if you asked me, I'd rather eat two thousand bowls of ramen and let my egg allergy kill me than hire you. Or just buy a thousand and a quarter of another thousand of explosive kunai, I'll let your little calculator in your eye do the math and check if I'm correct, I get it, you're big, it takes time for blood to reach everywhere..." Hisako kept on throwing insults at the man but it appeared like the more she insulted the man, the more he kept on laughing.

"Now there's a bitch who knows how to talk to a merc..." Hachi laughed out. He stood up and took his "Julie" off aiming to the side and blasting a single bright blue ball of pure chakra into the area where the three have come from. A deafening sound equaling a thousand thunderclaps made Mana lose her hearing for a moment and the bright light completely devastated her sight. The magician only regained her senses after almost a minute and she only saw devastation and destruction, craters and trees pulled with their roots and incinerated in the blast into dust and ashes. This man blew up at least fifty meters radius area with just one blast, a glass container shot out from "Julie" breaking on the ground. It was empty.

Hisako nodded, she didn't appear surprised or impressed but Mana could smell the sweat from the girl, she clearly was stressing out a little even if her act was pitch perfect. "Fine, we'll take either you if you're willing to work for this price or a man whom you trusted enough to join your group. Give us someone of your choosing."

Hachi sat back down putting his trusted cannon back it its sheath. "Not so fast. There's still one matter I don't get. You came here with this mission and hired us, that's fine. But then where will you go at night? You are clearly also asking us to let you sleep here in our tents, that'll cost twelve thousand ryo extra, I mean you're ninja and this gal looks like a Yoruma with those fucking tats, I can't really trust you out here unless you're willing to buy my trust. You're also asking us to lead this "Hisako" chick right back into Konoha, so you're expecting my mercs to just waltz into a ninja village? That's twelve thousand ryo extra. So to sum it up you owe me twenty four thousand ryo more than you got."

Mana shook in her seat uncomfortably, they didn't account that at all. When a mercenary feels ripped off he might turn uncontrollable. Kiyomi looked really pale and it didn't appear like she knew a way out either. Hisako on the other hand wasn't worried, she was utterly terrified. Mana couldn't understand it, what exactly could this girl be so terrified of? Then the raven haired woman just stood up and walked up to Hachi on the other side and whispered something into his ear. The man laughed out from his full lion's chest, the buttons of his shirt shot out revealing his hairy and bulky chest.

"Well then... This girl knows how to make a deal, then again, you did tell me that you were doubting my skill, why should I value yours at that price? I'll need a display of your skill or I'll just send your two underage brats home and keep you under my protection." Hachi ironically winked at Hisako who just lowered her head. She nodded, then Hachi pointed at some random mercenary who took Hisako to a tent.

Mana turned at Kiyomi who was a bit horrified by the transaction, more perhaps that Hisako was the one to initiate it. The magician didn't get what exactly was scaring her teammate. Clearly Hisako made some sort of a deal and from how skilled she was with words it appeared like she was quite skilled at those sort of deals. "What happened?" Mana asked Kiyomi with a whimpering and silenced voice, trying to talk with just her friend. The Yamanaka weaved a hand seal. Her words started appearing in Mana's thoughts as if the two were linked with their minds, Kiyomi knew how to telepathically communicate!

"It might be better if you don't know..." the Yamanaka said. Mana wasn't completely sure why on Earth was the atmosphere suddenly so sad and why her teammate was so crushed. Kiyomi's hands were trembling for some reason. Fifteen minutes later the mercenary and Hisako walked out from the tent and the mercenary nodded at Hachi. The boss then smiled at the two and at Hisako who soon joined the two by the fire. "Well then, I suppose a fun lady for the night..." Hisako raised her palm and nodded at Mana. Hachi coughed up, "To tell me stories from her rich ninja life whole night, I mean... That concludes the deal if my associate is happy..."

The boss stood up and spread his hands out wide with a happy smile, his giant cannon almost slipped off of his back. "Well then, young ladies, enjoy yourselves, eat and sleep wherever the fuck you want, my camp is your camp, my mercs are your mercs. My associate just let me know that I in fact owe YOU some. I am glad we could reach a consensual agreement here." Just like that Hachi disappeared, he danced around by the fire, sang songs and kept on drinking. Mana looked at Kiyomi who couldn't pull her eyes off of Hisako, for a moment the magician saw the reflection of Kiyomi's eyes from Hisako's crystal eyes. The Yamanaka was looking at the Yoruma with both pity and disgust.

Finally the big feast and all those horrible songs and hilarious dancing was over. Mana sat by Hisako who had her hands untied. Kiyomi disappeared in her tent, the mercenaries chose to vacate the tent which Kiyomi had chosen. "If that bitch tries something just think about it, I'll cut her throat that same instant!" Kiyomi's thought appeared in Mana's head, this ability of Kiyomi's sounded scary, just how did the girl use it? How potent was it? Who heard it? How exactly could Mana talk to Kiyomi back? Apparently it was as easy as focusing on a thought. Still, now the magician saw why the Yamanaka clan was so treasured by the village. They may not have been "point to make the problem disappear" people like Yoruma but they were incredibly handy in other departments.

"Why the fuck are you still here? What are you, seven? Go to bed, twerp!" Hisako hissed angrily at Mana, for some reason the woman wanted to stay alone by the fire. Mana looked at the sad female and she sort of felt sad for her. Whatever that deal she made was it looked like she was really familiar with those terms as that cruel realization moment made it apparent that Hisako had done it multiple times before. Did she often hire mercenaries or something? Mana just wrapped her hands around her knees and buttoned up her blazer and moved in closer by the fire, the night was a really cold one.

"You look sad, I thought maybe you needed company..." Mana tried to be nice to the woman. "Plus I'm like almost fourteen, so come on, don't be like that."

"Trust me, kid, I'm about to have my company, more than most can handle." Hisako hissed back, just with a little less anger, Mana wondered if maybe she could talk to the woman before it was time for the assassin to go to Hachi's tent to tell those stories of hers.

"You know... If you don't want to follow up on that deal, if you don't know that many stories or if you don't feel like it... We can just leave, we can do the mission just the three of us, we wouldn't need the mercenaries, we'd just have to get together..." Mana suggested, she was really ready to follow up on that suggestion, if Hisako felt uncomfortable with any part of that deal she made the magician just wanted to let the woman know that she had options.

"Jeez you're so fucking stupid. How do you think it'd go? Me working with that blonde Ms. Morals in there, I'd never wish to impose on her "my bloodline is so exalted and you're all just fucking disgusting plebs here" personality. Plus just seeing you makes my blood boil, I'd probably just kill the two of you anywhere in the middle of the job. I'd rather tell stories to this whole fucking camp by the fire for a month and then go to prison than have to listen to the condescension of that Yamanaka bitch." Hisako grunted out, she spoke quietly but she was visibly angry. She looked like a woman who was hurt way too many times as a girl and when she became corrupted by that damage people's hatred for her made that damage grow out of control.

Mana placed her hand on her chest and wiped her nose. Her eyes started watering a little. "Hisako-san, why do you hate me?" Mana asked.

"Shut up, go to bed already." The woman hissed back at her.

"I mean... Why are you so stubborn that you'd rather do something you don't like than just work with us?" Mana asked again.

A painful shock emanated in Mana's side, Hisako kicked Mana pretty weakly. Kicks from a sitting position weren't that potent but it really did hurt, mostly the mental idea that the woman would've rather hurt the magician than talked to her. Mana picked herself up and sat at the same spot where she was.

"I mean, I think I get it why you hate me, Hisako-san. You're a person who's had bad things happen to you a lot for your whole life, you became a person who could deal with that pain and all that darkness but other people didn't like that person. All that dismissal and all that hate, all that condescension and all that prejudice of your Yoruma legacy made you shut in even more, it's a circle... No, a drowning spiral of darkness and sickening hatred that doesn't help anyone." Mana spoke up, Hisako turned at Mana with a violent stare, the magician saw the woman's hands trembling on the handles of her knifes on the belts on her thighs.

"I'll fucking kill you kid, it's not worth it, leave it alone!" Hisako warned Mana as her voice started to pick up.

"Mana?" Kiyomi's trembling mental voice reached Mana's mind through the telepathic link.

"Please go to sleep, we'll have a troubling couple of days ahead." Mana thought concentrating on the thoughts with all of her might.

"You don't have to concentrate that hard, you're basically screaming it at this point..." Kiyomi replied mentally.

Mana reached up and hugged Hisako unexpectedly. She felt a sharp pain in her gut, Mana coughed up as all traces of oxygen left her lungs and she fell down on the dirt. She looked down where the pain came from, Hisako tried to punch the magician out by punching her in the gut. The girl desperately struggled to pick herself up. "Next time there will be a knife in that hand" Hisako grunted out. The woman stood up and started walking away moving to the large tent that belonged to Hachi.

"Does this hatred come from your family? Do you at the very least have a home to go back to and relax?" Mana huffed out, struggling to breathe. Hisako punched like a truck and a single punch almost made the girl throw up all that brief dinner that she had. Even after almost a minute had passed the magician struggled to get up.

Hisako stood there for a moment, she didn't say anything, she just stared into the tent and closed her eyes, the woman's head lowered as she stared into the dirt, she was shaking but then her voice returned to Mana.

"My mother was killed on a mission, she was a spy assassin, the slipping poison kind and she slipped poison to an official who was immune to it. She got tortured for hours before she died. My father was killed in front of me by the same people who wanted revenge for that attempt, they didn't attack the Kage, they attacked the family that was hired. That scar on my eye, that's from back then. Now go back to sleep and don't go to that tent, not if you want to see this world for what it really fucking is. Sick world for sick people, a world where excess of sickness is rewarded and kindness and weakness leads to suffering and death. Keep living in that dream, keep thinking it's beautiful, keep thinking you can change it. I want you to have that thought in you when I kill you, I want you to think about that, I want to see that thought leave your eyes at your last moments."

After that monologue Hisako entered the tent, Hachi's happy welcome echoed from inside and Mana finally managed to stand back up. The girl still rubbed her gut from the pain, Mana painfully walked up to Kiyomi's tent and peeked in. Yoruma had a way with murderous monologues, that much Mana had to hand it to Hisako...

"Kiyomi-san, can I sleep here too, I don't want to force some pair of mercenaries out of their homes?" she asked in an apologetic tone.

"Sure..." Kiyomi's sleepy voice returned. Mana entered and settled down into the corner of the tent on the fur that was taken off some dead animal's carcass, possibly even that same animal that Mana ate that night. The magician sighed, the air that entered her lungs was shaking in fear and hesitation.

"Don't talk to Hisako anymore, don't even think about her, she's nuts and she will kill you." Kiyomi warned Mana, this tone she used was incredibly strict and almost maternal. Mana closed her tired eyes and rubbed them wiping all the remains of any premature tears that may have formed. Yoruma really could talk, their scary monologues were so cold and so distancing, they made any sane person realize that this person was trouble. Most people would've described Mana in many ways but sane wasn't one of them. "Also, you may want to cover your ears, maybe cover your head with the fur." Kiyomi said gently pulling the fur cover on Mana's ears.

Mana's head slipped out from the fur, "Why?" she asked. Kiyomi grunted in frustration, "Yoruma kill a lot so I imagine her story telling techniques will be quite vivid and energetic, if you want to get any sleep you might want to cover up" the Yamanaka said covering the magician's head back up. "That sick self-centered bitch..." Mana heard the last message come through the mental link before she couldn't feel Kiyomi in her own mind anymore.

Despite the tent being cold and stuffy and the smell of dead flesh being all around her Mana drifted off rather easily, that fight with Hisako earlier left her quite exhausted.


	78. Crossroad Between Order and Chaos

It's strange how deep and long the sleep of cold autumnal nights was. It's like the body was getting ready for some sort of human hibernation, the exhausted body and the somniferous cold nights made a very freezing and almost dreamy combination. Maybe it was the cold, maybe it was the fact that everyone had their troubles to wake up to, oftentimes those troubles got edgy during the autumn period as one had to both work and prepare for the winter. This may have been a very primal reflex of postponing stress of preparation and casual trouble but it seemed to be passed down the generational line quite efficiently…

It took Mana good two or three "love taps" from Kiyomi to wake her up. The magician softly rose from the fur, rubbed the aching skin as the fur etched into her face. She made the right call to sleep with her clothes as her entire body would've felt itchy and had those weird sleep marks of hair rubbing at her body. Ignoring the stench that once again smashed itself mercilessly at her nostrils, Mana also desperately tried to get her wild hair in order but unfortunately the bed hair was strong on her. Kiyomi giggled looking at the magician.

"God you're so cute like that, I'd nom you like a pickle…" the blonde remarked but then her lovely smile quickly changed back into disgust as the Yamanaka peeked from the tent to see Hisako by the fire.

After Mana left she just barely restrained her surprise. Hisako looked amazing, someone did her hair and she wore a majestic, almost regal-looking, fur coat. It appeared to be made from the skin of some rare and once very beautiful marten, sable perhaps. Also when Hisako turned back Mana noticed her wearing a silver hairpiece. Were her stories that great that the assassin earned some additional bonus points with the mercenaries?

"Well, Hachi liked Hisako to begin with, I suppose she just got to know him better, I wish she let us in and opened up a bit as she did with…"

Kiyomi's grunt interrupted Mana's thoughts. For a moment the girl wondered if the Yamanaka was able to hear everything but then the blonde transmitted something back at Mana.

"I've had it with this bitch, let's get our merc and leave already, they'll deliver Hisako to the village or keep her for themselves, I don't care…" Mana still hadn't gotten used to the mental link. Thoughts just materializing in her head with her partner's voice sounded just too weird. It was like the blonde was some sort of an alien or something and communicated through telepathy. Just like in all those weird plays that spoke of the Moon People…

"Why would the mercenaries keep Hisako-san to themselves?" Mana thought back at her teammate curiously.

"Oh, for God's sake, Mana, Hisako paid for the mercenaries, the food, the tents and all that with… Ugh, you laughed at a dirty joke before, come on!" Kiyomi blasted a powerful sensation into Mana's mind. The magician tapped and rubbed her head as the thought was really powerful and caused some headache, even by shouting through telepathy Kiyomi was able to cause headaches, just how powerful her clan hidden techniques were it was scary to imagine!

Mana couldn't believe for a moment but then it all made sense. Why Hisako whited out before committing to it, why Kiyomi was so disgusted, why Hachi was so happy and content and why Hisako got all that special treatment like she's the queen of the mercenaries now… The magician walked up to the woman and gently tapped her shoulder.

"I'd stab that hand but I'd stab so deep that I'd plunge it into my own shoulder too, what do you want, idol-bitch!?" Hisako yelled back at Mana to which the mercenaries just laughed like they were bunch of monkeys.

"How did it happen?" Mana let out a very serious and concentrated question, her tone implied that she was about to do either something very stupid or just let it go, depending on the answer.

"Scuse me, didn't you fucking hear what I said? Bugger off before I'll ask one of the guys to spank you with a belt like an annoying little bitch you are!" Hisako rudely shouted back at Mana pushing her and removing the girl's hand from her shoulder.

"Mana, you're doing it again, just leave it at that, she's not worth it…" Kiyomi's thought was voiced on the link, it was interesting how the Yamanaka never included the assassin in the link. Almost like the hate for Hisako was so deep that the blonde wanted nothing less than let her anywhere close to her mind whereas she had little problem letting Mana in.

Seeing how the magician didn't move and continued to stare at Hisako with an angry stare that didn't budge off of the raven haired woman's eyes for a moment the assassin waved her hand at her, two assassins stood up and tried to lead the girl away, gently. With a single flick of her fingers, weaving a single hand seal sent the two writhing on the ground.

"Get them off!" one yelled, "They're all over me, oh my God, why did it have to be mole crickets!" the other joined in with his own horrifically pathetic scream.

"How… Did it… Happen?" Mana repeated the question. More mercenaries stood up, they looked much angrier than the lot that came at Mana before and while the girl's exterior acted all tough, internally she was beyond afraid. If all of them came at her she wouldn't have been able to detain all of them. She had to work just to keep that illusion on both of the other guys.

Hisako stood up and grabbed Mana by her elbow, forcefully dragging her further away from the band and Kiyomi. "Drop your fucking cheerleader act, now!" she hissed at the magician but Hisako noticed that Mana's eyes didn't change.

"You whited out when Hachi-san told us that we had nothing to pay him with, then you instantly switched to that. I want to believe that they forced themselves on you but… That simply doesn't happen like that. I'm confused if I should kick as many of their asses before they overwhelm us to teach them a lesson or if we need to have a talk." Mana insisted hissing back at Hisako. The magician didn't really understood what sexual violence was, it wasn't even much to her care, she didn't want it in her perfect idea of a world but killing was her primary opponent, she was bit too young to realize just what sort of a thing it was so she usually never thought about that. That meant she was about to pick a side on the spot, depending on Hisako's answer.

"So you're gonna condescend me too then, huh? That blonde cheerleader bitch got to you then? Well at least she's got some guts, enough guts to hate me! Idol-bitch and just bitch, ain't you just a fucking Bitch Brigade!?" Hisako started throwing a fit but then she noticed that she's not getting a reaction from Mana.

"If I have to ask you the same question again… I don't care how much chakra I spend, I'll make you pee yourself all over that fancy fur coat, eventually I'll find the insect or animal you hate…" Mana replied, it wasn't a threatening tone or an imposing one, while the content of her reply may have been interpreted as such her voice and tone were completely distant and cold.

"Fine!" Hisako yelled out before switching to a lower tone, "Yes, I paid with… That… I told you, idol-bitch, this is a sick and twisted world and sometimes sex helps you to make some shortcuts. I made a decision on my own free will. Tell you what, I didn't go pale because I was afraid of fucking with that giant hunk of muscle and gear, I did so because for a moment I thought I'd actually have to work with you two bitches and that thought made me wanna puke so much that I'd have died and if I did I'd have been happy because I wouldn't have had to look at your stupid fucking face for once"

Mana sighed and lowered her eyes, she didn't know what to say or do. How could she? Was what Hisako did wrong? Yeah, it probably was by Mana's moral point but… It was what Hisako wanted, wasn't it? Mana couldn't have known if it was wrong or not, she was too damned young and inexperienced with those sort of matters.

"I can hear you two caring but I simply don't care enough that you care, now if you'll excuse me, if I screw with that Hachi guy enough maybe I'll yank that fucking cannon off of him…" Hisako replied turning around and walking towards the center of the camp where the mercenaries were cooking some animal for breakfast. As the woman approached the fire the other women moved to the side and let Hisako sit down.

"Well at least it worked…" Kiyomi's thought materialized in Mana's head, "In just one night the Yoruma went from being a prisoner to being pretty much the queen of the whole band. If she asked them, they'd even let her stick around and wouldn't take her to Konoha…"

Mana's head sunk down, the magician couldn't even fathom how wrong it felt. Hisako did something so seemingly wrong but also she was so good at making it sound right. Also she wielded results, had the woman not done what she did Mana and Kiyomi would be heading back to Konoha to return Hisako and they'd have jeopardized the mission as they'd have wasted too much time. What Hisako did was wrong and immoral and… But she saved the mission, even if she was a selfish cunt about it. Maybe if she regretted it one bit…

Having grown with the mental sickness that she had, having to experience all the joys and misfortunes, having to relearn all the facts and rules, both written and otherwise, all over again, Mana sometimes got confused. When a deed seemed bad to her but the perpetrator felt not even a single drop of remorse about it she always lost her damned mind. That was just the simple defensive reaction, the social implication was that in such a world this sort of behavior was acceptable but… Mana tried to desperately tell herself differently, that was what caused her to freeze and just think about it hard.

"I'm sorry, Mana… I'm still looking at your thoughts because you're still transmitting them, you'll learn to keep things out of the link eventually, sorry… What you feel is right, what Hisako did was wrong, there are no written rules that forbid such behavior and female ninja are even trained to do that sort of thing to get what they want but… The human nature is that a woman must have some dignity, she needs to own and respect herself but she also has to respect the other gender. Using one's own advantages like this is disrespectful but… Technically she did what some kunoichi do and there's nothing illegal about that. Ultimately…"

"Thanks, mom… I got it…" Mana thought to herself rudely letting Kiyomi know that she wasn't that young and inexperienced to get morals from her superior of that nature.

"Yo! You two cunts hungry? There's some bitching sable cooking and I think I'm wearing it so… I dunno, feels kinda cool, like I totally destroyed that bitch, you know?! I mean we'll eat its flesh and then we'll wear its skin..." Hisako yelled at the two when Mana closed her eyes and shook her head moving towards the fire to get a bite or two before leaving. Kiyomi followed shortly.

"Yeah! Let's eat the shit out of that dead rodent!" one merc yelled out when Hisako laughed out maniacally.

"I was kidding you fuckwad, the animal's fucking dead, like it fucking cares!" and she started digging into the animal. It didn't appear like Hisako was at all ashamed of her using someone, it was the exact opposite since she was almost happy and proud about it!

A mercenary came in, his face was completely black from blunt force trauma. Mana looked horrified at the man when Hisako dropped her chunk of meat.

"You look like you kissed the bottom of the canyon from all the way up, what the fuck hit you?" she mumbled out taking another chunk of meat out of the animal to munch on. Mana suddenly felt like she wasn't hungry.

"Hachi…" the man sadly jumbled out through his toothless mouth and wrecked face.

"Holy fuck, I mean… I get it why he did it, technically we were supposed to screw and no one shares boss' bounty, that's like the first rule of mercs…" Hisako replied peeling a chunk of meat from the thigh of the animal and munching on it almost comically as a strip slipped out of her mouth only for her to slurp it back.

"Yeah but we didn't even fuck…" the man whined grabbing his jaw and almost starting to cry from pain. Kiyomi looked at Hisako curiously to which the Yoruma just shrug.

"So I held the knife to his balls and told him to say it was the best fucking shag of his life, no offense, man, but even I got standards…" she replied. Mana wasn't sure if this revelation made her dislike the woman more or less, seemingly everything about Yoruma Hisako was worth complete and utter hatred and disgust. Mana stood up and stuck the stick with the chunk of meat onto the ground close to the fire moving further and closer to the tents.

"Aincha gonna eat, idol-bitch? I mean you got a nasty right leg stomp, I'll hand you that, but you're not gonna squash a bug if you don't eat…" Hisako asked. Kiyomi nodded

"Yeah, Mana, you should eat something, today will be a tough day, hopefully we'll find the kidnappers and set camp around their location and plan the ambush overnight…" the blonde added agreeing to the basic idea that the Yoruma brought up for the first time.

"I don't feel like it, just know one thing, Hisako-san… I don't hate you." Mana replied. Silence took over the circle sitting around the fire when Mana turned half of her face back and glanced at the raven haired woman over her shoulder with a very faint smile aimed at the assassin.

Yoruma turned back, for the first time in a long time she looked actually pissed. Not pissed in a comical manner, not acting like she's angry when in her heart she's content. Hisako looked like she burned with such anger deep in her heart that it was about to explode and take over this whole forest. Kiyomi smiled so hard that it was clear that the Yamanaka was restraining herself from breaking into laugh from the apparent humiliation that Hisako felt in her heart. Obviously the Yamanaka wanted to kick Hisako in the butt, to somehow get at the woman but this was better than anything, this was seeing the woman get hurt internally and it was worth a billion ryo to the blonde.

"I know you put this exterior and talk nasty and bully people because you want to reject them, you want to be alone because then you have an excuse to be pitiful. You can whine about this cruel world and act like you're in control by stimulating sexual relationship with men you think you're using for your ends when in reality you're just compensating your vanity. That's why you were so mad yesterday, right? You wanted us to hate you, to push you away, you were also angry and impulsive towards the mercenaries but today you're all shining…"

After Mana turned around she heard a loud scream and then a strong tearing sound. When the magician turned around she saw Hisako halfway to Mana with her hand on the sword handle and Kiyomi locked her hands onto the assassin holding her in place. It was impressive that the Yamanaka could hold the assassin in place, it was likely that some degree of chakra augmentation was used and for a genin it was no small feat to pull off. It just proved that Kiyomi should've been a chuunin at this point having her ability to slightly augment her abilities with chakra in mind…

"You may not hate me or whatever… But have in mind that I will still kill you." Hisako said angrily, Hachi left his tent and Kiyomi instantly let go of the woman, the last thing she wanted was to be seen brawling with the woman that the leader of the mercenary band slept with. Too much depended on Hachi's cooperation to make it happen, if Hachi pulled the plug on his support Mana and Kiyomi would be leaving on a suicide mission and if he just decided to murder the two kunoichi then and there he probably had the manpower to do it…

"Now! What's all this ruckus about? I really feel like getting some beer about now!" the man roared out, Hisako sheathed her half drawn blade and picked up a jug off of the ground, rubbing herself at Hachi's body even if she just reached up to his lower chest area.

"Sheesh, what a godly woman, why on Earth would I take you to Konoha?!" Hachi laughed out as beer spilt all over his chin and down his black cloth and over his chest.

"Because I'll gut your oversized balls if you don't…" Hisako replied rudely. A devastating blow whistled in the air, a slap able to blow down entire tents or smaller vendors and crushing them to bits. Hisako's raised arm blocked Hachi's blow with a deafening thud and an awesome shockwave causing violent gales of wind that picked up the crashed chips of trees from last night. Hachi's wild laughter echoed through the air…

"What a wild, godly woman…" he kept on chuckling like an oversized ape

The whole band of mercenaries was preparing to go. Hachi actually decided to aid Mana and Kiyomi and send his entire mercenary band to aid his "queen". The degree to which Hisako had the leader wrapped around her finger after just one night of her "magic" was simply unbelievable, she may as well have run all the things in the band. The magician had even heard the colossal mercenary boss attempting to talk the young woman over and convince her to stay with the group. Hisako was smarter than she acted, had she done so she'd have been instantly declared rogue and then there'd have been no place on this planet where she could've hidden from the Hunter Nin hunting rogues or rogue bounty hunters who were rogues themselves but made a living hunting the most expensive heads to add to someone's collection.

Mana sat down gently to the side of Kiyomi and observed the Yamanaka twisting a flower between her fingers, enjoying the sight of the yellow petals and the charming scent of the plant. The magician smiled softly, "Do you like flowers?" she asked trying to find out more about Kiyomi. The Yamanaka closed her eyes and nodded.

"Yeah, my mother had a garden and we liked to take care of it together, she even called me her "little flower"…" Kiyomi replied, the girl looked a bit sad and very concerned before but when reminded of her past she bloomed like a flower during spring. Mana's smile became more apparent, she liked hearing stories like that, stories of happiness because it reminded her what she was striving to change the world for. She wanted every child to have a childhood like that of Kiyomi, at least the image of it that Mana had in her head…

"They even treated me like one, due to the potential inheritance of the high status of the clan they kept holding me back, they did everything in their power to keep me from getting as much as a scratch on me. I was inexperienced and weak even by the standards of the other students in the Academy, if it wasn't for my brother training me in secret I'd have never even graduated…" Kiyomi then continued to talk. Apparently Mana had caught her friend during a very nostalgic moment. Those happened often when one's life was at stake, people commonly referred back to their childhoods and history trying to validate their own existence in case it just ceased soon.

"What happened to him?" Mana wondered, regretting the question almost instantly when the blonde started sniffing. It was clear that the question still hurt her and those memories were sealed, still, the young girl didn't break down and she maintained her posture as well as her kind and noble features.

"While I was weak because I was held back, not being permitted to even get a scratch on me without the tutor getting fired, my brother took the responsibilities for both of us. He was expected to be my protector, he was supposed to be the strongest of us and so he worked twice as hard. He became a perfect protector, a legend and a hero of the clan and he also still was my big brother, the best kind I could've asked him to be…" Kiyomi replied, she wasn't taking the story well but she appeared adamant to finish telling it.

"He was too good for his own good, I suppose, he made enemies and he died protecting me…" Kiyomi finished it summing it up really quickly, it was clear that at that part she would've almost broken down. Mana turned her eyes away looking at how the mercenaries put out the fire and how they lifted Hisako to be carried on their shoulders like she was some sort of royalty. It was almost comical really. It now made sense why Kiyomi hated killers, rogues and criminals, people who defied the village authority so much. Mana smiled turning back at the blonde and gently placed her hand on her shoulder.

"It's OK, I think your brother would've been really proud of you. You're the strongest genin I've seen, you've worked with Chestnut Hanasaku, one of the Konoha Sannin and the current Hokage. You've become one of the most prospective ninja in the village while still being next in line to inherit the leadership of the clan. Any person who wouldn't be proud of such a sister is not a brother whose approval is worth earning." Mana replied almost whispering, as softly as a feather of a dove passing by fallen off of its wing.

Kiyomi chuckled, all traces of tears disappeared from her eyes. "Heh, Hanasaku-sensei was weird, she just took over watching me when she saw me being pandered, she thought that I was getting spoiled and so she wanted to grind my face against stone, to make my life a living hell and make the next inheritor of the Yamanaka leadership worth their mettle instead of them just being a spoiled brat. Every day Hanasaku's idiocy almost killed the three of us, the Yamanaka elders complained again and again when I got back wounded or full of broken bones but the Hokage only suggested them coming to Hanasaku-sensei herself… No one in their right mind would've objected that woman, not if they wanted to keep their face from having to peel it off the pavement."

Mana got surprised, "Wow, Fifth's training was that tough?" she wondered recalling how badly Tanshu treated them, breaking Sugemi's arm just because he acted just like sensei predicted him to act, leaving the kids to get mauled and eaten by the animals of the Forest of Death which were supposed to test genin who were advancing to the next rank. It was the edge one needed to overcome to become a Chuunin but it never stopped sensei.

Kiyomi winked she lifted her shirt revealing clean and pale skin with a large visible white scar tissue shaped almost like a small cross. "Once Hanasaku failed to decipher the map properly and missed a trap warning, I stepped on a panel that sent a stone with wooden spears crashing at me and impaled me. I thought I'd die but Hanasaku-sensei healed me haphazardly, then the medical ninja said that they had to rearrange my innards because sensei messed something up, obviously because she was lazy and because she rarely healed others, her physique was mangled so much that to her silly things like that don't matter. Usually scars like that get removed through several medical ninja healing sessions but I was completely gutted on the table and surgeries like that don't really go completely clean…"

Mana scratched her head, she still wondered which was worse: getting injured because one's sensei was just silly and couldn't do their job properly or because they were insane and purposely let one get injured. Had Mana not been quick enough she'd have been cut in two by the centipede back in Forest of Death as well, had it been an acidic centipede the girl would've either gotten crushed by the archive caving in or dissolved in the insect's acidic goo trying to swim through its guts. While the Kage and the Sannin were considered the greatest teachers and the students of those kind of sensei were supposed to inherit their teachers' status, they also seemed to be quite ruthless and crazy with their methods!

"Alright, ladies, let's move!" Hachi ordered, he swung his fist up in the sky gesturing for the others to move too. Going against his own plan he also took five extra mercenaries with him to head towards the area of supposed kidnapping. He happened to know a new encampment having risen in his area of where he sold his services, apparently it was just a day long walk further and if the group hurried up and moved as fast as ninja usually do they may have reached the area before the night fell, which would've been the plan as the night could've been used to set up plans for ambushing and recovering the hostage.

"I don't like it." Kiyomi telepathically let Mana know, "Hachi is taking extra men, he is changing his plans every minute, now Hisako will only be watched by fifteen men…"

"Don't underestimate mercenaries, during my early days I could barely match up to one of them and only beat them through trickery and cheap luck. They're trained to fight ninja, plus Hisako-san said she'd rather make love with the entire camp than work with us." Mana replied back, she was slowly getting the hang of this telepathic link thing. It worked very strangely, when one wanted to send something all they had to do was think about it like they were going to say it, the harder the concentration the stronger the tone and the louder the thought. If one wanted to think but to keep it away from the link all they had to do was to think without voicing those thoughts internally, it took some training but Mana was a prodigy at meditation and self-control, she found the trick really easy to pull off and only needed brief training with it.

"Smell you soon, bitches, or better yet, never again!" Hisako smiled gesturing a farewell motion and leaving with the leading crew, heading back to the village whereas Mana and Kiyomi were moving to the completely opposite side. "Trust me, the feeling is mutual…" Kiyomi replied also waving her farewell. Mana smiled and waved at Hisako.

"I hope we do meet again, I'd like to talk to you about what happened to you again…" she replied.

"I'd rather choke on cocks" was Hisako's reply to which the entire mercenary crew once again fired off their barrage of wild monkey laughs. These guys may have been even less mature about dirty jokes than Mana was and Mana was still working through her puberty, the time when dirty jokes were at their most hilarious.

"I most sincerely hope she does…" Kiyomi replied on the link as the groups finally moved beyond where one could have seen the other. Mana glared at Kiyomi, it was advantageous that the girl knew that telepathic communication ability, after all, they were surrounded by mercenaries which honestly couldn't have been trusted even by the most optimistic people. They could've been working for the kidnappers and tried to kill the two girls deeper within the forest for all Mana knew.

"So, Kiyomi-san… What are your specialties, I'd rather know who I'm working with and what they can do before we get into a team scuffle like the last time, while we worked together quite well, it'd be better if we actually knew what we're doing…" Mana asked on the link.

"Actually, from what I've seen, mostly same as you. I'd say that I throw a punch better than you but your kick sent that bitch crashing and pissed her off even through augmentation, I'd say my upper body is stronger and I've more experience with my hand to hand. Other than that I use ninjutsu of Fire Release and Ground Release, I can also do some basic Wind Release techniques and obviously the Yamanaka hidden techniques…"

Mana took note of all that her partner had said.

"I do genjutsu and ninjutsu, my kicks are just to keep my opponent at range in case they try to rush me down close and dirty. I mostly use ninjutsu for annoyance and displacement purposes whereas my genjutsu is more of the crippling kind. If I land one, we may as well have won."

It appeared that Kiyomi also took what Mana told her seriously. Now that the two shared their affinities and preferences in battle and had experienced fighting alongside each other first-hand, they'll stand a much better chance when trouble came their way.

"You two are awfully quiet, my lovely Hisako used to talk a lot of obscenities but she at least spoke… I like women that can talk, even if they talk nonsense, talking is just more of a woman's thing to do, you know…" Hachi tried starting an interaction, he must've suspected some sort of foulplay being involved with the two just silently walking by each other and looking at one another from time to time.

"You do realize "your lovely Hisako" screwed you just for gain, right? That's what kunoichi do, they show some skin, sometimes even at some very sensitive areas so that they can plunge a knife into your heart or slip something into your drink?" Kiyomi asked, Hachi looked at her angrily, Mana realized that her friend shouldn't have walked such thin ice, having in mind the man's reaction to his friend "sleeping" with Hisako before him, even if it was by his order.

"I'd say… That beer tasted strange last night…" Hachi remarked to which Kiyomi and Mana just curiously stared at one another.

"I can't fucking believe it…" the Yamanaka slapped her face in frustration.

"Well, at least Hisako-san got the "underneath the underneath" part of the ninja life right…" Mana added. Hachi laughed out, still obviously not getting the clue.

"She danced so well that I passed out pretty darned fast, if only she wasn't a ninja with all those going rogue rules…" Hachi replied "I thought a woman should be at least a little mysterious but Hisako-chan just slipped out of her clothes instantly, I thought I'd have a heart attack."

"Too many details, Hachi-san" Kiyomi angrily replied "Let's just focus on the road"

Mana laughed to herself inside, Hisako stripped because she wanted to accelerate Hachi's blood circulation so that whatever she slipped into his beer worked faster. She was a true assassin, born and bred. Able to take her enemy by surprise and use whatever means she had to take them down. Kiyomi and Hisako were both older kunoichi who were potential examples of what Mana could've grown up to be like, they were both guidelines for what she'd become and it was only for the magician herself to choose who she'd be in life. At the very least that event taught her to always look for something deeper in simple statements and things.

"Holy shit, look at that rich caravan!" Hachi's voice rumbled through the forest depth as his finger shot forward pointing at a wooden but sophisticated looking caravan passing by. It just screamed rich as it was covered with colorful silk cloth and the horses were armored, as well as the caravan driver.

 **Author's Note: Finally reached 5000 Views! Thank you guys so much, it's much more than I've expected to get (honestly I barely expected any attention at all seeing how this isn't the typical fanfic type everyone is interested in and features pretty much all OC cast). You guys are the best 3**


	79. The End of a Dream?

"No! Absolutely not, you can't be serious, we're on a mission right now!" Mana objected out loud. She got Hachi's idea almost instantly, after all, it wouldn't have been that tough. A caravan with no visible guards, pretty far away from any active Konohagakure guard patrols, a mercenary band already mobilized and prepared for battle. It all could've only meant one thing. "You are not robbing that caravan, we have an assignment!" the magician repeated as if that was the most important thing that bothered her.

Obviously Mana was much more worried about the innocent lives that could've been lost. The caravan driver, maybe whoever was protecting the goods inside as well. Mana trained for over a year, she trained with one purpose in mind – to prevent innocent people from dying, whether she's there to do it or not. Now that she was right up close to the lives threatened there was not even a single moment of hesitation, she'll pick a fight if she had to but those people will reach their destination.

"Chill out, kid, I know what I'm fucking doing. There are no guards in this caravan and even if there were, we'll overwhelm and crush them quickly. We're risking nothing." Hachi pressed his temple with a finger and his radar eye started running down numbers.

This was bad, the mercenaries were ready to plunder this caravan right in the middle of a mission. Mana looked and Kiyomi and finally realized why the blonde had that particular dislike for mercenaries. The magician didn't rule out all mercenaries as being total dickbags, still, those guys definitely were if they were willing to just throw their entire mission away.

"Odd, there seems to be no one inside that caravan or I just can't see any heat signatures…" Hachi mumbled placing his cannon arm forward, was he going to blast his cannon at that caravan? Why would he be so reckless and risk destroying it? The mercenaries all took their bows and arrows off their shoulders and quivers and prepared for an ambush. This was a stupendously bad idea, it was an even worse idea to pick fights with those guys. Mana and Kiyomi were underhanded already, they needed the mercenaries, not to mention that a fight like this would draw out resources, tire them out, injure them or even kill them. To fight them now would've been to jeopardize the whole mission!

Hachi's cannon fired off a small concentrated beam hitting the horse, the heated beam went right through the animal's flesh as if it was a heated knife going through butter. The animal fell right under the other horse's feet tripping him as well, the entire caravan stopped and the driver fell over and off his seat bumping his head. It was then that the arrows appeared. Mana and Kiyomi moved at the same time. The two dashed to the driver, making their hand seals while moving forward, they made it right before the arrows started landing forward, each mercenary shot out at least ten arrows, it was safe to say that some amount of chakra must've been used. It probably was a similar technique to the "Multi-Shuriken Jutsu" which Shimo used once during Team Oak's first training session with Tanshu-sensei. The arrows multiplied while in the air.

"Wind Style: Friendly Gust!" Mana shouted out, a powerful burst of wind chakra shot out from her thrusted palms deflecting most arrows heading for the driver. It was clear that the target of the mercenaries wasn't the driver himself, it was the caravan, they were trying to draw out any people hidden inside, set off any protective seals and scope the material it was made from. Still, some arrows went off their path and would've hit the poor driver who already had his head split open from bumping it to the ground. Mana looked back, Kiyomi moved the guard away and told him to run. For once the magician was glad to have a partner who cared about the lives of the innocents as much as she did.

A loud clang drew the girl's attention, the arrows meant for the caravan just bounced off their target. Mana slowly advanced to the large box that was on the carriage and poked it, it was solid steel. The kind of steel they'd make shields and high quality blades from. Something here was really fishy. Why would someone make a steel container, such high quality steel nonetheless, such container would be more expensive than most things that could've possibly been inside it. Hachi moved out from the cover of the forest with all of his men. Mana checked her pockets and sleeves, she still had some cards that she picked up after using them all out during the brief fight with Hisako. This mission was cursed or something, at every twist and turn something went wrong…

"Now why would you girls have done that? As I told you, we had it perfectly under control, we'll just snag this container now and then we can go on our merry way and help you with that mission!" Hachi laughed out, his eyebrows and mimic suggested that he was annoyed and alarmed by Mana's and Kiyomi's actions against his ambush however.

"You…" Mana was about to start swearing in a manner similar to Hisako when Kiyomi shut her mouth by covering it. The Yamanaka decided to try and salvage the mission, they desperately needed the help from those mercenaries even if it meant having to bend over from time to time.

"Look, something doesn't make sense here, Hachi, this caravan has no guards, it carries some weird solid high quality steel container that probably not even our greatest Fire Release users could melt, you drop everything you've had up until the point you saw it, jeopardize our deal and the mission to plunder it clean… What's in that container, Hachi?" Kiyomi asked the key question. Mana looked back at the container, it did really feel strange that Hachi was willing to go back on the deal they made, while he was a mercenary the deal did provide him with lots of pleasure, or at least he dreamt of pleasure while he was knocked out by Hisako's poison, right?

Hachi cocked his cannon arm, Mana looked at a blue liquid running up and down it and it seemed odd to her how the amount seemed lower than it was before. Could it have been that this cannon used that strange, glowing, blue liquid? Didn't Hachi claim that "Julie" ran on chakra bursts? Unless… Unless he couldn't manipulate chakra and had to provide it with ammunition of some sort of chakra cells. That meant that running him dry on ammunition meant that he couldn't fire that cannon, it also meant that the cannon had a very volatile weak spot.

"Now that's none of your fucking…" Hachi opened his mouth to talk, Mana was already up in the air, aiming her kick at his neck. This wasn't a concentrated and full powered kick, she purposefully made it slow and wanted for it to be blocked, it was just a distraction, she just wanted to get close. The girl's kick actually was blocked by Hachi's hand, he tried to wrap it around the girl's foot and slam her but Mana's lack of force behind the kick let her kick off of his hand and leap back – now his cannon was an open target! The girl tossed several cards at the cannon with all the force she could come up with without it hurting her aim. The cards bounced off of the steel cannon. The giant mercenary leader grunted out and ordered his subordinates to kill the girls.

"I really liked the deal we made, too bad that this caravan is a thousand times more worthy loot. Guess I need to make sure Hisako-chan doesn't reach Konoha either, otherwise they'll think it's a bit suspicious, I mean little girls die out here all the time but why would their teammate return with a bunch of mercs, right?" Hachi pressed against his temple when a large device popped out from around his ear and covered it. It must've been a very strange communication device.

"The manner in which those cards bounced off… That caravan is made from the same kind of steel, it's probably carrying more of Kumogakure high-tech weapons to Konoha. That's how Hachi got the hands on all of his tech…" Kiyomi sent a message on the link. Mana tried to intercept Hachi delivering the message but the lowlife mercenaries got in her way, they tried to rush her down swinging spears and swords at her, at that moment they were far too close to fire arrows at the girls. Mana was so reckless that one spear actually scrapped her in the shoulder, almost lodging in.

"Don't rush so recklessly, Hisako is a tough bitch, she can handle herself…" Kiyomi warned Mana mentally kicking at a mercenary and breaking their spear. The other one behind the girl tried to stab her with a dagger which Mana blocked using her leg to wrap around the man's arm. With a strong pressing twist of her leg she broke the man's arm. The mercenary fell down on the dirt screaming like a madman. Kiyomi then started pummeling her own mercenary with a combination of blows, too fast for the man to keep track of, too strong for him to stay standing after the Yamanaka was done.

"Help us fight, Hachi!" the mercenary yelled out in fear as two of his friends rushed off to fight the girls as well.

"Are you fucking crazy? If I start firing my cannon and throwing my fists around I'll destroy everything around this place, you guys will get crushed just a badly as those little brats. Plus it'd attract attention. Just shut up, get brave and kill those two before I grind you to the dirt!" Hachi replied angrily.

Mana threw a mad combination of kicks, too fast and unpredictable for the shield wielding mercenary to block consistently. His wooden shield crumbled and he started skipping blows. The man swiped his dagger that he held behind the shield, cutting the magician onto the lower part of her leg. Mana grunted in pain and flipped backwards kicking the man in the chin and knocking him out. With her leg injured she botched the landing and fell pretty much almost on her face. Kiyomi crushed her mercenary with a powerful punch and rushed to the magician's aid.

Hachi sighed and looked at the last mercenary, "Go, survey how the situation with Hisako-chan is, make sure she's dead and that no one finds her body. I'll take care of these two". Mana had never seen a happier man than the mercenary who ran off, glad that he won't have to fight these two ninja. Mana examined the two cuts that she picked up, the shoulder wound looked a bit nasty but if it hit an artery she'd have already been dead, she just wasn't fast enough to turn for her dodge and the blade still got her. The leg injury was a little bit less serious but it impacted the speed of both her kicks and her running.

Kiyomi looked at Mana, her concerned voice reached the magician's mind. "Are you gonna be OK? I can take this fight if you need some time to patch those up…" Kiyomi was a really caring, kind and noble girl, the last thing Mana could've done for her was to make her fight this thief alone. A man who built his power on stealing Kumogakure's tech meant for Konoha and killing innocent people, a man who lied to everyone that he's an investor when in fact he was pulling side jobs behind his previous leader's back… It'd be a crime not to deck this guy in the face at least once.

"I'll be fine, just give me a couple of seconds, stall him, make him shoot that cannon, the big one." Mana asked to which Kiyomi looked really confused. "Just trust me…" the magician added to make her teammate feel a bit braver about herself. Kiyomi charged forward while Mana examined her wound, still keeping the eyes on Hachi. The man laughed out and pointed his cannon at Mana.

"A diversion? Don't take me for a fool! Obviously I'll pick off the weak first!" Hachi yelled, Mana weaved a hand seal and leaped to the side just in time before the cannon fired. Her "Mystical Wings Jutsu" propelled her and pushed her to the side enough to avoid the cannon's blast, it wasn't the all destroying blast, but instead the weaker beam version. Kiyomi started pummeling Hachi's hip area, the tallest she could reach before she had to give up on strength in her punches. The punches of the Yamanaka linked together perfectly, she threw entire combinations but it didn't look like any of the punches did any damage.

Kiyomi slid back waving her arms from pain, "It's like this guy built himself from the same steel…" she let Mana know.

"He probably has several prosthetics or something in that fashion, be careful, we don't want to bust our knuckles against this guy, we still have a mission to do later on!" Mana warned as she painfully grunted, trying to pick herself off the ground. The burst of wind combined with the small explosion of Hachi's cannon sent her through several bushes and she hit a couple of trees, she was lucky not to have broken or dislocated anything. They were taking way too much damage, there was no way after this that they could have still carried on with their mission…

"Ha! You just postponed your death, fuck her up "Julie"!" Hachi yelled pointing the cannon at Mana, the magician heard Kiyomi's warning shouts in her head but her mind was too buzzy and mumbled up to make it clear. She could hear the sounds of the cannon charging up, it must've been the big blast, the magician relaxed and spread her hands, smiling. An awesome, deafening explosion broke all the trees around the area tossing them around. The explosion however was not from the cannon disintegrating Mana's tired body, it was from the cannon misfiring and blowing up in Hachi's face. By overextending Hachi ruined his favorite weapon, had he just fired the small beam blast at Mana he'd have killed her, he had to go big and so he triggered that explosive card Mana tossed at him earlier.

"I thought those cards bounced back!" Kiyomi asked Mana mentally. "One of them was not steel tipped, just ordinary paper, easier to make it get stuck into smaller areas like between the chakra cell and the cannon compartment that holds them…" she replied. Even Mana's thoughts sounded tired and pain ridden.

"Are you OK?" Kiyomi asked. Once again her voice was so worried and concerned, it was like she was genuinely worried and cared about Mana. That was not the kind of relationship that most ninja shared. It wasn't even Mana that triggered this reaction, Kiyomi was the one who bonded with whatever team she was given, that must've been why she was hit so hard when her old team walked their separate ways.

"Yeah just… Glad to be alive…" Mana stood up, she looked at her wounds, they looked manageable but she'll need to seriously take a look at them soon.

"You little bitches, look at what you did to "Julie"!" Hachi's enraged roar echoed through the area of the forest that the girls were in. Mana's eyes shot wide open in surprise and so did those of Kiyomi, the girls observed completely taken over by fear and disbelief as Hachi's figure appeared from the smoke. Some parts of his flesh were torn off, he really did have some steel prosthetics on him, the man shrugged off the whole damage from his cannon blowing up in his face and peeling off of his hand. He now had just a torn up stump but he didn't react to the inhuman pain he must've been in…

The mercenary leader started slowly walking towards the caravan, still clutching the shards of "Julie" in his working arm. Kiyomi tried to charge at Hachi, she kicked him in the weak areas of the leg, targeted all the joints trying to trip him over, hit him in the neck but to no avail, she was backhanded off of him like she was just a pest. Hachi shouted out loud in rage, he shoved the shard of his cannon into the caravan, then putting his working prosthetic arm into it and peeling the caravan open. He took out some sort of knuckle-like gloves, when applied to his wrecked hand the glove drilled into his bone with a small drill and after just a brief second, just like that, Hachi had a new hand, twice larger than those he would've normally had.

"Shit…" Kiyomi slapped her own face with her palm. "I think I know where this tech is coming from, it's from Kumogakure."

"I think that much was already made abundantly clear…" Mana replied on the mental link.

"Yeah but… I know why it's here. It's because Hanasaku-sensei stroke a deal with the Raikage and the other countries, that's why we have no one in Kirigakure, because all the other countries are paying us with technology not to have someone there. Sensei traded political power for scientific and technological advancement…" Kiyomi explained, Hachi was quite busy testing out his new gigantic fist prosthetic.

"Yeah, too bad this scumbag takes all the cargo, Fifth must have still not noticed we're not getting our share…" Mana replied.

"That's just like sensei, she'd really be too dumb to notice…" Kiyomi rubbed her eyes in frustration when Hachi finally remembered that the two were there. A thundering clang emanated from his point of location when Hachi cracked his metallic knuckles. At that point in time he was far too close to Kiyomi for comfort. Mana stood up and felt her foot, she could just about move it around. Moving it did cause her some pain but by that time the magician had gotten used to some degree of pain. She remembered when she overexerted herself daily and every movement caused pain, this was a joke compared to her training.

Mana leaped up and weaved a couple of handseals, shooting off another gust off of her feet using her "Mystical Wings Jutsu", shooting her off forward at great speed. Using the technique as a superfast and incredibly powerful dash wouldn't have cut it, the magician invented that technique as a child as a pathway to mastering flight, complete and total levitation, similarly to how Iwagakure ninja could fly by reducing their own weight to almost nothing. Obviously, Mana's skill with ninjutsu and inventing new techniques still wasn't great enough but this was still something.

Mana's kick clashed with Hachi's, whatever the mercenary leader had in his legs wasn't that steel alloy prosthetic, it had to be something unnatural to withstand Mana's kick but it must've been something else, clashing with that steel alloy would've busted Mana's leg up. Even now, the magician felt incredible shock passing through her body, she had to slightly augment her endurance to withstand that shock and keep her leg bone from being grinded into dust. Mana flinched and fell, grabbing her leg and clutching it in pain, Hachi seemed completely devoid of any pain. He raised his oversized fist to crush Mana where she was.

Just before he could do that Kiyomi's fists sent the man stumbling forward forcing Mana to roll sideways. The Yamanaka was pummeling the man's back again and again and while it did no damage it successfully pushed him stumbling forward. Before Hachi could have turned back and backhand slapped Kiyomi like he did before, the girl finished her combination with a stab with an explosive kunai, after a leap backwards the girl detonated is as well. Kiyomi obviously pulled no punches, if she had the chance to kill Hachi, she would've!

Mana was of entirely different mindset, she wanted to stop this man, she wanted to take little to no damage while doing it but she also wanted to somehow not kill him. She was childish and naïve but that was just how Mana was. She wanted everything and strived for it, she may have torn her muscles and overstretched her childish shoulders trying to support all that responsibility but that never scared her away from at the very least trying. Kiyomi leaped forward, kicking Hachi's back right into the cloud of smoke that picked up. Her kick hit right into Hachi's cheek and sent him down for the first time that day.

"Stop holding back, Mana, we can't allow ourselves to take too much damage against him, you've already taken far too much. We're killing him, now!" Kiyomi declared.

Despite her inner conviction that she was absolutely not going to kill Hachi, despite everything he had already done and what he'd do in the future. Mana accompanied Kiyomi on her attack on the giant. The cut on her leg started to feel better and better, while it still burned with each sudden step, at least it was somewhat tolerable. Ninja were trained to retain as much battlefield functionality when injured in battle. With a swift and decisive step both Kiyomi and Mana lunged themselves at Hachi avoiding his strike. Both girls were tossed up into the air from Hachi's ground pound, a powerful shockwave ruptured the ground and caused fissures to open up.

The elevation allowed Mana's combination of kicks to connect right to Hachi's face. She didn't care nor did she check just how much damage she was dealing, all that mattered was to keep kicking, to not stop for a moment because stopping meant that the man could've gotten his hands onto her and that would've meant it was all over. Just slightly below Mana heard Kiyomi grunting, the young woman was shouting as she was expelling all of her rage and energy into a fierce onslaught of blows directed at Hachi's gut. The colossal man was completely overwhelmed and yet he didn't rush to fall, he just grunted in pain continuously and stumbled back, occasionally trying to toss a half-baked response which forced Mana and Kiyomi to change places, the magician descended and started kicking at the man's groin and gut, Kiyomi used her kunai to climb onto the man's face and started pounding it.

It would've been much easier if the girls didn't have to use tremendous amounts of chakra to keep their own bones from shattering from having to punch what felt like a brick wall. Augmentation came very hardly for Mana, she wasn't used to it and only used it several times before and only in the matters of life and death. While this most definitely was a matter of life or death as if the man caught her he'd have pulled her limbs off one by one without any effort, Mana still was getting more and more tired the more she struggled to keep the combo of kicks going.

Kiyomi screamed, Mana stopped punching and saw Hachi catching her by her hair and holding the Yamanaka up in the air. Using her "Mystical Wings Jutsu" Mana dashed up but Hachi's head was thrown right at her. Mana covered her own face to block the man's headbutt, it still felt like a truck. Mana tightened her back and augmented her endurance, she knew what'd happen next, Hachi threw a lackluster kick to get the magician away from him while he finished Kiyomi off. Mana screamed out in pain as the kick broke through her augmentation. The girl writhed on the ground clutching her back, she had no time to cry like a little kid, her friend was about to get hurt very badly!

Hachi used his free hand to punch Kiyomi straight into her face, Mana saw her friend's hands weigh down, whether she accepted her fate or just passed out from the pain was yet to be found out. The magician saw drips of blood coming out from her friend, angry and desperate Mana weaved a couple of hand seals and leaped up, Hachi looked at the magician angrily ready to kick her again but then he froze. The man collapsed onto the ground, waving his arms and legs wildly, desperately grasping the air for an ounce of breath while Mana caught her friend and moved her away.

"Polymorphy Jutsu!" Mana whispered to herself as she placed Kiyomi onto the ground, her friend's forehead had a nasty bruise and an open wound, probably from that steel knuckle hitting her in the face. Her nose also looked broken as blood was wildly bursting from it. Finally the blonde got back to her senses. Hachi finally recovered from the illusion of thinking he was turned into an octopus, he leaped at the girls intending to crush them but Mana once again made some hand seals and placed her hands forward, lightning ran down her entire body passing through her arms and then a wild barrage of small balls of lightning started bombarding the man's body, forcing him to take steps backwards, stumble away from Mana's jutsu.

"Lightning Style: Lightning Spark Barrage!" Mana yelled out, she was getting tired and worn out by all that chakra wasting, it'd have been much better if she didn't have to use chakra to survive every blow this man threw her way…

Finally Kiyomi had recovered as well, the blonde leaped right into fray, Mana just barely managed to stop her jutsu as Kiyomi jumped with a combination of kicks aimed right at the overwhelmed colossal man, with his defenses broken with Mana's unexpected lightning style jutsu, Kiyomi's kicks definitely hit home and took Hachi down. Kiyomi tossed a bunch of explosive tags up into the air and weaved some hand seals of her own.

"Earth Style: Traveling Rock Pillar!" she yelled as a great formation of rock shot out and went on aiming towards Hachi almost like an oversized fin of a shark, gathering all of Kiyomi's explosive tags in the process. The blonde finally set off the tags blowing the rock formation up right when it was up in Hachi's face. Whatever technological replacements for his bones and limbs Hachi applied to his body really made him a juggernaut in the battlefield. Even this combination that'd have without a doubt killed anyone without a significant skill in chakra augmentation or agility to dodge it only bent and mangled his body a bit, torn some more flesh off of him exposing more prosthetics and various devices inside of him.

Hachi quickly recovered and dove out from the smoke, he still had debris like small pieces of rock and dirt deeply etched into both his fleshy bits and his prosthetics. Hachi's sensor eye was completely blown up and shards of glass had dug deep into his eye socket shooting blood out of it. The giant man twisted around his own axis throwing a powerful kick towards Kiyomi, the poor girl couldn't have possibly avoided a kick with a leg so large and covering so much space. She just lifted her hands up for a block but it didn't work that well as her body was tossed backwards like a ragdoll. Kiyomi screamed out in pain, a barrage of crunching sounds emanated through her body as she slammed into a tree further behind.

Mana tried to step in to protect her friend since Hachi advanced for a finishing blow, the girl jumped into the giant's path, angry Hachi tossed a punch at her. Mana leaned backwards avoiding his hook just barely but then she felt something grab her by the collar of her blazer. Hachi pulled her in closer and dug his oversized fist right into her gut. Mana's eyes whited out. She didn't even feel anything, her mind went completely numb with just loud squeaking noise audible in the white void she's been transported into. The girl could hear something in the distance, something reminding of Kiyomi's voice… Then the pain returned. Mana lifted her head off the ground, her long hair felt sticky, she probably had a bleeding wound on top of her head. She felt nauseous.

"Mana, MOOOVE!" Kiyomi yelled out but the magician had no strength left, Hachi picked her up by her leg and swung her around. If he smacked her down like that she'd die, it was the equivalent of hitting the ground falling down from space, Mana could hear complicated machinery working in Hachi's shoulder joints.

"Die!" Hachi screamed out with his cybernetic voice a loud poof and a slamming sound killed all the other noises. A deafening silence ruled supreme, Kiyomi covered her mouth, tears started running down her eyes. Hachi looked around trying to peek into the cloud of dust and dirt that he raised from slamming the girl into the ground. Only a stain of blood bleeding into the fissures and various crevices of the ground was visible. Hachi pulled his arm out of the cloud and stumbled back. He looked at the joint and saw a card stuck in there, his joint started shooting off sparks.

"That bitch… Did some damage to the joint before she died… No matter, I can finish you off without the use of the big fist…" Hachi quietly remarked. Kiyomi couldn't stop crying and slamming the ground. She was afraid to look at the magician's mangled body. Not that she'd be able to see much, the poor girl made quite a crater from being crushed and grinded with dirt, it would've taken a jounin to amplify their defenses hard enough to withstand such a blow.

"She was so young and kind… You bastard!" Kiyomi yelled out.

Hachi shrugged, "What can I say, most mercs love their money, I say, money's good, power's better. Technology is the future, who cares if you guys can manipulate that ninja magic shit, I can use that same cultivated energy for same purposes. Also I can replace my squishy parts with others, time of ninja is ending, ironically enough by the hands of ninja themselves inventing weapons that'll replace them." The giant laughed out maniacally.

The giant pulled his damaged arm hard, the cybernetic prosthetic snapped off and fell onto the ground, black oily goo shot out from Hachi's arm socket, the giant advanced to the large caravan container and removed a new arm, putting it into place.

"Not as good as the old one, but it'll have to do… Shit, I hate using puppet parts for my prosthetics, they're all snappy and really stiff. Oh well. That bitch… Ruining a good arm like that… Good riddance." Hachi mumbled to himself.

"You dirtbag, I'll kill you!" Kiyomi yelled out through tears and frustration, pounding the ground until her knuckles started bleeding. The blonde didn't take loss of team well, she'd never had a teammate die on her watch before. Seeing Mana's body smash into dirt and dig up a giant crater raising dust and dirt into the air so dense and thick that it still didn't settle down…

Kiyomi was pissed. She'd avenge her friend even if it meant having to die herself!


	80. After the Dust Settles

With a wild shout Kiyomi lunged forward at Hachi. She held two kunai in both of her hands, ready to poke an eye out or deepen the already gruesome eye wound that Hachi's own sensor eye made after bursting during the explosion. The girl's entire body was tense, so tense it was shaking. She was ready to murder this man in the most painful ways she could make up in her mind. A man who so mercilessly and gruesomely killed an innocent and inexperienced ninja had no place on this Earth, or maybe what was so painful to Kiyomi was that fact that such was exactly the kind of man who would've thrived in this world?

Hachi didn't just stand and took the punishment meant for him, his giant puppet arm slammed at where Kiyomi was leaving a crack in the ground from which several fissures started opening up but the girl was no longer there. Hachi's fists only crushed a thrashed log of wood with which Kiyomi had replaced herself using the "Substitution Jutsu" at the last moment. Hachi lifted his arm into the air but then he froze. A cruel smile dyed Kiyomi's face as she raised two of her fingers up, making up a single hand seal. Hachi was frozen in place, the man's entire colossal build was shaking in tension.

"Chakra Hair Trap Jutsu!" Kiyomi whispered to herself, only then Hachi's single working eye lingered down to see strands of hair scattered on the dirt with a blueish glow of pure chakra connecting the hair to a line that also connected Kiyomi and him. The man grunted and tried to force himself out of the technique but unsuccessfully.

"What did you do!?" he shouted out. His cybernetic voice box was bugging out, the damage he had taken throughout the battle must've been doing its part. Now his voice often just dimmed, when the voice box bugged out the man's voice just disappeared as if he had no voice without his box. He may have had several voice boxes to switch up with as this current one sounded a bit differently from the one the two girls had heard yesterday or even earlier that day.

"It's a secret Yamanaka paralysis technique. I always wondered why did my clan elders teach me that if it ties both my and your movements and forces me to insert chakra continuously to keep it going. Seemed like a disadvantage to me, if anything. After I fought Hisako yesterday and missed my clan technique leaving me wide open I realized it… The Yamanaka clan jutsu are incredibly powerful, being able to transfer one's mind into another one's and just force them to do things… However if it misses just by a slim margin the user is left open for a follow up attack for a lengthy window for a counter. This technique is integral to using Yamanaka clan jutsu."

Hachi tried desperately to break out, he could barely even move, Kiyomi was surprised by the effectiveness of the technique. Usually it wasn't supposed to be so completely debilitating, it worked similarly to the usual Nara "Shadow Possession Technique" which just restrained the target but a particularly strong opponent with strong willpower could've resisted, maybe even broken out. Hachi was completely tied down like a machine which was turned off. Maybe it was because of his machinery bits that made the technique so effective, fleshy bits always had enough strength to resist chakra effects but machine was just a tool, a tool that was useless without flesh manipulating it. Seeing how Hachi was now at Kiyomi's complete mercy he couldn't really work with any of his prosthetics or technological replacements.

"Let me go, let me go and I'll leave you alone…" Hachi started singing a whole different song after he realized the horrible nature of the situation.

"No. Scumbags like you, people who kill other kind and noble people like Mana don't get to just leave. I'll play around with you until I'll think you've had enough, then I'll knock you out, I'll leave you here, knocked out and your subordinates will find you here, they'll never look at you the same, the great Hachi bested by two little girls. You'll be everyone's bitch, serving grub to everyone's dogs and cleaning after their litter." Kiyomi replied looking Hachi right in the eye.

The girl's arms shot forward in the shape of the Yamanaka clan technique seal. "This technique is the first taught to most Yamanaka children, "Mind Body Switch" transfers one's own consciousness into another's body, it's not overly useful in one on one fights, after all, I take all the damage that my weightless body takes, I also take all the damage that YOUR body takes while I'm in it. I can't just force you to commit suicide, not unless I cancel the technique at the very last moment, when avoiding death is impossible for your returning mind."

A loud howl echoed as a hollow ghost-like figure floated from Kiyomi's body straight into Hachi's. Just like that the chakra flow through the hair ended, the wind that blew through the forest scattered them everywhere. For at least two minutes the two bodies just kept standing there, Hachi's body was twitching with his eyes completely whited out, Kiyomi's body collapsed as if she had just died, not even a single sign of its owner's life was apparent. Hachi was the only one with any signs of life, yet very faint and rather grotesque as his wild twitching wouldn't have made anyone get the right idea…

A powerful howl echoed again as Kiyomi picked her body off of the ground and leaped back, she took great haste, right after the girl gained some distance she collapsed on her knees. The girl was breathing heavily and her face had the combination of both fear and anger on it. She used so much chakra, she took quite some damage and it was all for nothing… Hachi's flipped back twitching head returned to its original position, the man wore the most gruesome and disgusting sadistic smile.

"What's the matter kid? Weren't you supposed to make me kill myself or something?" he asked sarcastically, letting out a despicable thundering laugh afterwards.

"It won't work… Part of his body isn't controlled by his mind, it's a machine, I can't take over the prosthetic part of his body for some reason, I can only control one part of his entire collective mind… My techniques won't be too effective as long as he is of that collective mind." Kiyomi grunted in her own mind, still transmitting the message through the mental link, as if she still kept some small rustling flames of hope inside. Finally the smoke settled down, the Yamanaka wanted to take a look at Mana's crushed and broken body but she couldn't force herself to. She had seen people die during her time away with Hanasaku and her old team but they were always bad people who deserved punishment. They were always just like the dirtbags who killed her brother!

Mana was different, she didn't deserve anything coming at her, she was naïve but she had only the best intentions in her heart. She even believed that someone like Hisako still had kindness and something to foster in her black heart. To Kiyomi the heart of someone like Hisako was just a black oily sludge, similar to that which was running through Hachi's prosthetic parts, there was nothing but dirt and ooze in that woman's heart but Mana believed that everyone was necessary in this world. It was a retarded ideal but the girl wore it proudly and that deserved respect.

"What the!?" suddenly Hachi got over his feeling of superiority, it was when he peeked inside the gapping crater and noticed that there was no body in there, actually there was just the wrecked giant scrappy part of "Julie", it was not Mana's blood running in torrents down the fissures, it was Hachi's own from when his poor "Julie" was blown up! The colossal mercenary roared out in anger and frustration, he started looking around the forest, paranoia was starting to take over, the magician girl was a ninja and she was a particularly slippy and tricky one to get a hold of. She could've been anywhere or nowhere, she could've bolted and yet still Hachi would worry that she could've appeared out of nowhere…

Kiyomi smiled. This whole time she looked at Mana like some sort of inexperienced kid, someone who had to be protected, sort of her younger sister who was let out on the field for the first time. That was why Mana's death would've hit her so hard home, knowing that the magician was well able to take care of herself and think of a plan independently made the Yamanaka appreciate the magician a little bit more. Consider her somewhat worth the praise and opportunity to get to work with the future leader of the Yamanaka. People often said that "Konoha's Sorceress" being a ninja was just a publicity stunt for her shows… No. The whole "Konoha's Sorceress" act was just another training session to aid her with being the trickiest and craftiest ninja out of her entire generation. Mana used "Substitution Technique" so masterfully, she wasted just the right amount of time, made the switch at the very last moment making them believe until the very end that she had perished.

"Come out!" Hachi's voice thundered throughout the whole forest area. Kiyomi placed her hands forward, she had to give Mana some time to do whatever the magician planned to do. Initially Kiyomi saw herself as the deciding factor just like she ended things with Hisako but after wasting so much chakra the Yamanaka started to count on Mana's plan more and more.

"Mind Switch: Art of War" Kiyomi chanted as the hollow ghost shot out at Hachi, the giant was unprepared, he was looking for Mana everywhere and the clever Yamanaka seized the moment. Her clan technique connected taking over Hachi's mind. The gigantic leader of the mercenaries fell down on his knee and started yelling out loud into the sky. Clawing at his head, at his temple until it started to bleed. He was so strong and his cybernetic arms were so sharp that he almost peeled his scalp off revealing that half of his skull was plated and filled with various technological replacements.

"Art of War" was a B-Rank technique that caused excruciating migraines to the victim, the user transferred their mind into the victim's body but they didn't shelve the other person's mind, they literally started warring over their mind. That was why the technique was a short one, even when one's mind was shelved it usually broke through and kicked the user out of their mind. When the two minds waged war like that the war took only moments but those were immensely painful and debilitating moments for sure, human brain wasn't built to have two mental projections in it. It wasn't built for conflicts like that.

Hachi's puppet arm shot forward, extending in the middle, his hand wrapped around Kiyomi, the blonde was caught completely unprepared. Apparently the giant's arm could stretch, it was some sort of incredibly elastic type of steel alloy. The machine man dragged that Yamanaka closer and tossed her in the air, his mind still pulsed with pain, his temple was still spitting blood from the gashes he himself made by clawing at his temple to try and ease his pain. The monstrous man started tossing wild punches in the air, toying with Kiyomi by punching her up a little with weak jabs, his weakest jabs felt like the most horrifying pain to Kiyomi, every punch felt like it went through her bones and dug into her vitals.

"You hear those screams? Those moans? They're for you, stupid brat! Come out! Come out and show yourself!" he yelled out. So that was his plan, Mana had some sort of plan but he wanted to torture Kiyomi until the magician was forced to come out and reveal herself shelving that plan…

"Don't! Mana, you hear me! Do whatever you're doing!" Kiyomi found some spaces between the punches that took over her body. Every time she was punched the girl couldn't help it but scream out from the bottom of her lungs.

Another punch, and another one and… Hachi's third punch was pushed to the side by Mana's kick. The fool came out of hiding and ditched her plan just to save Kiyomi. The magician girl twisted around and delivered another kick straight to Hachi's unflinching face and then kicked off of it grabbing Kiyomi and moving as far away as she could while holding a heavier person than she was.

"Sorry about the landing… And the time I took…" Mana whispered to Kiyomi. "I shouldn't have come here probably, I don't think I'm ready for this sort of mission yet…"

"You idiot…" Kiyomi grunted out, she spat some blood out, probably those punches gave her a nasty case of internal bleeding. "The only thing you did wrong was come save me. I had things under control…" the blonde smiled.

"Sorry, I guess an artist like me just likes to snag the great finale from others…" Mana replied. A loud snapping sound reached the ears of the girls taking their entire attention. Hachi tore off his elastic arm was currently searching the container for some more tech. He removed an arm attached to some sort of chest plate which Hachi added.

"It should be fine now, Kiyomi-senpai, he clawed his head off, damaged his tech enough, his speed and response time dropped. If you land another clan technique he won't be able to resist." Mana said looking at her opponent. It was clearly just a theory, just a plan improvised because her previous plan went up in flames horribly after the magician had to give up on it.

"Call me "senpai" again, see what happens…" Kiyomi squinted at Mana angrily, while to the magician the honorific used with superiors fit both Kiyomi's professional and personal status in Mana's eyes the magician noted the girl's disdain for that honorific.

Hachi smiled, he started pulling switches and pressing pressure points on the chest plate, some sort of sharp metallic devices appeared from Hachi's arm and from his back plate as well as the shoulders. Each had the same kind of chakra battery cell, glowing with blue liquid attached to it.

Mana realized what those devices were, the glowing chakra cells gave it away. The magician took two kunai from Kiyomi's tool pocket and flung them at Hachi, just to occupy his attention and make him direct those missiles to her. Kiyomi tried to shout something, try and stop Mana's suicidal plan but the Yamanaka couldn't properly talk after being pummeled in the chest and gut like that. She tried talking to Mana's mind but the magician closed her mind off, the blonde couldn't believe it, she was just familiar with the technique for over a day and Mana already successfully managed to close her mind from any telepathic messages.

The magician just kept repeating a phrase in her mind, like a mantra, again and again. That was the way to close her mind from Kiyomi's mental messages. For her friend's pleas to stop and think, there was no time for that. Mana got the man's attention. The pointy steel devices with chakra cell tips took off with a loud poof, within just moments they closed in on Mana's location, the magician leaped into the air and activated her "Mystical Wings Jutsu" to push her away, one last dash further from the zone of explosion.

Kiyomi jumped onto her feet with adrenaline pumping and forcing her body into action. The powerful explosion sent her back down onto the grass, Kiyomi covered her ears for a moment so that she didn't hear Mana's gruesome scream when the chakra missiles exploded so close to her. The magician did everything right, she gained Hachi's attention, she pulled the target further away from Kiyomi who was at that moment in time injured beyond the ability to successfully dodge… She even pulled a desperate attempt to avoid the explosion entirely but…

Hachi smiled. "Died again?" he ironically spat out seeing Mana's lifeless body on the floor fifty meters further from where the explosion went off, her clothes torn and tattered and smoke coming from her smoky rags. The girl's body reeked of blood and burning flesh, she probably took some damage but chakra burns were unlike normal burns, they could've been completely healed if Mana received medical attention soon. Obviously even if she was still alive it was all messed up… Where would they get medical attention from in this middle of nowhere? Mana may as well have sacrificed herself right after coming back to life…

Hachi looked at Kiyomi who stood back up on her feet. "What, you gonna lash out again? We're doing this whole "You killed my friend" routine all over again?" he didn't drop his sarcasm.

Kiyomi angrily flung some ninja tools at the man, first things she could get her hands on inside her pouch, just like with the tools Mana threw they bounced off of Hachi's body. "You two are giving up your lives, refusing to die, wasting chakra just to barely survive each attack and then wait until you recover with your insane ninja metabolisms… Where do you think this'll go?!" Hachi yelled out angrily.

"I'll tell you where it'll go. One of two ways, either I kill both of you quickly with you helping me and stopping using your cheap augmentation and replacement tricks, suffering so much just to barely survive each blow. Or my comrades, who are probably already on their way after murdering your friend from behind, will come here and then you'll really know pain. I'd prefer to finish this all quick, I've already gone through half of the toys in that container, it is becoming useless to me now… Give up."

Kiyomi smiled, her usually tidily tied hair were now wildly all over her face, just her smile was visible on her dirty and blood covered face.

"So if your sidequest of getting that container is worthless, can we return to our previous deal and go on with the mission?" Kiyomi asked following up that smile, "Work like nothing happened? My friend there is either dead or dying, we killed some of yours, we're even, right?" she huffed out spitting out blood as she tried using lungs to draw air and then talk.

Hachi stepped back confused before Kiyomi continued.

"Is what ninja are taught to say in such a situation… But… Me and Mana aren't like Hisako, our generation isn't like the usual ninja, we have our heads on our shoulders but we aren't just weapons of the Hokage or the Feudal Lords, we're soldiers, not tools. That's what I believe, that's also what Mana believes. So come, beat me up so Mana can recover and keep on fighting, then beat her until I recover. One thing I know for sure, we'll make your fight not only worthless, we'll make you go bankrupt… That peeves you mercenary folks, right?"

Hachi shouted and pointed his arm at Kiyomi, shooting off smaller chakra missiles as the armor started literally firing itself, just flinging the parts off of Hachi's chest and arm in the shape of missiles, except they didn't have the chakra cells so they weren't explosive. Kiyomi carefully and slowly avoiding each and every missile, the smaller explosive ones tossed her around, making the girl spill some blood but she still picked herself up regardless. Once again, Hachi was unarmed in the literal sense of the word, but Kiyomi wasn't about to let him re-arm.

"Mana… I feel like passing out, I was beaten and tossed around pretty badly, if you aren't dead and feel like tagging me out for a while… I wouldn't mind…" Kiyomi whimpered out looking at her lifeless friend, the smoke coming off of her unconscious body was the only sign of life coming out from her. Hachi started taking slow steps towards the container again. Left, right, left, right… His feet let out strong thuds, bumping and crushing the grass beneath them. A soul crushing huff came from Kiyomi's left just as she was about to try and interfere.

Mana was on her feet, shaking, huffing and looking pretty dead but she was on her feet.

"That rage back when I came back the first time was completely uncalled for…" she said, her voice was weak and pathetic, her hand seals were just one tenth of what they once was but her tenth was probably just as fast as anyone else at her age…

"I did complete my plan after I "died" the first time…" she finished the sentence making Hachi freeze in fear after putting his hand right into the hole in the container. Mana shot her hands forward and lightning once again ran down her body and concentrated onto her palms.

"Lightning Style: Magic Spark Barrage!" Mana yelled out firing off the more powerful version of her lightning sparks. These lightning sparks were shaped like little baseballs, they flew at the speed of an arrow and they bumped into the target leaving pretty big bruises, they also let out all of their lightning chakra upon impact. Hachi started yelling out, desperately trying to pull out his arm off of the container to dodge the jutsu being fired at him but failing as it got stuck.

The container blew up, violently, throwing both girls off their feet and making them work to get back up. It was just pure luck that none of the container's shrapnel hit them while they were down.

"Some of the things inside that container were pretty explosive, I tossed a little something inside and waited for him to come closer. Last time he didn't go in as deep, he switched his arms too quickly, plus if those chakra cells exploded in unison with those weapons this whole forest may have been leveled. I waited until now to set them off…"

Kiyomi wanted to laugh but she physically couldn't, it took her a couple of moments before the girl could even sit back up on her butt and look at her disabled friend. Mana turned her head at Kiyomi.

"Can you stand? Like use you chakra augmentation to force you on your feet or something?" Mana asked.

"Nah, augmentation is dangerous by itself, you're messing with your own chakra flow and you may mess it up without return. You can permanently damage your maximum chakra level, you can also injure your body beyond repair. I've done it so many times on a very small scale that if I did it in my current condition my heart would probably blow up or something…" the blonde replied. Mana laughed, her body ached, the girls were in no condition to move, their mission was failed all because of those mercenaries.

"So I guess all that's left is to wait here for death?" the magician asked with a grim tone in her voice.

Kiyomi lowered her head, "So it would seem, still, if the mercenaries would've killed Hisako they'd have already been here. The bitch is giving them trouble, either way, whoever wins out of the both of them – we lose…" she replied falling on her back and stretching her arms.

Mana took a handful of gravel in her hand and let it gently and softly sip out from her fingers. She didn't want to die like that, not at that moment, not there… Well… She cheated death multiple times that day, but this must've been how everyone felt in this world, everyone who died. They kept thinking on and on about who they were, what they did, what they planned to do and never for a moment accepted death like that. Mana didn't either. She didn't want to die like that, out there it was just not her time. While the girl's body kept fading away, she felt the light release right within her reach, Mana still fought on. For what though?

Thud, thud, thud… What was that noise? The girl lifted her head witnessing the most gruesome and horrifying sight – Hachi walking out from flames, his flesh completely torn off, mangled and burnt up, just a part of his brain must've remained, the part that was hidden inside the prosthetic part of his skull. Hachi didn't talk, he probably didn't think much, he acted out on instinct, just what his damaged dying brain told him to do… Kill. The mindless leader of the mercenary band kept on walking forward, with his single damaged prosthetic arm intending to drive it through the fleshy soft bodies of his disabled enemies.

Hachi drove his arm forward, aiming right at Kiyomi's heart but the girl caught it and tied her legs around the arm. The mindless mercenary lifted it up. The girl kept punching, clawing and bashing the steel skull, trying to finish off the man's brain. Hachi stumbled back and almost fell – as weak as Kiyomi's taps were, they were doing some damage, all shocks to his steel skull were shocking his brain as well, all damage to him mattered in those cruel final moments. Hachi started advancing towards Mana, Kiyomi dropped down unable to keep her hold on Hachi's arm. The mercenary stopped above the girl, raising his arm in a straight palm position to impale her on it.

"I'm killing him, Mana!" Kiyomi yelled as she focused her chakra and made the handseal pointing her seals at Hachi.

Hachi tried to impale the girl but she rolled to the side and kicked his head, the mercenary slowly stumbled backwards but he turned around.

"Initiating Protocol: OP Punch!" Hachi's voice box let out, his mechanical mind was operating while his human mind was out cold.

"No… Please… Maybe we can still…" Mana tried to talk but a strong punch to her gut made her spit up blood and pass out from the shock and the pain. The damage she had taken was simply too great and the girl's body just turned out, slowly fading until it was ready to die for good.

Hachi's arm tensed up and straightened imitating a blade again, ready to go through Mana's heart since the girl was powerless and unconscious.

A loud howl echoed, Kiyomi's mind entered Hachi's, this time there were no two conflicting minds, nothing to kick Kiyomi out. The Yamanaka was now in complete control.

"Mind Body Disturbance: Harakiri" Hachi's cybernetic voice spoke, the what remained of the mercenary jumped up, high into the air and backflipped, pointing his head right at the ground. The heavy steel frame just drove into the ground, it's head snapped severing the ties between Hachi's spine and his brain as the neck snapped and broke off, just being held by a small strand of steel wire.

Hachi was finally dead. Kiyomi heard footsteps. This was either the mercenaries or Hisako, either one would've finished both of them off. Hisako had a particularly nasty distaste for Mana. Going out of her way to every time they met point out that she'd kill the magician… Mana's honest and kind approach pissed the assassin off more than anything in the world could, by not sharing Hisako's hatred but instead loving the young woman, Mana earned the woman's eternal scorn. Kiyomi's head raised up, while she was powerless to oppose impending horrible death in the hand of the mercenaries she looked at who would appear from the forest's depths.

A short and slim figure of a torn up and showered with blood woman appeared, her body was covered in cuts, she was almost naked and dressed just with what she looted from the female mercenaries' corpses, her wounds were so intense that the cuts destroyed her clothes. Hisako's hair was bloody and looked extremely greasy, the woman's eyes were the same color but for some reason they emanated hatred and bloodlust. Seeing Kiyomi and Mana powerless like that must've satisfied her sick feelings… Kiyomi wanted nothing more but to rob her of the following satisfaction. The bitch kneeled up to Kiyomi and felt her pulse, checked her eyes. She must've wanted to make sure that the Yamanaka was alive to see her plunge a knife into her heart…

No.

The woman stood up and advanced to Mana, checking the girl's neck, running over her injuries and observing her lack of response. She then yelled out to someone. A young boy ran out from the forest, covered in blood but he had little to no wounds to explain that blood – the blood was not his. The boy handed something to Hisako and pointed at Mana's chest.

"She needs to be awake, wake her up, make her feel the pain and snap out from it, drive this right into her heart!" the boy ordered pointing at the long glowing object he handed to the raven haired sadist. Hisako looked at the object in her hands and at the Mana. Kiyomi tried screaming something out, fighting it. She had to stop it, Mana saved her life so many times in just two days, Kiyomi had to fight those wounds, somehow stop it all. Hisako raised her hand up, taking her sweet time, Kiyomi took the time to look the Yoruma assassin in the eyes… Oh, she was enjoying this moment so very much…

This was so horrible, to die here like this, having won the fight yet knowing nothing, being not a single step closer to the mission objective. Nothing worked out, the boy remained kidnapped and will probably soon follow Mana and Kiyomi. Who the hell even was this boy Hisako kept around, was he another boy-toy of hers? Just like she had manipulated Hachi she'd manipulate this fool, maybe he'll lead her to the village and then take the dive for her? Maybe he'll admit having killed Mana and Kiyomi… No… Not like this, injustice couldn't have won like this… Kiyomi wriggled around, flipped on her belly and started crawling towards Mana and Hisako pointing the object.

"What are you waiting for!? Do it!" the boy shouted out, he was pretty rushing this execution. What was his gain in killing poor Mana!?

"I dunno, you sure you don't wanna?" Hisako asked him back.

"No! My hands are shaking, I'll miss her heart!" the boy replied "Now stop being such a wuss and do it!" Kiyomi was so close!

Hisako's hands shot down, plunging the object into Mana's chest. The magician's eyes shot wide open and she screamed madly. Hisako sat on top of Mana keeping her from writhing around too frantically. Kiyomi relaxed, it was all over…

She'd be next…


	81. No Rest for the Kind

White seemingly eternal bliss was everywhere where one's consciousness could reach. There were various strange voices, long lost memories, voices of people who once said or did something. Was this life flashing through one's eyes right before death? A blast of needles struck Mana's forehead forcing her to peel her eyes open. She didn't remember anything. The girl looked around, her floating vision and migraine didn't let her forget that something horrible must've happened but her mind was still in shatters.

"Jeez, idol-bitch, you really struggled like a beast, you know that? For a little bitch like you I didn't expect that much resistance, thought you'd claw my fucking eyes out." Hisako's soft voice reached Mana's ears making the girl turn at the raven haired woman. The woman's annoyed face leaned over entering Mana's sight of vision from above, her eyes flared up, catching all semblance of light that the fire nearby emanated and reflected it off like a colored glass panel.

Mana gripped her chest and grunted out, some throbbing sensation reminded her of something horrible having happened earlier. A young man passed right through, looking at Mana for a second and breathing out heavily. "Oh, you're awake… That's good, for a moment there I thought we lost you." he said acting as if he was someone Mana was supposed to know.

Mana sat up, still clutching her chest, only then she realized how cold she was – her uniform was full of fist sized holes all over, close to her laid her cards, all stacked in a steel tipped deck. When the magician was found her uniform must've been so singed up that all the hidden pockets couldn't hold her weapons inside. The girl took the cards and tried to find where she could've hidden them. Mana weaved a hand seal and removed a small pouch from the bottom of her hat unsealing it from father's seal. She had several necessities in there in case of an emergency as large as this.

Slothfully the girl placed all of her cards into the empty leather pouch, her body was shaking from the cold. Thoughts started flooding in, thoughts of what exactly happened, her memories were all jumbled up so it was tough to put them together. Mana definitely wanted to unleash a flood of questions because at the moment nothing at all made sense to her. It was like she woke up in a dream or something. The magician let her vision get straight, she let her eyes run around the small camp consisting of several sleep bags placed around a small fire.

"What happened? Why does my chest hurt so much?" Mana mumbled out through the cold that made her grind her teeth and shake. The magician moved in a little bit closer to the fire, Kiyomi smiled at Mana and hugged the girl. It was strange to see such expressions of softness and affection from the blonde, usually ninja didn't care that much about their comrades except the professional bonds or the ties of sharing ones village that tied them all together.

"Hisako stabbed you in the heart, I got really scared but then they told me that this guy here is a medical ninja I've no idea why he saw it necessary to put that thing into your chest, you may want to ask them…" Kiyomi replied. She looked pretty happy that Mana was OK but she didn't seem overly fond of the situation they were in, perhaps it was because it was Hisako and that strange young man that pulled the two out of trouble.

Hisako shrugged, she was eating something that looked like a fish cooked on a stick and it didn't appear like she overly cared about anything going on around her except for that fish. "I was walking down the forest path, thinking how I could return to you guys and help with the mission because I suddenly got the urge to actually do that mission and all. I didn't think how much fun it'd be killing all those criminals, it's basically a kill-all-you-want buffet of murder. Then I heard those strange whispers behind me, also that strange radio transmission, naturally my instinct told me something was wrong and I didn't take any chances, I started rampaging all over the crew of mercenaries."

The young man walked up to the fire and sat down, he stroke his messy and spiky blond hair and took off his dirty cloak tossing it to Mana. The girl looked at it and gratefully dug herself under it, she was freezing.

"You really didn't think covering Mana up while she was out? It's goddamn freezing and her clothes almost got torn and burnt off by that explosion!" Kiyomi angrily lashed out at the medical ninja boy.

"I'm a Quack" the young man shrugged.

"What's a Quack?" Mana wondered out loud, there was just so much information she needed to absorb: why did Hisako suddenly want to cooperate with the two girls, was it really just for a chance to murder all criminals freely, who exactly was this young medical ninja and where did he come from, what was his role in all of this, what exactly happened back in the battlefield fighting Hachi, how was she healed and how much time had passed after she passed out, what was the progress with the mission?

"A Quack is a rogue medical ninja, some of them are really charlatans however rogue ninja need medical ninja so a lot of Quacks are often more skilled than your average village medical ninja. Their methods are strange, often too rough and unethical to be used by village's medical ninja" Kiyomi explained taking a stick with a fish on it away from the fire and digging in.

"So I keep cutting everyone down with those guys completely unprepared, they didn't even hear that fucker's order to kill me till the end and all… Suddenly this Quack just stands there looking me in the eyes as I lunge at him with a sword, completely unfazed by all the murder and without a single twitch to defend himself. Naturally I was interested in his story so apparently he was some medical ninja apprentice who had his superiors killed in the field and he himself got kidnapped and passed around from one band to another as their personal Quack."

"So you decided to release him from his slavery?" Mana got curious, that was a very kind thing for Hisako to do…

"Fuck no, he's my Quack now!" Hisako started coughing after Mana's suggestion made some food get stuck down her throat. "So anyways, I pick the Quack up and kill every fucker in that mercenary gang while they were unprepared. Then I hear the transmission from the headset of that beheaded head and take her earplug, the bitch didn't even turn off the transmission so I heard most of the bullshit going on. Since my desire to murder those criminals was still there I decided to bail you two bitches out and start a new page, just until we're done with the mission."

Kiyomi finished the fish and wiped her mouth with her sleeve. "You should've seen that, Hisako rushing into the battlefield covered with blood and guts, rushing up to you and stabbing you in the chest, I thought she was actually murdering you."

"Nah, I may have been a bit too bitchy about that whole murdering thing, I'm still working on that decision… I really feel like we've connected, like we're making a progress here" Hisako replied starting another fish. Kiyomi squinted angrily at Hisako's joke suggesting that it wasn't funny to her at the slightest.

"Okay… So how exactly stabbing me in the chest saved me?" Mana asked completely confused. There were some more important questions, this didn't really matter that much but it really made no sense and distracted the girl's still hazy mind from the more important matters.

Hisako's eyes flashed, she stared at the Quack to explain it. The young man sat down close to Mana and removed an incredibly thick and large rod.

"Basically the worst nightmare for any medical ninja is an unconscious patient, you don't know if they just passed out, if they're completely dead or if they're in a coma. Medical ninja have a very limited chakra pool and wasting chakra on a comatose or dead patient is a bad decision putting it mildly, that chakra is better used making a run from the hunter ninja coming after you. Most Quacks use this sort of tool to stab their patient through the heart, the rod pulses with chakra and because of the pain and the shock it wakes them up, it'd also kill them normally but usually a good medical ninja can get that wound under control and it also makes healing a little bit more clear and an easier task. Good thing I had Hisako here to hold you still though, you were flailing pretty hard…" the Quack explained.

Mana didn't really understand any of it, maybe it wasn't that she didn't understand it but it didn't really make much sense. Then again from what she remembered seeing in the Konoha Hospital most medical ninja never woke up their patients, they just supplied a certain amount of chakra into healing them and if it didn't work they called them hopeless. Obviously their stats were always monitored and sometimes the condition stabilized even while the patient was unconscious but Mana had never wondered about those sort of things, to her medical ninja just sounded like the real magicians with their ability to bring people back to life and patch them up quickly.

"OK, so what's the status of our mission then?" Mana wondered, the fact that they weren't in Konoha at that moment must've meant that there was still hope that they'd complete the mission. The magician wanted to know how far they travelled so far and where exactly they were and if any new intel came up.

Kiyomi tied her long hair and sat up close to Mana opening up a small map of the Fire Country. The girl pointed at a random point. "This is where we were a day ago, we've moved to here at the moment…" she dragged the finger further to another point and then even further by a narrow inch, "This is where we speculate the kidnappers are in and where they're holding the hostage, we managed to catch a black market dealer passing through the area and he revealed some pretty sensitive information about a young purple haired brat being held in an underground bunker nearby disguised as a warehouse"

Mana jumped up rushing to the fire, "Why is this burning then? We're giving away our position, they're so close that they can definitely see us!" she yelled out starting to panic, Hisako tossed the fish bones at the magician which she managed to avoid, the stick with the bones hit a tree behind the girl and rolled down the hill somewhere.

"Calm your tits, that's what we're counting on. We don't want to engage the kidnappers in a fucking bunker, that's where they're holed in like fucking rats. They'll have trap seals in there or just ordinary pressure plate traps, we need them to fight us on our territory. Don't worry, I have a hunch for being ambushed…" Hisako smiled with a mouth full of fish. Mana sighed.

"This is a terrible plan…" she replied, "I mean I know they most likely knew there'd be at least a single party of ninja raiding them to retrieve the kidnapped kid but that doesn't mean we need to let them ambush us just to avoid playing by their rules"

Hisako didn't even honor Mana with a response, it was painfully obvious that the girl wanted to fight those kidnappers, she wanted her life to be in danger, she thrived in such situations. Suddenly Mana started to realize more and more about this young woman, about the Yoruma mentality in general. These people just wanted to fight, they didn't care who would get hurt in the process or anything like that, they didn't care much about the mission objective, to them the missions were just an opportunity to fight someone strong enough to get the village's attention.

"Plus, if they're so well bunkered in, they won't risk ambushing us in the first place. Did you forget that it's us who need to extract that young man, not the other way around?"

"That's what I told Hisako but she is an adamant young woman…" the Quack replied shrugging and sighing as if he was looking at it all like a big joke. Mana sat down and looked at Kiyomi.

"What do you think? Why are you suddenly agreeing with this plan?" the magician asked curiously, of all people Kiyomi was the fastest to point out the flaws in Yoruma because the Yamanaka couldn't stand those guys and how they just did whatever they wanted. The blonde winked slowly and turned her eyes away.

"She's our superior, she pulled our asses out of the fire. She wants the same we do, she wants for the mission to be completed. Sieging the bunker would require cooperation and trust and we have neither of those things. Surviving in this state of everyone for themselves just gives us better odds at both surviving and completing the mission" the blonde replied, despite her great annoyance by the situation it appeared like the Yamanaka truly believed in what she was talking about so Mana gave in.

"You know… I really liked you when we met, I looked up to you like this amazing great ninja I wanted to be more like. I still do. You're like my idol, like a big sister for me to look up to and shape myself to be more like. If you trust Hisako's plan, I'll go with it too…" Mana replied, trying to appeal to Kiyomi's own sense of what's right. If the Yamanaka just wanted to repay some sort of debt to Hisako for saving both of their lives this wasn't the right way to do it, it was the Yoruma who was repaying the debt for trying to kill the two when they first met.

"Look, I get it, idol-bitch, you don't want to get stabbed a bunch of times in your sleep, that's not what I fancy too much either. We will keep the night watch, cheerleader-bitch agreed with that." Hisako looked at Mana with those eyes that one's best friend gives you when he tries to tell you that peeing into the city hall fountain is a really good idea.

Mana looked at Kiyomi, "The only thing I see here that's wrong is you lashing out on me for calling you "Senpai" when you completely ignore being called "cheerleader-bitch"…" the magician gave in and sat down, the Quack handed her some fish and told her to drink some hot tea with some strange herbs he put in. He observed carefully while Mana drank it but only when it was halfway down her throat did the girl realize she may not have wanted to drink it, she looked curiously at the young man who smiled at her.

"Don't worry, it's just drugs…" he said through the world's most genuine and heartfelt smile.

Mana spat the second gulp out and almost spilt all of the tea out. The Quack jumped up to her trying to calm her down.

"Don't worry, it's fine, they will accelerate your natural ninja metabolism. Most people regenerate injuries naturally, ninja have incredibly potent out of field regeneration factors which are granted by them mastering their body through chakra manipulation. These drugs only enhance that… And… Might give you some side effects…"

Mana squinted angrily leaning closer to the Quack and clutching her fists. "Side effects?"

"Yeah, possible nausea, hallucinations and insomnia, it's really worth it" the Quack explained.

Hisako chuckled, "Don't worry, idol-bitch, he tried to drug me when we first met too…" she added.

"Umm… It may have been better to ask you this before you drank but did you by any chance ingest any alcohol today or have a history of heart sickness? Cause in that case you'll most likely die…" the Quack then winced with an innocent and begging forgiveness smile.

Late evening finally turned to night. The drugs that the Quack gave Mana with her tea actually helped her feel a little better about her pain, even if it wasn't intentional for her to consume them. Either way, it also gave her a massive case of insomnia. That was why to the magician those three hours just laying by the tree waiting for her turn to watch, when it was time to take over from the Quack were as gruesome as torture. Every time she looked angrily at the medical ninja who was watching and listening to the surroundings waiting to wake them up if something suspicious came up gave her an innocent smile back.

Finally it was her turn, Mana stood up and crept up to the Quack putting her arm on his shoulder softly and waking him up, he had been sleeping like a baby for the last forty minutes but since the magician was awake anyways she didn't bother saying anything. All of this goofiness that surrounded this Quack was almost a bit cute, he may have won a lovely smile out of Mana had he not successfully drugged her with insomnia drugs.

The girl sat down on the wet and cold feeling stump and sighed. This didn't feel very comfortable so she ran up the tree and settled down there. It'd give her more perspective to see a wider area, she could see both the lower and the higher levels from where she was anyways. Mana really believed that those kidnappers would come for them, she was almost certain about it even if before she theorized that they wouldn't. Maybe it was just a hunch, an instinct similar to that of Hisako's. Regardless of her personal fears, multiple attempts to relocate to get a better vantage point she heard or saw nothing suspicious.

Her watch must've ended because Kiyomi woke up and knocked on the bark of the tree where Mana was. The girl slowly and carefully climbed down.

"What the hell, Mana? I thought you were supposed to wake me up when my turn comes…" Kiyomi whispered rather angrily, still rubbing her sleepy eyes with her knuckles. Mana yawned, while she felt tired and kept yawning until her eyes started tearing up, she still couldn't catch a Z even if she tried.

"Sorry, those drugs just made me a bit sleepless so I figured that I'd just watch it until the end…" Mana replied, Kiyomi smiled.

"You're lucky, I actually got nauseous yesterday cause of that same shit… I'd really pound that Quack hard if he hadn't healed us from the point of dying." the blonde replied, she then settled down on the same log that the Quack was watching from earlier.

"Come on, I'll keep you company, I mean… May as well since I'm awake, right?" the Yamanaka smiled. Mana sat on her knees placing her back to a rock. She dug into the cloak that the Quack gave her as cold started sticking needles into her body since she stopped frantically moving around looking for better vantage points.

"So… That thing you told me earlier, about you looking up to me, treating me as your superior and all that…" Kiyomi suddenly brought up a topic after a couple of moments of silence.

"Yeah, I meant it." Mana confirmed it nodding at the blonde with a smile "To me this mission feels really strange, I was put on a team of two extremities, two older young women who are both strong and amazing women. Even Hisako-san has a certain amount of qualities she could teach me. She's probably more valuable to the village than I'll ever be because of her classic virtues. Then there's you – a slightly older, beautiful and strong and badass young woman who knows who she is, what she's doing and how she'll get to her goal. Yet doing it while following her own rules, your own personal ethics together with the code of a ninja…"

Kiyomi smiled and closed her eyes, for a moment the magician wondered if the blonde actually snoozed off but then she turned and looked Mana right in the eyes. "You're a silly girl, Mana, you don't need to shape yourself after us, you don't need to look up to me and sure as hell not to Hisako. You have your own life, your own nindo, sure you feel confused about everything, sure you think you're a lesser person because you see amazing people around you every day and you feel like you don't add up to them. You were taught by Tanshu himself and you feel like you will never rise up to his legacy, like you'll never fulfill his expectations. Truth is that you don't have to become a Sannin like he was, you don't have to become Hokage or whatever…"

"God no" Mana laughed out sticking her tongue out in comic disgust, "I'd never agree to being Hokage, it's just a symbolic post, you do paper work, you compromise with the Council that cares more about efficiency and money than people's lives. A Hokage needs to sacrifice people daily, send ninja away on missions they may not return from. I couldn't do that, I'd want to do everything myself but I couldn't leave the village because the Hokage is needed there at all times to manage trivial administrational matters. The big chair just isn't for me…"

"Don't spit at it…" Kiyomi smiled back "Your goal is becoming a hero, in other words, a symbol to people. A person who values all life, a person who treasures life and treats all life as being magical and by example encourages the world to change as well. A Hokage is in the best position to be that sort of a person, people automatically look up to Hokage and it's not because of the big hat they get to wear, it's because it takes great charisma and strength to gather enough people and trust to become one."

Mana closed her eyes and sat there silent, she understood where her friend was coming from but it still didn't change her stance on the seat of Hokage. She'd support any righteous and heroic Hokage with all her strength and heed their every order that didn't force her to be something she's not.

"My point is, you don't need to look up to us, don't chase me or Hisako or anyone else's image. Don't be like I was when I looked up to brother, to Hanasaku and failed. I failed to become a strong ninja like brother because he was always the wall of what I could achieve, that was why I couldn't help him at all. Same with Hanasaku, I tried to become more like her except the incompetent part and I still failed, Hanasaku made the team disband and I was an even lesser woman than she was because she was my goal. The person you are destined to be is without walls, limitless and knows no boundaries. If you make your ideal self the only wall to strive to rise up to, you'll have no walls or barriers, you'll transcend all others. Don't try to be your version of us, try to be Nakotsumi Mana through and through." Kiyomi finished her thought from before.

Mana lowered her head, "I guess… If I tried to be you I'd fail anyways, you have all those cool Yamanaka abilities I'd never manage to keep up with while I'm just… Me. You can be everything I can ever be and more…" she replied.

Kiyomi punched Mana in the elbow painfully.

"That's completely not what I meant. It doesn't matter if I'm an heir of a clan or whatever, it doesn't matter if you have a clan or not. I knew an Uchiha shithead who was an inch of a person that you are and that arrogance got him nowhere. He lost an eye and he then stopped being a ninja altogether donating his second Sharingan to his clan, having implanted normal set of eyes instead. For his arrogance he was punished with what he deemed the worst punishment ever, being ordinary, losing his Uchiha heritage."

Mana kicked a small pebble around, "Except he didn't" she added, "Your friend didn't lose what made him… Him. He just thought that he lost it with his eyes that's why he gave up on himself, he could've been just as skilled of a ninja with one eye or normal eyes if he just trained and worked hard and learned to deal with it…"

Kiyomi placed her hand on Mana's shoulder and smiled. "That's actually is what I meant, now you get it…"

The blonde smiled and stood up, stretching out. "Well, I think I'm off to sleep a little bit, I'll wake Hisako up, you may want to get up that tree again, I wouldn't want anywhere close that woman when she's woken up like this from her beauty sleep" Kiyomi said, making those last words sound especially mocking and comical. Mana giggled into her hand and observed the Yamanaka waking the Yoruma up, the swordswoman walked up to Mana and sat down to the same stone.

"The fuck are you still up for? Don't tell me, that fucker's drugs actually are keeping you awake!?" she thundered out loud waking the Quack up, annoyed the young man flipped on the other side and tried to go back to sleep. Mana didn't even answer that, probably because by then she had learned that Hisako didn't particularly care about that. The only person she cared about was herself.

"Hisako-san" Mana's gentle and softened voice reached the assassin's ears. The woman turned her head at the magician.

"Thanks for saving our lives. Kiyomi is an heiress of the Yamanaka clan, her life is really important…" Mana smiled at the woman.

"You fucktard, everyone's life is important. Your life, my life, her life, everyone's. That is why Yoruma kill, because when a person is dead nothing else matters, it's the ultimate "fuck you" to everyone. People can say how fucking amazing they are and how they defy death but truth is that they love life, that's because there's something everyone loves and that thing exists within life, ergo they love life by extension. Taking that life away is to the complete discretion of a ninja, it's an ultimate act of playing God and I'll be fucked if it's not fucking fun."

"I… I didn't realize you treasured life, Hisako-san…" Mana looked really surprised.

"Only an idiot doesn't and odds are if you're an idiot, you're dead or about to be, that's the world we live in. It doesn't matter if you're strong but it helps, doesn't matter if you've got a nice set of tits but it helps, the only thing that matters if you're fucking retarded or not… The only thing that ass-kissers get from life is a warm ass to crawl up in and live in while the "honorable" can all go get fucked. Killers live, victims die. If you don't love your fucking life you're a lot of things but a retarded fucknut is definitely one of them and if you searched the dictionary, retarded fucknut is another way of spelling victim."

"You curse a lot…" Mana smiled, it didn't really hurt her that much that her teammate did but it was just an observation, the girl really wanted to realize where this habit may have come from.

Hisako started wildly looking behind where she was sitting, trying to life the giant rock that she was sitting by, Mana looked really interested in what on Earth she could've been doing.

"What are you doing?" the magician asked.

"Looking for a fucking medal for this child fucking detective, with those fucking skills you should've become a Police Force officer, you'd look really tits in that tight uniform too, oh, you wear one anyways…" Hisako lashed out and then collapsed by the same rock. Mana broke a chuckle, it was clear that Hisako was trying to push the magician away and offend her but she wasn't doing a very good job. Or maybe it was just Mana who had gotten too attached to her newly met teammate to push her away because of something she said.

"Chuunin Exams… What were they like, Hisako-san?" Mana asked with the same smile that she greeted the woken up partner with.

"Eh, cut some kids to pieces, get a promotion for it… Simple as that…" Hisako replied.

"They let you kill people in there?" Mana was a bit surprised by that revelation.

"Fuck no, but you know, accidents happen, to some they happen every time in a row." Hisako smiled.

"I've never before met a person who was proud to have killed children" Mana looked at Hisako with a worry in her eyes. It wasn't a worry for her own safety or anything like that, she was worried for how twisted her friend was.

"Well I was a fucking kid back then, plus, when a kid picks up a weapon and comes at you, you don't give a fuck if it's kid or not, no, you give more fucks and kill them without hesitation because a kid doesn't give as many fucks as an adult does. An adult thinks about bullshit like "What if this fucker has a family, what if it'll hurt, what if this manner of death is inappropriate and wrong", a kid just fucking slits your throat because the good man down the street promised him a fucking ice cream stick for it, do everyone a favor, when you face off against a kid coming at you to kill you, kill the fucker."

Mana shook her head, "I would never kill anyone, no matter the age, no matter if they're good or not"

Hisako laughed out, "I'll come to your funeral, kid, that is if they deem your death important enough to give you one, sometimes they just dig the fuckers up randomly, outside the village walls. Only the strong and smart people earn a nice grave, that's even if your enemy won't cut your head off to show it off to their Kage…"

Mana looked at Hisako weird, "Wasn't that an ancient custom of Kirigakure, back from the Bloody Mist days?"

"Once a killer, always a killer, kid" Hisako replied. She then drew her sword nonchalantly and spun it to the side deflecting a spear flung her way from the forest. Mana jumped up and prepared for combat, with a loud whistling sound a wire attracted the spear back to the owner's hand cutting Hisako on its way back. The woman grunted, Mana already saw the bloodlust in her eyes… Hisako was already in her primal rage mode and she was beyond being reasoned with now…

"Everyone wake up!" Mana yelled out but she didn't even need to, her teammates got woken up from the first clang coming out from Hisako's sword deflecting the spear.

The ambush had begun!


	82. Life-Treasuring Monster

One thing that was impossible to get used to as a ninja was how quickly shit could have hit the fan. After all, had Hisako not used whatever supernatural reaction time she had and deflected that projectile Mana would've seen a friend die before her very own eyes just like that. One moment everything was fine, the other moment one's friend could've just kept on standing with a spear in their chest and then collapsed and faded away. That was the world that they all lived in, the world where anyone could've died at any time. The world that Mana intended to change during her lifetime.

"Stop daydreaming, dear, let's move" the Quack snapped Mana out of her thoughts.

Barely visible figures were flashing above in the higher level, those must've been the assailants. Someone flung a knife at the young man, Mana managed to form her "Friendly Gust Jutsu" just in time to deflect the projectile, also the one hidden right below the other. The man who attacked them tossed a knife and then another one right below the first one, it was a deceitful attack. Such attacks were common for ninja, could these people have been rogue ninja?

A black figure swooped in, swinging on something reminding a rope or a whip, her high heels drove into Hisako's cheek as the woman was quite busy reflecting the projectiles from her knife tossing friend. The raven haired woman peeled her face off the dirt almost instantly and shouted out in frustration. A smooching sound reached everyone's ears from the other side, the woman who kicked Hisako sent them an air kiss and swung away from the battlefield using her swinging tool.

"Oh no you fucking won't!" Hisako rushed forward head forward, Mana jumped forward to stop her but the woman was faster, also Kiyomi caught Mana's hand and shook her head. She was right, splitting them apart and picking them off one by one must've been the idea… Out of nowhere Hisako returned to the area, rushing in from the other side.

"Fuck… That bitch is fast…" the woman was hyperventilating quite excessively. Mana looked at the small skyline, barely visible through the trees and she noticed three shadows. One belonging to a man with spiky hair, a slim one but also he had a strange hairy and large figure by his side, almost like it was a head of a wolf growing out from his shoulder. The other one belonged to the woman from before, she wore a full black bodysuit that disguised her in the darkness making her able to just swing around with that thing and deal damage either up close or from further away. The third one belonged to a very bulky and apparently quite hairy man. He must've been the knife slinger as his shadow was quite edgy and had bunch of spiky ends. The figures split again…

"One of us has the heir, I wonder which one…" the woman's sultry and playful voice echoed through the camp. It was followed by an evil laugh overkilling her idea of a taunt. Hisako grunted and prepared to lunge after where the voice came from, Mana shook her head placing her hand on Hisako's shoulder.

"Move your fucking hand or I'll chop it off for you!" Hisako hissed out.

"No, if they are really carrying the kidnapped boy with them the most likely person to have him would be the one with the dog by his side, I doubt the others would risk carrying him around. Please go after that guy, Hisako-san, I'll handle the swinging woman." Mana replied.

Kiyomi didn't like that idea. "You're suggesting that we send our psychopath after the man with the kidnapped boy? She won't reason with that man, she'll murder him and won't care about the boy!" she shouted out, all three girls realized that they didn't have any time to stand around and argue.

"I know, that is an advantage, the man will have no leverage over Hisako because she simply won't care, her mind will remain cold and calculated no matter the odds. Also she is our strongest member which means she has the highest odds of rescuing the boy." Mana explained. What Kiyomi complained about was right, Mana knew that it made little sense to send Hisako, someone who was in it only to kill people to save the boy. Either way, Hisako was able to fight off both Mana and Kiyomi before, obviously that wasn't a clean fight as no one knew of the others' abilities but Hisako was fast, strong and ruthless. She stood the best chance of winning that fight.

The raven haired assassin nodded with a sadistic smile and disappeared. Just a mere moment later a whisper returned from her, "Don't worry, I'll bring the wussy back, what remains of him at least…" Mana didn't like Hisako's idea of a joke, not at all but this was the only call they could've made at that point. Kiyomi rushed forward on, she decided to chase down the knife slinger since Mana claimed the woman previously. Mana stopped her friend.

"I don't like the idea of splitting…" her voice faltered.

Kiyomi smiled and gave Mana a thumb up, "Don't worry, you're amazingly strong, you can handle it."

Mana shook her head energetically, "That's not it, I want to watch over you two, I want to know you two are alright."

Kiyomi just leaped up and forward, a message on the mental link reached Mana back, "Don't worry, we're both stronger than you are, you'd just get in our way. Now don't die, my mental link will soon dissolve 'cause we'll be out of the fifty meter range, watch out for yourself!" the blonde let the magician know before the mental link snapped like a string with too much pressure on it from both sides.

Mana only laughed, she wasn't the one with self-confidence trouble, more like the whining kind. She never took herself as being unworthy or anything of the sort, still, Kiyomi was most likely right. The magician just smiled and moved on, following the woman. These assailants were moving slowly, it didn't take Mana much time to catch up to her, must've been the same with the others. Had they wanted to escape they'd have never alerted the trio, they wanted to split the group and kill them off one by one. Now they were playing the game of their enemy which was a very dangerous thing to do.

Back at the camp the young Quack just shrugged and sat down by the tree, he looked at the briefly visible skyline, the leaves on the higher tree line covered most of it. The young man smiled, "Yeah… I'll just sit here and patch you three up. New crew, same shit…" the boy laughed to himself. While the girls treated him with much more respect, he was still doing the same thing he was doing with the mercenaries. That Hisako person even claimed him as "her Quack". That woman seemed to always linger between the dark side of the line and doing the right thing, most of the time she did the right thing but with the darkest of methods.

Further away, Hisako was catching up to the man with the strange dog head close by. Now that she had gotten closer it was apparent that he was having a white wolf by his side, the animal seemed to be moving at the same speed as the man was, he must've been a ninja-hound. This must've meant that the man either was a ripoff who used ninja-hounds or that he belonged to the Inuzuka clan, the famed users of ninja-hounds. Hisako was slowly getting excited, Inuzuka were amazing taijutsu specialists with unusual sync techniques utilizing their hounds. Maybe she should think about not using her swords to make it more interesting?

Inuzuka were amazing, they lived with their dogs, grew up with them. An Inuzuka member was given their dog as a partner from the early days, right before graduating from the Academy. Due to their mastery of chakra manipulation those dogs were pureblooded badasses who mastered their bodies, they possessed all the natural strengths of a dog enhanced, also there was none of the "dog years" shit. Hisako smiled, this was going to be an incredibly fun battle. Over their long years working with the dogs the Inuzuka members also started possessing dog-like features, they had those strange fangs, their eyes were almost canine in their features and they also had a much larger portion of the dog's senses compared to common ninja. A dog was still the better sensor, had a better nose and hearing, but the Inuzuka member was incredibly close to matching that prowess which was incredible all by itself.

Suddenly the dog split off from the man, spinning in a wild vortex and heading for Hisako. The dog howled and the Inuzuka turned at her and grinned, the bastard must've sensed her coming from a mile away, smelled her sweat or something incredible like that… Hisako drew her blades and blocked the drilling vortex. The dog applied the pressure and suddenly the girl felt really weak, the pressure and the sheer unrestrained brutal force of the animal tackling her with that spinning manner blew her off her feet and made her plummet down to the dirt.

"Tunneling Fang!" Inuzuka's growling voice reached her. Hisako got back on her feet, she had heard of Inuzuka techniques before, seen this technique in action during the Chuunin Exams. This idiot was using his easily predicted techniques on a Konohagakure ninja, most Inuzuka were native to Konohagakure anyways, there was only a small majority in Kumogakure and most of the other portion was living in the Snow Country. A Konoha ninja would've seen those idiots fight at least once in their lives, who did this fucker think he was kidding attacking Hisako like that!?

The man landed right in front of her with the dog following him not too much later, landing right by his master's, no - his partner's side. Hisako pulled out her swords and brandished them just to taunt the man. The Inuzuka's face twisted with a smile, his creepy long dog-like fangs were visible in that weird mouth of his, before that day was over Hisako will have pounded those teeth out. Maybe she'll make a necklace out of them? Wearing heads around one's necks was strangely uncomfortable and creepy anyways, teeth made much better trophies for accessories.

"I see you took some damage there" Inuzuka rubbed his nose with his finger pointing at Hisako's torn up top, he must've got some pretty dirty look at something through that hole and thought that'd dishonor Hisako or make her feel shameful at the slightest. Yes. Hisako was a sexy beast and she knew it, she won't cover up what that dog tore out while she augmented her body not to get injured too hard. If some naked skin excited this man that much, he may have wanted to get a good look, Hisako will use that to her advantage and make it the last sight the man would see before his head parts from his shoulders.

"It's fine, your dog will make a fine coat anyways, they say this winter will be pretty chilly…" Hisako retorted, it was quite apparent that the dog understood human speech as he slightly flinched and looked intimidated by that retort. The Inuzuka comically started flailing his hands above his head.

"What!? Who does that to dogs? Are you some sort of sick bitch? Jeez! I mean… You don't hurt dogs! That's like… Too evil even for this sick world!" he started yelling out. This Inuzuka must've been a funny-man, Hisako liked funny men, namely how their fun tended to leave their eyes shortly before they died. There was simply nothing quite like that sight to be entirely honest.

"I see you don't have the kid, who has him? Don't tell me that the bitch with the whip has him!" Hisako grunted taking an offensive stance preparing for her attack. The Inuzuka finally snapped out from his shock that this world had people who'd hurt his wolf, he then started snickering like a dirty teen. "Heh, we fucked with you good, you'd think we'd wanna move that fucker an inch further? We left him at home, we just wanted you bitches to think that we moved him so that you didn't ignore us and just stormed at the bunker."

"I see…" Hisako thought for a moment before her body just disappearing and reappearing right in front of the Inuzuka, a giant gash opened up on the man's chest, the woman cut faster than even a ninja's eye could see. It took great skill and perception to track her incredibly fast movements. "Not that it matters since I'll kill you and proceed to that bunker anyways…" Hisako mumbled out making an elegant swipe with her blades, opening another cut on the man, not quite as deep but still prominent and painful. She then dug her feet into the ground and kicked off, spinning like a dancer with her blades and opening a very deep cut on the man's face, he tried to lean back out from her finishing attack but he got cut regardless and was sent tumbling back.

The Inuzuka managed to get himself back together. "Wow, I seem to have had some streak of bad luck…" he complained.

Hisako smiled. "Tell me about it, an Inuzuka user who uses the "Chakra Absorption Technique" to enhance his clan techniques, don't think I didn't notice it when your dog used that "Tunneling Fang" technique on me… You're a perfect counter to any little fartface who uses ninjutsu techniques as you quickly drain them and make them feel too weak to fight you back. However when you face a physically strong opponent who fights at close quarters and doesn't rely on chakra that much… That's bad for you, right?"

The Inuzuka's dog leaped forward biting at Hisako's neck, the woman just stuffed her blade sideways into the dog's mouth blocking his bite and then swiped her blade to the side leaving a big cut on the dog's jaw. A powerful impact from behind – this Inuzuka was really fast as he used the opportunity granted by his dog to get behind Hisako and ram her back with his shoulder. His arms lit up with blue flames as he started pummeling Hisako with a powerful combination of taijutsu blows at the same time as his dog occupied her by biting at random vital points. It took Hisako great trouble not to die from that dog's fangs, every time the man hit her she felt her very own life-force seeping out from her body – he was slowly draining her chakra with each hit!

Hisako flipped back, shooting her arm onto the ground to keep her balance as she stood on that arm upside down and flung her blade, the blade etched slightly into the Inuzuka's body. Hisako finished her flip and then lunged forward, sadistically and rudely pulling the blade out and making a whole fountain of blood shoot out. Those swords weren't exactly piercing swords, they were more like slashing swords, built to cut their opponent and leave deep cuts or chop their limbs off, stabbing left wide holes but it was near impossible to hit any vitals because of its curve and it was very hard to drive the sword very deep. The Inuzuka coughed up some blood, to add up to the shower of it that dyed the grass.

"You're a lucky fucker, lucky that you sipped up so much of my chakra, now it sustains your life, you're using it to sustain you post-injury right? It's common for little fuckers like you to use chakra stolen from others just to prolong your own pathetic lives, right? Face it, you've lost, had you faced off against idol-bitch you'd have slaughtered her because she relies on chakra, the cheerleader-bitch would've struggled but she packs a mean right hook so she'd have also come out on top eventually. You're basically fucked, give up and stop torturing yourself by using your chakra to keep yourself alive." Hisako taunted dashing right at her opponent slashing at him and knocking him off his feet.

"Fuck… Sunomaru, we're retreating!" the man shouted out at his dog, who responded with a whiny bark. A loud snap - a small smoke bomb was seen in his fingers and slammed at the ground making dark purple smoke shoot out, Hisako covered her face and coughed, she felt a powerful palm slap at her chest and suddenly weakness took her over again – the man took a large chunk of chakra from that.

"Thank you, ma'am, I'll take that wrapped to go!" the man taunted her and after the smoke bomb cloud cleared he was gone, almost like he was never there.

"Fucknuts wrapped in a pussy sandwich!" Hisako cursed, she almost had a pretty neat kill but her bloodlust was kept waiting again. For how long could she have kept herself in control? If she as much as smelled some blood she'd leap into the fray blades swinging. This was fucking ridiculous!

"Whatever" Hisako thought to herself as she turned and started moving back, she needed to assist those two bitches if they got in trouble after all. Maybe they got lucky like she did and ended up against the opponent whose skills they countered perfectly, maybe that wasn't it.

"Dad… I won… He got away but not THAT man, I killed HIM…" Hisako thought to herself closing her eyes, her mind started drifting, Hisako's speed dropped drastically to the point where she was barely even moving forward. Her mind moved back to her early days, that fateful day…

Hisako lunged at her father, she swung the bamboo sword as hard as she could, attacking from the side and from above, trying to swipe from below, to break his sideways placed guard too, nothing worked. Father always blocked every strike, he found his way to block literally everything. Not to mention that he then punished the girl by driving his actual sword into her, he slammed the blunt side into her face, her gut and her knees, he hit wherever it hurt. Such was the Yoruma training: die or become strong, survive by wishing for the pain to stop, every time one failed they were stabbed, cut up, had their kneecaps broken by cold steel being bashed into them. Steel against bone was hardly a fair match…

But then once the kid started to wish for the pain to stop there were just two options, strike better, faster and stronger, be more precise and technically superior, improve your technique and get good. Either that or just give up and die. Either way worked, whenever Hisako landed a blow on her father she got to eat her dinner and when she didn't her father beat her up. That was the Yoruma way, father was not a monster, quite the contrary, he did it because he loved Hisako and wanted her to be strong. He beat her and stabbed her and broke her bones because he wanted his daughter to be strong, to win, to have what it took to survive in this world. If she chose death, the coward's way out, then she wouldn't have been her father's daughter and she'd have deserved what was coming.

"Enough" father shouted, Hisako tried to strike him while he was off of his defensive stance but father's blunt side of his katana hit her right in the head sending her down. Hisako bit her tongue and cracked a tooth after that last slam. She felt like the whole world was spinning, she felt nauseous, must've been another concussion.

"I said enough!" father yelled kicking Hisako in the gut when she was down, the kick was strong, lifted the girl's body off the ground by a significant margin. The girl grunted and spat out some blood, she'll probably pee it too for a while too. She should've been better, stronger and faster, her sword loops just didn't work, father worked his way through them with a single displacing block. She was sloppy, she was weak… Like mom…

"Your attack is impressive, Hisako, however you have no defensive skill whatsoever, you just rush attacking combinations with no attempt to block my attacks. That is a silly idea, a katana is a perfect blade for combining both – attack and defense" father said, his voice was judgmental but also a bit soft, he was showing kindness by not killing her when she was making so many mistakes! Father was so merciful and kind! The girl tried to get up but the nausea and the coughing up blood sent her back down, writhing in the puddles of blood she herself spat out.

"Defense is for weaklings… Mother was all defense, she was beautiful so she used that to deceive, she was tricky so she used that to slip poison and escape but it all caught up to her… If I'm exactly the opposite of Mother… I'll survive. Only attack, no defense!" little Hisako chanted.

Father lost it, he started rampaging through the yard, he knew that his daughter was dying so he didn't push it, he didn't hit her but he hit everything that wasn't her. "Don't ever speak that way of your mother…" father spoke in a different tone. "Your mother was discovered because of bad intel, she did everything right, it's those pencil pushers that fucked up, YOUR MOTHER WAS PERFECT!" Father shouted out.

"Perfect people keep their heads on their shoulders" Hisako replied. She whited out, something hard hit her and the girl couldn't remember anything. Everything was white, father must've kicked her pretty hard for those last words.

Hisako woke up later, she felt like her chakra and most of her endurance was restored, she felt up her body and saw that while most of her scars remained, her wounds have already closed and made some new ones. Father fed her a medical food pill, he never showed that much mercy, he always just tossed her bandages and water and a needle to sew her injuries. Father must've lost control… He kicked Hisako when she was too injured and he didn't want to kill her like that. Even father wasn't perfect, father lost control.

Hisako looked at her bamboo sword, she took the thing and drove it at her knee. The wood broke, Hisako shouted out as she heard a powerful crack at her knee. She must've busted up a bone again. Not that it mattered, it'll all heal up in a day or two, that was just how ninja were. If they weren't dead they could've come back from it in just days time. Hisako had her knee busted many times, both of them even. This was nothing for a big girl like her to cry over…

Hisako crawled up to her bed and laid down. She looked at the ceiling. The bamboo sword represented the katana, it was the perfect weapon for offense and defense as father put it but… If Hisako's style was all out offense why would she use such an unfitting weapon for her style? Katana was meant for striking and then returning to defense, Hisako needed something like… Like those swords from the east that she read about in the Academy, those twisted swords that were perfect for only attacking, if she needed ever to defend those would've helped but Hisako didn't want to defend, she'd survive anything, she'd kill the enemy before they managed to beat her loop…

The girl stood and crawled up to the two pieces of her bamboo sword. She whined in pain as her knee didn't let her stand but she picked the pieces up, Hisako swung those for hours, adapting her style to these new weapons. Only when she passed out from the pain of her bleeding and broken knee rubbing against the incredibly tough wood did she finally get some rest. The next day Hisako woke up to a deafening shout of pain. The girl fell out from her bed and got onto her feet, limping downstairs she ran into the yard.

Father was there, he was kneeling by a group of men with strange green kimono and he… Had a sword driven through his throat.

"Fucking Yoruma, you fuckers should all just die with your sick and twisted ways! Sending your wife to seduce and poison me… You should know that I plowed that bitch good before giving her the satisfaction of getting to die!" the man shouted at Hisako's dying father before pulling his blade out of him.

"He didn't send shit, the Konoha council plays those sick fucks like puppets. What husband just lets his wife go to some guy's house and fuck with that guy because some old fucktard says so?" the man's companion shrugged.

The third one pointed at Hisako, "Look, that's a little fucking Yoruma bitch, looks just like her mother this kid!" he laughed out.

"Look at how beaten and bruised she is, she's pale like she has no blood in her…" the man kicked the corpse of Hisako's father. "Those sick fucking Yoruma, they should all fucking choke on dicks and die, they make their kids as sick as they are since their baby days! Having the guts to come and kill me… ME!" the man walked up to Hisako and punched her, the girl fell down on her back. Tears started accumulating in her eyes.

"Hey, calm down, man, we're in Konoha, this ain't Kirigakure, we can't just murder a family in the middle of the street!" the man's companion started encouraging his leader to leave the village as fast as possible.

"The fuck are you so pissy about?! This is the fucking Yoruma clan district, do you think anyone even steps their fucking foot into this pisshole? Do you think anyone fucking cares if these dogs live or die? They have no morals, they have no pride in them, this little bitch would suck my cock if asked her to. That's the kind of people Yoruma are, she'd bite it off after I'm done with her though… Fucking and killing is all those sick bastards do!" the man slashed at Hisako trying to behead her with a single swipe but the girl dove to the side. She screamed like she was getting killed, the girl covered her eye up, there was a deep gash on it going deep into her eye. She was blind with it, blood was bursting from it but even if it wasn't she'd still be blind with it!

This was her eye… Her eye… The one that mother and father made her with! This was… Her eye!

Hisako lunged at one of the men beating him senselessly with the two pieces of her broken bamboo sword that she still held in her hands. Initially the other men just laughed looking at the wild girl they were about to torture and kill but when Hisako started madly laughing and stabbing the man with the sharp parts where the sword was broken they suddenly froze in place… This kid just killed their friend…

"You fucking bitch!" one of the men yelled out leaping at Hisako. What followed was hours if not days of beating, torture of the most inhuman kind. It all happened on the backyard of one's family's household but no one passing by dared to intervene. This was a Yoruma household after all, Yoruma were all assassins and killers and this must've been just common practice, this must've been just how they made their kids behave. No one cared about the two brutally murdered men on the lawn, this was Yoruma district after all.

Who even cared about them fucking Yoruma?

"Who even cares if you live or die? You Yoruma fuck a thousand times every day and breed like fucking rabbits, what's one little cunt less in this world?" the man held Hisako's beaten body lifted up, holding his sword and readying to strike. He let for the girl's body to slip out from his hands and fall on her knees onto the bloody grass. Hisako didn't even feel like herself anymore, it was like her soul moved on, she looked at her body from further away, who was that horribly beaten and mangled person? Was it her? No, it couldn't have been?

The man turned away, Hisako knew that move, it was the typical fake-out slash at the back of the neck, he was going in for the kill. This man who killed her mother after torturing her for hours, this man who just murdered her father will kill her too now… No! No he won't, Hisako suddenly opened her single working eye, before the man could turn around and slash at her, Hisako's knife was already in his throat. The man gurgled with blood and fell. She could've just let him drown in his own blood for minutes before he died, just like he tortured her mother!

"You're right… My life doesn't matter, no one's life matters, our all existences are meaningless. So don't be offended if I do this to you because none of it matters… It's because you think like that that you die, if you treasured your life, you'd have never turned your back on a Yoruma!" Hisako sat on the man's chest and stabbed at his eye, she'd pay all of it back, giving the man time before moving on to the other debt. She had several minutes, half an hour if the man was adamant to steadily prolong his pathetic life using chakra.

When the Konohagakure ninja arrived after receiving a report about an unusual, even for Yoruma district, breakout of violence in one of the family's household they saw the most horrible sight to behold: a single girl just barely breathing, kneeling over a pile of corpses. Just barely alive but still pushing it strong. Hisako was quickly carried to the Konohagakure Hospital.

Finally Hisako landed by the camp, she looked at the Quack who was just sitting by the tree admiring the stars through the small gap in the tree line.

"Where are the other bitches, are they OK?"

"Seeing how quickly you've dealt with it… They'll be just fine…" the Quack replied with a creepy smile, "Even if they don't, little ninja die every day, what does it matter?"

"Everyone's life matters, that's why they beg you so much not to take it away…" Hisako replied. Quack smiled, he liked Hisako, she was more like the people outside the village walls, she knew what this world was like but she was still a bit unique. A very unique kind of monster…


	83. Kiyomi VS a Cat-Hobo

Kiyomi was moving steadily through the black thickness of the Fire Country's endless forest. She had treaded so far from the village walls before, even as far as to the islands of the Water Country but that by no means meant that she knew the place. There was a certain degree of worry, that speck of fear when chasing an enemy of unknown level of skill throughout a dark forest, knowing little of what the enemy's actual plan is, knowing even less if the next branch you set foot on would break or have an explosive tag on it ready to peel one's leg off.

Maybe that was why Kiyomi was losing the sight of her projectile slinging opponent? No. The man must've possessed a certain degree of dexterity and physical prowess as he was moving incredibly fast. Almost like these thick forests were native to him, Kiyomi did not see him move but she heard the noise of rustling and shuffling leaves and his sandals hitting the wood of the trees at high speeds before the man leaped off of the tree to the next. It took Kiyomi a lot of chakra to even keep up with the man, leaping from one tree branch to another while keeping one's sight on the target as well as where one stepped on was incredibly tough. Almost made Kiyomi appreciate the profession of a Hunter Ninja.

Right after her brother had passed Kiyomi wanted to become one, the job of a Hunter Ninja was to roam the outside of the village walls searching for rogue ninja. With just their wits and the Bing Book by their side, the book with information about most notorious high ranking ninja, both rogue and village alike. Information gained through investigations, favors and blood, lives were lost, probably even made for this information. Whoever compiled the yearly editions of the Bingo Book must've been incredibly crafty, to be able to track a rogue and get such detailed information as to make an entire databook on them…

Thing was that the lifespan of a ninja was quite lacking in its length, life of a Hunter Ninja was even more so. Hunter Ninja were vultures, hunting dogs barking at everyone and not afraid to bite any hand to get to their prey, they were not much better than all those Bounty Hunters roaming the forests. One could've said that a Bounty Hunter was just a rogue version of a Hunter Ninja, one who kept the pay for one's head to themselves instead of giving it all to the village, also Bounty Hunters killed for money, Hunter Ninja killed because the rogue ninja inconvenienced someone important. Not to even begin on how Hunter Ninja hunted village ninja from other villages alike with the criminal scum…

Ninja villages were highly competitive. Almost like separate firms doing same sort of business, which was to say – all kinds of businesses, whatever pleased their paying clients. That was why highly skilled ninja, the "employees of the month" so to speak, were highly sought after, each ninja village secretly craved elimination of skilled competition which was why Hunter Ninja always hunted the most skilled ninja from other villages as well. It was incredibly dangerous for someone ranking higher than Chuunin to roam around not only the outside village walls, where Bounty Hunters were looking for a cheap cash for someone's decapitated beauty shot, but also even look for salvation inside the other village walls. Hunter Ninja hunted them there. To survive long enough to make a name was to literally become a public enemy… It was like the world itself was out to get the most illusive survivors of its sick natural order.

Kiyomi would have never known or thought so much about these things had she not travelled with Hanasaku for all that time when her sensei had that mission, right before the Kage Summit. It was during that time that the blonde realized what it meant to be a high ranking ninja, when everyone wanted you dead. Villagers refused to house Hanasaku in their homes in fear of those homes being destroyed when she would've inevitably had ninja come looking for her, every passer-by could've been a killer in disguise, several attempted at Hanasaku's life in broad daylight in the middle of a small settlement. Innocent bystanders got hurt quite often, at some point the woman wrecked so many houses by causing earthquakes during her fights that even the villagers tried to stab her with forks in her sleep. One night Kiyomi woke up to a sight of a hooded men with knives around their beds. Seeing and living through something like that made experiences like this even scarier than they had to be…

Kiyomi slowed down, continuously losing speed as the sound of her prey's feet shuffling through the leaves and hitting the wood disappeared. The Yamanaka looked around, trying to pick up anything, any sound, nocturnal birds, maybe rodents running around the lower levels looking for a good night's snack. Nothing, absolute silence matching that of a graveyard during a Friday night. This man may have been sitting silently, looking to make a cheap and quick kill. Kiyomi drew her kunai blade from the pouch and prepared to deflect any projectiles, trying her best to listen in to that horrible sound of steel whistling and buzzing through the air aimed at her chest.

Sharp pain, almost like ice cold glass being dragged over her flesh on her back. The girl couldn't help but let out a grunt of pain, grinding her teeth together, as her body fell over forward, through the branches only to land softly on the moss below. The ground was soft, sludgy, almost like a swamp. Kiyomi looked around, touched her knees and felt a painful wound on them, probably caused by the fall, her elbows and knees were bleeding, the hot air made the warm stream of blood running down her back barely even sensible. The girl looked around, just by her own good luck she turned to see her assailant in mid pounce, instinctively the blonde raised her kunai knife and blocked the man's stab by shoving it to the side, his knees however dug into her abdomen sending her down and leaving her opponent on top of her ready to poke something out.

He was so silent! He moved with little to no sound, as if his steps moved no leaves, pressed against no moss, snapped no twigs. He moved fast, silently, hit right to the point. His knife was aimed right at the girl's chest, had his attack connected she'd have a giant knife sticking out from her heart, having cut right through her spine. Paralyzed and dead momentarily, a silent and flawless kill. Just who on earth was this guy!? The man raised his arms for a finishing stab, Kiyomi thrust her knife upwards, fighting strength with speed, the assailant leaned back to avoid the kunai so she wrapped her legs around his throat. No. At the last moment the man dropped his knife and blocked her thighs, shoving them aside he leaped backwards, so strong and so fast, he disappeared into the swampy forest with just a single leap back. His legs must've been able to dent steel to have this kind of force in them, either that or he used augmentation of his speed and dexterity to retreat.

Kiyomi got back on her feet, moving backwards and always looking around her surrounding, trying to summarize what she already knew about her assailant. The man was strong and fast, leaped through the air as if he had no air resistance to oppose him, walked and jumped without a sound. He knew his way with projectiles but he also seemed to wield a pretty large knife. Large enough to cut through Kiyomi's chest and leave on the other side, maybe even wide enough to chop limbs off if he had the piss in him to cut hard enough. Looked more like cleaver than a knife but was too fancy to cut dead meat with it.

His look was so strange, he looked like a really well trained hobo, he had long mane-like hair all over his head, the like that would get in one's way when travelling around through such a thick forest, maybe that was why he stopped moving and decided to just take the girl out and be done with it. Well, Kiyomi was the future heir of the Yamanaka clan, one of Konoha's elites, she'll make the man work for his kill, ideally, she'll take him out. He was travelling way too fast to have the hostage with him, travelling so fast and so carelessly with a passenger would've been too difficult, even for a bulky hunk like he was.

Kiyomi shook her head, a strange detail entered her mind… The man… He had grey whiskers and fangs, his teeth reminded her of Inuzuka teeth, she'd know, she'd seen those numerous times during her days with the old team. His whiskers rubbed against her face, right before the man tried to kill her, also she felt a pleasant tickle on her thighs, right where her skirt was torn by the explosion.

"I guess it's inevitable that there's a cat clan, I mean there can't just be a clan of dog people and no cat people, that'd make no sense…" Kiyomi thought to herself sarcastically. The man hunted like a large cat, however he didn't act entirely like one, great cats like the ones that were native to the Lightning Country's wastelands or some native to the southern parts of Fire Country's forests tried to bite through the neck, kill the enemy momentarily. Waste no time, waste no energy. This man acted similarly but differently, he aimed at a lethal spot but not the neck. Maybe he wasn't taught all of his clan's secrets just yet, maybe he's a reject of his clan or something?

A knife plunged through Kiyomi's neck, right through her throat, right through the spine and out through the front. A loud poof dispelled the clone making the cat-man confused, Kiyomi's shoulder dug into the man's back making him grunt and get thrusted off balance forward, the cat-hobo tried to turn around but Kiyomi's punches kept him from fighting back or getting back straight on his feet, neither was he let to get away again now that he showed himself again. Once again without a sound or a single sign of his existence. After a large number of punches, enough to take out most ordinary men and even weaker ninja the large cat-man stumbled back, struggling to keep his stance straight. Kiyomi was nowhere to be seen.

"Earth Style: Submarine Voyage!" Kiyomi shouted out appearing from below with an unexpected punch from underground. The man blocked her punch and swung her, tossing her aside with little to no effort and disappearing into the forest with a single leap once again. His stupid quadrupedal pounces tossing him to the other side of the battlefield annoyed the girl greatly. He took all of her punches and stood, that wasn't something many people were able to do, she also caught him unprepared, it's very likely that if they contended one on one just with their hand to hand skills he'd come out on top, Kiyomi needed to be careful.

The girl wanted to get the man talking but she knew that was impossible, if he was an actual stealth using assassin he'd stay quiet and out of sight. The fact that he didn't use projectiles showed that he either used all of them out before or he realized that projectiles didn't move as fast or as silently as he did. Both assumptions were right, the man moved faster than a thrown knife, he leaped more quietly, almost like he didn't contact with air. Kiyomi pressed her back against a tree, she knew that the man was likely able to cut right through it, no he'll be tempted to do that, in other words she made a mistake to draw the man out where she could've seen him.

Almost like she sensed the man coming Kiyomi rolled forward, the man's knife appeared from the tree bark cutting through it like butter, with a roar the man pulled the knife out from the tree. His muscles were tense and were apparently working overtime to pull the blade out, that meant that it wasn't chakra-enhanced weapon. It could only cut thing depending on the toughness of its alloy and the strength of the user, it could've been subjected to dullness and rust. Not that Kiyomi could make steel just wither...

The girl pulled out her knife, she wasn't that great at knife combat but she couldn't afford letting the man slip from her sight again. This was not good, the man countered her perfectly, he was constantly out of her sight so the girl couldn't have possibly hit him with her clan techniques, he was a very agile and dexterous combatant so even if she did see him it'd be hard to catch him off guard again. He was a pretty tough cookie!

Loud clangs emanated through the forest as Kiyomi tried desperately to injure her assailant, the man deflected her swipes near effortlessly, as predicted he was much better at armed combat. It didn't took long for the man to find holes in Kiyomi's defense and start swinging around her blocks, leaving cuts and gashes on her, tag and mark her as ripe for killing. Kiyomi needed to get back from him, to get away from this confrontation or she risked skipping a thrust and dying a painful death before she could claim her position as the leader of her clan. Something Kiyomi was rightfully proud of, something she viewed as a great honor and as a responsibility, she had no right to get hunted down like some deer in the woods!

The girl raised two of her fingers, the hunter stopped in his track, his knife was right atop of her chest, perhaps several inches away from entering it. His unsuccessful attempt to behead Kiyomi separated a lot of hair from her head, the girl smiled looking down and seeing her chakra channeled through the hair and stopping the man in place, now she had him. Kiyomi weaved her hand seals again.

"Mind Body Disturbance: Art of Valentine!" she shouted right before a loud howl echoed and a pale hollow left from her palms, one shaped similarly like a sphere with a Kiyomi's facial features onto it and entered her opponent. The man twitched and shook violently before lifting the knife up into the air and plunging it into his own chest, blood squirted out from his wound and Kiyomi's mind left his body. This technique was quite different from her simple "Mind Body Switch", she didn't take over the opponent's mind by entering it, she instead just ordered them to do something, something like injure themselves.

The cat-man struggled, clutching his chest he stumbled back and tore his shirt off revealing a grotesquely hairy chest. He then disappeared into the forest thickness with a single leap. Kiyomi once again heard no sign of his existence, she was really surprised that the man could still move so swiftly, if he could move like that, it meant he could still fight even with that wound in his chest. Kiyomi didn't know how deep exactly it was but this man had some stamina and pain tolerance, she had to give him that…

The man's figure leaped out from the forest into the fray, stabbing at Kiyomi's location, this time the girl could hear his cloth rustling, he had his shirt wrapped around his chest like a tourniquet and charged at her without whatever stealth techniques he used previously making avoiding him an accomplishable task with enough effort. Finally some luck smiled at Kiyomi's side too, she could compete with an opponent who perfectly countered her abilities, she was really a prodigy! Now the girl realized what exactly the clan elders saw in her, well, technically her origins had a lot to do with her status but skill must've also…

A loud poof alerted Kiyomi that the man who leaped out was just a clone. A spear flew out from the forest plunging itself into Kiyomi's stomach. The girl coughed up blood, she got careless for just a moment, thought she had the man… Almost instantly Kiyomi weaved a hand seal and forced her body to use chakra in hyper mode, waste as much of it as it needed to in order to keep her alive. As her life was fading the Yamanaka supplied her chakra to replace it but the more time would pass the more chakra she'd need to fill the gap. Kiyomi moaned, no screamed in pain pathetically as some sort of a wire dragged the spear out from her gut and made her fall onto the ground. She saw the blood spill out madly, a wild burst of chakra slowed the process down a bit. This was bad… She couldn't die here, not like this…

The cat-man prowled at her from the thickness of the forest, he smelled the blood rushing out of her, he saw her pale skin, he sensed her body slowly seeping the life out of itself. Yet the man was desperate, he was also bleeding out so he desperately tried to take the girl's life with carelessly wide swings, Kiyomi was no knife combat master but even she could avoid or deflect such careless and desperate swings. The man roared, two more knives appeared in other spots on his hand, he held a knife using the holes between his fingers as if they here his claws. Like a real great cat he lunged forward with a barrage of mad swipes. Kiyomi's body got torn into shreds, into small pieces as if she was file in a paper shredder but then her body poofed and de-transformed into a piece of log that she substituted with using the Academy "Substitution Technique"

The girl breathed heavily clutching her bleeding gut. She charged at the man using her knife, maybe he'd be just as lackluster with his defenses as he was with his offense? Kiyomi's theory was correct, he was getting sloppy but the bad news was that so was she, her blood loss made her swings weaker, sloppier, the dizziness in her head made her swings strangely lack power, speed and precision so the man managed to avoid them. Kiyomi thrust her knife forward sending it right into the cat-hobo's eye, from a cloud of smoke she realized that she just pierced a log of wood, the cat-man also managed to use the "Substitution Jutsu" in time, so he actually was a ninja who went through the Ninja Academy…

Kiyomi leaped to the side, instinctively, knowing that the man would try to take her out after her attack missed and just barely she avoided a spear, another whistling sound, the wire returned the spear to the man's hand and he tried hitting Kiyomi with her again. The man returned the spear back to his arms but Kiyomi had already pinpointed his position from where the spear returned and sent some shuriken at him, she couldn't afford to miss her clan techniques now, it'd leave her a free kill out in the open during the time that her mind would take to wander back to her body…

A loud clang and her shuriken falling down signaled that her projectiles were deflected. The man leaped out from the forest aiming to plunge his knife at Kiyomi, the girl just stood there, too dizzy to fight back, too injured to oppose… She made the look that pleaded for her life, she of all people, a Yamanaka heir could not have died, not like that… Not in some goddamn swamp out here… That was just the helpless act she needed!

"What the fuck!?" the cat-hobo shouted out as he realized that he was stuck in the air. Unable to move a muscle and when he forced it, steel wire cut into his flesh, making him drip and lose even more blood.

"What, did you think the real me was just doing nothing back when I replaced myself, did you think that I just revealed myself after having a chance to disappear from your sight? I played the prey this whole time…" Kiyomi smiled through pain, her lips were slowly becoming pale and blue, she pointed at the trees on the other side that had kunai in them, the kunai had steel wire tied around them which made an efficient wire trap, students were taught to make similar traps in the Academy so falling for it, thinking for a moment that this fight was over before being over was this man's mistake!

"I lost my explosive pouch in my last battles…" Kiyomi said and she switched the minds with her opponent again using "Mind Body Switch" again. "That's not too bad, you still have yours anyways…" the man's body spoke for Kiyomi as the girl forced the arm to reach for the pouch, the wounds opened also on the real Kiyomi's arm but she managed to let the pouch slip off, Kiyomi forced the man to weave a hand seal and her mind quickly returned to her real body before the explosion was set off.

A deafening explosion killed all the other sounds, it devastated the battlefield and set the moss on the ground ablaze starting a forest fire. Kiyomi looked around, she wasn't about to get cocky again, she needed to see the man's torn off limbs and blown up body to confirm her victory… Only a bunch of spears… The man must've substituted himself with them, he had several placed all around the forest, that mean that he also wasn't just staring at the blonde when he was hiding, he was setting up a plan B as well…

Kiyomi turned around catching the small knife aimed at her heart with her hand. She was so injured and so desperate that now further injuries barely mattered, the girl was on her final legs so she had to throw it all at the man, this was her final resolve, do or die! Kiyomi's punches ran wild, entire combinations connected to the man's tired body and face, she then fell on her knees but even as she did that, Kiyomi didn't let herself rest, even on her knees the girl kept pounding at the man's gut, blood started shooting from her stomach, running down her mouth but Kiyomi refused to just flip over and die, the girl weaved some hand seals, the man prowled back to the forest's thickness.

Kiyomi slammed her arm onto the dirt making a large boulder shoot off from the ground, making it rise controlled with her chakra. The burning moss on it stank even worse than that cat-man's beard! With a chakra fueled punch Kiyomi shoved the boulder forward, forcing it to crash into the area of the forest where the cat-hobo was supposed to be.

"Earth Style: Boulder Rush!" she shouted.

A wild roar, almost like that of a cat whose leg was just stepped on echoed after the deafening rumble of the boulder crashing through the trees, Kiyomi knew that she hit her mark! The girl fell on her knees and raised her head forward, she barely had the strength to defend herself but… She must've won, right? Purple smoke spreading from that area right behind the boulder suggested that a smoke bomb was used. Kiyomi waited for a counter… She waited and waited… And waited… Nothing.

The girl's body weightlessly hit the ground, she heard the forest burning down around her and saw the light closing in… She was too weak, lost too much blood…

The blonde felt a pill being shoved down her throat, thinking that it's a medical food pill the girl cracked it in her mouth. A wild flood of blood, no, some sort of blood substitute that instantly got absorbed into her mouth started running out from Kiyomi's mouth and into her stomach.

"Shit, blondie, you're not supposed to bloody crack it in your mouth… You're supposed to swallow it… Get it, I said "bloody", because it's a sanguine pill… Eh, fuck you, tough crowd, I guess…" Kiyomi heard the Quack's voice and saw Hisako slap the back of his head. She still felt weak, the Yoruma lifted the girl off and put her onto her shoulders.

"You'll heal her when we make our way back to the camp, as much as I appreciate that cheerleader-bitch set the forest on fire and let us know her position this place is about to kill us pretty fucking badly. I'd rather not have my fucking flesh melt like noodles in pee…"

"We have vastly different tastes of food, dear, you know that?" Quack snapped back at Hisako and the two took off

Kiyomi struggled to keep her consciousness, she felt warm stream of blood go through her body and her cheeks, she felt much better but it still felt like dying. It didn't matter, she just won. She got to prove her worth as a Yamanaka heir and that was all that mattered, leaving that alone she also kicked that cat-man's butt pretty hard. Maybe with some luck he'll be out of commission when the team stormed that bunker.

Kiyomi kept on relentlessly bashing the training dummy. The knuckles of the young girl were bleeding, it was entirely safe to say that she no longer knew what she was doing. Much to her defense, she just woke up in the world where her brother, the only person in this world who saw her as a person instead of some delicate flower who couldn't be let out of a bubble and had to receive only the right amount of sunlight. Kiyomi punched the dummy again and again but it barely budged, the girl looked at her bleeding wrists, her hands looked so messy…

A man in strangely feminine blond hair and a purple kimono walked in on Kiyomi's "training". He ran up to her immediately trying to pull her away from the dummies. Why won't they break? Why won't they bend or fall how they did for her brother? Why was Kiyomi so weak that she couldn't even deliver a proper thud when she clocked those wooden leather covered targets.

"Lady Kiyomi, please, you can't be doing that!" the lady-man pleaded with her trying to drag her away.

"What's wrong? No sensei to fire for actually doing their job and training me?" Kiyomi rudely tossed back trying to yank her arm out of the man's grip but he was surprisingly strong for his build and looks.

"Lady Kiyomi, you must understand you must grow up to be of serviceable condition, you will be the image of femininity and compassion to not only your clan but the clan of your chosen husband. You absolutely cannot have broken knucklebones with knuckle gumps like some brawling wanderer when you grow up!" he pleaded again trying to drag her but Kiyomi pulled out a knife and slashed at him, leaving a small cut on his kimono but not yet cutting his "delicate" girly skin.

"Screw that, I want to be strong, I want to be a good ninja to be like my brother. I won't be some damned damsel described as a big cheese but actually fainting when the temperature falls below her comfort zone…" Kiyomi snapped back at the man and rushed at the dummy as if it was her actual opponent, as if that dummy would've killed her brother.

"Please, Lady Kiyomi… The clan shall provide all the tutoring you will need and it will also keep you safe, if you asked me it's for the better that you won't be around your brother, he was a bad influenc…"

Kiyomi slapped the man, tears filled her eyes and she bolted from the garden, rushing as far away from the clan district as possible. What a pathetic ninja she was… Her brother would've been disappointed, slapping and crying and whining like a spoiled brat… Her clan's strategy at pampering her must've been getting to her, she needed someone more like her brother, someone who could've watched her trip and fall, someone who'd laugh at her when she stepped into dog poop instead of licking it off from her shoes and then get fired for allowing the "Lady" to get dirty.

What was so special about her anyways? It wasn't like she was THE next in the line, she was just a conditional heir, then again, it was highly unlikely that her uncle would've actually had any heirs with his age and attitude in mind. Kiyomi kept running, heading to the training grounds. That was where her brother trained, that was the best place for her to be, be alone with her thoughts.

A powerful shockwave shook the ground tossing Kiyomi at least a meter into the air and then plummeting down. The Yamanaka stood up and ran towards the shockwave's center point. What if it was actually another bad person, a rogue ninja or something? No, it made no sense, how could it have been a bad person so deep inside village walls? It wasn't a desire for revenge against the very abstract idea of evil that lead Kiyomi rushing into the training grounds, it was sheer curiosity. Regardless, it was a powerful force to be lead by.

A middle aged woman with the usual Chuunin flak jacket and vibrant and wild brown hair was standing close to a leather dummy, knee deep in sawdust and small leather pieces. The brown haired woman closed up to the dummy, carefully, taking one or two steps at a time. As if she was expecting a counter or some sort of movement from it. Slowly the brown haired stranger moved two of her fingers up to the dummy and flicked it ever so softly. Another violent shockwave tossed Kiyomi up, the dummy dissolved into a pile of sawdust and leather cuts from the force built up inside it and small fissures opened up letting the excess of the leftovers spill inside. This woman was so strong!

Kiyomi flew up into the air and landed face first onto the dirt, the girl started tearing up again as she felt blood rushing from her broken nose. She felt a cold relief in her bleeding nose and saw a green flash of light right up to her face. It kept glowing and shining… For so long that Kiyomi was both bored and hurt from just sitting like that on the dirt.

"How long is your healing going to take?" Kiyomi asked, starting to get annoyed, her own clan medical ninja would've fixed something like a broken nose within seconds. She's been sitting there for a very awkward amount of time.

"Hey, I'm not used to healing other people, most people can't really take my healing, sometimes I break… Things." The woman loudly exclaimed. She sounded like one of those class clowns and Kiyomi had little time to deal with such people. Though maybe she could have been used, maybe this woman could've taught her to be strong, like her brother and this brown haired idiot?

Kiyomi opened her eyes, they ran around the camp and stopped for a moment just to see Hisako and the Quack talking, having noticed Kiyomi waking up the Quack wandered back to her and sat on his knees.

"You snapped the sanguine pill in your mouth, while it did do the job of giving you a universal blood replacement to compensate you bleeding out through your gut while I healed you it did it halfway so you passed out, I was just about to stab you in the chest but it seems you've woken up, that's good, I've healed up your guts, your welcome, by the way. I used out most of my chakra checking after you and Hisako so beg that the one with the weird choice in clothes doesn't get too roughed up. It'd be best for you to rest now, I promise to do my best not to stab you in your sleep checking if you're not dead." The young man smiled for Kiyomi and walked away.

"We'll need to siege the bunker in the morning, we've no time to wait, they already know we can kick their butts so they'll move as fast as we give them the chance to, if they move outside the Fire Country we can't chase them. The seas are a neutral zone and the Atlantis Archipelago is already Water Country territory and jurisdiction…" Hisako's voice reached Kiyomi's ears after the blonde closed her eyes to rest.

"No, that's stupid, I told you that I won't be able to take care of you two for at least two more days after this, we need to wait! Quacks don't use medical food pills because they're too expensive and rare, if we carried those on us we'd be a constant target for rogues, my supply of sanguine pills and snap crackers is running low, you break a bone or lose some blood – you're on your own. Don't get me wrong, I wouldn't normally care if you kick the bucket, well, the blondie's kinda cute but she's not my type, plus she has a year or two before she's allowed to look cute…" the Quack replied.

"Wait, so do you give a flying pigeon's raging diarrhea of fucks about our lives or not? Because that makes a huge fucking difference!" Hisako started losing it.

"Of course I do, you're my only chance to get inside Konohagakure and legitimize, settle down, stop healing wild mercenary swingers' broken dicks and feeding them blood pills when their concubines shank them. All I'm saying is, if you want me to help you – you'll wait."

Kiyomi snoozed off, just a tiny bit short of hearing the resolution of that heated debate. She felt tired and wanted some rest. There were a million thoughts running through her head, worries about Mana and what'd happen if she got injured, worries of how the mission would go if Hisako just ignored an exhausted Quack on their team…

It all disappeared with a flick of a finger right as the girl slipped into sleep.


	84. I Want to Kill Rogues!

Kiyomi sighed happily after Hanasaku sat back and the green flashing light of the woman's healing stopped. The young heiress of the Yamanaka clan had just met this brown haired klutz and while she was impressed by the sheer awesome power of the woman, her skill with healing could've used a lot of polish. Hanasaku smiled like an idiot with a full-teeth smile and gave the girl a thumb up, her thumb then was dropped as horror changed to woman's expression.

Hanasaku's horror ignited the dark flames within the blonde as well, she shook uncomfortably and asked the woman "What's wrong", being a bit worried that she may not want to know the answer.

"Your nose... It's... It's on your cheek at the completely wrong place, it happened to me again!" Hanasaku shouted out slamming her own forehead in frustration.

Kiyomi jumped up and started running around frantically, completely lost and unable to get even a single idea of what she should have done in that situation. This woman... She bumped the girl's face and now she ruined it for good, what will the clan elders say? They will immediately remove Kiyomi from the line of heirs that much was for certain, what kind of a husband would've wanted a wife with a nose growing out from her cheek...

The girl dashed to a small leaking pond and looked at her own reflection. She then touched the point where her nose would've been normally feeling it up. It was only then that Kiyomi realized that her nose was completely normal and Hanasaku's heal was totally fine. The blonde felt a gentle pat to her back that sent her flying over the surface of the pond like a stone tossed at the ocean bouncing into the horizon before sinking like a brick in the middle of the pond.

Kiyomi swam up and got onto the surface of the water using her "Art of Water Climbing", a technique that she was taught after leaving the Academy. There were many sensei that gave her tons of meaningless techniques to work on, they had to occupy the attention of the young heiress so that Kiyomi felt that she was learning something useful when in fact she was learning something completely trivial like walking on water...

"What was that all about!?" Kiyomi yelled having lost all semblance of composure, at this point she was pretty much barking insults and lashing out on the woman while Hanasaku was rolling on the rocky dirt where she accidentally sent Kiyomi flying all the way to the other side of the pond.

"Sorry, sorry, I never get used to my own strength..." Hanasaku finally managed to stop rolling on the ground and give the blonde a reply, the woman then pointed to the side with a smile and rubbed her own nose, "That's what this training was all about, I was learning to restrain myself..."

Kiyomi wiped her hair rubbing it over with her hand and letting the excess of water just flow off of it. This idiot was unbelievable! The blonde stepped off of the pond's surface and deactivated the jutsu she used to walk on it. "Who on Earth are you? My clan elders will hear about you insulting the future heiress of the Yamanaka clan!" Kiyomi shouted out. She was acting like a diva, she had no idea why, after all she hated all of that over-glorified childish pampering that she got. Maybe she just wanted this woman to pay for this transgression but she knew well that she couldn't have matched up to her in any way.

Hanasaku made that weird guilty look, almost like a little puppy and introduced herself. "I am Hanasaku, I have a clan name but I don't like to throw it around because I grew up in a normal family of clanless villagers..."

Kiyomi's eyes shot up wide and her mouth opened almost to the ground in shock.

"Wait... Hanasaku... Chestnut Hanasaku, Konoha Sannin!?" she asked yelling out and completely losing any semblance of cool she may have preserved before that, even that façade of a pampered child was blown away, no way that could've been true...

"Why do you have to go around telling your people this... I'm sorry, I don't want to have to beat them up, you know!" Hanasaku exclaimed with little to no restraint to her tone, she was so outspoken and extroverted that she pretty much almost yelled her words out.

Kiyomi rubbed her chin like a supervillain plotting her next scheme, she could almost feel the hellfire burning behind her and a devilish cape growing out from her back, together with the small evil horns to complement the whole set! There was no way that any of her elders could've ever found any muscle who could've left a scratch on the Chestnut Hanasaku, that was exactly what Kiyomi always wanted, that was a chance for her to become strong, to break free of her shackles, of her cage and become an amazing ninja! Someone actually worth the mettle of being the next leader of her clan instead being just a sissy lady with a fancy dress and being all name.

"Ummm..." Kiyomi thought out loud before flipping back and falling on her butt and slamming her head into the dirt, trying to make her fall look convincing. "Owwie, ouch, ouch, ouch, ouch, ouch! That slap, why did you do that... Oh no... I think I'm really hurt... I... I may be dying, in fact!" she started faking an injury. Hanasaku shot up to the fallen girl and started freaking out.

"Oh no! What?! Wait, what'll I do!? I killed the heiress of the Yamanaka clan, Shiyomi!"

Kiyomi lifted her head off the ground comically.

"Kiyomi... I mean... I decided to temporarily postpone my death to remind you that you're a medical ninja..." she said out quietly, almost whispering like the autumnal trees dropping their leaves.

"Wait..."

Kiyomi shook on the ground, shit, her act was outed, now she'll be announced as fake!

"I think that you might have an internal fracture!"

The Yamanaka couldn't help it, she leaped back on her feet and started yelling at the woman from the deepest abyss of her lungs, so hard that even the deafest of all pigeons took off in fear for their life.

"How an idiot like you could have finished medical ninja education, you're supposed to study at the Konohagakure Hospital for that!"

Only after realizing that this time she outed herself for real Kiyomi just coughed and scratched the collar of her top in discomfort. She raised her palms up to calm the Sannin down and explain her intentions, Kiyomi was pretty good at playing people whether it was via her mind control hidden clan techniques or otherwise. However she didn't count on how difficult it'd be to actually be playing an idiot, a complete buffoon!

"Fine, I'm not really injured... Just... Look, you offended me, you made me slam my face into dirt, then you scared me with that prank and then you threw me into the water, I could've drowned you know... Actually, it might be an actual miracle that saved me from having my spine break from all the backflips I did after you slapped me over the water."

Hanasaku just stood there and looked at Kiyomi with the dumbest puppy eyes possible, it was quite not out of the park that the woman didn't even realize where the girl was going. No. She must've struggled with the basic concept of most of Kiyomi's sentence structures as she looked like she'd appreciate having a notebook to write all of it down.

"The thing is... I want you to train me in return, to repay the harm you caused me today." Kiyomi declared her terms of how Hanasaku could've avoided the horrible fate of having to beat her clan elders and their hired muscle effortlessly.

"Oh... Okay, you should've just said so... You go around and around and around and I get really confused, when I train you, tell me how it is. I should really teach you to talk, you know..." Hanasaku pouted like a little baby wrapping her arms around her chest.

Kiyomi rubbed her temple with her fingers angrily, she struggled to believe that this Hanasaku was an actual adult human being. She looked like she was at her late thirties yet it was hard to tell as medical ninja often enjoyed a much more youthful and beautiful appearance since their healing prowess somehow managed to affect them indirectly as well. The woman should've been much older, maybe in her mid to late forties if all those stories of her participating in that huge battle at the Tower of Bones was true... That scuffle actually formed what was known as the Mammoth Graveyard – a giant pile of bones and crushed and grinded soil north of the village walls.

How could a half-wit like this be one of the strongest ninja in not only the village but the whole world? Even more, the famed Chestnut Hanasaku was among some of the most powerful of the Sannin among all of the villages, the top percentage of Sannin. How could she ever be so numb-witted? How did she survive daily activities? How didn't she cut her hands off when making a sandwich or cutting fish? Kiyomi sighed, trying to push all rude thoughts away. After all she wanted to learn from this woman and demoralizing thoughts didn't help anyone...

Hanasaku leaped up into the air and landed right on top of the dummy's head, settling down in a meditative position. She must've leaped well over ten meters into the air to make that jump and the precision was incredible. Still, a chuunin or a jounin could've made a jump like that. Kiyomi couldn't help but still be a bit sceptical, after all, most jounin level ninja she met were absolute geniuses not only in terms of combat experience and strategy but also in such subjects like geometry, mathematics, literature and philosophy, some higher ranking ninja were even world known authors themselves. They travelled a lot and saw a lot of what life had to offer after all!

"So... Why do you want to be my student, Kiyomi? Don't you have a sensei? If I have to beat someone up to rip you from your old team I won't do it" Hanasaku asked seriously, she seemed to have dropped the goofing around tone, at the very least she could still do that much...

"Actually... I just want to train. I had multiple different sensei in just the last three months, some of them were actual genin, hired to play around with me, some of them were really good but my clan ditched them because they wanted me to stay safe" Kiyomi explained, she didn't lie, she told things how they were with all of the feelings and frustration intact with those emotions. Hanasaku smiled.

"Why would they do this to you? Why would they hold you back? That's a terrible idea, if you're a weakling you'll die outside the village walls!" Hanasaku asked viewing Kiyomi's expression of desperation and frustration as some manner of a joke. The girl pouted, she felt a bit offended that the woman found something to laugh at, this was her life, her pain, her deepest and most honest feelings, were they all just a joke to this brute!?

"Because they don't want me to be a real ninja! They just want me play one. Since the Academy I was bred to be some child bearing princess mare, I was never taken seriously. "Oh no, Lady Kiyomi, that knife cut your precious finger, let's fire your teacher who let that happen!" and bullshit like that was what I grew up with! It's more important to them how good I look in the royal kimono than how I can handle myself in battle..." Kiyomi's face switched quickly from anger and frustration and locked feelings of angst into teary eyes and sadness.

Hanasaku just sat on that dummy and looked at the Yamanaka for a while, her face was serious and she did look like she had a certain amount of empathy in her heart. She actually appeared to be lamenting the fact that Kiyomi was being spoiled.

"I won't teach you" Hanasaku declared.

Kiyomi leaped forward, trying to grab the woman but the brown haired fury just concentrated all of her chakra and let it go in a burst sending the blonde back as if a hurricane had just blown her way, the blonde's furious attack didn't even break Hanasaku's delicate balance!

"Why!? I thought we had an agreement!" Kiyomi shouted out angrily. She was both depressed and angry at the same time, she was thankful to whatever sick God oversaw this world that Hanasaku was a powerful ninja who could've taken all that Kiyomi could've dished out in her blind fury or else the blonde could've done something she'd later regret.

"Because you've been spoiled, it's been too long, you're a ruined child. I've no time to waste on you, there's a low cap of skill where even I can't help. I won't hold back, I'll give you all of the challenge right from the get-go because that's the kind of person I am. If I only used half of the teaching methods it'd be doing just what you hated – I'd be spoiling and pampering you. You'll either die when I get serious about training you or you will become a liar to yourself when I treat you like a little pampered lady once again" Hanasaku explained.

Kiyomi fell down on her knees, she clutched her eyes together desperately trying to restrain her tears. She wasn't a crybaby, she couldn't have been, it's just that all of it hit her so hard, so recently... Her brother dying, the clan becoming even more annoying with the pampering than they usually were and now Hanasaku refusing the deal to teach her. The blonde pounded the ground, again and again, opening the wounds that she had on her knuckles from before, blood ran wildly on the rocky ground dyeing the whole training area crimson red, almost like a petal storm of roses had just been brought its way.

"I... Brother... I'm sorry I'm so weak!" Kiyomi shouted out in angst and frustration. She was literally shaking in tension.

"Brother?" Hanasaku asked curiously when Kiyomi shook her head, her wild hair slipped out from the hairband and flowed down covering the girl's crying and pathetic face.

"He... He counted on me, he wanted that I became a real ninja, he always saved me, saved me from this stupid life of being just a toy, just a little doll heiress. Saved me from death and pain too..." Kiyomi couldn't stop crying, she stood back up and wiped her teary eyes looking at Hanasaku with brave and determined eyes.

"I wanted to become as strong as he was so that I could've been able to fight the people likes of which killed him. He died after he made an enemy from the wrong people, bad people, strong people. People who defy the rules and moral norms, people who are worse than scum! I want to learn to punish rogues, I want to learn to kill them like they killed my brother!" Kiyomi shouted out from the bottom of her heart. Hanasaku sighed and stroke her own wild brown hair.

"Well I guess then you have a motivation that'll keep you from dying. Let's make a deal, I teach you and go balls out on you, I'll literally break you and then pick up the pieces off the floor and grind them to even smaller dust. If you die in the process – it's on you, you'll be a disappointment to your clan and your brother, if you live, that'll be because you have the determination to live to fulfil your goal." Hanasaku smiled extending Kiyomi her hand.

The blonde walked up to Hanasaku and the two shook hands, driving them together. Kiyomi shouted out in pain as her shoulder instantly shot out from its socket and her elbow twisted in a very grotesque manner snapping her hand in two. The girl fell onto the floor and Hanasaku forced her back up to heal her arm back. Even when the bones were being mended they hurt. Hanasaku was a lousy healer, her healing hurt even more than the injury itself, usually healing was supposed to feel relieving and good.

"We'll get there eventually..." she calmed Kiyomi down.

"It's fine..." the girl stopped whining and closed her eyes to endure the pain. "It's better to fall a thousand times and break every bone in your body while running than to keep crawling."

"You dummybutt, why would you crawl? You'd just get into more dog-poop if you're closer to the ground..." Hanasaku laughed.

"I... It was a meta... Why am I explaining metaphors to you... Ugh..." Kiyomi grunted in frustration but then the sensei and the student shared a laugh. The two didn't even know each other for more than an hour and they already felt like friends, something about Hanasaku made her pretty easy to get along with. It had to be her insulting lack of intelligence and brutal honesty because of her inability to think of both the reality and her lie at the same time...

"Hey, twinklefuck! Get up!" Hisako slapped Kiyomi waking her up from her glorious slumber she deserved so justly by passing out. "Do you have any idea where idol-bitch is? Did you see which direction she left at or maybe saw how she's doing? She's been away for a pretty long time and we see no signs like your burning forest to come to her aid..."

Kiyomi sat back up and shook her head.

Quack walked up to her and kneeled up to her level. "Did you at the very least get the bloody fucker?"

Kiyomi smiled, "I sure as hell hope so... Hate rogues..."

"You and me both, blondie..." Quack replied quickly popping a pill of some sort. Must've been one of those crazy medication things he had, what could it have been for though?

"You're a damned rogue, Quack!" Kiyomi snapped at him angrily.

"Not if everything goes according to plan, babe, plan to legitimize myself right after we off those fuckers and bring the richboy back... I healed the lives of you two lovelies far too many times for me not to become man of the year when I bring the three of you back." The young man smiled before coughing up like an old smoker. Black rings appeared below the youth's eyes all of a sudden, if those pills he was popping were so poisonous why would he take them Kiyomi wondered...

"Not if Mana dies, she's an actual idol to the kids, Konoha's Sorceress they call her, heard her magic tricks ain't too bad..." Kiyomi smiled looking at the thickness of the forest.

"Pffft, please, kids idolize everything these days, they'd tattoo their bodies with all sort of bullshit if they let them. You've no idea how many tits I could've signed out here..." Quack looked pretty sceptical about Mana's ability, that couldn't have been helped, the last time he saw the girl she was unconscious and burnt up, with smoking rags in place of her uniform...


	85. Long Range Ninja VS Long Range Ninja

A light tap echoed through the nearest acres of the forest. Mana gently kicked off of each branch in her way just to keep her moving. She was looking around and trying to see where the woman she was pursuing had gone, the swinging lady was incredibly agile and fast, she flipped around and must've possessed some degree of superhuman strength to swing around like she has been, she easily traversed the forest by perfectly adjusting her leaps using whatever it was she was using, it may have been a whip, a rope or a chain, either way the degree of speed, precision and agility was unmatched.

Strangely enough for the most part of their little game the woman didn't even try to escape Mana's sight, quite the contrary, the woman even taunted the girl, hanging on a branch upside down and gesturing for the magician to come closer. The more she taunted the more intimidated and afraid Mana felt, she was now all alone with none of her friends even close around to help her. She was chasing someone much faster and possibly stronger, this woman must've been in her early twenties at the very least since her voice sounded quite sultry and mature.

Sometimes when Mana got lost her voice came in to guide the girl, just something really weird and creepy like a joke or a direction where she should head. This woman could've been luring Mana into her trap or selecting a favoured combat environment, either way it wasn't good. The magician did her best to look out for any traps but with the speed she was moving in and the absolute darkness around her it was impossible. If she stepped on a tag placed below the branch it would've been set off and Mana wouldn't have noticed it until her leg was shredded to pieces and the magician was already in mid fall. Mana always assumed missions would be dangerous but she never thought she'd have to rely on luck and chance like this...

Mana stopped for a moment, she's been moving at the speed of a moving vehicle, leaping and flipping over branches, desperate to reach another branch on another tree which may have been ten or twenty meters away. The girl was tired, she may have been leaping around and running for an hour or maybe even two, this was getting to the point of ridiculousness... Was the woman intending to run away from Mana or to fight her? Did she have the boy or not? Most likely she didn't, several times Mana had come quite close to the woman but then the rogue just dropped and swung to the other end of the forest. It was getting quite ridiculous.

Mana was also quite worried about her friends. She had no idea how was Hisako or Kiyomi doing, despite Hisako's most genuine attempts to make Mana hate her the girl still cared for the raven haired assassin and treated her as a friend. There was this thing that the magician had noticed in the woman, no matter how disgusting her swearing was, no matter how nastily she spoke or how she threatened everyone, when the time came Hisako did what was right all the time. She helped the three girls not to get themselves murdered when they first entered the mercenary camp, she saved the two from Hachi and had them healed, she listened to Mana's reason. Maybe this nastiness of Hisako's was just a façade, otherwise why would she had done everything right when things came down to it?

"Awww... How cute, what's the matter, are you lost, little girl?" the woman's voice picked up. Mana heard the voice of a young man shouting in pain following the woman's taunt shortly, her eyes shot up in surprise so quickly that the girl's tired eyes shot out some tears. Mana hadn't slept at all that night, she was running for an hour or two at the speed that surpassed her usual limits just to catch up to the woman... Did she have the hostage with her? That changed everything! Mana leaped towards the voice.

Sharp pain emanated through Mana's abdomen, she looked down and saw a cruel smile, the woman was dressed in all black, the girl didn't even notice her jumping in from below and driving her elbow into her abdomen. The woman then grabbed hold of Mana's shoulders and flipped over the girl using them as her support, throwing the magician after her feet landed on something solid. Mana felt a cold breeze and the howling wind close to her, what amazing strength! Then she moaned pathetically when something made of leather wrapped around her neck – it was that thing that the woman used to swing around the forest.

Mana realized what was going on, the woman tossed her down and wrapped this whip of hers around the girl's throat, she counted on Mana passing out after hitting a tree and then her neck breaking or her getting hanged on the whip. The grey tree bark was closing in quick, Mana thrust her legs and activated the "Art of Tree Climbing" to stick to the tree. She then grunted again and felt something warm like blood or slobber shooting out from her throat when the woman pulled the whip yanking Mana off of the tree and once again falling down.

"Get out of that loop, get it off of you, you'll die... Come on... Come on... MOVE IT!" Mana ordered herself in her mind as her childish heart was pounding relentlessly inside her own chest, it felt like it'd hop out at any time, honestly. Finally, the loop tied around Mana's neck went off just in time, Mana made some hand seals and activated her "Mystical Wings Jutsu" to break her fall with a powerful gust of wind. After Mana fell onto the soft mossy dirt she took a moment to catch her breath and calm her pounding heart, she almost had a panic attack there and it wasn't helping. Had it not been for Mana's experience with hanging devices and deathtraps during her magic shows she'd be hanging lifeless with a broken neck off of a branch right now...

Mana swung her arms wildly tossing some steel tipped cards at where the woman was, Mana heard the sound of tearing and the woman grunting – she hit her! The woman leaped down, Mana noticed her jumpsuit having been torn up but it didn't seem like Mana's cards opened any bleeding wounds yet, she just scored some lucky close shots. The magician girl shoved her arm deep into her hat and activated father's seal, she was just about running out of her cards and Mana didn't intend to clean her resources just yet, she had to use some tools she sealed into her father's seal.

The girl pulled out a new box of cards and shoved it into the device inside her sleeve, the intricate holster was now exposed since Mana's uniform was all burnt up and had holes in it. The girl still felt cold and a bit ashamed to be walking with a torn up attire but that was not the time for being embarrassed. While cold could eventually kill her but currently it was only slowing Mana down, it was not yet a problem but the time when it'd be one was approaching.

The magician tossed another card, the woman leaped up and tied her whip around a branch up above pulling herself even higher up. The seal on the card activated firing off three shuriken at the woman from the back of the card. All three dug into the woman's back and she hissed like a cat whose tail was stepped on. The woman hung herself upside down on the branch. Her hoodie slipped off and her short ginger hair finally slipped out, strangely enough two bangs right near her face were brown, while the rest of her hairdo was bright orange. She had some strange whiskers on her face and her teeth looked pointy, she reminded Mana of a cat version of Inuzuka.

"You play dirty, little mouse, this trap was meant for your delicate neck reaching in for the cheese..." she pulled out a radio from her back pocket showing it off to Mana and playing a recording of the hostage yelling in pain.

"I didn't know Inuzuka also bred cats..." Mana bumbled back scratching her aching neck, honestly with how close that call was a little neck ache was the least of her problems...

"I'm no Inuzuka, I'm a member of the Nekomata clan, just like my brother." The woman angrily replied, it appeared that being confused for an Inuzuka was a pretty sensitive subject since there would've been no other reason for her to reply.

The woman then gracefully leaped on top of the branch and unwrapped her whip swinging it around, letting it crack and break off several pretty large branches of the trees and sending them crashing down. That whip may have killed a normal person if it as much as hit them once, even a hit on a leg or an arm would've sent a shockwave throughout one's entire skeleton shattering bones where it made its way through. This was dangerous, Mana didn't want to use chakra augmentation so shortly after using it to traverse but this may have been unavoidable.

The woman also was smart enough not to pull out the three shuriken that were stuck in her back, that'd have caused a pretty intense bleeding. The woman then laughed seductively and lashed her whip at Mana, the girl leaped back but the end of the whip bounced off and hit the girl in her chest tearing off more of her uniform and opening a gruesome gash, blacking the area around it almost instantly. Mana screamed in pain as her body froze, it hurt like nothing she had ever felt before...

"Does it hurt? I bet it does, you've been a pretty bad girl hurting me like that, I'm afraid I'll have to whip you around for a while before I kill you!" the woman then laughed as she swung her whip again. This time it lit up with chakra, piercing through the trees as it passed them, Mana leaped away from several falling trees and avoided the whip's snap, while she avoided the tip of it, the middle part leaped off of a tree it was close to and once again hit the girl making her fly back into the rubble of fallen trees and screaming in pain. Mana desperately tried to crawl away from the rubble she was thrown at as she was a sitting duck in there. She took a brief glance at the wound – it was a pulsing reddish and black blunt force trauma. So concentrated but so strong! It wasn't meant to kill, maybe if it hit her directly yes but... The bouncing was made to torture. That whip was impossible to avoid entirely.

Suddenly the leather tied around Mana's neck again out of nowhere, the woman yanked the whip pulling the girl in and applying pressure. Mana grunted pathetically, she had to get that stupid whip loose, she had to escape, do something about it or she'd die. She'd die when the woman felt like letting her die, after gruesome torture. Now Mana realized the point of that weapon – show the enemy that avoiding it meant to torture yourself. Make them refuse to avoid it and choose death by their own choice... Such a cruel way to go...

"Well? Do you like my "Cat's Tail", just relax, stop kicking around and I'll hang you like a good little girl, I won't need to whip you again!" the woman yelled at Mana, the girl kept kicking around and grabbing for stumps so that the woman didn't drag her in close enough to actually hang her.

"As you can see, I am a long range fighter, I use my "Cat's Tail" to keep my enemy as far away from me as possible. Long range is a pain in any ninja's butt... I've killed many chuunin like this as well so don't feel sad about dying here, you've done well, now just stop struggling and accept it, it'll come faster that way..."

Mana kicked around, her vision was becoming blurry and she felt like going asleep, no, that couldn't happen, not now not ever, not until Mana finally changed the world! The girl pulled out a card out of her hat which she still clutched in her right hand, the other one was looking for a stump to hold to before the woman yanked her so hard that Mana's bleeding left arm couldn't hold on any longer. The magician swiped the steel tipped card at the leather whip, luckily enough it wasn't enhanced with chakra then, the woman didn't want to behead the girl, just to strangle her.

Finally... Freedom, Mana tore the leather off her neck and coughed frantically, for the second time that day she almost died... All that training she did, all that struggling and she almost died again. She became so much stronger but it still wasn't enough. The magician stood back up once her blurry vision lined up and looked at the furious Nekomata woman.

"Actually long range is just fine for me... Now I've shortened your range by cutting your whip in half. I'm really more of a long range ninja myself, I usually have to use my legs to keep the enemy at a much more comfortable range but you actually prefer long range which is great. I'm what you'd call your counter..." Mana huffed out once she regained the use of her voice.

The woman laughed maniacally, "Don't joke around, kid, you should've just been a good little girl and died, now I'll have to mess up your pretty body, that's of course if they'll even find it!" she shouted after raising her palms into the air and activating something – short chakra flames lit up on the woman's fingernails.

"Man-Beast Formation: Cat Mimicry!" she yelled out as the chakra flames formed long claws where her nails would've been, her hair also stood up as more spiky and the woman leaned forward standing on all fours. Chakra was shooting off in jets of blue flames all around the woman's body, it must've been quite the costly technique to sustain.

Mana's arms went through the hand seals and shot forward. She had something new to try out, an improved version of her mostly visual "Magic Spark Jutsu".

"Magical Sphere Barrage!" she yelled forcing lightning chakra to light up and crackle around her body before forming several sets of dozens small lightning chakra spheres and shooting at the woman. The Nekomata leaped at Mana trying to slash the girl but the spheres started collectively bombarding her, pounding into her body with enough strength to crack bones and then shocking her leaving nasty burns. A combination of small loud thuds and crackling lightning echoed lighting up the night's sky briefly before the lifeless Nekomata woman fell from where she was. The tree she was on as well as several others and some of those she cut down were ablaze from Mana's technique, the girl smiled, this version was so much stronger than her previous one, it actually dealt some damage and had some lightning properties, it wasn't just all sparks and no burn...

Mana gurgled up some blood and stumbled back, suddenly the burnt up and injured woman just appeared right up close to her and slashed her chakra claws, she was so fast! One moment she was lying around and the other she was up and close to Mana. The woman started wildly cutting at Mana, the magician tried to leap back and avoid everything but more and more cuts opened wounds on her, Mana was tired, injured already. This wasn't looking good. The girl made hand seals but then changed the last one, she planned to repeat the previous jutsu, just try and power it through but the Nekomata slashed at her gut with enough reach to let Mana's guts out, wind chakra shot from the girl's legs throwing her backwards after she activated her "Mystical Wings Jutsu" again and landed further away.

The girl coughed some blood up and clutched her injured abdomen – the woman cut her pretty deep, not yet guts-out deep but one more cut would've done it. The woman leaped forward. Mana closed her eyes and felt her body tense up. This was just like with the Demon back in Konohagakure – she wasn't strong enough, wasn't fast enough. She mastered her kicks just for situations like this, where she couldn't keep her opponent at range.

Right before the woman's claws dug into Mana's intestines the magician's knee dug into the woman's cheek so incredibly fast that the woman who invested all of her effort into offense had no time to respond. Mana smiled as her eyes shot back open, her opponent was hit, stumbling and dazed. The magician continued to keep up her wild kicking combination, aiming for the burned areas, for the sensitive spots like the abdomen, face and nose. With a final jump kick to the woman's gut Mana sent her tumbling back. She looked completely out.

Mana looked down, she heard her own blood tapping onto the leaves and grass below, the wound on her abdomen was pretty deep. Mana took off her covered with holes jacket and tore off her blouse tying it around her waist, almost instantly the white cloth dyed crimson red, then Mana wrapped the jacket around just to have some cloth on her so that she didn't freeze to death. It was known to the magician that her natural ninja metabolism should've kept her going for a while, maybe just long enough until that wound didn't bother her as much. Mana knew a lethal wound when she saw one, over that last year she pushed herself to the limit many times and this was not the kind of wound that the girl was ready to die because of.

A loud pop alerted her, Mana turned at the beaten Nekomata but she saw nothing else but a cloud of purple smoke. The magician stumbled back, worried it may have been poisonous but then when the smoke split there was nothing there but a small puddle of blood and torn black cloth. Mana weighed herself back and hit her back against a tree, she grunted as more bruises opened up when she slid down against the rough tree bark. Mana breathed heavily, waiting for the Quack or Hisako or Kiyomi to come... Ten minutes passed, fifteen, half an hour... Mana was all alone, left alone to die here.

"Well, if I'm gonna die, may as well die moving..." Mana thought to herself forcing to pick herself off of the ground and starting moving towards the camp. The night was already passing, soon the Sun would rise. Mana was moving so slowly, she didn't know if she'd make it back to the camp or if anyone was even there. This was what the life of ninja was like, this was the world that Tanshu-sensei warned her of.

Mana wasn't about to prove Tanshu-sensei right by dying with a bleeding gut wound in the middle of nowhere.

And so the agonizing walk back began...


	86. Phantasmal Maturity

Mana took careful and planned steps so that she didn't trigger the overwhelming onslaught of pain which would've sent her grunting on her knees. When the cut in her gut was moved it let itself be known by completely crippling the youngster. Each and every step was agonizing but it also took the girl closer to her team, to where she could've gotten help. Mana wasn't sure how far away from her team she was. She's been tracking the Nekomata member for quite some time and she was moving at her top speed which was nothing short of a speeding vehicle. Then again the woman could've lead her in circles...

Mana didn't know what was worse – the pain she felt with every step or knowing that an incredible amount of steps she needed to take was left. Each and every step took her closer to help but the number of total steps compared to each individual step just made her getting to her final goal that much more impossible. Mana tripped on a large root and fell onto the mossy ground. The girl whined for a while but picked herself back up. She felt pain but none of the release that dying offered – she was very much going to survive it but having the suffering in mind it was not much of a relief at that moment.

The magician took a brief moment to examine her wound, it didn't appear to be bleeding, it used to spit blood in torrents before slowing down, then completely closing in. Such was the ninja metabolism, injuries like this tend to heal quite fast as long as the ninja was out of battle and let their chakra circulation enhance the natural processes of the body and treat the wound somewhat. This wasn't some sort of a miracle, it didn't work in a middle of battle but it also didn't take care of the wound, it just kept it from killing the ninja. One stronger bump, one irregularity in one's chakra flow could've reopened the wound again and that would've made it all worse again.

Mana's steps were trembling, her entire body was fighting off the impulse to take another step. Her mind was determined, completely set in stone with its decision to make it back to her team in the camp. Her body gave up however, it wanted for the pain to stop, the battle itself didn't exhaust Mana but having to power through the pain of her various injuries tired her physically. Taking each and every step took a toll on her, it not only made her power through pain but convincing herself started to tire her mind as well, her iron will started appearing less iron every second.

"Ugh..." Mana grunted putting her back by a tree and sliding down on her butt, she looked onward into the darkness of the forest and felt the first gentle rays of light warm her cheeks. These weren't her final moments, not yet, this was just a trial for her to power through, it was something she had to do, a pain that was inevitable for her to continue existing yet this trial felt so impossible. She may have tracked the woman for hours, how long it'd take with this turtle's pace to come back? No... It wasn't worth it! She was just a useless weakling, she trained for so long yet she hesitated to fight the cat woman with her very best from the start.

"Really? Of all the people to prove me right, you'd disappoint me the most..." Mana heard Tanshu's voice and noticed the man's brownish locks and thick beard in front of her, wearing the same messy clothes he always did and looking with all of his disapproving glory at the teen girl.

Mana didn't respond, she just turned away, that was how it happened, huh? At some point everyone encountered a challenge that was so strong and made one suffer so much that they had to turn away, give up on their lifelong dreams and become the grey mass that comprised this world.

"Where did all that bullshit about everyone's life go? Were you just showing off? Were you just a filthy all-talk little shit!?" Tanshu started yelling at Mana. The magician was so tortured by her own exhaustion and pain that she didn't even question the appearance of her dead mentor in front of her. Mana breathed in and out.

"Hisako-san and Kiyomi-san are alright, they're stronger than me, they're smarter and they've been doing this for far longer. Hisako-san went through more pain and loss than anyone deserves to, she'll handle her trials, Kiyomi-san is the most amazing ninja of her age I've ever seen, if anyone can survive this it's her and if she can't I sure as hell can't help her... I give up..." Mana started mumbling under her nose, imagining that this phantom of her mentor heard her. That was it huh? That was her breaking point? What would her friends, what would Shimo and Sugemi think about her if they saw her broken like that?

Sensei's imaginary phantom arm passed through Mana's cheek, the girl's mind forced her to turn her body to the side where she was slapped by her own imagination.

"This was never about Hisako and Kiyomi, this was about you! You keep talking about how important and sacred everyone's life is, what about YOUR life? You're throwing it away, you see a person with a sacred life inside of their heart dying and you're giving up on that person, you're giving up on yourself... Stop embarrassing yourself, you know I'm just in your head, there's a part of you that hasn't given up yet, give in to that part, put it on the wheel..."

The teen magician turned at where the ghost was supposed to be but it wasn't there, it never had been, it was just Mana's injury that forced her body to start seeing things that weren't there, things she'd have liked to see. Mana let her head rest at the rough bark of the tree, she looked down at her wound and saw that the blood mark was already darkening – the stain wasn't fresh, Mana carefully removed what used to be her shirt from her wound and looked at it – it'll make for a pretty nasty scar...

Cold raindrops fell on Mana's forehead, it wasn't a rain but a drizzle, it took a great quantity of raindrops before they gathered into a big chunk of water that ran down Mana's face.

"Not gonna make it easy for me, huh?" Mana looked at the sky, she used to believe that there was this energy in charge of everything, this certain Magic that gifted parts of its own being into each living being, giving more to some, less to others and those with more of Magic inside of them had a responsibility to compensate that difference by watching out for those with less of it. Maybe those beliefs formed little Mana's hero complex...

Despite not believing in that thing for quite some time, maybe there was still more of it inside Mana than she have realized? She still sometimes sarcastically spoke to something, something greater than everything else. She had the full understanding that her cries of pain, her questions and her sarcastic thoughts all didn't reach anything, they didn't amount to anything, they weren't being listened to. No one cared about those things but it was so easy to believe that someone did, naïve but easy...

Mana grunted and clutched her scar, some rain water running down her torn clothes washed some blood off of the wound, the cold raindrops sort of refreshed the girl to stand up and keep moving. Mana always loved the rain yet it wasn't like the rain made her stronger, it wasn't that some supernatural force of nature sent it there, it wasn't that rain picked her up all by itself. It was just something that happened, despite being the simplest explanation, that there was no causality for this event and resurrection of Mana's spirit, the cancellation of her inner surrender, it was much harder to believe in the simpler things because people hated the idea behind them.

The magician kept on walking, it hurt a little less now that she accepted this pain, this responsibility and no longer fought against herself. Fighting against pain and cold was much easier than fighting against oneself. Tanshu-sensei... Tanshu-sensei's phantom, whatever that was... It was right. Mana's life mattered, it mattered just as much as the life of anyone she strived to protect. That meant that Mana was responsible not only to someone else but also to herself, she was responsible for keeping herself alive, she had to become a hero for herself as well as everyone else.

All this time Mana knew it, she knew that gap in her logic that her own mind was just as sacred and that she was throwing it away. Throwing it away was the easiest thing to do, some part of Mana wanted to just change the world and die right after it so that she wouldn't have to face that world. But if she gave up one herself that would've made Mana actually fail at the very least one person – herself. Even more, as the architect of this new world, one where all life mattered and was protected Mana was responsible for all of the problems in that world. She'd have to answer the cries of hatred of every mother whose children would be killed by killers who were left alive because of Mana's ideals.

"Forward... Only forward..." Mana whispered to herself, biting into her lip until blood was drawn, the pain was difficult to take but it was her responsibility, all of this was. The Fifth gave her an assignment to save that boy, she was integral to this three person team, without Mana the mission would've been impossible, or so Lady Hokage believed. Apparently the magician was also responsible for the mission, for the lives of everyone in her team and the boy kidnapped, she had to come back successfully.

Why was she so silly? Why didn't she just explode with all of her new skills from the beginning? Why didn't Mana just dropkick that tree down where the Nekomata woman was, why didn't she blow her away by overwhelming her with her new techniques? The magician could've won that battle much faster, it was just her inner kindness that prevented Mana from unleashing that anger and power inside her. Once again, even after the lesson from Guru Ayushi and her own endless training and moralizing that she had to always fight with all she had and that it was OK to fight, Mana found herself holding back because she was kind.

Mana felt a bit warmer... Almost like someone placed their hand on her shoulder. The magician turned to the side, no one was there, she was all alone... The young kunoichi kept on walking until she heard a familiar voice.

"You're so rude, Mana..."

The girl turned back, happy to hear that voice again but... Something was wrong. Behind her stood Shimo with his usual messy dung green kimono and his significantly longer hair. This was not Shimo, it couldn't have been, Mana imagined how Shimo would have looked now many times and she had imagined him just like that. This was her own imagination again, she must've twisted her gut a bit too sharply and caused her wound to bleed again. Mana stopped and coughed up, she was definitely going to catch a cold out there...

"Fine, what do you mean?" the girl honoured her own mental projection with a reply. Talking to oneself seems like a really good idea when one suffers from a fever and is slowly bleeding out. Especially when one is out in a middle of nowhere and has to cover hell knows how many miles on foot without the ability to sprint.

"Your enemies, you disrespect them all the time, you play around and keep your strength back. Even if you believe inside that fighting is the right thing to do, face it, you know it! You already know that you'll change the world by punching the person who wants to preserve its twisted ways out, that's the only thing you can do, you are not a medical ninja, you're not smart enough to write laws and make contracts between countries... You'll make the world violence free with violence, you'll try to change it by fighting the people who threaten it. The reason you're so bad at it is because you don't just fight the people you need to fight, you fight yourself as well."

"We both know Shimo calls me "Mana-chan"..." Mana replied lowering her head and avoiding the observation, her own mind was giving her a moral lesson and the girl knew that no one hit harder than her own mind because she knew exactly what was wrong with herself.

"Everyone's life is sacred, there are no evil people, just people with different ideals and some idolize the entirely misguided things... I get it, of all people I, who is part of you, really do... But tell me, if they decide to fight you, what right do you have not to honour that decision? If a person decides to fight, it's their decision, they bring the consequences upon themselves and that's where your responsibility over their well-being ends. When the first punch is thrown, you make sure you beat them down, you do whatever it takes to win and then you decide if you kill them or not... We all know which you'll choose every time!"

Shimo's last sentence sounded so soft. Mana turned back at the phantom with her face full of tears, her lips were shaking.

"Come back some time... I miss you... Aaaand I'm talking with myself again..." Mana sighed realizing that the man she had imagined Shimo to be now had disappeared already, her ninja healing factor had already fixed whatever was wrong with her, cleansed the minor sparks of infection, started working on that fever. It won't cure those problems but it'll make them tolerable.

"If they decide to fight, it's their decision..." Mana repeated to herself again, continuing to walk on. The drizzle started settling down, it was so barely recognizable now that the magician could barely even feel the freezing drops of rain hitting her red and heated from fever cheeks.

A loud scream pierced the forest's depth, Mana scratched the wound trying to pass around a bush but scratching her abdomen with a branch, she cried out pitifully again and stopped, standing by the tree for support. After a moment of precious self-pity Mana pushed her body off of the tree's salvation, she could've just stayed by that tree and enjoyed its fake and treacherous sanctuary. That would've meant giving up, going back to all that responsibility shit. While Mana acknowledged all of the responsibilities she took by her own free will, that didn't mean that she liked to be reminded of how numerous they were.

"I think the problem is in how you view the battles..." father's voice echoed, it only made sense that Mana would once again start seeing things since she reopened the wound and even made it seem nastier after bumping into that bush.

"You view them as battles, you take them seriously which is why you always have that idea of possible outcome of killing your opponent. You need to find a way to trick yourself, make yourself think differently before you get used to that prospect that someone might die. There's no shame in that fear, there's no single thing more worth our fear in this world than death, whether it be ours or that of others..."

Mana didn't reply initially, she loved to hear father's voice, it reminded her of home, reminded her of the calm and cosy pleasure of looking through the window in her oversized winter sweater and seeing the bleak and gritty rain and cold from the warmth of her home.

"You mean like a performance? Stop having a giant divide between my magic shows and battle?" Mana then asked her father's image but realized it was no longer there. She was alone, yet she fell for the illusion that she wasn't three times in a row. The idea that there was someone in the world that gave a shit about your pain and your regrets was so tempting that it made one fall for the same trick three times and the magician was sure she'd fall for it as many times as it'd have happened...

"I guess that was the idea the whole time, use ninjutsu as an art form, not a tool of murder. May as well treat fighting as art too... Look out world, here comes the girl who'll pull a rabbit out of a hat in a middle of a fight." Mana sarcastically mumbled under her nose.

"What the hell are you talking about?"

Mana heard a familiar voice but she didn't turn back, it must've been just another phantom. She just kept walking, it was then that the magician felt a cold hand on her forehead and someone picking her body off of the tree and putting it around her shoulder. Mana lifted her head and saw the Quack holding her straight.

"Whoo boy, seems like you got yourself messed up a bit, shit... Here I thought I wouldn't need to... You know... Use actual medicine. Sit down here, this has to be done here, just let me..."

The young boy reached for his speaker and pressed his ear, turning the headset on.

"Hey, my lovelies, I found our little magician, she's injured but I can get her singing in a jiffy. Stay clear, I might need to use some medicine here, my stitching is a bit rusty, I just always popped some pills... I've no idea how medicals actually do it..."

"Okay are you kidding? Tell me you're kidding? I saw you down two flasks of what smelled like rice wine earlier! No way, I'm going there, what's your location!?" Kiyomi's loud voice could've been heard from the one earplug that was out from the Quack's ear. The young man must've loved having just one in his ear as it let his other ear stay vigilant of everything around him.

"Fuck that shit, am I the only one alarmed by him saying "in a jiffy"? What sort of a jinglecunt says that?! I let this fucker treat my injuries! A man who says "in a jiffy" cleaned my infection..." Hisako's voice also followed shortly.

Quack pulled the plugs out and shoved them in his small bag.

"Sorry there, lovely, I'll just shut those two tigercunts up, the only thing I let to mess with my medical hand when I stitch is alcohol..." Quack sat down and made some hand seals, a small jet of water rose from the man's little flask inside his bag and wrapped around his arms, it got blacker and blacker and then the water just darted to the side, black as tar.

"Alright, now you..." Quack made some hand seals and pointed his arms at Mana's wound, more water shot out and covered all small scratches and the big gash on Mana's abdomen. They all soon blackened too and then flew to the side only to disappear as they've been absorbed into the dirt. Mana felt her fever falling back, her wounds also somehow felt... Fresher... It must've been some sort of cleaning technique. Quack started breathing really hard, he must've been tired.

"How are the others? Are you okay? You look tired..." Mana got worried.

"Hold it... Going in..." Quack silenced Mana putting his needle into her wound, strangely enough Mana didn't see any thread in the needle, it must've been some strange ninja tool specific for Quacks. Mana bit her lip in pain, honestly when her entire body was pulsing and aching getting one's wound sewn didn't feel half that bad but it still made her wriggle a little bit.

"The two are peachy, well they sort of weren't, I helped them get there, Hisako was a bit messed up and had her chakra flow all tangled up, fought some sort of a leecher cunt or something, the blonde got herself messed up pretty badly too so I wasted most of my chakra healing them. Sadly I'll be out of commission for two days but the sword swinging one is adamant on hurrying with the siege of that damned bunker. That means I will be only as helpful as conventional Quack medicine can help you, no medical ninjutsu mumbo jumbo..."

As Quack explained he was almost done. The young man pulled some pills again and popped them, his skin paled and dark rings dyed around his eyes, the young man ran to the corner and threw something up, this was the first time that Mana saw him do that.

What exactly was going on with this young man?


	87. Babies Born and Made

Quack's finger gently ran down Mana's face down to her lip and examined it with its touch.

"Does it hurt? What is this?" he asked after finishing patching the magician's abdomen gash up. Strangely enough, despite there appearing to be no thread, the needle somehow still stitched the wound up and closed it with each puncture just like there would've been one.

"I bit it, accidentally from the pain..." Mana replied blushing a little since she was ashamed of such a stupid injury. Quack smiled and started examining the other scratches, moving away from the lip bite. He then handed the girl a purple pill, similar to that which he had been popping the whole time.

"What is this? Is this poisonous or something?" the girl asked confused, remembering quite well how violently the young man's body reacted to a pill just several shades different in colour. The young man shook his head, he looked a bit annoyed, must've been the notion of his patient questioning his judgment.

"No, lovely, the poison is for me. This is an immuno-booster, it boosts your short term ninja metabolism but it has a pretty nasty cooldown period, I'd suggest to refrain from getting injured for about four to five days starting after tomorrow..." the man explained. Mana nodded and took the pill, swallowing it without water hurt her dry throat a little but she took it down with moderate effort.

"So... Why do you drink poison then?" the magician got curious, she guessed that the pills that the boy was taking was some sort of a drug or maybe medication from some sickness, apparently it was a poison which intrigued the magician a bit. Why would someone take poison in such continuous and prolonged periods of time, she could remember the boy popping the pill before sleep, he just popped one now just about when he'd have awakened under normal circumstances.

"It's a long story, lovely, a really long story..." the youth tried to dismiss the question but Mana shook violently, the medical youth then touched her forehead.

"You're getting cold, usually ninja metabolism counteracts the fever when it starts hurting the brain, my booster multiplied that reaction so your bodily temperature is now dropping..." the young quack explained removing his long coat and wrapping it around Mana, the girl was far too short and of quite different build to wear the man's long coat but she buttoned the top button and wrapped into it like it was a blanket.

"I guess we're not going anywhere..." the magician sniffed her nose and felt it clearing up, this immuno-booster thing just cured her cold during its starting stages within seconds. Obviously there must've been a payback, by now the magician had learned that whatever use the Quack's medicine provided it had an equal counterbalance to it.

Quack stood up and took a sip from his flask, Mana looked at the young man's frail body covered with merely a tight white shirt. His skin had no goosebumps or signs of cold at all, was the man immune to it? He also had no fear taking poisonous pills with alcohol as he only took the poison maybe twenty or thirty minutes earlier. Did he have a death wish?

"Umm... Sorry if I sound annoying but... What's your real name? I mean obviously you have one, you're not just called "Quack" right?" Mana asked shyly rubbing her freezing cheeks against the man's coat. The blonde rubbed his messy hair with his arm swiping bunch of rainwater off of it. He sat down and sighed.

"It's Eiju, Eiju Fuuhen" he grunted out, his voice sounded quite rough, he didn't particularly enjoy talking about himself apparently. Several minutes later the man angrily glared at the magician and asked, "Have you warmed up enough? I need to take a look at the other cuts and you're bleeding all over my coat, as sexy as I'd find a lady bleeding over my coat under normal circumstances, I'm not that much of a children loving person and you remind me still of a child..."

Mana removed the coat and looked at several bloodstains left on the coat, this made no sense, her ninja metabolism was supposed to have already clogged those minor scratches, was it some sort of a weird reaction to his medicine?

Eiju sighed and waved his hand, "Keep it, lovely, you'll find a better use for it for now, return it to me when you wash it though."

Mana looked down and rubbed her heel against the dirt making a small bow mark on it. "So... Are we going to move soon?" she asked. The Quack shook his head and moved in closer unbuttoning and moving the cloak away from the injuries and started to look at Mana's cuts and scratches.

"No need, the two ladies will soon come to us, that's how I always like em... Bloody hell, are those chakra burns? Well at least they cauterized the wound... How did you get those cuts?" Eiju asked angrily, for some reason he still acted pretty rude with Mana, the magician didn't feel too comfortable with that since he acted like she was just a burden for him to watch over.

"A Nekomata woman did them, she has that jutsu that forms pure chakra blades around her fingers, almost like elongated claws." Mana explained looking at the scratches on her shoulders and all over the other areas of the body.

"Well the good thing is that you're going to get those completely removed by the time you're legally allowed to be hot. Blokes will line up behind you, chakra cuts and burns can be healed pretty easily as long as it's not an elemental release technique." Eiju explained and moved away from the girl giving her some time to cover up again and stop shaking from the cold.

"You're talking strange, I haven't noticed it before but... I've never heard words like "bloke" and someone referring to people as "lovely", you're not from around?" Mana was almost too afraid to ask because she knew that Eiju would get angry again for bringing up his history, he seemed to hate being around Mana to begin with. Seemed to be a pretty common habit these days...

"It's... I'm from Kirigakure, a certain rich and snobby layer of society there speaks that way, "bloke" means a guy, "lovely" is how we used to refer to women." Quack rudely replied, his tone was still a bit rough but this time there was something different in there, longing for his home perhaps?

"And "jiffy" means... Quickly?" Mana smiled at him moving her nose out from the coat for the first time in a while feeling warm.

"Yeah, something like that..." Eiju replied.

Mana's sad eyes moved away, suddenly she felt something tearing inside her chest, something pulsing and burning her from inside, some kind of profound sadness the source of which she couldn't initially understand but then she did and the realization of what it was terrified the girl.

"You know... I could beat your story out of you, you look like an asthmatic zombie to begin with, even if I couldn't I could just tell Hisako and Kiyomi that you're from Kirigakure and they wouldn't trust you, they'd beat it out of you too..." Mana had no idea where this rude anger rose from. This realization that this man was from Kirigakure just angered her, somehow brought all the pain that the country was responsible for: hurting her father, killing Tanshu-sensei and the Fourth Hokage...

"Well, fuck me... Never thought little brat had thorns... Don't expect me to call you "lovely" for a while, only blokes talked to me that way so I may start referring to you like that from now on, little bloke." Quack grunted back at her but for some reason Mana's negativity fuelled him, the man started to enjoy talking to her as if it was the magician's softness that made him dislike her.

"I'm sorry it's just... Kirigakure..." Mana admitted lowering her head and removing one scratched up and beaten arm from the coat's collar to fix her messy and wet hair.

"Yeah... I get it, kid, tough history, to you it may be the place that killed your whoever and had your mum through the bottom-hole but to me it was home, it was where I ate my crumpets and sipped my mum's tea so stick your hatred to your bumhole and push it down with a walking stick." Eiju replied, while the content of his words was hateful but they were delivered in a soft manner.

"Could you... Talk to me? Like... About where you're from, just until Kiyomi and Hisako comes, please?" Mana asked looking at Eiju with the largest and wettest puppy eyes she could make. The girl just wanted to hear how he was brought to this corner of the world from entirely another, she wanted to know how a young boy from Kirigakure's aristocracy could've ended up in Konoha as a Quack to whichever mercenary gang claimed him.

"Jeez, kid... Fine. I'll talk but only to keep your mouth shut." Eiju started but Mana interrupted him.

"Don't lie to me though, I'll know..." she lied.

"Fine. So I guess I was popped from my mother's womb in Kirigakure, the high and mighty layer of society, crumpets and tea all day long was my diet until I was old enough to enter the Academy..."

Mana shook her head and raised her weak and wobbly palm from under the coat. "I'm sorry, what's a crumpet?" she asked.

"It's not like it's bloody ruining the story, kid, stay focused, that's not the detail you should focus on..." while Quack kept trying to explain the concept of his story Mana's eyes forced him to sigh and plant his slap onto his own face.

"It's a bloody dessert... Okay? So the point is, a kid can only grow that large and that strong eating just cookies and tea, right? So I was a thin, sickly little chump, not unlike now but now I'm more plagued by lack of crumpets than overdose of em, anyways..." Eiju stopped, looking down, he pointed at Mana and then reached into the inner pocket of his coat removing a bottle of pills and showing them to her.

"Basically I lied to you already but you didn't notice, so much for your lie detector skills, huh? I wasn't booped out my mummy's funnyhole like I said, I was lab bred because my mum was as sick as I am, you take a chunk of your daddy, you take a chunk of your mum, mash it into a mass and give it to a funky little bloke who does some insane and, quite frankly, illegal Quack work – you end up with a world's most handsome baby... I suppose."

Mana looked up into the sky and then turned back at Eiju, the man sort of looked like he was finished but Mana's look encouraged him to keep going.

"Can you really do that sort of thing? Why would people ever have normal babies then if you can just make one? Why would it be illegal?" she wondered.

"Well there's one chick who never made babies, it's bloody fun, I'll tell ya one thing... The point is that you don't simply "make babies", the result isn't random, you "create babies", you give them whatever you want them to have, you want them freckled, you have that, you want them blonde – easy. The prospect of just creating a human like it's a bloody chunk of clay is scary to some, having in mind what I've seen, there's a reason behind that fear... Let's just say there were a lot of... Less fortunate Eijus before I was bred, ones with funny looking heads and extra limbs if you catch my cold. Because the practice is so hated it didn't have time to be polished yet."

Mana shook from disgust imagining a laboratory somewhere underground filled with fail genetic experiments. If she ever actually saw one she'd probably be pretty messed up for life and started swearing herself.

"So why were you made? Why didn't your parents just make you the casual old way?" the magician got curious as to why one would go for such a risky and disgusting way to breed heirs.

"Because my mum was pretty sick and her sickness was very much hereditary, I've lost a brother and a sister before parents decided to model me in a tube. They asked the bloke who made me to program a tissue inside of me that constantly regenerates me before my body gets eaten from inside by my mum's sickness, technically I'm sick with what my mum had before her death, whatever killed my sister and brother, however the tissue counteracts it and heals me. That's both what keeps me alive and is a bloody nuisance..."

Mana shook her head, "Nuisance how? I'd really find such a tissue useful for my father's burns..."

Quack spat to the side and waved the pills he removed previously up in Mana's nose. "The tissue starts growing, breeding, it's basically a regenerative cancer, I need to keep popping poison to kill its excess growth, because of the fucking thing the poison doesn't work like it should on me. It feels bloody disgusting but the fucking thing always keeps me alive and kicking, always sacrificing its bloody chunks to survive as a thing, it's a living, growing thing. Well, at least I can drink as much as I bloody want, no fucking old hag will mess with my drinking habits cause every drip of poison I take, whether drug or alcoholic keeps me alive..."

Mana listened and struggled to believe in any of it, then again she did see the man down a pretty large amount of poison and his reaction was quite grotesque...

"Okay... So let's say that's true, how did you end up here though?" Mana asked for Eiju to continue.

"Eh, if you've been paying attention you'd piece it together: little bit of jealous aristocratic rivalry slipping the Mizukage some delicious info of an artificially bred child, an abomination of nature, a little bit of good ole discrimination and prosecution and violence and you've got one little kid on the run and two beheaded snobby parents... I just didn't feel like sticking around Kirigakure or the Archipelago of islands around it, I got into a pirate ship, this medic there noticed my tendency to drink poison, initially he went all "Kid, don't drink poison, you'll die!" but then he found out too..."

"And? Did they cast you out again?" Mana asked sadly, she was starting to really feel bad for the difficult life that this young man had for something that just didn't seem a crime to her at all, more so not one he should've been held responsible for since he had no control over it.

"Nope, turns out pirates are a pretty merry bunch, they started teaching me stuff, the old medic on that ship was a rogue Kirigakure Hunter Ninja, he was a master at gutting people and harvesting their organs. He was also a dying fellow so he decided to try and gut my tissue out 'a me. Since I thought it was the source of all my problems I let him keep operating on me as much as he wanted, hoping that he'd succeed but then one day we both realized he won't, he found out that the tissue is linked with my body, he knew if he'd extract it I'd die so he chose to make the sacrifice and let me live..." Eiju started rubbing his eyes, Mana turned away because she noticed that the man tried to hide his tears, maybe he wasn't even crying but he was about to.

"Since I was a source of a lot of the old bloke's chopping sessions I picked a thing or two from him, he finished my training on his dying bed... The pirates decided to keep me around, I was the best at cutting out and transferring organs. The only thing I was always shite at was actual medicine, medical ninjutsu, harvesting DNA and organs, entire bloodlines, that I can do, but stitching still makes my hand shake. Conventional medicine just wasn't the Quack way so I self-taught that stuff from spying on ninja on the field right before the muscleheads I was with decided to off them..."

For a moment Quack stopped talking, then he looked at Mana and back, visibly annoyed that the two other kunoichi were taking so long to get there.

"From then on it was just one gang slaughtering the other and taking me with them as their Quack and harvester, most didn't even know that I was good at it, they just used me as a Quack but this Hachi bloke realized my potential and forced me to do all the stuff he had on him, in the end he was more a weapon than he was a man, to think they called me an abomination of nature... I've no idea how he could even mate with women when I replaced his funstick with a kunai shooting cannon long time ago, must be really good with his tongue..."

"So we leave you for five minutes with a fourteen year old and your best idea is to give her the birds and the bees talk?" Kiyomi's voice thundered behind the two, Mana turned around and smiled at her friend. The angry blonde leaped down and examined Mana's wounds and heard Eiju's suggestion not to storm the bunker out.

"No! We may be wounded but so is the enemy, we can't give them a chance to regroup and move away from here, they're too close to the border, from here on it's just one day away." Kiyomi seemed to finally agree with Hisako on something, with a worried look she looked at Mana who nodded and stood up and gestured that she'll be fine.

"Well then, those fuckers woke us up, let's shove things up their asses so that their screams play us the anthem!" Hisako smiled drawing her blades and playfully spinning them around before sheathing them back.

Kiyomi squinted at the dark haired swordswoman, "I thought you told me you were going to try the whole "no cursing" thing..."

Eiju stood up and started moving east. "Yeah, not until she can cure whatever's causing the itch in her sandy panties..."

Hisako shrugged and then looked at Eiju, "Nah, I just don't want to wet turkey it... Wait... What did you just fucking say, fucktwig!?" she snapped and started chasing Eiju, it was impressive that the Quack could escape his inevitable evisceration so effectively.

"It's cold turkey, Hisako... I'm starting to think you swear just because you are verbally challenged." Kiyomi sighed as she and Mana followed the trail of destruction behind Hisako's attempt to cut Eiju to pieces which resulted in a lot of trees being cut down, at least it was easy to follow...


	88. The Smell of Purple

A strong gust of wind and a tap on the wooden border of the window alerted those in the nearest vicinity that someone decided to drop by. The sound was heavy, usually when ninja travel they make little to no sound at all. Now anyone inside the building and a decent distance outside would've been able to pick it up and distinguish that someone had decided to crash there. The two figures that arrived took their time to carefully step over and inside the bunker and approach the hole that lead to the lower levels.

As the two figures moved, the larger one tripped over and dropped some trash cans, making a powerful sound of tin and rubbish of various kind rubbing together and rolling all over the floor. The muscular male who caused this event cursed. The woman who was trying to lead him steadily holding him together gently caressed the man's cheek and looked over his trashed face and multiple beatings all over his muscular upper body.

"You still haven't told me how this happened, Roe... the young woman tried to ask about the subject that troubled her, the man just growled angrily and sat by the hole.

"It doesn't matter, I'll have to give the briefing to Yellow anyways, what's the point of explaining it twice, I had my ass kicked by a little girl, it's not a subject one likes to discuss, you know!" he grunted out angrily. The man's whiskers shook and tensed up, his rage made his muscles twitch as if he was excited for an upcoming fight when the real fight had finished long ago.

"How about because I'm your sister and I care about you?" the woman asked softly blowing gently into the man's injured part of the face, the man roared like a large jungle cat but then the refreshing feeling of cold air being blown into his face alleviated the pain a little.

"Sorry..." the man replied softening his voice a bit, he tried to push his sister away but she kept holding him, after a brief moment he remembered that without his sister's aid he could barely stand. The man growled again, like a lion threatening another animal aiming at his fresh kill. "You know how Yellow is when we make him wait, he'll do something stupid again..."

"You're right, brother, let's report to Yellow and endure his punishment for failing, then we can plan our revenge... Just... Don't forget that Yellow is up there in our revenge plan as well" the woman in black once again gently rubbed her brother's wound and lead him into the hole, she extended her torn whip for him to land.

"Never. No one burns our family and forces us to work for him and escapes unscathed, repair your whip, do you still have the material?" the large man asked looking questioningly at his sister, his eyes burned with conviction and pride, ready to claw the heart of this "Yellow" who had wronged them and forced them to work for him out with his bare hands.

"I have mother's hair in the chest, the wax and the fats are there too, the supply is running out, if I can't use our mother's hair the material will not be the same, mother loved us so much, tapping into that love she left behind in her chakra makes my whip pierce through anything, makes it as tough as our mother's love..." the young woman explained to her brother who was carefully using her whip to climb to the lower level.

"And without it? If mother's hair runs out or if her chakra actually fades, we don't know why it is still in her hair so long after her body burnt to crisp..." the large man grunted, his voice was sad and disappointed, almost like that of a cat lamenting the loss of its owner.

The woman wrapped the torn up whip around her arm and then whipped it on a strong steel pipe, after the tip of it tied around the structure the woman leaped down breaking her fall using the whip and then removed it and tied it around her shoulder.

"I don't know, I can always use just a normal leather whip with my own chakra infused, even without it I can still use my claws..." the woman replied, she was a little worried about the supply of the hair that her mother cut off and gifted the woman before she and father were burnt alive by Yellow's ambition. The man claimed that he had nothing in common but the twins knew that he did, he was too sinister, his eyes emanated pure evil, he spoke soft and sweet things but his tongue was that of a demon, promising, kind and caring but his intentions were a different thing entirely.

The large man's muscular arms wrapped around his sister's frail body and then pushed her farther away. He had decided to move by himself after that display of affection. "Never, Cony, never take risks, keep using a whip, keep fighting from afar. I'd die of sorrow if I saw you getting hurt."

"You should've seen me, Roe, I was amazing up close, I totally destroyed that brat..." the woman tried to argue but a backhand slap tossed her figure to the other side of the narrow corridor. Her brother roared out angrily, emulating the sound of an angered feline predator perfectly. Realizing that her brother wasn't going to back down from his stance and would've rather lost the last memento of their mother than lost his sibling the woman gave up and just followed him to the lower level, then an even lower one and an even lower one, down to the final level which served as the basement and base of operations where Yellow did all of his planning.

A loud sound of a growling dog broke the silence and the Inuzuka who was standing inside the basement room turned at the new entrants, he placed his arm onto the top of his dog's head and calmed him down. While the canine had long since gotten used to the Nekomata twins, he always kept reacting aggressively at them, must've been their feline looks and mannerisms.

"We've returned, Yellow. The mission is a failure, they're coming here, now, with full force and pissed off..." Roe growled angrily back at the dog and grunted out at his superior who was sitting on a chair cloaked in a black hood.

"That's a lie, dear Roe, you injured them, no blood is shed needlessly, blood always serves someone's needs..." a childish voice came off from the hooded figure.

"That is true, Yellow-san!" Cony, Roe's sister, kneeled before the man and smiled at him after raising her head, happy that her boss found what to enjoy in their failure. "I've shed plenty of the young genin's blood and Roe just almost didn't bring you his opponent's head on his spear..."

Yellow laughed, "There, you see, my dear minions, your efforts weren't in vain, what Noji and Sunomaru told me that you just had a streak of bad luck – he faced off against a close range ninja, you, dear Cony faced a long range ninja who enjoyed your long range approach... It was my fault as a leader to let you out there with no knowledge of your opponent's abilities, then again, obtaining said knowledge was the point, now we can carefully plan who will face who during their little siege..."

The Inuzuka who was called Noji nodded. "It is advised that I face the long range kunoichi, from what Cony told us it seems that she would be injured during our fight, also I love fighting ninja who focus on ninjutsu and other chakra reliant techniques and fight at long range, using my Inuzuka clan techniques I can close the distance between us easily. She wouldn't last a minute against me but I'd love to sap every little sip of chakra from her body as I'm quite tired and injured myself so I might take a while, rest assured, while I'll take a while to play with her I will win against such an opponent for sure with Sunomaru at my side..."

The large canine standing close to the Inuzuka barked out loud, almost like it was confirming the words of his master. The ninja hounds were quite intelligent, they were capable of understanding human speech but the only reason they weren't able to talk, not all of them at least, was because of their anatomy, not all of them possessed the needed voice box for such a feat.

Yellow nodded, "Sounds like a good plan, last time they beat you because they countered each and every one of your abilities perfectly. Let's reverse that advantage then?"

Roe growled angrily, he looked where he imagined Yellow's eyes to be in all of that black shadow of his hood. "No. I want to fight that blonde again, I am sure that this time I'll take her. We both made mistakes in that fight and now this is a matter of pride!" he grunted out, his sister reached out at him but her arm stopped just inches short to the man's shoulder remembering what happened the last time when she tried to argue with him.

Yellow laughed, "Well then, you always were about pride, I'm surprised you're not plotting against me, Roe, tell me how do you deal with me being in charge of you when you're such a prideful one..."

Roe wanted to react violently but his sister intervened by jumping in front of him and raising her arm.

"Very well then, I shall take on the close distance swordswoman who took down Noji. Short distance fighters are my specialty and I believe I can easily counter her abilities with my long range whip attacks once I repair it" she explained looking back at Roe and shaking her head at disapproval of his prideful antics.

Yellow's dark hood slipped forward covering more of the figure's face. "Very well, this sounds good. We expected that pulling this off would attract ninja attention, we just never expected that this attention wouldn't be shaken off after this first attack. I'd be very happy if these ninja found their most tragic deaths in here instead of the boy they are coming for. Now go, prepare for your approaching battle..."

Roe grunted and took a step forward, his eyes then changed from ones filled with rage like one's eyes would be after seeing the man responsible for the death of one's parents and subjugation of oneself and one's sister into a more ironic yet submissive stare.

"Perhaps if we get our butts kicked we can finally see the mighty Yellow show us a thing or two in combat?" he sarcastically remarked. So far he had never seen Yellow fight but the man carried significant influence, so extensive was his reach that it could've only been earned by either high status in society or an extensive knowledge in the art of combat.

"Hah, trust me, dear Roe, I could teach you a thing or two in combat, if you didn't believe that, you'd have killed me long ago... Or maybe you're afraid you'd fail and that I'd rip the second dearest thing from you as I did the first?" Yellow returned the offence.

"SO YOU ADMIT IT!" the cat-hobo's figure tensed up as his muscles shot out and tensed in a tonus even Kiyomi didn't see during their last battle, the man pulled out a knife and tried to leap at the man but then stopped in his feet, kneeling before Yellow, not because of his own wilful submission, because his entire body was aching from the past battle.

"It does not matter now, I may have taken your family away but you will do everything I tell you to because you're afraid I'll take your sibling from you, that is how I obtained your loyalty, that is why I left the two of you alive, you are both my dear subordinates and my insurance policy against your sibling. Now go, prepare for the battle, if you are as pathetic against that brat during your rematch as you are now against me I may not get my chance to play the "I'll kill your brother card" against your sister, she's been much more submissive towards me, perhaps she'd already forgotten?" Yellow wondered. Cony's eyes filled with tears and she just outright dragged her injured brother out of the basement.

Once only Noji and Yellow remained the Inuzuka stepped closer to the hooded leader. "I've carried out your orders, now please..." he whimpered like a scared child.

A puny and weak arm emerged from Yellow's coat holding a small vial, Noji picked the vial with the purple liquid and shot it into his dog's body. The canine shook on its feet and barked happily. Noji sighed relieved to know that his canine friend will live another day, he turned at Yellow with an angry stare.

"You know, you should stop taunting those two. They're strong, fast and dangerous, even more so once you piss them off and trust me, burning their house with their family inside of it in front of them is pissing them off plenty..." Noji hissed out.

"It wasn't me, it was a wild bloodthirsty band of mercenaries like many roaming the Fire Country... And why would you care? Maybe you care for me!? I am touched!" Yellow playfully acted out a scene with his tone switching from childish innocence to a playful question and a faked display of affection.

"Don't play around, Yellow, everyone knows you're the one who hired them and that doesn't make you less involved. Also, yes, I do care, don't mistake it for care about if you live or die, it's because you have the perfume with the herb that is vital for Sunomaru's survival that I care, I wouldn't under any other circumstances!" Noji explained showing his Inuzuka fangs for the hooded dwarf leader.

"Well... I suppose I may have hired a certain mercenary army to gather me a couple of ninja for my band, that being said, I had no say in the course of their actions... I mean... You know how they are... Romantics all of em, letting the family go ablaze while the kids work for me, just a bit more Romeo in their hearts and they'll start eating noodles in the moonlight with rice wine..." Yellow shook his arm.

"Whatever, I need you alive so stop making it so hard for the twins to not eat your throat out, they certainly have the fangs for it... I need those perfume shots! If you die and leave Sunomaru without his medicine I'll kill everyone you care about, just know this in your final thoughts when you see Roe's fangs dig into your throat with your blood squirting on the walls..."

Yellow laughed with a high pitched laugh, "Ah, that famous Inuzuka bond of souls with their dogs, I've heard so much about that love, that kinship of hearts. It is said that once one of them dies the other suffers pain like none other, if the master dies the canine suffers so much that he dies of sorrow, if the dog dies the master is left in a crippled and beaten state that they never recover from... It's so romantic that I am tempted to test that bond... Maybe I'll ask you to track some Inuzuka for a test."

"Chew a dick, I'd never give in my own blood for your sick servitude..." Inuzuka changed his tone completely and started growling at the hooded figure himself.

"Oh? Would you do it for a perfume shot? Maybe for a whole box of them? Heh, I can't wait to see where the edge of your morals lies, call me a lover of the scientific method..." Yellow giggled playfully, Noji and his hound disappeared in the darkness of the corridor. The hooded figure pressed his slim blade tighter to his side, a cruel smile covered his face. This was so much fun, what would happen? Would the Konoha ninja kill his playthings, his precious family of subordinates or would the Konoha ninja get killed? Would one of his playthings betray him? Which one? Would they successfully kill him or would one of the others kill the traitor because Yellow had something they want... This was so much fun!

Silent taps of sandals passing through alerted absolutely no one of four figures entering the bunker through a hole in the window as the volume of their steps was just too low. The footsteps were simply too silent. Mana looked back at Quack and shook her head, Kiyomi and Hisako turned back as well. Eiju shrugged, "Bloody really!?" he almost shouted out in surprise after the girls asked for him to wait outside.

"Trust me, cuntcheeks, it's not cause we give a fuck about a fuck, it's cause we'll need a bitch to patch us up and I ain't trusting any of those two bitches to patch my ribs. As shaking as your drunk arm is when you stitch, it'll have to do. I don't care if you can fight or not, you're keeping your blond stubble outside." Hisako hissed and drew her sword pointing it outside.

"Fine, I hope you all have your bloody guts poked with a thousand dicks, thank you very much!" Eiju grunted as he slothfully crawled back outside.

"Yeah, we love you too... Hope you'll be OK..." Kiyomi squinted at Eiju's annoyed expression of some weird kind of friendship.

"Plus you're my fucking Quack and I fucking own your ass cause I killed the last bitch who owned it..." Hisako couldn't help but bite right briefly after the youth left.

"If Eiju is pardoned in Konoha by the Fifth you won't be able to "own" him, plus, I'm not really sure if that's how Quacks even work from how Eiju explained it..." Mana smiled at Hisako reminding the raven haired assassin of her Quack's final goal.

"Oh, come on! Yeah, a rogue Quack gets pardoned and lives happily ever after, shut the fuck up, your optimism gives me cooties..." Hisako yelled back at Mana pushing her to the side playfully with her shoulder.

"We should've really made it a bet back when you said you won't curse anymore, Hisako, I'd have been a rich clan heiress right now..." Kiyomi sighed as the three threaded deeper into the bunker.


	89. Yellow's Cruel Plan

The three girls treaded carefully, Hisako was the most experienced with missions and so she was clearly supposed to observe the environment for traps. It was just so easy for one to set their foot on a floor tile that was sealed with some trap, it only took a genin decently skilled in sealing techniques to seal a simple explosive burst of chakra into stone tiles, hell, some could even seal entire techniques into scrolls that other people could use without learning the technique first-hand. Mana knew quite well how potent seals were, she wore a large pocket space full of tools that her father crafted for her after all.

Even if Hisako was overly excited about the prospect of upcoming slaughter Kiyomi did her part for the raven haired swordswoman. Luckily enough Kiyomi was quite familiar with stepping up and dealing with a sloppy leader's part of responsibility since she worked so long with Chestnut Hanasaku who, while being one of the most powerful ninja in the world, was quite sloppy and, most of the time, a complete idiot. Mana was glad that the Yamanaka had that experience, with Eiju tired out she needed that injury least of all things. Usually a ninja would just augment their chakra at the specific point to shield them from a blast or an incoming arrow but when they didn't know it was coming it wasn't that easy.

It was a strange thing, chakra augmentation. Mana and someone of her skill level, which was to say slightly above that of an average genin, should've been able of some degree of augmentation. The thing was that even if she could have done it and she could've just coated herself with augmented bursts of chakra shielding her entire body from explosions or sharp projectiles and it'd have not killed her or injured her that badly. However to shield oneself was to waste an overwhelming amount of chakra, also chakra augmentation had the nasty side effect of messing with one's chakra network already. It was best used just in short bursts and only when it was needed.

"Hey... Look, what's that?" Mana asked and approached something that looked like a poster with several very distinct and darkened hieroglyphs, they were so clear that to the magician it instantly became clear that they were meant to be read. The girl was very careful and didn't touch it, just let her eyes run down it and waited for her friends to come check it out.

"Looks normal, don't think it's a trap, trust me, I've seen plenty..." Kiyomi examined the poster and carefully touched it, both Mana and the blonde augmented their bodies to emit a weak forcefield like shield that'd have protected them in case of an explosion and kept their limbs on their bodies or protected them from the penetration of a cloud of arrows coming their way. Those two were the most common types of traps anyways...

"Tear me off and my friends at the same time or the perfume kid gets it..." Hisako read it out loud.

"So it actually is a seal, it's probably linked to a bunch of explosive notes stuck around wherever they're keeping the kid, if we try and act smart we risk blowing him and ourselves up or setting whatever trap it is..." Mana pondered.

"Smart girl... Although Yellow is a guy who has a flare for the classic dramatics, he actually placed the boy in a prison of hardened glass and dipped the whole thing into a vat of acid, if the seal is set off the walls will disintegrate and the boy will take the last skinny dip in his life, probably still better than one in Serenity Lake but he'll die anyways..." a voice echoed through the bunker, all three girls turned and saw a Yamanaka dressed in a white zip-up combat jacket and smiling with his wolf-like fangs and his trusty dog by his side.

Hisako flashed at him almost instantly, moving at incredible speed but her blade got stuck in the fangs of the Inuzuka's dog. She smiled ready to once again rudely pull the sword out and leave another wound in the dog's mouth but then the Inuzuka sighed and yelled out.

"Wait, each of us can set the seal off ourselves, you three will play by our rules and the rules are – the fancy Nancy smartsy pantsy here fights me, you two can go to the lower floors. If you want to set the boy free you'll each beat the ninja protecting the seals in each room and remove the seals at the same time. How you coordinate this is none of my concern..." the Inuzuka explained waving his arms frantically and smiling confidently.

Hisako looked at Mana and closed her eyes, suddenly the swordswoman realized how hopeless the situation was – the enemy had complete control of the situation here and they just walked into a far more intelligently crafted trap than they had any right to expect...

"You'll die, idol-bitch. This guy is a close range Inuzuka who can drain your chakra, he combines the peeling and overpowering Inuzuka clan techniques with the usual Chakra Absorption Jutsu. He's a perfect counter to your style" the swordswoman explained looking at Mana, she may have already realized that whoever was waiting on the other floors would've also been a similarly crafted match-up.

Mana gulped and shook her head, then faked a smile. "Nah, it's fine. You guys go ahead, if I die it doesn't matter because you can just beat down those other guys and come back here and finish him off. We need to save that boy no matter what, no teen deserves the experience of being kidnapped and put into a glass surrounded by acid..."

Kiyomi walked up and opened the hatch, after a brief glance down she looked back at Mana hesitant to leave her friend behind in such a pickle. "And if it doesn't work? If this is all just a ruse and the seals don't work?" she asked to which Mana just faked another smile.

"I'm a stage magician, glass cages sinking in acid are my specialty, I'll get him out either way, still, might be a better shot to try the seal method first." Mana tried to calm her friend down but she struggled to hide her fear. She wasn't really afraid of being beaten down or killed, she was afraid of failure, she was afraid of dying knowing that the boy would die too and his father would lose his son. That was what scared her the most.

Hisako nodded and leaped down, apparently cool girls didn't use ladders... Kiyomi gave Mana an encouraging thumb up and slid down the ladder. Just like that it was just Mana and the Inuzuka.

Kiyomi looked at Hisako after the two girls dropped to the lower level. The blonde wanted some support, she wanted a teammate whom she may have talked about having just left a young and inexperienced and naïve girl in a situation she was sure to die in. More so Kiyomi wanted to make a plan or something, playing the way things were was just not at all right, they were playing by the rules set by the opposing force.

"Stop being such a fucking momma-bear, that's idol-bitch's role. If she survives that shit anyways, if she doesn't – she's not cut out for this work. Situations like this happen all the time, one fights in fights where things are stacked against one's favour all the time!" Hisako angrily hissed back at Kiyomi looking out for the other member of the enemy group letting them know the rules of this floor and whom he had selected to be their opponent.

"Yeah but... Mana's already injured and a bit tired from before, none of us had much sleep and lived through fights that nearly claimed our lives, one of which was with you by the way!" Kiyomi yelled back angrily

"Oh, please, I knew you'd augment your gut and not just get your gut poked out... I have a feeling for those things, it's needed for a swordsman because if you don't predict it and put too much force into a strike that's gonna just hit a chakra forcefield it'll break your wrist." Hisako explained, still looking for someone to see in all of the darkness.

"Well... Lucky shot for you, I guess, but I just want a teammate to talk with, I just want to be sure that Mana's gonna be alright. She looks up to me like I'm some goddamned hero or something and I guess that somehow made me feel responsible for her a bit" Kiyomi explained, soothing her tone down and softening it up, appealing to Hisako's humanity.

"Pffft, you and your fucking responsibilities, take a responsibility for not being such a condescending cunt once, why won't you!?" Hisako suddenly broke out reaching for the handle of her sword.

"What was that all about!?" Kiyomi also prepared to punch the black haired assassin in the face.

"You know what it's about! Ever since we met you're always just yelling and talking about how fucking messed up I am and how my clan is somehow not worth the shit dripping from their assholes. "Oh, Hisako is such a bitch, she wanted to test her teammates she'll have to trust, oh Hisako is such a bitch, selling her cunt to save the lives of her team!" Guess fucking what, Princess, your shit doesn't smell of gold either!" Hisako snapped back drawing her blade, Kiyomi took a dash back seeing the alarming rage accumulating in the assassin's eyes.

"Look... I'm sorry, I just... It's clear we both have issues. I hate criminals and people who do things that while legal in our line of work aren't ethical, in other words I hate cunts and... Well... You're a bit of a cunt... You also seem to have some psychological issues that I clearly stepped on and I'm sorry, let's just agree to never work with each other and trust our lives to each other and keep going. This mission is bigger than our quarrels, Mana was ready to sacrifice her life for this, let's forget this for at least until we're back home. Then if you still want to have a go at me, I'll take you on in the Training Grounds... Sound fair?" Kiyomi carefully tried to calm Hisako down and with a depressing sigh she realized that the assassin relented.

"You're right, you're a good ninja but we can't work in a team. You hate people like me, I hate people who hate me for no other reason than just hating me because of my clan or what I do. We're meant to cut our throats out not to fight together, for all I know those guys are doing us a favour splitting us up." Hisako sighed a couple of times and sheathed her swords, only to grab their handles again and deflecting a bunch of knives flying right at Kiyomi.

"Thanks..." Kiyomi uttered surprised. She never heard those coming, that could've only meant one thing – that annoying cat-hobo from before.

"Leave me and the Yamanaka alone, I'm sure that Noji explained the rules already, my sister will take you on on the other floor. This between me and the blonde is personal, it's a matter of my broken pride! Make sure to let my sister kill you, if one hair falls from her head I'll make sure to stab you everywhere but where it'll kill you for it and leave you to bleed out!" the man roared out. His lion like growling and powerful voice was something to admire as it instantly covered all of the room.

The man looked like Kiyomi's boulder gave him quite a beating – his powerful and muscular chest was covered with several deep and nasty bruises and purple as prunes blunt force traumas. His hair also was no longer worn in dreadlocks but was wild and all over his half naked body. He still wore several belts full of knives, Kiyomi would've loved to see him take Hisako on as both of them had similar fashion senses with belts of knives being the dominant accessory.

"Awww, I didn't know it hurt your feelings, big guy. Maybe if you asked nicely I'd have let you off with a tie..." Kiyomi taunted the man with a smile as she removed her kunai from the pouch and let Hisako leave. It appeared that the assassin didn't even need to be encouraged further, right when the lion-man stated his conditions the assassin was gone.

"My name is Roe, I was an heir to the Nekomata clan and I plan to cash my claim in once I kill everyone who stands in my way. My father was unfairly dismissed by his stronger sibling who took my father's spot in the line of succession, I must be the strongest there is to take my claim back! You've beaten me and that makes me respect you a great deal but I will kill you, I must to become the strongest one there is, to become a man worth inheriting the leadership of my clan I must remain undefeated. Only such a man is worth the Nekomata name!" the cat-hobo growled angrily drawing two knives and spreading his arms and legs out wide, preparing for a fight.

"I'm Yamanaka Kiyomi, an heiress to the Yamanaka clan, if my uncle doesn't miraculously have a son that is... Anyways, there are things I must prove also, but not to you nor myself, I must save the child you keep down there and prove to my stupid sensei that I am worthy of a promotion. An heir of a clan who doesn't believe in his own strength and needs to beat someone to trust his own claim doesn't deserve to lead a clan."

Roe roared again, proudly and pounded his chest with the handle of his knife. "You fool, the leader of a clan must be the strongest there is, only by remaining undefeated can I trust my claim, only those who protect their family, their clan and are strong enough to never lose to anyone are worth leading a clan"

Kiyomi shook her head angrily, "You're wrong, leading a clan is so much more than just being a muscle-head and killing everyone in your way. Strength has little to do with that nonsense, it's all about the will of being a leader. All about love for your own blood and putting the interests of your clan in front of those of your own. All about the responsibility of always doing the right thing and if you do a wrong facing the repercussions, because that's who a leader is"

Roe stepped back and disappeared in the shadows, Kiyomi prepared for the rematch, that inevitable second clash between her and this crazy and stealthy cat-man of the Nekomata clan. "One clan shall lose their future head today, only symbolic that you'll lose yours as well!"

Kiyomi turned behind and blocked the man's knife, leaping backwards to avoid his slash with the other hand. She fought this man already and knew his style, she knew he favoured striking at her blindspots and disappearing again unless he felt a relentless assault could've earned him his kill.

"I'll show your head when I claim my position! It'll show the Nekomata that I am willing ready and able to bring the clan above even the Yamanaka!" somewhere from the shadows the man's voice still reached Kiyomi's ears and while the cruel tone still froze her body in intimidating fear she loved the fact that he now had his feelings hurt and was emotionally involved into this fight, it may have been what would make her come out on top again...

Hisako carefully and silently walked around the third level of the bunker, it had a bunch of cargo crates in there which begged the assassin the question of how they were carried down there. This place may have been the basement and it only had doors that lead further, not lower. This floor must've been it – the main base of their leader's operations, just who was this "Yellow" guy whom the Inuzuka spoke of? Surely it couldn't have been that woman with the whip from before, Yellow sounded like a nickname based on some detail like a dominant piece of clothing or the man's hair... It could've been a man or a woman... They haven't even seen the leader which was odd to the assassin, why didn't he or she attack with the crew? If the leader was present in at least one of the battlefields he or she would've meant the difference between victory and defeat... Maybe this Yellow guy wasn't that good of a fighter, that would've explained everything.

"Well, you've come" a seductive feminine voice alerted Hisako of her challenger sitting on top of a stack of cargo containers, playfully dangling her legs and smiling with her blood red dyed lips and greasy purple hair. She looked like a countryside whore with a fancy ninja jumpsuit, if it was Hisako's guess the bitch must've looted it from some kunoichi, no way she was worth the reward which would've been needed to make such a fancy piece of attire, maybe it was worth snagging from her dead body...

"Wow, it's like you're a fucking detective or something... How did you guess, I'm fucking stumped! May as well give the fuck up, no way I'll beat Mrs. Perception over fucking here..." Hisako snapped back at the woman. It was clear that her snark hit the mark.

The woman leaped down and swung her whip around preparing to lash out at the assassin. "So you're the witty tongued one, you talk a mean talk for a bitch who couldn't catch up to me earlier, even the idiot dressed like a magician caught up no problem... Isn't it a bit too early for you to get old? I guess you are how you feel..."

"You know fucking what? I'll strangle you with your own fucking whip, how'd you even get to "Last Boss" status anyways, did you fuck that other cat-guy? You look alike..." Hisako angrily snapped back taking a fighting stance and preparing her blades for a fight.

"You bitch!" finally the whip wielding cat-lady with those stupid cat ears dropped her sultry façade and got angry, maybe she'll make a mistake or something... "He's my fucking brother!"

"Yeah, he may have said something like that... Didn't listen to him much, he's hot but I don't fuck much with airheads and I don't listen to people I don't plan to fuck or kill in the future and guess what, I'm not a lesbian!" Hisako smiled leaning back for a charge, intending to settle the fight with a single swipe.


	90. Moonlight and Roses

For a brief moment the entire room where Mana faced off against the Inuzuka was completely silent and the two remained perfectly still. While Mana was afraid, somewhere, on a very deep level, she didn't let it affect her too much. The fear she felt was not the kind one always naturally felt when a battle was about to break out, this was not the natural threat of dying that was inevitable when one decided to fight someone. This felt more like a test the likes of which the girl had never had yet.

Mana was a little bit tired, she didn't have much sleep those couple of last days, she also faced off against Hisako and Hachi, also she had that nasty brief run-in with the black jumpsuit wearing purple haired woman with that peculiar whip. While the injuries from the first battle were healed by her medical food pill and those from the second one were taken care of by brief rest and Eiju's best medical ninja efforts, the third one still gave her some weight to trip over. The injuries from those battles were patched a long time ago and her natural ninja metabolism was quickly patching them up every second the girl was not engaged in exhausting use of chakra manipulation, that being said, they still ached and kept her down.

The knowledge that Mana was not at her best wouldn't have been nearly as frightening if this young man wouldn't be, at least according to Hisako, her natural counter. The three exchanged information before coming here, they were formulating complex strategies and battle plans only for it all to go to waste after they fell for this strange game. The enemy completely dictated the rules, even if she would've gotten the upper hand, what could've stopped the Inuzuka boy from just activating the seals that'd kill the boy anyways? This was the worst situation there could've been, greater ninja died in such scenarios than Mana.

"It is a custom for ninja to exchange names when they face off in a fair one on one fight, it is so that once one of them survives they can spread the tale of the other and if the other becomes someone special, his opponent, if they survive, can brag about having faced that person in battle. I am Inuzuka Noji and this lovely doggy here is Sunomaru. We fight as one, as do all Inuzuka clansmen, as a Konoha ninja you should know that, my kind hails from the village, so don't feel like this is unfair that we're taking you on two-on-one."

Mana remained silent for a moment, just trying to stare her opponent down, her wounded and cut up lips then gently moved.

"I'll give you one chance to back away, one last chance to leave, I am no longer the girl who left the village several days back, I no longer hold back. If you decide to do this I will cause harm to you, as much as possible but not enough to kill. You may not enjoy your life after facing me but that pain will be on you. I am Nakotsumi Mana and I am the one who will beat you to save that child, that is the only reason we are here and I don't care if you walk away from this. Capturing rogue ninja does not interest me."

Noji's body blurred, Mana knew what it meant, this boy moved so fast that he left an afterimage but this was no longer the Konoha's Sorceress who played around. The magician's thigh lifted up to block the entire barrage of blows tossed at her using her feet while keeping the Inuzuka at her leg's reach. This was an efficient strategy, she didn't let him get too close, always kept kicking at his blindspots and kept Noji at her foot's reach. It was then that the dog joined in on the offensive. Mana started dashing back, giving space. She skipped a couple of punches, the dog's teeth went dangerously close to her chest and neck a couple of times and tore several holes in Eiju's coat which the magician still wore.

Mana huffed heavily after their exchange of blows ended, this was hopeless, this young man was leagues ahead in terms of hand to hand combat, while keeping him at leg's length was a pretty good way to go the dog joining in changed it, Mana couldn't keep up with both of them and had to lower her legs for balance, she had to move around and for that to happen she couldn't kick around. It was either stand in place and let the dog maul her, or move around until she runs out of breath and let the Inuzuka deepen his advantage.

A powerful shock of pain emanated through Mana's chest, the girl coughed and fell on her knee, several drops of blood dripped from her mouth. Mana shook in pain and stood back up. So this was the "Chakra Absorption Technique"? The girl had heard plenty about it in the Academy, it was a very well-known and somewhat common technique among hand to hand experts, it wasn't too great on higher levels because it required its own style, in order to sip one's chakra at relevant amount one needed to make full palm contact, in other words, the more of one's arm contacts the opponent's body the more chakra was taken.

This was bad, the outcome of this battle was inevitable, even the way things were Mana would run out of breath, she'd tire and get completely sapped of any semblance of her chakra within several dozens of brief contacts like this, even worse, chakra was her life-force also, the more this teen would absorb out of her the more her body would break down like this. In the most extreme cases she would barely be able to move which meant he could easily come in for the kill.

Mana's arm went into her pocket, quickly she pulled a card and tossed it at the Inuzuka, she wasn't fast enough and the boy just leaned to the side smiling. He saw that it was a desperation move. This was bad, without her uniform Mana couldn't utilize the card holsters, she couldn't use her dispenser devices – she was just a kid reaching into her pockets to pull out tools, that was significantly less tricky and much slower. While Mana's uniform was called out to look very impractical and stupid it was another weapon of hers, it didn't matter that it was very tight and hard to move in, it had a bunch of card holsters, hidden pockets, small switches to shoot cards out from her sleeves etc.

The card Mana tossed emitted a loud beeping sound and then a loud pop came out of it. Transparent gas started emanating from it and the Inuzuka grabbed his nose shouting in pain, his dog started howling and rubbing his nose with his little paws. While it was spectacularly cute and Mana was barely restricting herself from shrieking she had to treat that dog as an enemy. It was large and able to kill her with a single bite.

Without wasting any movements Mana leaned forward and dashed at her opponent, Noji's arms lit up with the same blue flame that signaled that he activated his "Chakra Absorption Jutsu" but Mana knew that as an Inuzuka he was impaired and his dog was completely disabled. The girl caught his punch in between her powerful thighs and leaped over him flipping over the boy's shoulders behind him. Something snapped and Noji yelled out loud in overwhelming pain. Mana's arm shot forward to keep her from bashing into the steel floor face first and her legs started working on Noji's back sending him tumbling forward. After that the girl simply swiped at the dog who was still writhing, augmenting her lower body strength to send the dog into a bunch of crates further away.

Mana jumped back at her feet and caught her breath, this was an impressive attack but it was unlikely it'd work again. The Inuzuka smell was impressive, it was many times superior to that of a normal man or even of a ninja, it was approaching that of a canine and the senses of an Inuzuka dog was even beyond that of a normal canine. Inuzuka were unmatched in terms of their smell and that served as both their strength and their weakness.

"What the hell was that!?" Noji grunted, shouting as if he was in a loud room despite the fact it was dead-silent.

"It's a smell-card. I use it when I fake my own death, it's usually used in my magic shows." Mana humbled her opponent by responding to his attempts to get her talking for the simple reason of needing to take a breather, she just performed a pretty impressive movement for someone who wasn't known for their physical prowess.

"Shit, I guess I should stop taking you lightly…" Noji cursed, his face suggested that he was really serious and he looked to the side looking at his dog trying to get up and walk away from all the wooden pieces of the boxes he slammed into. The Inuzuka leaned forward and stood on all fours, chakra started flowing from him erupting from the teen's body and forming an aura like burst around his body, it was wild and powerful. Mana didn't like it one bit.

"Come on, Sunomaru, get out of there!" Noji yelled at his dog who was still inside the boxes, then the dog yelped and walked out covered in purple goo, the canine shook frantically getting the strong hitting perfume off of him.

"What the…!?" Noji suddenly broke out of his stance and covered his nose again, wildly scratching at the point on the back of his head as the powerful smell sensations took his body over.

"Shit, Suno, you hit the fucking perfume supply! Goddang it, go find somewhere to wash yourself, I can't sync with you like this!" Noji complained yelling at his beloved dog who just barked with a small speck of guilt in his reaction. The intelligence of those Inuzuka dogs was really something else! They could easily understand human speech and respond to commands as the dog quickly ran off somewhere leaving Mana alone with Noji and finally giving her a chance for once.

The girl didn't even have time to get serious as Noji leaned forward again and resumed his strange chakra concentration technique. His voice got more feral and rough again, reminding much more of a wild growling dog, a large one.

"Don't think you stand a chance just because you lucked out!" the young man growled out at Mana. He reached for his back pocket, Mana tried to intercept him with a quick draw from her upper left pocket which contained the simple steel tipped projectile cards but she was once again too slow – this coat was making it all so slow!

The young man popped a smoke bomb and soon a dark cloud started to cover the entire area. It wasn't poisonous as poisonous clouds all had a clear purple shade to them for some reason. It didn't really make sense for all poisonous clouds to be purple but they were, as someone who didn't even dabble at the medical ninja arts and had little knowledge with poisons Mana didn't dig too deep into it but it was just common knowledge and taught in the Academy. The cloud dissipated at the point where Noji was only to reveal him activating some sort of technique.

"Four Legs Technique!" Noji growled as the smoke once again covered him. Mana placed her projectile back into her pocket as there was no way she'd hit anything with this smoke all around, fighting in an enclosed space made smoke bombs just that more powerful.

Mana hunched over and flew backwards from the force of Noji's impact, once again the pain in her chest pulsed all over her body as her chakra was torn from the girl's body and absorbed by the Inuzuka. This was bad. This technique that the young man activated made him incredibly fast and dangerous, it was like chakra augmentation of one's speed and strength without the actual downsides. It was all just because of his clan heritage!

Mana felt a sharp pain in her back, by the time her body recovered from the last hit she managed to augment her endurance but she couldn't believe how fast and strong this Inuzuka was. He was completely dominating her in close quarters by closing her vision while he could easily keep track of her by smelling her in the smoke. Noji continued to kick the girl around, his single kick sent her to the other side of the room making Mana hit the steel walls with such force that her body bounced off of them but the Inuzuka was fast enough to already be there for the follow up kick, he was just playing around kicking Mana all over the place.

With each hit the magician had to re-augment her body because each hit absorbed the chakra she spent augmenting it, it was incredibly dangerous to use chakra augmentation against an absorption technique user because they were able to absorb not only the amount of chakra they usually absorbed through contact but also an excess of chakra one spent to augment their technique. In a blinding blitz the Inuzuka continued to juggle Mana in the air before growing bored and kicking her up, Mana ran out of augmentation and she felt a powerful blow from the man's elbow to her back. She screamed in pain as her powerless body flew right down but before she hit the floor the Inuzuka's knee dug deep into Mana's gut almost making her throw up. The only thing that kept her from dying instantly after that final hit was her pathetic attempt to re-augment her body again.

With another weak kick the Inuzuka sent Mana to the other side of the room, rolling on the steel floor pathetically. She stood no chance. Still, the thought of a boy trapped in a cage of hardened glass and stuffed into a container with acid all around him with no hopes of escape motivated the magician, it gave her strength to stand back up and fight. Mana's shaking arms got her body back up, the smoke started to clear, finding even the smallest crevices and vents to dissipate into.

"Just know, Mana, that I take no pleasure from this. I only fight to regain the chakra I lost previously and because Yellow told me to. It hurts my heart to kill you, it really does but it's either you or Sunomaru…" the young man growled back at Mana, the girl reached into her pocket and pulled out a card. She wasn't about to honor this man with a reply or pity him, he chose this fight, she would fight until she either ended it or died trying. This was Mana's new way, protection of those she loved by beating the enemy but never crossing the sacred line.

A loud bark from behind her froze the girl's heart in her chest – the dog was back and he must've not smelled so much because Noji smiled and welcomed the canine back to his side. Mana's arms flashed through a bunch of seals, still clenching that card in her hand so hard that the steel edges cut into Mana's own delicate childish hand sending a couple of drops of blood down her hand.

"Just give up, let me take what's left of your chakra and I'll kill you fast, you won't have to suffer any more than it is needed. Sunomaru is a born hunter and he can end it fast, just one bite and it'll be over." Noji asked her, no, he almost begged Mana to give up, looking right into her eyes. His eyes were kind, they were genuine and it was clear that this Noji was a very kind man, had Mana been who she was before she'd have completely shut down, just like she did with Sugemi… No more.

Mana would no longer make it easy for her enemies by talking to them, by letting them hurt her and by extension her friends. Her friends would no longer have to fight the battles that the magician lost because she was too scared to injure her opponent too much or just too scared of her own strength in general. This was the time she proved that she had grown, that she not only became stronger but also that she was ready to fight the hard battles.

"Look, I know you don't want to give up but this is just cruel, Yellow has the supply of perfume that cures Suno's sickness, he was born with a disease that needs a really hard to get herb, they're no longer even selling that herb, it's only found in that one kind of perfume which Yellow has and I need it, I need it to keep Suno alive because he's all that I have left! Please, don't suffer anymore and just give up, you fought bravely, you've done all you could and stood up to an opponent you had no hopes of beating but… Come on…"

Sunomaru barked, he wasn't angry, it was a bark of agreement to what his master said, it was strange, Mana couldn't remember the last time she fought a battle like this, a battle in which her opponent was not her enemy, who didn't want her to suffer and die. This was not a conflict between a good person and a bad person, this was a conflict between a person who needed to save one person and another who wanted to save his friend, his soulmate. Hisako was right, Noji was Mana's natural counter but not because of his skillset, it was because he was a genuinely good person. The Mana whom Hisako thought she was would've never fought such a person and died needlessly. Hisako must've counted on that, it must've been the assassin's plan all along…

Mana's arm moved up, her steel tipped card still being held firm. Slowly the girl moved her arm right up to her throat and swiftly pulled the card. Blood exploded all over the cellar, splashing all over Noji's face and spoiling Sunomaru's snow-white fur. It was almost like a petal storm of roses all over a field of daisies. Noji just kept standing still, completely dazed and still struggling to believe it.

Mana slit her own throat and collapsed on the floor.


	91. The Lion and the Lamb

With a loud thundering roar of battle Roe charged at Kiyomi, this was a completely different approach coming from the Nekomata. The hunter was now treating this fight less like a hunt and more like an actual duel, he didn't want to simply plunge his knife into the Yamanaka's heart, he wanted for fate to determine the more worthy heir to lead each of their clans. It may have seemed odd that Roe was so determined to best an heir of a clan completely different from his own but this Roe guy seemed to be all about pride.

After leaning back to avoid Roe's quick swipe Kiyomi threw a quick jab at the man's jaw, she was terrified to see that the jab barely even fazed him at all and the cat-hobo continued to throw knife swipes at her. First, his knife holding hand moved back, trying to rip out a good chunk of the girl's flesh but Kiyomi's arm was already back on the defensive and she managed to duck under his swipe, throwing a combination of blows at the man's gut, all of them were absorbed by his powerful body. Suddenly the man bolted back like he had seen his own death or something.

For the first couple of moments Kiyomi had no idea as to what exactly may have scared the man but then she noticed strands of her blonde hair slipping carelessly onto the ground like petals of a flower hit by a strong spring breeze. The Yamanaka smiled, now she'll have some of her hair on the ground ready to unleash her secret clan technique. All she needed was to catch this man unprepared... The bad news were that Roe also seemed to be quite familiar with this technique since it was used on him previously.

One thing Kiyomi wasn't a fan of was their environment, they were located in a steel basement which completely disabled any of her attempts to use Earth Release techniques. She couldn't submerge underground, she couldn't even fling boulders at the big guy which proved to be so successful the last time. Kiyomi gently giggled, "Punching you hurts me more than it seems to hurt you, I thought after hitting you with a boulder I'd have softened you up a bit..." she tried to taunt the man.

"If I fail this assignment Yellow will have my sister's head. As a good sibling I must protect her!" Roe charged forward swiping with his gigantic knife. That explanation of Roe's determination stunned Kiyomi, she dodged the first swipe but then the man's knee dug deep into her nose. While the girl managed to augment her abilities so that her skull wasn't crushed with that single kick she was still thrown back, just barely did Kiyomi manage to roll around and pick her body back up off the ground.

"This guy is just like Kenji... He's just trying to protect his little sister... Shit... I need to get my mind into it, I'm having a hard enough time as it is!" the blonde started scolding herself and trying desperately to get over the realization that she may have been fighting a representation of what her most beloved and admired person in the world may have been like. "If I kill him, will I then be just like those thugs that killed Kenji? Will I make life as tough for his sister as those rogues made it for me?!" she wondered without noticing that Roe was already behind her and with a powerful horizontal kick to the girl's back he sent Kiyomi tumbling forward.

The Yamanaka coughed, she stood up all shaking and afraid to fight. Was it always like this for Mana? When one viewed all of your opponents as someone one didn't want to fight? When you want none of this violence, when all of it brings back this sickening feeling inside you that you'd want to puke if you landed another punch? Poor girl... No. She wasn't poor, she was stupid, she wasn't fit for battle, no one feeling like this was fitting for battle.

Kiyomi's hands went through a bunch of handseals, she just barely made them go correctly, just barely she managed to not mess them up. Her chakra had already taken a huge hit after protecting her from instant death that each of Roe's crushing blows would've delivered. Kiyomi had no more chakra to waste.

"Wind Style: Great Breakthrough!" Kiyomi yelled out shooting a powerful and invisible blast of wind at Roe. The man's body flickered, he then appeared right before Kiyomi holding his knife up and ready to impale her on it when the wall of wind hit the man head on and sent him crashing into a bunch of boxes.

The blonde staggered back and placed her back right at the ladder to the upper floor, taking a moment to look up. How was Mana doing? Was she OK? Of all places Kiyomi wanted to be there the least. Fighting someone who reminded her of Kenji so much was so difficult that she was almost ready and more willing to die than cause more harm to this man who was a living memory of her brother.

"Let's stop this, there's no use in fighting further for the two of us, you just want to protect your sister and I can help you with that..." Kiyomi yelled, then a strong smell of flowers caught her nose, the girl tried to move out of where she was but a strong elbow slam pinned her to the steel wall and lifted her in the air, trying to smother the life out of her. Roe was just so fast! The man growled with his cat-like fangs right up in Kiyomi's face.

"It is true that my sister is the reason why Yellow even got me serving him, but the real reason I'm fighting you is because you hurt my pride, the pride of an undefeated Nekomata heir. My sister's life will be saved by the same action that will satisfy my pride – your death and your head on my belt." Roe almost whispered right into Kiyomi's face.

"Normally I'd say... Ewww for your breath... But... Is that tulips I smell? Did you get perfume spilt on you?" Kiyomi taunted the cat-hobo who was covered with some strange purple goo from those boxes and hat shards of glass all over his muscular frame. The Yamanaka then lifted her feet and kicked at two shards digging them deeper into the cat-man's chest making him let her go and roar out loud in pain. The heiress took a couple of seconds to roll to the side and catch her breath.

"No. He's nothing like Kenji, Kenji only cared about his village and his family, he never let personal feelings get involved in it all. This man is all about pride, he is a lot of things but Kenji he is not! I'll just have to try not to kill him, I don't need this sibling vendetta on my consciousness..." the girl thought to herself coughing out and standing back straight.

Roe slammed his arms together, "Nekomata Clan Secret Technique: Roar of the Prideland!"

Kiyomi was blown back almost instantly by some invisible force, it was like the man's voice got multiplied a thousand times and made into some strange ring of pure force that grinded and threw objects around. Once again Kiyomi felt her chakra taking a huge dip. She's been abusing chakra augmentation but there was no other choice here – any single of these blows would've killed not only a normal person but it'd have been enough to level a mountain. As the shockwave of Roe's roar passed through casual objects it completely grinded them to dust, not even a single shard of wood remained – the shockwave completely disintegrated everything by its intensity.

Kiyomi felt warm drips of blood running down her ears, she got back on her knees and then back on her feet. The girl looked around – the entire room was demolished, there were absolutely no objects to substitute with, even the steel was completely wrecked, the whole room was bent up and just barely holding together – the shockwave must've ran out of its own range, otherwise it'd have demolished the entire room and buried both of them beneath the upper floor. This Roe guy was a madman, he was ready to destroy everything just because he felt prideful.

Kiyomi's arms went through a bunch of handseals, she noticed that Roe slipped into the shadows again trying to hunt her down again but this time she'd be ready. This time the cat-hobo was all covered in perfume, this time Kiyomi knew of his abilities and she'd be ready for him. With a tap of her knuckle the Yamanaka set off a genjutsu, Roe leaped at her but his body stopped suddenly, he then just fell down on the floor straight, the girl went through even more handseals but then her jutsu failed, no, the blonde stopped it in time – she was running out of chakra slowly, she needed a breather.

"You changed the appearance of the room using your genjutsu, making me believe that I was charging at a steel wall when actually it was just you... Stop postponing the inevitable, either fight me or die proud!" he shouted out reaching for the loops of some wires. The cat-man pulled on them setting off an excessive trap. Kiyomi did her best to move backwards, to try and navigate so that she didn't get caught but it appeared like this whole place was set up to become some sort of intricate spider web when those two loops were pulled.

The girl felt tight steel wire wrapping around her wrists, her elbows and her shoulders, her body, thighs and the lower leg all the way to her feet. Just barely the Yamanaka heiress managed to avoid having one loop tie around her neck, if it did, this man could've beheaded her with a single pull on the right strings.

"Remember? Last time you caught me in a trap just like this, I prepared this specifically for you." Roe's fangs grinded together angrily and his peculiar whiskers moved up and down as he exclaimed what he thought was his victory speech.

"Awww, you shouldn't have." Kiyomi tried to keep the talk going so that she found at least one way to escape this tight spot without losing any limbs or dying.

"Normally I'd just stab you through the heart and end this, maybe bite through your neck but... You beat me, you crushed me and insulted my pride!" Roe charged forward bashing into Kiyomi's body with his shoulder. The girl screamed out from the depths of her lungs as the steel wire dug deeper into her body. She heard the horrible sound of steel being pulled from its sheathe but this fool had already made his mistake – he messed with his own trap by bashing Kiyomi in it, he may have opened a bunch of wounds bursting with blood but... That was what Kiyomi was trying to avoid, now that he did it she was ready to just struggle a bit and pull out from there.

Roe's fists flew freely, he kept punching at Kiyomi's side and the girl kept augmenting her chakra to keep herself alive. A single free punch could've destroyed her, a single punch would have just killed her instantly and sent a shockwave through her body strong enough to grind her bones to dust. This man wasn't playing around. Kiyomi kept on screaming and taking all of his punches but then it happened – one of her hands got free, the steel tore off a nasty chunk of her flesh and opened a pretty bad wound but it let Kiyomi pull out her knife and swipe at the man. With a click of his fangs he broke the kunai into shards of steel. Kiyomi didn't stop, she roared in pain and pulled her legs and the remaining arm out getting cut up and injured and swept at the man's legs after landing taking him down for a moment while she ran to the corner to examine the extent of her wounds.

Kiyomi disappeared in the same shadows where Roe used to hide. She was hiding, trembling and just barely restraining her weeping from how much her whole body hurt from that nasty trap. The worst part was that Quack was tired out, he won't be able to heal all this... Darn it, Kiyomi needed to win this, she needed to win this fast and go help Mana, the hatchling depended on her, she looked up to Kiyomi and the blonde needed to live up to that trust.

"There you are!" Roe's thundering voice echoed as his figure leaped out from the darkness, Kiyomi had sensed him coming, he still couldn't get rid of the smell, the area was so dark that the Yamanaka was only able to barely distinguish the hunter once he got very close up to her. Then again, it was quite likely that it was the same with the Nekomata member. That gave the blonde an idea, she avoided the swipe of Roe's knife by observing the steel as it reflected the feint rays of light emanating from the other side of the room, Kiyomi rolled under Roe's feet and then disappeared again.

"Stop hiding! Darkness is my weapon!" Roe roared out. Two punches into his lower legs sent him on his knees, two swipes from Kiyomi's kunai left gashes on his back. A flip over his head followed by a double kick right to his face made the man roar in anger. Kiyomi couldn't believe this was working, she was tired and in the process of bleeding out yet she somehow managed to find out that the man's greatest strength was also his greatest weakness, after all – who hunts the hunter? Finding out stealthy opponents was really not his strongest suite.

Suddenly an iron grip locked around Kiyomi's throat just before she could knock Roe out with the back of her knife. The man's face remained looking somewhere else, it was just his arm working completely independently yet so incredibly precisely! Kiyomi moaned pathetically as her body was effortlessly lifted up in the air and she felt air starting to leave her body, she tried to jerk around, struggle, kick the man a couple of times but it didn't work.

"Did you really think that I couldn't see in the dark? I fucking fight in the dark you stupid bitch! Which part of "cat-like physiology" was so hard for your little brain so hard to understand?" Roe roared moving Kiyomi's face, still gasping for at least a little breath of air closer to his own. He then laughed out.

"No, not like this, you'll suffer more, you injured my pride, you won't die enjoying yourself like this!" Roe shouted out tossing the blonde aside into the light.

"We'll play the same game we played last time! You look around, desperately try to find me and fail! My knife plunges one organ after another until you give up and die!" Roe's voice came from somewhere in the darkness. "Last time was just a fluke, I'll prove it to you, I am the world's strongest hunter! No one can find me when I don't want to be found!" the man's voice kept echoing.

Kiyomi coughed up and stood back up, she saw blood dripping from various wounds all over her body from that stupid trap. This was so close! She was just about to stab his eye out! The blonde still clenched that kunai in her hand, she got caught completely unprepared but she managed to get her kunai ready to poke the cat-man's eye out before he decided to kill her differently... If only he behaved in a logical manner and proceeded to try and choke her out. His illogical behavior was making it pretty hard to plan all of this.

There it was! The dreaded smell of tulips, Kiyomi turned around and flipped back to avoid the knife. Silence once again took over the room, she knew this game – he'll tire her out, either that or she'll bleed out. No part of this game was going her way so she had to change the rules. Kiyomi felt up her own chakra, tried getting the general feeling of just how much she had in her, just how much more fighting she could take. It wasn't that much, she had it for several more techniques, maybe a couple of augmentations too but that would be pushing it... She'd need to conserve some chakra on that augmentation, maybe augment a little bit less, it was a really big risk but it was a necessary one.

Kiyomi staggered back avoiding another slash. The man's body flickered and disappeared again, he moved much faster than the girl's perceptive ninja eye could see. He must've been one of the most amazing ninja the girl had ever seen and yet Hanasaku could've taken care of this joker so easily.

"Just do it how Hanasaku would, take the hit – hit him back harder... I'll just augment my body, just in case..." Kiyomi thought to herself right before the figure of the cat-hobo appeared from the darkness charging in with his knife up and ready to cut through the Yamanaka. Kiyomi felt chakra bursting, surging through her creating an invisible armor to protect her from things that'd kill her normally and she raised her arm like a shield, with a little luck the man's stab would pass right through the augmented arm and hit the floor opening him up for a finishing blow, a stab to the neck should do it!

A loud flesh piercing sound echoed and a burst of blood shot out all over Kiyomi's face. For a moment the girl just stood there and looked at the gruesome sight of her hand being easily penetrated by her assailant's knife. It was then that the overwhelming pain hit her and Kiyomi screamed in an inhuman-like voice throwing a mad kick to get the cat-man further away from her. The pierced arm shook wildly, blood was squirting from it and Kiyomi didn't care about standing there and fighting, she was bolting, retreating into the darkness to tie something around that arm.

Roe stabbed so hard he cut through her chakra augmentation! How could've she been so stupid!? Reserving chakra on something as integral as toughening her arm up... Right as Kiyomi tore the shoulder off of her top and started wrapping it around her arm she begged whatever forces there may have been overseeing this battle that this mistake would not be her final one.

"Yeah, that's right, run. Run. Run, little lamb!" Roe's annoying voice echoed all through the darker parts of the room once again, Kiyomi knew he was coming for her soon and she had to be ready for him, she had to get ready for him!


	92. Bell Which No One Heard

It didn't take long before the whip wielding Nekomata youth named Cony started her offense. The woman winded her whip around and smacked it at Hisako's location. The raven haired swordswoman didn't wait around, she decided to utilize the time that it took for Cony to wind up her whip and before it made a full circle and to gut the young woman before it happened. It was a good plan, normally the whip user would've had the advantage of long range on Hisako but Hisako could still utilize her speed right? Kill her enemy before they could press on that advantage. This cat-lady must've had some impressive abilities to rough the magician kid up after all, Hisako always knew that Mana had it in her to be a pretty powerful ninja.

The main reason why the Yoruma thought like that was because of the magician's skillset. She just used the least normal and the weirdest ninja arts: ninjutsu and genjutsu. Ninjutsu techniques were some of the most destructive ninja arts utilizing chakra to perform supernatural larger than life abilities. Most of the ninja considered the best by today's standards were also ninjutsu experts at least on some level.

The other one was equally as tricky. The girl used illusions which was an exceptionally annoying but also a complex subject. No one knew that well about it, everyone just knew what was passed on by their ancestors but few bothered to delve too deep into the art of illusions, there were some Jounin who focused in it but their illusions were just meant to be distractions for their main techniques. No one used it as their main skill quite like Mana. As much as Hisako hated Mana, she acknowledged that the kid would one day make an exceptional or, at the very least, very annoying to deal with ninja. For that reason anyone who could inflict those injuries onto the girl deserved at least Hisako's actual effort to gut them for having earned that amount of skill.

A brief sultry laughter broke Hisako's mad dash, the girl felt pressure on her feet and suddenly a blunt shock on her head – she was tripped. Hisako looked down glaring at the whip and seeing a knot tied around the Yoruma swordswoman's leg. The raven-head decided to cut at the whip but with a strong yank to the side wall the effort was interrupted. Hisako just couldn't get a mean enough swing, her half assed swings seemed to bounce off of whatever that whip was. It wasn't ordinary leather that much was for sure.

"I really wish I could bash you more and more but... Sadly you seem to have eaten one too many butter cookies." Cony playfully taunted the Yoruma. It was a big mistake to taunt a Yoruma, those people only knew hatred and violence, taunting only made them delve even deeper into their own insanity.

Cony moved to the side and grunted in surprise and shock – a knife dug deep into the steel wall. A knife of exquisite Yoruma bladework, thrown using the unnatural strength of an assassin.

Cony looked back at Hisako trying to find her opponent but the black haired woman was already gone from the loop, she was leaping all over the place, her body was just a blur and her continuous leaps were just distractions. She moved at such inhuman speeds that her body wasn't even visible, only loud clangs and thuds on the wooden boxes and the solid steel structure alerted of Hisako's movement.

"My father used to say..." Hisako's voice echoed ominously from multiple areas in the room, while she finished that brief sentence she managed to move all over the room making her words more ghostly but also much clearer.

"It's not how you throw, it's how you stab and twist!" Hisako's body blurred and flashed up to Cony finally confusing the woman with her upwards thrust of the two blades that the raven haired woman wielded. Her leather jacket tensed and emitted most awkward grungy squeak from the pressure.

While the whip wielding rogue managed to avoid the impaling double thrust, Hisako's foot followed almost instantly digging itself deep into Cony's stomach and sending the woman back into a bunch of boxes, the woman's body bounced off from one box to the other before painfully bashing into a wall and then back on some of the boxes she fell on. Hisako leaped forward driving her shoe down to slam Cony and crush her into the box and whatever was in it.

After a deafening thud the swordswoman fell into a bunch of bottles and flasks, most of them got crushed and instantly Hisako felt being submerged in some sort of sticky purple fluid. It smelled... Weird... To a trained Yoruma assassin only the most normal things like flowers and pies felt weird and unnatural. This goo was... Perfume? Why would these rogues have entire basement loaded with this purple goo? They kidnapped this kid, this perfume tycoon's heir but they already had entire basement filled with perfume shipments. Something here felt off, Hisako's mind started wondering away from the fight, trying to desperately put together what could've happened there.

The woman heard something loud and screechy, Hisako tried to leap outside that horrible mixture of glass and perfume but the explosion sent her body blasting off from one side of the room to the other. Cony must've avoided Hisako's stomp and then moved in back to having the tall ground advantage as well as being able to just attack the assassin with her projectiles.

"You know..." Cony laughed looking at Hisako standing up and tearing the burning and torn leather jacket off of her body, looking back at the rogue with the furious stare coming from a face covered with blood from cracking her head into the steel floor and perfume. "You don't really strike me as an assassin. I mean looking at your weirdly dark shade of hair, those scars on your face and those clan tattoos on your face and cleavage... You're Yoruma huh? Anyone could recognize your foul stench. Strangely clear and exotic hair color, clan tattoos and love of scars. There's a reason why people treat you as dirt, because you treat all life as dirt. Right now you threaten the life of me and my brother and I'm having trouble to decide if I want to kill a Yoruma shitstain or a woman whom I was ordered to kill by a man holding my beloved brother ransom, forgive me if my feelings confuse you, Yoruma. Emotions are something only a human would understand, not a Yoruma trash like you."

Hisako's body was shaking in sheer rage. "I'm not an assassin. Assassin is just a word for simple minded fools who fall by our blades to call us!" Hisako lashed out straight out shouting her words.

The woman's body flashed forward, no more distractions, no more leaps or anything silly like that. Her body was injured by the explosion, she had multiple broken ribs and several burns. The glass of those perfume bottles cut Hisako up pretty nastily when the assassin just tried to use her senseless aggression to kill Cony. None of those things mattered. Yoruma were rage, pure desire to kill, pain was one level below that.

Hisako's leg swept at Cony's before the woman even noticed Hisako having moved a finger. "I am a murderer," The Yoruma's leg then kicked Cony upwards bashing straight into the ceiling of the lower floor with utmost ruthlessness and violence "I am a slayer, decapitator and a ravager,". Hisako's bloodthirsty frame kicked off the ground dashing right at the plummeting opponent and passing through her in mid-air "I desire to kill everyone I see except those I want to fuck with, that is the Yoruma way. The word assassin doesn't fully capture that". A heart freezing scream pierced the temporary silence as a nasty X shaped gash covered Cony's chest, from her groin over her chest and ending by the neck.

It was far too fast for the woman to even have the time to augment her strength and endurance. Taunting Hisako was something she really shouldn't have done. While in mid-air Hisako pulled two scrolls out of her belt and unsealed them, she attached it to the a wire device that held it with two wires and spun them like one of those spinning toys that the young ones liked to play with trying to see which one would spin the longest.

"Secret Yoruma Hijutsu: Blooming Petal of Death!" Hisako shouted as just when her body started to land down the rotating scrolls started to fire off automated barrages of weaponry: kunai, shuriken, various small daggers probably meant better for opening letters than killing but all of that fired off all over the basement.

It was like the woman's whip rose up and formed a protective twister deflecting each and every projectile thrown by Hisako. The assassin kept emptying her supplies, firing off everything she had sealed inside those scrolls, literally thousands of small weapons but all of them just bounced off and fell by the woman's sides. Right when the technique ended and the scrolls together with the detached strings fell off of Hisako's wrists the woman pulled her blades back out throwing them at the circling whirlwind of leathery whiplash.

The blades bounced off as well flying back at Hisako but the woman caught them in middle air and then with a wild roar dove back down, if she couldn't penetrate this wall with her onslaught of these weapons she accumulated after emptying her wallet in the Yoruma Black Market she'll gut the bitch herself. Personal was always her approach anyways!

It appeared that Hisako was especially lucky, the woman's skydive back down appeared to time properly with Cony's whip running out of its supernatural juice and falling down the boxes below where Cony could reach. The woman moved to the side skipping just one sword. Hisako's left sword penetrated Cony's side making the woman scream out in pain and spit out some blood into the assassin's eye. Hisako staggered back giving the injured cat-woman some time to drop down for her whip.

Cony's laughter echoed through the basement, it was this bloody and terrifying combination of fear, pain and also pride and joy. It was clear that the woman was injured, probably close to dying and in a lot of pain but she also felt really proud of something even while being afraid to die at the same time.

"So this was my mother's will then?" Cony's voice echoed.

Hisako cocked her head and cracked her knuckles picking her swords back up and licking the blood off of her sword. The woman always did that, it helped her realize if she was back from her murderous rage. If she cut her tongue that meant she was hyperactive, too jumpy to act straight, still in a rampaging mood. A clean and soft lick without injury meant that Hisako's mind was back to being its bitchy cold self. "The fuck are you on about now? I don't think I stabbed you in a spot where you'd start to get delirious." The assassin asked.

"This whip is made from my mother's hair. Yellow hired mercs to take me and my brother from my family several months back, those mercenaries separated me and my brother giving us just a couple of final words with our mother, our father was killed after he opened the door. Mother just gave us her hair, she didn't say what it was for or anything but she was a ninja and we felt the chakra in them, then they burned our house down even after her death the hair continued to harden my whip, act like it had a will of its own."

So that was it? That was why Mana was so busted up then? The dumb kid-idol just couldn't deal with the whip having a mind of its own while also being coated with chakra and completely invulnerable during those moments of free will? If that was all it took the kid was of no challenge to Hisako, not even worth staining the blade of her sword with the kid's blood.

"I didn't realize it up to now but... Mother's goal was to protect us, it must've been some special seal she placed in them, to not fade before it saved both of our lives. If I died right now Yellow would've killed my brother too because without me he'd have no use for him. Because of that my mother's will inside that seal acted by itself and protected me, now that both me and my brother are safe her soul moved on into the Afterlife. Her lifelong goal of protecting us is complete."

Hisako laughed out in the most ironic and sarcastic laugh she's ever had and lunged back at where the woman's voice came from. A nasty flesh tearing sound followed Hisako's flashy assault, the woman managed to augment her chakra right before the blade entered her body making it just inflict a wide but incredibly shallow cut, barely passing the skin. The second cut was blocked by Cony's knife. The woman leaped back dropping several more marbles with explosive notes stuck all over them. Hisako rolled back avoiding the explosion.

A powerful whiplash hit right into Hisako's jaw from the smoke, then another and another one. The ruthless combination continued before the whip wrapped around the assassin's neck and the rogue ninja slammed her opponent's head into the ground again and dragged her body up closer. Cony's foot slammed on top of Hisako's head leaving a large dent on the steel floor and making the young woman's body twitch creepily and emit a powerful scream of pure pain. Hisako managed to augment herself to avoid having her neck snapped but Cony continued to stomp on her face. Again and again until the augmentation could barely even protect Hisako, until her nose broke and fired off wild torrents of nose bleeds.

With a strong backroll Hisako stood back up and then dove forward slashing right at Cony's shoulder, augmentation helped the woman only receive a small cut to what would've been a nasty injury. Cony twisted her whip around once again in a wide circle whipping at the Yoruma's jaw again sending her broken nose into blood spilling overdrive. Another whip hit Hisako straight into her groin. The woman yelled out in agonizing pain and fell on the ground scratching the cheaply placed shot.

"What's the matter? I didn't know you Yoruma felt pain at all? What was that bullshit about you being all-killers before!?" Cony shouted out in a pathetic voice of an injured and desperate woman who was ready to reach out to dirty shots for survival. The woman swung her whip up in the air aiming straight at the last hit spot.

"Let's make sure world sees no more filthy Yoruma babies!" she grunted out before stumbling back in shock. A sword was etched into her gut, one thrown in a desperation move by Hisako.

"Shit, fuck, cunt, ass... You fucking sodomized pirate whore cunt licker!" Hisako writhed on the floor before picking herself back up off the ground and dashing to her opponent, with a swift movement she pulled the sword out of the woman's gut and then grabbed hold of her whip cutting it in half using her other blade and kicking Cony back to die in agony.

"I'll suck the cocks of a clusterfuck of dickwhistling dead men before I'll let you win!" Hisako yelled out completely having lost all fucks to give.

Cony appeared to not even plan to die yet, the woman kept crawling back, leaving a bloody trail for the raven-haired assassin to follow. She must've used chakra augmentation to keep her blood loss contained as much as possible, in the most extreme cases chakra could've been used to prolong one's death but it was rarely ever used that way in battles, it was used as a last effort to receive medical help whereas in this case there was little to no hope. Cony's arms raised up and blue flames flared up where her nails were forming long chakra claws. The woman's body burst up with chakra, transparent blue flames of pure chakra started flooding off from her spiking up the woman's hair, straightening and sharpening her whiskers and her cat-like fangs.

Cony lunged forward, wild red stripes started cutting everything to pieces, Hisako leaped back a couple of dashes looking around. The impossibly fast claw swipes seemed to pick up an object and utterly shred it to smallest chunks. They appeared to be somewhat random so the assassin barely felt threatened but she had to make sure, the shredding barrage of Cony's chakra claws intensified, the barrages started multiplying and suddenly it started seeming like there were more and more of Cony as if the woman was so fast that she started leaving afterimages.

Hisako leaped into the midst of that clawing madness and raised her blades up. With a bold right step forward and raising her blades as a wall Hisako managed to impale Cony onto her swords. The chakra flames went out, Cony was just about to die, her wounds were too numerous and deep even for chakra augmentation to sustain. Hisako dropped Cony's powerless and weeping body on the floor. Tears started gathering in the woman's eyes, her previously seen pride in her mother's final will was now gone after finding just how pointless her mother's sacrifice was.

"Come on... Tell me how pathetic I am not to welcome death..." Cony started crying in her final moments, "Tell me how inhuman I am to not desire death upon myself!" she tried to scream but she only spat up more blood from her torn stomach.

"There's nothing inhuman in not wanting to die. I've never met anyone who wanted to die when I killed them. Death is the ultimate bad ending, it's only normal to hate it, to wish it upon everyone else but you. In some ways that's where me and the magician-bitch are real fucking similar. We both accept that death is bad, the worst, in fact. I don't know what sort of monsters you imagine Yoruma to be, but even we know that, that is why we kill so much – because death is the worst we can give our enemies and life is the most precious that we can take from them."

Cony tried to move but she managed to only twitch pathetically. "At least I'll meet my mother in the Afterlife... I just hope Roe makes it..." she uttered.

"There's no Afterlife, you die – that's it, nothing beyond that. No praise-hungry God to suck his dick off for eternal salvation, no meeting your lost ones. To say that there is something like that is to diminish all that the Yoruma do. To belittle a killer." Hisako picked up Cony's whip and looked at the woman.

"What are you doing?" Cony cried out in horror after Hisako wrapped the whip's remains around Cony's neck and started applying all of her superhuman pressure, just barely holding herself back from snapping the woman's neck.

"Being the kind of monster you think I am. Wouldn't like for you to be a liar in your final moments now would we?" Hisako snapped back at Cony angrily and held the pressure before the woman stopped moving, after a powerful press on the whip the leather snapped and so did the woman's neck already after her death.

"Well that's demented. Even I wasn't that twisted..." a voice reached Hisako from the back of the basement, it belonged to a short cloaked figure with strings of blonde hair.

"You fucked up her life by making it a living nightmare, you were a fucking creditor of her fucked up slaving life and if I hate one thing more than being whipped into my genitals that's fucking creditors. At least I had the decency to finish her off, I was just as sick as this world is and not sick enough to be the sick fucker in this room..." Hisako replied pointing her blade at her next challenger – the mysterious dwarf called "Yellow"


	93. A Wolf That Cried Boy

Noji remained standing in total awe, looking at the giant gap in the throat of his opponent and her body weightlessly slamming the ground. The young man didn't move, nothing more but an occasional twitch of a facial muscle. Why would this girl do that? Was she so desperate and finally willing to admit her loss? If she was driven by honor that'd explain why she'd take her own life before letting Noji do it, no, she was too nice to do something like that. The Inuzuka looked at his partner.

"Tell me you saw this too, buddy" he mumbled out to which the dog only howled and nodded his head a couple of times.

"Shit… I'll just never get used to people dying, good people…" Noji quietly started talking to himself under his nose. He looked at the static corpse of his opponent and then back at his beloved dog. He was at a conflict, was all of this worth it? Obviously Noji was willing to go to any extremes to save Sunomaru – the dog was his soulmate after all, however for how long can he kill? For how long will he be able to justify his actions with necessity? How many dead bodies of children like this girl have to stack until Noji would finally have enough?

Noji's tirade of self-pity was broken by a loud thud followed by a loud whiny howl of Sunomaru. Much to his horror the young man turned at his white large canine friend only to witness the magician's sandal slamming on top of the dog's head and driving it to the ground. With a gentle backflip Mana regained and repurposed her balance for a direct assault and lunged at Noji punching him right in the jaw, then again from upwards down and then with a vertical kick launching the man up into the air. The magician dashed back and prepared a counterattack. Her corpse had disappeared from where it fell, almost like the action of suicide had never transpired at all.

"No one dies today. Not on my watch." Mana firmly stated gripping her kunai tighter. Noji stood up wiping blood off of his lip and spitting some to the side, he looked at Sunomaru who appeared to be alright after Mana's attack. He was just knocked out but still breathing heavily, the dog's giant back was lifting up and down repeatedly while the dog was taking large breaths.

"What was that?" Noji asked still trying to regain his balance since while the magician's punches were pretty puny, her kick really made his vision blur and almost crushed his jaw, the force of it alone was enough to toss him around like a ragdoll.

"A genjutsu technique, I told you I'm a stage magician remember? The smell card?" Mana smiled slightly through her serious expression. She felt that Noji's voice was warm and almost friendly, it was almost like he felt thankful for something. Like he didn't really want Mana to die and the realization that she was alive was liberating to him somehow.

"Oh, right… Those handseals you made before and nothing came out, so it was back then that I fell for the illusion… You had a perfect opening to kill me or Sunomaru yet you chose to knock Suno out. You held nothing back, came at me until it was no longer safe to keep going without being countered. You fight with all your strength yet you don't wish to kill… Thanks for not hurting Suno more than you had to." Noji nodded with a warm look. Mana did feel a little conflicted about all of this. She wasn't about to make the mistake of holding back but she felt really bad about fighting these two.

"I told you – no one dies today if I can help it" the magician firmly repeated. That painful journey through the forest, looking back on her past, her greatest mistakes and her losses made her grow like she's never grown before. In just those couple of hours she matured more than the girl had matured ever before. She still felt hesitant inside, still wanted no part of this violence but she felt like honoring her opponent by giving them the fight they asked for – fighting was not her will, not her decision but if her opponent wished it, they'd have brought it on themselves.

Mana's body twitched, all of her muscles kicked into overdrive and the girl leaned forward with her legs thrusting her forward as fast as she could go without augmenting her body needlessly. Noji tried to grab her, counter her straightforward attack but Mana's body just disappeared, she boosted her speed using chakra augmentation just for a brief moment, let it all flow out but only for one insignificant second. The magician's body blurred leaving only an afterimage which the Inuzuka fell for while the real Mana moved right past and behind him.

The young man collapsed on his knees after Mana's kick hit him on the soft spot and the back of his legs. Noji took time to stand back up and turn around and Mana made sure to capitalize, he gave her time to wind up and prepare another combination of kicks. She had to go all out, kick him so hard that he passed out, give him all the punishment she could and not stop because this was a precious opening, one he'd not provide in the future. If Noji regained his footing and started dictating his advantage again he'd kill the girl for sure this time. Mana had to keep herself from giving him the chance.

A crushing kick connected to the side of Noji's jaw. An entire combination of precise kicks collided with his chest, Mana leapt into the air activating her Mystical Wings Jutsu to push her forward, a gust of wind pushed her body diagonally down with a sharp kick to the man's gut grinding him to the floor, bending steel where he was sent down again.

Mana dashed back, she completed her attack, she could've attacked more, pressed forward but it would've been risky – she was getting winded and without a doubt Noji would've regained his balance and breath at any time soon. At least the magician was making the Inuzuka work for it a little, the fight stopped being an absolute stomp once the girl took the dog out of the equation.

"Heh, I'm much faster and stronger than you, as a close range Chakra Absorption user I also perfectly counter your long range abilities, even with your long and strong legs in mind… Still, you have a mind of an exceptional ninja, you're tricky, unpredictable, making strategies on the fly each more deep and advanced than the other – that's where you would make your mark on the ninja world if you left this basement…" Noji laughed coughing blood up from his torn and busted stomach. He must've used some sort of chakra augmentation, Mana kicked him to kill knowing full well that he'd do that. If she held back he'd have just tanked that attack and then swatted her aside not giving her a chance to counter – he'd have killed her.

"That's what my sensei taught me, that's the only thing that makes me unique. I have no clans, no bloodlines, no special abilities beyond just what makes me Konoha's Sorceress – a crafty stage magician who is also a ninja." Mana replied retaining her seriousness. What was this attempt to talk to her? Was he just trying to play the emotional game? After all, big talking was just as effective in a battle when one dominated their opponent, everytime Noji reminded Mana how much stronger and faster he was it terrified her a little, just the reminder of how badly this fight could go if Mana ever lost control of it for just one moment.

"Heh, you know… This kinda makes me dream like a fool, want for both of us to survive this day so that one day I can perhaps return to Konoha and see your show. Seeing how you improvise I dread the excitement of seeing your scripted performance." Noji laughed out as if this battle wasn't a matter of life and death. This young man was so different from how Mana imagined a rogue ninja, so different from what she imagined a "bad guy" to be. No, Noji was not a "bad guy" per se. His interest just clashed with hers, he was ordered to take care of her so that his soulmate could live another day. Knowing that situation made Mana sort of feel sorry for the young man.

How could he have fought this battle? His mind couldn't have been all in this, not after seeing Mana "kill herself" and stressing out. He must've told himself a thousand times that he was ready but in reality seeing a young girl die because of his actions woke something up inside of him. Hesitation perhaps, questioning of his actions and his motives. He was tearing himself up from inside, that was why genjutsu sometimes were more effective than given credit for. A right vision may have completely broken an opponent, that being said, Mana had no idea it'd do that, she just needed an opening.

"I keep having optimistic thoughts like that every time, people make fun of me a lot because of it. If both of us make it out, please come see it sometime, I'll make sure to reserve a seat for you…" Mana replied with a brief smile, for a moment her own eyes faltered, Noji saw it – he knew that the girl realized his internal struggle and somehow that knowledge made it all different. The hands of the young man went through a couple of handseals and the blue transparent flame lit up around his arms. "Chakra Absorption Technique!" Noji chanted out taking his fighting stance.

The Inuzuka leaned back and then dived forward. "Tunneling Fang!" he shouted as his body started rotating like a drill, the blue flames of pure chakra around his arms dyed this whole impressive horizontal vortex of claws light blue. Noji unleashed himself flying at Mana with his ferocious spinning attack. "Combination Technique: Life Shaving Fang!" a loud howling voice came out from the vortex as it shot right at the magician with blinding speed.

The girl couldn't even dream of having the speed and agility needed to avoid the technique, it may have moved instantly for all she knew. Having no knowledge of the technique coming Mana just let it hit her, just barely managing to augment her lower body so that he didn't drill a hole right through the girl. It was like her chakra was torn out of her, the technique combined the offensive speed of Inuzuka clan technique and the chakra draining of the Chakra Absorption technique, even more, the technique absorbed not only the chakra it'd have normally sapped but that which the user spent on augmentation – augmenting one's body to survive the attack only made the technique more effective.

The tunneling vortex of blue claws pushed Mana back and slammed her into a wall. The Inuzuka dashed to her body right as it bounced off of the steel structure and started punching, his punches were weak, he pulled them back but not because he felt sorry – he wanted to drain more chakra out of her. Full powered punches may have damaged organs, broken bones and that'd have reduced her chakra greatly. Now Mana barely felt each individual punch but the total combination left plenty scratches and internal blunt traumas and drained so much chakra too.

With an elbow strike Noji let the combination end and then he leaped back, his Chakra Absorption technique timed out and the flames around his arms faded. Striking so ferociously and with such speed must've worn him out since the young man couldn't even move or lift his arm to stay in his fighting position. Mana coughed some blood up and jumped back on her feet – her chakra took a huge dip into nothingness but she had to keep going.

"Your chakra…" Noji kept breathing and looking at the girl strangely. Mana's hands froze in their handseal forming position. "People's chakra feels different. That of most people is colorless, it has that bland transparent light blue color to it and feels the same as anyone else's. However some people are different. The chakra of incredibly evil people or people who have witnessed a lot of darkness in their lives is as black as tar, the chakra of people defined by their desire of vengeance and their rage is blood red. Yours is azure blue… You have something inside you that defines you, makes your chakra feel unique. It really feels good to absorb it, I told you I take no pleasure in taking it but… For a moment there I seemed to have lost myself. You should discover what that means if you live through this day. It might serve as a very interesting and helping you know yourself better discovery"

So that was it? Noji didn't make a mistake by overextending his attack and leaving himself at a shortage of breath, he lost himself in the strange feeling of Mana's chakra. What he said was interesting, some emotion defined by the color of azure blue defined her, it made her chakra feel different and pleasant to feast on for those that absorb chakra. That was strange, there was nothing special about her chakra besides its color, Mana had known if it had some innate abilities inside of it. Maybe it just told the world just how determined and defined the magician was by that trait that defined her?

The girl completed her handseals, reaching for her pouch. She pulled out a small explosive marble-shaped package and threw it right at Noji, the boy leaned back and let it fly far to the other side of the room. His attention was distracted by the tiny package and while his eyes were focused on avoiding the explosive package which didn't even detonate yet, the remaining arm of Mana's completed the handseals. Her arms lit up with crackling lightning chakra and she shot her hands forward. "Combination Technique: Explosive Lightning Combo!" she shouted firing off the barrage of small lightning spheres at her opponent.

Noji covered up his face and his eyes, having winded himself after getting lost in absorbing Mana's chakra pool and taking in too much at one time. Chakra Absorption technique was still a C-Rank technique and while its absorption effect was dangerous and lethal, it had this strange "overfeeding" effect when taking in too much chakra at once. The force and shock behind Mana's lightning spheres bounced and dissolved once reaching Noji, the youth shouted out in pain and struggled to stay still, stumbling back more and more, right into where the package was situated. Mana stopped her technique with one arm and detonated the package close to where Noji was – she didn't want to kill him so she didn't drive him back far enough for it to be torn up by the explosion but she lead him close enough for it to really hurt him even with chakra augmentation in mind.

A deafening explosion echoed throwing even Mana off of her feet. Noji's torn up and burnt, also bleeding profusely frame dived out of the cloud of smoke with his arms lit up with the Chakra Absorption technique. His punches once again overwhelmed Mana, she was down and unable to use her kicks to hold the man at bay. Noji continued to strike again and again, one of his arms grabbed Mana and lifted her up by the rags of what used to be her uniform before, tossing her up slightly into the air and then unleashing an agonizing combination of draining punches into her lower body. Mana struggled not to pass out, staying conscious hurt too much, her eyes whited out for just a moment. Then a powerful grip around her neck forced the magician to return to reality.

Noji held her slightly lifted up in the air so that only Mana's toes could barely reach the steel floor. His arm was choking her out and the draining technique around his hand made it impossible for the magician to escape it since her chakra was being sapped with each second the two made contact. Supply of air was becoming short, Noji made sure to pound her gut enough to take all of it out before starting his finishing choking move. Everything was fading to black, Mana couldn't believe how difficult just twitching her fingers was while her chakra was being drained. A full grip was nearly impossible to escape from without augmenting one's chakra and Mana was too tired at that moment for that.

Suddenly the blue flame faded – that was just the opening Mana needed, using the last of her will and her fading mind the magician swung both of her legs forward into Noji's stomach and then when she was let go and fell on her toes briefly augmented her chakra to perform a backflip to send Noji flying off his feet as the magician's feet collided with his chin, cracking something that sounded very painful in there. The Inuzuka youth's body lifted up all the way to the steel ceiling and just barely didn't bash into it before falling down.

Mana grasped for air, she was tired, she still had some chakra to finish this fight up but her exhaustion made using that last ounce of chakra close to impossible. She needed to finish that fast. The magician took off Eiju's coat and tossed it aside, flicking the small hidden mechanisms that she still wore and revealing them on her body, when she wore her uniform it helped conceal them, it also fit very well into her tight choice of clothes and held it firmly, now the bumped and beaten up devices were letting off some weird noises and just barely functioning. It won't be as comfortable as when she still had her uniform but at least the coat won't get in the way.

Suddenly the girl's heart froze – she heard a loud bark from the side of Noji's dog who alerted his beaten and spitting blood and his own teeth from his mouth master that the pooch had woken up from being knocked out before. The Inuzuka smiled, the bodies of the two lit up with chakra and the dog transformed into a clone of Noji, the clone leaped on top of Noji's back, who in terms leaned closer to the ground forming his back into a more comfortable and horizontal platform for his soulmate. "Let's go, Suno, sorry, Mana. It seems luck just wasn't on your side. I'll make sure you'll get buried with care and respect, you earned it! Ultimate Combination Technique: Life Shaver Fang Over Fang!" Noji shouted orders for his hound, the two leaped forward and started spinning changing into those dreadful spinning horizontal hurricanes of claws. The two lunged at Mana determined to tear her apart.

The two vortexes collided not with Mana but instead with something dark brown, long and much more like leather – the magician used Substitution Technique to replace herself with the coat she just tossed aside and rolled aside to avoid the brunt of the technique. She observed in horror when Eiju's coat was torn to absolute shreds. The two vortexes worked in a ruthless and almost mechanical combination rotating in circles tearing what they thought was Mana apart. The two must not have had much vision while they were spinning around since they only stopped tearing the coat up when they stopped the technique.

"Shit! Suno, again! Good thing we took so much chakra from her, huh, buddy!?" the youth exclaimed energetically as the two once again fired off at Mana, this time however the girl had time for her response. Her handseals went off and she looked into the one vortex that just spoke. The vortex got thrown out of its way right into the other. "Polymorphy Technique!" Mana shouted out the name of her genjutsu illusion. Noji started believing that he was a dog, the illusion also did some weird things with one's brain, they resembled more what they thought that animal was like which meant that Noji thought he was the alpha of the pack and since Suno was right beside him that made the affected Noji treat the dog as a challenger of his authority.

Noji attacked Suno violently digging into the dog's neck with his Inuzuka teeth drawing blood. The dog howled in pain and leaped at his master performing the "Tunneling Fang" technique that Noji used previously hitting disabled and delirious friend right in the head and knocking him out. The dog then growled looking at Mana.

"You idiot!" she huffed out, "Look at those boxes, what do you think is stored here!? Perfume! The secret ingredient herb you need is in there, just take it and carry it back to Konoha, have it analyzed and then just ask the hospital to give it to you every day."

The dog barked back at Mana growling and slowly approaching her.

"Aaaand I'm talking to dogs now, I wish I knew what he barked back at me…" the girl scratched her head angrily. "Look, if the perfume Yellow has can help you that means the perfume that the hostage's father has can too. I mean why would he just have a bunch of super expensive perfume stored in entire crates and target specifically an heir of a perfume tycoon and then not express any demands? Instead of killing and doing these horrible things for this guy you and Noji could ask Konoha for shelter, legitimize yourselves and after a brief sentence you could live normal lives. You'd live and no one would have to die because of it, you'd get your treatment every day."

Mana leaned to the side avoiding Sunomaru's tired leap at her trying to bite her neck out. The dog stood still and barked angrily back at her, it was clearly communicating something to her but the magician just didn't know what. "Look, I don't know what you're telling me but… Don't you remember how torn Noji was when he saw me die? If you died he'd lose himself but he's already losing himself even while you live with every horrible thing he is forced to do . There's no happy ending where you two are right now. Stand down and leave this room with Noji on your back and head to Konoha, take some of the perfume, hell, you've been doused in it with those wounds on you so you probably have enough in your blood to last some time already. Once Noji wakes up he'll explain it all to the hospital staff. You didn't have that much time to perform that many crimes yet, you can still legitimize if we vouch you were forced to kidnap the kid for the Administration."

Suno calmed down and walked up to Noji pushing the boy's bleeding face with his snout, Mana carefully crept up and placed Noji on top of the dog and added a handful of perfume vials from the boxes into Noji's pouch. The dog then barked something at Mana. His last howl sounded something like "Yellow" but the magician just dismissed it. "Look, I don't know what you're telling me, I'm sorry, I'll handle it from here, I still have some chakra left for one or two jutsu and I think now I can use my cards more efficiently cause that damned coat isn't in my way. If one of the others won I should have enough to finish them off, I'll save the kid for sure!"

The dog barked at Mana angrily again, repeating that last yellow-like growl. "It'll be fine… Look I don't get what you're trying to tell me, just go. I'll handle it." The dog shook his head and howled as if he was just mad at the magician for not getting his clue. Maybe he really did howl something about "Yellow" knowing well that she didn't understand his common way of speech, trying desperately to convey something important. Well, at least this ended without any more needless bloodshed, even Noji's busted jaw could be fixed in half an hour by a skilled medical ninja.

The girl then took a piece of Eiju's cloth and handed it to the dog's mouth to hold. "Look, if a young man stops you and tries to kill you, please show him this and don't fight him, he'll get the clue" she with a soft tone informed the dog and stroke its head. The dog licked back at Mana and then bumped her head as if it still held a grudge for not understanding him earlier. The white wolf-like dog then started moving on the path leading outside the bunker. Mana sat down to catch her breath and regain some of her stamina and what she could still muster of her chakra. If whatever this dog wanted her to know was this important she may have yet needed it.

The girl looked at the tattered and utterly destroyed Eiju's coat and sighed. "Eiju-san is going to kill me…"


	94. Memento No More

Kiyomi kept creeping around through the dark edges of the room. Her mind was all over the place, jumping from her own bleeding arm back to one floor above, wondering how Mana was doing. More and more the Yamanaka started wandering off. Maybe it was a genuine worry about the youngling's well-being or perhaps more her wish to not confront a young man that resembled her brother a little. While the realization that Roe was more prideful than protective did help Kiyomi look the man in the eyes, she still had several bonds that needed to be severed.

"My friend down there, the one facing your sister is a cruel and violent killer. She'll kill your sister and she'll do it very slowly and very gruesomely. It'd be for the best if you left and went there to save her." Kiyomi grunted out, her voice still sounded a tiny bit whiny over the pain and losing all that blood. Roe leaped out from behind Kiyomi, his feet kicked off of the wall giving the young woman some time to react properly and roll out of the way, clenching her tied bleeding arm.

"Cony can handle herself and if she cannot she isn't worth my clan's legacy. She is of royal leading bloodline, she has no right to die against a filthy Yoruma and if she did that'd be on her. I love Cony but it'd be her wish that I killed you and rebuilt the pyramid of my pride which you've toppled and made myself whole again" the man shouted out angrily. Trying to step back into the light when loud clangs and sparks of shuriken being deflected by his knife lit the area up for some time while Kiyomi moved into the light.

That was it – that severed all of the bonds, all of the similarities between Kiyomi's late brother and this man. Her brother was a little bit arrogant but more in a confident kind of way, he'd have never allowed his pride get in the way of his family. He even gave up his life, his promised dream of being the next greatest Yamanaka shinobi to ever come from that bloodline by fighting multiple opponents whom he had no hope of beating. He trampled on his own pride by choosing to lose, by choosing to risk it all for his little sister and his family. Now Kiyomi could fight this man at her full power without holding anything back!

"Multi-Shuriken Jutsu!" Kiyomi yelled by firing off a continuous barrage of shuriken that multiplied from the ones that she had already tossed, it was a simple C-Rank technique that most genin learned right after the Academy, one that didn't clone the user but cloned the tools they used to be used in larger quantities. Roe continued to deflect the shuriken, skipping just a couple. Kiyomi's chakra was large, larger than most genin in the village so she was able to fire off a much larger barrage than most users of this simple technique.

The cat-man pulled several ninja stars out of his shoulder and chest, the small spikes of the shuriken left small wounds but it didn't appear to reach beyond his muscles and cut any blood vessels which was unfortunate. Kiyomi hoped to sever one by hitting Roe in the shoulder's soft spot but she didn't hit it deep enough it seemed… The Yamanaka slapped her hands together channeling chakra through the hair she had cut previously, just in time she rolled to the side to avoid Roe's throwing knife that he tossed right at the center of her skull to intercept her technique.

Having faced off against the Yamanaka once already, Roe knew that she couldn't just pull her techniques off quickly and easily. Kiyomi needed a moment for her chakra to reach the hair and then connect the channel to her opponent, she needed time to fire off her clunky soul-like hollow figure when she used her clan techniques and missing it left her wide open. If Kiyomi only used those clan's hidden techniques she'd have never survived this long, it was only due to her physical prowess equal to if not surpassing that of her fellow genin that she managed to excel.

The girl grabbed a kunai in her other arm, holding the bleeding and injured one carefully in a cast-like position and lunged at Roe. He was injured and bleeding now, the girl needed to press that advantage and make him lose more speed, then when the cat-hobo is tired and bleeding out she could hit him with a clan technique and it'd all be over once she did. Roe's knife clashed with Kiyomi's the two clashed several more times in the darkness. The shadows of the room were occasionally lit up by the lethal dance of knives of the two ninja, now that Roe was injured Kiyomi could somewhat manage to not let up to him up close. Kunai style of knife-fighting only used one arm anyways so Kiyomi's injury didn't hold her back that much.

Roe leaped back – there it was again, the same trick twice. Just like the last time the cat-man let Kiyomi believe she could contest with him up close wishing to make her confident before he speared her gut. This time the Yamanaka leaped to the side and the spear got stuck in the steel piercing halfway through the floor and getting stuck in it. Seeing the spear tear through solid steel halfway in made Kiyomi shutter remembering that pain from before, it was a good thing that the three met Quack in this mission or it'd have been all over for the three of them ages ago.

Kiyomi pulled out a scroll from her belt, she opened it and slammed it onto the ground. The girl made the handseals and bit her finger until it drew blood dragging it across the scroll's surface leaving a bloody mark. Roe wanted to intercept but he had never seen that scroll or what was inside it, he was worried that his reaction was just what Kiyomi wanted when in fact it was the opposite. The Yamanaka predicted such a line of thought and had no defenses against that counterattack, that was why she simply played the right psychological game and got a little bit lucky to unseal what was inside that scroll.

"Lightning Style: Proximity Mine!" Kiyomi yelled out unsealing a technique she asked her friend seal into the scroll before she left on the mission. It was one used by her Inuzuka friend from before and it was one of his early favorite techniques. Having jutsu of both of her past teammates sealed in the scroll felt like they were always there for her, almost like they watched her back. Such thoughts were poisonous, those two goofballs were gone! Kiyomi now had a different team, it may have been just a temporary team but she'll be given a real one until the Chuunin Exams. While the young woman got rid of the toxic bond with her brother, finally being able to let go of his memory, she may as well have spilt it all out.

The lightning style sphere flew slowly at Roe, waiting for Kiyomi's order to dissolve into a larger storm of small shocking bolts that'd have been both a pain for the cat-man but also briefly stunned him giving Kiyomi an opening for a wounding close range attack. Roe jumped into the air tossing another spear to the ground finally ridding his body of those long and dangerous weapons. Kiyomi activated her teammate's technique but the spear acted like a lightning rod and absorbed the bolts inside of it burning up and dissolving into black dust and the tip playfully clanged as it got torn off of the steel floor and spun around from the force of the explosion. Just like that one of her teammate's memory was let go of!

Kiyomi dragged her finger across the scroll again letting her blood touch another symbol on it. Suddenly violent shocks erupted through the steel starting to tear it apart leaving large fractures and fissures – only the Earth Style of her sensei could've able to rip through steel. This was just Hanasaku's last memento for her student – a powerful A-Rank technique to pull her favorite student from a sticky situation when she'd need it.

"Earth Style: Tearing Fissure!" Kiyomi shouted when the fissure exploded from the pressure built inside the steel tearing large chunks of the floor and firing it off at Roe who was still in the air, descending. The cat-hobo covered his chest and head so that one of the sharp chunks didn't dig into his skull or heart. Toughening his body, augmenting it as much as he could so that the explosion of pressure on the floor didn't kill him, the shrapnel all hit the man but none of them drew blood, they all just made him yell in pain and leave sharp looking blunt force trauma all over but none of them impaled him like they should've – must've cost a lot of chakra. Once Roe's feet touched the ground the powerful force that was tearing the floor apart finally hit his body too. The lion-man lifted off from the ground yelling madly as his body contorted in the strangest of shapes, it genuinely looked as if the force would just rip him in two like a strongman ripped phonebooks.

Sadly the aftershock of the technique was not enough – Hanasaku's memento was also let go off. With the third stroke on her scroll Kiyomi sent the third technique – a large fireball, the signature "Great Fireball" technique of the Uchiha clan. Roe covered his body and took it all. The raging flames weren't that powerful, they were just an overflowing tongue of flames wrapping into a circle shape, not yet on the higher ranks where it formed a powerful projectile of a wrecking ball that exploded in a violent firestorm upon impact. A powerful dissolution of flames appeared to eat Roe up but once they cleared up it became apparent that they didn't.

The man continued to stand with his hair and his beard completely singed with the short remains of the hair still being in the process of it. His body was covered with burns from heated up steel tools that he carried around his body pressing against his skin once they've been heated up but the man's chakra augmentation protected him from getting third degree burns all over his body. Still, the injuries he took were huge, he also augmented his body multiple times as evidenced by his hyperventilation after the technique dissolved. Even after the flames had ceased Roe stood there with an X shaped block to protect his vital parts, slowly his twitching and smoking arms were pushed back and he took a fighting position again.

With a powerful fling Roe tossed a couple of throwing knives, Kiyomi was too tired, she only had the option of making sure they didn't poke her brain or heart out as she let them get stuck in the least-vital areas she had the time to pick for the projectiles to hit. The girl screamed out in pain and stumbled back. Roe's body blurred and flashed up to her, his kick aimed to hit Kiyomi in the side of her head knocking her out or outright killing her but the Yamanaka leaned under the kick avoiding it.

"Just go down already!" she grunted in pain throwing a strong uppercut under the man's raised legs straight into his groin. She needed to resolve to cheap shots, she needed to target his eyes, groin, any weak spot she could've found. She was stabbed by those throwing knives that while pretty short and slim still left their mark and would bleed her out in minutes if pulled out, she had multiple pretty deadly injuries and her chakra was approaching its limits.

Roe screamed out like Kiyomi had never before heard men scream. It was a similar scream to a wild cat being dragged across the pavement held by her tail. The man tried to toss several desperation counter blows but Kiyomi carefully dodged them, every time she twisted her belly or sides that had those knives in they burned like Hell itself but the Yamanaka persevered and kept on swinging. Several punches hit the man's face sending him stumbling back, then a finishing large punch to knock him out! Sadly the blonde lacked the physical strength to do so, even with slight augmentation she only sent Roe stumbling back even more where she intended to knock him down. The cat-hobo leaped back, Kiyomi stepped forward but something was wrong, she looked down and realized how lucky she was to have noticed the slower and almost alluring speed decrease of her opponent.

On the ground in front of her laid makibishi – small spikes used by ninja to pierce through their opponent's feet and either ruin the hooves of a mounted opponent or disable their opponents feet by making walking a living hell. Roe kicked off the ceiling after his leap, doubling his speed after realizing that his opponent saw through his clever trap, swinging his knife at Kiyomi. This wasn't good, the girl pulled out her own kunai, she couldn't move around much because she could've missed some of those pesky spikes – she couldn't move around as much as she wanted and was forced to just slug it out with a physically superior opponent. The knives of the two clashed, they were both extremely worn out – Kiyomi had a bleeding arm that she could only use for handseals and several knives stuck in her body, she was slowly losing chakra and blood and had more bruises than she could remember. Roe was also beaten up but also had severe internal bleeding from Hanasaku's sealed technique and was quite worn out by tanking that fireball with his body, something that also left numerous burns all over his body.

Kiyomi pulled out three kunai and tossed them forward. Roe leaned to the side avoiding all of them and letting them get stuck somewhere further in the wall behind him. Kiyomi pulled on the string making the string tied to the three kunai attached to the string in the blonde's hand tie a painful loop around Roe's foot. The girl then tied the string in her hand up to another kunai and tossed it to the ceiling getting it stuck in the wiring of some lights. Avoiding another desperate blow from her tired opponent and using the last of her willpower Kiyomi tied the wire with her final string pulling it hard while augmenting her arms so that the tearing and cutting steel wire didn't cut into her hands.

The result was her opponent hanging helplessly tied to the hanging trap on his one foot. The man tried to reach up and cut it loose but Kiyomi's punch knocked several of his fangs out and made him lose his large knife. Roe closed his eyes and made a calm expression.

"Your willpower succeeded. Kill me, your clan is found to be superior by fate, you've been selected as the victor."

Kiyomi turned around. "No. I don't want to, it'd probably be a good idea having in mind that I could pass out at any moment but…" the girl stumbled to a wall and slid down onto the floor leaving a bloody trail on the steel wall. "A greater punishment for you is to hang here until you regain your physical strength needed to tear the steel wire apart, you'll live the rest of your life knowing that I beat you fair and square twice. Maybe then you'll lose this stupid idea of pride and being the strongest and finally spend some time with your sister, I'm sure that she loves you and cares about you a great deal. Don't waste either of your lives with this bullshit, it's too short in this world of ours."

Roe relaxed before a wild burst of tension and his final powerful burst of chakra, that outburst of rage caused a powerful gust within the room that made Kiyomi cover her face and look aside. Once the rage burnt out the cat-hobo passed out and finally the prey had overcome the hunter. Kiyomi sadly grunted having realized that her enemy probably had learned nothing in the end from this encounter. The blonde closed her eyes and let the pleasant release of sleep take her over. Was this just her losing it or was it death? In her current state of mind the Yamanaka couldn't know or care.

"Shit…" she heard a familiar voice. "I think we're losing blondie here, I'll see what I can do but I may need to wake her up…" it was Quack's voice. Wait. Wake her up!? The Yamanaka heiress suddenly remembered the method used by this quirky Quack to wake his allies up and her eyes shot wide up, "I'm awake, I swear, I'm awake!" she yelled out.

Mana, all beaten and covered in wounds, having torn her cloak and standing there in her tattered remains of what remained of her uniform and some weird mechanisms that held decks of cards in them and were attached to her fingers that were now exposed. She must've won, even though it didn't look like it happened easily.

"Alright, though no way you're moving anywhere, blondie, I'm keeping you here and alive. With a couple Sanguine Pills and stitches you'll be up on your feet in a minute or thirty" Quack sighed with a shade of annoyance in his voice.

"Wait, how did it go, Mana?" Kiyomi looked at the girl, she was the one with the least experience facing off against the hardest odds as the man she fought was supposed to completely crush the magician's style of fighting.

"It's fine, I knocked Noji-san out and let his dog carry him back home. The dog needs Konoha's help with some medicine so it won't run away. I'm going on forward to help Hisako-san, the dog said there's something really important I had to know but I didn't speak dog… Whatever that language is called, if whatever it said was so important Hisako might need help, you stay put for now while Eiju-san patches you up" the magician explained with a worried and friendly voice.

"What did it sound like? The dog's message?" Kiyomi asked, her teammate was an Inuzuka, after spending so much time around the two she picked a couple of things from the two. When she linked herself with the two of them on the mental link she could compare the thoughts to the words they said to each other which helped her grasp the basics of the Inuzuka communication. Dogs had a system of howling, barking and growling that formed words, they were responded with normal human language which they understood. Kiyomi knew the basics of the Inuzuka dog language, she hoped that maybe she could've helped.

Mana tried to repeat the message with the best of her effort. Kiyomi slapped her face making Eiju who was stitching her up look at the Yamanaka angrily.

"The underwear is what!? I don't think you said it right, try again…" Kiyomi growled angrily at her friend. Mana apologized and tried again.

"Okay this isn't even… You didn't even get a single word, none of those are words dogs say…" Kiyomi grunted again.

Mana concentrated harder. Repeating the growls and barks and howls perfectly.

"Yellow is hospice?" Kiyomi wondered repeating the message out loud. Mana's eyes then shot open instantly. She jumped onto her feet and rushed to the lift, bashing at the button that was supposed to activate the mechanism to murder the hostage. Kiyomi tried to jump up and yelled at Mana but then a hidden door opened at the center of the wall with light emanating from below leading to the deepest underground floor.

"What does this mean? Why would the hostage killing button do this?" Kiyomi asked Mana who turned back at her friend with horrified eyes.

"It's not "Yellow is hospice", it's "Yellow is the hostage"…" Mana explained, "If he tries something on Hisako-san she'll freak out and when Hisako-san gets freaky she gets murdery, she'll kill our hostage. Even if he is this "Yellow" guy, we need him alive, our mission is to bring him back alive!"

Kiyomi tried to stand up but as her wounds and her stitches burst more blood shot out making the blonde dizzy. "You can't go there. If Hisako does indeed go mad… You'll be getting in her way – she'll kill you."

Mana looked at Kiyomi and then at the staircase. "She won't. I saw her fight, I know her moves, she'll be tired and I am no longer the Mana whom she faced back in that forest. I need to save the life of the horrible bastard that manipulated us all so I absolutely won't lose."

Just like that Mana ran off, her body disappeared in the confusing downwards spiral of the staircase leading down.

"Well… Magician's dead… Too bad, she was kind of cute, may have tried something with her in a couple of years." Quack gruffed out in an ironic tone making Kiyomi squint at him angrily and then grunt in desperation – she had to be there. She had to help Mana. No matter where she'll end up – facing Yellow or Hisako, either two of them were bad endings…

"I thought dark haired girls weren't your taste…" Kiyomi angrily shot back at the medical rogue fixing her wounds, right now he was her only hope of getting back at her feet and helping Mana solve this nonsense once and for all.

"Are you mental, lovely, all girls are of my taste, I must've been high when I told you that, or I'm high now, could be either one really…" the Quack replied in his weird dull and annoyed tone while he stitched Kiyomi's stab wounds.

"Is there any use complaining about your work ethics now?" Kiyomi asked ironically.

"None. I'm too poisoned and drunk to remember it in the morning, in my defense, you made me wait your fights out until I saw that dog. It was cold…" Quack replied finishing another stitch.


	95. Viva le Revelacion

At the other end of the tip of Hisako's extended blade was the little man everyone was so afraid of and hating at the same time. It would've been just so easy for the woman to flash forward with all of her speed and cut that person down. Just when the Yoruma started wondering what was the use of having that hooded dwarf alive, Yellow reached for his hood while his other hand held firmly on the handle of his sword that he wore by his side. Hisako was pleasantly surprised that she may have had the pleasure of killing yet another person that day, by now she had made peace with the idea that she may have only had only the boring part of traveling back with the hostage to deal with.

"Aren't you worried about your friends up there? Go on, rush to their aid, you won didn't you?" Yellow's squeaky voice came from under the hood right as he pulled hard removing it and tossing it aside in an overly dramatic fashion that made the dark cloth linger around his face in the air for a while.

"No offense but you're a really bad fucking backstabber. I see your intentions from a mile away, the tip of my blade is all you're getting, I'll reserve my back for someone I decide to get fucked from behind by." Hisako grunted angrily still pointing her sword straight at Yellow's face from the other end of the room.

Finally the hood hit the floor, right on top of Cony's emotionless corpse covering the poor young woman up. It wasn't that Yellow cared particularly about that yet another victim of this cruel messed up world, it was more that his garment landed there by sheer luck covering the unsanitary and slightly frightening sight of death up.

Yellow stood there looking Hisako straight in the eyes. The dwarf behind the cloak turned out to not be a dwarf at all, his short stature was not because of a disorder that the man had but instead due to his age – Yellow was just several years into his teens. His nickname must've come from the kid's golden colored hair and strange, almost purplish hue of his eyes combined with his golden locks made the kid look almost a little majestic and regal. He wore quite unusual clothes for a rogue, wearing a white shirt and a strange leather vest, that was not an attire of a combatant, not of a ninja anyways. He looked like an overglorified jockey.

"Well?" Yellow shrugged his arms, moving them away from his long but incredibly slim sword sheathe. Hisako blinked a couple of times in confusion.

"I'm sorry, are you expecting a fucking compliment of your looks or something? Sorry, kids aren't of my particular taste, between the categories of "fuck with" or "kill on sight" they lean more to the latter" the woman replied.

"You stupid bitch" Yellow cursed not really suiting his young age, "I can't believe someone can be so incompetent! I mean I sort of expected ninja peasants to be as dumb as a cow shit sniffer but not to recognize your own mission objective personified is beyond hogwash!" the little runt yelled back at the woman angrily.

"Oh, so you've escaped captivity and dressed like a goddamn opera villain, good for you, let's go home now" Hisako swung her swords around getting ready to sheathe them when all of a sudden Yellow leaped at her pulling his strange sword out and thrusting it right at her eye.

With a near effortless movement the Yoruma leaned out of the way, getting a bit of a better look at the boy's sword. It was a sword possibly as long as two thirds of his whole body but it was as thin as a needle. Hisako was almost intrigued to see just what sort of toy-sword this toothpick was but she was surprised by how quick its thrusts were and how the blade became near invisible in mid-movement making it look like quite the trouble to block or dodge properly.

"You stupid poohead!" Yellow shouted out thrusting again and again, Hisako dodged each and every thrust without much trouble, resisting temptation to yawn playfully somewhere in the middle. "Is it that hard to understand that there is no crime lord named "Yellow", it was me all along, me using the money of my father behind his back to hire mercenaries to intercept perfume shipments, to find me a rogue ninja band, to neigh like blasted horses when I tell them to!? I did this, it was me all along!"

Hisako leaped back with a graceful, almost dance-like pounce and straightened her hair out which was starting to get into her face from all the leaning to the left and to the right quickly. "Okay, "poohead"? We would've needed a lot of vocabulary training to teach you how to fucking curse. So wait… If you're a criminal that means I can just kill you, right?" Hisako wondered to herself, barely even looking at the young man who was giving his all trying to kill her.

"That's right, you could because I'm really dangerous! I managed to muck up father's business enterprise by working through my mercs from behind the village walls, communicating only through children who were daring enough to venture outside for a hundred ryo or two. I am the worst criminal in the history of Konohagakure!" Yellow boastfully laughed lunging at the woman who just moved to the side and slapped the boy with the back of her hand sending him down on the floor.

"Well, you're technically a "criminal" so at least you got that part sort of right…" Hisako smiled to the sight of the infuriated child getting back on his feet and grabbing his rapier again only to continue his offense. Hisako had to hand it to the boy – he was sort of fast for someone not at all familiar with chakra augmentation or actual ninja physical training, he also had that strange thin sword that disappeared from her vision after reaching a certain speed of movement in mid-air.

"And now that I pit you three wenches against my band of unbeatable rogues who weakened you before you beat them I shall pick you off one by one using the skills I acquired planning for this day. This is all going according my plan!" the teen laughed out with the same degree of arrogance in his voice that he had made his own in those couple of exchanges of words with Hisako.

"It's a terrible plan, you planned for your rogues to get beaten? What kind of a retarded leader plans like that? Why would you plan to lose?" Hisako taunted the kid dodging several of his thrusts again when one of them actually nicked her cheek, that invisible sword was starting to become a bother and she actually was getting slower despite what she may have wanted everyone else to think.

"You hypocritical wench! How dare you of all people, a Yoruma, tell me sacrificing one's pawns is a disadvantageous move? That is exactly how Yoruma plan: sacrificing one's allies to land cheap blows, getting hurt just to find an opening in one's opponent's body! I've read many strategic guides and those written by Yoruma were simply the easiest to understand, give up something insignificant for something great!" the boy continued thrusting again and again until Hisako was forced to draw her blade and actually block the boy's attack or else she'd have had it pierce right through her mouth.

"And now that you're weakened I shall kill you and leave the bodies of the three of you here, then I'll melt one of my subordinates in the bath of acid I've prepared supposedly for the "lonely and scared hostage" so that everyone will think that I am dead. This will be the perfect withdrawal underground!" the teen started laughing as he continued to explain his plan, particularly acting up and mocking the part about him being the scared and lonely hostage. He finished his relentless assault of thrusts with a swing from his elbow right in Hisako's abdominal area but she barely felt it, it was just because she had wounds from the previous battle that it forced her to stumble back a little and get even more on the defensive.

Hisako drew her second sword and took a fighting stance, it was about time that she showed this young brat what exactly he was dealing with. Hisako lunged forward pushing the boy's counter thrust with one blade and elbowing him straight to the nose then kicking him to the other end of the room. She reckoned that'd have been enough to crack his skull and cause some serious injuries before the two other slackers got there and they could've decided what they wanted to do with this.

"Your "flawless" plan has one flaw, among many, I am not weakened. Not by a wide enough margin for someone of your skill to even leave an actual scratch. The only tags you can mark on me are those that I let you achieve" Hisako's body blurred leaving multiple afterimages in the air wherever she moved. From each side the girl's real body mixed into among the afterimages and started pummeling the boy using her punches and kicks, she pulled them severely, just what she deemed enough to teach this arrogant and murderous brat a lesson.

After Hisako finished her assault and watched the brat's knocked down body for signs of fighting spirit she noticed him getting up again. With his nose busted up and bleeding, with several bruises and black spots all over his face and wherever he had skin exposed to hit he was standing.

"My tutor was a foolish woman, I hated her with all of my guts and told her many times I need no lessons from her. I kept fighting using my own style of fencing, I assume in this tough spot I may give her lessons a shot…" the brat mumbled out wiping blood off of his lip and nose. The boy's body shot forward multiple times faster than he was before, Hisako's eyes widened in surprise and adrenaline rushed her tired body to deflect the countless thrusts. Using both of her blades she managed to do that but the boy's increase in speed surprised her, if he had this much strength in him, so much talent, this fight may have excited Hisako, this may have just been on!

What a strange boy this "Yellow" was. He had the talent and was taught skills of exquisite and quite exotic swordsmanship he called "fencing" yet he used his own stupid and sloppy style. Improving his posture and legwork according to the instructions of this "tutor" of his as well as holding the toothpick sword of his properly made so much difference he may as well have been a wholly different person. As blood and tension flowed through the woman's body she realized that the excitement for battle would make her lash out, attack the boy with all she had and that would've only ended one way – with his dead body by her feet.

A painful puncture made blood burst out from Hisako's shoulder. The boy was reckless and in a lot of rush so he missed her vital blood vessel but he stabbed her successfully. Had his sword been heavier, had a wider edge, it may have actually taken the assassin out for good. No. Fuck holding back, this brat brought this, he was too good to fuck around with. Hisako decided to let herself off the hook, unleash herself and throw everything she had at the extremely thin and wobbly wall hoping to tear it down, no, she knew it'd fall.

Without even flinching the woman's cheeks dyed red with rushing blood, her pupils dilated and she lunged forward with a swing of her curved sword. A single swing from the left, blocked, another much stronger from the right, blocked again but the boy was struggling, his small sword was quite puny and transferred much of the force right into his arm, he couldn't have kept on blocking for long, some pressure would open him up like an Academy girl after giving her a daisy and calling her pretty. Hisako's swings widened, she repeated her left and right double swing combination, this time putting more and more force into it and the boy stumbled back falling on his butt.

Hisako spun like a whirlwind making Yellow fall on his back and hope that her arc didn't cut him in two. Bunch of his hair flew all over the place and were shredded to bits by Hisako's two bladed spinning attack. Yellow crawled back and picked his sword up again. He was breathing heavily, yes, Hisako knew that face, those eyes, those pale cheeks and that tremble – he was afraid to die. Had it not been for his much hated woman tutor he would've long since died. This kid had so much talent if he was able to defend against one simple combo from Hisako just relying on lessons he ignored during his training. He was so much talent and so much arrogance with no hard work put into it. Yoruma training would've destroyed the youth, it'd have killed him. Or it could've made him stronger, after all, Yoruma trained their children by fighting them for real, if Yellow picked his hated fencing lessons style up because of threat of death, maybe he'd have excelled being pressured all his life instead of being pampered…

"Tell me, kid, who is your "tutor"? If she was able to give you this much skill just on lessons you ignored, she must be quite formidable, sort of makes me want to fight her instead of wasting my time on you…" Hisako looked at a bunch of golden hair floating down on the floor with a cruel and devious smile. The kid gathered himself back up and took a more defensive stance.

"You would not know her, she is a swordmaster from the Land of Snow… The only person I've ever seen wielding this kind of sword." Yellow replied preparing for another clash. "She was strong enough to thrust her blade so swiftly that she made air itself into small projectiles, she called it "Air Bullets", to me it was quite stupid obviously, my own stances were quite superior to hers in all ways possible but I would like to try it now if I'm honoring her…"

The youth swung his slim toothpick of a blade around raising it above his head. Now he pretty much was just looking to get his gut itch scratched with a point of a blade. Hisako dashed forward with all of her diminished speed attempting to impale the boy on her swords at the very end just as she had nearly done so to that Yamanaka previously and as she finished that whip using woman before. All of a sudden Hisako's blade just froze in the air, it was like air itself formed a cushion to absorb her sword. With a quick jump forward and a thrust aimed at her chest Yellow attempted to take Hisako out. The girl grunted.

A loud flesh cutting noise echoed through the floor, followed shortly by a noise of a liquid splashing on the walls. Only those that would've been close to the two combatants could've possibly seen what was going on inside there.

Mana kept on running down, for some reason this shortcut wasn't nearly as short as she had previously thought, it went around several different rooms, one had a large container filled with what appeared to be acid, at least Mana's visual inspection of the large container could've explained that much together with the story that the band made up about the hostage actually being locked in a container similar to that one. It also had several strange empty rooms, some of them had dog hair and uncleansed dog poop, the other one was much different, much more personal.

It had two beds placed on the differing ends of the room. The rooms didn't have much furniture but this one had two bed cases with pictures on top of them. While having little time for such matters the magician took the time to give the pictures a brief glance. They had strange images inside of them of some people she had never seen previously, a young boy with quite exquisite and excessive for his age body hair, looking similarly to that man which Kiyomi had knocked out on the second floor. The other people inside that photo were: a little girl, just a bit younger than the long haired young man and two people – a man and a long red haired woman. They looked so happy… Mana could only wonder what may have happened for them, knowing the location where those photographs were held on only suggested that nothing good. Most stories in this twisted world had sick and depressing endings so the magician decided not to go too much deeper into details of the rooms. Maybe she was better off not knowing.

Mana continued to run down the staircase, she saw another room on the way down, some strange room that looked almost like a throne room of some kind, she saw several like that before. Sometimes the downwards spiraling staircase changed into a long round corridor leading her in circles and then starting to spiral down again. There were many of those strange confusing throne rooms in those corridors. Whoever designed this bunker really liked to sit on a different chair every couple of hours…

While rushing to her friend's aid Mana wasn't exactly sure what she was rushing for or what she'd find when she makes it down. She believed that Hisako could best her challenger, after all both Kiyomi and Hisako were such powerful and amazing ninja, if someone like Mana could beat her challenger who was perfectly placed there to beat her, so could those two. On the other hand could Hisako best the brat's plan, what could've his plan been? Would he come at the assassin himself? Would she find the two at each other's throats or one having recently killed the other? Mana dreaded that last thought the most. She was determined to save everyone's life in this, she refused to even thing about the prospect of someone dying while she wasn't there. She'd just blame herself, blame herself for not winning faster, for not going down there faster and not for preventing that death. Despite exhaustion and pain all over her body Mana kept on running…


	96. Crash Course

The sound of blood dripping on the ground repeatedly ran through the ears both of a young woman kneeling and struggling to keep her body on her feet and a bratty teen behind her. Hisako looked at the expanding red stain on her shoulder and grinded her teeth in frustration. The technique that the brat used was way too advanced for him, once again it must've been something he was showed by his tutor but something he never perfected by himself. Both his execution and follow up of the technique was highly questionable, for a moment it may have gotten dangerous but the Yoruma assassin was ready to beat that technique of his.

He used chakra manipulation, people untrained in manipulating their chakra could do it, obviously, but their control was all over the place. They couldn't sharpen their techniques, their degree of polish was pretty much non-existent and they wasted much more chakra on the simplest of techniques. It was only because of chakra's nature as an energy that all living beings produce using their chakra network and chakra nodes inside their bodies that this kid can even use such impressive moves. Most likely he himself had no idea of what he just did. Losing against someone like this would've been pathetic at best.

"What's the matter? Your heart gone soft?" Hisako taunted the kid by grunting out her insult through her grinded teeth. That fool leaped at her right when her blow was absorbed by the pillow of air that his strange sword movements formed. It was an impressive technique – using circular motions of one's sword to form a pillow of air by combining natural air circulation with chakra manipulation. The pillow was at its toughest at the sword's tip and got softer as it went deeper, that meant that it was perfectly crafted to absorb all blows and thrusts – the tough shell blocked and softened the blow while the weaker air mass inside absorbed the shock.

"No, I just felt like showing you the superiority of my form over the lacking one of my tutor's..." Yellow returned the reply after a brief moment – he was breathing much more heavily, as suspected even a single small use of chakra drained his untrained body and taxed it unreasonably. Had this kid listened to his teacher he may have been a pretty tough swordsman, he has impossible one-in-a-million kind of talent for it but he lacks desire to hone it, he also is incredibly arrogant considering his own flashy but stupid moves to be superior to those of his tutor's.

"You fool, you could've stabbed me straight into my heart the moment you absorbed my blow, that's the way in which the technique is used – you form the wall of air to cushion the blow and then when the enemy is open you thrust it. You could've killed me yet you played around."

The brat reacted with arrogance to Hisako's explanation. He remained on his knees even going as far as to sheathe his sword for a moment and turn back at her. "Oh, so I assume that now you can understand my complicated forms and counter them?" the kid asked with a confident smile. Hisako was wondering what to do further. The arrogance of this kid made him impossible to fight, he was basically giving up. He wasn't strong enough to beat Hisako even at her worn out form, even if he took it seriously but he was toying around too. This fight was completely useless and so stupid that it completely squished any desire of Hisako's to kill this idiot. She'd probably do it anyways but she'd take no pleasure from it. Murder just for the fucks of it, that was a new one for the raven haired assassin.

"I do, I know how to beat it too" Hisako informed the kid deciding to end it quickly. The young woman pulled two throwing knives from her belt, the knives that the Yoruma used were not the usual kunai knives, they were much thinner, almost like made from a thin single layer of steel. That way they had much stronger penetrative power than the usual kunai that rarely went all the way in. Swinging the knives around her hands on the rings at the end Hisako quickly launched them at the boy. Yellow drew his sword and blocked the knives, Hisako repeated the movement tossing more and more projectiles at him.

Eventually the kid spun his rapier once again and blocked the knives using the same technique again. The tips just barely broke through the thickest layer of air and got bounced off by the softer part of the protective cushion. The knives were flung right back at Hisako, the woman leaned to the side to dodge her own deflected knives, one of them hit the wall and fell down far away from Hisako but the other one hit her in the cheek leaving a cut. The Yoruma touched her cheek and looked at the blood on her fingers. She was getting slower, her reaction time was falling significantly. Fighting two strong opponents would do that to a person, even if the second one is more lucky and talented than he is skilled.

"I guess you got jack squat after all" Yellow laughed out before breaking into a streak of huffing heavily. He may have noticed it already – his untrained body failing to keep it up.

"Nope, I got you. Usually I'd just stand here casually bombarding you with knives from afar, shrieking like an Academy girl on her first date each time you tax yourself to that technique trying to block it until you eventually either die of exhaustion or a knife is stuck into your eye. Then I'd just come in closer and disembowel you like a hunted down animal up close. Strangely I feel little excitement about killing you so I guess I won't play the enjoyment game, I'll just end it..." Hisako spoke out in a cold and indifferent tone. The assassin spoke of murder as if it was just as casual as washing her dishes.

The brat swung his sword around and tried to force an arrogant smile. "I'll believe it when I see it" he replied. Hisako drew both of her blades and playfully spun them around in her hands pointing their tips right at her opponent.

"Yoruma Hidden Technique: Dance of the Night" the woman mumbled under her own nose, her lips twisting so briefly that one who didn't listen carefully would've missed the woman naming her technique. The dangerous thing about weaponry techniques and taijutsu techniques was that some of them used no hand seals which made them difficult to see coming. One had to be looking for signs on one's body or one's mouth, pronouncing the name of one's technique to alert their own body, to sort of use it as a mantra to get one's body into a mode fitting to perform the technique.

Hisako's figure leaped forward, almost twice as slow as she was before, incomparably slower than the flashing dark blur she was when fighting Cony. However this decrease in speed was not due to her exhaustion or numerous injuries, it was instead because of the technique she used. She was purposefully moving slower, she wanted her blade thrust to be blocked, it was how Dance of the Night worked. A single block would cause Hisako to quickly boost her speed, forcing the opponent to block again and again, causing them to be locked into an eternal circle of blocking until they tire or open up for her finishing strike.

The boy blocked the first strike from the right, he was as dumb as the Yoruma perceived him to be, or perhaps more arrogant, those two often treaded side by side. Using her second blade Hisako swung from the left, blocked again, then another swing from the right which was blocked also. The boy was at least smart enough not to use his dangerous defensive air wall technique – he realized that Hisako saw it. She saw through the technique, she knew that techniques that focused on less concentrated strikes and much more on continuous combinations of strikes had a chance to outlast the technique and also leave the enemy without a chance to counter the first block.

Hisako's lean and strong frame jumped slightly up in the air, letting her blades and arms extend and spin. She acted like a masterful dancer, her strikes were so precise and while she gave the boy a lot of openings she was picking speed up. That was the nature of her Dance of the Night – while the technique was incredibly slow to begin with it picked up speed at dangerous pace, within moments it made the speed even greater than the maximum speed of the user was before. A skilled Yoruma could contend with even the highest ranked opponents. Even a sword-wielding Sannin could've found the technique troublesome to keep up with. Still, it came at the price of reduced speed early on, as well as taxing the user's chakra and body continuously even during its early stages.

The spinning attack was also attempted to be blocked but Hisako's accumulated strength was too great, each attack that was blocked, avoided or otherwise did not hit its mark only boosted her speed creating an endless offensive loop. The puny and thin sword of the boy bounced off hitting him in the face, if it hit him with its blade and not the blunt part it'd have cut into the bone, quite likely, now it only drew some blood from the areas that were cut by his own blade. Within seconds, no, fractions of seconds Yellow's face was covered with blood. Hisako's momentum could no longer be stopped by an easy block. She was becoming a problem.

The Yoruma swung from the left, Yellow leaned back, his defenses opened up. Hisako could've finished it right there, just thrust her sword lower and stab him in the chest. Still, she wanted to finish the dance, if she attacked him right now she risked leaving him alive, she didn't want that, she'd finish the dance, she'd let it go only when her momentum could sever the boy in half, then she'd cut at his limb and chop him down like an annoying weed.

Double slash from the right beat the sword out of the boy's hand, using both of her swords and both of her arms doubled the increased momentum crumbling the boy's blade. Yellow pulled a short shoto blade from behind and tried to use it to defend himself. Hisako leaped into the air, spinning both her arms and legs, functioning almost like a horizontal propeller. There it was, the air pillow again – while Yellow avoided possible decapitation and evisceration he still used out his ace defensive technique, his shoto was too slow and short to properly counter Hisako and the woman had gained far too much speed. It'd all end there.

Another double slash slamming the boy's shoto out of his arms and making him scream in pain from the shock of the impact. It caused small shockwaves to emanate and bust smaller wooden debris into dust further away – it must've busted several bones which was the source of the boy's violent reaction. Hisako spun again, Yellow ducked and moved in behind her but he didn't have time to properly counter. Even if he did, what could he have possibly done being stuck in this endless loop of death? While he was still winding up his punch Hisako's speed which had gathered to degrees no longer comprehensible to the boy helped her already leap onto her arms tossing the sword up and catching them by their handles using her thighs and shins. Using her arms to spin her upside body around Hisako made a powerful tornado of death. Yellow squealed like a pig being thrown backwards and falling down covered with wounds. Blood started accumulating on the floor forming a small pool.

Hisako breathed out and kicked her own swords up, flipping back on her feet and catching them. She took a small breather to catch her breath and approached the boy, ready to finish it by thrusting her blade through his heart. Just one effortless motion and all this bullshit, all of this suffering of having to put up with those two other bitches would be over. Hisako raised her blade and thrust it right at the boy's chest. It'd all end here, this useless mission, her having to put up with Mana and Kiyomi, everything! Technically it'd be considered as a failed mission because their only objective is to bring the boy back alive, still, Hisako was never the one to care much about objectives.

The woman's arm froze for a moment. Seeing the boy frozen in place, beaten and awaiting for her finishing blow to end it all reminded her so much about her first mission. It was common among the Yoruma to invite youngsters like Hisako had once been, right after Academy, to accompany an older and more experienced assassin into their assassination mission. It wasn't that the kid did much, mostly the dirty assistant work, sometimes the older assassin sacrificed their little assistants if they got caught and booked it themselves leaving the youngster for a painful session of torture, humiliation and death.

The man that Hisako accompanied was this really big and important assassin. He was old, maybe closing in on a hundred years yet his lack of facial hair or any hair in general combined with his strangely small amount of wrinkles made him look twice as young. The man had trouble walking which made Hisako wonder just how could he assassinate someone. His cane had a hidden blade inside and he used a lot of strange knife sealing and unsealing techniques to compliment it but that was for fighting scenarios. Assassinations required one to be lightning fast, agile and incredibly fast on their feet.

And so the man did the usual Yoruma thing, he activated a seal in the middle of a town square unsealing bunch of hidden blade dispensers firing knives straight at the target, enough to kill him multiple times over. The target died before realizing what had happened however just as Hisako suspected he sacrificed her to grant him escape, pointing at her and informing the guards that she was the assassin and just carelessly walking away. Why would the assassins not buy it? She had hair of such dark hue of black that it was weird enough to be that of a Yoruma, Yoruma were known for their exotic and extreme shades of hair colors. Her face tattoos and multiple scars over her body also testified it, who cared about something a Yoruma said or did, right? Who cared if the girl pleaded and swore her innocence? She was just a Yoruma, just a child born in a filthy clan of murderers and assassins who had no human feelings, what could she have ever felt? Yoruma had no right to feel fear or pain, just kill or get killed themselves, being bad mouthed by their living clansmates as being "useless".

Hisako killed them all, each and every guard, the more they badmouthed her, the less they thought her to be a human being with emotions and feelings, feeling betrayed and afraid of her own life. The less they treated her a human, the less human she was. With each offensive word her hatred increased, with each drop of hatred her strength flared up even hotter. That was a trait very common to Hisako, she felt like a person, she felt pain, regret, wanted to love and hate like normal people but the less she was treated as such, the more she rebelled. If someone called her a "monster", "Yoruma filth" or similar, they only saw that same side of Hisako. People expected her to be a monster, someone beyond the range of human emotions and so she acted like that. Entire life just stretched to fill the human expectations of her. Sacrifice of her own humanity, trying to please everyone around her, trying to fit the grave dug for her and failing. The more monstrous she became, the more other people treated her as monster. An endless cycle of losing her own humanity.

Hisako's blade was thrown out of her arm by a small projectile accelerating and hitting right at the place between the blade and her arm. So close to her arm that it left a small annoying cut on her hand that held the sword and was exposed to the assailant. Hisako quickly leaped back picking the sword up on her way and turned at the source of light that came from a corridor. Just outside that corridor and having just entered the basement floor stood a girl.

A relatively short girl, even if Hisako was short herself, a slim one. The girl's hair was black, not as black as Hisako's but much messier, maybe she was running for a while before she got here? Her clothes were torn up, she once must've worn a white shirt of which now only strips remained, she had some strange mechanisms around her arms and several on her chest, they were connected to other pockets, other mechanisms, it looked like some early stage of an exoskeleton suit designed to help a person to walk but it was filled with small switches and boxes. The boxes had small traces of projectiles being placed inside them, the projectiles looked like... Cards. Hisako's glance turned at the card that got etched into the ground after cutting her hand and making her drop her sword. The girl who looked almost like a magician, wearing a top hat which strangely enough avoided any damage that ruined her attire and left her body covered with bleeding wounds and bruises was just standing there, angrily staring at Hisako with pouted lips.

Mana finally got to the lowest floor and faced Hisako, stopping her from killing the boy...


	97. Swords and Magic, Literal and Otherwise

The piercing glare of Hisako tried to kill her teammate before she could get her swords to do that. The assassin was infuriated that her kill was interrupted. Before that happened Hisako didn't care much about killing the boy, but now that Mana challenged her decision by attacking her and cutting her and disarming her temporarily it was personal. Seeing that unconscious boy now made Hisako fired up to kill him, not because he was worth it, but because Mana didn't want her to. That bitch dared challenge her decision and interrupt her battle and that gave the boy's death some sick rebellious meaning.

"The fuck you did that for, idol-bitch?" Hisako grunted out angrily at Mana, her tone was calm and cold, not the likes of which are used when addressing one's friend, much more that used in addressing someone you're about to murder. "Just cause you won your battle doesn't mean you have the right to butt into mine. I beat him fair and square, his life is in my hands and he's just too much of a dick to leave his throat uncut."

"I stopped you from making a mistake, I stopped you from making yourself the monster that the people around you think you to be. The monster I know you're not" Mana replied in an equally serious tone. She didn't know if she could take Hisako on, usually if both of them would be at top shape, Mana would've stood a chance in her mind. The magician saw Hisako fight, knew how her skills worked and while she missed a couple of her more recent fights the one against her and Kiyomi gave her enough to work with. Now with her hidden mechanisms all exposed and her uniform with all of its hidden pockets burnt up and torn, with her chakra drained up and her body burnt, battered and bruised… This could've been problematic.

Even if Mana saw Hisako fight, even if she predicted that the assassin would become a problem at one point, foreseeing that exact scenario since they set Hisako free from her binds – the assassin wanting to kill someone on Mana's watch, even so this fight wouldn't be pretty and the magician wanted to avoid it. While Mana knew how to fight her assassin friend that didn't make it alright, she'd still be hurting her friend.

Hisako kicked Yellow aside. Mana's hand twitched and a card appeared in her grasp almost instantly. Luckily enough for her the strings firing off cards and placing them in her hands still worked. The magician thought that Hisako would try and murder Yellow but the assassin just kicked him further away making space for the inevitable clash that the genin tried to avoid.

"Humor me…" Hisako grunted in a murderous tone, clashing her own swords against each other. Shaking bunch of blood off of them as well as a flurry of sparks. The assassin's blades were dyed rusty yellow, they weren't like that before – must've been a reaction to some nutrients in blood, something meant to intimidate and opponent. These weren't normal swords, they must've had quite a history behind them and it was unclear how Hisako got her hands on them, nor did it matter.

"This whole time I never viewed you as a monster, as a senseless killer. You were always just a ninja who wanted to do the right thing, just went about it differently. You go about things in usual ways, classic ninja mindset. You have no shame killing or offering your body if that gets the job done and those are the ninja values we've been told to work with. Even while you killed and cursed inventing new way to express your rude thoughts through combinations of curses I never knew to be possible, you've always done the right thing. You wanted the same things we did, you just had your ways of going about it." Mana replied.

Hisako swung her swords at her lazily, Mana flicked her hands up shooting a bunch of cards and then another switch that hardened the string behind them, making an improvised blade of cards stuck together that clashed with Hisako's, the woman forced her swords forward, grabbing and tearing the device off of Mana's arm with her bare hands and crushing it without much effort. Only her cold murderous stare right into the magician's eyes.

"I attacked you two bitches in the forest. Was that also "for the right thing"?" the assassin asked sarcastically. "I mean I certainly see your dead disemboweled body as being for the better but it may not fit your sense of justice…"

"You were testing us. Missions beyond the wall of the village are brutal and you wanted to see if we could be trusted, if we were able to handle it. If the two of us couldn't best you, more so going easy on us, restraining yourself so that we don't get killed, we had no place in this mission. After all Fifth is known for her lack of maturity and evaluation of risk, she may have as well sent two newbies into such an assignment…" Mana replied. That much was apparent, judging from the likes of enemies that Hisako managed to slaughter later on, the assassin must've held back significantly during that brawl, both Mana and Kiyomi did hold back as well and it would've made no sense for someone of the level of Hisako back then to beat a whole group of mercenaries without even getting injured.

"Even more, later on you made sure that we don't get killed, you risked the integrity and shame of your own body to make sure that we get the aid we need. You did everything in your power to make sure the deal with Hachi goes through and when it didn't you killed every bastard threatening us" the magician added taking her hat off and making a handseal. Bright purple light lit up the basement room as the girl pulled out a wand the length of a short sword or a lengthy knife. It had a bright greenish blue gem on the end, something she acquired during the time spent training after Team Oak split up. It didn't have much things special about it, it was quite sturdy and looked magical enough to be used during Mana's performance. The gem on the end could've been used to bludgeon someone but such use was not fitting for the magician's character.

"I just made sure the mission goes through, all I needed from you two was to make sure that the mission is completed!" Hisako shouted out lunging forward and swinging her swords at Mana's face, the magician leaned back successfully avoiding the swing but Hisako's swing continued as the assassin picked up speed using the momentum to boost her force. The girl thrust her wand forward blocking the second strike, her lungs started getting short on air and she wanted to avoid being caught exhausted and winded. A loud clang echoed through the room with the sparks lighting up the angry and determined faces of both young women facing off.

Mana would've stood no chance just fighting the assassin off using her wand, Hisako was buying time, she was using the talking time to get her breath back together acting like she's trying to kill Mana when in reality she was just playing around to make it look like Hisako is fighting for real.

"You saved us after we took on Hachi, you kept on helping us out throughout the rest of the mission even going as far as to save a young man from his life as a slave! You gave him hope for a better life, don't you get that!?" Mana lost her cool throwing cards left and right, those were just simple blade tipped cards, Hisako rolled to the side, blocked some more but two of them dug into the girl's body. The Yoruma grunted and cursed rolling behind a pipe. Mana furiously pressed the advantage on, unsealing a whole deck of explosive cards from the pocket space inside her hat and throwing them at the pipe. As the cards cut through steel leaving holes powerful streams of heated steam made Hisako yell in pain and move away from the pipeline.

"I know the kind of person that you are, the real you. You're a kind soul who has been oppressed and called inhuman filth for your entire life who just wants to rebel against everyone who calls you that. You have much love, much care, hurt and pain inside you yet no one sees that and it angers you. So you lash out, try to become an anti-social monster they take you for to fit their expectations, to make them at the very least love this twisted version of you instead!" Mana continued to attack Hisako with blade tipped cards, wearing the woman down from long range. The assassin tried to leap in and strike the magician down but a card stopped her from gaining momentum. Speed was not something instantly acquired, it required chakra control and body augmentation but even more – it required time and space to pick up. A speedster like Hisako needed to move, to pick speed up blitzing all over the room before she moved in at unimaginable speed to strike her opponent down before they have time to react, by intercepting that space and time with a well-placed projectile Mana denied the assassin her speed. The magician predicted this encounter long ago, she had plenty of time to think this through.

"That may be true, it may be all lies. Either way – I want to kill this rogue, so does that high and mighty Yamanaka bitch. Either I'll kill you and then him, or the two of us will beat you for that kill either way and while the blondy is busy with the boy I'll slip a knife between your ribs. Ninja who protect a life of a rogue are rogues themselves, a rogue has no right to live, the life of a criminal is that of an inhuman filth who only wastes everyone else's air!" Hisako roared out. That was one thing Mana tried to avoid, getting the woman angry. Anger and hate were Hisako's steroids. It made her ignore injury, it made her force through any odds to kill her enemy.

Hisako lunged forward, a simple steel tipped card wouldn't have done it now, Mana threw an explosive card, Hisako formed an X shaped block with her blades and augmented her body. The explosive force made the assassin shoot out from the smoke sliding back, doubling the distance between the two. Mana was in no worry to run out of cards, she had a couple of decks in that hat of hers and while unsealing them would've cost her some chakra that wasn't the main worry – it was time. Once the magician ran out of cards she'd need a moment to refill, would Hisako give that moment to her? Probably not…

Hisako roared forming a handseal and flipping her hand, five throwing knives flashed in her palm and then got launched at Mana. The magician threw a bunch of cards at the knives intercepting them in mid-air. Hisako's twisted smile colored her face in the emotional shades of absolutely terrifying. The girl's fingers twitched, "Yoruma Hijutsu: Shot Bladeworks!" she grunted as the small sources of light enlightened the wires tied around her fingers that sent the knives back directed at Mana.

The magician slammed her arms together. "Mystical Bubble Jutsu!" she yelled out shoving her arms to the side forming a protective bubble of wind chakra around her that deflected the knives. After the exchange of blows the two young women just continued to stand and huff at each other, each saw the weakness and exhaustion of another but none of them were confident enough to capitalize on it. Mana weaved some handseals, looking Hisako straight in the eyes with most sad look, she wished none of this fight between friends. This fight caused major callbacks to when Shimo was fighting Sugemi, back then Mana was hesitant to involve herself, she may have been injured but she shouldn't have let that get in her way, had she been less afraid of her own power she may have resolved the fight earlier, somehow prevented the downfall of Team Oak.

The magician threw a bunch of cards at Hisako, the woman easily turned the blunt side of her sword and deflected the three projectiles lunging at Mana and slashing at her chest. A gash opened up and blood splashed out all over Hisako's face. Mana's scared face twisted as her frame collapsed on the ground. Sadistic urges took over the mad Yoruma assassin, she continued to hack and slash at the collapsed teammate again and again, cutting off her limbs and cutting deeper into the already dead corpse of her teammate. A couple of cards whizzed through the air digging themselves deep into Hisako's back, the assassin woman leaned forward as the injuries of that day stacked up to bring her down.

"It seems that this illusion is fairly effective on the more sadistic opponents. It made you completely unaware of anything around you…" Mana's voice echoed as the girl glared angrily at her partner who was down on one knee huffing and coughing up blood. The magician once again used her "Scary Trick Jutsu" to slip into a state unseen to her opponent, leaving only her copy behind, an illusionary clone that appeared to get killed when in reality it was just a phantom. Just a figment of her opponent's imagination. Hisako fell for her illusion perfectly. That injury must've slowed her down, the cards left pretty deep wounds, they were thin and cut quite deep. Hisako didn't even augment her body, she may have been warned by her instincts but purposefully didn't trust them because she saw her dead friend right in front of her, she chose to get more kicks out of slaughtering the fake Mana some more and paid the price.

"You're fucking annoying, like a fucking branch of a chili tree stuck up my irritated ass with the pepper burning it from inside!" Hisako shouted out, turning at Mana, getting back on her feet through the sheer force of will and firing that disgusting fire of a maniac desperate to kill his prey before going down. There may have been no besting Hisako as long as Mana was drawing breath, the only way to knock her down so that she didn't stand up again may have been the permanent one…

The assassin jumped forward, no, she simply disappeared, reappearing instantly right up close to Mana, accelerating from her slowed down state to near instantaneous movement within mere fractions of a second. She must've poured chakra into that augmentation, Hisako raised her blades to an upwards slash, Mana had no time to block or dodge, her reaction time simply couldn't comprehend that attack, she never even realized what could've happened however her body worked without the approval of her brain augmenting her body with a powerful burst of chakra, the blades slid through the girl's body like they cut into rock, the bursting chakra of Mana's elevated chakra level formed somewhat of a forcefield on the girl's skin, Hisako's swords would've killed the girl with one cut but now they only left shallow scratches. That was how the bodies of a ninja dealt with faster than their reflexes blows, as long as they had the right amount of chakra, the body could've augmented the endurance even at instantaneous rate however if the chakra wasn't enough it would've amounted to nothing.

Mana's body was thrown down onto the floor, the magician finally realized what happened and tried to roll back, Hisako leaped forward again trying to raise her blades upwards and impaling the girl on them, lifting her body off the floor. Mana leaned back avoiding it, after using such a mad burst of chakra Mana was sure that her opponent wouldn't risk ruining their chakra network with another augmentation, she just avoided the upwards thrust by leaning back and dashing backwards. Hisako's kick drew air out of Mana's lungs, momentarily whiting the girl's eyes out and drawing blood to burst from her injured stomach. Mana slammed into the wall leaving a small dent. Her body shook in a creepy twitch as it hit the ground. Her will kicked in.

"Get up and fight, she'll kill you if you won't!" the magician's mind ordered herself. Her body refused to move however, what chances did she have against a Chuunin, more so, one on the higher tier of Chuunin? One who had killed everyone in her way to the top? Mana lifted her head up, she felt blood coming up from somewhere internally, she must've almost gotten killed from that one kick alone. Her long hair got in the way of her vision but her tired eyes with blood running down on them still saw the blurred sight of Hisako holding her sword above the boy's back.

"Oh? Have you passed out yet? Had enough? Well then, allow me to do my job then bitch, now that you've been reminded who's in the right…" Hisako shouted in a cold and emotionless tone. "Just sit still and admit you've been wrong and maybe I won't execute you for protecting a rogue. He may not be a rogue ninja because he's not a ninja, but he's a criminal, he's dangerous to the village and to himself."

"Should I relax? Just let her kill the boy? Just lay low, admit defeat and maybe live? Do I have the right to live if I let someone die?" Mana thought as she felt her stomach burning up inside of her, she felt blood running down from everywhere, something inside her was crushed, something was wrong. Mana felt badly, felt like dying several times in her life but never like this. Never have she felt her own body burning up from inside. What was crushed? Her spleen? Her liver? Her kidneys? Either way she was dead, it was just how she accepted that death that mattered. "Can I just lay here and die, watching her kill this boy? Kill him before giving him a chance to redeem himself, before he is mature enough to realize what he had done with his own life and those around him? No… No I can't, sorry, body, I can't"

Mana's body flared up with chakra leaking out. Her hands moved by themselves. Hisako looked surprised at her beaten opponent, only for her eyes to white out, suddenly Hisako fell on all-fours and started licking her palm. "Polymorphy Jutsu…" Mana whispered completing her illusion. The magician forced chakra through her body, leaping forward with the strongest kick that her body could muster up. Her body couldn't move anymore, it was moved with chakra alone, what little that she had left. Mana only knew a single low ranked taijutsu technique, it was time that she used that. The magician let her chakra run through her, move her body, she submitted to her flow that moved her forward and guided her, she may have died later on but that didn't matter, only saving this boy's life did. It was never about Mana making it, it was about the conditions of how she passed.

"Spear Kick!" the girl roared, her internally burning with pain body mustered up one breath to yell out the name of her attack proudly to dig her foot from up in the air deep into Hisako's gut, she was thinking of herself as a cat, she didn't augment herself because cats didn't usually manipulate chakra. Her body took all of Mana's strength. Hisako's body got kicked down through the layer of steel, peeling it like it was paper. The body of the assassin hit something that looked like a throne chair and dangled on it, Hisako may have broken her back as her eyes were closed and blood ran down her nose and mouth as well as several other spaces.

Mana's body weightlessly collapsed. The magician lifted her head to look at her friend, Hisako grunted and tried to move but could only slam her body down to the floor like a sack of potatoes. Mana forced her body up, she didn't care if she broke her body's chakra network. She'd die soon with those internal injuries and even Quack couldn't help her, what did it matter if her chakra network burnt out due to abuse of augmentation? Most ninja used it sparingly, once or twice per battle just so they didn't die or landed a technique that really needed to hit. Mana was a bit too much of a novice to use it at all, her higher than usual chakra level may have ensured that she wouldn't burn out but it was still dangerous. Now she had no choice.

Mana approached Hisako looking at her from above, her opponent was down, blood was slowly forming a tiny pool around the woman's head. Suddenly the body flashed, a black blur, like a hurricane. All was resolved in just a moment, victory changed into defeat. Hisako was on her knees and the tip of her sword was inside Mana's gut. The magician's chakra augmentation ensured that the girl's body didn't get completely skewered but she still got an injury, one that made her body helplessly collapse on the ground. The girl's conscience slipped up, switching from here and now to some other time and other place.

"Death… So that's how it feels? I've been nearly killed before but never like this? I was never feeling it happening, crawling up my neck, wrapping its fingers around my throat and suffocating me, looking me in the eyes with joy and pride. Pride of snuffing out the last daughter of the Wandering Ninja…" Mana thought to herself, her eyes opened up, her conscience returned, her first sight was her own hand, covered in her own blood. Then the sight of Hisako climbing up the throne, reaching up for the collapsed floor she fell through. Her body must've been just as broken as Mana's was, what kept the assassin going? Was it her will to kill? Was the will to kill stronger than will to protect? It couldn't have been. Mana's eyes closed, a smile twisted her face into an expression of bliss.

Hisako reached up for the torn shred of steel of the floor on the other level, she pulled her body upwards with just one hand, the throne chair fell down, shaking around and leaving the assassin's body dangling in the air. "Mystical Wings Jutsu!" an annoying whiny and bratty voice of a young girl echoed behind her, Hisako let go and turned around, the last thing she saw was Mana's body, dropkicking her right in the chest using the empowered kicking force of the wind that usually propelled her body from the ground. Hisako's body slammed into the wall and the powerful stream of wind drilled her deeper still. The woman's head bashed mercilessly into solid steel knocking her out instantly. She was lucky to stay alive.

Mana's tired and broken body fell down on her back. The magician clutched the stab wound on her gut, her breathless head weighed down to the right, her eyes closed. She knew she did good, at least as her final act. She fought a vastly superior opponent in every way and managed to protect a young soul, one that was dark and twisted but one with hope for redemption. The girl was a believer in second chances, hell, even third ones if it was possible. Mana was a lot of things, she kind of wanted to be all those things for some longer but her body didn't listen.

"Just close your eyes and go to sleep… You deserved rest" her last thoughts ordered.

 **Happy Holidays, I thought long and hard for ideas for a special Christmas Chapter but I couldn't think up of anything so instead I did a 4000 words longer chapter. I was never that good at writing people just celebrating something plus Christmas probably don't really exist in the Ninja World so instead I chose this idea. Hope you'll like it :)**


	98. Love and Genocide

**Fourteen and a half years ago:**

A lonely man was sitting on the armchair. His place reeked of cheap alcohol, there were several clay flasks of emptied sake all over the floor. A mass of unfinished lunch that reminded more now of slime than it did of waffles which it began its existence as lay dormant on the table, just couple of hours short before life would flourish on its surface making it dangerous to eat. It wasn't that the man cared that much of safety hazards of the edible food variety. In his line of work tainted waffles were the least likely thing to kill him.

The man flipped the flask of sake tied down to his arm, it was comfortable to drink it that way for drunks. One didn't have to constantly hold it in their arm, one flip of the flask, just a gentle movement of arm and the disgusting flammable devil's elixir poured all over one's mouth. Filling one with that feeling of disgust and regret but at the same time relief, satisfying one's desire for self-destruction, making their self-pity somehow feel better. As if the drunkard screamed to the world: "I'm miserable, so what, you may hate me but I hate myself even more, so fuck off".

Even with the more comfortable drinking mechanism on the man's arm, his arm twisted in a way that let the booze spill on the floor as he forgot to close the flask before lowering his hands. The man cursed but ultimately felt too drunk and lazy to fix it. His apartment already looked like a shithole so what's a little sake on the floor? If anything the liquor will serve as a decontaminant for all those bacteria and insects on the rarely cleaned floor and carpet. That furry thing was there before Nakotsumi Tsukumo could remember, belonged to his father, or maybe even his grandfather.

The man decided to pour his next drink, he spilled the contents of the flask on the floor, clearly he was too drunk for that kind of drinking to continue so perhaps a change in habit could somehow slightly give him some sharpness of thought back. He hoped desperately that this night would be nothing like the nights of the last eight weeks, nights when he drank himself until passing out, waking up covered in his own vomit, cleaning himself up and going to work. People looked at Tsukumo and hated him for being a drunkard slob, they called him a mess. They were afraid of him and pointed fingers. They didn't hate the man half as badly as he hated himself. He drank because he wanted to kill himself but lacked the guts to cut his own throat. Sometimes he got so drunk that the guts toughened, the man tried to kill himself in one of his traps, "Konoha's Great Trapster" they started calling him after Tsukumo became one of the more notable genin and approached the day he'd be called a chuunin even.

Yet every time the man tried, every time he failed – a drunk mind just couldn't properly set the darned thing up and Tsukumo always passed out. They called him a mess, how does one not become a mess after being involved in a literal genocide? Following and gathering intelligence on a band of people tied together by bonds of family – "Wandering Ninja" they called themselves. It was Tsukumo's information that helped their entire tribe to be killed, just snuffed out, stabbed and slit their throats in a coordinated fashion one rainy night. All of them but one woman, Hokage was merciful enough to spare her seeing how Tsukumo got involved with her. The worst part that it wasn't even Tsukumo's word that saved her, it was Hokage's own skills of observation.

"Tsukumo" he said, "I've heard you've been hanging out with this Kei of the Wandering Ninja". At that point the genin was ready to admit he was involved and slept with her numerous times, he was ready to let go of her, he was that sad and pathetic. Admit it all and let her die with the rest of her people, "Don't worry, Hokage-sama, it won't be a bother" was the best that fuckwad which was Tsukumo could come up with. Hokage allowed her to be spared, he said that even the Daimyo was fine with one woman surviving, after all – one woman was not enough to keep the purest form of bloodline alive. Even if those muts could be considered a clan before, with all of their mixed blood, they certainly won't be now, not for real.

A loud bang woke Tsukumo up, it must've been early morning. The man wouldn't have woken up if it wasn't, booze tends to knock him out good. The genin looked at the pieces of his glass and the damaged wall, he must've flung the damned thing pretty hard, he was proper pissed last night… Slowly dragging his feet and feeling worse than a dog having swallowed a bucket of banana slugs and a toad on top he staggered to the door, Tsukumo's head was spinning, he felt like he was going to literally pour out his stomach and innards on the floor if he as much as thought about it or opened his mouth. It's alright, he deserved to suffer, he deserved death for what he was responsible for…

Tsukumo opened the door. There she was… Short, dark purplish shade of long hair reaching the lower parts of her back. Kei of the Wandering Ninja. Tsukumo tried to slam the door but her hand got in the way. The man pulled it tougher, slamming the door on her hand and pressing hard, the woman grunted and barely restrained her scream of pain but she held it there, the bleeding hand was shaking but the woman left it there – she was desperate to get in.

"Look if you want to kill me for what I've done – be my guest… I've been trying to but I'm too much of a dirtbag to throw myself off of a cliff. Fucking excuse me for not having the guts to off my stupid face." Tsukumo spoke, he was right, just as he opened his mouth and opened the door he threw up close to the woman's slippers. She stepped back letting his torrent of vomit just barely slip from hitting her wet and transparent white shirt. Kei locked her hands on her chest and helped Tsukumo get back on his feet.

"I can't kill you, I wanted to, I mean… But you saved my life, similarly to how you can't end yourself I cannot kill a man who loved me so much that he saved my life from… That…" Kei spoke softly. Her hand moved onto her stomach. "Also, I can't kill you until you help raise my baby…"

Tsukumo's eyes widened, he jumped back on his feet and looked at the vomit, trying to swallow the following up reflex to throw his poison up again. "Scuse me, what?" he asked looking at the woman who gently took him by his elbow and dragged him inside his own home to hide both of them from the rain and closed the door.

"The child, two months…" Kei smiled looking at her belly with those most lovely eyes that Tsukumo got in love with.

"Fuck… Two months? That was… Fuck…" the man cursed stroking his lengthened hair and nearly clawing his own eyes out from dealing with the shock.

"This child was started on the worst night of my people, it's either going to be someone great or someone genocidal, either way, it's gonna mean something, I just know it" Kei looked at it before tears started bursting down her face. She turned away and crept up closer to the door, gently tapping her forehead to the tough wood and starting to cry for real.

Tsukumo cursed again and hugged the woman from behind, gently stroking the belly where his child was growing. "What's wrong?" he asked, he didn't feel nearly well enough to be dealing with the hormones of a pregnant woman but that was his life – responsibility and hatred. Hatred for himself for taking that responsibility up. He was warned about what that mission to gather intel on the Wandering Ninja would do to him. Still he went with it… He wanted glory, he wanted a shortcut to the next rank and being someone who caused a genocide in the name of the village was that shortcut. This world awarded the worst scum there were and if that was the truth, Nakotsumi Tsukumo was the worst there was. Maybe even worse than those who actually carried the mass assassination out.

"I can't, Tsukumo, can't you see? What kind of an ignorant ass would bring her baby into this pathetic and sickening world?!" the woman cried out, her heart was still aching, she still hasn't forgiven Tsukumo's betrayal. After all the man got involved with her while working behind her back to gather intelligence on her people which was then used to slaughter them all out just because the Daimyo didn't like them and the fact that they were people who loved freedom most of all things.

"You're right, this place sucks, everything about it is disgusting and it may be for the better if that child would never be born to see it how it is. Imagine the hatred and grief in that child's heart when they hear that they were started on the night that all of their people were slaughtered for refusing to be subjugated. Imagine its disappointment when it learns to not even belong to the tribe of their people, that anger for its own roots when it learns to be the child of their only survivor and the man who handed the dagger to their killers… We've failed our child before it was born, we've failed to give them a world to live in, only this… Just as we were failed by our parents and the list goes on…" Tsukumo rambled stopping a couple of times feeling like he was about to throw up again but barely managing to keep it in.

Kei turned back and hugged the man she loved, even with all that he did, she still loved him. "Then give me a senbon and I'll end it. We'll spare our child the suffering of being born, we'll spare it of the realization of the failure of our ancestors and its own parents…" she cried out pitifully.

"We have no right" Tsukumo's voice thundered it out, this wasn't the voice of a drunk who was responsible for a mass murder, it was the brave and strong voice of a future father.

Kei's shocked and surprised eyes looked her lover right in the eyes. She kissed him passionately and then shook her head in disbelief.

"I mean… Our child will probably hate this place, they'll probably be the cruelest and meanest bastard and let this world seep into their veins. I'm sure them being started on the day of a genocide isn't a good sign but… If our child will hate it or love it, it's a fifty-fifty chance. If we decide for our child it will be a one hundred percent disappointment and death. It may be too young to know anything yet but it will still be failure. We'll let this cruel world get to our child before it is even born, we'll show them the twisted side of this world before they even understand what is happening. No. I'm going to accept this responsibility, I'll answer for what I've done, I'll raise this child and be the best father at the same time while I fix this somehow… All I ask for is that you also give me the chance to be your husband. Look at this place, without you I'll fail. Please give this a chance… I'm not asking you to forgive me for what I've done, it's unforgivable. I'm just asking for your help in fulfilling this responsibility."

Kei hugged Tsukumo and kissed him again several times. Right after her sweet lips moved away from those of the genin he felt a powerful blow and saw a broomstick in her hands. "Look at this dump, clean yourself up, my future husband!" Kei laughed out through her tears handing the broom to Tsukumo who laughed out and picked it from her hands.

 **Several Days Ago:**

Kiyomi looked at the sleeping body of her teammate, her chest just barely lifted and deflated showing some signs of life. She must've been cold. The girl crawled up to her friend and covered her up with her own jacket. Kiyomi looked at the fire and moved in closer. She was fortunate that the Quack and Hisako saved the two, they'd have died if they didn't butt in and heal them. That Quack had the craziest healing methods but at the very least because of him Mana and Kiyomi are currently alive. Despite having met him just a day ago the young Yamanaka already trusted him more than Hisako, not that it was a tough limit to beat…

The young man looked at her and took a pill of some sort. He squinted his eyes and his skin got paler, for a moment it looked like he was dying as he started to choke and struggle to breathe and his blood vessels shot out but then just that moment later he started breathing again and his pulse got back to normal, only his pale skin still reminded the Yamanaka of this young man's strange ritual. She looked at him with a questioning glare. While Hisako was out getting them food she may as well have gotten to know the guy.

"Sorry, lovely, not your damned business… If you're a junkie of some sort, you can't have any, it's mine and I don't like to share" the young Quack replied, it wasn't that his tone implied rudeness too, he appeared to feel more annoyed than anything else.

"Story for a story?" Kiyomi smiled. The Quack laughed out sarcastically as if mocking the blonde, he must've doubted that she had an interesting enough story to deserve his own.

The blonde looked down, she was acting out of line, this man was just a rogue. Even more he kept on treating her and everyone else like dirt, he didn't even as much as look at Mana after stabilizing her condition, she may as well have died on his watch and until Hisako or Kiyomi ordered him to look at her he wouldn't have cared one bit.

"It's poison, I need it to kill something worse inside me, something that together with killing me is also healing me so that it can thrive and kill me longer, that's the short version, lovely…" the Quack replied quickly, he moved up closer to Kiyomi tightening the belt of his coat. It really was a cold evening. The rogue medic reached for her cheek.

"What's this?" he asked looking at it, "Looks black, bleeding black's the color of "I'm fucked through the bunghole" he examined it.

Kiyomi pushed his hand away and wiped the dirt off of her cheek. "It's just dirt you dum…" before she could finish her sentence the young rogue kissed her forcefully. Kiyomi's fist dug deep into his jaw sending the man down and rolling a couple of meters back. She was ready to kill him before the man lifted his head and spat a couple of teeth out before giving her that innocent missing teeth smile.

"Now you've paid for that story, lovely…" the Quack laughed out. He then came back to where he was sitting, Kiyomi kept on squinting angrily at him preparing to punch him in the face when he as much as twitched his damned lips. A goddamned rogue! He may have felt bad about it and he may have been forced into his servitude and he may have had no choice, he may have wanted to justify his ways and legitimize his work becoming a medical ninja but he was way out of line. She was an heiress of one of the most elite clans in Konoha. She should've killed him where he sat!

"Although now that you mention it… I mention it… Whatever… I guess I'd kind of like to hear your story. That punch felt like… Yeah, that didn't feel "stop kissing me, you creep!", more like "you killed my daddy, prepare to die, criminal scum". As sad as the story sounds, we've got plenty of time before the dark haired bitch comes back, may as well share stories while we're at it." The young man shrugged.

"Fine, but if I see as much as another movement I don't like I'll shove a handful of those poison pills down your throat, you may need them to survive but I can't imagine you liking that much of them!" Kiyomi whipped back at him angrily.

"Aw, don't be like that, lovely, you know how we criminal folk are, don't have lot of time to live our lives so we get right to the point. No need to feel bad if you don't like rogues, once I'll legitimize and start treating you, maybe wear that fancy doctor uniform I'll be all yours, I give you a 66% promise" the Quack winked at Kiyomi. The Yamanaka just wanted to punch him, beat him, maybe even kill him but… He was a medical ninja, a rogue one but still she and Mana owed him their lives. He may have been a womanizing scumbag but he at least deserved several more chances Kiyomi gave most not to piss her off.

"Alright, since you wanted to hear it, listen up…" Kiyomi started her story, telling the Quack all about her early childhood. All about her mother and her days of tending to the gardens and being pampered like a little flower by the clan elders, being prepared for becoming the next heiress. She went on to tell the young man all about her brother, how strong and amazing he was, how he took it upon himself to fight every enemy of the clan, how he took the responsibility of training Kiyomi and helping her graduate and become an actual ninja. Everything about him. How he eventually became a Justicar, an international version of a Hunter Ninja who didn't hunt for the profit and convenience of the village but instead to uphold the various international codes and laws of justice written before the villages were even built, some of them even by the First People, and how he died protecting his family after some criminals wanted to get at him.

Kiyomi did get a bit invested in her story, her eyes started watering and her body started shaking. She didn't even notice Quack's arm wrapping around her to calm her down. After finishing her story she took a couple of moments to realize it still. Kiyomi's elbow slammed right into the young man's face sending him down again. Whatever skills he had with medical ninjutsu seemed to heal his facial fractures and injuries quite fast, maybe it was the same skill that helped him overcome his poison? Either way, once again he stepped over the line. The blonde stood up and walked towards Mana intending to check up on her. "Stop this nonsense before you get hurt. I'm an heiress of the Yamanaka clan and one day I'll marry someone of high status as well… I've no right nor the desire to even look at a rogue medic like you, be it play or actual shot at me…"

"Heh, never say "fuck off, criminal scum" before you see me in a medical ninja uniform, lovely…" Quack writhed out through the pain of fixing his broken nose.

Kiyomi didn't want to admit that she cracked a grin and just barely restrained her giggles.


	99. The World of Bastards

Kiyomi grunted taking another painful step forward, she was rushing it. She felt like Mana was in trouble and felt responsible for helping her friend out. She didn't quite know the source of that responsibility, she barely even knew her friend, hell, they didn't even start off that great. Still, getting almost killed together twice in two days makes even the shakiest of friendships get hardened fast. Mana revealed herself and dumped her advantage back when they were fighting Hachi, Kiyomi's well-being was more important to this girl than victory, than her own life. She'd rather risk her safety and life than have Kiyomi suffer and that notion surprised the Yamanaka.

There weren't that many people like that. This world was a world of bastards. Bastards everywhere one went, ready to place their leg in front of you to trip you over, ready to drive a stick into your wheel to make your carriage flip over. That was just the human nature, in this world the death and suffering of one meant advancement of the other's position. When one ninja died, others got their work. If a ninja messed up their assassination that work was not only transferred to another, the other one had to pick up their assignment and they had to do it faster, before the target successfully managed to strengthen their security and destroy the chances of mission's success. That made the mission rank higher, that made it grant the ninja who completed it great fame and higher reward. It was a sick society where loss of one was a victory for everyone else.

Mana was different, she sacrificed everything and was willing to sacrifice more, she lamented not the fact that she gave everything up for the well-being of others but because she didn't have more to give them. Every time she gave everything up so that someone else could live better she felt bad because she didn't give them enough. If a person lived because of her actions, she was sad because that person didn't live a better life or because they had to suffer in the first place.

It wasn't even that she was delusional. The strange case of Nakotsumi Mana was that she perfectly realized the nature of the world around her. She didn't have naïve illusions that everything around her was made of cotton candy like everyone thought, she knew it was sick and messed up. There was no surprise in the face of this magician when Hisako yelled out her tirade of how sick this world was before going into the tent of Hachi's, no, Mana was almost bored by those words, she just looked back at the woman with a confused and slightly angered look. She knew how it really was, somewhere deep inside, she did know everything. Yet she didn't change one bit of herself. She was kind and giving by choice, with full awareness that this way of life had nothing but suffering and loss for her. People like this didn't deserve to fight their friends and their enemies and die, they deserved…

What did they deserve? Did they deserve to be in charge of the whole thing? Did they deserve the whole world for being like they were? Probably not. That'd diminish the meaning of Mana's mentality. The magician was kind not because she wanted to be in charge, she wanted to be that way because she wanted everyone else to be more like that. She saw the problem and decided to change herself so drastically that the others would only take a small fraction of her mentality and that fraction would still be enough to change and solve the problem. She was a hero of overacting with the kindest of intentions. Kiyomi wasn't sure of what people like Mana deserved, all she knew for certain was that it most certainly was not death.

"Do… Do you think Mana died?" the Yamanaka asked, her voice whimpered.

"Not sure, she's a dumb brat but if she's one thing, that thing's slippy like a bloody viper. I'm not sure if she can even die, every time I think she dies it's just a stupid trick or some ploy or…" the Quack spoke, for a moment there Kiyomi saw some speck of emotion in his voice. Usually he spoke in this incredibly indifferent and sarcastic tone but now he did have some desire to get there in time. He helped Kiyomi walk down the steps, much slower than Mana must've in her crazed rush to save everyone but they would get there in time, they had to!

"Yeah… She may be crazy but in my experience silly people are sometimes the ones you wanna be around the most…" Kiyomi smiled thinking back on Hanasaku, her silly sensei who was probably busy filing papers currently. Knowing that a person who couldn't count to thirteen without losing her track and focusing on a squirrel somewhere above was handling the logistics of the village was scary but at the same time strangely hilarious.

"I think why her dumb antics work so well is because she's a martyr, at least tries to be. She always tries to get killed, throwing herself in danger and so the enemy is supposed to take from it that she wants to die, so when she apparently kicks the dust no one expects her return… For a medical ninja people like that is the worst plague ever" Quack smiled again, he was really getting into this emotion thing, Kiyomi couldn't turn her eyes from the man's smile, not because she fancied him or anything but because she had rarely seen him smile unless it was the smile of the sarcastic kind.

"Good thing you're not a medical ninja then. For a Quack people who get injured are the best, aren't they? I mean you guys get paid for treatment by the contractors, you're like an independent medic for those who can't go to the village hospital so people like Mana pay for your food" Kiyomi replied finally witnessing the end of this horrible shortcut. It wasn't a shortcut at all, it actually took them at least ten times longer to get to the basement the way that they chose, they wasted even more time because Kiyomi was still injured and only had some stitching work and basic medic work done on her, some battlefield operations and quite skilled patching work but very spontaneous and erratic nonetheless.

"By the way, you don't really need to hold me, I can walk by myself perfectly fine…" the blonde squinted at the Quack suggesting some dirty play from his part.

"Nonsense, lovely, if I don't hold this lymph node here on your chest it's going to metastasize into your thyroid and you'll die of Huxley fever" Eiju smiled slowly moving his hand from the suggesting position it was situated in.

"That doesn't make a nick of sense and you know that" Kiyomi angrily pushed the man back and applied some pressure on her aching ribs slowly moving forward. The Quack rubbed his elbow angrily having bumped it into the wall.

"Jeez, if all ladies are so smart in the village I'm gonna have a problem, usually most rogues are around my neck the moment I say "subdermatoglyphic"…" Eiju sighed.

The eyes of both shot wide open in surprise seeing a little kid trying to slowly book it right at them. He was stumbling, must've been pretty cut up, blood was everywhere on his clothes and he had some pretty nasty bruises but the fact that he was booking it meant that the other two were either down or dead. The boy pulled a long and slim blade preparing himself to slash through the two, Eiju evaded his thrust and pinched an area on his thigh, also adding a slight thump on the top of the boy's knee sending him down on the floor screaming like he was getting murdered.

Kiyomi looked at the Quack pretty impressed, usually quite a large portion of Quacks were just that – actual quacks. Most of them were self-taught or taught by people who were self-taught medics. It appeared that Eiju may have been a Quack who knew his way around some medical things and also used some of the more unconditional Quack methods. He was the best of both worlds. He even knew how to work pressure points apparently.

"Holy shit, we should've taken you with us…" Kiyomi looked at Quack surprised after she tied the boy down and went on to examine the place.

"Nah, I'm pretty glad I didn't go, danger isn't really my thing. I only fight disabled or elderly when I have at least four mates to back me up. That's the medical ninja way. There are some dick rules about that for the village medical ninja, to stay behind the fighting ones, right?" the Quack asked examining the dents in the walls and blood all around the room. The signs of a very large scale battle taking place were apparent: the perfume boxes were busted so the place reeked of blood and the perfume combined making that vomit inducing combination. Any Inuzuka would've been disabled just entering this room alone.

"Yep" Kiyomi nodded finally noticing the hole in the middle of the room, the lack of decent lighting in the area made it really hard to notice.

"Well then, that's my kind of a rule already, just kick back and relax while everyone does the bloody murdering for you…" Eiju placed his hands behind his head, acting as if he was already relaxing on a soft pillow of air. Kiyomi's face paled all of a sudden and she dived down almost instantly, she was shouting incomprehensible things. She couldn't be blamed – she saw something horrible and she was afraid!

"Oy, blondie, so what are we singin?" the Quack shouted loudly into the dark hole, hesitant to jump in, letting the girl do the checking of how deep the hole was and what's below for him. "We singin the "Olė's" or "God Bless the Dead"?"

"Get your lazy ass down here right this instant!" Kiyomi's angry voice came back at Eiju – she was bloody furious. Seeing how Eiju still wanted to keep her as a list of possible dinner mates later on the young man just shrugged and leaped down.

The view there was horrible, dark and smelly, that hole however only reeked of blood, there was none of that perfume mixed in which was a welcome change. Kiyomi was kneeling and pressing her head close to Mana's bleeding face, occasionally checking her chest for a heartbeat or trying to desperately cover up the girl's bleeding wound. The Quack knew how it looked, that stab wound looked dangerously close to the girl's heart, it may have been nicked even…

"So, the three really did kick each other's asses up… Sad. I like ladies more when they're making out but that's just me and every other sane male individual…" the Quack slowly walked up to Hisako feeling her pulse, examining her with his eyes was stupid, the room was dark enough to make specific details too hard to comprehend but just tempting enough to try it, still, wasting time was not good for anyone in medical profession. He was in it for some time and he knew when stuff was going to fail.

Quack's hand carefully rubbed around Hisako's body, sight was tricky, with this deceitful shade around him he needed to use touch for his diagnosis just like that blind medical guy in that one mercenary band he served on. He didn't feel any fleshy wounds and those few he did feel were well covered by her own chakra augmentation. He had a specific diagnostic technique in his arsenal but he decided to save that for the magician girl – she was undoubtedly in the danger of dying so he had to get the lesser attention grabbing case off his shoulder first.

"Yep, the hot one with the scars is alright. She's got a motherlode of all concussions though, may as well not recognize your ass from the Hokage, her eyes are late to respond and she's got a small puddle of vomit near her head, she's knocked out for good but she's gonna make it…" he gave Kiyomi his diagnosis for Hisako. Usually a concussion of this magnitude would've been dangerous but the woman was a ninja with a healthy instinctual chakra augmentation response, her body was already recognizing the injury and doing its best to self-solve all the life threatening or life-altering problems.

"That bitch is the least of my worries, she might choke on her vomit for all I care! She almost killed Mana!" Kiyomi yelled back trying her best to give any first aid she was taught to provide in the Academy. It didn't look good, Mana looked completely knocked out with the parts of her skin that weren't covered in blood pale like the moon, which having the girl's complexion in mind didn't look remotely good.

The Quack gently flipped Hisako over onto the side so that she didn't choke on accident, she was lucky to somehow spill it all out on the first go. He then rushed to Mana and felt her up, he felt multiple cuts and bruises, several pretty deep flesh wounds, on one instance his fingers went completely into her flesh which scared him. Eiju took his hands up and moved them on top of Mana's face, he weaved a hand seal, he still had juice for this one technique, this one technique that'd help him determine just how badly the girl is injured, he can't diagnose it properly from where he is and moving her might be too dangerous and take too long.

"Diagnosis Jutsu" Eiju mumbled as his hands lit up with bright blueish glow, he moved them all around the girl's body examining her injuries and getting the horrendous full view of exactly how badly injured she was.

"Not nearly, lovely, the bitch did kill her…" Eiju sighed feeling the girl's relaxed muscles. She wasn't dead yet but she was getting there.

Kiyomi's eyes went through a myriad of emotions, they shifted from sadness, grief, to anger and that lovely looking bloodlust that the Quack enjoyed seeing in the eyes of young women.

"Wait… Aren't you at least… I mean…" she tried to say something but her emotional state was just too crippled.

"I can't, you two made the decision to move in before I regain my chakra, I can't heal her, even with my full chakra I doubt I could take care of these injuries. There's some extent of injury even a hundred percent of a medical ninja's capacity cannot take care of and usually the rule is ten percent per patient. You two made the call, you have to accept the consequences, I know it sucks, consequences are the least favorite part of adult life personally, right up there with alimony and mercenaries hunting your ass for gambling debts. Who am I kidding, I don't pay my alimony and I always poison those I gamble with…" Quack kept mumbling to himself, standing back up and rubbing his stubble that formed over the couple of days, he looked back at Hisako wondering if the last remnants of his stamina and attention should be diverted to the patient that can still be saved.

"But… She's just been stabbed… People survive getting stabbed, I get stabbed all the time, I even keep on fighting after that! Why isn't her own chakra dealing with it? I thought body augments its regeneration factor during extreme cases!" Kiyomi yelled back at Quack grabbing him by his collar and dragging him back to Mana forcing him to sit closer to her and look at her again.

"It does, hers doesn't. Something went wrong, she must've abused chakra augmentation, it's not something young and inexperienced ninja should toy with – her chakra network is all messed up now. It doesn't work at all, I didn't sense any bodily regeneration from her, she may as well be just an ordinary civilian girl getting stabbed through the chest, I'm surprised she isn't dead already" the Quack explained looking Kiyomi in the eyes and gently holding her head so that she looked him right in the eyes and saw how serious he was.

The Yamanaka burst into tears and almost collapsed, Eiju hugged her and pressed her head against his chest. He lowered his own eyes, was he an actual human being? He was reporting to a young woman that her friend was dying and all he cared about in his own head and gut was how good it felt having her head on his chest. That was the part he hated about being able to heal people, of making it his job and business, it made him eccentric, it made him completely indifferent and objective towards what were lives of actual people. The man pushed Kiyomi's blonde head gently removing his pills and popping them. If he had any dignity he'd have swallowed a dozen and been done with it. Then again, assholes like him fit perfectly into this world, the world of bastards.

"There has to be something you can still do…" Kiyomi whined, jumping back at her friend, shaking her lifeless body, trying to slap her awake and then searching Mana's pouches for something. The magician probably carried around medical food pills, those may have healed all of her wounds if she still had some but after a brief search the blondie gave up.

"Do you think so little of my word!? I told you, lovely, watch my lips closely! She's-going-to-die! Nothing I can do bout it!" Eiju yelled back at Kiyomi surprising the blonde. He articulated the last part like the worst kind of indifferent bastard. The Quack was so mad that he was helpless, no, that wasn't even it. If he was mad because he couldn't help a dying girl in front of him he'd be fine, it was because it wasn't even the reason he was mad because of. It was because he finally realized how horrible of a person he was, it was because deep inside he knew that Kiyomi wasn't his soulmate, because he was messed up and if he did indeed love her more than a tavern whore he'd have pushed her away from him because a sick bastard like he was would've only hurt her.

"What do you fucking care if she lives or dies?! Who the hell is she for you!? You just met her some days ago, why do you show all that older sister bullshit for her? She's not your sister, she's not your anything, she isn't even that important to the village. Out of the three of you she's the least paid one: she's not a part of a clan, she's still a genin and the least experienced one out of the three of you. You caring for her doesn't make any logical sense!" the Quack exploded, he started punching and kicking various objects over. He was so sarcastic, so calm and indifferent, why was he acting so weird all of a sudden?

"There's something you can do, isn't there? You're holding something back, there's something you can do to save Mana's life but you don't want to do it…" Kiyomi realized looking at the guy she let touch her and even tend to her wounds with horror and disgust. Finally he revealed himself to be the criminal scum that the blonde should've always taken him for, and to think that in her deepest corners of her heart she honored fantasies, joke scenarios, that maybe the two of them could work in some alternate universe, that maybe she and this ragtag rogue could say "fuck everything" and just escape the clutches of her clan, just do whatever the hell they wanted. Be happy together with this chemistry of love-hate between them. Why was she ever so dumb to give a criminal Quack hope for redemption?

"Answer me! There's something you can do, right!?" Kiyomi yelled out with the loudest her voice could, she stood up back on her feet ready to beat the living shit out of this scumbag if he answered the way she predicted it. She hoped, begged whatever forces oversaw this Universe that he wouldn't flip his miserable viper tongue the way she doesn't want him to, that he doesn't prove himself to be the worst kind of scumbag, that he doesn't completely destroy the faith Kiyomi still had in humanity.

"Answer me…" she whispered softer, still angry but now more of the grieving and depressed kind of anger.


	100. The Obligatory Wonderful Life Episode!

It wasn't like Mana woke up. More like she stayed asleep yet somehow aware of her slumber. She no longer felt the pain all over her body or the sadness over the way things went. Initially it was like her soul, like some ethereal substance that was only Mana because the magician identified herself as it floated in the air, just several meters above the girl's body. Observing one's own body knocked out and beaten, broken and without a doubt dying was a strange experience. The only thing about all of this that still kept Mana happy was that she didn't float away just yet and stayed around for a while more.

Mana had faked her own death numerous times on the battlefield. Sometimes it was her go-to strategy when she needed to make an opening when her opponents weren't giving her any. Had it not been for this strange fighting style she'd have never survived against Hachi or beaten Noji and Sunomaru right here. This thing going on now however was no trick, she was actually feeling her own existence fading away, for real. It's a spectacularly dark and incomparable to anything else experience. Needless to say Mana's heart was not calm even during this peaceful moment of silence and tranquility. She was afraid.

Could she really be blamed for being afraid to die? Someone at some point said that nothing was to be feared but fear itself, that sounded really stupid at that moment. Maybe true revelations only came before one's death? Maybe it was because she knew this unavoidable part of living – dying, that Mana could say for certain that fearing fear itself was stupid. What was the point of something existing just for the sake of it being applied to itself? Then again, it wasn't that in this world everything had its point. Mana, for starters, felt incredibly pointless at that moment, her entire life felt like having been lived for nothing now that she lied there dying.

Mana was afraid of death and she felt like that was perfectly normal, death was the ultimate end of everyone. If one didn't fear death or the concept of absolute end, what else could there have been to fear? Death was certainly scarier than fear itself, at least fearing the end made some lick of sense even if it wasn't as majestic and celestial as the greatest heroes of literature would have made the girl believe. They would've been disappointed in her for caring about her own life but for some reason Mana still considered herself right. Even if ninja could breathe fire and throw thousands of weapons at their enemies in mere seconds even the best and least human of them were susceptible to death. Even the strongest and the smartest died, just like Mana's own sensei – Tanshu did. There may have never been a more powerful ninja in this world and there may never be in the future and still he died, with all of his inhuman strength and endurance even he found his limit which he couldn't cross.

The girl closed her eyes, or at least its soul or whatever was floating above her body... It closed its ability to see. Suddenly the magician felt unifying with her unconscious body, merging with it again. For a brief moment her heart lit up with happiness for the first time in quite a while – maybe she'd still survive this? No. The magician was quite familiar with the concept of meditation, even going as far as to discover several stages of it. The first one she called Ego, in it she could witness all that was going on with her own body, it was like her own body lit up as a galaxy of stars and suddenly the girl could feel what was going on. The second stage was called Omnes. Mana had still very little mastery over it but it somehow extended the Ego stage to everyone but her. Somehow the magician was able to see small stars instead of people instead of the usual black void with stars around her own chakra network.

The current sight was almost tragic. All of the stars were slowly going out, some of them were burning up, the hottest they've ever burnt but slowly each of them were going out in these gigantic flares, gigantic being a very relative term since those stars were miniscule in comparison, smaller even than the chakra nodes they were supposed to represent. Her own personal galaxy, a universe inside Mana's body was slowly dimming and going out, one star at a time. The more time passed the more this process accelerated, stars started burning up faster and in larger numbers. The magician tried to concentrate, to try and feel her friends, maybe they could get to her and help her, maybe Eiju still had some silly methods of saving a person? She failed to enter the Omnes stage, it wasn't something too much of a novelty, even when she was healthy and at her best it was something she did accidentally and discovered new things about every time. She had some sort of gift, gift to see every living being around her with just her concentration alone.

"This is hopeless..." Mana sighed, somehow she managed to retain and salvage a part of her consciousness and bottle it up inside her dying body. She wasn't sure if it helped her live longer or if it just opened the tragic fate of her death up for her to see. So that was how she'd go? Dying while fighting a far stronger opponent, trying to keep them from killing a young man and destroying their own inner integrity. Did she save anyone in the end? Would the young "hostage" ever reform, would he ever know or care about the sacrifice Mana made for him? Would Hisako survive this encounter? It'd really be tragic if Mana crossed her ultimate line and killed her friend on accident with her dying desperation move. Maybe there was still hope for both of them? Just maybe the kid would somehow see where he was wrong, realize how messed up it all was, maybe Hisako would finally see that while she wanted the right thing to be done deep inside, killing a kid who didn't even know what he was doing and had no chance at redemption wasn't what she wanted...

Either way, that was all that Mana had as her calming thoughts that should've made her transition to the dark and scary embrace of death more pleasing and more acceptable. It did neither of those. Assumptions and hopes didn't do the trick. Even in her final moments Mana felt sad that her life ultimately served no purpose or use. Just like fearing fear itself instead of fearing death – something fear was supposed to help us avoid as an integral instinct of our being, her life was lived only for its own pointlessness instead of what it was meant to do – save people and change the world.

"You're wrong though, stop wasting both of our time with those thoughts and find out a way to live" a strange voice echoed loudly throughout the black void of Mana's dying Ego stage. It was an originally kind and soft voice, maybe a little bit on the whiny side but it had so much commanding authority and ruthlessness behind it. It reminded Mana of her own voice but perhaps much older. Her own voice had already transitioned through puberty and changed very little in its core, this one however was changed not by age but by the shift in the speaker's core itself. Almost like this Mana was angrier and meaner, almost like she had seen more in her life. For a moment the magician wondered if this could've been her from the future but it made little sense, even having in mind the nonsensical fact that she was thinking about it in a cradle of self-created mental cocoon inside her own mind with her body looking like a vastness of space constantly dimming away.

"What are you talking about? Who are you? Why are you in my body?" Mana wondered, thinking those words to herself similarly to how she would've done if she was on Kiyomi's mental telepathy link. Who knew someone peeping on everyone's thoughts would've taught a valuable lesson of how to communicate with mystical mental constructs? Live and learn, even if there wasn't too much living left and that reduced the amount of the other by extension.

"It doesn't matter, stop emo'ing about your sad life, you've done plenty and you'll do more if you help me and concentrate on what's ahead, instead of looking back if your life was worth it, look at how to extend it" the voice echoed back at her again. All of a sudden the space shaped around her body opened its eyes, glowing star-like orbs were staring at Mana's little mental cradle with large portions of the space bending around where the entity's mouth would've been forming lips, when they opened only darkness was inside, absorbing any rays of light that came from the eyes of the entity. It was like Mana was alive and talking to the representation of her own body, like two parts of her were conversing with each other.

"So did my mental disorder return? Am I seeing things now?" Mana scratched her head.

"Ugh, you just aren't going to let go of this, are you, you stupid brat? It doesn't matter who I am, I am someone so closely bonded to you that if you died right here I'd die along with you. You were the one giving birth to me but that process has not yet been completed. Let us say that I am still a creation in forming and you're killing me by dying before I can be born inside your own mind" the thundering voice replied, it looked pretty angry at Mana for some reason, then again, if what it was saying was true it had all the reasons to be angry. "Plus, your mental disorder was linked with failure to relate one concept to another, not forming of separate personalities inside your own body?"

"Oh, so you're like... A murderous me, an evil twin, I mean what would be the use of a good twin anyways? An imaginary friend? What am I talking to here?" Mana asked scratching her chin playfully.

"Look, it's too early for me to know what I am exactly, I haven't even been born yet fully, give me a break, you twerp! It's your sadness and fear, your hesitation that gave birth to me. What exactly I am remains to be seen" the entity kept on speaking. It didn't even have a body but it did seem to have some kind of personality already, if it was true and it was Mana's indecisiveness and fear that sparked its life.

"Well, I'm sorry if you'll die with me, you certainly didn't deserve to, then again, maybe you don't even exist, maybe there's no extension to even be made. If you're a part of my personality then there's no "you and me" when talking about who died. It's just me who is dying" Mana explained. "Sorry though, I don't know a way of how not to die, this withdrawal inside my own dying body is the best I could do and only because I dabble in meditation. Right now I have no false hopes of survival, there's just one thing I want to be made clear to me – have I lived in vain? Was my life ultimately useless? What if I even made the world worse by being born? Those are the questions I need answered before my passing and I'd love if you could help me with that..."

The entity stood there with its wide starry eyes shining its light endlessly at the magician's face. "You're stupid, I hate you. You would rather delve into meaningless things like meaning than save your own life. Here's my answer..." the suddenly the space of the black void moved forward, as if the entity moved and then a giant explosion lit up where its titanic fingers snapped. The expanding sphere of light expanded covering the entity and Mana. The girl found herself standing in her healed mental self in a white endless room with a red glowing orb floating besides her. When the entity continued to move or speak it acted through the fist-sized orb floating close to the girl's head.

An image of the Hanada estate flashed, then the training with her newly formed team and Tanshu-sensei, then the following missions, the brawl and getting lost in the Forest of Death, the huge scuffle between Shimo and Sugemi in the Police Force cellars and Mana hesitant to involve herself before exploding with all of her power and recklessness, then the final image of Mana standing in front of Hisako with a card in her hand with the unconscious hostage boy lying down close to them.

"Your whole life you were a bratty idiot, you spent wasting it by desperately trying to throw it away. You claimed that "All life is sacred" and you also said that you knew that your motto included you by extension yet you never showed that. You always leaped first into battle, always the first to endanger yourself without thinking that your friends and your family might feel the same way about you as you do about every life in this world. You wanted to die and you now got what you wanted, a true hero would've lived instead. Living and accepting that there are things you can't do, things you can't change is much harder and more heroic than dying bashing your head against the wall trying to change them still... That's what I have to say to the reckless moron that killed me before she finished creating me..."

Mana's head sunk down with her hair falling all over her face and getting into her sticky with tears eyes. Her mental cradle started faltering, blinking in and out of existence, suddenly the entity became incredibly troubled.

"Hey! What the hell are you doing!? Shit, fine... Let's take a better look then. See what we can find out about things troubling you. Maybe if you calm the hell down you can still pull us out of this"

The image flashed back to Mana's parents. Mother once told the story of how the two met, it was a story full of inconsistencies and lies so it wasn't until Mana learned the history of the Wandering Ninja that she actually could fill in the gaps in it and piece it together.

Mother was crying on the father's doorway, her dress was bloody on the lower side. The entity's voice reached Mana's consciousness, "Let's imagine that your mother suffered an unfortunate accident and you were never born to begin with, if we come with the consensus that your birth did good for the people around you, you will force yourself to life, I don't give a rat's dookey how. If we find out that your life is somehow making it all worse – I'll just leave you here with your blasted depression to let it sink away your mental barriers until your inner self fades and all that's left is your dying veggie of a body which would follow soon. It'll be a sad but painless death."

Mana looked at the tragic image of her mother covered with blood and it just made her feel worse. The girl felt a warm glow by her ear, the orb moved around over her hair as if it tried to stroke it.

"Look at this, already you not being born would affect people negatively, it is highly possible that after this your mother and your father would become living trainwrecks. Must we really go on?" it asked mentally.

"Yeah, if I was never conceived to begin with even this tragedy and sadness could be avoided. It depends on the scenario we create and this one is inconsistent..." Mana replied.

The image shattered into pieces like a broken mirror. The orb relented and another image formed. One of people just walking about the Konohagakure streets.

"Look at these people, what can you tell about them? They all live in a world where you don't exist, you've never been born, never even been conceived. Our mother and father just went their separate ways shortly before the genocide and their fated bedding happened."

"They're... Normal... Almost bored." Mana observed.

"Exactly, they have never had the pleasure of witnessing a young toddler in a black flowery dress performing magic on her way home from the Academy, every day on the same cardboard box. Even more I'd say that they are not just normal, they're miserable because they live in a world we both know sucks, our world is miserable, full of death and sadness, a world that doesn't respect its people, where life means nothing and happiness means less than the dirt on the shoes used to stomp on it. They never had you, some silly girl doing magic, telling people that there was still hope to change it all. You may have sucked at actually changing the world but you talked an awful lot and you weren't half bad at it. You must've inspired people, just look at all those people, most of them would've gathered in the halls you performed in and saw your magic tricks with all your philosophy in between. They'd have been amazed and thought, hey, if the right card can come out of the butt of a rabbit this girl pulled out from a pigeon which flew out of her hat, why can't people stop slitting their throats too?"

Mana's eyes lifted up slightly, she looked at the normal and bored people walking about and turned to the side. "I guess... That's not a real trick though..." she uttered indifferently.

"Forgive me for not knowing what magic is yet, I have not yet been born and I don't care enough to access those memories of yours to check..."

The image faded once again, this one was not smashed, it simply got painted by another one right on top of the old one. Almost like a gigantic brush just brushed it on by some cruel artist of a deity of fate. The image showed the Hanada estate on a beautiful morning.

"If you were never born, Hanada would've never covered the first months of your rent, you'd have never come to thank him and he'd have been killed by the mercenaries after gruesome torture. His kids and family may or may not have survived but without your meddling they'd have never escaped and warned the village officials. Best case scenario – one person dies in a horrible and gruesome way, worst one – an entire family as well as people in the estate at the time die too if the mercs decide to burn the whole blasted thing down. You being born saved a lot of lives even if you thought you just got your butt kicked in there and got saved. Your meddling, your involvement alone saved a lot of lives and you were on your first days as a ninja" the entity explained again.

"Yeah but... What if Hanada is responsible for more deaths by his survival than he... Whatever, it's still human life... I guess you're right" Mana was feeling emotionally crushed so she started to leaping to truly horrible arguments. She knew that she was grasping at straws only to belittle her own existence she was so afraid of losing. Somehow it seemed that if she acted indifferent she may have actually started to believe it – she'd have stopped caring about it that much. The fox and the grapes sort of thing...

The image flashed again, this time it was Mana who instigated the change just by thinking about it hard. She visualized just how the image should've changed and it did, everything she imagined happened. The image depicted the training grounds with Tanshu-sensei training Shimo, Sugemi and a generic looking third girl who wasn't Mana. The image still depicted the three failing but this time Tanshu had a smile on his face, not a full one but the sort of pleased grin he used to have when the three of them did small-time missions like the one with the dishes and the filing.

"If I wasn't born my best friends and my mentor would've been better off..." Mana uttered quietly before going silent again, forcing the orb to ask for her to elaborate since it didn't quite get where the girl was going.

"Well, Shimo only cared about me because I was a girl and he had that gentleman personality to him, before he went through emotional maturity he just tried to be nice to girls and tried for that to be the one thing that defined him. Well, usually Konohagakure teams are composed of two boys and a girl so it's safe to assume I'd have been replaced by a female so he'd be as happy to begin with as he was with me as his teammate. Later on the relationship might change but maybe the other girl being a better friend than me would help them understand each other and actually get involved with each other. Shimo felt bad for me which was why he said he didn't want to look at me as a girl he could date, I was kind so with him having his personality in mind he'd have played with a lot of girls and hurt me which he didn't want to do. Maybe the other one would've been different, it's a safe enough assumption..."

The image changed to Shimo, now having grown up to the point back when Mana last saw him leaving the Konohagakure gate with the grown third teammate by his side and the two holding hands. The orb floated around, "Let us assume it is so, go on..." it gave a temporary agreement but it was quite clear from how it glowed that it was desperately looking for counterarguments.

"Well, Sugemi never really cared about me, I was just his third teammate. He was the only one he cared about and Shimo was his rival so that gave him some amount of thought too. I don't think that there's any reason to think that the other girl would've made him feel anything about her, however, later on Sugemi started hating me because in his eyes I was wrong – "bad people needed to die, good people needed to live, simple as that" mentality fueled him which most people in the village agree to. All I have to do is just remember the funeral after the Kage Summit, people's eyes sided with enraged Sugemi screaming angrily for revenge, they looked at me with spite and anger when I dared to stand for my views... In the end Sugemi would've found a good friend in the third one if she was a generic village ninja with same ideals as the others... Maybe he'd have never rebelled like that, maybe he'd have never been imprisoned if I was replaced by that other girl"

The orb floated around for a while making several small circles. "There are a lot of assumptions in your words, you assume a lot of things so your words aren't entirely correct but yes, Sugemi would enjoy a more traditional minded teammate as a friend and expecting that generic teammate to be an extremity would be to make a wilder assumption than all of the ones you made. True. Sugemi would've been happier and his life may have went a bit better if you were never born" the orb floated around for a while as if gesturing for the magician to continue.

The image changed to the image of Mana down on the ground clutching her busted ribs and Tanshu kicking her while yelling how stupid she was, way back during the first day of their team training. "Tanshu-sensei would've always been happier without me. He hated people that thought like I did and sure, judging from his final words to me I seemed to have reminded him of some person in his youth but... Still, he hated my guts and working with me – that much is a given. If he had received a more submissive student he'd have properly shaped her into a worthy successor of his, not a confused mess who endlessly questions herself like I turned out to be"

The orb replied without hesitation, "True, Tanshu would have been happier if he had never met you and he'd have never been reminded of his first love which went so tragically, supposedly..."

Mana blinked a couple of times confused, looking at the orb. "So have we reached a consensus then? Team Oak would've been way happier and stronger without me?"

"Wrong!" the entity lashed back at Mana, her rude voice almost mocked the girl for daring to make assumptions like that, "Individually each member of Team Oak would have been happier have they never known you, that is correct. However you forget that without you Team Oak would have never been formed in the first place – it was formed because you were stubborn enough to make Tanshu-sensei get thrown out of balance and attack you himself..." the entity quickly flashed the memory back and stopped it at the moment where Shimo pointed the fact that the team was formed and that they won out.

"We have little time, running shorter every second... How about you hurry up, I still want you to work on saving yourself more, every second boosts your chances of figuring some trick out, you know..." the entity hurried the magician up. Mana thought deep and concentrated hard trying to come up with some person whose life she changed for the worse.

"What about Guru Ayushi?" she asked recalling the old man, "Had it not been for me he'd have never pulled that madness on himself and started talking about those weird ideas in the end, he'd have never latched himself on my beliefs and started talking everywhere about them, right?"

The orb floated around before lashing back at the girl rudely, "Wrong! Think about it, even if we do assume he has gone mad, isn't the saying "Happiness is bliss" right? He thinks that he is right and for the first time in his life standing up for something. You gave him that happiness even if it is just an illusion. Even more, remember when we spoke of people being inspired by your stupid ramblings of peace and hope? Now in the form of Guru Ayushi those ideas will reach more people, they will reach the ears of the most remote corners and when coming from a source like Guru they won't be doubted. If you have never been born Ayushi would have simple never changed, he'd have remained his stiff old self and have never gotten the illusion of happiness that you provided him"

Mana wiped her tears and then flashed forward a large chunk, right up to when she met Kiyomi with the two walking through the village gate being the center memory that shaped the image.

"What about this mission? Wouldn't Kiyomi have been happier meeting some other experienced genin? Wouldn't Hisako be happier, maybe even still alive?" Mana wondered.

"Absolutely not!" the entity cut back at Mana, "If you never gone to this mission, Kiyomi would've died fighting against Hachi because your silly behavior saved her life many times and while doing so you broke the conventional ninja rules. You once gave up on an advantage to save her life, that is not something ninja do. She'd have died several times, maybe she'd have even killed Hisako to begin with during their first encounter making this mission a certain failure. It's not that tough to believe when you take the Yamanaka's iron will of hating rogues, mercenaries and criminals. Even more, Hisako would've killed that young man for sure failing this mission still, you supposedly sacrificed your life for the only scenario in a million where this crazy mission where all the odds were stacked against you three could still be completed. Now stop whining and save your life..."

All of a sudden the orb started to glow dimmer and dimmer, the entire memory background started darkening and slowly dissolving pixel by pixel rising up into the sky and fading away, dissolving into even smaller pieces. The entity formed back into a special version of Mana, much younger, more like a toddler version of her before giving the girl one final look in the eyes, that final stare from those starry glowing eyes that begged the magician to find a way to defy death, that final starry gaze that begged for a chance to live even if it wasn't going to live its own life in the first place, just be a part of Mana's mind the nature and purpose of which still remained unclear. The spacial girl faded away just like Mana's memories, one small dust at a time until she was gone. A bright cocoon of light formed around Mana again as she curled into a small fetal position ball and fell asleep. The surroundings around her changed into that same void filled with dying stars. The bright light of the inner universe of the girl's body sometimes reflected off of her sleeping eyes making the girl squint a little before she closed her eyes back again.

Mana's body was slowly dying while her mind went to sleep to preserve its existence for as long as humanly possible. The magician's mind was now calm and peaceful but one thing was for sure – she had not given up yet. She wasn't able to save herself from dying from inside her own body but maybe she was able to prolong her life by surrendering her life to the hands of people whom she helped, people that she trusted. If there was ever a chance of her living and finalizing the creation of the entity that helped Mana figure everything out, it would not be done by her dying body or mind, it'd be done by the people she met along the way, people she helped, people she loved all the same and wanted happiness for. Wanted happiness for enough to prolong her own life and suffer through as much pain and sadness as necessary to make them happy, even if the cost of their happiness is her survival and her own happiness!

Hey, happy New Year everybody! How amazing that the New Year chapter is also the 100th one!? Wow! It's been 100 chapters already and there may just be several hundreds more :D. Anyways, I thought long and hard what to do about this 100th chapter, I wanted it to somehow be canon so that you guys didn't feel tricked for waiting but also feel special somehow. I made the chapter almost twice as long, also I decided to pay homage to my favorite childhood cartoons. Pretty much every cartoon I ever saw had the obligatory "What if the protagonist was never born" episode so I decided to pay homage to it. I know the trope is so stupid and has been done to death but I think it makes sense plus it's an homage so it by definition can't be wrong (yeah, that's how it works now :D)

Next week, it's back to basics and the story picks off where it left off!


	101. Equal Exchange

Eiju looked Kiyomi straight in the eyes before looking away for a while. He wasn't really feeling bad about this honesty which he was about to show. Technically he had no reason to feel bad about what he was about to say, no one ever should but that wasn't the source of his suddenly originating pain, it was quite another realization completely.

"Yes, there is one thing that could save Mana even now" the Quack looked at the lifeless body of the girl that actually meant nothing to him and should've meant nothing to the girl that he liked playing around with the thoughts of maybe calling out on a date when he settled down just because he liked her animosity towards him.

Kiyomi winded up a punch but then she clenched her aching ribs and lowered her hand relaxing it. She looked the medical rogue straight in the eyes and walked up to him trying to stare him down, she had a decently intimidating stare but the Quack's firm look didn't budge.

"What does that mean? Why would you withhold that from her then!?" Kiyomi yelled out angrily.

"Because it's a forbidden technique, it isn't that complicated so in theory a skilled medical ninja should be able to use it but it's forbidden, it's a kinjutsu, lovely" the Quack's eyes stared back at Kiyomi, it were the eyes of the Yamanaka that first quivered and started switching sides between focusing on her dying friend and on the Quack.

Kiyomi wasn't sure just what her stance on things was anymore. If the technique that the Quack referred to really was a forbidden one it may not have been proper to bully him into doing it. Truth be told there were no actual legal consequences on using the kinjutsu techniques but they were heavily frowned upon and they were absolutely never taught, most people possessing the knowledge on forbidden techniques were self-taught from various sources such as historic scrolls or black market scrolls containing intel on the techniques. If Quack was revealed to have used a kinjutsu right before the application to join the village ranks he'd sink his odds of actually having his request granted to the bottom.

"What do you care if it's forbidden or not? I know you… People like you. You don't give a shit if a technique is forbidden or not, you just care that it makes you strong, if it can get you to your goals…" Kiyomi whined out. She was honestly on the verge of breaking. Her friend was dying and there was a huge dilemma erected in front of her.

If she bullied the Quack into using that forbidden technique she'd lose his trust and hopes of ever playing around with those thoughts of rebelling against the clan rules, but she'd save Mana's life in the process. She could still let the magician die and she'd morally be in the right – kinjutsu were not to be used, it was more of a moral responsibility but it was responsibility, a badge of honor nonetheless. If she just told Hanasaku things how they actually were the Fifth wouldn't have winked twice and understood it.

"You're right, lovely, I don't care if it's forbidden or not. I couldn't give a horse's shit spouting arse if some bloke sitting in his office decided to ban a medical ninjutsu technique." Quack carefully placed his hand on Kiyomi's shoulder trying to comfort her, normally such gestures of kindness and emotional closeness would've been beyond his care but now he genuinely felt bad.

Eiju felt bad not because he didn't burn with the desire of using the forbidden medical technique but because he simply didn't care that much. Even if healing Mana by conventional means was an option and he tried it and the girl died the Quack wouldn't even frown a muscle. He was emotionless towards human life other than his own or that from which he was to obtain certain use. That was not a fitting emotional state towards a man hoping to legitimize himself.

"I care because of what that technique does. Do you even know why most kinjutsu are forbidden? Impure World Reincarnation is a technique that can bring a dead person back to life but it requires a life and soul of another as an equal exchange, Creation Rebirth and Dead Demon Consuming Seal are techniques that either kill or heavily injure the user beyond the point of ever being able to recover… They are not only vile and morally repugnant techniques, fuck that no one cares about morals these days and lives until their fifth birthday, that they're lethal or costly to the user themselves is what counts" Eiju explained.

Kiyomi turned back at the Quack and placed her hand onto his looking him deep into the eyes with the watery eyes of her own. She always tried to do what seemed right, even in this sick world she always tried to be a younger sister worth of her brother's sacrifice, she may not have been his last thought, may not have been the direct reason of his sacrifice but her life was protected by the extension of his sacrifice.

"Will this technique kill you? What will it do to you?" she asked with a firmer and more confident tone. She still considered asking a guy to use a kinjutsu he may have never even used before, there were so many things that could've gone wrong there.

"Not bloody sure. Usually medical ninjutsu take the medical ninja's chakra and convert it into universal chakra of healing nature that fuel the regeneration process of the body itself. This kinjutsu doesn't take chakra of the user, it takes their literal life force. It might leave me dying, it might kill me, it might take so much life force that it'll kill me and not even heal Mana. Kinjutsu are tricky bloody business, lovely…" he replied. The weird part was that Eiju felt so guilty by his emotional indifference, having his destination in mind, that he almost was about to do it.

Kiyomi stood up and looked at the rogue, then at Mana and back at the Quack. She sighed. "You have to do it, you have to try it at least, if it doesn't work just stop it"

"What does it matter to you if she lives or dies? She's just another ninja, thousands just like her, even younger, die every day. I've killed younger than her to survive out here myself. I've killed children trying to kill me because I am a rogue who heals rogues. You have no bloody right to ask anything of me, lovely, I've done all I can for all I know…" the Quack's tone changed into a more ironic tone. He decided to just go into Konoha with the same "fuck it all" attitude that carried him through life.

"How dare you!? Did you not swear to save all you can save, even as a rogue, did you not make any vows? Do you have any decency at all?" Kiyomi started to really get pissed at her companion. Truth be told she was pissed at him the whole time, the only thing that kept her from killing him when she first saw this criminal was gratitude for saving her and Mana's life when they were wounded. Then it was the hope that maybe he was just unfortunate, maybe he could've still been fixed and made into a proper human being. Maybe being a filthy rogue was just a mask one wears that can be washed away with a stream of water strong enough…

"I did swear to the bloke that taught me. The old fart told me that in the world of rogues one must always charge the coins first, then heal the client or leave them to die if they're too dangerous. I've healed the three of you this whole time without charging a single ryo because I hoped to legitimize and truth be told I still have all the right to. I've done all I can, no reasonable medical ninja would resort to kinjutsu ever, I mean those wussies even have precise timing lines of how much chakra spent exactly constitutes "worth saving"… Not for someone who is meaningless in the grand scale they wouldn't!" the Quack pointed at Mana barely stopping himself from kicking her unconscious body in his anger.

For some reason this blondie ignited a whole fire of anger that usually wasn't there. Just like this dying brat she made him remember the path that lead him here which didn't come simple for him… Maybe it was because Eiju actually thought he could be this different person, this good medical ninja guy who smiles to his patients as he heals them instead of charges their pants off of them and then laughs at how funny their exposed bones look.

Kiyomi kneeled closer to Mana and pressed the girl's forehead closer to hers. She didn't know why she had this emotional attachment, she tend to have that kind of kinship with her teammates, it took her entire years and almost dying before she could let go of the memento of her previous team. She almost fought her old teammates when they informed her that they're going to leave her alone with Hanasaku.

The Quack sat down, his anger slowly faded away when he gently pushed Kiyomi's face off of the bloody face of her friend. He looked at those sad eyes and that stain of Mana's blood that slowly dripped off of the forehead of her friend's, taking some time to calm himself.

"Look, I'm doing nothing wrong by letting her die, neither are you. People die, it's not your fault. She ran off alone to fight unknown odds without any rhyme or reason, she made a mistake and sometimes people die even if they do everything right and by the book. It's not supposed to itch you, lovely. It's not your bad…" he tried to calm the young woman down as she was starting to break down. Crying women were annoying and troublesome, Eiju hopes to one day genuinely form an attachment to his lovely blonde friend but now he just did to avoid that annoying weeping sound he heard a million times before.

"I know… I've no logical reason to care so much but… She looked up to me when we first met, I was almost like her idol, like her older sister and for a moment… For a moment I actually liked that, I really liked feeling like an older sibling and looking out for her. I felt like I was transferring all that love and care that my brother left in me into someone else, it felt like I was moving on past his death by becoming an older sibling to someone else… Like the torch was being passed almost…" Kiyomi replied, slowly and taking her time. She didn't know how long Mana had left or if she was even alive to begin with.

"Oh, for fuck's sake!" Eiju pushed Kiyomi off of the girl angrily and placed his hands above her. He popped a couple of pills before beginning his healing. If he died healing this fucking brat he may as well have died of transferring his literal life force into this kid and not because that tissue decided to eat his brain or whatever…

The Quack's hands lit up with a bright emerald glow. "One's Own Life Reincarnation!" he forced the chant out through his mouth struggling with the pressure of the poison and the technique sapping his very essence away from him at the same time. The glow around his hands intensified and colored bright blue. After a couple of seconds the tension and the shot out vessels on his forehead settled down, the pain became much more manageable.

"Yeah, I got it. As I've said, when you know what you're doing it ain't nothing to spend an all-nighter for, lovely…" the Quack grunted out, sweat started breaking out on his forehead, he suddenly felt the girl's body lighting up as a reaction to his very life force being transferred into her.

"What if she's dead? What if it's too late? Maybe… Maybe you should stop…" Kiyomi wondered to herself, mumbling under her nose. Quack was such a crazy idiot. He just flipped a full circle around and decided to use a goddamn kinjutsu technique just because she cared so much about this girl… He was literally willing to die just because Kiyomi asked him to. Maybe he wasn't completely hopeless.

"Doesn't bloody matter, this technique was made by some old maniac to transfer life into toys. The cunt liked to kidnap children and keep them in his little house locked down by his crafted and reanimated toy soldiers…" the Quack tried to calm her down without even looking at the blonde.

"It really bloody hurts though so if you'd just… Talk to me through it, I'd appreciate it, lovely…" he added.

"So… You actually did learn it from that toy person?" the blonde asked just trying to keep the conversation going per her friend's request, it may have been a final one for all she knew.

"Nah, that bloke is just where I found out about it from, apparently he was lively enough to survive giving life to one toy at a time so he brought a toy back and waited until his body recovered, sometimes he went back to the village to get healed, telling the medical ninja that he got attacked by some rogues and since he was a farmer outside the village walls everyone bought it… Did I ever tell you how messed up Kirigakure was some time back?"

"I was there once, trust me, I know…" Kiyomi smiled, the experience was scary, being so far away from home in that collection of islands floating in an endless ocean which didn't look so vast from the ground because the islands were so vast. At least all that scary experience made for a bonding moment with this young man willing to risk his life for her emotional stability.

"Maybe now that the reformation is going strong after the Kage Summit everything's going to be fine though? Maybe the Bloody Mist will actually be gone?" the Yamanaka wondered out loud. The Quack laughed out, clutching his aching ribs, his eyes started squinting, Kiyomi touched his forehead and felt the rising heat. He was burning up, at some point he may start go completely delirious if this keeps up.

"Heh, here's to hoping, then again, it happened a couple of times in the past too. People hoping that a new Mizukage or some new law would make big changes, the problem isn't the Bloody Mist in power, it's the Bloody Mist in the hearts of its loyalists. As long as the idea of survival of the strongest and the constant need to check who the strongest in the world are remains strong in them – Bloody Mist ain't going nowhere, lovely. I've seen people as young as five years old slaughtering other five year olds because the ideals are strong in them. Regimes don't mean shit, people are what always mattered…" the young man responded, he then smiled.

"I was never a sensor but… This girl's chakra feels nice, it's like drowning in ice cream. I think now I know why that Inuzuka wanted to fight her so much." Eiju smiled as the warm and sweet feeling of the magician's chakra helped him calm down the pain somewhat, the contact between his own life force and Mana's chakra made them closer than people can ever get normally, for some time they shared one life force after all.

"You mean she's some sort of special cookie after all?" Kiyomi's eyes opened wide, what if they were actually rescuing someone really important? What if the magician lied about being a normal kid, what if she was secretly a descendant of the Moon People or some elite clan like the Uzumaki or something?

"Nah, there are just people like that, I've met some. People that let their entire essences be defined by their personality, that one bloody trait. It literally makes their kindness… Or sometimes darkness fill their very chakra. It colors them, makes them a little unique, feel a bit different to a sensor or a ninja who comes in contact to their chakra. There was once this guy in our group that had chakra so dark that it literally petrified any sensor they came in contact with, we used to send him to fight sensors all the time. Then there was this medical girl whose chakra acted like a painkiller, she was too nice for her own good. Both of them are dead now though… Never be all good or all bad, always be what the situation calls you to be, lovely."

"I think you may be delirious or something, you usually don't tell anyone much about your past…" Kiyomi laughed gently, she felt that depressing glee that was both filled with sadness but also quite pleasant. She could possibly lose a friend while another one would be saved.

"Shit… I think I'm running out of juice, if this chick doesn't come back to life soon we'll be majorly screwed over by this. That fucking maniac always said I was too ambitious for my own good and that it'd be the end of me…" the Quack cursed. The black circles around his eyes started turning clear purple and then straight back to a much darker and more clear and terrifying shade of black.

"So… Did you kill that guy? The toy army guy that kidnapped children?" Kiyomi wondered, she tried to change the topic so that she didn't have to confront the fact that this rogue was about to die. For the first time in her life she felt something other than a wish to murder a rogue ninja.

"Oh yeah… Not because we felt heroic or had an affinity for capes and tight pantaloons, it was because he wanted to give me in to the authorities, I'm a fuckload of more wanted in Kirigakure than I am anywhere else so I couldn't allow that" Eiju sighed wiping the sweat off of his forehead with one hand and then resuming the healing with it.

Kiyomi pouted, "Maybe you can use my chakra for it? Maybe you don't need to die alone, maybe we can both live?"

"No that's just really stupid, chakra isn't water, you can't just pass it around spilling it wherever. It's a lot like blood, except there aren't several different types, there are as many different chakra types as there are people. Some techniques manage to adapt the chakra to another person's but in your case it'd have to go through my body and then into hers. No offense, lovely, but it's the dumbest idea I've heard in a while…"

Mana's eyes shot wide open, the Quack fell onto his back but managed to stop his fall with his own hands that got overwhelmed by his effort to Kiyomi had to hold him from falling and passing out. It worked, Mana was alive!


	102. Broken

Mana jumped and sat up as fast as she could surveying the situation. Eiju was huffing heavily with his face sweating and looking like all of his blood gathered in his cheeks to the point where his head would soon explode. His blood vessels were shot out and twitching on his forehead and black circles around his eyes made the young man look troubling.

"What happened? Is the kid OK? Is Hisako OK?" Mana yelled out, she knew little of what happened since her body gave in. The magician examined her body and looked surprised both by the fact that she was alive and that she was completely healed, not a single bruise or scratch remained on her body as if her life was just reset like a buggy computer.

Kiyomi silently thanked the Quack and then went up to Mana helping the girl get up. "Yeah, the kid is out, he attacked us when we entered so the Quack had to knock him out, Hisako is also alive, unfortunately, you clocked her head into the wall and caused a major concussion so she shouldn't be in fighting condition for a while…"

Mana felt her body around, she stretched her neck, her back and her arms, something felt a little off. She felt weaker, maybe it was just the result of her resurrection? Was it even a resurrection, was she ever truly dead? Her wounds were sure as hell lethal and she had that weird dream about talking to some weird cosmic entity inside her own body or something… Dying was weird.

"So how come I'm still alive, what did you guys do? Please tell me none of you sold your souls away or something!" Mana yelled out energetically trying to understand why she had that weird cranky feeling inside. It felt almost like she wasn't in control of her body, like her soul was just placed in a shell, like a driver placed in a car before being taught how to drive.

Kiyomi hugged Eiju and squeezed him hard pressing him to her chest. "The Quack used some forbidden kinjutsu to bring you back, he said he may have died but he doesn't look dead to me, maybe everything's gonna be alright for once?!" she looked really happy, maybe a little bit too invested in Eiju's life.

"Yeah, name's Eiju, pleased to be pressed to your bosom, lovely…" the silent and weak voice of the young man who apparently risked his life for Mana's echoed.

"He must really like Kiyomi…" Mana wondered to herself observing that scene. She never saw any signs of possible attraction between those two, maybe it all happened while she was out, maybe it happened while the Quack was treating her. It was strange how the world worked, a young woman so hateful towards rogues finds possible warm feelings towards a rogue whose main job is keeping rogues alive for monetary gain. A man who buys and sells life quite literally. "I mean last time we spoke, Eiju didn't really like me that much, he'd only risk his life for his own good, guess I can add Kiyomi's approval to the list now…"

"Say… Magician girl… You got anything to drink in that weird hat seal of yours?" the man uttered looking at Mana with his weak and sad eyes.

"Yeah, I think I've got some canned green tea in there somewhere…" Mana replied with a smile and took her hat off the ground placing one hand on the bottom of it and activating a hand seal with the other.

"Oh, lovely, that's my second favorite thing to drink, right after unidentified kind of booze you find in bottles…" Eiju joked showing that he was still able to smile and that his bad sense of humor was still intact, even if it did come through effort and moderate amounts of pain.

The magician waited for a while and then looked at the hat, she activated the hand seal again and again, waiting for a while but nothing happened. It wasn't that she didn't have any chakra, if that was the case she'd felt physical exhaustion and passed out or something, this was different, this was… Nothing!

"Yeah, take your time, lovely, I mean it's not like I'm dying here or anything…" Eiju laughed out in a manner of laugh that sounded more like a cough before giving a weak smile.

Kiyomi looked at the magician angrily, "Mana, stop playing around, this isn't the time for your magic tricks… Just give him the tea and let's go home" she looked really defensive for her friend, whatever happened between the two must've bonded them more than Mana had hoped.

"I'm… I'm not playing… I just… I can't do it" Mana stood there looking at her hat horrified by the realization of just what she was feeling inside. She couldn't feel her chakra flow at all. Usually when one learned to mold their chakra they felt it all the time, it was like feeling that great overflowing sensation of strength, that's why using chakra felt so horrifying when large quantities of that strength disappeared, now there was none at all.

"Wait… What?" Kiyomi's eyes shot wide open as she suddenly started looking really confused. It was that look in one's eyes when they officially lost the track of what was going around them.

"Shit… So that's what it was back then…" Eiju's face suddenly paled up displaying signs that his fever must've passed.

"Back then?" Mana looked at the man curiously.

"Please tell me this isn't your way of avenging her losing your coat!" Kiyomi looked at Eiju playfully still thinking this was some kind of a game when Mana started to freak out internally.

"No way, back when I used my diagnosis technique on her I felt her chakra network going completely bonkers. Like… I don't know what to compare it to. You must've abused your chakra augmentation and the excess chakra you've forced to flow tore your network apart… I'm sorry…" Eiju looked at Mana, straight into her eyes with that sorry look that made the magician feel like he felt sorrier for her than he did for himself nearly dying.

Mana's hands started shaking, her voice started trembling and she almost started losing it. Her eyes started feeling wet and she felt like she was on the verge of a breakdown. To her the gift of chakra control was everything, it was the sign that she was chosen by whatever magical force oversaw the Universe that she was meant to be a hero. That she was meant to protect the people around her who did not have that gift. Now she had that gift taken away from her, no, she squandered it by herself! She herself rubbed that gift back into the cosmic entity's, that granted it in the first place, face as if it meant nothing to her when in fact it meant the whole world to her. Her path as a hero was over, she was now just a clanless girl without a nindo, without an ideal. She was officially nothing now. Her existence was meaningless now.

"How long? For how long did I lose it!?" Mana yelled out the question louder than she'd have liked it.

Eiju shook his head, he looked like he was about to slip into a deep sleep at any moment but Kiyomi knew perfectly what that sleep would've meant and kept the young man awake. "I don't know, it happens to young inexperienced blokes a lot, I've never seen them recover honestly but it might be possible. I'd need a more detailed diagnosis to know for sure…"

Mana screamed out into the air falling down onto her knees and slammed her hand into the floor angrily. She heard a loud thud and felt the pain flowing through that puny knuckle of hers, no bodily instinct to enhance her strength, no instinct to protect her hand from breaking needlessly anymore. She only managed to keep her knuckle intact because her punch was so weak.

Kiyomi stood up and carefully placed Eiju's head on her wrapped zip-up top, she tried to walk up closer to Mana but she stopped halfway seeing how freaked out the magician was.

"Calm down… It may be temporary, Eiju did say that it's possible, right? I mean… He used a forbidden technique no one used for this kind of thing before, maybe it's a secondary effect or something… We don't know anything about anything at the moment, calm down. Maybe you'll still get it back…"

Mana's distress changed phases from an aggressive one to feeling miserable. Her violent outrage stopped and she just started weeping on her knees.

"Don't you realize what it means? My dream, my path… It's all over. I have nothing now. I lost everything that I was, my entire life I wanted to use this gift I was given to protect the people who didn't have the same gift and now… Now I'm…" Kiyomi carefully walked up to Mana and hugged the girl softly.

"Ummm, not that I'm complaining or anything, blondie, but maybe you could spare a hug or two for me? I mean I did risk my life after all here…" Quack's voice echoed when suddenly it was interrupted.

"Oh just fucking can it!" Hisako's rude tone interrupted the man's desire for more attention. Kiyomi looked at the kneeling assassin and lunged at the Yoruma with a punch which the assassin avoided by stepping sideways but then the nausea caught up with the raven haired woman and she threw up to the side. Luckily the place was too dark for the overly disgusting details to be seen.

"How dare you even talk to us after nearly killing Mana!" Kiyomi yelled out stopping her assault because she realized that at this point attacking the Yoruma was like kicking a downed disabled person. The slightest quick movement sent the woman into a vomiting frenzy from the dizziness that her head injury brought up, it'd pass in a couple of days due to the natural out of combat regenerative factor that ninja had but right now she was at her weakest.

"Actually… Yeah… I did get hotheaded and I'm thankful that the bitch saved my integrity and all, I still think that I should've killed that brat but at least now we'll complete that mission, idol bitch went through hell to save him, guess I'll respect that for now. Also, as payback, I'll save your integrity too, Ms. Royalpants" Hisako spoke out in a weak tone that had nausea written all over it.

"Wait… Me?" Kiyomi wondered confused.

"Yeah, why do you think the Quack had this sudden change of heart? Why do you think he healed idol-bitch?" Hisako mumbled out "It's not because he gave a crap if she lived or died, that much he already established, I could hear everything you two spoke about I was just too sick to intervene… It was sure as hell not because he cared about you or your feelings, you're just another blonde bimbo to him, one like hundreds of others he had over the years living free like a rogue should"

Eiju scratched his forehead, as his fingers touched his face the spots where they passed through reactivated the blood flow returning the brief red into his face for just a moment before he paled out again. "I'd appreciate if one of you ladies kicked her in the face, she's delirious and has no idea what she's talking about…" he spilled out. "That's my official diagnosis and you know I'm right because I said a big word like "diagnosis"…" the man added.

Hisako kept talking ignoring the Quack entirely. "He did it all because of himself, because he suddenly got the idea in his mind of how to make his life all better. He's a selfish bastard, he always was and always will be…"

"What are you talking about?" Mana joined in on the conversation finally returning back to life only for the following further disappointment in mankind.

"Oh come on! All this time he was taking POISON, people! And then so conveniently there's a technique he can use that supposedly kills him but as he does so he establishes himself as a savior in shining fucking armor and gives you two bitches a fancy story to tell the Hokage that'll finally rehabilitate him in the eyes of the village. His stupid regenerative tissue thing, that's what died, this fucking genius over here knew all along he'd be able to cure himself of that fucking thing, he just waited for a good chance to do it… Sure, I'm a fucking cunt for nearly killing idol-bitch, but at least I didn't use her distress for my own cure making me look like a fucking hero… Sure, I'm a messed up scum of society but at least I own it!" Hisako turned to the side nearly hurling up but barely managing to keep it down.

Kiyomi's head lowered down, her long blonde hair fell down on her shoulders and all over her face before she turned her surprised face back at Eiju. "So that's why you didn't fight that hard when we voted for sieging the bunker when you were out of chakra… Part of you wanted it to happen, you wanted one of us to get killed so you could make the "heroic sacrifice" and cure yourself in the process…"

"What do you guys care why he did it?" Mana's weak voice interrupted the three, the girl's eyes were still staring lifelessly into the ground, the girl was broken inside, still grieving her loss of chakra and wandering what was even the point of her miserable life at that moment if all meaning in it was squandered away.

"I mean… He still saved me… Or at least what's left of me. I'm still thankful for it, I'm sure my parents will personally try to get him rehabilitated and legitimized after we bring him back. What does it matter if he had a selfish motive for all of this?" Mana mumbled back.

Hisako jumped back on her feet and stumbled briefly before walking up to Mana and grabbing her by the girl's hair, lifting her face up so that the eyes of the two met.

"You fucking tool! Don't you get it? He wanted us to fight in these conditions! He wanted for one of us to die, he let us fight it out purposefully, all this time he wanted you or me, or anyone else to die, if he didn't want to cure himself so fucking much we wouldn't have fought, you wouldn't have half-died and I wouldn't feel like there's a shit goblin making more shit goblin babies in my fucking throat making me try and chuck em out of there! He may have brought you back, but your loss of chakra and your supposed death is on him. When he met us, I bet his only goal was to cure himself and legitimize using us"

Hisako let go of Mana letting her body weightlessly slam down on her knees and continue to lifelessly drift away into depression.

„Wait, how do you know about Eiju's regenerative tissue and all that stuff? Did he tell his story to you?" Kiyomi wondered, she needed some filler questions to help her realize that she may have been played and Yamanaka Kiyomi didn't like to be played with.

"He didn't tell me, that fucking tissue healing him from me cutting him down did… Back when those fucktards wanted to off me in the forest, when we first met" Hisako quietly replied.

"One thing I still don't get though, why wait for us? Why not just play the same game with some mercenary? I mean surely you've seen a bunch of dying mercs during your time, right? Why not do the whole thing on them years back? You'd have even gotten a promotion or something, you'd have been old Hachi's best friend for saving a dying guy's hide…" Hisako asked closing in on Eiju, carefully sitting the Quack back up.

"Because it wouldn't have been enough, lovely…" Eiju quietly replied and sighed after his plan came out into public. "I mean if I just healed some bloke I'd still be a mercenary Quack without a regenerative tissue keeping me alive, had I done that I'd have died when you went barmy on all those mercs in the forest, life of a merc is tough, lovely, people die all the time. I needed something more, I needed to do it when I had a clear chance of leaving this life behind, a guarantee that I'm not ridding my "get out of the shitter for free" card for nothing…"

Kiyomi walked up and lifted Eiju up by the collar of his shirt and slapped him strong enough to knock his eyebrows off. Blood shot out from the weakened mouth of the Quack and he spat out a tooth. "So that's how it feels like, losing a tooth for good…" Eiju smiled half-heartedly.

"For how long did you have this plan to use us? How long ahead did you plan this?" the Yamanaka angrily grunted out ready to slap all of the Quack's teeth out if he answered not how she would've liked him to.

"Eh, not too long actually… I had the idea the whole time but that the timing was right… That only popped to me when we were talking over Mana's soon-to-be corpse… I figured I'd need to do it at some point but I never planned or played you three, I swear. I needed a cure, you don't know what it's like living with that inside you…" the man replied, Kiyomi let go of him and let him slip down on his bottom.

"Oh, poor you, being able to regenerate from certain death, survive what should've killed you… What a curse!" the Yamanaka shouted out angrily, looking at the Quack with a condescending look and turning back at Mana.

"You decide what we do to him, he wronged you the most… He agreed to us coming here unprepared too easily, he must've known one of us was going to die, he is at least partially responsible for you losing your gift, even if he did bring you back, he only did it for his own selfish hide…" the blonde switched between Mana and the Quack.

Mana stood up and turned around, slowly starting to make her way towards a staircase leading up. "What does it matter? He may be a selfish ass who only looks out for himself but he can be useful to the village, Quacks know a whole bunch of weird medical techniques and he doesn't listen to rules that restrict medical ninja so he can actually save more lives that way… At least he's still useful to someone…" the magician lowered her head and slowly disappeared into the shade. Kiyomi wanted to go after Mana but a hand on her shoulder stopped her, Hisako shook her head slowly, the only way that let the contents of her stomach stay where they were.

"The kid finally realized there's no such thing as a hero, you're not a hero, you'd snap a rogue's neck if you got your hands around their neck, I'm a killer, born and raised. She just found out that this guy ain't no hero either, the realization that a man who saves one's life is only doing it for his own selfish gain is a horrible one. The worst thing of all – without her chakra control, she's not a hero either, don't make it even worse. It's up to her to decide what she wants to do with her life now…"

Kiyomi grabbed the Quack by the collar and slowly dragged him to the staircase, she planned to drag him around for as long as he couldn't walk for himself. The man reached into his pocket and pulled out a weird slimy green mass for Hisako, "Here, this ought to help your nausea, I didn't know if you were conscious before so I didn't give this earlier, it won't taste good but it should help for a while before your body fixes it up…" he handed the handful of goo to Hisako who swallowed it without question.

The assassin pouted and kneeled as if she was going to throw up again but then she stood up and relaxed, surprised she looked at the Quack somewhat relieved. "What's it made of? It actually helped?"

"The seaweed inside the stomachs of ninja toads…" the Quack replied only for Hisako to throw up almost instantly. Kiyomi looked at the pathetic man she was dragging by her side, a man she was ready to swear eternal love to only a couple of minutes earlier, a man whose gut she now despised and whom she wanted to murder on top of a mountain so that the whole world could see her do it.

"Ey, this ain't my pill, that one's psychosomatic…" Eiju shrugged with a smug smile. Kiyomi fought the desire to beat his teeth in but Mana was right in some ways, medical ninja, especially as experienced and skilled as Eiju were needed around the village. She just wanted that maybe the magician wouldn't have put it the way she did and wouldn't have gotten so down because of it, Mana was just walking in front of the entire party, leading the way yet looking the most dead inside out of all of them…

Mana closed her eyes for a moment just so the tears on her face weren't evident, she had never felt useless in her life before. Weak, wrong – sure. But those times were different, then she still had hope of growing stronger, of doing things better the next time. This time was different, her life felt completely empty, she had nothing inside of her that still made her into what she was when she left. She'd probably still be able to retain some of her stage magician self, she'd be slower, less skilled since she lost her chakra control and she'd need training to regain one tenth of her previous skill and speed. Still, what's the point of doing that when half of her essence was literally torn away.

Feeling useless, having one's purpose completely lost and never to be found, was the worst thing ever. Who could've thought that maybe dying would've been the better way. This was a dark thought but how else was one supposed to feel after knowing that their life was a result of someone's selfish desires and that she wasn't even herself and would never be herself again. In a way she was glad that she cured Eiju's sickness and that he'd never need to drink poison again, also she made someone else a hero, even if just for a moment, even if it was for all the most selfish reasons…

Mana turned back and looked at the powerless Eiju being dragged around by his collar like a ragdoll. "Eiju… Now that your regenerative tissue is gone, won't you die of that genetic disease of your mother's?" she asked.

Kiyomi and Hisako looked at the Quack surprised, they must've not known about that detail. Hisako almost dropped the "hostage" that she was carrying on her shoulder, now that her nausea was a bit calmer. Eiju smiled and shrugged.

"It can be managed by medical ninja, adults can survive with it for five or ten years maybe… Trust me, kid, dying is better than some sorts of living…" he replied with that arrogant tone he always used.

"No. Life is always better than dying…" Mana replied instinctively.

Quack smiled turning his head to look her straight in the eyes, making her feel almost like he looked right into her soul as they leaved the bunker and sunlight took over their eyes, making them need some time to recover.

"Is it though? Of all people, right now, do you truly believe that?" he asked with that same smug smile.

Mana covered her face with a bunch of her messy hair to hide her tears. How. How could someone cripple a person so much with just a couple of words? How could someone ruin someone's entire life, shake all of their ideals with just one action? Even more importantly, how does one still go on when all that they are is lost forever…


	103. The Evil That Helps Us Grow

The troubled eyes of a mother stared into a specific point in the ceiling. It was so concentrated and worried that to the woman it almost seemed like she could peek through it and into the room of her daughter. The young lady hasn't been eating or drinking, she hasn't done much sleeping either since she returned from the mission. Nakotsumi Kei tried questioning the girl but she barely even spoke, the mother tried talking to some people in the administration who confirmed that the mission was indeed successful and completed despite colossal complications with the mission objective that, if known, may have even bumped the mission difficulty by a whole rank.

Both parents of the young magician were troubled by the girl's refusal to talk, over the couple of days she spent just laying on her bed in her room she had never trained or meditated. That was something new and probably what raised the most concerns. Skipping a meal or two or having one or more sleepless nights was nothing unusual for young Mana but completely halting all training and not meditating even for a moment… Didn't the girl once look so happy after explaining how her meditation worked? Did her eyes not shine in that same childish glee while explaining the stages of her meditation like it did when they first introduced little Mana to strawberry ice cream? She went on and on about how it made her aware of any problems in her body and made her one with herself, completely familiar with all that was happening inside of her…

It almost felt to the woman like her daughter has given up, maybe something happened during the mission? That much was obvious but what exactly could've crippled that noble yet unhealthy obsession with doing good and changing the world that Mana had? How could someone so obsessive and so kind just give up? Millions of possible explanations went through the head of the worried mother, from Mana failing to save someone during the mission to finding out that she had a sickness of some sort inside during one of her meditation sessions.

The more she thought about it the more the woman returned to the idea that maybe her daughter knew exactly what was wrong with her body which was why she didn't meditate at all. Maybe she was even afraid to confront that problem, afraid to see it again, what could've been so scary as to cripple such an idealistic and naïve child? Over her still quite short life Mana saw plenty, she struggled for her life several times, she fought her best friends and saw them leave the village, she blamed herself so often for things that may not have always been up to her to decide and influence in the first place… Yet she always stood back up and went on. The girl was completely broken now.

Quiet and slow footsteps echoed through the house, slight remnants of the continuous sound of small feet tapping against the wood reached Kei's ear and soon Mana showed herself after a long while in the kitchen. It was strange, the girl really did look tired and like she'd have just lied in that bed for days without even moving – her hair was all over the place and her face was a bit swollen from the tears but it was evident that some attempt at fixing herself was made over the days. The girl did apparently shower, as proven by an absence of nose crushing body odor most outbreaks of self-neglect produce and there were some marks on her hair that suggested at the very least attempts at restraining the monster that was bed hair.

"Where's dad?" Mana asked softly, she looked exhausted and despite her doing nothing but resting this whole time she still sounded tired.

"He's out, something about those new herbs that are supposed to help his pain. He wanted to see you, he said that this new medicine, some potion or something is really helping him and he wanted to help you out with your shows more now but… You just shut inside your room and…" the girl's mother tried to approach the problem from multiple corners but she didn't know how to go about it. It was obvious that her child was suffering inside and she wanted to help without ruining it all or making it even worse.

"Oh… Yeah, I'll probably cancel all shows… Not sure about that anymore… Maybe I'll host more of them now that… Still figuring it out" Mana's voice wandered from one extreme to the other. It was clear that the girl herself knew how dumb canceling her shows would've been but it was clear from the lack of emotional attachment to the statement that she had given that concept a lot of thought.

"What happened in that mission? I mean so much happened, that hostage kid was returned to the family but now the father wants to disown him or something, this Kiyomi girl came a couple of times but when I told her how you were she left, she said she was just following some advice or something… Then this new medical ninja that the village took in, some Eiju fellow came and he gave some paper that apparently classifies you as suffering battlefield injury and temporarily suspended… What happened?" Kei asked having decided to not fool around and just ask the things she wanted to know.

"So everyone was fine? Kiyomi was OK? I see Eiju was accepted as a medical ninja, he wanted nothing more than to legitimize…" Mana asked, the mother nodded, she hoped that maybe the magician would be willing to admit what happened in exchange to some information.

"Yes, Kiyomi looked fine, she had some bandages and band-aids but she said she was fine when we asked. She was mostly concerned about how you were doing which was weird because you returned without as much as a scratch…" the woman replied.

"Oh, so that's good then. I'll be leaving for a moment, I'll fix myself and… I just need to see someone… Hopefully I'll figure some things out on the way" Mana continued to talk in vague terms, noticing the worried look of her mother she tried to force a calming smile but somehow it just didn't work for her.

"It's alright, I… My chakra network got messed up and I can't… You know, do anything now. I'm pretty much just a civilian from now on so I'm trying to… I don't even know. I need to see Hanada-san and tell him that I'm cancelling my shows, he's not paying my rent anymore but he's still investing a lot of money into them…" Mana declared and she rushed to the shower. Just mere moments later the brief glimpse of the girl was caught again as she ran to the door and rushed off.

Something worried the woman about her child. She didn't wear her uniform, choosing to go for a more comfortable and casual attire, she wore those weird purple shades and a hoodie almost like she tried to avoid attention.

Mana rushed through the streets of Konoha, as much as she wanted to avoid any attention from any of the other villagers a running person would attract a lot of it. Still, while people did look at her general direction they only noticed a shady looking teenager rushing through the street with a trashy leather jacket and a hoodie with half of her face being covered with those weird and oversized purple shades. While the magician was quite famous in the village, she was usually identified through her unusual clothing or her facial features, people did identify some weird girl running down the street but they couldn't really put their fingers on who exactly she was.

It didn't take too long for Mana to reach the Hanada estate. She hadn't really visited that place for a while, at some point she just asked the owner of the hall where she performed for Hanada's money to stop being accepted and started paying for the hall rent herself. She just felt like after that last visit she offended the man too much for her to still accept his money and after several refused payments the man seemed to get the clue. He still spent a lot of money promoting Mana as if she was his brand or something, he still invested a lot into the show but it was more through anonymous donations and gently asking reviewers and for the general public to be kinder towards the show.

Not that she really needed that soft nudge towards the public opinion, whenever Mana appeared on stage she was amazing, still as devoted and masterful towards her craft as she was when she started, even as new magicians started appearing in the village, Mana still proved time and time again why she was the original. Each new street magician trying to break into the scene would've had to struggle with Mana's petite and slim yet important shadow serving as a barrier they'd need to at least match up to.

"Oh, hey, it's Konoha's Sorceress!" the familiar guard still guarding the gates of the Hanada estate recognized Mana once she walked up to the gate and removed her hood and her shades. "What's with the stupid getup? You getting into the racketeering business… Which I would know nothing about…" the mercenary looked a bit confused by the girl's attire. His emotions were rather easy to follow, he wasn't the sharpest tool in the shed which was why his emotional reactions were always overblown.

"No. I'm leaving the magic gig behind and I want to tell Hanada-san about it so that he stops wasting his money on me. Can I see him or will you deliver it yourself? I'd reckon he wouldn't like to see me that much after the last time…" Mana said answering her own question and turning around as if she was ready to go away.

"Whoa, whoa, you're quitting?! No way! Nah, kid, you gotta talk to Hanada about that, he brags about knowing you to everyone he meets, every new business associate, you gotta see him with that!" the mercenary reached over Mana's shoulder and gently pushed her inside through the gate, gesturing for his pal to stand guard while he lead the magician into the huge mansion.

The mercenary asked for Mana to stay and disappeared in the labyrinths of the estate made of solid marble and filled with larger than life busts, statues and paintings. The girl wondered about the story of each one, how much blood should've been on each of them? Were they obtained by the owner buying them by bullying his competitor to withdraw from the auction or by simply removing them from the picture? The news and rumors spoke a lot about Hanada Katsuo's methods but not all of them could've been trustworthy, as slimy as Katsuo was…

"Ah! Konoha's Sorceress… I am glad to see you here, despite your apparent shyness towards me. I assure you I hold no grudge from last time, I went out of my shoes to offend you then and I'd apologize if you and your friends hadn't made me pay for that social transgression…" Hanada's expensively dressed body combined with that silly feminine hairdo appeared from a room to the east of Mana's position. The girl turned at him and scratched her elbow in shyness, she didn't really want to be there but she had to. She felt obliged to tell the man she was quitting.

"Sorry, I… I didn't intend to even see you I just… I wanted to tell you I was stopping the whole Sorceress gig, no more magic for me…" Mana mumbled out like a teenager getting caught in the process of escaping with their parents' car.

"Well that is quite sudden and a very life altering decision for you. I am glad you gave me a chance to talk you out of it!" Hanada smiled extending his arms to the sides as if he offered the girl a hug but Mana was smarter than to hug the king of Konoha's shady underworld.

Mana tried to jumble out some excuse as to why she couldn't be there but Hanada was much more persistent than she gave him credit for and also, now that her chakra control was off forever – quite significantly stronger than her physically. Mana honestly expected that after that last meeting the man would just make her disappear or something and pin it on the dangerous neighborhood which, truth be told, was only dangerous because he was there to make it so…

"Now, I realize there must be a reason for this incredibly spontaneous and, quite frankly, stupid decision? Before I talk you out of it I'd like to hear it!" Hanada smiled with that despicable way of twisting his lips and showing off those expensive teeth of his.

"There isn't one, I struggled with combining my life as a ninja and a magician for long, I just can't do it anymore… Things complicated a bit and I have to give one up now" Mana mumbled out trying to hide her eyes from those of her conversant. Ever since she lost her chakra control she felt really down and even more inferior to everyone else than usual. This success killed her inside more than any sort of failure would have.

"Hmmm, you see, normally I'd believe you… I mean I heard all about your success with that infamous last mission of yours. That mission removed "Ikiro Perfume" successor from the equation making it possible for me to buy the darned thing and place myself in the kid's place. Right now, everything you do makes me more money than you could imagine, every good deed of yours looks even more golden in my eyes. You saved a troubled and edgy young boy who decided that he's the next criminal overlord of the village – his father removes him from the line of succession… Surely you'll let me repay that favor for earning me the entry into the perfume business by saving you from making this horrible decision?" Hanada smiled

"I mean… I suppose this rash move has more to do with you losing your chakra control?" Hanada looked at Mana with the most petrifying eyes the girl had ever seen. So he knew of her injury? He knew everything the whole time? That made Mana's presence in his household incredibly dangerous and the only reason why Mana showed none of that inner fear that was rustling deep inside of her like a starting forest fire, was because she currently cared little if she lived or disappeared without a trace with her unrecognizable body being found in the trash in some alleyway like most people who crossed Hanada.

The man shrugged being cornered by Mana's suspicious stare, "I apologize, it's just I own the clinic that owns that medical ninja you've brought back, he was examined and questioned about his practice multiple times and… Some information like that slipped…"

So now Hanada owned the clinic that had in its employment the medical ninja who knew the medical kinjutsu capable of breathing life into people? The more she talked with this man, the worse the magician felt about the whole thing.

"I'm sorry, I really shouldn't be here. I'm thankful about all you've done for me, Hanada-san, however I'd like to stop now, stop with everything and if you truly wish to repay me as you've told me you do, you'll understand and let me just fade away…" Mana mumbled out, still hesitant to look the man in the eyes. Hanada's hand gently lifted her chin making the girl's messy hair slip to the sides and her eyes look into his again. Every moment of contacting the skin of this horrible man made Mana wish to scream and claw her own flesh that touched him off.

"I understand, young Mana… If that is truly your will then so be it, however, just as you asked me to respect your decision, I'd like to ask you to consider what I'll tell you. You tell everyone in your shows again and again how you want to be a hero, several times you've told in those brief interviews and when meeting the fans how you wish to inspire people so that they change the violent and bloodthirsty world we live in and magic is a way of expressing that. I understand that losing chakra manipulation crippled you, destroyed your self-confidence and any semblance of self-worth you had. Still, I must wonder where that devotion to your dream went, after all, there are more ways than one in being a hero. Your mother doesn't fight bandits in the forests, she owns a small lovely café she refuses to sell me, she is a hero, Mana, she inspires people and I think you'd agree she's a hero for everything she does for you and her clients…"

Mana nodded, "Yes, she is a hero she always hears everyone's stories over coffee, everyone's problems and no matter how much I screw everything up she never gives up on me…" she added indifferently thinking back on her mother who must have been worried about staying in the dark for so long about what was going on in Mana's heart, even if the girl wanted to admit about everything but somehow she was just too distressed to talk about it, every word had to be forced out of her at that moment and it wasn't the best time for that kind of talk.

"Well then, I still see that same passion in your eyes that I've seen in the eyes of a young girl in a flowery dress performing tricks on a cardboard box out in the street, she inspired many people despite not having punched a single bandit in the face and not spitting a single fireball out of her mouth. Just because you could fight evil physically doesn't mean that was all you could do. Your stage magic is the most powerful tool of your conviction, always was, I was never too big of a fan of your little ninja escapades anyways, I think it distracted from your main message… Please consider my words, young Mana. Ultimately, while you're still just a young girl, you're old enough to decide your own succession of your dream, to decide what you wish to do further…"

Mana bowed for the man, expressing some gratitude and some respect and rushed off. That bastard! He may have been a criminal, a thief within the law which Mana dreamed of having the means of taking down one day after he slipped up and didn't tie all the loose ends. He may have only spoken about those things because of his own interest, his own need to donate huge sums to Mana's shows and Hiro's halls so that he could brag being a sponsor of her show. He may have been just like Eiju was – helping Mana for his own gain, still, he was right. Mana may have no longer had the gift of the magic of ninjutsu and chakra manipulation but she still had the other, more common kind of magic running in her veins. She was still:

Konoha's Sorceress…Evil


	104. The Violent Warrior Clan of Iwa

A happy child ran down the stage, his large childish eyes were so close to watering but those wouldn't have been tears of sadness or depression as it was common in this world filled with murder and death. He was rushing down the stage from being called up the stage as a volunteer for Mana's magic show, it was then that the girl's eyes fell on a familiar face in the public. Normally she'd have proceeded to the main point of the show but now she pretty much had to call that little kid on stage as well.

"I know how much you guys want to see me try and kill myself by locking myself into something I set on fire but there's a very special little girl I want to call on stage. Please stay with me for another warm up trick, will you?" she smiled nodding while looking the little girl right in the eyes. The kid couldn't believe it for a moment, it was only once the girl's parents nudged her and encouraged her to go on and get on stage that she ran holding a plushy rabbit in her arms.

"Ease up on the grip, little one, you'll tear your friend's head off…" Mana joked as the girl made it on the stage. The magician had met the little toddler and her parents in the junk district way back, back when she and her team shut down criminal activity in that region. She invited the girl to see her show for free and informed all the hall officials of that deal, there were plenty of people that the magician let see her show for free and it wasn't anything special for them. While the magician occasionally did jarringly bad for business decisions her audience was growing so fast that it didn't matter in the grand scheme of things.

Ever since Mana decided to use her loss of chakra manipulation as a sign that she needed to use that effort and time of her life in other places, like her cooking hobby, her reading out and most importantly – her magic shows, Mana's shows were exploding in popularity. At the moment there couldn't have been a single Konohagakure villager who didn't know who Mana was or at least hasn't seen her face on a poster somewhere. She beat all the actors and movie stars that usually were around the place.

Recently this new trend of entertainment hit the hall, Hiro, the owner of the hall, decided to buy a giant screen on which some sort of pre-recorded material was displayed. Mana had never seen anything like it in her life but Hiro thanked her and the profit from her shows publically as a factor that helped him bring cinema to Konohagakure. Initially Mana lost a lot of people to this booming cinema trend but as the time went the boom calmed down and her audience started growing again in a quite solid rate. It was amazing how much could've happened and how much could've changed in just couple of months…

The little girl started whining on the stage before breaking into tears. This was something Mana couldn't have predicted. Her face twisted in that weird emotion that one always feels when they mess something up in public, on the most public stage of the village one might argue! The magician slipped her hat off, letting it playfully roll down her arm until Mana's quick hand grabbed the edge of it and then quickly put her hand inside of it, popping a smoke bomb she pulled from out of her sleeve that made a loud sound which surprised the little crying girl and made her snap out of her tears of happiness.

"Let's see if I can make a friend for your rabbit pal…" Mana smiled winking for the little girl as she popped a light bomb inside the hat, one she had specially stuffed with confetti before. Editing the contents of a ninja tool was difficult, pressure made them activate, something as delicate as pressing them with both fingers would've popped it and made it wasted so cutting it and adding content inside was pretty much like brain surgery.

The girl looked in awe at the light show which Mana had prepared and as the girl pulled out an ace card from her hat which came from Mana's pocket, the magician found a chance to reach for it in all the light show and confetti flying around which attracted the most of everyone's attention. The stage magician acted out a sad face, as if her trick failed, Mana failing to pull a rabbit out of her hat was a common running gag of her show, she sometimes did much more destructive failures like making a smoke bomb filled with ash explode in her face making herself look hilariously messed up with all that ash but cleaning up the stage afterwards must've been horrible…

The girl giggled as Mana pulled out a balloon out of her pocket and played with it blowing it up and trying to tie it in something resembling rabbit shape. Mana pulled on the tip too hard on purpose making the balloon explode with candy she stuffed inside during preparation.

"Well it looks like this is as good as you'll get today… I guess I'm getting washed up…" Mana shrugged playfully as the girl collected the small candy bags from the ground laughing her butt off to the point where she had to hold her belly with her hands as it started hurting from the laughter.

After the little girl from the junk district returned to her parents with probably the largest smile Mana has ever seen the magician followed it with the largest show stopper she's ever shown in a while. She had assistants lock her down in chains and close in a giant iron maiden-like device which had handles of swords that were held by complicated clockwork, each blade would've thrusted into the device at seemingly random order every minute, obviously Mana knew the order at which the swords went and she knew when it'd get dangerous. At the very worst if she didn't get out of the bindings and unlock the device the fifth sword would cut her hand and her side but it'd also break the chain, it was her last hope to escape the device because the seventh sword would've went through her heart and the eighth one would've decapitated her.

Naturally Mana imagined that in case of her horrifying death it'd have been nice to hide the device from public, the last thing she wanted all the kids to see was their favorite entertainer getting impaled and beheaded right in front of them so the device was also raised in the air and lowered into a giant glass container filled with gravel. The stage magician always topped her show off with one of those larger than life escaping tricks, naturally things were harder now that she had no chakra control to bail her out. She couldn't have substituted herself, couldn't have used a genjutsu to fool the audience. She was really inside a device that could've killed her, a deathtrap crafted by her father's ideas and built by her own hands. A social contract between the two that helped her father feel like his old crafty self and gave Mana something to do, namely think of ways of how to escape her father's deathtrap until the show starts…

Even without her chakra control Mana was good at escaping binds, she slipped out of the chains and pinched the right switch to loosen the device a minute before the fifth sword cut her, she did get cut in her thigh a little bit by it but she broke out and her hand burst from the gravel container before pulling her exhausted body out and bowing for the audience. Some people noticed the moderately sized still bleeding cut on Mana's thigh but they just saw it as a sign of Mana's devotion and not madness. Ninja risked far more every day and the magician was now in no condition to risk it like they did. She felt useless and weak and these dangerous and visually pleasing shows were the best she could do to push those feelings away.

Hiro and a couple of his assistants ran into Mana's little preparation room after the show looking at the cut.

"Shit, how are you!?" he yelled out angrily letting his moderately skilled staff examine Mana's injury

"It looks nasty, it's not infected but it might sting when you put weight on this leg for a day or two, a week in the worst case" the medical staff examining the wound concluded placing a patch on the girl's leg. They weren't medical ninja so they could only give first aid and not just heal the leg instantly like a medical ninja with access to medical ninjutsu would've done.

"Did it make an impression? Were people disappointed?" Mana asked, she was still hyperventilating from the physical stress of rushing her escape before the device killed her, the gravel also pressed against her body almost getting into her lungs and almost drowning her, she didn't account that much effort being needed for simply going up through gravel…

"Dissapointed?! Kid, you call those tricks "showstoppers", trust me, the show was "stopped" alright… I think it left an impression, that much you can be sure of, if you keep this up people from other villages will come flooding, I've already had offers from Kirigakure to have you tour there…" Hiro looked at Mana with his silly looking signature squint. The man was a short but slightly chubby guy who always wore a Hawaiian shirt and always had those weird squinted eyes as if he was always looking directly at the Sun.

"Maybe some other time… Might be dangerous to travel around without a ninja escort, even now…" Mana tensed her thigh muscle and pouted grunting a little from the pain, she's been cut before, it meant little to the girl at this point. Hell, she's been stabbed in her last mission… A little cut couldn't have kept her down even when chakra manipulation and the natural ninja regeneration factor was gone.

"Oh, right, you're not doing that anymore? Have they terminated your license yet? I mean you haven't been on a mission for a couple of months already, ever since that last one, right? How does it feel taking weeks to heal minor cuts like this? Hope you'll get used to it and stop getting reckless, I hate having to refuse all that Hanada Katsuo money on your medical bills every time you get injured on stage…" Hiro sighed out. He was always a bit of a scrooge…

"No, not yet, they still hope I'll eventually recover or learn to function without it. I hate getting injured on stage more, trust me…" Mana breathed out and took her bag, looking at her ruined pantyhose and ran out. She rarely brought clothes to change out of her uniform with her.

"Right? I mean be careful, kid, you ain't got nine lives, only got one…" Hiro flipped his hand to gesture the girl farewell until they meet before the next show.

Mana stopped and looked back on him on the doorstep, "It's not that, I hate getting hurt on stage because it makes me look sloppy… I want to inspire my crowd, I want to entertain them, I don't want them to see me bleed, to see me as just a normal human being…" the magician uttered before disappearing.

"That girl…" Hiro sighed looking at his medical staff, "I need new staff, she'll keep pulling shit like this and getting hurt, try to see if you guys can hire someone from the hospital, someone with medical ninjutsu experience…"

The medical crew looked at Hiro, they looked pretty hesitant to talk to him, one of them opened his mouth only after being encouraged by the superior to the right. "Well, sir… We did… You told us to last week…"

"Good, you're all fired then…" Hiro smiled before snapping his little chubby fingers, "Ah, don't fret, the compensation you'll get is twice bigger than you need to buy an apartment in these parts…"

"Sir, he didn't show. As you've said we've spent as little as possible on him – not even a ryo in fact…" a medical expert started explaining himself. Hiro still looked quite confused by that revelation, he did start remembering something like that being told to him but he wasn't paying attention and therefore forgot it by now.

"He's a young intern at the hospital, medical interns who wish to become full blown medical ninja need to serve three years at a medical experience related job… He's a young kid but he's dirt cheap, interns do come to work for free after all… He is late today though..." the medical worker explained. Hiro sighed.

"Fine, you're all unfired until he learns to come to work on time… Now chop chop, go see if any actors will get injured in their little play, honestly I've no idea why people even come to those things anymore, we've got moving pictures… Moving goddamn pictures… Seriously…" Hiro left Mana's little preparation room rambling with the rest of the crew following shortly after and one guy locking the room behind him.

Mana limped slightly through the endless corridors of the large hall. The small preparation room she used was given to her back when she was a nobody, when only a handful of people knew her as that girl who did tricks on a box in the middle of the street every other day. Now she could've gotten one of those large and sophisticated rooms smelling of rich mahogany and with a bunch of star shaped lights all around, one with more space than in her own room… Mana kept refusing, somehow she liked her little shack, it was dark and smelly but it reminded her where she came from, it was really nostalgic for the girl and Mana was always a sucker for nostalgia.

"Oh! Sorry, Konoha's Sorceress-san!" a loud masculine voice that must've belonged to a young teen alerted Mana that her attention was wanted behind her. It could've been a fan, Mana always had small fan meeting sessions after a show every Friday but today wasn't the day for those, still, sometimes some fans asked for some of her time and she gave them what they wanted. Answered questions or just spoke with them, a little attention made these people happy and pleasing people was all that Mana wanted to do after all…

Mana turned around with a curious expression and saw a short teen run to her and then break into mad huffs as he almost fell on his knees. He must've been rushing for quite a while…

"I apologize, Sorceress-san! I am a medical ninja intern and I was supposed to treat your wound but I'm so late! Darn it! Please forgive me! My father came home after a long while, he's a Jugo clan member, pure blooded so you must understand how rarely he ever comes home, inside the village walls! Please forgive me and let me look at that cut, it looks painful!"

The boy kept shouting in the most apologetic and polite manner, continuously bowing as if Mana was some sort of royalty. She could barely restrain her shame from dyeing her face blood red. She was never addressed with the honorific of "-san" before, usually everyone just addressed her without one or used the slightly condescending "-chan", the one used when addressing young girls or boys when one wanted to make fun of them.

She gently showed him the wound placing her leg forward so that he could see it. "It's alright, I'm quite thankful you are willing to take care of it, honestly. I didn't even know we had a medical ninja in here, saved me time having to limp to the hospital so you're really doing me a favor, might as well address me by my name – Mana…" the girl left a pause letting the teen get the clue to introduce himself.

The young man smiled awkwardly, "That's the wrong leg, Sorceress-sa… I mean… Mana. My name's Kouta Hirano, my father is a Jugo as I've mentioned before but I use my mother's last name because I'm not too proud by my father's bloodline… Oh, you probably don't care, sorry…" before breaking into a shy and restrained fit of chuckling.

Mana's face blushed instantly as she replaced the leg she pushed forward with the injured one. "It was a long day…" she let out an excuse. Then her expression changed back to slightly ashamed and mostly curious. "It's alright, I'd love to get to know you a little since you're so helpful, treating my injury and all. I've never really heard of this Jugo clan, truth be told, if it's not too much trouble for you I'd love to hear some more…" she smiled to him with that small shade of guilt as if giving him the wrong leg to look at was something shameful.

Kouta placed his hands above Mana's thigh and concentrated, his face, when initiating the usual healing ninjutsu technique – "Mystical Palm" jutsu, was much more stressed and concentrated than the faces of other medical ninja Mana had seen. He must've not really been used to the technique too much. Normally healing Mana's wound would've taken a professional just mere moments, Kouta took a couple of seconds longer than that. Then he stood back up and smiled giving the girl a thumb up.

"There it is, as good as new. It might take a while if you want to hear about my father's clan. May as well lead you to the door, if you've got the time, Mana-sa… cha… Mana…" the teen laughed awkwardly when he confused the honorifics again before deciding to use none at all.

He was such an odd guy, he was as short as Mana, who was a bit shorter than most her peers but he looked mostly about the same age, maybe a year or two older than her. His muscles looked pretty well trained, he must've been well versed in the physical techniques, taijutsu most likely, he had no weapons on him beyond the usual ninja pouch on his left leg. Must've been left-handed, it wasn't too comfy using weapons with right hand from the bottom of the left leg… His hair was pretty messy, dark and strangely spiked, long enough to run down to his shoulders but the sides were quite trimmed. His hair strangely didn't act like the usual human hair, they spun together in those strange spiky strands that curled around each other. He wore a simple white top and a dark jacket on top of it that he kept unzipped, some medical tools were visible from his pockets.

"The Jugo clan was found in Iwagakure, they were all banished from the village and hunted heavily because of their violent tendencies and destructive bloodline. Jugo can manifest chakra into cannon-like bursts or shape them really skillfully into all sorts of shapes. They can make their own bodies into cannons, like open holes and stuff, I can't do that but my father showed me once when I was a kid. They've changed through the years, they've become monk-like, calm and peaceful. They believe that unity with nature and peaceful way of life would help them stop being viewed as demons and hunted down. My father is not like most Jugo members though, he's violent and he does roam around because of that, he rarely ever comes home. Mother says I've inherited my father's bulk, all Jugo are like walking mountains…"

Mana laughed, "Well you're not much of a mountain, no offense, but anyone as short as I am can't be called a "mountain"…" she was actually enjoying hearing about this Jugo clan, after all, history was one of her hobbies, one she engaged in more and more now that she was no longer a ninja.

Kouta laughed out and scratched the back of his head messing up his already messy hair even more. "Yeah well… I guess I'm more of a "hill" though maybe "wall" sounds cooler, "the rock" is pretty cool too!"

"Could've fooled me…" Mana smiled gently before bowing for the teen as a farewell, "You seem pretty nice despite your pretty impressive physical condition. Maybe I'll see you soon around these parts?" she looked with excitement and hope in her eyes.

Kouta laughed, "Hope not, that'd mean you've gotten hurt, would it not? I'd rather everything was fine with you, you seem like a really warm and nice person and I hate nothing more than nice people getting hurt…"

Mana squinted playfully, "Seriously, how are you related to those "Jugo" again?" before running off, stopping mid-way and jumping up waving at Kouta who was watching her run off, "Glad to meet you, by the way!" she yelled back at him before running off.

"The blue uniform isn't your color! The black one looked better!" Kouta yelled back before walking back into the hall to get yelled at by Hiro for almost missing his opportunity to heal one of his most prized performers.


	105. A Prelude to a New Adventure

The way home was filled with people wishing to congratulate Mana on her successful show or just straight out stop her to say hello. It was weird how people functioned, the girl couldn't really understand the thought process behind just stopping a person to greet them but she enjoyed it and smiled back and greeted everyone who did so. These were the people that the magician loved most of all things in the world, it was nice to get at least a slight shine back at her from them.

Feedback for her deeds was not something she got as a ninja, ninja's work is a secret one and most definitely a dirty one. It includes things that should never be thanked for or congratulated for, twisted and evil things. Yet deep in her heart Mana knew that the work they did was necessary, all those missions she did for the people was the hard work. It was a dirty and nasty work but it was something that needed to be done, somehow being appreciated for working on a different field entirely felt like living on a permanent "easy mode" of sorts…

Evil had to be fought, there were plenty of bad people around the village walls, people who were buying and selling other people like kittens, people who killed, who rudely took the responsibility over deciding over life and death from the great order of the Universe. As much as Mana still wanted to believe there was Magic – a deity that oversaw all that happened and weighed its heavy hand on all things… After seeing what she saw it was apparent that either there was no Magic, no God or Goddess to weigh the right and wrong and decide for us, or that it was not a kind and loving Magic.

Yet the prospect of decision making, the prospect of herself being the only person responsible for everything going on with her life… It was a scary one, a terrifying one that claimed the teenager's breath every time she tried to wrap her head around it. If she is the only one to blame for all the failures, for everything bad happening around her… No. Maybe that's the right way. Only by realizing that the only reason something is bad is because she wasn't strong enough to change it into better can Mana truly change herself and the world.

But was this change necessary in the long run? She was weak now, she could no longer shoot bolts of lightning from her hands, she could no longer weave illusions to trap her opponents in. She was just what she was – a weak human, below even the potential and power of a normal adult, she was just half of what a human woman was… A halfling surrounded by superpeople, by people who could survive what couldn't be survived, people who could do all sorts of things, people who were strong enough to change everything and yet all they did was kill, maim and abuse that power. The greatest curse in the universe was to know the truth and being unable to make everyone see it.

Mana stopped by the door to her home and looked behind her, she saw young kids with Konoha forehead protectors run down the streets. Young genin embarking on their first missions, not unlike Mana and her friends did not too long ago. It all went so wrong so fast… Mana was now depowered to the extent where she felt like being crippled. Shimo was a wanderer without a purpose to his wandering, someone who did something he deemed wrong looking for redemption which was impossible to be found because the thing he tried to find redemption for was not something one needed to be redeemed for in the first place. Sugemi was a prisoner, a man who took his power for granted and decided that he knew the one true way as to how to do things. A once silly and naïve man crippled by loss. Death affected people in the strangest of ways.

Normally the weak hated the strong. It was natural really, Mana opened the door and sighed as she took of her blue blazer and gently hung it on the sofa, relaxing and stretching out. She looked at her damaged leg which was now healed perfectly as if no damage even befell it. There was a certain jealousy that the weak had for the strong, the salmon always despised the bear, from the viewpoint of the salmon the bear was evil but from the bear's point of view it was just doing what it needed to do to survive – killing the salmon. Mana felt like a salmon who felt bad for the bear, she felt horrible seeing the unnatural burden that killing placed on the young bears and she felt even worse for the bears that grew up and never even felt the weight of that burden as their shoulders and jaws became too strong to even feel it. And yet she was a salmon in another river, protected by slippery and edgy rocks that kept the bears eating the salmon outside it.

Mana was of the weak who didn't hate the strong, one of the weak who didn't let the hate define her and dictate what she should do or how she should feel. The morality of the salmon was lost on her. But if she was not of the salmon's morality, was she still a salmon? If the weak hated the strong and the strong were defined by their strength and Mana was a halfling who didn't hate the strong, what exactly was she? Where was she placed? Who was it that defined her? Dying back then would've been so much simpler… She'd have died like a hero protecting a child and granting him his shot at redemption for what he did, she'd have known who she was – a bear who found an alternate source of food and lived her life to the fullest, dying for something more meaningful than nothing at all…

A painful pinch on her cheek made Mana's peacefully shut eyes open up in surprise – Kiyomi was smiling leaning over Mana. The magician sat up and looked at the kitchen where mother and father were talking over a bunch of snacks – Kiyomi must've come to visit but Mana wasn't home so her parents suggested that the girl stayed for a while over some snacks.

"I heard it was a great show today!" the Yamanaka grinned out. She looked great, happy, strong and healthy, maybe a bit too healthy, wasn't she supposed to be on active duty? Determined to complete literally all the missions she could so that she'd prove capable of taking part in the Chuunin Exam?

"You weren't there?" Mana looked at the girl curiously, she smiled with a shade of guilt and scratched the back of her head.

"Sorry, I was on a mission and I came as fast as I could, right after getting my swollen and busted face treated…" she excused herself, judging from the guilt and honesty in her voice Kiyomi wasn't lying nor would Mana have blamed her if she would've. The magician told the Yamanaka that she could check her show out for free if she ever felt like it but Kiyomi never cashed that free ticket in, not a single time in all the two and a half months after their last mission.

"Your clothes are new and far too fancy for mission attire, you've been home to change before visiting the Hospital, seeing how even the best medical ninja can't heal cloth. You smell of flowers, you've mentioned your mother's garden to me before so you must've also spent time there, you weren't gardening since your fingernails are pristine clean and done which means you were there to absorb the flowery scent… You were there wishing to impress someone… Someone to impress in the hospital… Eiju?" Mana mumbled out a series of emotionless guesses.

Kiyomi looked in complete confusion and slight embarrassment, as Mana listed her features the girl examined her own clothes, her own fingernails and smelled her own girly palm trying desperately to debunk Mana's analysis but she realized that the magician must've been right.

"Wow… You've been… Doing something with your time…" Kiyomi mumbled out, "You're only half right though, I came to meet Eiju but he was busy, we barely exchanged words, he healed me and threw me out…"

"I've been reading a lot, history books are very lacking in quality and cohesiveness, also they don't always add up. If you want to get good on history and lore you pretty much have to craft your own theories, analyze details since a single word in a room sized scroll can change the entire fate of your theory… Busy?" Mana explained her newly discovered skill in perception.

Kiyomi nodded, "Yeah, Hisako's been pummeled like an apple on a mission in Kumogakure, from what she told us she was looking for some guy to kill, some Uchiha guy and then some large guy just snapped the guy's neck in front of her by just wrapping his hand around it and pressing with his finger, like popping a grape off the bunch and… You know Hisako, even if her mission's been completed for her she still took it as a personal offense…"

"Poor thing, I wonder what kind of a guy could beat her up like that…" Mana thought to herself, mumbling things under her nose "Or not kill her once he did beat her, people tend to kill their opponents until it is beneficial to them not to in this world of ours…"

"Is it still your world? I mean you haven't been really responding to calls to action, Eiju's been printing those excuse papers for the Administration like crazy without even bothering examining you. Hanasaku-sensei is worried about your indecisiveness, it's hardly the first time someone lost their chakra control over abuse of chakra augmentation but they always quit after, you've remained out of duty for months…" Kiyomi looked at Mana giving the magician that strange worried look.

"Yeah… I imagine Eiju feels bad about it but… Strangely enough, you can tell him to calm down during your next date. I don't blame him for what he did anymore, I mean when we spoke after my fight with the cat lady, when he told me about his sickness… I saw his despair towards that thing and… I really wanted to help him. I guess by being crippled for life, rendered absolutely useless as a ninja I helped him in ways I could've never helped by staying active" Mana explained, her voice shifted around from indifferent to outright depressed, it was apparent that she had given this matter quite a lot of thought.

"I heard interesting things from your parents… You're still working out, at night, when you think they can't hear you. You're still meditating and researching jutsu in your room during your free time. Mana… Please don't tell me you plan on going back to active duty. That's why I came here, I'm worried about you. I'm worried you'll pull some childish hogwash like apply for a mission without your chakra control back…"

Mana turned her eyes away, she was really sad about being called out on her dreams of regaining her chakra manipulation, regaining all that she'd lost, regaining her purpose and her lost dream. Why was she being called out on trying to call back at her dream? It was like yelling at a disabled person for still trying to hope to walk again, some day… In some way…

"There are ninja who can't control chakra, you know… There were several students in our Academy group who couldn't perform ninjutsu for their lives and focused purely on taijutsu or weaponry…"

Kiyomi jumped up, it was clear that she got angry and afraid after Mana validated her thoughts that the magician wanted back to her old life of being a ninja. "Yes! Yes there are ninja like that but those guys trained their whole lives! They trained their whole lives because they knew that they're inferior, even more, none of them actually lost their chakra control, they have working chakra networks meaning they can still augment their physical abilities if needed. Mana, don't do this! You're going to kill yourself! If a ninja punched you with an augmented punch – you'd die instantly, there'd barely be a body for your parents to recognize!"

Mana turned her whole body away crossing her arms on her chest and legs. She wasn't sure if she felt like crying or if she was furious. At any moment Mana could either explode in anger or break into tears and quite frankly she didn't want her friend to see either of those things.

The Yamanaka sat down and gently placed her hand on Mana's shoulder. The older girl calmed her voice and tried to appeal to Mana's common sense instead of yelling at her.

"Look… I'm not saying that you shouldn't train, training your body and your mind is healthy, I mean… That analysis thing you did previously was awesome and I could never do something crazy like that but… This is no longer a thing you can do. You look happy without it, you've got plenty of awesome things to do. The scissor guy in the archive keeps talking to me about you every time I go there, apparently you're becoming some prodigy nerd amongst the archive readers, your magic shows are exploding in popularity! If you return to your old life, you'll lose all of it, you'll become like us – a depressed and miserable superhuman who thinks they can make a difference by slaughtering an orphanage and bringing their heads home to their bloodlusted overlords"

"It's fine, don't worry about it, I won't go out again, I will never do a mission in my entire life and I've given up on my dreams already… Is that what you wanted to hear?" Mana replied angrily, still refusing to look her friend in the eyes.

Kiyomi hugged Mana and stood up, walking towards the exit only to stop midway and turn back at the magician. "You know… When you were dying there in that bunker and Eiju refused to heal you… He asked me what exactly you meant to me and I told him… I told him how you looked up to me like I was your older sister and… And that for a moment… Just for a moment… I gave into that illusion, I really thought of you as my younger sister, I really wanted to be to you what my brother Kenji was for me…"

"It's alright, don't worry, I've already found things to do, things that keep blinding me and filling that hole inside me. I do feel incomplete, every day… Can you blame me? My lifelong dream, my nindo was ripped out from me. Ever since I woke up I felt like an incomplete half-baked trash. Still, stage magic, history and books… Those things help me forget, forget that my identity lost one of the most important pieces" Mana replied and stood up, leading her friend to the door and saying her farewells. Kiyomi probably wasn't calmed down by this visit by the slightest. Still, she didn't know what Mana felt like.

Kiyomi was a member of a well-respected Yamanaka clan, ever since her birth she had a place in the Konohagakure village intelligence. She could've worked for the Protective Service, she could've interrogated prisoners etc. She was born and raised like an elite and she was – one of the best youths Konoha had to brag about. Mana was different, she was born with no advantages and she worked hard her entire life, not even for a moment getting closer to her privileged friends. Just barely competent enough to play her cards at the same table but never strong enough to not be the dead last. And then she got even that little that she had ripped away. Even if she was the slowest member of the race she got her kneecaps busted and she was beaten while she was down until she could no longer continue that race. Then one of the prize winners came to Mana and unintentionally rubbed it in, asking her to stop doing racing altogether and start baking pies for other racers…

That evening Mana and her father were working on a blueprint for another deathtrap. It was really a tricky one because it required a lot of different clockwork mechanisms and gears that were supposed to all work in a coordinated manner. They tried everything, kept arguing about how it was supposed to work. Mana had picked up some skill by working with her father for a while and her research and interest in world history and lore helped her sharpen her mind.

"What if we turn them sideways, change up their positions? They're all turned sideways but what if we flatten them and place them facing us?" father scratched his chin. Both he and his daughter were completely stumped by this new deathtrap.

"No, that wouldn't work, if we place those blades in then either the blade will damage the gears or they'll get stuck, either way I'll be too dead to know what went wrong…" Mana explained pointing at the part on the blueprint that was supposed to symbolize a ritualistic knife stuffed into the device and showing at how close it'd be.

"Well then… I suppose this device won't work…" father angrily pushed the blueprint on the floor. Mana carefully picked it up and straightened it out.

"There's an option, we could reduce the size of the gears, then they'd take less space, if we also turn them facing us and they're at least three times smaller they wouldn't contact the blades. We could use rubber bands as a connector here and here, the gears wouldn't touch but the rubber would make them act like they do touch…" Mana explained her plan pointing at bunch of complicated drawings.

"That would never work. I always draw these gears as small as they get, how would you make them work while they are three times smaller than the minimum people work with!? That's wishful thinking at best and a literal suicide at its worst, must I remind you, Mana that it's a deathtrap we're working on? It needs to be hundred percent foolproof for me to give you the greenlight to work on it..."

Father was always so careful…

"Still, better we give it a run before giving up on a whole evening of sketching, I'll run it around several blacksmiths in the morning, see if they could help us…" Mana smiled rolling the blueprint into a large roll and putting it into her backpack.

Father nodded and scratched his stubble, all those extra shows Mana was doing made their time working on the tools make him neglect his own personal hygiene. Not that he cared much about it to begin with, father somehow often acted like his accident that left his arms burnt and him without his ninja license ruined his life…

Like father like daughter…


	106. Yoruma Treatment

Early in the morning, right after finishing the appropriate morning routine, Mana headed out for the Konohagakure hospital. Normally only visiting the blacksmith was in mind for that day – she needed to know from a professional if the specific miniature gear-work mechanism that she and her father were working on was possible. Even if it was possible it was unlikely that Mana could make it, even with father's guidance. Father was incredibly crafty, he was known for his skill in tinkering acquired over a lifetime. Skill of that magnitude couldn't be picked up in just a couple of years.

After entering the hospital, and some time before, Mana had to deal with people wishing to greet her or talk to her, ask her when the next show would be. By then it had become the girl's normal routine so it wasn't a big deal. Just a minor hindrance, in terms of how long it took compared to the simple idea of it that Mana had. It was supposed to be just a short visit, in and out after a brief talk. After hearing how Hisako was hurt Mana wanted to see her friend by herself.

"Hey... You're Konoha's Sorceress right?" the lady in the medical ninja uniform sitting by the table at the reception smiled, looking excited to see Mana visiting the hospital.

"Ummm... Yeah. I just... I'm not sure if I can even do that but my friend's been brought from Kumogakure, pretty banged up from what I heard, could I see her by any chance?" Mana struggled out to ask this of the lady. Usually it wasn't like anyone could just waltz in and see people, especially the people who were in really bad condition.

"Oh... You speak of the Yoruma girl? Sorry, normally you could do that once her condition is stable but... I'm afraid she just slipped out from the hospital, we've been informed that she checked into the Administration as "in active duty". You'll probably find her at home at this moment, or drinking from the early morning before getting into a fight, as Yoruma are known to do, Sorceress-chan..." the nurse looked really willing to help Mana out, whether it was because of her job description or particular fondness of Mana's craft as a stage magician remained unknown.

A little saddened that this sidequest of hers ended up being prolonged even more Mana left the hospital building. She probably could've went to see Eiju but... She wasn't sure that she wanted or even could see him. She wasn't angry at him, what she told Kiyomi was true and if the Yamanaka, whom Mana considered a friend, decided to start a silly rebellious relationship with the newly appointed medical ninja she'd support her friend all the way, if that was what would've made her happy.

"Oy, well you're someone I didn't expect to see today!" Eiju's voice made cold sweat run down Mana's neck and down her back.

"Hey..." she greeted him half-heartedly.

"So... You willing to check yourself at last? You know they won't let you out on a mission unless I tell them you've been examined and you've skipped hell knows how many of those examinations already... It's time to decide, whether you want a shot at going back or not?" Eiju popped a pill. Mana looked surprised to see that he was still popping something after his regenerative tissue was removed by using Mana as a living tool for it...

"Didn't the tissue die? What do you still need poison for?" Mana glanced at him slightly but only out of curiosity.

"People sometimes drink even if they're not alcoholics, lovely, you were right – my tissue died but my sickness came back. It's no worry, there's still a couple of years till it'll flip me over..." Eiju laughed out.

"If you want to poison yourself may as well pick up drinking or smoking, bad habits of normal people. For all the slack you can't seem to cut me for my indecisiveness, you can't decide if you want to live or die yourself..." Mana snapped back at him angrily, she turned back to face the young man she used to hate so much. She started to dominate the conversation, she noticed his stance faltering so the magician closed her distance and stood on her toes to somewhat close the distance between her face and his.

"I don't hate you anymore, I'm not mad at you anymore. You saved your life without asking anyone else at my expense, may as well own it and not make the loss of my gift for nothing. If you die of taking poison I'll bring you back and kill you again. My gift is running down your veins, you're the only person I managed to help throughout my entire life, the only one whom I really helped all the way. You will NOT die on me!" Mana cracked down on the medical ninja angrily.

"Alright..." Eiju sighed, he leaned over as if he was about to throw up but he managed to keep the contents of his stomach in.

"How have you been holding up? Heard you became a medical ninja and sold your cheap butt off to Hanada-san?" Mana calmed down a bit and asked Eiju as if he was her friend.

"Yeah, usually there's a pretty messy procedure involved with medical students becoming medical ninja, since I was a Quack and wanted to legitimize I could apply for the spot with just a single exam. One might say legitimization into a village ninja from being a rogue itself was the hard part – lots of questions and lots of talks with a lotta blokes..."

"I'm sure Hanada-san made it very easy for you, friendly advice, since you're actually somewhat dear to Kiyomi we brought you back because we wanted you to move past your old life. Don't you dare return to being Hanada-san's personal slave medical ninja..." Mana threw somewhat rudely at Eiju before deciding that she wasted enough time and may as well have moved on.

"I'll have that in mind, lovely, thanks... So you think blondie still thinks I'm hot?" Eiju asked playfully.

"Ever heard of this guy named Shikio?" Mana asked coldly after turning around and facing Eiju again.

"Shikio? Can't say I did? Wait, wasn't he that heroic legend guy? The one in all the movies and plays? Chicks keep inviting me to them... Or they would theoretically if I knew anything about any "chicks"..." the medical ninja pulled a quite frankly pathetic save of his own ass, as he was known to do.

"Yeah... He's tall, muscular and strong, brave and heroic, really lovely beard. Thing is – every girl of ages ten and above had a poster of him around their room at some point. They knew it'd never happen, there were a million reasons why they would've never became the brides of Shikio, the fact that he wasn't even real being but one of them. Still, they obsessed over him, they checked him out and dreamed about him because he was just a dreamy guy. Point is... When I see her and the topic turns to you – you're her Shikio. It's not that she finds you attractive or sees you as the love of her life, you're her dream of rebellion against her clan rules, a living embodiment of it." Mana explained before starting to walk away again.

Last she saw of Eiju the man kept standing by the hospital back door pathetically, desperately trying to keep the contents of his stomach inside. So he wasn't a complete dickbag? He had guilt over what he had done plaguing him from inside, the guilt that worked in combination with his lethal terminal sickness which'd claim his life before too long. Those two combined made him engage in self-destructive behavior. Mana sighed. She didn't want to admit but him and Kiyomi getting together and striving to impress each other would be healthier for the two of them: Eiju would stop trying to kill himself and at least make an effort to look as good as he could with his natural born handsomeness, Kiyomi would finally embrace her dreams of rebelling and they'd stop burning her up from inside...

Love life was complicated, what could Mana ever know being just a fourteen year old stage magician who had more attempts at her life than boys showing any interest in her...

Walking around the Yoruma district was really dangerous, Yoruma were quite violent people. Hisako wasn't too far off from what a normal Yoruma was like. Normally it wouldn't be too correct to try and generalize people by their clans, even if people shared their clan they weren't all just the same as the common traits amongst their clan members. That being said, Yoruma were more alike than some other clans. If clan members weren't all like their common traits, how come Hisako was exactly like that? No. Mana knew better than that, her Yoruma traits were just a façade. Something to make the girl look worse than she actually is, something to distance herself from the rest of the world. Mana walked into a small inn, an inn in the Yoruma district no less.

The idea was to ask around, see if any of those drunkard brawlers knew anything about Hisako but the moment the girl entered the inn hall she instantly regretted the decision. It was filled with the worst looking sort of ninja one could find. Despite all of them having Konoha forehead protectors none of them looked like ninja, all of them looked like killers and most definitely all of them displayed a similar killing intent feeling to them like Tanshu-sensei used to have, except much weaker.

"Oy! What's a little girl doing in a fucking inn!? She doesn't look like one of ours!"

Similar yells started coming from each side of the inn. Mana shook in her shoes, she was afraid, she had a good reason to be. Yoruma were the worst kind of people one could meet: brutal, always angry and looking for a fight. They were just as likely to drink you under the table as they were to kill you on first sight. Just for the kicks of it.

"Ey! The little bitch ain't talking to us! Wait a sec! I think... Yeah, she's that magician girl ain't she? What, did you come to perform here!? Alright then, dance for us!" some idiot yelled out tossing a knife right where Mana's foot was, had the man not been so idiotically smashed he'd have stuck his hunting knife right into the girl's foot, now she just barely managed to track his hand moving. Her eyes, her reaction time was so horrible! She'll find her death in a place like this...

A shorter looking fellow stood up, he was toying around with a knife he still had some cheese on. He was older than most, maybe in his early sixties, one of his eye was completely white and judging from the scars it may have been due to a slash. The other one was pretty dimmed out as well, he must've been completely blind at this point.

"It's alright, girl, if that's your job, perform for those old fuckers, if you're here for a drink you've come to the wrong damned place..." he slithered out in such petrifying and shallow husk of a voice that Mana's heart froze just hearing it. Even if this man spoke of toast, one would've been afraid for their life. How many could this man have killed? Hundreds? Thousands? No. This must've been the effect of his killing intent... Mana's lack of appropriate chakra control made it really hard to deal with that pressure in the air.

"What's wrong, why are you silent? Are you mocking us?" the man asked silently, so quietly that Mana could barely make out what he was saying and yet that somehow just made his acknowledgment of her existence that much more scary.

"Just gut her already, we've gutted kids for less... Nothing runs back home to mommy faster than a gutted kid!" some drunkard yelled out from the side.

"I'm looking for someone..." Mana finally managed to break the immense pressure on her chest and say something. The sheer collection of killing intents in that place scared her to Hell. Just what kind of an inn would be full of drunkards in the early morning!?

"Well... I sure as hell hope it's death, because that's all I can give you" the old man husked out. "If you say one more word, I will. Leave. Now"

Mana wanted to leave, she was worried about Hisako though, her friend left without recovering, she was wandering around a region like this. A dangerous and a really nasty district. It may have been smaller than a couple of streets but it was still the scariest place to be in Konoha.

"It's..." Mana tried to say something but she heard that horrifying buzz in the air – that sound of steel whizzing right before the inevitable sensation of pain followed. One that was to shock the one on the receiving end so much that it froze their entire body for a moment, almost like they were shocked. Her body felt so stiff, it was like she was in a body of an old woman's, without her chakra control the magician couldn't have possibly dodged a fast attack like that.

A loud thud made Mana break out of her shock. A slightly taller feminine figure stood in front of her. The woman who saved the magician was covered in bandages and plasters on her head, the entire upper part had bandages tightly wrapped and one of the eyes of the young woman was covered with a large chunk of compress as if the eye was really injured. Strangely enough the raven haired woman also wore a poncho of sorts that covered the bandages of her lower body.

Even in her severely battered state Hisako managed to catch the dagger coming straight at Mana's chest by just catching it in her hand by the blade. She managed to focus her chakra control and augment her body so precisely that it surpassed the strength and speed of the assailant and let her hand remain uncut. Mana nodded in gratitude for her friend but the addition of Hisako's killing intent pressed against her chest even more.

"You old bag of dicks, the magician bitch can't talk because of all of your fucking killing intents. Stop being such a creepy old fuck and let the girl go home..." the raven haired Yoruma hissed out angrily. Hisako's voice was thicker, perhaps more masculine as if her throat had great pressure applied to it recently. It just added to her intimidation factor though.

"I sense weakness in you... I could take you right here, fill you with holes this moment. When a Yoruma's blade is stopped we must fight, you know the code!" the old man yelled out angrily, spitting some slobber up on himself from his blind rage.

"I'd gladly fight you if you weren't such a blind cuntslammer, you'll poke your own eye with the elk trophy in the corner if we go at it and yet somehow you'll probably see better if you do!" Hisako angrily yelled out and back at the old man.

"You're worried for my safety, hatchling? Look at your..." before the man could finish his sentence Hisako punched him out with a single strong thrust of her fist right into the man's teeth, her hand got so deep into it that for a moment Mana thought that Hisako would punch a hole through the old man's head.

Mana shook and took a couple of steps back leaving the inn and finally catching some breath from the overwhelming shock of all those killing intents. Hisako left shortly after.

"Don't worry, that's just about how all drinking sessions go, that old fart will wake the fuck up, laugh at it and keep drinking because he has no teeth to eat with... Rooster's raging cock! I opened my wounds..." the woman cursed looking at her bleeding fists. Mana reached into her pouch and removed a medical food pill from it, handing it for the Yoruma.

"Fucking hell! You've got one of those? Fuck, how much money do you make for those shows!? Or is it one of your yearly quota? Can't be, you and the blond-bitch ate two in the forest... Fuck... I can't take this..." Hisako looked at the black marble in Mana's hand. The magician quietly shoved her hand closer to the assassin's chest before Hisako took it and chewed it up. Soon the woman reached for the bandage on her eye and removed it revealing a perfectly healthy eye, she also stretched out as if she had no more pain from the previous fight.

"Thanks... I just wanted to see you, maybe talk about what happened a bit... It's been tough lately, shouldn't be but it is..." Mana decided that just giving her friend one of the most expensive tools a ninja could carry in their kit was not quite enough for an expression of her gratitude.

"Boo-fucking-woo... You make enough money to hire me as your hitwoman to snuff out all of those old faggots. Your face is known all around the village and some people outside of it. You're Little Miss Idol here, fucking own it" Hisako angrily stopped Mana's attempt at letting her feelings out. "I don't get your problems and I never fucking will, I'm a different person, a worse one? Most likely. A hopeless one? More likely than not. Thing is I'm different, stop wasting your time treating me as your friend and leaning on my shoulder"

"So... What happened in Kumo? Who was that guy?" Mana asked curiously trying to regain some of her friendship with Hisako by at least talking about one thing the Yoruma loved – fighting.

"I'm not sure he was even a man... He was large, like... Really large and brutish but his strength... It wasn't normal, he wasn't strong – he grew stronger the more we fought! The more I hit him, the stronger he became and my swords only cut through his skin, it's like his body absorbed the blows past that point. Fistfighting him was useless..." Hisako lifted her hand up, loud chirping noises came from her arm as lightning chakra formed around her hand.

"I hit him with this, a technique I ripped off from another technique, it was like I hit a brick wall with a toothpick... Around Kumogakure, when they gave me the emergency first aid before moving me to Konoha, they considered him a living legend of some sort, a living myth. Some urban legend who comes and kills people sometimes, completely randomly. He killed my target despite having no reason to, he left me alive despite my most genuine attempts to kill him... He's the only man in the world I truly fear just because I know nothing about what he is exactly. He's one of those guys whom when you encounter you just give up on trying to beat and feel lucky you just survived" Hisako stopped talking, Mana was surprised to see so much feeling from her mostly emotionless or just usually enraged friend.

Hisako was really scared, her face was turning around, her muscles were twitching and turning in ways they weren't used to and she was so close to firing off torrents of tears.

"It was nice seeing you again. Thanks for not letting me butcher that fucking kid, Hokage said I might get promoted soon, that mission was a good boost... Thanks for the pill too, I'm still calling you some kind of "bitch" though... Idol-bitch is growing old so I'll work with "Magic-bitch" for now..." Hisako changed back to her usual cocky and rude self and turned towards a large but really neglected house.

"I wouldn't accept anything else..." Mana smiled waving farewells to her friend. Right before the girl turned around and walked away Hisako turned back with an annoyed smile.

"How fucking dicks were those fucking old fucks?" Hisako almost laughed out.

"Real "fucking dicks". I really like the district of your clan though, it has a nice classical feel to it..." Mana smiled back at Hisako as the two parted ways. The assassin headed to her home to train more now that her bones and her busted body was healed by Mana's generosity and the magician headed to the best known blacksmith in the village to continue her life as a weakling civilian. At least she closed the old chapter of her life before beginning a new one...


	107. Shits and Giggles

„Hey, you're that Sorceress-girl, aren't you? Shoulda said so before, maybe I'd have let you cut the queue a bit. It's a busy season, I tell you!" the blacksmith laughed out slapping his large beer belly covered up with that weird but surprisingly thick and durable leather apron that most blacksmiths wore. Common clothing in Konohagakure was quite flammable so people around dancing flocks of sparks needed some sort of protection from the tongues of flames that could've erupted out of nowhere. Leather was quite protective of flames after all, anything else would've caught fire before that large impractical piece of cloth started rustling red.

"You mean every season? When is the job of a blacksmith ever not needed?" Mana tried to smile but her observation was quite a bleak one since most blacksmiths were exclusively merchants of death. The skill of a blacksmith was determined by how potent tools of murder they crafted were. After all, a blacksmith capable of crafting a sword of unmatched quality could've also done the same with any household tool in need of repairs. Crafting blades and armor built up skill like nothing else could, it was the most profitable and the most sought after way for a blacksmith to gain notoriety and skill.

Holding his large layer of fat in his hands as if it without such a notion it'd fall right off the blacksmith thundered out with a deafening laughter.

"True, so very true! The line of job of a killer would be made significantly harder when one finds oneself having to stab someone with their bare hands..." he yelled out trying to restrain his voice after having just let it go in that strangely amusing fit of laughter.

"So, girl, what sort of services are you looking for? Let me see..." the man finally managed to calm down and take over the scroll of blueprints from Mana, slowly unwrapping it and letting his experienced eyes run down them. The magician tried to not say a word, she just couldn't bring herself to inform the man of complicated this gear-work would be and just what sort of device it was.

"Huh... Strange, this doesn't seem to be something your father shouldn't be able to craft, isn't he Konoha's Great Trapster? The Trapster I've heard of could make such a thing with his feet, even if his hands were tied... You seemed to make a mistake though, girl, the scale numbers are way off..." the blacksmith smiled at Mana, his strange moustache twisted and lifted up revealing his teeth, a little nasty looking view, considering the still moving pieces of beef stuck in the man's teeth being in full view once his teeth were exposed.

"No... They're correct, that's the problem..." Mana reported with a guilty look, like a cat looking at its owner after they came home only to find their beloved ancient vase in shatters on the floor. For one reason or another the magician felt guilty bringing such a complicated blueprint for the blacksmith, as if she was guilty of coming up with such a wild idea for a device.

"Well then... Sorry, girl, as bad as my vision is... I'd need a molecular microscope, the likes of Konoha Hospital to even see what I'm working with... I'm telling you that I'm a million years behind this construction, it requires a molecular level of steel craftsmanship. Can't be done..." the man shook his head and stroke his wild beard giving Mana the scroll back. The girl turned around and looked at the small queue behind her, the old people bringing their metal canes for a little fixing, young ninja wishing to buy tools or order some of their own design to be made.

A strong and heavy grasp landed on her shoulder stopping Mana before she left. The girl looked back at the blacksmith who seemed to be scratching his curly brown hair with his oily gloves leaving sludgy remains in there wherever he went. His wife must've been one of the ladies who got excited from such sights, Mana knew some girls who got quite excited by men who tinkered and the only reason the magician was even approached by them to be befriended was because her father was somewhat of a prodigy in the field of tinkering. It was yet another Shikio-sort of situation, they just wanted to see him at work, see him tinkering knowing that their strange childish thoughts would be only dreams...

"Truth be told... I suppose you shouldn't dump those sketches, you could bring them to a Kirikuzu clan blacksmith, it's quite convenient but they're the only blacksmiths able to manipulate materials at a molecular level, it's their bloodline ability" quietly the man exclaimed, he removed his oily gloves and dusted his hands off putting a note on a nearby device that he's taking a break. He did seem a little winded so it may have been a good idea to take a break.

"Kirikuzu? Aren't they mostly residing around Snow Country and Kumogakure?" Mana asked for a clarification. She had heard about the legendary craftsmen who could manipulate molecular size dust of special alloys and create complicated constructs with them. So complicated, in fact, that they left their peers in the dust for centuries as it'd take endless years before similar technology would be discovered to aid the common blacksmiths catching up to the awesome skill of the Kirikuzu clansmen.

"Yes, all but one family, one family lives in Konohagakure and have their shop here. You see, most Kirikuzu do not craft weapons because they feel like their incredible ability would grant any weapon user wielding it a tremendous advantage, this man does indeed build weapons however he doesn't use the Kirikuzu bloodline ability to do so, he does it as a normal blacksmith. He'd be unable to work his little shop in Kumogakure so he moved to Konoha long time ago, you may be able to convince him to help you" the man explained grabbing a can of soda from a small cubical fridge and popping it open then flipping it so quickly that some of it ran down his thick curly beard after he flipped the can back.

Mana nodded and bowed slightly in gratitude before thanking the blacksmith and running off. She was quite in rush to reach the mentioned Kirikuzu workshop but she forgot that she didn't ask for directions beforehand in her excitement so she briefly returned for that small clarification. It wasn't a great surprise that the blacksmith found it immensely funny so the magician had to suffer another brief pause until he laughed his powerful large lungs off before giving her the directions.

It wasn't too far away from where Mana was, the small workshop was situated in the northern district of the village close to the Administration building and the Hokage Memorial mountain. Only after briefly glancing at the colossal constructions of the faces of all of the previous Hokage did an idea pop into Mana's head that the mountain was slowly running out of place. It probably only had in it for one or two more Hokage before the monument would've been unreasonably floated to the east as opposed to its current central structure, to fix it some Hokage of the future would have to be placed behind the face of the First causing possible confusion about the order of the Hokage...

Strangely enough despite the day approaching the second half of it there were still numerous genin queued by the shop. After just a brief look at the vendor displaying the sample goods sold at the shop Mana realized that it was a simple shop of shuriken and kunai, also other simple tools in lesser quantities like the Fuuma Shuriken as it's large windmill-like shape was showing off its great glory for all to see at the top of the stand. Without wasting much time Mana stood in the queue and waited for a good twenty minutes before her time to speak to the blacksmith came.

The man was an incredibly large and bulky individual, he had a much more well-refined muscular structure and he had no overly manly features like thick facial hair. He was dressed like a blacksmith but looked much more like a hulking warrior as his physical condition was much more suited for showing off or fighting than strenuous physical labour. The man's strict and boring black hair stood in a small stump-like column. After seeing Mana he tried to show some sort of emotion but he was unsuccessful.

"How can I help you girl?" the man spoke in a strange accent, Mana had never heard any similar to it, it wasn't even similar to anything one could hear in Kumogakure. As a prodigy in history, lore and culture Mana couldn't even place a finger on it and it intrigued her a little. His speech reminded Mana of northern people, they tend to speak in slower and more erratic rhythms, there was little elegance to the man's voice or tone.

"I showed this blueprint to a blacksmith in the central district, he told me you may be able to help me with it..." Mana smiled handing the man the blueprint scroll. He briefly ran it down with his eyes before returning it.

"It's not right, numbers wrong, fix it, then show me" he let his erratic and accent ridden voice take over again. He seemed to sometimes skip some words when he spoke, he spoke in a very simplistic manner making Mana suspect that there may have been something very ancient about his roots.

"No, it's actually quite exact, that is why the other blacksmith wanted me to show it to you..." Mana informed the man handing him the scroll back and not letting her polite smile fade for a moment.

"Oh, yes, I see now... Yes, that is small gear, very small gear. What is this thing you need to be made? Armor? Why would your armor stab you?" the man squinted at Mana strangely after having the details clarified to him.

"Well... I don't know if you know... I'm..." the girl opened her mouth to explain.

"Yes, magic girl from the hall, your poster all over the district..." the man interrupted her dropping another strangely worded and sounding yet crushing word bomb. He was clear to not speak too much but when he did speak it was the most important collection of words said in that conversation. He only spoke of important things, may have been one of the North-Eastern cultures that treasured words. Some ancient people living in those parts thought that each person was given a certain amount of words to say throughout their lives and that they died after that amount of words was said. Some people got millions, some got thousands, making each and every one of them treasure what they said and only speak when it was necessary. Maybe this man was a descendant of such people, he may have not even known of his origins but still unconsciously followed the philosophy of his predecessors.

"So... Then this is show tool? For show? Shits and giggles?" the man glanced at Mana angrily with a judgmental look, he seemed to accuse the girl of something but she didn't really understand what.

"Umm... I suppose, in a manner of speech..." she tried to bellow out but he cut her down instantly

"I won't work on this shit-giggle metal junk. I build real tools, weapons, armor, using my tools people fly, people kill or hurt other people. I don't make tools to joke with!" the man replied rather loudly handing the girl back her scroll.

Mana was quite disappointed by the blacksmith's decision but she respected it, slowly the girl sighed in sadness and bowed to the man also thanking him for his time. Then the door to her right burst open quickly and someone ran into the room.

It was a tall and rather bulky for a female girl, perhaps a year or two older than Mana was. She looked really well trained and refined and had a strange tomboyish attire that complemented her very strict hairstyle. She had bright red hair that was incredibly short and only reached the back of her neck, the only sign of any style of individuality in the girl was her green tracksuit and the small lock of her hair that covered one of her eyes. She rushed up right to the blacksmith and handed him something.

"There, father, I've finished the combat-shovel you asked for!" she exclaimed energetically, Mana was surprised to find out that she was related to the man since she shared very little with him. Her general facial features did look similar but her hair and eyes were coloured slightly differently and she didn't have a slightest sign of his accent, probably the result of her having been raised in Konoha.

The girl's eye then wandered on Mana's blueprint, she got excited and grabbed it out of her hands for some reason, rolling it out and admiring it in all its glory.

"Wow! What is this? This looks pretty cool! I've never seen such detail on an armor blueprint before... Wait... Why do those swords penetrate your own body, seems like a security issue, don't you think?" the redhead looked at Mana with curious eyes that also suggested great excitement. The father of the kid tsked angrily.

"This is my daughter, Meiko Wakizashi, she sometimes takes up silly projects to occupy her free-time. I'd have normally rejected this silly thing but... If daughter wants the stupid joke, she can take it" the blacksmith replied.

Mana looked a little confused, why did Meiko's father introduce her last name as well as her first name? Wouldn't the last name of his daughter be the same as his? If the girl was a Kirikuzu and had similar ability of working the materials into tools why would she dismiss such exquisite legacy by taking up such a last name?

The redhead turned at Mana with a really overly invested smile, she gestured for the magician to follow her into her part of the workshop. The footsteps of the girl were quite wide and Mana had trouble keeping up with her. Everything about Meiko just yelled masculinity and raw power, she was quite beautiful in her own way but she was a bit exotic in her beauty, she was no damsel that was for sure, any bandit coming against such a young woman would've had plenty to work for as Meiko looked quite like a dangerous brawler.

"Joke tool? What was that? Wait... I know you! You're Konoha's Sorceress, right!? You mean this tool is going to be used by THE Konoha's Sorceress!? Awesome! I'll take it! I'll build this thing for you, don't worry!" the redhead jumped up in excitement and rushed to the workshop slipping out of her tracksuit and into the leather apron, grabbing a nearby hammer and some steel plates as well as some gears from a small box to her side. She wielded those crazy sized tools like they were feathers, the sheer strength of the girl amazed the magician.

The girl just started pounding away at the tool, one loud clang after another she started from hammering parts of steel together, nailing them with some strange special nails, they looked like a combination of screws and nails but they kept the plates together. Meiko was rampaging around the blacksmith like a Goddess of War rampaged on a battlefield, as a warrior beheaded their enemies, similarly did Meiko pick up tools from random and remote points of her workshop and used them in their intended purpose. This young woman may have known crafting on a similar degree of mastery like Mana knew stage magic.

"Are you sure you can work those gears like that? I mean I was told that only a Kirikuzu could do that and..." Mana finally gathered the courage to ask for some clarification.

"Oh, definitely not! I'll just trick my father into doing those for me, don't worry. If you want Kirikuzu quality, you'll have it. The thing is that I'm not that good with the molecular manipulation thing yet, my chakra control is a little wobbly but I assure you it'll all be even better than you expect it to be! I'm kind of a fan, even if I don't have that much time to see your shows too often..." Meiko winked back at Mana and continued to hammer at the device. She then placed the tools down and walked up to the magician, wiping some sweat from her forehead.

"Don't worry, Konoha's Sorceress, the tool will be completed tomorrow evening, I'll work overnight. This is my baby! It looks pretty fun and I'll have a bunch of fun working those edges and those blades and all the gear-work making them work, gotta say the design is pure genius! Rarely does a design fit blacksmith standards, usually we have to make it work, make some edits, even more rarely, it surpasses possibility of what we can work with! Don't tell me you were the one to draw this baby!" Meiko looked beyond excited just talking about it and looked really excited to get back to work, she was snapping her knuckles and jumping around in anticipation.

"Not alone, my father helped, his name is Nakotsumi Tsukumo..." Mana started to explain but she was interrupted once again, must've been a trait running down in the family.

"Konoha's Great Trapster!" Meiko almost shrieked out. "I liked that guy, he wasn't too overblown and overused by the village but he had a pretty neat gimmick, I've seen his traps before and they were pure genius, I only dreamed of ever working on Trapster's design... Thanks, Sorceress, I really appreciate it!" Meiko kept scratching her palms in desire to come back to work so Mana smiled and bowed her in gratitude for taking up the job.

"Thank you, Meiko, you can call me Mana, though. I'm not on stage at the moment and all..." the magician smiled, "I can see how much you want to be left alone with it so I won't bother you with my presence anymore, I'll return the day after tomorrow to check in on how it's going, feel free to take as much time as you need, the show is not until the next week..."

"Oh, it's gonna be done tomorrow!" Meiko assured the magician with a thumb up. Mana left the small workshop with a strange feeling in her gut, these people were pretty weird but in a very positive kind of way.

P.S. The character of Wakizashi Meiko was created by a Joe Dupras - a reader and a friend.


	108. Bloom for Bliss

The very next morning Mana felt excited to check on Meiko's progress. The redheaded blacksmith was pretty confident that she could finish working on Mana's device overnight but somehow the magician just couldn't really believe that the strange girl could actually do it. After all, the device had a bunch of complicated gear-work as well as its visual enhancements such as engravings and various decorations meant to make it more visually appealing than a bunch of scrap. There was also plenty that the magician wanted to know about the blacksmith herself.

Meiko was apparently the Kirikuzu blacksmith's daughter, he did look at her with a great amount of fondness and love and did address her as his daughter but she didn't take the clan name from her father. More so she looked very little like him, having only taken his muscular structure from her parent. When the topic of her inheritance was brought up Meiko didn't deny being of the clan of famed Kumogakure blacksmiths but she did bring up the obstacle of being unable to use the manipulation of the Kirikuzu iron dust. That meant she really had roots with the clan and normally should've been able to do it, there was something really interesting hidden in the girl's origins.

After spending quite some time meditating and then taking a break to visit the archive and read up on some ancient history. The magician girl loved reading up on the Settlement period, it happened somewhere during the lifespan of Princess Satsuhimasa of whom Mana read during her mission to discover the hidden archive. Princess Satsuhimasa worked together with Senju Gan, a man who would later become the First Hokage. Reading on the relationship and deep kinship of the two was refreshing, however it was about during that period that the reputation of Satsuhimasa started to dip into the gutter so the stories of the two were filled with strange inaccuracies left there by purpose. It took a great deal of logical skills as well as skills of deduction together with a rich background in history to put the pieces together.

The Princess and the First had a very interesting mentor-student relationship. The Princess was seen as a living legend and Gan was someone who was taught under her wing and grew into quite a wise and remarkable ninja himself. He was really brave and powerful, known for the crushing strength of his Wood Release ability second only to Satsuhimasa's own. It was said that Gan's Wood Release could rip through tempered steel and once grinded a meteorite headed towards into a storm of beautiful falling stars, still, when compared with Satsuhimasa's destruction of the Moon using her Wood Release, Gan's own paled greatly. It was like comparing an exceptional prodigy to a legend. Gan may have been the King of Ninja but Satsuhimasa was on the level of being called a Goddess of Ninja.

Just as the collections of books turned to recalling the succession of Gan by his wife Uchiha Hakari – the Second Hokage, Mana put the books back and glanced through the window only to see the night changing the day and the slothful dance of the snowflakes going down taking over the view. Having put the books together and taken all of her notes and other things she took with her Mana dashed out.

"I'm astounded by your ability to restrain yourself from eating in the archives…" the librarian smiled at Mana fixing his tie and glasses as he jumped up to see the girl out with his eyes.

"If you found someone eating there you'd clip their head off" Mana joked giving the man a wink. The man lifted his hand wielding his scissor blade and clipped it playfully, the girl just barely managed to contain her giggling and ran out.

"It's quite chilly outside, should've taken a sweater!" the archive keeper tried to let the girl know but at that point she already bolted to the streets. The man just sighed and sat back down, flipping his table light to illuminate his own book – "Tales of Shikio the Great". The man took great pride in the edition of the tales without the bare-chested version of the main character on the cover, that usually attracted too much attention and giggles from the visitors as it was basically an image of a topless well-endowed man and the keeper loved to enjoy his book in peace.

While Mana had not heard the warning of the archive keeper before she left, she somehow came to the very same conclusion. She had to clutch herself by wrapping her hands around her chest and shoulders. Konoha was very peculiar with its seasons, spring and winter changed around, the seasons went and gone like normal but it was either warm enough to walk in one's casual clothes or it got slightly below freezing temperature when the winter came. That was why while in theory there were four seasons, Konoha only felt two of them, half of the year was warm but not hot, the other half was cold but not freezing.

The other parts of the world had it much more extreme, the air got much hotter to the East, the Wind Country had it pretty badly as they barely saw any snow and the desert was searing hot, people in Sunagakure had to deal with both the blinding sandstorms and the searing heat. It was up to the North where the weather was the oddest – the Snow Country was the coldest place in the world where one could easily freeze to death unless prepared for the freezing cold, however farther to the north laid the Lightning Country – a large mountainous wasteland that was surprisingly hot and then Kumogakure which was almost as hot as Sunagakure in the Wind Country when it was hot and almost as cold as the warmer spots of the Snow Country during the winter. Kumogakure was a country of extremes both weather-wise and as far as the reputation of the personality of its people went.

Mana wasn't really sure just what kind of weather was around Kirigakure, based from what she heard and read it was mostly just damp rainy days all year long. It wasn't that the place saw much heat, it was that it was too wet and gloomy to not get a major case of seasonal depression. No wonder the people there had their children kill each other in order to graduate the Academy… So much rain and mist could've driven anyone mad. However some of the Kirigakure's Archipelago of islands were quite tropical, they were supposed to be quite popular tourist hotspots if advertisement was to be trusted…

Still rubbing her arms and shoulders Mana finally reached the Kirikuzu workshop. Meiko's father was sitting in the workshop and resting at that time, his work for the day must've been already finished. The girl bowed upon her entry to show respect, for some reason she felt like the man didn't quite like her based on their first impression but surprisingly enough his reaction to the young magician looked quite warm.

"Oh, magic girl! You look pale and cold, I'd give you some sake to warm up but you are just a kid. Maybe my wife can make some green tea… Mari! Make some green tea!" the man roared so loudly that Mana had to clench her ears for a moment. Normally she'd have wondered if anyone inside the home which was right behind the workshop, connected to it with a system of small corridors and halls would've heard it but having the strength of the man's lungs in mind the whole neighbourhood must've heard him.

After the woman called "Mari" came in Mana instantly realized that Meiko must've been the daughter of those two – the woman was of average height, wearing a black casual tracksuit and she had long red hair, even her eyelashes were bright red and extremely thick! Her facial features were much kinder and slicker than the strict and sharp edges of her husband and the colour of both Mari's hair and her eyes matched that of Meiko's. The girl blacksmith must've been the child of the two, having inherited her mother's hair and eyes as well as her looks and taken her father's muscular structure and several stricter features like sharper cheek bones and a longer and pointier nose.

"I've already prepared a cup for you, you always drink your tea after work, would the young lady care to wait for a moment?" the woman smiled politely at Mana with an apologetic look as if feeling bad for not predicting the girl's arrival.

"This is Mana – Meiko's new best friend…" the hulking blacksmith informed the woman after spilling a small gulp of sake into his green tea and flipping the cup down before handing it to his wife.

"Ummm… I guess…" Mana squirmed a little uncomfortable, why would the man think that she's Meiko's best friend. The magician only met the girl yesterday and barely even knows her, the whole time of their acquaintance it appeared that the blacksmith was more interested in Mana's project that the client handing it to her.

Mari laughed out, "Oh, don't be shy like that, if you give Meiko something to work on, she'll be your best friend for the duration of the time she's working on it. I've heard she's especially excited about this project of yours…"

The woman disappeared for the refill of the blacksmith's tea and Mana's cup, the man stood up and stretched his tired muscles out. "Yeah, really fiery this kid… She almost exploded in a fistfight, coming at me to get me to work on those miniature gears! Can you believe it? Her own father! That's one kid who takes her job seriously…" the man laughed out, strangely to him almost having to fistfight his own daughter appeared more of a joke than a relationship problem.

"There you two go, I checked up on Meiko, she said the project is ready, you can go examine it now!" Mari soon returned with the tea. Mana carefully caressed the burning hot cup to take as much warmth from it as she could. The workshop was pretty warm and had all sorts of smells, the smell of burning, smells of oils, smell of sweat… Carefully the girl took a sip taking great enjoyment as the small sip went down warming her from inside.

Mari lead the magician to the young blacksmith's little workshop that she had, it appeared that the whole eastern part of the workshop was handed down to the girl. It was quite messier than that of her father's, it had a whole bunch of unfinished projects, parts and pieces of armours, handles and blades of swords thrown around. Meiko turned around with a creepy impression reminding of that of a mad scientist having just built a twisted masterpiece. She approached the two and nodded at the large finished deathtrap near the working table.

"She's done!" the redhead blacksmith smiled showing off her teeth so hard that she had to squint.

Mana laughed out awkwardly, "She?" she asked curiously examining the perfect craftsmanship of her device. It wasn't the exact copy of the blueprint but it wasn't supposed to be.

"Yeah, they're not tools, they're babies! They have personalities and they need to have their mommy give them some care of her own, it needs to be a perfect fusion of personality of the builder and that of the designer… I figured it's supposed to have that classical horror feeling to it so I eased up on the flower motifs with the engravings, added some spikes and made the whole frame bulkier… Hope you like it" Meiko explained waving her hands and making strange gestures, the magician could've sworn that at one point she tried to portray the cradling of an actual baby.

Mana awkwardly looked at Mari, the mother of the young woman just smiled pleasantly, "She didn't play with dolls as a kid, instead she insisted on building her own toys, that one time the boys invited Meiko to play ninja and she built actual ninja tools to play with them… She's a little quirky" the mother explained.

"No, it's amazing, I love it! I love the classical gothic feel of it, I thought that a monster face on the head would be scary but this beautiful woman's face is much creepier! Awesome, you're really talented, Meiko…" Mana's eyes just ate the deathtrap up, she couldn't believe that with just a couple minor alterations to the visuals the blacksmith brought up what Mana wanted to say with the device without actually knowing what it was that the magician wanted to portray. Meiko pulled out a scroll and sealed the device into it, the girl must've had some skill with sealing techniques as well since she complained previously that her chakra control is too wobbly even to use her clan bloodline ability which even most non-ninja Kirikuzu could use. After sealing it into the scroll the tinkerer gave it to Mana and the magician paid her a little extra for all the effort.

All of a sudden the magician's eye got caught on a peculiar thing Meiko had hanging on the wall instead – a long sword, the blade was of the length of an adult arm, maybe even longer. The handle looked almost like made of bronze entirely with a fake emerald on the centre, crafted and molten in a way that resembled the consistency of a tree bark with rough edges and the texture of a rough tree bark. The blade was so impressively crafted, it looked like a blood crimson coloured steel but the blade wasn't simply edged, it reminded more of a pin cushion. It was a collection of smaller almost miniature blades erupting form it, like a tree of swords, a long concentrated stream of blades that upon contact would left a nasty collection of cuts.

"Is this "Ranma"?!" Mana whispered out unable to believe her own words. Hanging on the wall of this young blacksmith's workshop was the legendary weapon used by the infamous rogue ninja who plagued the entire world during the times of Uchiha Hakari – the Second Hokage. The man was called Nakao Magobei, he was a man who was unable to manipulate chakra but he was a great swordsman who had such unfathomable willpower and conviction that he managed to tame a Tailed Beast and ride it into battle. He did not beat it, seal it inside of himself becoming a Jinchuuriki, he didn't trick it – he just fought it, befriended it and rode it to battle. That may have been why he was known as Yonbi no Magobei or Magobei of the Four Tails. He was a man who achieved more with his guts and "fuck it all" personality than most ninja had achieved up to his time and after with some of the greatest bloodlines of the most elite clans…

"You know what "Ranma" is!?" Meiko shrieked out like a schoolgirl who was invited to a date by her childhood crush. Mari smiled and left the workshop having decided that the two would just drift into conversation, maybe she had just seen it happen too often, or perhaps it was that this was the first time that her daughter finally saw someone who could match her own knowledge of weapons and legends…

"Yeah, the blade of Nakao Magobei, it is said that it was the sword that nearly killed the Second Hokage, or at the very least shortened her lifespan greatly… She was never the same after the battle against Magobei and the Four Tails… Some sources claim she almost went blind, truth be told, it isn't too hard to believe, she was really out of shape having just given birth to her son five days before the battle" Mana explained adding some history to the tale of the blade, she wasn't sure if Meiko was interested in the historic aspect of it, she most likely just loved the weapon itself.

"Wow, you know so much about history! Nah, this is just a copy I made, this isn't even the real alloy of the sword, I can't work blades that are chakra conductive yet, my control isn't good enough… It's just a steel blade dyed red, it looks pretty legit though" Meiko explained switching between fangirling over Mana's knowledge of history and the real "Ranma" the image of which must've still been in the girl's mind.

"The reason why I was so surprised by seeing this sword hanging is because I was quite sure that the real "Ranma" was broken, it was never explicitly stated in any historic sources but during the battle the Second used her Susanoo forming her own legendary sword – "Kinshu", it is said that it was a sword made of pure chakra, as sharp as the willpower of the user. Such a tool would've broken even "Ranma"… I suppose that may have been why Magobei was so obsessed with the Second, he knew of her possession of the blade and in his hands it would've been able to cut through anything in existence, his willpower was unmatched…" Mana told her speculations and theories just blankly staring at Meiko's replica with dreamy eyes.

After turning around she saw the rather creepy sight of her blacksmith friend standing behind her with another sword, a construct of steel that had a ring instead of a handle and just grew into a blade with gold-like engravings around it. It was the best replica of "Kinshu" Mana had ever seen.

"Once again, it's just a cheap copy made of ordinary steel used to craft swords and kunai and shuriken, it's not made of pure chakra and willpower…" Meiko's emotions shifted from sheer happiness to complete disappointment.

"It's really refreshing to meet someone with a similar fascination in history even if it just the legendary tools you're interested in…" Mana smiled.

"So… You think "Ranma" is broken then?" Meiko looked really sad, it was almost like she grieved over a loss of an actual friend. Mana gently placed her hand on the young woman's shoulder, having to reach a bit up as Meiko was a bit taller than the magician was. Mana could relate to that specific emotion on Meiko's face – the loss of one's lifelong dream. The blacksmith must've wished to acquire "Ranma" for herself at some point.

"It's fine, there are plenty of other great blades for you to acquire, you said your chakra control is "wobbly", are you a ninja? How good are you?" Mana tried to change the subject onto something else.

"Nothing to write home about, I just finished Academy last year, I decided not to take the graduation exam for two years longer than my peers because I was afraid I'd fail, and after graduating I only had small chores. No sensei wants to take me into their team because I really suck at pretty much everything but punching people and weapons… I wouldn't ever deserve to wield "Ranma" or "Kinshu" or "Dokyo" or "Chie", I'm just a wannabe who dreams big…"

Mana couldn't believe but she wrapped one of her arms around Meiko's head and gently hugged the young woman. It looked like after being informed that her dream weapon may have not survived the trial of time she remembered some past insecurities.

"It's really alright, you may not believe me but at the moment you're much more fantastic of a ninja than I am…" Mana smiled thinking of her loss of chakra manipulation.

"No way! You're Konoha's Sorceress, I've heard this one girl on one of my teams remark that you're one of the village prodigies on genjutsu despite the fact that you're still a genin…" Meiko pouted.

Mana smiled, "That's a cheat, genjutsu isn't something many people work on so it's really easy to be one of the best at it… Tell you what, maybe one day we can go on a mission to find a legendary object? I'm not sure if they'll let you keep it but… You never know…"

Suddenly Meiko's eyes opened up with glee and she burst out of the magician's arms and started jumping around in joy.

"I'd love to! What sort of item would we look for? Would it be the legendary "Ruyi Jingu Bang" or one of the "Swords of Virtue"!?"

Mana smiled and shook her head, "No, if we looked for something material, something we can bring home we'd never be allowed to keep it. We need something that doesn't seem all that useful from the first glance, something so incredibly obscure that the Fifth wouldn't even want it for the village"

Meiko curiously scratched her chin with a shade of childish playfulness, "Is there even such an item?"

Mana grinned and devilish sparks burst in her eyes from her childish joy, "Our target is – The Box of Ultimate Bliss!" she declared boldly as if this declaration was a sign of great triumph already.


	109. An Unexpected Return

A mailman was walking from one door to the other, dropping by packages and mail for the families to find once they wake. The elder had been doing this for many years, during the war, back when he was in his prime, he used to deliver mail not only in Konoha but also to other countries. Serving as a Courier Ninja was a difficult job, one had to travel through countries that may not have always had the best of relationships with his own, one had to worry both about their reception, village ninja on missions and rogue ninja at the same time. Needless to say that the man enjoyed the tranquility that the twilight of his years brought.

Something quite odd hit the man's eye once he passed the street to deliver a package to the house on the other side of the street to the one where he was. A young man walked past him, almost like ignoring him and just kept on walking. His facial features were barely visible but what little the courier's eye did catch reminded him more of a young boy than a seasoned warrior, yet this kid had immense presence and not the best of feelings around him. He felt like bloody murder, just being around him creeped the old man out, as a man who served as Courier Ninja he had encountered many men with Killing Intent, this one's was nothing special, yet still surprising having the boy's early years in mind.

"Hey..." the courier tried to strike a conversation with the young man but the youth just kept walking quickly disappearing from the mailman's sight. It wasn't that big of a deal that this youngling was wandering the streets, after all, if he was inside the village walls that meant that he was let in. If the guards at the village gate found the youth trustworthy so should anyone inside the gate. Still, very few were outside at such a time, it may have been four or five in the morning and so only those who were obligated to be outside usually were. It was not some fear for the village's safety that intimidated the man, it was the oddity of the boy's presence that confused him a bit. Just minutes after encountering the young silver haired boy who seemed to have let his hair grow far too long for the man's tastes he forgot all about the youth and just continued his job.

"To Meiko Wakizashi at the Kirikuzu Workshop..." the old timer read the next letter's address. The last name of the young lady who was the receiver of the letter sounded quite fake. These kids and their silly youthful heads, full of air... Back in the mailman's days a last name of a clan was something to be proud of, to wear like a badge of honor, these days kids just ditched this honor for some fake sounding made-up names like "Wakizashi"

"Was Meiko Katana or Meiko Buckler taken? If she were my kid, I'd smack her good, smack the dumb name right outta that brat..." the grumpy mailman kept talking to himself as he headed towards the Kirikuzu workshop. Talking to oneself may have seemed like an odd thing to do but it was how the man kept his sanity with him throughout the years of wandering the world during times of war. It was either talking to oneself or going mad from the combination of loneliness and fear that any small rodent below you could be a ninja disguised to catch you unprepared and steal all the mail, all the valuable information. The time of the old courier had long since passed.

Mana tapped her foot impatiently by the Administration building. She informed Meiko by sending her a letter that the magician had finally done enough research about the Box of Ultimate Bliss to approach the Hokage with the information. The girl wanted to tell the Hokage about what she'd found out so that maybe the woman let the two of them out. Both of them could actually use this little field trip. Even if they didn't find anything, Mana could have used the company of a friend as quirky as she was, also she wanted to know just how much of her abilities still remained. If she was attacked by a simple rogue bandit outside the village walls, could she still defend herself? Was there still hope for Mana to return to normal life? Maybe somewhere down the line she could still manage to do a mission or two even without her chakra control.

There was also a hidden agenda behind all of it. It was the nature of the said box which the two of them would be looking for. Most of the girl's hopes towards the mission counted on it being a fail, maybe they'd explore some ruins, find some dead ends and Mana gets to scope out her own abilities and give Meiko some good time for that amazing service that the magician got in her father's workshop. There was still an astonishingly miniscule possibility that Mana with Meiko's help could find that box. That was where the magician suddenly started feeling bad. She wanted to use that box, use it for her own gain...

"Hey, Mana, wow, you actually walk dressed like that? I thought it was just a show thing?" Meiko sniffed in a fit of laughter into her fist. She should've been the last person to judge, she looked like a warrior from one of those fantasy plays about those orc and goblin things. Even in the ninja world those plays and movies sounded ridiculous. An old species of people-like barbarians living in the mountains? That sounded stupid even in a world where children breathed fire and summoned lightning.

"Yeah... Well my uniform is very closely tied to my fighting style and my abilities as a ninja. I found myself without it during my last mission and it was a drag, I quite literally died without it" the magician shrugged, knowing fully well that her friend would get confused by that story.

For some reason the magician insisted on keeping her loss of chakra control from Meiko. It may have become apparent at some point but Mana just felt too embarrassed to admit it. Meiko looked down on herself for being sloppy in terms of ninjutsu and other chakra manipulation techniques but Mana's chakra manipulation was completely lost. The magician didn't want the blacksmith to think that the two were absolutely defenseless or hopeless or to kick what little remained of her self-confidence in the nuts. It wasn't all selfless however, a significant part of it was Mana's own embarrassment, she felt like a lesser being for not being able to do what she always could.

Her chakra used to be a part of her identity. Now she stood in front of a young woman who beat herself over being sloppy at it when Mana had absolutely nothing to say about it. Some people categorized ninja and their abilities into special groups: special ninja and physical ninja. It was an integrally flawed classification seeing how the best physical ninja relied on chakra to enhance their physical abilities, but basically a physical ninja was a ninja who fought with a weapon or their abilities of pure physical power or speed as opposed to illusions, ninjutsu techniques or seals. If Meiko felt like such a trash over being a lackluster special ninja, what exactly was Mana, someone who had lost all of it? Admitting her lack of chakra control would've made Mana admit that she was worse than trash in her own mind and she just couldn't do it.

"Huh? That's weird... Oh well, I'm glad you got better then! So, wanna maybe tell me a bit about that box? I know very little about it, I may have an interest with legendary weapons but I don't have that much of a fascination with artifacts" Meiko scratched the back of her head having decided that suddenly she was OK with Mana's attire and her style.

Meiko was dressed in an actual steel armor, it didn't cover all of her body but it was on her shoulders, some of the more sensitive arteries close to her neck, her chest and her knees as well as a little below the groin. The rest was all cloth or leather for easier movement. Just tough enough to protect her most sensitive spots but not restrictive enough for free and slick movement. It appeared that the redhead was quite ready to leave right after the two confronted the Hokage about it that was good, Mana had packed her things too but she left it at home. In the best case all she needed was a brief drop by to pick them up and she was good to go.

"I'll be explaining it all to the Fifth anyways, she isn't the kind to know those kind of things so you'll have all your answers then. Just know that if I asked you to meet me – the clues are solid enough" Mana encouraged the armored blacksmith with a gentle tap on her shoulder. It was strange how the magician could easily tell that her friend was worried just by how often and how much her chestplate lifted up every time she drew breath in.

After Meiko nodded confidently the two girls headed straight for the Hokage's office, waiting outside for a little bit before the ninja who entered before them could get their business straight with the Fifth. After the door opened Mana observed a bunch of kids leaving the office with a woman in a red dress and wearing a Konohagakure headband around her arm. The kids were fooling around, laughing and casually talking to their mentor who also looked cheerful enough, just how long of this childish joy could they have still had? When exactly would a tragedy make these kids realize just what the nature of this job was? Mana remembered being a lot like these kids one day, she had her reminder on the first day of the job what it was all about...

"Mana! You're staring, let's go already!" Meiko snapped the magician out of the stream of memories of her old team that started to take her over. The two walked into the office and Meiko slammed the door behind her. After the eyes of Mana, the Hokage and her assistant all fell on the blacksmith she just smiled awkwardly and apologized. Nervous Meiko was a bit cute, Mana had to admit.

"So... Have you finally had a medical ninja have a look at your chakra network?" the Fifth instantly asked, she looked really angry at Mana for missing all of her scheduled examinations for months. The last thing everyone in this building wanted Chestnut Hanasaku to be was angry...

"Ummm... No. I feel fine, I don't need examinations. In fact, I came here with an emergency mission I need authorization for" Mana tried to salvage her hopeless situation. A loud bang on the table silenced her instantly, having the Hokage's strength in mind it showed remarkable restraint that she didn't even grind the table into sawdust with a single tap.

"No way! I've already suspended your license until a professional takes a look at your chakra network and confirms that you are fit for duty. Whatever this is, you two can go now" the woman thundered out shutting the magician and her friend down, Meiko was already in the process of leaving.

"Wait! That means I'm not a ninja right? I'm technically a civilian at the moment?" Mana jumped up in surprise, as hopeless as the situation was, she had an idea that could've still salvaged it.

Hanasaku nodded, a little confused as to where the girl was going with it.

Mana put her hand and pulled out a cute but excessively oversized plushy wallet that looked like a bunny cuddling with a heart and unzipped it, slamming all of her ryo onto Hokage's table with a confident smile.

"Then I request to be a client of a mission!" Mana shouted out.

Hanasaku first stood up to yell at the magician but then thought about it for a moment and sat back down, she smiled so much that she was almost laughing so the woman had to hide her grin behind her own hands.

"Go on..." the woman's assistant encouraged to hear Mana's request out.

"Way back you gave us a C-Rank mission to find a hidden archive and retrieve a bunch of scrolls. I request a similar mission, as you know during my free time I spend a lot of time studying history, lore and legends in the Konohagakure Archives. Well... I believe I found sufficient enough clues to claim that I found the possible location of the Box of Ultimate Bliss deep in the Wind Country desert" the magician explained, after giving that last bit of detail she heard Meiko complain behind her.

"Aw man, you should've told me it was in a desert, I wouldn't have worn that leather under my armor. Steel bruises are better than sweating my brains out!" the blacksmith complained before realizing that she interrupted everything and once again after the annoyed stares of everyone in the room looked at her the young lady blushed and apologized.

"Box of Ultimate Bliss?" the Hokage scratched her head. As expected Chestnut Hanasaku justified her reputation of being quite a numbwit, while the object was a complete unknown for most ninja, anyone interested in history or in a relevant position of power should've at least have heard the name.

The annoyed Hokage's assistant fixed his glasses and sighed, he waved at Mana, "Please explain it to Lady Hokage as non-scientifically as possible... She usually loses interest after ten words or so"

"Well... The Box of Ultimate Bliss is said to be able to fulfil any wish of its owner. After that it disappears and reappears at a random location in the world. It is known to have appeared underground, underwater and inside volcanoes but it also had previously appeared right in a center of a village" Mana started from the most attractive trait of the box, just so Hanasaku properly understands the importance of the clues that Mana put together after almost a week of endless studying with just her magic show and secret workouts getting in the magician's way.

"I see... Why should I not send every ANBU operative and Jounin I have on call right now after the box?" Hanasaku scratched her head still relatively confused, "I mean... Something impossible sounding like that should attract the attention of every village in the world? Why isn't it in Sunagakure's possession right now, they're quite close to the desert in question..."

"That's because it's a longshot. What I've found describes the box's location but the box may have already been used and changed its location. Also handling the box requires someone with intimate knowledge of it, it is said that one of the First People sealed something inside of it and it is quite possible that careless handling of the box might make some of its power leak out and damage the environment or kill its possessor" the magician was preparing for this conversation for a while, she tried to foresee any possible angles from which the Hokage would try and bust her attempt at this which was odd – the Hokage never attacked a mission like this, even if it was a lady who lost her kitten or a man who needed to have his dishes washed...

"Something?" the assistant wanted Mana to explain in more detail. He must've been familiar with the box's reputation of being a wish fulfilment device of legends but he had never heard about its origins and the story behind it.

"Well, it is said that during the early days of our world, back when it was still forming and shifting, there was a being so ancient and so evil that it controlled death itself. It is said to have come from somewhere deep inside the Earth, it just burst from underground and destroyed a small settlement, its very presence corrupted this world and threatened to destroy it. It was on the level of the Ten Tails' power but whereas Ten Tails was a force of nature, this entity was pure evil. Whenever during its existence a person died it became a puppet and served its needs, it might be said that this entity "created" death itself, some particularly crafty poets claim that what we know is death is just leftovers of that entity's malevolent chakra. However that creature is now sealed inside a box the size of a ball and it is tied to the box's will"

"Wait... Are you sure it's a good idea to mess with that thing!?" it was strangely Meiko who interrupted Mana now.

"Absolutely, while the box is closed it is of no danger to anyone, even when it is opened the entity inside it would not be set free. There is not a being living or dead strong enough to break the chains that hold it although careless use of the box might leak some of its evil chakra out" Mana tried to calm everyone down.

"You said that this box can fulfil any wish its owner pleases, what's that about?" Hanasaku's face then suddenly shifted from a worried and somewhat relaxed to extremely serious.

"Well... It is said that the entity inside it wants to come out just for a moment and it rewards those who let it free for even a single free heartbeat by fulfilling their greatest desire. There are some people who claim that by finding the box they managed to bring their loved ones back to life, their claims are unimportant though, there is no solid proof that the box had ever been used since everyone who ever openly admitted finding it disappeared without a trace."

"It sounds like more trouble, if you find it and bring it back you will give Konoha a great bargaining chip but will also put a target on its back for any nation looking to test their military strength... Also... I hope this isn't about Tanshu... You're not trying to play me to use the box and try to bring him back, are you?" the Hokage stood up and turned to look through the window, to see her villagers go around their own business absolutely unaware of the matters being discussed in the Administration building.

"No... I am a firm believer that the Box of Ultimate Bliss has only cultural value and no mystical abilities. I wish to give it to the ownership of the Konohagakure Museum, if the mission is successful and the chances of this are one in a million... The clue is solid enough to come to you but not solid enough to make it a sure thing" Mana admitted, she did lie about the first part, she was quite on the believing side of the box's abilities and wanted to possibly use it if she found it to restore her chakra manipulation.

She was greatly pained by the Hokage's question about Tanshu, Mana would've brought him back if she believed there was such a chance. Still, it was years since Tanshu-sensei died, just what shape would he be back in? Could he even be brought back? What makes him so special to bring him back and not a bunch of other people that died like the Fourth? Everyone had already achieved some closure with these terrible tragedies, to bring any of the two back would be to claw at those stitched wounds. There were just too many questions about this venture but Mana counted on using the box if they found it, claiming that she didn't find anything to Meiko and when they came back. A clue to a legendary artifact being a dead end was nothing too tough to believe, was it? Mana craved her chakra back, her gift, her identity.

"Very well... I shall make this a C-Rank mission because it is such a longshot and because the only danger seems to be departure from the village walls. You will be followed and protected by three genin to the location of the said box, your mission is to validate the clue, just check its validity, do not touch or use the box in any way once you find it unless it is in danger of being compromised" the Fifth finally gave in.

"Wait... Three genin? Who? We need to leave as soon as possible, we've already possibly wasted a century or two based on the age of this hint, granted the scroll came from the archive we discovered so it is unlikely someone else read it but still!" Mana almost freaked out. She may have been able to put Meiko to sleep with a sleeping gas card from her pocket but taking out two ninja would be troublesome.

"Don't forget, you're not a genin, Mana, you're a civilian so you'll need two more people for this mission. It just so happens that there is a young man waiting to have his license re-approved who would like to assist you, I told him you're scheduled to meet me and so he so pleasantly waited nearby..." Hanasaku smiled and pointed at the wall.

A loud poof echoed through the room and a large cloud of smoke shot out from the wall revealing a young man having used some sort of camouflage ninjutsu technique. The young man wore torn up, burnt and bloodied green rags and had below shoulder length silver hair that were greasy and messy like the man had spent years dipping them in someone's innards without washing them. And he wore those same glasses he had when he left the village and had that same awkward smile.

"It's been a while, Mana..." Shimo waved at her.


	110. Chakra over Matter

Mana continued to stand there completely confused. At some point the awkwardness had become unbearable and yet still she couldn't find anything to say. She was happy to see her friend but after all that time she wasn't quite sure as to where everything was anymore. Shimo left the village on a quest of self-discovery and had his license suspended and was so crushed and confused by what happened when he fought Sugemi. Now he looked rested, completely refreshed yet at the same time he looked like a homeless bum.

"You let yourself go…" Mana smiled just a little, testing the waters by just letting her little toe dip. Judging from Shimo's warm laughter they were quite warm and shallow.

"Yeah well… A courtesan in Tanzaku told me chicks dig guys with longer hair, you've only grown cuter over the years though, Mana-chan" the Yuki swordsman shrugged with a small speck of longing in his voice.

So was Shimo feeling just like Mana was for some time now? Nostalgic and longing for the days past? The days when they were all a team thinking they're going to change the world? Was that the reason for his return or has he actually discovered himself like he intended to?

"You should never take an advice from a courtesan seriously, Shimo" Mana snapped back.

"Truer words have never been spoken…" Shimo broke into a wild laughter, must've been a reaction from his memories of the woman in question and some seemingly unpleasant history that the two shared. Just what sort of adventures did he have? His torn up and dirtied, burnt up kimono suggested that a lot of fighting was involved and his eyes looked much more careless and much more matured. This Shimo Yuki was a whole different young man from the one who left.

"Oh my God! This is Audra steel! The real deal! How on Earth did you get it, were you in Kumogakure?! These cost a whole fortune!" Meiko was geeking out on Shimo's sword which she somehow held in her hands and was examining at the moment.

Shimo freaked out. "Wha! How did you do that!?" he yelled out referring to Meiko's ability to snag his sheathed blade from his belt and just casually examine it and identify the steel alloy by just looking at it.

"Forget it, she's like that, if it's an armor or a sword or whatever she's gonna be all over it…" Mana smiled looking back at Meiko. The blacksmith was feasting her eyes on the various engravings and the fancy work that was put into the sword.

"Yes, it's an actual Audra blade, I studied under an Uchiha who had once faced the current Raikage and copied some of her moves using his Sharingan. Unfortunately he trusted a courtesan far too much to be considered wise and he lost his arm in the process, a blade such as this was useless in the hands of one armed swordsman so he gave it to me" the Yuki explained casually walking up to Meiko and taking the sword from her hands.

"I am not worthy to be in its presence!" Meiko bowed handing the sword back to Shimo who only grinned.

"If you're going to work with me protecting Mana-chan on this mission, I have a feeling we'll get along…" he concluded.

"What's an Audra blade?" Mana wondered out loud.

A loud slam on the table interrupted the hearty conversation, all three teens directed their attention back to the Hokage, it appeared that their bonding and catching up would have had to wait for just a while longer.

"That being pushed aside, I can still only count two ninja in the room, now that I've officially reapproved Shimo's license. Also, having the difficulty and location of the mission in mind the third genin must be a medical ninja" Hanasaku rumbled out with an authoritative tone, not the likes which one would've had the courage to argue against.

"Where on Earth are we going to find a genin medical ninja? Most medical ninja don't train students until they're at least Chuunin" Meiko scratched her chin.

This was just so stupid! After all these aces in Mana's sleeves and all this surprising luck that had followed her to get this mission approved… To bump into a dead end like that!

"Oh well. And I was so hyped to get to show off in front of Mana-chan…" Shimo shrugged indifferently. This journey of self-discovery he went on must've been quite something. The Shimo that Mana knew was never this calm, this relaxed, so confident. It was like he returned a whole different person indeed.

"Well, if this mission was to get approved it is a mission of maximum urgency, the source from which it originates is an ancient scroll, the object is located in another country's territory and it is an object of incredible importance. You have twenty four hours to find a medical ninja to complete your squad or this whole parade is cancelled. I will not have children leave on a secretive illegal mission unless it can be done quickly and efficiently!" the Fifth concluded her will.

"Well, technically, Fifth forgets that Fire and Wind Countries have the Serenity Treaty signed which is still in effect allowing us and Sunagakure to salvage cultural relics inside the Countries of each other and granting us a truce for five more years until it is renewed, there will be nothing illegal about this mission. Technically the box could be used as a weapon, if its mystical abilities are real, I'd say it is defined more as a "legal grey zone"… Still, the Fifth has spoken, unless you have some other urgent matters the three of you are relieved" Hanasaku's assistant added onto the mission objective and concluded.

Mana angrily rubbed her eyes with her knuckles, she was tired and frustrated. She was so close, so close to getting this mission put together. So close to reacquiring her chakra manipulation or at the very least giving Meiko a nice adventure as a reward for her kindness and skill. So close to catching up with Shimo and getting to know just how much he had grown over the time he had been missing…

"Look, guys, I know we should be looking for a medical ninja so our destination should be the Konohagakure Hospital and all but… Could we stop for a snack?" Meiko almost begged the two giving them the worst case of puppy eyes that Mana had ever seen a human being make.

Shimo laughed out and Mana could only sigh, the stress and frustration of trying to get this mission together was getting to her. She wanted to just pass out, she's been studying, reading and putting things together, comparing and combining historic theories and trying to make sense of it all, trying to predict the Hokage's possible responses and quarrels with the mission and refine the basic concept of it. Now they had to find a genin skilled enough to be a medical ninja and Meiko wanted to waste time snacking.

"Fine, let's make it quick though, genin medical ninja don't quite grow on trees" the magician replied as the two turned for the Yakiniku Q restaurant of Meiko's choosing. Based on the choice of the young blacksmith Mana was starting to realize that the three may have gotten stuck there for a while.

There were numerous restaurants and cafes and places to eat in Konohagakure. First there was Ichiraku Ramen which was becoming infamous for its incredibly fatty and quick served food. It used to be a small establishment of an old timer with a dream to cook the best noodles just like his grandma used to make them – quick and fatty. Turns out this quick and filling style of eating pleased many visitors and so Ichiraku was becoming incredibly popular among both locals and tourists. Mana didn't fancy fatty foods herself, not just because she was looking after her image as an entertainer, more so because she wasn't the greatest of eaters in general. She couldn't stomach fatty foods and only needed a minimal amount of any kind of food to feel sated.

There were plenty of sweet shops like the Dango Shop and Amaguriama. They served national sweets and recipes that the ninja managed to secure from other countries. Strangely enough securing a recipe was a quite common average difficulty mission, it also quite fitted the traditional formula of the mission involving secret information and scrolls that needed to be retrieved and protected so ninja partaking the mission needed little extra preparation and training for it. The magician had somewhat of a sweet tooth occasionally loving a sweet or two but always feeling done with them after a piece or two whereas the sweets were served in entire boxes. For that reason Mana rarely visited those shops too.

The final most notable restaurant was the Shushuya. It was a more adult-oriented pub/restaurant which served alcohol and strange exotic foods. Its entire menu was comprised completely of weird and unheard of dishes from other countries making the restaurant Mana's favorite, sadly due to its reputation and manners of things most commonly discussed over alcohol minors weren't allowed inside which irked the magician since she only could taste the food through leftovers her parents brought home.

The restaurant selected by Meiko was infamous for its godlike beef and barbecue. It was a paradise for people who loved to eat fatty and large servings of various sorts of meat and poultry dishes. That being said, it differed from Ichiraku Ramen because the food served was quite sophisticated and not nearly as quickly made. Also usually the people who favored the restaurant tended to be quite the lovers of food making the magician suspect that Meiko liked to eat a little bit more than their busy schedule allowed them to. Still, the blacksmith was her treasured acquaintance so the magician decided to let her indulge.

As suspected the place was crowded and smelled of barbecue and cooked meat. It had also the quite pleasant smells of various spices and tomatoes as well as some of the more popular local sauces in the air. Mana's nose was not the sharpest one in the shed yet even hers managed to identify and catch all of those smells so the aroma must've been quite intense. Perhaps that was the main cause of Meiko's open and comically watery mouth and her rush to shove something into her stomach. Strangely enough, while initially Mana wasn't a fan of the idea, watching her friend react to these smells and the prospect of food was just hilarious so she was beginning to enjoy this trip somewhat.

"Well, may as well eat too, haven't eaten since… I dunno, does a roadkill count?" Shimo wondered after the three finally found their seats.

"Awww, I hate those! My father eats those in a soup with red beets and it's the worst thing ever! If I wanted a crushed animal to eat I'd crush it with my own hands" Meiko replied missing the point of Shimo's sarcasm. The young man stretched out and smiled.

"Well then, I'd like to buy your father a drink in a couple of years…" he replied. It was strange how much Shimo changed from his early days. The gentle Yuki swordsman Mana knew could have never stomached roadkill.

As the time finally came for the three to get served Mana politely shook her head and refused, Shimo ordered a single serving of barbecue sausages. After Meiko started naming what she'd be eating the magician found herself getting bored and so she leaned over to Shimo and asked.

"So, did you find yourself already? Is that why you're back?"

"No. I just realized that I can never find myself in a place where I don't belong and so I've come back where I do belong. Konoha was always my home and while I'm glad of the experiences I've had outside and thankful for all I've learned, this place is where I'll find myself, I know it" the young swordsman explained it all, after that both youths turned at Meiko who was still letting the waitress know what she'd be eating.

"Meiko, just because I told you I won't be eating anything doesn't mean you have to order for me…" Mana whispered to the girl's ear as she just appeared to be reading the entire menu out loud to the waitress rather than ordering.

"Young lady, I will ask you to make a double order after you're done eating the first, I've run out of space in my notebook, sadly. I apologize!" the surprised waitress bowed quite low as an additional apology.

"Also when you actually do bring her the food we'll have no space on the table…" Mana joked looking at the young woman who rushed into the kitchen to list this insane order that will undoubtedly test Yakiniku Q's kitchen manpower.

"So, what's this Audra blade you were so obsessed with, Meiko?" Mana couldn't wait to find out. Maybe the explanation of just what kind of tool her friend carried around would help her understand the nature of the trials he faced?

"You know the general rule – "mind over matter"? It applies to chakra quite well, that is to say no matter how strong you are you cannot break a defense that uses chakra, your punch would only feel as strong as a normal blow. You cannot protect against an attack the nature of which is chakra unless the nature of your defense is chakra of greater strength or density" Shimo began to explain.

"It's a blade that can fight against chakra infused blades made of the Audra alloy" Meiko summed the explanation up quickly.

"You see, normally chakra infused blades pass right through normal blades, almost like heated knife through butter, they offer no resistance. Audra blades are able to block blows from chakra enhanced swords or not go dull after being blocked by one. They're basically slightly inferior versions of a chakra enhanced tool but they are able to contend with them instead of just breaking" the swordsman finished his explanation after giving the blacksmith a cruel glare for interrupting him.

"How is that even possible?" Mana wondered.

"It's an incredibly complex process. It involves combining the Kirikuzu bloodline iron dust, the dust of an incredibly tough meteorite steel and some blood iron as a catalyst. The Kirikuzu iron dust is basically living embodiment of chakra and blood iron serves as some sort of strange catalyst that makes it activate. They don't consume each other but they somehow feed off of one another and work in constant harmony and if the ratio of the ingredients is right – Audra steel is made" Meiko started explaining waving her arms and somehow making even larger sparks and stars form in her eyes from the excitement of explaining the process.

"And it's so amazing because one doesn't even need to use chakra at all, as opposed to chakra infusion that actively uses it…" Mana started to seemingly understand why her blacksmith friend was so amazed by the exotic steel.

"Can your father make it?" the magician wondered just out of curiosity.

"Sure, if given the right materials. It takes just one syringe of blood for a skilled Kirikuzu to infuse small iron dust of their own inside and control the iron in the blood by controlling the iron inside the iron and it'd take a decent chunk of the meteorite to extract what's useful and what's just a dumb space rock. He hasn't done so yet, no one came to him with such a request but he's above the needed level to make such a blade" Meiko nodded.

Mana would've thought that nagging questions of such a nature would've annoyed the blacksmith but they were only boosting her excitement. It appeared that Meiko was far too interested in the subject to ever get tired of talking about it. Cooking Meiko's order was taking a while, understandingly so but Shimo's order didn't take too long so the young man was enjoying his barbecue the first, much to the despair of the yearning Meiko and much to the amusement of Mana while watching her friend drool.

"So, for how long have you been standing there in your little camouflage technique? I'd figure standing by the wall whole day would've been boring…" Mana tried to annoy her eating friend to get some sort of angered reaction, maybe to make him look at least a little bit more like his old self as compared to this mature and relaxed man she saw right now. Not that she hated the current Shimo but seeing some of his old self in there would've been quite great.

"Eh, one thing you learn while standing in ambushes for your sensei's stolen underwear is – freezing and lack of comfort is worth a good entrance. Besides, it's not like the Hokage's office was my first stop, I stopped at home too, washed myself and all that, I grew out my old clothes though so I'm stuck with these rags…" he replied with an indifferent look while slowly munching on the small pieces of meat dipped in the tomato and chili sauce spiced up with some herbs. The slow manner of Shimo's eating only made Meiko more miserable.

"That's gonna be a good story for the road…" Mana laughed out. Initially she was worried that her friend may have gotten into some pretty shady business but based on his stories and impressions it appeared that he may have been more into the weird side of outside the village walls than shady. The magician would've been crushed to find out that yet another one of her friends had become tainted by the dark and gritty world around them.

"Eh, all I overheard was a couple of small time mission objectives, the more time passes the more shit stays the same: washing dishes at Ichiraku, filing for the Police Force, those brats these days do all the same things…" Shimo shrugged waving his chopsticks still holding the small piece of meat around while Meiko's eyes followed it like a cat follows the small fuzzy object when you wave it in front of their noses.

"You douche-nozzle, all of us are still genin. I mean… You two…" Mana looked to the side finally seeing some action with the waitress placing Meiko's order on a giant wooden slab and preparing it for delivery to the table.

The three shared a laugh, despite Meiko's hunger the young woman finally saw her desired food being prepared to be served and despite Mana's own inner darkness regarding her loss of identity. The magician was just happy because her friends were happy, the fact that they still had to find a medical ninja for their squad was almost forgotten in this brief moment of bliss.


	111. Identity

Now that poor Meiko had her nourishment finally brought to her she could finally dig right into it. There was something odd to be found in the manner in which the armored girl ate. She wasn't one of those brutal devouring monsters that just made food disappear in the most beastly manners imaginable, Meiko was much more sophisticated than that. She ate every piece of meat gently, like a normal person would. She used utensils and all that, never let any of the sauce drip to the side. That being said, she still ate literally everything that was brought, while watching her eat was somewhat pleasing and elegant, she still took double time doing it. At that point the magician started wondering if her eating like a monster wouldn't have been better…

At some point even observing her friend display all of her elegance and manners at making food disappear got boring, there were only so many thirty minute intervals one could've spent watching someone eat and so the magician found her gaze wandering through the restaurant hoping to find something interesting enough to occupy her attention. It appeared that Shimo was doing the same. It was awkward how little two friends separated for years had to talk about. The several attempts of Mana's to find out more in depth about his trip were quickly shot down by Shimo changing the subject making the girl believe that he just didn't trust her enough.

There was always that crushing moment when one realized that the person one thought of as one of their best friends had stories and other friends they didn't trust one with. Mana didn't have much experience with dating but she was sure that having her genuine feelings rejected by a boy must've felt somewhat similar. Now that she saw Shimo's hesitance to talk to her about his time away from the village or his lack of interest in what happened to her during the meantime she felt like the Yuki was avoiding her friendship for some reason.

"Shay, Mana… What wazhat Hokage shaid abouf yer shakra?" Meiko suddenly decided to ask with a full mouth. "Why did she take you for a civilian? Why are you just a client in this mission?" the blacksmith wondered. She must've heard bits and pieces about Mana's problem from when the girl was talking to the Hokage but neither she nor Shimo could've known the full story.

"It's nothing, really. Just an injury I had on the last mission, Hokage-sama is just worried if it's more than it actually is, there's nothing to worry about…" the magician smiled and looked away.

Mana's eyes fell on a peculiar young man standing by the counter to order, he must've been particularly impatient since the waitresses usually came to hear one's order out in a while right after sitting down. Why would this man be in such a rush to eat? Such a weird and unimportant detail interested the magician a little so she let her attention remain focused.

"Ummm… Yeah, I'll have the celery carpaccio please…" the man mumbled out like he had just woken up several minutes ago and stumbled into the restaurant for his breakfast.

"Sorry, sir, such a dish doesn't even exist. Carpaccio is an exclusively meaty snack…" the waitress quickly spilled her response out, feeling bad for the fact that she had to refuse a client. The staff here was quite polite.

"Oh… Then I guess… Cabbage shashlik is what I'll have…" the man quickly jumped to another dish.

"Yeah… That's… Not a thing either, a cabbage shashlik would be just cabbage poked on a stick, I mean…" the young waitress was starting to get quite nervous. It was visible that the client annoyed her and yet she felt bad for refusing him as if she felt like she was actually the one who was at fault for not knowing those non-existent dishes.

"Okay, I suppose I could then eat barbecued peas…" the man answered with the same indifferent and sleepy tone.

"Sir, this is a barbecue restaurant, also no one barbecues peas, I am as sure of it as I've never been sure of anything in my life" the waitress responded wiping the sweat off of her forehead, someone signaled the young woman that they were ready to order and the woman rushed off, an older woman came to change her younger colleague.

"Oh shit, Toya, the veggie guy is back! Come here and bring a large spatula!" the woman yelled behind her. As a larger woman left the kitchen with an oversized spatula the strange client just turned around and left the restaurant before the woman could ask him out with it. Seeing how Mana followed that peculiar man with her eyes all the way to the door her eyes fell on a familiar face sitting at the corner closer to the door. Mana excused herself and walked to the table.

"Hello, Kouta-kun" she greeted the boy she met some time back during her show. This was actually quite lucky of her to bump into the boy right here, who could've known that he was a rich eater?

"Ah! Mana" the boy shouted out in excitement jumping up and shaking the table a bit, the older man he was sitting with looked at the boy angrily but Kouta just scratched the back of his head and laughed out apologetically.

"So how're things, what are you doing here? I never took you for an overeating person?" the magician smiled trying to ease the boy into the question she actually intended to ask. Strangely enough the girl heard steps behind her and when she briefly glanced back she noticed Shimo approaching them.

"I am actually, I'm eating here with my father, father is still resting after the mission, you see! I must say I am the one surprised to see you here, Mana-chan, what could you be doing here, I wonder?" the boy replied with quite a large amount of excitement in his voice. Most people would've taken Mana's approach and interruption of a peaceful eating out at a restaurant with one's father as rude but Kouta appeared to be quite happy for it.

"Well, I stopped here to feed a friend, if I had known of her appetite though I may have reconsidered though… I see you two may just match her though…" Mana noted looking at a large column of emptied plates. It appeared that Kouta's father didn't even stop his mad eating ways even while Mana and Kouta were talking right up to him. Although whereas Meiko ate elegantly and rather slowly Kouta's father ate like a pig barbarian on a rampage to eliminate all the food left on Earth.

"Well… Juugo use out a lot of chakra with their techniques, even more than conventional ninjutsu users do so our appetites are naturally incredibly large because we have to compensate for it" Kouta shyly rubbed the back of his head, it was cute how ashamed he looked of his godlike appetite.

"The pipsqueak here ain't a natural Juugo though so he can't eat half of what I can… I'm Kusagoro Juugo, Konohagakure Jounin." Kouta's father grunted. He stood up and offered Shimo a handshake which the boy accepted. To Mana it appeared a little strange that he'd offer a handshake for someone who wasn't even participating in the conversation much and was just standing around because being there was much less boring than watching Meiko keep eating at this point.

"Hmph, I see Kouta keeps finding puny friends…" the man rudely remarked before sitting down and digging right into a colossal piece of cooked meat. He most likely referred to Shimo's handshaking skills which he must've found disappointing.

"This gentleman isn't my friend, yet, father. He's a friend of Mana's, who is friend of mine. I kind of work for her, I heal her stage injuries after her shows, for my internship, remember?" Kouta smiled back at his father, it was strange how completely different these two were.

"Pfff, a useless craft those healing techniques, it's a woman's specialty!" the man remarked after nearly choking on a large bite of meat.

"Well, it turns out that I need this "woman's specialty" expert for a mission, would you maybe wish to help us out?" Mana looked at Kouta with her best attempt at the puppy eyes she saw Meiko make some time back. She really needed this, Kouta was probably one of the few genin medical ninja in the village and she had little time to find the others. Even if Kouta wasn't yet officially a medical ninja, just intern obtaining necessary practice in Hiro's hall where Mana performed, he was still sufficient for a C-Rank mission.

"A mission!? With you? Sure, it'll be awesome!" Kouta yelled out excitedly before blushing a little and looking around everyone looking at his table with strange condescending looks. Everyone was already quite disgusted by the eating manners of the two and now the boy started making noise.

"Hmph… An easy buyer, just like your mother…" Kouta's father yelled out pushing the emptied plate away to form a new column of plates and looked at Mana from her face to her shoes like he was judging her. "If you stopped slacking off with your training by messing around with girls you could maybe survive at least a single one of my punches!" Kusagoro yelled out angrily at Mana even though his anger must've been directed more at the young Kouta who was now sadly clenching his fists looking pretty down after his father's scolding.

"I'll have you know, Kusagoro-san, a respected man once always used to say that there's no more useful and pleasant distraction than women. That being said he lost his arm because of his excessive trust in a wrong woman however that fact is something I should've probably kept quiet about…" Shimo but into the conversation.

"I'm not saying that Kouta's friend is to be kicked out of his life, I'm saying that he should at least determine her worth by challenging her to a game before accepting her terms. He's a good kid but he always assumes people are worth his time when most of them aren't!" Kusagoro angrily snapped back after picking up a turkey leg and digging into it. Finally his full frame turned at the three youths.

Kusagoro was a very large individual, with large and spiky orange hair that spiked mostly behind him. His exotic hair must've been a testament of his clan heritage. The man wore a simple jounin vest however his was quite modified. Kusagoro's vest only covered his gut and his chest leaving his neck exposed. It looked like he was issued a vest two sizes too small and just went with it. The man also appeared to be carrying absolutely no weapons with him, not even the usual ninja pouch. While normally Mana would've dismissed it to it just being his free time, the man was actually wearing his combat attire – the jounin uniform and it was battle worn since the black top below the vest had quite several gapping holes as well as his pants. His face had some quite fresh cuts and bruises too.

"A game?" Mana asked the man to clarify when Kusagoro smiled with a pretty cruel smile as if he was certain Mana would lose.

"Yeah! If you want a help of a Juugo beat him in a game! Seeing how you're such a slim little thing you probably couldn't even out-eat him" the man sarcastically made fun of Mana making some pretty crude hand gestures and making a smug face.

Suddenly Mana felt a crushing weight on her shoulder and felt an arm wrapping around her neck. It appeared that Meiko was listening to the whole last part of the conversation and decided to drop by.

"I've no idea what's happening but my food is all gone and I have to wait for more! I heard about an eat-off and since Mana had already eaten her lunch she's at a disadvantage, I shall be Mana's second in this eat-off!" Meiko cracked her fist right in front of the man with a confident smile.

Kouta shyly rubbed his hands together, he was observing the situation getting out of hand and yet he only found strength in him to oppose it now that the challenge was about to begin. "It's really not necessary, you guys, I'm ready to accept to be in your team, what's the point of this all?" he tried to calm the situation down but his father just yelled at him angrily.

"What's the point!? Didn't you hear? This hatchling tin can decided to challenge you! A Juugo never backs down from a challenge, especially one from a girl! Fulfil your duty and eat this girl under the table!"

"Fine…" Kouta sighed sadly and sat back down to his chair with Mana serving both of the devourers their servings. Somehow the magician decided that just going with it and helping the two out with their eat-off was the best choice.

And so the greatest eat-off in the junior weight class began, Meiko and Kouta ate one barbecue serving after another making entire plates disappear. It was Meiko's gentle style of eating against Kouta's barbaric annihilation of food which he picked up from his father, no doubt. The two ate for almost an hour which was amazing seeing how Meiko just finished half of her order. At some point the waitress brought Meiko the rest of her food which was split along the two. Meiko ate and Kouta followed, the magician had to hand it to the boy, for such a short and rather athletic fellow he ate like a beast.

"Ugh… I don't… Feel… So good…" Kouta bellowed and collapsed under the table slipping down the chair like a sack of potatoes. Kusagoro slapped his forehead and growled like an angry dog.

"Ugh… This isn't fair, I think the girl is still one deer leg behind!" the jounin tried to trick the trio but Mana shook her head and pointed to Kouta's plate.

"I've been serving him an empty serving for five minutes, he passed out from eating air for five minutes whereas Meiko kept on eating. If anyone's cheating, we should stuff five minutes worth of servings down Kouta's throat" the magician just barely contained her wild laughter.

"Ugh… Please don't, I concede…" Kouta moaned from under the table forcing his father to just pull his son out with one careless hand movement and put him back down on his chair.

"Fine, you can drag my son along with you, whatever your stupid mission is…" Kusagoro angrily growled and pulled out his wallet to pay for all the food. The mission he came back from must've been at least an A-Rank since his wallet was overflowing with ryo bills. A single A-Rank mission may have granted one an entire life living in moderation or a single wasteful night, depending on how one looked at it…

"Yaaay…" Kouta moaned out again rather indifferently but Mana knew it was just because of overeating. She saw already how excited Kouta was and she was a little glad that he'll be there to watch their backs too. Meiko stood up finishing her serving and nudging the medical ninja into his cheek.

"No offense, you've got a pretty mean stomach it's just that I was at my best shape, you never stood a chance…" she joked as the three were preparing to leave.

"A piece of advice, girl, next time as a team leader you should face your own challenges. A team leader that loses is much more respectful than one who chickens out and lets his lackeys win…" Kusagoro grunted out at the three as they were ready to leave. Shimo turned back at him angrily. This wasn't good, Mana had already seen those eyes on her friend.

"You offended Mana-chan and Meiko-chan at the same time. My name is Shimo Yuki and I'm going to kick your ass for the disrespect you showed my friends!" the Yuki swordsman declared starting to remind Mana of how he was before. She should've been more careful about what she wished for previously, this new Shimo was way better to work with, now he returned to his old self and picked a fight with a Jounin!

Kusagoro stood up and fixed the band around his wrists angrily before cracking his knuckles. "You better think about that some more, brat, cause when I start going at you I won't stop until you're in no condition to go on that mission!"

Mana angrily shook Shimo's shoulder, she could feel her own weakness since she tried making it hurt but her lack of chakra made it feel more puny than painful for the young man.

"What are you doing!? You don't have to do this, neither I nor Meiko were offended, if you attack him now you'll just justify his words – you'll fight for us. It's something we don't even need right now!" the magician tried to talk the Yuki swordsman down.

Shimo turned at Mana with happy eyes and smiled at her gently removing her hand off of his shoulder.

"It's fine, I know you don't want me to fight again, it's just like last time. The thing is though that defending woman's honor isn't something I let the woman decide, it's a part of my identity. I must do this!" Shimo declared.

Mana took a couple of steps back. Identity. Why was that his exact word? That magic word that crippled any resistance Mana had inside from letting this fight happen. She looked at Shimo with determination, confidently and a little angry at him.

"This time I won't pull you out of this, you're on your own. You better win, we've no time to find your substitute if you get hurt!" she let him know angrily.

"Are you sure, Mana? That guy said he's a Jounin, didn't he? He'll kick Shimo's butt…" she indifferently declared sitting down and turning the chair at the two to better observe their confrontation.

"Identity… I know a little too much how much losing it hurts" Mana replied looking at Shimo with a troubled look. She had no time for this, this was completely stupid yet this one stupid word made her just stand here and let him fight it out…

"I don't really get it but if you're OK with this, I'm fine too" Meiko declared laughing out and relaxing in the chair observing the fight that was about to break out.

"Well then, kid, let's take this outside…" Kusagoro declared as the entire party moved out. Mana's eyes slipped and stopped at Kouta for a moment but the boy hesitated, he was too shy and hesitant to stop his father and even if he did, it was quite unlikely that anything in the world could've prevented this nonsense…

Knowing the people involved one could've only wondered how come it didn't happen sooner…


	112. Foodfight

The crowd around Yakiniku Q restaurant stopped to curiously observe the two people who stood in front of each other, staring each other down and the two girls and a boy who stood a decent distance behind them. Bar-fights weren't uncommon in Konohagakure however they usually didn't happen in Yakiniku Q because it had a reputation to only appeal to the tastes of people with rather chubby bodies making them quite lazy and unlikely to brawl their differences out.

"One minute. I'll give you one minute of free punches before I take you out" Kusagoro grinned with a deviant but still quite playful smile. It was evident that to him this brawl was just a game and by all means it should've been to anyone of his skill level. This was a genin picking a fight with a jounin. Such fights shouldn't have lasted longer than the first exchange of blows.

Shimo didn't give in to Kusagoro's taunts, he calmly stood and waited it out. Prepared himself, his breath was calm and collected. Previously Mana made a mistake by thinking that this Shimo was somehow a return to his old self which very obviously wasn't true. While this Shimo had the same ideals as his old self he was much more calculating and much wiser. He didn't just leap into battle, he thought and prepared for it, only when he felt good enough about his attack plan did he initiate the brawl.

Such was the case now. Shimo's body just blurred and disappeared. His figure appeared right in front of Kouta's father, then another, then another and a dozen more. Shimos were popping out of thin air, all trying to hit Kusagoro with a drawing slash.

"Wow, he's pretty fast! I never thought a genin could move fast enough to leave an afterimage, let alone fifteen of them!" Meiko whistled into the air. Judging from the blacksmith's tone to her this fight seemed like an interesting distraction, something to feast her eyes on after a good lunch.

"No… Shimo's a Yuki, he was always fast but no genin can be this fast. Last time I saw him his chakra was maybe half of my level and it couldn't have been bumped up to a level where he could augment his abilities to this extent. It's a trick…" the magician recognized it.

She had a very clear reason to think that way – had Shimo truly moved that fast she'd have not seen him move at all as she had no chakra control so she couldn't use her supernatural ninja perception. She couldn't burst her chakra in excess all over her body sharpening all of her senses to the point where even supersonic and greater speeds could've been picked up on, where even the faintest changes of the environment or the most minor clues could've been picked up on. And yet even without her ninja perception Mana could see and understand Shimo's movements. It wasn't a physical feat, he was trying to outsmart Kusagoro.

Confirming Mana's theory each and every single one of Shimo's afterimages slashed at Kusagoro and disappeared doing so. It was a mirage of sorts, seeing how Shimo could manipulate ice with his Yuki bloodline ability it only made sense that he had picked up some neat and subtle ways to utilize the cold nature of his abilities. It was just a manner of playing with the air around him by manipulating his ice jutsu to incredibly weak level so that it only let out streams of cold air and then further manipulating those optical illusions with chakra. It was like genjutsu but the same effect was achieved through ninjutsu techniques.

Kusagoro's body lit up with chakra, a loud and powerful gust dispelled all of the afterimages instantly making Mana, Meiko and everyone observing the little brawl clutch and cover up their faces from being blown back or having dust blown into their eyes.

"You're a bother…" the man remarked once his violent expulsion of chakra settled down.

"What was that?!" Mana shouted out surprised, she had never seen such violent expulsion of chakra that placed so little strain on one's abilities. Usually chakra was something that functioned inside one's body, any techniques that brought manifestations of chakra outside it were usually higher level techniques and quite taxing on one's body.

"Juugo bloodline, remember what I told you, Mana-chan? Juugo can shoot pure chakra from their bodies as if it was water they drank and are spitting out. Father formed countless microscopic openings on his body, microscopic cannons if you will from which he shot out miniscule and nearly invisible amounts of chakra. This isn't just him bursting his chakra, this isn't father accelerating his chakra flow. It's a defensive technique of a quite different manner…" Kouta explained looking at the brawl with serious and troubled eyes.

"Just how potent are those "chakra cannons"?" Mana turned at the youth with a slightly worried expression.

"If I was you I'd look for ways to end this nonsense before father decides to fight. A Juugo can easily level mountains, destroying a whole village or a settlement would come easy to a skilled Juugo with a decent enough chakra level. If you truly believe that this Shimo can actually challenge my father then please beg him to stop, if father gets excited he'll blow the village up for sure!" Kouta explained the reason for his distress.

"Wait, what?" Meiko suddenly got back into her senses and started violently shaking Kouta like a sudden twister picking up a ragdoll, "You mean this guy can blow up a whole village?"

"Well, any Juugo of advanced level can. That's why we were hunted during the old days, that's why the Hokage usually sends father on away missions as far away from the village as possible, that's why most Juugo exercise restraint and peaceful lifestyles loving the nature and birds and animals and so on…" the confused and dazed boy mumbled out through his nausea from being shaken so violently by the blacksmith.

Shimo's figure appeared right in front of Kusaguro, Mana didn't see it move which meant this must've been the real Shimo, the one using his actual speed augmentation to surpass the human and even the ninja limits. A powerful punch flew right into Kusaguro's face, a loud thud echoed, the testament of powerful force and tremendous strain placed on each of the combatants' bodies. Kusaguro remained standing still completely unfazed by the punch. Shimo jumped into the air and kicked off his opponent's chest backflipping some distance away from him and panting a little, taking a sword drawing fighting stance ready to defend himself in case the man decided to come at him.

"Heh, was that it? I'm sorry, I must've augmented my body, I really should've just taken it, lose a tooth and not bothered. I bet the wench you're fighting for packs a better wallop" Kusaguro grinned with a cruel smile trying to psyche Shimo out.

Shimo's body leaped forward, drawing his sword and thrusting it forward, placing his hand right on the other side of the hilt and driving it forward with additional force. A loud clang signaled the sword hitting its mark, a powerful blue glow emanated from where the tip of the blade met Kusagoro's body. The faint blue light kept on shining as the Yuki kept on driving the sword forward trying to impale the jounin right in his chest. The light was glow of one chakra clashing with another since it was quite obvious that Kusagoro was augmenting his body to take Shimo's blows while the swordsman's blade was an Aura blade capable of contending with such barriers.

"I'm a swordsman, blocking my punch isn't worth jack squat!" Shimo roared out as he repurposed his effort and power into a swinging motion slashing his sword to the side. A small squirt of blood shot out from Kusagoro's body and dripped onto the dirt and by his feet, a small hole was left on the man's jounin vest.

"Hmmm, what is that sword?" the man smiled feeling the small cut on his chest and tasting some of his own blood.

"Audra blade…" the Yuki replied angrily taking a leap back and preparing a response, a follow up attack.

"I see, it was made with someone else's chakra, someone with much more pissing potential than you which was why my chakra augmentation wasn't enough. To take a hit from this I'd have to augment my body to where I'd actually risk messing up my flow. It must've been made by a skilled chuunin…"

"A rogue ninja… B+ Rank" Shimo sheathed his blade and quickly went through a bunch of handseals. "With the unfortunate experience of having faced the Raikage when they were kids and recording her moves"

"Ice Style: Thousand Needles of Death!" Shimo chanted out placing his arms forward. Countless needles formed around his opponent, needles made of ice which was made out of humidity of air around Kusagoro. The needles lunged at the man in a blinding shower. The man just kept on standing and took the technique head-on, each needle broke off and shattered like a shard of glass hitting a brick wall. In the end there was only Kusaguro standing with some leftover water dripping from his hair and clothes as the needles were thin enough to turn back into puddles upon breaking.

"I thought I told you, your own chakra levels are insignificant to hurt me. I could just stand right here and take your attacks for days…" the man grinned, his eyes looked quite cruel, Mana was starting to get a little intimidated by just looking at them.

"No… You're trying to psyche me out. No sane ninja, even a jounin would stand and augment their endurance to withstand blows instead of dodging. You're wasting your chakra and you risk overdoing it. You're trying to scare me, make me give up just from the idea that I cannot hurt you. So far you've wasted quite the amount of chakra just to prove one genin a coward, don't you think? Your minute has long since passed, please come at me now, Kusaguro-san" Shimo explained.

"Stop this, you don't know what you're doing!" Kouta yelled out at Shimo and he turned at Mana, "Please, Mana-chan, you have to stop this! My father purposefully lets his opponents reduce his chakra level by letting himself get hit after augmenting his abilities, that's a sign he means to enjoy a fight by bringing himself down to their level. If he lets loose now he won't return to his normal self until he is beaten!" the boy explained.

Mana shook her head, "I couldn't stop them even if I wanted to, plus if I did stop them in some way it'd only make things worse. They'd hate me, they'd keep thinking that the other got pulled out of this by an outside factor and that they could've won this if it didn't happen. They'd clash again and this time it'd be a much more ruthless clash. If Shimo is to lose, it is better that he takes it and moves past this, I trust in my friend that he will find a way not to get killed"

Meiko giggled "It's a good thing we got our medical ninja by our side, Shimo is gonna need some healing after this…"

Kusagoro yelled out into the air and then formed several handseals faster than Mana's eye could track them. "Earth Style: Displacing Tremors" the man shouted out by placing his hands onto the ground when a violent pulse went through the ground making it shatter below the feet of the villagers and the bystanders. Mana leaped back just barely avoiding a fissure opening up below her feet, Meiko shoved her aside and then carried her off from another one opening up – the technique created a small pulse of tension to the ground below the feet of the opponent and the user but it functioned just like a wave, it picked up power the further on it went and when it reached the bystanders it almost consumed them.

Mana's eyes slipped on ninja picking the villagers up from falling down and getting injured or killed inside the splitting ground, so village ninja decided to intervene then? It made sense, this scuffle has long since went past the usual bar-fight and was now quite threatening to the bystanders or the village itself. The opening fissures inflicted quite some damage to the homes around, some of them were completely brought down and the rubble was taken into the ground sinking down the fissure holes. Shimo on the other side was only shaken by the initial impact, only potent enough to make him loose his balance and footing, to make him unprepared for the following attack.

Kusagoro's body flickered before disappearing, "That chakra!" Meiko and Kouta chanted both at the same time. For one's chakra to be felt like that by non-sensor ninja it must've been impossibly strong, the man must've not been playing around, that punch must've been strong enough to kill Shimo!

"Earth Style: Titan's Drill!" a loud chant echoed, Mana wanted to interfere, she wanted to at least yell something out, to alert her friend but her body felt like it was completely frozen. Her completely normal body was only perceptive enough to hear the last words her friend may have heard, it was only fast enough for her eyes to shake and her lips to whimper in fear for her friend's life. What had she done? Letting Shimo take part in this…

A deafening thud made everyone cover their ears, windows burst from their sockets for entire miles around the impact zone. However instead of the man's fist hitting the genin's face with the force that was strong enough to drill right through any mineral or armor with enough effort to blow his body up from inside from sheer pressure of the force inside him it met an equal counterforce – the open palm of the Fifth.

"That'll be quite enough of this…" she casually said looking Kusagoro right in the eyes. Her fist was glowing blue – she was using the superhuman strength of a medical ninja to block the man's technique and she was doing it so effortlessly as if it was but a ball tossed by a toddler.

The shockwave coming from the clash of the two went out in a ring-like line that busted every building in a narrow line to the right and to the left of each of the two from the sheer pressure of the force that had nowhere to go as the Hokage's hand didn't fold or move back at the slightest from the impact zone.

"Could you explain to me why I am right now here, stopping some petty squabble between a jounin and a genin instead of in my office adjusting the budget of Konohagakure orphanage foundation?" Hanasaku squinted angrily looking at Kusagoro. The jounin made an apologetic stare and then tried pulling his fist away from Hokage's grip but he couldn't do it no matter how hard he tried – the all cutting sword was stuck in the toughest stone in the world…

"This kid picked a fight with me" the Juugo explained after the woman let go of his fist making him almost tumble down from the effort of trying to force it out of her hand.

"And as a wise and mature adult you obviously obliged and went at him with an A-Rank technique? You're fighting a kid here, you're not trying to punch out a Tailed Beast for God's sake!" Hanasaku shouted out.

"Whatever, I'm done here…" Kusagoro shrugged and started walking away.

"You most certainly are, your license is suspended for a year, if I see you brawling once more I'll eat that plastic card in front of you myself…" Hanasaku turned her back at the man to match his own.

The Juugo turned around and started waving his fists angrily, "You can't do that! That's the Ninja Tribunal's competence!"

"You really think I understand any of that bureaucracy bullshit? Consider this an executive decision…" the woman flipped the man the bird on the spot without turning around. She walked up to the captain of the squad that was responsible for saving the villagers from the destructive effects of the battle.

"We've managed to prevent all casualties here, we're organizing a rescue operation for the people trapped in the destroyed buildings and will have a more detailed list of injured and casualties later, let's hope they are minimal, Ma'am!" the man reported kneeling before the woman. Hanasaku nodded and walked up to Mana's team.

"What in the…" she started her scolding but Mana kneeled before her and interrupted the woman before she could yell so loud that blood would've burst from their busted ears.

"We've been looking for a medical ninja for our team as per your request, we've found one, Ma'am…" she quickly spilled the beans and lowered her head even lower.

The woman sighed and scratched her tired forehead and rubbed her even more exhausted eyes.

"Goddamnit! Fine, I'll fill the paperwork in and form the mission papers in the evening, get your things ready and leave today…" she let out an exhausted grunt. "I know that if someone actually died in the fallout of this battle you'll be delivering your own worst punishment, Mana, but I am very disappointed in all of you…" she finished it up with the softest yet the most painful scolding any of them had ever had.

Mana stood up and sighed, this went all the bad ways it could've went. She hoped that no one died, the Fifth may not have been the sharpest tool in the shed but she was right on one thing – if someone did die because Mana allowed this battle, because she encouraged Shimo acting on his "identity" she'll be blaming herself for all of it despite not even being a part of the battle nor having the physical or any other kind of ability to stop it.

"Well, you heard the Hokage, let's go home, get ready and we'll be leaving at sunset. Gather by the gate before that…" Mana said.

"I recall you being a client in this mission…" Shimo replied trying to suggest that she was taking too much responsibility by placing herself as being in charge.

"Yeah, if I leave alone and get killed your mission will be failed so either follow me and protect me from getting myself killed or act high and mighty and fail, your choice!" the magician snapped back at the silver haired Yuki angrily, still feeling mad for what he did by asking for this fight.

What a rollicking good start for a mission…


	113. A Silly Question to Begin A Journey

"Wait, I thought you lost your chakra control…" mother quietly tried to wrap her head around Mana's explanation of why she was packing her bags. The magician didn't give her parents that much to work with but it wasn't because of ill will, she just wanted to be ready. Ready for anything. Ready for success or for failure. Ready for safety and ready if her team would ever need a useless weakling which she currently was to pull their asses out. Mana packed her cards and stuffed the pockets and all the hidden dispensers of her uniform with them. This time she'd have to use them smart if she'd ever need to, she'd not have her father's hat to utilize this time.

"I am not leaving as a ninja on the mission, I'm leaving as a client and the team will serve as my bodyguards. It's a quite common C-Rank type mission" the magician explained with her full attention still being occupied by her stuff. Over all this time she spent completely powerless her weapons and ninja tools were all over the place seeing how they were mostly unused.

"Wait… Are you sure about this? You'll be leaving the village with a bunch of genin? Experienced genin, experienced enough to be given C-Rank missions, but genin nonetheless…" mother tried to argue, she looked at her husband who was just standing nearby for support, trying to ask him to join in on the attempt to stop her daughter from leaving the village without having recovered her ability to stand up to the threats outside it.

"It's fine, they need my history knowledge not my brawn, not that there's too much currently there to be desired…" Mana growled angrily, she felt so much anger inside which she had no reasonable direction to direct at. She didn't know what this anger was all about or where it came from. It was just like in the recent years she started to get angry and annoyed and outraged by everything all the time. Even the smallest injustice appeared to offend her and make her boil. It hurt having so much anger inside, anger she had no right to release being a public idol, showed and idolized by children with parents trying to make their own kids more like she was.

"Look… Mana… I know how it feels, losing the edge, being unable to fight on that level anymore. I hope every day that what's happening with you is not forever, that it's not as final as my injury but… What me and your mother wish to say is… Don't pull anything stupid, don't try to fight like you used to. What you're going through may be temporary and you may just get your chakra manipulation back, it's definitely not worth losing your life before you do because you want to prove something to someone…"

Mana pushed her bag aside and turned at her father, she dashed up to his face and almost screamed out into it. Just barely did she manage to contain her snappy reply at the last second. He was right. Father did know what Mana was going through, he knew it far better than she did, he's been dealing with it for much longer and for him it was definitely final. All this anger, all this sadness and lack of something to fill that part of her own self.

"I know, dad…" she hugged the man instead doing her best to push that rage down, maybe it'll be useful at some point, maybe there'll be some pickle jar in need of opening. That's just about all she'd be good for at the moment. Father's eyes looked completely blissful, he must've not even noticed that the magician almost blew right into his face, her mother however instantly picked up on Mana's hidden feelings, she pushed her husband out of the way and gently placed her hands on the girls shoulder holding her closer face to face to herself.

"I know it hurts, Mana, it hurts when people need you or think you're good at something that you don't wish to take pride of. You want to be strong again, that's why you work out every time you're out of our field of vision, you're trying to put something else on top of what you lost and now people recognized it but it still hurts because it's not what you want to be known for. It's the worst. But this isn't who you are, this is temporary and you'll deal with it. Just don't make a dumb mistake that'll ruin that for you. Cause you will hate yourself in the end for being so rash and stupid later, when you'll get your chakra back"

Mana nodded and hugged her mother. She needed something like that but… It didn't help all that anger at all. It just made her feel better for managing to contain it, for being able to push it all down. Her parents didn't deserve to see her like that, they were good people who only deserved to see Mana in her best behavior.

"Now go, those brawnheads won't find that thing without your bright head…" father pointed his chin at the door with a confident look on his face.

Mana nodded and dashed towards the door with her bag staying in her hand, the magician almost flipped over as the bag weighed her back, it was so heavy that just casually carrying it around was quite impossible, in her old days she had her chakra bump up her casual physical abilities to that of peak human condition, as strong as a human could be. Now she had to earn every extra pound she could carry around with hard sweat. Mana stopped and flipped the backpack onto her back, filled with whatever she'd need for the mission as described in the objective.

The magician ran off, rushing towards the gate, most ninja could just run on the rooftops or the wires on the upper level, moving around faster than how a thousand of horses combined into a mother of all horses could carry them like. Mana wasn't like that, not anymore, she had to use the way that civilians used to travel around. Maybe she should've used that grappling hook device her father and she designed for that one magic show? It'd probably have pulled her arm off having the weight on her back in mind though…

"There you are…" Meiko jumped up in joy finally seeing Mana approach the gate. This one was like a gumball of joy and excitement…

"You took your time, Mana-san" Shimo let the magician know that she was not only the last one to come but also the last by a significant margin. As if his displeased face didn't let her know by itself…

"Well not all of us can move like ninja…" Mana replied realizing that she may have said too much.

"Well, why can't you?" Kouta scratched his head confused by her words.

"Umm, the darned shoes make me trip over the cables all the time…" she made something stupid up, granted if she was running in heels that'd have been the problem but Mana wore similar sandals to what all ninja wore on missions so it was a made up trouble.

"Honestly you're always such a fashionista…" Shimo checked his sword and his tool pouch before turning at the gate.

The magician sighed, it was better that her friends took her for a silly girl who overdressed all the time than let them know of her trouble and the extent of her injury that left her just as a client this time. Mana didn't think she'd be ready to talk about that, none of them would've understood anyways. Meiko wasn't too confident in herself just because her chakra control was not up to par with everyone else's, she'd probably have looked at Mana really weird if she was told of the fact that Mana couldn't use her chakra at all.

The team of four headed for the village gate having finally gathered as a team. As the two approached the village gate they were stopped by one of the gate guards.

"Hey, you're the guys leaving for the mission in the Wind Country desert, right?" he asked.

The four nodded in almost synchronized manner, their sync may have needed work but they were a team put together completely at random just to fit the time requirement so their lack of team esthetics could've been forgiven.

"Could you guys fill this form, we'll send it to the outpost in Roiyaru for archive keeping. I mean you guys don't wanna get attacked by the guards there and get extra pain in the ass, do you?" the guard laughed out extending the form to fill. Mana had never seen anything like that before, it was a completely new procedure.

"We have a guard outpost in Roiyaru?" she mumbled out.

"Aggressive enough to react on sight?" Shimo added.

"Yeah, there've been a couple of pretty nasty security breaches in that area so we pretty much had to build an outpost and place some Chuunin there to watch the area" the guard explained looking a bit annoyed that he has to take extra time to explain it to a bunch of youngsters.

"Security issues? Sounds fun…" Meiko chuckled to herself tightening a belt around her glove that shot out a small blade from her forearm before deactivating it and retracting it back, it looked like a thin one time use tool that'd break upon hitting something tough but it was perfect for slashing soft areas and lodging into tougher ones leaving a weak spot there.

"Ah, I've heard people have been disappearing around that area lately, it's all about that, isn't it?" Kouta jumped up looking surprised that his teammates haven't heard about it.

"Well yeah, initially we just tried to play it as the rogue ninja having fun filling their bloodshed quota but when that Honda kid disappeared and his mother was found in a vegetative state the public outcry was something that forced the Hokage's hand. We don't have that many Chuunin to spare, they drop like flies and not that many join the ranks as most failed the last Chuunin Exam…" the man continued to explain the situation further, this time it looked like his annoyance was shifted on the events going down there instead of the youngsters talking to him.

"There…" Mana handed the man the papers back after leaving a couple of ominous scratches on their mission objective. It was not something that needed to be discussed in too much detail and she wasn't quite fond of leaving traces like that in a guard outpost surrounded by wilderness. After seeing mercenaries able to blow up a large portion of a forest in seconds with laser weaponry somehow an outpost didn't feel too safe…

"That'll do, thanks for not making it too much of a problem, this other team refused to leave and even brought the matter up to the Fifth…" the guard nodded and headed back to his post where his colleague was waiting for him and the filled documents. The placed it onto a leg of a hawk and sent it off. Those carrier hawks were quite fast, able to carry small packages faster than most ninja could move and much more silently, leaving less of a trace while also being much more expendable with the added bonus of being able to destroy the message by flicking a piece of flint on their claws at their steel plate and setting the thing on fire.

"For good reason, mission objectives shouldn't be sent around like that, if anything this is the security issue…" Shimo grumped around but then resumed his indifferent stare at the forest thickness. All around wherever one could see was just trees. Ahead was a trip unlike any that Mana has had before, they'd be going all the way to another country even if it was one quite near. It may take them a week or so moving fast or maybe even more moving at Mana's pace. She was able to run and leap at a relatively fast pace but she was just as fast as an athletic person of her age and build. She had no mastery over bodily spiritual and physical energy to aid her leaps and steps…

"Why are you moving so slow, Mana-chan?" Shimo looked back at her after having to slow down to match her pace.

"Yeah, you've been left behind for the fifth time this hour…" Meiko looked at her with a troubled look, "Are you OK? Maybe that meat in Yakiniku Q was bad or something?"

"If it was you'd be having it the worst, Meiko-san…" Kouta shyly laughed out before remembering that he also participated in an eating competition, "I would not be doing too well either, I suppose…" he added with a hint of sadness and disappointment in his tone.

"Let's not rush, we're not in that much need to be in a hurry, the source is relatively old so it's unlikely that it'll be followed now if it wasn't before. Also with those security threats being out there I want us to move slower and smoother…" she added.

"Well, you're the client, you don't really have to act like one and move slowly…" Meiko laughed out playfully slapping Mana's back almost making the magician trip over. She was having trouble keeping up with their slowed down pace as it was.

"That's a very strange, yet wise move…" Shimo replied ominously slowing down to a pace that was a crawl even compared to Mana's.

"What's that?" the magician looked back at her friend who appeared to be a little spooked by something.

"Back when I was still training on my journey with Hachiro-sensei there were some quite confusing behaviors he showed at times. He was a very lax but well-adjusted ninja, he had contacts everywhere and he kept on asking his contacts about that one specific thing, twice after hearing from them he paled and ordered me to turn back" the Yuki started explaining the source of his agreement with Mana.

"So, rogue ninja are always hunted by bounty hunters and hunter-ninja, they're not too popular with normal ninja either, most want to be the "hero" and kill one when they see one…" Kouta replied, slowing down significantly to match Mana's pace.

"Not like that, not Hachiro-sensei. As I told he lost his arm to a courtesan's charms because he was too trusting, too much of a slacker and too carefree. He trusted everything people told him, he believed that I was a war orphan and took me under his wing, even when a village ninja recognized me he assumed that the ninja was lying, even when he found my ninja license he thought it was fake… Yet there was something, something in Iwagakure that also moved near Shukuba town a little past Roiyaru road that intimidated him, that made him lose his cool and carefree approach" Shimo answered looking a bit scared himself by his sensei's intimidation.

"That's odd, you think whatever Hachiro-san was afraid off and the security threat could be related?" Mana asked her troubled friend.

"I believe it to be one and the same, whatever made this Honda brat disappear, whatever left his mother in a pitiful state barely alive… It has to be what Hachiro-sensei was fearing, he was so full of it in his pants that we got stuck close to a ninja village because Hachiro was afraid to move past Tanzaku town"

"Well now you're making me feel all warm inside…" Meiko chuckled in excitement and slowed down to match the speed of her team before she disappeared leaving them behind.

"I don't know what you know, Mana-chan, but you are wise to wish to be careful here, I believe you may be right when you ask us to move slowly and carefully before we move past Shukuba" Shimo looked at her with a comforting look.

Mana turned her eyes away because she basically lied to him, she felt embarrassed about not being able to admit her weakness but it was just how it was. "Well… I mean… I'm sorry but moving at this pace we will only reach Shukuba late at night, we may not get a room that late…"

"It's fine, Mana-chan, reaching it later is better than having whatever happened to that child happen to us, if we don't get a room I'll build you a hammock myself…" Shimo nodded with his face still not dropping his serious expression. He genuinely believed that Mana may have been worried about the security threat instead of being completely unable to move at the pace of a ninja.

"You seem to be quite intimidated by that whatever it is yourself, Shimo…" Meiko curiously inquired with a little hint of sly poking around and offense intended to be taken.

"I believe that whatever may have intimidated Hachiro-sensei is worth being careful of…" the Yuki shrugged.

The three continued to run around the ground levels of the forest which the magician was thankful for since she didn't feel confident in her ability to dash around the upper level and running on the trees like most ninja did. Finally the Sun set catching the four unprepared and forcing them to slow their pace down even more before they managed to even reach Roiyaru road.

"Shit… This might be a sleepless night cause of me…" Mana started feeling worse and worse about her lie now, her eyes started to wander off from what was in front of her and Shimo had to interrupt her by dashing to the side and tackling the girl before she hit a tree.

"Careful, you dolt…" he smiled carrying Mana around on his shoulders before stopping to put her down.

After they kept on going and Shimo slowed down even more, most likely because whatever must've lurked in this road intimidated him that much, Kouta closed in on Mana and whispered something close to her so that only she could hear.

"Say, Mana-san… Are you and Shimo… Well, you know…" he tried to form a question in a way that wouldn't have sounded rude. Mana smiled.

"We're longtime friends, you could probably say that Shimo is one of my best friends…" she replied to his question, Mana felt like she knew which direction the boy was taking the question but she didn't want to reply to it that way because if he didn't mean it she'd have literally burnt up from shame. An ominous response may have been the best one there could've been in that situation.

"Oh, I see… It's just you two look pretty close and he doesn't hesitate to push you around or talk weird to you and… I just wanted to know…" Kouta shook his hands wildly and moved back.

Mana smiled, even if due to the pitch black darkness around them the boy probably couldn't see it clearly.

"It's fine. You're new to the team so you didn't know…" she replied.

"Yeah… Exactly…" the medical ninja nodded erratically.


	114. Unexpected Encounter of the Family Kind

The never ending tree line around the small forest path that the quartet were still moving on kept on monotonously moving by as the four ran forward. The night had caught them unprepared and they were already supposed to have reached Shukuba town – a small pleasure town at the end of Roiyaru road. It was well known to thrive serving as a pit stop of sorts for ninja passing by and was a nice halfway stop for shinobi heading outside the Fire Country.

"Say, Meiko-san, your armor makes some noise and doesn't look too comfortable, aren't you worried about that in battles? I mean most ninja sort of dress more casually to blend into the crowds and have relative comfortability while sneaking around, an armor protects you when in battle but fighting face-to-face isn't what ninja are all about…" Kouta asked out of the blue.

"If we didn't have to worry about fighting we wouldn't really need you" Meiko replied, her tone didn't suggest that it was supposed to be taken as something offensive but Kouta did look a bit knocked down a peg.

"I think it isn't about fighting, Kouta" Shimo butt himself into the conversation, slightly picking up the speed to catch up to the two who were leading the squad by a couple of feet.

"I remember Meiko from the Academy, I was a little interested in her back in the Academy since she always failed her genjutsu and ninjutsu assignments but kept working hard even when she completely blew everything. During the exam her clone looked like an asthmatic bald granny and she never even managed to use a simple disorientation genjutsu throughout the whole course. What Meiko is doing with this armor and her focus in weaponry which she clearly telegraphs to everyone looking at her is finding her own identity and sticking to it. That is worth a lot of respect. Despite that, I must admit I was surprised to hear you graduated the Academy the same year" the Yuki added.

"I almost didn't, that asthmatic bald granny of a clone just barely flung me over the minimum grade…" Meiko admitted, judging from her tone and her facial expression her shortcomings weren't a topic she liked discussing too much.

"I don't know, I kind of like what Meiko is doing. She loved blacksmithing outside her missions so she found a way to incorporate it into her main job. Not many people can do that, it's tough to balance several parts of one's personality and combine two seemingly different things like that. Ninjutsu and genjutsu can always be sharpened later…" Mana gently smiled to Meiko who looked back at her, looking at the magician with surprise. It must've been not so often that she was commended for something.

Mana felt like there must've been so much in common between her and Meiko. Obviously ninjutsu and genjutsu were areas were Mana passed with flying colors and as far as her illusions were concerned could've tutored her Academy teachers a thing or two as it was not a very popular and researched subject. It was only due to her average intelligence test and slightly below average physical and accuracy exams that her overall grade dropped down from remarkable to average.

Still, Mana was commonly scolded for far too many things, in a similar manner to Meiko. Whereas Meiko was made fun of for not living up to her awesome Kirikuzu potential and outright denying it by changing her last name, Mana was commonly made fun of in the Academy because of lack of any special bloodline at all. She was never meant for great things, she was just a grey filler material in an army of special prodigies. Someone to fill up the statistic and that why she felt so similar and soul-mated with Meiko. It was like the two were always meant to be friends.

"Well obviously you'd like that…" Shimo started his reply but then stopped and got dead silent, he looked back and dashed on top of a tree with blurring speed, Mana could barely even see his movements with her perfectly normal eyes. The swordsman dashed up to a strong enough branch to hold him on it yet slim enough for his liking and placed his ear onto it.

"Shit! Someone's coming, hide, now!" he tried to combine sound and whispering with his alert. Mana's reaction time was good, she dashed to the side almost instantly but her teammates simply disappeared from her sight. They were holding back the whole time and now they were not and they didn't know that Mana wasn't able to move at the speed they were able to. Right before she reached the bush to dive behind to hide and powerful frame of a bulky man blocked her path – the man was so fast that he simply appeared right in front of her and Mana bumped into his chest falling on her butt in the process having been pushed back.

"Well well, I never thought to see you here. What are you doing here, girl? I remember you asking for my son's help on something but I didn't think it'd involve straying so far from the village" Kouta's father – Kusagoro asked. Not too long after he blocked Mana's path three other ninja appeared out of the forest and surrounded the girl.

Kusagoro changed out of his ninja uniform after the brief fight with Shimo, his headband protector lacked a village insignia and he wore a simple grey vest similar to that of most mercenaries. One that was cheap and filled with small interconnected chain rings that were able to protect one from most simple ninja tools. His hair was much messier than before and his face appeared much more ruthless.

"Perhaps the young lady embarked on a mission-related adventure as per Hokage's request?" a middle aged woman behind Kusagoro with a butler like uniform topped with the mercenary vest where her formal vest would've been wondered. Her hair was quite long for an experienced ninja and tied behind her back right at the end with a blood red ribbon. The woman's nightly dark hair and her silver pupils lacking any irises suggested that she was a Hyuuga possessing one of the most majestic bloodlines in the village – the Byakugan.

"I'm not. I'm not even a ninja anymore, I'm just touring the world, I'm a stage magician in case you don't know… Hokage-sama cancelled the mission shortly after the fight and suspended all of our licenses" Mana replied quickly and tried to be direct about her response while trying to learn how to lie on the spot. She could under no circumstance just share her objective with a man who had his license suspended and could've wished to claim the box for his own gains, he was a potential danger to her mission objective.

Another incredibly tall male pressed a strange device on his eye, it looked like the whole left side of his face was replaced with this cybernetic eye, similar to the sort of technology Hachi, the cybernetic mercenary used in her last mission.

"Well then are you aware of the three ninja of below average chakra signature following you in close vicinity?" he rumbled out. His voice was the rock bottom of low and husky voices yet somehow quite matching the man's bulky and masculine frame. His body build was well trained and he wore a sleeved version of the mercenary body armor with what appeared to be steel shoulder plates. Despite his quite hunky build his face looked like it has tanked its fair share of bricks though. He had so much of his face busted up and lazily patched up that it looked like he fell from the sky and the pavement with his face.

"No, I was not aware of that…" Mana replied, even she felt the hesitation and fear in her voice. She had to keep calm, she had to make them believe it. If she lied to them there was no telling what they could do. Kusagoro was a battle hungry maniac and he had no more village authority to answer to. If he killed them all right there and made them disappear and said to the Fifth that he knew nothing about it she'd have nothing to pin on them.

A darker skinned individual looking quite sly yet a little charming snuck up to Mana to the distance where he wasn't very comfortable to see. He pretty much rubbed himself against Mana and it freaked her out.

"Well then, little cherry blossom, it is safe to say that our merry company saved your life, it isn't safe for a performer to travel around the country with no ninja escorts, what do you think about that?" as the man was talking Mana carefully and slowly took a couple of steps back, he smelled of cheap perfume and was quite several years past his prime and his weird long and curly moustache made him look almost hilarious. A roach ran down the man's face, getting out from his hair spiked up with cheap hairspray and down under the collar of his coat. Mana gulped and tried to keep herself from throwing up.

"I would strongly veto such an irresponsible decision, it appears that you are once again lead by your desire to be a gentleman" the butler Hyuuga lady crossed her arms on her chest and squinted angrily at her comrade.

"I wouldn't mind that if that means blasting those bastards in the forest to Kingdom Come!" the bulky man roared out placing his oversized hand onto Kusagoro's shoulder as if trying to appeal to the man.

"No…" he closed his eyes and smiled a little, "I was just granted a vacation, I have no desire to take up responsibility again… However…" his fist shot forward faster than a shotgun shell right into Mana's gut almost turning the girl off. Mana felt her own blood shooting out from her stomach – she couldn't have augmented her body because her chakra manipulation was gone, she just took that punch. As her mind lingered between this world and the other, between awareness and eternal serenity her falling body was caught by the jounin and lifted up.

"Hmmm… I pulled my punch as much as I could and yet she didn't offer resistance… Either she's a suicidal follower of her little lie or she's telling the truth…" his grip let go letting Mana's struggling to stay alive and shocked by the overwhelming pain body fall to the ground as he placed his foot on top of her head.

"Now listen to me you three little fuckers in those woods! Either you come out here and tell me what the fuck you're doing with your lives, as I feel that I could be quite interested in that, or I'll pop this kid's head like a fucking grape!" Kusagoro roared out so that he may have been heard all the way in Shukuba. The man kept on standing, looking around and waiting but nothing happened. No one came out.

"Come on, squish her and let's go, we're late to get to Shukuba as it is because Gokibure had to romance those dancers…" the large one grunted angrily watching at Mana's lifeless body with excitement.

"Oh my, squishing someone's head is so unsanitary and uncivilized… Just like you to kill someone this way, Kusagoro, you're such a brute…" the Hyuuga lady complained out loud "Just let me close a couple of her vital chakra nodes and I can do it like a truly refined killer would…" she added lifting her palm in a striking position.

"Killing young ladies before they get a chance to mature into gorgeous young women to keep me company… That is always a sad sight to see…" the moustache packing dark skinned roach man looked like he was about to cry, he even stroke out a fake tear.

"Shut up, Gokibure, you've never had a lady near you for more than five seconds, your stupid roaches creep everyone out!" the large gentleman yelled out grabbing his comrade by his coat and lifting him up into the air. One of his eyes squinted while the other shot out to nearly comical extents. "Every time I see a roach run down from your hair or nose I wish to sacrifice you to Lord Jashin then and there!" he grunted angrily.

Mana's silent moaning stopped as Kusagoro removed the foot off of her head and relieved the extremely painful pressure he applied onto it.

"Hmph… Still can't tell if they called my bluff or if they're really just nasty murderers looking to kidnap a performer for ransom" the man scratched the back of his neck.

"My my, is this mercy I see from you Kusagoro? Serving the village made you quite soft inside… Or maybe it's that nurse wench in Konoha that made you like this?" the Hyuuga lady tried to psyche her comrade out.

"As much as I don't like this girl because she derails my son's training and keeps him in his stupid medical line of work instead of becoming a mercenary or a Black Ops killer like his old man… I can't kill her either. She's a bother but I need her because if she dies my son may never follow my footsteps and if he finds out I was the one who did it he'll go the opposite way on purpose". Kusagoro swiped a lazy backhand smack to the side breaking a tree in half in his irritation. The tree fell right on top of the man but broke again where it contacted his head. In sheer rage the man grabbed the main log of the tree and tore it to bits with his sheer hands leaving just small wood chips from the peeling pressure behind.

"Let's go, I know where we can get answers, something that gate guard said gave me an idea" Kusaguro ordered and soon the four disappeared.

Shimo and Kouta dashed out after a couple of minutes, the Yuki carried unconscious Meiko on his shoulder. The medical ninja examined Mana and took her on his starting to move, encouraging Shimo to follow.

"How is she?" the swordsman asked.

"She'll live until we can find a room to heal her in. She's in critical condition but this place isn't safe to settle down and heal her" Kouta grunted angrily, his eyes were completely different from the shy and goofy young man he was, this Kouta was determined and serious. He was decisive and he looked like he'd do whatever was needed to take care of his team.

Mana's eyes opened slightly, looking right into those determined balls of light Kouta called eyes, he was moving so fast, leaving nothing behind. It looked like he would fight his father just to get that room. The medical ninja looked down and his eyes met Mana's, he smiled gently and moved some of her wild hair out of the way.

"Don't worry, Mana-chan, just relax and rest, this is why you took me with you, isn't it? Let me do my job" Kouta assured the girl, Mana closed her eyes, subconsciously moving her tired head closer to the boy's chest and passing out.

"Why didn't she block that attack properly!? She should've given us away, just how far is she willing to go for such a low ranked mission?" Kouta kept on talking to himself as the large classical houses of Shukuba town and the small gate separating it from the Roiyaru road appeared in sight just past the tree line the two boys were moving in.

"Because she couldn't… Now it all makes sense: why Mana-chan was just a client, why she purposefully missed those medical check-ups and why her license was suspended, why she couldn't keep up with us and why she couldn't hide in time – Mana-chan lost her chakra manipulation ability completely somehow. Must've been in this last mission she spoke of." Shimo huffed out doing his best to keep up to Kouta's determination and his full speed.

"What you did to Meiko-san was quite ruthless, Shimo. Knocking an ally out cold from behind…" Kouta glanced back with an angry stare.

"She'd have given us away, she was about to dash right out to Mana-chan's aid, something had to be done. Those bastards would've killed all of us and made it look like an accident and then proceeded with our mission, if they'd have found the box they'd have kept it for themselves. They'd have tortured us before we'd have given them the information on our mission which they wanted" the Yuki explained looking at the unconscious armored teammate on his shoulder.

"Father wouldn't have gotten a thing out of me, I think Mana-chan proved that she wouldn't have said anything either, Meiko-san doesn't quite understand enough about it to say anything too useful, she just looks like she's along for the ride. That only leaves you, Shimo… Afraid of a little pain?" Kouta kept on quarreling with his friend as the two dashed into the little pleasure town desperately looking for a room.

"I'd have told everything the moment they threatened Mana-chan or Meiko-chan, I've a feeling you'd have done the same with any of us being at the other end… You don't even know how potent torturers work, you may just be more naïve than Mana-chan" Shimo folded.

Kouta didn't even reply anything, his face revealed the truth however, just the fact that the quarrel was ended so fast with that last observation said enough. Kouta would've lead his father to the box himself just to save Mana from having to suffer any more. She was so stupid, why didn't she tell them that she was unable to mold chakra? It made no sense… Unless…

"Shimo, why do you think Mana-chan didn't tell us?" the medical ninja rammed a wooden door of a small inn with his shoulder.

The inn keeper instantly tried to raise noise, to him two ninja bursting into the inn with two unconscious girls looked either suspicious or requiring instant medical attention. He tried to suggest the local clinic instead of his inn but Kouta would've had none of it. The inn keeper went out to see if he still had any rooms left.

"One thing trying to be a gentleman all my life has taught me… I would never understand women, why do you think I changed my nindo from making sure that all ladies around me were happy to becoming Hokage so that I could protect the weak from the wicked, it's a much more achievable dream…"

After the inn keeper returned the two rushed into the room for four. Since Shukuba was a pleasure town for passing by ninja they had plenty of rooms of four since most ninja traveled in squads of four, even the genin worked in teams of a jounin mentor and three genin so it fit perfectly. Right after locking the door behind them Kouta slammed Mana's lifeless body onto the bed and lifted her clothes examining her injury – the entire lower part of her abdomen was black, blue and purple with large red circles around it.

"Shit, I need to start treatment right now, father was so close to shoving his arm right through her… She'd have bled out on the spot" Kouta mumbled to himself as he placed his hands on the girl's stomach and emerald light started illuminating the dim room.

Shimo carefully placed Meiko on a bed and covered her up, he did feel a bit bad for what he did to her but that was the only way. This girl was just so loyal and ready to leap to help her friend out despite only knowing her for a couple of months… Mana may have messed up a lot of things all the time but she pulled friendship with this young lady just fine…

"Your father… I want to kill him but I must admit I lack the strength to do it" Shimo declared.

"Please don't think my father is a monster of some kind. He is quite brutal but he grew up outside the village walls. He only became a ninja in his late teen years. He acts following his killer's instinct and he doesn't understand the social skills that the village ninja who grew up in safety know…"

"His care for you is the only reason why I won't kill him. He kept Mana-chan alive because he cares about you and knows you like her, you are his connection to humanity and because he still has that I'll keep him alive but… One day… I'll kick his ass really hard!" Shimo grunted out raising his fist into the sky.

"I… Don't… Like… Mana-chan…" Kouta leaned up closer to act like he was examining Mana's injury to hide his face.

Shimo laughed off and sat by his bed watching Meiko. He knocked her out cold from behind, he was responsible to make sure she woke up and had some rest after that. Maybe he'll slip into slumber soon watching her but he owed her all that he could do for her for the time being.

All that remained now was to wait for the morning…


	115. Cooldown Period

Light seeped into Mana's eyes with moderation as the magician finally opened her eyes the other morning. As the girl carefully and slowly sat up, surprisingly feeling very little pain, more like a minor irritation in her gut that was burning so overwhelmingly the last night that it made the magician desire the most unfortunate outcome for however long it lasted. It was the most painful night in her memory, being passed out yet overwhelmed by pain, she could remember very little of her last night's agony.

It appeared that her comrades could remember very little as well as Shimo was doing his best not to fall asleep sitting by the edge of his bed staring at Meiko who was just carelessly humming a tune silently looking at the ceiling, Kouta on the other hand looked quite dead making Mana sit up and reach over him, after feeling the air move in and out under the boy's nose Mana was calmed that he was only tired and resting.

"Good… Whatever it is. How does it feel to be back to the realm of the living? Kouta said you were on the line a couple of times last night…" Meiko grinned as if she was telling a joke. Mana was not particularly mad for the girl's lack of understanding of the severity of that situation, in this world lethal injuries could've been taken away with a careless wave of a hand, depending on the waver's skill, obviously. Kouta was not quite yet tangling with the best of the hand wavers so he may have taken the whole night to heal the magician, still, he did heal her for which she owed the boy her life.

"It's becoming a tradition, sadly, as well as losing someone or something after I wake up making me wonder if waking up is even worth it in the process" Mana grunted out rubbing her eyes. Strangely enough she was feeling really tired and sleepy despite being treated while only being somewhat conscious. It wasn't like she could've been blamed, the pain inside of her and the fever which was raging whole night made sleeping impossible so she got as little actual rest as her team.

"Maybe if you let us know of your condition this wouldn't have happened…" Shimo carelessly threw an offensive remark at Mana, at least he meant for it to be taken like that which was implied by his manner of speech.

Mana's eyes sunk down to the ground, there it was again, waking up back to life giving her something to regret waking up for, last time it was loss of her identity, half of her whole life was torn out from her with an iron grip leaving a giant bleeding gash of emotion and regret inside. Now it very well may have been the loss of her friend. Another one, anyways…

"I'm… Sorry…" Mana mumbled out, she wanted to yell out her reasons of why she didn't tell them anything but now that they knew… She still couldn't. Even when she knew that they knew everything it was still too painful to talk about that for her.

"Sorry? Kouta said it was like a miniature explosive tag detonated inside your gut, you had the contents of your stomach spilling inside of you infecting you and raising your body temperature to the point where it threatened to fry your brain in your own boiling blood. I think recklessness like this sort of surpasses what a "sorry" can fix" Shimo looked proper pissed off and he had all the reasons to be like that. He was angry at Mana and he had pretty much no sleep at all.

"Meiko is probably quite angry at you too, I had to knock her out because she almost leaped to your aid out there. All because you didn't tell us everything there was to know about the person we were supposed to bodyguard…" Shimo looked at Meiko encouraging her to yell her feelings out.

"I'm actually pretty mad but… I'm not that good with words so I don't think I can express myself properly. What makes me even angrier is that I can't punch you either without killing you now… Expect some jabs once you're back to shape!" Meiko replied almost like she was happy and excited. This young lady was so kind and warm inside that she didn't even understand what it felt to be angry. She didn't know that feeling before she met Mana… That was one of the notes for the "FML" notebook in Mana's drawer of her own psyche.

"I know I let all of you down, I'll understand if you choose to head home right now. You've got no more reasons to trust me anymore and without trust in the person you must protect there's no way you can travel to the other end of the planet for a box that may not even be there at all" Mana uttered letting all of her inner anger and sadness to take over.

"It's not even all that you need to know, there's another thing I lied about…" Mana opened her mouth feeling Meiko's hand on the collar of her shirt lifting her up.

"The main reason for me planning this mission was because I saw the love and excitement that Meiko had for legendary objects, I wanted to pay her back by letting her leave on an adventure and by letting her actually hold an item of legends in her own hands but… After this adventure I planned to use the Box of Ultimate Bliss to restore my chakra manipulation, this mission was doomed to fail from the start" Mana spilled the truth closing her eyes fully prepared to having her head blown off by Meiko's fist of fury.

Instead she felt the armoured kunoichi's arms wrapping around her. Shimo smiled looking down, it wasn't a cruel smile but one that a friend has when they realized that a friend of theirs pulled a friendly prank on them.

"You should've told us!" Meiko shouted out to the point where the rotten wood of the walls of the inn started to shake. "You should've told us, you dummybutt! None of us give a crap about that box anyways, you're our friend, Mana, just knowing that you need something is enough for us to follow you to the edge of the Earth."

"I couldn't tell you guys because… It hurts too much. I thought I got over it in those couple of months, when I was just working on my magic shows and just living my life like a normal person who couldn't spit fire and create illusions with just a look… When we left I suddenly realized that I didn't get over it, that I just hid it so deep inside that it grew like a tumour and that now it had grown hooks and spikes and trying to pull it out just hurts too much"

Shimo's eyes slipped down as he examined a little bug running the whole distance from one end of the room to the other before almost bursting into laughter. "It's because of things like this that I chose to become the Hokage instead of trying to grant women around me happiness. Still, I must say I kind of feel you, if someone ripped a part of me out and expected me to deal with it like it was nothing… I'd be as crazy as you too. I'm with you till the end, just promise you won't pick a fight like that again until you get your thing back"

Mana's sad eyes closed and her head slowly nodded. She was too hurt and too tired to even promise something like that out loud. Meiko let go of Mana and slipped out of her armour tossing it aside and sitting by it to check up on it. "So it's set then, we'll find that stupid box, no matter if it's not where Mana thinks it is, we'll keep on looking until we find it and we'll restore Mana's chakra! That's just the kind of adventure I looked forward to taking part in one day!" she yelled out with excitement.

Kouta's head lazily rose off the pillow looking at his teammates talking. "What's going on?" he asked.

"Nothing much, we're just forgiving Mana for not telling us she lost her chakra control and that we're following her to the ends of the Earth to find that blasted box" Shimo informed the sleepy medical ninja who flipped on another side and closed his eyes to sleep again.

"Definitely!" he shouted out before his breathing once again became peaceful and calm. Letting his friends know that he went back to his peaceful rest.

"Well then, seeing how you can't do what you normally do, we need to teach you how to fight properly…" Meiko decided after tightening a loosened belt that could resulted in her armour just falling apart in the heat of battle. Her design must've still been a bit clunky but it was still beyond impressive for her age. Even old and experienced blacksmiths couldn't design a perfect suit of armour and while Meiko's was far from perfect it was quite impressive nonetheless.

"I know how to fight, I passed the taijutsu class in Academy…Barely" Mana tried to object but she knew deep inside that Meiko was right. The magician just didn't want to feel any more of a burden. She didn't want to keep her team back, she didn't want her team to get in trouble because of her or take too long barricaded in an inn instead of moving towards their objective.

"Just punching or blocking won't be enough. Your perception is crushed by your loss of your manipulation, your agility was nothing to write home about even when you had it, if your Academy grades are to be believed… You need to learn a temporary style of your own. Your punches and kicks will only break your own arms and legs now, you lack brute force and speed, also skill. It's nothing to fret over, knowing what you are hopeless at lets you focus on another department – redirection"

Shimo looked at Meiko impressed. "You know, you kind of sound pretty genius when you're talking about fighting… I'm kind of impressed and starting to get a little bit scared"

"You should see her talking about weapons and blacksmithing…" Mana smiled politely making Meiko blush and get angry. Mana knew that anger, that playful rage one felt when they've been scolded and brought down their whole life and then getting complimented on something.

"I'm smart you idiots! I just choose to be smart at very specific things! We'll start teaching you to redirect blows and focusing on using your opponent's overwhelming strength against them once I'm done maintaining my armour. It's not a tough style to pick up, I've seen some civilians being trained in it and quite a number of mercs who commonly fight ninja everyday use it. If some bonehead mercenary can learn it, you'll pick up on it quickly"

"We don't have much time, we don't have that much money left, less than a couple of weeks actually. If we spend it all here we'll have to sleep in the woods and the desert once we reach our objective. Mastering a fighting style will take many months…" Shimo hissed out annoyed. He must've known a thing or two about mastering fighting styles. Mana also didn't feel as skilled at physical combat as Meiko or Shimo so she would probably take whole years to learn something like that…

"That's why I'll only give Mana the basics, she'll train up on them on the road. We will take a week or two but it'll be worth it. Even if we find no box and have to move to another location Mana will be able to protect herself from at least the most basic or just underestimating and cocky threats…" Meiko explained.

Mana sat down and stretched out in her bed. She felt so tired and powerless without her chakra manipulation, would she actually be able to pull something like that off?

"Alright, I'll do my best, Meiko-sensei…" she said playfully.

"Keep pushing it, young lady, see what happens!" Meiko growled at her angrily still trying to patch up a small hole in her leather vest.

Meanwhile farther to the west an outpost of ninja was at the peak of its awareness. Chuunin were trying to pick up the smallest hints of the infamous kidnapper of people who was active some time ago. There were just so few clues to work with! All the victims were completely random, some of them were just civilians, some of them were actually ninja of varied ranks, some of them were men, some of them were women, there were both adults and children in their midst.

It was only ironic that what troubled these ninja the most would not be what attacked their little outpost. Finally after six hours of watch duty the shift of the outpost watch shifted, the tired guards went inside and new guards took their place, the eight guards quickly split with two dashing off to protect each entrance and watching each possible side, each of them had a small road to observe as well to protect the caravans and civilians and all the moving ninja from the unidentified mysterious kidnapper. They didn't want another little Honda incident on their hands… The civilians were already badmouthing the Hokage and the ninja enough as it was, they felt like for people able to move faster than an eye could track or striking with the power to blow up a mountain the ninja weren't doing enough to ensure their safety…

"Did you read that last report? About those brats looking for the Box of Ultimate Bliss?" one guard tried to start a conversation.

"Yeah, they always give those dumb "find something everyone knows doesn't exist" missions to kids, they never find anything though. Imagine if you found it, what would you do with it?" the other replied.

"I dunno, maybe ask for a promotion? I'm sick of playing watch duty, I went out on years of dish washing missions for this? This is stupid!"

"Seriously, you wouldn't want your ex-wife to come back?" the second one tried to bite his friend a little.

"Dude, like if I had an ultimate wish fulfilment device, I would ask for a million things but my ex-wife… I could marry Lady Hokage herself with something like that!" the first one laughed out.

As the second one laughed together with his friend he saw his friend's head and half of what's below burst in a combination of blood and guts all over his face. The eyes of the poor guard opened wide as shock and fear took over, behind what used to be his friend's head stood a tall red haired man with a mercenary vest and a headband of a nameless village.

A painful pinch took the shocked guard out, he was alive but felt overwhelming pain in the nerves of his spine. As he fell lifeless on the floor he saw his assailant – a strangely formally dressed Hyuuga woman, she must've pinched one of his chakra points and paralyzed him. The guard was sure that if he wasn't paralyzed and unable to feel anything he'd feel himself pissing in his own pants. That man… He was a Konohagakure jounin, one of the best… A Konoha jounin blew half of his friend up with just a punch!

"Hmmm, unrefined and brutal as usual, Kusagoro…" the Hyuuga woman whispered.

The punch of the red haired Konohagakure jounin aiming for his crippled back was the final thing that the guard saw, since he was completely paralyzed, he felt nothing at all.

"Hmph, I pulled my punch… I wanted to interrogate the guy but he blew up like a water balloon…" Kusagoro quietly cursed.

"That tends to happen when you hit someone with that much force, you need to learn control, what if you killed that girl your boy liked back then?" the Hyuuga woman scolded him again. Right then her eyes fell onto the blood all over the walls of the outpost entrance. She dashed right up to the wall, stroking the blood and reaching up to lick the leftovers before making a disgusted expression and shaking the blood off of her white tainted gloves.

"Let's move! Let's meet at the main room, where they keep all the files, I need to read on what this girl was doing. She was too secretive for it to be nothing interesting and I need a worthy adventure to entertain me before I return to active duty" Kusagoro barked out his orders and his team disappeared right after the last word was said, each one found an alternative point of entry, infiltrating the facility silently and easily. It was never built to withhold a high level siege or to fend off a skilled infiltration effort, it was just a pile of bricks put up for show so that the people saw the Hokage making an effort to stop that strange kidnapping maniac who was working locally.

A young woman was working the cameras at the main room, she was alarmed by the loss of feed from one of the observation points right before the shift changed. She was trying to contact someone, but she heard sounds of combat, shouts and screams, to send a pigeon she'd have needed to leave the room. She'd expose herself to the attackers and leave all these files that were most likely the target unprotected – it was her duty to see to it that they didn't fall into the wrong hands. But who on Earth would attack them? Who of such a skill level would be interested in encrypted mission objective files? They'd need to know the Konoha code of encryption and their reward for this difficult puzzle would be a bunch of gardening and local bandit band bullying missions.

The woman removed a kunai and pulled her short blade, given to her after graduating in the last Chuunin Exams, and trembled as she saw the sealed door getting blown out with a shoulder ram. A loud explosion echoed as the seals on the door were activated, the kunoichi guarding the files managed to hide herself behind the panels and monitors. As she peeked her head out she noticed an armoured man, completely unharmed by the combined force of at least fifteen explosive kunai devices, who reminded more of a mechanical monster than he did a man. He wore a strange combination of armor plates that looked rusted and ancient, he had no visible head as one of the plates simply wrapped around where his head was supposed to be making it look like the armour had no head, instead a powerful red glowing orb suggested where the man's face was receiving sensory input from. He barely even fit through the door, the woman leaped out and charged at the man as he de-armoured to enter the room. As the heavy plates hit the floor they let out loud thuds that would've intimidated most opponents.

She was fast, landing an easy tag on the man's chest and cutting right into one of his muscles through his mercenary vest with her chokuto blade, she tried a secondary swipe with her kunai but it was caught by the man and using her own momentum he redirected it right to her own shoulder before tossing the woman aside and clenching her weapon tagged with her own blood. The man licked the blood off of the kunai, the kunoichi growled and shouted in anger, pain and frustration, she moved her shoulder long dark hair with a single pink strand out of her way, they were obstructing her vision and with all of her might she tossed the chokuto straight into the man's heart.

Fifteen minutes later the rest of Kusagoro's squad gathered themselves into the room. The gruesome sight that greeted their eyes was their comrade stuck to the wall by a short blade stuck in his chest and at least forty six more kunai all over his body. On the other side of the room a slender young chuunin laid dead with forty seven bleeding injuries all over her body, all of them inflicted without damaging her chuunin vest, her white shirt which she wore under the chuunin vest was all soaked in blood.

"Goddang it, Mardith, I told you we've got no time for your stupid rituals in infiltration missions!" Kusagoro growled and let his friend drink something from his ninja pouch, the strange gooey purple liquid seemed to reanimate his recently deceased friend making him grunt almost pleasantly, as if enjoying the pain, as he pulled all the blades and daggers out of his body and fell down the wall.

"It's not like you needed it, we saw plenty heads busted by your armour all over the place, you did it just for the fun of it!" the man called Gokibure in Kusagoro's squad complained.

As Kusagoro carefully carried the gruesomely killed woman onto a bench and placed her there for a possibility of a proper burial which not all of the ninja stationed there would get he started running down the records of the recently received mission objectives. While he was doing it the Hyuuga woman crept up to the deceased body and picked it off the floor opening her mouth and reaching up to bite the woman's face off before shaking her head in disgust and dropping her.

"I never got your strange preferences, Remashi, I thought you told us you're a cannibal…" Gokibure spun his moustache playfully observing the mess they've caused by attacking this facility.

"Yeah, but I also feel really sorry for the people we kill, I was born with too powerful of a sense of empathy so I can never actually go through with it…" the woman whined almost bursting into tears.

Kusagoro smiled and slammed a large scroll back into the box, locking it and placing the same simple sealing technique. He turned around and fixed his damaged wristband that was still a little blazing from the fire technique he was almost caught unprepared by during the battle. Putting out the small tongue of flames the man laughed out loud and started slowly walking towards the exit from the facility.

"Our next target is… The ruins of an old palace in the Wind Country, the little lying brat is after something called B.U.B. her secrecy only makes me more excited!" the man couldn't contain his excitement. He was no monster, he'd have much rather not have killed all these people just to get his next destination but that was what he had to do. He was bored and now the village refused to give him more missions to fight to his heart content in, he needed something to do or he'd go insane and obtaining this B.U.B. was the next best thing!

"Don't you think they'll know we did this? I mean blowing people up with a punch is sort of your signature mess-up isn't it?" the large hulking man named Mardith complained, he just wanted an excuse to use his large hulking suit of armour to blow this whole place up leaving no trace it was ever here to begin with.

"Shut up, Mardith! I told you I was pulling my punch! It's not as easy as it looks! There's no use staying here or doing anything with this place, didn't you hear? There's a security threat roaming around these parts, they'll just pin it on that maniac or whatever and they'll be done with it. No one will wink twice about bunch of amateur ninja dying in a place with an unknown threat on the loose… Now let's move out, we don't know how much ahead this brat is and we need to catch up!"

The squad of four war veterans bonded by their common participation in countless battles, all of them recruited by Konoha for their ruthlessness and their reputation growing up like rogues and mercenaries, kept around just because of solidarity after the war was over. All four of this squad of warriors set out for the Wind Desert, without knowing yet that they are looking for the Box of Ultimate Bliss


	116. Redirection

Meiko punched her own palm from excitement. For some reason this training session seemed to excite her. Maybe it was just most things that the blacksmith saw in her life. Sometimes she looked like a little ball of hype, she did have a sensitive and a little sad part of her deep inside but she rarely ever let that part shine through. The part filled with lack of confidence in her ability, having been dropped out from several teams and barely managing to graduate from the Academy by the skin of the teeth was irrelevant. Neither was the part filled with disappointment for her inability to control her chakra properly.

"So, I think in the beginning it'd be best if I showed you some basic redirection moves. From what I remember in the Academy you preferred a quick and always moving and striking style, differently from everyone you used your palms instead of fists" Meiko started the mentoring, Mana still felt hesitant that she needed these lessons but the blacksmith was a superior physical combatant with decent knowledge of taijutsu even if she didn't focus in it.

"Yeah… Knucklebones are weak, they break easily also the palm isn't as likely to kill your opponent since they inflict less direct damage but they still knock one off their feet and can break bones with enough chakra focus. Recently I switched to a kick-focused style though" Mana nodded, despite her lack of interest in this training she figured that being honest was the least she could've done.

"Well neither of those will do. You're simply not quick enough without your chakra manipulation to utilize your movement properly" Meiko's body disappeared from Mana's line of sight, the magician turned behind her knowing the blacksmith's intent well. With a cruel grin Meiko was standing right behind Mana. It was like the magician was living in a world with a lagging view of it, one moment Meiko was there, the next one she was behind her…

"Even when ninja don't put much effort into it they can strike and kick ten or twenty times per second, they can move at speeds completely untraceable by normal people. You could train your entire life and you'd never tag a ninja"

Mana closed her eyes and sighed. "Unless you're a samurai or a mercenary…"

"That's different" Meiko nodded, "Most samurai use chakra, they just call it "Ken-ki" those that do not never rise above the peak human limit, they fight with pure technique which takes a lifetime to learn. Mercenaries use easy and cheap moves, they use high tech weaponry and various specialized methods of combat designed to fight ninja. Only a mercenary can teach you that style as I am completely unfamiliar with most of it".

Meiko showed a couple of flowing hand movements. She moved gracefully yet with speed, she didn't augment her body at the slightest yet her arms moved fast enough for Mana to have to see the movements a couple of times before she could fully get them. Even several more reps were needed before she memorized them.

"These movements work like handseals. You have to repeat them again and again and again and again before they become second nature to you, before your body automatically performs them as fast as you can while your mind can analyze other things and be focused on observing your opponent" Meiko said, apparently she was taking this whole teaching Mana how to fight without her chakra thing seriously…

Mana kept on repeating those moves, she kept repeating them for at least four hours if not more on end before sweat broke out from her forehead and her lips dried out, her tired hands could stay raised and waved around. Meiko looked displeased by the result. "You're not even closing your gap between where you are and from where we can start the actual training, we've only got six days left…"

Crushed and depressed by the lack of progress in her training and with arms that felt like they were literally filled with acid that burnt them from inside Mana went to bed that day. Meiko wanted to ask for Mana to keep on working on her moves but Kouta objected as a medical ninja, at least he said he did it as a medical ninja. He may have just felt sorry for Mana, her face must've looked so miserable. Feeling too weak for even basic training drills and then having her weakness rubbed into her face by Meiko's disappointed face.

It wasn't even that Mana felt bad about her own lack of skill and progress with the training, it was the sadness that she started to break through Meiko's façade. The blacksmith just started looking so sad and disappointed in herself because she wasn't able to properly help Mana, because she must've felt like she was failing her friend and on top of her own problems the magician started feeling bad because she made Meiko feel like that.

The next day Mana's movements looked even sloppier because of her exhaustion from the last day. Kouta decided to patiently sit with Mana and heal her arms from the damaged muscle tissue that was getting in her way. The magician had long since forgotten what this human exhaustion felt like. Ninja clearly got exhausted but their supernatural out of combat healing factor patched it up to the point where it all went away the same day. Kouta said that without his help this pain may have kept relentlessly plaguing the girl for a week or so.

"It's… Passable I suppose, we'll start the actual training tomorrow, you're just barely at an acceptable level but we're running out of time… We can't afford to stay here any longer than our mission funds allow us, we'll need to buy supplies for our journey too so we may get to stay here for even less than we originally plan, we've got no time to perfect your movements. You'll have to do it yourself on the road…" Meiko complained out loud, she tried to be gentle and polite to a friend but Mana saw it in Meiko's face – she was terrible.

The girl wrapped herself tighter into a sheet before passing out trying to get some sleep, she just felt so weak and vulnerable, cold never felt so troubling before, heat never took away all traces of her strength so quickly and effectively, she couldn't keep up with her friends and in the process she felt like she was just outright an inferior being to everyone. It was clear that the other teammates wanted to comfort her but they couldn't find the right words, they knew that they lacked the knowledge to properly understand what she was going through so they just kept quiet about it. Silence was not a good treatment, it just made Mana feel even lonelier despite being surrounded by friends.

Meiko's fist completely blurred, she said that she didn't use any chakra and that she held it back but Mana's face burst into a combination of blood and pain. It took Kouta at least twenty minutes to patch up her busted up face after each unsuccessful attempt to redirect a punch.

"Should I fix your teeth too?" Kouta asked referring to the gapping hole in Mana's mouth when Meiko's fist almost got swallowed by the girl in its entirety.

"Yes please…" Mana replied as well as her aching face allowed, her decent looks was the last speck of confidence that the girl had. She got kicked around and had to watch the disappointed looks of her friends all around her for entire days, at least she didn't want their looks to also be disgusted at Mana's busted up face too…

"It'll hurt, regrowing teeth and fixing bones is a bit painful…" Kouta warned her softly, his eyes were kind, he didn't appear to judge her swollen and covered with bruises face, her eyes that looked like they were assaulted by a whole swarm of bees and her missing teeth or her battered body.

"I don't care, I'll take it… I'd wish there was something to bite a rag with while you did it though…" the girl tried to joke with the most pathetic attempt to slightly alleviate the pathetic situation she was in. Why was she failing so much? Was all that she had ever achieved only because of her chakra control? Was the gift of chakra which she was given the only thing that made her special, the only thing that made her halfway competent? Was the girl behind the ninja worthless and unable to learn even the most basic movements?

"Yeah… They should make other pain management techniques for people without teeth" Kouta giggled warmly as the emerald light from his arms started glowing so intensely right up at Mana's face that it nearly blinded her.

Yet another punch hit Mana right in the gut, feeling merciful for the epic failures of Mana getting socked in the face with the power of a giant hammer every time the blacksmith started punching her in the gut or kicking her in the shins sending Mana down and sometimes dislocating bones or twisting her legs in the process. Each of the injuries that Mana went through every day would've crippled someone for weeks yet Kouta always found the time to fix her up in under an hour, no matter how severe it was. The boy barely trained by himself, he devoted his time to healing Mana completely.

"Can't Kouta do the punching me in the face thing?" Mana wiped the blood off of her face after skipping another gut punch and throwing up. "Doesn't seem so hard to do and he is actually well versed in taijutsu thanks to his father's training" the magician wondered on her fourth day. It only made sense that a ninja focusing on taijutsu would do her taijutsu training but for some reason it was Meiko continuously pummeling Mana.

"He didn't want to, he said so himself, after hearing his reasons Shimo agreed and appeared to be quite adamant about it. Didn't even tell me those reasons, he just insisted that I did the training…" Meiko scratched the back of her head throwing Mana some towels and band-aids. The magician patched her cuts and bruises up and wiped the blood coming out from her mouth.

"Looks like a pretty nasty internal bleeding, you may want Kouta to take a look at it…" Meiko looked concerned after Mana stood back up in her defensive position adamant to learn to redirect at least one blow her friend throws.

"Well if he dislikes me so much he doesn't even want to train me, may as well not get in his way with my petty problems, are you gonna punch me in the face or what?" Mana grunted angrily, she felt quite nauseous too so she may have had a concussion coming but at that moment in time she felt so hurt inside that she wouldn't have minded if she flipped up dead after one of those hits. It'd have surely been better to die while still having semblance of who she used to really be than living without a part of her identity having a new one forced down her throat.

"I don't like your attitude, missy…" Meiko slowed her punch up to a crawl, just to the point where Mana managed to tap her wrist and redirect it near effortlessly. "You do know you have to redirect those blows, not take them, right? I don't enjoy punching you half to death every day either, it hurts me internally just as much as it hurts you externally…"

Mana got furious and started throwing punches instead, not even using her palms but using her clenched tightly fists. Her blows utilized all of the Academy training, these weren't childish punches, these may have knocked out even a skilled martial artist. Meiko effortlessly caught or avoided each and every blow, she smiled softly because she knew that this was good for her friend, punching her anger and troubles away. For a ninja it was easy to block or dodge a blow like that, still, even Meiko skipped one punch. After the loud thud echoed Mana's eyes shot wide open in surprise, she jumped up to Meiko but only saw her unfazed face. Only then did she realize that she broke her fist after punching what seemed like a brick wall…

The fifth day was spent entirely of Kouta treating Mana's injuries, the medical ninja demanded a whole day because he had some treatment to do for the injuries that he stopped from being emergencies but left some nasty painful scars. He decided to remove all the bruises and black marks all over Mana's broken body, all of her black eyes and bumps.

"You seem awfully quiet today, Mana-chan…" Kouta observed after the girl spent several hours just angrily squinting at a small clock on a fridge instead of looking at the boy for at least a single moment. "Don't get discouraged, you could kick the ass of anyone not using chakra, you could easily reflect all the blows of Meiko where she only used her normal strength, each of your reflections is so skillful that you'd open up even the best normal martial artists for a counter attack. You may not fight ninja until…"

"Stop…" Mana shut him up angrily.

"Stop?" he looked at her confused trying to catch her eyes but he could only contact Mana's angry puffed up cheeks.

"First of all stop talking about how "my chakra will return eventually", no one knows if it can even happen and at this point I started doubting it myself. I was examined by a Quack when it happened and he said it may have been permanent, I couldn't even show my face up in a hospital because I was afraid a doctor would confirm it because that'd feel like he'd put a nail into my coffin!" Mana yelled out finally turning her eyes to greet those of Kouta's

"Also, please stop trying to boost my confidence when you have no hope in me. You're one of the most skilled genin in taijutsu yet you so adamantly refused to train me. Why would you do so unless you didn't actually believe that I could succeed? I appreciate the mercy you show me by healing me from time to time as if encouraging a kid putting their head into a guillotine by placing candy on the other end but if that is all it is – pity, please stop! It's hard for me as it is… Getting beat up every day and seeing all of my friends disappointed in me, feeling weak and useless, knowing that I may never be able to do that one thing I love, to achieve my lifelong goals!" Mana started tearing up after the last sentence.

Kouta smiled politely, his eyes never changed from that warm and polite look, he tried to move in closer and hug her but then he stopped half way and awkwardly breathed into Mana's face before jumping back and acting like he was just observing her face for more scratches to heal.

"I do care about you, Mana-chan. I do believe you can succeed. People can't fight ninja but you're not like most people. You are a very quaint girl and that's what makes you so special, that and one other thing makes me believe you can do it. You've already made some progress" Kouta kept on smiling as he was bandaging Mana's arm which had a nasty bruise from when the girl was tossed on her back and bruised it into a large rock which was in her way.

"Then why… Why wouldn't you train me?" she asked after slowly wiping away her tears with the sleeve of her healthy arm.

"Because I don't want to hit you, Mana-chan" Kouta closed his eyes and smiled with a full grin as if he had just told a joke.

The next day Mana got beaten up again, royally so since Meiko decided to once again boost her speed to superhuman extent which proved to be Mana's limit previously. It appeared like the word superhuman was there for reason, whatever the human limit was even when Mana knew the movements perfectly, even when she could analyze the visual ticks in Meiko's face before she made the moves she couldn't redirect the blows in time.

"Let's wrap this up… It's over, your body is broken, you've got just one functional arm, Kouta will definitely wish to heal you whole day tomorrow so… Let's say that you can easily beat any non-ninja opponent, even the best martial artists would get redirected and provide you with an opening, if you can finish them during that opening you'd win, if you couldn't they'd adapt to your solely redirective style and come out on top. I suppose you still, under no circumstances, can fight a ninja…" Meiko explained scratching her head. She still looked disappointed, she wanted to make Mana whole again, to give her friend an ability to fight against the other ninja so that she could perhaps smile once again.

"I'd suggest always finishing the fight using a kick combination and topping it off with the Spear Kick" Meiko sighed and turned her back

"Spear Kick?" Mana huffed out through blood and sweat, both of which she had all over her face and mouth.

"Yeah, that jumping stomp thing… I liked it so I named it, I own it now and you must use it when I demand it! It kicked me down even while I was blocking really hard, it looks really cool too!" the blacksmith replied.

"Wait… Meiko… Let's try again! You hit me with a decent punch, something that'd kill me if it hit me, you don't have to make it your top punch but… Please" Mana begged bowing to Meiko, the magician saw her blood dripping from her face and her open wound that made blood push through even Kouta's bandages. She risked bleeding out or passing out due to blood loss if this training continued.

"What? No! Look at you, you're almost dead as it is! If I punched you right now it'd be like being crushed by a flying boulder and your bones are broken as they are, you'd have your organs mashed into porridge!" Meiko turned back and swiped her arm angrily trying to talk Mana out of it.

"I can't do it. I can't live a life where I am always that person everyone's looking at like a china doll, someone that everyone cherishes to protect from every smallest thing. I want to be strong enough to protect everyone, if I'm not then what's the point? Please, all I'm asking for is to give your best shot and have faith in me…" Mana begged falling down on her knees.

"My best shot? You've never redirected even a decent shot, I can bend steel with my best shots, break boulders, that's how I test the gloves of my armor! What you're asking of me is madness, you're the client of this mission!" Meiko yelled back at Mana picking her off the ground by the collar of her shirt and making her stand on her feet.

"I know… That's why I'm asking you to do it. You still believe I can do it and I believe that you are an excellent teacher. I saw your disappointment deep inside when I couldn't fight as well as you wanted me to and I want you to smile just as much as you want me to do so. There's just one way to make both of us happy – try to punch me so hard that it'd throw me to the Moon, so fast that I'd never see a thing coming. My heart is in this, all the way!"

Meiko closed her eyes and clutched her fist. For a moment Mana thought she saw air bend around the fist making it appear like it was blurring, almost like a mirage. Her body instantly switched into the preparation position, her arm gently yet as quickly as it's never moved before flailed preparing her body for a redirection. Meiko's body disappeared, Mana could hear her friend's roar, she could almost swear she could hear her fist flying at her as if it was on fire. If that hit her she'd be left as a bloody stain – that was an all or nothing moment.

Kouta's happy smile appeared in Mana's mind. "Because I don't want to hit you, Mana-chan" the mirage said. Mana couldn't even see her own body pushing Meiko's fist aside and kicking the girl right in the center of the back of her leg sending the blacksmith tumbling down onto the ground. Kouta and Shimo rushed out of the inn, they looked in awe at the cracked and busted up ground where Meiko's focused energy of her blow was redirected.

"Mana-chan did it, she redirected a chakra augmented blow!" Kouta jumped up into the air in joy and ran up to Mana spreading his arms up for a hug before awkwardly switching to a faked interest in her injuries. "I need to look at those immediately! Let's go back to the inn!" he yelled out dragging Mana by her ear

"What the…" Shimo still stood there refusing to believe what happened, he walked up to Meiko giving her an arm to help her stand up.

"Well, I suppose you aren't a taijutsu focused ninja, you're just decent at it. We can't make big claims yet, also no actual ninja would just focus all their energy into a single punch like that… But… Still…" the swordsman just stood there with his mouth open looking at the hole that the force of the redirection made Meiko dig up.

"No… It was… Chakra. Mana did it, she augmented her body, both her perception and speed!" Meiko looked back at Shimo with a look of similar confusion. The two looked back at the inn where the light lit up in the second floor room. Mana learned a lot over these several days and yet… More questions got raised than answers and lessons were learnt.


	117. While You Were Sleeping

"Chakra? Are you sure?" Shimo mumbled out in a confused voice. This whole deal with Mana's chakra control was incredibly odd, at that moment the Yuki regretted not talking to Mana about it in more detail: what exactly happened, when exactly did she notice losing her gift etc.

"As sure as I can be, there was no way she'd have redirected my punch with human senses and agility, she even went as far as to counterattack and bring me to my knees, only someone with chakra augmentation could have done that" Meiko nodded examining her bruised fist that got wrist deep into the ripped apart soil.

"This is quite major, we may need to examine her and see if she's actually regained her chakra manipulation or if it was just a freak accident but… This puts the possibility of Mana-chan's gift returning back on the table and that's wonderful" the swordsman smiled looking at the light in the inn room.

After helping Meiko get up the duo headed towards the room. Both of them were quite confused and didn't know what to think of it. Once they entered the sight of tired and sad Kouta treating Mana's injuries he met their eyes. Mana really did look miserable from a third person's point of view, her body looked like she had just escaped captivity and endless sessions of torture, she was pale making her blunt force traumas contrast that much more horribly in comparison.

The magician's hair was messy and sticky, it probably had plenty of blood in it but washing it must've been on the lower end of the magician's priorities. She looked as close to being beaten to death as a person could have been. Kouta slipped off of the bed and rubbed his tired eyes while sitting on the floor.

"Shit, I… I can't… I'm tired, this week was crazy…" he complained as black circles not unlike those of Mana's appeared around the boy's eyes. No one could've blamed him, he spent the whole week healing Mana's injuries that often times came multiple times a day. His healing prowess improved daily just due to the extensive amount of repetition that the boy did saving Mana from dying from her injuries. Mana was reckless and stupid for falling to such state all the time but Kouta felt like it was his own personal responsibility to bring her back to perfect state each time and now he was paying the price.

"It's fine, rest up today, you can pick up tomorrow or in the worst case the day after, we'll move out in two days at noon. You've been pushing yourself quite a lot, give yourself some credit and rest up, if there's anything we can do, please tell us" Shimo replied placing his hand onto Kouta's shoulder.

"But Mana-chan is… Still in pain…" Kouta complained.

"I'll be fine…" Mana's voice ringed in the boy's ear weakly and softly. "Pain is what we need to get used to, I'm just glad I didn't get killed, thanks for giving me a shot Meiko…" the magician tried to smile but aching body made the girl clutch up and then fall asleep. As bad as the fatigue and the pain was it didn't seem to bother Mana's sleep for the first time in a while.

"Good, she's asleep, she could use some, this week was really horrible for her" Meiko looked at Mana's battered sleeping body with some pity in her eyes.

"And for you? I saw you suffer plenty too, for some reason you also don't look like you've slept well and plenty…" Shimo asked Meiko, the blacksmith lowered her head and closed her eyes.

"Yeah, this wasn't the best for me either. It's just that… Every time Mana got hurt it felt like it was my fault, that I failed her somehow as a teacher" Meiko scratched the back of her head making her short hair stay messed up in a goofy manner, it reminded a lot of bed hair perfectly reflecting the tired state which the blacksmith felt herself staying in.

"Don't blame yourself, what you tried to teach Mana-chan is almost impossible. People don't contend with ninja, it just never happens, the progress you two have made having that in mind is astonishing, you should pat yourself on the back, really" Shimo yawned.

"If you two aren't too busy, Mana-chan's injuries need treatment, I can't heal her right now but it might be quite useful to buy some herbs for her. Shukuba town has amazing herb shops" Kouta stood up and stretched out sitting close to where Mana was sleeping and resuming to examine her injuries.

Shimo and Meiko disappeared for a good half an hour, after they returned with the several bags of herbs that were described in a small list Kouta had made the medical ninja rushed up and started preparing the herbs to apply onto the bandages and wrap around the most gruesome of Mana's injuries.

"She looks… Better, did you try to heal her again?" Meiko squinted comically looking at Mana's sleeping body who was now sleeping with much more peace and serenity in her eyes.

"No, I just gave her a couple of specialized food pills, some of them were sleep pills and some of them were special pills to treat bone fractures. I used a small portion of my pill supply but it's for good measure, even if I won't be ready to heal Mana tomorrow, it'll help her a great deal" Kouta smiled proudly, even managing to smile through the black circles and bags around his eyes that appeared out of his chakra shortage and overall exhaustion.

"Good, she'll need to be in moving condition in the morning, we've spent a lot of ryo on these herbs so we'll need to leave one day earlier" Shimo lowered his head. "Also… There's one more thing me and Meiko discussed, "Could you use your Diagnosis Jutsu on Mana-chan? Just to see if her chakra network is still torn up?"

"Wait, what? No! Mana-chan said she doesn't want it! She doesn't want to know for sure because she's afraid of that knowledge, she's afraid of knowing that her chakra network is broken permanently! It's probably for the best medically to do some tests but… She's traumatized by the experience, we can't just poke inside of her even if we won't actually get inside her. The last thing you want to do to someone traumatized like this is to force the experience onto them…"

"We don't have to tell her, we just need to know" Shimo didn't relent.

"You don't get it, if we know, she'll know that we know! We'll eventually slip up and when she'll realize we went against her wishes and found out she'll… She'll hate us…" Kouta still opposed the idea and his agreement was integral to Shimo and Meiko's plan being pulled off.

"But imagine if it's all just in Mana's mind, what if the only thing keeping her from being how she was before is some mental block she herself placed!?" Shimo was starting to get really loud, Mana almost woke up, restlessly rolling around the bed and burrowing deeper into the sheets.

"Even more reasons not to do it, you do realize that there's no positive outcome in this, right? If we find out the network really is damaged beyond repair all four of us will be crushed, if we find out that it's all in Mana's mind, imagine her own inner pain when she finds out. When she is told that all of her identity problems are because of her and that she's just not wishing hard enough" Kouta snapped back which wasn't very common for the boy to do. He was usually quite silent and non-confrontational type, he wasn't quite yet shy but he was overly polite and to see him openly arguing like this was a new sight.

"I thought you liked her, guess you really don't give a rat's ass…" Shimo rudely and abruptly tore the thread of the conversation off, for a moment a total silence took over in the room, the Yuki turned around and walked towards the exit declaring that he needed some fresh air when Meiko saw something snap in Kouta's eyes, his fist lit up blue and at that moment she knew this wasn't going to end well.

Without saying a word Kouta lunged at Shimo, just because she predicted the assault did Meiko manage to get in the way of the two blocking the medical ninja's chakra enhanced punch at the elbow where the force wasn't as focused and destructive slightly tilting the elbow to punish the medical ninja's aggression with some helpful pressure pain. She felt sharp pain in her back and when her glance reached it she saw Shimo's Audra blade having left a shallow cut on her back, intending to slice right at the medical ninja. Clearly he had predicted the attack as well but he didn't quite predict Meiko's interruption.

"Shit, I'm sorry! I need to walk this shit off!" Shimo declared quietly apologizing to Meiko like he really meant it and angrily dashing away from the room.

Kouta stayed silent for a moment, anger in his eyes got changed by depression and sadness, since his blue glow around the fist dissipated and the arm relaxed itself Meiko let go and the boy slid down on his bottom sitting down on the floor. "Am I doing the wrong thing? Am I hurting Mana-chan?" he whined out, he wasn't crying but he was visibly distressed.

"Nah, I don't know her for too long but one thing I know is that no one but she herself can truly hurt her. No amount of pain or injury or threat of imminent demise would scare her but whatever she tells herself cripples her effortlessly. I think the way where she has the least to brood about is the best one but I still can't decide which way that is…" Meiko lowered her head and then looked at the peaceful friend just sleeping her injuries off.

After the bandaging was finished and Mana looked, for the first time in a while, like a pretty young teenage girl Shimo returned. He looked a little tipsy but he crept up to his bed and just fell down as if he just died at that moment.

"Let's do it…" Kouta's voice echoed in the darkness, filled with disappointment and sadness. Just like that life returned to Shimo's body and he jumped up on his feet. The three rushed to Mana's sleeping body and the medical ninja raised his hands above Mana's body, he straightened and relaxed his palms, softly he placed them on Mana's body and powerful yet silent and painless impulses of blue light started emanating through Mana's body

"Diagnosis Jutsu" Kouta mumbled to himself just to set in stone the horrible mistake he was about to do. Mana would probably never forgive him…

The next morning finally came and Mana looked incredibly vital and energetic for someone wrapped in almost excessive amount of bandages. At least this set of bandages wasn't soaked in her blood like many that were changed before. Kouta examined the girl's injuries.

"It looks okay, I can completely heal everything if you want, not even a scar will remain, these herbs did wonders…" he concluded.

Mana vibrantly shook her head, "No, conserve your chakra. I'm already really grateful to all of you. I don't deserve such devoted and wonderful friends. You've agreed to look for the box still, despite my revelation that I always intended for this mission to fail. Meiko did so much to teach me to fight without my chakra manipulation and Kouta overexerted himself to heal me every time, all of you wasted our inn money on herbs just to make my recovery faster and less painful… Almost brings a tear to my eye, you guys…" she smiled.

"Well, you're the client, your well-being is the only one worth a damn in this line of work. If it'd make you feel better I'd massage your feet even…" Shimo joked.

"I'll consider it, you said it so there's no going back if I take you up on your offer" Mana gave him a thumb up and smiled. She felt really great and she had some reasons to feel that way – after all she successfully redirected Meiko's attack and even threw some of her own in return after a week of trying, she's in so little pain that it may not even be pain at all and they'll be moving out one day earlier which makes it one day closer to them getting to the box… Things were finally looking not too bad.

"Well, if everyone has everything we can go then, let's hope that we'll never need to stop anywhere in such a hurry as we did coming in here" Kouta laughed out, it was a little strange as to the magician his laughter felt a bit faked. The medical ninja was just as bad as faking words and emotions as she was and so even a naïve teen like Mana could pick up that something wasn't alright with him.

"Are you OK, Kouta-kun?" she asked trying to sound careful and not too imposing. "You sound a little disappointed or sad or…"

"Just tired, Mana-chan" he faked a smile again, Meiko butt into the conversation with her large behind and pointed at the Shukuba gate which lead to the road which circled to Tanzaku.

The trio didn't quite travel efficiently, they wasted a lot of time in the Roiyaru road and only stopped at Shukuba because of Mana's injury, ideally they probably would've stood the best chance at success if they changed from Roiyaru to Rooibos road and went to Tanzaku town which lead to the Land of Rivers and then crossed to the Wind Country. Now they may have wasted at least six or even eight hours of journey but luckily Rooibos road was made for just that sort of scenario – easy travelling from Shukuba pleasure town to Tanzaku town. It took the quartet less than twelve hours to get to Tanzaku because of Mana's slower pace of traveling, a ninja may have made the distance in four if they were rushing.

Tanzaku town was a little larger and looked a bit more industrialized and modernized when compared to the small Shukuba town. Shukuba was a small town of classical architecture which contained many classical pleasures a ninja or a traveler may have enjoyed like hot springs, tea houses and inns, Tanzaku town was much more commercial in that aspect, filled with various small businesses, countless bright advertisement boards and gambling houses. There was still a problem of the four having no more money left but in Tanzaku money was everywhere.

"Mana-chan, you're patient and you can focus incredibly well, go win some money at Kingyo Sukui" Meiko suggested, Mana nodded.

"Those goldfishes won't know what hit them!" she declared and rushed off to look for the goldfish scooping vendor offering money for a successful game. The trick there was to catch a bunch of goldfish into small nets, the problem was that the payout for a fish wasn't that great and so to actually make profit one had to be pretty skilled at the game. She was just glad to finally be helpful at something since being just a normal client really depressed her to no end, feeling like one wasn't a part of the team often did…

"Okay, Shimo, you can toss some killer balls at those bottles, right?" Meiko looked to be quite happy ordering everyone around.

"I probably could but I don't think the inn owner will take plush toys as payment, I saw a shuriken target practice game somewhere that pays in ryo, also, weren't you the skilled one with projectile weapons? I'm more of a swordsman-type…" the Yuki tried to object.

"Nah, it'll be fine, me and Kouta will go slam some hammers, we'll be eating lobster dinner and sleeping in the inn in no time!" the blacksmith redhead energetically declared pointing at the sky with the largest hype grin this world had ever seen.

After a sigh Shimo headed out to find the shuriken practice vendor, they would all start out betting some of their possessions since they didn't have any money but eventually they'd make the money they needed. Tanzaku was a town of opportunity where decent money could've been made gambling and playing those small vendor games. They really weren't that fair since ninja easily dominated at them but there were just about enough homeless people or petty gamblers with no skill to make the vendor stands enough profit to pay the ninja out and still have some left. Plus it kept the more ill intent having ninja from just bullying the vendor owners out of their money encouraging to win it legally.

As expected, two hours later, Mana returned with a fairly decent payout of a wallet filled with ryo, Shimo returned with a moderately smaller sized loot since as he complained shuriken wasn't his thing entirely and it was only because of his "mad skills of concentration" that he even won as much as he did win. Kouta and Meiko actually looked like they made a whole fortune. Mana really looked surprised.

"Well initially we were hitting a slump, Kouta gambled half of his ninja kit away when he bet on the hammer slamming thing but his chakra enhanced strength turned the hammer into dust while the zinger only rose halfway, I had to bail him out and so some time was spent making up for what he had lost. Then there was this large guy who kept betting against me and we kept competing for hours on end and he lost everything so I guess I kind of hammer'd him out of his underwear, which in perspective, we didn't really need but we felt in a gambling mood…" Meiko smiled showing the completely surprised team a pair of white underwear with teddy bears all over it.

Kouta's cheeks were completely blushed from embarrassment and couldn't hide his eyes away from the passers-by enough. "Please… Please don't let Meiko-san gamble again…" he almost begged the rest of the group. With a playful laughter the four headed for the nearest inn.


	118. Trouble Stew

Loud thuds emanated in pitch total blackness, several pigeons resting on a small roof structure took off, feeling threatened by those booming sounds coming from inside the small inn in Tanzaku town. What transpired in that small room had nothing to do with the pigeons, in fact, one could've boldly claimed that the men causing the ruckus couldn't have cared less about some winged rats and may have considered their existence as a nuisance at best.

The inn room belonged to a small vendor owner. His name didn't matter, nor did any other details of his life. After all he was no one special, he was born in a family of vendor owners and he never showed too much talent or skill in anything ninja-related, he was never in prime physical condition yet he had above average talent for managing business, or so his parents may have thought. Truth be told his "talent for making business decisions" was more due to what his "friends" did to make their bread.

"I am telling you, it's not yet time for my payment, you're month early. Some ninja gambled all the money off, I only have what Nabagu lost to me. I can give you guys everything back!"

The people inside his home did not lay a finger on the man himself, they were instead thrashing his room, tearing it apart with their bare hands, sometimes employing thick staffs when a more delicate touch was needed. These men were well adjusted to survive as hired muscle in a world where travelers packed incredible weapons to defend themselves and children could spit fire and cover their blades with the power of lightning. They could've torn a building apart with their bare hands brick by brick and still be able to mix the melting sugar in their tea delicately afterwards.

"It's not the money that Boss wants, his enforcer had to prance around Tanzaku with his little ding-ling covered by just a piece of board and an old spinster's laundry. It's safe to assume that the Boss is a little bit peeved, see? Distressed… Worried… Absolutely livid he would say…"

The man to the right of the person trying to keep the conversation alive shoved his arm into a wall and carefully and slowly walked to the other side of the room crumbling the wall down, it was like his very skin was made of steel.

"And I'm telling you guys, it's not my fault, it was his decision to gamble against a ninja girl dressed in a full set of armor. It was clear the whole time that he won't out-hammer her but he kept going. I don't see what my part in his issues is!" the vendor owner yelled out trying to stop the muscle-heads from tearing his apartment apart.

The well-dressed gentleman keeping up the conversation with the man lifted a gentleman's cane blocking the vendor owner's path to approaching the brute who was crushing all of his eggs in his fridge with his fingers who were large enough to fit an egg in between of them.

"Don't get your pants in a twisty now, ya goose, we all know that good old Nabagu likes to get plastered, or as sophisticated peeps say – abuse some bad substances. He isn't in the most reasonable of moods when he does so and let's just say prancing around the town with his weenie getting filled with splinters from the board he stole from a fence of an old lady isn't even the worst thing he's done"

The talkative mobster wrapped his hand around the vendor owner's neck and pushed the man in closer to his own mouth. Mostly to let it be known to the man of the great importance of his words.

"Now… You see where I'm going, obviously when one of Boss' enforcers goes on pirouetting around the place with a splinter and board tutu on his waist half naked that puts a bad image on the Boss' face and… Well… Boss dislikes having a bad image, he's sensitive in that area"

Another giant mobster, so tall and bulky that his frame couldn't even fit into the room was desperately looking for something else to smash but couldn't find anything at all, all things considered, the vendor owner was taking the complete obliteration of his home quite well. That being said, it wasn't because he was a calm and collected person nor because he was afraid, it was because with the Boss' support behind him he could've made all of this loss back in no time.

"What you could do for the Boss, after all the unfathomably generous donations he made to your endeavors, is give at least a little bit of information that would help us track the young lady down and pop a knee or two, discuss our differences and compare our points of view, you see…" the spokesperson of the mobsters tried to make his point as sweetened and as far from the truth as possible.

The vendor sighed, "I don't know, she wore some weird armor that covered her vital parts, it was mostly green and grey, she had short red hair and hung around with some loser brat of her age, that brat was really weird looking, when he smashed the hammer into the pressure plate the hammer got torn to smallest shreds, on the shorter side, dark haired and looking pretty well trained…"

"I see, that's what happens when you use shabby tools with great strength… So the boy has more strength than he knows how to deal with, interesting… Did they wear any headbands?"

"Yeah, the girl had one on her forehead and the brat wore it as a belt… They were Konohagakure ninja"

The mobster who was still looking for things to smash found a cookie jar and smashed it onto the floor starting to stomp it. The shop vendor rushed to him pushing the gentleman mobster's staff aside and tried to stop the brute from destroying his precious cookies.

"Oh come on! Not the cookies! Is nothing sacred to you!?" the vendor owners yelled out pulling at the waist level of the brute as that was just about the only area he could reach. These mobsters were larger than most rooms, they had arms the size of a carriage and their skin was dark grey, their eyes were bloodshot and constantly flying from one edge of the room to the other looking for things to destroy until the gentleman mobster ordered the brutes to stop, after which point the giants simply stopped and stood still with their heads down almost to their waist so that they could fit into the room.

"The Boss thanks you for your contribution, expect your competitors you've named in the last meeting dealt with as… Apology for today's rude transgression, it is just very important for the Boss to maintain his high status and this unpleasant problem needs to be dealt with, you see…" the gentleman mobster bowed allowing the brutes to crawl out from the hole where they came in from and rumble down the stairs to the lobby.

„Come on, Boss, you know how it is when I'm tipsy, I got to get my gambling done and… Well I just lost control for a while…"

The large man whom Meiko gambled with the other day was kneeling in front of a large chair which was turned at an even larger window which was as huge as the whole wall of the great conference hall which it was placed in. The only sign of any life on the other side of the chair was a small trail of smoke rising from it, the chair was apparently much larger than the small man sitting in it.

Without as much as a warning the chair turned around revealing a comically short person sitting in the chair with a strangely misshaped head which was just about as large if not a tiny bit larger than that of most people where his normal stature was much smaller. He must've measured up to a normal person's waist, not much below that. He was the only one in his syndicate of significance except his enforcers wearing a suit, the other more important members of his syndicate wore exquisite and incredibly expensive kimono and had swords by their side.

"You see… I made a gamble with you" a very husky and rough voice came from the short man's mouth, something that could've only been a sign of great throat damage due to his long time smoking addiction. Had someone hung around the man for a couple of days they'd have found that the man smoked like a cheap chimney and took great pride in his ability to smoke up a whole cigar with a single draw of breath despite his lungs appearing to be one tenth of what a normal man had.

"I've replaced all of my other muscles, after we've formed the deal with the Bellucini family in Kumogakure and gained access to the Land of Rivers Gold Mine, and what lies deep inside of it… You told me… Come on, now, tell me what you told me, I want to hear it from your own ungrateful mouth!" the short man ordered the kneeling muscle to talk.

"I said, "Boss, please don't do that sick and twisted shit you did to the others, don't replace my skin with that thing… I won't let you down… One day you'll need a normal flesh and bones enforcer and then I'll be there", that's what I said, Boss…" the man bellowed like a whining dog with a broken leg, probably because he was just that – the man's lapdog with a broken leg and kneecaps that got blown up after the other enforcers spat at them.

"That's what you said… Now I remember" the little man tried to colourfully mock the irony in the situation which his lapdog prophesized and the one that actually transpired. The shorty kicked his desk with his comically small leg and seemingly colossal, as compared to the rest of his body, feet so that his short frame span around in his large and comfortable office chair.

"Do you have any idea what it's like to be a short man in this world? What it's like to live in a world where everyone's so special, one daddy's little princess has a puppy that can headbutt stone to dust, one good boy can control insects and tell them to eat away at the very essence of their enemies… What it's like to be born in such a world and not only be unable to do any of those things but also be handicapped, even less than those other folk who couldn't care less about war or peace but care only about having enough shit to slap at their walls so that they stand firmly and stick those fucking bricks together?" the man spoke out spitting his cigar to the side only for one of his modified enforcers to pick the thing up and eat it, munch it up before swallowing the thing and breathing out a small cloud of smoke.

The poor man just kept on kneeling, only because he had little choice but to remain in his position having his crushed knees in mind.

"So I spend so much time, do all these things to finally start getting people to respect me. I make business trades, I buy and sell property and not all goes according to plan but… Small details can be adjusted by means that some people may call questionable. After all, I was blessed to actually have something to compensate for my short legs and everything else… I had a brain that saw an opportunity everywhere. So I go ahead and build myself a life where I'm finally respected and what do you do?"

The little man hopped down the chair with a little difficulty, walking up to the mobster who was kneeling in front of him and looked him right in the eyes, now that the leader of the syndicate was standing and his ex-enforcer was kneeling while bellowing about his popped knee caps and broken legs the two were finally at the same level as far as the height of their eyes went.

"Look, Boss… Just… Whatever you do, don't do to me what you did to those other guys, I can fix it all, I can make you respected again just… Don't bring me to the mines…" the wounded man begged and whined, begged and whined like a dog with broken legs looking at a man who held a treat in his hands.

"The mines? You think after what you did I'd fill your skin with the merchandise, pump you up!? You'd think I'd waste the time of my blacksmiths and the invaluable precious ores on your sorry ass!?" the little man shouted in his husky voice so hard that it broke, kicking the man down with his oversized foot and pulling out two large crossbow-shaped pipe-like weapons from behind his jacket, they were so incredibly large that it was tough to imagine just how he could've fit them in there since they were almost as large as the shorty himself.

The man extended the pipes at the crippled man and fired the weapons, the string mechanisms inside fired off a bunch of kunai at the man's chest while several more hit him in the neck making him die instantly.

The four large grey enforcers behind the man rumbled and growled like they weren't even human anymore, a remnant of pains of the past and all that they went through to acquire this ability to make their boss actually feel threatening.

"It's not like you to just snick a guy like that, Boss, did your knuckles feel rusty today?" one of the other mobsters with the kimono and tattoos all over his body and a shaved head, one of five others in the room, asked.

"I don't feel like getting trash in between my fingers, I plan to eat at momma's tonight and I'd have it all over my food. My knuckledusters got a bit rusty so I'm having my guys work on new ones, they should be ready shortly, if they work I'll get all of ya some. My guys need to be and look like…"

"Boss?" another rich and sophisticated looking made man asked for a clarification as to why their Boss stopped talking in the middle of his speech.

"Fuck… I forgot the name of that teen actor who plays Shikio in that movie…" the little Boss man complained out loud before lighting up another smoke, he fully intended to enjoy this one.

"Fukuharu Shunko?"

"Iito Seichi?"

"Okumura Yoshitaka?"

"Haga Akimichi?"

"Onaga Maritsumo?"

Each of the five of the slightly brighter and more sophisticated of the mobsters started suggesting the man names of actors. Now that the movie industry started booming recently some of the artists made a name for themselves making them, it wasn't that common for an artist to make a name for themselves. Especially not for an actor in a play, people usually remembered a character that they played and not the actor, the actor was only mentioned if he did not become the character they played, it meant a great sign of disrespect. In a lot of ways Mana's success at entertainment paved the way for other famous people to appear and start getting idolized. Only novelists used to be known for their work before and even then most of them signed under a nickname so that their fame didn't overshadow their actual work.

"Nah… This young little guy, a midget like me, he wore those huge shoes…" the little man cursed to himself.

"I wouldn't say… Midget, Boss… You're just… Of short stature, there are taller people and there are smaller, you're just smaller than the total average…"

The other members of the syndicate nodded and looked at each other nodding in sync with each other. After this fiasco of his memory and the point he was trying to make the Boss sat back down and angrily rubbed his oversized eyes that didn't quite fit with the rest of his body, as he stretched his aged skin and his scars that he had acquired in gang fights when his syndicate was in its earliest stages it looked a bit weird and creepy when the whole skin seemingly moved as it was shaped, almost like clay.

The door opened and the gentleman mobster walked in followed by two of his empowered experiment-made enforcers. "I've got news for ya, Boss!" the man almost sung out in his beautiful singing voice. The gent had a small time career singing in Tanzaku on Friday nights and planned on moving to Konohagakure soon but the place was a tough business to break into.

"How're the brutes? Performing well?" the shorty asked his subordinate to which the man only danced with his shoes, letting them freely tap onto the incredibly overpriced marble floor and then bowed after pressing his cane at his belly playfully.

"No one's as great as smashing cookies like those two!" he replied.

Being fully aware of how his subordinate acted when he was in a good mood the Boss just gestured for the man to get his point over with.

As he was walking up closer to his Boss the gentleman rudely stepped over the corpse of his buddy which was being slowly dragged away, after the corpse got into the mobster's way the other brutes flipped him over their shoulder when bringing him outside to dump him somewhere. It wasn't even the first person to disrespect Boss that week and respect was a subject where the Boss was very sensitive at.

"We got something, a teenage girl with green armor and short red hair, a kunoichi from Konoha, hangs around with a weird looking pretty muscular guy from Konoha who is a medical ninja and definitely pack a wallop… We asked around and we know where the young lady is resting her half a million ryo richer red head!" the gent smiled bowing to the applause of his Boss.

"See, men, now that's some bloody service… Someone fucks up and this guy comes in couple of hours later and says, "Hey, this bitch had the cojones to do it, go do yer thing" the Boss clapped for a couple of seconds before sitting up and resting his hands while leaning his body on his office table.

"Well, what are the lot of you waiting for? Do yer thing!" he yelled out. The gentleman swung his cane playfully and marched out the door, four brute mobsters followed him as if they were compelled to, the remnants of what little human intelligence they had before whatever happened in the mines which was now overwhelmed by the memories of insufferable pain dictated their every move…


	119. Ninja VS Mafiosi

No one ever wondered, nor would they need to, about what would happen to a house of cards if an oversized boulder fell on it. However a small inn right in the middle of the small pit stop town called Tanzaku town collapsed in a manner not much different from the way in which a house of cards would rumble. A young man with normally quite slick and spiked behind him hair, now in a state of recently awoken fury and a massive case of bed hair could only blink witnessing the fall of the inn.

"Your welcome!" Shimo's annoyed voice from down below yelled at the young man before the medical ninja noticed that a large twister of cold air slowly brought him down from the spot where the massive force shockwave tossed him aside. After Kouta finally landed firmly on his two feet he stroke his messy hair angrily.

"I didn't really thank you, not because I'm not grateful I just… Have no idea what's going on!" the boy shouted, his hearing must've been impaired since small torrents of blood were coming out from his ears.

"No idea either, I woke up from this weird bad feeling and then… A massive boom tossed me out the window, had I been the intended target of that… I don't even know, it hit like a small meteor… I'd have been a wet stain, I think Meiko's gut took the punch though…" Shimo grunted out looking at the pile of wood, after just a single impact the whole wooden structure crumbled leaving just the first floor barely supporting the whole frame.

Kouta sniffled, "I'm not sure people thank other people for sending a blizzard their way, medical ninja can't cure common cold, you know" he complained as a joke.

Shimo didn't reply, he knew it was meant as something to lighten up the mood, after all their whole home was busted up, all of their stuff and their money was in there and it was hard to tell just how much could've been salvaged from there. The jutsu he used to prevent Kouta's injury or death was a technique used to shock and slow an opponent down by overwhelming their bodies with cold air, if all that the medical ninja would get from it was a common cold, he'd have gone off as quite lucky.

"Where's Mana-chan and Meiko?" Kouta asked rubbing his red nose and wiping some more of his snot off

A deafening thud followed by a crashing boom which contained the sounds of solid steel being torn to shreds and wood being pressed so hard that it got peeled to small sawdust from the pressure alerted the two shinobi to a most recent sound coming from the side of the barely standing structure. A hulking monstrosity wearing what appeared like a torn up business suit and a fancy hat with a red ribbon and an eagle feather included in the whole set bashed another person through the wall carrying them with their unstoppable charge.

A barrage of loud thuds made Kouta scratch his ear – it was Meiko who was caught by the hulking brute's charge and the freak was charging at such a considerable speed that the blacksmith girl couldn't leap off of the oversized elbow. What she could do was exactly what she was doing – pound the shit out of the oversized man's little brain with her enhanced with chakra blows. Meiko's chakra control was shabby so she put all of her possible chakra into each hit without worrying about the consequences that have so efficiently broken Mana's life.

It looked like the brute cared very little of Meiko's blows which was awesome all by itself, judging by the sounds which the blacksmith's blows made she could've busted large boulders with them yet it barely even fazed her opponent. The mobster leaped high up into the air, repositioning his arm to grab Meiko by the piece of her armor and trying to spin her around by spinning his arm, without a doubt intending to slam her with an added momentum of this spinning move. The mobster's target was another inn just couple of blocks nearby.

Meiko's quick reaction flicked a small belt that instantly slipped out and helped the girl get out of one shoulder pad which the monster was holding her by. The girl made a couple of seals in mid-air and placed her palm at her shin.

"C-Rank Seal: Release!" she yelled out as blue flames fired off from her boots propelling her downwards at the ground as her opponent disappeared in its awesome leap. Meiko adjusted her position using her flames as air pillows by quickly activating them to stop her propulsion and adjusting her descent. She activated it one last time right before landing on the ground making a large, almost blinding cloud of dust.

"Hmmm, that bonehead, he must've leaped to the other side of the town… I wonder if he's smart enough to remember to come back here…" a voice which the girl had not heard before reached her ears making the curious kunoichi check its owner. It was yet another overdressing gentleman with brown shades, an even more expensive looking suit and a really nice cane which had lightning bolts drawn on it.

"Wow! Those lightning motifs, they're an added extra layer, the whole thing is aluminum and those look like titanium! It's not just paint right!?" the blacksmith shrieked like a schoolgirl seeing ice-cream for lunch on the table after coming back from school.

"How is that the only thing on your mind right now, young lady?" the gentleman smiled swinging his cane around before tossing it aside and cracking his knuckles. An earth shattering sound alerted Meiko of another combatant joining her in this alleyway she landed in. Two more powerhouses burst through the buildings tearing them down with just a light push. The redhead pouted, this may have been a battle she shouldn't really put much hopes in.

"Red-haired armored girl, I assume you're the one who gambled our associate out of his underwear, correct?" the good looking non-beefed mobster asked tipping his shades so that his brown eyes could see the girl better.

"Oh, so you're his friends? Sorry, I don't feel like gambling right now, if you want we could have an eat-off, if you want that underwear back that is… Oh wait… No, I tossed it away… Sorry…" Meiko scratched the back of her head making a really sad face, only now an idea came to her mind that the poor guy may have been quite inconvenienced by having no underwear, he could've frozen his peepee off this time of year!

"Well then, I sure am glad you acknowledged it and confessed, it'd have been awkward if we toppled several buildings chasing the wrong girl…" the mobster sighed flicking his fingers as if alerting his muscle-headed friends to attack. That command was just what the two were waiting for as they leaned forward and charged at Meiko, the girl made a handseal and placed her palm onto her right arm.

"Storage Seal: Release" she uttered and after a loud poof and a cover of a cloud of smoke a buckler shield materialized around the spot where she placed her palm on, the blacksmith's right hand grabbed hold of it, it was just in time as the non-roided out mafioso pulled out a strange tube-like device and flicked a switch on it firing a barrage of kunai at Meiko. The girl's buckler collected all of them, she rolled to the side to avoid the first punch of the brute, then leaped to the side firing off more jets of blue flames to move sideways and stick to the wall quicker.

"Art of Wall Climbing!" Meiko uttered as her feet stuck to the wall maintaining her stuck onto it like the wall was just another surface she could effortlessly walk on. The girl stumbled a couple of times running up the wall, her chakra control was really lacking and she had trouble maintaining even this simplest of Academy techniques.

After reaching the corner of the building Meiko flipped back, making a handseal and then flung her buckler at the direction of the shorter and weaker looking mobster since she felt like the brutes could withstand such a defect blow effortlessly. The buckler was tossed with great force and speed, the gentleman mobster tried his best to dodge it however it still hit his large kunai shooting weapon disarming the assailant of it.

"Storage Seal: Release!" Meiko yelled out unsealing a large claymore from her left arm and cleaving it right at one of the brutes allowing gravity and her chakra augmented strength to enhance the hit, it'd have been enough to cleave through a building sized animal in two without much resistance.

The brutes didn't appear like the kind to dodge, force emanated through Meiko's arms as it was like the sword hit pure titanium. The enhanced mobster merely tried to block the blow with his arm but the claymore busted in pieces from the impact.

"No goddamn way!" the girl yelled out in a combination of awe at her opponent's abilities and how cool it must've looked. Her arms were completely disabled though and the previous couple of blows she took from those things exhausted her chakra supply, she was just reaching her vital limit which she couldn't cross and her arms were completely disabled, Meiko also felt surging pain in her palms – her hands must've been broken, or at least some bones in there.

The mobster lifted his arms up to smash Meiko to the ground, the girl saw the leftover crater from the last guy's blow, she saw those guys tear through buildings with their mere hands as if they were made of paper and feathers. Meiko decided to wait until the last moment to move to the side but she saw the other brute walking up from behind the first one – she didn't know for how long she could've avoided those blows, several attacks, maybe more. They looked pretty pissed at her for some reason.

"Wait… Don't tell me we already had an eat-off and you lost, you're being sore losers, you know that?" Meiko grinned as the brute's arms moved down to crush and grind her bones.

A powerful beam of blue light followed by deafening howls of wind followed. The brute standing right in front of Meiko froze solid. With a surprised expression Meiko looked to the side and saw Kouta and Shimo charging in. The Yuki swordsman made several handseals.

"Water Style: Water Asssault!" he yelled out spitting from his mouth a small stream of water right onto the ground filling the large hole that the brute's fist previously left. Shimo made at least twelve more handseals with speed of weaving them that would've looked completely invisible to a normal human.

"Hijutsu: Crystal Ice Mirrors!" Shimo grunted out as the water inside the crater leaped up and formed thirty or so plates around the battlefield closing everyone inside in a formation of large ice mirrors, with a slightly audible bling sound Shimo's reflection appeared in all of them. What followed was a deafening blur of invisible movements. Meiko couldn't see anything that transpired as Shimo moved in a speed invisible not only to a normal human but most ninja too!

A crumbling sound gave several clues as to what may have transpired, a large chunk of the frozen brute fell down before the whole statue of ice collapsed in pieces. Kouta moved Meiko out of the way and placed his hands above hers, a strong green glow quickly patched her hands up – the boy was becoming faster and more skilled with his healing every time.

"Well then… He took out one, haven't seen that before, will have to go to the mines and make some more, what a bother. Kill them too!" the only talking mobster waved his arms indifferently moving in to pick up his weapon before Shimo's afterimage appeared in front of him and then disappeared, as did his weapon. It was like the swordsman was everywhere within this field which the crystal mirrors surrounded.

"Shimo, don't overdo it, you've already killed one of those guys like that! Let me take care of him! Just watch my back" Kouta yelled out charging at the remaining brute as his fist enlightened with the chakra glow, medical ninja had the ability to focus their chakra in their strikes much more carefully and with more finesse and control as compared to the usual chakra augmentation, they could've enhanced their strength without any fear of the repercussions which someone who augmented their abilities normally would've had to think about.

With an awesomely winded up and clearly telegraphed punch Kouta's fist dug into the brute's face, the oversized mobster didn't even try to lean out of the way, he just took it and the force from the impact emanated throughout breaking every window and even every ice mirror of Shimo's tossing the swordsman back from the sheer force of the blow.

"You idiot! What the hell are you doing!?" the swordsman yelled out annoyed by how unskilled they were at working together. That was commonly the problem with spontaneously formed squads.

Kouta's eyes looked back at his friend, his face twisted in an apologetic smile, "Sorry, sorry, I didn't think he'd take this blow head-on…" only after apologizing did Kouta's brain realize that the brute was just standing right in front of him unfazed by the blow. The medical ninja stepped back rubbing his aching arm which would've blown up from the force of his punch had he not took great precautions with augmenting the endurance of the arm as well as his strength.

The brute raised his hand and winded it up to throw a punch at the medic. Normally medical ninja were taught quite extensively of the useful art of evasion so the boy leaped up into the air and onto the brute's shoulder, using his shoulder to kick off of and jump into the air. The boy then placed his arms forward and growled, with a loud cracking sound, reminding most of the sound bones make when they shatter, two pipe-like protrusions of hardened skin formed around the boy's arms – a testament of his Juugo heritage.

"Chakra Pistol!" he yelled out firing a fireball of blue chakra formed from small blueish marbles of chakra that floated out from those protrusions and molded into a singular larger projectile. The concentrated ball of chakra exploded with far more power than any number of ninja tags could've, the explosion tossed the medical ninja back making him fall on his butt and almost breaking his elbows and tailbone from the impact but it gave him distance at least.

The sight of the brute however surprised the ninja greatly. He was twitching and had a large bruise on his chest, it was like the flesh his chest was peeled off with a knife. Kouta just couldn't understand why would such a weak technique have inflicted so much damage, it wasn't even his damaging attack, it was done purely to propel him further away after an unsuccessful attack and yet…

"What's wrong, why aren't you moving?" Shimo growled angrily at Kouta, evidently still quite pissed for how the boy ruined his technique.

"It's… So strange…" Kouta mumbled under his own nose.

"What do you mean?! That was awesome!" Meiko yelled out shrieking and cheering like someone who attends the firework festival for the first time.

"It was a distraction, I've no idea why it did so much damage, the destructive power of my punch was at least eight times stronger than what this technique could do even head-on! It usually just burns people and slightly injures them, the reaction this guy has to it is… Just like a normal person with no enhancements would have but he took that blow as if his whole body was hardened with chakra!" Kouta explained standing up slowly.

As the team stared at the injured brute confused and still trying to figure out just what must've happened, the brute clenched its arms by his side and roared into the air, his shout let out powerful shockwaves that broke windows far from the alleyway it came from. The picking up winds from the shout tore laundry off the ropes and tossed it all over the place making it fall and stick onto any surfaces it fell on, several shirts and kimonos even got torn to pieces just from the force of it.

"Oh well, now you pissed it off. I've never seen it pissed off but it might just wreck this whole town, I've seen these guys lift small buildings above their heads just for the fun of it even when they're on their joyful drooling mood" the gentleman mobster cracked a grin, clearly excited to see the potential of his bodyguards.

"DESTROY EVERYTH…" the brute yelled out as his muscles tensed so hard that they tore his suit and shirt to shreds. His mantra of destruction was however cut quite short by another brute falling down from above right on top of him. The weight of these brutes must've been impressive because it was enough to knock the large raging mobster down and even leave a small crater matching that in size of the one left by one of the punching the ground.

The trio looked up seeing Mana jumping from one balcony to another, grabbing the one she landed to by the ledge and then kicking off to another and then back, in just a couple of vaults the girl landed on the ground and dusted her aching hands. Some of the wounds she acquired from moving down from the rooftop were quite painful and were bleeding relentlessly, such minor injuries could've been avoided if she still possessed the ability to run down walls like a ninja…

"Holy shit, Mana!" Meiko kept screaming in joy, despite the efforts of these gangsters being solely devoted to crushing her this night proved to be an endless ride of joy and hype for the blacksmith.

The brutes started to pick themselves up from the ground, they stood up and stared at each other for a while before roaring and throwing a punch at each other's face. An overwhelming gust of pure force sent everyone who wasn't a roided out brute clutching for something to remain standing as the two heavyweights hit the dirt having knocked each other out.

"Well, it looks like that training in redirection I did wasn't in vain… Good thing I went down to ask the owner for a glass of water when I did though, I'd have probably been killed in that initial impact" Mana smiled dusting off the pants of her pajamas.

"Did you just take out two of those things without your chakra control?" Kouta's mouth open pointing his finger at Mana and then at the scene of the two unconscious brutes.

The girl's face blushed as she stroke her bed hair madly, "Well, the stronger the force, the more effective the redirection…" she couldn't handle compliments that well but the three just kept staring at her completely refusing to believe what just happened.

"Well then… I woke you guys up, you beat up my guys… I'd say we're even, you see…" the gentleman turned around and started playfully dashing to the opposite direction. Shimo stood right in front of him before he could make it to the first corner kneeing the man into the stomach.

"You owe us, we're leaving in the morning so we have no time to mess around with you, pay up and we'll be on our way first thing in the morning. I believe your problem is with Meiko since the first hit was thrown right at her from above, we're leaving tomorrow so we actually will be even. Your boss won't even blow your head off for this failure if you lie…" Shimo's husky and annoyed voice weaseled out a deal for the mobster. The gentleman's arm reached into his pocket but Shimo's arm reached it first, moving at blurring speeds.

The swordsman removed several large blocks of bills and tossed them at Meiko. The blacksmith struggled to keep them in her arms, letting them playfully slip around and tossing them like a hot potato before managing to finally catch them at which point she sighed and placed them into her ninja pouch, the blacksmith picked up her shield and placed it by her right hand.

"Storage Seal: Seal!" she yelled out as a bright light shot out from a hieroglyph that appeared on the girl's armor piece and absorbed the shield within. Despite her jarring holes with ninjutsu and genjutsu techniques Meiko appeared to know how to perform sealing techniques at the very least.

"Ummm… I'm not travelling in my pajamas, we should drop by another inn and hit the clothes shop in the morning, then maybe the weapons shop and then we head to Land of Rivers" Mana scratched her head trying to make some sense of this mess and put their plan back together.

"Actually… Could you maybe… Not go to Land of Rivers?" the slimy mobster who was still on the ground after getting his jacket pocket emptied weaseled out.

"Why? What's in the Land of Rivers? We are heading to the Wind Country and Land of Rivers is the only way there, it literally is the only passage on land and there's no reason for us to sail around…" Kouta complained.

"Well, Boss' Gold Mine is in the Land of Rivers, now that you offed so many of our muscle we'll need to restock so our syndicate's elite will leave to recruit some more brutes, they are umm… Trained… In the mines. If I am to lie that the armored girl is dead… It'd be better if we weren't on the same place at the same town, just in case…" the mobster explained waving his arms as he spoke, he appeared to gesture a lot and his face was one of those overly detailing and emphasizing the emotion that its owner wanted to portray.

"Then our destination is clear – we'll destroy those mines and head to Wind Country for the Box. I mean we're going to Land of Rivers anyways… We can't allow these gangsters experiment on more people and then use those poor things to bully innocent people" Mana nodded crossing her arms on her chest.

"The client has spoken!" Meiko declared lifting her fist up to the sky as the four grouped up and headed towards another inn to finish their night in before the Tanzaku shops opened up.

"That complicates things…" the mobster grunted getting off of his knees and fixing his tie before placing his hat back on after picking it off the ground where it must've fallen at some point of the battle. "The Boss would like to hear about this "Box" though…" he spoke to himself as the four ninja had long since left the alleyway.

He had no choice, the Boss wouldn't have accepted failure and if those Konoha ninja were ready to cross the Wind Country's border for it this box must've been worth Boss' attention and his mercy towards the failure of his subordinate…


	120. Entertainer's Creed

"I was wondering..." Mana mumbled indifferently while she was trying a nice casual jacket that would've fit her black shirt which she found just recently referring to Meiko whose head playfully dug through the clothes on the other side and popped in between several different sets of coats.

"Hmmmm" she mooed like a cow

"You were in your armor when this whole thing happened, you were hit directly by that thing, right? You're lucky to be alright, those guys are nothing to sneeze at even by ninja standards…" the magician wondered picking several different sets of clothes off of the stand and placing them into her cart to try out. Mana was always a sucker for clothes, a part of her identity as a performer was to always look her best, the problem was that despite enjoying changing her wardrobe up a lot she rarely got the chance to do any shopping with all those crazy missions she's been doing lately.

"Yeah…" Meiko's head nodded and then disappeared back to the other row through the endless ocean of coats, a loud tomboyish laughter let the magician know just where her friend was standing behind the giant set of clothes.

"Don't worry, I can take a punch. Though yeah, I was checking my armor before I went asleep, I always do because my armors are made of simple materials: leather and steel mostly. I need to maintain all those bunch of belts, see that all the switches and parts work properly and aren't damaged. It's a lot of work, you know. So I just fell asleep while checking something, the last thing I remember checking was the belt that kept my shoulder pad connected to the rest of the set…" Meiko explained. It was really lovely how invested she got into talking about her armor and her job. Then again, Mana would most likely be just as invested to talk about stage magic if there was someone to talk about it with. Maybe it was her own desire to talk about things that she loved that made her be that person who listens to other people's passions and things plaguing them.

"Yeah, I know what you're talking about, my uniform is quite similar – it has bunch of pockets and all those switches that slip cards in or out, shoot them and all that… It really is a lot of work, making them good for both stage magic and fighting is the tough part" Mana smiled even though her friend could not see it. Surprisingly there were more things she could relate to Meiko with than she initially thought. Surely they were pretty much polar opposites but a lot of things that they hated about themselves and things they loved had similar aspects to them.

It only took the girls two more hours to conclude their shopping, mostly because of Mana's own fault, she was perfectly aware that she won't need that many different outfits for this missions but she was adamant to finish her shopping. Then again, she was the smart one to remind everyone to buy appropriate attires for the Wind Country desert, it was getting closer and closer and they may travel it for days before finding the ruins. Mana's natural love for shopping was masked behind her own lie that she was doing it because it was practical and while it certainly was on some parts, her motive behind spending so much time and earnt money was purely for enjoyment.

"Finally…" Shimo rolled his eyes, he had already dressed a white long robe which appeared to be most suitable for the desert, it wasn't a bad idea as they were going to reach the Land of Rivers which was pretty much a huge resort in just a day or two, maybe faster depending on their rate of travelling.

Kouta smiled in a white and blue tracksuit and scratched his head, he didn't appear to be nearly as annoyed as the Yuki swordsman but he didn't spend too much money on clothes either. "If you need help carrying that backpack I can do it for you, Mana-chan…"

"You ate all of your money meant for clothes and supplies away, didn't you?" Meiko squinted at the boy feeling suspicious for his sudden desire to help his teammate out.

The cheeks of the medical ninja dyed in a rather crimson hue as his eyes closed so that he didn't betray the truth but the truth was really apparent.

"You're just jealous that you didn't think of it, Meiko-san" Kouta tried to bite back at his teammate which was somewhat effective as Meiko stopped talking for a while at least. Finally the four set off to leave Tanzaku town, they may have optimally stayed there to make some more gambling money as with their ninja skills it wasn't really gambling. Still, they made a deal with that mafia weasel that they'd leave early and something deep inside made them honour that deal.

"Stupid buildings… All the same…" the quartet heard rumbling yet deep and powerful voice close by, they slowly walked up to check. After turning the corner leading to the street where the unnatural voice came by they bumped into one of the large mafioso brutes. The living mystery of the Land of the Rivers' Gold Mines. The monstrous man twisted his upper lip in contempt after seeing the four approaching.

"I think it's the one that jumped away from the battlefield, he's still trying to find his way back, not too bright, those guys, are they?" Meiko observed leaning back curiously, it was interesting how this girl expected no danger from the brute even though she was their main target yesterday judging by how they specifically aimed at Meiko when they tore down the inn.

"Head hurts… Hurts when I try to think hard…" the man uttered lifting his worn out hat and scratching his messy hair.

"Whatever they're doing in those mines… It must be so painful that their bodies undergo a protective mindwipe so potent that it wipes it permanently, any semblance of complicated thought appears to bring up their painful memories, interesting…" Kouta slid around the brute as if he was a living specimen in a museum, even climbing the monster and poking him on the head curiously, just to see if the stimulus wouldn't call a violent reaction.

"Where is home? Boss must be angry…" the mafioso mumbled out loud, despite his loud and rather aggressive tone he didn't seem to be in a fighting mood at all. All he cared was getting back to the headquarters.

Mana smiled at the man and walked up, touching his large arm gently and lifting it up, as she removed the hand four small wooden balls remained in his hand. Mana intended to have them as a part of her improvised ninja kit seeing how using knives and shuriken was made more difficult without the enhanced ninja perception and accuracy being on her side, every skill she ever possessed needed to be retrained.

"Balls?" the man grumped out shaking his head and starting to get angry before Mana slowly took them from him and juggled them for a couple of seconds just like she used to do as a child, standing on a cardboard box in the middle of Konohagakure.

"You can make your own money like this, money can buy you food, shelter, anything you'll need. You'll also make people happy…" she smiled handing the balls back to the giant looking at his stumped impression, "You do know how money works, right?"

"Me talk hard, not stupid! Fifteen hundred ryo for apples…" the man read a sign on the other side of the street, the magician kept on smiling.

"Make sure to practice a lot, making people happy is tough and sometimes it'll come at the cost of your own happiness but it's OK, that's what we entertainers do. The only kind of money that feels rightly earned is money earned for making someone happier…" the girl said after Kouta dragged her off since the four were heading towards the exit from the town. The man just kept on standing there stumped with the balls in his hand, still trying to fully grasp what the young genin told him.

What followed was a rather long and uneventful run towards Land of Rivers. It was said to be a beautiful natural paradise that had plenty of settlements all throughout the country but it was by far the least tampered with land of any places where people actively lived. People made homes and caves inside rocks protected only by waterfalls, they made homes inside trees instead of from them. It was a lovely idea of living in sync with nature taken to its natural limits.

After just three or four hours of movement the four genin could already see the changing scenery, the leaves became greener as the trees in the Land of Rivers soil grew larger and richer in nutrients. They were also much more numerous in their numbers, not only larger in size. A river or a massive lake commonly interrupted their uneventful and even boring trip, Kouta pleasantly agreed to carry Mana over them as the three used the "Water Walking Technique" which most genin learned in the Academy to simply run across them instead of bothering to walk around them which would've cost them days more time spent on the road.

The four didn't bother to sleep for the whole three days of travelling, they did stop for a small rest, just place their backs to a tree, relax and let their minds slide away for a while, just for an hour or two. It wasn't that they were worried about criminals, which all things considered would've been a legitimate worry, they were just really rushing to get to their destination – Land of Rivers was the final stop before the Wind Country and that Gold Mine inside it was the last obstacle they needed to be cleared. After seeing in action just what was done to people inside those mines the four didn't even talk about it – all of them agreed that whatever was happening there had to end, no matter that it was neither their objective nor did it have anything to do with their objective whatsoever.

Finally, the Land of Rivers welcomed them with the four reaching a small settlement village which was the thing that reminded of civilization the most in that large untamed land of natural beauty. It was a small and a simple settlement, numerous homes built of wood, all of the villagers appeared to be at least somewhat involved with the mines since the road to the mines was the main road of the village and most males that the ninja squad saw were definitely mine workers – carrying mining tools and had figures far too well defined and trained for them not to be used to heavy labour.

"Well then, not much use standing around, let's head out to the mines then?" Meiko growled out, it was clear that the lack of sleep got to her. It may have been a wise choice to postpone that trip.

"We may not even find anything there, it'd be ideal if we knew when the syndicate that we bumped into decided to do their thing in the mines, they'd lead us straight to it…" Shimo replied, he was much more skilled with that kind of thing, having lived beyond the village walls and living and training with a rogue ninja himself, he must've picked up on a thing or two about how things like that were handled.

"Doesn't really feel right to torture people, even if they are criminals…" Mana pouted, that was really the best way she could express herself in having her exhausted condition in mind. She wasn't like those ninja who could've had their bodies sustain themselves even if they were literally dying, her body had no supernatural feats about it and she was stuck with just one frail body and an even frailer mind.

"Well, I am a medical ninja, I was taught how to torture humanely…" Kouta shrugged.

"Torture… Humanely?" Mana growled squinting angrily at him.

"Yeah, the Konohagakure torture method is quick and incredibly painful, I've went through the course, it's always so painful that maximum pressure is applied making the one being tortured instantly pressured into surrendering the information so that…"

"Yeah… No… Plan B" Mana cut Kouta's explanation of the methods of torture taught to the medical ninja. The profession of medical ninja had so much romance to it for Mana, the magician had always wanted to be one but those who got to practice it and be taught in its ways were always the prodigies with the best grades and the most amazing chakra control. Even back at her peak Mana could probably ever hope to heal minor wounds, even if taught the basics of medical ninjutsu. And she was supposed to be quite proficient at it due to her self-training.

"Well dismissing torture and interrogation… It doesn't leave us with many options, we're really too tired to sit and hope that an ambush situation presents itself…" Shimo scratched his chin looking around for a proper plan to somehow make itself known to him, be it with just a smallest hint…

"No, we'll get in, blow it up and get out. We find out how those things are made and then we blow that thing up so that people are no longer made into those things! That's it" Mana tried to explain her idea of how their work was supposed to go down when a hand grabbed her by the mouth covering it up and dragging her into a tent. The rest of the squad just stood there for a moment before leaping in to follow her and whoever decided to attack the magician. Once they entered the tent the sight that greeted them was Mana standing above an old miner she just threw over her shoulder once she recovered from shock and gained proper footing. The man was whining on the floor as the magician had him in an armlock.

"You fools, don't just discuss things like that on the street!" the miner grunted out through the pain that the girl's armlock gave him.

Meiko grinned with a full-teeth smile and gave Mana a thumb up, "That's my student! Don't let em bully you around!" she commended the magician who finally realized she may have harmed a possible ally and let go of the miner.

"What do you know about the mines, old man, what's happening there and when?" Shimo pressed the man to the back of the tent after letting him get back up, not giving him much time to recover.

"What are you talking about? Aren't you four with the Agurotti family? Who do you work for then, Bellucini?" the man asked leaning slightly at Shimo trying to figure him out. The miner nodded at the Yuki's blade that was half drawn the moment he showed himself.

"That's an Audra blade if I ever saw one, can't get enough of that shit unless you're a Lord or you've got a crapton of Audra dust and… You know…" the old miner winked at the four.

"Right, the mines… Yeah, we're working for Bellucini…" Shimo lied sheathing his blade all the way and blinking rapidly.

"Shit, the guy started recruiting them younger, that's for sure, his vigilante coup problem that bad?" the miner whispered leaning up to the Yuki, the swordsman slapped the man with a backhand, Mana and Meiko tried to jump up to object, so did Kouta but the man jumped back up on his feet and giggled.

"Yeah, I know, I know, I was just testing ya. I know ya guys don't talk business with us common folk. I guess it's gotta be bad enough that he's sending green kids without any intel whatsoever…" the miner wiped the blood off his teeth and picked up a large duffel bag placing it onto his shoulder and pointing at the exit of the tent.

"Well young folk, what are ya waiting for, let's go, I'll lead you to the mines. You're in luck, Boss is arriving soon, he sent a message so he needs another batch of the product. Too bad if you guys came here for the same reason… Might return empty handed is what I'm saying… You see?" the miner started leaping around and pointing hands and fingers at things completely unrelated to his topic, his manner of walking and gesturing while he spoke sure was weird.

"Right, the product. Bellucini-sama needs some…" Shimo silently sung it out for the miner.

"Aight, no need to wrap me in your deals, I'm just a manager of the middle men, you can get all the matters discussed with the Boss when he drops by. It's really lucky you guys came here when you did! Like… I don't know if the mine can service your order, the Boss had his whole supply wiped out… Are those ladies it?" the miner nodded at Mana and Meiko.

Kouta leaned at the ears of the two girls and whispered to them, "I think the product is those brutes, why would he refer to you though…" he wondered whispering to them.

Shimo nodded.

"Damn, I don't think Boss ever tried making women products, somehow just feels cruel, ya know, then again, Boss was always more of a male dominated business guy… Guess Bellucini is getting desperate eh!?" the miner giggled out as the scenery once again changed once they left the small village and started walking up to a large black as smoke rocky structure.

"Talk about Bellucini-san like that again and I'll smack you again, middle man…" Shimo coldly replied.

"Eh, I'm just fooling around here, don't wanna ruin the relationship between the syndicates or anything… Just fooling around, I'm just an old man, I talk dumb things sometimes" the miner quickly excused himself waving his hands frantically. After he entered the mine Shimo politely excused himself and asked for the man to go about his business and told him that they'd wait for his boss outside.

That was just another way of saying that he got all that he needed from the man…


	121. That Which Glitters May Just be Gold

A gentle shake woke Mana up from the brief moment of slumber that the squad was taking while waiting for the Syndicate to arrive at the mines. It was Shimo's decision to wait for them and then stumble into the mines after them, following them quietly they could've surveyed key points, seen all the hidden sensitive spots and they wouldn't have even had to wander aimlessly around a mine. The plan was for one person to keep watch at all time, Mana was excluded from the watch since the sleep deprivation had the worst effect on her.

Ninja could normally push their human limits to superhuman without much effort. A young genin, just out the Academy could lift a large boulder above their head if they pushed themselves to the limit, could've spent at least twenty or more minutes underwater or in an environment where breathing was impossible like a room filled with gas. Poisons and sickness worked differently on them just because they mastered the control over their bodies, they've learned to tap into the combination of spiritual and physical energies deep inside their very essences.

Mana had access to none of that, she couldn't spend multiple days without sleep and only then feel the negative effects of sleepless nights, she was nodding off midway into the first night, she had to eat and drink as often as she could. An interesting fact that she found out was that ninja didn't have to eat as often as they could, the magician thought when leaving on this mission that Meiko's monstrous appetite would be impossible to satisfy in the middle of wilderness, as she found out quite quickly, Meiko didn't eat that much because she had to, she ate so much because she loved to. At the moment of stalking, the blacksmith had not eaten a thing for two days and she didn't even complain one little bit. It appeared that the clear limit of ninja endurance and potential was not well explored and depended much more on the will of a particular individual. After all, the injuries that Mana sustained during her fight with Hisako before she lost her chakra manipulation would've killed even the most tough-headed a person several times over.

"Is it my turn to watch?" Mana moaned in a whisper, she was woken from a quite calm and utopic dream of her early days. She was washing dishes at Ichiraku with Shimo and Sugemi and Tanshu-sensei was making fun of them for enjoying it, just like he used to way back… It's hard to imagine that at some point in one's life cheap work of washing the dishes would seem dreamy and call up nostalgic longing for better times.

"Get real, it's never your turn to watch, you can't see in the dark half as well as we do" Shimo grunted just as silently and pointed at a rich party of people gathering at the gate.

Mana looked away, obviously her feeling offended and crushed didn't matter to anyone at that moment, anyone but herself but Shimo's words really hit her deep. It appeared that training all this time was just her fooling herself that she could ever fight on the level of her friends and the enemies that ninja usually fought. It wouldn't have been nearly as painful if she was the one to stumble to that conclusion but it was a dear friend, one she loved more than anyone else in the world speaking those words.

The party below was composed of a bunch of mobsters, some of them wore similar attires to the slimy gent that the team met back in Tanzaku town: just slick and expensive suits and more sophisticated hats than the peacock feather stuck onto them. Others looked different in status, whether they were higher or lower the chain remained to be seen: several wore black and white kimonos with dragon motifs and had their heads shaved, they had their entire bodies covered with tattoos but it was too dark for Mana to make out the details of those tattoos, she could've sworn several of them were kanji symbols.

"Rabbit, Dragon, Rooster… What do those tattoos mean?" Kouta wondered, clearly his superhuman perception of a ninja allowed him to make out some details of the tattoos and his curiosity also informed Mana of what exactly they had tattooed on those exposed chests of theirs, some of those tattoos extended well past the chest and all over the bald head of the men as well.

"Doesn't matter, ideally we won't engage them, we'll just get what we want from this place and be on our way. We can report on the Syndicate's activities once we return and Hokage-sama will send people to deal with them…" Shimo cut the topic down turning his eyes on the more… Peculiar looking figures.

Mixed in between the Syndicate's members were two incredibly frail figures, they were wrapped in bright coloured cloaks and one of them was really short and bald while the other one was much taller, had similar tattoos to the rest of the kimono wearing group and a strange braid wrapped around his head. They stood out from the rest of the group and that said a lot having in mind that the group involved two more brutes amongst their midst, similar to the muscle-heads that the team met in Tanzaku.

"So they weren't completely out of those numbskulls…" Meiko remarked scratching the back of her head.

The group left the two brutes behind to watch the entrance, they entered the mines without wasting much time, Shimo grunted and leaped down the slope, his ninja stealth skills allowed even his shoes to slip down without making a single stone fall down the slope picking up other stones and making too large of a ruckus and the sound of his slipping shoes was muffled by stone and coal being worked on by complex machinery nearby. The rest of the group followed, Meiko grabbed Mana by her collar and held her in her arms while she slid down, as thick skulled as she liked to appear at times, the girl was not by any means lacking intelligence.

The group hid behind the machinery and moved quietly closer to the entrance, one step at a time. Shimo cursed to himself as he was almost seen by one of the brutes.

"This isn't good, we didn't plan on them bringing those guys here, we still have no foolproof plan on fighting them…" the Yuki swordsman whispered.

"Yeah, some blows are completely ineffective, then others seem to work just like they were made of flesh and bones…" Kouta reminded everyone.

Mana growled under her own nose – she was putting her friends to threat, a single blow from those monstrous men was enough to tear down a building, they were told to be strong enough to lift one above their heads when enraged and she personally saw the one she fought tear through walls and any kind of barriers she placed in their way effortlessly. He even tore through wet cement, using his large palms to dig himself out and tossing the goo aside. The only thing that stopped them for good was certain techniques, the mystery of which was still just that – a mystery, and punches of ones of their own.

"They didn't bring anyone for the "product", remember the miner thought that me and Meiko were tributes of some sort. That means that this "product" they're making here, these brutes, they cost people's lives. Since they didn't bring anyone with them except those weird looking soggy guys with cloaks they'll probably use the innocent miners. I can't let them do that…" Mana whispered out. Once again her principles put the mission objective in jeopardy by making them do a detour.

"Hey… Where's Meiko?" Kouta asked slightly louder than a sneaking person should.

Mana's eyes slipped up and on to the open field where she was standing right in front of the two brutes, the giant mobsters cracked their fists as Meiko slapped her hands together into a handseal.

"Don't worry guys, I got this! Transformation Jutsu!" she yelled out as in a loud poof and a blinding cloud of smoke she appeared to have transformed into an animal to distract the brutes.

The problem was that the specifics of the animal were hard to tell, it was the most chimera-like animal that Mana had ever seen: it had a tail of a fox, a rich fur all over its body that looked like that of a terrier except it was as thick as an old bug infested carpet, not unlike ones that grandmas put on their walls. It had a tapir-like snout which was also covered with fur, its eyes reminded most of an old cat but for some reason one of them was shot out and much larger than the other.

The brutes looked confused at the miserable pile of failure that this animal appeared to be and burst into laughter. These men appeared to have little to no control of emotion as they rolled on the floor and punched stones and machines close-by to dust in their mad laughter induced rampage. Mana decided to move in, she leaped out from the cover and signalled the team to follow her, the boys did just that and they sneaked through completely unseen.

A couple of minutes later the miserable fusion of animals poofed back into Meiko. The girl appeared to be visibly annoyed to the point where her face was so grumpy that it was hard to tell which was funnier: the animal she transformed into or her grumpy and pissed expression.

"Not a single word…" she growled out angrily.

As the blacksmith bolted forward in an attempt to make the squad feel more occupied with chasing her than thinking about the miserable attempt to pull off a decent transformation, something that was actually in the curriculum of the Ninja Academy so it was one of the most fundamental skills of a ninja, Kouta leaned in on the rest of the squad and whispered.

"I thought she did that on purpose… Didn't she?" the boy whispered out.

Meiko looked back at them with the most angered and horrific also threatening expression one could imagine.

"Let's go, we'll lose them!" she yelled out, caring very little if the brutes pick up on her voice since the mine was much too small for them to fit into it.

"Apparently not…" Shimo cracked a grin as the team picked up the pace. Mana tripped and fell in the total darkness busting up her knee. Meiko leaped into a wall and kicked off of it to repurpose her momentum to get her to Mana's location quicker. The magician grunted and pet her knee in an attempt to get the rocks out of it.

"How are you?" the blacksmith asked.

"Ummm… Fine just… Hurts a lot…" Mana reported, Kouta cursed as he leaned in.

"It's a bit too dark to see for sure in here, let me check it in more detail… "Diagnosis Jutsu"!" he suggested as bright blue light emanated from his hands. In a brief moment of his hands making a more decent light source than the few torches on the walls and the couple of lamps on the ceiling every hundred meters or so Mana could see a nasty flesh wound and her bone sticking out.

"Well then, this needs attention…" Kouta sighed, "Let's just slow down for a moment… It's dark enough for this to happen to any of us so don't beat your head around it, Mana-chan" he tried to calm her down. He must've known how sad Mana felt whenever her humanity and loss of chakra control was brought up.

Meiko looked really on the edge, it was weird since it was Mana who had her knees getting checked and a bone getting put back into place and healed up. As she had learned from her experience so far – bone injuries were some of the most painful ones to heal as even if the usual Mystical Palm Jutsu treatment felt calm and refreshing, almost like soothing cold water being spilt on one's wound that made it feel really warm and relaxed, with bones it hurt much more. Whether it be repositioning or them being stuck together, bones were a tough thing to fix and they hurt even when patched skilfully.

"It's all my fault…" she said, the blacksmith leaned up to Mana and placed her hand on her shoulder. "I'm sorry, I shouldn't have rushed so much it's just… That fail with the Transformation Technique… I'm sorry, Mana!" she kept apologizing, jumping up and quickly walking from one side to another as if the magician was her child who was in the middle of a surgery or something.

"Relax, I know you didn't mean anything bad by it, it's fine. We wanted to catch up to those guys anyways but I guess now we kind of lost them so… We probably would've been in a rush even if you weren't distressed. No need to worry. No one cares you botched that transformation, for all we know it worked flawlessly, it did what it had to do, didn't it?" Mana smiled even though occasionally her lips twisted in pain and she even slapped Kouta's face on accident when the bone got stuck together and all the bone shards and dust in the wound just fused with the bone forming a fresh and strong bone, after that the knee closed almost instantly.

Kouta sighed, he looked visibly more drained than before and Mana felt ashamed that she was the one who needed such a stupid treatment for something as dumb as a clumsy mistake. Still, she didn't apologize or said anything to defend her clumsiness, Kouta made it clear that he didn't want to hear any of it.

"I see some light further down the line, the lamps on the ceiling become more frequent there, we can pick up the pace there, for now let's stay careful and move slowly…" the swordsman smiled, his eyes opened up and softened in a kindred expression for the first time in a while. All this situation with the Syndicate must've reminded him of a tough time he spent with his rogue sensei training and learning the ways of how the rogue ninja survived, how they communicated and how they thought. Shimo's rogue skills were quite useful when dealing with these guys but Mana didn't want to notice that out loud – he may not have been proud of those skills…

The four started moving again, it was odd, this whole mine seemed to have just a single moving pattern, so far it was just a single way leading up to something. It was dark, it looked just like one would've suspected a normal mine to look – bunch of coal and rock on the side, it all fortified by some oak wood beams so that the whole place didn't cave in at the first shock. Most beams were also fortified by solid hardened steel, having in mind that these brutes were made in this place this may not have been such a bad idea…

"Wait a second…" Kouta stopped and turned at the wall, carefully stroking it.

"What's wrong?" Shimo asked slowing down as well.

"They didn't touch any of the coal in the wall, it's a valuable resource, I've seen machines that work the ores in this place use coal as fuel, why wouldn't they touch such rich veins of coal so close to the entrance if they need it for fuel?" the medical ninja wondered bumping the wall again and again with his kunai knife, examining it.

"Forget that…" Mana said as her eyes widened, her hand carefully stroke a soft bright glowing vein which playfully glowed in her eyes as the light from the lamp on the ceiling reflected off of its pleasantly reflective surface. The rest of the squad turned at her direction.

"They're not touching the gold either…" the magician's lips barely moved to utter these words just due to how tough it was to believe what she was saying.

"I thought this was a gold mine? I mean sure, they may use it to make those brutes also but… If you're doing it in a gold mine, may as well take the gold too…" Meiko scratched the back of her head trying to get to the bottom of it.

Shimo closed his eyes, he tried to figure it out but then his eyes shot open widely and anger filled them, anger because he couldn't wrap his head around any of it.

"Let's get to this elevator, it will take us to the lower floors, if this is the only path that means the mobsters took it too. I don't know why they're not touching the coal which is integral for their machinery or why they don't care about the gold here but I very much intend to find out if we're stopping whatever we're doing here…" the swordsman replied stepping onto an old elevator of a very questionable quality. The rest of the squad stepped onto the elevator too, Mana kept on looking at the wall.

Somehow to her descending and finding out the answer felt like cheating. She saw this as a really exciting puzzle and she wanted to find out about it with her own smarts. Was this how her audience felt when watching her shows? Seeing something incredible, something so unbelievable that it seemed illogical and then being given the honor to figure out that great mystery, "How did she do that?", except in this case it was more of a "What" than "How".

"Come on, get on the elevator…" Shimo complained waving for her to step on the platform before he pulled the lever to lower them down.

Mana kept observing the wall with her eyes closed, they rapidly moved to the left and to the right as she tried to figure it all out, put it all together: the mobsters, the brutes, their lack of any interest in gold or coal… No, this wasn't a lack of interest, this was a blatant denial, almost like they NEEDED for it to remain in the walls…

"Mana-chan! You said in one of your shows, when a little boy asked you how exactly did you do a trick… You said "I'd never be as heinous as to spoil you the secret…" then you gave him a small hint to help him figure it out by himself. If you want to figure it out by yourself before we find out, that's fine, that's kind of cute but… There's nothing wrong with getting some more hints along the way" Kouta smiled.

Mana's eyes opened and looked down hopelessly, she slowly crept onto the elevator as Shimo pulled the lever raising them up first. The lever seemed to go both ways: above and below. The trip above or the top floor, for that matter, weren't a very eventful or interesting one – it appeared to be just a very mechanized and well-built base of operations.

As the four left the elevator to look around Kouta's eyes seemed to have been fixed onto something that appeared to intimidate him quite a bit, after Mana saw the medical ninja just standing there staring at some sort of a window above on a small station with a control panel operating a large cart system which was supposed to transport a large amount of carts filled with whatever they were storing there she also froze. Looking through the window was Kouta's father and his crew from before. The man's hand reached up to press a button.

"We know you're looking for something called B.U.B., whatever you guys are so interested in also intrigues me. I know that these Syndicate guys are too weak to take you down but they'll slow you guys down enough for us to gain a small lead. Let us spoil it for you – the interesting part is what's underground this mine…" after saying those words he pressed a small button initiating the movement of the carts.

"Shit, this'll alert everyone!" Kouta yelled out, "Father, stop this stupid nonsense!"

"As I've said, I don't want you or the other brats getting yourselves killed but the thought of a scavenger hunt excites me, race you guys to the B.U.B. then?" a sick smile covered the face of Kouta's father as he and his team behind him disappeared in a black flash while the doors all around the upper floor of the mines burst open with miners and mobsters spilling into the place like ants swarming to protect their home.

"I can't stress out enough how much of a dick your father is!" Shimo roared out loud in pure rage as he reached for his blade.

"Protect Mana-chan!" Kouta ordered trying to cover her from the rushing swarm of miners armed with small knives and pickaxes, Mana gently pushed him out of her way.

"Sorry, after being punched in the face so many times, I'd like to see the fruits of my training. I may just be an ordinary teenage girl with a lot of training now but I refuse to hide when I'm in perfect condition to help…" she replied.

A miner leapt at Mana swinging his pickaxe, the magician saw his moves from a mile away having been attacked ten times as fast, she leaned out of its way guiding his arms down to get his weapon stuck in the grate below. The girl's gentle and flowing movements flipped the man over using his own momentum and her foot snapped right onto his face breaking his nose and knocking him out with one go.

Just like that the mad brawl began…


	122. Reckless Sacrifices

For a moment in time, barely conceivable and comprehensible to the mind of a normal human, Mana's instincts froze her body, right before the other miners charged at her and her squad. For a single moment, just a raindrop in a raging ocean storm of moments to come, the magician tried to think, analyse the environment like she used to. Brawl in autopilot, surrender her body to pure instinct, let her chakra and her ninja perception guide her actions while her mind was busy analysing the environment, predicting the opponent's movements. Oh how forgetful it was of her to do that…

Mana's body moved slick and fast, avoiding every blow, every swing of each weapon, built or improvised. She avoided fists, steel gloves meant to rip loosened minerals from stone with tremendous force, pickaxes, axes and even tossed chunks of stone and coal. Just like Meiko taught her, all of her movements were fluid like water, she was ready to fight just about anyone or anything who wasn't faster than human perception. Her movements were sharpened perfected, not only during the week of training but also all those years of being trained to be a soldier for her own village. While her full power was crushed beneath the feet of cruel fate, her mind was still the same… Mostly: slower, incredibly sluggish but at least just as potent.

Mana felt regret, doubt, she didn't want to fight initially because she didn't know if these men were just miners doing their job or tools of the Syndicate to be thrown at them. The first man was different, she knocked him out because she wasn't ready, she reacted in self-defence, she restrained her movements from snapping his neck despite having full access to it. Then something snapped in her mind. She was protecting her opponent again, just like before… No more of that.

The kunoichi's hands and feet joined in on her smooth evasion, her arms redirected every blow, every weapon choosing a new target for the attack for the enemy, using their momentum and their own strength. And there was plenty of it to spare, these blows were strong enough to shatter bones, crush skulls, maim and even kill. A pickaxe meant to be stuck into Mana's eye, sent right into the knee of the miner's friend to the right, a kick meant to kick the girl in the shin, it'd have sent her to her knees where she'd soon be overwhelmed had the man's kick not been pushed into the groin of his friend. Despite her best efforts to stand there and fight, Mana had to move backwards, she had to avoid getting surrounded or else…

A sharp scratch composed of nothing else but sheer pain emanated through the girl's back, sending painful shivers to her very core. She was tagged, her defence was slowing down, it was natural, she was only human. A punch to the gut hit her but Mana bounced back, adrenaline and fear kept her on her feet. She kept fighting back, trying to find weak but not overly weak spots to redirect the punches to. It wasn't going ideally, she had more miners to deal with than she was comfortable dealing with. As much as she didn't want to admit it – she needed some help here… Fights were never pretty but if she was left alone Mana may need some more healing after this.

Meiko on the other hand was blowing everyone away. She unsealed the buckler from the sealing mark on her arm, shoving it into people's faces, dashing around like a moving wall and blowing everyone off their feet, several times her swift and blurry movements saved Mana by cleaning her opponents right in front of her own eyes. The blacksmith leaned down and pressed a mark on her boots.

"C-Rank Seal: Release!" she yelled out as blue flames of pure chakra shot out from the seal in her boots. Had the blacksmith not spent so much time on maintenance of her armor and its seals she'd have completely forgotten to refill the chakra supply in the seal. A jet of flames sent the armored ninja on a rampage through the battlefield wielding her buckler as a battering ram, judging from the looks and the tremendous success she had blowing miners away it was more of a crushing ram.

"Look, Mana! I'm like Kurye from "Tales of Shikio"! The Mighty Valkyrie of the Shield!" Meiko yelled out, to her this was just a foolish game, just something where she could goof off and show her tremendous combat potential off, test out some new combinations of her weapons. Mana on the other hand was fighting for her life… Well, more like her pride, she couldn't allow to be beaten there, even when outnumbered a dozen of times…

"Ugh, I'm like so Team Vetsu!" Mana yelled out rolling under a pickaxe, as her roll was almost completed her arms shot forward and using the momentum of the unfinished roll she repurposed the force generated by the leap into her legs that kicked the man's pickaxe back into his face hitting him with the top side instead of the sharp one. Shouting in pain the miner collapsed.

"Seriously?! We're going to have a fistfight later!" Meiko yelled out angrily throwing her shield but it was blocked by a miner with a pickaxe, the force of the throw still sent the blocking pickaxe back into the unsuspecting miner's face blowing his helmet off and making the poor man flee with a bruised face and his pride in ruins.

Mana wanted to quip around and act like she was having fun but the truth was that she wasn't. She was struggling, she was getting hit and she could on occasion see some black marks on the few patches of her exposed skin that she saw. All of the damned miners from outside must've been rushing to this place. Still, their numbers were starting to dwindle.

Shimo couldn't even be registered, he just flashed around in a blur, sending a small scale vortex of cold air to slow the reaction of anyone he attacked that looked like they were worth their mettle. Most of these miners were surprisingly good so they may have had some combat experience which was a little bit odd. Still, with a single swing of his sword the Yuki sent several men down at times. Kouta on the other hand was holding himself back much more, restraining his punches to the best of his ability. His blows still threw the men around the whole damned mine, propelling them well over fifty to hundred meters and slamming them into sheer rock or steel, leaving them crippled and if they didn't have some shock absorbent vests on them and their helmets they'd easily be dead. Mana saw Kouta crush one man's helmet to smallest pieces with just a flick, flipping the man over with the leftover force as well.

Mana saw Kouta's body being covered with bruises and marks as well, even worse, due to him holding his full power back he was getting surrounded. Her eyes got serious. Suddenly it was like her fury over her friend's injuries made the time stop around her, she had time to focus, she had the time to react. Or maybe she had it in her the whole time? Mana's gentle taps moved so fast she could barely see them herself, how was this possible? She changed the direction of over twelve attacks coming at her at the same time!? All the men surrounding Mana fell over after receiving the attack from a comrade of theirs while the magician flicked a device on her sleeve getting some cards ready. With several quick swipes letting them fly she leave them etched deep into the flesh of the men giving Kouta trouble.

The boy looked at her surprised and blushed, he must've felt ashamed being rescued by a girl who didn't even have her chakra manipulation. No… It was something else! Mana tried to react, she tried to move with the speed that she used before but where her mind was aware of the danger behind her, her body was not fast enough, it was once again the body of a normal, well trained in combat and martial arts human girl. She felt a sharp as a knife touch pierce her shin, then another on her shoulders, a gentle tap from a foot to her knee sent her down while the hand of her assailant grabbed her own wrist, still armed with a sharp tossing card and moved it to her throat. She was subdued! Those pinches felt like they sent lightning itself pulsing through her entire body, almost like she got shocked every time they touched her.

"Stop!" the man who caught Mana ordered. Mana just barely restrained her smile as each of her friends had already finished every single miner who rushed there. Why were there so many!? Were all of them responding to an alert?

"I'm sorry…" Mana murmured, she felt so horribly. The worst shame for a ninja was to be caught off guard and be captured alive, to be used as a burden for their team. Ninja were tools of their own village, not their enemies. She was a disgrace thinking she could still fight at that level.

"It's not your fault, Mana, these men aren't like ordinary brawlers, that was pressure point assault" Shimo sheathed his sword and prepared to lunge at them, the magician saw his eyes calculating the distance between her and him, he was trying to judge accurately if he could leap at them and cut them down with a drawing slash before they could react. While sounding quite impossible it sounded quite right for the boy in question.

"No, we're not like you ninja guys, we actually had to train our entire lives. Push ourselves to the limit that is… Me and my brother, also every other Silkman in the Syndicate are versed in every martial art in the world. Even with their amazing speed ninja find us tough to keep up with up close and this girl was both impressive enough to pose us a threat and distracted enough by something, or rather someone to subdue…" the man spoke up.

"Silkman?" Mana wondered silently whispering to herself. Her eyes glanced below seeing the end of a long black and white kimono. So these were the bald kimono mobsters? Were all of them so skilled in martial arts?

"You fools! She's not even a ninja! She poses no threat to you! Let her go and let us pass!" Kouta yelled out, his chakra was raging deep inside so prominently that his violent Juugo heritage made it leak from his pores in the shape of blueish glowing dust. His hair started flowing upwards from the rising pressure and the electrifying presence of chakra particles in the air around him.

"Quite the contrary, she's the one who would've been the most bothersome one to tag and take out in a rush. We were fighting ninja our entire lives yet this girl uses no ninja techniques and still has such a well-focused and purposed style of countering our martial art styles that she had to be disabled…" another voice behind her spoke up, so there were more than one assailant?!

"Also, we're not the ones stopping you from passing, you're not letting our men withdraw from the mines!" the first Silkman shouted out angrily pressing the card closer to Mana's throat in anger. "We've disabled this girl's dominant leg with a pressure point pinch for several minutes, we observed your styles and know which pressure points would most efficiently disable yours too but we've no time, we need to retreat now!"

Mana saw more miners moving in from below, walking up the ladders since the elevator was unavailable. Using the emergency tunnels made to exit the mine in the event of the main elevator and all other exits being blocked. They were all armed and ready to take her friends out. These mobsters were right – the magician felt her left leg being totally numb so she was in no condition to leap or even to stand up right.

"You shall stand there and let us pass…" the Silkman ordered as several more miners moved onto the elevator before some broke off of the group and moved up closer to the aftermath of the fight.

"Wait a second, these brats beat up our friends! Let's kick their asses!" the miner yelled out to his friends.

"Don't fool around! The monster down below is free! The brutes won't hold him for long! We need to get out of here NOW!" another miner asked his friend to return onto the elevator but more and more branched off heading to beat these young ninja to the inches of their lives or even beyond that line.

Meiko grinned, "Don't worry, Mana, I have a plan… You just sit calm and don't worry"

Shimo grinned, he was visibly worried by the impending beating. "I could use a joke right about now, what's your wonderful plan?" he asked.

Meiko gave him a thumb up, "We'll endure everything they throw at us until they fall unconscious and exhausted!"

Kouta slapped his face. He extended his arms at the incoming attackers, preparing to open up the holes in his arms and concentrate the leaking chakra into the Juugo bloodline blasts, but the second Silkman ordered him to stop and stand down. Mana almost burst into tears from her shame. It was because of her that her friends were going to get beaten and killed, it was because of her that this mission will fail. After all this time, after all this training… It wasn't even because she was too weak… It was just a simple mistake.

No. They won't be hurt, not because of her! Mana looked Shimo in the eyes, he knew her the longest, he knew just what she was about to do and she was right to think so as the swordsman's eyes shot wide open and his arms extended at her to stop her. He was actually afraid, Mana's intentions actually broke his façade of cool and empathy.

"Mana! Don't even…" he yelled out but the magician closed her eyes.

"Find the box, I owe Meiko to let her hold it in her hands…" she uttered before shoving her neck forward and cutting the lower side of her neck on it. The Silkman leaped back, he clearly didn't expect this sort of suicidal effort so he tried to dash back and find another way to deal with it. His movements slowed down Mana heard his wild and uncontrollable scream and a loud slash from a blade – Shimo got to him in an instant… He wouldn't have made it if he tried before. The girl coughed… Blood was flooding everywhere, both inside and outside, her hair felt sticky. She heard deafening barrages of thuds, they were like small explosions and after every single one there were uncontrollable screams of pain, Kouta was angry…

"You idiot! Stop the damned fisticuffs and go heal her!" Meiko screamed like a wild cornered beast. Mana's vision was starting to blur but then she felt something – something freezing. Shimo must've used one of his cold air gusts to freeze up her wound. It wasn't delicate, it wasn't the thing to do in a situation like that but it was at the very least enough to stop her bleeding somewhat. The blurry vision dyed in a shade of salad green. Kouta's sweaty face cleared up.

"Can you treat her!?" Meiko's wild scream followed by screams of the miners and the sound of them hitting the ladders and stairs to escape this place reached the medical ninja. His face covered with wild torrents of mixture of blood and sweat turned back.

"Yeah, the wound isn't fatal, I've treated worse but she may have trouble breathing and speaking for a while, I'm not sure yet, the lower part of her throat is damaged but it seems to have missed the major arteries, I don't think those cards are meant to slit throats" he reported back lifting Mana's head a little to check her neck for any other wounds. The girl coughed up something that looked like blood but Kouta stroke her hair and calmed her down.

"Don't worry, it's just the water from Shimo's ice ninjutsu, it melted and got into your lungs… Shit it opened the wound again… Sorry…" the boy lowered her head and started treating the wound again.

"Run! Someone blow the fucking exit!" a voice of a miner reached Mana's ears. By that point the shock disappeared and overwhelming pain took over. She wasn't sure if this pain was dumbed down by Kouta's treatment or if it was the full experience but it hurt so much that she started to wriggle, she wanted to scream but she knew it'd open up her wounds and she'd probably drown in her own blood.

"Please try to endure it… I'm almost done… Sorry… I'm doing it as fast as I can but… I'm… I'm a bit… Inexperienced..." Kouta wrapped his hand around Mana's head and pressed it tighter to his chest so that it remained still while she writhed in pain.

Mana wanted to talk but she couldn't, she forced a smile and looked Kouta in the eyes trying to portray her feelings with the best of her ability. She wanted to calm him down, to tell him that there was no one else she'd rather have taken with her to this mission but him.

"I'm not letting you die! Try as hard as you might to get yourself killed…" the medical ninja smiled back at her he wiped something from his eyes, it could've been tears, could've been sweat and blood getting to his eyes. "Look at you, you're bleeding out from having your throat slit and I'm the one you're calming down…" he almost laughed out. Judging from the relative calm look in his eyes the worst was over – she was going to live.

"Shit! You fucktard, what did you do!?" a miner yelled from far far away at a friend.

"I stopped the ninja from escaping, I sealed the doors!" he tried to answer but then his voice twisted into a grunt of pain.

"You sealed the other miners!" the man yelled out, "Now they're trapped down there with… With that thing and the elevator's stuck on this floor since the elevator room down there is caved in!" the other miner said something back but their voices were too feint to hear. Some amount of them actually escaped from wherever they were running from.

Kouta helped Mana get up. Meiko looked closely at the magician's neck trying to make out the mark that this reckless move left.

"I'd punch you right now, a full out, direct blow to your stupid face!" she yelled out, "Can I do that!? Won't it open the wound again?"

Kouta shrugged, "I did the emergency treatment, I'll give her some herbal concoction for the voice, several more Mystical Palm sessions will make the scar barely visible, I'm sure the medical ninja in the village may, in time, completely heal it. The card isn't really an ideal tool for cutting necks, even with steel tip, it's still a bit too flexible so the wound wasn't too deep…"

Mana spoke up, her voice was shallower, almost like when she had the flu and her throat was really irritated and her voice was husky and it hurt to speak. It hurt to utter every word, felt like her throat was on fire but she had to tell her team what ailed her mind.

"We need to get down there, to the bottom of the mines, as deep down as it goes. There are still miners there and the secret of this mine is still a mystery. We get the elevator down there and break the elevator room open… We need to save those miners"

Shimo cursed and sheathed his blood covered sword.

"Well… At least we know you weren't switched with a changeling… The Mana I know would worry about the people that tried to kill her first, right after nearly drowning in her own blood…" the swordsman's image blurred and then a green light lit up on the control panel where Kouta's father activated the cart belts previously, he moved in an instant, at least it looked like he did to Mana, the other may have been able to make something out of his movements. The elevator lit up with a green light and the cart belts stopped.

"Ladies first…" he tried to make an offensive tone while sarcastically bowing to show Mana the way to the elevator. It was clear that he had some very negative feelings towards the magician and her continuous attempts to get herself killed and her lack of the instinct of self-preservation. There may have been a very tough and uncomfortable talk in the nearest future brewing but it appeared that the swordsman kept it for a time when the magician could talk more comfortably.


	123. The Secret of Katabami Gold Mine

The elevator could not have taken more time to take the party of ninja to the lower levels of the mines. Even more, a couple of times the entire structure rumbled, dust and pebbles started falling from above, several of them were chunks of pure gold.

"Well at least if we plummet down and die we'll be buried under solid gold…" Shimo tried lifting the gloomy mood but he was proper annoyed himself so even if the mood was even salvageable in the first place he wouldn't have garnered much success.

"Those shakes and quakes… I wonder what's causing it all…" Kouta wondered looking at above, from where they were the top of the elevator shaft looked like an abyss. They were descending so deep down that some of the ninja were visibly starting to get stressed out, Meiko was squirming and tapping her foot impatiently, Mana locked her hands around her chest and pressed her own elbows hard as if by closing in on herself she could protect herself from wherever they were going.

Shimo kept trying to make some bad jokes from time to time, to make matters worse, he was the only one laughing at them as well. It just made the entire situation seem even more eerie than it was. Kouta handed Mana a flask with a weird dark green gooey drink.

"There, this should ease up your throat, maybe it'll let go in a while and it won't hurt to talk…" he murmured looking at her while she gulped it all down. His stare was starting to become a bit creepy at some point, luckily the medical ninja realized it and turned his eyes away just in time before Mana had to tell him he was acting weird.

The concoction he gave her was weird, it was sludgy and felt sticky but it actually slid down one's throat quite well. It was also a bit sweet, probably included a mixture of honey but the best alternative to its texture was a limb of a squid. It flowed slowly, like chunk of goop, it smelled bad but it didn't really taste that bad if it weren't for the minty taste. Minty taste wasn't bad per se but it sort of didn't fit the combination. Too bad medicine didn't have a good taste critic. In a world where lethal wounds could've been patched up in ten or twenty minutes surely someone would've had enough skill and brain to make tastier medicine…

"Kouta… Did you use all of your chakra to heal me?" Mana broke the silence with a question, her voice was still lower pitched and it still ached to talk but not to the extent as it did previously.

"Most of it" the young man blushed and nodded.

"I'm…" Mana opened her mouth before Meiko pulled her in by the collar of her shirt.

"Shut up. You can give your apology for being a suicidal asshat later, then I'll have a talk with you but now let's just focus on saving those miners…" Meiko's grip loosened as the elevator finally stopped. As the door opened clouds of dust started spreading and the environment turned dark almost instantly – the place must've used mainly electricity to light everything up and it must've went out when whatever happened here happened.

"Ugh…" Shimo cursed stumbling around the dark, he headed towards the closest light source which happened to be a small flashlight, it still was on, its holder was nowhere to be seen though. Shimo turned it on and waved the narrow tunnel of light around. There were multiple trails of blood but no bodies, that was quite odd, the boy followed one trail up the rocky wall which fused with a small metallic wall which signaled the beginning of a small floor administration building.

The blood trail ended right up to the ceiling, right in a gigantic hole in the rock. It was like someone used a six meter wide drill to drill a giant tunnel above the floor and then dragged all the bodies into it…

"I can still hear some voices nearby, the miners are alive…" Meiko looked to the east where the least modernized structures of the mines laid. This entire place looked like the living quarters, it reminded more of a modernized laboratory made right in a manmade hole in a bunch of rock. Whatever was being done in the mine was being done here, it was supposed to be the lowest point where the elevator went. Just as the miners above said, there was a colossal pile of rocks separating the room with the voices from the outer laboratory administration and the elevator room. The miners were stuck behind at least fifteen meters of rock and only feint noises could've been heard through the crevices. It was impressive even for a ninja to hear it, Meiko's senses deserved a lot of praise…

"Wait a second… Could you please shine over there…" Mana's irritated voice asked of Shimo.

"Oh? Did you find another tool to kill yourself with?" the Yuki angrily snapped back at her.

"Look, I know you guys are angry at me… You have a right to be, I acted upon my own thought without hearing your input. But if you expected me to…" Mana coughed up "To stand and watch you die, you're no better than I was when I struggled out of that hold…"

"Our deaths don't matter, we're ninja, you're the client" Shimo tried to argue but Mana's slap silenced him. Due to the darkness it awkwardly hit him on the nose, the blow was much more direct than turned to the side making it much more powerful, unintentionally of course.

"Sorry, forgot it's you we're dealing with here…" Shimo expressed himself not in any way less edgily. He had a lot of anger deep there, he could've kept it all to himself or expressed it at his own leisure and Mana would've listened to it all because she had it coming for getting caught off guard. However one thing she'd not stand for was him berating the lives of her most beloved people, a group to which he himself belonged to.

Shimo's small tunnel of light turned towards the small rotund stones that Mana asked to direct it at. Meiko shrieked like a little girl, she started to jump around and leaped towards the stones, she started caressing them and almost smooched them a couple of times. Mana scratched the back of her head. She wasn't entirely sure what this ore was.

"This has to be an illusion, someone check it!" Meiko screamed out in sheer unrestrained excitement. Honestly, Mana had never seen her like that and she saw the blacksmith examining some more of her father's blueprints when she was reading up on the Box in Konohagakure archives.

"What exactly is this?" Mana asked trying to touch the ore, it was very soft and warm to touch, a slightest touch made its blueish stones etched into it light up with bright azure flame deep inside them. The magician had never seen such exquisite work, especially in nature. This reminded her more of something that the man's hands made.

"This is literally impossible…" Shimo murmured to himself while Meiko screamed out like she was a child receiving a thousand copies of their favorite toy during their birthday.

"Right! This is only the most incredibly impossible legendarific awesometubular superbtacularest thing ever!" she yelled out kissing the stone for longer than Mana considered normal for a little maniacal blacksmith finding something incredible deep underground the Land of Rivers mines.

"Okay, will anyone finally tell us what this blue ore is?" Kouta asked quite annoyed by the scene the two made himself.

"This is… Kill me for saying it out loud… 100% literally pure, okay I mean… 50% stone, 50% product so technically it's 50% pure, nevertheless it's… Audra ore!" Meiko uttered as if she just told an estranged son she was his long lost mother.

Mana shook her head, it sounded like utter nonsense. "But… Didn't you say that Audra was not a natural element? That it was a manmade alloy with… Meteorite dust and molecular… Chakra particles or whatever? That it's only made by skilled Kirikuzu members due to their bloodline ability?" she asked for a clarification.

"That's why it's so astonimazing! Apparently they exist in ore form! This makes absolutely no sense, isn't it just superlicious!?" Meiko yelled out still stroking the stones as if they were a baby she just literally gave birth to.

"I'd rather you stopped slaughtering the language and… Tried to understand what the hell this is… I mean… How?" Kouta scratched his chin looking completely stumped.

"Of course… Audra IS manmade, these ores ARE manmade!" it occurred to Mana all of a sudden – everything started to make sense, the entire thing. It still needed to be put back into places and the proper order of the rows of this puzzle was still a bit confusing but she knew just about what this mine was.

"Uhhh, no they're not!" Meiko yelled out hopping back on her feet and off the cold wet floor "Look at them, they're so beautiful!"

"Yeah, that's the point – instead of shaping the Audra alloy into a weapon or a shield or a piece of armor, the Syndicate are making them into ores by infusing the particles with the walls of the mines. They've got all this space to use, all those endless floors, the ores laying here may just be worth… All the money, like literally all of them the world has to offer, and it's a completely limitless supply of infinities waiting to be exploited…" Mana explained her theory.

"Except why would they be making Audra alloy into ores when they can just make weapons!?" Meiko yelled out, more of her failing to restrain her excitement than because she felt angry.

"Because a weapon is worth as much as a weapon is worth, an ore has a potential to become anything, so it is worth infinitely more. Other Syndicates like the Bellucini family we've heard of can just buy this ore and work it in secret, this secrecy is worth multiple times over more than just a weapon. Think about it, you can buy one of the most awesome materials in the world from someone without telling them what it's for…" the magician started to get just as excited as Meiko which didn't do wonders by any means to her voice as her throat started feeling sticky and the girl broke into coughs after expressing her theory.

"Hmph, now those brutes suddenly make sense!" Kouta exclaimed having a breakthrough of his own. "These brutes are people with skins fused with the Audra steel particles. The process would be incredibly painful, it's like getting skewered on a molecular level but with a bunch of precautions it could be done, that's why my blows were completely ineffective – because Audra can only be destroyed by a more focused and concentrated chakra, that's why Shimo's ninjutsu was so effective against them, that's why my Chakra Pistol Jutsu completely bypassed their defenses…"

Shimo smiled and locked his hands on his chest. "Good, if we meet any of those brutes ahead we'll know how to fight them now…"

Kouta closed his fist concentrating chakra into just the tip of it until it started glowing with sharp azure flames protruding from random points. "I think I can modify my Enhanced Strength technique to do more damage to them but punching them using chakra augmentation is like slashing at chainmail. Ninjutsu would work the best. At any rate, it'd be for the best if we saved whoever is stuck in there"

The medical ninja leaped forward pulling a large stone out of the pile, some of them had to be lightly "tapped" from below to shatter into smaller pieces by the medical ninja. Meiko ran up to help him, her physical strength was unbelievable and while her chakra augmentation could only be used at its maximum since the blacksmith completely lacked any semblance of subtlety in her chakra control, her natural physical strength was enough to move large boulders without active aid of chakra.

"Nice call, Mana…" Shimo acknowledged her putting the puzzle together with an arrogant look onto the other side while the two waited for their much physically stronger friends to clean the path. Soon Kouta crawled out to join them popping a blue food pill. It was one of the chakra regenerating food pills that medical ninja used, it didn't replenish one's chakra but it accelerated the natural body aging process a couple of days so the chakra started regenerating much faster by itself. The cost of tricking one's body in such a way was that it naturally stressed out and aged a couple of weeks or even months so abuse of them could've shortened one's lifespan, however they did regenerate a lot of one's chakra within an hour or two instead of couple of days and good rest.

It was clear that Shimo was still angry since he refused to look Mana's way but at least he still didn't hate her half as much as her other ex-best friend – Sugemi. That youngster outright declared that one day he would clash with Mana and fight her to the death because Mana's belief was dangerous and foolish…

Meiko appeared out of the tunnel all covered in black coal marks and dust, all dirty and huffing from being worn out but happy like a kid seeing a bunch of glow-worms for the first time in their life. She gave the resting squad a thumb up.

"Path's open, I don't think the suits and miners on the other side noticed it yet, let's go tell them!" Meiko laughed out

Carefully and quietly the team sneaked through the tunnel, Shimo even went as far as to kill the lights since the other side had a tremendous excess of light coming from it – the main labs must've used some sort of a different light source or had a lot more resource power than not at all which case the outer labs was stuck with. Shimo peeked from the tunnel and then looked at Meiko with an annoyed squint.

"This "tunnel" is cone shaped. We can easily walk the early parts but then it seems you've got lazy and it gets narrower and narrower…" he complained

"Yeah, sorry bout that…" Meiko laughed out as she kicked the final barrier leading to the main labs down exposing their attempted entry. Right as the wall collapsed and the main lab reconnected with the outer labs and the elevator chamber the miners started rushing through the tunnel. They didn't care to fight or to curse at the Konoha ninja, Mana could've sworn she even heard a couple of absolutely terrified and soaking with sweat and piss grateful miners coming their way from the rushing crowd, there could've been as many as twenty miners still trapped there. What troubled the four ninja were the five suit wearing mobsters with the shorty Boss staring angrily at the ninja.

"Waste em!" the Boss shouted out pulling out two large X shaped crossbow-like devices with kunai belts attached to it and pressed a switch firing off streams of kunai knives at the ninja, each of those may have fired anywhere to ten or so kunai per second. Meiko's arm swiped through her arm as her other hand made a simple handseal: "Storage Seal: Release!" she yelled out unsealing her buckler which she picked up and resealed after the fight was over before getting onto the elevator. Loud thuds and clangs signaled the successful block of the Boss' offensive.

"Hey, calm your pompadour, suit-man! We're here to save your butts!" she yelled out trying to out-yell the endless barrage of kunai that'd have made them into pin-cushions if they were allowed to fire off unblocked. Suddenly the barrages stopped and Meiko pulled the shield away.

"What's saving our butts is all those guys we left below to fight off the Big Guy, we're almost tempted to stay here and lure him to the main lab again just to see him chomp your little heads off!" one of the mobster goons yelled out.

"Ye, we kept him locked down and sapped his blood for the Audra manufacture for so long that it must be really hungry…" his friend decided to join in on the threat.

"Although… To put matters into perspective, mayhaps it would be for the better for us to… Not be around when the Big Fella breaks out… Ya see… Anyone?" the less enthusiastic one wimpered.

"Heh, ye hear it, Konoha goons, lotta guys with a lotta kunai dispensers are keeping the Big Guy down there now that we used the Big Culling Gun to repel it to the lower levels! When they whack the damned thing they're gonna get here and get really angry!" another one yelled out.

Meiko's eyes shined with a bright spark of excitement. "Big Culling Gun!? Sounds awesome!" she yelled out, quite enthusiastically, yet not quite at the same class as the Meiko who found the Audra ores. The Boss turned at a large turret like device with an oversized pipe.

"There! Fifty meters long, twelve meters tall, as tall as this whole lab complex, fires cannon balls with four hundred Audra infused kunai each shot! Each cannon ball costs around fifty billion ryo to make!" the dwarf started his power fantasy speech before coughing to his fist, "We used it to repel the Big Guy's attempt to eat us all but… It sort of ran out of ammunition, we even filled it with normal kunai balls and explosive kunai balls but, nothing we do seems to work… We only delay the Big Guy's advances…" the little man complained.

Mana turned to observe Meiko's reaction to the description of the weapon that even amazed her a little, to someone as maniacal towards various contraptions and devices and exquisite craftsmanship it must've been outright orgasmic. Lo and behold her friend laid down completely knocked out by a rampant nosebleed.

The girl couldn't help but smile, even if they didn't find the Box in Wind Country, Meiko's time was certainly worth it, the blacksmith maiden saw more than her share of awesome things throughout the journey so it may have already been worth it.

Kouta and Shimo disappeared. The Yuki's sword's hilt dug deep into one mobster's gut, he then swung it to the side hitting the still sheathed blade straight into the head of another one before he could blink. These two attacked faster than the human eye could track them! Kouta's knee instantly knocked one fellow out, a combination of weakened blows knocked another one out. The fifth one tried to lift his hand but Shimo moved to the side and ripped his sleeve off exposing a kunai dispenser with strings to set it off attached to his wrist, with a quick grabbing motion Kouta crushed it together with the wrist bones of the poor mobster.

Suddenly Kouta's body got tossed aside, the boy bounced back off of a solid steel wall and fell deep into a strange crater. Mana was surprised by the strength of this "Boss" guy but then her sight fixed on his strange blueish knuckle-dusters – these must've been Audra steel too, having in mind that he had a full mine of its ores.

"Kouta!" she screamed out trying to get his response but the dwarf only laughed ridiculing the magician girl.

"You little twit, I tossed him to the Big Guy down below! He's as good as headless, the Big Guy likes biting people's heads off first!" he laughed out revealing a full mouth of Audra steel covered azure shaded teeth.

"I'm getting sick of hearing about this Big Guy… What exactly do you hold locked down here, chibi?" Shimo asked, Mana noticed Meiko slowly recovering from her nosebleed knockout.

The little man reloaded his kunai barrage tubes and pointed them at the swordsman. "Do you know what this place is? It's the Katabami Gold Mine, the place where the last Jinchuuriki of the Nine Tails died! In other words, chained below by his last Jinchuuriki before his passing and starving to death down below is none other than…The Nine Tailed Fox"

 **Author's Note: 10 000 views, you guys! Wow, I really never thought that the story in its entirety would get half that much attention seeing how it isn't a usual fanfic that gets much views but I'm really glad to see some people were actually able to find something to enjoy in it. Thanks for the time spent reading it, however much it may have been, the story hasn't even properly taken off yet so maybe there'll be many more intervals and little goals like this to be met in the future. Thanks a lot to those who left your input, whether its criticism or praise, it's all well appreciated. Thank you guys! 3**


	124. No Way Out

The three teens continued to stare at the mobster leader with completely out of this world expressions. Having just been revealed so much within the last couple of hours of their lives, something like that would cause such reactions in a person so they were completely justified in their utter confusion. It was safe to say that their entire worlds had flipped over, the entire way in which they conceived this weird world changed to the point where the world where children could breathe fire and lift giant boulders looked incomparably weirder than it initially was.

After several seconds of confusion Mana's body just leaned forward as if it was falling to the front, then it tensed up, her muscles just shot into action and fired her body off to run towards the giant hole where her friend was tossed into, where apparently the Nine Tails resided below. She ran towards it with all of her speed, which while unimpressive to a ninja was quite something compared to her normal standards. The leader of the Syndicate even stepped aside to let the girl through, he had no intention to stop her in her quest to have her innards be feasted on by a colossal Tailed Beast.

Shimo's head leaned forward slightly, he closed his eyes and then looked at Meiko. "Stop her" he commanded her with a voice full of disgust and desperation.

To the blacksmith redhead it was apparent that the stunt that Mana pulled in the top floor of the mines greatly rotted the relationship between the two friends. Shimo now looked at the magician as if she was a burden, an annoyance and whereas previously he looked at the girl with some admiration, nostalgia and eyes overflowing with friendship, now he looked at her like a cow looks at a horsefly.

"What do you mean, what's this Nine Tails? Why is it such a big deal?" Meiko shook her head before Shimo broke into a fit of rage.

"Just shut up and stop her, damn it! I'll explain later. This is above not only our paygrade but also that of a Kage level ninja. This is a monster that needs to be left there, don't listen to any of Mana's bullshit, just grab hold of her and don't let go. Knock her out if you need to. The Nine Tails and she must not cross paths, it's not a brawl that'll end favorably. I'll take care of this joker here…" he explained. Meiko nodded, her body blurred and disappeared leaving a ghostly afterimage.

Mana kept on rushing towards the hole when Meiko's image appeared right in front of her. These ninja moved in such speeds that it was tough for Mana to even keep up with it. She may have had peak human ability to perceive speed but even a genin managed to move so fast that to her it appeared like Meiko was teleporting around the place. It was like she was everywhere, or rather, anyplace she wanted to be in.

"Mana, stop…" she uttered pushing away Mana's hand which tried to push Meiko out of her way. The blacksmith gently let Mana's hand flow forward and then directed it to move behind the magician before she locked it behind the magician's own head placing her in a painful lock where any effort to break free would've caused Mana some additional pain.

"No! Let go! Kouta is down there with the Nine Tails! We must get down there and save everyone who can still be saved…" Mana shouted out through pain, even when dislocation of her arm was the danger it didn't scare the girl. She was ready to struggle until her shoulder popped out of its socket and then face the Nine Tails with a dislocated arm if she had to.

"Look… Just… Wait, can you please explain to me what this Nine Tails thing is first. I know that Shimo doesn't want us to even face it, he's threatened by it to the extent where it actually sounds pretty scary even without knowing what it actually is…" Meiko mumbled out trying to buy some time, she knew that once Mana would get into explaining just what this Nine Tails was she'd get into detail, that'd buy Shimo some time to finish fighting that mobster and get there to help her convince Mana of… Whatever their next plan was.

"There's no time! We need to help him!" Mana yelled out as she leaped forward in such an angle that it'd have dislocated her arm instantly, it was fortunate for her that Meiko released the lock just at the last second seeing that the magician's desire to save her friend wouldn't be contained by any boundaries of self-preservation. Meiko's foot however sweeped at Mana's knocking the magician down and then Meiko sat right on Mana's chest placing her arm on the magician's neck. She didn't apply any pressure onto it because she knew that Mana would just waste all her air and get strangled instead of stopping.

"Kouta is a smart guy, pretty tough too. He can stay hidden, he can escape if he wanted to, ninja can scale walls, right? He'll appear up here at any moment, no need to put yourself in danger, so what's this Nine Tails? Why can't we just hop down there and kick its ass?" Meiko grunted out as restraining Mana's relentless struggling was starting to tax her a little as well. She didn't want to actually knock her friend out but she was approaching that line and would cross it quite soon if it was needed.

"No. It's impossible… Look, I'll explain it to you, just… You have to trust me and let me go, if you want an explanation then let me go and follow me, I'll explain it to you on my way down there" the magician tried to trick her way out of Meiko's immovable lock but Meiko let Mana go and shook her head.

"No, you explain it to me now and I'll decide later. It's either that or I knock you out for good. You may be a challenge to me when you're at your full strength but not in your hindered state, it'd only take a single restrained punch…" Meiko decided.

"Fine" the magician sighed, she stood up and dusted her clothes with a rough pat before fixing her hair and beginning to try and make a short explanation for it all.

"There was once a powerful kunoichi, she was called Princess Satsuhimasa. She lived in the time when all the clans were unified into two groups: the Earth Clan and the Moon Clan. At some point the Moon Clan decided that the Moon was too small to contain all the mighty clans that comprised the Moon Clan so they waged war on the entire world attempting to take it over. Princess Satsuhimasa destroyed the Moon and forced the Moon Clan to submit, then she went through a quest of redemption and fixed the Moon again, transferring her own life force through her tree that fixed the Moon." Mana tried to shorten the story and compress it as much as she could but then she realized how much still needed to be explained to someone who didn't care about history that much.

"Okay… Let's say any of that makes a sand grain of sense and assume I believe all of it…" Meiko squinted at Mana. The magician couldn't blame her friend's lack of trust, the story of ninja who could effortlessly destroy planetary objects did sound a bit hard to believe even to someone who grew up in the world of ninja which wasn't a very natural world that was easy to believe in all by itself.

"The mistake of the Princess was that she granted her own life force to the tree by letting it flow through it. The World Tree became sentient, it formed a being of Satsuhimasa's soul and the body of the most powerful Senju clan wood – the Ten Tails. It was said to be so massive and powerful that just the sight of it caused people to go insane and claw their eyes out, just its very existence threatened to destroy the world – Earth would've been destroyed just because the Ten Tails was in it. Despite giving the Ten Tails its substance and life, Satsuhimasa herself couldn't even hope to match up to it and so she and her husband and her son were beaten, however her husband – Yosuke Uchiha did manage to split the beast into nine smaller beasts, it initially intended to seal away its power leaving Ten Tails in a weaker form but that didn't work, he had to split its immense chakra into nine separate beings"

Meiko scratched her head in confusion but then she suddenly realized something, "Wait, are you telling me that what's down there is actually… A part of this Ten Tails thing!?"

Mana knew that she was digging a grave to whatever hopes of Meiko letting her save Kouta she had previously but she decided to be honest. "Not just "a part", it is said later in some of Yosuke's own chronicles that the form where he tried to seal Ten Tails' chakra away is the Nine Tails. That is to say, Nine Tails is actually a weakened form of the Ten Tails and the chakra that Yosuke managed to seal away in the next dimension got later mixed into it again and then split apart into more parts. The Nine Tails is so powerful, or one could say, Yosuke's seal was so inefficient against that incomprehensible power, that Nine Tails alone could've challenged Ten Tails and fared quite well against it. The rest of the Tailed Beasts are just made out of the chakra which Yosuke did manage to seal away while the Nine Tails is what's left of Ten Tails without that chakra"

Meiko grabbed Mana's elbow and started to drag her back. "Well then… Back to the top floor we go…" she cut so decisively that her intention to never be questioned on the grounds of this decision was self-evident.

Mana gently pulled her elbow out and looked at her friend with a begging look. "Meiko… Please… I know it sounds stupid to you, it looks stupid that I want to go down there and place myself in front of that thing to save Kouta but… I have to. I brought him here and I can't let him get eaten by that thing"

Meiko shook her head. "You're not the Mana I know. The Mana I know makes rational plans, she manages to pull off impossible moves like convincing the Hokage to leave on a mission to find some mysterious wish fulfilment box just to make her friend feel good or slitting her own throat to avoid getting her friends killed. But she always knows something, has some ace in her sleeve – she plans out the conversation beforehand or she knows that the card won't cut her deep enough to kill her. What you're doing now is irrational, you're placing yourself in front of someone strong enough to shatter worlds into clouds of rock, someone who could disintegrate us with a mean look. There's no rational part in this plan which is why I can't let you go down there"

Mana looked away and then back at Meiko. "Yeah, there's no plan, there's no Plan B because there isn't even a Plan A. I just… I need to save Kouta, even if that means placing myself in front of the Nine Tails to do it. I'd rather get eaten alive than lose him when I'm the one who took him with us"

Meiko turned back at Mana to finish the argument but a powerful shock impact made her cover her eyes – a blinding cloud covered her entire upper body as Mana's smoke card blew right in her face. When the smoke settled Mana was nowhere to be seen. The redhead looked around knowing how badly she screwed up and looked down into the largest hole in the floor she's ever seen, caused by the Nine Tails trying to get out initially before it was pushed back by the bombardment from that gigantic cannon.

"Shimo's going to kill me… Oh well… I guess I'm dead either way then…" she whispered to herself before leaping into the hole herself. The darkness swallowed the girl and just like that deadly silence covered the bottom room of the mine up. Only brief sounds of Shimo fighting the mobster leader killed it on occasion.

"Okay, let's mambo, ye goomba" the mobster stood in the fisticuffs position ready to use his Audra knuckledusters. Shimo's body blurred again, he slashed at the mobster who instinctively thrust his fist forward to try and interrupt the ninja's movements but he was unsuccessful. The boy's sword left a wide gash onto the mobster's back. The dwarf recovered from the pain swinging around him and hitting blindly behind his back. Shimo placed his sword to block the blow, a powerful shockwave echoed sending chakra ripples that mercilessly whipped into the mine walls causing them to start falling down.

"Shit…" Shimo grunted picking his body off the ground, he didn't expect such a powerful shockwave to come from that impact. That must've been the strange chain reaction of two Audra weapons colliding.

"Heh, what's the matter? Afraid of a little cave in? I'd rather get buried under fifty floors of rock than go face the Big Guy down there, consider us lucky…" the mobster smiled leaping forward and swinging his fist at the ninja, Shimo carelessly leaned out of the way when he saw a small kunai dispenser slip out from the dwarf's sleeve and get placed right into his forehead. The little man's face covered with a confident smile, it looked pretty creepy combined with his pompous hair which was now all whipped up and all over his face like someone poured a bucket of black hairy sludge over his head.

"Yer pretty fast, ye bugger, fast enough to evade a kunai shot right in your face, I wonder?" the dwarf smiled as his finger pulled the small ring connected to the rope that fired the kunai. It took only small fractions of a second to fire that kunai which would've pierced deep into Shimo's skull and easily penetrated his brain killing him instantly or leaving him with some nasty brain damage however… The kunai just flew forward and down into the giant hole as the man who had the dispenser rammed into his head was no longer there the other moment.

Lacking any semblance of belief in what had just happened the mobster took a couple of steps back, he shook in disbelief that someone could've evaded a shot in point blank range, he had faced ninja before but he never had the pleasure of actually fighting one to the end like this. Seeing those inhuman bastards pull stunts like this made the dwarf genuinely terrified of facing them ever again. Even with all those tricks, all those fancy tools and weapons… He was still outmatched.

Shimo's body flickered back into existence, as far as the dwarf mobster could perceive it at least, right up to his still extended arm and raised his arm up nonchalantly in an attempt to literally disarm the mobster. The poor dwarf screamed out in pain as he fell onto the rocky floor writhing in pain, separate from his arm which was twitching somewhere further. Shimo lifted his sword up into the air and tried to finish the job by placing it right in between the mobster's eyes but the blasted idiot managed to place his knuckle duster in the way causing another shockwave to ripple through the mines. This one finished the job…

The entire mine was starting to collapse, the rippling shockwave passed through rock causing unrepairable damage to its integrity and sending crashing chunks of rock down on the two. Shimo's lightning fast reflexes and speed as well as his instinct lead him to evade the destruction of the mines, each rock was evaded by a leap to the side, each gigantic falling structure was dodged. The Yuki didn't even try to run towards the elevator – it was too late for that, at that point the other mobsters would've been already out but it'd have taken too much time to lower the elevator again. Down to the belly of the beast was his only choice. Where was Meiko, where was Mana? Had they already leaped down there? Shimo did consider the fact that Meiko could screw that up, Mana may have been a complete idiot but she also was pretty crafty, however in this case… The blacksmith was right to fail her assignment so...

The stone floor crumbled, the entire mine caved in and fell onto the poor dwarf, Shimo wasn't there to see the man getting mangled and crushed, even if he wanted to as he was too busy leaping down himself. He evaded a couple of falling rocks even in mid-fall down to the lair of the Nine Tails however… Eternal darkness once again took over when a large chunk of rock covered up the seemingly endless abyss of the crater made by the Nine Tails. There was no way back… The only way forward was to face the Nine Tails, or rather, try to sneak around its senseless rampage feasting on the lifeless carcasses of the other unfortunate miners and gangsters left below to feed the insatiable appetite of a beast left unattended for so long.

Shimo focused chakra into his feet, he made a couple of hand seals and breathed in.

"Water Style: Water Assault Jutsu!" he yelled out spitting a torrent of water from his mouth and then making another hand seal. "Glaciation Jutsu!" Shimo yelled out as the torrent solidified into a jet of ice for him to slide down on. It softened his landing so that he didn't splat down into a pancake upon reaching the bottom. He could only wonder if Mana had enough brain to have a way to somehow not splatter herself all over the bottom, maybe she and Meiko leaped down at the same time? That'd have saved the magician since the armored blacksmith had that weird chakra jet technique sealed into her boots that helped her fly around...

Shimo finally realized that he had reached the bottom as he was seeing tough rocky and wet floor below, it was red from the blood and guts that covered it however most of it was so old that it could've been made at just about any point in the past. Shimo leaped down from the jet of ice he was sliding on and looked around. Mana always dragged him into those things but this may have just been the absolute worst thing she'd made him do… She picked a fight with the goddamn Nine Tails.

"Why would she go pull the Nine Tails' whiskers just to save that medical ninja? We can always just hire a Quack or something… If the opponent was anyone else I'd be with her, do my best to save my comrade but… The Nine Tails… This is crazy even for Mana…" the boy kept thinking as his hand didn't move from the grip of his sword hilt. If the Nine Tails attacked him it wouldn't have helped in the slightest but he liked to think that he could at least do something to defend himself. Made him feel less hopeless when he thought so…


	125. What Lies Beneath

Kouta rubbed his aching behind while looking around the primal lair he ended up in. After the unexpected and far too powerful for a human throw that the little made-man pulled off on him the young man almost fell down breaking every single bone in his body. That would've left him paralyzed and broken, just laying down there waiting for whatever fate befell all those mangled victims of whatever was haunting this mine to also reach out to him.

Luckily enough, Kouta managed to take control of his fall, flip over and touch the wall with his feet which allowed him to stick onto it. The shock and inertia of the fall sent his knees crashing straight into the wall tearing up his ragged pants and opening some nasty feeling bruises. The medical ninja may not have been overly agile under these conditions so stealth was his only option at that moment.

The place that he ended up in was impressive, it was a gigantic cave with the usual cave structures like stalactites and stalagmites all over the place. A careless fall may have made the boy get impaled on one of them which would've been a very nasty injury for his exhausted state to take care of. Most of his chakra was spent on Mana and her healing, the medical ninja didn't regret that for a moment.

After his eyes got used to the pitch black darkness and the quiet, which was occasionally interrupted by a powerful quake sending small pebbles down from the ceiling and then an occasional water drop from above pecking into a small pebble that must've formed from a collection of such raindrops, Kouta started slowly moving forward. His knees hurt when he was leaning down to sneak around. Must've been due to the injuries.

Kouta's tired eyes then saw a strong and concentrated source of light, the young man rushed to a wall of salty stones and hid behind them. Letting his eyes peek over for just a small occasional glance. Deafening screams and even louder quakes shook the place. One of them lifted the medical ninja off the ground and then smashed him back down once the gravity took control of the situation again. A small group of miners ran out hiding everywhere behind similar structures to the one where Kouta was hiding. An even smaller group of mobsters ran out firing their strange kunai dispensers at something still remaining in the darkness of the cave which was not illuminated by the Audra ore shining its purplish blue light from above.

Kouta tried to peek again but when he did he could not believe his eyes. Humongous red eyes shined through the darkness and a colossal snout at least a meter larger than Kouta himself pierced through the veil of the darkness. The creature's nose slammed into one of the mobsters with enough force for the poor man to explode into a combination of guts and blood splattering everywhere, perhaps it was good that the place was so poorly lit, that made the gruesome scene hard to see.

"Give that fucker all ye got, pin-cushion him!" another mobster shouted before he was splattered into a bloody stain by a demonic paw of the creature. Just briefly the young man hiding behind the rocky structure saw glowing orange fur on the creature that was slaughtering the remaining below mobsters and miners. Another mobster tried to use an explosive kunai on the fox-like creature but it didn't appear to do much damage, it barely even registered with the monster at all. The fox leaned up, half of its immeasurably large frame was already in the blueish light of the Audra ores shining their natural light which the chakra particles in them emitted.

Its monstrous snout breathed out, the torrent of air coming out from its snout looked so easy and effortless and yet… The poor mobster screamed in agony as his skin and flesh got torn off by the immense pressure of the creature's breath. Kouta looked at it in awe, "It's the Nine Tailed Fox…" he realized, most genin knew of what exactly the Tailed Beasts were but not all of them.

The reason why genin may have known of the Tailed Beasts was because they were a bit overzealous, Jinchuuriki, the ninja with Tailed Beasts sealed inside of them were some of the most wanted people to be captured by a village so that their immense power could've been used by the village. However genin never engaged in combat with Jinchuuriki, only the most curious and excited to grow in rank ones bothered to read reports on the wanted alive posters containing information on the mysterious Jinchuuriki and then a little bit of extra research in the archives let one get the full picture.

The panicking last remaining mobster fled for his life firing off two smaller handheld kunai dispensers at the gigantic fox behind him before the monster's mouth closed around him severing his arm and a leg which have been caught outside the creature's bite range whereas the mobster was quickly munched up, as the demonic fox continued to chew blood burst from its mouth dripping madly onto the floor. Just what kind of trouble did Kouta end up in this time? He couldn't have fought off the Nine Tailed Fox, his only way out of here was to go back and scale that wall up. He thought that was what he was doing in the first place but he got lost in all of his falling disorientation and all of that darkness in that primal cave.

"Hey, get out of my spot!" a miner's whisper reached Kouta's ear, the boy looked curiously at a miner shaking his fist at him. The medical ninja shook his head but then the miner decided it would've been the best idea to swing his pickaxe at him. Kouta rolled to the side and after the clang alerted the fox, one of its humongous nine tails quickly wrapped around the miner and soon he ended up right in the Nine Tails' jaws just like the mobster before. Strange… Kouta had never heard of the Tailed Beasts being so predatorial in nature. That being said, the young man had no idea what the Tailed Beast fed on but he was pretty sure that eating people with such ferocity was not its usual behavior.

The Fox screamed out in rage, its demonic voice and the pure compressed chakra in its yell sent crushing shockwaves that grinded all the stone around it to dust, the walls above elevated by several meters, the floor lowered as a crater formed around the demonic beast, the stone structures behind which Kouta tried to hide got grinded into dust and Kouta felt his body getting sapped of its last remnants of chakra augmenting his endurance so that he did not meet the fate of the miners. Those without the ability to augment their chakra ended up torn to bits by the powerful concussive force. Some of them were left in small pieces, dismembered and torn to tiny chunks, some got tossed and grinded to the wall, crushed as if the shockwave was made of stone grinding them to the wall. Just the Fox's angry scream decimated the entire cave and killed everyone but Kouta.

Slowly the Fox crept up to each and every pile of body parts and guts slurping them into its smelly blood dripping mouth as if they were just oysters in their shells. Such desperation! Kouta grunted angrily as his entire body felt like it was broken. He tried wriggling around but he couldn't achieve much success, slowly he got behind a pile of stone dust hoping that the Fox took him for a corpse. Judging from the feeling of warm blood all over his face and his wounds he must've been quite similar to one. Then again, even if the Fox took him for a corpse, it'd have simply devoured him like the others…

"No use, boy… I can sense negative emotions, fear in your heart is crystal clear to me, don't go too far" the strangely manly voice for such a thin giant Fox rumbled through the cave sending more crashing stones from above. It appeared as if though the monstrous yell of the creature almost destroyed the entire cave they were in. With a gracious leap the Fox appeared right next to Kouta, its breath rustled the young man's hair, blood and guts from its growling mouth fell onto his face and exposed by his torn up clothes chest. Those demonic red eyes was the worst thing about the situation. They must've been the most devilish eyes the boy had ever seen.

Kouta tried to struggle but his body was completely paralyzed. "No use, little ninja boy, I've killed so many and destroyed so much that my killing intent is second only to the Ten Tails. Any ninja who value their lives are rendered completely helpless in my presence"

Just then a combination of loud clangs signaled that a loud and intense barrage of sparks fired off from the beast's eyes. Kouta's head just barely managed to look away only to see Mana standing further away, wielding one of those kunai dispensers, firing her own cards which she had loaded into the weapon straight at the creature's eyes. The cards exploded, some of them emitted a freezing gas, some of them burst into acid, some of them emitted a highly flammable liquid that quickly burst into flames upon air contact, some of them exploded into a barrage of kunai and shuriken, firing them in all directions. Despite hitting the creature right in its eyes, without even blinking the Fox continued to stare at Mana as she kept on firing and reloading, desperate to save Kouta's life.

"This girl's fear… It surpasses yours, but then why would she be able to fight me if she is more afraid than you? Perhaps she's not afraid of me, but afraid of your death?" the Fox continued to ponder as Mana fired off her entire ninja kit straight at it with no effect. Not even a single hair on the Fox's fur was rustled let alone fell from it. The eye took completely no damage nor was it irritated at all by continuous barrages of explosions, flame and ice. Nothing worked at all.

"Leave him alone!" Mana yelled out angrily and with a trembling as well as desperate tossing the dispenser device at the Fox but failing to toss it strong enough that it'd reach the monstrous titan when she was left empty.

"Hmph…" the Fox cursed flicking in the air. The flick sent a howling wind projectile. Mana couldn't even react in time, it was like the projectile travelled faster than the howling sound of it. She was ready to die at that moment, she almost accepted it. All that she wanted was to have had a little bit more success saving Kouta. Mana closed her eyes, accepting the compressed projectile of wind but when her eyes opened it appeared that Meiko caught her from behind using her jet boots and moved her away.

"You suicidal bastard" Meiko's grin flashed right at Mana's surprised expression.

The Fox growled angrily, judging from its expression it became much more pissed off and the intensity of its devastating attacks may have increased. The Fox then looked down and noticed that, except for a small trace of blood, Kouta was no longer there. He moved quickly while the attention of the demon fox was all focused on Mana and its killing intent no longer applied such dominating pressure on his chest making it impossible to breathe properly when the beast was looking at you.

"I'll… I'll EAT YOU ALL!" the Fox roared out in its destructive low pitched tone that started sending more rubble their way, giant stalactites started going down from the floor aiming to impale anyone they caught in their way. The Nine Tails found it impossible to evade them due to its immense size and so the stalactites made of pure Audra ores seemed to bother it a little. Clutching and dodging them to the best of its abilities the beast fled further into the cave.

Meiko blinked rapidly a couple of times. "Holy shit, we've repelled the Nine Tailed Fox!" she yelled out in glee. The blacksmith must've been the only person down in that cave not to be terrified beyond relief. Kouta was afraid of the beast, Mana was afraid of losing Kouta, Meiko was afraid of absolutely nothing. She was there to do her job and she would've taken on even the Nine Tailed Fox if she had to… The redhead placed Mana down on the floor, the magician stood back up and checked her empty ninja tool case.

"No… Something's wrong" Mana admitted looking down and trying to find anything that she could've used. She may have needed a weapon if the three were to escape the mine through the back, it was entirely possible that mobsters were still watching the exits of the mine.

"What do you mean?" Meiko asked, Kouta just fell against the wall, the young man was pale and breathing heavily – a side effect of being crushed by such overwhelming killing intent without a doubt.

"The Fox should've had no problem eating our guts. Its roar should've disassembled us on a molecular level, it's a being that can destroy the world by just punching it really hard…" Mana checked her body for injuries and then looked back at where they came from.

"Wait… Do you mean this isn't the real Nine Tailed Fox?" Kouta finally managed to speak but his shortness of breath made it incredibly difficult to do.

"No. It's as real as it gets, you can't emulate that killing intent. At my own time I thought Tanshu-sensei had the worst killing intent in the world, it was impossible to stand around him but this… This is something else entirely" Mana closed her eyes and started slowly walking back to where they came from.

"Wait… That's right… You're now a normal human… A killing intent like that should've made you go insane!" Kouta finally remembered what he learned in the Academy. Killing intent worked on a multiplied fiftyfold scale, even a smallest killing intent of a child who managed to kill someone in their early career as a ninja intimidated people to no end. Something like an ancient demonic fox creature should've made Mana go insane from fear and yet she didn't tremble for a moment to grab the gun and fire off everything at it.

"I… I've built a tolerance of it after spending so much time with a murderous Sannin. Also I'm pretty good with self-control, I've spent my entire childhood meditating and learning to understand my own body. I could never again go insane, no matter how afraid I get, for better or worse… Sometimes when you find a very firm thought to focus on and repeat it in your head you can survive such an influence over your mind and matter" Mana lowered her head and stopped for a moment before rushing forward.

Meiko looked back at Kouta and winked at him playfully, "Yeah, she digs you, you should've seen her up there… "We've got to save Kouta!" that's all she could babble about!" the blacksmith laughed out before rushing after Mana, losing the track of each other in this darkness was completely counterproductive and it was slowly starting to cave in out here. The three should've hurried back, it was safe to say that even if they rushed back to the best of their abilities it'd still be a close call if they could leave the mine.

"Wait… Really?" Kouta blushed and ran after Meiko "Wait up… Did she really say that!?" he kept shouted and Meiko while watching out for some of those stalactites so that they didn't cut him in two before crushing him.

After a short track back to the large hole Mana bumped into Shimo, it was tough to see the Yuki in this darkness. The swordsman rather rudely pushed her off of him.

"What are the three of you doing? We need to go the opposite direction, the mines are caving in and the hole is completely covered up. It's raining stones out there and soon the whole place will end up buried. We need to go the other way!" the swordsman yelled out grabbing Mana by her elbow and dragging her forward, this time a little bit softer than his initial push.

"Wait… What?" Mana looked at him confused.

"That stupid mobster blew up the mines, it's all buried under, the only way out now is to hope that it has another exit down there" her teammate informed the magician of how the battle went down.

"We bumped into the Nine Tails, it's pissed beyond belief and it fled further into the mines. We're going exactly where it ran right now" Kouta explained their end of the story.

"Well then let's hope we don't bump into it again. We need to move, this place isn't stable either. It's falling apart as we speak up ahead" Mana closed her eyes and nodded to Yuki's suggestion having just realized what their situation was. Having been the person who brought everyone to this mine she felt incredibly guilty about it all. She felt bad that she put them all into this situation where their only way out was to fight off some ancient demon fox for their exit.

"So… How did you survive that? Meeting the Nine Tails?" Shimo asked curiously.

"It was… Different…" Mana explained "Its eyes were completely glowing red and it was almost… Starved to death, it was so slim and exhausted. It must've spent decades buried here, it must be on its dying stages, its last legs"

Meiko blinked rapidly in confusion and then shook Mana wildly. "Wait, Tailed Beasts can die?" she asked curiously.

Mana nodded, "Technically they can, they die every time their host – the Jinchuuriki dies however since they are not actually living beings but created artificially constructs of chakra, it is said in most historic sources that they are reborn instantly after their death. Within an hour or so after its death the reborn Tailed Beast is at its full power again with all of their memories intact."

Kouta scratched his chin, he was still limping around due to his knee injury. "So waiting it out until it kicks the bucket is out of the question, even if its reborn weakened something tells me that it'll still be hundreds of times stronger than this dying Nine Tails we've bumped into…"

Mana shook her head in response. "It wouldn't work either way, this mine would fall down on our heads and this cave would collapse sooner than it'd die or we'd starve out long before it died. Plus, I don't intend on letting it die, we're going to free it, it's just a wild animal who was caged in here, it may be a destructive force of nature but its place is out in the wild, not continuously starving to death and being reborn only to starve out again… Even destructive world breakers don't deserve such a fate"

Shimo cursed, "Here we go again…"

Meiko laughed out playfully as if their plan didn't include approaching a colossal Nine Tailed Fox just to lure it to freedom as the three carefully avoided the falling down rubble and moved in to the large spiraling tunnel which the Fox fled into, wherever it lead to, it appeared that the four would end up confronting it quite soon…


	126. Belly of the Beast

Following the Nine Tails into the deepest parts of its lair hidden deep below the mines was not as tough as it may have been considered for it to be. Tired and struggling with severe starvation and malnutrition the monstrous Tailed Beast ran slow, sometimes bumping into the rocks or tripping over. While the four genin could not confirm that fact, the vicious quakes and roars of the beast confirmed at least that much.

"Mana… Are you sure about this?" Shimo grunted finally gathering the courage needed to once again question the client's actions.

"I'm really not. None of this makes any sense and I cannot make a proper plan without understanding why everything is so convoluted…" Mana shook her head angrily. "That being said I feel that saving the Nine Tails is the right thing to do, even if it is just a rampaging force of nature. Our predecessors tolerated its existence, the greatest of all ninja gave it life in the first place. It must exist and it must serve its role in this world whatever role it may be"

"What did you mean when you said that none of this makes sense?" Kouta curiously inquired once the beast shook the ground below them keeping them rooted firmly onto the rocky floor while the tremors ceased.

"The Nine Tails appeared to eat people, thing is that Tailed Beasts shouldn't feed at all, it's unnatural. It was never recorded in known history to feed on anything. They are living constructs of pure chakra given conscience and life, they are destructive in nature and malevolent because they are beings nor of Earth nor of Moon that feel out of place everywhere. They were the bridge connecting Moon and Earth as the Ten Tails so now they feel a huge gap and desire to fulfil some sort of purpose yet they're unable to do so which is why they're so angry, at least that's the theory most commonly discussed in ancient scrolls…"

"Well, it looked pretty darned hungry to me back when we tangoed with it the first time…" Meiko nodded to herself looking on forward trying to see the end to the spiral rising tunnels they were roaming looking for both the Nine Tails and an exit. At their current location the ground appeared to have already been stable and nothing was falling from the ceiling aiming to crush them so that was already an improvement.

"Also, since they do not feed, their chakra should automatically rejuvenate every couple of days, just like it does for ninja under normal resting conditions. Their levels of chakra are nearly infinite, they can rampage around the world for weeks or months firing beams of concentrated chakra and never tire… The fact that it is so severely exhausted is just so odd, truth be told such degree of exhaustion should be completely impossible to someone with such vast supply of chakra…" the magician grinded it out through her teeth again. She didn't like to be completely unable to understand just what was going on there.

"Well, let's just ask it when we see it, maybe if you tell it that it doesn't have to eat – it won't munch us like all those remains of all the mobsters on the floor back there…" the Yuki swordsman snapped back at Mana with a certain shade of sarcasm and irritation in his voice. He clearly didn't fancy the idea of confronting the Tailed Beast, he may have fancied it more if sneaking past it was their idea and not clearly confronting it.

Finally, the four left the endless halls and tunnels only to enter into what appeared to be an improvised temple, some sort of man-made lair with four tunnels leading up to a large platform in the center, strangely enough it also had the same belts of carts and steel beams viciously torn up and tossed all over the place.

"I think it was tied down by those things, why else would they be torn apart…" Mana noticed and directed her gaze at the ruined track system.

"Yeah, makes sense. That's why they didn't normally use the belt system and carried the ore out by hand, it must've been used to detain the Tailed Beast in here and when Kouta's father activated them they must've tensed up and forced the Tailed Beast to break free. Whether he knew it or not the man caused a lot of trouble…" Shimo nodded looking at the ruined cart system from afar.

The Nine Tails turned around. It was like it knew exactly where the four were the whole time, it must've known, judging from its apparent pride in the ability to sense negative emotions and all. It wouldn't have been too foolish to assume that everyone felt really terrified for their lives.

The beast swung its arm around and smacked it into the central platform. All of a sudden the platform cracked, shattered and the entire structure started digging in deeper into whatever surface it stood on way down below. The four bridge structures at different sides to the central platform just crumbled and started falling to the black abyss below like a biscuit smashed with a hammer. Meiko grabbed Mana and activated the seals in her boots, blue chakra flames fired off as the armored kunoichi carried the magician and herself onto the unstable and shaking central platform – the only safe spot in the whole cave system however at the same time the most horrifying – they were all within reaching distance by the colossal fox demon.

Shimo once again used the combination of his Water Release technique and his Glaciation technique to create a sliding platform for him to slide down and reach the ruined central platform, Kouta focused his chakra and kicked off of the falling bridge structure, it took a lot of focused chakra enhancement to make such a powerful leap but the medical ninja managed to barely pull it off, he landed solidly onto the central platform. With a loud rumble the edges of the platform cracked off and fell down below, quickly Kouta made a small hop forward to avoid losing his balance and falling down. There was no end in sight to wherever the bridges fell…

This time the Nine Tailed Fox looked so much different – its fur was far less shining and its eyes no longer glowed red, they had the signature red irises that the Tailed Beast was known for in the tales, but they no longer displayed that strange maddening glow. And yet still it was dried up and thin as if the fur and skin covered only a half-dead skeleton of the once majestic Tailed Beast. The Nine Tails' snout snapped open as a large red colored ball of pure chakra fired off from its mouth, Meiko once again grabbed Mana and moved the girl away, Shimo used his incredible speed to avoid the projectile and Kouta leaped back, hanging down on the edge but narrowly avoiding the projectile that slammed into the wall making a crater at least fifty meters wide and deep.

"Wait!" Mana screamed out trying to communicate with this much more ordinary looking Tailed Beast. "We're not here to hurt you, we're here to set you free!" she tried to explain when suddenly she realized that she was no longer where she was a second ago.

The magician was standing on a large lake of some sort, surrounded by total darkness and the fox standing right in front of her in all its glory. It took the confused girl a moment to realize that the Nine Tails must've invaded her mind somehow.

"Hurt me?!" the beast laughed out sending crashing waves and ripples at Mana that tossed her around like a ragdoll. This was so odd, despite the waves being twice her size the magician didn't feel wet or hurt when they dragged her under this strange murky water nor when their smashing awesome might crushed her chest taking all oxygen out of there. It felt horrible, uncomfortable and very unpleasant but it wasn't the real thing.

"Well… We're not here to fight, anyways…" Mana realized the wild assumption she had made previously just assuming that the four of them could've as much as scratched the demon fox even in its weakest stage.

"Hmph, that's what everyone say… That's what the old man said… Then again, a frog doesn't pick a fight with a stork, does it? Yet they all lie: "We're going to live here from now on, Foxie", he said, "it's just so that we can't hurt anyone else…" but he only wanted for me to suffer surrounded by those infernal walls!" the Nine Tails replied, Mana stood back on her feet finally managing to settle on the uneasy waters. It was strange, despite not being a ninja anymore she could still stand on top of the surface, just like she used to be able to in the real world.

"Okay… What is this? I never thought you could invade minds… Why did you do it in the first place if you just want to eat us?" Mana asked for a little clarification before she tried to reason with the beast to help them set it free.

"I normally cannot, my sight usually crushes people mentally, paralyzes them in fear or outright makes them go insane. It's always the same, everyone screams until they pass out every time I look at them, your mind, however, feels strangely… Trained. Nowhere near as messy as that of the others and you don't seem to be afraid of me, more of what I can do to those you love and care about. As you may have seen previously, even weakened, just my mere voice can level mountains and I can't seem to get it under control in this cursed cave so I decided to try this mental communication instead…"

Mana closed her eyes and tried to settle down, it appeared that the beast was in quite fitting condition to negotiate at that moment, also it just so happened that her entire life devoted to meditation and mental training managed to make her mind strong enough to not be crushed by the mere sight of the Nine Tails and helped the fox communicate with her.

"Well then, as I've said, we want to set you free…" Mana confirmed her previous statement, "But first I'd like a little bit of clarification because there are things happening here I still cannot understand, what exactly happened there? How did you end up down here, how did those mobsters manage to place you here and keep you chained by something like steel beams and carts? Also why are you eating people, I thought Tailed Beasts don't really need to feed?"

The Nine Tails leaned up to Mana, its gigantic eyes were level with the girl's entire body, its red irises and bloodshot eyes stared right at the magician. "The old man settled down here, my, as you call them, "Jinchuuriki". Way before his death… I once managed to take control over his body, he leaked too much of my chakra and we destroyed a small village in the process. The man decided to fight my influence by hiding in a cave down here, he placed bunch of seals on his own body and then he stuck his hands into these rails before his death so that once I broke free I stayed stuck. I kept waiting to regain my strength after his death but it never came back… Once in a while I feel those… Urges to kill, to tear things apart! But I'm so weak! So damned weak in this blasted cave! It's like poison itself seeps from the walls, like those strange blue stones and the light they make burn me!"

After the fox finished talking an awesome stream of breath escaped its snout blowing Mana off her feet and sending her rolling backwards on the surface of the water, it was relatively painful and the girl almost passed out. This must've been only a visual illusion her mind made up to explain the overwhelming crushing presence that the Fox's mind had on the girl's human mind. Despite her "hospitable" mind, Mana's psyche was still slowly getting torn apart by the Fox's presence. It appeared that the beast realized it already and started to withdraw. The colossal figure of the fox started slowly turning into orange foam, large bubbles formed where its glowing fur once was, the entire frame was slowly disappearing under the surface of the mental waters.

"I would have liked to apologize for my actions but I don't feel bad about blowing you brats up at all. I know you feel bad about it, you're kids with childish lives and families and all those futures ahead of you and you feel like I'm evil or something for disintegrating you where you stand. The thing is that I am not evil, the very concept of evil is what I am, I am defined by it because it's just the way that I was made. I am a world breaker, I kill and destroy, it's what I am, I don't care why…" the demonic thundering authoritative voice of the Nine Tails rumbled out as the entire foamy carcass disappeared under Mana's mental waters and suddenly the girl snapped out of this weird sensation back where she stood before.

"Meiko! I need you to take your armor off now!" she screamed out. "I know what's going on here, we have a chance to survive it but we need to move fast!" Mana pleaded desperately but her friend appeared to simply stand there completely still, almost like she was dead or just trapped in her own mind.

The magician grunted and looked at the others, Kouta was also standing there with his eyes rolled up and his mouth open, only his pounding heart alerted the magician that the Fox's sight didn't kill her friend of sheer terror. Shimo was also stuck on his knees, he must've been in a middle of a mad dash, some sort of attempt to attack the fox but he was caught before his attack could start.

"Shit, shit, shit, shit!" Mana's heart pounded, beat against her ribs like it had never beaten before. The fear inside of her was so intense and the adrenaline rush was so real that her entire gut felt like it wrapped around her throat internally and started to choke her out. The magician tore the countless belts around Meiko's armor, trying to figure out just how to use them, how all of this complicated system of belts and screws worked. One by one the magician tore the armor pieces off, feeling intense heat and hearing the most dreadful sound behind her – the shrieking sound of a chakra blast charging up.

This was a hopeless idea – Mana had no idea just how potent the seals in Meiko's armor were, she had no means of activating them or anything of the sort. Slowly the magician's mind realized that the chances of this day ending in utter disintegration were becoming so very overwhelming that just thinking about them almost made her drop down on her knees and accept demise. With a loud roar Mana pulled off the final strap making Meiko's heavy chestplate fall onto the ground. The girl whined as assembled the armor and piled it back one piece on another, she placed her arm on the back of it. There it was… If only she could use her chakra again… She could've at least tried activating Meiko's seals, tried to absorb as much of the Nine Tails' blast as she could into Meiko's storage seals so that… What was she even trying to achieve?

Mana's watering eyes looked to the side, she saw the red chakra ball in the Nine Tails' mouth become larger and larger and larger but her eyes wandered off to her friends. Frozen in time, could they even see what was going on? The worst possible scenario would've been if they actually saw what was going on, saw their impending doom but had no way of moving, no way of controlling their body and the last thing they saw was their friend who doomed them like this in the first place letting them down.

The girl's hand started slowly slipping down Meiko's armor as she tried her best not to collapse on her knees in complete mental devastation. She failed everyone! She brought them here trying to prevent suffering of the people converted into monsters here, people who had to endure steel particles being infused into their very skin, a process so painful it made their minds shut down and made them into bumbling rage monsters. She wanted to release an ancient fox demon just because she wanted for it to stop being so lonely, stop suffering inside those Audra particle infused walls…

Finally the shrieking sound shut up and with a final boom the giant red ball of chakra was released. It was like time slowed down… Almost like Mana saw the blast coming at them, a blast powerful enough to not even leave a single cell of them there, powerful enough to destroy the very platform where the Nine Tails and the four were standing on sending the Fox down into the abyss itself. The magician looked at her friends whom she disappointed and doomed to death…

"Storage Seal: Open" she uttered, knowing well it wouldn't work – she had no chakra to spare either way, she couldn't control her chakra so she'd fail even at using basic Academy level sealing technique…

Everything whited out. Mana could feel heat scorching her skin, her ears got overwhelmed by sound to the point where she felt blood firing off from her eardrums like a bursting volcano. Intense pressure blew the girl back, for a moment she thought that she was actually flying before the magician felt hitting the stone wall. The white in her eyes didn't let her see her friends at their final moments… The pain and overwhelming heat and the pressure were too much… The girl's mind let go… Farewell…

"So should we tell her what she did?" weak remnants of Kouta's voice somehow broke through the kunoichi's conscience.

"We don't know if she did it… It could've been a great many things… Fuck… She released the goddamn Nine Tails… Well now the world is fucked…" Shimo's voice which sounded much louder than the voice of the medical ninja broke through again, powerful sensation of pain shut up around Mana's head on the sides almost as if a bear trap snapped shut around her head forcing the girl's eyes to slightly peek open.

"The world will be fine… I mean it existed for so long before the Nine Tails was imprisoned. But why did she have to use my armor… Look at it, it's completely molten and messed up, I can pretty much just leave it behind" Meiko's playful sniffles completely woke Mana up forcing the magician's eyes to open back for good.

"Ugh… What happened…" her weak and pain ridden voice uttered. She felt… Cold… Probably because the heat almost burnt off her clothes and the Land of Rivers at night was quite chilly, despite its warm resort like look during the day.

"Well… Somehow you managed to use Meiko's armor to overload the capacity of the storage seals with Nine Tails' weakened chakra, you sealed away parts of the blast and the part that hit us was mostly a concussive blast" Shimo explained helping Mana get back up. The girl looked at the smoking black remains of Meiko's armor. It was almost like it molted into a shape of strange sticks and then solidified again into solid coal, or something similar to coal. It was also smoking and looked quite brittle. Meiko was wearing a green tracksuit and crying over the remains.

"Which raises two problems: first being how did Meiko's armor have enough storage capacity to store away such excessive amount of chakra, isn't the Nine Tails strong enough to destroy the world and then keep going? Also how on Earth did you open those seals up if you can't use chakra? Maybe your control is returning? I'll need to examine you once I recover, healing the burns of you guys and all the broken bones from when we got sent out that giant hole sucked the last of my chakra out…" Kouta complained pointing at a giant crater. What appeared to have once been a mine. The Nine Tails blast must've bypassed Mana and the others with Meiko's armor working as an improvised barrier absorbing the demon's chakra while the walls behind were blown up and the concussive force tossed the genin outside.

"Hey, you didn't have to scale the platforms around the whole damned mine to collect everyone's unconscious bodies!" Shimo growled angrily at Kouta who apologized and laughed out uncomfortably.

"It was the mine itself. I've been wondering for a while as to how exactly the mobsters made the Audra steel, I mean to craft such excessive amounts they'd have needed to use the Nine Tails' own chakra, its own genetic material and infuse it into stone via some Kirikuzu master blacksmith's aid. The entire mine had a strange radiating glow to it. Those walls must've emitted some sort of weird vibe that weakened the Nine Tails and made it act out of its mind. Almost like the entire mine was poisonous to the Nine Tails but not poisonous enough to kill it for good, just to keep it at half-dead state, almost like a weakening allergic reaction for Tailed Beasts…" Mana explained.

Kouta nodded, "Well that makes just about as much sense as everything we've seen in that mine… Anyways, mind if I quickly scan you? I mean you just used chakra, didn't you?" the medical ninja stood up and tried to place his hands above Mana's body but the girl stood up and pushed them away.

"You will do no such thing…" she uttered with a much ruder tone than she usually used, Kouta was one of the people she spoke especially softly to but it appeared that the magician was quite adamant to avoid a scan. She was just afraid of getting the final answer that much, even when she just got a sign that things may not have been as final as she once thought them to be.

Meiko, Kouta and Shimo looked at each other awkwardly, almost as if they knew something that Mana didn't. The three just gulped and slowly followed the magician back to the Land of Rivers settlement where they could've stayed for a while and examined their wounds.

Whatever Kouta's initial scan back in Shukuba town showed seemed to unify the magician's teammates, that uncomfortable secret that needed for the speaker to admit that they went behind one's back to fully be explained seemed to haunt the three before other thoughts finally pushed it away and everyone started to act like it was business as usual.


	127. World's Largest Scavenger Hunt!

"I don't know how to pay you guys back…" Mana awkwardly smiled rubbing the back of her head. The trio took a whole night off after nearly getting utterly incinerated by the Nine Tails' immense power. They still had to keep moving to the Wind Country, especially now when they knew that they had competition on their tracks who currently were a whole day ahead of them.

The head of the small family bowed his head and politely shook his head refusing any payment. The man saw the bleeding and injured quartet wandering the streets, he took pity on the four letting them stay in his shabby home overnight, he gave Mana some of his daughter's clothes since hers were almost completely burnt off. Kouta rested overnight and then took care of their injuries, leaving a little bit of healing to various burn ointments and pills instead of using his chakra to heal them up.

Meiko grinned and opened a satchel showing some shards of a glowing purplish mineral inside. "How 'bout some of this for your trouble, a single shard probably costs a billion ryo, you know…" she explained.

Mana was surprised to see that Meiko had the time to snag some of the minerals while she was down there. Must've happened either when she was digging the tunnel for the four to cross from the resting quarters over to the labs or when they were down in the mines.

The house owner looked quite intimidated by the prospect. "Please don't, we don't need something like this in our lives. This cursed rock already cost this town its freedom, it has become infested with criminal families trading it and making it down the mines. Now that the mine is closed and sealed under layers of rock and gold, perhaps they won't find it worth the hassle to try and salvage what they've lost, having some of this around would only bring my family trouble!" he explained.

Mana nodded, it may not have been the best idea to leave something like this in the family's home. If they tried to exchange it for money word would spread, just one word of the ore's presence in the family's home would bring crime families on their doorstep trying to reclaim some of what they have lost. After some overly long farewells the four departed from the Land of the Rivers settlement, heading west towards the Land's border with the Wind Country. They were getting closer to their objective.

"Wait… So did we win? Whatever we were doing in the mines?" Meiko scratched her chin wondering, "I mean I lost my armor, at least tell me we've won…" the blacksmith complained once again.

"Well, we've buried the Audra ore under endless layers of rock and gold, it'd take entire years for them to reach that ore, more so, the Syndicate no longer has the Nine Tails' infinite supply of chakra for their production so even if they did reach it in however many years it'd take them, they can no longer produce the element artificially. Eventually the crime families should move out of the settlement since they'll have no more business there. Also, all of us survived that which very few have before – a scuffle with the Nine Tails, a weakened and delirious Nine Tails but still, it could've killed us easily if we were any less lucky… All of those are small victories in my book" Mana mumbled out looking at the murky grey sky. Rain clouds were gathering, the girl could only wonder as to what these clouds could have actually meant.

"On the other hand, Kouta is still not completely recovered after healing us so many times in such a short period of time, your card supply is completely empty, Meiko's armor with all the weapons sealed in it was destroyed, also now we know that Kouta's dirtbag father is after the Box as well. We're not ready to fight him or pretty much anyone strong at that matter…" Shimo replied to Mana's pondering. "Still, we've helped quite a lot of people, I just hope that the Nine Tails won't blow that statistic up in our faces now that it's free to rampage freely"

"We've got another trouble on our hands, that ore, I assume Meiko can't work it since if she could she'd have rebuilt her armor long ago. That means we've got bunch of heavy cargo and no money…" Kouta brought up another problem.

"The Wind Country desert will be full of raiders and bandits, some of them I've been introduced to by sensei. I may try talking to some of them and see if they want to buy some Audra, their prices won't be one tenth of its worth but it'll at least give us enough money to bargain with the wandering tribes living in the desert for food, water and shelter as well as supplies we'll desperately need. On the other hand, those guys will absolutely make that ore into weapons. We'll be selling it to the bandits who would use it to rob and kill people. We should think about what we're doing before deciding to go with it" Shimo suggested a rather immoral yet, having their situation in mind, quite alluring to some idea.

"I don't fancy selling my precious minerals but… Mana looks like a twig already, guess we do have to eat something at some point, the bandits would be the problem for the Wind Country and Sunagakure, they have ninja in their arsenal who could probably handle them easily" Meiko wondered.

"Plus we'd technically be helping Konohagakure out by giving Wind Country extra trouble, it would almost be like we'd be doing the job of the Black Ops, I'm sure it'd score some points with the village council that'd go quite a long way when our promotion comes into question…" Kouta theorized.

"Normally I'd be against selling Audra ore shards to raiders but… They can't possibly have means to work it properly. They won't have a Kirikuzu among their midst so they will either try working it with normal tools and ruin their tools or they'll have to wait for nobody knows how long before they'll find an expert capable of working it. We should give it a shot, if we see that it's not going to be pretty we can always inform Sunagakure after returning to the village" Mana once again decided on their actions. Strangely enough with her being the client of the mission she had quite a heavy voice among the group and her say usually happened, as it was with them taking a detour to destroy the Katabami mines and setting free the Nine Tails.

Either way, it was at least several more days before they'd even reach the Wind Country border and start getting sand in their shoes…

A bunch of suit wearing tall and bulky men rushed into a tent of a white cloaked middle aged man. His assistant, a young female with glasses and a similar white cloak fixed them nervously, the young woman didn't like having dealings with the Syndicate but their clients were always of the like, such was the bread of being a Quack, or rather, a Quack in-training.

"Yo, Quack, we've got a job for you, we're paying coins this time…" one of the muscleheads informed the middle aged grey haired man by lifting a body bag onto his table and unzipping it.

"Oh? That's new, what's the matter, trouble with the damned ore? I still haven't managed to sell a single rock to anyone so I'd appreciate the change in payment…" the man washed his hands and peeked inside the body bag, quickly moving his face away from the nasty sight and stench that came from inside.

"We've had issues with the… Production… The little rock we have we want to be used on the man in the bag, you know… Upgrade him to mess up any… Competitors…" the mobster who was dealing with the Quack informed the man.

"Oh, so this is my patient? I thought you brought mashed tomatoes for lunch…" the Quack joked opening the bag revealing a porridge like mass inside. Whoever this patient was, we looked like he was utterly crushed to the point where he was completely unrecognizable and reminded little of an actual person.

"You've got to be kidding, he's missing entire body parts! We can't possibly bring this man to life even if he somehow is miraculously still alive!" the young assistant objected, once again angrily fixing her tight glasses and moving her blond hair out of the way of her sweating forehead.

"Whatever body parts you will need we shall provide, we've got plenty of… Human resources to go around. The Big Guy left us a lot of… Leftovers too before he bolted" the mobster looked at the man in the body bag and then back at the Quack nervously.

The Quack broke a grin, "Heh, so it's that bad, huh? I assume this man here is the Boss? No one else would be worth so much after the whole family was completely blown up. Ironically enough we saw the Nine Tails breaking out and bolting north ourselves, I was taking a leak at the time… It was the most monumental piss of my life"

The mobster grabbed the Quack by his coat and pulled the man up closer lifting him off the ground. "Listen you, wise guy, we got a knuckle duster with the coordinates of your face on it. We don't know if the Boss is alive or not but the fact that some of him was still recovered makes us think that you can play some of your Quack mumbo jumbo on him and at least salvage some of him. Isn't that what Bellucini's Quack did for Bellucini's old man? Put the man's brain into a jar and attached him to a puppet of some sort? Do whatever it takes, if you need arms, legs, organs or whatever we'll give them to you"

The Quack sighed and tapped the man's arms so that the mobster put him down, the medical rogue then walked up to the mass and placed his hands above it, scanning it a couple of times with his "Diagnosis Jutsu".

"I'll need twelve fresh bodies, blood type AB. I can make you a Boss from the body parts of twelve more bodies. Also bring me as much of the ore as you can, we may need to use the chakra properties to keep that monstrosity together, also I'd advise to switch out his brain since whatever trauma befell and will befall him would and will in the future, most likely, ruin his brain, if not physically then psychologically"

"We'll get you everything you need, it's important that you use the brain of the Boss, we don't need A Boss, we need THE Boss" the mobster growled and then took notes of the medical rogue's orders. "The current Boss' brain is jambled up but its here, we've made sure of that before bringing him to you, what trauma are you talking about?"

"Not the trauma from the injury, the trauma of recovery. I'll have to bring him back throughout the whole process, it's too much of a risk to have him sleeping through such a complicated and long period of time so he'll have to be awake, that'll ruin a man's screws…" the Quack explained.

"Okay, so you can bring him back then?" the mobster asked for confirmation.

The Quack smiled and nodded at his assistant, "First we'll need to fix his brain from being way over the edge of braindead. Okay, girl, do it like I showed you, use THAT technique…"

The woman fixed her glasses and rushed up to the mangled mess of a man that the Boss was. She placed her hands above him and concentrated. Sweat broke through her forehead and blood started dripping from her nose somewhere down into the mashed mass of human remains.

"One's Own Life Reincarnation!" she shouted out through pain and pressure, blood vessels shot out on the woman's forehead and her eyes became bloodshot with heavy bags. Her glasses fell down onto the floor and broke into small pieces. About twenty minutes later the eyes of the poor woman rolled back as her body collapsed lifeless onto the floor, only to be caught by the hair by her superior. His quick fingers quickly shot into her eye sockets removing the woman's eyes with a skilled and swift motion, he then forced her mouth open and removed some scissors from his pocket laying her body close to the body bag.

"I seem to have miscalculated, I only need eleven more bodies…" he smiled briefly, having all things in mind, he probably should've informed the young woman of the cost of that technique before teaching it to her, that being said she was becoming far too confrontational lately and was of no use to him anymore. Rogues had no tolerance for useless things, now at least her eyes and her tongue could've served some use, her eyes would need some adjustment work though, she did need glasses didn't she?

A deafening moan came from the body bag. The Quack quickly zipped it up, maybe he rushed a bit too much resurrecting the… Whatever inside of it was, now he had to deal with those gut wrenching moans. At least he knew that whatever that thing was, it was functional enough to scream in agony as it was resurrected prematurely.

The mobsters scurried from the tent and back into the small settlement nearby in search for the bodies. Boss needed to be brought back if the Syndicate was to survive. They were right to hire and to come to that Quack, he was ruthless enough to sacrifice his own apprentice just to save them some trouble and silence her…

Syndicate will survive, and then… They'll go right for that Box thing that the Boss spoke of. At least they still had some intel about some alternative business idea now that their main source of income was ruined. Syndicate will survive… If the other families paid so much for an overpriced chunk of rock, imagine what they'll pay to make a wish upon this Box of Ultimate Bliss!

Loud huffs and moans echoed through the streets of Sunagakure. Even in the middle of a scorching desert it was cold enough to freeze one's balls off in the middle of the night. A man in a furry coat was running for his life, running at speeds that to the common villagers would've appeared incomprehensible. Just a furry blur, then again, he was being chased by someone much faster, a black flash of light with red sparks for eyes, eyes that emanated malevolence and death.

The man leaped to the side as the black flash hit a building making it explode from the pressure and the force of impact and crumble on top of it. Bunch of ninja leaped around the rooftops, tried attacking the black flash surrounded by some mysterious devilish chakra. A chakra that crippled any sensor in the range, close enough to sense its black toxic sludge like substance. However the owner of such black malevolent chakra was not as toxic and sludgy as one may have taken it for. He was more of a majestic force of nature. Almost like a graceful angel of darkness.

The Sand Village ninja leaped into the fray, attempting to cut the man down but their screams of agony woke up anyone in the alleyway. Due to the blitzing speed of this man it was impossible to tell that many details about him, only that he wore black and had some strange shining red irises in his eyes, almost like miniature crimson stars burning up. Within just mere moments the black flash started chasing the man in the furry coat with the brown hood. More and more ninja tried to get in the black flash's way, some of them waved gigantic fans sending entire whirlwinds of cutting gusts that simply disappeared once they collided with whatever this moving dark shadow was, as if they were absorbed by it almost. Some more sent entire sandstorms its way but those were absorbed by the force of nature as well.

The black flash leaped up into the air, covering entire village with a single bound, landing right onto the rooftops were the attackers stood. In a wild hurricane of strikes and grabs he tore the men and women, the loyal ninja of Sunagakure apart in a twister of blood and limbs flying out from it. His punches made even ninja with access to chakra augmentation explode into clouds of blood and guts, his hands grabbed ninja and tore them apart limb by limb with all of this happening faster than within a moment. The ninja didn't even comprehend their demise. With a loud shout the mysterious dark shadow with the eyes of red announced its victory and disappeared in the alleyways of the Sand Village.

The man in the fur coat landed in the outskirts of the village having left his chaser back inside the village to slaughter the ninja that attempted to apprehend him. A woman in a red hood approached him. She wore a furry coat of desert foxes, skins of whom she tore herself, all of whom came from animals she herself hunted down and a golden gourd encased with gems like rubies and sapphires, also emeralds and onyxes that contrasted the golden casing of the gourd. The two kissed upon coming in contact. They hugged passionately and for a moment it appeared like they would go all the way with their display of love but then the man violently tore the woman off of him.

"We've no time, we have to move, he'll find us here…" he pleaded the woman in a desperate and almost whining voice which was surprising having his powerful and determined tone in mind. He did not possess a voice that commonly came in a whiny shade.

"Where's Aziz?" the woman asked, just her brightly red colored lips were visible as her entire face was covered in shadow of her red hood. The moon could only illuminate her lips.

"The Leech got to him first, I went to sleep, Father said he'd watch the perimeter and… Next thing I remember is seeing that monster suck the life out of him with that bloody smile of his… Those crimson evil eyes were shining so brightly! I tried attacking him, I cut him again and again but you know how he is when he's well fed, I could only run… That's all we can ever do… Run!" the man cried out in desperation.

"Well… At least now we know he won't come after us immediately, Aziz… Father should've satisfied his sick appetite for at least a short while. He's an Uchiha, like you, isn't he? Then there were all those Sunagakure ninja…" the woman's crimson lips turned into a wicked smile. She felt sorry about the death of the father of her husband but she also was glad that he died and not her, such was the life of a family chased by a monster such as the black shadow with eyes of red.

"Where's Aisha? If she's out in the brothels again screwing with some lowlife… The Leech will be the last of her worries…" the man cried out angrily, he still felt pain of loss, yet he too felt relief that this day it was the life of his elderly father that was taken.

"Ahh, so you do care, brother?" a sarcastic voice of a teenage girl reached the man's ears, he turned at her and saw a figure of a girl in her late teens with short black hair and those malevolent Sharingan eyes glowing red in the moonlight. Her clothes were messy as if she hastily put them on, it was apparent that she was once again entertaining herself…

"You bitch, the Leech tore our father apart, he tore his arms off so that father could not resist as easily as one tears a sheet of paper! If you were with us tonight, maybe we could've saved him! I'll fucking choke you in your sleep one day!" the angry brother pulled a curved sword from the sheathe on his back and approached his sister, his mouth slobbered as the young man expressed his anger towards his sibling.

"Sleep? When was the last time we had any of that? The life of being chased suits you ill, brother. Well, while you two were busy playing wolf and the lamb, I was actually getting some intelligence that might help us kill the fucker who ruined our lives" the teen snapped back playfully flipping off of the small rocky structure she observed her brother from.

"Is that what you call being plowed from behind now?" the woman in red hood replied sarcastically.

The teen's red Sharingan glared angrily at her sister in law. "Konoha made their move, they sent ninja to retrieve something called "the Box of Ultimate Bliss" and according to a friend I met today that thing is a wishing artifact. Think about it, just one word and we could wish the Leech away…"

"Is that what you were doing while your father was dismembered and had his chakra absorbed until he was just a dried out corpse? Listening to fairytales that your boytoys told you as a bonus for your payment for their services?" the hooded woman angrily yelled out.

"Good thing your sandy crotch isn't in charge. You're not even a part of this family!" the teen pulled out a knife and lunged towards the hooded woman thrusting the knife at the lady's face before it was stopped by a wave of golden glowing sand that flowed out from the gourd on the woman's back, the sand was glowing in bright golden light that illuminated the part of the desert they were meeting in.

"We've had no hopes, only fled in terror ever since that monster touched us, tasted our chakra and decided we're tasty enough to be its food and entertainment. We ran and changed places, fled all the way from Kirigakure through Kumogakure and now here… We've lost friends, anyone who was kind enough to shelter us got their bodies gruesomely mangled because they were kind enough to shelter his food. Now sister tells us we've got a rat's ass of a chance… Some semblance of hope! Isn't that the best thing one could ask for? A chance to finally for once fight that thing back? Where is this Box, sister?" the man asked letting his hood slip down revealing a messy curly dark haired head with an almost primal beard and sleepless eyes, a face covered in scars and bruises, missing one eye while the second one was shining in red – with the infernal Sharingan eye of the Uchiha clan.

"The ruins of the Jookselman settlement, east-south from here, may be a couple of days path ahead…" the teen answered.

"Well then… We're heading to that old graveyard. We'll get this Box even if we have to peel it from the cold dead hands of those Konoha ninja! I saw that fucker take my own eye out and pop it in front of me like a grape, let's see how he likes it when we return the favor!" the man declared vibrantly and put his hood back on, turning towards the ruins, heading towards a giant sandstorm. The chased had no time to hide or rest. Now that the Leech had their taste, he could've found them anywhere at any time and either left them barely alive, beaten and almost void of any chakra, or outright take everything and leave them as sandy shells, gruesome remains of the body they once were.

There was no rest for the ones who were being chased…


	128. Deal with the Devil

Scorching desert sun combined with powerful yet not less searing at the slightest winds that also pelted Mana's cheeks with sand. The magician despised the sand and wished that she had something to protect against it better. Had it not been for her strange habit to find conflict everywhere she went, halting the squad's progress at every twist and turn she'd have perhaps not have had her desert cloak burnt to a crisp from inside her backpack when the Nine Tails blasted them back in the Land of Rivers. Now she was stuck with what she had, still, it was better than Meiko's situation, the poor blacksmith hated the feeling of scratching sand so she never removed her tracksuit making travelling through the desert a living torture for her.

Shimo was talking to some mean looking desert raiders. These were apparently his contacts from the time he trained with a rogue ninja during his journey of self-discovery. He seemed to have picked up a lot of weird skills during that time. The one that Mana fancied the least, secretly of course, was his newly found love for self-preservation. Obviously it was nothing wrong to protect oneself and one's friends from harm at all costs, Mana herself would've been quite an established follower of that rule if it was made law, that being said, rogues thought of it differently and that different approach made all the difference where it counted.

Mana could see it in Shimo's eyes, he roamed the world for over a year, training gruesomely with a powerful rogue ninja who taught him not only improvement of his swordsmanship and also his physical attributes, but the boy also picked up some less than stellar attitudes and skills. Since when did he know some pretty well equipped and well established raiders in the middle of the Land of Wind? These guys he was talking to reminded Mana of criminals that, be the situation any different than it was, she'd probably be gunning for on a mission with a team of ninja.

It went so far beyond just being a matter of changes, the magician could see it in the eyes of her friend that he changed. He saw some things beyond the village walls that made him always fight to survive. No longer did he take things for granted, all those stories of women and crazy brawls and daring escapes from villages when his sensei's status of rogue ninja was discovered… He suffered a lot to discover himself and he failed to do so. He got lost even more. Now he had that strange shadow of the young man he was before looking from deep inside locked in a chest while his true self fought to preserve himself and berated anyone else who did not share that belief.

Perhaps Mana was just paranoid, maybe she just felt bad that her friend and she no longer really saw eye to eye. Every time they spoke it all looked so blissful yet every time she made a call he couldn't have judged her more. Yes, her calls never compared with the rogue ninja code that well, she was rarely looking out for herself or her team and despite being just a client she held the mission hostage every time she decided to make a detour to help someone on the way to the mission objective…

"So how's the old pervert doing?" the raider in a strange head cover with a ring on top holding the thing in place wearing light armor and covering white cloth all over his body asked Shimo as if the two knew each other.

"Well, he lost an arm to a courtesan, turns out she was no courtesan at all…" Shimo strayed from the topic, Mana wanted to have as little as possible with these men, they were looking quite suspiciously at ninja, the only reason their guts didn't cover the desert sand was because they weren't Sunagakure ninja which meant they had no jurisdiction here. Usually the order in the deserts was maintained by Sunagakure but it was hard to oversee such a vast land and so it was mostly left to self-regulation. The worst bastard of them all always controlled everything until an even worse one raised his head and either had it cut from his shoulders or actually succeeded in becoming the next worst bastard. It seemed to Mana that this man talking to Shimo may have just been a bastard not unlike the theoretical one she imagined.

"Well, I kept telling him, gotta check their backgrounds first, never bed a woman you don't know, their crotch is the last place you need to get to know…" the man shook his head unpleasantly and then the bunch of raiders behind him laughed out loud. They appeared to look at their friend losing an arm as if he passed out first in a drinking game and someone drew an inappropriate picture on his face while he was out.

"It's different in places where crotches aren't full of sand, you don't have to worry about that part so can't say I blame sensei for his call… Did you hear it, though? That man he was so afraid of is now close to Shukuba…" Shimo scratched the back of his head and then wiped sweat off of his face. The Konoha ninja weren't used to such weather so they definitely were wondering if meeting in the middle of the day was even the best idea.

"No shit? That's good to know, whatever fucker made that guy stop talking about breasts scares the shit out of me, so, I assume you and your Konoha crew didn't come to Viper's Pit to chat?" the raider started walking up closer to Mana and looked at her, his brown eyes examined her skin closely.

"Where's this girl from? Ah, nevermind…" he reconsidered raising the subject once he saw Shimo's face turn sourer by the second when the topic turned at Mana. He was really still mad at her for pulling that irresponsible feat back in the mines and then surpassing that feat just half an hour later.

"Anyways, we wanted to sell you something, something we snatched from a bunch of losers in the Katabami mine, the whole Syndicate is down and out, also there's zero chance of them placing a fancy shoe wearing foot down on the Land of the Wind's sands so it's safe, no bullshit or anything…" Shimo walked up to Meiko and tried removing her pack filled with Audra ore to which the girl hissed and then opened the backpack herself.

The purplish blue shine of the ores glowed even brighter when reflecting from the greedy raider's dark eyes.

"So what do you want for that? An army? This whole damned desert? I don't get it…" the raider looked confused, he approached Meiko and carefully touched the bag, like a housecat who was getting cosier with the new people around her Meiko let the man check inside the backpack but it was clear that she was ready to bash his head in if he tried anything funny.

"Nope, the thing is that we know you've no means to work it so we know it's of limited use to you, it's Audra ore for crying out loud and we're really desperate for supplies. This young woman's here got a killer appetite and this one that you were so curious about is a civilian who is currently hitting four days without a bite in her mouth. We've got a lengthy trip ahead and we'll need water, food, maybe even a camel or a bulky raider to carry us on his damned shoulders. We have no time to… Realize this merchandise for an appropriate price so we're willing to give you a shard of Audra ore for one thousandth its market price as long as you're taking up the responsibility for doing whatever the fuck you want with it and leaving no strings on it attached to us. As usual, if we do this, we don't know your ass from a camel's upchuck."

The raider removed the veil covering his mouth and stroke his long black beard playfully. "Shit… As it happens… There're things you're not up to date with yet…" he spoke up turning away from the stones and approached Shimo.

"Dammit, you know we could murder your entire camp, I've kicked your ass before! You're turning away a stone of Audra alloy, something that shouldn't even exist, for a million ryo worth of supplies a piece?" Shimo growled angrily, yet quietly right up in the raider's face. It was somewhat entertaining seeing a half-developed fourteen year old hold more intimidation power over a fully grown man who owned a raider encampment and managed a whole band of raiders.

"No, that's the thing… The deal is so sweet I'm willing to cut my fingers off with a blunt rusty axe so that I could place my lips up your ass. The thing is that I'm not the man in charge anymore and if you knew the… Full picture… You may not want to sell me this" the raider's cheeks extended in the most despicable and twisted smile. He wasn't a very plump gentleman, looked more like a weasel and yet he managed to legitimately look like a guy who'd steal medicine from a baby.

Meiko zipped the bag up, she apparently took this sign as a clear indication that the deal wasn't going to happen. Kouta looked at Shimo questioningly, Mana's eyes looked at the boy with a glare of jealousy since Kouta managed to have enough brain to buy multiple copies of a desert suited cloak so he wore by far the most sand-proof attire out of everyone there.

"Speak. I've broken a man's tail bone with a headbutt for you, if I missed my head would've literally been inside another man's ass, don't you dare screw me over now!" Shimo cut his words down like he was swinging his sword and not flipping his tongue. The boy legitimately wanted to show Mana how real ninja did things, ninja with actual world experience and now his plan was blowing up in everyone's faces and he didn't like it.

"I know, I know… There's this guy… This old fucker with fancy gems on his cloak and all, gold laced teeth and bunch of overblown neckwear. He's buying the raider bands, like outright buying them, those that don't sell out he annihilates! Technically he's the guy in charge of us. He owns all nine of the relevant raider camps out of fourteen, he says he plans to fuck Sunagakure over once he has all of them on his payroll. From what I gathered he's an ex-Sunagakure ninja, dishonourable discharge most likely, maybe a Tribunal case. We don't know how to work Audra but that guy has… Power and influence and I'm sure that he'd manage to properly work the ore" the man weaselled out.

"No way, only Kirikuzu can work Audra ores, everyone knows that!" Meiko yelled out of line. Previously the four stroke a deal that they'd let Shimo handle it but Meiko was never a person who let rules and lines get in her way. Not when she had places to be in and had things to find out about things she cared about…

"Correct, missy, but the guy… Fennec he calls himself… Has this weird stash of sealed bloodlines. He's got all sorts of bloodline jutsu sealed in a bunch of scrolls and I've never seen him not having a bloodline he needs ready to use. He's got a Kirikuzu bloodline in there somewhere, trust me, ability to craft perfect weapons is something he'd think about when gathering an army and Kirikuzu are the best there are" the man answered. Meiko turned away, the topic of her clan heritage was still sensitive to her, she didn't quite like her clan rules, she wasn't that good at the signature clan techniques. It'd only make sense she'd want to hear about how great a name she disowned was as rarely as possible.

"I'd imagine the knowledge that we're fully able to work the ore and mean to use it to overthrow Sunagakure would be a dealbreaker then?" the raider smiled once again as if he was talking about making candy cotton and not weapons out of one of the most difficult to get one's hands on ores that was capable enough to contend with chakra conductive weaponry.

"Very much so…" Mana spoke out of line again.

"See? That's where I have to play the scumbag then, we really need those ores, you see…" the raider spoke up but before he could blink Shimo's blade was already drawn and almost stuck in his eyes, had the man continued to blink he may have cut his eyelids on its tip.

"Don't do this, drowning in your own blood mixed with desert sand is a very nasty way to go, I'd hate to do it to a guy I had my arms mauled by desert dogs for…" Shimo calmly explained. Strangely enough none of the man's raiders looked remotely scared or surprised nor did they jump to arms after seeing their leader threatened.

"Nah, I wouldn't dare threaten you or your lovely young ladies you're trying to impress with all that heroic ninja antic. You see, you know how these deserts work, right? There is Sunagakure, those guys are the top dogs here so they play like they're in control when they're really unable to oversee everything that goes on here. Not everyone wants to be a part of a ninja village so they're all over the place. There are bunch of wanderers and small settlements of wandering people moving from one source of water to another. Robbing them and owning them and all they have is our job, the job of the raiders and yet these people don't care because ultimately they ran away from a ninja village owning everything they have to us doing the same thing…"

Meiko leaned up to Mana's ear. "So should I be punching him now? I feel like I missed a signal or something? Did Shimo raise his hand or was he just itchy on the nose?"

Mana couldn't help but chuckle but then she whispered back, "Just stay still for a while, let's see what their game is"

Once all this was cleared up the magician kept her eyes on the raider leader. The man looked quite charismatic and may have been a pretty fast fellow, he wore a simple curved sword, Mana read about them. Pretty short and light but nasty to face since their slashes were much deeper at the center but they also had the potential to thrust over simple armor and shields. Knowing he was a raider, essentially similar to bandits close to Konohagakure, he must've had concealed weaponry but the magician felt confident about their chances at taking this camp if they needed… The problem was their tired and exhausted condition, it was the same problem that lead them to even striking this deal in the first place. Also it may have been ideal to not face them from the center of the camp where they were surrounded and clearly observed from all corners.

"We know the location of at least four peaceful settlements of merchants, cattle-breeders and just all around nice people who shelter lost desert roamers and feed them. Thing is, we're ready to make their days a whole lot worse if this deal doesn't happen. I'm talking fire, blood and bunch of people drowning in their blood on the sand, which, as you pointed out before, sucks quite a lot. So are we talking business or do you want to go to sleep knowing that several hundreds of people died because you didn't want to sell some rocks over to desert raiders and their noble goal of overthrowing a village and starting a war?" the raider smiled once again with that disgusting twist of lips he called a smile. Mana's fists clenched and her head sunk down with her hair getting in the way of her face. She was almost shaking from anger.

So many things went wrong and the worst part was that this was her call. Shimo wanted this, the others were a bit hesitant about selling this tide turning ore to desert raiders but Mana affirmed them that they needed this. She thought that there was no way that a band of bandits would have means of working such a tough to handle material. Now it was a tough choice between selling the ore to people who would use it to spark a war with a ninja village where thousands of people would die and possibly the Sand Village would be spiralled back down to the pit it was after the Great War ended and letting all those poor innocent people die. There were tales spun about how kind and welcoming the wandering people of Land of Wind desert were, always helping out dying and lost travellers, always willing to trade with them even if the deal isn't too useful for them and if a deal is impossible even giving stuff away just because they were kind.

"So that's the kind of guy you call a friend, Shimo? Some Third Mizukage wannabe serving another Third Mizukage wannabe?" Mana's shaking voice broke through the silence, she saw Shimo completely stumped and frozen in place. Normally someone like him, someone with a rogue mindset, wouldn't have cared if hundreds of people died because of a deal, Mana knew of his nindo however, his dream of never letting harm befall innocent people like it has fallen on the shoulders of his parents when they had to flee the Kirigakure during Mizukage Daikon's reign.

"Come now, young lady, we just really need that deal to be made, it's not like we're being unreasonable here, I mean we're not bullying you out of the stones, we just wanna make sure you sell them to us. We're willing to pay…" the raider shook his arms and walked up closer to Mana. The girl carefully observed his quick hands, knowing full well of the raiders' "stab first, talk later" ways. It was unlikely that the band would try anything funny but the situation was out of control enough already.

"Really, because it smells like long and fishy Daikon moustache here…" Shimo grumbled out completely crushed, he was really having a crisis deep inside.

"No, we'll sell you guys the ore…" Meiko said out of the blue, walking up to the guy and chucking the whole backpack right in his face. "Mana was kind enough to put this mission together for me, she helped us out many times throughout this trip and she doesn't deserve the feeling of being dead inside, she'd literally kill herself over the lives of those people and I don't want to see it. Sunagakure is strong enough to handle a bunch of sick losers who'd do something like this anyways…"

"Hmmm… You're this… Mana? I assume?" the raider smiled at the magician who was still shaking in defiant anger. She wanted to just leap at the man and kick his face into the dirt until he was just barely alive so that he could no longer open his mouth by himself and so every time he did open his mouth in agony he'd think of her. She was no longer afraid, she was angry, unlike so many times before she wasn't afraid to be angry, after meeting Guru Ayushi she knew just where her limits lied as far as fighting went. She wasn't afraid to leave all of those raider scum bleeding out on the sand, just barely on the line but never an inch past it.

"You're quite a leader if you get your friends so loyal to you. This girl however, her build, her slight hint of accent, her reaction to when I spoke about Kirikuzu… She wouldn't happen to be from Kumogakure, wouldn't happen to be a Kirikuzu herself would she?" the scumbag dared to ask, Meiko's face twisted in disdain and shame.

"No, I'm Wakizashi Meiko, Wakizashi, you hear?!" she yelled out.

"Wakizashi? I've never heard a more made-up name in my life. What, was Bucklershield taken too many times for it to seem natural? Doesn't seem like you made much of an effort to disguise your heritage, little missy…" the raider shrugged.

Mana walked up to him and got on her toes so that her face got as close to the raider's as possible. She no longer felt threatened by him, no longer protected herself against any surprise attacks that the man could've thought of throwing her way. She wanted the hatred and anger in her face to be crystal clear to the man, her guts that it took to approach him so carelessly must've impressed him because the man leaned back for a moment before matching the girl's gaze.

"We'll make the deal but just to save those people. We've come right out of the Katabami mine where we confronted the Nine Tails… It's not a good idea to mess with us. I'm just crazy enough to leave all of you in the rubble of your own camp even if it costs me my life and my mission objective. Mark my words. We'll be coming back for that ore, this Fennec will see none of it, not a single pebble…" the magician uttered slowly and clearly, never letting the hatred disappear from her tone for a second.

"Holy shit, we've got a little Stifferson here, we'll be having that Kirikuzu girl too, we need insurance that Fennec will be able to work that ore" the raider opened his mouth again.

Meiko started making a ruckus, she was ready to leap at everyone but then Shimo grabbed her shoulder. "Didn't you hear what Mana said? Just sit here on your ass and drink lime sherbet until we come at night and take our ore back…" he uttered. Meiko's angry eyes looked at Mana who just calmly nodded.

Meiko looked at the raider and smiled spitefully, "An all-you-can-eat sounds nice…" she said after calmly sitting down where she stood. To Mana it appeared like the exchange of camels, food and water as well as endless bags filled with golden ryo coins happened instantly. The four looked back at Meiko who was currently finishing yet another barrel of ice cream which apparently existed in the desert, stashed deep underground where the nights chilled the sands enough to keep it cool. Once the three ninja left the raiders surrounded Meiko and tossed a bag of ore at her feet.

"Well, work your ore, Kirikuzu!" the raider leader ordered to which Meiko's lime green coloured smile greeted his eyes.

"I can't work it for shit… You just bargained your whole operation away for nothing. Shouldn't have messed with us really, now Shimo, Mana and Kouta will come back for their ore with your food and camels and kick your ass like there's no tomorrow" she laughed out energetically.

The raider yelled out in frustration and pulled out a curved blade swinging it right at Meiko's neck. The girl's arm moved almost instantly, with a loud clang and an awesome deafening shockwave picking up sand and bashing it mercilessly at anyone around where it started the man's blow was blocked by Meiko's bare palm.

"Impossible…" the raider's surprised jaw fell down almost all the way to the sand he stood on while a small rock fell out of Meiko's hand. Her arm moved to the backpack and then still was in time to block the man's strike using a shard of Audra ore.

"Well I guess I could kick your asses too, after all, it doesn't look like you guys are just gonna let me eat in peace…" the redheaded girl unzipped her tracksuit and ventilated it around to try and chill her incoming heatstroke out.

The sound of Meiko's knuckles cracking was deafened by a combination of sounds of hundreds of swords being drawn.

Finally night came and the temperature dropped almost a full 180 to where it was, from being impossibly hot it started to become so cold that Mana felt bad about trading her jacket away with a traveller close to the entrance to the Land of the Wind. The three genin carefully snuck up to the camp and looked at it from far away, all the way from a large dune that wasn't even there in the morning. Apart from a small fire and a brief source of light in the center of the camp there appeared to be no action inside. The four snuck up closer, surprised to see no guards watching the camp, after all, they pretty much declared that they'd be back once they weren't surrounded by raiders inside their own camp… The sight inside of the camp made the jaws of the four shot wide open.

On top of a giant pile of unconscious raiders, wearing a white coat and a blue headscarf, borrowed from one of them while her torn up and dirty tracksuit laid on the beaten to a pulp leader of the raiders, still eating a larger than herself barrel of ice cream and enjoying herself, sat Meiko, covered with scratches, cuts and bruises but as happy as a child seeing a dolphin for the first time.

"Yo, nights around here really are a way better time to eat sherbets…" the girl smiled with a dirty mouth full of coloured treats that made her cheeks and tongue as messy as the mouth of a child.


	129. Conflict at the Entrance

Four genin stood on top of a great dune watching a breathtaking sight that appeared before them once they finished the great steep climb. Mana was the first to recover from total awe, she was currently checking and loading several kunai dispenser devices she found and snagged from the camp of raiders that Meiko so fantastically dispatched by herself. The Viper's Pit was one of the largest and well equipped raider camps in the whole Land of the Wind, it only made Mana admire how awe striking Meiko was and realize what the wedge between her and her ninja friends actually was.

This whole time after being taught by Meiko and then picking up some tools from the mobsters and the raiders Mana was starting to feel like a part of the team but she couldn't have disposed of several hundreds of raiders surrounding her while unarmed to save her life and Meiko did it so easily, so casually. She was wounded, cut and bruised but she acted like those wounds barely even mattered to her, Meiko was cheerful and vibrant the whole way there. Mana never really was even close to their level… Not until her chakra control is restored.

The ruins were amazing, it was this giant castle composed of three colossal towers placed in a trinity position with smaller channels that could've been at least a hundred meters tall connecting the sky reaching towers. The fortress was completely run down, sand must've pelted against the stone walls for centuries and yet it didn't look like it did any lasting damage. All it did was ruin the paintjob… Surrounding the towers of the castle was a collection of four captivating walls that could've been at least fifty meters tall. Each of them had red steel plated ornaments that were blunted a little and had minor damage but looked mostly intact. At the center of each wall was a demonic smiling face, the wall looked a bit overly decorated to be practical but the sheer size of it must've granted more than enough protection by itself…

"This is the Rashomon Gate, isn't it? Those walls?" Kouta asked the team for clarification.

"That's right. One of the strongest defensive ninjutsu techniques, each one has a seal that absorbs chakra to nullify ninjutsu techniques, similarly to Meiko's armor except thousands of times more potent" Shimo nodded.

"If it's so amazing why does it have that gapping hole in the center!?" Meiko yelled out right into Shimo's ear angrily making the young man lean back in fear and shock of how simply the blacksmith got pissed off by him comparing this masterpiece to her armor.

Meiko was quite observant, right on the center of the southern wall there was a giant hole, it went all the way through the Rashomon leaving at least fifteen meters radius hole, enough for a caravan to fit through except it was made so high up that one would've had to lift the caravan up there to fit it through.

"So what's the story of this place, Mana?" Meiko asked scratching the back of her head while the four made their way down the dune, carefully so that they don't shift any sands beneath their feet and tumble down.

"I'm not that well educated in Sunagakure history but this here used to be one of the largest and most dominant settlements during the Settlement Period. Back before there were ninja villages and ninja were just freelancing wandering tribes, it is said that it was built by a great warrior who was so charismatic and such an amazing strategist that he lead his followers to conquer every other settlement, he was one of the first merciful leaders who accepted those who wished to join his side instead of killing them which lead to the size of his tribe spiraling out of control. These ruins belong to a castle which was the first attempt to settle down, you could say this here is a predecessor of what later became the ninja village" Mana explained.

"Maybe that Fennec guy is trying to do the same thing? Maybe he's so fascinated by this past leader of the desert tribes that he's trying to repeat his success?" Kouta wondered as the four got closer and closer to the giant hole in the Rashomon.

"Fennec is using money and influence to buy his way into leading the raiders. That is nothing like what the King of the Desert, as he liked to call himself, was. The King took people in by being someone people wanted to be around, he was merciful, he was also strong and he always knew the right thing to do in any situation he ended up in. He has never lost a single battle and he expanded his tribe through fighting the opposing tribes and taking in those that wished to switch sides" the magician looked at Kouta surprised that he cared so much about this Fennec, she herself had almost forgotten about him. Probably because she was so focused on the mission at hand… Someone like that had to come into her mission report however, hopefully Konoha would inform Sunagakure about such a person so that his quest for a bloody revolt could be stopped before it escalates…

"Hmph… Now I'll have to run up the wall all the way there, instead of just using my chakra jets!" Meiko complained looking down at her desert attire and internally lamenting her lost armor. She must've missed her armor a lot but she never held it against Mana, deep inside the redhead must've realized that Mana did what she had to and that she never meant for Meiko's precious armor to get molten into a solid lump of black rock.

"You'll have to be carrying me too, I could probably run up the wall for a couple of steps but no way I'd manage to go that high…" Mana mumbled a little bit ashamed that she had to be carried around.

"Fine…" Meiko sighed grabbing hold of Mana's arm and casually tossing her several meters into the air so that the girl landed right on top of Meiko's back. The blacksmith leaped up and stuck to the wall so that once Mana landed the blacksmith had already scaled several steps up the wall.

Suddenly after maybe about fifteen steps the girl tripped up, the blue burst of chakra coming out from Meiko's feet dimmed and the blacksmith grabbed hold of one of the Rashomon's decorative fangs around its mouth keeping herself from tumbling down. Mana felt the liberating desert breeze before the state of weightlessness change into the paralyzing fear of freefall, she was falling down to the sands below, a fall like that could've broken her legs and maybe injured her back, possibly even broken her neck if she landed the wrong way.

The magician tried her best to adjust her position but right before the closeness of the ground made her stop her breath and brace for impact she felt someone's arm wrap around her middle section. Mana coughed up as the sudden stop of fall felt almost like she had hit something but she felt quite lucky to be caught, obviously had the fall been greater than this she may have suffered internal bleeding but Kouta managed to somewhat repurpose his weight to do his best and stop her fall not instantly but gradually.

Mana smiled and thanked the young man who managed to notice her falling and then turn back and dash all the way down the wall faster than a bullet and properly repurpose the energy of her fall so that she didn't suffer too many injuries. One could've only expected as much from a medical ninja. As the young man dashed through Meiko on his way up the Rashomon the blacksmith waved and apologized before hopping back onto the wall and sticking her feet onto it so that she could finish the run up.

"What the hell was that, Meiko? Mana-chan could've died from a fall like that…" Kouta softly warned his teammate to be more careful.

"Sorry, I think I lost control halfway…" the blacksmith's mood changed back to being almost depressed and disappointed. It must've been just like that time in the Katabami mines when she botched the simple Academy transformation technique. Focusing one's chakra to run up the wall or on top of the surface of water was no rocket science, it was something that most ninja were able to do with no hand seals or without even thinking much about it, only genin right out of the Academy had to focus to pull this technique off. Meiko's chakra control must've been really iffy if she just tripped over like that, it was like the chakra just stopped moving through her feet or something.

"How do you mess up Art of Tree Climbing? It's a simple Academy technique, I mean you used C-Rank Storage Seal before… Well, anyways, nice save, Kouta" Shimo appeared to be a bit confused by the whole situation but then got over it. He had no reason to doubt Meiko's effectiveness, the blacksmith just took out an entire raider encampment by herself, what did it matter if she sometimes had trouble with basic ninjutsu?

"I'll take care of Mana-chan on the way down, just in case…" Kouta nodded and took the magician up in his arms before leaping down and activating his surface climbing technique right before he hit the ground in a larger burst of chakra to break his fall.

Shimo leaned down and examined the hole in the wall before leaping down in a similar manner as well, he questioningly suggested Meiko to help her get down just in case she didn't feel like it but the blacksmith answered his kind glare with a look of fury, almost like she felt like her teammate was looking at her condescendingly. The Yuki swordsman just shrugged and leaped down, letting the redhead's sad and distant state to soon follow him. Meiko just appeared to be completely out of it for a while after her small trip-up.

"This crack in the wall… It was made by a punch, a really, really out of this world punch" Shimo dropped a bomb once he landed down on the other side of the Rashomon to Kouta and Mana. The medical ninja gently placed Mana onto the ground with a kind smile that was supposed to let the girl know that if she needed his help she could have relied on him any time. Honestly she didn't need that, Mana already would've relied on anyone in her squad for help. She had grown quite fond of all three of her teammates, then again, she grew fond of pretty much anyone pretty soon…

"Isn't Rashomon Gate strong enough to withstand a B-Rank ninjutsu technique, with a chakra absorption seal the rank may be bumped up to A-Rank…" Kouta wondered.

"Yeah but techniques like that wouldn't have left so little damage on the ground around the gate or the other parts of the gate. It looks like the hole was blown out by a concussive hit, look over there…" Shimo pointed at a giant pile of stones having destroyed a small group of clay houses that were built inside the walls. The castle had a small ring of clay houses that were apparently supposed to house ninja who didn't live in the castle and any non-ninja settlers.

"It didn't look like the big slugger took much of an effort, if he or she had, the blow would have cracked the rest of the gate because of lack of control and finesse, now the blow just worked like a battering ram but concentrated enough to only damage the center where the blow was focused in. If a blow of such caliber hit the ground it'd cause a shockwave strong enough to blow a village away…" the great rogue detective Shimo continued to analyze the surroundings.

"So someone strong enough to punch a village to dust beat us to the punch?" Kouta wondered, "Well, I guess it only makes sense, after all, aren't those scrolls Mana took the intel from like really old? Maybe some historic superninja already found the Box?"

"Question remains if this hole was made long ago or just recently… We know that Kouta's father is after the Box too" Mana replied.

"Oh, so B.U.B. is a box then?" a loud and deep voice hit the ears of the four genin making them instantly turn around to see Kusagoro and his squad of friends sitting on top of a larger clay structure, possibly what used to be a barrack of soldiers. "Interesting… What kind of a box is it?" the man smiled visibly excited by this sidequest of his.

"Father!? Did you blow that hole? This is a historic monument! Konoha and Sunagakure are supposed to protect it together as per the village peace treaty…" Kouta shouted out angrily.

"Yeah, I may have punched that darned thing a bit too strong, we only needed a hole large enough for a person to fit through, we could've ran up all the way but it was getting really annoying… It just turns out that this gate is a bit too crappy even when I don't make an effort" the man thundered out an arrogant laugh.

"Anyways, I will need you guys to tell me what this box is and what it looks like 'cause me and my team searched this dump through and through and we found nothing… I guess we saw some pretty sophisticated looking stuff but we didn't know if it was B.U.B. or not" Kusagoro grinned while explaining. It didn't look like he was in the mood for a conflict, all he cared about was to find that box. All that this was to this man was a giant game, just a race to entertain him while his license is suspended and he's unable to fight people in his high ranking missions.

"This is ridiculous, father, stop this nonsense, Hokage-sama told us to…" Kouta tried to talk his father down but the voice of his father, now in a much stricter tone interrupted the medical ninja.

"The wench told you guys to confirm that the B.U.B. exists, that's all. That's all your mission records in the archive building said. You guys shouldn't care about actually bringing the B.U.B. back home so there's no actual conflict with you guys telling us what it is. After all, we can tell you if it's there or not, the castle is still filled with traps for raiders and treasure hunters, it's pretty dangerous for some young whippersnappers like you to roam around there" Kusagoro explained.

"If we tell him about the box, Mana-chan won't be able to use it…" Kouta whispered to the squad trying to tell them to not open their mouth.

"Oh? So this little brat wants to actually use this B.U.B.? Behind the Hokage's back? What a disappointment…" Kusagoro's voice informed the four that the man moved right behind them in a brink of a moment and overheard everything that the medical ninja whispered. Such speed was invisible not only to Mana, it was completely untrackable even by ninja, even Shimo looked completely blown away by it and that youngster focused on outspeeding his opponents.

"No way! Mana will get her chakra control back, we're not letting these guys get their hands on the box!" Meiko yelled out and lunged forward pulling both of the curved swords she looted off of the raiders. The steel cracked into multiple pieces upon hitting Kusagoro instantly without leaving a scratch.

The jounin continued to stand there with his hands locked on his chest, looking seriously ahead right at the castle, he didn't even bother to turn around and face Meiko and the rest of the team.

"I see… So you're involved in some criminal activity behind the Hokage's back, huh, Kouta? Well then… I guess it actually is fine if we kill this brat and all of her brainwashed friends. They're bad influence on you, Kouta" Kusaguro declared without turning around. His team leaped off the barracks roof and charged forward. A large brute pulled out a steel rod and drove it through his shoulder making a handseal as large metallic gloves wrapped around his arm, his steel backpack extended into tank-like armor that covered his entire body and his legs and then a large helmet like dome shut powerfully around his head with a blue visor fueled by chakra lighting up on his front, two awesome cannons shot up from the backpack armor and then locked onto the man's shoulders and aimed forward.

"Holy shit, this is awesome!" Meiko screamed getting all of her desperation to save Mana's dream and depression for failing her basic Academy technique behind her. "I'm taking this guy on, I want his armor!" the blacksmith girl yelled out charging to take the man on.

Shimo pushed Mana behind him and got into a sword drawing position to intercept the Hyuuga butler-like looking lady rushing at him and the weird guy beside her. The man had changed his attire from before, most likely because the weather in the desert didn't let him wear his usual warm jacket. The man now only wore a simple pink shirt which made him look like some singer from Kumogakure when combined with his crazy licked back and flooding with hair gel black hair.

"Father, stop this!" Kouta yelled out rushing out in front of his father and pleading him to call his squad off. The boy knew his companions a little bit more than he may have wanted to admit. While his mother hated the bunch and so they didn't come over as much as his father may have wanted it, there were several cases where the boy had to meet them. They were so much ahead of the skill level of his teammates that the medical ninja knew the only way to survive this fight was to plead his father to call this madness off.

"I'm doing this for your sake, for both of our sakes. I won't let your honor be dragged down and shoved into the dirt by those guys. What do you think the old wench would say if she knew you used the B.U.B. behind her back, she'd suspend your license or even terminate it. Also bringing those traitors in will possibly score some points with the lady for me, we'll be leaving on missions and training like the old days in no time…" the man calmly explained, still continuing to turn his back at the giant scuffle behind him, choosing to just strictly stare at the sky reaching towers of the castle in front of him.

"No, I won't let you hurt my friends and definitely not Mana-chan!" Kouta roared out as his fist lit up with a blue flame of chakra surging through his body, bursting through his fist as it was all focused into this amazing blow. The ground shattering punch hit Kusagoro right in the face and stuck there for a moment. The ground below Kouta and his father sunk, the shockwave from the blow blew the clay buildings around the boy and his father away, it crushed the ground below them into a crater and then as the boy focused into his punch and pushed it forward with even more determination and force the crater deepened and deepened, widening its radius endlessly.

"I won't let you hurt them… I won't let you hurt Mana-chan because… Because I like her!" Kouta roared out pushing his fist with all of his chakra focused into it. Using all of his Juugo legacy to fire his chakra through his body as if it was a cannon, reshaping his feet into cannon-like structures and then pushing his fist deeper into his father's emotionless and unfazed face using all of the medical ninja prowess to enhance one's strength. Kouta's father's face dyed with surprise as the boy managed to break through his defenses and lifted the man's body up and sent him crashing through the countless clay building toppling all of them down before digging the man deep into the eastern Rashomon Gate, leaving a small dent in the wall.


	130. United We Fall

Sweat dripped off of the medical ninja's face as Kouta was so forcefully drawn to just collapse on the ground by mother gravity. He channeled all of his feelings, all of his chakra into a single punch and had he not been a medical ninja with extensive training that lasted whole years as to how not to overdo chakra augmentation, a fate similar to that of Mana's would've easily befell his ruptured chakra network. The searing heat of the desert only added to the boy's exhaustion.

Deafening cracks, similar to large structures of ice cracking reached Kouta's ears forcing the young man to straighten his back out and prepare to face the consequences of punching his father. A mad laughter came from the side where Kusagoro was punched at, the excited and near crazy sounding laughter that bypassed all the ruins of destroyed buildings that the man was sent through. The boy's father had such sky-reaching chakra levels that augmenting his body to survive such blows must've barely even lowered it…

"You actually punched your father… This is… Almost great. All those times we trained and you were afraid of your own power, of your own destructive Juugo bloodline… Right now I'm almost considering keeping that little magician alive because she may just be a good influence on you, as far as our training is concerned anyways..." Kusagoro's voice reached Kouta, the man appeared from a cloud of sand and dust pushing barely standing buildings so that they collapsed and got out of his way. The man's forehead had a small wound that bled a little, several small streams of blood going all the way from the man's forehead dripped off of his cheek.

"Still, I don't like you stepping out of line, this isn't the time to defy your father…" Kusagoro smiled placing his arm forward, in a fraction of a second the arm took a wooden greyish brown coloring and appeared to transform into some manner of cannon-like tube. Soon the man's second arm followed.

"I know quite well just how distracting women are, your mother did the same to me in my time. That being said, I'd rather not risk it with this one, her insolent behavior might bring both of us trouble if we don't deal with her. I can see now that you intend to interfere, because of that I'll take you out. I need you to understand why I'm doing this son, just augment your body to the best of your abilities, this is not an attack that should kill you…" the man explained as glowing blue dust of chakra shot through small pores on the sides of the man's conjoined two tube cannon that became of his arms.

"Chakra Flashbang!" the man yelled out as the dust concentrated into a colossal bullet-like structure that fired at Kouta in barely conceivable speed. The boy reached forward, he tried to use his chakra augmentation, what little of it that he had to stop this attack, continue hurting his father so that he decided against hurting Mana. This was a mean battle, he needed to fight this like a guerilla war – hit the larger and stronger enemy until they decide it's not worth it.

Kouta's arms changed into large and wide plate structures, they both closed into a buckler shield. Black marks consisting of dots conjoined together into a tattoo of madness appeared on the boy's face and chakra jets split off from the tendons of his legs shooting wild bursts of chakra, Kouta tried to use his legs like jets to slow father's attack, he used his arms for protection. Still, even with all of his newly accepted Juugo legacy he was overwhelmed, slowly initially, then at an accelerating rate the attack was pushing the boy back into the Rashomon Gate.

"Hey, hey, come on now, don't overdo it…" Kusagoro observed the boy's struggle for a moment before turning away. He knew how this clash would end already – one attack was all he needed to injure his son beyond the edge where his body could keep going.

A deafening explosion combined with a blinding flash interrupted all of the scuffles transpiring by the entrance to the castle ruins. Kouta's whited out eyes and open mouth and burnt off to the crisp clothes and wide burns all over his body that was stuck in a crater in the Rashomon Gate informed anyone who would've bothered to check that the boy was out. Just one attack, one attack that was meant more as a distraction effort was all these ninja needed. This couldn't have ever turned out well.

Kusagoro looked around, his eyes tried to find Mana because ultimately she was the one he needed. Her head was the only thing that could've possibly pleased the middle aged woman in the fancy hat enough to unsuspend his license, he was just handed an opportunity to have fun on Black Ops missions again without waiting for the license suspension to expire. He wasn't about to let that chance slip…

Shimo dashed around a black mass that was emitting some strange screeching sound, almost like backs of millions of insects with intensely hard shells were rubbing against each other. No. It was exactly that. Not only was the swordsman fast enough to evade each mass that the strange Hispanic looking Aburame gentleman sent his way but he also had enough time to push Mana out of their way too. To Mana this entire battle was looking beyond terrified – she couldn't perceive any of it but Shimo just managed to place her on different locations just out of harm's way. Finally feeling sick of evading the young man attempted an attack stabbing at forty different lethal spots within just a mere seconds. A heart stopping shriek and an immense shock sent Shimo on his back, rolling away.

"What the…" he wondered before seeing the masses of insects crawling all over their master. Finally the insects slowed down somewhat to make their species more identifiable.

"What's the matter, young gent, have you never seen a ninja cockroach with a nearly impenetrable shell before?" the butler Hyuuga lady continued to observe the battle and despite of her early unsuccessful attempts to land a couple of blows taunting her opponent.

"You know, for a moment I thought that this Aburame guy was a kindred soul, he appeared to be quite a lady-lover like me back in the Land of Fire forests… He also looks like a pretty desperate bachelor, maybe that's why swarms of cockroaches all over his body look very much out of place, especially on that hairy bare chest that probably makes middle-aged ladies go wild…" Shimo grinned despite realizing how screwed he was. These were two opponents in front of him, both on the level far beyond his abilities and on top of that he still had to watch over Mana.

"Huh? Gokibure makes ladies go wild? You're quite the comedian, Yuki. He has never had a lady stay around him for more than a second after seeing a roach crawl on his face, not because of lack of trying, though, I must admit…" the polite Hyuuga woman mocked her teammate.

"Stay silent, Remashi, I just haven't met the right cockroach loving lady yet!" the man yelled out playfully stroking his black hair and putting a strand of it behind his ear.

"That's because such don't exist, you twit" the woman taunted her friend again.

"They totally do! Remember when we once faced badgers that were rigged with explosive seals? I refuse to believe that cockroach loving women do not exist in the world where kamikaze badgers are a reality! Either way, I'll find a wife before you actually dine on human flesh…" the strange looking lovelace tried to bite back at his comrade.

"Wait, what?" Shimo asked confused, while he had no idea what the two were rambling about he could appreciate this brief quarrel between them because it gave him a chance to catch his breath.

"That's right, the woman claims to be a cannibal yet she's never done more than licked some blood off of a wall…" the roach-man pointed at her friend feeling somewhat warmed up to the Yuki swordsman now that he had found an ally in this verbal showdown.

"That's because I feel bad for those people and I can't take a good bite! It doesn't mean I'm not a cannibal, I'm just really sympathetic!" the woman suddenly lost her cool shoving her fist up to her comrade's face.

"Sorry to break it to you, ma'am, but a person who feels bad for another person they're trying to eat and so doesn't end up eating that person… Isn't really a cannibal…I mean, I feel bad for other people and so I don't eat them, so I'm quite sure I'm not a cannibal" Shimo shrugged in confusion. He was almost ashamed that this squad of weirdos was so incredibly strong.

"Right? That's what I tell her…" Gokibure smiled and pulled out a rose from his back pocket and sniffed it to distract him from the terrible desert heat.

"Boy, you have greatly offended me. For speaking thusly I require you to come at me so that I could kill you for my satisfaction…" the Hyuuga lady growled angrily pushing her teammate out of the way. Shimo dashed back and formed a couple of hand seals.

"Ice Style: Eternal Frost Jutsu!" he yelled out as powerful gusts of wind scurried forward covering both of his opponents. This was the most efficient of Shimo's ice techniques, it was supposed to cover them in so much ice that it literally froze his opponents solid in large blocks of ice. Obviously the potency of the technique would be severely hindered in such scorching heat but it should've still disabled both of his opponents. That, of course, was a glorious theory, but only a theory. It didn't help that this desert air was so very dry and difficult to find any humidity to make ice out of…

The Yuki felt a strong grab that lifted his wrist into the air and then an overwhelming painful shock breaking his arm right at the middle. Shimo couldn't help it, he screamed from the bottom of his lungs as he had never been in so much pain. Only then he saw the afterimage of the infernal Hyuuga butler appear in front of him, only after the pain had already reached his brain did his own blood splatter all over his face and the boy was able to start thinking of a counterattack.

A crushing kick to the side of his knee broke his leg too. Shimo shouted out and collapsed onto the sand. He saw blood accumulating from the open fractures on his arm and leg.

"I'd stop your heart right now by closing your central chakra node but I choose to leave you to suffer instead, killing you wouldn't feel right after you dared call me not a cannibal…" the woman placed her palm right up to Shimo's exposed chest as a warming blue flame of chakra lit up around her palms. The Hyuuga clan was known for their ability to see the chakra nodes and being able to see those vital weakspots of every ninja and close them temporarily by striking them with precise blows. With a powerful kick right to Shimo's face that easily broke his nose and his jaw the boy was knocked out cold.

The block of ice that Gokibure was enveloped in cracked, cracked again after a brief moment and then broke as a colossal pillar of cockroaches appeared from it, the infinite masses of cockroaches then all scurried back inside the man's body or beneath his revealing purple shirt and behind his tight leather pants or even inside his pompous hairdo. Within an instant what appeared to be a structure made entirely out of ninja cockroaches ended up being just a man he was before.

"Oh… You're alive…" the Hyuuga woman exclaimed more as a meaningless statement of a face rather than a sign of her relief.

"Of course, the ninja cockroaches are the most indestructible species of ninja insects used by the Aburame clan. Remember that time Kusagoro flung me into the stratosphere and I survived not only that but also re-entry back to Earth enveloped in cockroaches?" the man bragged.

"I try to forget, the sight of that insectoid orb was rather unsettling…" the Hyuuga woman complained. "Well then, perhaps you could kindly finish off the young lady, I've heard your cockroaches work almost like insectoid disassembler – devouring all they see in their way. It would be useful to keep the young lady's head for the Hokage though… I believe such is the protocol of capturing rogues and traitors?" the woman suddenly remembered her butleresque manners.

"I have no desire to hurt a young woman, not until she blooms to make a decision to love my roaches or reject me…" Gokibure pouted and locked his arms around his chest.

"That being said… Where is she?" Remashi Hyuuga finally noticed that Mana was nowhere to be found in the nearest vicinity.

Meiko kept on swinging her wild fists, grabbing hold of the steel plates and tearing them off the armor of her opponent using her own bare hands. The man's shoulder cannons aimed at where the girl was and fired a burst of wild flames but Meiko leapt on top of the cannons avoiding the flamed and smashed them with her fists.

"Look at me, I'm a blacksmith" she yelled out playfully as she swung her fists in a manner reminding a hammer from the top downwards, smashing them as the man's armor and leaving him without it.

The large man angrily thrust his foot forward but Meiko managed to block it, the force of the kick forced her to roll backwards getting sand all over her hair and her face that the young woman had to spit out.

"Why is your armor so shit?" the redhead complained, "I don't want it anymore, I could make a higher quality one when I was a toddler…Even though it looked kind of awesome" she pouted.

"That is because it is cheap, I didn't sell enough damage for the merchant…" the man explained biting his finger and making a bunch of handseals. He then slammed his arms at the sand from where a bunch of seal hieroglyphs shot out in lines diagonally to the man's palm and a powerful sandstorm picked up. Once the Summoning Jutsu was complete the disruption of sand settled down again.

The man whom his friends called Mardith, the follower of Jashin, stood in front of Meiko covered in strange wooden armor which was covered with odd engravings and his helmet had even weirder ear wings whilst the entire helmet was shaped as a head of some ancient divinity.

"Wood? I thought Summoning Jutsu summons your contract ninja animal…" Meiko wondered examining the visual aspect of the armor that the man summoned.

"It can be used to summon a great lot of things: weapons, reinforcements of living people, also… Totems" the man explained as he removed a dagger that appeared more like the ritualistic daggers than ones used in actual combat.

"What's a Totem?" Meiko asked still quite captivated by the ancient and breathtaking engravings and craftsmanship of the armor that the man had summoned.

"Ancient objects, as old as the First People, each of them can be used as a summoning contract all by themselves. Each of them requires proof of one's abilities just like a ninja animal would, these ancient legendary structures have a mind of their own and each of them have different abilities sealed inside them by the First People. They are living relics of that time, almost like beacons meant for us to discover and explore by our ancestors" the man explained before taking a praying position, he stood tall while placing his hands together and against his chest while he closed his eyes and lowered his head.

"Seems a bit of an overkill to use to kill a blacksmith genin from Konoha…" Meiko smiled before taking a fighting stance herself.

"No. Using my true ability would be an overkill. I have no desire to kill you, our target is your friend. However I am a follower of a religion that demands utter and complete slaughter when its abilities are used. I am a follower of Jashin however Lord Jashin only demands death when his gifts are used in battle, that is why to beat you I do not plan to use any of Lord Jashin's Curse Ninjutsu, that forces my hand to use my Totem" the man answered leaping forward and winding up for a strike.

"Hmph, I can't let you kill Mana but… Thrashing such a gorgeous armor feels really wasteful…" the blacksmith complained trying to punch the armor but them she noticed that the man stopped in mid track and his knife stabbed right through the wood into his own thigh. Blood squirted out hitting the sands below and dyeing them crimson red.

"What the? Are you insane!?" Meiko yelled out but then a blue fist made out of pure chakra materialized out of thin air and backhand slapped her right in the jaw sending Meiko crashing into the buildings to the side. The crushing force of the armor blacked the girl out momentarily and demolished what little remained of the small shanty town, now the castle ruin was the only standing thing in the whole courtyard.

"This Totem is known as Merchant of Blood. Instead of my chakra it feeds on my injury and suffering, to put it into words you can understand – I "sell" any damage I take to it to manifest that energy it absorbs into living armor. In its sealed form it can only shape up something as cheap as that armor you peeled to shreds before, now that I actually summoned it… You stand no chance for you face the power of an artifact of the First People" the man spoke to Meiko's unconscious body that was lying somewhere in the ruins of the shanty town under piles of rubble. Had the man suspected that the young woman would've temporarily have blacked out he'd have spared himself the trouble of explaining his ability.

"Everyone! Listen to me! Please, run away! Flee into the castle!" Mana's desperate and tear ridden voice screamed out from atop of a small wall of a fallen building. Her fingernails bled profusely from her attempts to scale those walls the usual human way and her hands were completely dyed crimson and in the process of bleeding the girl dry. She had almost scratched her eyes out from sorrow of seeing her friends being one by one picked off by opponents vastly superior to them. She decided to take matters into her own hands.

"Run! Find the box! I have faith that you can do it! Ruuuuun…" Mana's plead was silenced by Kusagoro's elbow digging into her face breaking her face almost instantly even when the man completely diminished his chakra level and did his best to reduce his physical power to nothing. The man just appeared in front of her moving instantly through the entire battlefield, the blow to her face lifted the magician's body off the ground but she could still feel every tiniest ounce of the pain. Kusagoro's hand locked on a torn rag of clothes on her shoulder and pulled her up so that her body didn't fall down to where she could've slipped away.

"Your voice is annoying…" he quietly uttered so that only he and Mana could've heard it from way up the busted building. Mana kicked off of the man's chest, tearing the shoulder strap of her top off and leaped back, she landed on her knees down below busting both of them open as blood poured from her wounds. The magician pulled off her kunai firing weapon and aimed it at Kusagoro, the man leaped down and slowly started walking up to her.

"We know you can't mold chakra, what do you think this toy can do to hurt me?" the angered man shouted out.

"It's called automated explosive kunai firing mode…" Mana replied pulling a small switch with her ring finger that unleashed a flurry of kunai at the man, each of them bounced off his chest and then exploded in a moment after impact, one by one the endless barrage of explosions continued as the smoke cloud expanded to beyond even where Mana was standing. A strong arm grip locked around the girl's throat as the arm appeared from the smoke and lifted her up beginning to choke Mana out in seconds. Kusagoro didn't even take a scratch, he effortlessly broke the tool with his other free arm, still holding the girl the man leaped back onto the tall wreckage so that his comrades could hear him properly.

"Don't let them escape! She may have brainwashed those idiots into using the B.U.B. but that doesn't mean they can…" Kusagoro opened his mouth to order his folks around

"Sorry, dude, they're already gone… I think the blacksmith may have come around to her senses and stealthily dragged them to the castle by now…" Mardith's low pitched and shallow tone informed the squad leader.

"Fuck!" Kusagoro cussed and punched Mana in the gut and then dropping her body down on the rocks below.

"It would be beneficial if we didn't rough up the young lady's head any more than we did, lest the Hokage will fail to recognize her…" the Hyuuga informed the rest of her squad.

"I know, I know…" Kusagoro yelled out in rage as he suppressed all of his chakra again just so Mana's body didn't blow up into tiniest bits upon his punch. Angrily he dropped down to where she had fallen and started kicking her covering body until his fury ceased. Had he captured every single member of her team his odds of being reinstated back to his duties would've been greater, also he hated this girl on the most fundamental level for messing his son's head up so that he also was in all of this mess.

"You may want to just pull her head off and try catching up to that redhead in the castle…" Mardith yelled out, whether it was because of mercy for Mana's beaten and miserable state or because he actually only thought of capturing all the genin still remained a mystery.

"I would appreciate if we honored the last will of the young lady and spared her friends, I mean they were held hostage by their client's will, correct? We can just tell Hokage that she threatened them to bite off her tongue off if they didn't follow her lead and abused her position as a client they had to protect and ordered them to use the B.U.B. for themselves…" Gokibure complained, he was quite visibly feeling bad for how ruthlessly his leader had beaten up the kid.

"Ugh… She doesn't deserve it…" Kusagoro yelled out kicking the girl with less restraint sending her weightless body so that it hit another rocky wall of a collapsed building.

Mardith took his ritual blade and slit his wrists with it, a shining and flaming with blue flames sword made out of pure energy materialized in the air right above Mana's head. Mana grunted out, so weakly and so silently that only she could hear her own pitiful moans of pain. Was this the end? Her body felt so light and so weightless, it was like it didn't even belong to her, it was almost like she was but an apparition looking at her beaten and bruised bleeding body from above. She had some medical rations she took from the raider camp in her backpack, if only her body wasn't completely broken and she could've… The chakra sword swung down, a loud flesh cutting sound echoed through the plains as Mana closed her eyes ready to accept her demise.

A sound of a heavy head rolling on the rocks alerted everyone to the north, Kusagoro, Gokibure and Remashi both jumped in surprise to see that their comrade was now missing a head, Mardith's bald head was rolling down the shanty town ruins. The chakra sword he made vaporized into thin air as well as the Totem on his body. A rag wearing man stood behind him with a curved raider-style sword placed on his shoulder that was dripping with blood, the man had messy shoulder length black hair and only one working eye, the other being covered by a blood covered patch, the working eye was glowing red with strange black tomoe symbols on the eye – the infernal Sharingan of the Uchiha. Behind the man stood two women: a gorgeous looking woman in a white desert attire and a huge gourd on her back, her knee long black hair flowed freely in the desert wind unrestrained, and a little teenager girl with twin sheathed swords on her back and both functioning Sharingan eyes. Had it not been for the lack of the facial hair the young teen would've reminded a lot of the one-eyed man suggesting a blood bond of some sort.

"I've no fucking idea what's going on here but… I'll be having that Box of Ultimate Bliss now" the one-eyed Uchiha roughed out with a tired and serious tone.


	131. Will to Live

The situation that developed in front of Kusagoro would have never appeared nearly as odd as the expression on the man's face. He was just ambushed by some unidentified party of the Sand Village as the assailant showed no desire to hide that: the Sunagakure mark was present on the gourd of the beauty of the party, it was also on the center of the leader's eyepatch, the teen Uchiha in the group also wore the Sunagakure headband tied on her arm. And yet the suspended jounin of Konoha couldn't have looked more excited. Finally once the man recovered from the initial glee of seeing new opponents reveal themselves the mood of the man suddenly changed to worse as he turned at his comrades and coldly and lacking any emotion ordered them.

"Treat Mardith, kill all of them. I'm heading after the kids in the castle, we know now that we're looking for a box of some sort" Kusagoro cut down in a commanding tone and slowly started walking towards the ruins.

"Yeah, not gonna happen!" the one-eyed Uchiha leapt forward swinging his sword at the leader of the Konohagakure group when the Hyuuga lady leapt into the air, Remashi's eyes were wide open with veins around them being shot out creepily with her white irises of the Byakugan being as clear as ever.

"Eight Trigrams Palms Revolving Heaven!" she yelled out as the woman's body spun creating a violent bright blue sphere of energy that blasted the Uchiha assailant away, the man was caught in a hand-shaped mass of glowing sand that shot from the gourd of the woman that followed him. Gently the mass placed the man on the ground.

"Be careful, husband, these people appear to be stronger than your useless sister reported. These are no genin…" the woman said slipping back her sleeves to make arm movements faster and more comfortable for her in the upcoming battle. Once Remashi's sphere of chakra ceased to spin and the woman landed Kusagoro was nowhere to be seen, he had used the commotion as an opening to slip away. Now it was just two against three of the Sand.

"Choke on dicks! I'm not responsible for everything going on in Konoha you ingrate bitch!" the teen got unreasonably angry for the insult thrown her way, it didn't appear that the two family member were on the greatest of terms.

"That's why I have you here, Regalia, it's your job to watch over my back when I get reckless" the one-eyed leader of the group stretched his body out and pulled a second curved blade from his sheathe. The swords that the man wielded were much more detailed and of much finer quality, had Meiko had the ability to feast her eyes on them she'd have most definitely taken a moment to admire the fine craftsmanship of these tools of murder.

"Are you quite done yet, Gokibure?" Remashi turned at her teammate seeing a whirlwind of cockroaches bringing her teammate safely to their beheaded teammate. Once Gokibure reached his goal the man picked up the separated head and placed it closer to the beheaded lifeless body. As consciousness returned to Mana's head overflowing her senses with crippling pain the girl observed closely as to what exactly this man would do – something that could've reversed death interested the magician greatly as preventing meaningless death was her lifelong dream after all.

"Nano-roach Style: Fix!" the man mumbled as green light emanated from the corpse, the skin from the edges of the head stuck together in a grotesque manner as a loud steely scratching sound started covering the area. Just mere seconds later Mardith stood back up on his feet and cracked his reattached head around.

"I seem to have been caught unprepared…" the gentle giant apologized to his friend.

"Don't sweat it, old pal, that's why I placed my nano-roaches into your bloodstream, right? To fix you up with your insane self-stabbing style when you need it…" the cockroach wielding Aburame bowed his head playfully as if he was greeting a lady. He appeared to be quite proud of this ability that his insects possessed, Mana felt her forehead and realized that while she was having an insane fever she couldn't have been dreaming as everyone fighting Kusagoro's team was as surprised as she was.

"He's an Aburame who has reached nano-insect level of clan ninjutsu mastery, be careful with that guy" the one-eyed Uchiha warned his team clearly frustrated that the odds were evened.

"Interesting, it appears that he has placed nano-insects within that man's body specifically, must have something to do with his fighting style, there'd be no way he'd be able to sustain several bodies worth of nano-insects though, right?" the gourd wielding woman observed.

"Yeah, they seem to grant some passive form of regeneration, they must be on the lookout for injuries which they try to fix once they find one, with that Aburame being able to kick it to overtime with a jutsu. It'd be beneficial if we took out the roach-man first" the one-eyed man nodded.

"Kay, I'll kill him for you, bro" the teen smiled and charged forward swinging her twin blades at Gokibure.

"I'll take care of the Hyuuga woman, as someone who uses great deal of chakra flow in your techniques you'd be greatly inconvenienced by her chakra network closing fighting style" the leader declared before roaring proudly and leaping into the fray swinging his swords that lit up with chakra infused glow.

"Very well, then… Dear Jiou, I shall kill for a chance of our freedom from our demonic pursuer as well" the older woman swung her arm carelessly as the glowy golden sand from her gourd flooded in a crashing wave towards Mardith, intending to crush the life out of the man once again right after his life was restarted again.

Mana grunted, this was her chance, if only she could've managed to stand up and… The girl tried to wriggle around but she couldn't, it hurt far too much to try and move. The magician lifted her arm and tried to force her body back on her feet, angrily she tried to push herself off the bloody ground but couldn't. Disappointed in her own strength the genin just looked at her blood covered hand as her vision blurred in and out. For moments it appeared like she passed out only to regain her vision again.

The girl knew that these Sunagakure people would just rush into the castle once they're done, so would Kusagoro's squad. Then again, if Kusagoro's squad won they'd surely make sure that she was dead, they wished to claim her head, didn't they? Such a cruel and unnecessarily brutal custom of the past, to cut off the head of a traitor or a ninja of another village that a ninja defeats. Mana didn't know that it was still practiced, at least not in Konoha, it was made famous by the Seven Swords of the Mist who were operating in Kirigakure. Why such a pointlessly gruesome custom would become so famous was beyond her.

The girl thought about it for a moment, imagining once again that feeling of being helpless and completely overpowered. That feeling when her life belonged to her enemy, when that sword hung above her head ready to cleave it off and end her. At those final moments the girl imagined her head being handed to the Hokage, the magician knew that Hanasaku would not tolerate such behavior, she'd discipline any Konoha ninja still engaging in this bloody tradition of the past but there would've been no use trying to tell these people that. Her head was welcome on any table since she was a ninja after all, even Sunagakure, a village protected by Konohagakure and the other great villages for a long time would probably still payout the bounty on her head, as insignificant as it may have been.

Some ninja in the countless history books Mana read claimed they felt proud when their enemies would've beheaded them. They felt some sort of pride knowing that their killer would receive a hefty bounty on their head, they felt pride knowing that they've caused enough trouble to someone that they were ready to drown their killer in ryo coins. To give them such excessive bounties that one could've literally retired and lived in luxury after killing a single jounin and cashed them in. Mana felt none of that pride. Maybe it was because she wasn't that important in the end, the bounty on her head would barely even pay for her slayer's dinner. As a nameless nobody genin nobody cared much if she lived or died but were ready to reward for her death just because this was the world that rewarded such brutality. Such was the custom.

No. It wasn't because of just lack of pride in causing enough trouble. When the girl imagined her head rolling on the Hokage's table and then the woman yelling at the ninja bringing that to her, even after the explanation that the girl planned on using the Box for herself and lie that it wasn't there, even after the lies that she forced her will on her team threatening to bite her tongue off if they didn't comply. Even after all that the Hokage would've still suspended or outright discharged everyone involved in this brutal murder. Then she'd have had to inform her parents and eventually the news would reach everyone in the village. That was what Mana was afraid of the most.

She wasn't a popular girl, she wasn't chased after by many boys and while she did qualify as a popular entertainer she still wasn't sure if she was worth an honorable burial for just what she had done so far. She dreaded the idea of her parents witnessing the head of their daughter and she was ready to fight her hardest to prevent that from happening. Her parents were amazing people who didn't deserve to experience something, even dirtbag parents didn't deserve anything of the sort. And even when Mana was completely sure that no one in the world would give two fingers to pee on if she died, she still would've refused to give up just because she loved those few people who would have cared. Even more so, she wanted to stand back up on her feet because she wanted to live!

Yeah, lately Mana had been wondering about that a lot. Ever since she lost her gift of chakra manipulation she felt down, she felt useless, she felt miserable and she didn't really see the point of her rebirth. After all, her lifelong dream was to be who she was before her "death". If her gift was taken, technically the responsibility to protect everyone was supposed to be gone too but it never felt like that, despite gifts being able to be lost with a snap of one's finger, responsibilities were much more difficult to shake off. Mana wanted her gifts back and for that she had to live. She was no one important and in order to become someone important, someone people would look up to if they wanted to change the world around them to a world where life mattered she needed to stay alive. Mana wanted the world to change which meant she wanted to stay alive, she wanted to see life being treasured which meant that by extension she had to live to achieve that dream. She wanted to live!

Deafening barrage of clashes echoed through the field, gusts of sand picked up blasting straight at the ruined shanty town, gusts so powerful that they shifted the rocky ruins around. With every clashing blow of the two sides of ninja craters as far as hundreds of meters deep opened up and these clashing sides barely even meant it. Mana flipped over on her front and coughed up some blood. Her hand reached to the back pocket where the food pill they looted off of the raider camp was supposed to be in. She placed the black pill in her mouth waiting for it to restore her dormant and useless chakra and immediately treat her injuries. The medical food pill was supposed to be able to do that, the magician waited and waited and waited. The pill was a fake…

"When will I ever learn… Nothing comes easy, what I wish can't just be handed to me. It has to be earned!" Mana grunted to herself, for a moment she felt horrified by just how miserable her weak voice sounded. Just how badly was she beaten? Mana slipped her arms beneath her weakened body and tried to push herself off the rocky edges that slipped into her battered body, going through her beaten skin and spilling blood from closed up wounds all over their clay surface as they cut into her flesh.

"Come on, you asked for everyone to flee, at least have enough decency to gather them back together, they need you…" Mana whispered to herself before slipping up and slamming back on the sharp edge she was stuck on. She heard blood dripping somewhere even lower below in a hole dug up by one of those destructive techniques that decimated the courtyard. She looked at her pale hand, her vision was blurry also the whole head of the magician was spinning.

"They don't need you. They're all so amazing, they're all pushing the boundaries of what it means to be ninja, you're just laying around waiting to catch your death… No one needs you…" Mana whispered to herself, then suddenly from deep inside she felt anger burning up. Not at the world because it didn't need her, at herself because she wasn't good enough to be needed. No one needed dead weight. Mana lifted her lifeless frame off the ground, one moment her eyes looked at the couple of puddles of blood below her, the next one it stared into the distance where countless invisible blast waves rustled her sticky hair every couple of seconds. There were so many explosions and blasts going off there, there was some huge battle going on and she couldn't see any of it…

Suddenly a figure flashed in front of her. It was one of the Uchiha assailants, the one-eyed one. "Stay here, you will lead us to the Box" the man ordered her. Mana spat in his face, she was surprised to see blood come out from her mouth, she must've been pretty banged up. The magician felt a shock, the man must've struck her down carefully so that he didn't kill her and so she was back where she started from.

The girl giggled, she felt blood budging from her gut and running down the edge of her lips before dripping beside her. "The enemy needs me, at least…" she couldn't stop laughing even if her entire body shook as she did so. Suddenly the girl felt some relief, she wasn't sure if the fake pill she just ate was at least somewhat medical in its nature or if her laughter eased up her pain somehow. Mana got back on her feet and looked over at a small corridor of ruins stacking a small tunnel which lead straight into one of the entrances to the ruins.

"Everyone hates me, Shimo and Sugemi must hate me for who I am, for what I choose to be. My enemies hate me because they need me for their goals to be fulfilled, Meiko and Kouta must hate me because I couldn't properly lead them after taking that responsibility, I lead them straight into a beating and almost dying… A beating for which I am fully responsible both as a leader and the person who inspired the reason for this battle. I'm sure once this fever passes I'll feel horrible about myself…" Mana thought for a moment, every negative thought, every self-bashing word fueling each painful step forward.

"Goddamn stairs, why did it have to be stairs!?" Mana yelled out grabbing her injured chest after being brave enough to shout out. Both squads appeared to be overly engaged in their battle to care about her slipping away. The magician's body gave in and fell right onto the stairs, she cracked her head at one of them but then quickly picked herself up and started climbing. Her bleeding fingers and nails from before opened back up. At least that fake pill she ate kept her from dying, now she could punish herself again by trying to not mess everything up again.

Mana's curious blood covered face peeked inside the room she ended up in. She was officially inside the castle's entrance. The girl looked below her, she happened to end up on the upper floors balcony which was busted up and could've sent her tumbling down into an abyss at any time. The girl screamed out in fear when the castle shook up. Its very foundation shifted around, rubble started falling splitting off of the ceiling, Mana looked closer at the dark ruined hall below. It had a bunch of columns that could've been used for climbing if she felt suicidal enough to attempt it. There were multiple holes in the ceiling so this suicidal climb could've allowed her to reach the upper floors. Kusagoro mentioned some traps but Mana doubted if any of them could even be functioning at this moment in time, centuries away from when this castle was last used by a living being.

The magician got back on her feet again, she tore a sizable piece of cloth off of her white torn up top and tied it around her head where the only currently bleeding wound was – the one she got from bumping her head into the stairs. The girl then tore one half of her trousers off and made a cloth for a climb up the pillars. There was no way she could've done it without a little aid from the laws of physics. She had to use parts of her jeans as a climbing aid and still it would hurt like nothing she experienced lately as most of her bones were being halfway treated by that fake medical pill. Mana knew the pain of bone treatment and she was going through it all but in the slowest rate imaginable.

"Okay, world's worst squad leader… Here's what you're gonna do, you're gonna run up this balcony, kick off the edge and grab that column right there, then before you tumble down to your death you're gonna wrap your legs around it and this cloth around it to use for climbing instead of your useless weakling arms, okay?" Mana asked herself as if she was someone she could talk to. She just wanted confirmation that she was about to do something really crazy while under effect of some behind the counter forged food pill.

"Yeah, sure, it's gonna be the best idea ever…" the girl answered herself in a different voice as if her mind contained multiple people. "We're great at climbing, it's not like we ever failed tree climbing in the Academy or anything…" Mana mumbled out before bolting forward and kicking off the ledge only for it to fall beneath her feet sending the girl down just inches from the pillar. The magician's instincts kicked in almost instantly, still with her cracking with pain bones she swung the denim strip forward and tied it around the column pulling herself in only to grab the pillar half way and cry out in pain as her lower body hit the rocky surface of the column in a way that reminded a crash more than wrapping it around as she intended it.

"I hate you… I hate you, you're the goddamn worst!" Mana screamed out at herself nearly bursting into tears from the pain of bashing her body against the rock. Pain like this used to be nothing. Had she had her gift back her body would've just hardened itself instinctually with little to no pain, she wouldn't have even felt a dip in chakra from something as miniscule as that…

A loud rumbling suggested the girl that the column she landed on may not have been as solid as it looked from the side. Mana's instincts instantly switched from self-pity and self-bashing to moving, the magician quickly turned around the pillar and kicked off of it grabbing a curtain that was hanging from another balcony to the right of the pillar she jumped to. Right after her body left the pillar the entire rocky structure collapsed into a black abyss below. Mana sighed…

"Holy shit, curtain, what the hell are you made off…" she joked about the toughness of the curtain that was somehow holding her weight despite the fact that it was several centuries old. Mana slowly started scaling the cloth to catch a breath on the balcony she leaped up to. After reaching the end the girl tried to pull the curtain off but the blasted thing held firm, it would've taken a knife to cut this thing and even then it would've been a real struggle to do it. This cloth was really impressive!

"Okay, so this was a good start, let's see about this column…" Mana spoke to herself again bracing for another jump, first she leapt several balconies further leaping over several meters away with each balcony, catching her breath only to leap further before she could even reach the column. Once she reached the central balcony of the hall the magician prepared for the jump before looking back, there was a huge hole in the back of the wall and once the girl peeked outside she saw that there was a gap for her to climb out through and scale up the rocky surface to the next floor instead of trying her luck with that huge jump and the unstable structures again.

"Sorry, Mr. Pillar but your brother was kind of a dick…" Mana smiled before leaning outside as the cruel desert winds bashing sand into her face made her regret the decision to move out almost instantly. Still, grabbing hold of several gaps Mana managed to slip out and start crawling the wall. The genin saw several more cracks, maybe one of those lead her to somewhere she could've found the rest of her team in. For a moment the magician wondered if she even wanted that, if she really wanted to see her team again. After all, it was because of her that they got beaten up like that. She caused Kusagoro's team to attack them and then she wasn't a good enough leader to somehow help them overcome that impossible gap in skill and power.

"Well, want it or not, you've got nothing better to do, it's either that or falling down and bashing your brains all over the rocks below so… Not much of a choice…" the magician spoke to herself again reaching up for another rock and pulling her aching body up before letting it roll inside a large hole several floors higher. She may not have wanted to get inside that hole like that but her fingers were bleeding and really slippy from the combination of the wind pushing her off the rocky surface and her own blood making the climb tougher than it had to be.

Mana hyperventilated for a while down on the rocky floor of the room she landed in after a small tumble down the ruins. "It's okay, no pain will break me worse than my pride is broken at the moment…" once again the magician tried to lift her own mood up and peel her body off the ground. Before she moved on to another room the girl decided to first check the one she ended up in out. She could've used a breather before deciding to crawl back out and try to climb the rocky wall outside bashed around by the winds up here or try and find an actual staircase this time.

The room she was in appeared to be a dining hall of some sort, with the wooden table included and some strange pictures on the wall depicting someone impossible to identify. The paper was in such a bad condition that the pictures looked like someone spilled the paint all over them with random colors covering the whole thing.

"Yeah, no one is going to hide the box in a dining room, move on!" Mana ordered herself as she flung her body forward rushing up a spiraling staircase. At this point she was just wandering around the place aimlessly. She needed some more planning in her quest.

"This is the Settlement Period, any treasure worth hiding would be kept in a treasure room hidden in the throne room. That means I have to find the throne room first, then figure out where the treasure room is and how to access it… Easy…" Mana realized before looking around any clues in these barely functional ruins that may have tipped her off to the location of the ruins. There was no use in wandering around looking for her friends, they could've been anywhere and running into them would've been a matter of luck, finding the Box was actually a bit more orderly and Mana could've also tried to plan out her attempt at using the Box as a bargaining chip with literally everyone trying to kill her at that moment in time.

Purpose and hope was once again back in Mana's busted up little heart. She was finally doing something that made at least a little bit of sense which felt refreshing after having the tables flipped over like that with the metaphorical dinner being smashed all over her face in the process…


	132. Inquisition of the Wicked

All of the fighting transpiring around the castle ruins seemed to pick up a raging whirlwind of violent desert winds. In their storming rage these winds tossed weighty masses of sand bashing them against the bodies of anyone silly enough to stay outside during this windstorm. That being said, the rage of the forces of nature did not yet reach the overwhelming level of a sandstorm that blew one off their feet and buried them in sand however it was approaching that point quite soon. In just fifteen minutes the entire shanty town would be covered up with sand, together with the main entrance to the castle which would've made anyone need to look for an alternate entrance.

"Kunoichi of Sunagakure, you have incurred my wrath for beheading me, I shall fight with full intent of killing you..." Mardith's voice thundered outmatching even the mightiest wind of this windstorm. An impressive feat having very much to do with how powerful the man's lungs were. The gentle giant reached towards his back pocket pulling out a much larger black rod with a very pointy tip.

For a skilled weapon expert it would've been quite difficult to discern as to what purpose such a peculiar tool would've served: it had no handle so it couldn't have been comfortable for swordfighting, on the other hand it had a pointy end so it had to be some sort of weapon, it had no sharp edges meaning it was purely a stabbing tool however the material didn't look too tough and firm to risk close distance approach without having the weapon break down.

"Oh, you're one of those..." the woman in front of him nonchalantly remarked without an effort to be heard. Unseen several glowing sand grains slipped out from her gourd mixing into the endless swarm of grains within the picking up sandstorm. The woman closed her eyes and smiled. She saw everything wherever her glowing and overflowing with chakra sand grains got carried by these violent desert winds, they also had incredible uses of their own. Even as they spoke her opponent had her sand slipping into his nose, his skin, his mouth, his eyes, his ears... Everywhere whether he was aware of the crevice's existence or not. She was well aware of her opponent's strengths and weaknesses due to her personal history with his kind.

"Die, kunoichi of the Sand!" Mardith yelled out tossing his ritual dagger at the woman, even with her eyes closed the bombshell beauty of the Sand Village leaned to the side avoiding the straightforward projectile as it whizzed rustling her black as night hair. The woman's blood red make up which covered her eyelids made her closed eyes appear almost demonic in nature, almost like a bloody eyed beast was observing her opponent from the cover of the picking up sandstorm.

Unnoticed by the woman, Mardith's fingers twitched as a steel wire pulled the dagger back, the beauty of Sunagakure whose name was revealed by her husband to be Regalia ducked, almost like she knew where the dagger was coming from. The gentle giant who was desperately trying to kill her waved his arm around, not without skill or finesse, his movements were trained, well taught to draw blood as the ritual dagger moved to the right and to the left to the woman's location. Perhaps even more impressive than the man's coordinated assault was Regalia's impressive skill in evading the knife.

The ritualistic dagger was small, it was moving at an incredibly deceptive and untraditional manner. Even so, Regalia leaned to the side, jumped up and ducked down, stepped wherever it was more beneficial for her to go to avoid the attack perfectly. Finally the giant pulled the knife back to his hand and grabbed it by the grip.

"Impressive, you did not strike me as a physical type and yet you perfectly evaded my attack even with that weight on your back. I cannot mark you for my Curse Technique at all despite my flash speed overwhelming offense..." the man commended his opponent as the woman deserved all the praise being able to move so swiftly, so deceptively with that heavy gourd on her back.

"I am not a physical type ninja. It is simply because of my ability to see forward in time that I avoid your techniques. I see forward where they will cut me and so I avoid the strike..." the woman smiled playfully tipping the ends of her desert coat while she bowed to her opponent.

"That is impossible, ninja cannot possibly control time, not without achieving fame and great status..." Mardith's eyes angrily squinted at his opponent, he didn't believe the woman's words for a second.

"The sand I hold in my gourd is very special. It is infused with chakra just like it is for anyone in the famous Sabaku clan, mine however possesses the ability to bend time and space, which includes the ability to alert me of the events set in stone to transpire..." Regalia continued to explain while her opponent took his fighting stance.

"Prove it to me then, woman. Prove it to me that your Sand Release has the ability to control time, manage to defeat me without being cut once!" the man yelled out through the raging sandstorm as his flowing chakra split the winds apart sending a shockwave the woman's way.

"I very much intend to..." the woman informed leaping forward and waving her arms, sending a crushing mass of sand the man's way. Mardith's hand shot to the side, his ritualistic dagger cut into the sand and the man pulled at the string that held it flinging his entire body to the side to avoid the crushing tsunami of sand sent his way, once Mardith reached the dagger he retrieved it by gripping its handle and pulling it from the sand.

"Did you not know I would do that?" Mardith taunted the woman.

"I did know that..." she smiled, her dyed crimson lips were clearly visible through the murky background surrounding the two.

"You're a joke, a woman clinging to her lies!" Mardith tossed his knife at the woman, Regalia leaned to the side, her arm grabbed the knife in mid-air and pointed it at the giant.

"If I didn't read the passage of time, how could I have grabbed this in such terrible air condition with no weaponry training?" she taunted the man but Mardith's heart freezing laughter cut Regalia off.

"You foolish wench! Curse Technique: Strangling Noose!" Mardith yelled out as Regalia's bloody crimson dyed lips soon shot wide open and paled before turning blue and somewhat purplish. Mardith raised his arm and clenched it into a fist, almost as if his grip actually strangled the woman in front of him and what was the most gruesome – it worked. Regalia just pathetically tried to catch any actual oxygen but her neck extended upwards and black marks started covering it almost like she was being hung.

"Had you actually had the ability to see into the timeline you'd have known that the followers of Jashin – Jashinists possess the Curse Technique that is initiated when the opponent grabs an object of theirs. That is how the ritual is started. Do not fret, it'd take twenty grueling minutes for you to choke before you actually died, only for five of them would you be unconscious, I fully intend to kill you much faster than that..." Mardith rumbled out pulling his ritualistic dagger back to his hand and then tossing it right at the woman. The dagger cut her right in the cheek despite the strangling Curse jutsu ceasing when the knife left her possession. The woman had just so little air that her first instinct was to clench her throat and cough profusely which lead to her being cut.

Mardith licked the blood off of the knife and playfully toyed with the long black rod in his hand. "If you didn't lie about your experience with the followers of Jashin, you'll know what comes next... I would wish for us to take our time and properly fulfil the ritual but I will have to go for the short version – I am in a rush to find this Box" he explained as the man thrust the rod through his own stomach spilling extensive amounts of blood over the sand, using his bare foot Mardith dragged the bloody sand into the Jashin symbol of a triangle surrounded by a circle as his skin turned black with white skeletal motif markings all over his body. The Totem armor crumbled off of him as if it rot instantly. Truthfully it was merely released as it was no longer needed.

Regalia finally recovered from her injury, she weaved a hand seal as a perfect copy of her appeared from the sandstorm being composed entirely of her glowing golden sand and dashed off into the distance. Further away her clone landed close to her husband and whispered to his ear – "The Konoha girl is getting away, I've placed sand grains inside her so I can feel her and track her but she may get out of range if she tries to flee instead of looking for the box – scare her a little so that she hurries to the Box's location, beloved". After delivering the message the clone dissolved into miniscule particles of sand and mixed into the messy sandstorm.

"Whatever tricks you try now, woman, they shall be ineffective, let us share the pain on our final journey to Lord Jashin, only as I possess the nano-roaches in my bloodstream I shall be brought back whereas you shall die for good. Sharing pain with your enemy is truly the best... Curse Technique: Death Controlling Possessed Blood!" Mardith screamed out in glee as he stabbed himself through the heart using the long stabbing rod. Regalia gasped in surprise as all the damage that Mardith took was transferred to her body as well. She tore off her desert coat and looked at her crimson dress which did not properly portray the bleeding injury she took, only due to its soaking appearance could she see that she was bleeding from her heart before the painful shock claimed her life and the woman collapsed dead together with her opponent.

Fifteen years ago, a young family in the Land of Tea was preparing to go to sleep. The young girl, the daughter of the family, instead was more hyped about her positive result from the Academy tests. She spent two years in a ninja student exchange program between Konohagakure the jurisdiction of which Land of Tea belonged to and Sunagakure which was very beneficial to the girl who was of the Sunagakure native Sabaku clan capable of infusing their chakra into the grains of sand.

The girl just couldn't sleep as hours passed and the night grew more mature. Close to the hours of early morning the young one heard yelling voices reminding of the voices of shrieking teenagers. Slightly curious she looked outside seeing a bunch of black wearing gothic looking bunch wandering around. These weird folk reminded her of those strange tales that her parents told her. Apparently while she was gone a new cult was being born within her beloved native village, some sadistic people started killing victims while also maiming themselves, inflicting wounds upon their victims while wounding themselves the same way.

It would've been just an ordinary gang of cultists had they not attracted the attention of some strange ninja who helped these people adapt their MOs into actual ninjutsu techniques that the bunch called "Curse Techniques". Father was quite intimidated by those stories and begged for the young Regalia to stay home after the late hours as these "Jashinists" as they called themselves were not above sacrificing children to their sick bloodlusted God. Regalia observed in utter horror as the cloaked figures started kicking the doors down in the neighborhood and rushing inside, two or three at a time.

The girl ran down, she wanted to warn her parents of what was going on, ask her father to push something firm to the door but when she reached the staircase she saw a breathtaking sight – the door was already down and cloaked men with dark colored faces with white skeletal markings were rushing in. Her father was struck down instantly with a single cleave of a large scythe that one of these men wielded. Another man attacked her mother tearing her clothes off and cutting her above her breasts. Regalia leaped forward to help but a powerful kick sent her flying back to her room as a third assailant sneaked up to her.

The man raised his black axe and swung it right close to the girl's gut nearly disemboweling her but leaving a wide gash. Regalia screamed in pain clutching her bleeding belly as the man then cleaved half of his own arm off sending blood gushing all over her and over her room floor. The man used Regalia's scared face to paint the cult's symbol all over the floor and then the girl heard it – her mother's agonizing scream being silenced by death's embrace. These people killed her mother and her father... And she was going to be next...

No one knew what they wanted, they never showed fancy for anything less than slaughter, they left no one alive according to the stories and they had to be stopped. The Jashinist lifted his arm wielding a black rod ready to stab himself into the heart but then the hand of the little girl shot up in an open palmed position, sand seeped out from a gourd under her bed and enveloped the man in a large mass, making it impossible for him to move. She raised her hand into the air and the mass followed, moving the man outside his drawn circle.

"Sand Coffin..." she uttered with mad eyes, she couldn't believe what was happening, her mother was desecrated in front of her own eyes and her parents were just murdered, her own gut sliced open and she was slowly bleeding out...

"Fuck... Cunt... Kill you... Slaughter... Lord Jashin will be pleased... Pain... So much pain!" the delirious cultist screamed out in pain and utter madness licking his own blood covered lips.

"Jashinist... You destroyed my life, I'll kill you now for what you've done, you and your friends, all of them!" the maddened girl screamed in all of her pain and tears ridden voice as she clenched her open fist up.

"Sand Burial!" the mass crushed the man into a blood raining mass of crushed flesh and bones.

Slowly the girl made her way downstairs, one of the Jashinist scum rushed at her but her arm instinctively shot to the side with the sand bashing the man's head to the wall and splattering the contents of the man's head all over it.

"Biiiitch!" another one screamed in mad fury but sand covered his wrists and the lower parts of his legs, Regalia's blood covered face turned at him, her smiling face screaming for suffering of these men looked him into the eyes. She opened her arms as if she was preparing for a victorious hug as the sand strands tore the final Jashinist to pieces. Only then did poor Regalia notice the golden glow in her sand, what was this strange technique? The girl stumbled outside looking at the madness that was transpiring. People were screaming inside their homes, once in a while blood splattered on the windows or human corpses were flung through the doors busting them open.

"Jashinists... I will kill you all..." the girl deliriously mumbled as she was bleeding out on the porch of her home. She fell down on her knees when she felt a gentle tap on her shoulder. She turned and saw the most civilized yet most intimidating man she had ever seen, a man surrounded by a black shroud of mystery with only his red glowing eyes being visible. As she was being touched the girl screamed, it wasn't that she was hurt by that touch, no, it felt strangely... Soothing. But she felt her chakra being ripped from her body, almost like the man tore his hand into her innards and pulled chakra out of her despite only touching her shoulder.

"You wish to kill these men plaguing your village? Their chakras are bland and disgusting, yours however... That golden aftertaste... Yes... Most savory meal I've ever had, no, just an appetizer..." the man mumbled to himself as the shroud finally disappeared and the three meter tall figure of the man became apparent, his ravenous black hair, his pale skin and those... Crimson eye-gouging scary eyes!

"I'll let you do whatever you want, just kill them all!" Regalia demanded as her lifeless body fell down on her front she looked up at the man's well maintained shoes and formal attire. He buttoned his jacket and fixed his bowtie.

"Very well, I shall smash them all to bloody bits and then... Taste some more of you... But I won't kill you, no, a delicacy like you must stay alive and feed me again and again. We're bonded now, Regalia, I shall find you wherever you go, I am faster and stronger than you. I am your natural predator and I find you irresistibly tasty. However you're so tasty that eating you before you become boring would be sinful, I'll take more and more every day from you, leaving you just enough chakra to live..."

"Shut up and kill them all, whatever you do with me later doesn't matter!" the dying young woman screamed out.

Moments later the Land of Tea was filled with screams, whatever the Jashinists did was messed up, whatever this Leech did to them was infinitely worse. Regalia was lucky to not have seen what happened to them, the surviving villagers would later treat her and call her a hero for her actions, they'd say she did whatever she did to the Jashinists but... They'd remember those torn, bashed and mangled corpses. They'd never look at her the same way again forcing the girl to leave her home to the only place she could call home – Sunagakure, the place where she was exchanged to as Academy Student, the place she met friends at. The place where HE was not, at least not yet...

Regalia's body stood in front of the suicidal Jashinist. She looked at the deceased Mardith from above. Genjutsu was a powerful tool, illusions to make her opponent believe whatever she wanted them to believe: that she could control time, that she could reverse it, that she could read it. And all it took was a simple slip of some sand grains infused with chakra to enter the man's nose, eyes or mouth. How easy was it to pull in the middle of a sandstorm? Too easy...

"Jashinist... There will be no return for you..." she uttered closing her eyes and feeling billions if not more of small roaches swarming in the man's central heart area, trying desperately to fix it, begging for the Aburame clan's technique to kick them into overcharge to resurrect the man shortly after his death.

The man believed that Regalia dodged his attacks, he believed that she was stupid enough to get cut when facing one of his kind. He believed he initiated the ritual when in reality he only stabbed himself in the heart and died like an idiot he was for accepting Jashin as his God. Foolish sadistic men of religion had no right to exist in this world. This plague of death and suffering had to end, preferably by Regalia's own hand.

Regalia spun two fingers raised above her head. Violent vortex of golden sand formed around her before she aimed her two fingers at the man, the sand crackled with lightning as the chakra infused sand grains rubbing together produced friction and thusly released the energy in the shape of a lightning technique that would've fried the nano-insects in the man's body.

"Sand Release: Eye of the Storm!" she triumphantly declared as the wave of golden sand slammed into the dead Jashinist the weight splattered his body into a mass of blood and broken bones where the lightning fried not only what remained but also the nano-insects inside him.

Regalia, the Illusionary Queen of Time killed another Jashinist that day...


	133. Getting Up

Pain was a poor companion for someone who had just woken up after being briefly knocked out. Yet it was the first one to greet Kouta as the young man's consciousness returned to him. The medical ninja felt a little bit of shame, even against an opponent like his father he expected to do more, he expected to buy his friends more time. He wasn't sure about what had happened but he was surprised to say the least to wake up inside a briefly lit ancient stone room. The tiles below him, ravaged by time, made for a poor pillow forcing the young man to sit up and look around him.

Shimo was resting nearby, he didn't look too bad but his arm and leg was bleeding out and gruesomely broken and were very amateurishly patched. Without asking too many questions the boy stood up and staggered up to his friend, removing the bandages and getting to work. He was drained after punching his father, he put all of his heart, all of his chakra and all of his feelings into that fist. Any lesser man would've been flung into beyond the farthest layers of skies but his father snapped right out of it. Even with the crazy Juugo bloodline combined with the medical ninja's enhanced strength, Kouta was still too weak.

Thundering bumps sending dust and pebbles down the ceiling onto the boys' heads made Kouta jump up in surprise and fear.

"It's Meiko, Mana bought us time by revealing herself, Meiko had to leave her behind to save us. She's not taking that well…" Shimo explained grunting in pain as Kouta was examining his broken bones.

"Well, these injuries can be treated, these blows were weak but precise, they didn't cause too gruesome and irreparable bone damage but they merely stroke at the tension points making the bones snap. Remashi-san is a very gentle and pinpoint fighter, had she been rougher your bones would have been beyond my ability to fix without Mystical Palm technique which I am too drained to use right now" Kouta explained trying to move the subject past Mana.

He felt ashamed about the whole situation. He didn't know what happened, all he remembered was him doing his best and getting knocked out by father's blast, one of his weaker ones too, one used to blow up buildings or bust barriers, one with more bang and concussive force than actual killing power. From what he could put together the rest were overpowered too, that only makes sense, father was a top tier Jounin after all with experience in the Konohagakure Black Ops called ANBU. All of his teammates were of similar level as well. They stood no chance from the start.

And yet loss was not what brought Kouta shame, it was that Mana was apparently the one to buy them time to escape. She was the weakest one and yet she flung herself head first to the jaws of death again. Father would've killed her if he had the chance, Kouta harbored no hopes of Mana's survival which started making him visibly distressed. Maybe even more torn inside than Meiko was, at least the blacksmith was expressing her rage whereas Kouta was allowing it to pile up.

"We have to keep moving…" Kouta said trying to move his thoughts away from his shame and his regret over Mana's apparent death. He knew exactly how lethal and ruthless his father was when he wanted to be, Shimo and Meiko may not have known and so they must've still believed that the girl was alive.

"Hey, hey, don't lose any tears over her. She's alive as long as she doesn't show that bastard where the Box is or explains what it is. Had they known about the box they'd have long since claimed it even before we came here. They needed us to explain what it is and tell them where it may be hidden" Shimo tried to calm his friend down, Kouta backed up and sat into the corner where he woke up in.

"That's a long shot, all that father cared about was killing Mana-chan for wishing to use the Box without the village's permission or without informing it. She's as good as done now…" the medical ninja mumbled out, he sounded like his mind was moving in closer and closer to snapping at any moment.

"Shut up!" Meiko's loud roar reached them from inside a large library further on. "Don't you think I feel shitty enough for leaving her behind?" more and more loud thuds and cracks reached the ears of the two injured genin laying by the crossroad between the library Meiko was in and nobody knew where.

"It's… Really bad…" Shimo lowered his head staring at the ruined castle floor.

"Wow, it's like you're a detective or something!" Meiko's angry reply came from the rampaging blacksmith as the floor of the library was starting to collapse but it didn't appear to even irk the girl at the slightest. The redhead continued to catch the giant stones as they fell on her head, pounding them with all of her strength using chakra enhancement to bust those giant stones to dust before they reached the ground.

"No, I mean… Meiko feels bad for leaving Mana behind, she really shouldn't, she had no other option. It was either leaving her to die or letting all of us die, it's surprising she even managed to pull our sorry asses out with her. Kouta feels bad because he couldn't beat up his father which is straight out ridiculous. He's whole leagues above our paygrade, there's no shame in losing to a guy like that. I'm the only one with a legitimate reason to feel bad about…" the swordsman scratched his bandaged forehead. Meiko must've bumped his head into somewhere while she was carrying him opening a wound on the back of his head which Kouta treated.

"What do you mean?" Meiko's face with a giant bump on her eye and a swollen jaw appeared from the library which completely collapsed once the blacksmith wasn't busting the stones to nothingness inside.

"Well… I actually didn't really feel bad about it when I woke up. That's the only legitimate reason to feel bad about. My friend probably died and had her head torn off and I… I didn't feel bad about it to begin with" Shimo spoke almost laughing out from how ridiculous he sounded. Meiko walked up to him and lifted his body off the ground by his collar.

"What do you mean, what do you mean you didn't feel bad about anything?" she uttered silently but with a hidden spark of threat brewing in her chest. Just one wrong word may have sent the blacksmith over the edge and forced her to splatter the swordsman's brain on the wall behind him with a well-placed punch.

"Well, when I was away, training and trying to realize who I actually was or what I wanted to be like… I always wanted to come back and see Mana again, not because of some specific reasons but because of the fun times I remembered having with her. I didn't chase her, who she was, I chased all those fun experiences and so when I did come back and see her again I expected more of the same. Then I saw that she didn't change one bit after I left, the worst part was that I did change. I became more like a rogue, whether I wanted it or not, I started to only be worried about what was there to gain in everything, always looking out for my own ass and asses of my friends…" Shimo started to talk, Meiko let his sorry body to slip out from her grasp and hit the rocky floor as the swordsman collapsed and kept on sitting. Kouta stood up and approached him too.

"Then I saw just what kind of person I became friends with all those years ago. Someone who couldn't have been more different from what a rogue was and she started to piss me off in all the wrong ways. She spat at survival, sometimes she even put our own lives in danger too but even when she did that she was always ready to die first, even when the threat was out of this world and someone none of us had any chance to beat. I thought I discovered part of who I was and then Mana showed me that she's an exact opposite of that. I saw a person who was the exact opposite of a rogue and I saw how miserable and in how much pain she was every time while doing it but… It made me confused again, confused about what a ninja is, confused about who I am. That whole year of self-discovery, all those injuries and all that training went down the drain. I no longer know who I am again and that's why I hated Mana for a while, hated my best friend for reminding me why I left but also for telling me that I haven't come a step closer to discovering who I am. She rubbed into my face how wrong I was… The only feature about her I liked was her selfishness, I thought maybe that's what we had in common, that's one step closer to me being a real ninja, a ninja with identity, someone who knows who he is…"

Kouta and Meiko continued to stand there in silence, the medical ninja moved back into the shade to try and hide his watery eyes whenever he thought about the teammate he thought he had lost. Meiko no longer felt bad about Shimo, it was almost like she realized what the swordsman was talking about and she started to feel bad for him.

"You see I always saw Mana like someone who knew exactly what she was and what she wanted and I wanted to be like that, I wanted to be like her. And so when I returned having discovered part of who I am and saw the real deal be everything but that… I tried to cling to the only parts of our character that matched – our selfishness. Part of me wants me to survive, that's just rogue programming, rogues always bolt and leave their friends behind. Mana also had some of that, she lead us all here just so she could regain her chakra control instead of living her life as a starlet stage magician? That's selfish as shit, right? Then she gambled our lives to save some mobsters and corrupt miners, just to feed her ambition and hero complex, that's selfish as shit too, right? Now when I saw her giving up her life for us… I no longer saw that selfishness, I no longer saw anything in common between me and her. I'm just a confused swordsman who became even more confused after trying to find himself. Mana lost her identity but she knew what it was, I never found one in the first place, I guess in the end, that's the only bond we ever shared…" finally Shimo sat there in silence, staring at the floor as his hair flowed over his sorry face.

Meiko was the first one to speak up. "You're right, I did think that maybe Mana just wanted the Box for herself, she just made up this whole story about me being nice to her and her wanting me to see it and hold it just so she could regain her gift and her identity in the process. It must've been painful for her to be so weak yet yearn to be strong, strong as a true hero. Then when I heard her plead for us to go on, when I heard that weak crying voice that begged us to survive and find the Box… No, she may have tried convincing herself that she was going to get her identity back and nothing more but, she told us that before ripping us off, right? She told us halfway, no, she told us from the very beginning, before we even got halfway through our journey and then she sacrificed herself to make this all possible. She wanted us to find that Box, she wanted me to hold it in my hands and see a legendary artifact just like she said, she wanted all the best for us because she had already given up on herself inside…"

That must've been the largest collection of words that Meiko had ever said, she usually didn't say much, mostly she just shrieked and acted like a fangirl over the strangest things but now she was so much different. She had a whole different side to her. Maybe it was because Mana saw that side right from the beginning, right when she met Meiko that the magician wanted her to hold that Box in her hands…

"Well then, what are we waiting for? Mana-chan sacrificed herself so that Meiko can have that Box. Our mission may be failed because our client is most likely… Dead but… Let's at the very least honor the reason and what she gave up her life for. Let's find that Box!" Kouta sneaked up to Shimo and extended his hand forward for the rogue swordsman.

"You said you didn't know who you wanted to be, you said you were confused and Mana was the person who showed you what a person with identity was, now you know who she really was, how she really felt and what she was willing to do for us. Does that not answer your question? Does that not clear out your confusion? The answer to your question was always lying within Mana's dream, you wanted an identity to strive for, Mana wanted to be a hero that people would strive to be more like. You told me that making ladies happy was one part of your identity once, I'm not sure how it changed but you defended Mana's honor even against someone like father. You have solid foundations to build your new identity on, identity isn't something you find, it's something you build. To build you need to stand up and move…" Kouta stroke his tears off with his wristband.

Shimo grabbed hold of Kouta's hand and stood up.

"Well, it seems I caught you at the wrong time…" Kusagoro's voice reached the three from behind them. "It just seems that luck isn't on your side, I just flashed around the place from bottom floor to the top and I happened to hear some ground shaking from around here"

Meiko scratched the back of her head with a silly apologetic grin as the boys looked at her annoyed, the girl's rampage through the library must've been what this man had picked up on.

"No, father, you've caught us just at the right time. Had you caught us a moment earlier you'd have found us in a broken state, now we've picked ourselves up and we will find that Box before you, we'll let Meiko hold it in her hands to honor Mana-chan's last wish and then we'll ask the Box to bring her back to life!" Kouta yelled out trusting his fist close to his father's face.

"I see, well then, I don't particularly mind if you do that, however I will still try to have some fun and stop you from doing that!" Kusagoro grinned angrily and winded up his fist playfully to smack his son. The ground beneath his feet trembled and the man flashed backwards to avoid tumbling into a black abyss together with the falling apart ruins.

Meiko laughed out as her sudden and incredibly powerful stomp was what caused the collapse of the floor. She stood on the other side, the one located at the other turn as opposed to one that lead to the thrashed library she wrecked before. Kouta was also moved there by Shimo who moved much slower yet still managed to pull his friend out in time. The Yuki then went through a couple of hand seals predicting the assault of Kusagoro to come soon, after all, the man moved too fast even for his ninja eyes to track, he may have been moving far faster than sound itself and if he was caught unprepared all three of them would get captured and incapacitated.

"Ice Style: Blue Screen!" the boy yelled out as a translucent blue screen erected in front of them covering the passage, now not only a large gap of collapsing floor covered the distance between Kusagoro and the three teens but also this strange barrier that the young swordsman had erected. Kusagoro only grinned. "You think your foolish barrier would stop me? Someone who busted through a Rashomon gate with a mere backhand slap?" the man gloated as he charged forward with a lazy and weak punch.

As Kusagoro's punch collided with the near invisible blue barrier a powerful chakra feedback fired off from it, the barrier broke down almost instantly but the blue shattered pieces gathered around Kusagoro and covered his body like armor, slowly the pieces started to evaporate into cold mist and soon the Konohagakure Jounin found himself completely encased in ice.

"Holy shit!" Meiko yelled out in surprise that Shimo actually had some more tricks up his sleeve.

"Yeah, it's an ace in the sleeve meant to be used for quick escapes in closed spaces, I wouldn't have been able to use it outside because the bug creep and the Hyuuga lady would've simply moved around it… Let's move, he's a Juugo so he probably expelled enough chakra from his pores to make an invisible force field around him, he's not frozen solid and he'll thaw out pretty soon, as soon as he deals with the absolute zero temperatures from inside…" Shimo explained as he turned to run further the ruined path, intending to follow it wherever it lead.

Meiko and Kouta nodded and followed the young man, the three ran on the walls and ceiling wherever the path had collapsed, they swung around flagpoles when their chakra ran out or they ran out of stamina, taking turns and shortcuts wherever they saw them just to put as much distance between them and the infernally powerful force chasing them. They were not yet aware of the irony how similar their troubles were compared to the Sunagakure party outside…

"I'm afraid we're playing into father's hands…" Kouta huffed as all the running was getting to his lungs and already crippled stamina.

"Yeah, he's having fun from this little chase and I've already seen how dangerous he is when he's having fun…" Shimo grunted pouting his face.

"Let's just hope that we'll find the Box soon or we won't run into any traps, this place is a real ruin, let's just hope that whatever traps it holds inside are just as broken…" Meiko worried over completely different things. She knew there was no stopping Kouta's father if he caught up to them, he would've likely already learned to deal with Shimo's barrier technique anyways…

"With our luck, I wouldn't bet on it…" Shimo cracked a small grin as the three kept on rushing wherever eyes lead them in coordination, following the main path until they found it too difficult to follow it.


	134. Gentleman's Oath

A young Uchiha grumped out with annoyance when a whole batch of shuriken bounced off the seemingly invincible wall of ninja cockroaches that her opponent put up. Normally one wouldn't have imagined cockroaches being the ideal insect to rely on defending themselves, they didn't even have wings like the usual Aburame chakra leeching insects, even with that natural shortcoming, however, the roaches managed to form structures like shield and insect waves by simply crawling on each other's backs. The teen Uchiha named Aisha let her hands flow through a bunch of hand seals before she let even a larger cloud of shuriken loose.

"Multi-Shuriken Jutsu!" she yelled out feeling a little strain as the number of shuriken she cloned out of the existing barrage was more than a usual genin could put up. Even with her extra effort put into the technique, the weapons simply bounced off the insect wall like the insects were made out of tougher steel.

"Hmph… You've got to be kidding me…" the young woman grunted and slapped her forehead with her palm, letting it stroke down a bunch of sweat off of it. This fight was straining her more than the young one was willing to admit and she still couldn't manage to find any holes in her opponent's invincible defense. Her only way out was to try and talk, stall the man for some time, try to change her approach.

"So… Roaches, huh? What made you wake up one day and make that decision? Cockroaches aren't the species of insects that Aburame are given at birth, the process of switching the species must've been grueling and could not have been worth the trouble…" Aisha smiled and stretched her tired muscles out, fighting this sandstorm was tough enough without having to worry about her opponent, some time off talking may have suited her well, especially when her opponent was doing nothing else but defending himself.

"Ninja-roaches are actually more majestic and godly than it would seem at first glance. Yes, the process of switching the usual Kidaichu for roaches was grueling, after all, the insects are resting inside one's skin, an Aburame member is a living nest for the insects so removing the ones I was given was not simple. Managing to maintain two species within my body was even tougher, the two were constantly at odds with each other which is why I chose to eventually deposit the nano-insects within Mardith's body" the Aburame member explained. Now that his insects were riled up they were crawling all over his bare chest and his face, his expensive looking hairdo was literally rustling around and looked like it was about to burst with insects swarming out of it.

"Cockroaches? Majestic? That's a fancy way of saying totally icky!" Aisha yelled out letting her tongue slip out in disgust. She had to admit that one of the most efficient parts of her opponent's defense was how those roaches frantically swarmed around the man's entire body making the teen rather hesitant to approach him in close distance as she was quite creeped out by those bugs and the potential disgusting abilities they may possess together with their indestructibility.

"No, you see, these insects seem casual and parasitic but… Once a member accepts the ninja-roaches and lets them nest inside their bodies, they teach their host a new thing about the origin of chakra and how it works, not directly, but just by observing them it grants them a revelation." The man smiled extending his hand forward and letting the insects swarm around his arm, he then swiped it to the side letting a whole bunch of those things fly at Aisha's direction as projectiles. The distracted teen leaped out of the way as her Sharingan flared red throughout the cover of the sandstorm even. The teen used all of her abilities to avoid being as much as touched by those bugs.

"Fire Style: Great Fireball Jutsu!" Aisha yelled out as her hands went through a couple of hand seals and her chest bloated up before she spat out a giant burst of flames from her mouth, it was a bit too erratic for her to shape this flaming inferno into a proper exploding fireball but a flamethrower shape would have to do for now. The thought was that fire was supposed to be an insect's natural enemy, maybe it would've roasted them. As the man extended his arm forward and let a flowing wave of insects bash right into the flames clashing with them this theory was quickly proven wrong.

Aisha kept on breathing, blowing all the air from her lungs out just to try and burn everything around the man to crisps but the Aburame just continued to stand there as insects flowed endlessly from his sleeves and from his shirt, also from his hair and even his mouth. The endless swarm was like a living weapon and within just mere moments the teen realized that her stream of flames was diminishing, she had felt that before, that terrifying sensation of her technique being completely ineffective, not only that, but also boosting the enemy's abilities…

The overflowing stream of swarming and marching on insects soon extinguished Aisha's flames by literally eating them away.

"Parasitic Destruction Insect Technique!" Gokibure yelled out forcing his swarm of ninja-roaches to burst through the flame and eat it up to the finish before the swarm enveloped the young Uchiha teen. "Insect Tomb!" Gokibure slapped his hands together into a hand seal that ceased his endless stream of insects rushing forward as the cockroaches closed Aisha into a sphere that quickly filled up with cockroaches. Soon the sphere collapsed exploding into a rain of insects that briefly matched the sandstorm around them.

"I know you substituted yourself with some random piece of debris. My cockroaches eat everything that they touch up, to be closed into a tomb like such with them would've made you scream without a doubt…" Gokibure yelled out into the storm as the roaches spread into a wide field around him. To approach anywhere within the range of at least hundred meters around the man would've meant to sink in a mass of these all devouring insects.

"It'll truly be quite sad to kill such a young flower so gruesomely before she has a chance to bloom, I usually refrain from such brutalities, I'm more of a lover than a fighter, perhaps we can somehow talk this out?" the gentleman looked around the perimeter trying to spot his female opponent but it was like she completely disappeared from his sight.

Suddenly Aisha appeared out of the blue, leaping at the man from unknown length of distance aiming to cut him down with her cleaving blades. The girl didn't wear the usual native blades that most ninja wore, her weapons appeared to be much better suited for dismemberment as they were quite flat and very ellipse shaped. They weren't long blades but their short size allowed Aisha to wield two of those.

"Parasitic Insect: Arena Trap!" Gokibure chanted out as the cockroaches instantly shaped two meter sized spikes all around the perimeter they were spread in, several enveloped Aisha and devoured her, this time the man heard the scream he longed for but also a loud popping sound alerting him that what he had just killed was just a clone. The cockroaches even ate up the residual sand that the clone left behind as unknown to Gokibure it was not just a simple Shadow Clone, it was a Sand Clone.

"You're wasting quite some chakra, to make a Shadow Clone just to fake out an attack and not follow it up…" the Aburame taunted his opponent but suddenly he noticed what he failed to notice before – the infernal Sharingan of the Uchiha glowing blood red from several meters further from the farthest reach of where the insects still covered the area.

"To think that I had to waste my Sharingan analyzing a stupid ability like this…" Aisha cursed as the red eyes blurred signaling that she was on the move, quickly leaping around the ruins of the small shanty town around the castle, Gokibure tightened his insects' patrol by gathering them up closer to him. He wasn't sure just what exactly the teen's game was but she proved to be rather resourceful and underestimating an Uchiha was generally never a great idea.

"I see… So she analyzed my technique and the chakra flow involved by seeing how I dispatch of the clone… That isn't too stupid at all…" Gokibure mumbled to himself as he started admiring the young lady a little bit, he felt great pity that she like most women he tried talking to despised cockroaches, perhaps in time she could've been shown how truly awe inspiring these insects were.

Aisha in the meanwhile was resting on top of the tallest ruin she could find. Observing her opponent and the swarming insects around him, knowing quite well that the moment she tried to close in these bugs would cover her up and eat her and even if she managed to land a blow on them they'd be near invincible as she's not yet seen one insect die or get injured.

"You know now how my technique works, it must reveal a lot to you about how chakra works in general, right? If you are as perceptive as your Sharingan allows you to be you must've realized by now that you cannot win. My ninja-roaches use a form of chakra augmentation to survive any attack together they can share the chakra they devour making a living network of chakra augmented armor, almost like insect-chainmail, each small chain in the link shares its input and once the initial blow is deflected they eat everything they can get to up, leaving nothing behind" Gokibure explained.

Aisha gripped her cleaver swords tighter, she was getting more and more pissed the more she found out about this man's ability and just how those insects worked. Why would those insects have so much chakra to begin with? There must've been a finite number to them, how could they have acquired so much chakra and replenished their resources from eating literally anything around them? Wasn't chakra only inside people? That would've meant that either chakra was not nearly as exceptional to humans as Aisha may have believed or that these insects possessed the ability to convert anything into chakra, but for that to happen the things they eat must have some primal source of chakra, some particle that is converted into chakra as they process that particle… Aisha just saw those insects devour just smoke and sand that her "Sand Clone" technique released and refill with chakra, what could this have meant?

"I'll take your refusal to attack as a sign that you're confused about what you just saw. Yes, it is as confusing as it seems, it should be to anyone who was told in the Academy that the First People granted us chakra and that it was exclusive to humans and certain species of animals. These insects I wield are ancient and their workings are beyond my comprehension, they work as machines with instinct instead of programming and they devour anything they see in the way and convert it into chakra, they existed before even the First People and coexisted together with the First People. Observing them could teach us a lot about how chakra works and what it actually is…"

A red flare lit up from behind the man, Gokibure turned around as he felt the immediate reaction from his cockroaches that squirmed and begged him to swarm the area where the chakra just flared up. The Aburame could not peek into the brief semblance of crimson flare within the blinding cover of the sandstorm, as he did he felt like he was frozen in place. Soon the surrounding turned completely dark and large stakes fell from the sky piercing his body and sticking it to the ground. His insects were nowhere to be seen.

"Sharingan: Genjutsu!" Aisha chanted out quietly releasing the hand seal and gripping her blade tighter to leap forward. The young lady spun around in mid-leap, she only had one chance at this, one chance to destroy her enemy by removing the man's head. Now that he had no control over his insects because of his mind that was crippled by the illusion she cast using her Sharingan she could finally end this.

A blur of red flashed right up Aisha's eyes, she broke her perfect aerodynamic leap and fell close to the man and groaned as she hit the sand with her head and upper body first, her blades slipped out from her hands. This thing she saw… It was interfering with her memories, this revelation about chakra she saw inside those insects confused her. What if… That man also was like those insects? What if the man chasing them could also be sated by other sources and didn't have to suck them dry every time? What if he wasn't a force of nature, a predator of ninja as he claimed to but just a sick man who kills people and tortures them for fun?

Even more gruesome memories flashed by Aisha's eyes. Images of her beaten self being held in the air, that crippling feeling of chakra being sapped from her body by just a touch, almost like her whole soul was being pulled violently, yanked out from her body and eaten right in front of her. That all crushing fear, that agonizing realization that her life could've ended at any time that made sleeping out for information not only soft by comparison but also preferable over life cowering in fear for the shadow man with the crimson eyes… No. She had to push those images away! Aisha grabbed her cleaver blades, the sand squirmed between her fingers as she grabbed the sandy handles and swung the blades cutting through.

Blackness surrounded Aisha, she was suddenly drowning in some black itchy substance, it was then that she realized – the man she cast the genjutsu on was not actually the one she cut down. Her hesitation, the panic fear placed inside of her by the man who was torturing her and punishing her existence and that of her whole family for years on end, ever since that faithful day when she was still a child, ever since her brother met that bitch Regalia… She brought this to them, it was because of her that their parents were dead, it was because of her that this demonic man was pursuing them, it was because of that woman that she was now surrounded and covered by those insects…

That brief moment of hesitation allowed Gokibure to slip out, no, it must've been before that, he made a living clone made out of insects before that and replaced himself with it without Aisha noticing. She felt the man being affected by the illusion so the real him must've also been affected but it didn't matter because she attacked the wrong target, she cut down the clone. Aisha covered her body and rolled into a ball, she was surprised that she still was not eaten alive, the insects were just rubbing together squirming, that unbearable noise of their backs rubbing against each other…

All of a sudden the girl felt heat all around her, even greater than the one in the desert, she was someone born and raised in Sunagakure, she knew what the desert heat was like and the heat she was surrounded by was like she was shut in an oven and being cooked alive… Aisha screamed out and desperately tried to burst out from the invulnerable sphere of insects she was surrounded by but the sphere expanded, the squirming of the roaches became more rapid, more layers of squirmers was added and so the heat levels sky-rocketed. Aisha gasped for air one last time before passing out. It was then that the insects suddenly spread out leaving an unconscious body of a girl laying on the sand.

The roaches gathered around the real Gokibure surrounding him and going back into their lairs, some hid inside his hair, some went into his nose or inside his shirt, inside his sleeves and feet. The insects went inside the man's body and some burrowed into his skin leaving large bumps where they lurked. The roaches weren't happy, then again, they never were – they lacked the emotional complexity to be happy or sad but they were really acting up, angry perhaps that their master didn't let them eat the girl? Or maybe because on top of that they had to inject their chakra and share it with their host so that he broke out of the illusion cast by the young teen.

Gokibure blinked and stretched his arms and legs out. He examined his body for holes but saw none. That illusion was so powerful, he felt the pain of being skewered by stakes, he felt fear and desperation as members of the Aburame clan were never used to feeling so alone. They had swarms of bugs around them and inside them at all times so the feeling of loneliness was the least known but also the most painful and fearful to them.

The man approached the unconscious girl and felt her neck for a pulse, she was alive. Almost cooking her alive by making his cockroaches close in and rub against each other tightly was a cruel technique but it quickly made her pass out, he was surprised she didn't try to consume her chakra by augmenting her abilities and try to outlast it, the feeling of that intense heat was either that overwhelming or she just was too stressed out to think of that. Ninja could survive heats much more intense than the one possibly generated by those bugs but… The pulse was too slow and weak, she couldn't have faked it. Just in case Gokibure extended his hand and let his insects form a structure that reminded an arm form and lift her off the ground. Her cleaver blades got left behind to be covered with endless layers of sand from the sandstorm. She'll have no use for that in captivity…

"Yeah… I know… We better check on Remashi, a gentleman must always swoop in to save a lady when she's in trouble…" Gokibure mumbled to himself, almost like he was talking to someone but his companions were too primal to understand basic speech. They were ordered around by chakra movement, almost like a carrot in front of a pig. Sometimes a gent like Gokibure just liked to talk to himself, apparently.

Further to the west of Gokibure's location another battle was closing in to its conclusion, to the east of his location however Mardith was already killed by Regalia, the outcome was still unknown to the Aburame, nor were the further actions of the woman in red. The brief scuffle of the two squads was just about to reach its climax. If his only remaining opponents would be men, Gokibure would feel no shame in going all out to begin with and letting his roaches devour them quickly so they could go help Kusagoro out to catch those kids and find that Box.


	135. Crystal Rain

„Out of my way, bitch, I'm heading for the box…" the one-eyed Uchiha grumped out through his grinding teeth. It was like the man was full of and leaking rage itself. He acted like he was addicted to something and the certain something was located within the walls of the castle ruins.

"I apologize but I am under orders to keep you here while Kusagoro finds the Box and the girl. I am afraid we'll be taking everything of value from these ruins unless you're after some other treasure, then again, I am to believe we'd be interested in that as well…" Remashi gently smiled and stood into a Hyuuga fighting stance, stretching her legs out wide to gain more balance, extending one arm diagonally forward as her whole body leaned to the front and extending one arm backwards for a counterbalance point but also setting up a defensive technique just in case.

The leader of the Sunagakure group only growled angrily and moved his messy black hair off of his face, he quickly pulled his curved swords and spun them around playfully in his hands. The man's body blurred and then disappeared, only to reappear close to the woman aiming with a wild swing from one of his swords. The blades were highly decorated and crafted from a rather peculiar alloy, the steel of the swords had a strange stone-like texture. The swords were also carved up and more of the slashing and dismembering kind, not unlike other blades that the desert people used.

While the man's speed was nothing short of impressive, Remashi Hyuuga managed to match it, her hands quickly shot two fingers forward for precision strikes and her arms flared up with flames as her lightning fast strikes greet the man's blades gently tipping them at the edges and pushing them away from her. To someone standing beside the two, even for a highly skilled ninja, it would've been tough to track their moves as they performed combinations of blows faster than the blink of an eye.

Remashi's precise and swift blows pushed every single slash away, the one-eyed Uchiha referred to by his comrades only by the name of "Jiou" delivered dozens of slashes that would've left anyone as countless pieces of chopped up flesh within only fractions of a moment but Remashi pushed each and every strike out of her way with a careless and light tap at the edge of the blade from the side, each strike shot out heated flocks of sparks as the woman's fingers and her entire hand was enveloped in flames and each strike emitted blinding flashes of light combined with playful explosion of fist sized sparks.

Neither of the two moved to the side, front or backwards, neither of them gave way. Then unexpectedly Jiou decided to end this senseless standstill struggle by performing a deceitfully faster than his previous onslaught spinning attack, the tricky Uchiha purposefully held some speed back so that he could unleash it when it counted and when his opponent felt comfortable. He spun aiming at the woman's neck, an attack which would've left her headless faster than a lightning bolt descended from the sky. This man was a well-trained and remorseless killer, he did not hesitate or consider the worth of killing someone, he only saw an obstacle in his way and decided to act upon it. His single Sharingan eye was racing around following the woman's every movement, to him his attack was impeccable.

However Remashi was even faster, she spun around as well, at the very same time as the Uchiha did as fiery chakra dyed her spin and emanated a powerful shockwave of chakra, a half-sphere shaped circle of burning inferno formed around Remashi as a blast of fiery chakra similar to the typical Hyuuga defensive rotation technique blasted the blades out of Jiou's hand but the man kicked his own speed and reaction time to the limit, within immeasurably tiny fractions of a second after the blades even touched the blast of fiery rotation shockwave the man leaped back with a back handspring.

To a neutral spectator, this entire exchange of attacks would've happened faster than their brains could have registered, it would have appeared like the two were just standing apart from each other and then they both disappeared before the fiery explosion of whirling chakra appeared out of the blue and then they were both back where they stood when in their time the dueling sides have exchanged most of their blow combinations and already scoped each other out. Well over a couple of hundred strikes came from each side.

"I have seen your every strike, your fighting style is now recorded in my Sharingan and I'd be able to overcome it with a second a clash. Move aside!" Jiou yelled out without a sign of exhaustion or shortness of breath.

"You stroke me as the no-bullshit kind of fighter. Had what you told me been true you wouldn't have bothered to talk, you'd have merely stricken me down and proceeded forward. You've found my Fire Release infused ninjutsu-taijutsu combination problematic, didn't you?" Remashi replied extending her palm set for a striking condition forward and spreading her legs for balance.

Jiou lowered his head forward, once again his shoulder length hair fell on his face forcing the man to stroke them out of his way. The desert heat was making his missing eye wound hurt and just was all out uncomfortable feel, all this sand from the sandstorm was getting into his eye socket causing an annoying itch. Now there was this woman with her incredibly well thought nin-taijutsu combination.

He was faster than her, he could tell, the problem was that this was the absolute worst opponent he could face under the absolute worst conditions. He was an Uchiha who was the hope of the Sunagakure Uchiha branch. His family pushed him to become the Second Coming of Uchiha supremacy ever since he was a kid. He could create moon-sized fireballs in the sky and crush them onto his opponent, he could create fissures and sinkholes on the earth or even sink entire villages into them. However he couldn't break loose here – he needed that castle ruin right behind the woman intact. All he had to use were his swords and his taijutsu.

Remashi smiled slightly, she realized that her opponent realized his fault here, he must've seen and analyzed the situation that transpired in an incalculable fraction of a second between them. He was faster because Remashi at one point stopped training her speed, she instead infused her blows with Fire Release chakra causing her blows to burn like hellfire, the problem was that her fire was too slow to follow up on her blows creating an incredibly difficult to bypass barrier around her. Whenever she swung her arms around, faster than lightning itself, she created a following after-trail of flames around her. Such a natural defense created by her all-out offensive style made faster opponents naturally have to adapt to her style and further training her speed would've been counterproductive. Even if the man was faster, in close distance the longer he spent around her the more intense her defense was.

"That wasn't the Hyuuga rotation technique, was it? That was just a wall of flames created by your blows…" Jiou asked in a tone that sounded more like a conformational one than questioning one. His entire tune changed, he realized that the woman may not have matched his speed but with some careful planning she managed to overcome her lacking speed, when compared to him, but also she managed to pin him into a corner by fighting him close to a place he wanted to preserve, a highly volatile place too, one that could've collapsed and buried or broken the Box of Ultimate Bliss if something like that happened…

"If it was the Hyuuga rotation variant of my nin-taijutsu, you'd have probably been pretty burnt up, however you were a bit too fast for me to manage that, I had to make do with less…" Remashi admitted.

Jiou's arm was raised up sideways and started crackling with lightning. The crackling blue lightning intensified until a donut-shaped disc formed around his hand. When the man raised his one-eyed face enough for it to be visible his Sharingan flared up in the cover of the raging sands, two tomoe signs could've been evident on the man's iris, informing that the technique may have been copied from some another ninja this man had encountered throughout his life.

"Lightning Style: Lightning Chakram!" Jiou chanted out throwing the disc forward. Remashi knew that he wouldn't have attacked her in such a simplistic manner, this technique must've been a diversion, the man just saw her move faster than that. Lo and behold, the man's body blurred and disappeared, racing faster than his lightning projectile, much faster, in fact.

This time Remashi was ready for him, her hands lit up with flames again, something she rarely had to use against weaklings like mercenaries or silly genin children like the one she had to face earlier. The woman switched stances in an instant and started spinning.

"Fire Style: Eight Trigrams Palms Revolving Heaven!" the Hyuuga chanted out but her words were uttered so fast that they wouldn't have ever been registered by a ninja of lesser caliber than hers, let alone a normal civilian. Chakra burst from every chakra point in the woman's body, similarly to how Kusagoro dispelled his chakra from his except the woman expelled it only from her chakra points and not her body pores. The woman's rotation created a flaming circle of chakra that blew up and deflected the Lightning Chakram but also, judging from a loud yell of pain she also defended from the attack of the man behind her. The disc of pure lightning proceeded to fly upwards and sliced into and through one of the upper castle towers making it crumble below.

Remashi quickly ceased her rotation and flashed in a fiery blur right behind where Jiou landed kicking him in the back just to send him back to where he stood and further away from the castle. The man moved much faster than lightning, he moved faster even then Remashi and got behind her faster than his lightning cutting projectile did, she pushed him behind her and closer to the castle using her technique which meant he could've simply raced to the ruins and left her behind as his speed was greater than hers. Still, even with his greater speed he needed to stop and repurpose his energy into striking her from behind which gave the woman time to respond. His speed didn't surpass hers by that wide a margin.

The man grunted and picked his body off of the ground, his cloak and desert attire were burnt to a crisp and he only wore smoking burnt up cloak and what little remained of his white desert attire. The man angrily peeled off the armor beneath his attire as it was heating up and starting to melt on his skin, the peeling left nasty burn marks on his chest and his gut.

"How hot is that thing?" the man grumped out, taking his sword fighting stance again by lifting one of his swords above his head for a quick block and placing another in front of him for a more offensive purpose.

"It depends, you weren't hit by the attack itself, you were hit by the heatwave coming off of it. This is the fastest but also the least hot version I can make, it's a searing flame hotter than any natural lava could manage. Usually just breathing in close to it burns one's lungs from inside, it appears you managed to survive, as much as I'd love to cook you up as a stake and eat you up…" Remashi explained fixing her messed up butler uniform and getting her messy long hair back in order, the stress and speed of her movement and the intensity of the flames she created made her tied hair escape its rubbery bonds.

Howling winds gathered up a vortex of rotating sand streams, streams of golden sand which were all too familiar to Jiou, the tornado of sand took the shape of his wife. It was merely a clone that could travel together with her sand, having her abilities in mind with this sandstorm mixed in she must've been having a field day. The woman's clone informed Jiou that she had slipped one of her sand grains within the girl and that she could've used encouragement to find the box for them so that they could track her later. After informing her husband of that, the clone dissolved into sand and split all over the area.

"Hmph… I'm afraid you'll have to give me a moment" Jiou apologized to his opponent and disappeared briefly. He planned on feeding the girl some reverse psychology, maybe encourage her to stay put and try to make her force herself on forward. She looked pretty young, younger than most genin that were allowed to tread to other Countries at least. She must've been stupid enough to fall for it, after all, she wasn't doing this game nearly long enough to recognize this common trick…

It only took brief moments but then Jiou suddenly returned to his opponent with his body simply flashing back to its initial location. "So, you've been saying you plan to cook me and eat me? I wouldn't have taken you for a cannibal, I thought that was something exclusively reserved to some of Kirigakure's most remote islands. When I arrived I saw you beating that girl up yet you didn't as much as lick her, didn't even ask for it, what makes me so edible?"

"Well I actually never managed to really bite anyone, I just always started empathizing with them and feeling bad for them so I left them alone, only now the idea came to me that I can cook people alive…" Remashi scratched her head with a lovely smile almost as if she was discussing family recipes and sharing them with a friend.

"Tsk, forgive me if I sound rude but… A hunter who feels empathy towards his food is not a predator" Jiou rudely shot back at the woman. He felt annoyed by her roadblock, she sounded so stupid and almost ridiculous but she was so incredibly powerful and so lucky that she stood right up to the ruins that Jiou needed preserved…

"You… Take that… Back… Now!" Remashi lost all traces of her cool, her hands burst up in flames and steam started coming out from her chakra points, she was about to use something pretty powerful…

"Hmph, when a man finds himself living his life as a prey, he not only learns to understand the relationship of hunter and prey, he never speaks words he'll be taking back later. Everything I say I mean fully, everything I do is because I want and need to. You'd never understand the life me and my family has been living these past years but I will go past you and then get that Box and I will use it to destroy that man pursuing us!" Jiou completely lost his own cool too, his face twisted in anger as now this raging fiery woman in front of him embodied that Shadow Man with the eyes of red who was after him and his family, the man who killed his mother the very first night Jiou met him, the man who killed his father just days ago, the man who crushed Jiou's eye in front of him…

Remashi slapped her hands together in a hand seal and with a loud pop formed three more clones splitting her total chakra into three parts. Each one of the clones started spinning together with her in perfect harmony, all of them were in absolute sync. All three of them spun firing off excessive amounts of chakra from their chakra points, forming the same infernal spherical shield of flames and pure heat but also joining their rotations together into a single colossal and overwhelming attack. Jiou dashed forward, enhancing his blades with lightning chakra he believed he could cut right through this sphere but he was overwhelmed quickly, never expecting the sheer size and the absolutely impossible heat contained within. It may have been five if not ten times hotter than the previous version, maybe even several times his estimation. The overwhelming light blinded his one working eye, the scorching infernal heat made Jiou use out all his reserved chakra for augmentation just so he didn't get incinerated instantly.

The heatwave extended well beyond the castle walls, fire burst through every crevice, every smallest hole made in the structure by the time and pelting sand. However the structure still stood, the fire didn't blow the structure away, instead it bypassed every obstacle but the shock must've still been felt inside, some of it must've still gotten in the ruins and did some serious damage. Had Jiou not had enough on his plate to deal with he'd have been seriously concerned with the wellbeing of the ruins he'd have gotten more desperate. If more desperation was even possible in his case.

"Fire Style: Hyuuga Great Revolving Heaven" the four Remashi's incarnations that remained standing inside that extending sphere of devastation declared with synchronized voices. After the technique ended all the clones disappeared, returning what little of their chakra reservoirs that remained to their creator. The technique greatly exhausted the woman as she was breathing heavily and her body stood in a pose suggesting that she was drawn to collapse on the scorched sand. It wasn't even sand below her, the floor and the entire sandstorm around the woman got heated until it melted. The ground got shaped into a crystal like structure, almost like the floor was made of glass or crystal, the sand particles in the sky shifted into crystal as well as started raining from the sky. The raging sandstorm turned into an actual crystal rain.

"Y-You bitch… You could've blown the castle ruins away!" Jiou's scorched and burnt up frame roared out into the sky as his clothes got completely decimated and burnt off but the man himself managed to augment his body to avoid disintegration. His body was covered with burns, in some places there were black patches of coal-like texture, elsewhere it appeared like the man was merely singed and dirtied up.

"Hey, hey, you really overdid it, Remashi…" Gokibure's voice declared standing on a crystal hill as the desert sun created a blinding flashy glow that reflected off of it, the only detail that the battle damaged Jiou or tired Remashi could see was the unconscious young woman in his arms.

"Aisha…" Jiou grunted out to himself. He loved his sister, loved her perhaps even more than it was usual to love a member of one's own family, after all – he was an Uchiha and Uchiha were notorious for their ability of great and unconditional love. Love that so often turned into hate. Now he would have to choose – stay here and save Aisha, take extra time fighting these two jokers or slip into the castle leaving his beloved sister at their mercy… Jiou's wild laugh echoed through the crystal hills, there weren't as much as a speck of dust remaining of the shanty town that once was as it was too close to the blast zone.

"You fools, where do you think my wife is now? Do you truly believe she didn't kill your friend and just slipped past you all into the castle? The fact that she's not yet here means she'll find the little magician bitch before all of you and she'll get the box" the man explained the source of his amusement.

"That's only if Kusagoro hasn't found it yet…" Gokibure tried to talk his way out but Jiou's laughter only spread more powerful and even farther away.

"Then she'll claim it over your friend's dead body. My wife may only punch like a woman and she may not be nearly as fast as me but she has her tricky ways of beating any foe" the Uchiha explained as his functioning Sharingan raced wildly across the battlefield analyzing the field and giving him ideas of potential response.

"Except that man chasing you three… Right?" Remashi hit the man's weak spot remembering his previous ramblings.

Jiou's face only got serious from a temporary state of amusement. "Well, if HE follows us here – everyone is dead…"


	136. The Bloody Kaleidoscope

A sky piercing stare of the one-eyed Uchiha turned at Gokibure who still held his sister on his shoulders. Despite possessing one of the most potent and unstable defences that could've been repurposed into all devouring offense at any moment the Aburame just barely resisted the instinct to shiver. Even when his opponent was outnumbered, even when his body was covered in bruises and burns and he was cornered right up close to an object he had to keep standing. Such was the power of mere presence of Jiou Uchiha.

"Do not believe for a second that I'd hesitate to pierce my sister's heart to get to you. I love her too much to let her burn herself in self-directed hatred for being a burden" Jiou's silent yet efficient voice reached Gokibure's ears and now that the sandstorm had ceased and become a rain of grain sized crystal dust he could understand every word.

"I saved your sister because I hate hurting women. I consider myself a gentleman and even when a woman is too dangerous to keep alive or I only barely pull myself out of a tough battle, I still cannot push myself towards such a thing…" Gokibure replied with a cocky smile, he meant every word. He'd have much rather took the young Aisha for dinner than fought her in such a cruel battlefield.

Remashi placed her hands together and suddenly veins violently shot out all over her face coming out of her eyes as her white Byakugan of the Hyuuga clan intensified. She scanned the battlefield around her while still trying to keep her eye on her injured opponent just in case he decided to pull something funny.

"He may be right, I don't see Mardith's chakra at all, nor do I see your insects inside of him. He may actually be dead…" she said with a hint of surprise and a slightly smaller shade of hidden sadness.

"Hmmm… I seem to have sensed the signal of the nano-roaches going out some time ago, I was troubled by that but figured it could've been a great lot of things. I thought maybe the woman shorted the roaches out with a Lightning Style technique… If he actually is dead that is unfortunate" Gokibure nodded looking back. Before he could back Jiou's injured and bare-chested body leaped up to him for the kill. Before the Uchiha could deliver a lethal blow or the Aburame could command his insects to protect him Remashi flashed up to the man getting in between the two and thrusted her palm forward.

"Fire Style: Eight Trigrams Vacuum Palm!" she chanted sending a powerful heated up shockwave that blew Jiou backwards a great distance inflicting damage all over his body as he took the technique head on. The intense heat burnt up parts of his hair, it completely incinerated his eye-patch revealing a black hole where his Sharingan once was. The technique left even more patches of black burns over some areas of the man's body, the heavy injuries that he sustained from the previous superheated explosion of chakra greatly impacted his speed.

"I am your opponent, I recommend you treat me as such before I end up killing you…" Remashi exclaimed looking back at her friend. She wasn't overly fond of the roach wielding Aburame but she would have preferred to keep him alive. Kusagoro's squad saw many difficult missions and somehow they started taking each other's lives for granted, even while they bickered like children normally, they'd have protected each other's lives if given the choice.

As the smoke cleared and the searing horizontal twister of fire burnt out the two Kusagoro's teammates realized that they were played – Jiou was nowhere to be seen. The eyes of the Hyuuga woman squinted and focused on a specific point in the castle ruins.

"I've got him… A slippy bastard…" she grunted with great annoyance and dashed onwards to the castle entrance. She knew that Jiou was faster than her so the woman leaped up into the air and drove both of her hands backwards.

"Fire Style: Eight Trigrams Twin Vacuum Palms!" she yelled out as two crystal piercing jet waves of pure flame and heated air fired off of her arms sending her body skyrocketing forward faster than sound itself into the castle. It took great mastery and perception for the woman to flip over in the air and dash off the couple of walls surrounding her, she bounced off of the walls in her way like a pinball only losing a small fraction of her momentum, she had to catch up to that Uchiha bastard, she hit him with a head on "Vacuum Palm", that closed at least four of his chakra nodes, his total chakra level must've been plummeting down at that moment.

The Hyuuga specialized in techniques that closed the opponent's chakra nodes. It was a very dangerous style to face off against since most defensive techniques such as chakra augmentation already sapped great amounts of chakra, losing chakra nodes was like losing chakra generators in the middle of battle, it wasn't just losing a specific amount of chakra, it was losing a part of one's chakra network, every time chakra passed through that part of the network large chunks of it got lost somewhere in the mix. The man must've been a fool to let himself get hit by that just to slip into the castle.

Remashi extended her palm trying to hit the man at the back of his head but Jiou leaped off the ground and turned around placing his elbow to where she would've hit him and blocked the strike.

"Fire Style: Last Resort Eight Gates Assault!" the woman chanted out as she flashed with fiery shades all over the endless corridors of the castle clashing with Jiou's own blows, it was like a combination of blurs, almost like a rotating jet twister of flames and pure power busting and drilling through the doors and walls of the castle that then extended into two that continuously clashed together.

The two involved themselves into a lethal and endless dance of taijutsu combinations. Jiou's stamina and chakra levels must've been insane since he dared to clash with Remashi's Fire Style Gentle Fist combinations up close taking heavy damage and burns even if he perfectly countered her blows. Even when he completely outclassed the woman at close distance martial arts, perfectly avoiding each of her blows and answering with his own the splash damage from her fiery style of assaults burnt the man either way. Remashi didn't have to land a single blow, even her missed pokes hurt the man more than any direct punch could have.

The two danced on through spiralling staircases, through endless abysses that opened over the countless decades that this castle rot inside this desert, they bashed through every barely functional trap in their way. The heat from their exchanging faster than sound blows melted the steel spikes on the floor, the sheer force of the shockwaves from their clashing blows and sometimes their conscious effort destroyed any dislodged stone or ceiling structures trying to crush them and grinded it to dust. While keeping up their dance of fire and death the two managed to deflect or block every single pebble falling on their heads, not because they wanted to show off, it was due to instinct. They didn't care to check if it was just a speck of dust, a pebble that would've felt annoying inside their shoes or if it was floor sized rock, they just destroyed everything in their path shaking the very foundations of the castle.

Their graceful exchange of blows felt like fencing, two skilled fencers dancing all over the place, all over the towers of the castle, throwing each other out the holes in the towers and window holes and then leaping after their opponent wishing to pummel the life out of them. The two traversed one third of the ground floors of the ruins and at least six towers of the castle, the one great tower of the castle even collapsed due to their fiery clash.

"Enough… Begone!" Jiou grunted out through the blood shooting off his broken nose, his handseals flashed at incomprehensible speeds and the man inhaled. He felt his chakra draining out rapidly, it was almost like every blow he took from the woman divided his chakra into bits and pieces, messed up his network but the man didn't care. It didn't feel one millionth as bad as one single touch from the man pursuing him felt, the woman stroke like a butcher gently slicing his chakra to pieces, that man ripped all out and devoured it like an animal, like a devil feasting on chakra instead of human souls. Jiou had no more time to waste with this woman, that man had to be stopped!

"Fire Style: Great Fire Annihilation!" Jiou chanted intending on breathing out a firestorm hotter and denser in its all devouring flames than even the previously displayed Remashi's clone rotation technique. The one-eyed Uchiha was sure that it'd have blown this castle away, it'd have made an all incinerating blast of destruction all the way to Sunagakure. It'd have created a Hell on Earth, a magma spilling crater and a testament of the Uchiha might and destruction. He almost regretted it himself, he needed and wanted that Box but he had to rely on his wife's ability to recover it. He could no longer afford to hold back, this Hyuuga woman would've been a considerable opponent even if he was unchained. He held back long enough, it was time to raise some Hell…

"Fire Style: Eight Trigrams Inferno Crusher!" the Uchiha heard a lovely voice of the Hyuuga woman yell out as she dove ducking in to bypass his defences, she extended her palm on forward making Jiou cancel out his technique before it even began and flip backwards. A concentrated beam of flames a thousand times hotter than her previously displayed Hyuuga Fire Style techniques fired off diagonally into the sky burning through the stone of the castle and firing off away farther than the man could even follow it.

"It was a waste of chakra to use this as a Hyuuga nin-taijutsu, the heat of that technique would incinerate everything and anything in its path, just whose chakra are you aiming to close if your opponent is scorched and not even an atom remains?" Jiou smiled, at one point of his life, before being chased by an unstoppable force of nature, he enjoyed fights, he even looked for powerful opponents and would've loved to challenge this woman. Still, it was useless to dwell on what once was, all that he was at some point was gone now, at the moment he was just prey…

"You're the one to say, you'd have left a bottomless canyon of destruction out of this entire desert with that technique, I thought you wished to preserve this castle…" Remashi huffed heavily, that last technique followed right after such a breath-taking clash must've taken quite the toll on her. She must've been pushed all the way to her limit, able to put out such impossibly searing hot beams of concentrated chakra into such precise and restrained blows, a technique like that must've cost some chakra.

"I lost control for a moment… You are fortunate to meet me in a battlefield I wish to preserve" Jiou also was breathing increasingly heavily and was pulled towards the ground. The aftermath of their clash suddenly opened large fissures on the floor they were standing on forcing the two to once again leap at each other. The Uchiha clenched his fist tightly ready to knock this woman out while the Hyuuga woman was preparing yet another one of her Vacuum Palm techniques, Jiou cracked a grin, he was confident that he could withstand one more head on but if he confirmed his punch he would've knocked the woman out. She seemed to put a lot of care into defending herself so Jiou's theory was that she couldn't take blows nearly as well as she defended against them.

Strangely enough Jiou was not overwhelmed by the Vacuum Technique, his fist cut through the air around him and dug deep into the woman's face first, it must've been his superior speed that helped him achieve this. A loud pop alerted him that something was wrong, the woman's body was replaced with a large chunk of the stone floor that was collapsing and falling to the bottom of black abyss below, Jiou tried to turn around but as he did he realized that it was too late.

The woman's hands lit up with bursts of fire, she shot two fingers out from the both of her palms and precisely planted them right where Jiou's chakra nodes were, she started slow with a slow combination of blows. "Fire Style: Two Palms!" she yelled out planting two searing hot but precise pokes that felt like heated knives tearing through his flesh, where the woman stroke and closed his chakra points a black burn mark remained. "Four Palms!" she yelled out repeating but doubling the combination, "Eight Palms!" she continued striking lightning fast, this encounter has taken so much out of Jiou that he didn't even have enough in him to put up a decent defense. "Sixteen Palms!" the woman continued to mercilessly bombard his defences, "Thirty Two Palms! Eight Trigrams Sixty Four Palms!" she roared out triumphant with a crushing blow to Jiou's chest that left her palm permanently burnt into his flesh and sent the man heated like a comet crushing through the castle walls back into the desert where Gokibure was waiting with his sister on his shoulders.

The Aburame covered himself with the shield of roaches to protect himself and his captured hostage from the blast of a falling star-like man crashing out of the castle into the crystal floor, leaving a pretty wide crater. Jiou's body appeared beaten and mangled, burnt most importantly of all quite badly. He was quite a miserable sight with his one eye missing already. Life as a running man also badly reflected on his overall looks and now he had the messed up wounds to match it.

With a fiery flash Remashi appeared close by, down on her knees and breathing heavily. She couldn't do much more but stay down herself. It was impressive how one man could push her so far while holding back most of his abilities afraid to destroy the castle nearby. In this world the most destructive and powerful abilities were also the most useless, being able to create moon sized meteors couldn't have been more useless when one was a silent assassin and a spy. Because he was a man who took pride in his destructive godlike abilities Jiou was destined to lose against a much more restrained and focused fighter…

Jiou's blood covered and burnt arm grabbed the edge of the crater and pulled his pathetically beaten and burnt body out of the hole. His blood covered and singed hair still fell all over his face, a single movement forced blood to squirt out of the man's crushed inner organs all over his stubble and onto the crystal floor below. Pools of blood were poor decorations for such natural beauty as pure crystal. Remashi looked surprised, she almost begged Jiou to stay down but most of all she was surprised that she wasn't able to kill him. A technique of such heat… His organs should've been molten into one solid pile of goo, the only viable explanation for him to have survived would've been chakra augmentation but how could have one man had such impossible levels of chakra. For him to have so much he should've rivalled the levels of weaker Tailed Beasts or Lesser Demons.

A loud thud reached the ears of the two combatants, Aisha's lifeless body slipped down Gokibure's shoulder and slammed into the crystal floor cracking her head, the poor girl's eyebrows angrily twisted and lowered, she must've been alright but just passed out, in a state of delirium.

"Rest, Remashi, I should take it over from here. You seem to be unable to keep this man down for the count and my roach friends are squirming deep inside… He still has plenty chakra left, enough for at least one more technique, huh?"

"Yeah, one last technique strong enough to blow this whole fucking desert up, however it's sort of useless, that last technique of that bitch locked my chakra away. Whatever little I had left for any hidden aces, I just can't use it anymore… What a despicable feeling of the chakra being there inside my body but being unable to access it!" Jiou grunted out falling down on his knees and pounding the crystal floor of the desert, he reached to his right and picked up one of his swords and gripped it tightly.

"What are you planning to do? You could try attacking Remashi but she could blow you back with one of her Vacuum Palm techniques burning you up even more, you could attack me but my roaches would block any attack and then eat you up, you can't cast your Sharingan genjutsu on Remashi because she'd break out of it noticing it with her Byakugan and she'd also kill you before you could kill me. Face it, you're beaten. Just sit down close to your sister and sit this one out…" Gokibure explained in his sultry confident voice as multiple cockroaches scurried around his face from his hair and disappeared behind his shirt.

Jiou's body blurred, Remashi braced herself to block an impending attack, Gokibure surrounded himself by endless shields of his impenetrable cockroach defence. A moment later the two realized that neither of them were hit, they looked on only to see Jiou flashed forward and behind Gokibure grabbing his sister and holding her up in the air lifted up by the collar of her clothes.

Jiou closed his eyes… "I'm sorry, sister, I wish there was another way. Still, I'm sure you'd see this as a salvation compared to what living chased by that man feels like. You're lucky to leave first…" he mumbled to himself piercing the young woman's chest with his blade after letting go of her and letting her fall onto his sword. The young woman coughed up some blood without even waking up, her body twitched for a couple of moments before letting out a final breath.

"What the Hell did you do!?" Gokibure shouted out enraged.

Jiou's only working eye closed and a single stream of bloody tears ran down his cheek. He let the dead body of his sister slip off his blade and hit the floor, quickly flooding it with the pool of her blood.

"There is a reason why Uchiha love so much… Because the source of our power is directly dependant on pain of loss. Whenever we lose someone we love the most we grow infinitely stronger. Losing someone that one holds the dearest to their heart, that unlocks a very special power…" Jiou's one working eye shot wide open as his Sharingan had changed its markings, three circles added to his Sharingan symbol and the three conjoined identically around his pupil straight onto the centre of the iris.

The pain of loss opened a new power inside Jiou, the pain and desperation of living his life as prey made him ruthless enough to do what was needed and seeing his loved ones in constant danger made him love those close to him strongly enough for them to become vessels for his newly awakened power – the Mangekyou Sharingan.


	137. Boy Meets Girl

**Over ten years ago:**

A large crowd gathered around a large and round stage-like structure. Some people appeared to be quite bored whereas the others appeared to be in some sort of rush, they were cheering on with their fists almost like they were hungry for blood. Such sights used to be very uncommon in Sunagakure – a village that was warring for a long time and then completely overwhelmed and one that lost its respect and dominant position in the grand political arena. Lately however the moods were shifting, people were growing increasingly angry and desperate to reclaim their lost glory. Wishing for a second go at any larger political conflict just so they could show their newly acquired power. Power they've been gathering during times of peace.

"Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the great Gumbai arena!" a tall man wearing an almost regal cloak and turban, just barely letting his long black hair and beard flow through yelled out, declaring the beginning of the event that'd start the festivity which the people were waiting for so long.

"Yeah!" "Come on, show us some fighting!" "We came to see some Uchiha!" "What the Hell is all of this!?" various yells came from the side of the crowd but the people were at the very least excited. It was nothing less than what long bearded man on the stage wished for, the dyed with eye shade eyes of the man flared as the red Sharingan activated in his eyes, the man walked backwards and turned at the building that lead up to the elevated arena.

"Villagers of Sunagakure, our powerful village has been mistreated and disrespected for too long! Fifty years ago I left Konohagakure with my family and moved here. I don't think anyone will disagree that I've done everything I could for this village and spilt more blood than my fair share for it. I freely surrendered my Uchiha power for this village and together with my wife granted it the greatest gift this village can get – an Uchiha legacy, the most majestic of ninja bloodlines in its military!" the man declared as a young bare-chested man walked out from the building and onto the central stage.

The young man stood with resolute calmness but also inspired respect and fear just by his mere presence alone. He was a really well developed and incredibly trained young man. His shoulder long black hair were tied up at their tips where they would've fallen onto the young man's eyes.

"Today I demonstrate to you the future of our village, the mightiest soldier to ever graduate the Chuunin Exams! My son – Jiou Uchiha!" the man declared as the young man stretched out and started performing acrobatic warm up excercises.

"Wow, he's so hot! Isn't he hot, I told it's the best idea to come here!" a young girl shrieked out into the ear of her friend who seemed less than impressed. The young friend who wore a large gourd on her back just nodded and smiled uncomfortably, while she didn't really want to be here and she didn't really understood the point of all this militaristic propaganda nonsense she continued to observe the young man's performance and his effortless dispatching of several Sunagakure uniform wearing soldiers in a playful spar session. Young Regalia had to admit, seeing the young man dancing like that, fighting gracefully and effortlessly seemed to awaken some sort of hidden emotions inside her.

"Ha, I know what you think, bloodthirsty audience, any fool can dispatch of eight trained Sunagakure Chuunin. That's what you mistakenly believe, right? Now witness as my son takes on a trained Uchiha, my brother – Cimaro! And proves just how astonishing of a prodigy he is" the old timer declared as an equally strong looking and equally ill equipped Uchiha walked out on the stage, with his Sharingan flaring red in his eyes equally as strong.

As the two traded blows it was apparent that the young man was superior from the very beginning. Both of the sparring men possessed the infernal Sharingan eye meaning they could easily predict the opponent's movements and to them each attack appeared like launched at slow motion. Each movement, each attack was predicted and processed and it looked like each combatant grew bored of the slow motion response which they predicted before the last one was even thrown. And yet… Where Cimaro only predicted the attack and adapted his moves to it, Jiou predicted not his opponents attack, but also Cimaro's response, he predicted what exactly his opponent would perceive and predict from his own motions. It wasn't long before the young prodigy mopped the floor with his opponent.

"Wow, he's so amazing! I wonder if he'll attend the Kazekage's inauguration, I'd love to meet him!" Regalia's friend continued to obsess over the young man looking merely at his handsome beefy side and missing the point why this young man was actually so great. Most Uchiha were arrogant and vain from their inception, they possessed the most revered and treasured bloodline of all, they were of elite ninja descent and had centuries if not entire millennia of history running in their veins.

What stood before the two young women and hundreds of other bloodthirsty and destruction of the other "Great" ninja villages wishing biggots was an Uchiha who was actually working hard and living up to his potential. Where most Uchiha just assumed they were the hottest shit around and had power running in their veins, this young man sought and actively pursued it, he only saw his limitless potential of a bloodline as something he was given, as a natural advantage over his peers but he also continued to live up to that potential. It was men like this that made history, a legend in the making surrounded by cocky fools. If only this remarkable youth would not grow spoiled due to his regal upbringing…

As the young Uchiha showed another amazing trick, managing to avoid or deflect and catch every of the sixty thousand arrows launched his way, so many of them that they snuffed out the Land of Wind's desert Sun even and made the arena appear like a pin cushion except where the Uchiha boy was, Regalia's friend turned at her and pinched the blushed cheeks of the young lady.

"You're jealous, you're jealous 'cause he's better than you!" the friend teased her.

"I'm not jealous, this is nonsense, I could block any number of arrows, I could block entire tons of arrows without moving a single step to the side and you know that!" Regalia declared blushing even more.

"Yeah, but you've got your sand to do it, he's catching and dodging them with his bare hands and body and doesn't even have as much as a scar. He could dodge as many arrows as there are raindrops in a stormy night and he's just a teen! Konoha ain't got shit on us and I'm gonna be his wife!" the silly girl shrieked out again.

"Oh shut up…" Regalia smiled and locked her arms around her chest, sometimes her friend tended to get overly excited and dream about the heavens. Still, as silly as the young lady was, she was the only girl who ever agreed to become a friend of the young Regalia who had a stigma of being a mass murderer and a girl around whom everything got destroyed and everyone close to her got horribly murdered. While officially the mass slaughter in the Land of Tea was attributed to her, the only reason she didn't undergo Ninja Tribunal and imprisonment and execution was both because the details of the event were too shady and because while openly the two villages worked together, secretly a portion of Sunagakure population wished destruction of Konohagakure due to nothing else but toxic jealousy of the village's power and reputation.

Regalia was someone who was continuously questioned and held in the officials' custody so her fate in the Academy and beyond its walls was that of a loner whom no one liked and everyone pointed fingers at. Even more, her sand was different from that of most Sabaku clan members, hers was golden, almost enchanted. After the death of her mother Regalia's sand was more powerful, more amazing and she could do so much more chakra channeling with it than her peers. Almost like the love and will of her mother passed into the young lady's sand making it stronger and denser than the cores of stars themselves.

This whole time, throughout those couple of years she was pursued by that infernal man with the eyes of red. He always found her, always caught her and managed to grab hold of her. Whenever the young Regalia ran he was able to catch her, destroying everything and everyone standing its way and when he caught her the man sapped her chakra from her like a butcher bleeds a pig out. The difference was that the man left her living with the aftermath. People pointed fingers at her, blamed her for all the unfortunate destruction around her and wanted her to die. And yet the man in black never grew tired of the way she tasted, the way her chakra tasted. He always left her just enough to stay alive…

"No, haven't you heard? They're looking for a suitable match for him, for some reason his entire family is involved, they're almost forcing him to find a young woman and marry her! Some say that's why the Uchiha keep putting so much money and support into the Kazekage inauguration ceremony, they want the huuugest ball!" Regalia's oddball friend waved her hands around in the sky like a fisherman exaggerating about the size of a fish they caught.

"Well, whatever, I won't even go… I'm not invited because of the whole "possible traitor and an overall bad omen" thing following me around" Regalia sighed and turned around.

"Teehee, well things around you do tend to get blown up and crushed…" her friend chuckled and raised her fist into the sky yelling out, "Hey Aziz, your son is a loser, my friend can kick his ass!"

Suddenly the bloodthirsty crowd went all completely silent. Everyone parted to the sides and made a small circle of shame around the two girls and the glares of both the old man Aziz and his young son fell onto the two girls.

"Is that so?" Aziz smiled, the crowd around the girls kept on whispering rumors going around about Regalia's possible involvement with the Konohagakure officials and how she was talked off as a filthy traitor. Even if those rumors had nothing to back them up but the amazing fantasies of children in the same teams as Regalia was, as she changed several because very few Jounin wished to train her due to her reputation, people still let those rumors fester.

"Well, my son is undoubtedly weary, he's fought multiple opponents and dodged enough arrows to cover the sky when standing from where he is, he fought one of our village's strongest Uchiha…" Aziz started to explain why he wouldn't have liked for his precious and treasured son to fight someone he barely knew with less than stellar reputation surrounding them.

"No" Jiou's firm for his age voice cut his father down. The boy's voice was indeed weary and he was sweating himself to death and that much was visible with a naked eye, "Let her fight my sister, Aisha is half my age but also half my strength. If the girl can best my sister, I'll be impressed enough to admit defeat"

Regalia sighed and looked at grinning friend with a desperate look, she really didn't need more trouble and attention in her life, it was only a couple of years after her entire family was killed in front of her, it was only a couple of days since THAT man nearly killed her and the restaurant where she and her team were washing the dishes due to a mission. It all felt like one big never ending nightmare. Hesitant and a little depressed Regalia stepped onto the stage allowing her golden sand to carry her up.

"Golden sand? What's that? I've never seen something like that…"

"It's said it's not actually gold dust, it's just sand overflowing with chakra that glows in this golden hue!" villagers started once again spreading rumors, even if that last observation was a correct one as it was taken out of her ninja file. Information like this shouldn't have been so freely accessed but no one cared about Regalia's life enough to protect her secret. All that people cared about was someone to direct their hatred at, it didn't matter if they had to make some information public to have more topics of hatred to discuss…

"Son, Aisha isn't ready, she's…" Aziz tried to pacify the situation but Jiou took a towel and cleaned his sweaty face and chest before smiling and gesturing for a young and shaking girl to leave the shade of the building entry point.

"Nonsense, I've sparred with her and at times she managed to surprise me and land blows on me, she's just shy in the public, that's all…" Jiou laughed out. The handsome devil of the Uchiha was so cheerful, almost like an actual heroic icon that people gather around. Regalia almost wished to throw the fight out the window and just let him win so that his perfect reputation was not tarnished.

The little girl quivered out into the sunlight, she looked like she couldn't have even been ten years of age, she was dressed not too much differently from how all girls of her age who were Academy students dressed and she could barely even hold those two blades she carried around. They were an identical image to the swords her brother had on his back, the girl must've idolized her brother. It was always a ninja's privilege to see such things, identify and describe the psychological profile of their opponent before battle.

This girl looked oppressed and yet when she looked at Jiou she was happy and shined with glee. Her own weapons were identical to the weapons of the young man, it was clear that she idolized her brother but she also had that trait of fear of large crowds and she was very shy. Such traits were not common to an esteemed Uchiha warrior which was why the family chose to keep the girl concealed within their mansion's walls. Maybe in this fight Regalia could help the little girl to come out of her shell? Maybe after seeing what Jiou has seen, the one person that this young one trusts enough to reveal her true nature, this kid will no longer be treated as a second rate, will no longer be ignored by her own family?

The young one walked out in front and bowed, her movements were so restrained, she was so afraid and hesitant even to bow.

"Wow, you're quite well mannered, young one, what is your name?" Regalia tried to be nice to the girl, it was quite clear that she had seen enough hatred and neglect in her life. The last thing she wanted to do was to make fun of her.

"A…Aisha…" the girl mumbled out in a thin and weak tone, she still clutched her chest as if creating an artificial wall to protect herself from all those bloodthirsty people around her. The girl pulled out her blades and took a very clumsy fighting stance, Jiou whistled with annoyance and lifted his arm up.

"Come on, Aisha, like we do during our spars! Don't hold back!" he yelled out. Despite very clearly positive intentions the negative attitude towards her stance from her brother was very clearly a negative for the girl, she started shaking and stepped out of her fighting stance looking confused.

"I told you it's a bad idea!" Aziz yelled at his son and then tried to approach his daughter but Regalia's golden sand blocked his progress with a hastily placed wall.

Regalia tipped her dirty red dress, the shade of which now looked more like brown due to all the damage and dirt that the attire has seen, and bent over her knees kneeling closer to the eye level of the young girl.

"Hey, Aisha, I'm Regalia… Look, I know you're worried, I know you're shy and afraid but this sand of mine is magical actually" the young lady smiled letting the glowing sand gently pass by her lifted palm in small jets and strands, playfully stroking it like it was the actual hair of her mother.

"Magical?" the girl blinked a couple of times, just for a moment her shyness faded and she appeared to be more interested in Regalia's story than anything.

"Yeah, with it I can see into time itself. I can see the futures and the pasts of people around me, people it touches, and I see inside of you that you're fated to be a courageous and strong woman. You're not going to be afraid of anything and you'll be able to stand up in front of crowds larger than this and tell them all to go to Hell…" Regalia softly and kindly explained.

"B…But I'm not like that…" little Aisha whimpered.

"Yes, but it is important to me that you know that while you're not like that now, one day you will be that person. That is to say, that person and you are the very same person just in different time periods…" the young woman explained to the little girl. She made up that lie about her sand being able to see into time and knowing the future, it was a common lie of hers but it always worked for some reason.

Maybe the reason she made that lie up was because Regalia was unsure of what the time held for her, just like this young kid she was unsure of her destiny. She didn't know if the people will in time accept her or if she will continue to be a traitor until the end of her days, she didn't know if she will become a great hero or never achieve anything, she never knew if she'd see that horrible man again tomorrow and if he'd finally kill her or not, if he'd claim everything she had just like he promised to do. That unknown made her wish to see the timeline and what it had for her more than anything in the world just so she wouldn't have to live in fear. Life in fear of something, something big to come, almost like being a sheep being observed by a lion who is about to pounce and feeling uneasy because of that supernatural fear of what's inside the dark bush just around the corner… Everyone believed her lie because everyone thought like her. Everyone was chased by their own demons.

Chase is what made all of us feel so alive but it was also our greatest fear…


	138. Quest for True Love

"Well, here I go, ma'am…" Aisha hesitantly declared, the visuals of her body stretched out like a crazy nature's spaghetti as the girl's speed messed up how light flowed around her body, Regalia was not prepared for such outburst of speed and she realized that she was about to pay for underestimating this child. Luckily for her right before she pulled off her defensive technique by coating her body in her golden sand the little girl stopped halfway and fell to the floor.

"I dropped my sword, I apologize…" she cried out afraid that Regalia or whoever else would flip out in anger and yell at her.

"These swords truly are too big for you…" Regalia smiled, trying her best not to appear shocked or afraid by the incredible speed of the young one. Had she taken the moment to exhale and wipe away the sweat that broke out running on her forehead after witnessing the girl's inhuman speed she'd have given away her own intimidation.

"Nonsense, my brother wields them and I wish to prove that I am just as worthy as he is. I can do this, just give me another chance…" Aisha rubbed her eyes with knuckles as her entire face blushed in shame.

Regalia smiled and swiped her hand to the side ordering her sand to move out of the gourd and form a whole bunch of strands, jets and defensive walls around her. Her enemy was that of speed far surpassing her own, this girl was quite close to moving faster than lightning and she had not yet awakened her Sharingan as far as Regalia saw it.

"Your brother… He said that you're about one half of his skill level, does that mean that he's double the trash you are? That still makes two piles of trash…" the young ninja offended her opponent. It was Regalia's intent to play on her opponent's emotions, to make little Aisha angry so that she stopped thinking about all those people watching and judging her, so that she stopped screwing herself over.

"What? How dare you!?" Aisha screamed out, her body disappeared, completely untraceable by even the few ninja standing in the crowd. Loud thuds and bangs could've been heard as the girl's invisible body bumped into one sand wave after another breaking through them with her mere speed. Loud sounds of steel grinding against sand could've been heard as well – the little one had drawn her blades and meant to cut Regalia down.

The young woman turned to her back where Aisha's last image flashed, the speed of this girl was insane, the natural limit and the fastest that the ninja's body was recorded to go was the speed of light. There were multiple samurai in the Iron Country who were told to have reached that speed. It was not that the ninja's body was incapable of handling more, it was just that the laws of physics themselves placed a barrier on the human body. There have been strange events recorded whenever a swordsman, thirsty of fame, has tried it. This world or any other in this Universe did not sustain any higher speed than that. Strangest things happened whenever someone tried it, people just broke down or flat out evaporated or reality itself imploded and created large cataclysms.

For a moment there Regalia was starting to worry that this girl may not realize that barrier, that perhaps no one in her family knew enough about her abilities to explain it to her. It was not that Aisha's speed approached a place anywhere close to those limits, it was more that Regalia could neither perceive nor move in to counter in time. The body of the young girl was flashing all around her with afterimages and fake out attacks – the young one was shoving her superiority in Regalia's face like most Uchiha were known to do.

"Don't you dare offend my brother!" Aisha's scream emanated through the public as the girl flashed right through her opponent, cutting once for each word and then fading out from everyone's perception again. Old man Aziz turned at Jiou at disbelief.

"Why didn't you tell me my daughter was capable of this? I can't follow her movements!" Aziz shouted out

"That's because you try to follow them, you must use your Sharingan to predict her movements and evade or counterattack before they happen…" Jiou continued to observe the small scuffle with his Sharingan still active.

"Her body will collapse if she doesn't stop, she's augmenting her own body to withstand the pressure, such children cannot possibly understand or prevent the risks of conscious chakra augmentation" Aziz mumbled to himself.

"I'll interfere before she goes overboard, I've seen her move faster than sound without much problem while fully managing to fight properly. She isn't approaching her mass limit yet" Jiou replied grabbing his swords and gripping their handles more tightly. As the body broke those impossible speed limits it was crushed by their increased mass for which they had to augment itself with chakra to withstand it. It was said that samurai that moved at light speed had to deal with literally infinite mass placed on their bodies which greatly strained their movements. Wise ninja withheld their bodies from going too far…

"Don't tell me you've been training her in secret!?" Aziz grinded his teeth feeling both angry at his son for possibly teaching his sister things she may have been to young and naïve to learn and a little proud of his own blood.

"Don't worry, she's too fast for her own good, she can't properly track or perceive her own movements to she takes extra time, she won't break herself, she physically can't" Jiou tried to calm his father down feeling very proud of his sister and the power she displayed but also grateful that her opponent drew that power out from her.

A slash that Regalia couldn't have possibly seen or predicted cut at her from below, a powerful shockwave fired through the entire crowd picking up their cloaks and outright knocking people off their feet for well over half a kilometer away. Regalia's body lifted up into the sky with sand struggling to keep up with the young lady. Aisha's body leaped up, her feet kept kicking the air below her to propel her upwards as ground crushing gusts of wind fired off from sheer force and rage behind each kick.

Within mere moments the young Uchiha girl flashed up just slightly above the flying Regalia, the young girl thrust her blades into the older one's body a great number of times bombarding her body with stabs, stabbing the girl over twenty times per second almost like an automated weapon. Then with a finishing slice Aisha cut her opponent's body clean in two letting the body of her enemy dissolve into thousands of flesh chunks.

However instead of blood the pieces of Regalia's body bled with sand as the woman's entire body dissolved into grains of sand surrounding the young Uchiha. Aisha slammed down onto the arena from so high up that the entire arena cracked and collapsed into pieces.

"The fight is over…" Regalia's voice could've been heard from the public, people parted and moved away from where the voice could've been heard leaving the young woman exposed in a wide circle as she lifted her fist up into the sky.

"Sand Style: Temporal Shift" she mumbled under her own nose pressing her fist hard, at that instant Aisha flipped over on her back and started crying like a baby despite there being no visible changes to her body. It was a powerful genjutsu transferred through the kunoichi's sand, with her desperation to move as fast as possible and cut as hard as she could the young girl breathed in a lot of it, got even more into her eyes and under her clothes.

"We're done here, I assume?" Regalia looked at her friend hurrying her to leave. The friend of the victorious ninja couldn't keep her pride and joy inside of her pointing out hundreds of time that she was actually with Regalia and how she couldn't wait for the great inauguration ball.

Later at the Uchiha estate things couldn't have been more heated up. Some members of Jiou's family couldn't stop yelling how stupid of an idea it was to let Aisha out to fight Regalia and how lowly their entire elite clan must've now looked having lost to some Sabaku nobody, especially in such a shameful manner. Sister of their prodigy and future hope of the entire clan whined like a baby and while it may have been due to an illusion cast by her opponent the civilians would not see it that way.

That night however quarrels of entirely different matter occupied Jiou's room. Right after the young Uchiha prodigy calmed his sister down and listened to the young whippersnapper scream in anger over how embarrassed she was, almost like her childish shyness was taken away together with her dignity, Jiou's father entered the room and asked for an audience with him. Jiou once again tried explaining to Aisha just why her opponent spoke so rudely but the capricious brat didn't relent and her anger did not cease one bit. After a worrisome sight the young man left her room heading for his own.

"Have you decided who will you invite to the ball?" his father angrily asked, while he was clearly annoyed by that day's fiasco, he was also too proud in his daughter's previously unseen display of skill to scold her any more than public humiliation did.

"No, nor do I intend to. I do not seek love, I seek power, isn't that why you gave birth to me, isn't that what you are so proud of?" the Uchiha prodigy asked, clearly stepping over the line but caring very little. He was not loved, he was not given birth to or respected for his social skills or some special bond of his father with his mother, he was only alive because he was supposed to be the best his clan had – strongest male bonding with the strongest female, the greatest Uchiha elite to be born in centuries.

"That is exactly why me and your mother wish for you to find love, son. Was my lesson about the source of Uchiha power lost on you? Must I repeat it?" Aziz angrily tapped the young man's forehead as if trying to hammer the lesson in with his fingers.

"The greatest source of Uchiha strength is their unparalleled power of love. That is the dumbest thing I've heard in my life. I consider your little family bond to be mostly Platonic, at least as far as mother and your love is concerned, and yet I've achieved greater power than most Uchiha manage in their entire lifespans, that's because like my sister or your brother they fall victims to their own power and stop seeking for more. They enjoy it and flaunt it in their opponent's faces, I care little for such things…" Jiou pushed his father's arm away and tried to walk away on him but father grabbed his elbow.

"Son… That is why I wish for you to uncover the greatest power of the Uchiha – Mangekyou Sharingan and as the scriptures say the key of that power is through love!" the old man yelled out waving around like an old creep which he was, how this pathetic old bag of bones could've once been the mightiest Uchiha in the world was beyond Jiou's understanding.

"I see, well then, do you think so little of our clan that this "Mangekyou Sharingan" was not awakened for entire ages? Where was it all this time? Truly there must've been at least one of us who loved strong enough to awaken it!" Jiou angrily yanked his elbow but his father's grip did not falter, the old man had more strength in him than his appearance could've suggested.

"That's because it may not be the only element… I may happen to know… The finishing touch of the formula but true unparalleled Uchiha love is a key component. One must also experience… Something else entirely…" Aziz whimpered like a widow talking about the loss of her beloved.

"Don't tell me you knew the secret of the Mangekyou those entire years but never willed to awaken it? What could be so incredibly scary to shake the mighty Aziz Uchiha off of the idea of inheriting the power of Uchiha unheard of for centuries?" Jiou laughed out in a joking tone but the look in his father's face betrayed that this was no joking topic for the old man. After witnessing the look on his father's face the young man lowered his head and turned away.

"Very well, I shall wed this Regalia girl from today, the one with all those rumors floating around her. She's incredibly strong and does not flaunt that power needlessly, she appears to be a person I can tolerate. Perhaps in a couple of years this "true Uchiha love" shall peek its head" Jiou smiled.

"I warn you son, do not play with this, if this Regalia invites no feelings of love towards you and you only speak thusly to make me calm myself there is no use for it. May as well declare out loud that Mangekyou Sharingan does not interest you like your old man to whom the price of acquiring it seemed too steep" the old man shook his hand as a warning to his son.

"One more thing, let's say I would be interested in that sort of power, if true love is all it needs, I do feel like I love you, mother and Aisha sometimes. Would you three not qualify for this "price"?" Jiou asked purely out of curiosity, the air whistled around him as his father's fists pummeled his face a couple of time before the boy even had a chance to react sending him down on the floor.

"Don't even think about that, ever. The price is too inhuman to pay even when the woman one loves is concerned, family is out of the question entirely!" Aziz declared and left the hall. Jiou got back on his feet and laughed to himself.

"Regalia it is then…" he said to himself and then laughed out again.

The very next evening the great Kazekage inauguration ball was already firing up. Jiou was noticed and invited to dance by countless young women seeking his attention but the young man decided to follow his father's advice and stop playing around. He needed to find that specific young woman who has peaked his interest and the one that may have fit his father's description of "true love". The young man still had no clue as to what exactly the other part of the equation was, he just hoped that his old man would not bring that secret to his tomb.

"Regalia, so you got the invitation then? I have to say I remember you from the Academy but our paths seem to have gone separate ways once you left to the Land of Tea…" Jiou faked a smile approaching the young woman in an impressive red dress he had noticed among all the guests.

"If by invitation you mean your Uchiha cohorts following me around the whole time and insisting on doing my hair, make up and paying for my dress… Yes, it was a lovely invitation but it'd have been even lovelier if my friend could've made it, I thought she had the invitation?" the young Sabaku lady smiled uncomfortably. Her well done black hair and red eye shadow combined with the striking job that the Uchiha assistants did on her made her feel quite out of her comfort zone in the ball.

"Yes, well, despite her rather important family roots she is quite bothersome…" Jiou nodded, "You are the only one I care to entertain myself with".

"Uchiha modesty in all its glory…" Regalia smiled deceitfully as the smile came while trying to offend her host just so she could see his true intentions. A man like that would not have invited her there without a reason.

"Well, in my defense, I do truly love you and therefore wish to appear more than I actually am. I thought that was the widely accepted custom of courtship?" the Uchiha prodigy bowed extending the young lady his hand.

"That is rather quick…" Regalia accepted the invitation by taking the hand and following Jiou's lead onto the dance floor. She wasn't sure why she accepted his offer to come here or to play this game, whatever it was. Maybe it was just refreshing to see all those other girls who constantly dissed her feel jealous of her for once, maybe she just liked the guy deep inside. As far as the girl was concerned curiosity was all she felt.

"Well, that is why I invite you to dance before I propose…" Jiou smiled.

"You don't dance nearly well enough to skip the drink phase"

"There is a drink phase? I was not informed of that…"

One couldn't have been entirely sure if the evening progressed more awkwardly or magically for the two. On one hand Jiou did have this strange confidence and he always made the impression that while he didn't really need this relationship he wanted it. Such strange appearance and act was quite strange to Regalia who was always widely regarded as an outcast around whom everything blew up and fell down when the man with the eyes of red came for her. However the young Sabaku prodigy also had the shame of seeing the eyes of Jiou's sister every time the two passed her on the dance floor. The young one appeared to have held quite the grudge on her after the big fight…

"Well, are we now ready for the marriage and eventually "true love" phase?" Jiou asked after flipping up a small cup of rice wine. Both Regalia and Jiou have had more than their fair share of those and yet it wasn't like any of them needed it to say it how they thought it.

"Look… All this… It's really lovely and you're really cool and this is basically the dream of every girl ever but… Well it's not really a "but", it's more like a…"

"I don't like "buts" make it not a "but"…" Jiou angrily shook his head downing another cup of rice wine.

"I'm trying to, don't just stop me and then ask me to keep going… Well, I'm sure you've heard the rumors about me, that everything I do ends up in things around me being destroyed and people around me getting killed" Regalia decided to see how her strangely charming new friend would react if she told him the truth about her, maybe later if it went bad she could've just played it all down to the excessive amounts of alcohol in her blood at the moment, not that any of them had reached the excessive point then but a woman's life was not above a little lie and acting…

"You know I've been thinking, you always wish to control time with your sand, I mean that's why you have that genjutsu thing with it right? I was thinking what if you increased…" Jiou started mumbling something unrelated before Regalia placed her finger on his lips but he gently pushed it away.

"The speed of the sand to where it moved past the speed of light and so then you could actually manipulate the time around the area where you use it without suffering the risks that the speed of light places on the human body… Sorry, your topic was boring so I just changed it…" Jiou finished his explanation and then shrugged.

"No, you have to hear this. Those Jashinists in the Land of Tea, they weren't killed by me, they were killed by a man who is after me. A man you would need to accept as a part of your reality if you decided to actually love me"

"Wait, I still reserve the right to kill this man and delete that part of reality, right?" Jiou joked but then saw Regalia's terrified eyes and realized she was telling the truth.

"You don't understand, he's not like anyone someone can meet in this world. He is completely invincible every time I tried to fight him, he always finds me. He's a sensor I think… He eats chakra of people but for some reason mine is incredibly tasty to him which is why he chooses to keep me barely alive each time he catches me so that he could have some more of it once it regenerates. Every time he touches me it feels like… Like being desecrated in the worst way possible, like he tears everything positive and bright about me and devours it like an animal. Several times he mentioned being a "predator of ninja"…" Regalia almost broke down into tears with the few wet drops that fell out from her eyes dragging a bunch of her make up with it coloring her face crimson red as if she cried bloody tears.

"Sir, I've not yet seen your invitation…" somewhere further away an unintelligible complaint of a bouncer reached the guests.

"Well, I suppose part of loving someone "truly" includes killing whoever bothers them, I'll do that then if you agree to become my wife…" Jiou nonchalantly waved his palm around.

Right after the young man finished a loud splatting noise echoed as the clothes of each guest around the entry point dyed with blood of the bouncer. Regalia turned her head around shocked by the crunchy sound of the scene as her eyes opened wide and her weightless lips flipped over to whisper.

"Not now…"

A well-dressed gentleman stood in the center of the entry, his fist was right where the persistent bouncer's head once was before an effortless backhand swing demolished it into a burst of blood similar to how a bubble bursts from the pressure. The oversized man towering to almost twice the size of a normal person was smiling awkwardly with his eyes fixed on Regalia and his tuxedo was completely surrounded in black shroud like substance that was coming off from his pores, the only clearly intelligible feature of his frame were those demonic glowing red eyes, like two infernal light bulbs with no irises to them…

The Kazekage inauguration ball was about to turn into a literal bloodbath.


	139. Stars that Died Out

To a neutral observing party it would not have appeared that Jiou was at all worried about this towering man emanating mysterious dark shroud and staring straight into the petrified eyes of Regalia. The young woman gently slipped off the chair she was sitting on and prepared to bolt. Right before her mad dash towards the door began her hand was gently caught and stopped, Jiou softly turned her face at his own and pressed his forehead against hers.

"Is this any way to live a life? Running? Leaving everyone around you to die? I shall free you of this life and then you must promise to be my wife" the Uchiha prodigy whispered to her. Regalia's face, petrified with fear, nodded in agreement.

The giant demonic man took a step forward before a scythe bounced off of his body leaving a shallow gash. A long haired man stepped in front of him and pulled the scythe back as it was held on a long steel wire. No blood dripped out from the man's wound, it appeared like the scythe barely even cut through his skin.

"Protect the Kazekage!" Akasuna Mugao, the man who would become the next Kazekage after the one being inaugurated that day died of lung sickness years later ordered the other Jounin gathered at the ball. A couple of dozens of Sharingan activated in a crowd of Jounin as the ninja gathered at the party surrounded the infernal giant who just waltzed into the ball and committed a casual yet most foul murder.

"Your chakra is too bland to satisfy me, step aside" a strong toned voice came off of the three meter tall giant who had to hunch slightly to fit into the room. The cut on his chest closed almost instantly as the skin tied together with other strands of skin. The voice of Regalia's demonic pursuer seemed to be quite convincing as Chuunin and even Jounin took steps back in intimidation despite most of Sunagakure's elite ninja being inside the ballroom.

"If my chakra infused scythe cannot hurt you, let's see how you like the toughest armor and the sharpest blade in the Universe – the Neutron Shogun!" Mugao's fingers twitched as his tuxedo got torn apart, steel parts shot from under his formal attire and covered the young Jounin up building bulk and size to match that of the mysterious giant who was his opponent.

"A man dressing in tin foil to avoid being crushed by forces he does not understand, step aside before I am forced to strip you apart limb by limb…" the giant exclaimed calmly placing his fist up in front as if threatening to punch the hulking armor of Mugao's. And an impressive structure it was – a dark red glowing steel alloy shaped and modelled after the typical armor a shogun of Iron Country wore, bits and pieces of the armor glowed as if miniature fusion reactions transpired on the armor firing off jets of pure unrestrained energy.

The armor shot forward with a cocked back fist as it emitted a cybernetic roar. It moved so fast that windows exploded in bits and pieces of glass and the floor below it set on fire, walls cracked and the roof started dropping rubble. The civilians had started to flee long before the first punch was thrown however and the ninja inside were fully able to take care of themselves.

A blinding all covering flash was emitted from the armor's blow, a shockwave fired out digging deep into the ground below but before it created an abyss reaching the planet's core it was soon absorbed by the man it was aimed at in its entirety and barely managed to decimate the marble floor the two stood on. The other ninja leaped back to avoid the all destroying aftermath of the armor's crushing blow. Mugao was one of the most powerful ninja in the village and the assailant was a fool to pick a fight with him and not even bother dodging his blow.

After the blinding flash of light cleared up and all the smoke settled down the giant just stood there with his chest placed still, the armored fist collided with the man leaving not even a single dent on him. Mugao's armor could not even move, the man inside was shaking in shock and disbelief.

"I…Impossible… I modelled this armor after the neutron star, I imitated its molecular structure by creating and studying it inside a chakra barrier! I created an entire new steel alloy based on its molecular structure - Neutronium! Neutron Shogun should be indestructible, it takes all of my chakra just to move this heavy thing!" the cybernetic voice freaked out from inside the armor. The massive arm of his opponent slowly reached out and grabbed the neutronium arm.

"A feeble attempt, lifeless and artificial trash, simple iron infused with chakra, something of life and substance is harder than this chunk of rubbish…" the man yanked the arm clean off leaving Mugao's fleshly arm exposed. The Neutron Shogun fired off jets of flame trying to escape the man's grip but the giant yanked the armor right back and peeled all the neutronium plates and parts right off crushing them right in front of the man in his crushing grip and tossing them aside.

Jiou's eye winked right at his sister, once an Uchiha opened their Sharingan they observed the entire surrounding missing not a single detail, the Uchiha prodigy had not to worry that his sister may have missed his signal.

Two red blurs flashing at the man at a blinding speed could've been picked up by anyone possessing the top level of perception as the image of the two siblings froze right up and close to the man's neck and etched itself into everyone's minds. Jiou and Aisha coordinated their assaults aiming their chakra infused blades at the man's neck, they could've sliced through virtually any substance with such an attack, even if the man was able to tear away the toughest known substance in the Universe, the presence of chakra infusion in their attack instantly made their attack more lethal.

A loud clang deafened the ears of everyone observing the battle forcing every ninja still hoping to overcome their crippling fear of this giant man so that they could have their turn at fighting this man to cover their ears. Small bits and strips of the giant's neck skin tore leaving shallow cuts but not even a single drop of blood fell, Jiou's and Aisha's swords seemingly exploded from the pressure falling onto the floor in pieces.

"Your chakras feel… Different… Yes, I may keep you around for a while, you'll be a worthy nourishment…" the demonic man smiled, his white teeth could've been seen through the black mysterious shroud that covered him when he was fighting, combined with his ever present glowing red eyes it made for a terrifying combination of features.

Aisha collapsed on her knees, she could not believe that hers and brother's combination attack was completely ineffective against this man. Suddenly she felt her father's arms forcefully pulling her out of the harm's way, a soft peck on the top of her head informed the young girl that her father was proud of her bravery and strength.

"All Uchiha, let us show this fool real Hell!" Aziz ordered them, "All those who can use Fire Style jutsu join in!" he yelled out as more ninja than it was possible to count went through their hand seals and breathed out a Fire Style jutsu of some sort combining all of them into a vortex of flames as hot as a thousand dying stars. Possibly hot enough to destroy vast regions of all that existed had it not been for the highly coordinated and controlled flow of the chakra that purely fired off from the user and was absorbed by the opponent in its entirety.

Even with the highly coordinated flow of chakra and unparalleled mastery a beam of whirling flames fired off into the sky, passing through the Moon and leaving into unspecified regions of space causing unknown and cataclysmic amounts of damage. The searing hot inferno of all Sunagakure ninja who possessed the ability to use Fire Release surrounded the man in a technique that would've annihilated anything that could've ever existed even before it was cast by the searing heat of air surrounding it alone. And yet…

As the hotter than destruction of a thousand stars flame ceased the man remained standing without as much as his clothes searing off or losing a single eyebrow, his body was almost glowing in fiery light, he was twitching and writhing around, struggling to contain the amount of chakra, his eyes took in the fiery blinding glow blinding several fools idiotic enough to have not closed their eyes gazing at the spectacle of untold power and destruction unfolding in front of them but then… He calmed down and the fiery glow turned back at the black shroud of darkness that he always wore and flame colored eyes changed back to their usual blood red glow.

"Men of bland taste, all of you…" the giant's fear inspiring tone whispered yet there was not a single man or woman who had not heard it. The man clapped effortlessly sending a powerful shockwave through the ranks of the ninja splattering all of their bodies on what remained of the walls around them. "Unworthy of me feasting on your essences…" he concluded as the giant stood there hunched over the room filed with blood and guts.

Regalia was afraid to open her eyes but the fact that she felt fear informed her that she must've been still alive. The woman blinked and opened her ears. A tall woman in a divine white dress with pitch black flowing hair and an active Sharingan held the Sabaku kunoichi in her arms.

"My son claims he loves you, you shall not die tonight" the woman smiled and placed the girl down, "Go, pick up Jiou and Aisha and protect them with your life, you said this man is after you, you've evaded him for so long, evade him this time, I shall do my best to buy you time…" she said as the woman moved forward so far that Regalia was completely unable to see her eyes. And those were the single set of eyes she wanted to see – the eyes of a mother willing to sacrifice herself for her family. The eyes with willpower to inspire to overcome even the greatest of challenges.

Aziz was kneeling in front of the giant in disbelief, everyone he ever knew, every member of the Uchiha clan in Sunagakure destroyed and disintegrated or splattered on the wall without this man having to throw a single punch. He had seen those very men fight for days and weeks in wars where explosions as strong as dying planets were casual occurrence and hundreds of chakra infused swords danced over their flesh every couple of seconds. Yet a single clap eliminated them all faster than he could perceive what had happened.

"You wonder why you're still alive? Your chakra is relatively mild yet not bland, you shall suffice as an appetizer for now which was why I allowed you to live" the giant thundered out in his regal voice as he towered over the kneeling old man. A deafening explosion tossed Aziz aside, his body instantly forced chakra to augment his body so that he was not torn apart and disassembled on a subatomic level from the exploding shockwave.

"Megaton Punch!" his wife roared out as the shockwave cleared up with her fist being placed on the giant's face yet not even being able to twitch a single muscle on it.

"So you've copied Chestnut Hanasaku's Ton Punch taijutsu style with your Sharingan? But the name was all wrong, it was at least fifty times stronger than a megaton…" the giant spoke indifferently, the woman described as the most powerful female member of Sunagakure branch of the Uchiha leaped back and prepared for another attack.

"Yes, I've fought her during the war and took a long while to record her techniques, I record every jutsu that defeats me so that I cannot be beaten by it again…" the woman nodded as she shook her palm around as the aftershock from the punch she just threw broke the bones in her entire arm and even a couple of ribs. She couldn't believe that Chestnut Hanasaku had punches stronger than this, namely one incredibly powerful jutsu that the woman swore she'd never use for she did not possess the healing ability of Hanasaku. Copying the woman's abilities was a mistake… No one but the madwoman herself could fight like that.

"My husband is no appetizer for any monster such as you, at the very worst case he is the main course!" the woman angrily yelled out as she focused the chakra augmentation to keep her right arm useable, she needed to throw an immeasurable number of times stronger punch and it may as well kill her but she had no other choice. It would hurt more than anything, even tossing a simple Megaton Punch jutsu broke her own arm and her entire right side and she was about to unleash Hanasaku's ace technique… This would hurt more than anything else…

"No, your husband is not the main course, your son and your daughter will be…" the giant smiled once again letting his pearl white smile be clearly visible from the dark shroud surrounding him. It appeared like the man could control that shroud at will as when he entered the ball before this cataclysm of untold levels unfolded he was not covered by it.

"I will send you beyond the reaches of known Universe where you will never find your way back!" the Uchiha woman whined out through the crippling pain in the right side of her body as with a couple of leaps back she covered multiple miles and winded up for another punch. She wasn't even one thousandth of Chestnut Hanasaku's level but she saw the woman sending an entire battlefield into farthest reaches of space with this final punch technique when Konoha's forces were being overwhelmed by Iwagakure's forces.

Gently the woman's steps sent her forward, faster than she or any other Uchiha could keep up with, maybe she was approaching even the speed of Iron Country samurai? Perhaps she was moving just as fast as those light speed swordsmen able to freeze time itself as they moved? The woman smiled as she hoped so certainly… The first lady of the Uchiha appeared right up the man's face and tossed her punch, knowing fully well that her enemy would not bother to try and dodge, after all, why would he? When he took the fiery chakra as strong as thousands of exploding stars what did he have to fear in this world?

"Yottaton Punch!" the woman's lips whispered the name of the infernal jutsu that sent an entire island beyond the reaches of any telescope any country had. Silence took over the world around the two, almost instantly the woman went blind from the flash of erupting chakra that was quickly transferred to her opponent and him alone. She had to be careful when dealing with such powerful attacks just like her clansmen were, if she didn't control the flow of the immeasurable amount of chakra flowing through her she could've caused untold destruction but she had to do this to protect her village, to protect her husband, to protect her children.

Jiou's mother screamed so loud in pain that she deafened herself and took away her own voice falling lifeless on the ground in front of her unfazed enemy. Her entire body tore up and simply dissolved into dust so small that only the Sharingan could've picked up their existence.

"That wasn't very pleasant…" the Leech fixed his bowtie and proceeded to walk forward heading for the escaped prey. They may have escaped that night but they would not outrun him for long, he'll find them, eventually, he always did. He sensed all the chakra in the Universe but once he tasted a specific chakra he could always tell it from any chakra anywhere in the Universe. It was like a man seeing millions of people but once he was slapped by one he could see and identify the man anywhere due to their unique features. Except instead of identifying the person by their scars and tattoos he identified them by how their chakra felt.

Everything had a specific taste. Any living natural substance was tied by a chakra bond. What these fools, these ninja prey did not know was that all in nature was filled with chakra, chakra was a universal force that was there long before ninja and even people came to be and that would exist long after them. They thought chakra was unique to them and to a point they were right. The chakra of a rock in a desert was different to theirs, to a chakra gourmet like him that natural and primitive chakra of a rock would feel like a rotten egg. Eating such transgression against nature would've been worse than death of starvation. However these ninja thought that their chakra was unique when in fact it was chakra that made them a part of this Universe. It was the source and the feedback that connected it all.

People crafted artificial lifeless materials trying to copy strongest structures they found in nature but they didn't realize that created lifeless matter is not worth nearly as much as a simple lump of iron filled with chakra. It was not the fancy name or the emulated molecular structure that made power, that made importance. It was that warm natural bond, that feedback of chakra that made everything special. A simple iron sword of chakra could've pierced through even the toughest artificial neutron star shield. Perhaps one day these naïve fools would realize that… The man slowly made his way through the desert without looking back at the bodies and the destruction he left in his wake.

"Kazekage-sama…" a Jounin spoke to his leader on top of a desert hill.

"This is a nightmare… Our entire military force, all of our decades of militaristic breakthroughs, our elite Uchiha branch decimated…" the man mumbled to himself. He pulled out a white hanky and coughed up blood, placing it back into his pocket.

"Shall we message the other villages, ask for help? Perhaps combined military effort could beat this man, this monster?" the Jounin whispered to the Kazekage.

"Do not be foolish, we cannot tell them that a single man decimated most of our military elites. Think of what it would do to our image, Iwagakure and the other countries are just waiting for a signal to pounce on us and eat us up. They're waiting for just a moment like this. This event must remain a secret… Me and my predecessors are trying to return Sunagakure to its once Great Ninja Village roots, if we let these news loose now all of that work would go down to nothing" Kazekage grunted out loud wiping blood off of his lip with his sleeve.

The lone giant disappeared into a sandstorm, wandering the desert and looking for prey. Far away a lone crippled old man followed by his two children and a woman followed him.

"You shouldn't have gotten involved…" Regalia mumbled out to herself. "Now you've also placed yourself in his sight"

Aisha let go of her father and pounced on the woman to slap the life out of her before a strand of golden sand wrapped around her neck and lifted her into the air to wail around uselessly.

"You bitch, you brought this onto us, you brought him to us, you ruined all of our lives!" she yelled out, for a girl her age she perhaps realized the best just how much all of their lives had changed from this moment. From now on they'll keep living but they'll live as prey running from their hunter, they'll be chased until the end of their days. They'll need to be ready to defend their lives and run at any moment and a second of serenity will be a luxury they cannot have.

"Language, Aisha…" the old man tried to calm his daughter but could not find the right words, was he to blame for it really? Everything he knew for certain was crushed and ruined. There were no more Uchiha in Sunagakure beside them, there was nothing left, even his wife gave up her life in vain…

"The fuck do you care about language? Our lives can end at any point now, mom's dead, everyone's dead… May as well not bother holding ourselves by fucking chains if we're to die at any point…" the girl cried out jumping on Regalia's neck for comfort after the sand let her go. The young woman's arm wrapped around the neck of her "husband's" sister.

"Yeah…" Jiou said. Regalia turned at him curiously.

"Yeah, I'll take you as my wife, invincible monster chasing us and all that included…"

Old man Aziz tried to smile but that night brought too many tragedies for his smile to resemble anything a human smile should look like.

 **Ten years later:**

Jiou roared out in pain and fear as his only functional eye opened up, the first sight that greeted his awakened eye was his father lifted into the air and shaking as the giant man's, the Leech's as the four used to call him, embrace sucked the very life out of him. Blood was pouring onto the floor from some wound that the monster left on the old man. Carelessly the Leech tossed the barely living body of the old man for Jiou and coughed.

"He tasted a little mild, I suppose a little bit of you shall be just the right aftertaste…" he thundered out as Jiou held his dying father in his arms still refusing to believe what he had just seen.

"The pain of loss…" Aziz's dried out lips whispered, Jiou leaned up to his old man to hear his final words as the monster approached him, he had but moments before the monster's grip would lock onto his own body sucking his life essence out of him as well.

"The final element to Mangekyou is… The pain of losing that which you truly love…" his father's last words ignited some hope to Jiou's heart, as the Leech's reach extended the young man was no longer there, just his father's dead body. The Leech surrounded himself in the black shroud and gave chase to the young man… Much has changed over these ten years but one thing remained and would always remain a constant…

The chase continued.


	140. All Ways Lead to Bliss

The sound of small squirt of liquid splattering over the castle ruins made any creepers lurking on the walls, waiting for another one of their kind to creep by just so they could feast on their insides, creep away. It was not a gruesome death that stood behind the noise and it was not blood that coloured the ancient structure walls. It was Kusagoro spitting over his shoulder in frustration.

"Shit, I must've taken a wrong turn somewhere…" he cursed as he was moving quite fast and yet he still hasn't found his son and the others that accompanied him. The only explanation that with all his speed would've still kept him behind was getting lost. He wasn't able to really get into his speed reserves because the place was filled with non-functional traps, sharp twists and turns and bottomless pits that went nowhere. He was still faster than those twerps could've possibly been…

The sound of squirming alerted Kusaguro as his entire body was instantly surrounded by golden sand. The golden grains concentrated into a structure that resembled a cocoon of some sort, a spherical coffin of death that lifted into the air.

"Desert Funeral…" Regalia's cold voice chanted out as the sphere was crushed grinding anyone inside to dust. The technique was lethal to ninja even when used by genin, strong enough to grind stone to dust, strong enough to tear steel apart. When used by Regalia and her unmatched golden sand it should've been enough…

And yet the man simply slumped onto the ground, he appeared relatively unharmed except for a scratch on his forehead and one above his eye that sent blood spurting down his face. His mercenary vest which was strong enough to withstand kunai and sword slashes was also torn up and now less useful for protection. Had the woman used such a relatively simple technique on someone as world-breaking as a Tailed Beast it'd still have felt some pressure… This golden sand was dangerous but to the man it felt more like a nuisance.

Normally such an event would've invited excitement to Kusagoro's lips, maybe even joy that his abilities were somewhat challenged. After all, having fun like his old days was the goal, normal forced suspension from his ninja duties would've killed him of boredom and while he still craved the magician's head he did feel some gratitude to the girl. If it wasn't for her he'd have not had this much to do…

"Why are you here?" Kusagoro asked with a serious face, the face of a killer who was ready to burst into emotion at any point despite his current expression looking quite lifeless and bloodthirsty calm.

"I'm looking for the girl, the magician girl, who is currently looking for the Box. Judging from her movements she knows what she's doing, she's moving in a singular direction and only stops briefly when her dormant chakra takes a significant dip to regain her breath" Regalia replied. After seeing this man only receive minor scratches that were more visually repulsive than actually effective at keeping him down she felt like picking a fight with him may not have been too wise.

"Hmph, I'm looking for my son and his party. They're a safer bet. The little brat is slippery and crafty, if you can control her friends you can control her. Sadly I won't let you lay a finger on my son" Kusagoro lifted his palm forward, his palm extended and his fingers stuck together in a mash of flesh as his hand formed a giant hole in the center and his skin at the end formed a cannon of wooden-like texture. A blue ball of chakra started glowing at the end. Yet the man did not fire his technique, he stood and watched the woman for whatever reason.

"Back out, Konoha Jounin. Yes, we can tell you're too skilled to be genin following the girl. She must've done something to annoy the Hokage and we aren't interested in her per se. We only wish what she knows, namely about the box, more specifically where it is. Whatever you wish to do with her is of no interest to us" Regalia's skin became dried out and cracked, her arms dissolved into golden sandy dust and created a dust cloud behind her as the woman resembled a creature made of both sand and flesh alike. The golden sand from the woman's gourd mixed in with her natural sand creating more golden sand with a mere contact of the two sand grains.

"This box… An awful lot of really interesting people want it, why? What is it exactly?" Kusagoro's emotionless face finally twisted with a smile, he asked the scary question, this whole time he followed Mana and her party without actually knowing too much about the box they were looking for, they just knew that it interested them and because it was an adventure waiting to happen it interested Kusagoro's crew too. He didn't even bother asking the kids before about what the box was, they would've carried that intel to their graves if they had to… Now this woman was interested in a peaceful solution so they may as well have had a brief chat and seen where it went.

"The Box of Ultimate Bliss is a wishing artefact. It is said to fulfil one wish of its founder and then disappear beyond the reaches of the dimensional and universal walls only to reappear again at a random location. I sense great disturbance in the girl's chakra, I theorize she may be seeking it to restore her ability to control it, most likely caused due to abusing chakra augmentation, I've sensed similar disorders before…" Regalia explained still standing ready for the man's next move. His face looked too rough and barbaric to avoid making an unnecessary mess out of things, he was going to do something very stupid most likely.

"Hmph, well then it's of no use to me. All that I want is to have a little fun and finding the damned thing first and winning the hunting game would already fulfil that desire of mine…" Kusagoro smiled letting his hand weigh down and shape back into his human hand. He was somewhat pleased by the lady's cooperation, enough perhaps to forget that he tasked his friend of keeping her at bay and it may have cost his friend his life since she was there talking to him.

"Game? You dolt! Me and my husband need the box, we wish to get rid of a monster unlike anything else in this world, a monster of a man that chases us who is capable of ending all of us in an instant and the only reason he doesn't destroy everything in existence is because some of those things are "tasty" to him. Your own friend paid for this game with his life! Is this all just a game, just for fun to you? How can you seek the box for such a stupid reason!?" the woman lost all her cool and started screaming at the man in pure rage, letting out all the angst, all the anger she felt repressed and reserved for the man chasing her family, chasing her ever since that fateful day in Land of Tea.

Before the sentence was finished Kusagoro was no longer there, the man disappeared and reappeared behind the woman in an instant, faster than anyone that Regalia had witnessed before as the ground beneath his feet crumbled from the sheer force of him kicking off. Before she could turn around she felt her golden layer of sand armour explode and crumble as the man's blow broke not only it but also a couple of her ribs right through that armour.

"Such power…" she coughed up feeling the taste of blood in her mouth. It would've taken more than enough power to destroy a large moon to break through her emergency golden sand armour which she usually wore as an invisible layer of protection against things she couldn't see coming. She used a similar to the Transformation Jutsu technique to make the golden sand layer completely blend in with her skin. And yet the man chasing her has outran both her husband and her sister-in-law, both of whom were some of the fastest ninja she had seen. And now it was revealed to her through this all demolishing punch that there were other ninja matching her husband in speed.

Regalia clinched her gut feeling sharp stabbing pain coming from the previous blow and surrounded herself into a ball of golden chakra infused sand. She felt emanating awesome pressure and air rushing all around it, more and more bumps – the man was rampaging and unleashing all of his might outside the ball trying to break it. It took four to six layers of sand to protect from a single blow and the man was punching more and more and more and more in an endless barrage of anger fuelled blows.

"I'm going to run out of chakra if I keep defending myself like this, or worse, he'll miss a punch and blow everything up… He's like a Tailed Beast this man, enough power to destroy the whole world and no responsibility using it! Just instinctual rampage" Regalia thought making her golden bubble explode violently pushing Kusagoro away into a wall. It did not seem to hurt him too much, just keep him at bay for a moment as the woman floated. She will need to use THAT against him, it was the only way…

"You're like a wailing child! Hasn't your village taught you responsibility after you've achieved that level of power? I saw your Juugo bloodline, were your clan's teachings lost on you? Don't you remember the serenity and tranquillity filled ways of your clan?" Regalia yelled out as Kusagoro angrily yanked himself out the wall he was stuck in causing a castle ruin tower to collapse. The man's feet were shifted into jet-like cannons that emanated a feint chakra flame which kept him floating above the bottomless pit below and Regalia was using her sand as a floating platform to stay floating.

"You've killed my comrade. That changes my plans, I shall kill you then find that box and use it to bring my friend back! That is the ideal Juugo way, the way of ninja bruisers!" Kusagoro roared out rushing at the woman at a much slower speed, he clearly saw how much the castle was damaged by his enraged attack and he didn't want to destroy it now that the rebirth of his friend depended on it.

"Hmph, that was what lead to Juugo being hunted by Iwagakure, your kind has reformed since then and become peaceful with nature, where is some of that tranquillity in you? Leave and you'll need to lose none more of your friends" Regalia tried appealing to Kusagoro since she didn't really wish to use her following ace technique. Still, she began molding her chakra right after uttering those words because she knew that the man was not one to see reason all too clearly.

"The other Juugo have become afraid of what they could do! Fear over their extinction made them afraid to be who they are, what kind of life is that? They act peaceful and love the nature and the animals when actually their souls long for battle, at least I had enough guts to reach out for a village that found use to my abilities everyone wanted to keep hidden. Do you know what those "peaceful" Juugo do to children that do not learn the lesson of "peace and tranquillity"? They kill them before they become trouble, before they draw attention. Is living in fear of standing out, in fear of being excellent any way to live?" Kusagoro roared out trying to punch his way through Regalia's endless waves of sand she kept bombarding him with. He did break some but then some others kept hitting him again and again, opening more and more bruises and blunt trauma.

"Those youngsters are killed because they possess the power to destroy the world at an age much earlier than they know how to use it. Slaying them is a preventative measure, everyone knows that, everyone knows of Juugo's peaceful natures. I see that your elders killed one Juugo troublemaker too few, when a skilled ninja punches strong enough to blow up planets or cause lasting damage to the universe or the integral laws of physics we bow to they control their chakra flow, they purpose it thusly so that it flows through their opponent and nowhere else. They fight with control and finesse and preserve their precious homes. You're like a scared dog, wailing left and right making things blow up where you throw your stupidly aimed fists. I hoped to make you see reason but I'll do this world a favour and save it from blowing up next time you decide to punch an alarm clock…" Regalia said by ceasing all her sand defences and letting the endless waves of sand fall into the abyss below.

Kusagoro roared out, a tube of wood-like texture shot out from his elbow firing a jet of chakra that propelled his fist forward at an even greater momentum, the jets on his feet shot his entire body forward charging at the woman faster than sound, faster than lightning itself. The bruiser's fist did not collide with soft and warm feminine flesh however, he only bruised through sand sending his empowered fist full rotation around and hitting his own left side opening a bleeding wound there.

The man screamed out of pain and aimed his leg jets at the woman shooting back, a demolishing wave of chakra fired off shooting right through the woman and destroying her body made of sand, the beam of pure chakra continued to travel through the tower, splitting the heavens above and into space, hitting an unidentified planet far far away when it lost most its momentum and force leaving a large crater in it flooding the planet with magma bursting from the crater. Kusagoro himself was sent back into the abyss opened by his previous attack. He crashed into hot waters below, apparently the place laid on some sort of heated water source that was boiling both because of the heated by the desert sun ground and because of the depths it was in. The man felt chakra automatically being used by his body to keep his flesh from boiling as he raised himself up and leaped up sticking to a wall at the bottom of the hole. He fired off the jets on his feet to raise him back to where the woman's body dissolved into sand just in time to see it slowly reforming.

"What the flying fuck is this? For a moment I thought it's a sand clone but it's clearly not, it's reforming plus I tracked you pretty clearly, I would've noticed you replacing yourself using Substitution Jutsu or using a clone technique…" the man inquired when suddenly he felt frozen, paralyzed and afraid. It was strange, how could a battle scare him, maybe it was an emotion placed on his affected mind? Suggested? It was genjutsu! The man's body burst with chakra that disrupted his own flow dispelling the genjutsu almost at the same time he realized he was hit by it.

"It's an incredibly complex technique, it's neither ninjutsu nor genjutsu but it has elements of both. It's a Tenketsu Shinto technique. Tenketsu Shinto is a combination of ninjutsu and genjutsu cast on oneself that allows me to manipulate my own body at a molecular level and for example – become sand when I am hit" Regalia explained as her body popped into clouds of sand that blew Kusagoro's way, the man just stood there letting the sand cut his cheeks and caress his wild hair. The man huffed angrily as the ability as explained to him sounded quite troublesome.

"A technique like that must cost a lot of chakra to maintain…" he said when suddenly his body felt paralyzed again, Kusagoro looked at his arm and witnessed it aging rapidly and drying away into dust. The man knew it to be an illusion again, he quickly used some more chakra bursting through his system to dispel it. He was surprised by how easily the woman transferred illusions through his system using her sand, only now he understood just how dangerous she was – whenever he hit her she dissolved into sand and remained unharmed and yet she could use her golden sand to transfer techniques at his expense if even a single grain of sand got into his body. How was one to track all the sand in the middle of a desert?

"Not at all, it does cost some chakra to command one of my chakra nodes – the Tenketsu to activate the technique on a very small scale, then one must simply overflow that chakra node with enough chakra to cause a small shockwave signal that passes through the others and passes the signal. It can be activated quickly and efficiently" Regalia smiled a little, she took great pride in her Tenketsu Shinto technique, there were very few if any living ninja that could use Tenketsu Shinto. It required higher than that of a medical ninja chakra control to manipulate something on a molecular level at that exact way, it also needed manual reactivation every time one's body was completely destroyed to reassemble it. A smallest miscalculation could've manipulated the body's molecules permanently transforming it into the substance one emulates causing Regalia to permanently become just a pile of sand or a smallest miscalculation of chakra amount left compared to how much was needed to reassemble her could've left her in separate places at once making what remained of her life quite miserable.

"Hmph… Well in that case I can't kill you because I know no way of beating your Tenketsu Shinto. I've never seen or heard of someone manipulating their own molecular structure making themselves invulnerable, however you also have no way of beating me. Your most powerful golden sand techniques might hurt me but you can't use it inside the castle or even outside without risking it falling apart and sinking your precious box to the bottom of the abyss, also you can keep casting genjutsu and reducing your chakra level but I have chakra to beat your illusions now that I know they are coming. I have more chakra left than you so all you'd achieve is cancel out your Tenketsu Shinto leaving you fleshy and very punchable" Kusagoro laughed out from the bottom of his lungs realizing the deadlock the two were in. If only this woman did not kill his friend whom he planned very much on bringing back he could've fought her to the end of time there… He could've had so much fun!

"True…" Regalia sighed, Kusagoro turned at the corridor he was heading to when the woman's body dissolved into sand and then reassembled with two armoured minions with steel helmets and chest plates and twisted desert swords, the equipment matching that of best equipped desert raiders. The two minions assaulted the man but with a quick flip in the air Kusagoro's kicks blew the two up into two bursts of sand.

The golden sand wielder shrugged with an innocent smile, "Can't blame a girl for trying…" when Kusagoro looked at her with a little annoyance to his face.

The woman floated up closer to the Jounin and landed on the same corridor he floated into. She lifted her palm up pointing at one direction and then turned at another.

"I am also an Advanced Sensor, I can sense anyone within two hundred meters of my sand grains and I've placed one on the magician girl so I know perfectly where she is. The sand grain she has feeds back with the others and reaches me in a chain. She is over there. Since we cannot possibly walk the same path, go the other way…" the woman suggested.

"Hmph, that glowy sand of yours is pretty handy…" Kusagoro growled angrily and then looked at the other path, "Why should I go there?" he asked curiously.

"Because I don't know what's in there. Imagine the adventure and the thrill of going that way, you may meet the magician girl and stop her from finding the box if this path cuts in with hers, you can find your son and the other Konoha genin or butt heads with me again… The possibilities are endless" she smiled playing the man just like she wanted him to be played.

"Fine… I suppose it beats walking the same way as you and us trying to kill each other every couple of seconds" the man sighed as the two parted ways heading to the different sides of a corridor that split into two paths. Five floors higher Mana was still rushing towards where she thought the throne room was, the planning of the castle reminded her a lot of the long and detailed history analyses of the Land of Wind architecture and she couldn't feel more proud in herself for studying all of those boring books back home.

The only problem was identifying all those ruined rooms correctly but she was making way – the throne room was close, she could feel it!


	141. Belated Regret

Slowly but, at the very least, surely Mana was progressing through the endless hallways of the castle ruins. A couple of times the floor spooked her by having a couple of spikes shoot out, large enough to pierce right through her legs and maybe even reach her abdomen but they were so few in between and so barely functional that they only provided a temporary scare. Luckily for the magician she was using the walls for support so the few spikes that did shoot out in the center missed her by a mile. She pretty much had to use the walls to help her walk forward having the state she was in in mind.

If her experience with the architecture of that age was correct, the throne room should've been somewhere in the ground floor, however, having in mind that the throne room also must've served as the treasure chamber it should've been at a separate wing of the castle somewhere at the northern parts. It was surprising how much in common different buildings of the same era had. Mana made a sharp turn that she didn't really calculate to the end, she tripped and fell right on her front and shouted out in pain peeling her body off the ground through sheer force of will.

What her eyes saw after she stood up made her curse internally. The entire corridor in front had no floor, judging from the rather visible part where the floor lead to, the corridor must've once been a trapped one, it must've once had pressure plates on the floor that when triggered sent those poor unfortunate skeletons down below to their spiky demise. The water below was still evaporating even now, it must've vapored away and then gathered at the colder ceiling and then dripped back down to the heating source. Not only did those poor souls fell on giant spikes larger than their whole bodies but the water they fell into was also boiling.

"Someone really didn't want anyone to find whatever's in that throne room…" Mana thought to herself trying to find a way to make it across. Her fingernails were already bleeding and almost peeled off from the time she crawled the castle walls from outside the good old fashioned way, using her boots and torn up and scratched bleeding fingers.

Slowly the magician walked up to the wall on the other side, right up to where the big fall lurked there waiting for another careless visitor to claim.

"Well, if I was a big fancy castle snob, I'd want an easy way into my king's throne room, scaling the walls and ceilings couldn't have been the ideal way to pass this place…" Mana spoke to herself as she softly stroke the right side wall trying to find some pressure plate or switch that triggered something. Her foot accidentally stepped on a strangely elevated brick that closed the drop with a floor made of wet stones.

Mana smiled.

"I didn't see any rocks below, the floor doesn't crumble, it goes into the wall, it's got to be a deceitful switch… The floor would most likely just close back in once I trigger the pressure plates again" she loved every single moment of this. Even when her entire body was beaten and broken, even when she felt like passing out from blood loss and pain of merely staying on her feet, Mana loved trying to beat this puzzle of death. Finally the magician's hand pressed against a stone on the wall that was supposed to open a passageway but the wall was so old that instead of opening it simply broke off and partly blocked the girl's path.

Through pain and a lot of teeth grinding Mana slipped through the small gap that was still left for her to slip through. It wasn't ideal but she had to be careful not to rub her body too hard against the stone as it could've just all broke into bits and crushed her beneath it. Try as hard as she may have, Mana's body still got covered with cuts and bruises from slipping under the collapsed stone wall. Not that new scratches and scars bothered her at this point, the pain was already so strong that new scratches barely even registered, she just left her bloody mark on the collapsed wall.

Slowly the girl made her way through the passageway and pressed a wooden switch that collapsed another wall instead of merely opening her. After a brief sigh and a moment to catch her breath and let the rampaging pain settle down somewhat Mana continued her walk forward. She looked around, this was strange, the room she was in was the treasure room but it made no sense. She had figured that the desert king would've kept his treasure somewhere inside his throne room, not made his treasury the default access to his throne room.

Right up there for her reach on a small platform stood a gigantic black cube, four or maybe even more times larger and wider than the girl that was admiring it. The black box was covered with some sort of beastly or demonic ornaments and had huge decorative fangs that looked large enough to impale someone on. The whole structure looked like it was made of some sort of gemstone, it felt almost like black marble or a slightly bleaker onyx. The magician smiled and sighed. This could have been it, the box!

"Step away from the box, girl…" Mana heard a voice behind her, terrified she turned around only to see wild golden grains of sand whirling in a vortex that looked like a miniature sandstorm that then gathered into a single feminine shape which soon gained substance and color. An impressive looking woman in hair matching Mana's in their darkness and of rather similar skin color but with much more make up on her face and a much less conservative view on clothes stood in front of her with an angry look on her face.

"You're one of the Sunagakure ninja that attacked Kusaguro's squad… Why? What does Sunagakure want from this place? Didn't you guys know that the box was here? I mean it was recorded in some pretty old sources, you had to know…" Mana tried to stall for time when a violent explosion of sand coming from the woman herself knocked her on her back. The woman slowly and confidently walked up to Mana and stepped on the girl just to keep her from standing up, she didn't apply pressure, she must've somehow known that the girl's insides were pretty banged up and didn't want to further injure her.

"Those old sources you must've read it from were inside the Forest of Death's archives, whoever recorded of the box's existence wasn't aligned to a single village. He hoped that the box would remain hidden if he hid the box in one location but placed clues about that location in another country. He was a pretty smart fellow, even if someone figured it out centuries from when the source was written they'd just assume that the box was already claimed since the location was so well known to another country…" Regalia answered and then walked up to the box spreading her arms and admiring the structure in all its beauty.

"I thought it was supposed to be as large as a building… Still, seeing it like this is impressive, how do I activate it?" the woman asked without even turning at Mana.

The girl grunted in pain as she sat back up on her behind and tried to check on all her reopened wounds and see if any of them were leaking too much blood for her to not be worried over.

"You can't, this isn't the original, it can't be" Mana explained when Regalia turned back at Mana and walked up to her lifting the girl up and pressing her against a wall with her elbow, the woman placed some pressure on the girl's throat taking away her air supply for a moment.

"I have no time for games, the man after us might follow us here, he always follows us wherever we go. We need the box to make him go away, where is it, I'm in no mood to play around, I'm warning you" the Sunagakure ninja slowly and firmly stated right up to Mana's face letting the pressure loose when she was done talking. Mana fell on her knees and started coughing up blood in rather alarming rates.

"Hmmm, your chakra level is really low. You can't have much left in you, even if you do activate the box the only wish that'd make sense for you in your current state is one that would keep you alive. I've seen you worry over your friends, let yourself be beaten to this state to buy them time. You're a kind person, I know you are. The man after us does not negotiate, he does not sleep or eat or do anything other than take away innocent lives. Don't you wish to make the world a better place, make a noble sacrifice and rid this world of that monster instead of just selfishly healing yourself?" the woman once again revealed how well she was able to read people from one or two signs she picked up.

Mana stared at the small puddle of her own blood on the rocky floor. What if the woman was right? All that she wanted was to leave this world a better one that she found it after being born. What if this was her way to make a difference, to leave a mark? What if by ridding this world of that thing she could've actually made a difference? It didn't matter, her heart was already nagging her to do the right thing and selfishly asking for her chakra or her life back was not it. She wanted Meiko to hold that box for at least a moment but it couldn't be helped. As the woman claimed Mana must've not had much time left in her.

"Fine, I'll help you find and activate the box" Mana bowed her head and closed her eyes, knowing full well she signed a contract that ends with her own death.

"Really? Wow, you're… Actually different from everyone I've ever met. No one in their right mind would give up their chance at a wish coming true for another person" Regalia's eyes opened wide but then the woman strangely turned sad, "You know… You remind me of how I used to be, before this all… Before that man put me and everyone I love in danger"

"It sounds like that person after you is quite scary, you don't sound like a bad person just… You love with all your heart and are ready to do all it takes for the people you love. With that I can relate. If I just asked for my chakra back the box would just give me a second chance to fail, if I helped you and your family I'd actually help someone before I die, it's the only right choice"

Regalia's hand softly pressed against Mana's shoulder. The girl's fading eyes opened up a little and the paleness faded from her cheeks. "My sand is special, I can transfer chakra through it, that is how I use illusions on my opponents. I can keep you alive, even after you help me, I promise I'll keep you alive until your friends find us"

Mana smiled hopelessly, "It won't work. You'd need to be an actual medical ninja. My body doesn't do instinctual chakra augmentation anymore, I'm broken, been that way for some time now. I do appreciate the gesture though… Let's go, if the box is here it's in that throne room" she turned forward and started stumbling over the stone stairs before Regalia carefully took the magician into her support and held her up helping her walk.

"I'll need your name, girl, it is possible that in your village you'll be known as a traitor for this, you helped another village and defied your own mission objective but… To me and my family you will always remain a hero, also to thousands of people whom that man would have killed after us" the woman softly asked of Mana as the two slowly made their way through the L shaped corridor into the throne room.

"I'm Nakotsumi Mana and… I'm not a ninja anymore. I used chakra augmentation beyond my ability to control it and it ruined my system, I beat my opponent and protected the young man I wished to protect but it broke my body and I'm unable to help anyone anymore. This is the least I can do…" Mana replied her voice was filled with sadness but also a small hint of happiness behind what she was doing. It was obvious to the woman holding her in her arms that the magician was ready to give up on everything she still had to help her.

"Maybe all is still not lost, I've seen people with your disability, I'm an advanced sensor so I've sensed my fair share of chakra disorders and… Well, usually people like you bounced back. I mean to travel here from Konoha… By now your chakra system should've fixed itself already and I am actually quite surprised that your disorder still persists. I think your problem may not be physical but mental, the event that left you disabled didn't scar your body nearly as badly as it did your mind. If you live through this, please try to overcome not your physical disability but the mental block that forces you to consider yourself worthless" Regalia explained as the two shared their first impressions on the ruined throne room.

Once in history this place must've been quite impressive, it had several burnt down carpets and silk covers all over, diamond incrusted walls and various art pieces ravaged by time were all around the place. The entire room in its colossal entirety was rotten to its core in that depressing rocky grey that was only emphasized by the slowly dying desert sun. Mana's weak hand barely lifted up pointing Regalia at the throne where the woman placed the girl's body.

"Look… Maybe… Maybe this isn't the way… Maybe we should… Take care of you…" Regalia started to shake as she didn't seem so sure about her determination to let a person die over her dream. "I mean, I'm using you as a tool for my own survival and it just makes me feel so rotten inside… Almost like living like that wouldn't be worth it"

Mana didn't even listen to the woman's words, she had to be strong, it wasn't any easier to her either. She was the one who accepted her own death just so Regalia's family could live after all. Mana's weak and pale hand, covered in bleeding scratches ran over the inscriptions on the throne. The giant stone chair had one large silk and suede covered cushion that was torn up and also similarly to this entire building crushed under the weight of entire centuries passing by.

The magician tried to stand and move down the throne but she just slipped and fell down the stairs. Seeing her own brief track of blood on the stairs looked pretty gruesome to the girl but she only laughed out, she solved it… Regalia tried to lift the girl up, the woman's eyes were almost tearing up but Mana shook her head and quivered out of the woman's hands.

"The throne itself is a giant ancient safe, just break it and you'll find the box inside" her pale lips uttered.

"You sure?" Regalia asked.

""Ultimate power caressed by the Greatest One's butt cheeks, breaking through the stone of arrogance will yield the dream that one seeks" that's what the inscription on the throne says in Anansu dialect, I'm pretty sure" she smiled feintly.

"No, about all of this… What if there is another way, maybe some way to find the box once it has been used, we could heal you using the box or maybe… Maybe there's some loophole in its rulings that would let us fulfil two wishes, maybe we could ask for a map of all the box's future locations?"

"For the wish to work it has to be a selfless one. Why are you hesitating now? All of this life being chased by that man has lead you to this moment. Don't you wish to finally get rid of everything that plagued you, finally have a happy family life like you dreamed to? I mean it must've meant a lot to you to come here and risk your own life over this box… Go on and claim it, I want to still be of some help to someone, maybe before I die I'll still get to see a woman freed from being chased…" Mana closed her eyes annoyed that the woman wouldn't follow up on the deal.

"I was so entranced by being chased, reduced to a primal state of being a prey, never standing up to the one after me that I failed to recognize just how the chase has changed me and my family. What we are actually ready to sacrifice to gain what we want – freedom. I'm starting to realize that people like us, people willing to let young and kind people like you die to achieve their dream aren't worth of life. I have come to realize that I no longer wish to have my curse be magically wished away at the cost of someone else's life. I wish to earn my freedom by defeating that man" Regalia declared crushing the rocky throne with her golden sands. A small sphere of sand moved above her open hand and dropped a small iron ball with the manji symbol stuck on it.

"I… I don't get it… Where is the box?!" Regalia shouted out in desperation, "I want to help you, where is the box!? Mana, where is the box, don't die on me!" the woman yelled out gripping the symbol in her hand almost strong enough to crush the iron it was made from. Seeing Mana's twisted by pain but unconscious face brought horror to her own, the woman tossed the iron ball aside breaking the manji decoration on top of it. The woman pounded the stone floor below her.

"Get away from Mana-chan!" Kouta's voice made Regalia's tear ridden face to once again reveal itself from the mess of hair that she was hiding it in.

"I think she's still alive, dying frees one of pain and Mana like anything but free of it" Shimo mumbled out gripping the hilt of his sword and preparing to intercept the woman if she tried something funny.

"So is this the Box of Ultimate Bliss?" Meiko pouted tossing the round iron ball around in her hands, "I thought it'd be shaped like an actual box…Oh, well, Mana's wish for me to hold it is complete, we can now kick this woman's ass, save Mana and go back home!"

Mana's team has finally reached the throne room as well!


	142. Requiem for a Chase

"If you are Mana's friends I have no reason to fight you, I have seen and helped much younger than you find their deaths during my quest for survival" Regalia angrily exclaimed when it appeared like an inevitable conflict would erupt between them.

"Oh yeah? I see Mana-chan passed out and running out of time with you above her lifeless body, that's shadier than I am willing to overlook. What did you do with the real Box?" Kouta yelled back at the woman angrily clutching his fist and focusing what little he had of chakra into it making it glow in blueish flare.

"That chakra focused punch… You're a medical ninja? I suggest you save your chakra for helping Mana and not waste it for pointless…" Regalia couldn't finish her sentence because Meiko kicked right at the center of the woman's spine from behind her. The body of the woman in the red dress dissolved into sand as if the genin kicked a large sandbox and then reformed when the grains of sand re-entered her body.

"What the?" Meiko's eyes shot wide open in surprise and confusion. She had never seen an opponent like that before. Usually even when her opponent was stronger they merely augmented their body to be incredibly hard so that her fist never really did any damage but she had never seen a ninja become sand before.

Regalia's hand extended to the side firing a blindingly fast wave of sand that slammed Meiko to the wall and held her there.

"I am running out of patience, how such a kind soul could find friendship inside such brutish and numb-skulled kids is beyond me" the woman growled almost like this outburst was more meant to herself than the kids attacking her for no reason.

"Ice Style: Freezing Wolf Blade Jutsu!" Shimo roared out letting his hands flash through a couple of hand seals as a blinding sandstorm covered the entire area extending to the corridors and rooms much further to where the scuffle was going on. The blizzards were shaped like a dozen of smaller scale vortexes of cutting wind with knife sharp icicles inside, the winds were cold enough to also freeze whatever they passed through. At the same time as those roaring winds of absolute frost collided at Regalia's location the young swordsman leaped over the woman with a wolf-like figure shaping from solid ice around his sword making his blade appear several times larger and much more impressive in length and appearance.

The attack itself only lasted for an instant as Shimo's figure appeared behind the woman. Regalia's entire body froze into a solid chunk of ice that then split into three pieces and collapsed onto the floor, the same also happened to the stream of sand that held Meiko pressed to the castle wall crushing her chest slowly so that the blacksmith did not resist.

"Enough!" Regalia screamed out in anger as her body reformed. She was breathing much heavier as she had beaten many much stronger opponents that day and spent quite a large number of chakra on them, she wanted to stay there and slowly explain everything to these kids but frankly they were surprisingly much more capable than ordinary genin and she had little chakra to spare on them after wasting so much on that Jashinist and his team leader.

Regalia's golden sand exploded violently all over the room, avoiding only the small spot on the floor where Mana's body was laying and blasting all three of her friends off their feet and bashing them mercilessly into the castle walls breaking all of them through them. The woman remained standing for a brief moment just to see if the kids still had some fighting spirit in them but all of them appeared to be quite battered by that blast of sand. It appeared like these kids also had very little chakra to spare as even such a weak blast injured them quite heavily decimating their clothes and opening a bunch of nasty looking wounds.

Slowly the woman walked up to Kouta and lifted his body off the ground holding the youth by his hair, she turned his bruised and battered body at Mana. "She is your priority, not me. This girl is a remarkable youth who is ready to sacrifice her own life and dream for a total stranger on a whim. There aren't many people like that. I don't know where the box is, nor do I care. The magician girl has convinced me to reach for my dreams using my own power and not some fairy tales and legends. As the medical ninja of the group you have the responsibility to heal her, if she dies I'll hold you responsible"

"I thought I froze your body, it should've been drenched in water when that ice melted, didn't that make your body vulnerable?" Shimo's loud huffing growls came from the next room as the young swordsman clutched for his ribs.

"It does not matter if you heat my golden sand or if you drench it. Tenketsu Shinto techniques cannot be beaten using ordinary chakra nature advantages for I do not just become sand, that sand is more chakra than it is sand" Regalia explained letting go of Kouta's head and letting the young medical ninja fall on his knees trying his best to crawl to Mana's aid. His own remains of chakra were already keeping him alive and kicking so he had to reach the girl before his own body uses out too much chakra for his own survival.

"You're a Sunagakure ninja, aren't you? What are you doing here? Does the Sand Village intend to interfere with our mission?" the rogue swordsman asked. If Sunagakure actually knew about the box and intended to interfere it would've made their mission much more difficult.

"The Sand does not care about the Box because it apparently isn't here. Your mission is over, go home" Regalia replied, she didn't really like this swordsman because he still looked quite hostile and was readying his body for another attack, as a sensor she could somewhat tell.

"What do you mean it isn't here!?" Shimo yelled out burning up with rage. "We've come all this way, fought through crime syndicates and faced the Nine Tails, we didn't come all this way for nothing!"

"Open your eyes, boy, look around you. Two villages clashing with deaths on every side, people are ready to kill each other over a fancy fairytale. That is the kind of world we live in now, the world where wishes don't just come true. If you have a dream, in this world, you need to work for it, kill for it. Most of the time all those deaths are pointless, in war people die all the time and none of it ever makes any sense. We are born and we die without a purpose, only if we give ourselves a purpose, a thing to live for do we have actual point to our lives. Only then can we have dreams to work for. That is what I have come to realize after meeting Mana. I know you are ready to attack me, I can feel the blacksmith girl waking up as well… I need to disable you to actually make you stop coming for me"

"If I find out that you were responsible for Mana's pain, that you stole the Box or made it disappear, I'll find you and kill you wherever you are!" Shimo declared to which Regalia only smiled.

"Get in line, boy…" she closed her eyes, the woman could no longer feel the chakra of her sister-in-law. Jiou's chakra has shot blazing up as if he had just received a second wind. The chakras of his opponents were slowly fading, did Aisha actually get herself killed? Perhaps it was for the better, she received a fair and honorable death instead of being tortured and sucked dry by that man. Regalia would've chosen to die a thousand times in battle over another moment in that man's grasp.

"Sand Style: Temporal Shift!" Regalia chanted unleashing her genjutsu that made the three friends of Mana's de-age to their infant years upon their very eyes. She looked at the medical ninja who was crawling and rubbing his tired and disabled body against the stone crawling to Mana. Regalia knew that feeling inside the boy's heart, that feeling that made one crawl when they had no legs to walk with. She felt calm leaving Mana's fate in the hands of this young one. Then she felt a crushing pressure at her chest that made her open her eyes and fall to her knees.

"No! He has found us… No… Not here…" she started mumbling to herself before releasing Kouta from the illusion while she left the other two to writhe on the floor whining like little babies asking to be taken into someone's arms and calmed. By now Regalia was used to seeing grown people acting like babies so the sight no longer looked comical to her.

"Whatever you need to heal Mana is already inside her. Please do not rush to leave the castle until you absolutely have to. It'd be for the best if you forgot the way you came from, this is a castle, it must have some emergency tunnels, use them instead, wherever they lead it will be safer than the way you came from" the woman in red spoke to thin air but she knew that Kouta heard her. The woman's body dissolved into sand and rushed off to assist her husband who was about to have his hands full.

Finally Kouta's hand touched that of Mana's, the boy pulled himself up closer and sat up placing his hands above the girl's body. He tried to gather his last bits of his strength but he couldn't find any left. He had just what he needed to survive, just enough to stay in a better condition than Mana was in currently.

"What you need to heal Mana-chan is already inside her…" Kouta mumbled to himself as he used the diagnosis technique to scan the girl with a blue light flaring up from his hands illuminating his friend in the shadow of passed time that had devastated this castle. Mana looked terrible, once again she got injured to the point where she lingered on the edge of living and dying, that was how much they had failed her as friends and as ninja protecting their client. The world past the village walls was so scary, so strong. They could've never been ready for it.

"The woman gave Mana-chan chakra because she wanted her own body to use it to augment itself but Mana-chan's control is disabled so the chakra just stayed there…" Kouta realized pulsing a small flare of his chakra that illuminated his hands in green light and quickly pushed the mass of chakra out of Mana's system into his own stream. Usually chakra couldn't just be passed around like water from a jug, however in this case Kouta wouldn't pass it to anyone, he'd use a small signal from his own body to repurpose that chakra mass to heal Mana. He'd use that woman's gift to Mana to bring her back, it won't be enough to heal Mana, she'll still be banged up but at least she'll be in no danger of dying…

Kouta used one of his arms to wipe blood that was dripping on Mana's body from his forehead which was busted up, he took a moment to look at the side seeing his friends still affected by the illusion. They either still haven't realized that they were under an illusion or they simply didn't have the necessary amount of chakra to overcome the genjutsu technique. After all, usually it took much more chakra to break out of illusion than that was used to cast it and the illusion that manipulates one's own perception of time must've been incredibly advanced one.

"Then there're you guys…" the young man smiled a little…

"What happened, what is wrong with his eye!" Gokibure yelled out when he saw Jiou's Sharingan symbol shift around, circles formed inside the tomoe signs that a normal Sharingan eye had, they also twisted into a strange shape that reminded more of a manly trinity sign with two of them positioning at the top corners of the eye with the third taking the central bottom position. Two shifted circles that looked similar like the asteroid rings accompanying planets formed around the tomoe signs in Jiou's eye.

"You killed your own teammate to acquire more power? What sort of a twisted man would do something like this?" Remashi spoke horrified by Jiou's actions. The woman always thought that most people she met in the battlefield were innocent, just people doing their jobs. Maybe that was part of why she could never actually push herself over the line to satisfy her cannibalistic curiosity. This man was sick, twisted… And the worst part was that he used an ancient Uchiha ritual to gain power, that meant that being twisted was the whole point of his cursed clan. It was said by many romance novel writers that no one loved stronger than an Uchiha, which was why most main characters in novels and plays were Uchiha. However to love so strong and yet choose power over life of one's love was just wrong to the Hyuuga woman.

"I wonder which of the Mangekyou Sharingan powers I have acquired… Either way I am incomplete, I need both eyes to fulfill the Mangekyou potential" Jiou mumbled to himself as he reached over his eye and touched it while his other hand made a handseal.

A deafening scream of a woman being murdered and screaming endlessly overwhelming all the other senses of the two opponents of the newly awakened Mangekyou user and stopped both Gokibure and Remashi in their tracks. Their bodies witnessed their own deaths, their blood vessels exploding in gruesome ways, their limbs contorting into positions no one had ever taken for imaginable. The genjutsu completely overwhelmed the senses of the two and froze them making them unable to protect themselves.

Remashi quickly burst her fiery chakra all over her body recovering from the shock but when her vision finally ceased seeing her own death all over and over again with the voice of an unnamed woman screaming in her ears and overwhelming her senses. Finally that terrifying voice calmed down and then disappeared however the first sight she saw of the real world was Jiou standing in front of her friend with a sword penetrating Gokibure's chest.

"I figured you'd see through the illusion and recover first with your Byakugan and all that…" Jiou mumbled. He was no longer the man that Remashi started fighting, he was currently just a monster who has just killed his own precious one and had little to no feeling in his eye or his expression. He pulled the blade out with Gokibure's body squirting blood all over Jiou's body and face, the man turned back at Remashi with a blank stare, his face still dripped with her comrade's blood.

"His body didn't even try to resist, didn't even augment itself in any way… You guys are so invested into strength, finding the strongest technique you can that you lack ability to protect against the simplest illusions, then again, the power of Mangekyou Sharingan is anything but simple…" he spoke like a man who has lost his mind but not due to how emotional he was, how he lacked any emotion whatsoever.

"Come, Hyuuga woman, push me to my limit and force my body to reveal which one of the Mangekyou abilities my eye has…" Jiou shouted with emotion finally returning to his twisted with rage face. The man leaped forward thousands of times faster than sound, Remashi's pain ridden muscles forced to woman to follow albeit slightly slower, the two clashed again and again. Remashi's Byakugan couldn't even track Jiou's chakra points due to how fast the man was moving. The woman's fire infused pinpoint strikes clashed with Jiou's blades firing off miniature explosions of flames and sparks, they clashed again and again, it looked like there was no end to their battle.

The sound of Remashi's fiery strikes colliding with Jiou's swords reminded of automated fire barrage except one sound followed the other so closely that sometimes one hid the other beneath.

"Fire Style: Eight Trigrams Inferno Crusher!" Remashi roared out focusing most of the chakra she had into her last resort technique, thrusting both of her palms at the equally exhausted opponent of hers. A fiery beam shot off of Remashi's palms that was supposed to incinerate her opponent. Hundreds of millions of degrees of concentrated power intending to destroy and absolutely obliterate the man who has killed her comrade.

Her hands moved in closer and closer. Remashi's eyes observed every atosecond of her own movement, it was like the entire attack played out in a slow motion crawl, her heated palms and the concentrated beam firing from them ready to incinerate the central chakra points and leave a large gapping hole in her opponent moving up closer and closer to Jiou, the man was tired, he may have been much stronger than Remashi initially but all the holding back and worrying over the castle ruins forced him to squander that advantage – he was caught open. He was within range!

Jiou's body started disappearing, fading, almost like it was spaghettified instantly and flushed down some sort of a hole in time and space appearing from his eye. Remashi's beam fired off into the distance, continuing forward without an end. She missed… The woman awaited for her opponent's punishment, she was fully expecting to feel a sword stabbing through her from behind but as she kept on standing nothing happened. She just stood there and her opponent was nowhere to be found. What happened? Where did that man go? Did she win?

"Shit… That fucker stabbed me…" Gokibure's annoying voice reached Remashi's ears making the Hyuuga turn around and rush to her friend. She kneeled up to him observing his blood spitting wound on the man's chest.

"He just disappeared…" Remashi uttered still confused about what had happened.

"I really hope you incinerated him somehow, I mean that beam puts a large star to shame, doesn't it? Maybe he just burnt from the intensity of it, disintegrated instantly?" the man coughed up blood when his insects burrowed inside his wound covering it up from bleeding.

"You should've defended yourself against that illusion, didn't you see it coming you idiot?" Remashi tried to annoyingly bite her friend. Now that she saw her friend being in no danger of dying she remembered how much he pissed her off sometimes and what their working relationship actually was.

"He… That illusion was different…" the Aburame sniveled like a whining child sitting back up and standing up in time. He could've walked that injury off now that his insects would cover the wound up and keep supplying his body with chakra that they eat, using their instinctive minds to keep their host alive so that they too can stay alive.

"Yeah, it didn't attack our chakra flow, it pinched our brain centers. Even if we somehow suppressed our chakra or even if we were of the clans immune to genjutsu we'd have been completely defenseless… I thought genjutsu focused chakra flow and not one's brain directly…" Remashi nodded.

"Damn genjutsu users, no one is ever ready for them and then they evolve their techniques even further…" Gokibure spat blood to the side. All of a sudden his body just burst into a combination of blood and exploded all over the desert sand and over the rocks and the debris around. Remashi's eyes continued to stare at the space where her friend once was now only seeing a tall three meter sized hunched over man with long black hair and a rich beard, the man's eyes were glowing red as if they were red lanterns or two small stars that just glowed red. His position implied that Gokibure blew up due to the man's overpowered punch. The man's massive hand quickly wrapped around Remashi's mouth, surprising the woman by how deceitfully fast the man was and lifted her into the air.

The woman tried to resist but it felt like her whole body was powerless, she still had chakra to fight back, she was supposed to but she felt more powerless than she had ever felt. It was like the man's touch took away all of her essence, all of her chakra in one instance. She kicked around in the air, flailed her hands and punched and kicked and clawed at the man. All of her kicks and punches did not even register, it was like she hit a diamond wall, her own nails broke and peeled off from trying to claw the man's eyes out. Remashi's hands powerlessly weighed down as tears squirt from her Hyuuga eyes.

"Excuse me, did you see a woman with a red dress somewhere around here? I see her teen friend laying dead here so I just wondered…"

Remashi felt her essence: her emotions, her memories, her strength and everything that she called her own being sucked out of her, it was almost like a mere touch of the man tore open her body and had the man burrow inside her guts, both literal and emotional and scavenge for whatever he fancied. The woman had never felt such a horrible feeling, she's been blasted by explosions more powerful than exploding worlds, burnt than fire hotter than anything found on Earth and punched by people strong enough to lift mountains and yet she'd choose all of those combined over a second more of that man's touch.

"No? Nevermind, I sense her closing in, thank you for your time…" the man spoke Remashi screamed out in the man's grasp as she felt his palm penetrate her body as he thrusted his arm through her and let her go, leaving her dead body hanging on the arm he pierced her through.

A twister of golden sands circled around the red eyed man forming a humanoid form that then took Regalia's shape. The woman was tired and she felt like any technique she used could've been her last but she was the happiest she's ever been since that night when she met this man for the first time. She was finally free of fear, free of that feeling of powerlessness. She was facing her greatest fear, facing her problem and she wasn't about to let more innocent people die and suffer because she was too scared to face her fear.

"Was she even delicious to you at all, monster? Anything like feasting on me for all those years was?" Regalia asked angrily yet without any trembling or fear seeing the Hyuuga's body dangling still impaled by the man's arm that didn't relax and let her slip off his grasp.

"Not really, she didn't feel like anything, I killed her because she was in my way" the man's strong and loud voice thundered out. "Well, which direction are you running to now? Who will you hide behind this time?"

"No more running… No more dreams or fairytales. We do this here and now" Regalia replied thrusting her hands forward and surrounding the man in endless waves of sand. She kept on adding more and more and raising the ball higher and higher. She used the sand below the man as basis to lift him above the ground and it was not even remotely easy even when he was surprised to lift him off of it. Regalia tapped into the supply of sands around the entire desert forming what looked like a miniature planet made out of compressed sand with a core made out of golden sand. The planet rose up higher as more and more sand was added to it, the Sabaku clan's woman of the golden sand moved the planet way past the Moon even to the point where it only resembled the size of a small ball in the sky.

"Desert Planetary Funeral!" Regalia chanted out making a handseal and releasing the technique, all of the sand crushed the golden sand core inside making it rain grain of sand and gold. Giant chunks of sand started falling from the sky as Regalia had to elevate the ball of sand well above the tallest layers of her home. She smiled, she purposefully pushed the planetary ball of sand farther than the Moon, she wanted the central pouring stream of sand to land onto the Moon and not back here. Regalia screamed in pain and fell on her knees. She knew she pushed well past her limits but it didn't matter, she faced her fears, she ceased the chase and she may not have killed that man but she at the very least left him stranded.

Let him choke on space, let him die on the Moon… She will be the last one whose life that monster will claim, no, Regalia died on her own terms, she died free. The woman coughed some blood up as black circles formed around her eyes, her skin paled and she fell down on the rough rocky layer that laid dormant deep below the sands she lifted. The woman felt rushing waves of sand lifting her body up slowly, she probably left most of that sand up in the Moon together with the man only returning less than half of what she'd taken, still, it was worth it.

"Live your life free of the chase, Jiou. It was fun being your wife and loving you. Live your life to your heart's content, Mana and… Thank you…" Regalia closed her eyes peacefully as her life faded from her body letting the overflowing sand flush her away and bury her beneath it as her lifeless corpse offered no resistance.


	143. Separated

Mana's eyes softly clapped as the first sight they saw after she came to her senses was Meiko's silly ear to ear grin above her head. Right after the blacksmith noticed the girl's recovery she alerted everyone else and Shimo helped Mana sit back up while Kouta did some quick medical check-ups that made him calm down about her overall condition.

"I didn't have much chakra to work with and I've never just repurposed someone else's chakra like that, I need to make sure everything went fine" he explained.

"So that woman in the red dress with the sand and genjutsu, did she hurt you, should we have kicked her ass?" Meiko asked sitting down closer to Mana.

"She did intend to hurt me if I didn't help her but… At some point she seemed to have changed. After I told her that I was willing to sacrifice my wish to help her she just froze up and said something about how much she changed and how much she hated that, what happened to her?" the magician asked. For a moment the others looked rather surprise by Mana's revelation but then none of them really dared to say anything.

"She kicked our asses then left, told us to not leave through the main entrance and use the underground tunnels for some reason. Then she made such a huge ruckus that the lower floors of the castle are completely overtaken by sand. I'm not sure how we'd leave through there in the first place" Shimo complained a little or at least his tone made it clear that it was supposed to be a complaint. "On top of that, Kouta's crazy dad is still probably after us"

"She didn't look like a bad person, she held back the whole time and tried to calm us down but after seeing the state you were in we couldn't think clear. She knew that my chakra was at a low so she didn't hurt us too bad, she used illusions to subdue us and they wore off a little later for some reason" Kouta said as he carefully applied a bandage over Mana's scraped abdomen.

The magician sighed. "She decided to confront the man she and her family were running from, if the illusions wore off within an hour with no effort from your part to deal with them it probably means she either left the effective range or died…"

"Hey, don't get all depressed on us about losing someone again, we don't know if she died or not yet… She was tough enough to grant the benefit of the doubt" Shimo growled knowing Mana's personality too well.

"Yeah, thanks…" Mana thanked her old time teammate, she really needed at least a spoken statement that there may have still been hope that she didn't completely screw it all up again.

"We messed up, we had to protect you but we were too weak. We got our asses kicked by everyone we fought and all we could do was survive. I'm done living this stupid rogue life of just surviving, Mana, next time we'll protect you properly. I swear!" Shimo angrily exclaimed carefully punching the wall and looking at his friend with an angry glare. The magician had never seen her friend look at her with those eyes, he used to endlessly praise her for no reason and watch out for her just because she belonged to the gender he swore to pamper, then he started to get annoyed by her protective and needlessly selfless personality but something changed after this encounter.

"It's fine… You had no way of fighting those guys, Kouta's father is at least a Jounin level ninja, those people from the Sand Village were on the other level entirely. We weren't and could not have been ready. Also, Meiko, thanks for saving everybody when I asked you to" Mana smiled at her friend, her face hurt like she'd have been bashed with a rock for hours and her eye still felt swollen so Kouta must not have had enough chakra to deal with those injuries, just the life threatening ones.

"Well I mean… You told us to and… You're not our leader but your calls tend to be the right ones or at least pull us through most of the time and that's good enough" the blacksmith blushed, her shame wouldn't have been visible due to poor fire lighting had it not been so overblown.

"No, you were the best anyone could've asked you to be. Leaving your friend behind can't be something that comes easy but it was the right thing to do and you didn't hesitate" Mana sighed and looked down, her left eye could barely see right as it was hard pressed by the swellings all over it, it felt like a blown up bump shooting out from her face and she must've looked horrible.

"So is our mission a bust? We've heard the woman in red say that the box wasn't here?" Shimo asked but before Mana could give him her answer the castle floor started shaking. Without hesitation Meiko grabbed Mana in her arms and bolted towards the door followed by the others, as a feat of inhuman reaction the magician slipped out of her teammate's hands and crawled up to the small sphere that was inside the throne. Her covered in dried blood fingers wrapped around the sphere before she tried standing up but Meiko once again grabbed her and pulled her aside from the falling roof.

"Someone must've moved the foundation!" Kouta yelled out over the sound of falling debris.

Mana was taken over by the feeling of absolute dread and helplessness, she was powerless and then beaten to a pulp, one of her eyes barely worked and even the one that did was almost blinded by the lack of lighting and everything around her was falling down on her and her friends whom she wished to protect.

"Jump down there!" Shimo yelled out as he took a leap of faith, Kouta remained standing but Meiko turned at him and explained.

"The corridor that leads to the tunnels is down there on the first floor, we saw it on the run from your father, remember?" the blacksmith finished explaining and followed Shimo.

"I'm pretty sure I was still passed out at that point…" the medical ninja scratched the back of his head before following.

A blueish flash of light echoed and then Shimo's loud roar of anger, Mana shook in surprise and tried to see what was going on below but Meiko pressed her harder so that the magician didn't slip out of her grip and plummet below.

"It's fine, Shimo just froze a bunch of sand and sliced a tunnel through them with that totally awesome Audra blade" the blacksmith girl giggled in awe when talking about that sword which made Mana realize that this was no dream. One couldn't have been too sure about what was a dream or an illusion but Meiko's childish glee when talking about weapons couldn't have been emulated with any illusion of a sane individual.

A strong and quite painful splash made Mana yell out in shock as cold water filled her lungs. Meiko quickly pulled the girl out of the water and then pressed her chest to help the magician cough it all out. Not too long later Kouta splashed and swam to the rocky edge himself.

"Wow, the water is hot!" he yelled out quickly rolling out.

"What are you talking about, it was cold as shit, look at Mana, she's shaking…" Meiko looked at the medical ninja funny.

"It was boiling actually, I froze it but the temperature seems to change quite rapidly… It boils and evaporates but then falls back down because of vast differences in temperature here and up in the shade of the castle at night. The rocks on the bottom must be really heated by the desert rocks and sand" Shimo said removing the upper part of his desert cloak and placing it on Mana's shoulders.

"Well, the tunnel's right here, we can leave the castle or go wherever it leads and hope it's in better condition than this but what's our plan?" Meiko asked looking at Mana. Kouta sat down and looked at the magician questioningly as well, Shimo pressed his naked back against the rocky wall and crossed his arms on his chest looking at Mana too as if waiting for her decision.

"What do you mean? Our mission is over, there's no Box, even if it exists it isn't here and we don't have any authority to look for it. We're done, let's go home…" Mana mumbled out, speech came a little weird as she must've been missing some teeth.

"Wait… But, what about your chakra? You were all crushed and ruined before, it clearly means the world to you, I mean no one would subject themselves to Meiko's training unless being strong was essential to them" Kouta gently touched Mana's shoulder making the girl shake his hand off as it hurt her cracked bones and blunt traumas everywhere.

"Wait, what is that supposed to mean… I mean… Yeah, you wanted your chakra back hard enough to go behind the village's authority. You were ready to be labeled a traitor, you subjected yourself to this cruel world by leaving in your frail state and now you're just giving up?" Meiko couldn't understand the magician's decision either.

"Mana, don't give us your shit. Tell it how it is, what made you change your mind? Surely that sphere thing must have something important for you to risk getting squished by a whole castle going down. I won't have it with you lying to yourself. If you tell us to go back we'll do that and that'll be the end of it but if you want to go on, if you have any hints or clues or any ideas how to find that box or get your chakra back we're going with you, you're far too puny to let you wander the world at your current state" Shimo angrily shouted out at Mana.

"I don't know what it is, it is just filled with random numbers one to six that don't seem to make much sense. I just thought that the numbers being written in modern scripture and not Anansu dialect like everything else from this castle's time period was odd. I grabbed it because it was interesting, out of instinct not clear mind, truth be told I've never felt like under so many concussions as I do right now so my mind can't be further from being clear" the girl answered in a silent and oppressed tone.

"Something must've happened, something made you give up on your wish to get your chakra control back, what was it?" Shimo repeated his question.

"I… Well… It's something that woman told me, she told me that my chakra manipulation isn't gone because of my chakra network being messed up, she said it was working just fine. She said there's… Some mental block to it and now I don't know if I even know what I want anymore, I don't know if my body even wants me to get better. What if what I considered being one half of my identity is something that doesn't belong there" Mana explained saddened and hiding behind her messy and sticky from blood hair.

Meiko, Kouta and Shimo all looked at each other with odd stares and kept on switching from each other.

"Guys?" Mana suddenly started realizing something was off.

Kouta leaned down on his knee and wiped hair out of Mana's face making the girl slip out of his hands again and hide her messed up face behind them again. She didn't want Kouta to see her banged up like that.

"Look, Mana… We… Back when you trained with Meiko we… We kinda scanned your body and I did the diagnostic check that you refused in the village" the young man quietly revealed.

"You… You looked into my body? You've… Had no right" Mana's whiny and almost weeping voice made the young man turn back at Meiko who was just looking at the ground like she was a toddler being busted for breaking a vase.

"Well, I…" Kouta tried to explain something but Shimo took that responsibility over from him.

"He didn't want to do it, we pretty much bullied him into it. This whole time behind your back we were discussing some sort of excuses if you ever found out but you don't deserve that bullshit. Yes, we wanted to know what was wrong with you for sure and if there was a potential for you to get better without the Box because none of us except Meiko really believed that Box of Ultimate Bliss was real in the first place"

"You didn't?" Meiko squinted at the two, she seemed to genuinely have believed in the box's existence.

"What Kouta found was identical to what that woman told you – it's your mind that still blocks your chakra control, not your body. That chakra augmentation mess up was big but it only injured you for a brief period of time, at some point down the line your network repaired itself" the swordsman explained, his face didn't suggest any regret for his actions.

Mana stood back on her feet and walked up to him, she didn't care that her thighs were burning up from fatigue, that her feet had open bleeding wounds from the endless walking having covered one fourth of the world's longitude over almost a week on foot. Mana didn't care that only one eye of hers could see, that when she spoke bloody slobber spat out from her mouth through a gap between her broken or busted out teeth. She didn't care that her hands were stomped and had to hold her entire body weight during a raging sandstorm while she climbed those rocky castle walls and were still covered with bruises and wounds. She punched Shimo right in the jaw using the lower part of her palm while also shoving her slightly grown fingernails straight into the young man's cheek drawing squirts of blood. He didn't even augment his body and just took the hit despite having every tool in his arsenal to dodge it or counter it.

"You had no right!" she screamed out until her voice broke down from the several blows to her throat that Kusagoro managed to land and from when he tried to choke her out.

"Mana…" Kouta tried to calm her down by coming closer to her.

"Go home" the magician cried out. "This sign says that the straight path of this tunnel leads you right to Sunagakure's gate, I'll take whichever one doesn't go there"

"Wait, Mana, this is stupid, even if we do let you go back to Konoha alone you'll get raided and killed before the end of the first day on the surface" Meiko almost laughed out as she still believed that this breaking out was just a joke of some sort.

"Your mission is over, report to Konoha from Sunagakure by sending a message and then head home after you recovered, you told me you respect my call, that is it" Mana quietly whined out while slowly limping to the tunnel that still had brief lighting every couple of steps from eternally burning torches that burnt with some strange green flame. Must've been some Fire Style technique that couldn't have been put out by water and humidity and consumed no oxygen, it just burnt for as long as it had to, just to light the way of anyone needing its light.

"But… Where will you go?" Meiko's voice trembled as a clear sign of the blacksmith realizing that this conflict was no joke.

Mana's beaten face turned back with tears all over it, the tears picked up and washed some dried out blood that her brief dip into the frozen boiling lake didn't wash off making the tears appear almost bloody. She sniffed her running nose.

"I don't know…" the girl said and kept on limping forward.

Kusagoro growled as he dug through endless walls of sand. His mad swings pushed entire tons of sand pushing him forward hard enough for the sand passing him to actually hurt. He used his angry punch to bust through the damn thing but all it did was form a crystal wall of sand by superheating the sand from the energy that the punch put out. He didn't even mean for it to be too strong, he wanted to preserve the castle but as Kusagoro's slightly injured body swam out and emerged outside the castle he saw the blasted thing collapse and fall down.

"Son…" he wondered if his boy made it out before that. He wasn't sure where his son was or what his further goals were. Most likely he'd return to the village now that the mission was over together with that traitorous girl, Kusaguro no longer gave a crap about exposing or beheading her. He looked back and saw a bloody hand in the sand. The Juugo brute pulled on the hand and dragged out a corpse of his friend Remashi with eyes filled with horror and a gapping hole in her body as large as a thick log. He gently placed the body of his friend down and closed her eyes with a soft stroke, the all seeing Byakugan snuffed out, finally getting a chance to rest…

The man tore off his friend's bowtie and tied it around his arm, he looked around and found the body of his other friend – Gokibure. His body was for once lacking the insects rushing all over it with the ancient buggers having abandoned their host at some point after his death. What remained of him was only his lower body, Kusagoro wasn't sure where the upper parts went. The man pulled out a bloodied white rose that his friend carried around in his pocket and handed to various women he tried to seduce, all of whom rejected his advances due to the man's symbiotic relationship with his insects.

Kusagoro pressed the ring of the flower in his hands and let the petals slip from his hands and be carried away with the desert winds. It took a little longer for Kouta's father to find Mardith, the man was also a bloody stain, carefully the man removed Mardith's mask which he wore on his neck and put on his face when he needed protection from water or toxic gas. Kusagoro tore the upper google part of the mask and took off his headband replacing it with his friend's googles.

"I'll avenge your deaths…" he uttered in the wind before seeing the floating body of the woman responsible – the woman in red. Her eyes were peacefully closed and she was quite clearly dead. So the bitch died too? Kusagoro roared into the endless sky letting his raging chakra bursts pick up and throw sand around the place. The man lifted the woman's body up by her hair and effortlessly flipped it over his shoulders to carry around. Further there laid another young teen, Kusagoro didn't give her much attention though, maybe it was because of her age that reminded him of his own kid, maybe he just couldn't place the hatchling behind being able to kill any of his friends.

There he stood with all of his friends, the people who saw him as a friend ever since his early days, the people that were through soft and hard with him, hot and cold. All dead and no one to exact his vengeance upon. He used to think things were easy – if someone killed someone you care about, you kill that person. This was so ironic and so annoying…

"Remashi… I'm not sure if I'm happy or sad that you died without actually eating anyone's face off, maybe we should've gotten drunk and tried it just to know for sure if you were half as sick as you said you were"

"Mardith… Your bullshit rituals pissed me off and I often killed you just because I knew I could with you coming back. Guess a man can only pull death's skirt for so long before the bitch kicks back, huh?"

"Gokibure… You were a creepy bastard but all you wanted was to be loved by someone. Love is bullshit but since you were my friend I would've handed it to you even if I had to force a bitch to go out with you myself but you didn't want it, you wanted the real deal. Hope there's a woman that finds you loveable wherever you are"

After giving a couple of words to each one of his dead friends the man just looked up into the sky. For a moment he almost begged the sky for a downpour.

"What's the matter, Big Guys? Can't spare a single tear to weep over my friends? Well fuck you too…" Kusagoro cursed and pressed his knuckles into fists as hard as he could until he drew blood from his own fingernails digging into his own flesh. He wanted revenge but revenge on who? He could submit the corpse of this bitch to Hokage, see if she's worth anything as a ninja from another village, there was something odd with her so maybe the brainiacs in the medical center could've used her DNA. It was either that or the bounty hunters…


	144. The Ancient Hunters

There was this stage of pain where one accepted it as a part of their being, as a part of their daily routine. Together with that stage came those memories of days of happiness and the thoughts questioning how could one have ever taken those days for granted so badly? It was only one's own fault really, Mana could only blame herself and only hate herself. She was told what the world outside the village walls was, what ultimately her fate would be, she was told all about how stupid she was and yet defiantly she kept on strutting that road to disappointment and loss.

To most it may not have been that big of a deal, the magician realized that her friends wished well. They wished to know what Mana's state really was but to the youngster it just seemed like she was betrayed. Her friends broke that sacred line of consent, it was supposed to be up to Mana and her alone to decide how much of her condition should have been made public, how much of her body should have been explored by anyone. Not only the people she loved and trusted the most crossed that line purposefully but they stayed in complete silence and would've undoubtedly lied to her if asked directly.

Why would they have ever been asked such a thing? After all, it would've never occurred to Mana that her friends could have done something like that. She trusted them completely, she would've given up everything for their sake. There were no ill feelings from Mana's side towards her friends. Hell, in their boots she'd have probably done the same thing, if she saw that her friend was suffering she'd have crossed every line imaginable and even made herself hated in the eyes of that friend to save them from that torment.

It was just that cursed combination of hatred towards oneself and confusion about the betrayal of her friends. Mana hated her own body and mind for blocking an essential part of her identity off, almost like it was a self-preservation mechanism. Almost like being a ninja came with Mana having to shoulder all those responsibilities she placed on herself making getting hurt or killed an inevitability. Ultimately even her own body betrayed her and yet neither one wanted to stab her in the back, everyone who betrayed her wanted all the best to Mana making her the wrong one. That was what hurt the most.

Mana collapsed by a dark wall illuminated briefly by the dim salad-green flames from the eternally burning torches. She grabbed her hair and pulled it back behind her head so hard that it almost peeled her scalp off. She was such a mess, beaten yet healed just to the point where she was in no danger of dying, her hair was soaked in her own blood yet all of her wounds were closed. Only now did she understand those words that came from Guru Ayushi that time she revealed to him that there were no lines she wouldn't cross to save someone's life.

This was just the kind of life she cursed someone to by crippling them but keeping them alive…

"Mana! Wait up!" Meiko yelled out leaping forward but Shimo stepped in her way. Meiko rudely tried to push him out of her way but the swordsman twisted his body around her palms and pulled his blade placing it to her throat in a surprising speed.

"She's mad at us, give her some time. Were you really so dense to believe that what we did would never come up? What do you expect to tell her to make her stop being who she always was. She's silly and childish but that's who she is, that's who we've befriended. Give her some time" he growled angrily the words he couldn't stop telling himself trying to refrain from chasing Mana himself.

"But… She's leaving out there all alone!" Meiko yelled out pulling out a kunai from her back pocket but Kouta stepped in pushing the two off of each other.

"Shimo's right, we know exactly where she's going, which path she's taking. Right now she wants to see our faces the least and going after her is the worst possible idea. We've accepted this outcome when we decided to get our answers. Knowing what she just found out, Mana-chan must hate her own body just as much as she feels betrayed by us. Finding out that her own mind is keeping her from being whole, that has to be a cruel thing to know" the youth explained himself to Meiko. "Let's just respect Mana-chan's word and go to Sunagakure"

"If Mana gets hurt we'll still fail this mission" Meiko irked out worried.

"Mana's smarter than to get hurt" Shimo replied.

"But she's not herself at the moment, normally she may be pretty sharp but now her mind may not be focused on the right things. Let's give her some time but catch up to her at the end of the tunnel. The first path heads to Sunagakure gate, we'll then track her back finding where the other one leads to – with our chakras recovered we'll be faster than she is" Kouta scratched his forehead still refusing to fully comprehend the disaster that just happened.

The three entered the tunnel walking straight onto the path where Mana told them to. They've already pissed her off already so if they ever wanted her to talk to them again they'd need to do right as she told them to.

Mana's stomach growled, the magician kept on breathing heavily without even bothering to look into her backpack. She knew that Meiko carried around all the food. The girl thought about eating one of those creepy hand sized spiders that scurried all around the walls, avoiding just the spots that have been illuminated by the fire on the walls. The noise of their shells rubbing against the rocks and their giant crawlers ticking and tacking against the walls was creepy but despite their incredibly terrifying appearance Mana knew she was bigger than them. She was in pain in more places she could count so if they bothered to bite her it'd barely even be a shock to her, some parts of the girl actually wanted those crawlers to pick a fight with her so that she could express all of her anger properly.

Something rustled the sandy floor by scurrying around the path that Mana was in. It sounded like… Fur rubbing against the rock and the sand. Could there have been some mammals living in this cave? How could they have maintained their fur, most mammals living in dark and desolated places like this must've lost their furs and their eyesight over time…

"The fires…" Mana realized looking at the green source of light. These torches displaced the natural balance of the cave ecosystem by eliminating the irrelevancy of sight. Most mammals must've seen just fine, some insects must've relied on eyesight as well since the place did have some illumination that never dimmed. Still, this place had a system of its own, Mana had never seen anything like those giant critters scurrying around and avoiding her sight or those giant pincer wielding spiders on the walls.

What could they have been running from or where towards if they didn't mind entering a human's line of sight?

"This cave is boring, I wish Mana was here so she could translate all those hieroglyphs on the walls…" Meiko's face dragged out reminding that of a horse.

"You do know that not all ancient languages are the same, Mana isn't a universal translator, she may not even be able to read those…" Shimo looked at his bored friend with curiosity.

"Hmmm… Something isn't right…" Kouta scratched his chin.

"How so? Are we being tracked? Will we be ambushed!?" Meiko excitedly pulled her fists up to her grinning teeth and shook in her boots.

"Well the whole way through we've heard weird noises, crawlies and some sort of critters and snakes digging through the sand, this cave has an ecosystem of its own made of animals I have never seen before" Kouta continued to slow down before he completely stopped and looked behind him with worry.

"Yeah, you told us to watch the sand ripples so that we don't get bit by any snakes" Shimo stopped and grabbed the hilt of his blade, he trusted Kouta's senses even if his current sense he relied on did feel like a bit on the sixth side.

"Precisely, this place has animals who are ready to hunt in the environment of this cave and appear to be completely different from any others. I may not have the antidote against the local snake or insect poisons nor the skill to properly analyze it. Having our environment in mind these may be the animals from thousands of years ago that have went extinct everywhere but in this cave" the medical ninja explained.

A hissing sound alerted all three of the genin. Frantically all of them started turning around, they pressed against each other's back so that they are not attacked from behind.

"Is that… A snake?" Meiko asked with a serious yet still somewhat excited tone, "A giant snake maybe? Fighting the little ones would be boring" she added.

"No… Sounds like… Gas…" Shimo noted too late as the hissing noise started coming from another corner, then another, then another until it was finally coming from all around the genin. Smoke as black as tar filled the area making the genin hold their breaths for a while.

"Do we run or do we fight?" Meiko asked exhaling some air but keeping herself from drawing any in, Kouta pulled off some of his cloak and tied it around his nose. The boy leaned down and fell to his knees, despite them holding their breaths and trying to filter the gas out it still passed through whatever blocked its path. All four started coughing.

"Vision's blurry…" Meiko complained and judging from Shimo's staggering attempts to stand straight it could've been correctly assumed that the same was with everyone affected by the gas.

Suddenly the gas started circulating and forming humanoid shapes that were just briefly illuminated by the green flames, no careful looks were needed, Meiko would have recognized the shape and face of her father wherever she saw it.

"Why did I leave my clan and move into Konoha?" the man asked in a haunting voice.

"Am I the only one seeing it?" Meiko looked back at her friends but she noticed they were all gone. She was alone in a room filled with black as night gas with her father who seemed to be emanating some sort of light. The figure was carefully proceeding forward and walking up closer to the blacksmith.

"You left because of the falling out with the clan, they didn't want to make weapons, you thought weapons didn't necessarily need to be made for killing, that everyone decided what they'd use their weapon for and you didn't want to limit your skills. You wanted freedom to make whatever you wanted to make…" Meiko replied. Father's figure shrieked in the dark with a creepy almost animalistic noise. The sound of scribbling and taping against the rock could've been heard. For a moment the gas cleared up around Meiko and she saw her friends again.

The blacksmith screamed out seeing Shimo being held by some sort of insectoid creature. It was at least one and a half meter tall, standing on two legs while two others held the swordsman and pressed it against its black shell while the two upper legs stabbed the young man in the back. Shimo shouted and struggled for a while before passing out, his eyes were completely white, some sort of white substance mixed with blood was dripping from his mouth.

Kouta's eyes were completely normal but his pupils were running around. "I don't know your favorite food, you chow down everything you see in front of you! he yelled and waved his arms around, his cheeks were blushed and he looked like he was having a fever. Another two insects crept up to the medical ninja, Meiko tried to leap to his aid but she didn't notice yet another one scurrying up to her from behind and standing on its two legs.

Black smoke once again sprayed from small cysts at the insect's face, it's face looked similar to a large wasp except it had three pairs of mandibles, in between of each pair was a large pus filled cyst that sprayed the pus out whenever the insect pleased. That sludgy substance was highly reactive to air because it turned to that noxious gas whenever it came out. Suddenly Kouta's troubles and unconscious Shimo and all the other swarming insectoids disappeared. It was just Meiko and Mana who was standing right in front of her.

"What weather do I like the most?" the magician's voice asked, the tone was so wildly different from Mana's, it was so… Deceitful. Meiko knew the answer, she had it somewhere deep in her head. That one day the blacksmith visited Mana in the archives and the magician told her, it was a small throwaway line but… Darn it… What sort of a friend was Meiko!? She kept failing Mana at every turn, forgot everything her friend had ever told her, she deserved every injury, she didn't deserve to see and hold the Box of Ultimate Bliss like Mana wanted her to…

"I'm sorry, Mana…" Meiko's tear filled eyes tried to walk up closer to Mana, she didn't want to play this one question game, she didn't want to see what those bugs were doing to her friends. She just wanted to tell her friend that she was sorry, that she just wanted to be close to Mana and support her friend when she felt betrayed, when she needed a friend the most…

A powerful grip clutched Meiko's body and shut it in pressing it right up to Mana's body. The blacksmith's eyes were racing all around but she couldn't see what exactly was gripping her or what was hurting her. Sharp pain made her close her eyes and bite her lip but Meiko didn't scream. She felt blood running down her back, Meiko felt her consciousness fading, her eyes weren't listening anymore, they rolled back, suddenly Meiko felt so nauseous.

So sleepy…

Mana kept on stumbling forward. She ate some sort of supersized maggot that was crawling around, it was the worst thing she had ever eaten, its insides felt fatty and slimy and it didn't swallow even remotely well. The magician knew that she needed more, one upchuck summoning maggot wasn't even remotely the amount of protein she needed to recover from those injuries but she physically couldn't keep those creepy things down. She had to force herself to swallow as much as she did.

A hissing noise stopped the magician in her tracks, she frantically looked around, her eyes raced trying to find where it was coming from. She felt a weird sensation, something was smelling way off but Mana's sense of smell was actually inferior to even most normal peers of hers, she only smelled that something was off with the air when it was already too late. The girl started to cough, what was that smell and those sounds? She heard pairs of feet clacking against the rock, somewhat was trying to sneak up to her from above using the rocky ceiling for support.

The magician girl tried to roll away to avoid an attack she predicted but her body was too trippy from all that gas she inhaled so she just carelessly stumbled around and almost snapped her own neck by sloppily flopping her face down into the sand.

"Just great… I deserve to get killed now…" she thought to herself crawling desperately as far away as she could from where she imagined her assailants to be. She scratched the sand out of her eyes wildly scratching one of her eyelids so hard it started to bleed. When she regained her blurry and racing vision the girl noticed that the entire cave was sunken in black clouds of that gas she previously inhaled and that she must've taken in all of it there was.

A feint light emanated up front, slowly it was closing in on Mana, turning around and shaping itself until it made a solid humanoid shape. It was Kouta's.

"What are you doing here!? I told you I want to be alone!" Mana screamed out angrily wiping blood off of her bleeding eye. It was her good eye that was bleeding while the other one was still swollen and blocked off by lumps of swelling flesh.

"Whom do I love?" Kouta asked, his tone was hateful, deceitful and wishing the girl harm.

"What… What are you talking about?" Mana's voice shook and she took a couple of steps back, she looked back seeing similar figures and lights approaching from behind her, they looked almost nightmarish in appearance forcing the young magician to stand her ground there.

"You love your father, Kouta" Mana answered making the figure stop for a moment. It then started moving forward but pain took it over and forced it to twitch as if it was on its dying legs. Mana grabbed a torch off the wall and slammed Kouta's face with the open flame. This wasn't Kouta, this was some sort of a dream, a nightmare. Some sort of vision caused by this accursed ancient cave!

Clarity returned to Mana's vision, she kept on bashing the fallen figure again and again and again and again. She wasn't sure how or why was the nightmare creature disguised as her friend or what was it aiming to achieve by that question, also why did it stutter like that almost like her answer was neither right nor wrong. Whatever nightmarish rituals made it must've been crossed. Finally the illusion faded and Mana saw a crushed and shaking figure of a giant insect wailing around, one set on eternal green flame and one with head completely bashed into the stone but still alive to feel the heat of its final moments.

Mana cried out in pain and dropped the torch, her ribs were burning, she clutched at her aching body and ran on forward using the last of her strength. Suddenly the world blurred and turned black again, the girl stumbled and hit the wall. She felt pulsing pain on her nose and a warm torrent of blood going down her face. The magician stood up and turned around pressing her body against the cold wall and feeling her own pounding heart as if her arms formed an imaginary barrier that protected her.

Another figure appeared from the black smoke. It was Meiko this time.

"Why did you take us on this mission?" she asked just as slyly and deceitfully as the previous nightmare incarnated.

"Because I'm a greedy and selfish person!" Mana screamed out at the shapeshifting image of her friend.

"I don't care about any of you, I just wanted my chakra control back. Now just kill me or leave me alone or do whatever you must do! I don't want to see any of you anymore" the magician collapsed on her knees in tears. Why was all of this haunting her so much? Why did she purposefully lie to this image to get it to hate her, to get it to go away. Why would she wish to push one of her best friends away? Why would she purposefully wish to be hated?

The figure closed in, Mana felt a tight grip press her body against Meiko, one so strong that it almost broke her spine and cracked her ribs. The girl didn't scream, she just cocked her head back and gave up, if this thing was here to kill her it could go on. She wouldn't stop it. She deserved it really… Abandoning and pushing away everyone she ever loved. Sharp pain almost made Mana scream, finally the illusion went away revealing the magician completely in the insect's grasp with its upper legs having penetrated her back. Mana felt some sort of gooey liquid being pumped into her body and coursing throughout, what was that: poison, some sort of anticoagulant?

"Why am I not dying? Why am I not going asleep?" the magician wandered to herself. She wanted to die, she relaxed her body and tensed it again forcing the poison to course along her body easier.

"But… What if… What if these things also attacked the others? Do I have the right to give up and die risking to let my friends die too? No… No… I must fight… I need to find out if they're okay" Mana's eyes shot wide open, she couldn't ever hope to free herself from this creature's grasp, she didn't know why didn't the poison work on her nor did she care, the magician thrust her teeth forward past the creature's mandibles and dug deep into the gooey cysts on the insectoid's face. Warm and sticky goo that smelled worse than a paralyzed diarrhetic pirate's diaper shot all over her face and down below. The insectoid violently shook on its hind legs and twitched falling down and shaking in a grotesque and nightmarish manner. Mana grabbed another torch off the wall. Her hands were shaking, her ribs were burning.

It was time to do hero's work…


	145. New Course

Several drops of a purple gooey liquid fell to the sand below, Mana turned the limb of the insect equipped with a sting on each leg around the green torches to examine it. In the other hand she held one of the cysts she ripped off of the insect's face. Before she attacked those things and started swinging she needed to examine these creatures. She needed to understand these primitive yet terrifying insectoid hunters, the magician needed to understand what made them so effective at what they did.

Close to Mana's feet laid a pile of small rodents that Mana impaled with the limb, they weren't dead nor were they even bleeding. The girl wished to understand what the poison was doing exactly before she started digging deeper into why she wasn't affected by it. Judging from the results the magician would also find out just how much time she has to put a plan together, if her friends were indeed captured she needed to know how these hunters feed, do they kill and eat their prey immediately or do they just paralyze it and have some further goals to fulfil with the carcasses of their prey.

So far judging from the delirious and disabled yet hyperventilating rodents it seemed like the poison merely paralyzed the prey and caused excessive fever. Mana was not completely sure why these insects would not kill their prey immediately or how do they actually finish it off once their ulterior goals are fulfilled. She had no time to find out. Understanding the mechanisms that made these things work had the priority…

Meiko's eyelids clapped heavily, it felt similarly to how it felt awakening from a heavy beating. Her entire body was paralyzed and the blacksmith felt sticky and hard surfaces beneath her, she wasn't laying on sand, she knew that smell – it was blood. The genin tried to squirm and shake but something shaped like a rib just dug deep into her back, all of her effort only made her move a single muscle. Whatever these insects injected in her was very potent…

Sounds of squirming and clacking of chitin shells against the stone and bones took over the place. Meiko's heart started pounding harder, as always she tried to overpower the poison but that was simply not enough. Once again she found herself just a little bit short of sheer power. She was so strong, she yearned to be even stronger and yet she wasn't able to be strong enough anytime she needed to. She couldn't beat that totem using guy in the desert, she wasn't able to resist the trap of those things and now she'll end up in some insectoid intestines…

One of the insects crawled right up to Meiko, the blacksmith angrily struggled trying to overcome that numbness of her body but nothing worked, she heard some bone cracking sounds to her side so Shimo and Kouta must've been resisting those insects as well.

"I feel my chakra… Back…" Shimo grunted angrily, his voice was filled with pain and made the effort in trying to break free quite clear.

"Yeah, we must've been out overnight, maybe even longer" Kouta agreed, "It's no use, even with all of my chakra enhancements I can't break out… I don't think it can be broken out of with strength alone"

The insectoid's creepy eyes leaned up to Meiko's face. The insect lifted one of its creepy limbs and penetrated one of their cysts with it squirting an entirely different cloud of gas as the chemical compound in their poison reacted with the gas stored in those blobs on their faces, one of pinkish red shades of color. Meiko coughed, her mind was starting to feel hazy, her pupils simply faded from her eyes as her irises were all that distinguished her eye from being completely whited out.

"Meiko! Damn, they must've hypnotized her or something!" Shimo grunted. Another insect crawled up to his face and spat the cloud of gas out into his face as well. The genin tried to reach out and bite into the cyst, defying the gas's effects.

"How did you not get hypnotized like Meiko?" Kouta asked yelling out loud and scared as another one of the insectoid hunters was climbing up to his face to try and numb his mind and body as well.

"It's genjutsu, just keep focused on the fact that what they do is genjutsu to keep identifying it and keep applying chakra to dispel it!" Shimo answered.

"Genjutsu? How could insects…?" Kouta tried to fight back but then his eyes started acting weird, his mind started dulling and fading so the boy simply burst his chakra from his body accelerating its flow and breaking out of the illusion. He couldn't keep that up forever, dispelling genjutsu cost chakra, the more intense the illusion, the more strain fighting it placed.

The insect that knocked Meiko out crawled up to her face as if it wanted to sit on it. Its shell opened revealing a rather squishy and pudgy torso that was strangely glowing in the rather shady cave, most likely due to the substances stored inside its blobby bodies.

"Why didn't you tell us earlier, Meiko may have saved herself too?" Kouta angrily scolded the ex-rogue swordsman.

"With her chakra control she wouldn't have been able to fight off genjutsu anyways. She packs a mean punch and can swordfight with the best of them but her skills managing chakra aren't the sharpest. Also we need those insects thinking they can actually knock us out, if they get annoyed by our resistance they might just kill us immediately and be done with it. Eventually we'll need to give in too…" the swordsman grunted out annoyed by his current situation.

"I wonder what they want with us…" Kouta just barely lifted his head up looking at the insect pressing its squishy inner body against Meiko. A sharp sting burst out from the insect's intestines making blood squirt out together with it and forcing the insect to violently twitch and shake in pain stabbing out powerfully against the floor surrounding Meiko with its stinger limbs.

A large sticky fluid shot out covering the insectoid hunter and pulling it to the wall upwards. The insect exploded in a mass of goo and separated chitin shell parts as a gigantic spider pulled its prey from the ceiling of the cave lair and crushed its entire body in its massive mouth.

"It's trying to lay eggs in your guts" Mana's voice echoed through the cave lair. Slowly the girl walked out into the light from the corridor making all the insects in the cave turn at her and lunge at the girl's direction. The magician closed her eyes and grabbed hold tighter of her two torches that were her only defense besides the gigantic spider chowing those insectoid nightmares down one by one.

A deafening hiss interrupted Mana's attempt to explain Shimo and Kouta what was happening and to calm them down. All of these insects launched their gas illusions at once.

"Damn it, Mana-chan can't control chakra so she won't be able to resist those illusions and cancel them out!" Kouta yelled out in fear.

Mana just continued to walk on forward, slowly but without making her face twitch even once.

"As you've correctly concluded the cysts on these insects' faces emit gases that cause illusions, they seem to be chakra induced so they do qualify as genjutsu of quite sophisticated nature." Mana calmly explained as illusions of her friends and her past enemies appeared in front of her, all of them spilling questions trying to confuse her.

"Most simple genjutsu are initiated through what is called a "genjutsu focus", it could be a sound or a certain visual stimulus, this one is initiated through gas but this isn't a simple illusion because it attacks a person's brain center and not their chakra flow. It doesn't require someone to possess a working chakra flow, just a functional brain. That's how these hunters must've hunted for thousands of years before intricate chakra networks became a common evolutionary trait among the species" the girl spoke without bothering to combat the illusions. The insects all approached her slowly completely captivated by the defenseless girl and oblivious to the fact that they were hunted out one by one by a giant predator above them.

"Mana, damn it, stop fooling around, fight them or run!" Shimo yelled out as more than a dozen of insects surrounded the girl and all grabbed and lifted her in the air.

"You see the most common illusion consists of a person in your memories asking a question the answer to which exists in your memories. Answering it correctly stimulates that part of the brain and cancels the illusions, answering it wrong wastes time and lets these things close in on you…" Mana kept on talking as the insects kept stinging her with their stings two at a time. The magician squirmed and yelled out in pain before finally pulling out something out of her pocket and drinking it before spitting it out on her torches.

The flammable liquid extracted from the smelly glands of the insects burst into flames in a wild firestorm setting all the insects around her on fire. The predators kept on shaking back and falling to their backs, their legs twitched still squirting the poison around as they died out one by one. Satisfied by the successful hunt the gigantic spider quickly left as well. Mana slowly crept up to Kouta and Shimo and cut them lose. The magician then fell on her knee and threw up. Holding that smelly liquid in her mouth even for a couple of moments was really disgusting, especially when combined with what she had to chow down to maintain immunity to the poison.

Kouta gently laid Mana down and gave her some water, he also mixed in some spruce thorns extract meant for combating infections just to kill her nasty breath. The rodent from which the magician extracted the highly flammable substance defended itself by squirting it using it as a smelly self-defense weapon.

"Is Meiko OK?" Mana smiled, her body felt like she could walk or do nothing more. Like she was all out. Honestly she could've fought those things and not just take their stings but she had no more strength. All the research, all that effort and all-night planning, all the previously sustained wounds…

"Yeah, she's fine, don't worry, Mana-chan, my chakra returned, I can finish treating you. I'll treat everything so just relax and rest… After I'm done you'll be good as new" the boy softly stroke her hair out of Mana's way pressing his hand against the lump of swollen flesh by her eye and green light burst from his hand. Initially the girl could not see it but then the overwhelming green made her slightly shake her head in discomfort. If it hurt that much to heal her swollen beatings just how badly would it hurt to regrow half of her teeth and heal her ribs? Bones were always the most painful to heal…

"How did you find us?" Shimo asked slapping Meiko around a couple of times, then pressing his hand against her back and sending a pulse of chakra that shocked her out of her illusion and broke it for her.

"That spider-like-thing is the natural predator to those insects. Strangely enough it grows from a maggot the size of a brick, since that thing hunts those insects it is immune to the paralyzing effects of their poison and I happened to eat one maggot when I was hungry before by sheer luck. That's how I didn't get captured, I found one grown up version of that maggot and stabbed it with the detached version of that sting to find out if its immune, then simply hid from it and followed where it'd go. It found you guys and brought me with it"

Meiko screamed out after seeing Mana and her face that was slowly starting to resemble her previous state. The blacksmith jumped up to Mana and hugged the magician screaming in joy. "You're back!" the genin yelled out. Angrily Kouta yanked Meiko off Mana and continued his treatment.

"You did all this planning and risked your life coming to the nest of these things? There had to be a lot of variables that simply aligned properly…" Shimo coldly exclaimed. He must've been suggesting that Mana may not have been in it to save everybody because she take a lot of time and relied on a lot of questionable factors where she simply lucked out.

"Not really…" the magician shook her head softly, "This nest is one of many, we weren't too far away from each other when we were attacked since this cave system is massive. It only made sense for those insects to carry you to the closest nest to where they got you and that would've been the nest the spider found during its hunt"

"And what if we got killed while you did all that research?" Shimo squinted at her.

"You wouldn't have, the insects wanted your bodies for nesting purposes so you were safe for possibly days if not weeks or entire months. They are predators that eat flesh but they need that flesh molten and mushed up, usually their eggs burrowing from your bodies would do that, if they're desperate they also can overdose you with the poison and melt your flesh from the inside" Mana started feeling like she was being interrogated. Did Shimo really suspect that she may not have wanted to save them and was only in it for her own interest?

"Wow, Mana-chan, you could've died from so many stings, it was like your entire body was skewered by them!" Kouta exclaimed ripping Mana's raggy desert cloak off to see the pulsing wounds still dripping poison from them.

"It wasn't life threatening, I gorged on a bunch of those maggots and applied their goo on my skin so that the spider didn't feel suspicious around me. The poison also works as an anticoagulant so it kept my blood inside. It hurt and probably poked some organs but it wasn't something I'd die immediately from, also I needed them all in one place, I wasn't strong enough to fight all of them even while their ranks were compromised by the spider-like-thing" Mana complained looking at the pulsing purplish swellings all over her abdomen that leaked a drop or two of the black poison.

"Holy shit, Mana, holy shit…" Meiko grinned with her full smile, that girl sometimes really confused the magician. Just a couple of moments ago her face was almost flooded with insect eggs that would've moved to her innards and then started growing. Mana suspected the possibility that her friends may have already been laid eggs in but she counted that Shimo or Kouta would've had something to say about that. Maybe Kouta would've been able to surgically remove them once they reached Sunagakure or Shimo could freeze those areas slowing down their development. And yet the blacksmith just laughed and looked excited as always.

"You've changed…" Shimo closed his eyes and lowered his head but then smiled and looked back at his old teammate, "I think for the better. The old Mana wouldn't have been brave or confident enough to use all of that big head on her shoulders or play it like that, not to mention totally murdering a bunch of bugs"

Mana screamed out in pain as Kouta finally finished healing her facial scratches and her teeth and moved to her ribs. Those were probably the most intense part to be healed.

"They're not people, their own brains aren't complicated enough to be affected by their own illusions. They don't understand or comprehend anything, they just live and do what they do by instinct. They don't understand self-preservation and just kill, mate and lay eggs…" Mana closed her eyes, she'd have much rather have found a peaceful solution but those things weren't really people nor were they things capable of understanding what death was.

"More so, their existence is only because of us tampering with their habitats, the ancient people dug up these caves and let them take them over, they placed these torches all around that helped them find this place as their new home as the world around them evolved. Truth be told, they live in a world that is no longer theirs, ideally they should all be allowed to just pass on to the species succeeding them. That's what the First People did, wasn't it? Died out and left chakra mastery for us allowing people to inherit it and succeed them" the magician looked away at the rustling salad flame behind her, she focused on the one point in space and time to avoid having to think about the pain she was feeling while her gut was healed and all those penetrating wounds and the insects' poison were healed and extracted.

Meiko didn't let Mana rest, she knelt up to the magician and looked her in the eyes, the blacksmith's eyes were sad and filled with regret.

"So, when we will heal you, will you leave us again?" Meiko asked, "I probably could've dealt with those illusions but they showed you to me and I forgot the right answer and… I just felt like reliving that moment again, that moment of letting a friend down, messing up again"

Mana tried to force a smile through her face as being healed wasn't as peaceful as she remembered it being, Kouta was a young and inexperienced medical ninja so his treatment was not nearly as precise and quick and painless as an experienced medical ninja in the Konoha Hospital could've done it.

"No. I returned because I still care about you guys, I care about everyone and it is as I told Tanshu-sensei once. I have the most responsibilities in the world because I must protect it whenever I can, also I won't allow myself to take any lives while doing it. Sometimes my enemies won't play fair, they'll exploit me and my weaknesses and sometimes people dear to me will annoy me, let me down or abandon me but even so I must be better than to abandon and give up on them. I'm sorry, guys…" Mana sadly exclaimed.

Shimo sat down closer to the magician and closed his eyes, he was checking out some of the insects' chitin plates that they wore as shells but then he deemed it too weak and tossed it aside.

"So, what's next?" he asked directly.

"We head to Sunagakure, report to Konoha…" Mana tried to cut it short but her friend didn't let up.

"They'll tell us to go back. If you still want to hunt the Box you need solid reasons to ask for the mission objective to be extended due to unforeseen circumstances" Shimo shook his head. He was right, after coming back he was so often right but very brutish about the way he was right in.

"Well, before I was attacked I took a look at the sphere, it was one of the only things I took with me when I left you guys… It's covered with numbers, the first two numbers say "4/4" and then it's just endless streaks of three random numbers one to six ending with a bar" Mana sighed.

"Maybe it's a puzzle of some sort? Maybe it's a clue to where the Box was taken to after the person found it but lacked the balls to use it? I mean the Box does carry some risks, that whole bit about the wish needing to be selfless, right? So what if the original finder just sold it to someone for a lot of money?" Kouta wondered as he kept on healing Mana, the magician suspected that she'll need plenty of healing and that they should've found a better place to stay.

"It's a music puzzle!" Meiko cheerfully yelled out.

Everyone looked at her curiously, Mana even lifted her head out of shock to look at her friend. Nobody expected Meiko of all people to solve it. The blacksmith was an unmatched crafter and a great fighter but not much of a puzzle solver most of the time.

"What? I like music…" the girl shrugged as response to everyone's stares.

Meiko took the sphere and turned it around, "You see, the 4/4 tells you how many beats there are per bar, each number must indicate some sort of a note or a beat but there are only three beats per bar in every section meaning each bar is missing one beat. It is a music puzzle, you need to insert a beat to each bar to make it all make sense…" the blacksmith explained.

Shimo looked at Meiko with a sarcastic squint, "I don't suppose you can solve it too?" he asked with a certain tongue of wit behind his words.

"I said I like music, I don't write it. We need someone good with that to complete it, a composer or something…" Meiko shrugged and handed the sphere back to Mana.

"When the puzzle is solved the bars must indicate some sort of coordinates-based clue to the Box's location… That was amazing, Meiko! That's definitely enough for us to ask for an objective extension" Mana finally had a reason to smile.

"Well, we'll still need to drop by the Sand Village to inform Konoha and give them a partial report. We can use the Sunagakure Aviary to send a coded message, we'll also use that time to sell off all we got from the raider camps and all of this insane journey and buy more supplies. We'll need clothes and food and to restock our ninja kits and fix our weapons" Shimo thought out loud, "But in general this can still work…"

The quest for Bliss was not yet complete but it was just resurrected back to life. For once there was still hope that things could still turn out OK. After that gruesome nightmare in the caves the team would finally catch a break and refill their empty and depressed by defeat hearts with some semblance of hope!


	146. Locals

Meiko threw a sloppy punch, Mana leaned to the side, bobbing and weaving like a boxer would've. A slightly faster combination of blows followed this tricky displacement punch, the magician moved the weight over to her left leg and ducked spinning on it and aiming her right leg to hit Meiko on the shins. The blacksmith's body blurred as she leaped backwards faster than Mana's eyes could track her.

"You're getting better, before I thought you should only redirect but you seem to start feeling comfortable with counters too…" Meiko smiled.

"Yeah well, I'm still done for if my opponent uses chakra augmentation…" Mana sighed fixing her messy hair and stretching out a little to let her weary muscles adjust the blood circulation somewhat to ease the tension.

"You can train for a hundred years and you'll never prepare for that. As skilled as a martial artist can get they'll never surpass elementary chakra augmentation, your redirection mastery should provide enough defence for those sloppy powerhouses so don't hate yourself over it" Meiko used a towel to clean floods of sweat off her face.

"You two done? We need to move…" Shimo grunted. It didn't take long to leave the caves for the four of them and start heading towards Sunagakure through the Land of Wind deserts, the closer they got to the Sunagakure walls the rockier the desert became, where before the layers of heated sand saw no end, at this moment the layer couldn't have been thicker half a foot.

"Mana-chan is getting better…" Kouta smiled gently and packed his things as well.

Mana and Meiko took the time to train a little bit more with every smallest stop to eat or rest. Having the heat of the desert in mind the genin tried to only move during the early hours of the morning or the later hours of evening. At least the desert parts closer to Sunagakure had plenty of rocky blocks that resembled small mountains that served as great source of shade during the hottest parts of day.

"She's wasting her time, we've decided to have her gain her ability to manipulate chakra back. We should focus on that instead teaching her how to fight in her current state. It feels like a Plan B type situation, we'll get that Box for sure, there need to be no doubts or other plans…" Shimo arrogantly declared tying his sword to his waist.

"Maybe you should train your swordsmanship a little too during the break times?" Kouta laughed out cheerfully biting Shimo a little.

"That'd be a waste of energy and chakra, I use Ice Style to restrain my opponent and it won't be too effective in the desert. My stamina is best reserved to deal with the pressures of travelling, look at those two, they're winded and now we'll have to move at a slower rate because of that" Shimo pointed at Mana who was sitting by the rock gasping for at least the smallest breath of air that didn't heat her lungs. Meiko was also stretched out on the sand, normally she'd have little to no fatigue but not using chakra to supplement her stamina or her physical stats wore her out. Meiko severely restrained herself to make her a fitting and equal opponent for Mana to draw out her abilities and teach her proper fight planning and to challenge her accordingly to her skill.

"Well, at least with your Ice Style we'll always have a proper source of water with us" Kouta laughed out flipping his flask over his face and spilling some icy water on his face before taking in a couple of gulps.

"Speaking of which, I need to take a leak…" Shimo snapped his finger and placed his bags on the sand again. The boy started rushing towards the other side of the large boulder they were resting close to before Kouta jumped up on his feet as well.

"I'll watch…" he nodded with his cheerful laughing face diminishing into a friendly smile.

"Excuse me, you'll watch?" Meiko huffed out still struggling to get her breath back into proper rhythm.

"Yeah, the desert is full of raiders and snakes and all that thing, peeing alone is dangerous. You always watch Mana-chan pee, don't you?" Kouta curiously asked the blacksmith.

"Yeah but I thought it was a social thing, I wasn't sure why we're doing it…" Meiko shrugged and leaped back on her feet, weaving around and throwing a couple of quick jabs in the air to check if her breath was back for good and if she could again physically strain herself without tiring too fast.

Mana laughed and sat back up, she took a hairbrush out of her bag, angrily yanking it out from under loads of stuff they took from the raider camp they thought they'd need. The magician took a couple of seconds to brush sand and various small insects out of her hair. She then handed the brush to Meiko but the blacksmith shook her head.

"That's why I have my hair stay short, I'm still astounded by your skilled head movements to keep your hair from slapping you in the face during spars, almost like it's a part of your style, but if I was some genius martial artist it'd make your movements a little predictable. If you plan on slugging with people you better trim that mess" Meiko did a couple of squats and then jumped on her index finger doing a couple of upside one finger push ups just to see if her chakra augmentation worked fine. It appeared the blacksmith finished her warm up.

"No, I need it that way for my magic shows. As an entertainer I want to look good on stage and I'd probably look weird with short hair" the magician measured her hair and tried to imagine herself with half of that or even with shoulder length hair having never imagined herself with that sort of hairdo. There were very few instances where she ever cut her hair that short…

"I thought you hated that thing? I mean didn't you leave because that magic thing wasn't you? If you actually like that stage magic thing why would you risk your life for getting your old life back?" Meiko wondered curiously sitting on her knees and looking at Mana stretching out and packing her things.

"No, I love stage magic just as much as I do my life as a ninja. Truth be told, I kind of miss that. I miss being on the stage and performing. I wasn't feeling depressed because I was a magician instead of being a ninja, I was crushed because I'm a ninja magician and I was forced to be only one of those things. If I had to be just a ninja I'd have a similar identity crisis as I do with losing my chakra control" Mana explained, a large smile covered her face as the girl imagined being on the stage again, recalling that sensation of making people laugh, making them look at her tricks with awe and finally seeing ninjutsu as a source of entertainment instead of fearing it as something that could have taken lives of their family of those of their own.

"Well, you're doing just fine without it, you know… You're pretty darned smart on your feet, if you perform like you did in the caves with those creepy crawlies you could still be a low ranking ninja even without your chakra control… You could even go a long way if you worked with intel or in the Administration offices" Meiko scratched the back of her head.

The blacksmith was right. There was a large quantity of ninja that only did paperwork and achieved moderate success even as genin and chuunin who had never before left on a single official mission and just managed paperwork and pushed files. There were people working in the office or handling intelligence, people interrogating criminals and captured rogue ninja, there were ninja who were drafters of peace treaties or spokespeople in the Ninja Tribunal and so on. They had their chakra control but weren't overly impressive in battle so Mana's disability would barely even matter.

"No, I'd hate working like that, reading about people dying and being unable to change anything. I'd rather work out on the field and perish being unable to beat an opponent with elementary chakra manipulation skills than have to file folders about how many children burned to death after the latest attack of rogues in a nearby settlement…" Mana's head sunk down, she pressed her fists up to her hips and shook for a moment imagining that moment in her head.

"Well, you saved our butts, I'm not keeping count or anything but it matters and you've changed something. If it weren't for you we'd be still paralyzed with insect eggs in our guts waiting to burst out and make us into goo that those creepazoids could slurp. Shimo can be a grump but Kouta is a nice person and I'm alright too, I guess, so technically the world is a better place already because you were born. Don't think of yourself as useless or anything. Don't hate yourself or think you don't matter" Meiko gave Mana a thumb up to which Mana could only stare at her in shock. Those words really hit her where it counted. For the first moment in her life someone acknowledged what she was doing and said that she may have made a difference.

"I'm not going to stop, those insects taught me a lot about how ancient genjutsu worked, how it was before it evolved into what it is today… They gave me a key that will help me complete a technique I've been working on for the longest time. Genjutsu used to be something that assaulted the brain directly, when things evolved into creatures with those large chakra networks the illusions started targeting them instead of the brain but that means no one will know how to defend against those primitive illusions anymore. I'm going to become strong, I'll protect everyone" Mana mumbled out under her own nose, still feeling some joy and pride in her heart from Meiko's words.

"You know, you've got to teach me how to defend against genjutsu one day, I felt so helpless back then, I was hit with something I had no way of breaking, even Shimo and Kouta could only barely fight it" Meiko pouted her lips remembering how her mind was completely overwhelmed by that numbing feeling and how she was rendered helpless by something so simple as a chakra signal sent to her brain reacting to her own neural network.

"Most ninja can't defend against genjutsu well, it might be a very useful skill for you to have but the primitive brain targeting genjutsu cannot be defended against. As long as you have a functional brain you'll be hit by it, no matter how strong you are physically, no matter what protective techniques you have. That's why they were so fascinating and dangerous to me" Mana explained.

"Wow, you really sound hyped when talking about that, you're like a jutsu nerd of some sort…" Meiko laughed out rolling on the sand while she clutched her sides. Everything this girl did was kicked up to a hyperactive degree. Everything she did was supercharged with childish emotions, she was happy like a laughing baby, she was angry like a raging caveman and she felt sadness more profound than anyone else's.

"Look who's talking…" Mana sarcastically squinted at Meiko and just barely resisted the temptation to bring up a talk about some sort of crafting technique or a historically significant weapon to spark Meiko's own passionate reaction.

"I've no idea what you're talking about" the girl waved her large hand at Mana and then punched her own palm in excitement. "Very well then, you've gone as far as you can go at this level, now you'll be training me!" the blacksmith cringed with almost aggressive level of excitement.

Suddenly the girl leapt up on her feet and pointed further away, Mana turned and witnessed a gigantic vortex of raging sand, almost like a super compact sandstorm. The raging whirlwind hit something as it appeared to violently explode. Loud yells, thuds and explosions shaking the ground beneath the girls' feet could've been heard from where the boys left to pee.

"Come on, let's go!" Meiko jumped up and just disappeared. Mana sighed as she was left to get to the battlefield the old fashioned way. Running on the sand was tough already and now she had that burning fear of her friends getting hurt in her heart that made her run that much faster.

Finally the magician figured that she'd have more luck looking at the battlefield and supporting her friends from above. She pulled out two kunai from her pouch she recently refilled from the supplies they took from the raiders' camp and made her way scaling up the dry desert rock. It was a good thing that she was light and that those kunai were quite hard and high quality so they could be used that way. After a couple of moments scaling up the rock the magician found it much easier to run over rock than sand. She took a peak from the large rock that ended right above where the boys left and where Meiko momentarily dashed to.

Below there was a huge brawl going on. The assailants appeared to be desert raiders similar to those that Meiko beat but some of them used simple low ranking ninjutsu which Mana found surprising. Usually raiders had no such ability, at the very best, most high ranking threats coming from the raider ranks were ex-mercenaries who were trained to deal with some low ranking ninja but certainly not use ninjutsu themselves. Someone must've been tutoring the desert raiders on the ways of the ninja which was a scary concept to imagine. Rogue ninja were enough of a threat already, if any small time scumbag outside the village walls could raise sandstorms or use the crushing force of layers upon layers of sand it would've really challenged Sunagakure's military prowess.

Kouta was all over the place, sonic booms were everywhere where he stopped to move as he accelerated from nothing to breaking the sound barrier in less than a second. He must've been using most of what he had, using his chakra augmentation to enhance his speed just so he could combat most of his assailants at the same time while using his medical techniques to enhance his strength through precise chakra control. The magician noticed how the boy was pulling his punches and yet the raiders were being flung around like ragdolls from his easiest blows. While those raiders knew ninjutsu they were unable to use chakra augmentation or chose not to use it having its risks in mind.

Shimo didn't pull his attacks, he was barely even visible by Mana's eyes and she could only tell of his blitzing existence because of the dozens of raiders that were cut down or lost their limbs in Shimo's ruthless rampage through the battlefield. This was a young man who spent so much time beyond the village walls to hone his skills that he no longer recognized the value of holding anything back. These men were trying to use Wind and even Fire Style ninjutsu but the young swordsman outraced their flames and their fiercest and fastest winds. Several raiders formed entire projectiles or elongated their weapons with Wind Style techniques but Shimo wasn't scratched once, several supersonic projectiles did scrape his messy desert cloak however but it only appeared to piss him off more.

Meiko seemed to relish this brawl, she didn't appear to be moving too fast, maybe she was still a little winded from the spar before as Mana could see the red blurs from her movement. The magician could still track Meiko a couple of seconds after the blacksmith's movement which was entire leagues below the speed that Kouta and Shimo moved in but Meiko appeared to be more skilled with her approach, she tricked her opponents into falling her slower but more powerful attacks, she used stomps to split the sands apart or cause fissures in the more rocky surfaces, she punched the sand creating rippling waves that tossed her enemies in the air leaving them suspended for Meiko's crushing yet lightning fast blows. Almost like picking apples from a tree, if the apples were enemies and they had to be picked at supersonic speeds…

All of a sudden a loud popping sound echoed as five small sand projectiles hit the raiders in their chest making them pass out instantly. The Konoha three froze in their tracks and looked back on the same large rock where Mana was, the magician looked to the side only to see a friendly smiling young man extending his hand for her and another red haired man with an oversized white scarf and a toothpick with his index fingers extended firing sand projectiles from his fingers. That redhead was the man who was making those loud sounds.

"Sand Style: Desert Automaton!" the redhead chanted out as the deafening pops intensified to a barrage and Mana became completely oblivious to all the projectiles the young man fired but could see an entire field of put down raiders. Each one of them was cursing and grunting in pain so this youth just put everyone down without killing a single one of them and managing not to hit the three targets he didn't want to hit as well.

A chubby female ninja standing to his side flicked her fingers. Her large backpack burst open with a great steel box shooting off from it and opening itself in mid-air. The young female made a quick hand seal with her one hand, not nearly as fast as Mana was able to but it was still completely invisible to the magician's eye with her current impaired perception.

"Ninja Style: Tool Expansion Jutsu!" she shouted out as chakra threads coming from her fingers lit up and went all the way up to the large box-like tool she shot out. The container extended and opened what appeared to be its mouth, large steel tentacles fired off from its sides making the entire thing look like steel flytrap of some sort. The puppet then started to chug the fallen raiders into its enlarged "mouth" keeping them as prisoners. After the girl was done she once again reduced the size of the container puppet and moved up to it in an instant, placing her hand on it and sealing it into a scroll of her choosing.

Mana finally recovered from the shock giving her hand for the blond haired ninja with the Sunagakure headband who helped her get down from the rocky side of the mountain by simply walking down the side of it using the Academy wall climbing technique.

"We've had the entire situation under control. While Land of Wind desert may be your jurisdiction we were attacked…" Shimo crossed his hands on his chest, typical coming from an ex-rogue – he didn't appear to trust these three very much.

A man appeared behind him wearing the Sunagakure jounin west and a turban on his head with an impressive brown beard and equally as rich moustache but he didn't need the facial hair to point his manliness out as his bulk and muscle could've done it by their own. The man must've moved so fast that even Shimo couldn't register his movements and didn't even know he existed. Judging from the sound of the man's flashy and blitzing movement he used the high ranking "Body Flicker Jutsu" which was common among higher ranking ninja. It was a way to enhance one's speed to near instantaneous movement without having to augment one's chakra and risk tearing one's chakra network apart.

"We are Sunagakure ninja under direct orders to pick you up and lead you into the safety of our village. Kazekage-sama was contacted by the Hokage and asked to do so because Lady believed you four may have been in trouble since you haven't contacted her for quite some time. With Kazekage-sama wishing to improve his political situation with Konoha he immediately sent a team to retrieve you and here we are…" the man spoke standing back-to-back with Shimo with neither one turning around to face the conversant. Shimo's mouth and eyes were still gapping wide open from shock of the speed of that man's movement.

The frail blonde genin bowed his head to the degree that people used when referring to professional superiors.

"Please do not look at our intervention as a display of force. We merely wished to spare you the trouble of dealing with these raiders" the youth spoke with an apologetic tone never opening his eyes or wiping the smile off his face. He had very messy and spiky blonde hair and rather profoundly blown up cheeks and a double chin which would've been cringe worthy to everyone seeing it for the first time. The blood vessels around his cheeks also seemed to be quite evident giving the blown up cheeks some hieroglyph like blood vessel markings.

The chubby female fixed the bandana tying up her long tied up blond hair and then spoke up. She looked similarly on the comical side but mostly due to her t-shirt that had a futon on it partly covered up by the jeans that were held on her shoulders with straps. Despite her intimidating size physically she appeared to dress like a five year old boy.

"These men answer to a known criminal who calls himself Fennec, he is a big pain in Kazekage-sama's ass and we apologize you had to deal with his lapdogs" the young woman also seemed rather polite and apologetic for something she had little to no control of.

"So Sunagakure knows of this Fennec already…" Mana realized as this information was something she really wished to report after finding out about him from those raiders back when they first entered the desert.

The third one who was the tallest of the three genin, just barely short from matching the height of their sensei, appeared to stay quiet. He wore a rather fancy desert cloak and had a large scarf which must've proved rather useful to tie around one's mouth during a sandstorm or could've served as a decent turban to protect one's head and hair from the blazing desert Sun or the raging sandstorms. His silence and strict stare truly looked a little intimidating. After a moment of awkward silence the redhead also opened his mouth, his voice was tougher than that of teens his age but also a lot huskier and a bit on the silent side.

"Don't worry Leaf, Sunagakure has your back…" he uttered.


	147. Choices Matter

Moving through the desert with someone who knew very well what they were doing was quite different. Naturally the secrets of the desert were not all that mysterious to these people seeing how they lived in a village built of clay and sandstone entirely surrounded by a hulking wall of desert stone and residing in a large crater of mysterious origin so that the slightly colder layers of sand below offered some chills and the surrounding rocks provided ample shade.

"Enough…" the jounin leader of the Sunagakure team raised his fist signaling everyone to stop. While Shimo couldn't help but feel suspicious by the Sunagakure party leading them to Sunagakure such was his job in the group, to question everything and use his cred and experience he picked up being trained by a rogue ninja to help and guide them through the tough environment of outside the walls.

"Why are we stopping, we can still move for a good two or three hours!?" Shimo grumped out, he constantly questioned and complained about the jounin's leadership. Mostly because he was waiting for the man to slip up so that the ex-rogue could expose him as not who he claimed to be. It was a mystery to Mana as to why he wanted to pick a fight with a jounin but the opponent's rank appeared to be of little importance to the Yuki swordsman.

"What we walk in distance is inconsequential compared to the energy we waste walking during those hours. That rock right there is a very decent shade, we won't find anything like that several hours later down the road" the bulky Sunagakure jounin explained stroking his beard.

From what the Konoha team picked up so far the man was called Izem, it was a very strange name the likes of which Mana had never heard but she just assumed people from different parts of the world would have different names. He was a calm yet very authoritative in his presence individual, just like in the current quarrel of question and answer what he said sounded perfectly logical and no one really questioned it further. Even Shimo didn't seem to have a problem with the jounin's decision.

While the Konoha three awaited for the conclusion of Shimo questioning the jounin the Sunagakure team just settled down. The only girl in the Sunagakure party – Tiwul chose to settle down on the edge of the rock providing them shade, initially it appeared weird to Mana as to why the female would choose to sit in the Sun throughout their stay but the girl then pulled out a sheet of paper and a some drawing brushes and small containers of paint and began to draw the desert sights.

Meiko, while feeling totally bored, scaled the rock up and settled down on top close to the girl to see her paint. Shimo just sat down by the stone, pressing his back against the shadier and colder parts to chill himself out, it appeared from the low position of the boy's head and his hair falling over his face that he had fallen asleep or just functioned in some sort of trance-like state. It was very similar to meditation but occasionally the boy swatted his sheathed sword around to scare away the insects buzzing around him. There must've been some dead animal carcass nearby because the concentration of flies was not very pleasant to deal with.

The blonde boy kept on looking at his refilled flask and laughing to himself, he drank a gulp and then looked at the slightly diminished amount of water. To Mana such behavior proved odd so she slowly and without any attempts to sneak around walked up to him and sat down on a small rock close to him. For a moment she observed the boy playing with the flask like a little child having discovered a hidden wonder of the world as children often do.

"It's astounding, isn't it?" Menna, the blonde youngster who was distinguished by his excessive politeness, asked.

"I knew that the people living in desert didn't see water often but I never would have thought you'd be amazed to that extent" Mana smiled still not quite catching Menna's cold.

"No, your friend's ability to use his ice to refill our flasks. It is such a remarkable ability, he is born to live in the desert, we would never let go of him if he was our prisoner. Truth be told, most of us would grow quite fond of such a man… Not that we intend any harm!" the young man shook his hands once he realized how strangely his sentence must've sounded.

"Not that many Yuki clansmen around your parts, I assume?" Mana winked at the boy trying to tell him that his poor choice of words was forgotten and ignored.

"Not really, Sunagakure might have a rapidly recovering military potential but we don't have a very wide variety of ninja. Most of us are either Sabaku clansmen manipulating sand, puppet users or Wind Style ninja. There are quite a lot of swordsmen and weapon masters in our village but no one with such an exotic ability like your friend" Menna continued to stare at his flask.

"Well, if you ever need your flask refilled, don't hesitate to ask Shimo or me" Mana smiled and nodded her head leaving the boy to obsess over the water.

As the magician passed over the rock from below a couple of small stones almost hit her on the head forcing her to look up. The magician was intending to go talk to Meiko about training her to defend against genjutsu like the armored ninja asked, also she felt a little curious about how Tiwul's drawing venture was going on. Sitting above was the fourth member of the Sand party – Tala. The boy didn't speak that much and Mana only knew his name from his teammates referring to him. It didn't even feel too comfortable to refer to a person by their name when they don't tell it to you themselves…

With moderate effort the magician scaled the rock upwards and settled down closer to Tala. It wasn't that she wanted to spend some time and get to know him or anything, even if she pretty much had to scope him and his intentions out with him being a foreigner and all, but she needed some rest before she finished climbing that rock.

For a moment there both she and Tala continued to stare at Shimo sitting quietly below, Izem, the strong-headed jounin stretching out and training and Menna obsessing over water and some of the food looted from the raider camp before that they shared with the Sunagakure party. The boy must've never had sherbet, preserved in those strange cooling sealing tubes, before or at least it must've been quite the delicacy around these parts. Granted Mana had never had any herself before finding out about it from Meiko and finding a hidden stash of it that Meiko still had not eaten during her brief stay at the camp. Even with all the sophistication around that delicacy it was getting tiresome to eat dessert for breakfast, lunch and dinner, saving smoked meat and fruits for the special occasions.

"You don't talk much?" Tala asked speaking up first which was really unusual for him.

"Why? Does it bother you? I just stopped to rest for a while, I'm sorry if I'm disturbing you…" Mana replied beginning to feel a little awkward having just stopped climbing close to the young man's location and not talking at all.

"No, I like it, I'm just used to everyone talking all the time so I'm a little surprised…" the redhead shook his head and resumed his over-watching duty which he himself decided to take up.

"I've seen your ability when you took out those raiders, are you a Sabaku clansman? I've recently met another Sabaku clan member, I never knew you were so common in Sunagakure…" Mana took the liberty of asking.

"Really? A ninja wielding sand in the middle of the desert is surprising to you? No, I'm not a Sabaku clansman, I am a Wind Style user, I wrap the sand and compress it into small spheres of wind chakra making it add some weight and force to it. I'm not going to tell you much more than that, Konoha kunoichi" Tala responded with some malicious sounding and offensive irony in his voice but Mana decided to not push it, she already felt thankful that this young man spoke to her at all having the last couple of days in mind.

"Oh, I'm not really a kunoichi, not anymore, anyways… I overused chakra augmentation and broke my chakra network" Mana decided to be honest with the boy and see where it'd go.

"Oh… I'm sorry, that must feel horrible. Still, to break it permanently you should've tried to kick the planet like a football or something, I know it'll sound rude but it's really your own fault" Tala finally looked at Mana with some curiosity but also some hidden judgment. At least he understood how crushing losing one's chakra manipulation ability felt, at least his eyes suggested that he did because they projected pity from them. At least being honest opened him up somewhat.

"Yeah… It's not really that, a sensor told me that everything's fine with my chakra network it's just my mind…"

"You are telling me an awful lot of things about you, why? Aren't you afraid I'd use them against you? I am from another village after all, your head would grant me a moderate bounty, enough for lunch at least. Why do you trust strangers so much?" Tala asked revealing why he was so interested in Mana.

"Because you shall not allow a single hair to fall from this girl's head, she is the client of the Konoha Four…" Izem's strong and low pitched but also relatively gentle in tone voice explained. Shocked by the man's presence being completely unknown not only to her but to a ninja nearby Mana turned to the side seeing the slightly aged man hanging sideways off of the rock with his hands crossed on his bulky chest with his feet sticking to the rocky surface and holding his entire weight.

"Well, if you're the VIP, my point is just strengthened. Your head would pay a little more than that of your friends…" Tala closed his eyes and crossed his own hands and legs suggesting that he was done talking. Izem extended his hand to Mana with the intention of bringing her up the rock. Once the magician allowed the jounin to bring her up the man apologized for his pupil.

"Forgive Tala, the old ways are still not lost on him, he is a lot more conservative than even my generation… The Kazekage would pay for neither of your heads, Konoha is in exceptionally good standing with the Sand Village so don't pay Tala's ramblings much thought. In fact, Kazekage-sama and your Fifth engage in casual friendly rivalry from time to time and meet quite often in various meetings and Summits. He'd never go so far as to encourage putting sticks in Konoha's wheels. Actually I'll let you in to a little rumor, the Kazekage is a little afraid of Lady Fifth, that being said, if you were in Land of the Waves or Kirigakure you'd be smart to heed Tala's advice and not talk too much about yourself" Izem explained while he slowly carried Mana up and placed her on top of the rock.

"Now please check out Tiwul's painting, it's really something else, or so people that see them say…" the man smiled to Mana twisting his facial hair in strange manners and then leaped down the rock landing down as if he barely even leaped half a meter, without even picking up sand from beneath his feet.

Slowly Mana approached Meiko and Tiwul sitting down. These two looked so much like two boys when looking from behind and being blinded by the desert Sun. Meiko was rather tall and had a very physical build, it would've been clear to any observer that she could physically kick their ass if she needed to. Tiwul was rather chubby and didn't appear to be ashamed of it at all but her attire choices made her look like a little boy if anything else. While walking up closer to the two the magician could not help it but see Tiwul painting a heavenly oasis with palm trees, ripe fruits and flowing rich rivers. The only sand in her painting was on the ring-shaped beaches around the small squirting spring of mineral water she drew in the center.

"Izem-san was right, this is amazing, albeit not too accurate…" Mana smiled meaning no offence with her critique, she was just a little stumped as to why would Tiwul choose to sit on top of a rock in front of the raging desert Sun in the middle of a day if she wasn't drawing the desert itself and was just imagining her own painting and bringing it to life.

"I always draw not what I see but how I want it to look, how I'd like for it to change during my lifetime. Maybe one day after this life kills me someone will see my paintings and decide to realize that vision… That is just my way of…"

"Leaving the world better than you found it, actually leaving a mark" Mana finished Tiwul's sentence to which the girl turned around and smiled at the magician. It was only then that Mana noticed that Tiwul was missing a couple of teeth. The magician wanted to bring it up but she wondered if it was somehow important to Tiwul to keep it that way, after all, most medical ninja were able to heal missing teeth back in half an hour or so.

"Yeah! When I told Meiko about it she instantly brought you up, it appears you think quite similarly to me. I am very glad that there are more people like us, she also told me you even go as far as to never kill people which to me sounded a bit overboard and too hard to live by in our line of work. To each their own, I guess" Tiwul laughed out and continued to draw.

"We made a bet that I could beat Tiwul at an eating contest, we're gonna go at it when we reach Sunagakure. That way I'll have the chance to check the local cuisine out!" Meiko smiled with wicked excitement, looking back at Mana while dangling her feet off the edge of the rock.

"You know… Kouta is pretty skilled at healing missing teeth, he helped me with that a lot, if you wish I can ask him to heal yours" Mana tried to carefully go there and find out why exactly didn't Tiwul have her mouth healed.

"Nah, I'm fine. I had quite a number of them grown back and it hurts too much, I'd rather keep 'em out than go through that bother" the chubby girl giggled to herself, her appearance appeared to not at all bother her, while Mana took a completely different approach in life she couldn't help but warmly smile and look at clouds covering up the midday Sun.

"Say, Mana… Tiwul said that Fennec guy is kind of a jerk, think we'll have some time to kick his ass during our trip back?" Meiko looked back at Mana questioningly.

"Huh… It's strange, you're not actually that strong or fast yet your team looks at you with trust and considers your voice important, I don't think I'd like to paint you at all, you're really good the way you are…" Tiwul murmured to herself.

"I don't know, it's not really our primary or even secondary objective. If he gets in our way I suppose we can take him out but I think our best bet is leaving him to Sunagakure since he's really their problem. We can't just solve their problems for them, it's people like Fennec that might make the next Sunagakure generation famous…" Mana scratched the back of her head. While she did wish to solve that problem someone of his caliber just sounded completely out of their paygrade and totally unrelated to their objective.

"Yeah, but don't worry, he's not really keeping himself contained to just Land of Wind anymore so you may just have your shot soon enough. Recently he blew up a small settlement in Land of Rivers as a signal to Konoha to stop interfering, I think he's mad for something you guys did, you're the only Konoha team working here at the moment, as far as we know…" Tiwul carelessly explained while not losing her rhythm of painting.

"Shit, you think he's mad on us for taking down that raider camp?" Meiko looked at Mana worried. The blacksmith must've finally realized how living in Mana's shoes and blaming herself for everything felt like.

"Oh, so you guys did do it? Well good riddance, Viper's Pit or whatever it's called was a hole anyways, still, Meiko, you should listen to your friend. This Fennec guy is our problem and we'll deal with him. Stop meddling with him and putting other people and other countries in his crosshair. You have a mission of your own, don't you?" the chubby calmed the blacksmith down better than Mana could have. Mostly because Mana actually felt bad about their decision now. Maybe if they played it cool they could've avoided that whole fallout with the raiders and then all those attacks on Land of Rivers. After all, it was her call to bargain with them for supplies they needed so much…

"If anything it's my fault, I made the call to bargain with them, don't feel bad about it, Meiko. Now I don't like that Fennec guy one bit but Tiwul is right. The best we can do with a guy like that is report him to Konoha so that they offer assistance to Sunagakure, maybe some manpower or intelligence we have on his growing syndicate. Ultimately our meddling and attempts to help already cost lives. We need to stop messing this up and leave it to those able to actually help" Mana sadly explained. It appeared all the talking about Tiwul's art and that unifier of raiders Fennec made the magician forget bringing Meiko's training up.

Tiwul then stood up and sealed her work of art into a small scroll with a simple sealing technique. She looked at the clouds with a sense of wonder, clouds must've been quite a rare occurrence in the desert.

"Well, the opportunity to move out presented itself, by the time the sky clears up it'll be late enough for us to move anyways. Let's go" she said and headed down the rock. Mana and Meiko followed. Sunagakure was just one day away so they should reach it pretty soon.


	148. Village Hidden by Sand

Kouta threw a lazily put together combination of blows, Menna who was honoring the boy as a sparring partner avoided it easily. Curiously sitting on the rock Mana was observing the playful match between the two while Tala angrily squinted at it before closing his eyes and acting uninterested for most of the spar. The magician felt a little bit curious about seeing Menna's abilities since he has not shown them during the brief battle with the raiders and was the only one of the squad save for the jounin leader to do so.

"You shouldn't have requested this spar if you hold back the whole time…" Menna smiled while avoiding another half-baked combination of blows with his eyes closed. Mana couldn't really get Menna's point, she could barely even see blurs and flashes from her point of view, was that amount of speed considered so pathetic amongst ninja, even genin? It only made her feel that much more powerless and outmatched.

Finally Menna allowed himself to respond with a combination of strikes, he fought very similarly to Kouta, his style was highly improvised yet reminded of a demanding and very physical striking and kicking style. Surprised if not a little bit scared due to the sudden outburst of brutality and sheer strength from his partner Kouta raised his arms in a striking position around his head, leaving his arms and fists to defend his head while his elbows were left open for striking if he found an opening.

"Hm? Aren't you a little bit interested, Tala?" Mana asked looking at the annoyed redhead who was just angrily rubbing his boot against the rocky surface wishing for the Sun to finally hide behind the clouds again so they could move.

"Fights for shits and giggles do not interest me. Fighting is a process of attempting to kill someone, there is nothing playful or sporting about it" the grumpy young man replied continuing to rest with his eyes closed as if he was forced to not look at the spar going on in front of him.

"You say that yet you did not kill those raiders, they were full of wounds but none of them died…" Mana reminded the boy.

"That's because if we killed more of Fennec's men he'd raid another settlement and slaughter everyone before razing it to the ground. Murder only invites more murder as vengeance for the murder committed. For that reason one must target the head of the fold and kill them before they can plan out their response. Fighting means to kill, that doesn't mean it has to be carried out with no thought to it, in fact, it means it needs more thought than everything else because people's lives are on the line. Now if you'd forgive me, I want to nap a little…" the young man lied because he kept on angrily kicking the rock he was sitting on while acting like he was sleeping the entire time.

Kouta was thrown back by Menna's strength, the medical ninja was sent dragging through the ground for at least fifty meters after Menna's blow which he managed to block. It appeared that while looking the least ready to fight physically the blonde may have been the most ready to slug it out of his entire team.

"That power, that chakra breaking out when you strike…" Kouta mumbled to himself before moving his smoking blocking arms out of the way from blocking his face so he could ask his next question directly. "You're a Juugo clansman, aren't you?"

Menna scratched the back of his head, "Juugo? What's that? No, I am Menna of the Ayaka clan" the blonde smiled gently as he always did when talking to someone.

"Ayaka clan?" Kouta turned his head to the side wondering if he had heard of such a clan before. Menna attacked just as fast and strong as Kouta did when he used his Juugo bloodline to form jets around his feet to move around or when he enhanced his blows with chakra using the medical precise chakra manipulation techniques. Certainly it couldn't have been just chakra augmentation, no one would use augmentation of such caliber so casually for a friendly sparring match, at least a genin wouldn't.

Tiwul dropped down from above to sit closer to Mana, the girl looked quite happy, almost so to an alarming degree that looked a little too creepy.

"Your friend is about to have his butt kicked… Ayaka clan members have genetic mutations to their chakra systems allowing them to casually augment their chakra without any risk of inflicting damage upon their chakra network. That means that Menna can augment his chakra as much as he wants and not worry about injuring himself or losing chakra manipulation permanently…" the chubby tomboy explained to Mana.

Menna moved his arms to the side and bent forward preparing for a dash, rays of blue light appearing almost like needles at where they shot out from his body that split into endless flocks of smaller pins at the end started shooting out from Menna's body. It took a great amount of chakra being released for it to be visible outside a person's body, usually such displays of power displayed desperation for the ninja using it. It signaled that a ninja was ready to go all out for this one final attack and then collapse from the pressure of his own chakra network being out of sync. Just for a moment such burst of chakra accelerated the body's flow of chakra and after a couple of moments the body believed that was the natural flow, making it consume chakra normally at an accelerated rate before returning back to place. That is if it ever returned to normal…

Of course if Tiwul was to be trusted, to Menna such degree of augmentation didn't mean anything at all.

Menna leapt forward, Kouta's body suddenly appeared to shift, almost like his entire skin changed to a more wooden texture as his pores opened and started bursting chakra through his enlarged network venting the built up chakra through the open pores so that his body never got used to the faster chakra flow and never had to adapt to the strain placed by augmentation. In a way both Kouta and Menna fought similarly, to Kouta augmenting the strength of his punches was easy and without risk since medical ninja could enhance the strength of their blows through medical techniques and precise and unmatched chakra control, also as a Juugo he could vent the excess chakra stored in his network so that his network didn't break. Both of these young men were users of chakra augmentation that found different ways to bypass the risks using their natural born advantages.

Both Kouta and Menna clashed with each other, exchanging fists at incredible speed, sonic booms flew out from where their fists collided, rocks and debris were thrown at any watchers to the point where Shimo who was resting nearby and observing the spar had to draw out his blade and deflect the flying hazards coming from nearby battle that was moving everywhere and raged throughout the entire desert field they were resting at.

Tala's eyes suddenly shot wide open overflowing with annoyance and anger, he placed his arms forward in a hand seal position.

"Sand Style: Desert Automaton" he yelled out as the sand below his feet shot upwards in bullet-like projectiles at the debris and small stones hitting all of them and destroying them with pinpoint accuracy.

"Thanks for that, Tala" Tiwul laughed out scratching the back of her head, they could've been injured if Tala didn't act as fast as he did.

"You idiots! Stop fooling around already!" the redhead yelled out loud making Kouta and Menna stop rampaging around the battlefield with fists up close to each other's faces. "You're tiring yourself out and you're making a mess out of this place risking injury to the VIP and others, even more you're revealing our position with this display of destruction and violence. What if at least one of you fails to properly control their chakra and they end up causing an explosion strong enough to destroy the whole desert? Stop messing around!" he yelled out expressing his annoyance.

Menna and Kouta both moved back from each other, Menna's face was completely swollen and the blonde was gripping at his ribs as if they may have been broken whereas Kouta had a cracked forehead and his cloak was torn up and had some blood marks on it signaling that he may have had some internal damage since he was spitting up some blood after being punched.

"How did they get those injuries? Just how fast were these two fighting? It looks like they've been fighting for entire days…" Mana thought looking at the two hyperventilating boys, Menna was breathing much heavier than Kouta which made the magician better able to analyze his clan's ability.

"It's alright, Tala, their control was exemplary and they've only transferred the entire force through their opponent, it was their speed and the secondary effects of it they could not control. While the world around them was in no danger of blowing up just yet, that is why sparring like this is important, it teaches us about what can be improved, how our own power can be controlled. That being said, Tala is partially right, spar at a much more casual level next time. For now it's time to move out…" Izem, the jounin leader declared after appearing close to the huffing youngsters. He had left to do some lookout and the fact that he returned so quickly suggested that he may have found something interesting.

"Hmph…" Tala closed his eyes and leaped off the cliff landing on the ground without raising too much sand beneath his feet despite the fact that he leaped down quite the distance. Tiwul helped Mana get down as well.

"Why are you back so soon, sensei?" the chubby puppeteer asked.

"Because we need to move" he replied casually.

"But isn't it the peak of Sun's activity?" Shimo raised an eyebrow, always ready to bicker with the man.

"Yes, but Sunagakure is just a good twenty minutes of walking speed away, the desert winds are strong so the sand they picked up obstructed our view before, I bumped into the guards almost instantly after I left" the man explained. The team then quickly packed their things and started moving, moving through the midday would be pretty tough and they'd need several showers to wash off the sweat and sand from their bodies after this trip but if they would reach Sunagakure within twenty minutes of Mana's walking pace it'd all be worth it.

"For the record, Menna would have kicked Shimo's ass…" Tiwul playfully pinched Mana's elbow, the magician smiled and shook her head.

"No, you may not have noticed but there is a difference between the Ayaka and Juugo bloodlines. Menna's body indeed does protect him from tearing his own network apart like I have done in the past, however it does nothing to protect his muscles from fatigue, in fact, he is fatigued much more intensely because his network takes no pressure away from his muscles where the excess chakra is probably redirected damaging the already fatigued muscles even more. Kouta, on the other hand, vents the excess chakra away through his pores. Menna is stronger as far as short bursts of augmentation are concerned, he can augment his chakra to much higher extents but Kouta is more of a marathon runner and he'd be able to outlast Menna in an actual fight" Mana found a prideful moment to bite her newly met friend in the butt. Tiwul opened her mouth to argue but then closed it and looked away after noticing how much trouble Menna had just standing on his feet and how much he was rubbing his aching thighs and arms.

Sunagakure was a very odd village when compared to Konohagakure which was the only village that Mana had to compare it to so far. Konoha reminded of an actual small city built in the middle of a rich and prosperous forest surrounded by sky-reaching trees and crystal lakes. Konoha was surrounded by a gate, an artificial wall made of wood and bricks that was then imbued with chakra and various seals and barrier ninjutsu techniques to protect it. Unless the barriers were dealt with in a cleverer and discrete way previously it'd probably take enough force to destroy the entire world to destroy both all the barriers and Konoha itself from outside the village.

That being said, Sunagakure appeared to be built entirely in a large crater that appeared more like ones caused by meteorites. The magician could not quite remember all the legends talking about Sunagakure's origins as the village was absurdly old, perhaps as old as Konoha itself having been built relatively soon after Konohagakure's rising. Some of them said that a great ninja purposefully made this crater to host the village inside of it, there were others that said that the crater was caused by a meteorite falling down and leaving it imbued with incredibly pricy minerals making this specific spot much more fitting for a village to be built. There were legends that claimed that this was a site of an explosion caused by a Tailed Beast or a Lesser Demon…

What surrounded Sunagakure was not a manmade barrier, it was not a wall nor was there an actual gate. Regardless, there had to be barriers and seals protecting it just as strong as those of Konoha, at the very least Sunagakure should've had the barriers that did not offer protections but signaled of the entry of any entity with a chakra level strong enough to register. Those were quite simple to put together by a barrier ninjutsu user but all of it was just speculations, the true nature of the protections surrounding the village must've been a military secret guarded by the village's Black Ops and Protections Service ninja. The natural barrier around Sunagakure was a tall valley of rocks and judging from the tall wall of natural rock on the other side it only had one passageway to and out of it.

There were two ninja with Sunagakure uniforms watching the long and narrow pass and doing watch duty. They must've also served as the first line of the village's defense so Mana assumed they were also formidable combatants as well trusted by the Kazekage to defend the village first before the reinforcements swarmed the perpetrators and assailants from all sides moving in from above the pass. Even if someone managed to beat the guards and move in they've be closed in from both sides and sandwiched leaving themselves open for attacks from each side or above. It was a pretty impressive defense, Mana wondered about how this village could have been hit by the war so hard with such competent natural defenses.

After a brief conversation and check-ins with the guards Izem managed to get both the Sand and the Konoha genin past the gate guards. Right after the whole party entered the narrow pass the magician noticed hawks or eagles flying above their head, these must've been the messenger birds used around these parts as well. The Kazekage must've been already reported to about their arrival even without there being any need to report to his office.

"So where to now, will the Kazekage wish to see us in his office?" Shimo looked at Izem questioningly. The jounin lifted his fist up into the sky and extended it into a palm, it was a sign for the Sand genin that they were set free. Right after the palm was extended the young ones whispered their farewells and dispersed disappearing into thin air faster than Mana could see which was slowly beginning to be a habit. At this point the magician wondered just how could she not be considered blind when she was able to see so little of what went on around her…

"There's really no need, I'll report to Kazekage, your business is to report to the Hokage. That in itself is really not our mission objective anymore but after that you can feel free to hang around the village for as long as you need… Konoha and Suna are no enemies, you'll be under no threat here" Izem replied slowly walking towards a large rotund clay building with a crimson hieroglyph symbol on it, seeing how it was the largest and the most impressive building in the whole clay-based architecture of the village it must've been the administration building.

"Awww… I thought we agreed to an eating contest with Tiwul… Yeah, she'd better run" Meiko sighed looking a little down, she must've not been overly fond of all this sand even inside what appeared to be the largest center of civilization in the entire Land of Wind.

"In any case, I'll go on and report to the Hokage, you guys find us a place to stay for a couple of nights. We'll need to receive a reply and an official permission to continue the mission, technically our objective is already complete but let's hope Lady Fifth will allow us to continue with our objective extension" Shimo stretched out and took a couple of moments to locate the building that had the "Aviary" sign on it, it was not too far away from the Administration building as it could've been expected. It couldn't have been too difficult to find since a large concentration of birds soaring above the village landed there and departed from there.

"Here's to hoping that what little clues we have to the Box's location will be enough to grant us an extension…" Kouta replied stroking his messy hair and wiping sweat off his face.

"Well then, we can go refill our supplies. I'll take care of our clothes and our ninja kits, also Shimo please take these custom orders I've written up for Konohagakure, I doubt that Suna will be too cooperative with giving us custom made weapons to carry around here. It'd be smart for Kouta to refill our medical supplies and for Meiko to refill our food. We still have plenty of stuff to trade after that raider camp raid so let's make sure we do that" Mana finalized.

"Should we trade our Audra shards? Our deal with the raiders didn't go well…" Meiko wondered out loud.

"That's a good call, let's not risk being called traitors and return those to Konoha instead. Give me those bags, I'll ask for them to be delivered via space-time delivery to Konoha. If they'll wish to check inside I'll just wave words like "confidential" around or pay them off if needed and they should shake off, I mean we're sending things to Konoha and not from it so it shouldn't be too much of a problem" Shimo took the large bags filled with heavy Audra shards that they managed to recover from the Katabami gold mine.

"Great, let's meet here after we're done and then I'll lead you guys to the hotel I'll find. Sand Village is known among medical ninja for its fantastic herbs and I'm looking forward to seeing what I can barter out from the local Suna Greenhouse" Kouta excitedly declared.

"Don't forget to patch up your face, no one will barter with you when you look like a war survivor…" Meiko laughed out pointing at dried blood all over Kouta's face since he appeared to have forgotten to heal himself after the spar which was odd since he did patch Menna up remarkably well.

"Sadly, whatever he can do will not fix all the problems with his face…" Shimo playfully teased his teammate before disappearing into the crowd far away from where the friendly wrath of his teammate could have reached him.

Finally the team reached the Sand Village, hopefully what they have planned for the Box would go just as planned, after so many bad twists and turns ruining their plans throughout the entire trip they could've used at least one thing going according to plan…


	149. Canned Cat Food of Space-Time

Shimo felt surprised by how much more loud and hectic the streets of Sunagakure were. He couldn't help but scratch his head and lean away from some of the particularly noisy stands and entertainers. The swordsman wondered just how strange it should've felt to Mana, someone whose secondary profession as a stage magician had similar origins to these people yelling their prices on the street. There were even some who were bold enough to approach him and demand payment from him because he overheard their stories or their comedy which was inevitable seeing how it was leaking from the top of the man's lungs.

"You're not getting a single ryo from me and while you're arguing you're missing profit from fools who'd fall for it…" Shimo always answered, or something of such fashion. After all he had spent over a year wandering with his sensei throughout several closer regions of the world and he's seen and done a lot of strange things that taught him of the survivor's mentality.

That being said, that very same survivor's mentality would have demanded from him that he ceased satisfying Mana's need to regain her chakra and Meiko's need for adventure as well as Kouta's need to stick himself as deep up the magician's good side as possible. The only reason why Shimo went so far beyond his mission objective, even going as far as providing his services for the sake of a supposed extension was because he decided to change himself. His confusion of what kind of a man he wanted to be was supposed to be over, he wasn't just a survivor anymore, he would no longer just merely live for the sole purpose of living as long as possible.

First of all the boy entered the Aviary, it took a while to code his message just in case, these hawks used for message delivery looked quite strong and well fed, their feathers, even while lacking in color, were shining brightly. Still, as fast as a bird can possibly get they would never outrace even an average ninja, while snagging them in mid-flight was a challenge, every message was in danger of being intercepted and Shimo wasn't sure if their team was still tracked by Kusaguro's squad or not. He had little to no reason to believe that they weren't. Still, having the fact that their enemy was a Konoha ninja meant that whatever code he used it would only give them time, not certainty that the message will remain a secret…

Shimo attempted to honestly explain the situation, he wrote in his report that they had not found the box and encountered opposition of unidentified alignment, doing the best he could to go into detail about the skillset of the woman in red. He also included the information about Sunagakure's cooperation with the mission, included all the known clues about the actual location of the Box and asked for an extension of the objective. He decided to be smart about it, instead of asking for an extension of the objective to find the Box itself, he only asked the Hokage for permission to extend their objective of confirming the information's validity before returning home. It was much more likely that their mission would get approved that way, especially having in mind that he reported about the opposition.

The Yuki swordsman sighed, he wanted to report on Kusagoro's involvement with the mission, he really did but the new man he wanted to become was yelling from inside his part of the brain that it was a bad idea. After all, all he'd be doing would be tearing up Kouta's family and also it would be an equivalent of signing on the Hokage's refusal to extend their objective as well as her demand for their return to Konohagakure as soon as possible. Kusagoro was a very dangerous threat as a man with a high ranking in the village with experience in Black Ops unit of the village – the ANBU.

After the report was done the young man left the Aviary and headed towards the commercial section of the village, that is to say, just about any region of the village. After several looks around and disappointments such as quality of the craftsmanship not being satisfactory or the shop owner refusing to craft weapons for a foreigner the young one had appeared to have hit a brick wall. Shimo decided to ask around and if needed pay some locals to know where he could have found someone willing and able to make custom weapons for a foreigner. In that particular case his experience in the streets got him a little benefit at last. After shaking a couple of merchants who appeared to operate in a very questionable part of the village the swordsman got a couple of them to talk.

"So you need men? Go to the Agbarah Sheikhate, you can find able fighters there with nothing to lose!" the strange orange merchant with shifty shot out eyes explained before Shimo slipped him four hundred more ryo, he knew that the man would keep on talking as long as coins would continue to fall in his pocket. Such was the initial foolish glee of being paid off, he would've been wise to use the brief period before the thinking part of his brain turned on.

"No, I don't need men and I can't leave the village walls, I need a smith inside the village willing to make custom average rank weapons of sufficient quality" Shimo looked at the man curiously, after spending so much time around his sensei and seeing some darker parts of the world that were not surrounded by protective walls he had acquired a certain cold and fearless look, a look of a young man who has seen too much and wouldn't be surprised by anything, it complimented the clinging coins in the merchant's pockets just fine.

"Oh, that's great! So you're a foreigner then? Doing some solo work or do you work with the Shaphac?" the merchant surprised Shimo with the amount of information he held, that being said, the swordsman decided not to slip into the newbie trap of being lured into completely unnecessary information purchases.

"Just need to restock before leaving the village, don't plan on any work" Shimo grumped out showing the merchant that he didn't wish to engage in an overly lengthy conversation.

"Oh, well, in that case… There is a guy who actually arms the Shaphac, if he arms those guys behind the counter he'd have no reason to refuse you if you can give him an alluring offer" the merchant answered and pointed with his finger at a couple of directions showing a number of fingers with the other hand detailing on how many blocks Shimo had to walk in any particular direction. Without engaging in any more conversation the boy grabbed an orange from the man's stall and cursed at him.

"Your oranges are too pricy, old man!" as loud as possible to confuse anyone attempting to listen in about what this exchange was all about. It didn't take too much time to reach the old man's house, he prepared Mana's order of steel tipped cards almost instantly and didn't charge too much, Shimo was smart enough to buy spare decks because he knew of the girl's nasty habit of running out of them in a single mean battle. Meiko's armor took a lot longer and that was the armor without any seals. Shimo decided to let Meiko place the seals both on Mana's cards and her own armor just to save time.

Strangely enough Shimo felt more pressure and fear leaving the slightly rundown districts of the Sand Village than he felt entering it. That was his world for too long, was this man who obtained information like a rogue and felt more comfortable around questionable people who he was now? How long would it take for that man to change back? How long until Shimo can be who he was before? Maybe this decision to change the man he was into the young man Mana wanted to see and inspire in him was not too bad…

The Time-Space transfer office was full of people. Initially Shimo was a little interested into what exactly Sunagakure used as their method of transferring objects through long distances. Each village had one of these but each used a different method as far as Shimo could tell: from what he heard from his sensei the office in Iwagakure used an ancient water well that had a miniature wormhole somewhere in its depths that could be repurposed using chakra. It had a nasty history of sending objects to the wrong villages when used by an unskilled or unfocused sealing ninja. The one in Konohagakure used what was called the "Flying Raijin Seal", different offices at different villages had the Flying Raijin Seals on posters inside and an object could've been transferred from one seal poster to another with a massive insert of chakra.

The mean in which Sunagakure appeared to transfer objects looked particularly odd. There was a glowing slab of stone right at the end of the office room with a seal placed on it, the hieroglyph symbol of the seal shined red whenever it was active and had rotating sand particles around it rising from the hieroglyph symbol. When placed on the slab an object was engulfed in sand and disassembled at a subatomic level, only to be reassembled where it needed to be as Shimo guessed.

"Impressive, isn't it?" a masculine voice inquired starting up a conversation with Shimo, the boy looked behind him to see a middle aged man, just a dozen of centimeters shorter than Shimo wearing a conical straw hat and a poncho covered with cartoonish embroidered desert foxes, brown coyotes and various Sun symbols. The man's greyish black ponytail shot out from a hole in the back and flowed gently on the man's back, the man's face was completely covered up with a scarf like rag on his face leaving only his eyes visible.

"I suppose so, looks a lot different from the other Time-Space transporters but I suppose it serves the same goal…" Shimo shrugged restraining his chuckles, he assumed that this man was just as much of a stranger to these parts as the Yuki was since he wore a poncho indoors a building of a desert village and a rag on his face as well as that hat. It may have served him well in the cold desert nights but evening was still a couple of hours away. At this point he looked like a pretentious fool just for the sake of it.

"It was actually invented by the current Kazekage after seeing a young genin in the Chuunin exams and getting the idea. The sand is fueled by chakra cells from Kumogakure and the grains move faster than light, it doesn't only transfer the object through space but also small gaps through time. Just imagine if we were able to time travel using a similar device" the ponytail man continued to obsess over the device when Shimo looked at the device and back at the man, switching his glares between the two.

"If the device wouldn't seemingly disintegrate the object before transferring the particles that is…" Shimo replied.

"True, I don't think even Chestnut Hanasaku, the Fifth Hokage, could survive such a device and if anyone could it'd be that woman… Do you think that perhaps that has something to do with how close the Kazekage is trying to make Konoha and the Sand?" the poncho man asked.

"Differently from a friend of mine who wishes peace and cooperation between all the villages and countries… I don't particularly care that much" Shimo replied trying to cut the conversation down.

"Ummm… Okay… So… Transfer this canned cat food using that witchcraft first, then these coins, these coins… I guess these coins… Can you still transfer more?" an old lady was trying to sort out the objects she wished transferred.

"It's not witchcraft, ma'am. Also… Could you please explain why you need these coins transferred separately? You do realize we are creating loops in the fabric of time and space to transfer your items so we will need a pretty good explanation to make several just for a couple of stacks of ryo…" the office worked tried to make as much sense from the request of the old lady as possible.

The body of Shimo's conversant disappeared, the young man could only hear flapping of the poncho cloth in the air and the hat slipping off his head stroking the man's hair. Shimo's body overflowed with chakra as he augmented his reaction, his perception and his speed to leap in to counter the man in time blocking his sword strike right above the head of the old lady.

After a good thirteen seconds of the swords colliding in the air hard enough to fire off blueish sparks off of their collision course as the poncho assassin's chakra infused blade met Shimo's Audra sword the old lady looked above her head and witnessed what made that deafening clang before. With a more comical than terrifying scream the old lady slowly ran out of the building taking her sweet time to move her senile thighs. The rest of the queue also decided to choose another transfer method for their objects or just to wait this conflict out.

"This lady was taking an awful amount of time, it was getting annoying…" the poncho assassin tilted his head a little so that his cold eyes could meet Shimo's angry gaze and clash the man's will against that of the Yuki swordsman.

"She was…" Shimo blinked in agreement, "That being said I'd rather not see her cut down for such a silly reason"

The two continued to clash with their blades, usually Shimo's Audra steel sword expelled all the force of the opposing sword in a powerful shockwave but this time his opponent used a sword infused with chakra, it didn't appear like the chakra had any elemental qualities to it or that it was too precise, had it been, Shimo's blade may have even been damaged because of the chakra over matter principle that the ninja universe existed by.

"This sword, it belonged to the Diamond Hand from Shukuba and was stolen from it by a rogue six years ago… You are a rogue ninja too, why would you care about the fate of some old lady?" the poncho assassin asked pushing his sword against Shimo's while the man's katana lit up with blue sharp chakra glow alerting the Yuki swordsman that Wind Style chakra was infused and that the precision of the enhancement was improved forcing Shimo to leap back and avoid damage to his weapon.

"The person I used to be may not have cared but I am a new person now, I have decided to care about all sorts of petty things and it's actually a little new and exciting" Shimo cracked a sideways grin and sheathed his sword preparing his sword drawing stance and leaning to the side to place more weight on the leg he'd use to kick his body off the ground.

"After all, had I not understood just what kind of man I wished to become I'd have never had a quarrel with you to fight over…" the Yuki finished his thought before his body blurred into a mirage and the entire building filled with a hazy white mist.

"Ice Style: Haze Blade!" Shimo yelled out as numerous mirage version of the young man appeared from various sides of the swordsman. The swordsman could not believe what he was seeing – the eyes of the poncho assassin were closed. A blue flash disintegrated all of the mirages at once followed by a howling sound of cold steel cutting through the air. Where the cold mirages were cut down the man's sword covered with persistent ice layer making the sword heavier and duller but also covering over its chakra infusion making it no longer covered with the sharp coating of wind chakra it had before.

With a loud yell coming from the depths of Shimo's lungs the young man dashed at his confused and frosted opponent with a powerful drawing slash that was supposed to completely disable his enemy. The young man moved all the way to the other side of the building leaping onto the northern wall and kicking off of it making the entire clay wall crack and crumble from the force of the acceleration. Shimo's passing slash was met not with soft sensation of flesh being cut followed with a stream of blood missing him by a mile for it was too slow to keep up with the movements of the swordsman that inflicted the wound, it was met by a powerful shock of a cutting wind bubble that blew his sword completely out of the Yuki's hands and stuck it into a wall to the eastern side of the office.

"Wind Clone?" Shimo wondered to himself as he continued to rub his hands trying to ease the overwhelming numbness and pain in the upper sections to reaching up to his elbows. This swordsman was of higher rank than Shimo was, if he even had a rank to begin with, he looked too much like a rogue ninja who infiltrated the village. He used chakra enhancements on his weapons as well as elemental clone techniques, such skill with elemental chakra natures was above the paygrade of a genin that Shimo still officially was.

The poncho wearing swordsman turned his head to the side and shook the shards of ice off of his clothes and tore it out from where it penetrated and stuck into his flesh. He then turned his head to the side angrily mumbling to himself.

"Hmmm, it appears the clerk has fled. While you may be an annoyance your interference may actually help, the Shaphac will obtain the Time-Space transporter and there'll be absolutely no casualties making our move here seem small time. I suppose I should thank you…" the man said directing his speech to Shimo.

"Why do you need that thing anyways? Do you plan to transport something here from another village to bypass the gate checkup?" Shimo tried to get the man talking all the while he eyed his blade on the wall and planned how he could arm himself without his opponent's response. The poncho swordsman was fast, he would severely injure Shimo and it's likely that any chakra augmentation the Yuki would use would be negated by the poncho-man's chakra imbued blade of higher precision and intensity.

"No, if the old ways are to be preserved, if this village is to survive they must stay at war with the other villages. This device will help us make sure that happens" the swordsman fully finished thawing his blade out and sheathed it preparing his finishing attack.

"Ah, so you'll transfer to other villages to make sure nobody trusts Sunagakure anymore. What'll you use, explosives? Rude notes?" Shimo grinned despite feeling a little desperate, the boy slapped his hands together trying to weave handseals to slow his opponent down using his Ice Style so that he could retrieve his blade and continue his battle with ample time. His opponent flashed up right to Shimo slicing sideways at the Yuki's chest. Shimo coughed up blood, his eyes rolled back. Pain pulsed all over his chest but the pain was strangely numbed by his body feeling weightless and soaring through the air.

The poncho assassin took a moment to look at the boy he had just cut down, his blade was coated with chakra, he sliced hard enough to slash the boy's heart in half and was fast enough to intercept his hand seals. Too bad, the young one appeared to be quite fast on his feet with a sword, surpassing any sword wielding genin but his hand seals were just as good as anyone's of his ranks would've been. The poncho-man grew up in the Iron Country and was trained as a samurai, samurai would always best ninja in a fair fight…

The flashy and cartoonish poncho once again rustled in the air as the man hurried to retrieve the Time-Space transporter. The swordsman took great care so that he didn't accidentally touch the stream of glowing lightspeed sands, taking his time to seal the device into a scroll after placing numerous chakra barriers around the device. When the swordsman turned around he stopped in shock, his eyes lifted up so that he could confirm what he had suspected.

Bare-chested due to his torn cloak and with a gash on his chest Shimo stood wielding his blade, on the ground by his feet laid a wakizashi blade in its sheathe cut in two, while the chest of the young swordsman bled quite profusely his heart must've been protected by that childish toothpick he carried around his chest as a secondary weapon.

"You appear livelier than I expected, I have no time for this, the village ninja will be here at any moment" the ponytail swordsman grunted out through grinding teeth.

"Neither do I, there's a package I need to transport" Shimo angrily looked his opponent right in the eyes, the back of his head had a bleeding and painful wound that greatly annoyed him, not to mention the giant gash on his chest that cleaved through a wakizashi blade right in two and also left a pretty deep wound.

"If I quickly unpacked the device and let you transport your package, would you let me through?" the poncho assassin asked sheathing his blade for a final exchange of drawing techniques as if he already knew the answer.

"The man I used to be would've, the man I am trying to become knows that this peace is important to a friend of his so he won't let you out with that in your hands. I am still in a rush though so let's settle this with this one final draw!" Shimo yelled out angrily with a sense of pride of his new identity.

And so stood two swordsmen inside a clay office during a hot desert evening with the Sun slowly approaching the horizon, preparing to kill each other if needed when the room is covered in darkness. Two men in a standoff.


	150. When Gods Arm Wrestle

At the pace of a creeping turtle the rays of the setting Sun became less and less giving, sinking the room where two swordsmen were preparing for their final standoff to resolve their battle in total darkness. The office was empty, not even a single soul was there except for the two, not that it mattered since the swordsmen were completely absorbed by their clash, waiting for some auditory tick to signal them to rush at each other but it appeared that they would have to wait for the room to completely sink in darkness. For Shimo such was a natural occurrence, ninja were accustomed to the dark and preferred it, to someone enhancing their perception using minor chakra augmentation darkness was barely an obstacle.

Finally the rays of Sun completely disappeared almost as if light itself entered the now sealed time-space transporter and evaporated into nothingness only to be reassembled at another moment in time and space. Both men kicked off the ground with just a light tap on the clay floor that in no way represented the tremendous force of their movement. They moved lightning fast, no, even faster than lightning. Their movements were barely even intelligible to each other but it didn't matter. This was no match of skill or technique, there was no need to see opponent's actions clearly or predict them. There was no time for that. Each of the two decided to just use their trump techniques at the same time and let fate decide who'd win.

Shimo's body tensed up, blood vessels shot out and tore up dyeing his body in a creepy darker pink hue that was quickly calmed by the intense sensation of freezing air accumulating behind him. The young man extracted all the humidity from the air surrounding him, as little of it as there may have been chakra did the supersizing of the actual quantity. A ghoulish light blue shape of a giant wolf formed behind the young swordsman leaning over the Yuki's shoulder and placing its gigantic paw forward, it was lucky that this apparition of pure frozen water chakra was on all fours or else it'd have demolished the three floor tall clay sphere of a building that the two resided in.

The Yuki was lucky that the clash had come to a comparison of a single technique, he was facing a swordsman of seemingly superior skill and experience, hindered merely by the lack of time. Had the battle continued without the danger of the enemy ninja coming and taking the poncho samurai in, it was likely that the young man would've sustained great injuries and possibly even lost. He had no right to further hinder Mana's journey, he had no right to strain Kouta's abilities and further deplete his limited healing potency so that once again the medical ninja would find himself with emptied resources when he was needed.

"Ice Style: Ice Wolf Rampage!" Shimo roared out as the technique strained his body and his mind to its limits. The incredibly precise requirement of the combination of chakra shape manipulation needed to form the wolf and the sheer speed and physical ability to mimic Tanshu's Cerberus Draw technique that the Yuki saw only once but obsessed over repeating successfully. This technique was powerful and complex enough to qualify as an A-Rank technique, it was his pride and joy, his very soul as a swordsman. The embodiment of the will and the sword of his family. There was a high risk of it failing and yet Shimo's mind was clear, failure or success, the chances of winning were slim so the technique was his one last chance.

It was a combination of his two greatest techniques, two different identities he had during his life that currently clashing. The Ice Wolf part of the drawing technique was his Ice Wolf ninjutsu technique that he relied on before the whole clash with Sugemi and departure, back when he lived by the principle of being nice to girls and punishing the strong that abused the weak. That was a very different Shimo, younger and more naïve. The second part of the drawing technique was the only thing that the old Shimo couldn't wrap his head around – slashing three times at the very same time just like his sensei was doing. It was a technique element that only his experience with the rogue ninja allowed him to master through need and desire to live. Only adapt or perish environment could've ever allowed a swordsman to break the rules that governed all others. That was why that technique would have won, not because there was no way of triumphing that A-Rank drawing ninjutsu-weaponry technique with an offensive technique, because it combined all identities of Shimo into a singular entity with a single goal – to win.

"Wind Style: Flock of Swallows!" poncho assassin roared out with an equal amount of conviction. He drew his sword too early, initially it appeared as a mistake for Shimo but then he understood that the actual sword was not the dangerous part of the technique, it was a cause to what was to come. Once drawn the chakra infused blade created a gust of wind flowing one direction, meanwhile using his sheathe holding hand the man formed a hand seal which allowed him to create another current of wind that moved the opposite direction. The man had created a miniature typhoon inside the office room.

Even faced with such an amazing yet seemingly simplistic technique Shimo did not flinch for a moment, the young man continued to dash at his opponent with his technique. Tanshu once told him that no sword technique could have matched the triple cutting techniques he used, the vortex of cutting winds appeared quite formidable but at best it would match Shimo's technique, not break it. Even if their swordsmanship techniques were dead even there was still the ninjutsu wolf made of ice chakra. Shimo was going to win!

A deafening howl followed by a crashing noise followed as the two clashed with their techniques. The poncho assassin's facial cover and his poncho tore to bits, Shimo's body tensed and blacked up in multiple spots and his arms almost blew up in a bloody mess from the sheer pressure of their swords clashing, while initially the poncho assassin was smiling, soon his smile faded from his face once he realized that Shimo's apparently singular draw actually cut at three spots at once perfectly blocking poncho's typhoon of swordsmanship. Then the man's eyes quickly shifted up but couldn't form a definitive emotion instead of running through a myriad of them before understanding that his fate was not to escape – it was to freeze solid. Such an ironic end in the middle of a desert village…

Bang!

Shimo's Ice Wolf avatar of chakra behind him exploded into shards of icicles and a kunai that shattered it fired from a long range dispenser fell onto the floor, the two swordsman dashed past one another with Shimo falling on his knees and thrusting his sword into the floor to keep his body from hitting the floor and passing out. That sword was the only thing that kept the young Yuki on his knees and breathing.

"There's a second man… Outside the office…" Shimo huffed out as sweat broke out through his forehead combining with the blood already going down the boy's forehead and the back of his head.

"What can I say?" the poncho assassin replied with a cocky expression while he sheathed his blade and looked back at the boy who was in no condition to stop him now, "While my origins are as those of a samurai of the Iron Country, the Shaphac are no samurai and do not follow the Bushido, they are actually terrorists. I am under no moral obligation to face you honourably. In my defence, my ally outside is a blind marksman. Think of it what you will…" the man replied turning away only to face a large man who appeared to blink into existence seemingly out of nowhere, dressed in a white cloak with a blue hat that had a great hieroglyph proudly stating "Wind" on its centre.

The bulky arm of the interloper swiped to the side, in mid-strike steel parts assembled a set of armour around his arm that sent the poncho assassin flying through the side wall, after the assassin burst through the wall, passing out from the combined damage taken from the intense and almost instant-fast hit and hitting the wall, the armoured hand of the interloper fired off and grabbed the man dragging him back to the hulking brute's grasp.

"I think it's hilarious, personally…" Akasuna Mugao grinned at the young man who just barely managed to stand back up and face the Kazekage.

It was quite convenient that Shimo was already on his knees, after all, kneeling against a person of such high stature may have been the proper manners however most foreign ninja chose to merely bow their heads to their mid abdomen level suggesting great respect but not subordination.

"There is another man outside…" Shimo huffed out to which the Kazekage just grinned.

"The men I brought with me got that covered… Now if you will excuse me, there is a package I was expecting to receive today that was too important and sensitive to handle to send my assistants to pick it up" the redhead giant unsealed the time-space transporter device back in its rightful place, "What's this?" suddenly he stopped turning at Shimo's bag.

The exhausted Yuki tried to pick it up but the Kazekage was simply too fast, the contents of the bag soon became public.

"What are those shards? I've never seen the likes of it before…" the man wondered to himself.

"It's something I wanted to send back to Konohagakure, Kazekage-sama" Shimo replied in a more grumpy tone than he would've liked. While this man didn't remind of a scumbag this was his village and he did hold a bag full of Audra ore in his hands. It was expensive beyond belief, even if the Konoha four only managed to secure a limited quantity of what laid beneath the Katabami mines.

"Hmmm, this looks like… Audra ore. The same colour as Audra alloy would have, I wonder how a full armour or a puppet made of this thing would run, might give me an edge in my next rival match with Lady Fifth, what would you say? Shall you lend this to me, young man? I might reward you with something from my arsenal, you know" the gentle giant looked right Shimo in the eyes with a look that suggested more of a curious gambler's interest than malicious intent.

"Actually… Wait? Why did you say you need it again, Kazekage-sama?" Shimo squinted as he found the man's reason for needing this ore quite odd. Using these shards he could've armed an entire unit with Audra layered weapons or made entire crates of ninja kits of Audra alloy kunai and shuriken. The Kazekage was known as an inventor beyond his time, building puppets, weapons and armours for himself and others, inventing barriers and new techniques and also technology to improve the quality of life in his village.

"You see, young man, me and Lady Fifth have this friendly competition every year after a Summit of our villages. She comes at me with an intent to kill me in a location of my choosing and I use all of my traps and puppet armies and puppet suits of armour to stop her. This package is in fact an absolute hot generator, it generates temperatures of close to one and a half quintillion degrees, this year I intend to attempt to dehydrate the Hokage, you see. This way we settle friendly differences where peace treaties demand a coin toss or some other trivial ritual, sometimes we arm wrestle but I soon learned how hopeless that was…" Mugao smiled pulling out a glowing battery cell that appeared like a miniature star held in a battery-like containment unit.

"I'm sorry, sir, I'd rather send the bag back to Konoha" Shimo replied after an uncomfortable pause of silence.

"I see, that's too bad… I went through a lot of trouble to acquire this generator from Kumogakure and an Audra infused puppet army would've greatly benefited me by cutting down the chakra costs to maintain them all in active combat. At this pace Konoha will have their representatives take over the Kirigakure slum district from us as well as a couple of islands from the Archipelago that the Lady Fifth has already won. After getting trounced with my black hole dispenser last year I am running out of things to throw at her" the man scratched the back of his head

"Wait, you met the Kazekage!?" Mana yelled out in disbelief as the four were talking over breakfast the next morning.

Last night they all returned having taken care of things they needed to do so late that they didn't bother doing much more. Kouta just stitched Shimo's chest injury with simple ninjutsu-free good old medical science and the four went to sleep. Everyone was really curious about just what kind of trouble could Shimo have run into as they didn't appear to have that eventful of a day. Since it had gotten far too late for tales the impressive story of terrorist groups functioning inside Sunagakure and the opposition to world peace had to wait.

"Wait, so Hokage-sama has won over the right to take over the management of several Kirigakure locations, I wonder why doesn't she actually send people there, a couple of years more and Kirigakure might just learn and regain their autonomy, we'll run out of opportunities to stick it to them" Kouta wondered to himself eating a morning dumpling.

"It is said she receives some sort of benefits from other villages for not utilizing her right to take over the areas that belong to her authority, however the Kazekage appeared to mention that Konoha might have representatives there that would take over some areas yesterday" Shimo replied scratching his stitched wound to just Kouta just angrily objected, the disadvantages of good old way of dealing with wounds was that there was an entire healing process to it, even if ninja healed at a much accelerated rate with their insane ninja metabolisms.

"We've been away from Konoha for so long, so much must've happened while we're gone…" Meiko looked at the sky before stretching out on the emptied table longingly.

"Well, this may just be the worst line to bring it up after but… I found a very interesting poster yesterday stuck on the walls of one of the buildings" Kouta wriggled in the chair before pulling out a torn up and worn out sheet of paper with a smiling lady on it. The young lady in the picture had the most playful of smiles and was winking at the supposed viewer of said picture, she also wore a very curious set of headgear that appeared like some sort of a headset and stood close to a table that appeared very hi-tech with a lot of glowing buttons and panels. The whole poster was black in the background but it was filled with streamers and lights that gave the poster a vibrant and artsy feel to it.

The title of the poster said, "Notasa – Last chance to see her perform"

Mana blinked a couple of times still struggling to get the clue. "I don't think we have time to see a singer of some sort… Especially if you check the date of it – the concert happened last week"

"Yes, she is from the Land of Sound's Otogakure and is apparently a musical genius" Kouta explained. Finally the whole table got interested.

"She may help us solve the puzzle of the sphere…" Shimo calmly stated what everyone was thinking.

"That's right, from what I gathered from people in the streets, she can compose and perform complex compositions in the middle of a show, it's what she calls "Improvosition", she may just be to music what Mana-chan is to stage magic" Kouta explained slowly gathering hype for his idea and getting more and more excited as he went on. Mana slightly blushed and looked away after being complimented, she really missed magic and while being complimented on her entertainment skill felt great she really wished it didn't remind her how badly she missed all of it.

"Well then, once we get a reply from the village we'll head towards Otogakure then…" Shimo confirmed with a strong nod and finished his morning tea.

"It's actually great because no matter what the reply is – Otogakure is close to Fire Country, if we are denied permission no one will get suspicious because we'll be sighted in Fire Country anyways moving towards Land of Sound" Kouta got energetic to which Mana sadly shook her head.

"Even so, normally it'd take you a couple of days to get there once we reach Fire Country but with me in your way it'll take much more, maybe even several weeks to get there. If we are denied permission that will be it… Our adventure will be over, I don't wish to put you guys in more trouble than you already are" Mana looked at every teammate sitting around the table.

"It'd be really great if we got the permission to extend our objective, we could use it as a safe-card against my father if he decides to mess with our mission again" Kouta dreamily looked into the sky relaxing in his seat. It appeared to be a tranquil and calm morning of warm Sun that had not yet reached the point where it was annoyingly hot.

"Still, it'd have been better if we figured it out earlier and used it in our report, an actual plan would've been a much better reason to grant us extension than just an abstract clue to the Box's location" Shimo angrily complained looking away and relaxing in his chair as well.

It's been a long time since they could just relax and enjoy their meals after sleeping in warm and soft beds. It was definitely no home of theirs but it was the closest second thing to it. The four were slowly becoming accustomed to the hot desert climate, soon it'll seem weird to step on the ground and not have one's foot get filled in scratchy and searing hot sand…


	151. Inside the Dark Room

Heavy muffled breathing could've been heard from another room, breathing coming from a man with a broken nose whose mind was violated and invaded by a skilled interrogator who has extracted all that he was able to. Interrogation using illusions was a much slower and a little less potent sort than that of a Yamanaka clansman but Sunagakure did not have too many of those in their roster of ninja. Yamanaka were a proud Konohagakure clan having a several branches in Kirigakure that have split from the main branch shortly before the Second Great Ninja War. The beaten marksman spoke nothing and yet all he knew was known to his captors.

With a heavy metallic screech the door to his containment cell opened. Slowly and confidently, holding all the aces in his playing hand, the Kazekage entered the room allowing brief semblance of light to seep into it. Not that the blind marksman cared too much for he was used to life in total darkness. Even so, right after the Kage entered the marksman turned to the side as if a source of light as overwhelming as the Sun had entered the room. He continued to hide his eyes and turn his busted nose away even as the door was closed and the room sunk into darkness once more.

"You broke my nose…" the blind marksman huffed out, his voice sounded very intimidating by how strong and passionate it was. It was like the man was hungry and a burger cooked to perfection had just entered his room.

"An unnecessary measure seeing how physical torture tends to be ineffective with trained fighters. Nevertheless, you guys aren't liked around these parts, opposing serenity and peace so actively and all that, so I suppose the interrogators got overly excited" Mugao replied sitting in front of the marksman and slowly placing googles that the man carried around with him onto the man's snow-white eyes without even a semblance of irises. As the googles were firmly placed on the marksman's face they lit up in feint yellow glow with a small briefly intelligible dot at the middle that raced around the yellow circles it resided in.

"Why are we alive? Those genjutsu users appeared to be quite thorough with scoping our minds. Overwhelming us with memories and raising fever by aiming at our brain centers. Playing with someone's body like that… And to think that they tried to restrict only the physical torture" the marksman started casually talking to the Kazekage whom he actively opposed.

"Politicians and diplomats tend to know very little about the world they negotiate about. That being said, even the physical torture Fourth Hokage fought so hard against has never been restricted, no village signed that treaty, a waste of a perfectly good paper" Mugao replied continuing to stare in the slightly illuminated yellow circles that the marksman's googles made out in the dark.

"Why am I alive? You've got information on as many Shaphac bases and operatives as I knew of, obviously for convenience sake no single member knows everything…" the blind marksman finally got to the point.

"What are you guys doing? What's the point of spinning the circle of war again? Have we not had enough of that lately?" the Kazekage sighed relaxing in his chair.

"We're doing what has to be done. War is tough business but it's simple, it's primitive. Make people, foreigners whom we fought for generations, your friends, let them into your walls and you risk letting the enemy in, this risk isn't worth a couple of allies you gain this way. Warring with everyone is simpler than playing good-willed but secretly doing background checks of everything" the man replied, his speech did not appear to be nearly as twisted by delusion and passion when he spoke of the Shaphac goals as it was when he spoke of different things.

"No. The reason you're alive is not because I needed intel or because you don't seem nearly as passionate towards this pointless infighting as your comrade. The reason is because I need you for a job" the Kazekage spoke clearly, it was good that the blind marksman could not see the awkward and almost ironic smile that the leader of Sunagakure wore on his face as he uttered those words.

"And why would I be interested in that job?" the marksman leaned in very close, as close as his bindings allowed him to the point where his googles flowed right up the Kazekage's face but Mugao didn't as much as flinch from this awkward and creepy gesture.

"Because the nature of said job is hurting Konohagakure and taking their asset away from them, delivering it to Sunagakure. The Shaphac are terrorists plain and simple but you are patriots first and foremost. The boy that stopped your comrade – "Poncho Assassin" as he insists to be called, sent something to Konoha, we've managed to stop that delivery halfway somewhere in Agbarah Sheikhate but the Konoha genin believe the delivery to have went on successfully. We need you to pick it up and return it to the village, if somehow Konoha will get in your way well… The ninja world is cruel, you may need to break some bones" the Kazekage explained.

The yellow circles continued to stare the man down with the black dots being fixed on a random spot somewhere close to Kazekage. It was impossible to tell just what the man was thinking about for sure.

"That's doesn't sound very nice of you… I thought you loved your union with Konoha and treasured that friendly rivalry with the Fifth Hokage" the marksman uttered and sat back down

"That is why I need you to do it. You guys are terrorists, someone I have no control over. If you happened to intercept the delivery I could just say I had nothing to do with it, I'd have ample proof that I am doing all in my power fighting the Shaphac but also a bag of Audra alloy shards as an asset for the village" Mugao explained himself.

"And what if we take the package and disappear halfway? What if Fennec or the Agbarah Sheikh and his asthmatic wimpy legion stops us and gets the package?" the marksman asked with the returning passionate tone in his voice. He was clearly thinking about it.

"That means you aren't trying hard enough, in this world people who don't try their hardest and don't live up to their potential don't live too long. You are terrorists and I have plenty of information on your organization's heads and headquarters. I have weaponry beyond your wildest dreams and while some Sheikhs supported your cause I would spit in all of their faces and leave not a stone on a stone or a single tooth remaining in each of your mouths"

"You really need those shards badly, don't you?" the prisoner wished to assure himself. To some extent he wished to agree but he was still suspicious as he felt like being used only for his body to disappear in the desert sand after he had served his purpose.

"I've seen a man tear through neutron star alloy as if it was toilet paper with his bare hands, I've seen that same man withstand a fiery inferno hotter and more pulsing with destructive chakra than tens of thousands of dying stars. I've seen Lady Fifth shrug off black holes like they were beehives that just barely stung while managing to keep perfect control of the situation and not letting a single ounce of chakra leak to the side and destroy the world. If any of those two ever decided to attack us, if any of them ever wished to destroy us we may not last too long, not while I can't make a single decision without having to get the Sheikhs onboard, not while my own people wish for me to go to war with those people. All I wish is for my village to make it into the records of history and be there to read it, all I wish is for the next generation to not have to put up with the shame that I had to put up with. Being crushed in the war and spared, beaten to the brink of extinction and left to ourselves to recover. Right now there are so many things that keep this village from blooming: the Shaphac trying to make us go to war with every other village, Fennec unifying the desert raiders and building an army, the Sheikhs meddling with the village affairs just because they can and they control vast land and influence. I could deal with all of them but doing so would needlessly threaten my village and cost lives I cannot risk"

"I'll help you" the marksman's reply followed almost immediately after. "But if I do this I need permission to at least kill some of the Konoha ninja in case of a clash"

"Out of the question" the Kazekage swatted the idea aside almost instantly.

"We're going to fight in the Agbarah Sheikhate. If they have women among them it wouldn't make sense for them to leave that place alive, you know Sheikh's stance on them" the blind man explained himself.

"Very well, avoid conflict at all costs but if they follow you to Agbarah you can kill the females, we'll play it down to Sheikh's madness. Maybe that'll make the Fifth help me deal with that old sexist asshole"

Loud clangs and metallic noises followed, a sharp and black puppet arm reached for the marksman's bindings and pulled hard tearing them apart.

"Are your optics still working?" Mugao inquired as one last parting question.

"I don't need these googles for shooting, I may be blind but I am still a sensor, these googles just keep sand from getting in my eyes. While my eyes are blind as a mole they aren't immune to sand itch…" marksman's answer echoed before the man's figure disappeared from the cell. Mugao stood up and looked at the open door behind him. He wondered for a moment about how the marksman would sneak out from the containment facility but Shaphac were good at infiltration and extraction. They got in unsighted, did what they had to and disappeared. That was why the Kazekage contacted them for this job.

Audra alloy by itself was not too valuable, it was inferior in toughness when compared to ordinary chakra infused steel but if someone found a way to artificially manufacture it and make actual Audra ores it interested Mugao a great deal. The tools he could make using such ores would greatly improve the village's arsenal.

Loud burping sounds combined with some sort upchucking noises came from the bathroom. Meiko relaxed and tapped her belly that shot out from her tracksuit and lifted up her t-shirt.

"Justice has prevailed!" the blacksmith declared lifting her fist in the sky.

"It'd be quite nice of Justice to also pay her own bills for once" Shimo angrily remarked looking at the ladies room from which all manner of horrible sounds were coming from with awe and pure horror in his expression.

"I hope Tiwul is okay…" Kouta nodded his head lower as if feeling ashamed by the people staring at Meiko's eating competition with the Sunagakure girl. They've been waiting for an answer from Konoha for a couple of days now and it couldn't have been too far away. In the meanwhile the four trained extensively preparing themselves for another journey, whether it'd be home to Konoha or to Otogakure to solve the music puzzle.

Finally Tiwul left the bathroom and smiled with a little healthy blush on her cheeks since people still continued to stare at her and Meiko in horror as they've been doing since the eat-off started. Meiko was adamant to try every single one of the desert delicacies and while most of them didn't look like edible things at all to Mana the blacksmith made sure to devour them faster and in higher quantities when compared to the Sunagakure competitor.

"Round two?" Tiwul jokingly asked to which Meiko shook her head.

"You threw everything up, I'm at a disadvantage here…" Meiko declared, it was quite possibly the one of the very few times that the magician had seen Meiko say she's had enough.

"That camel stomach was not very good… I'd rather have that horrendous egg jelly than have to eat that crunchy-munchy mess again" Meiko stuck her tongue out complaining about the quality of food she may have devoured at some point post factum.

"You didn't tell Meiko what that actually was?" Mana quietly whispered into Shimo's ear to which the swordsman just maliciously laughed out.

"I'm reserving that for a future moment" Shimo shook his head, the young man appeared to not be overly fond of Sunagakure's kitchen as well, that being said some of their desserts were quite lovely.

"You guys should know better, really, that was very rich in protein and is considered quite the delicacy. The desert raiders live exclusively on that diet during hard times" Kouta tried to look sophisticated and educated but he just came off as slightly pretentious and very much continued the joke that made Mana and Shimo crack up grasping at their sides.

"Well, I'm off then, I need to train those calories away…" Tiwul declared slowly stumbling out of the small restaurant that the five genin decided to eat at. Shortly the remaining Konoha four also decided to head home before checking in at the Aviary if they have received the reply from Konoha.

Strangely enough they have received news from the village. Shimo took the entire message wrapped in a small scroll and attached to a hawk's leg and then placed the majestic bird back at the stand letting the hawk to soar back to where the birds resided. Since there was quite a lot of decoding to be done with the message the four decided to carry it back to the hotel they stayed in for the couple of days. Since Shimo and Mana were the best in decoding Meiko decided to go out and train meanwhile Kouta decided to check the bags and see if they did and packed everything.

The magician looked at Meiko shadow boxing and lifting a large sword that reminded much more of a mast of a ship made of solid iron than a sword. Only then did she remember the promise she made to the blacksmith to train her a little about how to defend from genjutsu attacks. After all, Meiko did so much to train Mana before…

"Shimo, could you maybe decode the message alone? I need to help Meiko with something" the magician asked to which the swordsman just nodded and swung his hand indifferently around gesturing that her presence may have been more of a nuisance than actual help.

Mana came up to Meiko and asked her to train the blacksmith in defense against genjutsu just like she had promised to do before. The armored kunoichi appeared to be quite excited about it, she dropped the giant chunk of iron she was swinging around and stood in a defensive fighting stance as if she was about to engage in a sparring match with someone.

The magician shook her head. "Defense against illusion is a more spiritual and perceptive craft than it is physical. You'll need vast resources of chakra but also you'll need much more than that – concentration and patience"

Meiko pouted, "Can't you just hit me in the face a lot before I learn it? It worked really well for you…" she complained.

Mana sighed, she may have signed up for quite a long day. The magician calmed herself and sat down crossing her legs.

"Most common illusions attack your mind, injecting the chakra of your opponent into your body and disrupting your chakra flow. You would never notice any changes however unless you possess certain abilities that allow you to sense chakra or see it clearly. That is to say, unless you belong to the Uchiha or Hyuuga clans or if you're a sensor you'll have to rely on perception to identify an illusion" Mana explained to which Meiko just mimicked the magician's movements. The kunoichi wasn't sure if the blacksmith was mocking her meditation like position or if she was just not good at sitting still and concentrating, most likely it was the latter.

"Why would I want to identify an illusion? Can't I just dispel it by bursting my chakra?" Meiko pouted looking for an excuse to not have to sit still and concentrate for a while.

"You could, but then you'd wind out instantly or tear your network apart. You'd never know when exactly you need to disrupt your own flow to overcome your opponent's disruption so you'd have to constantly mess with your own chakra, you'd both be fixed on messing with your own body instead of fighting your opponent and you'd risk to pointlessly tear your own network apart ending up being a useless burden to your team like me" Mana tried to be a little stricter because she was starting to think that this may have been hopeless. The magician now knew how Meiko must've felt when she saw how bad Mana was at physical combat before. It wasn't like her friend looked incompetent, Mana herself felt incompetent at tutoring and guiding her friend through it making the magician feel more and more frustrated.

"Okay, I get it, identify the illusion first, kill it with chakra disruption later… But what if I don't have enough chakra to force the disruption away or if I can't identify an illusion?" Meiko's hands sunk down, Mana understood what the blacksmith meant, she remembered her friend having trouble managing precise chakra control before. She even messed up a couple of Academy techniques several times before.

"Well, that is a possibility, some illusions are extremely powerful making them so hard to dispel that dispelling them would leave you without enough chakra to stay alive, also the illusions that target brain centers instead of chakra are much more dangerous because they can be used on just about anything with a functional brain. Theoretically someone else may also dispel the illusion for you by moving your own chakra using their own chakra injection, sort of like dispelling a bad illusion by using their own illusion on you. That is why it is important to identify the illusion and its potency before trying to dispel it yourself, illusions like those of A-Rank or even S-Rank require pooled attempts of multiple people to defeat completely because of how potent they are" Mana tried her best to explain it to Meiko in a way that would make sense for the blacksmith's simplistic yet effective mind.

"It's too bad you can't use illusions anymore, it'd have been great for you to put me under a genjutsu to give me some practical experience…" Meiko spoke before realizing what she just said and that she may have brought up some bad memories to Mana. The blacksmith jumped up and started apologizing to which the magician just stood up and turned away.

"It's alright, for today just try learning to identify your surroundings. The caster of an illusion needs to emulate the world around them starting from sight to even the smallest details like air temperature and humidity. It's almost like creating an illusionary world of your own and placing the target inside it at times. Write down everything you feel around you: what you see, what you hear, what you can touch and the tastes you feel in the air, how humid and how warm it is. Learn to concentrate on your environment and once I see that your level of perception is sufficient we can move on"

After leaving her friend with some instructions as to how to move on forward the magician rejoined Shimo who looked pretty hyped up. Mana didn't really wish to talk to anyone right now, she was in a state that made her wish to just fall down in her bed and be left alone. She felt like bursting into tears and crying until she died of dehydration and her own sorrow for being reminded of how weak and pathetic she was. By being reminded of the new identity that was forced and shoved down her throat on her.

"Mana! It's okay, we've got a green light to look into the clue but our mission remains – we don't retrieve the Box unless absolutely necessary, Hokage-sama just wishes us to confirm the information and our gut feeling. She also noted how many distractions we've been engaged in and urged us to be more careful! We can go on to Sound Country!" the swordsman gleefully declared. Mana just nodded with an indifferent "That's great" and rushed on to her bed wrapping herself under layers of sheets and pillows.

Kouta and Shimo looked at each other and then at Mana's slightly twitching buried body. An awkward silence took the room over.


	152. Towards a Waterfall of Experience

"So you guys are leaving already?" Menna happily yelled out stopping the Konoha four from entering the long pass to the Sunagakure gate.

"We've received answer from Konoha, Lady Fifth wishes us to further investigate the Box's location, nothing specific, just check some clues, tie up all loose ends…" Shimo shared surprisingly a lot of details with the Sand team that he didn't trust previously.

"Oh, so that's what you were doing in the desert. Did you guys seriously expect to find the Box of Ultimate Bliss in that old wreck of stone?" Tiwul laughed before sticking out her tongue rudely, acting almost like a monkey spewing air and slobber through the mouth just to playfully appear rude.

"Hmph, looking for stupid fairytales instead of training and developing real skills, is that what Konoha has become now?" Tala sarcastically bit the Konoha team as well walking out from behind Menna's shadow. Even while his personality and the content of his words could've been picked up as offensive he had a rather warm if not a little challenging smile suggesting that his bite was more of a toying nature.

"I suppose we'll see during the Chuunin Exams just which village's method is actually stronger" Kouta smiled closing his eyes and raising his fist up closer to Menna who smiled and bumped the medical ninja. Mana remained silent throughout the entire exchange but not because she was still sad, she had no right to be.

This entire short exchange of words before the four turned around and moved through the pass heading outside the village was something that the magician wished to preserve in her memory and carve into her heart. The young of old warring villages saying warm farewells after only having met less than a week ago, already having formed some sort of bonds and connections.

That was beautiful, after witnessing that moment Mana wished to experience that day countless times. Moments like this would have made the world closer to the world she wished to see, world without war or suffering. During either of the Great Ninja Wars any Konoha ninja would have been in danger in Sunagakure, there would've been endless threats to take their lives and claim on their bounties even if as genin they weren't worth much.

"Are you OK today, Mana-chan? You seemed to have been quite distressed yesterday" Kouta noted walking up closer to the magician.

"It's alright, I just… Have you ever felt like your own body would betray you? Not only your body but also your mind, your entire essence does the opposite you wish to do and then you do not understand what you even are anymore…" Mana spoke up, shortly peeking back just to see if Meiko and Shimo weren't listening in, she didn't really wish to share with anyone but Kouta who appeared to be dealing with Mana's problems in a way that seemed most appropriate at the time for the magician.

Meiko was a person who wished to fix everything, punch through everything. She was someone who has heard of legendary heroes wielding mighty swords slashing through injustice and as someone who was looked down on, a reject branch of an elite clan who was a reject even by the standards of rejects, Meiko wished to fix all injustices directly. If she saw a fly stuck in a spider's web she'd immediately kill that spider and free it, without having a single bit of thought about how sensitive the ecosystem is and what the most correct course of action would be.

Shimo was beginning to appear like a mystery to Mana. An old friend who has been through much and after living through so many experiences changed in ways she couldn't yet put her finger on. He was a man who merely wished to become Hokage, to make sure that the strong would not oppress the weak by becoming the strong. Then, after realizing what the world was actually like he stopped caring that much, his core objective had become to survive and help survive to all he cared about, while still keeping parts of his old dream somewhere deep inside. And yet… His behavior in the Sand Village appeared so… Odd. Why would a young man who was a survivalist above all else interfere with that terrorist organization's goals? Was it a sign that old Shimo was breaking free through the rock hard façade of an ex-rogue? The kunoichi couldn't help but feel a little intimidated by Shimo but only because she couldn't understand him and things she couldn't understand, or obtain knowledge of, felt intimidating.

"Heh, I got to say all the time…" Kouta rubbed the back of his head with a pleasant smile, he didn't appear to be acting all too serious about Mana's question even if his tone and words appeared to be honest. "I mean I'm a medical ninja, I wish to heal everyone all the time, I wish to beat everyone hurting people, punch everyone meaning my friends harm, but sometimes I just can't do it. I run out of chakra, sometimes I run out of stamina and willpower before I run out of chakra. Sometimes there are wounds I outright cannot heal. My body and the reality around me betrays me all the time but as long as whatever of me that desires those things remains I do not question it, I just take the hit and become stronger"

"You're doing a pretty good job, before we left you took a while to heal a simple blade cut, now you've healed me so many times that you could do it in your sleep…" Mana smiled trying to make her friend feel better, such notions were simpler when she did not have to lie. Kouta has become better in terms of his healing skill, a whole level better. Simple scratches and cuts took him less than a couple of minutes where extensive injuries or internal bleeding took twenty to thirty minutes whereas previously Kouta expressed doubt in dealing with it at all.

Kouta blushed, "To be honest… Well… I've gotten used to your body, I'm not sure if I could fix teeth and swellings and facial injuries of a person I've just met nearly as well and fast" he said.

Mana blinked a couple of times looking at the boy with surprise, "Really? There's a difference? As subtle as the person you heal?"

"Oh yes, it matters quite a lot actually, it's like navigating a map. Imagine having to locate and mark several points of a map without the names of the locations. If you have never before seen the map you may wish to scan it very well before marking the locations so that you do not waste time and ink. Once you've drawn a certain map that many times you actually could do the task in your sleep. Each person has subtle differences like chakra network quirks, previous injuries that may not have been properly healed, hidden genetic or physical anomalies, all of these things matter to a medical ninja and influence the healing process.

"Well, now that you put it like that it really seems difficult…" Mana looked away a little bit embarrassed by the notion that Kouta may have scanned and delved through her body so many times that he knows it extensively.

"If it weren't everyone would be doing it, Konoha High receives a lot of new applications of hopeful recruits wishing to learn the craft. Not that many pass the selection process, the chakra control ability of the person needs to be absolutely without a flaw and even then not many pass to the internship stage in the Konoha Hospital" Kouta proudly explained rubbing his red nose as all the supposed boasting made him feel a little embarrassed.

"You think… You could ever… Teach me healing ninjutsu?" Mana asked mumbling quietly and feeling a little down about the whole thing. "My chakra control is not without a flaw but it is sufficient enough to dabble in genjutsu. I keep talking so much about changing the world but all I do is fight and invite more fighting, becoming a medical ninja would help me change all that, finally actually do something positive without causing pain or suffering to anyone, do absolute good"

Kouta squinted, it appeared that his mind was very shifting and jumping from one thought to another. "It is true that your knowledge of genjutsu suggests hope in the craft, illusions are some of the most demanding form of ninja techniques and one of the least rewarding. Still, healing ninjutsu is… Complicated. A person who learns not from the official Konoha High and Konoha Hospital course is called a "Quack", do you really wish that mark on your resume? It's slightly more tolerable version of "rogue", after all"

Mana blushed and jumped up waving her hands wildly in refusal, "Oh, no! Sorry! I do not wish to dishonor you or bring you any bad rep in any way, if it's like that then I wouldn't dream of ever harming your reputation. I don't imagine teaching Quacks is very looked up on in the field either… I just… Wished to help someone, in some way"

Kouta did not answer, he merely continued to awkwardly walk by Mana's side, his face looked strange, it looked almost like he felt really bad about refusing to do something that'd dishonor him, almost like he actually suffered internally about refusing such an elementary thing which really confused the magician. Why would he care that much about what she wanted? Why would her foolish ponders really matter to him that badly?

"Mana! Mana! Look, I took notes yesterday about what I felt of my surroundings!" Meiko declared out loud rushing up to the magician and handing her notes full of sloppy handwriting. Mana peeked into it and felt really stupid for stopping training with Meiko, it wasn't like the blacksmith was bad at it but she lacked concentration, she lacked precision. She quickly lost focus and shifted around. She didn't delve into the temperature, the humidity, she merely acknowledged that it had one property or another.

"It's a very decent effort, we'll work on it together tonight" Mana smiled trying to break the news down to her friend as gently as possible. It wasn't that Meiko was bad, it was just that she was not much better than anyone else would reasonably be and that wouldn't have necessarily have been enough. Meiko wasn't patient enough or perceptive enough to identify her surroundings properly, to analyze them, she appeared to grow bored and move on to another property far too quickly.

Was that how Kouta must've felt towards her? Did he see that she was not meant for such training and that was the main reason why he had to refuse? After all, while when she was in her prime Mana's chakra control was certainly superior to most of her peers, currently her chakra control was non-existent which the main problem was. That was why the four of them were roaming these lands looking for a legendary wish fulfilling object in the first place.

The journey away from Sunagakure heading east towards Takigakure was more of the same desert that the four were beginning to get sick of. The gracious and merciful change was the lack of any mercenaries or raiders attacking them. Whether it was because of the official use of the roads they were travelling on by Sunagakure and merchants going in and out of the village or some other reason remained a mystery. Either way, each night was spent training, now since Meiko was engaged with Mana's genjutsu defense course she had no time to tutor Mana.

There was a solution to it – Kouta informed the magician that an incredibly important part of the official medical ninja training was evasive taijutsu course. Medical ninja were trained to avoid danger in battle, best medical ninja didn't get as much as a scratch while fighting in week-long battles and even entire wars as they had to reserve all of their chakra for the wounded. Chakra wasted healing themselves was basically paying for sloppiness with someone's life. Naturally medical ninja were tutored at evasion by some of the best taijutsu and martial arts experts: mercenaries and ninja alike.

While medical ninja's perception as well as chakra enhanced speedy evasion was honed, significant importance was placed on evasion skills that use no chakra due to importance of chakra of a medical ninja. If a medical ninja evaded all injury by enhancing their abilities with chakra augmentation they'd have ruined their networks making them effectively useless. Kouta was all shining with glee having found his purpose to Mana which continued to baffle the girl. He was quite adamant to train her during times when Meiko was training with Mana's assignments.

Kouta's evasion training was very merciful, perhaps overly so. The boy purposefully moved slower, pulled as many punches as he could as if he thought of Mana as a fragile object he had to preserve. That part of the training felt really pointless but Kouta has taught Mana a lot of very useful things. He taught her about the principles of evasion, about how her eyes and her body had to move to waste the least possible amounts of movement and about proper breathing. About the openings and possibilities of counterattacks. It appeared that all of them had something to teach each other…

One evening Mana grew a little frustrated by Kouta's obsession over holding back against her. If he didn't come at her with full intention to kill how could she properly learn actual evasive skills? She suggested change. It was something that was bothering Mana's mind for a while – part of Tanshu-sensei's final will. Despite Kouta's objections and lack of fondness over the general idea she involved Shimo into the training sessions. She proposed a deal to the boy that he would come at her with precise enough chakra control that she could evade his blows, while still augmenting his abilities. That way he'd always have to fight at fraction of a percent of his abilities and such refined control wouldn't come easy.

"If I slip up for a moment I'll cut you down instantly…" Shimo said, it wasn't like he was against the idea. Based on his tone he thought that Mana had not considered such a turn of events.

"That means Kouta-kun will have to try extra hard at teaching me to evade, if he doesn't do it right – I'll die" Mana smiled as if she didn't just sign her death sentence by her long time friend's hand which she very well may have done. Kouta's face was absolutely pale and he opposed the idea completely.

"Very well then, I suppose I shall go without training then…" Mana smiled playfully teasing Kouta who almost completely lost his mind. The medical ninja had not held a single ounce of his strength back, he never pulled a single punch much to Mana's "enjoyment". She started to get beaten again, beaten and cut down because she had to evade a skilled swordsman and a medical ninja trying to scare her enough to get serious. Once again broken ribs and bone deep gashes became a part of her routine.

At any rate – that way everyone was training, everyone was doing their best. Meiko was slowly becoming more perceptive, more capable of identifying changes in temperature or animals that may not have been very native to that land or not supposed to be seen unless one was looking really carefully. She became able to spot hidden lurking predators like snakes burrowed in the sand or scorpions under a rock just by correct guessing and perception alone. Most even the smallest signs of sand being moved around and something being burrowed inside did not evade her. There could've been no question about it – Meiko grew stronger without stretching a single muscle. She became a bit more attentive and analytical instead of fighting by instinct. That sort of mind Mana could work with in terms of further defensive genjutsu training.

Kouta became more skilled at taijutsu by seeing Mana evade and adapting to it, his strikes became less inventive, he feinted attacks much more often and started inventing new combinations, new ways of attack or deceive his opponent. He wanted to truly prepare Mana for the combined assault of him and Shimo, he wanted all the best for her and the best was not being cut down. Even if Mana did get injured from time to time, it was because the combined forces of Shimo and Kouta were almost impossible to evade to her, it was only a question of time when Shimo would cut her deep enough to take her out or when Kouta would break one bone too many for the magician to continue. Needless to say black bags of exhaustion also once again became Kouta's routine as he had to continue healing Mana day after day.

Shimo's chakra control truly improved. Just by fighting while augmenting his abilities and responding to Mana's level of skill actually helped him adapt to using impossibly small fractions of his power, as the kunoichi had seen later on, the boy was capable of multiplying his experiences and fight at much more subtle levels than before. While initially such training would appear useless it helped Shimo preserve air in his lungs as well as spend less on his ninjutsu techniques. He became stronger by learning to fight weaker. Outlasting Shimo with his quickly improving chakra control became tougher and tougher every day. Not to mention that finally at least partially Tanshu-sensei's will was honored.

Mana became near impossible to hit without being experienced with chakra augmentation and simply outspeeding her in battle. One had to be stronger and faster than Mana, to absolutely dominate her in battle to land a blow. The girl even went as far as to successfully evade kunai dispenser fire up close, she listened on Kouta's breathing, listened on his tensing muscles rubbing his clothes or his finger tensing on the dispenser's trigger. That way Mana managed to evade being made a pin cushion even when the dispenser was shoved all the way in her face. Slowly the magician was becoming as strong as her impaired body allowed her to be. Not even the greatest taijutsu masters fighting at the human level would have been able to defeat her combination of redirection and evasion techniques. Soon training would've become meaningless as she was slowly approaching a wall that her body could not overcome.

The closer to that wall Mana got, the greater was her pain.


	153. Explodnado 2: Fiery Boogaloo

Long tongues of smoke broke through the cracks of a seemingly well concealed bunker that appeared most like just another large rock etched into the desert sand, not unlike countless others under which one could've found various crawlies looking for a cheap sting or a bypassing prey. Usually rocks such as the smoking one provided ample shade and cover and ironically enough while the rock was a fake one, it actually did serve some very similar purposes to the people concealed inside. Concealed was perhaps a very strong word to use in this particular situation as the relentless streaks of dark green smoke continuously broke through the cracks in the rock and loud yells and laughs could've been heard if one crept up close enough.

The hole, inhabitants of which called it a "bunker", was similarly filled with clouds of dark green gas that appeared to come from some weird crunchy snacks that the people inside have been munching on. It was a bright yellowish sort of chip-like cracker covered with flower and appearing like a waffle chip that upon being eaten happened to emit some sort of smoke from it, likely from a contact with saliva or some other substance present in the mouth. The spreading smoke ventilated and travelled through the consumer's system and left through their ears and nose, often through the mouth after the consumer coughed.

There were only three people inside of the bunker which would have appeared quite odd as the walls of the place were covered with weapons, shields and armor, the place was meant to be a sanctuary when darkness caught one unprepared or when preparation was needed or perhaps a refill of supplies for the organization of terrorists that built it there. It did not appear that the inhabitants were using it for that purpose however. They were just crunching on the snacks and drinking molten sherbets that were likely a little stronger than the casual sherbet deserts enjoyed by richer people in the Land of Wind.

"I've had, like… An idea…" one of the trio, a man, spoke up. He sat in a relaxed position and tipped his ice cream up of molten sherbet before flipping it up letting some spill down on his hairy bare chest. Despite the fact that the man wore strange denim trousers and a vest and an incredibly raggy t-shirt that approached very close to being validly categorized as that belonging to a hobo, his chest remained exposed and was covered in bright blonde hair, matching the long hair on his head and a very rich beard that he wore which was also a little soaked in ice cream and covered with smoking crunch crumps.

"Hi hi, I think it's just the Hat'ash you've done talking…" a girl who had the man's arm wrapped around her like she was the last support pole, keeping the man from tumbling down into an abyss. Her appearance was not in any way special, besides her above average physical appearance and shape and her clothes were too few to earn a description.

"Hush, my friend is talking. What idea graced you this… Morning, day… Whatever, haven't looked outside for a good while" another man who appeared like an ordinary desert traveler silenced the woman by pressing his index finger to her sultry and plump lips and exclaimed his respect and desire to hear what his hairy friend had to say.

"Like… We should like… Have a deal… Or something" the hairy one said letting his head weigh backwards as he exhaled the dark green gas from his mouth in a controlled stream so much that the colorful bandana fell off his head and finally revealed the oasis picture sewn into it in its full.

"Aw, that would be quite cool! What kind of a deal should we make?" the other male spoke up, the attention of the woman in between of them continued to shift from one male to another as they exchanged words in between. His words came at a dreamy and tipsy slur that suggested the man may have wanted to refrain from making deals in his current condition.

"Like… Dude… I came up with the idea that we should make a deal, how 'bout you twist your head a little and come up with the deal, I dunno, like… Sometimes I think… Do you even respect me, man?" the blonde man replied shaking and throwing his hands and his feet around angrily, had the woman close to him not been sprawling and slipping asleep she'd have quite likely been accidentally hit by him warranting and instant end to their attempted negotiations.

"How dare you!? We met only yesterday yet I love you like my own brother! But how am I supposed to know what kind of a deal we should make, I mean I don't know what you have, I'm not really sure what I even need at the moment either… Besides a good pair of pants" the man sitting close to the blond haired hobo-like man replied genuinely looking guilty that he was completely unaware of the situation he was in nor could he suggest terms to this supposed deal they'd make.

"Aw man… You like… Killed my deal-making mood, man… Like, I wish we could like… I dunno, make a deal or something and you'd give me a way to talk to like hawks and all that… Sometimes I just want to… Like… Really know how to communicate with those birds, man" the blond man picked his bandana back up from where it had fallen and tied it on his scalp again slightly helping his crazy hair situation that he wore on top of his head.

"Shit, sorry, man… I just… You can't really go at a guy like that, you know? Gotta ease me into it. Don't just say, "hey, let's make a deal" and not know what sort of deal you're making" the man shook his hands around and shrugged wildly a couple of times trying to explain it to his friend yet feeling far too drunk on the sherbet and a little dizzy from the Hat'ash they've crunched through the night to be able to successfully do so.

"Man, like… Whatever… I'm bored, wish we could like… Blow up or something…" the bearded blonde replied pulling his finger out from his nose which he was picking at the time and flicked his finger allowing a small booger size white ball of clay to leap off his fingernails as if it actually had sentience. The dust size booger of clay stopped in mid-air and screeched for a brief moment covering the entire bunker in a blinding flash of light.

BOOM

Light footsteps through the desert approached the bunker location and walked up to their wasted friend, his clothes were damaged but they were such to begin with. It appeared that his t-shirt and his denim attire was singed and blown up so many times that it had built some sort of a tolerance to it already. The man's long hair was singed-up as well and also significantly shorter and his beard was still in the process of singing appearing almost like blond tobacco in a rolled up cigarette in mid burning.

"You imbecile, you've blown up our bunker!" the blind marksman yelled at the just barely conscious friend of his who just shrugged with a friendly "what can you do" type smile and stood up with significant effort from his part.

"Also, where's Iyasha?" Poncho Assassin placed his hand on the hilt of his sword preparing to strike his wasted friend down where he stood, or to be more exact - laid.

"Like… I thought she'd augment herself using chakra, like I did and… I guess she's dead… Like… One of life's mysteries, you know? You get to know a gal, like really communicate with her and… She, like… Blows up" the blond hobo shrugged again and stumbled around looking at the gapping crater still being filled with flowing torrents of sand which he was lucky to have landed beyond the range from.

"He killed Iyasha and he destroyed one of Shaphac's bunkers, remind me why we're not only keeping him around but taking him with us?" Poncho Assassin looked at his blind and googled friend who took a cowboy hat to hide himself from the blazing Sun.

"Well, we couldn't have taken Iyasha with us anyways, people in Agbarah Sheikhate are way too stingy with women, even accompanied by men, we'd have attracted too much attention. Her loss however is an unfortunate one, she was one of few different and exotic ninja in Sunagakure, her Bloom Release would've been an asset to us later on" the blind marksman tipped his hat lower and fired a couple of sharp kunai-like sharpened bolts that just disappeared deep into the sand after the impact as if sand offered no resistance to them at all. The tipsy explosive specialist tried to dance his feet comically to avoid the bolts but he just fell backwards like a sack of potatoes just barely avoiding being skewered by them.

"Like… Cut it out, Denton, I'll like… I dunno, make it up to you guys… Somehow… Like, make some rice cakes or blow up a meat loaf again to make it like extra soft, or something" the barely conscious man complained.

"Whatever, we need this idiot with us, he is a monkey-brain with explosive power to blow a chunk of this planet off, we need him if we are to do what we were told to" the blind marksman called Denton angrily fixed the tip of his hat and carefully tapped the fallen comrade around until he found the belt on his jeans, grabbing hold of it and dragging his tipsy friend through the sand.

"We could retreat the package without him, you know, less people means less chances of being seen…" Poncho Assassin casually remarked smiling a little at the hilarious sight of his friend being dragged face first on the sand by his annoyed comrade.

"We're not just going to extract the package, we're going to pop the knee caps of those Konoha scum and make them beg for death, then we're going to pop them in the head and leave them for the coyotes to feast on their ribs, isn't that what the Shaphac stands for? Isn't that what we're doing this all for? Acts of war? If we kill a bunch of kids on a peaceful exploration mission, Konoha is sure to declare war on Sunagakure" Denton huffed out as dragging his friend appeared to be more of a struggle than he counted on it being.

"Huh… But weren't you ordered to only fight and kill the Konoha ninja if they move into the Agbarah Sheikhate?" Poncho asked him.

"Yeah, which is why we need an explosive diversion to lure them there, we'll kill the little women, then we'll have this shitbrain blow the guys' corpses up, we'll say we never saw 'em…" the man finally had enough and let go of his trigger-happy friend who without uttering a word just stood up and followed his friends.

"You're a pretty sneaky bastard, Denton…" Poncho laughed out. "Playing the Kazekage is also pretty dumb…"

"Whether we succeed or fail, whether the Shaphac will get destroyed or not, death to these kids will bring war, which means that the Shaphac will achieve their goals to some extent anyways" the blind marksman finished his train of thought.

The trio continued to walk on until they disappeared off of a hill into the slowly setting desert Sun.

It finally got so deep into the night that the temperatures started approaching the freezing point. Mana was glad to have bought something resembling her uniform where she could hide her emergency tools that she couldn't pull out of her kit in the heat of the battle. She also brought some sheets along with her, having experienced the freezing desert nights prior. When it got as cold and as dark as it got at that moment, the team always stopped walking and hunkered down, there was absolutely nothing positive to gain from traversing the place during the night, that one time of day when all the predators are out lurking and hunting and the temperatures match Konoha at its coldest time of year.

With a little struggle the team managed to light a fire, Mana didn't want to use her custom cards, one of which had a kunai dispenser modification sealed into it that basically exploded with flammable liquid and sparked upon being fired. The magician sort of felt bad about not having a kunai dispenser with her, she had already discovered that with a little effort they could've been reworked to fire not just kunai but other small objects like bolts, arrows or even cards at the speed approaching the speed of sound. When she was still a ninja she may have slung projectiles at such speed with her hands alone when needed but now she could only toss them as fast as a teenage girl with a lifetime of intense training could.

Kouta started making some of the quickly heated food packs that he bought from Sunagakure. They were quite odd things and Mana could briefly remember seeing similar things in Konohagakure shops. They were small bags, size of a hand, that when heated extended into the size and shape of an actual dish. Some had to be treated with care as Kouta bought plenty of ramen packs that just bloated with hot soup and noodles and needed a separate bowl to be eaten. After the team settled down to have their one meal per day that could've both kept them from dying and warmed them up it appeared like the day was about to end peacefully.

"Say, Mana-chan, what kind of food do you like?" Kouta asked with a smile. "I bought some ingredients sealed inside paper tags which we could use when we leave the desert, maybe I can make something you like one day?"

"Hm?" one of Shimo's closed eyes opened and looked curiously at Kouta before closing with a smile on the young man's face.

"Hey? Why don't you ever suggest making something I like? Then again, I suppose I'll eat anything so that question is sort of redundant…" Meiko answered her own question right after rushing up to Kouta and leaning over the fire angrily. Mana could only slightly chuckle every time she saw a similar episode play out, seeing Meiko be Meiko improved her mood a lot.

"I have to say your question does sound a little weird, Kouta-kun" Mana smiled, "While I do have to eat much more often than all of you because of my normal human metabolism I still fail to see the need to pamper me"

"It's because you're the VIP, you're the client" Shimo sarcastically answered the question with a smile after seeing Kouta blush and lose himself in trying to find an answer to the simple question. "Your morale is the most important to be kept up, you're constantly in danger yet we are directly responsible for your well-being and your stress levels. This is why not many clients are allowed to leave together with the ninja. It's something meant for stress management and a morale boost"

Mana looked at the starry sky and laughed a little, the desert was beautiful at night and yet just as deadly as it was during the day, if it wasn't for her friends helping her out and her doing all she could do in her current condition they would've died so many times over and yet together they made this insane mission work. Living in the moment helped the magician to appreciate the beauty of the natural wonder located around her and the company of her friends, despite streaks of depression over her loss of identity popping in and out her morale was not a problem to be worried about.

"I like gyoza, it's my favorite dish. Since I don't eat much nor do I need much to feel sated I am not overly fond of fatty and overly strong foods" Mana replied. Kouta smiled gently but then couldn't help but feel a little confused.

"Gyoza is a rather simplistic dish… I'd have imagined an artist like Mana-chan to love something really specific and sophisticated but everyone knows how to make gyoza and it's accessible to everyone, it's hardly a lord's dish. I mean I love rice wine chicken which isn't a dish I see on the table everyday" Kouta scratched his head.

"That is exactly why I like it. It is simple, it has nothing special about it, just like me. And yet a fantastic and skilled chef might make something special of it, be it something with the dough or something with the vegetable and meat filling inside. It's a simple and unimpressive, rather bland dish that under experienced and amazing hands can become a food that is more exquisite than any other" Mana replied with her happiness suddenly becoming more lyrical than the absolute glee she felt before.

The gyoza dumplings were just like Mana in many cases, just like gyoza Mana was a girl with nothing special about her. She didn't belong to a clan of amazing ninja just like gyoza were made by even the lowest layers of society, the blandest doughs could've been made even from flour and water. Mana didn't have any fantastic bloodlines inside her just like the gyoza didn't have anything special in their filling to make up for the bland and tasteless dough. And yet… Gyoza could become so divine, additional ingredients could've been added to its dough or its filling making it surpass everyone else and fulfil its goal of sating its consumer just like Mana dreamed of one day fulfilling her goal.

"We're not alone…" Shimo mumbled and stood up, looking behind him and staring into a blank space on a dark rock which Mana couldn't even begin to make out in the blinding desert darkness, especially when contrasted with the all devouring flame that was used for warmth and light. While it could've attracted attention it was integral for desert survival, it repelled wild animals, it provided enough warmth to survive desert temperatures.

Meiko's frame blurred and disappeared as she dashed right in front of Mana deflecting a barrage of bolts that flew at her at blinding speed. The barrage was connected by such a short amount of time and fired in such a rapid burst that to the magician it appeared to have let out a single deafening clang while Meiko may have deflected as many as sixty of sharpened bolts. The blacksmith looked at her ruined wristbands and gloves.

"Darn it, they're very loosely chakra infused, it ruined my armor" the blacksmith cursed as Meiko pulled off her wristbands and gloves and let them crash into the desert ground in a sound that alerted and scared Mana suggesting that Meiko may have carried the weight of a human being just on her single piece of armor. The wristbands weighed so much that they just sunk deep into the sand where Mana could no longer see them as the sand quickly covered the sinkholes.

"Her chakra control isn't nearly sharp enough to infuse her armor with chakra… Meiko can't defend well against chakra infused weaponry which puts us in a lot of danger" Mana thought to herself looking at the hills she couldn't even make out with her ordinary eyes, realizing just how useless and how much of a burden she was to her friends in her current condition.

"Don't worry, Mana-chan. Don't split from us, we'll take care of them for you" Kouta angrily declared and moved in close to Meiko to assist the girl if needed.

A loud howl of the desert wind picked up strands and torrents of sand, Shimo looked around witnessing the very unnatural breeze of wind that slowly started breaking and rotating as twin currents clashed against each other creating a tornado strong enough to make endless sandstorms of itself rotating around it.

Kouta's firm grip grabbed hold of Mana before the girl felt it loosening. Something was wrong, the medical ninja should've been strong enough to maintain a stable hold of her throughout a tornado, she saw him break through his father's defenses once.

"It's me he's worried about, he doesn't want to crush my arm or to pull it out of its socket" the magician thought to herself as Kouta let go, Mana couldn't help but scream at her own helplessness as she was taken by the raging winds and carried upwards, she couldn't see or hear anything but the currents of wind slowly tearing her body apart, she felt tearing force and sand bashing at her face, it was painful, it almost tore her body parts, almost broke her bones and left scratching marks all over.

Mana heard a loud sneeze that forced her to open her mouth. She saw thousands if not more of small white grain-like particles rotating and attaching to the sand.

"On the other hand, run, Mana-chan!" she heard Kouta's voice from below but she couldn't help herself, she was already floating in mid-air. Mana tried to somehow overcome the tearing grip and the cutting force of the wind and the sands bashing at her face but she couldn't even after giving her best. It was when she noticed that those white grains started glowing that Mana felt a tough shoulder shoving her out of the way, the magician heard loud clanging close to her suggesting that it must've been Meiko who picked Mana up and tore her from the tornado of these glowing white grains. A loud screech overcame Mana's ears, she couldn't even hear the raging winds around her, even nature's perfect monster was nowhere close to being registered by Mana's body that was beginning to shut down from being assaulted on so many fronts at once.

A blinding and deafening explosion that could only have been described as destruction itself echoed ripping through the desert. An explosive force so potent that a beam of its controlled explosive power and searing blaze of obliteration streamed straight into space and could've been picked up by a curious extraterrestrial visitor if such existed. A hole so deep that no one could've even seen its end was made where the tornado filled with miniscule clay bombs detonated, bursts of hot magma danced deep below, providing a brief clue of just how deep and all covering the explosion was. Slowly the sand around the area started pouring back into the destructive blast, the crystalized and molten particles first, those that weren't molten before became so once they hit the blazing wild tango of the magma streams and torrents below.

It was as if like the God himself has poked the Earth with his mightiest of fingers


	154. Welcome to Agbarah

An epitome of headaches fitting to be a description in the textbook of headaches hit Mana's head as she opened her eyes. She'd woken up from bad situations before, she's even once woken up from nearly dying, this couldn't have felt worse than that and yet somehow it managed to feel like that. It was like some device was placed on her head, similar to the snappers that snap the shells of nuts, that kept applying pressure to her temporal bones and yet barely not hard enough to crush it completely. This was one of the worse waking ups that the girl has had throughout her life.

Even if Mana felt the warm if not heated up sand beneath her cheeks and her hands as it shifted through them she could not see it. All that she could see was completely white, nor could Mana hear any sounds of the desert like the howling winds and scurrying little critters squirming around the sand. All that Mana could hear was loud shrieks, almost like two rusted pieces of metal rubbing against each other close to her ears, the girl could feel warm drops of blood making their way down her face and her cheeks from her ears however.

She was blind, deaf, hurt and bleeding, without the ability to control chakra and in the desert. Quietly Mana spoke into the wind, asking for someone she knew, naming all of her friends but their names just went completely unnoticed as Mana couldn't feel any of them touching her, had they spoken to her or gestured for her she'd have not seen them but if Kouta was with her he'd have known that. She was all alone. Alone in a different country, in the middle of she knew not where surrounded by endless miles of desert spanning one fifth of the entire land mass of the planet. This may have just been the worst kind of trouble she's ever been in.

Sitting on her bottom would've been the equivalent of waiting for her death. She could just vaguely remember the explosive cataclysm that transpired and despite the situation reminding one where most people would feel boredom, Mana felt desperation and worry. Worry for her friends. If she was to die here, blind and deaf, bleeding out on the sand she at least wished to know if her friends were alright. Slowly the girl rolled on her shoulder that ached the least and forced her body off the ground, picking herself up and stumbling for a while as her brain struggled to keep her body upright.

"I need to keep moving, I… I need to do something… I can't just wait here for death" Mana spoke silently to herself, at least meant to do so as she could not hear herself and couldn't really control her speech. If her friends were there they'd have stopped her but no one did, there really was no one there, no friends nor enemies. The only enemy around was the desert itself.

"This isn't so bad, I still have my skin, it wasn't singed off so I can feel with it, I can touch, I'll know when it's hot and when it's cold… I can manage… For a while" the magician thought to herself trying to confuse herself that somehow she wasn't in a total hole of the bottom unlike any trouble she'd found herself in before that.

For a couple of hours the girl just kept on walking, feeling the sand in front of her with her fingers, softly letting it shift through it, she tried to speak to herself loud enough to alert any predators of her location, to sing or to just hum some melodies she could remember. Most snakes and larger predators of the wild were afraid of people, after all – people were armed, some of them could breathe fire from their mouths or employ lightning at their command or summon tornadoes and typhoons. People were out of the food chain and upon hearing a single tune of their voice most predators cleared out of the way. That way Mana may have avoided dozens of snakes that lurked in the sand burrowed in the sand she may have stepped onto and died normally.

Finally the girl realized from her sweating and slowly scolding skin that it was becoming far too hot to keep walking. Mana helplessly wandered around trying to locate a rock to hide under, to see if she could find some shade but she could only find a cactus that she found in a rather painful way, luckily she didn't swat her hand at it too hard… Mana removed her shirt and placed it on the cactus, placing the blazer that she carried around on it to make some shade. She was no survivalist, she was just getting lucky so far, there was only that much that she could do in her situation. She was just stumbling into things, lucky to not having been bitten and died slowly grasping for another breath of air as the snake's poison paralyzed her muscles and lungs… She was pathetic.

At the state which she was in currently she was no savior, she was no hero that would change the world. No one would remember her story and be inspired to change their violent ways from the way she's been living up to now. A broken shell of what she once was chasing after days long gone, after life which was long lost. The only deed she had done which was remotely worthy of her final pride was that time she saved a child from being horribly murdered by Hisako, that being said that child was a murderous psycho who would likely grow up into an actual criminal but as long as he was alive there was still hope he wouldn't… Ironically, that very point was also when Mana lost herself, her identity.

The girl's body shook in a cold evening breeze, quickly Mana took her shirt and got dressed to protect from the breeze, she still had a couple of hours to keep on walking, then she'd have to somehow survive the coldest night in her life… Just that thought, that fear of her own uselessness and demise sparked something, Mana wildly shook her head around realizing that finally she could hear something. Her hearing was slowly returning to her, perhaps her sight would soon follow? The magician did feel a little ashamed by the fact that she relied so much on her sight but it was the sense she was the most accustomed to. She was a visual artist after all, it only made sense.

The girl continued to walk, burrowing herself into her blazer by how cold the evening was. Usually there'd be someone who would give her some extra clothing during those final hours of walking. She was still weak, she relied so much on the protection of other people when she yelled so loud that she'd be the one protecting everyone. Mana closed her blinded eyes and kept on walking forward, she shoved the depressing and wild thoughts away, forced them away. She had no time to feel pity for herself, she either lived or died.

Some walking sounds on the sand, Mana tried to yell for help but she could only hardly whimper. A loud animalistic sound came her way, similar to that of a bear's roar but since the magician knew that those things didn't live in the desert she just extended her hand forward. A slobbering wet tongue licked her hand before the animal's slobbery, wet and warm mouth let Mana's hand completely disappear in its mouth. It didn't bite her, it just held her hand inside its mouth and sort of flipped it around with its tongue before the girl pulled it out and wiped the slimy hand at the sand. Mana stood up and felt the animal around.

"It's a camel…" she realized, upon further feeling inspection it appeared that there was a man with a bleeding wound on his head lying beside the camel. The night was getting cold, if he was allowed to stay down he'd likely die, whether it was from the cold or the predators. Mana was lucky that she laid at the edge of the explosion, the radiating heat warmed her, the emanating light must've scared animals away for miles. This man had no such luxury – he'd die here and so would Mana. The magician stroke the animal's fur and grunted after the pain took her over as she tried to lift the man up. The camel appeared to be a bit smarter than one would give it credit for as it bit the man's sleeve and helped Mana flip it onto its back.

The saddle on top of the camel didn't appear to be ready to handle two people at once, Mana would just have to grind her teeth through and have a bumpy and painful ride as just walking made her bones hurt like they were being kicked every second. The camel just shook uncomfortable after Mana jumped onto it but it seemed to be quite dealt with the idea that it'd be carrying two people wherever it was going. The magician lightly slapped the animal on its butt making it get the clue. The camel started rushing forward. This was going to be an agonizing trip, wherever she was going, but at least it'd be a lot faster.

A couple of hours in Mana was quivering, she felt cold needles digging into her fingers and her toes, she started feeling numb and sleepy. The magician needed to find something to warm herself up, the pure physical effort it took to not fall off was not enough. She was working out quite a lot to keep her body on top of the animal, if she fell off she'd have been done. Mana took the liberty of letting one of her hands to slip back and check for a blanket or something like that, there was something covering the merchandise that the camel was carrying which Mana removed and placed on her shoulders. She let a couple of bags to fall off just so she could secure her own legs into those belts and stay safer on the animal if her body ever failed her and the girl fell off.

She was quite right to do so as some time later Mana's eyes shot open and she realized that she was leaning to the side, had it not been for her secured legs she'd have fallen off and would've either snapped her neck going down or woken up far too late. Slowly the air was starting to warm up more and more – the morning must've been close. If that was the case Mana would need some water, she felt really bad borrowing some from the man as she already cost him a couple of bags of his merchandise. Only then she realized how much she relied on Shimo's Ice Style ninjutsu to create water in the desert for them and fill their flasks.

Mana screamed in pain as her eyes started watering. Bright flashes of light hit her eyes, whiter even than the eternal white she was stuck in and suddenly the girl realized that while her vision was still extremely blurry – it was slowly returning to her. Dying now would've been quite disgraceful, after all, she's made it through for so long with no vision or hearing. Forward was the only way, to ride, only to ride on. Judging from the brief flashes of light in her watery and pain ridden eyes the morning was slowly approaching as the desert Sun peeked from the horizon like a predator lurking on its prey, peeking at it from the tallest grass patches around.

Only then did Mana wonder about where her mission stood at that moment. She was stuck in the middle of nowhere without knowledge of her team, she was ruined and getting short on supplies again as she never carried much for the team, with all of her normal human carrying strength and all… Together with the worry for her team and the mission Mana couldn't help but feel curious about the place that this majestic desert animal was carrying her to. It couldn't have been too far from the location she was stranded in, they were heading east from Sunagakure and the explosion may have pushed her a little south…

"Oh no, I'm heading the wrong direction, I don't need to go south…" Mana thought to herself. Then again, the mission may not have been the exact priority realizing the situation she was in. She needed to find a stable way of getting her through a couple of nights, then think of a way to let her friends know of her location or find them in any other way. Still, she needed to head to the Land of Sound and Otogakure, maybe her friends would head to the objective thinking she'd catch up to them? No. They knew of her condition, they'd never move on without finding Mana previously. They were too worried about her well-being, or just as worried about hers and Mana was with theirs.

After several more hills and the morning finally hitting its peak Mana noticed a shadow in the horizon, it wasn't too large and yet it was no oasis. It must've been just a mirage but then why would a camel head that way? Camels should've been smart enough to tell mirages, weren't they? Where exactly was this animal bringing her? The magician checked the man's vitals finally enjoying the complete and returned vision. That last day navigating without sight or sound and just pain there to remind her of how painful living actually was couldn't have been described differently than a living nightmare. The man was alive but his bleeding head injury that was slowly drenching his bandage which Mana made sure to apply after tossing his turban away was worrying her.

As expected the camel slowed down almost to a halt once it had reached the large settlement it was heading towards. It was filled with clay buildings similar to Sunagakure but was much less fortified by natural barriers of rock. It appeared to have more guards patrolling the place but they didn't look like ninja, they reminded much more of raiders or rogues. This may not have been the best place to be in but…

"A woman, a woman in Agbarah!" a loud yell through the street alerted the surrounding settlers and even the guards to the point where they approached Mana drawing their crescent shaped blades and threateningly pointing them at her.

"She's torn up and injured, a beggar maybe? Does she wish us to put her out of her misery!?" another settler angrily ranted before picking up a rock and tossing it at Mana, with her human reflexes the girl could just barely lean to the side avoiding it.

"Look, I'm sorry, I don't…" Mana tried to speak but a guard leapt at her at an inhuman speed blowing her down from the top of the camel and ramming her at the sand below. He placed his sword by her throat so close that it almost drew blood, he had his sword at her throat the entire time, for someone to be so precise and controlled as to not sever her head with a rushing move like that… It told Mana a lot about the skill of these guards, she may have been able to face several in a fight if all of them were like this man but she'd be overwhelmed by a larger group even with all of her defensive skills and evasion skills.

"Speak once more, woman, see what happens…" the man spoke up once more, he had a much longer beard than the other guards, it was so long and thick that it almost ran down and touched Mana's face and the guard on top of her appeared to be much older than the others, maybe he was the leader or at least the most skilled one? In that case she had a slightly better chance at fighting them off…

"This woman is carrying an injured merchant. This camel has never seen women, he'd have not allowed her to ride it if it didn't think it necessary – she saved the merchant's life I presume" a guard stroke the animal's head and slowly lead it away, Mana could follow the guard and the camel no longer after it was taken behind a corner, to follow them visually would've meant to turn her head in a way that would've slit her throat and Mana has done that before – it wasn't a fun experience.

The guard holding her down examined Mana for a while, he pressed her harder to the ground looking if she'd resist but Mana didn't. She would've only tried fighting if there was literally no other way to survive. Maybe they wouldn't kill her still, maybe they would imprison her and escaping binds and prisons was what Mana did on stage for a part of her living.

A settler walked up to the girl and looked over the guard's shoulder. "This woman isn't a woman, she is a child woman" he uttered. Something told Mana that these people have not seen that many women around but definitely for a reason as they didn't appear to be overly fond of the kind. That begged the question of how did this settlement sustain itself but that was not the most pressing matter to find out. Mana tried to flip her tongue to ask the guard where she was but she remembered the man's threat and reaction to her speaking before.

"Ten or twenty years don't make you grow a sack between your legs, a child or not, she is a woman but we can't kill her as we do with the others. She seems of fit shape and she did save that man's life. Let us bring her to the Sun Disc. That seems a fitting end for this little woman" the guard chained Mana's hands and sheathed his blade before standing up. The man took Mana's chains from behind and slowly lead her towards this "Sun Disc".

All around Mana could hear people whispering and pointing fingers at her, some tried to spit at her or fling rocks at her but the guard appeared to be quite adamant about not letting her get too wounded on her way there. He carefully turned her aside from the spitting folk and moved her away from the flying rocks.

"A woman in Agbarah Sheikhate?! How dares she!?" shouts of this and similar manner couldn't cease as Mana made her way through the place.

The guard leaned up to Mana's side after a young man tripped her over and picked her up, whispering to her.

"Welcome to Agbarah"


	155. The Story of Sun Disc

The entire trip to this Sun Disc place where she was apparently being taken was not a comfortable one. Despite his somewhat present degree of empathy towards her the guard holding her didn't shy away from being too rough or pushing Mana around and while he did sort of try to keep the cursing furious mob away from her somehow to the magician it seemed like there was a much more material reason for it than simple human empathy. And yet, with all the roughness and all the new wounds she got from falling down after being pushed too hard when she didn't expect it to or getting hit by an object tossed at her, the trip itself was not the worst part.

The worst part of it all was easily the hatred in the eyes of people Mana had never met in her life before that day. They looked at her as if she was responsible for all that was bad in their lives, as if she was the scapegoat for all of their suffering. Maybe not everyone would feel as crushed by such stares and all of that hatred, most perhaps would simply ignore it all and feel high and mighty as they've not really done anything to deserve this hatred making them feel in the right. Mana had not done anything to these people and yet she still felt terrible just due to the fact that they hated her for no reason.

She was supposed to be the person who helps people, one who guides them through example. If she wanted the world to stop being violent, to view life as being as precious and as magical as she thought it to be she needed to eliminate all this hatred and become someone people would follow and yet… These people couldn't have been more to the opposite side of the spectrum to that which Mana tried to achieve. She didn't know why or how but… She was failing her objective miserably and that just added to Mana's sadness. Made her feel even more depressed than just seeing a mob of people try to hurt you and spill their hatred out in whatever ways they can.

"Can you fight?" the guard mumbled quietly so that only he and Mana could hear, the girl looked back at the armored elder, wondering about the purpose of the question. What was she supposed to tell him? If she admitted being trained from her earliest days in the arts of killing people but perverting them to save them instead, would she be executed on the spot? Won't she at the very least get the chance to fight for her life?

"Depends on what I'm supposed to fight" Mana decided to be vague about it, usually in life half-assed answers were always wrong but in this case the world around her was mad enough to not answer to the rules that it usually followed. The guard actually cracked half a grin, maybe she didn't answer wrong.

"An interesting answer, if you can't I can always kill you quickly, it'll be faster and you won't have to suffer. It's an easier option" he replied revealing the purpose of his question at last. He didn't really feel like a bad person, from what Mana's gut told her he was just someone following a very messed up set of rules.

"I am known to always torment myself with harder options just for the sake of it…" Mana kindly smiled to her captor showing that she didn't really hold any bad feelings toward him. "I am to assume that I am arrested merely because of my gender then?" she asked again once the guards leading her to where they were supposed to go took a turn into an alleyway.

Another guard punched Mana in the gut, he yelled something out in a strange dialect which the magician couldn't initially pinpoint. It was a lot like hearing a weird accent of a language one spoke in, it took hearing a couple of sentences before one could've gotten accustomed to it. There was only one universal language in the ninja world, still, some people around various parts put different spins on it, invented new words or ways of pronouncing words and those dialects were as numerous as drops of water in a river. As someone who read a lot the girl knew a couple of them but most of them were already gone as the people talking them were extinct.

"I'd advise you to stay silent, little woman, stay silent unless you are asked a question" the elder guard spoke once again, this time it was in a much stricter tone than usual.

Finally once the alleyway ended Mana realized where she was taken, in the middle of the street there stood a giant temple of hulking towers surrounding a great central structure. Rotund shapes dominated in this strange eastern style architectural wonder, shapes and mosaics danced all over the building telling tales and stories starting from possibly quite old times when this wonder was built. The Sun Disc was finally in sight.

Once Mana was lead into the building she was taken into one of the towers, it was an endless spiral of stairs with dark and damp rocky cells protected by steel bars. The kunoichi was surprised to see steel bars and chains being used instead of chakra barriers and seals. The girl was lead into a cell and was thrown inside.

"Wait here for your calling, once it is your time you will know what to do, if you won't… Well, no tears of sadness will be shed" the elder guard lowered his head and closed Mana inside. Once she was closed in and chained down to a small rotten wooden bench the girl sat down and looked at the ruined floor with a sad and lifeless expression. So many people with pure hatred for her, so little hope that she would ever see her friends again but if there was at least some that would be what Mana would be counting on.

"You're a woman… Sorry, a girl… In Agbarah? Are you suicidal?" a large man sitting in front of Mana's bench asked. He was a very large and bulky individual, couple of meters tall and lifted his fair share of boulders. His body was covered with scars and one of his eyes looked really creepy and messed up – must've been a battlefield wound. For someone like him to be really freaked out by her presence it must've been a really big deal.

"I'm a kunoichi actually… Was at least… I don't even know what I am anymore" Mana tried to calm him down a little but she ended up just confusing herself in the process.

"Oh… Didn't notice a headband on you… A kunoichi should've known not to venture into Agbarah Sheikhate" the man replied, he didn't really seem very hateful towards her, whatever ailed the common folk didn't seem to be as deep rooted as Mana initially thought.

"Yeah, I must've lost it, been through a lot these days…" she admitted, "I'm not from around, I wouldn't even know where I am if everyone wouldn't constantly remind me as if I committed some huge sin by coming here"

"Hasn't everyone?" the man asked, his tone was friendly, he didn't try to scold Mana for trying to imply that her burden was greater than everyone else's, he just tried to empathize with her and try to show her that the two were somewhat on the same boat and that they didn't have to be too distant from one another.

"What's the deal with this place anyways? Why does everyone hate me just because I'm a girl? I mean, if all girls and women are brought here or executed how does this place even stay on the map?" Mana asked the first thing on her mind. She really felt bad being hated by everyone around her for no reason at all, being hated just for the sake of hatred just didn't feel right for her and made her hate herself and feel down for no reason. Not one that made any sense anyways.

"Oh, this place isn't like a settlement or anything. It's a place people come to and leave, like an entertainment center, it's very unlike the other Sheikhates in that way" the large man shook his head and explained. The man continuously caressed several of his fingers on his left arm, upon a longer glare at them Mana saw that they were actually broken and swollen. Was this man going to fight too? He wasn't in a fighting condition…

"What's a Sheikhate? I thought Sunagakure was the only large cradle of civilization here and all the other settlements were just a couple of small portable tents and blocks" the girl asked trying to find out as much as she could from the man.

"Well, technically it's like a settlement of desert people but… It's hard to explain, the Land of Wind is unlike the other countries, before there were ninja here and Sunagakure was founded, there were the Sheikhs that split apart the riches and all the resources and the land of the desert to rule in their Sheikhates. I don't really wish to go into too much detail but some of those Sheikhates still remain in some shape or form and they have some political power too. They're almost like separate states of the Land of Wind and often times they hold the Wind Lord back as well. It's not a secret that the Kazekage wishes to remove the Sheikhs from their posts and unify the desert under the Wind Lord's rule, still, the place is too vast and too complicated to just place under a single Lord" the man explained. Mana leaned up closer to him, straining her chains as much as they could've been strained. His skin appeared to be quite dark, much darker than even hers, he may have not been from around either.

"Strange, I like to read history scrolls and legends and I may have come upon a term like that before but I don't recall hearing much about it" Mana scratched her chin confused before nodding her head down and letting it stay that way. So even as an amateur historian she still had things to learn.

"Well, you know… Not every little bit of information is found on a scroll, sometimes you have to leave the archive and travel a little" the man tried to crack a grin but he couldn't. Just a tiniest look at his face revealed the reason – he pitied Mana. He knew something that was going to happen, or at least thought he knew and he must've thought that it wasn't fair that such a fate would befall her.

"So, are we going to fight then? Is this like one of those gladiatorial arenas where people fight for money, like ones in Kumogakure?" Mana asked. The girl was not sure about how much time she exactly had, she may have had days, she may have had minutes. May as well find out all she could from this man as long as he feels generous with the information he knows.

"Something like that… This arena was actually built to mimic those in Kumogakure and it used to be just like them: people fighting for fun, entertainment and money, ninja and common folk, mercenaries even, no hits too brutal, no murder, just the art of combat at its finest. It used to be one of the best too once, ten or twenty years from now if you asked around – Agbarah Sheikhate was the best place to see some kickass fights and the Sheikh was a wicked manager. He knew all the right matchups and all the right recipes for an amazing match. That's how a place like this – an establishment could even stay on the map and relevant in the political scheme" the man kept on explaining, he then looked at his mangled hand and then back at Mana who, while banged up and clearly been through a lot, looked still quite young, frail and innocent, "Nowadays, you better remember your ninja days, but don't stand out too much, they'll kill you if they think your abilities give you unfair advantage and I don't think you are high ranked enough to take on the entire Sheikhate military force"

"I… I actually can't do any of those things anymore, I'm sorry if you relied on me or put hopes in me or anything. I don't think I'll be of much help to you in my current state" Mana looked away sadly.

"No, no, it's fine, I wouldn't be much of a warrior who travelled all the way from Kumogakure to compete in the amazing Agbarah Sun Disc arena all these years ago if I relied on a young lady to fight for me. I may be worn out by all these years of senseless murder but I will manage or die trying, either one is fine by me, it is the life I chose, the only one I know" the man smiled, so Mana's thoughts were correct – he was actually from Kumogakure, just like her ancestors may have been, that's why the magician had a slightly darker shade to her skin compared to her peers and such dark hair and those weird facial features that were more native to the Kumogakure folk.

"So you came here willingly? Why? It seems like a place one is cursed or banished to, not one people choose to live the rest of their days in" Mana wondered.

"Well, when I came here all those years ago, this place was still in its prime, shining, golden and mighty. Glory and strength emanated throughout these walls and there were no bars or chains to it. This place was once a fighting heaven for mercenaries or martial artists, low ranking Sunagakure ninja also trained here but it would've been unfair if the higher ranking ones applied so they didn't bother. Then one day… It happened" the man allowed his own head to sink down, just like Mana's has done quite a number of times, it appeared like the memories of that fateful day had plagued the man and invited darkness into his heart not quite unlike the one that being hatred for being born invited into Mana's.

"So what happened?" the magician hurried her newly met friend as he sat there for quite some time sulking in silence.

"The greatest fight the world has ever seen. You see, the Sheikh was and still is a fighting aficionado, he lives and breathes to see a good fight, a long fight between equal opponents and he had eye for talent and was always a good manager of this arena. He always matched equal fighters and knew how to extract the best out of them to deliver a fight unlike any other. That day he outdid not only himself but also the Gods. It was like the Gods themselves descended and took shape of the bodies of the fighters competing, they punched each other for the whole twelve hours, they fought on and on and on and exchanged blows with such grace and finesse… The Sheikh was in ecstasy and so was everyone else! I'm not sure if the fight was so divine and majestic due to the power of the two contestants or if it was so because of how equal they were in strength, it was the cream top of management and combat. The complete perfection" the man got so invested into his description and his tale that he failed to notice Mana's growing discomfort hearing about it.

"What's wrong? Do you hate fighting or something or are you just that afraid?" the veteran asked her trying to realize the true reason behind her disgust.

"Well, I suppose if it's purely a sporting event I see nothing wrong from it but… I hate killing, always have. For the longest time I held myself from fighting in general just because I was afraid of causing too much harm to people or that I'd kill them" Mana revealed the real reason. The man just spat aside and cursed in some strange dialect the magician did not know.

"Well then, girl, you truly are dead, I'm sorry. It seems you've found yourself in the worst place in the world to be a woman in without your ninjutsu and with hatred for violence… If you feel like you can just talk yourself out of here or try being smart, trust me, I've seen women try all the specter of the rainbow out in the arena to survive and only those that can kill did… For a while" the man's opinion of Mana appeared to deteriorate a little after that last revelation, just like everyone else's did. It must've been the combination of the facts he knew of her – the whole deal about Mana being a ninja yet refusing to kill… Just another person disliking her for someone Mana was deep inside.

"So why did that fight change this place so much? I mean if it's so amazing should it not have had the opposite effect?" Mana asked trying to see if the man would still even talk to her. He was a fighter after all, a warrior who looked for the best places to compete and display his skills in and she probably offended his entire way of life. As if she didn't have enough enemies, as if she didn't have enough reasons to hate herself, at least this one would make sense, at least this one would be actually caused by her and earned…

"Well, I suppose for a while it did, but you know what happens to a collector who finishes his collection – he goes insane. After that fight there was always something missing in the Sheikh's heart, he always wanted to satisfy that need to see a glorious fight once again and yet… He kept organizing fights one more crazy and mismatched than the other, he tried everything to recapture that moment until he killed his greatest contestants and almost ran this place into the ground, right now he's in the process of losing everything just for that thrill of seeing a good fight. Contestants are now more his slaves than anything else and these days he throws anything and anyone into the arena. All things considered, I'm not sure how no one thinks him mad, the place gathered the weirdest and the most messed up creeps in the whole ninja world now that it's known more for its bloodshed than honorable competition, the fighting experts and aficionados have long since left, the crazy bloodthirsty freaks are all that stick around" the man replied without a single hint of spite towards the girl, he didn't appear to feel offended and yet he still wore that pity for her soul just as proudly as he wore his warrior's pride.

"Huh… One thing doesn't make much sense though, why all the hate for women?" Mana wondered, "I thought the story of this place would involve a loss of a woman in the Sheikh's life and that would've lead him to this but… Everyone just appears to hate them for no reason"

"Women are just weak fighters in public opinion, I mean it isn't like we see many kunoichi here so that doesn't help either. The Sheikh hates them because they're useless in his eyes they cannot give him his perfect fight, the rest are just catching on to the wave. I suppose the guy thinks that if he kills all those women that come here in the arena they'll stop coming and stop wasting his time. Those few women that prove themselves in the arena are actually quite respected, not any less than any man would be. They don't hate you for what you were born like, they hate you because they think you're weak and won't put up a good fight before you die. Most women try to seduce, they try to escape, they try to trick or beg their way out and die dishonorably in the arena, very few bother fighting the dirty fight. Still, I believe the public opinion of this place outside Agbarah must be terrible, with so many women never returning from this place the talk of this place must be just as bad as it actually is" the man lowered his head.

"My name is Mana, what's yours?" the magician asked.

"It doesn't matter, it doesn't look like I'll be lasting another fight so it may be better if you don't get too attached, just see me as that old geezer that couldn't carry your weight but really hoped you'd walk as long as your frail legs let you" the veteran replied with a lukewarm expression and laid down turning at the wall. Seeing how before she was taken here it was not really even remotely late, Mana just assumed that the man didn't wish to talk any longer.


	156. Let the Games Begin

It was incredibly hard to tell the exact time of day inside the Sun Disc's living quarters. While the conditions were not exactly inhumane Mana still could not shake off the feeling that she was more of a prisoner than a competitor as the purpose of the place would've made one believe. While the quarters did have torches providing minimal light sources during the night and the outside corridors had decorative holes in the ceiling providing light and warmth during the day, the Sun Disc's inhabitants still could not shake off the feeling of dread and gloom.

Also despite the minimal effort taken to lighten the place up a bit, the decorative gaps in the ceiling also "provided" more than fair share of flies, mosquitoes and pests of various sort. Most things flying around the place were not even seen by Mana previously, even during her time roaming the desert. It appeared like the gloomy and damp hole that was the Sun Disc's living quarters invited the worst kind of creepy crawlies from the desert, the pests seemed to take the place as some sort of a cave, which, in their defense, it reminded of very decently.

Throughout the first night she spent in the place Mana had heard some voices of people talking inside the quarters. She had expected more hatred from those people, maybe even that matching of the people outside the Sun Disc but no one even acknowledged she was there. Most of what reached Mana's ear through the night were prayers, then there was the pair several blocks to the west that very loudly bet on who of known competitors would compete tomorrow and who would die. To Mana it appeared a very cruel and cynical way to look at the situation everyone was in.

"I feel lucky, I think Damij will compete tomorrow. Just feel crazy, wanna bet on that"

"No shit? Maybe you feel crazy enough to bet on Damij losing?"

"Screw that shit, whoever he'll fight the guy will demolish in seven minutes, as usual"

Mana looked at her blockmate who was still acting like he was sleeping. While there was little light any time of day, with enough effort day and night could've been identified through the changes in temperature. It appeared like the fire torches on the walls may have served more as a mean to keep the competitors from dying of hypothermia as well as being a source of lighting, perhaps even more being the case of former with the luminescence being more of a beneficial side effect.

"Who is Damij?" Mana asked trying to get her blockmate talking to her. Being sort of a fan of knowing every smallest part of the equation and preparing accordingly to her knowledge, the girl just had to know.

"Oh, he's just a crowd favourite. A dropout from the Sunagakure Ninja Academy, rumor says he quit because he didn't like taking orders from anyone and wanted to use his strength all to himself" the man replied squirming in the comically too small bench to sleep on, the man was several times larger than it so it must've been painfully uncomfortable to sleep on it.

"Doesn't sound like crowd favorite material…" Mana remarked flipping on her side to face her blockmate who did not share the courtesy and continued to stare at the wall.

The veteran raised his injured arm in the air showing the extent of damage on it, it was swollen and looked like it was crushed in between two colossal boulders or something of the sort.

"He's the one that did this a couple of weeks ago. There's an event in this place called "the Ascension Gauntlet" where one faces three champions of previous smaller events in a row and if they win they acquire unprecedented glory, the one that completes the Gauntlet may even leave the place at their leisure and live as royalty in the Agbarmahal – the Sheikh's palace. So far, Damij is the one of the only two who have beaten the gauntlet, I acquired this wound facing him in a warm-up event where killing is very rare. He did not throw a single punch, my hand and body broke from just punching him" the man explained placing his aching and ruined hand under his other arm.

"Sounds like chakra augmentation to me, endurance most likely" Mana replied, her blockmate flipped over and looked at her with a curious stare.

"Hmmm… Even if it is, the Sheikh knows the ninja arts, to him the degree of augmentation must appear somewhat fair so he allows it. Either way, you won't face him unless you attempt the Gauntlet yourself, he's too far up and the only event you can be matched against him in would be a warm up fight. Still, I have real trouble after facing him, every battle keeps crippling me more and more… If you are ever told to face off against him do not fight him, surrender immediately, you'll lose face but you have none to lose to begin with, I'm serious" the man warned Mana.

The magician smiled and shook her head.

"I'm sorry, Sir, but I have a mission outside this place. I very much plan to take the Ascension Gauntlet challenge" she replied through an ignorant grin. It was an idea so foolish that it made the girl herself laugh but she has decided. The more fights she takes part in, the more injured she'll be, her odds will be lower and lower with each event, she needs to run the Gauntlet and do it fast.

"Mana, did you not hear what I said? Why are you in such a rush to make all these people happy to witness your death? Damij can leave this place and live in luxury this whole time, he is the strongest fighter in this arena. He stays here because he enjoys fighting and killing, his fights always end in seven minutes where he just toys with his opponents and the only reason the Sheikh keeps him around with all of his abilities is because the crowd loves his sadism. He did not join this arena during its golden age, he joined it when it hit the shit because he wanted a place to kill people for fun" Mana veteran blockmate started yelling, shouting at her with fear taking over his expression, his hands and his head started to shake subconsciously as if taken over by some mental sickness.

"You lie, Bult" a creepy voice of what Mana could only imagine as an elderly man reached the cell. "Damij is not the strongest fighter around, he is amazing but you've joined too late to see another competitor…"

"Do not listen to this old fool, Mana" Mana's blockmate who was apparently called Bult replied to the old man's mysterious banter. "He weaves tales of old times, a man who survived the golden age and became far too sickly and old to entertain the Sheikh so was left to rot in the cell until he becomes stupid enough to ask for a final fight. His Goddess of Battle does not exist, old man's tales is all they are"

"She did exist, she was the first person to complete the Gauntlet, she beat all the other champions without killing them and left the arena to continue her training as this place had nothing left to teach her" the old man screamed out frantically, like a child whose lies of the world most ginormous lollipop was challenged by another child.

"So there was a woman who completed the Gauntlet?" Mana curiously rose her voice so that it reached the old man wherever he was located. "What was she like?" the magician honored the old man's fantasies both out of curiosity if they were real, and an attempt to uncover a lie if they weren't.

"She was a friendly gal when she joined, she came here totally green and didn't know how to throw a punch even. She made bonds with everyone, learned the fighting style of every single one of the competitors of the golden age. She bested me in combat a couple of times as well, by the time she became the first champion of the Ascension Gauntlet she was a master of at least eighty six different martial arts from all around the world, then she left…" the old man spoke, his tone suggested that he really believed his own tale and he had a talent at storytelling, that much Mana had to admit.

"To never be seen again. So convenient that there is no one alive here to vouch for the story except for you" Bult once again angrily stopped the old man's tale.

"Could it be that you refuse to believe in her existence because it would imply that you didn't lose to the best? Because your pride as a warrior wants you to believe that you've lost to the greatest competitor to ever fight in this arena?" Mana asked.

"The old man never confirmed that she was capable of chakra augmentation, he only babbled about how many different martial arts she knew. I thought I knew my way in a fight but Damij blew me out of the park with no chance of me beating him, even in my prime, even with all the time to train in the world I'd never beat him!" Bult yelled at Mana, shifting the source of his anger. The old man fell strangely silent and Mana just bent into an even tighter fetal position wrapping herself in her own blazer which she used as a cover from cold.

"This Damij certainly seems formidable, any man who is able to crush a warrior like you this way must be. I've met plenty warriors, hell, I've known mere boys and seen the extent of a man's pride and I've never seen it shattered like that. You seem like a man who is afraid of this Damij, this entire place lives in his shadow. That is just another reason I must beat him. The object above your head must be a star of hope, not the moon of fear and despair" Mana said quietly so that only her blockmate could hear it. She spoke so privately because she knew the sort of feeling a man's pride was and didn't wish to let the others know how her friend's pride was broken. Just the mere public knowledge of such fact could've made it even worse.

"You don't know jack shit about how this world works. You'll just die needlessly entertaining the sick fantasies of those bastards. Even if you do win, all you'll show me is that I failed at something a teenage girl can do. For one who tries to sound as some stupid hero you don't know anything about it" Bult replied with spite and disgust in his voice. He then continued to lay around, several other fighters from the other blocks yelled at him asking for his input in the bet as to who will fight the next day but he remained silent.

Mana didn't have that much sleep that night, for a day that may have ended up being her last she should have at the very least tried. The magician couldn't remember her last dream, she was a very sentimental kid, imagining the moment of her death she would most likely wish to callback at the very last time she saw her friends, the last time she saw her parents, the very last thing she dreamed about. Somehow she just couldn't shake the feeling like the next day actually could've been her last day. To the kunoichi it felt similarly to how one would feel the last night before their execution and yet there was little to no reasonable excuse to feel that way.

Finally loud trumpet calls and sounds of various instruments, mostly the deafening symphony of flutes and other wind instruments called the spectators to another day of events. Judging from everyone's mood the day appeared to be a case of rather eventful collection of slaughter. All the martial artists were getting really visibly hyped as grunts and other noises of people working out and sparring could've been heard. Loud thuds from a neighboring block suggested that someone there may have been hitting the wall leaving some nasty cracks in the thick brick wall.

Then all of a sudden silence took over as the guards walked in and started making their way through the hallway. One bulky fellow just stood at the end of the corridor and read from a list.

"Today's event will be Fatal Warfare match, between Bult and Almash. Also three simple Engagement matches between competitors that shall be selected by the guards. Everyone please step forward towards the bars where the competitors competing today shall be lead onstage, the blocks will be unlocked for the duration of the event so that you can spectate the event through the lower points of observation. You know the rules, if anyone does anything stupid, it's public execution or the Descent Gauntlet for you" the guard finished reading his scroll and continued to stand around as the guards continued to pick fighters one after the other from random blocks.

"Descent Gauntlet?" Mana curiously looked at her blockmate.

"It's basically another word of execution, the fighter faces people one by one until they are either killed in action or the Sheikh deems they've redeemed for their sins, the only upside of winning it is that you don't get executed for your mess-up" the man replied, his tone was still rude and his eyes continued to look at Mana as if she was some silly child.

"A Fatal Warfare match, are you in any danger?" Mana asked the man trying to show him that she cares about his life greatly.

"It's just a simple one on one fight where the area out of the ring is filled with spikes. You win by making your opponent submit, killing them or dropping them onto the spikes" Bult replied.

"Maybe you should submit, I don't think you're in a good condition for a match like that" Mana threw the idea out there to which the man only squinted, appearing to get annoyed by her lack of information even more. It was quite evident that the man was a warrior and not exactly parenting material.

"I've submitted in several lethal matches and lost four non-lethal ones before my last win. If I submit again I may be up for a Descent Gauntlet, it functions as a sort of disciplinary action to keep things entertaining" the man firmly cut Mana's worries down, the elderly guard from before appeared in front of their block and opened the door. He chained Bult and then stared at Mana showing her a set of chains as well.

"The Sheikh wants to see his new fighter in a warm-up match. Feel grateful, woman, usually the baptism of the newbies is a full out Deathmatch but that is the Sheikh's way of thanking you for securing most of his merchandise. Let's go" the man explained locking Mana up and pulling both of them out of the block and placing them into a long line of people of varied moods. Some were depressed, some looked hyped, there were a couple of women up front that kept on walking out of the line and trying to talk to the other competitors, asking them for protection or some sort of aid.

Mana opened her mouth to talk to the guard but Bult pressed her mouth nearly suffocating her with his enormous hand. "You haven't earned your right to talk as a woman yet…" he whispered in his ear.

"Excuse me, guard, I'd like to know who my blockmate's opponent will be?" the veteran asked a passing guard instead of Mana, almost reading her thoughts. The question must've been quite obvious one to be asked in her case so it wasn't that surprising to the magician that he pinpointed it without needing to tell him what it was she wanted to ask the guard.

"Gaffu Mujaji" the guard answered checking his scroll.

"It's OK, he's an underdog, lost several non-lethal fights in a row and submitted in one lethal he took part in, he may be facing the Descent Gauntlet or a no submission lethal fight in the future. If you're able to fight, you'll beat him easily" Bult explained to Mana.

"Yeah, it'd be a whole new low for good old Gaffu to lose to a little woman" the competitor behind Mana and Bult interrupted the two and laughed out loud to himself. "I always wondered why did the guy decide to take part in this, always seemed to me more like a thieving type than a fighter"

Mana lowered her head staring at the ground. So the man she was supposed to face was someone really weak facing disciplinary action in the future? What was the point of such a fight then? How was it entertaining to anyone to see a teenage girl fight some guy who kept on losing fights, what was the possible gain from all of that? Mana did not deny that a competition of martial arts had its appeal to some people, not her, obviously, but people who saw the more artsy and professional side of the thing. And yet, what was there to gain from facing some little guy like this Gaffu? Mana felt confident that she could beat him but what was the point of such an action?

Finally the crowd settled in the surrounding seating areas and with a loud rumble that reminded more of a thunderstorm than working gears the roof of the arena split into multiple parts and a large circular structure which was supposed to be the ring rose up from below. Mana felt a rough shove from her behind that was leading her onto a track that lead to the ring. The entire structure of the ring was at least fifty or so meters in radius and about two meters elevated from the ground, the out of ring area was covered with grass but it looked a bit artificial for Mana. There were two pathways that lead to the ring and multiple protective walls that served as barriers, the observational areas were at least three meters above the ring and surrounded it from all sides. There were countless decorations that reminded Mana of some sort of a festival and as she and her opponent entered the ring fireworks fired off into the sky.

The girl took a long look at her opponent. He was a feeble man, probably in his late forties to early fifties and was already beginning to grow bald, he even had a pair of glasses and reminded the girl of an alien from the sci-fi plays where people tried to imagine how people on the Moon looked like. He had long fingers which finally made the kunoichi understand just how the comparison to thieves was made. The ring announcer actually looked more menacing than Mana's opponent. The man was at least somewhat chubby and wore a pretty exotic looking vest and some pretty spacious trousers. His turban combined with his strange make-up made him look a little mysterious at the very least when compared to feeling of pity one had when looking at Gaffu who was Mana's opponent.

"Ladies and Gentlemen! This here is a warm up fight between a young woman who has not yet deserved your consideration and attention and a competitor who is on a miserable losing streak but strives to recover and one day challenge the Ascension Gauntlet to fulfil his dream of living in luxury – Gaffu Mujaji" the announcer energetically yelled out, the man appeared to possess a unique talent of hyping up a crowd of bloodthirsty psychos for a fight between an aging man with sight problems and a teenage girl.

"Begin!" the announcer yelled out leaping backwards onto a platform that rose him up to the audience seats with a gear mechanism below it.

The warm up fight of that day's event had begun.


	157. Mamoru'ing One's Pride

Mana's slick opponent leapt forward without wasting any time, right after the announcer declared the beginning of the battle. He weaved around and jumped like some exotic animal or someone trying to keep as little contact with the ground as he could. It looked similar to some of the larger desert animals that Mana has seen, there was this rather peaceful species of desert foxes that leapt around much like this man did so that they did not injure their flesh covered feet pads during the peak of the day on the scolding desert sand. It only made sense that an inhabitant of the desert would fight similarly to the animals he saw around him.

That being said, his style was sloppy, he wasted so many movements that Mana found the man's hopping and weaving style absolutely useless. She knew what he was doing – trying to intimidate Mana, try to dodge blows that weren't even coming yet, trying to show her how fast and experienced he supposedly was when in reality he must've been pretty shaken up himself. If Mana just stood calmly she'd have winded the man out without flicking her finger. Gaffu jumped around her, running and leaping, flipping even. By the time he tried his first punch his body was already strained and winded.

Mana's body moved instantly, as far as human standards were concerned at least, she ducked under the man's punch and shot her leg backwards hitting the man in his shin. The showy fighter fell down nose first into the rocky tiles breaking his nose in a rather painful upwards direction. Breaking one's nose like that made one's eyes water making further fighting quite impossible, the fight was over as far as Mana was concerned, not that it had ever began. This man was not a fighter, he looked built more for thieving, he was slick, acrobatic, could certainly move around and lean his body in flexible ways.

"What is this!?" someone in the public screamed out in anger.

"This is pathetic, Sheikh-sama, execute this fool, getting beaten by a young woman, of all things! He always loses, he has no honour or skill!" another one screamed out.

"You're a shame to the Sun Disc, Gaffu!" countless more yelled in perfect sync as if they were actually rehearsing this shaming process.

Mana turned at the Sheikh, he sat under colossal constructions of palm tree leaves that gave him ample shade and he was surrounded by strangely dressed women that wore revealing outfits on the lower parts of their bodies and yet shrouded their faces and wore turbans despite their long dark hair slipping down through them. These oddly dressed women used large fans to cool the large man.

The Sheikh looked quite impressed and surprised, the thing that scared the magician most of all was that he was staring right at her like she was his long lost niece or something. Mana's sight quickly shifted back at the face-planted enemy who continued to writhe in pain on the ground and try to get back in fighting shape, that is to say restrain his wild nosebleed and to make his eyes stop watering like he had just been slapped in the face with the spiciest chili.

The girl would've been a fool not to notice the hatred and utter disgust that the Sheikh had while staring at Gaffu, his eyes appeared to spit flames of hell while the man's arms were shaking. The Sheikh was a well-built but quite elderly gentleman so his emotions were easily noticed even by Mana, someone who was giving him glances from several meters below. The Sheikh wore a very fancy desert cloak that had multiple gold and gem pieces attached to it around the man's neck, on his belt and the middle section of his arms.

"Get back up and continue the fight or give up, Gaffu!" the Sheikh declared after raising his hand covered in rings with gems larger than a man's eyeball. Rubies, emeralds and sapphires shined in all the various colours as the famished desert sunlight danced inside them, devouring all of them in its all covering and scorching light.

"Damn it, I won't lose this one, not with my life and honor at stake…" Gaffu yelled out powering through his broken nose and wiping his tears, while a momentary solution it impressed Mana that the man had the sheer willpower to go on where most men would have given up.

Gaffu leaped forward, jumping back and forth, trying to blitz around Mana only to leap back to his initial position, he kept on trying to confuse Mana with his speedy movements but the girl's eye, that was trained to track superhuman ninja, kept up. Not only that, to Mana this fight seemed quite hopeless. She merely wanted to test her opponent's skill with that last kick and she ended up almost taking him out, now she'll take him out for sure.

The man screamed angrily telegraphing his attack, a pity since he tried to hit Mana from behind, kicking her right at the back of her head, a connecting kick like that could have killed a person. Mana's body turned around lightning fast, her body was trained by her friends, ready to survive the superhuman attacks of ninja, knowing the best counters and redirection maneuvers. The brunt of the girl's foot connected to Gaffu's leg stopping the blow and with a strong push shoving it backwards, opening his body.

A barrage of kicks overwhelmed Gaffu's body making the man quiver and shake, his body twitched without a halt as if it was bombarded by automated fire. For a human it was as fast as attacks went. The magician was sure that she broke ribs, left internal bleeding wound and kicked him in the head a couple of times, finishing with a jumping stomp at the man's solar plexus that not only crushed his body to the floor but also drove all the oxygen out from his body making him overcome by pain and winded. Attacks like this caused pain and shock strong enough to stop hearts of weaker people and for a moment the magician wondered if this was overdoing it, she expected the man to deal with some attacks at the very least.

This was bad, usually Mana just went with all of her skills, all of her abilities and didn't hold back unless she fully meant to. Her opponents deal with some if not all of her offensive barrages making them get hurt but never too badly, this man was so unskilled in terms of hand to hand that he just got crushed and tired himself out too much by his own attacks before having to defend. Mana was beginning to feel bad…

"Stop the fight" she asked the announcer looking at the pathetic ball of pain and misery that was down on the floor in front of her. Some people in the public were beginning to cheer for her, once again, the Sheikh's look was absolutely overblown, the man was on the edge of his seat licking his lips and enjoying the show. Everything that she was told of this place was true – it loved combat and martial arts skill most of all. There was no money, no fame or glory other than that earned through one's fists and that disgusted the magician to no end. There were people in this world that weren't bad people per se, people that found pleasure and self-discovery through combat and while the girl could begin to understand them she despised such a way of life herself and felt disgusted by the fact it was forced on people who may not have wanted it.

Gaffu stood up, slowly, peeling his ruined body off the ground he took the fighting stance.

"I cannot stop the fight if the contestant wishes to continue" the announcer shrugged. His filthy and smug face covered with makeup disgusted Mana, he was almost smiling while stroking his beard, he was taking pleasure in all of this, seeing a man getting ruined.

"Stay down!" Mana screamed at her opponent angrily. "If I kick you in the face once more – you'll die, if I kick you in the body once more your ribs will skewer your body from inside. Stay down!"

"I can't, this is the only way to achieve anything in this place… If I lose now I may as well place my head on the chopping block…" Gaffu's messed up face somehow spat out. Mana angrily lifted her hand up she was not going to take part in any of this.

Gaffu leaped up to her, she could've punched him, kicked him, elbowed him right in his almost blinded from all the blood running down it and unprotected face but that may have killed him in the state that he was in. She let him hit her but to her surprise he didn't – he placed his bloody hand to her lips.

"Don't you dare surrender…" he declared. Mana's eyes shot wide in surprise but then she understood – that was not the way that pride was earned in this place. If she surrendered like this everyone would know that she did so out of pity and there was nothing that asked for execution or the Descent Gauntlet more than being pitied by a woman in a battlefield.

"Pride… Rituals that are made by humans to be followed by other humans… So stupid, all of it…" Mana thought to herself as she lowered her head, Gaffu must've understood that she got it, she got his point but now the girl was wondering what exactly was there for her to do. She couldn't fight him further, this man was hesitant to rise above the ordinary folk, he wished to make something of his life and the only way to do that was to succeed in the Sun Disc. The only way to enter the high layers of society was to win the Ascension Gauntlet and this man wanted it, hell, even Mana wanted the Gauntlet for her own freedom.

She couldn't fight him nor could she surrender. If she fought him he wouldn't surrender until she either killed him or made him pass out, while entirely possible, Mana didn't want to make the man get knocked out either. If she won right now the man's only options would've been the Descent Gauntlet, execution or a lethal match and if he got messed up by Mana his hopes of surviving either would've been next to none. This man was only living in the here and now, his future mattered little to him.

"Can I kill him?" Mana asked the announcer giving the man an angry glare.

"Well, not really, not in a warm-up match but… In this case… He is a very reckless and foolish one and also a trash, feel free if you can, woman… If he loses he'll probably get thrown out like a trash which he is anyways…" the announcer shrugged looking at the Sheikh for confirmation, the Sheikh just nodded. He kept staring at Mana, she must've revealed some degree of skill in her taijutsu to him. Even as a human she could've bested even master martial artists due to her lifelong training and experience fighting on the higher level, she trained her body to avoid or redirect any blow opening even the most powerful martial artists for finishing blows. The Sheikh must've noticed her exceptional skill…

"Come at me, trash… I'll kill you where you stand" Mana declared looking him in the eyes angrily, "I'll save you the embarrassment from getting killed in a lethal match or the Gauntlet and end you right now, it'll probably also give me some public points too"

Gaffu quivered, he hesitated for a moment seeing Mana's newly discovered and, to be honest quite faked and bluffing, bloodthirst. Still, he took a fighting stance and forced his body to run at her, he no longer hopped around – his legs were busted up, he didn't flip or roll around as his brain was shaken up inside his tough skull making him move pretty pathetically and stumble over endlessly. A single tap from her elbow to his nose would've put him to sleep…

Gaffu punched Mana straight in the face making her fall down on the ground. It appeared like the feeble man couldn't believe his own luck, this young lady continuously and effortlessly dodged even his most confusing and fastest patterns and yet she got hit by his desperate stumbling and pathetic hit? The man looked at Mana who didn't move, the girl just kept on laying on the ground with her eyes closed and her head turned to the side, her body looked completely lifeless. The announcer crept up to her and felt Mana's pulse.

"She's… Alive but… Her breathing is slow and pretty feint, the fight is over, Gaffu wins!" the chubby gent declared loudly making the crowd cheer but not in joy but in confusion. None of them could understand what was going on, why did this loser pull out a win despite getting absolutely trounced the entire time? How could this have been?

"I can't believe it, a loser like Gaffu pulled a win like that?" one man in the public spoke to his fellow to the left.

"Yeah… This woman appeared to be quite good, her moves were so fluid and quite unlike any other martial arts I've ever seen… I wonder where she's from?" his friend replied just as confused.

"Who cares, she's a dumb woman who got taught a lesson, she may have trained her entire life but she lost even to the weakest of men! What a disgrace, if I was the Sheikh I'd hack her head off right about now" another man in the public laughed out.

"Or maybe this Gaffu guy is better than we all thought, he overcame so much in this battle and won it with a single punch…" yet another person wondered butting into the conversation.

"Oh, come on! We all know women can't compete with men, how hard could it have been to knock her out!?" a response came from somewhere in the public.

All of the conversants laughed out to themselves wildly. They were planning to have quite the day and even this first battle proved to be much more entertaining than they thought. Who could've thought that a hatchling woman facing off against the outsider of the entire roster of fighters could've made for such an entertaining and controversial fight? Maybe this Gaffu deserved to be given another shot?

"You're an idiot!" Bult yelled out shaking Mana violently after her body was taken back to the waiting area, "Who did you think you were fooling?"

"I couldn't keep it up, that man wouldn't have quit, he'd have died before giving up and if I knocked him out I'd have sentenced him to death as well, whether it'd have been by an executioner or someone in the Gauntlet matters very little…" Mana replied "miraculously" recovering from her incapacitation and wiping the several drops of blood that the man's puny punch drew from her nose. The man barely even packed a punch, just wildly swinging his arm and using his shoulder as the delivering force of the punch instead of transferring it from his feet like a proper fighter.

"So you did it to buy this man some time? How long do you think it'll be before he'll once again fall to the bottom of the list? What do you think your own standing is right now!? I'd be surprised if your next match wasn't a Slaughterfest match" the fighter veteran scratched the back of his head giving Mana a troubled look, similar to a look of a father of a kid who did bad but didn't understand just how bad her behaviour was.

"Slaughterfest?" Mana wondered looking at her blood covered hands and using the washing bucket to clean it up. She looked at the side to a bunch of fighters carrying Gaffu around and swinging him around like a hero, he must've looked like one to them.

"It's not an actual match, it's a term we use, sometimes the Sheikh sets up his matches so that the odds are so uneven that it's basically a de facto execution, that's what we call a "Slaughterfest"…" the man sighed and stroke his forehead.

Mana looked at the other fighters who were pointing fingers at her, acting out her fainting act and laughing at her. She couldn't even begin to imagine how much they must've hated her now, before they just hated her for her assumed uselessness, now she lost to one of the weakest fighters in the roster. She actually expected to be placed in a lethal match against someone amazing next even if she didn't quite know the term of such a match while she was planning it.

"Hey? Aren't you next?" a bulky man with a strange rubber helmet yelled out at his friend.

"Oh, it seems so!" the friend replied in a tone that suggested mockery and a playful act.

"Watch out and don't walk into a wall…" the first one warned his friend playfully. "Those are known to kill hundreds of weakling women per year!"

"Oh no, the wind is so strong… I can't take it!" the other sarcastically yelled out in a mocking and feminine voice before pathetically acting a falling down act. Mana lowered her head and then looked away.

"This is just the beginning… You've earned this, this is your place now" Bult said with a hint of sadness and a little care behind his voice.

"I know, I've made a conscious decision, I couldn't give up or hurt him too badly, either way it'd have been the death sentence for that man. I wanted to buy him some time, to give him some hope" Mana exclaimed sadly, grinding her teeth in pain. She couldn't really do it, great heroes she read about in stories could just take hatred, they didn't care when they were being made fun of and hated everywhere, when they were abused and mistrusted. Mana wasn't like that. Still, Bult was right to some extent – it was an unavoidable part of her decision and she knew it. She now embodied the label of a weak young woman that everyone had already stuck to her before they even saw her fight.

"Time? Hope? What for? What does that weakling need time or hope for?" Bult still tried to talk Mana out of her stupid thoughts and strange decision making.

"Just enough time before I beat the Ascension Gauntlet and free him, free everyone" Mana answered. Bult turned around and walked away, he said nothing but his silence already told Mana everything – he left her alone to her own stupidity. The gesture was clear – Bult did everything in his power to help Mana but she refused his aid again and again, choosing to stick to her ideals instead. She was now beyond the man's help so he left her alone, it was the equivalent of him washing his hands.

For a moment Mana herself started to believe that she may have simply been wrong, that there was no more hope or time left to buy. Her next following match would quite likely be a lethal match, she would need to kill someone to leave the arena. How could she possibly do something like that? She was destined for death now so she needed to somehow outsmart the system, if she played by the rules she'd burn…

Mana needed to do something desperate and really cool, cool enough to impress the Sheikh.


	158. Fatal Warfare

Mana couldn't keep on looking long after the next fight started. She wasn't even sure about what she should've done next. The person she was trying to become would've busted in and stopped all the fighting, right now out there in the arena there were people trying to kill each other. But was Mana that person really? She was never anyone special and now she'd lost even what little special that she had. What was her plan actually? Maybe Bult was right about everything, she spoke a lot of things about peace and saving everyone but she didn't even know the further course of action.

"Come on, let's go…" a guard rudely grabbed Mana from behind and dragged her down from the small stand where she could almost see the people bashing their faces in inside the arena.

"Go? Go where?" she mumbled out, her voice was still muffled and ridden with confusion and stress.

"You've had your chance to earn a nice place to spend your nights in. You've squandered that so you're being moved to the basement. We're moving some new folks, Damij's crew into your cell. After today it'll clean up…" the guard replied caring little that Mana dared to speak.

"Clean up?" Mana spoke but the guard slammed her to the wall warning her without a word that his brief explanation was as good as she would get without pushing it too far.

What could that have meant? Why would her and Bult's cell clean up after that day, she was alive and so was Bult until the fight concluded. Something must've been wrong, something shady must've been going on. Bult's hand was busted up and his entire body was riddled with scars of various sizes but he was a long time veteran and normally shouldn't be counted out unless…

"He's being slaughterfest'ed…" Mana realized. She turned back after the realization hit her but the guard started pushing her even move violently. Whatever little decency she had before was now gone after she lost to an underdog of the roster. Mana's body and mind was taken over by a new sensation – fear and not knowing what to do. Her normal human body was working so slowly, thinking so slowly and shaking like a leaf. A ninja thought fast, acted fast, everything in their bodies, even the signals in their brains were supercharged. Being how she was made Mana feel like she had a mental condition or something.

"What are you, having a panic attack or something? Don't worry, the fighting is over for today, you get to live another day… Not that you tried too hard to earn it, though" the grumpy guard replied laughing half-assedly after that last remark. "Those moves were pretty sick, what were you a dancer maybe?" the man asked but Mana didn't reply, she knew better than to speak in her current standing with the guards and the roster.

The new cell she was shut in was pitch dark, moist and rather cold. If one was troubled too much by the desert heat there was some solace in this dark cube of containment but it did its best to completely limit all the other senses. Mana didn't even doubt that she'd go blind after a spending some time in that pitch blackness surrounded by silence so quiet that after some time her own mind started imagining screeching noises just to make sense of it all. Finally something above started leaking, drops of cold but smelly water from above entertained her fleeing mind at least for several moments.

Mana wrapped into a ball grabbing hold of her head, trying to keep her mind intact. There was a conflict once again between what had to be done and what Mana wanted to do. Just like every time she did anything, Mana was forced to choose between her mission objective and what she had to do to become the person she wanted to end up being. Mana's mission was clear – help her team confirm the Box's location, even while she was separated from the team, if they were OK – they'd find her eventually, all she had to do was sit tight.

That being said, she didn't have the luxury to sit tight, even if the magician could've used her newly learned defensive taijutsu styles to survive as long as she had to, beat any martial artist that the arena threw her way she couldn't do that. Bult was a kind man, a warrior soul who may have been very different from her: rude, combat loving and primitive but he was a kind person as well. He helped her and looked out for her in every way he could. He'd get murdered out there today, Mana didn't know when or how but he was being set up for a slaughterfest. Could she really sit tight and just do everything she could to survive? Beat up a bunch of people and gain respect? If she was anything like these men she could've even made a living here, be respected and gain fame and trust… No, Mana couldn't do that.

Even if she decided to do something stupid, something she'd likely regret, what exactly could she have done to help her friend? She was locked in a cube of solid steel, bound by chains and located underground in a catacomb below meters of sand. Mana stood up and slowly tumbled up to one side of the cube she was locked up in slamming her heavy hands against the hard steel wall.

"I really miss my magic shows…" she thought to herself.

"And now, finally, the event of the day – our beloved veteran Bult, the Bare-Hand Axeman faces off against the Asura Berserker, Basher of Faces, the Bare-Chested Rampager – Almash!" the announcer was having a field day presenting the main event of the day to the public.

"Raising the stakes even more, just to make it that more interesting our beloved Sheikh-sama has decided that the two would be facing off in a Fatal Warfare match so if the engineers below would be so kind as to set up the arena…" the man yelled out loud pointing his finger at the artificially grown grass below that already had some teeth and blood scattered loosely over it. Loud screeching followed and grinding noises announced that the needed levers were being turned as the ground plates with grass were set on flames singing everything off leaving just bare steel plates. After several moments bloodied and rusty spikes shot out through holes surrounding the arena in deadly field, each spike at least as large as a short person.

"Introducing the first contestant who needs no introduction or tales to be spun about his feats as they would not serve him justice, the legendary icon of the Sun Disc arena and the Agbarah Hero we all grew up with – Bult!" the announcer yelled out as the platform slowly moved from the circular structure of the arena up to the small quarters were the waiting contestants were housed forming a sort of bridge for the contestants to enter through. Slowly Bult made his way over the bridge, he didn't even bother to look at the sides, his stature was slightly hunched as his entire body ached, he hasn't completely recovered from his previous wounds and he also managed to gather an impressive collection of scars over the years. The man pressed his busted up hand tightly to his chest. Bult survived many matches like this, countless more lethal matches, if he was to die that day he would've left this world seeing it some sort of repentance for the sins and lives he had claimed over the years in this arena.

"And now, the newest addition to Damij's crew, the man with one of the most impressive winning streaks – the bare-chested berserker who was found surrounded by desert raiders with the flesh, skin and guts of his captors in his nails and his teeth, the Tearing Scorn of the Desert – Almash!" the announcer spat out squirts of slobber in his impressive immersion into his tale of the man's abilities, on the other side of the arena another platform extended to the other side of the arena's living quarters, another, much more luxurious living quarters. After the sandstone gate rumbled and open only loud foot taps to the stony bridge could've been heard for a moment and then… He appeared.

Almash was a rather short man, certainly entire head shorter than the bulking yet hunched Bult. His skin was white as young cheese implying he may not have been from around the place. The man certainly fit his label of a "bare-chested berserker" as he didn't choose to wear absolutely anything, usually the fighters were allowed to keep their clothes and once they killed someone they had the right to claim them from the corpses of their opponents. If even half of the tales describing the man were correct he should've had at least a shirt to cover his scarred iron-hard chest.

The man's eyes were as wild as a raging storm, they scurried around the arena looking at the observers, then moving onto the Sheikh's corners and freezing by the women surrounding the Sheikh. The man's nose moved slightly, just enough to remind of a brief twitch of his nose but not yet distinctly enough to be seen by the observers in the crew. "Almonds… Bitches reek of almonds…" he mumbled under his own nose proceeding to slowly move forward. He did not just walk, he moved in a fashion that reminded a deadman being brought back to life, dragging his feet, twitching and turning a full three-sixty before resuming his ghoulish proceedings to the arena. His hands and legs were cuffed but the chains were torn so the man now wore his cuffs and the torn chains like an accessory. His wild red hair moved wherever the wind took them, long enough to reach his knees but looking so natural. The man's rugged facial hair implied that he tore the excess out with his own fingernails, his whole face was covered with nail scratches that further proved such theories.

Upon walking out in the center of the stage Almash simply roared into the air tensing up all of his body letting his wild yet not yet pretentious level muscles intimidate the people in the crowd, this was not the battlecry of a man, it was the roar of a wild beast who probably still ate dead people for breakfast. Then Almash cracked his knuckles and locked his hands around his chest and stretched his neck around. In an instant he switched from reminding a wild animal to almost looking human-like and well civilized. He must've been an individual who switched from civil to crush-your-head-with-bare-hands mode in the blink of an eye. Must've been the trait that Damij liked in this brute.

"I really don't envy Bult… That Almash guy is pretty wild, remember how he killed four people in the Battle Royale last week? I can handle a good fisticuffs but it always looks like Almash just doesn't understand what's going on and murders everyone on a whim" someone in the public spoke to his neighbor to the left.

"Don't forget who you're talking about, this is Bult, he's been beating people up and killing them for years. He's a living legend, a survivor, if nothing else. He's got experience on his side and it is something I am willing to bet for" a man with a Kirigakure headband replied, it appeared like the Sun Disc arena attracted even ninja to look at the skill of martial artists who barely were even acquaintances of the chakra augmentation arts.

"Remember that this match is a lethal match! You win by killing your opponent be it inside the arena or impaling them on the spikes outside, just falling on the spikes does not constitute a loss, don't repeat Wenid's mistake… Heh, heh… Begin!" the announcer declared before cringing into his own fist, remembering an event when a Fatal Warfare contestant was thrown outside the ring and impaled on the spikes but climbed back into the ring and snapped the neck of his opponent as the man was too engaged in prideful boasting to the public.

Both contestants lunged at each other, Bult knew that this youngling was faster, more ferocious and possibly, all his injuries in mind and all, just as strong so he decided to go on the offensive and not let his opponent press his advantages on. He remembered how the young kunoichi he met fought and just barely resisted the temptation to curse. In this situation a defensive approach would've suited him ill, he needed to clash with all he had and not let his enemy dictate the terms because he could afford no more scars or broken bones.

The two clashed, exchanging fists, the single working arm of Bult's functioned almost like an automated rifle pounding a couple of times per single second. Each of these blows carried enough force to shatter rocks and yet Almash just caught them in his own palm slowly letting Bult drive the red haired brute back almost to the edge of the arena. It was then that Almash's body blurred and disappeared, the dark skinned veteran's eyes opened wide as his body quickly tried to turn around – this was chakra augmentation!

A powerful blow to his back made Bult scream out in pain, the blow was so strong that his entire back area where Almash elbowed him felt numb, it was like heated needles pierced his entire back channeling electricity – his spine must've been hit pretty badly as some nerves were acting weird. Bult's weightless frame disappeared as it fell down to the spikes below. Almash raised his hands into the air and roared with pride once again before turning at the spot where he saw his opponent weightlessly drop down like a sack of potatoes.

A collection of fingers still clutched to the arena. A deafening roar of pain and a man doing all he could do to survive made the entire audience cheer and deafen the entire settlement as the public went wild – Bult pulled his entire hulking frame up to the edge and got back onto the arena.

"You're treading dangerous ground, Almash…" Bult huffed out, "If the Sheikh decides that your augmentation is cheating he'll Slaughterfest you…"

Almash did not reply, he merely smiled with a sadistic grin, Bult could not understand why would his opponent risk it. He probably could've evaded that blow without using chakra augmentation, the veteran wasn't even aware that the man even knew chakra augmentation to begin with.

"Damn that Damij… He must be teaching his crew. Soon he may start dictating all the terms, do a total takeover of the arena" Bult continued to huff, his back pain made him twist and bend it to a very uncomfortable extent. As a former mercenary he knew that strategy – at some point in the future Damij is planning to take over using his crowd of trained fighters, assembling only those he deemed elite and tutoring them in chakra augmentation. The old and idiotic Sheikh would not see it coming and his army would have trouble keeping up, the Kazekage would definitely approve of it as well…

Bult couldn't believe that his opponent was letting him get a breather, suddenly the man remembered that his plan was to press his offensive on and now he took a hit that almost killed him and just barely was too weak to completely paralyze him. This plan was not working, holding back and defending would not work either. Slowly the veteran was running out of options.

"Come now, you were trying to press on your advantage. Show me your famed "Bare-Fist Axe Handle" slam that you're known for… Oh wait, Damij broke your arm, didn't he?" Almash kept on speaking, Bult roared into the air and dashed wildly at his opponent, the hulking brute spun around a full three-sixty driving his functional arm into a backhand slam at his opponent.

"Bare-Fist Axe, One-Handed Variant!" Bult chanted out the name of his attack as the public started to get off their feet to cheer for their favorite. After all, while Bult may have been on a losing streak lately he was still quite legendary and many fans of the arena have seen him perform his moves since they were young.

Before the crowd could even jump up and cheer Almash slammed his hands at the middle section of Bult's functional arm and drove his knee at Bult's elbow snapping the man's arm and forcing the bone to shoot out and fire off a wild squirt of blood all over his face. The aged veteran's eyes whited out – it was his natural instinct to just lose control and awareness of his body when overcome by impossible pain, to skip the pain and the threatening realization that his life may have ended in a couple of seconds. Bult just collapsed on his knees, giving in to instinct but having little way to respond.

"Hmph, if you were in your prime it would have been a pretty neat fight, I just wish Damij wouldn't have told me all about your moves. There's a bad side to being a legend, it's called "being washed up"…" Almash explained as he stepped back on Bult's arm messing it up even more, driving the bone back into the wound. "Déjá vu, isn't it? Just like the time you faced Damij…" Almash taunted the whited out opponent who was trying to not be completely taken over by instinct, to maintain at least some more control but the warrior inside him was leaking out. The veteran was unleashed and he kicked the man out of Bult's psyche…

The tall man leaped up with a knee strike driving it right into Almash's gut, turning around and delivering a straight kick into the man's chest and then jumping up with a kick to Almash's nose making it burst with blood. The red haired brute staggered back and his body leaned backwards almost forming a bridge shape, just one more shove could've done it but Bult barely had any strength left.

"That bastard didn't even move, I broke my hand punching him, you had to actively take me on. You're a lot of things, pup, but Damij you are not…" Bult angrily roughed out with his eyes still being snow-white and his teeth still grinding against themselves. Blood dripped from the newly formed wound on his arm but the man was determined to finish the fight with his knees and his legs if his hands were broken. Even if the Bare-Hand Axeman was no more, the veteran survivor of the arena was still doing the dirty work and ready to kick, knee and stomp.


	159. Bet on Freedom

Almash laughed out wildly, the monstrous man wiped the blood on his face, both that shooting from Bult's wound and the one from his own nosebleed. The stain of the two bleedings made a twisted mask of red covering his face that only made the man appear much more monstrous and inhuman. Almash's eyes were slowly beginning to white out as well with the man's irises and his pupils beginning the rise upwards as if trying to stare into his own brain. Pure fighting instinct was beginning to take the man over. With a petrifying battlecry that man leapt at his opponent.

Almash's attacks were blindingly fast, faster than even the human limit. No normal martial artist was capable of attacking so fast. The brute's brain no longer thought about his attacks removing the invisible yet usually present lag between the sensory inputs and complicated patterns and fighting combinations. This was a completely primitive and instinct driven rushdown and Bult knew it but he also functioned entirely in the survival mode. His eyes were equally flipped over and he was biting his own lips and palate drawing blood that flowed from his mouth. This fight was becoming much more primal, these two men no longer looked like martial artists, they were animals trying to gouge the eyes of their enemy out, peel their skins and flesh off with their bare hands or at the very least pound their opponent's face into the ground.

Sadly it was impossible to avoid all of Almash's attacks without his arms, Bult could only barely control which blows he'd take and which would bombard his body, break his ribs, open old wounds and make his barely seeing eye swell up, knock out his teeth. He never intended to be a looker anyway… Still, the old veteran was proud to be able to return at least a couple of good blows however where Almash only had his wild animalistic roar in his lungs and was only stopped by Bult's blows, Bult also carried the weight of a thousand other battles, hundreds of previously broken and sloppily healed bones. Slowly the man was beginning to realize that he would not be leaving the arena alive…

With a wild and blindingly fast upwards thrust Almash tossed Bult's body up in the air, the primal man leaped up into the air and swung his leg around kicking the dark skinned martial artist at the top of his head driving the man into the ground so violently that layers of dust were raised up and covered the entire arena, cracks opened up and tiles broke etching into Bult's skin and opening new scars on top of his old ones. For a moment the Sheikh leapt out of his chair in excitement thinking that the entire ring was destroyed by Almash's inhuman animalistic strength. No one knew where this monstrous man came from but he could outwrestle a giant ape and run faster than a desert cat. He also was strong enough to choke both of these animals out, this was known because the man had done it in multiple occasions during the more exotic arena events in the past.

"Just fucking burn!" the bare-chested berserker screamed out wildly making a handseal and swiping his hand to the side, a wave of heated air formed a small fireball that dissolved into a simple crescent projectile of roaring flames. It was a very primitive and imperfect manipulation of chakra but it was ninjutsu at its most basic stages nonetheless.

"I'm being slaughterfest'ed…" Bult realized when he put two on two together and realized why the Sheikh didn't as much as roll his eyes after seeing this demonic man use chakra abilities under two separate instances. Heat took Bult's senses over returning the man who was afraid for his life back, wild sweat burst from the veteran's body as a wild grunt was all he could do before the flames blasted the ground exploding in a small firestorm – the technique was supposed to be a small restrained fireball – a C rank ninjutsu technique or even weaker but Almash was no ninja and couldn't accurately control his chakra that way so the flame was just wildly shooting from his hands in masses that needed to be slapped around and directed at their target.

The dust cloud and the smoke cleared out. Almash was a little winded as using chakra was no small feat to a man who wasn't even enrolled or sat a single class in the Ninja Academy. He was entirely tutored by Damij. Trained and bred to take out not necessarily the strongest but definitely one of the most iconic veterans of the arena. The smoke cleared revealing Bult's huffing and kneeling frame, one body part at a time.

"Huh… You used the heat from the technique to cauterize your bleeding wounds, rolled out of the way just halfway" Almash smiled sadistically before his body lunged at his opponent again kicking Bult into the man's jaw and sending him sliding backwards and over the edge of the arena. Once again the survivor inside Bult rose up and gripped up to the edge of the arena just to hold him from falling down, just to survive as long as he could, it didn't matter what he'd be surviving for.

It was easy to lose one's way of life in a place like this. When life takes a hard oaken stick and drives it right into one's kneecaps. It ain't hard to let suicidal thoughts or madness take over, if one isn't secretly also the other… The only thing that keeps one not only alive but moving is the thought, the promise that no matter how hard things would get one has no right to give up. A man or a woman, it doesn't really matter as both are made of the same flesh and bones, must promise oneself that even when they'll lose their way, when they'll be blinded by their opponent's punches or falling halfway down to being skewered by spikes they won't give up on their wish to live. Technically at those moments it wasn't even much of a "wish", more like survival because one promised oneself survival during their toughest moments. Bult was acting driven entirely by such a promise. He didn't want all this pain, all this punishment. All he wanted was to rest, to finally repent for his sins, for all of his kills and just let go but… He promised, all those years ago!

The crowd jumped up off their seats, one childish adolescent even tore her top off in wild enthusiasm as Bult pulled his body up to the edge once more using one of his busted arms, screaming his lungs out from both pride and pain. If he was being forced to kick the bucket he may as well give these fuckers a bloody good show. Countless glasses of beer were slammed at the steps of the arena, men and women screamed in hype and excitement but Bult couldn't entertain them anymore. He couldn't stand back up on his feet. He was a soldier wounded in too many battles and his old horse carrying him through them refused to go on. Suddenly the public realized it and fell dead silent. Their hero was about to meet his doom…

The Sheikh was leaning over the edge of his platform, he was excited, but he was also mad. His face was dyed entirely red in fact because he loved this battle, it was a solid brawl but… It wasn't enough… It was still missing some pizazz, that one final volcano eruption blowing the top of the rocky mountain off. And here this amazing fight was about to end… He had to stop it, he had to do something, he was about to reach that one moment in time, that amazing fight between two masters so many years ago but… It would end before it could reach that peak… No! It had no right to end, not now, not so close!

Almash licked his lips, licking blood off of the couple of wounds where Bult managed to bust the monster's lips and in couple more places where he bit his own lips in excitement himself tearing entire miniscule chunks of skin and flesh out of his own palate tongue and lips. He loved this fight but he loved the end most of all. Almash closed his fist and cocked it back, he knew what he'd do, he'd channel just a single ounce of chakra punching hard enough to bust through the man's broken ribs and blow up his heart with pure concussive force – it'd be his glorious finisher move… Maybe one day it'll reach the level of fame to match the Bare-Hand Axe Handle?

Almash's fist howled in the air, Bult no longer was able to see with one eye while the other one barely translated passable quality view of the world around him, it constantly needed to blink to let the pouring blood to pass over the eyelid and go down below. Bult was done for and he knew it, he accepted his death, he accepted his repentance, this wasn't Almash finishing him off, it was his endless victims unifying into a single indestructible entity comprised of cosmos and vengeance itself that possessed his opponent that day. Maybe it was just his beaten and shaken brains making up stupid bullshit…

A strong crunching sound made Bult's eyes shoot wide open as no freedom greeted him, instead he continued to kneel in front of his opponent unable to stand back on his feet. Standing in front of him was a young lady, short in stature, waist long raven dark hair flowed freely in the desert breeze just softly stroking and touching Bult's face, wearing some peculiar uniform-like get-up that was dirtied up by desert sand and the dirt in the cells. Her long and rather muscular for her age leg was wrapped around Almash's fist stopping it in its tracks, her thighs and her shin were grinding the man's arm to dust as Almash could neither push the fist forward nor detract it to defend himself until the girl let go of her iron grip and let the wild demon to stumble back on all fours like an ape-man.

"Mana?" Bult's half-toothed mouth asked spitting blood as he spoke.

There was absolutely no time to respond for the girl as the crowd jumped off their seats and started throwing their turbans and face-veils up in the air. Men were cheering and slamming their glasses overflowing with alcohol they were ready to rampage in their hype – they saw something that this arena has never seen before, an interference in a one-on-one battle saving non other but a veteran icon of the arena.

"Unacceptable! You'll be stoned, quartered by blade, executed where you stand!" the announcer shrieked out slobbering and drooling all over the platform he stood on looking up at the fazed Sheikh who was completely blown away and yet… His face was… Smiling, the Sheikh then erupted into a wild fit of laughter shuffling the entire affair, flipping all of the tables in a figurative sense.

"Guards, how did she escape the cell? How did she enter the arena? Guards?" the announcer kept trying to get the situation under control but then he noticed that no guards replied. "Don't tell me…" he uttered.

"How did you?" Bult tried to speak but Mana carefully knelt up to his face and examined his wounds, pressing her soft and fragile finger to the man's busted and swollen lips.

"I was a stage magician in Konohagakure, escaping cages and bindings is what I did for a living…" she uttered silently, "I had to take a couple of guards out and I had an idea to free all the fighters but I figured it'd devolve the whole place into chaos, many fighters would riot, try to avenge their ruined lives and kill innocent people. I could not allow that so I just rushed to your aid once I found out you were being set-up"

Bult's only functional eye was tearing up.

Mana stood back up and faced the growling, demonic, red-haired man. "I apologize but I will have to beat you up, I cannot allow this senseless brawl to continue, if fighter's pride is all you care about – you've won, leave and it'll be the end of it…" she tried to explain but Almash rushed at her swiping with his overgrown fingernails opening up a nasty scratch, Mana screamed in pain – she didn't see his movements! He was using a very feint and very primitive form of chakra augmentation moving faster and hitting and scratching stronger than any normal man. She'd have to predict his movements using Kouta's basic taijutsu patterns, examine which leg the man uses to kick his body off, which muscles twitch and which arm is cocked back etc… A lot of complicated body language reading would be involved.

Almash rushed at Mana but the girl leaned back, to the side, ducked under his swipes without needing to see the movements. He was beyond the human limit but she was just barely managing it, she was dodging and redirecting his blows combining the training from both Meiko and Kouta, combining the two defensive styles into a single combination of invincible and seemingly impossible move economy.

"What grace… What economy… Not a single move wasted, not a single hesitation… This isn't the same woman that lost to Gaffu, she could've stomped that man's face without breaking a sweat…" Sheikh started talking to himself, turning and shouting at his concubines in joy and utter and complete glee. It was a moment of his weakness, he was caught surprised by an event that no one could've predicted.

Mana flipped to the side slapping Almash's fingernail scratch straight into the stone tiles making him bust his fingers and scream out in pain as he broke all of them and left some of his flesh and blood on the stones. Mana's legs assaulted and danced on the man's face, chest and his legs, she kicked him in the knees, shins and stomped his feet to keep him locked down, she kicked his chest to make him cough out all of the air in his lungs and kicked his face to inflict as much damage as possible. Her opponent was stronger and faster than her, she needed all the advantages she'd get, she needed to explode right into his face and deal all the damage because if he hit her he may have taken her out outright. How tough was he compared to Damij? Could Mana really take on anyone stronger than this man? She was hitting this monster with all that she had and yet…

Mana leaped up into the air and thrust her leg forward, driving it deep into the man's gut and then forcing Almash's body right into the arena's messed up and cracked tiles.

"Spear Kick!" she roared out giving in to the chanting of the public, it was a moment when to her fighting really seemed "cool", when she was inspiring the public and when the people around her were behind a full one hundred percent, it was a sensation like no other, it was just what Mana lived to achieve throughout her life. If she was to become a hero she'd need to make people cheer for her and be inspired by her without all this violence but for just a small second she surrendered herself to the arena and let the warrior inside her take over. She remembered someone at some point, one of the ninja she worked with or sparred with calling this kick "Spear Kick" because she drove it into the opponent's gut like a javelin and speared them to the ground stomping on them.

Almash was passed out, his eyes were totally white and he was bleeding from his nose and his mouth. Mana looked over the opponent she had conquered and then back at the Sheikh, the man was chanting for her to finish him off, the public was wild. Why were they so hyped for violence and murder? Why would they cheer for her to take out a tired and injured opponent that she had beaten after busting out of her cell and invading an event?

"No!" Mana declared and stomped viciously on Almash's arms twisting them in gruesome ways until the muscles made a grotesque grinding noise and a loud snap could be heard. "No more violence…" she told half to the public but also to herself trying to control her raging spirit. She had so much anger pent up inside her, so much fear, desperation and sadness that all exploded into violence against this man… She needed that violence, had she held back one little bit it'd have been her lifeless body impaled on those spikes down below.

"How dare you!?" Sheikh screamed out angrily. The announcer also growled out similar words and the public raised the biggest riot beginning to throw things at Mana, one glass hit her in the head but only with its tip cracking a bleeding wound open but not completely knocking the girl out. Mana's lips pouted and her nose started sniffling, she was about to burst into tears… These people hated her once more after making her believe that they were behind her. How could she for one moment be mistaken that these people wished anything other than for her to kill or die herself?

"I won, there's no need for any more violence…" Mana tried to speak but everyone completely sunk her voice in an ocean of angry and hateful remarks thrown at her side. Mana restrained her childish desire to cry but she was shaken to her core, alone in an arena of bloodshed and death, surrounded by people that hated her guts while she loved every single one of them somewhere deep inside and would've given up her life to save any of them. Only Sheikh's angry cough silenced the arena.

"Girl, you have interfered a Fatal Warfare match. That alone is unheard of, interference has never happened but if it had it'd have been punished by Descent Gauntlet. You provided some entertainment and brought more life into this arena than it has seen for a long time but then you disobeyed its rules and disrespected this crowd. There must be a body impaled on these spikes or killed in a Fatal Warfare match and there'll be a body on those spikes, be it yours or someone else's" the Sheikh said.

"I wish to run the Ascension Gauntlet!" Mana screamed out silencing the crowd after they once again riled up with hateful remarks and throwing objects at her. One little girl screamed a c-word at her and tossed a plushy toy of some fighter that fell down and got impaled on the spikes below. Seeing such bloodthirsty people made Mana realize just how impossible her lifelong dream may have been. She no longer had conflicting thoughts – she'd run the gauntlet and either die or achieve her goal without killing anyone, whether this public liked it or not.

The Sheikh laughed out madly, "That's some misguided arrogance coming from your side, girl! What makes you think you're respected enough to ascend? No. You shall run a Gauntlet however it shall be a Descent Gauntlet and by the end of it you shall either kill someone and satisfy this crowd of martial art lovers or you shall become a meatbag accessory hanging on those spikes" the Sheikh declared to gleeful cheers of the public. While the public was no longer as unified in their hatred as they were before they still would've loved nothing more than to see Mana's body getting impaled on the spikes giving them what they thought to be a fitting ending to a Fatal Warfare match.

"And if you do complete the Descent Gauntlet I shall grant you a tomorrow's warm-up match against Damij, a match for your freedom, what say you, young woman?" the Sheikh deceitfully asked Mana, the magician knew she was being played but she had no choice. She needed to change this place, to show them that killing wasn't the beautiful and artsy part of martial arts, that no blood needed to be shed for people to admire the art of fighting. Also Mana needed freedom badly, she needed to find her friends and continue the quest for the Land of Sound.

"I accept" she uttered, barely twitching her lips before repeating it louder much to the wild enjoyment of the crowd.


	160. The Gauntlet

"What have you done?" Bult mumbled out through his swollen and beaten mouth, it took Mana a good couple of seconds before she could even understand what the man had told her.

"It's the only way to change this place" she quickly replied. Right now the last thing she wanted was to quarrel with the veteran who has helped her so far.

"There is no changing this place, there's no changing these people or the Sheikh, you're throwing your life away. He's just playing you because he wants to see a body on those spikes by the end of the day…" the man continued to plead Mana to reconsider and declare that she had changed her mind.

"You're wrong, if what you told me before is true, this place has been a sanctuary of martial arts once before it lost its way. That means that this madness is not yet too deep to be pulled out with its roots. The reason why this place hadn't changed back before is because people are doing it the wrong way" Mana replied observing the announcer disappearing into the tower where all the fighters were held. Clearly there was supposed to be a short while before the fighters were prepared and the Gauntlet was set up.

"And how do you think it should be done? By dethroning the senile Sheikh? By tearing the Sheikhate down to the ground? By talking to these people? Many better than you have tried and you have spoken to them yourself, trust me, you've only pissed them off more" Bult was starting to switch into a sarcastic tone which greatly pleased Mana, that meant that he was still alive and kicking enough to crack jokes.

"No. I need to show them that fights where no one dies can be just as entertaining. I am an entertainer, remember? All I need to do is entertain these men until they realize that the reason why this place became this way is because of the illusion that entertainment must include murder. People and regimes don't change with violence or talking, talking isn't efficient enough and violence only leads worse evils to take the empty seat. Things change by addressing the problems" Mana smiled to Bult "Entertainment will save this place, whether by beating the snot out of everyone or dying I shall entertain this crowd by the end of this day"

"You can't, you've got amazing moves but you can't think on your feet, you can't recognize patterns and you are barely able to predict moves, you lack experience on the field" Bult said trying to stand up and try to help Mana with the Gauntlet but his head got dizzy and the man just fell on his butt, his eyes teared up more and more the more he realized how pathetic he was in his current state and how old he had gotten.

"Then help me, guide me through it, give me as much information as you can before each battle. Let me gain experience by supercharging it and rushing it, let me become experienced over one night. You've got experience, I can move. We can do it, don't you want to see Damij's ass kicked?" Mana appealed to Bult's warrior's pride. The man closed his eyes and laughed out wiping his tears off with a closed knuckle.

"I'll help you but… You'll get yourself killed" he warned Mana, "If anyone from Damij's crew comes they'll be using chakra augmentation like Almash"

"It's not chakra augmentation" Mana shook her head kneeling up to Bult and examining his wounds with worried eyes. The man could've used some patching up, he didn't look like he was in any danger to die but he was banged up pretty badly and not in any shape to actually fight.

"To call it chakra augmentation would be the same like calling a rock a statue. Their abilities are so primitive that they barely even use actual chakra. It's a very basic form of taijutsu that isn't taijutsu combined with ninjutsu that isn't ninjutsu… Budojutsu, if you will" Mana explained, she wasn't able to sense Almash's chakra but she recognized some patterns in his increase in speed, strength and damage he could deal up close. Chakra augmentation was something only stronger genin and above could've used, it was beyond the reach of people who have not trained their entire lives to master the complicated combination of bodily functions and chakra control.

"This… Budojutsu, do you think you can fight that?" Bult asked looking right Mana into eyes with a hopeful expression, the magician closed her eyes and shrugged.

"It's no chakra augmentation, if it was I'd be crushed instantly, at no moment fighting Almash did I feel completely overwhelmed but it was tougher than I thought. Let's just say I'm happy to have this moment to breathe" Mana replied as truthfully as she could, her answer didn't seem to calm Bult however the girl's honesty was appreciated, that much she could see in his busted face.

"Now, ladies and gentlemen, without further delay we shall start the spontaneously planned event of the day – the Descent Gauntlet of this young girl who has invaded a match and requested a match with our champion Damij!" the announcer declared as the bridge structure once again connected the arena to the living quarters on the other side with the announcer being ported right up to the arena since he stood on top of it once it got moving.

"For those who are unfortunate enough not to know the rules, there are few – the challenger fights until the Sheikh thinks they've had enough or are liberated by death! We've already met our challenger, she surprisingly lost a match against Gaffu today however she finished off Almash, the Bare-Chested Berserker! Ladies and gentlemen, I introduce the first contestant, the man who shakes the world beneath his feet and crumbles the ground – Sadar!" for the second time that day Mana had the honor to see the announcer engaging in his craft, for the girl the man appeared far overly excited by his introduction but at least he was devoted to his thing.

"Darn, he's not in Damij's crew but it ain't good… Whenever Sadar fights he ruins the arena, one time he knocked a person down and bashed their face to the ground until the whole arena crumbled down. He's a big and strong guy, don't try to overpower him, don't engage in standoffs with him, he's also deceitfully fast so don't get caught out" Bult started coaching Mana who carefully observed her opponent making his way down to the arena.

"I've faced large men before, I'll hit him low and make his legs give in, hit him in the joints and behind the knees, that usually worked. Fast or not no human can get his hands on me unless I want to, I've trained myself that way. I shall not allow him to ruin the arena, that'd mean us falling to the spikes below and I won't let that happen" Mana firmly declared quietly revealing her strategy to her friend.

"That should do it, be careful though, don't take chances, you've still got other guys to worry about" Bult suggested. Mana nodded and slowly started walking forward.

"Begin!" the announcer yelled out declaring the beginning of the fight. That very same instant Sadar went onto the offensive, his stance was strangely open, implying dominating presence and with countless openings, Mana quickly pranced forward avoiding the first chop, ducked under the first elbow counter and backflipped over the man's tripping sweep. The girl kicked the man right in the face a couple of times but he didn't appear to get overly fazed by it – a troubling sign.

Suddenly the air around Sadar started to vibrate and glow barely intelligible golden glow, the man's blows intensified, they became faster and much more ferocious, with each blow they caused almost a small explosion wherever they hit making entire chunks of the arena fall down below. The ground shook and Mana almost fell down due to loss of balance from the man's relentless offensive effort. He didn't appear to tire which also felt really intimidating for the magician.

He wasn't yet too bad to avoid. Mana's training with Meiko with attack redirection and the ability to make her own openings allowed her to get countless cheap shots in and her training with Kouta with perfect evasion techniques allowed her to quickly identify the telltale signs of upcoming attacks and quickly make up perfect evasion tactics on the fly. She was going to pull it through, if that was all that her opponent had.

Sadar was an incredibly tall man, a good thirty centimeters taller than even Bult which made him actually appear almost towering. He wore a sleeveless mercenary vest which was made to protect one from knives and various bladed weapons, it also offered limited protection from blunt force trauma and elemental ninjutsu of a small rank. The man also wore a black skintight shirt below the vest so that the rough armored fabric didn't tear off his skin and leave pressure spots and various wounds of other nature. Sadar appeared not to shave his facial hair however he was completely bald suggesting that he may have been a monk from one of the Ninja Temples before joining the arena.

That fact alerted Mana, ninja monks were trained extensively in nintaijutsu, they were able to use chakra augmentation to much higher extent than even average ranked shinobi. Each of the Ninja Temples had their own secret techniques which were taught by the strongest and most determined and spiritually excellent monks. For that reason the young woman tried to avoid cheaply exploiting his lower body like she expected to do before – if he was at all confident in his technique he'd have countered his natural shortcomings. Before Mana hits him low to incapacitate she needed to wear him out a little bit more.

"He's also using Budojutsu, why? Why not use nintaijutsu like all ninja monks?" Mana thought to herself, feeling like she knew the answer deep inside. Finally the true reason revealed itself – the man was keeping it as a hidden ace card. The man slapped his hands together and his entire hulking frame started glowing like a miniature star with natural sunlight firing off from behind the man. A powerful shockwave sent Mana sliding backwards and she could only barely recover in time to avoid the man's technique.

It was some strange technique that formed countless golden arms around the man, they weren't too standing out or look too fancy suggesting that perhaps they were an early version of a much more advanced technique but these golden palms formed almost in thin air in overwhelming numbers. Mana was beginning to run out of breath while she was avoiding these blows, so far she managed to perceive each and every palm before she was hit and avoid them by leaning out of the way or slapping at the side and redirecting them to the other side. Shockingly the magician soon realized that she was running out of space to dodge as the relentless barrage of endless palms was pressing her to the edge of the arena with only the spikes of certain and painful doom lurking below.

"Spear Kick – Spear Kick – Spear Kick!" someone in the public started chanting, many more picked up on the chant requesting the magician girl to perform her makeshift signature technique. Mana was not nearly without control like she was before when she first performed the technique, that being said she was about to run out of time. The idea and the imaginary feeling of being pushed down the hole and being skewered by spikes made Mana's skin crawl, her body tensed and she moved in an instant, leaning under a couple of palms by lowering her body almost to the ground like a cat about to pounce, as her legs kicked her body off Mana's elbow was driven right into the man's groin. For a moment the entire crowd died, clenching as if they have witnessed the most gruesome murder they've ever seen. Mana's nimble frame jumped up into the air flipping gracefully a couple of times before driving both of her feet into the man's back as he leaned with a comically destroyed facial expression, his hands grasped for his crushed groin area desperately but Mana's feet stomped strong and swiftly slamming the man's giant body into the rocky floor before Mana landed on her feet and flipped backwards to twist the man's leg from behind.

Sadar screamed out in pain before slamming his own head against the arena floor and passing out in pain. Mana once again had to explode all out on her opponent because she was afraid of Sadar's response if he wasn't fazed by at least one of these attacks – striking at the man's genital area was a desperate strategy but it opened him all up for follow up attacks and he won't go anywhere with injured pride and a twisted leg.

"Kill him!" the announcer excitedly declared as the public started chanting for Mana to finish the man off but the girl walked further away from the man and stretched out, taking the time to catch a good breather.

"You know I shall not, call in the next opponent or stop this foolishness" Mana exclaimed visibly feeling worn out by her endless barrage of dodging and leaping around. The magician wasn't really sure about just how much she could keep it going but she knew that she'd go as far as her body would allow her.

"Ladies and gentlemen! This young one continues to defy our traditions! Let us welcome the next challenger that has agreed to fight this young girl at a moment's notice – Myrwa!" the announcer declared pointing at the extending bridge and the entering challenger. Mana slowly walked back at Bult and looked at him questioningly.

"Look, you may want to do something a bit more securing, right now Sadar is just laying sprawled in the middle of the arena, he might wake up at some point in the middle of your challenge and attack you from behind…" Bult advised, Mana nodded and then pointed at her opponent who was slowly closing in. The man was of very lacking height and looked of rather ridiculous proportions. It was a pathetic and pale looking man, about Mana's height with puny and shaking arms and legs but weirdly creepy looking shot out and plump stomach that was covered up only by a ragged shirt.

"Be careful, this man is not as formidable and deadly as Sadar but he is deceitful, that plump spot at his abdomen is his twin brother, Myrwa was born with his undeveloped brother attached to his stomach, it's just a distraction tactic, I don't know why he wanted this fight so much – he's only won a couple of non-lethal matches. Something seems fishy, be careful" Bult explained

Mana blinked a couple of times in rapid succession, "Wait, that's his brother!? How does that work?" she asked looking surprised, her eyes glowed not in sickness or intimidation by the grotesque and rather pathetic sight but the desire to see that combination in action.

"Don't get your panties in a twist, that thing is dead and doesn't move, he just uses it as a surprise factor to get cheap shots in, maybe he'll slap it around and try bodyshielding himself with it. As I've said, the brother is always asleep and is just hanging there like a parasite, he's a weird guy, not formidable but don't let your guard down…" the veteran explained, he looked a little entertained himself seeing Mana display some scientific interest in how exactly that man worked. Maybe he just saw for a moment the kind of child that was forced to fight in the arena, Mana was no warrior who fought for pride. She wasn't afraid to fight, not anymore, but she fought because of necessity, not desire or pride. Her interest in her opponents was purely scientific and sporting one.

"Now, are the contestants ready?" the announcer asked before Mana took an evasive stance preparing to carefully observe her flabby and puny looking opponent to identify his movements and properly defend herself. Both nodded firmly before the announcer declared the beginning of the battle.

Screaming like a madman and flailing wildly Myrwa started running at Mana, the girl took a couple of leaps backwards before leaping with a whirling kick right at the puny man's head. With a pathetic whine Myrwa was sent to the ground. It almost felt bad bullying this guy around… Mana still decided to keep her guard up and she playfully jumped around a little just to catch her rhythm again before her opponent stood back up. All of a sudden Mana twitched in shock realizing that Myrwa's shirt got torn up and a creepy large eye was staring at her from the shorty's chest. Mana wanted to turn and ask Bult if that was normal but Myrwa attacked her faster and more ferociously, the magician continued to evade the man's blows but then a ripping sound made her jump up in fear as she saw the single-handedly the most disgusting thing ever – a malformed even more pathetic version of Myrwa tore its way out from under the man's shirt and hit Mana in the head with its soft and sticky elbow.

Mana shouted in pain and skipped a couple of more blows before rolling aside. Her leg was caught by Myrwa's brother's flabby arm and she was dragged closer to the man who started stomping and punching Mana. The girl covered up her head and took a couple of nasty blows before she shoved her arms towards the ground throwing her legs right into Myrwa's face. Screaming in pain the creep staggered back and let Mana recover – he wasted his opportunity.

"So your brother is actually alive?" Mana asked looking at the little malformed creature sticking out from Myrwa's gut and pathetically hanging down and using its arms to keep its body from just rubbing against the ground pathetically. It was a small and malformed creature, its legs appeared to be non-existent as it was only sticking out from his abdomen being connected to that of his brother's, almost like he was inside his brother's guts but then burst through his belly like some sick monster from a horror play.

"Everyone started learning those weird techniques in the gym, my winrate isn't too stellar so I asked some of the fighters to help me learn a crazy technique of my own!" Myrwa shrieked out with a strangely high-pitched voice that also reminded eerily of gurgling.

"So it's a Budojutsu technique, somehow he is sharing his chakra with his brother making it appear alive… I need to figure out how it works, I can't predict such a peculiar fighting style unless I know what and how it can do" Mana thought to herself as she just couldn't move her eyes away from that odd creature sticking out from Myrwa's stomach.

Myrwa once again started flailing forward and rushing at Mana, the young magician just took a defensive stance and avoided contact with the strange looking fighter for a couple of minutes, dodging each and every blow, jumping far away from him so that the grotesque thing he carried around sticking out from his gut couldn't punch Mana, not because of a lack of trying though…

Mana then swiftly leaned under Myrwa's blow and grabbed the "brother's" neck pulling it fast and strong behind Myrwa's back until she could hear a loud snap. The freaky brother screamed out in pain and started freaking out.

"You killed my brother, you bitch! How dare you!? Ouch, brother! Brother!" he screamed but Mana only closed her eyes.

"I'm sorry, Myrwa but you were tricked. Even skilled chakra manipulators cannot bring dead things to life, not without a very gruesome cost and what you use isn't even ninjutsu, it's budojutsu – a primitive form of chakra manipulation that can barely be described as dabbling in ninjutsu. Your technique did not bring your brother back to life because he was always dead, it merely made you capable of controlling him like a separate body part. Your brother was never alive, he was just an arm of yours I had to break, there is no more use for us to fight, please leave…" Mana explained, her face was sad and twisted by pain as she had to explain to a saddened brother why he felt his "brother's" pain so literally. Of course it hurt for Myrwa when she snapped his brother's puny spine, it was because the entire abomination of nature felt like a body part, it was similar to how having one's arm broken would've felt.

As Myrwa collapsed on the ground caressing his broken brother, Mana looked at the announcer, "Have you not had enough yet!?" she yelled at him but the man's smile betrayed that it wasn't even close.

"She asks if we've seen enough fighting but she has not yet met Fajal, the Majestic God of Martial Arts!" the announcer proudly declared pointing at the direction of the building where another bridge was extending.

"This can't be good…" Mana huffed out, she was now wearing a couple of injuries she had earned and she was getting tired to dodge all those blows. The girl looked back at her makeshift coach and realized that her fears were justified. This Fajal must've been something to make even Bult sit silently in fear.

"Mana, he's the third most powerful member of Damij's crew…" the man exclaimed with a weakened and pain ridden voice. Mana looked at the sandstone gate as it slowly cracked and rumbled as they opened, staring long and deep into the darkness that concealed the next fighter with some fear and respect to that fighter before she even saw him. Anyone to scare Bult that much must've been worth Mana's fear as well…


	161. The God of Martial Arts

The crowd kept squirming in their seats, yelling unintelligible things but from what little Mana could make out – it was all just out of surprise of this Fajal making an appearance. The magician slowly walked back to Bult's resting place and knelt up to the man. It was hard to see fear in the man's swollen and beaten face but Mana could see it, see his eyes shake in fear, hear air uncontrollably pass in and out of his lungs and see his swollen eyelids twitch. The magician took in a couple of controlled breaths just to let her body recover from the stress of surviving multiple fights with master martial artists who would've beaten any normal human. She had taken her weak human body farther than most humans were able to but she was about to face a test unlike any other.

"Bult-san… I need to know about this Fajal, as much as I can if I am to survive this" she tried to get the veteran of the arena speaking but he finally managed to regain control of his body only to show what seemed like the signs of giving up, complete surrender to the fate that it was all over for the two of them.

"There's nothing to know, he's trained with every prominent martial arts master in the known world, he's won tournaments in every arena worth a shit. He's the only known person to give Damij a fight for all of the seven minutes instead of just being toyed with. He's trained for his entire life, he's the closest thing to what that old man rambled of, you've won a lot of amazing fights today, beg the Sheikh to call Fajal off, please!" Bult yelled out loud, Mana was shocked to see the warrior's pride she saw so much of being broken by a mere mention of a man's name. The dreadful sound of a platform covering all the way to the living quarters tower interrupted Mana's attempts to get information.

The young kunoichi stood back up and faced the tower to see this Fajal that all of the audience was now cheering for despite having been mostly on Mana's side throughout this entire thing. The door opened with a loud rumbling sound, the old stone structure shook and sent clouds of dust as it was moved open at a turtle's pace leaving a gap wide enough for a man to walk out.

Fajal's boots were the first to touch the platform and appear from the darkness, they weren't the usual sandals that most ninja wore or plate boots that mercenaries wore. They were made of leather, covered with belts to shape it around the man's foot. Fajal wore a black bodysuit, similar to the one that ninja wore however he also had a reddish armored vest, it looked custom made, possibly looted from some high ranked mercenary during his wandering days or even in this very arena.

Fajal's full facial hair was even longer than the dark hedge of his actual hair, covering his both sides of the face and extending richly and thickly but not long enough to make it into an advantage for his opponents. The man's actual hair was short, rudely cut as Mana assumed leaving them in a rather militaristic looking bland style. His face bore no scars, something that alarmed Mana having the man's background in mind, wasn't he hit at least once before? A good hit would've left him without teeth, left something on his face, marks not unlike the chains of scratches and gruesome mosaics of war that Bult had all over his face. Fajal's face was completely clean, not even his nose appeared to have been broken once. He stood in a strict militaristic stance, his back was as tense and straight as a string of a violin, his tense and rather bulky arms were placed behind the man's back and he had a cocky yet strict stare to his brown eyes. Mana could feel them judging her almost immediately when their eyes met.

"Desert or wasteland?" the man slowly and rather quietly uttered when he finally stepped off the platform onto the arena staring at Mana.

"Huh?" she uttered confused.

"Your skin is slightly paler than mine but it is dark enough to suggest that one of your parents was from the Land of Lightning or Land of Wind, that is why I ask, wasteland of Lightning or desert of Wind?" Fajal explained his question of few words. His tone implied some degree of condescension that the girl was not able to pick up on his question but he was looking down on the girl ever since he first laid eyes on her so that was not really much of a problem. The man spoke rather quietly but had a very cool and frightening demeanor to him making the crowd die out when he opened his mouth and making his every word clear and heard.

"Neither, my mother was a traveling woman but I am from Konohagakure" Mana replied.

"A ninja perhaps? Taijutsu I assume, if you were one of those fire breathers the Sheikh would've executed you already and you would need ninja tricks to beat Almash" Fajal wondered when the announcer lifted his arm into the air and declared the beginning of the fight. Both Mana and Fajal did not hurry to attack one another. Mana wasn't even sure about how to approach this, technically her redirection and dodging fighting style would've been able to beat any human, no matter their degree of dabbling in martial arts but she had a bad feeling about this Fajal and she was also quite winded after the last couple of fights.

"I was, I am no more" Mana replied in Fajal's manner of speech, the man cracked a grin.

"A woman of few words? Isn't this a surprise…" he took a fighting stance breaking out of his militaristic and strict stance, slightly leaning to the side and lifting his striking left hand into the air, placing his right in front of himself and ready to block, one of his feet was slightly elevated and only his toes touched the ground with that foot, he must've been ready to attack.

Finally Fajal leaped forward, Mana followed, for a man called the "God of Martial Arts" his speed appeared to be rather human, peak human perhaps but Mana's eyes were certainly fast enough to follow him, her body was fast enough to kick to keep him at bay. That was her strategy, use her legs to keep the man at a range where his fists couldn't reach her, she was a short girl with rather short legs, her growth was not yet completed so the man's fists would've probably reached her anyways but it'd give her maximum time possible to redirect or avoid the blows. Fajal did not attack after the first couple of elbow strikes and punches, he just blocked Mana's responsive kicks before retreating for a moment with a graceful leap back. He wasted no movements, it was like the speed that would've been a peak of human ability to most came of no effort to him. It was at that moment that Mana realized that Fajal was holding back – checking her out, measuring her skill.

"You did not beat Almash, I came here to fight the person who has" Fajal said casually closing his eyes and once again taking his lax militaristic stance, moving his arms behind his back.

"Mana, what are you doing? Do not exchange blows with him, do what you've been doing this whole time!" Bult yelled at her encouraging Mana to stop trying and take her opponent on and instead repeating her strategy of avoiding strikes and redirecting them, creating an opening for her to finish her enemy off like she was trained to do by her friends. The magician continued to stare at Fajal carefully, she couldn't do that, not yet. She was too tired, too hurt in her sides. She'd taken a couple of blows and unlike the time when she was still a ninja every strike left its dent now. She needed more time to breathe freely, correct breathing was integral to her style.

Fajal once again rushed at Mana, his hands still held behind his back, his eyes still closed and his face emotionless and arrogant. The magician tried to kick him right in the face, seeing how he pointed it forward and rushed at her almost taunting her to do so but in an instant her opponent disappeared, her kick only hit thin air.

"So fast!" Mana thought as she felt a crushing blow at her dominant leg that kept her balance during her kicks – within just a single exchange of blows Fajal had found a weakness in her offensive style and exploited it perfectly. A powerful jumping kick made Mana scream in pain as it slammed her tripping body to the rocky ground, the girl could her the stone beneath her shifting and heard her own body gurgle and crack as it was brought down without any effort from this man's side, when her perception returned to the world of man the sight of her opponent with his eyes still closed and his arms still behind his back greet her. Fajal was walking away from her.

"What are you doing, Fajal?" the Sheikh yelled out, "Throw the girl over the edge and kill her!" he ordered the fighter but Fajal turned back and faced the Sheikh.

"I came out here to fight the person that beat Almash, I woke from my nap when I heard that Almash was beaten, I could not believe it at first. I did not learn a hundred and fifty styles of martial arts to kill a little girl, she is not worth this match, she is not worth this death, she cannot in a lifetime reach the level needed to deserve to have the spikes of this arena penetrate her, have her serve the fighters water after the fights, wash their wounds or something" Fajal said, still keeping his back turned at Mana, the magician coughed out some blood, grasping at her burning abdomen and chest. Her ribs must've taken quite the blow, she must've been bleeding internally. Slowly the girl got her body off the ground and looked at Fajal's back as if encouraging the man to continue.

"I beat Almash-san" Mana declared, "Then I continued to beat Sadar-san and Myrwa-san, I will beat you and whoever else enters this circle through that door until Sheikh-san decides he's had enough" Mana said wiping the blood off her lips, she still felt the taste of it in her mouth. She couldn't take that much more of blows like this, she needed to be more careful. Gone were the days when she could get stabbed with a sword and fight the very next day.

Fajal turned around, his eyes were still closed and he didn't move his arm one bit from being locked behind his back. The martial artist rushed forward the same manner as he did when he attacked the girl before, this time the magician knew how he would attack – he'd exploit her single dominant leg being on the ground while the other one was aiming at him, he'd try to duck down and sweep it again opening her for free blows. She'd be smarter this time! Mana didn't leave a single leg on the ground, instead she leapt up spinning her body horizontally as she threw a double spinning kick aiming at Fajal's arrogant and smug face.

A crushing blow at her chest sent Mana flying back and over the edge of the arena. All air left her lungs, her chest exploded with pain that reminded most of being burnt alive from inside and just trying to take as much as a single breath to return at least some of the air that she needed to stay alive was making Mana's mind scream in pain but her body couldn't because she had no air to do so. Just her feeble bruised arm grabbed the edge ever so barely, as her nails dug into the rough and ancient stone they broke off and burst with blood. Her puny human body was slowly breaking down.

He predicted her prediction, he gave her enough of a benefit of the doubt to assume that she had seen what he had done before and he knew that Mana would come up with a response but he was one step forward – he knew what kind of response she'd make up and he created a simple one strike counter to that. His movements were so fast and so odd, he moved unlike any ninja, unlike any other martial artist Mana had seen as his body was sometimes firm as a rock and sometimes flexible as water – must've been a testament of the countless styles of martial arts that the man knew.

Mana finally got able to breathe, her thirsty and burning lungs drew air in but she could only cough in pain and grunt, her weak and injured arm couldn't pull her body back up, the magician lifted her hand back up and grabbed the arena with it giving her ruined and bleeding hand a little rest. She felt a firm grip pulling her up, Mana saw Bult's beaten in face but the figure was looking a little blurry – she must've taken some damage too.

"Thanks…" she uttered.

"Stop this" he replied but Mana softly tapped his shoulder telling him to move to her side. Bult looked at her and lowered his head, the girl passed around him and walked out in front of Fajal.

"I've met women that loved to be abused. They screamed in pain when their husbands beat them but they always came back to them in the end for more, they cried when I killed the bastards that hurt them. Am I to assume you love suffering as well, is that why you stand up for more punishment?" Fajal asked her still not giving her as much as a look.

"I made a mistake trying to buy myself some time to recover from the previous fights by just trying to match you in skill. You're clearly superior to me in every way: physically stronger, faster and much smarter, a combat genius through and through with a lifetime of experience…" Mana said

"Hmph, so you're one of those women? The kind that tries to please you and begs in front of the entire arena? Spare it" Fajal finally opened his eyes, not because he thought Mana a worthy opponent to do so, more because her words annoyed him as they were burning with anger.

"However… Now I will stop fighting you with skill, I won't look for openings in your moves I shall create them. I will beat you so I suggest you keep your pride intact and retreat. Sheikh-san has seen a lot of fighting today, I'm sure he's satisfied enough to leave it be" Mana gave her opponent a chance to retreat, as was her usual behavior.

"If you insist to be killed by my hand I shall do just that" Fajal angrily grunted leaping at her, still adamant about not using his hands. Mana slipped behind him, moving just like Kouta had taught her, just like the medical ninja avoided being hit by even a single kunai or fireball in a battlefield. The most amazing medical ninja were able to avoid any injury when fighting for entire days inside a battlefield surrounded by ninja wishing to kill them, Mana had the training of a young man who was trained by these men and women. Fajal's humanly movements were no match to kunai and fireballs, they were certainly no bolts of lightning.

Mana ducked and flipped over the man's kicks, she even hesitated to dodge some of them just to annoy Fajal more. On some deep level she was personally annoyed by the man's cockiness and wished to rub it into his face – she was as slippery as an eel underwater, as fluid as a storming river and as precise as the finest clockwork. Even Fajal, the God of Martial Arts of over a hundred and fifty styles could not as much as lay a finger on her, toe to be exact. The man switched to using his arms as well instantly, trying to surprise Mana but the magician continued to avoid his attacks, it was definitely harder but she could've dodged even another man like Fajal trying to kill her. The blows she could not avoid the girl redirected, opening Fajal up for cheap blows which she didn't even exploit. She wanted him to know and Mana knew that Fajal saw it, he knew that she could've pummeled him like a horse crushed fallen apples on the ground when rushing through a garden but she didn't.

Fajal roared into the air with absolute rage, it was the sound of a man's pride being broken into a million pieces. The rage of a warrior who despised women for their weakness but was being simply outmatched by one, not even a real one, a child. It wasn't that Mana was more skilled or faster, her movements were just like a formula of mathematical precision, the man could've come at her with a million and two martial arts styles and it wouldn't have made a difference. The only martial art that was truly worth contending with the best was the taijutsu that ninja used, it was a style that unified all martial arts and combined them with the mastery of chakra, that was to say, the perfect understanding and control of one's body. Only a chakra manipulator could have overcome those of chakra manipulation, just like the principle of chakra over matter stated. While Mana was not able to control hers, she learned the formulaic movements of a person who was, she took time to carefully study any and all ways she could be attacked and learned to avoid them. She trained with actual ninja that moved faster than her human eyes or her brain could perceive – she dodged their blows through prediction alone.

Mana's firm palm strike hit Fajal's nose making it burst with blood, the man's eyes teared up. It was a common response of hers after she had made herself an opening by redirecting someone's blow, with a swift kick she sent Fajal tumbling backwards only to kick off the ground and backflip back on his feet. The man cracked his neck and his knuckles around and took his fighting stance.

"I have underestimated you. You definitely would've crushed Almash with those moves. Indeed this cheap style of yours could best any human and seems entertaining enough to the public to make you a favorite. Damij would invite you to join his crew, he would love to have someone like you by his side. Too bad I won't give him a chance to" Fajal spoke up wiping the blood off his nose only for it to continue to drip.

"I do not care, my goal is to beat him and change this place back to how it was during its glory days – I initially wanted to free everyone, destroy this place and bury it beneath the desert sands but now I understand that it isn't the right way. You martial artists live by exchanging fists, I would not dare to take that away from you however by beating Damij and the Ascension Gauntlet I shall change this place to how it was before. Sheikh-san wishes desperately to see that battle again, the one that changed everything and I shall show him that but not with you, you cannot give him this battle. I believe that after seeing that battle again this place could come back to being the haven of martial arts it once was" Mana smiled taking a brief moment to look at the people who sat there in extreme silence listening to her and looking back at the Sheikh who was on the edge of his seat absorbing this fight.

"It is rare that I meet a person more arrogant than I am, I also seemed to have been wrong, you're no woman of few words. You talk rubbish and talk it in spades. Well then, shall we then begin? Showing you your place and knocking you off that high horse, ruining the world of childish dreams?" Fajal smiled wiping blood off his nose again. At that moment Mana knew that the man had some sort of an ace he had not shown just yet.


	162. Hypocrisy

Fajal appeared to talk a big talk despite his seemingly little short performance. It didn't feel like Mana was actually beating him down, truth be told. Her fighting style was a combination of multiple taijutsu arts, martial arts and taijutsu were a little bit different as they focused on different concepts. Taijutsu sometimes had different fighting styles as its component but it mostly focused on bodily improvement through improving one's overall chakra level and learning proper chakra augmentation techniques. Martial arts were based on pure fighting technique, if a martial artist did increase their chakra level it was unintentional and they had no way of actually controlling it. Martial arts focused too much on budojutsu which wasn't even a part of the typical ninja arts.

What Mana did to defeat all these martial artists, all stronger and infinitely more experienced and trained than she was, was basically a cheat code, an easy mode in the game of martial arts. She exploited the humanity's experience in countering specific moves, universal cheat moves that allowed her to bypass and avoid or redirect her opponent's movements. She tapped into the ages old experience of ninja training to beat martial artists and mercenaries of pure martial art mastery. It was a cheap way to win these brawls but Mana was not participating in this for sporting interest, she was saving a life here.

Fajal's body started glowing faintly, it was a different emanation than the usual light blue glow of chakra. The man's shimmering aura was purple and didn't flow like a flame, it rose like smoke, coiling and evaporating from the man's body like separate parts of him. The sheer fact that the man was able to emanate this strange spinoff of chakra from his body in a visible manner greatly surprised Mana. Usually it took an amazing skill to make chakra appear from one's body, to make it visible not only to sensors but also ordinary folks, what budojutsu used was not even chakra, just the physical aspect of it so how could this man have been able to display such mastery over such unrefined energy?

The master martial artist moved, it was like he skipped through space and time, like reality glitched around the man as it failed to properly render and display its movements, on some moments the man was visible fully, sometimes he just blinked out of existence. Mana tried to evade and redirect, she knew the perfect response to each of his attacks but she was physically too late to move. She could've matched a very small amount of superhuman speed and power in her opponent, truth be told, she could've handled any amount of power as her art of redirection only made the counterattack stronger on more powerful opponents but she totally misjudged the timing of her response.

How could she have properly gauged those movements? This man moved like his entire body was being augmented by chakra on the weakest and the most primitive levels, but having in mind that to slightly less than half of the world's population such enhancements gave the physical power to destroy the world and the ability to move faster than reality itself could allow them to, even the primitive levels were unbelievable. This was dangerous and Mana knew it. As she skipped blows and felt her body being pummeled to a stump she realized that this man had no control over his augmentation, usually when ninja augmented their abilities to the point where a single punch released enough energy to cause an explosion that'd decimate the entire world they controlled the flow of chakra, they absorbed the energy inside their chakra flow and transferred all the force directly through to their opponent and not the world, this man was not able to do that. If he continued to grow in power he'd be able to demolish and ruin everything.

The man thrust his knee into Mana's gut making the young magician throw blood up. His blows were inhuman, while her own body was not only human but also worn out. The fact that she survived these blows, this initial spark of speed and power surprised Mana. Initially the girl thought that the samurai were the strongest people in the world, while ninja were incredibly strong as well they couldn't have matched the more warrior based samurai on a battlefield however she'd never imagined that other sorts of people would've manipulated the same energy ninja manipulated like Fajal and the rest of Damij's crew was able to.

Mana's body was young, maybe that's why she didn't instantly die from those impacts but she felt it. Her organs grumbling and shifting inside, she hadn't been punched like that ever since Hisako beat her up back during the mission to save the perfume tycoon's kid. The girl tried to move but she couldn't, this was what her parents warned her would happen. She was a human in a world of impossible number of possibilities and things. Every couple of steps she saw things that the history scrolls never prepared her for: Tailed Beasts, some weird ritualistic syndicates of criminals, artifacts with the power to do whatever their possessor pleased. She had no place in such a world, not anymore, not with her being so simple and weak.

The magician screamed out in pain and fell blood bursting from her mouth in weak yet relentless drips. She could've countered those moves, they were multiple times faster than the fastest a man could move but she could counter them if only she compensated the lack of speed with beginning to counter earlier. She could still predict the man's moves, she saw too much of his patterns, she saw him trying to hit her with all that he could and the painful pulsing wounds all over her body were like a book for Mana to read the man's new patterns, that is to say – old but faster ones. Fajal lifted her body off the ground holding her by the magician's long hair, he dragged Mana to the edge and lowered her to the point where even if the magician reached up she'd never grab the edge.

"You actually do deserve a warrior's death, I was mistaken, you're not like most women that we see here. If there's a heaven for martial artists maybe you'll be permitted to stay there…" Fajal coldly stated letting the girl's hair slip from his fingers.

Bult yelled out, he tried to wriggle up to Fajal and attack him from behind but he was too weak and too late. Now the beaten and battered veteran of hundreds of battles continued to stare at the spikes below in horror. A sound of ripping clothes reached the arena and then Mana's flying kick dug into Fajal's cheek. The martial artist stumbled back before being literally flung by the force and tearing up his cool armored vest into the rocky ravaged surface of the arena. The magician looked at the man, beaten up and bleeding, having lost her blazer in a wild attempt to catch a sticking surface of the arena and swing herself back up from another side, enhancing the speed of her kick and the strength of it. Mana's eyes shot literal lightning at her opponent.

The black bearded fighter roared proudly into the air leaping at Mana fully intending to tear her limb from limb. He no longer viewed her as a little girl, she was no longer the typical woman who was found wandering around the Sheikhate being brought into the arena just to die. The audience had accepted that long ago, probably the moment she stepped in to save her friend's life. Mana was no ordinary teenager, she may not have had her chakra manipulation or any of its benefits but she did still have her lifelong training from the Ninja Academy and the training she did with Meiko, Shimo and Kouta to rely on. Even when they were far away her friends were still helping her and being with her.

Mana started moving earlier, she did just like she thought it'd be right to do – start responding to the moves before seeing them being made, predict the moves and stop relying on her perception to avoid or redirect the movements, throw her own counters Fajal's way. She didn't avoid every blow, she didn't land every blow. Those blows she did get were considerably weaker, Fajal was visibly getting weaker and slower. Mana knew it'd have to happen eventually. The magician continued to avoid the man's blows, she stopped relying on hitting the man and just kept on focusing on redirection and dodging. She was getting tired too, she was getting tired before she even began this fight with Fajal but she was getting tired from human effort, Fajal was wearing himself out superhumanly.

"Enough!" he yelled out leaping up into the air at least eleven meters like it was nothing. Even when beginning to feel the strain of his budojutsu enhancements Fajal performed leaps like that with little to no conscious effort. The man's muscles tore holes in his black shirt, his exploding strained body tore the zipper of his armored vest and let it slip off his body to the spikes below, continuing to tear holes in his jumpsuit as well. Fajal started punching the air as if shadow boxing, initially Mana couldn't understand just what was going on but then she saw.

He was horizontal to the arena's position, his superhuman blows were sending powerful air gusts to the ground propelling him and keeping him afloat. Fajal's rage exploded kicking his budojutsu enhancements into overdrive, Mana knew it was bad news. A loud screeching sound forced the girl to jump back, it was a good thing that the first blast was not aimed at her or else she'd have been totally crushed. Fajal's mad punching skills and superhuman speed created waves of pressurized air that slammed right into the arena destroying it. Mana made the maddest dash to Bult, tackling the man and leaping off of the arena, it appeared like Bult knew what she was doing. Fajal destroyed the arena and sent it crashing down onto the spikes below not by his mere punches but just from the gusts sent by them.

Mana felt Bult grabbing hold of her abdomen, she heard the man scream as he held firmly to the protective wall that provided minimal protection for the lowest rows of the audience. Had she not had this large man in her aid both of them would've tumbled down and ended up impaled. Even when completely battered Bult was strong enough to stay holding onto the wall with Mana in his grasp. Fajal's weightless body slammed into the rocky debris of the collapsed arena, where the debris fell they broke and flattened the steel spikes but the martial artists still must've broken quite a number of bones falling well over twenty meters. Mana was confident that if some of his budojutsu augmentation remained in Fajal's system he'd have survived the fall. Bult shouted in pain and through tremendous effort kicked off the wall landing down onto the destroyed arena below.

Mana looked around, the bodies of the other contestants that were still conscious appeared to all be knocked out, she wasn't sure if they were alive or dead but they were hit by the side blast of Fajal's barrage of air pressure waves, they suffered additional injuries than those Mana left them with but none of them fell onto the spikes at the very least. Myrwa's "brother" however was not so fortunate, the dead twin of the man was crushed by a piece of debris.

"Could you check if they are alive?" Mana looked back at Bult who was breathing heavily. She was glad to see the veteran in a stable enough condition to perform such amazing feats of agility and strength. When she saved his life he was on his final legs. His ability to slowly recover in the midst of a battlefield was certainly to be admired.

"Once I catch my own breath…" the man replied indifferently. Mana looked at Fajal standing up, the man didn't breathe, his tanned skin was getting paler and paler every moment. It was a signal that he must've broken a great number of ribs from that fall. The man dashed at Mana with all of his supernatural speed, his dash was short and much slower than before, a drawback of the extensive abuse of augmentation and the injuries he received. The magician moved aside, she kicked the lower part of Fajal's leg. The man did not notice a broken spike piece behind Mana, he was tripped over and falling right at it head first.

A tight grip to the man's belt stopped him. Mana leaned back to maintain some counterbalance as she lacked the strength needed to immediately stop him in his tracks but her kick slowed him down enough to make her job significantly easier and Fajal's eye stopped a millimeter to the spike's tip.

"A mistake" he uttered flicking the belt out of his jumpsuit with a flick at his belt buckle, the man then grabbed the belt and pulled Mana together with it towards himself planting a firm blow at her abdomen sending Mana down.

Mana never expected her opponents to have mercy on her or to somehow feel grateful towards her just because she saved their lives. That much she told Tanshu the very first day of training. She didn't feel regret or anything resembling it for a moment while she fell. Mana couldn't move, the punch completely drove all oxygen from her body and she needed it to fuel her muscles to pick her body up. She was just like a fish out of water, pathetic and gasping for air on the ground. Blood was spilling from somewhere internally. A couple of more blows like that would've knocked Mana out, couple of more from there on would've killed her outright.

Mana knew that Fajal was going to pick her body off the ground and throw it at the spikes she saved him from, those bent and broken tips were duller and much smaller, death on them would take much longer as she'd be impaled sideways and not from upside down where the gravity aided her lethal impalement. Mana didn't care how she'd die, she just wanted that Bult would live. Judging from the set Sun and how excited the Sheikh's face was he shouldn't have been in much danger… Good. Sheikh was smart enough to leave it only at Mana's death, Bult could've potentially made too much money and had too many amazing fights for him.

Fajal leaned up to pick Mana's body up, he lifted her off the ground as effortlessly as a strongman lifted a phone book, each moment she was being lifted around and flung by someone that strong Mana felt like she could've ended up torn in half just like the phone book in the comparison eventually ended up. However as Fajal swung her body backwards, winding it up for the throw onto the bent spikes, his body froze. His muscles started cramping and twitching weirdly, blood vessels shot out from the tips of his muscles and started wriggling like worms burrowed under the man's skin.

Mana slipped from his grasp – it was the abuse of budojutsu augmentation catching up to him. When used by an unskilled or an untrained user chakra augmentation could've damaged the user's own body – torn it apart, forever taken the user's own ability to mold chakra like it did to Mana. Budojutsu was primitive and unrefined in its very nature. Fajal was doomed the moment he used it and it was just a matter of time. Mana kicked as hard as she could at the back of Fajal's knees sending the man crashing flat on his back before jumping up into the air and delivering a "Spear Kick" into each of his kneecaps. Fajal was no longer in any fighting shape.

"Who else wants some!?" Mana yelled out into the air, her body was at its limit. She expected Sheikh to send the next man out but the man just stood up and slowly, so very slowly began clapping. The audience shortly followed failing to believe what they just saw with their eyes. A teenager, a young woman no less, just plowed through several Damij's crew members and actually performed well in a Descent Gauntlet. She defied the rules and expectations and beat all of her opponents without killing them.

"That'll be enough, young woman, you have earned your right to face Damij the day after tomorrow in a warm-up match. You have fought long at hard for your chance to be humiliated, please enjoy it…" the Sheikh declared, despite somewhat spiteful words his face wore a very rich and genuine smile, just as the man finished speaking and sat back down into his pompous throne of cushions of silk and suede the women around him wrapped around the man like eels around their prey.

Bult pressed his hand against Mana's shoulder. "You have given me a chance to fight and die another day, I'm not sure if you comprehend what this means for a warrior but…"

"You're right, I don't, but saving your life is the greatest victory I could've achieved. Now all I need to do is…" she began talking but Bult pressed his finger to her lips.

"Don't talk about Damij, you first need to recover, you're beaten and broken, tired and hungry without a doubt. First see how well you can recover, how much training you can do before facing him. If you see that you're not ready when the time comes…" the man started his advice but Mana let her face slip out from his soft grasp that attempted to silence her and make her listen.

"No. There is no "if". I may have saved you but I intend to make sure that people don't die needlessly in this place or else it'd all be pointless, for that to happen I need to give the Sheikh a battle like the one that changed this place to begin with, Damij is the most suitable man for such a fight…" Mana declared as the platform opened to their tower the two looked up and wondered just how they were supposed to get up there as the platform extended at the arena's initial level and not where it crumbled down to.

Suddenly with the sound of shifting gears the spikes disappeared underground and finally a pathway was made to an open door where guards awaited for Mana and Bult. The whole way back to the cell that was supposed to be taken away from them and given to Damij's crew the magician felt respect and fear coming out from the guards. So Bult was right… In this place only strength matter and the only reason for the immense degree of sexism was because of pre-conceived notions that women could not be what this place needed them to be.

"Is this how warriors feel like having punched their way to success?" Mana asked with a rather silent and whimpering voice as pain almost tore her down alone, even without the amount of walking needed to be done. Not surprisingly, the guards did not hit her or try to silence her – she was now one of them, one of the fighters of the arena and she was treated with some respect, at least as much as the male competitors.

"Yeah, a good feeling, isn't it?" Bult smiled revealing a mouth of halfway missing teeth.

"No. The only thing I am proud of today is having saved your life, the way how I went on to do it I am not overly fond of but I simply couldn't find another at the moment…" Mana sadly exclaimed pressing her blood covered hand against her chest as it was pressed by both kinds of pain – internal and external.

"Violence would not exist as a concept if on rare occasions it wouldn't be the only available answer… That is what I believe as a fighter" Bult said settling down. His injuries were far worse than Mana's but he appeared to be able to take them much better as well, such was the tremendous difference in body bulk and strength, as well as endurance.

"Maybe… Maybe one day I'll find another way" Mana uttered weakly as the door to their cell screeched open.


	163. I Must Win

"Shit, you're heating up" Bult growled after checking Mana's forehead in the morning. This whole night after her fight the magician felt like some underdeveloped amphibian stuck in a puddle of sludge and drying in the Sun. Her own body was heating up and betraying her, she kept kicking around and writhing in her lackluster bench that most fighters called a bed. She threw blood up a couple of times and the veteran fighter tried to get some attention from the guards who only promised to send someone with some healthcare skill in the morning, if Mana survived that long. She must've taken quite the beating…

"You can't possibly fight Damij like this" Bult sat down on his bench after Mana stopped grunting in pain and rolling on the bench, every time the pain intensified the man held her pressed down to the bench until she threw everything up and the pain stopped, only to come back later. The man sat by her side the whole night, checking that she didn't choke on her own vomit of fall off the bench. Her innards must've already been crushed enough, at least some of her bones must've been broken and another shock could've just killed her outright.

When the medical staff came they only did some brief tests, checked the blunt trauma all over Mana's body, examined its color and tasted her blood. They did some really weird looking tests but they claimed that there was no time to do accurate analyses, had she not delivered such a wonderful fight night last evening she'd have not even deserved as much courtesy as she got now. Apparently the Sheikh was somewhat interested in Mana's condition and was adamant that the best people checked her injuries. Even the big man was looking forward to Mana's fight which placed unimaginable pressure on her to get better.

"Well… Couple of more hours and she'd have died, we can treat this but she won't be in a condition to fight for weeks" one of the medical staff declared placing their hands on Mana and beginning the Mystic Palm treatment. The other one pulled out a strange blob of purplish goo and stuffed it down Mana's throat, the girl could feel the goo blowing up inside of her, it was a similar feeling to having a sanguine pill of Eiju's stuffed down her mouth so it must've served a similar purpose. Some strange liquid that helped her body heal.

"That's good, she's done some killer fights yesterday, I'm sure Sheikh won't mind waiting a bit" Bult sighed but Mana shook her head. Her body felt weird, eyes were heavy and her skin was drowning in sweat, she wasn't sure if it was because of the desert heat or the burning up fever she was having. Whenever she moved any of her arms the bones wriggled and cracked letting out some pretty disgusting noises but the medical staff assured it was harmless.

"We've given you all the medicine we have, it is a medical concoction invented by the great doctor Avemari himself four hundred years ago. The man basically jumpstarted the medical art in the Land of Wind. It has healed much worse injuries than this. Now it's just a matter of how fast your metabolism will absorb it for, for ninja it'd take hours, you might take a bit longer" the doctors kept calming the two down.

"I'm not much of a martial artist, it'll probably take too long. I need to be up by tomorrow's fight" Mana complained.

"Yeah, you're kind of a puny little thing. That's why fighting Damij is out of the question" Bult replied looking Mana straight in the eyes. Initially he was completely sure that Mana's condition would deter her from taking the man on but after a couple of strange remarks his calm demeanor was beginning to fade.

"No. I need to fight. Every day I spend getting better people get hurt and die, fighters taken here by force and those who came here mistaking this place for what it truly is. I have no right to lay here until I feel comfortable to fight, that's not how this world works. You don't get to wait before you're comfortable to take challenges on" Mana replied pushing Bult away and sitting back up. The doctors didn't appear to object it too much but one of them warned the ex-kunoichi to try and refrain from walking or standing up for too long.

"It's not your challenge, you challenged yourself with this! Throwing your life away will change nothing. Maybe you can beat Damij, maybe you can jump around and flail like you did with Fajal, maybe you can survive longer than seven minutes against him – something no one has ever done. One thing that's for certain – you can't fight him like this. Even when you're good and ready it's just a big "maybe" that you can beat him" Bult started getting annoyed, he jumped off his bench and started flailing his arms as he spoke which was never a good sign. His fighter's metabolism was starting to kick in, his swellings had already changed color, it'd probably taken a couple more days for those to heal completely.

"So you will fight then?" a low pitched and a little screechy voice reached the ears of the two as a slim and beaten up figure walked into the cell – it must've been the time when all the fighters were free to watch the fights and no one checked where one went or what they did so Myrwa had snuck into Mana's cell.

"Myrwa! If you're here to hurt her I'll…" Bult jumped up waving his boulder sized fists but Mana gently pressed her hot hand against his chilly dark skin making the giant back down.

"Myrwa-san… I'll understand if you hate me and wish me harm for what happened to your brother, I have sworn to myself that I'd never take a life and trust me – I have not yet broken that word. I just wish you to know that I am sorry for what happened and…" Mana tried to speak but her fever and pain all over her body made her words slurry and come out a bit dizzy.

"Will someone let me talk for once?" Myrwa laughed out scratching the back of his head, only when the man had moved his slim arm from his abdomen had Mana noticed a bandaged and strangely brother-less body of the slim fighter. So that accident in the arena made the man have that dead weight removed? Had the man finally moved past his brother being born dead? As much as Mana regretted all the pain she had to inflict to this man, both physical and psychological, having to break down to him what everyone must've known but no one bothered to tell, she felt glad that the man had a new chapter flipped for him.

"They've removed that stump from my body, normally I'd have to stay confined to bed but they said that my blood is something weird. They said that someone in my family must've been from some clan in Otogakure and that my brother was a bloodline of some sort. Apparently since my father was a clansman and my mother was not that tainted the bloodline and that's why my brother was born dead. The healers also said that my brother's blood and his cells themselves were poisonous and so my own blood had to possess regenerative properties to counteract my brother's own poison" Myrwa grinned, closing his eyes and twisting his mouth. While the girl had to hand it to the man that he did appear quite creepy from a bystander's point of view, reminding more of a ghoulish wraith than a man, Myrwa's smile was quite pleasant to see. Mana only wished that she had enough strength to smile.

"I have seen a similar condition, you may need to take poison for the rest of your life because regenerative ability is something that carries dangers all by itself. It'll form…" Mana tried to warn Myrwa, remembering Eiju's sickness and the Quack's desire to be cured of having to take poison for the rest of his life but it appeared that Myrwa was shining with glee from it.

"Yes, I know. It'll form growths, miniature incomplete organisms inside my body that'll grow and damage me. They said there's another way – my cancerous cells could be used as treatment for injured fighters. They said that my blood could be used as a metabolism booster of sorts. They said I can be a doctor if I so pleased. I have risen above the slums, just like I always dreamed…" Myrwa teared up wiping his giant teary eyes with his comically puny arm and his long fingers fit to play an instrument or steal.

"I am glad that you've found another purpose. I hope you'll live a good rest of your life, having moved past the death of your brother and all this mindless fighting" Mana still desperately tried to smile but she couldn't. She was just too weak, her body hurt too much. Every time she tried the pain made her expression more whiny than happy.

"A weird thing, closure… I used to keep having hope, hope that my brother is alive, hope that I could use that budo-mumbo-jumbo to bring him back even if he wasn't… Hope that we could rise above being good for nothing losers together. It's ironic that all my dreams came true when the hope died, I suppose sometimes hope is the only thing keeping you from moving on and growing. I've learned from this that only when hope dies can you truly move on and deal with something terrible" Myrwa kept weeping like a child. Despite something revolting appearance of the man, especially so when his facial muscles shifted and bent during his weeping, Mana felt really happy for the man.

"You're not out of the woods yet… Think the Sheikh is just gonna let you go? Think again…" Bult angrily intercepted, finally settling back down after realizing that Myrwa came to thank Mana and not finish her off.

"That's why I came here, Mana… I wanted to see if you were actually sticking to your word, if you still fostered that foolish hope to change everything, to give us the choice to leave this place. I want to travel the world and heal people using my clan's legacy, I want my brother's death to mean something. I want to be the man with the golden blood. I want you to set me free, Mana!" Myrwa shouted out kneeling before Mana and falling onto the ground. Myrwa rubbed his face into the messy stone floor of the cell, almost like he tried to force his face through it and onto the lower floors.

"Hey, what are you…" Bult jumped off his seat but then Myrwa lifted his head, all the rubbing he did to the ground made his forehead gush red with blood.

"I am not asking you to die for us, I am willing to give you as much of my blood as I have to. I can accelerate your metabolism, Mana, I can make you be in fighting condition by tomorrow, will you do it!?" Myrwa shouted out loudly declaring his offer. Mana looked to the outside of her cell and saw the doctors being lead back by a feeble old man.

Finally Mana's emotions broke through, her eyes teared up and she had to dig her slobbering nose into the middle section of her own arm. "Yeah! I'll do it! I always meant to do it and I'd have done it even if I wasn't able to walk there by my own!" Mana cried out.

"Mana!" Bult shouted out, "That's dangerously arrogant of you! No one was able to beat Damij or stand up to his crew in a long time, you're really strong, much stronger than anyone gave you credit for but… Please!"

Mana took off her torn up and messy shirt and extended her arm for the medical ninja, with the other hand she pulled Bult's beaten and swollen head to hers and pressed it against her forehead.

"I will fight him! I will win back the arena you want to fight in, the best fighting arena in the world where you can fight to your heart's extent until the day you die tragically in your bed of old age. I will explain to Sheikh that forced fighting only leads to needless death and harm and that only fighters who fight honoring the art can deliver that godly fight he wants" Mana explained, letting Bult's head go.

"It is dangerous to do this, kiddie, I imagined you'd have ended up facing Damij one day, you've got the same hungry eyes as the Goddess of Battle had. However I imagined I'd have the time to train you" the old man who lead in the doctors shook his head and scratched his long and messy beard. It was the same man who told Mana the story of the legendary woman who once completed the Gauntlet, even before Damij did. Finally Mana could place a face behind that voice.

The man was a short but very wide shouldered one. He looked like he could've been a prominent martial artist but his age got to him after long years. His face was covered in thick looking skin and strange scratches. Those must've been the stigma that lifelong fighting left the old man.

"It'll be fine" Mana replied laying back down as the doctors prepared to make some treatment from Myrwa's blood. Naturally they couldn't have just spilled his blood into her body, they needed to extract the right cells from it and make medicine which Mana's body wouldn't have rejected. They had no time to play around with blood types so they needed to make the medicine which would've taken some time.

"I'm not much of a fighter so training me wouldn't have worked, took me whole weeks to learn just what I know now" the girl grinned with a guilty look.

"True, your fighting style reeks of disrespect towards martial arts, designed to win and not fight, defeat and not clash. Still, if anyone can repeat the feats of the Goddess of Battle it's you. As much as it disgusts me to aid someone like you, you're the last hope this place has to becoming a sanctuary of martial arts like it used to be" the old man giggled, despite talking a lot of rather mean things that were a bit offensive to Kouta's and Meiko's fighting style, he appeared to look at Mana with joyful eyes, almost like a grandpa would've looked at his grandkids.

The doctors took at least half an hour more to create the medicine and inject it, Mana didn't feel much different, the cells of Myrwa didn't feel like Mystical Palm treatment or any other regenerative measure she'd taken up to that moment. It felt like absolute nothing. On the contrary to the weirdly unimpressive feeling of the medicine it appeared to really have worked. The old man continued to sit around the cell, kneeling by Mana's bed and waiting for her to recover, desperate to have at least one or two hours to train her before tomorrow's fight. Despite Mana's recovery, her fever moving away, her sweating ceasing to as much as it possibly could have in the middle of a desert and her internal bleeding marks fading to just slightly darker spots on her body, by the time she recovered the old man was lead back to his own cell by the guards.

"You shouldn't fight. Even the old optimist thinks so, take some time, let the man train you. Win a bunch of fights and earn the right to face Damij in a one on one fight the right way" Bult was adamant to make Mana change her mind about fighting Damij but the magician was equally as determined to fulfil her dreams about this place.

"If I did that the Sheikh would pit us against each other in a fight to the death, not a warm-up match. A fight to the death cannot be epic, it cannot be that godly fight which the Sheikh wants. Both of us would just be wishing to survive, furthermore the Sheikh's joy of battle would be diminished by my refusal to kill Damij once I beat him. It would not work. I need this. This is right" Mana replied with a hopeful and soft voice. She appreciated her cellmate's worries for her well-being and her life, she really did. The man was beaten and crippled by this Damij and how to him the champion appeared like some sort of sky towering wall of stone and fire.

"You're just like I was when I was young. You never consider the possibility that you can lose. You keep saying "I'll win", "When I win"… What if you lose, what if you're nowhere close to Damij's level? What if he breaks your spirit and destroys the momentum and love that the public already feels for you, how long do you think it'll take to get it back? How many innocent fighters will die then, just because you rushed recklessly. Should've at least let the old man train you…" Bult rubbed his aching battered face, probably still remembering the beating he himself received from Damij that crippled him.

"I've lost so many times in my life, got beaten so much and refused to fight enough times to never lose the dice roll ever again. If I lose – I'll die, that's how I'm used to think and that thought deserves no further consideration. I'm willing to die for my dream but honestly focusing on how to win justly is hard enough for me to bother thinking about how to die honorably. If I die, I'll die, that's that, that'll be the end of the last daughter of the Wandering Ninja, if I win I'll move one step up the ladder…" Mana's feeble voice reached Bult, both cellmates were on their sides only showing their backs to one another because each one was worried about all the different things about tomorrow.

"I mean… No need to dramatize things, it's just a warm-up fight tomorrow, killing during warm-ups is frowned upon and Damij won't wish to lose face" Bult replied with a little more cheerful tone, maybe he wished to cheer the magician up a bit, maybe he wished to let her know that this may have just been one of those trials that made her grow where victory was impossible.

"No. I must win and I must do it tomorrow" Mana firmly cut it down.

The two didn't exchange another word after that until the next morning, the morning of the big fight.


	164. Seven Minutes

"So, how're you feeling?" Bult asked Mana next morning as the girl seemed to be more silent than usual the whole time since she woke up. As usual the guards announced the fights after the breakfast and lined the crew up, despite taking part in the very first fight and Bult not fighting at all, the two ended up at the front of the row.

"It doesn't matter how I'm feeling" Mana replied, she was afraid and worried, despite the fight not being one that only death ended, a lot still depended on her performance. She needed to not only win but also do so in a manner that'd change the Sheikh's attitude towards martial arts. She needed to give the man the fight he had not seen for many years. One like the kind that changed it all. Mana hoped that Damij would be helpful in that but she wasn't quite sure. The man was apparently the strongest fighter around so if he couldn't be the second part of the greatest battle this arena had ever seen no one could and that possibility greatly scared Mana. Having an impossible goal set in her mind did not worry the magician nearly as much as not having one at all, if this failed she'd know no other way to change the Sun Disc arena back to its glory days.

"Look, if you lose… Well, nobody will blame you for anything. Everyone knows you're really strong but nobody depends on you, we've all seen too much of this place to put all of our hopes on you" Bult tried to calm Mana down, he wasn't really successful but it wasn't because of the fact that his words weren't the best suited for that goal, more so due to the fact that Mana tried to hide her fear to begin with. This was her test, her chance to be a hero without the ability to mold chakra, chance to be the kind of hero she always wanted to be. Heroes of legends didn't feel fear, they weren't afraid before their big battles, or so legends made everyone believe.

"I don't care about that, I'm depending on myself being able to do this. I will win. I still have another mission I need to complete so I can't take too long here" Mana said looking forward into the darkness of the waiting area. Not too long after the area sunk into the darkness Mana could hear loud voices from all the way inside the arena. She couldn't exactly make out what was being said, not for the lack of trying, all she could hear was a feint voice of the announcer and deafening cheers from the public. Finally the light seeped into the waiting area as the gate rumbled open and the bridging platform extended to her end. Mana took a small step forward onto the platform as it closed in to the ring of the arena. The magician took a brief moment to look down. There were no longer spikes to fall down on, just grass.

"I have a feeling that this warm-up fight will set an unfair high for the other matches to overcome, ladies and gentlemen!" the announcer yelled out energetically pointing at Mana who finally gathered the courage to look at the man called Damij.

He was a tall individual, well developed and trained, his body was muscular edging out to the limit where he may have appeared too muscular to move fast but not just yet. His physical condition bordered perfection, his build suggested enough physical strength to compare even to the strongest arena's fighters but he also looked fit enough to move fast. His stance didn't appear anything special – the man just stood with his arms lowered and his chest buffed up front and open, his legs split shoulder-wide. The man wore some strange head attire, Mana had seen some people wear it in Sunagakure – it was a cloth garment covering the man's head and held down with a golden ring. He also possessed rich facial hair, just like Fajal and his cold facial expression suggested some experience in military discipline. The man wore a long white coat on top of his black tank top and white rather baggy pants held pressed to his abdomen by a large rubber sash so red that the colour almost hurt to look at.

Upon setting her foot onto the arena Mana stretched out a bit, jumping on her left and right feet just so her legs got accustomed to the pressure of quickly having to keep all of her bodily weight and transfer it to the other foot just as swiftly. Something told Mana that Damij would give her absolutely no time to breathe easy. Mana took a brief glance at the Sheikh's balcony, not much appeared to have changed except the women appeared to be more passive as the Sheikh was all over the balcony edge, the man was hyped about the fight. Even the Sheikh expected to see something interesting, maybe that'd help Mana in the end?

"Begin!" the announcer screamed out gesturing for the two to go at each other but for great public disappointment the fight didn't immediately explode out of control. Damij continued to stand there looking at Mana while the magician dashed to the edge of the arena to give her maximum time to react to his attacks. The ex-kunoichi expected Damij to be faster than Fajal, stronger as well which meant that she'd need all the time and advantages she could get.

"Well? Won't you attack? I'm giving you seven minutes before I finish the fight…" Damij asked looking curiously at Mana while the public roared up, throwing their headgears up into the air before remembering they'll need them once the Sun reached its peak so they quickly caught those at their way down. Damij's seven minutes gimmick appeared to be a beloved one in this arena.

"Darn it, if he's going to be passive about it this fight won't change anything. I need this fight to be the best that the Sheikh has seen!" Mana thought to herself angrily, she was usually a patient girl but now her goal pushed her forward, forced her to be less cautious than she'd have usually been. Mana rushed forward with a jumping kick which Damij effortlessly avoided by leaning back. Mana quickly repurposed her force into a downwards axe kick but Damij moved sideways just as easily. His move economy was just as impressive as that of the other fighters. That being said, the move economy of Fajal was so good that Damij's only matched it. There was no possible way for it to be even better.

Mana continued to attack Damij with a flurry combination of kicks, switching her balance foot often so that the martial artist couldn't counter by targeting it. Damij avoided each and every kick with such ease and grace that it appeared like he had entire seconds to spare when in fact Mana's strikes peaked the speed that a human was capable of. The girl grunted, she noticed it immediately – the secret that made Damij the most powerful martial artist in the Sun Disc arena. Damij wasn't necessarily that much more masterful, stronger or faster than Fajal or the second strongest member in his crew, whoever they were. Damij's budojutsu enhancements were so weak, so feint that they allowed him cross the superhuman limits by a small margin without tiring him like Fajal's monstrous power boost did. Damij won through control, not sheer power and speed.

Damij's foot flashed below, the man swept his leg faster than a blink – a feat of perfect economy not only of movement but budojutsu as well. Mana felt her balance being taken away as the man's hand made the air whistle around his thrusted arm and rustle his long sleeves. Instantly the girl felt a tight grip around her throat, her body being lifted up effortlessly. That wasn't as impressive as it'd normally had been – Mana was quite a lightweight and yet… That perfect economy of Damij's slightly visible power boost made all the difference in the world. Fajal was faster and stronger than Damij but the latter's perfect economy of both physical movement and his budojutsu augmentation made Damij a challenge even for genin ninja while Fajal would've landed a couple of blows and winded out. Mana was out of her league.

The girl tried to smack the man's wrists, slip her finger thrusts in between his soft spots and pressure points that'd cause the man pain and irritation forcing him to let go of her neck but he kept on holding her, snuffing all the air she had. Mana couldn't believe she'd be taken out this easily… If this was a one on one fight she'd have died like this! She had no tricks in her sleeves – her ninja tools were taken away and her limbs didn't listen to her. As her bodily temperature rose, sweat started breaking out the girl felt a light breeze – her body was being thrown sideways. Damij wished neither to kill her nor to end the fight before his seven minutes clocked out.

"Sloppy, you're not even a martial artist, how did you beat Fajal and Almash exactly?" the man spoke. It wasn't cockiness as such snarky comments would've been coming from Fajal's mouth – the man had a genuine point. Mana tried to attack him using her self-taught taijutsu style of kicking which to a martial arts master would've appeared childish and primitive. Her ace was her combination style of redirection and dodging, if she just employed that she could've matched Damij, Mana knew that but… That wouldn't have been the fight Sheikh wanted!

The magician grunted, she rushed forward with the textbook Academy taijutsu moves, she was at the very least as skilled at them as a common genin would've been. Finally Damij noticed a slightly elevated challenge as Mana heard him breathe erratically dodging these blows just for a brief moment. However he once again dodged each and every attack. It was like he was a perfect evasion machine, Mana was now shown how her opponents felt when fighting her one on one.

The girl screamed as the man's kick flashed tapping her lightly in her chin before his palm strike sent her stumbling backwards. Damij then leaped spinning his legs like a buzz saw hitting the back of Mana's head and pounding her body into the rocky floor. The magician heard something in her crack, she felt the taste of blood and stone in her mouth, her eyes were watering – she was failing her objective, she was being humiliated and by then the public knew just how this fight would end. Another seven minutes of punishment before Damij ended his opponent. In the end the strange girl that rode into Agbarah on the back of a camel and showed these amazing moves no one had ever seen before was nothing special, she fell just like everyone else…

"No!" Mana screamed in her mind as her body started boiling, three and a half minutes had passed, she still had half of that time to end it before Damij was fighting her seriously. She had faced superior opponents in the past and it never stopped her, adrenaline forced Mana to jump on her feet and bounce right off the arena, the girl saw the cracked floor tiles and couldn't even begin to imagine how much damage her body had actually taken from these blows, these mad whirlwind kicks would've busted through stone and left dents in steel but Mana's adrenaline kept her body moving, shock kept pain from being fully registered just yet.

Mana tried to attack Damij but then dashed backwards herself – this man was as skilled and powerful as a genin ninja that focused on taijutsu and trained their body in the technical side of martial arts. He discovered a new form of chakra augmentation – budojutsu. One that Mana had never seen before. He was a prodigy of taijutsu whom she could never match in a fair one on one fight so it was time she stopped trying. The magician took a couple of deep breaths before taking the defensive stance that Meiko and Kouta's training helped her devise. This combination of styles allowed her to evade attacks from both Shimo and Kouta at the same time. While those two were holding back from chakra augmentation even without it they'd have trumped Damij in skill together. Mana felt confident that she could evade Damij's perfect movements.

"What is this?" the martial artist asked her as he slowly started walking up to her.

"My true fighting style, the one that beat Fajal-san, Almash-san and the others…" Mana replied.

Damij cracked a grin, he punched a couple of times using his palm – just like Mana did. It only made sense that the man fought similarly to her, after all he was a Sunagakure Ninja Academy dropout if Bult's tale was to be believed. Mana avoided his blows just as effortlessly as he avoided hers previously. The man raised an eyebrow and started relentlessly attacking her with a string of spinning kicks, he delivered them from various angles, as he was jumping, flipping and spinning in the air yet he was unable to land them now that Mana switched to the defensive.

The man performed a couple of lightning fast backflips and took a straight fighting stance again.

"Impressive…" he noted "People refer to the human peak of speed and power as 100%, I suppose you could call my current state 120% and yet I don't quite tire myself because my increase is so miniscule and irrelevant. My subordinates love to multiply their power at least twenty and more times but I advise them not to go beyond 2200% increase. It appears none of budojutsu augmentations can touch you if you don't want them to… I mean if Fajal's 2200% couldn't, how could my measly 120% ever hope to compare?" Damij complemented Mana's evasive style.

"My friends taught it to me so that I was able to fend for myself and didn't drag them down…" Mana replied briefly, she noticed that Damij was stalling for time. He knew by now that he'd have been unable to beat her using just the level of power he had now and he wasn't willing to show the audience that he didn't have things under complete control. Sadly the pain of being beaten and thrown around like a ragdoll was slowly beginning to catch up to Mana finally as adrenaline could only help her for so long to fend off so much pain.

"And that is all that it is… Defence. A style to help you to survive, just something to keep you from getting hit" Damij smiled.

Normally he'd have been right but the style of redirection that Meiko taught Mana was still up the magician's sleeve, while the evasive style was purely defensive Mana still had the option of creating her own openings using redirection and beat her opponents, even those of far superior skill. Still, Mana wished to use that style either when she was pressed to a wall or when Damij's seven minutes of playing around ended. If she managed to keep fighting after the seven minutes ended she'd be able to entertain the audience by showing that there was someone able to fully challenge Damij even at his best.

Damij quickly charged at Mana, his body blurred as he once again briefly augmented his abilities just barely above the human limit and dashed to Mana trying to strike her down. She didn't have much time, less than a minute left to seven minutes. The magician leaned back to avoid Damij's palm strike, moved the rest of her lower body back to avoid his flipkicks and barrage of offensive acrobatic kicks. She had to do it, she couldn't just keep on dodging forever. Mana thrust her own palms and knees to work, opening Damij's body for secured blows.

Mana opened her own offense but Damij evaded it, he evaded her artificial openings! Now he knew of Mana's ability to redirect, to create openings and exploit them. Brief dark aura started emanating around Damij – his augmentation was increasing. Mana found her hands caught in Damij's grasp, her eyes opened wide in surprise, "Ten, nine…" she counted down seconds until Damij's seven minutes would clock out and he'd supposedly beat her.

"I see… So you can redirect to create openings even from the most perfect styles… That being said, such strategy works only on humans of peak human strength and speed. The moment you redirect you are no longer defending and evading. You still switch and jump around from offensive to defensive styles and you lack harmony between them. You can only defend yourself, you won't lay a finger on me…" Damij explained as Mana desperately tried to kick the man as her hands were firmly locked down in his iron grasp. Damij's feet matched Mana's, not only blocking her kicks but kicking her in the gut and her knees as well, sending the girl on her knees. Damij lifted Mana by her hands as her pain ridden beaten body weighed down.

Mana didn't even try to resist. She knew that Damij was right, she could only defend herself in infinite loops of evasion but she could never tag Damij. Eventually she'd tire out or Damij would but she had to use her full one hundred percent to evade his superhumanly fast strikes and he only had to warm himself up to throw them, a body capable of two thousand percent augmentation tired little when it fought using a bit over a hundred. She'd have timed out first, most likely… Mana knew it was all over, she gave up. Damij's crushing headbutt made everything go black. Her seven minutes were up…

For the first time in a while pain of light seeping into Mana's eyes didn't cause headaches that made her wish she was dead. Mostly because it was the middle of the night that Mana woke up, she was laying on the bench with a bucket laying beside her and Bult passed out by his bench. Mana smelled something very disgusting inside that bucket, the magician tried to sit back up but she couldn't, her head was too dizzy. Bult must've kept himself awake the whole time tending to Mana's knocked out body, watching that the magician didn't stop breathing all of a sudden or didn't choke on her vomit. This must've been quite a nasty concussion…

Mana checked her forehead feeling a cold and damp cloth dripping on it. It must've been something to help her concussion but… What exactly would she be returning to? She lost. Hopelessly and unconditionally. Damij had the full control the entire time, he dictated the terms, he named seven minutes and once the last second ticked Mana was knocked out. Maybe she could've resisted for a bit longer, just long enough to defy him his seven minute satisfaction but… What was the point? Damij was right, she wasn't a martial artist. All she had was the ability to run away, evade blows and survive. That wasn't a skill worthy of an arena champion or the legendary hero that'd beat the Ascension Gauntlet and save the arena once again.

Mana took the damp cloth off of her forehead and flipped onto the other side as her shoulder was completely numb and hurt a little already. Crystal tears started running down Mana's cheeks, she was so arrogant thinking she could've won. She needed to listen to Bult, to the old man, to everyone telling her to wait and do it right. This silly arrogant rush to save everyone every time would've ended her life if this wasn't a warm-up match. Why was she so adamant to rush it, the save the arena as fast as possible? The girl sighed and tried to get some sleep. At this point she wasn't sure to what exactly she'd be waking up to, she must've disappointed everyone that secretly believed her and started having faith in her once she beat one opponent after another, each stronger than the other.

She raised everyone's hopes up just to let them all down…


	165. Road to Ascension

The next morning was met with silence. Neither Bult nor any of the other contestants spoke to Mana at all. Granted, that may have been due to the magician's lack of trying since she just assumed that she once again squandered all of the respect and rights she had earned previously after losing. Wasn't that how this place worked? People had to fight and win to get the treatment that any human being deserved… Everyone just continued to stare at Mana uncomfortably and all the talking ceased immediately when she left the cell and walked around the hall during breakfast and the announcements of that day's fights.

From what Mana gathered there was a huge influx of new recruits. A small time settlement was destroyed recently, not too far away from Agbarah, the work of the desert raiders who lately were becoming more and more aggressive as they gathered under the wing of their new leader, granted, Mana wasn't able to get any other clues about Fennec and his ambitions being involved. She thought it was very likely that it may have been a statement, maybe even possibility that the cursed rogue was looking for the Konohagakure team that crushed the outpost of his subordinates.

Finally when the fights were announced and everyone rushed out to peek at the fights through the small observation spots they could put themselves into, Mana, not feeling like looking at violence she failed to stop from happening decided to just return to her cell. The girl's feet dragged along the rough rocky ground so hard that she even tripped once and her sandals got full of sand. She lifelessly fell onto her bench and looked at Bult who was also laying and looking at the wall. Why would a veteran warrior withhold the pleasure of seeing some good fights?

"You know, I really expected this hatred treatment from everyone else but… I just thought you'd be different" Mana said with a dreadful combination of sadness and some scorn behind her voice. Perhaps she wasn't entirely just to suspect her cellmate of losing belief in her, for no longer looking at her like she was a human being but Mana was just too frustrated and crushed by her loss to deal with all of that bull properly.

Bult flipped over and looked at the magician, "No one's angry at you, we've just seen you give up out there and… We thought your dream was crushed, none of us are willing to get in your way now that you're going through what all of us had already gone through" the man replied, trying to smile gently for the girl just to soften her beaten and squished heart.

"He didn't crush my dream, I didn't give up because I gave up on my dream, I gave up because further violence would've been pointless. It was a deadlock, I could've kept on dodging him forever but I'd have never been skilled and fast enough to respond, in the end he was just a superior fighter" Mana replied scratching her aching abdomen. Her head still felt a little dizzy, that all too familiar sensation of colossal slimy slugs sliding up and down her throat trying to force vomit to burst through as if trying to pull a mean joke on Mana.

"So you're still going to do something? You still plan on fighting him again?" Bult wondered looking at his own busted up hands and the wounds he sustained during his own fight with Damij.

"Yeah, I just… Need to figure things out, I don't know how to go at him, what went wrong… All I know is that I was too focused on what needed to be done and not enough on how to do it" Mana replied as her eyes dimly closed down. She was very far away from being on Damij's level. It was quite possibly impossible for her to ever reach such mastery of martial arts in her entire lifetime. Maybe there were more hacks she could've learned but she needed a master who knew them. Kouta knew perfect dodging techniques because he was a medical ninja, Meiko knew redirection techniques because she was a skilled sword user and knew some mystery ways of punching someone in the face. All she could've learned here was pure martial arts and there was little to no point of doing it since Damij was better than anyone else there. Then there was still Mana's own quest of finding the Box of Ultimate Bliss and regaining her chakra manipulation.

"It's fine, you're still young, we were all young and ambitious once, we all only looked at things thinking what there was to gain from them and never considered failure as an option. We've always thought that if we failed the world would explode and we'd cease to exist so that the best option was to focus on the difficulties ahead, instead of what'd happen if we lost and how to deal with the consequences" Bult replied squirming on his wooden bench and sitting up. "Hey, old man! Are you here?!" the large man yelled out.

"Yeah, I'm listening" the old man replied, "You're willing to start training or what?" his high pitched elderly voice reached Mana's ears. "It's been too many years since the Goddess of Battle last rampaged in the Sun Disc arena, let's make the old bitch proud, shall we?" he tried to motivate Mana.

The magician laid there in total silence for a couple of minutes, considering all of the options. Her friends may have been wandering the Land of Wind desert looking for her. She needed to somehow let them know exactly where she was and that may have been possible by using some hawks from the Agbarmahal palace. Nothing in her mission directly contradicted her current new side objective, that being said she didn't have all the time in the world. This was just a temporary stop on her quest.

Mana's eyes shot open, "Let's go, old man, however I don't have much time. We will train for one week, then I shall challenge the Ascension Gauntlet. There are people I must inform and using the Agbarmahal's hawks or the Sheikh's merchants to find them and deliver my message would save me a lot of time. I will still save this place, just like I intended…"

"Mana…" Bult tried to object. He would've been right to do so, after all, Mana was making almost the same mistake she made the last time.

"Hmmmm, a week you say. You couldn't defeat Damij one on one before, to make a fighter out of you capable of fighting off three champions of the arena one after another, Damij included…" the old man mumbled to himself.

"We have about a week until any of us are likely to see battle, right now the Sheikh is checking his new recruits, filling the days with useless warm-up matches just to measure their strength, one or two kill matches at best per day. We've got time but not much of it, Mana can't afford to fight and get hurt again before taking on the Gauntlet…" Bult finally got onto Mana's side despite most likely thinking that she had the wrong idea. He was supporting her just because he knew that the magician needed him. That made Mana's small but often pouty lips twist in a way resembling a smile ever so slightly.

That very same day, after lunch and getting their daily water rations Mana and the old man got together in an old previously unused cell. It was slightly larger than all the others but all four new and temporary inhabitants were participating in a Battle Royale match. The ex-kunoichi tried her best not to think about how she failed those men and women, how she could've saved them from this suffering and potential death if only she fought harder, if only she… Could somehow have won. This was her curse, her suffering but it also made her stronger by giving her purpose and direction, it showed exactly what failure meant and it made her push harder to avoid future failure.

That being so, she was still below average and the old man bodied her every time she wasn't just dodging and redirecting his blows. She could dodge him and redirect him like everyone else perfectly, not skipping a single blow but the moment she switched styles the old man completely dominated her. It was like he didn't fight in the present, each and every move of his looked so slow and useless but he was working Mana like a chessboard to place her at a place and in a stance he needed her in to beat her down.

"You're terrible, it'll take ten thousand years to make a martial artist out of you…" the old man angrily declared after wiping sweat off his face and sitting down. Technically he was superior than Damij and Fajal combined in pure technique, he must've been a martial artist of such skill that it pushed the maximum amount of martial art skill imaginable by the farthest stretches. It was like thinking a pebble was the largest concentration of rocks and then seeing a meteor in action. However the old man was slow, he was also battle worn breaking down in bleeding sessions in mid combat and also he got tired almost instantly, after one or two combinations of strikes.

"Just like I thought…" Mana replied as the two left the cell, she looked at two stretchers with a bloody cloth covering a cadaver of unclear origin, most likely someone's remains from the Battle Royale, one she could've prevented. Needless deaths everywhere she looked and she should've stopped them all… And yet, Mana knew no way of how she could've helped these people: the only way would've been to win but to win she had to have had her chakra which meant having to let the perfume tycoon get gutted by Hisako back then… No person could've been blamed for any of this but… Mana somehow found herself responsible for everything, as a person who placed responsibility to change the world upon their shoulders should.

"These moves…" the old man grumped out looking at the gruesome sight of dead men and women being carried through the rotten and smelly cells that reeked of rodent poop, blood and vomit. "How and where did you learn them?" he asked, probably referring to Mana's improvised style of dodging and redirecting, the combination of two styles taught to her by Meiko and Kouta.

"My friends, ninja taught me those, I needed something to replace my lack of fighting ability after I lost my chakra manipulation" Mana replied looking down and thinking about where her friends may have been now. She could only hope that they were alive and well.

"I thought I saw some ninja taijutsu in there… As a non-ninja I know nothing of those moves but they appear designed to kill, you use them to dodge. There is something that could give you the power to fight Damij, Fajal and all of his crew all at once breaking each of them like a parrot's beak breaks nuts. That'll need some… Questionable means to be taken" the man ominously cut down.

"You say that these styles are designed to kill, what do you mean?" Mana asked.

"Well, I see potential in them, they are incomplete. What you show is a paper with a girl of exquisite beauty drawn on it but the face and the bosom are not yet finished and remain blank, you get what I say?" the old man hinted giggling into his fist, no doubt imagining something dirty.

"I'm not sure I do" Mana squinted at him, it was a strange feeling having to squint at someone downwards since the old man was very crooked and so quite shorter than Mana.

"All ninja moves are built to kill and yet yours lack that ability, taijutsu is an art of murder using one's own body, if you use it differently your style is incomplete. Your moves are just 75% complete and the 25% that remain are a very naughty detail – killing blows. Your martial art could be a new brand of martial art completely unseen on this planet, you basically invented a new combat style but it is incomplete yet, your moves show capacity for another move very often suggesting that your friends purposefully took something out of them, knowing you'd never kill" the man explained.

Mana had gained a great deal of hope previously but now her face sunk down again.

"I apologize but I cannot complete the style, I have sworn to never kill and I'd rather die than take a life" she exclaimed almost like a mantra.

"And what about the lives of others? If you do not do what you dream of doing people will keep on piling under bloody cloths and will get carried away in masses, good, peaceful people that were just mere settlers before raiders raided their settlements, sending them to this war zone to fight for food. Will you still not take lives then?" the old man angrily growled at her.

"I will find another way… You have given me a great idea, to include offensive moves into my incomplete defensive martial art. Perhaps I can perfect it in this next week but I shall understand if…" Mana began another speech before she was cut short.

"Shut up! I shall guide you until the end of your path, granted it shall be a short and painful path but I shall see to it that you walk it until your feet bleed. Counterattacks. That is your answer. One of your styles focuses on redirection, the other on evasion, they are each purely defensive styles but the first one opens your opponent up for counterattacks. Show me your taijutsu style and I shall use my experience and expertise to help you devise a perfect counterattack style to include into your combination. You shall avoid every attack perfectly and respond with equal or greater pain than your opponent meant to cause – I find no more suitable style for a foolish pacifist such as yourself" the old man replied stroking his beard so hard that if it was a cat it'd have clawed the man's face off.

Mana jumped up in excitement. That sounded so perfect for the kind of fighter she meant to become. She'd never become as skilled at martial arts as a purely taijutsu focused ninja but she'd at least have means to fight them hand to hand, so far the only times she'd been beaten were times when she didn't use her evasive style or used it improperly. If she was taught offensive moves to incorporate in her defensive style in the form of counterattacks it'd be the perfect addition. She'd be the protector of peace and human life who'd respond to any violence with slightly larger force, perfectly avoiding a strike, redirecting it in a way that opened her enemy up for counters and delivering the strike. The perfect trinity!

"Well then, we shall start first thing tomorrow, I just need to know that you shall do nothing stupid until we complete the training. Also if at any point I see that it won't work I need to know that I can count on you to finish it properly" the old man responded seeing the girl's excitement.

"I can promise the first thing but I shall fight in the Gauntlet after one week, seven more days is more than I can afford to stay here, for seven days I can tolerate seeing pain and suffering of innocent people just because I am still unable to save them but not longer. I shall make everyone's pain and lives mean something, this time I'm sure of it" Mana replied.

The old man sarcastically sighed, "You may possess one millionth of her talent and martial arts prowess but you certainly have all of Goddess' conviction. All of her worst traits and none of her good ones, what have I gotten myself into, I wonder?"

For the next seven days the brutal countdown began. Every day Mana showed the old man the basic moves of ninja taijutsu that she was taught in the Academy, helped the man understand its basic principles and the man helped her adapt those moves into a perfect counterattack based mini-style which she eventually could combine with her present two. The man was adamant about Mana ditching the kicking style, he said that there was no longer any use in the magician keeping her opponents away from her because she could no longer use genjutsu and ninjutsu anyways. She should've just focused on the style she was trying to master completely.

An important part of the training was also Mana's attempts to make the style visually pleasing. The man expressed his disgust of Mana's cheap and abusive style and claimed that it felt like cheating at an honorable art of martial arts and the magician took it to heart because she wanted the Gauntlet to be the best fight that the Sheikh and the public had ever seen. She was an entertainer as a stage magician, she knew what pleased the public, cheap visual and auditory tricks to keep them entertained, strikes that may have looked visually pleasing but were less than stellar in their sheer force. Mana wouldn't be losing potency, she'd still be overcoming any attack thrown by a human or weaker ninja. So many times the magician was told that she could never fight on an even level to a ninja who can use chakra augmentation, ninja that can move in blurs and destroy entire buildings and even mountains with their full power, not to mention chuunin and higher who could probably blow up the entire world if they didn't control their chakra transferring through punches alone. Studying with the old man made the magician doubt those claims for a second. She was getting good.

Was she good enough to beat all three champions of recent events? Possibly, maybe not. That much remained to be seen but she was growing in strength, speed and technical knowledge of the martial arts. She still despised an art based on violence but she fought not for destruction of this arena but for the art meaning what it was always supposed to mean. Improving oneself through the art of fighting. Mana was not that kind of person but she saw the people to whom it was a way of life and she wanted that for them. She wanted the Sun Disc to mean what it once meant, not for it to be some rubble of stone with its inhabitants let to wander the cruel desert.

The entire time, those whole seven days of her training Mana also took a brief moment to talk to Bult every night, hear what he had to say about each and every champion of every event of the recent days. She was a girl who loved knowledge, certainly on the geeky side so the more preparation she could've gotten on the potential opponents she may have faced in the Gauntlet the better. Despite only being able to get a couple of clues, as few as she had gotten went a long way. Right before the seventh day dawned Mana knew deep inside that she was as ready as she could've possibly been. Tomorrow she'd once again waltz her way out into the arena and demand for the Ascension Gauntlet!


	166. Of Dentons and Doomsdays

A trio of colourful characters was making its way through the ending narrow layers of the desert that quickly transitioned into a more urban and rather ancient surrounding. The change of scenery suggested both a social and a visual change, one left the endless desert of the Land of Wind only to enter a realm ruled by someone else entirely. Where the first one was ruled by the strongest, those who managed to take everything they needed, the second one was ruled by the Sheikh, who just for the sake of simplicity kept a very similarly run ship.

One of these characters was a tall and slim man who almost looked like he was put together from bone and hay. His narrow arms and legs appeared almost skeletal and it would've been a surprise to anyone looking from aside as to how exactly could the man keep himself walking upright, his large round head was covered with a metallic mask that had two very clear details to it: a breathing and filtering apparatus that allowed the man to breathe without getting a mouthful of sand in the desert and large yellow googles that covered half his face. The googles also had small little dots that scurried from one point of the yellow glass to another, telling the observer where exactly the wearer was focusing his attention. The man's hair looked nothing fancier than if someone slapped a handful of hay onto one's head and called it a hairdo, it appeared that only the man's large hat let the hair keep from scattering in the wind.

The other one wore a similar hat, with a hole at the back to let the man's long hair flow through it. The hat was meant to protect the man from the Sun and the hair needed no such protection. Differently from his friend the hat which the second traveller wore was a conical hat, whereas the first gentleman wore a more reminding of a cowboy hat accessory. Also setting the second man apart was a large poncho that the swordsman wore, probably where the man's nickname "the Poncho Assassin" came from. It was a mystery how this Poncho Assassin didn't sweat to death under that unfitting piece of attire as compared to that of his teammates' which was more ragged, torn up and moderate. The slim friend of the Poncho assassin wore a torn up sleeveless white shirt meanwhile his bearded third friend wore something that resembled an almost Hawaiian shirt but it was soaked in too many different kinds of sauces, vomit and God knew what else to tell for sure.

The third one also wore a strange bandanna with all the different Sheikhate insignia. One may have assumed that such was to blend in wherever the man went but it would've more likely only pissed the locals off. After all, the man wore literally the signs of every Sheikhate and even the symbol of Sunagakure on his bandana. If it wasn't the headset that would've brought the bearded blonde trouble it would've been his terrible smell and an apparent lack of personal hygiene. Either that or the man's evident slouch as well as his affinity to snag things before he blew them up, not because he was worried that the owners of these things would come after him, it was just that things tend to blow up around him and they couldn't have exactly been snagged or been of much use after an Earth shattering explosion, could they?

"I think you overdid with the explosion…" the slim google-man whom everyone called just Denton remarked trying to bring up some manner of small talk with his teammates.

"I mean like… Can we really overdo anything in this life of ours… Like… Is something we overdo just more of our goal or a causality of our failure, or is it the causality of like… Our inevitable demise that like… Follows all of us as a species and is ultimately like… The fruit of our hubris" the bearded man slurred, still high on Hat'ash he had consumed recently.

"Can I kill him now?" Poncho Assassin grunted, "He traded your projectile knives for drugs, he'll blow the whole fucking Sheikhate up when he gets the chance… Not that he'll wait for one" the man warned.

Denton sighed.

"I mean like when you say like that… I feel like we all may have made a mistake collectively but… Like… It's really easy to point fingers and blame someone but like… You have to look at it more as a human problem, a problem of us all as a species and shit…" the bearded explosion expert continued to speak while his friends erratically rubbed their temples.

"It's true that you may think we don't need him anymore but we do, there are also other reasons why we cannot kill him" Denton announced with a certain degree of sadness to his voice.

"Awww, this place is like… Pretty beautiful… It's so natural… Like… Sandstone on clay and it all smells like it was put together on camel poop. I like this place" the bearded man continued to speak

"Why? I mean I get it, before we needed him to scare the Konoha kids to get lost in the Agbarah so we could have an excuse to pick them off but… Then you said he wouldn't be worth the blades it'd take to cut his throat, what now? I mean he just sold all of your blades, you had to go out of your way to restock your supply just so he could fuel his substance problem, what's to stop him from selling all of us into slavery for more drugs?" Poncho desperately tried to talk his partner into killing their explosive expert and dump his body in the desert, similarly to how the explosive expert got rid of the body of their female colleague previously.

Denton clacked his tongue annoyingly and reached up to the man's upper body, he ripped the upper parts of the man's shirt apart revealing a chest of scars and burns on the terrorist's chest. Right on the upper right corner of the man's chest laid a round seal with a curse word tattooed on the man's shoulder and surrounded by smaller kanji symbols.

"I mean like… I feel a lot of pent up anger coming from your directions but… I mean… Like… I get it… I killed Iyasha because we got a bit excited and I blew our bunker up, I get it. But I feel like both of you suffer from… Hey… Why are you tearing my shirt apart? Like… Come on… Not cool, man…" the bearded gent kept on needlessly bantering with a completely dizzy manner as Denton pointed at the seal on his chest and explained.

"I used to know him, back from the war, the fifth Desert Blitz. He fought on the side of Bethiod Sheikhate and I did as well. He placed this seal on his chest to be set off once he dies, when his heart stops beating it will go off. If anything we're lucky that he's high on drugs all the time and harmless, we're lucky that he became this bumbling fool that he is now because the Shaziya I used to know would've sealed enough explosive chakra to blow up the goddamn world when he died" Denton explained to Poncho who just sighed and turned away.

"Yo, yo, man… Come on! I moved like… So past all the violence and all the murdering… I left all the Shaziya name thing behind, man… Now I'm like… Shazster, man, I told you. Why you so disrespecting me, man?" Shazster the bearded terrorist pushed his old war friend aside and tried to button his shirt back before realizing it was ruined.

"It would be the worst possible time to remind you that the fucking dolt keeps trying to blow himself up every chance he gets…" Poncho Assassin slapped his own forehead wiping the sweat off of it and using his own hat to ventilate a little bit as the three got deeper and deeper into Agbarah Sheikhate.

"I feel like you guys are like… Really misinformed about what Hat'ash is, man" Shazster brought up after a moment of uncomfortable and awkward silence.

"Please tell me that this goddamn addict terrorist is not about to lecture us about drugs!?" Poncho complained

"Hat'ash ain't no drug, man. It's like… A cracker and shit, it doesn't get you addicted to it, it doesn't even feel that pleasant really. It's just smoky with brain killing goodness, man" Shazster started his tirade.

"Shaziya was really pissed about Bethiod losing the fifth Blitz, he didn't get on Hat'ash to escape or to relax, he actively tried to mess his own brain up because he didn't want to deal with the world around him anymore. He blamed everyone around him for losing the war, he thought everyone around him was incompetent and he kept grunting how he needed to blow everyone to shits. I think part of it was because everyone he ever knew was killed during that Blitz, he didn't know too many people, most of them were other soldiers. One day he just started poisoning himself" Denton explained.

Shazster continued to stare at the sky, "Have you ever like thought… What'd it be like to like… Really communicate with the vultures? I mean like… Really communicate with them? They're like one step closer than us to space dolphins"

"Please don't get him talking about space dolphins" Denton pleaded when Poncho curiously looked at his mentally damaged colleague.

"Space… Dolphins?" Poncho couldn't keep himself from asking.

"Prepare to have you minds… Like… Blown, gentlemen!" Shazster waved his hands around frantically making Denton crouch slightly expecting his unstable friend to actually blow something up.

"So do you have the bag?" Denton asked a contact in the Sun Disc arena.

The trio had to meet a contact who was working for the Kazekage and who was partly responsible for intercepting the transportation of space-time that Shimo set off. Naturally there was only one place in the entire Agbarah large enough and well known enough for the two groups to meet up. As Poncho looked around at what appeared to be a rather lazy day at the arena he noticed a couple of more suspiciously very careful and observant men mixed into the crowd. Working for the Kazekage as well, no doubt.

"Sure, there ya go. Did you run into any trouble?" the contact inquired before handing the bag.

"Yeah, we had to fight off the Konoha kids, they were really close to Agbarah and they were having two women on the team, that'd have gathered too much attention and we've discussed the possibility of killing the kids with the Kazekage if they treaded too close to Agbarah" Denton explained.

"Is that guy OK? He looks really not well" the contact looked at Shazster who was apparently imitating some sort of a fight with his fingers as action figures.

"He is acting out an aerial battle of the Desert Blitz he took part in, he's our explosion expert" Denton replied.

"That ain't really cool though, the big man may want to bring someone in for those dead Konoha kids. Someone needs to take the fall, trust me, you don't want the fucking Chestnut Hanasaku ripping the chunk of the planet we're on and slinging it beyond the known Universe" the contact looked with rather intimidated and troubled eyes at the Shaphac members, he wasn't in a very pleasant position, having to ask those two to surrender someone and take the fall.

"That'll be no problem at all. You can have Shazster, he's ready to take the fall for the Shaphac" Denton explained gently leading his old friend to another seat right behind the contact.

Poncho suddenly looked at his colleague with newly enlightened eyes. The hat wearing swordsman wondered if giving up his old war friend was always the intention or if Denton just came up with it now. Truth be told, Denton's plan was kind of successful in short term – he used Shazster's explosions to blow the Konoha kids up, it was so clear that Shazster did it that there'd be no questions about it and the man was too crazy to talk even if he wanted to. Still, a terrorist organization treaded dangerous grounds dealing with the village administration.

"Just please keep him contained in a solid B-Rank or higher chakra containment barrier, things do tend to blow up around him and he has an affinity for Hat'ash" Denton lowered his head before standing up and gesturing for Shazster to stay. Obediently his friend kept on sitting close to the Sunagakure contact.

"Isn't Hat'ash not at all addictive? Why would he have an affinity for it?" the contact wondered scratching his head before Denton signalled for Poncho to leave too.

"That, my friend, is the story of your life! Like… Settle down for a tale of space dolphins, action, love and mystery" Shazster declared as he wrapped his arm around the contact's shoulders and sat down closer to him like the two were old buddies meeting up.

"Oh and Shaziya" Denton turned around alerting Shazster to turn around.

"I'm Shazster, man! Come on!" the bearded fool yelled out.

"If you blow up anything at all in Agbarah, I'll shoot you in the fucking face with a kunai after stuffing five boxes of Hat'ash in your rear end so that when the Earth blows up from your seal you'll have to sniff the mixture of that shit and your own shit for the entirety of your final moments" Denton said angrily walking away with his poncho wearing friend.

"Jeez, man… Like… You could've just said, "Hey, Shazster, don't blow anything up, how 'bout that?", what do you think I am, some sort of a maniac? I sense a lot of pent up violence in you, friend, you need to like… Kick it way down, relax for once…" the blonde beardo yelled at his friend as he left and continued to converse with the Sunagakure contact while watching the fights. Granted that day was a slow one for the Sun Disc arena as nothing but settler refugees fought each other in various measuring skill contests that were meant for the Sheikh to determine their worth.

"Jeez this place is like… So violent, man… I mean… Like… Can't they just talk it out and shit? Like… I don't know, have some sherbets, talk like rational human beings?" Shazster kept on sliding in strange pacifistic remarks in once in a while as if he wasn't just warned by his friend not to blow up everything around him.

"You gave up your old friend to be imprisoned…" Poncho said, more like a statement of the obvious than a question with any degree of disbelief or doubt.

"If Shaziya is safely imprisoned he won't blow up the world, he won't even blow up the village. The reason why me and the Kazekage had a temporary understanding is because both of us wish prosperity for the village and both of us need what the other has. Shaziya is safer behind a barrier, as powerful as they can muster, protecting the Earth from blowing up after that fool kills himself.

"So what now?" Poncho wondered looking at Denton. Their condition at this point as well as their standing wasn't really clear. They had far too much Audra on their hands to not consider all options. If they just handed all of the shards to the Kazekage nothing guaranteed that the man would follow his word but his own word. The thought that the word of a man who negotiated with an underground terrorist organization that wished endless wars upon his village to ensure peace was not worth too much deserved at least to be considered once.

"Now we give the shards to the big man and you go home to your wife, we follow the rumours and news and listen for possible assignments. Our original plan to incite war between Konoha and Suna failed but there'll be many more opportunities. For now we just need to settle down and wait, maybe I'll pick off a local politician or two in the meanwhile with different village insignia marked kunai, maybe that'll go somewhere, start something" Denton replied.

"Nah, I don't feel like going home to Tali. She supports our cause but I feel it's only because it's what I do, she's a white sheet of paper coloured by whatever I do because she wants to support me" Poncho lowered his head as the shadow from the hat he wore covered his face up completely.

"Talia is a good woman, what we do isn't nice, it isn't what common villagers would understand but it is for the best. We've warred with the other villages the entire time ever since the first large settlements were made, spears were flung ever the first rock held firmly on the stick, we cannot afford to let them in, the last time we failed to keep them away they sacked the village and left not a grain of sand on another, all of them rained down Hell from above collectively, not a single village is innocent of slaughter and destruction. War is simpler, war is safer, we cannot afford peace and diplomacy" Denton sunk into memories.

"Were you there? During the Second Great Ninja War? When Suna got sacked?" Poncho also appeared to feel very interested in Denton's sinking into details to that specific event.

"No. Me and Shaziya were elsewhere, serving the Sheikhate that paid more at the time, back then the tensions were high already, once the great fat hand of the Kazekage was unable to do anything all the Sheikhs went at each other's throats that very instant. It's ironic really, some fools claim that losing meant the longest period of peace that Sunagakure has ever known, I say it lead to the bloodiest and dirtiest conflict to ever see the great desert Sun" Denton replied sulking and remembering old times.

"You know… I could always kill one or more politicians abroad dressed in Sunagakure gear, there are plenty events coming: from one of the million rallies in the Kirigakure's archipelagos to the upcoming Chuunin Exam in Konoha" Poncho suggested.

"We will definitely strike at the Chuunin Exams, we've got six months to come up with a plan but if you feel like you want to kill someone do it the other way around – kill Sunagakure politicians dressed in Kirigakure uniform" Denton suggested

"People in Sunagakure are aware of our methods, I've killed too many officials in other villages' names. It's old news" Poncho replied.

"Very true but people hate Kirigakure now more than ever. The recent rallies at the Archipelago suggest that it may be time for Kirigakure to regain their independent rule, to elect a new Mizukage and let go of the village representatives and administrators. That outrages far too many commoners, even if in the depths of their hearts they'll know it is us, their wish for a reason to hate Kirigakure will work to our favour"

A sky piercing black figure dived from above slamming into the ground where Denton and Poncho were treading. The clouds separated where this figure dived downwards with a roaring punch that shook the ground beneath everyone's feet even while the boy restrained most of his force.

"Kouta!" Shimo grunted, "You could've caused another tsunami on the other side of the world!" he yelled out before the sand cloud cleaned up and a messy young man dug from countless layers above him.

"Sorry" he giggled "I restrained myself as much as I could but I think Meiko dropped me from too high up. Don't worry, it shouldn't reach the other side of the world, probably just a small quake at best" the young man apologized as he dusted off his messy and torn up desert attire.

A bubble of rotating winds appeared from the cloud of sand where Denton and the Poncho Assassin hid from the devastating punch that Kouta threw. A bubble of pure Wind Release chakra that Poncho created using the drawing of his sword and the natural momentum from it.

"We'll be taking that bag of Audra from you" Shimo said placing his hand on the handle of his own sword.

"We'll wish to hear all that you know about the location of Mana-chan, our VIP who got lost after your attack" Kouta added.

"And we also paid you douchebags back for that explosion back then!" Meiko yelled out angrily as she descended from above using her green tracksuit as a parachute and feint chakra bursts coming from her boots as jets that softened her landing.

Shimo and Kouta looked at Meiko confused why the girl yelled it out so loud.

"Sorry, I think the wind up there did something to my ears, or maybe it was Kouta's punch though!?" she yelled out again before instantly forgetting what she was talking about and concentrating on the enemy ahead of her.


	167. Standoff

Poncho continued to stare the three kids that decided to butt in down. He was not a prideful individual but he wished to conclude his duel with the sword wielding brat from before, the one that lead to him getting caught. It was not as much what followed the capture of Denton and Poncho Assassin that annoyed the swordsman, more that he was bested by someone of lesser skill. This brat had no right to best him back then and yet he did for the sole reason of being lucky.

"It appears that our combination attack didn't really kill the kids" Poncho grumbled out rather quietly, the exchange of words was meant to transpire with Denton after all.

"Even better, now we get to kill them right on the edge of Agbarah instead of days walk from it. The Kazekage will have no quarrel with us" Denton smiled removing two fist sized spheres from pouches on his large manly leather belt. His smile was known only to the man himself since the mask only slightly tipped forward, not something visible to a trio of children a decent distance away from the sharpshooter.

Poncho and Shimo dashed at each other, both drew their swords on their way meanwhile Denton leaped back a great distance flinging the two spheres forward. The masked man expected the kids to attack him since he appeared to be a frailer and long range focused fighter however the female ninja and the strong punching boy disappeared from his sight altogether, just a moment later Denton realized that his gut was warning him justly. The two reappeared right in front of Denton however at that moment it was too late – an ironic thing to consider having the flashing speed of the two younglings.

The two spheres that Denton had thrown exploded, one of them emitted black gas in wide range covering clouds, the other meanwhile burst with purplish smoke. Meiko and Kouta covered their faces, it appeared that Denton managed to outsmart them with these smoke screen bombs and leap away. Meiko felt a crushing grip grabbing her abdomen and then wind violently ripping her short hair as Kouta pulled her off of the smoke clouds jumping up and then away.

"The second bomb was poisonous, he used the pitch black smoke of the first one to cover up the purple smoke of the second one, purple smoke means poison" the medical ninja explained to Meiko who just grinned and scratched the back of her head.

"Wow, I totally forgot that, boy we're lucky to have you around" the blacksmith carelessly giggled acting as if she didn't just get pulled out from certain death.

"These guys aren't toying around, they're the real deal… And now that masked bastard slipped away too" Kouta angrily grunted out turning back to check on Shimo who was clashing his sword with the other Shaphac assassin.

The two clashed again and again, moving in almost identical speed. They outraced the sound and sparks of their own sword clashes, spun around, flipped and clashed trying to catch each other off guard but none of them gave in. Finally the two settled down in a struggle of strength as they rammed their swords against each other and tried to overpower the other with a forceful shove, even if Shimo was a teen he managed to hold his own against the rather slim Shaphac assassin in a struggle of strength.

"Your skill has greatly improved since the last time…" the Poncho Assassin commended Shimo to which the Yuki only smiled cockily, Meiko and Kouta's bodies flashed in from two different sides in his aid, winding up their punches that were supposed to crush the Shaphac swordsman in between their two sides of assault, breaking the man's body completely.

Suddenly Poncho let Shimo's force to push him back, he pulled his sword and sheathed it, unsheathing it again in thousandth of a second, the man drew the blade so fast that it released a wave of compressed air that knocked the two teammates backwards on their butts while the Shaphac swordsman took a couple of quick and subtle hops backwards gaining some distance over his three opponents.

Meiko and Kouta jumped on their feet and prepared to sync up with Shimo once the Yuki decides to attack. The three were worried about Denton slipping away and getting a chance to hide from them, looking for an option to slip in a cheap shot, no doubt, however if they could quickly team up on this swordsman and take him down all three of them could have devoted all of their attention to searching for Denton.

"Let's go!" Shimo yelled out as all three teens rushed at the direction of the single opponent they saw in their way, the Yuki grabbed the hilt of his blade preparing to draw it right when he got into range. Kouta's skin once again shifted becoming wood-like in texture and multiple tube-like cannons opened up at the spots of the young man's shoulders, his thighs and larger ones on his elbows. Meiko leaped up into the air pressing her boots and activating seals that fired off brief pulses of chakra, forming small jets that fired her off into the air. The three were preparing a combination to finish off anyone foolish enough to stand in their way, one they had plenty of time to perfect.

A silent metallic tap alerted Shimo, interrupting his rush, the boy's eyes quickly located the tool that caused the sound – a round metallic sphere that landed close to Kouta.

"Stop!" Shimo yelled but it was too late, the Juugo medical ninja dived on his knees, sliding onwards using the rough surface of his morphed skin and twisting around, the holes on his small tube-like chakra cannons lit up but didn't have enough time to go off before Denton's grenade interrupted the boy's offense. Kouta's jutsu was supposed to be a full circle covering barrage of chakra blasts however he didn't have enough time to set it off.

The metallic grenade cracked releasing shocks of crackling lightning that covered a narrow field around Kouta. The young man yelled out as the electric shock passed through him and flipped him over, firing off a wild blast of chakra from Kouta's cannons that blew dangerously close to Meiko's face up in the air. Despite not being hit head on the girl wasn't ready for that sort of misfire, Shimo wasn't entirely sure of her condition but she was slowly falling out of the air, smoke slowly rising and curling around in black twisting curls from the girl's burning clothes.

"Don't get your eyes off your enemy! Wind Style: Eighth Zephyr!" Poncho's voice made Shimo realize his mistake however by the time the Yuki realized he was being played it was too late. The poncho wearing swordsman moved faster than Shimo's eyes could perceive which should've been impossible, that meant that the man moved faster than lightning, Shimo could distinctly remember training by cutting at natural lightning bolts with his sensei, back during his wandering days. Such inhuman speed should've been impossible.

Blood and pain interrupted any thoughts that Shimo could've thought at that moment, any strategies he may have considered and attributed to the poncho wearing swordsman or his pal who was firing grenades in the far off corner of the battlefield. Meiko's body hit the ground with a deafening pound that left a small crater and lifted sand and dust into the air. Shimo's eyes whited out as eight different cuts opened up on his body sending the Yuki down. He was cut eight times and the assassin dashed right through him before Shimo could even react! These were not opponents they could've fought one on one. They needed coordinated and powerful responses directed at each of them. It must've been a singular drawing slash that hit him, the other cuts were just projectiles of Wind Release chakra synced up to the sword strike…

Poncho Assassin sheathed his blade and turned his head halfway around checking Shimo and a small puddle of blood gathering beneath the boy's downed body, the assassin's face turned to the left and to the right, examining the shocked and grunting body of Kouta, the medical ninja of the team who was the most important. Without a doubt the medical ninja was the target to aim for. Poncho's body disappeared from sight again. Imbued with pure Wind Release chakra the assassin dashed up to Kouta and slashed with a sword drawing slice aiming to cut the boy in half at his abdomen. The figure of the young teen split in two but it didn't remain that way, it poofed and instead of it appeared a sliced up large stone, one only a powerhouse like Kouta could've substituted with.

"Denton!" Poncho yelled out, realizing that they've been played, they were being played this whole time!

Kouta's figure appeared as it jumped to the air from underground the sand, blowing it aside as the boy leaped out from the hiding, his arms molded together into a singular cannon-like tube and several smaller tubes formed around the large one.

"Juugo Hidden Technique: Chakra Cannon!" Kouta grunted out firing a singular focused beam of chakra into a random spot in the air, Poncho looked confused, it wasn't even flying at the general direction of his partner. If anything it was aimed at Agbarah Sheikhate. Was the young man's goal to blow up the entire settlement? The chakra blast probably had enough power to level a settlement, even a large one but why would the medical ninja want that? Poncho Assassin just couldn't wrap his head around it.

Meiko's loud grunt alerted the swordsman who frantically looked at the painful growl of the young teen, the girl flung a piece of her own armor, a shoulder pad if Poncho's eyes did not lie. The shoulder pad that the blacksmith girl flung at the beam lit up with white and red beams of light, it appeared that the girl's intention was to fling it right at the concentrated chakra beam…

"Reflective Barrier Seal!" Meiko chanted out her own technique that gave Pocho a general idea of what the three may have been scheming but by that time it was too late. The beam's tip hit the armor and struggled to incinerate it completely almost as if it was covered with chakra, but then again it was covered with the young blacksmith's seal. Meiko's seal redirected the beam in a full ninety degrees angle down right where Denton was situated.

An overwhelming explosion covered the desert, loud enough to drown out Poncho's warnings and loud enough to make blood burst from his ears in relentless torrents, powerful enough to singe off most of his clothes and blow his hat off to Hell knew where. Poncho got thrown off his feet and sent flying backwards despite not even standing close to the explosion. The reflective seal of the girl appeared to absorb a decent amount of the blast but Poncho knew that his friend was in trouble. Once the explosion settled down the swordsman rolled around on the sand writhing in pain before thrusting his trusting sword into the sand and pushing his body off the ground, using his weapon for support.

It was all calculated, the three runts deliberately got hit by Denton's attack just so they could find out his approximate location, with a blast that could've leveled a settlement or a village they didn't need to be more precise than that but they needed to at least be somewhat on point to hit Denton with enough force to take him out immediately. Shimo smiled, he knew that their combination was successful, Meiko was really upset that she once again had to bump up and leave dents on her impressive handiwork. Kouta was huffing and panting pretty heavily, the hidden clan technique that he finally managed to pull off after long training drained him of a lot of his chakra so the team may not have wanted to rely on the medical ninja too much.

"It was an impressive combination, team" Shimo smiled.

Meiko looked too worn out by the fall and too bummed out for losing her shoulder pad to care. She also got one of her favorite green tracksuits incinerated, one of several that she lost on this mission. Kouta was slowly getting back on his feet, the situation called for one more combination attack because Shimo wouldn't be able to take his opponent out alone.

Poncho slapped his hands together forming a hand seal and then placed his palms behind him, the swordsman leaped up and jumped onto a jet of Wind Release chakra, an artificial current that he formed. The man's clothes have also been singed, as well as his signature poncho and his hat. The man was now left bare-chested with burns all over his upper body, his wild hair flowed freely as the hat restrained and shaped them into a ponytail no longer. His sword was all that Poncho needed anyways…

"Wind Step Jutsu!" Poncho growled out through pain, he felt that the explosion may have thrown him through a couple of deceitfully underground boulders as his body was dragged through the sand by the force of the blast. The swordsman closed his distance on Shimo near instantly slashing at the young man's chest, Shimo drew his blade swiping it to the side, attempting to counter Poncho's assault but it was a feint. Using the current of wind Poncho slid around Shimo and slashed his back. The wind riding swordsman continued to skate his wind current and slash the Yuki swordsman again and again, Shimo could only slightly evade the slashes, also augment his body so that the Wind Release chakra imbued blade of Poncho's didn't cut him up to little pieces.

Shimo grunted and threw up more and more blood as the shallow cuts accumulated. The Yuki tried more and more to respond but the unusual wind riding movements of his opponent's, also his superior speed, experience and skill made the young ex-rogue unable to land a single slash. With an elbow strike the Poncho wearing swordsman sent Shimo down on the sand. At that moment Shimo wondered if he was going to die, he almost waited for that finishing stab at him from his standing opponent but right before Poncho could skewer him a loud blast forced Shimo's eyes open.

What greeted the young Yuki's eyes was a small contained blast from a spherical grenade similar to those Denton used, the blast hit Poncho right in the back and forced the man to stumble forward, desperately struggling to keep his body upright. Shimo glanced to the side seeing Meiko holding and making out with a large cannon that appeared to fire these round projectiles, she must've dragged her tired body to Denton's and picked his weapon up.

Judging from blood, shooting from Poncho's mouth and the man's loud grunts that suggested great pain, ranging all the way to agony, Shimo knew that this was his chance. The boy rolled backwards and pushed his body off the ground with his arms, throwing himself back on his feet. Shimo's wounds bled profusely but it didn't matter, his body was literally burning up and sweating from the immense desert heat and the damage it had sustained that day but it didn't matter. Nothing would've mattered if they all fell to this Shaphac assassin here and didn't find their friend. Shimo stood in a sword drawing stance and focused all of his chakra and concentrated on his opponent. Then the young man moved his hands closer to his chest, the man's hands flashed right through the hand seals he had to make within portions of a second. Faster even than Mana's used to be during the times when she could still use chakra. All the training he had with Mana, it was beneficial to both of them. That way at least one of the things that were Tanshu-sensei's last words would've come true.

A powerful vortex of howling winds picked up, snow and small icicles inside of it. Shimo's immense concentration allowed him to create this freezing blizzard even in the middle of the desert heat. The secret was to insert more chakra into his ice than usual, the more chakra focused into it the less ice properties his Ice Release bloodline of his clan had.

"Ice Style: Ice Wolf Rampage!" Shimo roared out leaping forward, a wolf shape formed behind Shimo, a pinnacle of shape manipulation that the young man managed to achieve. This time Poncho knew better than to clash his own technique against Shimo's, the assassin leaped up into the air, aiming to avoid the technique, he once again activated his "Wind Step" technique using it to rise far above the heights he'd have normally been able to jump to. Shimo knew that if his technique missed he'd be too tired to fight, none of them were in the fit condition to combat Poncho right now. Kouta's and Meiko's shapes blurred out as the two appeared right up and above Poncho, slamming the swordsman down with their hands together in a combination, right back down into Shimo's sword drawing technique.

After the moment of truth the Yuki knew that his opponent must've been dead. Slowly the young swordsman walked up to him and checked the pulse, then he looked up at Kouta and Meiko. The blacksmith once again set off the seals on her boots and caught Kouta in her arms to help the two land properly. Their combinations and teamwork allowed them to overcome two much more talented and experienced opponents that day.

"Is he dead?" Meiko asked, Kouta didn't even need to know, more exactly, he already knew. Shimo closed his eyes and nodded, he took no pleasure from that death nor did he regret what happened. These men were dangerous, they also tried to intercept their Audra transportation and somehow succeeded. They tried to kill the four of them and separated Mana from the crew.

"It's not good, that Denton guy is completely blown up, I don't think his total chakra level was all that, he didn't appear to augment his body" Kouta also confirmed the death of the other Shaphac terrorist.

Meiko sighed "Mana wouldn't have liked that…" she said but no one even honored her rhetorical observation with a response.

"If we can find Mana-chan in the first place, I'd like to hear all about her discontent" Kouta looked disappointed as well. He then approached Shimo and looked at the Yuki's wounds.

"Let's find a place to stay in that settlement further down the road, maybe someone saw Mana-chan there" the medical ninja suggested quickly bandaging the more immediate wounds while doing a half-assed job on the others only for them to be properly treated later, when they find a more appropriate place and time.

"We kind of suck at interrogating" Meiko looked at the two corpses they leave behind disappointed.

"Couldn't be helped, they were too strong to play around with. We were lucky all of our combinations worked out like they did" Shimo noted. The blacksmith girl and the medical ninja both helped the injured swordsman on their way to Agbarah which was only a half an hour walk down the road. Meiko leaned up and picked up the Audra shard filled bag and casually flipped it over her shoulder. Somehow that blasted thing followed them and brought them trouble everywhere they went…


	168. 1 v 300

The old man and Bult didn't leave Mana's side for a second the very next morning, the big day when Mana would take on the Ascension Gauntlet was here. Truth be told, the magician wasn't totally sure about if she was ready, one thing that the girl knew for sure was that she did all she could do during that last week. If that week didn't get her ready and able to take on the challenge, the time it'd take to get Mana ready wouldn't have been acceptable. It was quite literally do or die, despite Mana being under no particular pressure to fight that day.

"Who's fighting today?" Mana asked quickly devouring the greasy and disgusting camel stomach dish that the locals ate as an energizer. It smelled of digested grass and was quite greasy and sticky – just the kind of food Mana despised but the girl had not eaten for a while and she'd need all the energy she could've gotten.

"Another Battle Royale between those captives from the ruined settlement. A big one this time, I think the goal is to emulate a small battle. There'll be at least couple of hundreds of them out there" Bult informed Mana and the old man.

"How many people are permitted to win such battles?" Mana wondered just wanting to know.

"Well, it depends, if it's an everyone for themselves kind of brawl then only one, if it's a team bout, probably the last team standing but if they're equally inexperienced expect only a couple of people to be left standing. Good news is it'll take the whole day to finish that butchery, that's why the fighters love events like that. The Sheikh wants to filter the warriors from the chaff and he's almost done rotating all the settlers through the grinds of battle" the old man replied this time, he looked Mana in the eyes and from his eyes the girl knew that the old man realized what she'd say.

"Well then, I have no choice but to fight. It's either that or letting hundreds of people die" Mana closed her eyes and stomached down the putrid mess of meat that she had to stuff down her throat.

"Say, girlie… Ya think you could… You know… Maybe get your chakra back? That one time you said that during your trip you managed to use it once" the old man brought up. Maybe his idea wasn't that bad, maybe trying to reawaken Mana's lost ability to use chakra properly would've been a much more fruitful training regimen but truth be told Mana had not the slightest idea as to how to remove the mental blocks that her body placed on it.

"It's… It's too risky, I need surefire ways to win, not faith. Lately I've been thinking that even my own body couldn't be trusted…" Mana's eyes squinted a little bit in sadness. "I mean there's nothing I wish more than to be able to use chakra, to be what I always was – a ninja magician, neither one is able to fully outweigh the other, I am both. Why would my own body keep a part of my own identity locked away like that?" the girl wondered out loud.

"Well… I've never seen any human move quite like you're able to right now. I'd say we've both made a fighting monster out of you. There's one last thing that troubles me though…" the old man also shared Mana's trend of thinking out loud.

Mana and Bult looked at the old man curiously to which he leaned forward and explained.

"The Sheikh is an amazing fighting ability expert. He's surveyed decades of amazing martial artists doing what they do, he may not have seen through your hacks before but after he sees you move now… There's no mistaking it, he'll see through it. He'll know that your moves are a style designed to win any gamble, a defensive style that is more of a cheat than a legit martial art" the old man revealed the root of his worries. Mana smiled.

"Well, in that case I'll hold myself back, only reveal my abilities at the very last second and by the time I am outed it'll be too late" Mana replied carelessly.

Bult stuffed the rest of the camel stomach that he held in his hand.

"But didn't you say you wished to show the Sheikh the best fight of his life? If the final moments are you revealing you've cheated by breaking the laws of movement and honorable martial art traditions…" Bult raised a point that actually made Mana concerned. Loud booms and yells came from the side of the arena. The girl leaped up from the bench and rushed to the arena winking for the two fighters sitting by the breakfast table.

"I'll think of something…" she pushed the problem away to a more convenient moment, or at least she did so in their eyes, internally she was still feeling like she was being burned alive by those observations that the two of her only friends in this place made.

"Now, ladies and gentlemen! Prepare to witness a true gift from the Sheikh, the one and only amazing fighting event unlike anything you've seen before! Five hundred settlers entered the arena last weekend, men, women and children, all lost their homes to a desert raider rogue warlord. Now today, ladies and gentlemen, we shall relive that glorious battle that left these people homeless! See as all the three hundred remaining living settlers face off against twenty five trained warriors of the arena, in a reenactment of the worst day in their lives!" the announcer was yelling from the top of his lungs, slobbering all over himself and his head was shaking so vibrantly from all of the shouting that his ruby earrings were shaking and jingling on his ears from the vibration and head shaking.

Three hundred people were let into the arena, rounded up around the center. Most of these men had already tasted battle, not many women and children survived the initial trial by blood and fire of the Sun Disc arena. At this point more than half of women and children that survived the disaster and were unfortunate enough to be tested in combat throughout the last week were dead. Most of the settlers were now ravaged and scarred settlers, not in any way experienced, ruined was a more fitting word. To someone it'd have seemed a very uneven match up to round about three hundred men, few surviving women and children and have them fight twenty five people. To Mana it seemed like a slaughterfest, the Sheikh must've seen no worth in any of these men and the others as fighters so he wanted to get rid of them, slaughter them in front of the audience making a very good end of the weekend.

A black shadow lingered on the window of the waiting building, Mana leaped off of the window and dived right onto the platform transporting the fighters that were supposed to surround and slaughter the settlers. Every single fighter standing on that platform shook in their boots and stepped back, surprised by the appearance of Mana whom none of them saw coming. Mana scratched her aching foot, the jump almost made her twist her leg, it definitely tested her abilities. Had she gotten injured now it may have been all over but luckily to the young genin it seemed she'd actually be able to fight after all. Finally the platform closed in letting the twenty five trained warriors and Mana gather around the settlers that clutched together grabbing hold of each other, children and women wept, some of them have killed some of their own last week so they couldn't have really been blamed.

"Young woman!" the announcer yelled, "You have no business here! Why did you appear here today?! Do you also wish to partake in this reenactment?! If so then perhaps the mighty Sheikh shall grant you permission!?"

Mana glared angrily at the Sheikh's balcony up high, the man was on his feet and standing on the edge, good. He was already intrigued.

"There will be no reenactment, I wish to participate in the Ascension Gauntlet" Mana declared out loud. The public stood quiet. Usually such brave declarations would've meant the death of the partaking one, for that reason no one took part in the Gauntlet. Some of them wished to see these lowly untrained people getting slaughtered and now they may be forced to see something that initially appeared much less refined.

"How dare you!? Interfere with yet another battle, will you!? What shall the Sheikh say!?" the announcer angrily yelled at Mana, the girl heard feet grinding against the stone and noticed the trained fighters trying to surround her, attributing her more and more to the cattle they were supposed to slay there that day with their bare hands.

"Whosoever kills this hatchling and tears her head off her shoulders with their bare hands shall be granted entry into the Agbarmahal. No one has the right to do as they please in this arena but the Sheikh, this girl clearly has a death wish" a feminine voice spoke from the Sheikh's quarters, a woman speaking for the Sheikh himself, maybe the old man had not the strength left in his lungs in his old age to yell loud enough to be heard?

The announcer roared and leaped on the announcer's platform that was moved further from the arena, Mana felt the crowd thinning and forming a circle around her. This was bad, she had to earn the right to even face the three champions of the previous events in a row, she'd be worn out even before the actual Gauntlet would take place…

As the announcer declared the beginning of this pitiful event a large crowd rushed at Mana, men mostly, women and children cowered behind the large crowd of men, both the trained arena fighters and the settlers, hoping that they'd do the dirty deed for them. It'd certainly be a dark and dirty deed, there were no spikes below the arena, only grass. Mana's head would have had to come off without any aid from external sources which wasn't that easy to do, not for a normal human anyways.

The ex-kunoichi took a breath or two, right before the storm of punches and kicks tried to hit her – slightly less than three hundred men and a couple of braver women and older children trying to kill her. Each of them pushed each other away, stepped over each other in a mad symphony of sadism and hatred, wish to kill someone else to survive themselves, not only survive – live in the Sheikh's palace in luxury and honor. Not a single punch, kick, scratch or any other sort of harm landed on Mana. The girl's dodging and redirection, her nimbleness and acrobatics were so on point that she purposefully let the people trample each other, push each other down without laying a single finger on any of them. Within twenty minutes of doing nothing but dodging and gentle redirection Mana emerged from a pile of beaten and broken bodies. All of them were breathing but powerless to go on.

The magician looked at the cowering twenty or so women and little children, then back at the Sheikh. The moment one of them tried anything funny she'd smell their sweat, she'd hear their footsteps. She'd already beaten all of them and it felt so easy. Almost like dancing in the grasslands in the Sun, just like she used to do as a little girl, except this time it wasn't the grass to caress her thighs and her knees gently, it was kicks, fists and fingernails trying to claw her very flesh of her limbs, unsuccessfully fortunately…

"If we're done here I'll follow up with my challenge then?" Mana shouted out, her voice was a little winded but with a little clever space management and control of the storm of people rushing at her she managed to efficiently control this insane situation as good as possible. These trained martial artists didn't feel much different to her, truth be told the simple villager was much more difficult to read, the better the martial artist the easier they were for Mana to blow away.

"What guts, what nerve!" the announcer yelled out, the public was still absolutely silent, refusing to believe what they just didn't get the chance to see. All they saw was a messy stampede of fighters who barely even fit in the arena trying to trample and murder a little girl but only managing to tear up her already ragged shirt a bit. The mess of all the fists, feet and bodies was too confusing to follow, it was unlikely that any of them even saw how little Mana had to do to beat all of them, had she actually played with all of her cards she'd have beaten every single one of them much faster, maybe even in less than five minutes…

"Each one of them is alive, are you not worried that they'll attack you while you have your back turned?" the same feminine voice reached Mana from the Sheikh's quarters.

"They know already they stand no chance. There's no use in it. If you feel like getting me off the arena, please, by all means, send everyone out here and I'll beat everyone you throw at me but I will get my challenge and what you'll get in that case is a mangled roster and no one left to entertain your audience tomorrow. I have reached the level of fighting ability where quantity has little importance, you need a more skilled opponent, not more of them" Mana yelled out getting the public riled up. The audience was completely hyped and on the girl's side. Maybe it was her guts that entertained them, after all, no one previously interrupted an event like this and this young woman did it twice during her quite short stay in the arena.

The Sheikh's elderly figure appeared from behind the thin silk curtain together with a strangely similarly aged woman. Mana would've assumed that the man who had it all would've wished a younger and more attractive company, this woman appeared to be dressed more as a mercenary and looked a bit too frail to be an eye candy. Who could she have been? The Sheikh whispered something into the woman's ear and she spoke again, without a doubt it was the same voice that spoke for the Sheikh before.

"What do you wish from all of this?" the question reached Mana.

"Just to fight in the Ascension Gauntlet. If I win I get to leave and send a message with your hawks, hopefully the tracking kind, do you have Blood Hawks?" Mana explained adding a question at the end, her throat was getting a bit irritated from all the long distance communication.

"The Sheikh has everything he wishes to have, Blood Hawks do live and breed in the desert so they have a place in the Sheikh's aviary. Do you realize that if you win the Ascension Gauntlet you can live in eternal glory for the rest of your days in the Agbarmahal?" the woman's voice inquired.

"I don't care about that, if I win I'll just send my message and be on my way, hopefully my fights will also help Sheikh-sama make some realizations of his past mistakes as well…" Mana respectfully bowed when referring to the Sheikh. The old noble lifted his arm gesturing for the injured and crippled beaten fighters to be quickly moved off the arena. The platforms once again connected the arena with the living quarters as the guards and the medical staff, little that remained of them, did their best to vacate the arena.

"Very well, you have ruined my event, however, girl. Make sure that you make up for that ruined event" the Sheikh's own voice finally spoke directly to her. Mana nodded her head in a manner similar to bowing again.

"That is very much my intention" she replied.

For a moment the magician stood there, observing as the arena was being vacated and prepared for the Ascension Gauntlet. Finally when all the injured and those unwilling to fight were lead out of the arena and the place was prepared the announcer began the declaration.

"Ladies and gentlemen, in an unexpected turn of events… It appears that today we won't be seeing the glorious three hundred on twenty five battle but instead an Ascension Gauntlet of this strange young woman who joined the roster just a week ago. Does this young woman know the real meaning of her actions? Does she know that in the Ascension Gauntlet it's all kill or be killed? That remains to be seen! However right now our staff is quickly looking for champions of recent events for this brave soul to face, one thing is for sure – the third challenger will be Damij, the man who has soundly beaten this young woman in the past!"

After the man finished speaking the public just cheered. Mana closed her eyes and took a deep breath trying to calm down her bumping young heart. Her body was still stressed from the sudden need of evading three hundred people trying to kill her. Had she only used all that she could in that twenty minute long brawl she'd have tired much less, perhaps the first fight would be a bit easier and provide her with a chance to get a breather during it? That much remained to be see… All this cheering and noise. It reminded Mana of home, of the stage where she performed her magic tricks from, even that small cardboard box where she began her "career"…

"Finally!" the announcer joined the cheers himself as the platform extended to the other side of the arena. "You may cheer for this young woman but this next challenger is similarly a survivor of a Battle Royale, the last year's "Great Ninja World War Reenactment"! You shall be reminded that this lady did not get a single scratch on her after an all-out war where she had to play the dishonorable princess that started the war and everyone wished to kill. She was the Woman that Changed History – Apheiya!"

"A woman?" the magician opened her eyes in surprise to see her next challenger. The girl had never thought that this place would have another distinguished female warrior seeing how women had such a reputation for being useless in terms of warfare around this place. It'd be a great honor seeing this woman with such a strange title. Someone who defied all odds and when cast in the role that was supposed to be murdered horribly not only survived but beat all the enemies without a single scratch deserved such a name…

"The Woman that Changed History…" Mana mumbled to herself waiting for her next challenger to appear.


	169. Do as Agbarahns Do

As the platform extended and the slim yet tall figure stepped onto it to be brought onto the arena Mana continued to try and pick up any details about her next opponent. The only detail that stuck out like a sore thumb was the decision of this woman to extremely overdress. She wore a white simple desert cloak together with a black coat on top and a black headdress that appeared most like a shroud, her face was also covered with a crimson red cloth making the woman appear even more mysterious than usual.

It may have from the first glance seemed very rude or not quite proper for a woman to dress scantily in these conditions but it was actually quite the other way around. During the day the heat would've made it unbearable to stay under these clothes, these suggestively dressed women in Sheikh's quarters made few if any sexual or implied sexual hints towards their master and they very well may have been just protecting from the desert heat with their lack of clothing covering them up. The entire time Sheikh's eyes were absorbed by the fighting and he appeared to have little to no interest in the female forms unless there was nothing else to see.

For that reason the way in which this Apheiya, the Woman that Changed History, overdressed appeared odd to Mana and the magician tried to see what could've been made out from it. Was it some sort of suggestion towards personal insecurities? Was it somehow reflective of her personality, could it have been used to devise a more precise dodging style or maybe somehow helped her define a valid prediction of to how exactly this lady would fight. Apheiya stepped very gracefully and her head was held up high, almost like that of a noble.

"Apheiya, this young woman…" the announcer began his attempt to rile the champion up for this fight but the older woman lifted her hand up silencing the announcer with a single gesture.

"I know who this girl is, I've been observing her for a while" Apheiya spoke in a very deep Land of Wind accent to her speech. The Ninja World had only one universal language but different time periods and different locations placed different spins on that language and sometimes it was quite easy to determine where the person was from by their language alone, sometimes these accents and dialects were faked for various purposes, such tricks were handy for ninja to learn.

Mana did not speak to the woman, while the magician had a great deal of respect towards any woman who managed to break through the prejudice and hatred that women inevitably received when arriving at Agbarah, that didn't in any way change the girl's goal. This woman was just a nimble and strong rooted tree that bloomed right in the magician's way to her goals, that tree needed to be stepped around or trimmed if needed.

The announcer appeared to be too unnerved to speak any more words so he just announced the beginning of the battle. Instantly the woman's body blurred, she moved at least fifty time faster than Mana thought was humanly possible. The woman's knee thrust towards Mana's lower abdomen, attempting to instantly incapacitate the young one, no doubt. Instead it hit Mana's palm which also used the force of Apheiya's forceful knee strike to propel herself and flip over the woman.

Mana didn't even look behind herself, she did not speak.

"Heh, I must admit I expected you to get hit at least with this first strike, that's how it usually goes with you. I observed your battles, you never expect the burst of speed that martial artists are capable of. How can you respond to such inhuman speeds? Do you use budojutsu as well perhaps?" the woman inquired. Mana turned around partly, turning to the side to face both directions and keep herself able to defend from both frontal and back assaults.

"Not at the moment, I merely always expect the top speed I can respond to from everyone. I usually need a hint as to what kind of an attack is coming so I begin my response well before you even begin your attack, by the time you realize I am countering your attack you're too invested into your speedy attack to change it" Mana replied casually. It was an advice given to her by the old man. There was always a limit to how much a human could perceive, part of that limit was how much they were expecting to see. Mana not only stretched those expectations to the max every time but she also cut the brief response time in half by using her opponent's speed against them by giving them less time to counter her response because of how fast they themselves went for her.

"I expected this to be an easy fight, I expected to give you a lesson to how far beyond yours our level is, just like Damij has done but… It appears I shall have to work for it a little" Apheiya's facial rag twisted suggesting that the woman may have been smiling under it. She removed the facial rag and the black shroud that covered her face and tossed them aside letting them land beyond the arena's bounds.

"Your attires are severely hindering your speed" Mana mumbled somewhat coldly, "They not only move in the wind alerting me of your location, even when my eyes cannot clearly perceive you but they also slow you down, it's like wearing a parachute on you"

Apheiya's body flashed black once more, she charged at Mana with long reaching kicks but the magician could've evaded them with her eyes closed. For a moment the girl was hesitant to counter but then she realized that she didn't care if Apheiya fought at her best or if the fight was in any way fair, Mana only cared that she beat this Gauntlet. With a swift pirouette and a backwards kick the magician sent her opponent face down onto the stone, gracefully giving it a couple more leaps to get some distance which would've given Mana more time to react.

"It appears I may need to surrender…" Apheiya stood up and dusted her clothes.

"Go ahead" Mana replied.

"Since I cannot remove my clothes, I must protect the honor of Wind Patriarch's granddaughter" Apheiya explained.

"You're the granddaughter of the Land of Wind's temple leader?" Mana wondered, a history lover inside of Mana wished to talk with the woman after the fight to find out a bit more about the religious culture of the Land of Wind but currently there was little time.

"Yes, I am in the middle of my pilgrimage, training here in the Sun Disc fighting arena to return once I become strong enough to escape its grasp. I must suffer true hardship to be accepted back in the temple" the woman explained.

Mana wanted to just let this female monk surrender but something inside of her wished to help Apheiya. After all, even if Mana saved this place and changed the Sheikh's mind about his lethal ways and using literal slaves for combat, Apheiya would still not change. She'd keep on fighting here wearing a mass of clothes on her, sweating out of her mind and getting heat strokes in the middle of battle or being too slow to properly fight any of the higher tier martial artists. The woman's pilgrimage would literally never end.

"Would losing your honor in front of these people not count as "true hardship"? Being beaten by me as well as losing your honor, I've lost both battles and honor, often at the same time. There are few things that are more painful for one to lose than these two" Mana replied grinding through her teeth. The last thing she needed was to make this woman stronger but… The magician wished to help Apheiya with her pilgrimage, she also wanted deep inside of her heart for the woman to complete it within the reaches of this century.

"I am already twice faster than Fajal was when you fought him, are you not afraid of me once I remove my cloaks?" Apheiya asked curiously as her feeble feminine hand reached up to her collar and yanked hard enough to tear layers upon layers of cloth apart.

"I am not afraid of death, I just do whatever seems right at the time" Mana replied quickly, hating herself for not letting this woman surrender.

"Then you still have much room for growth, then again, you are still a child" Apheiya smiled friendly, almost like a mother would smile for a child.

Apheiya finally hatched from her cocoon of clothes and cloaks, appearing with a simple green dress that didn't appear much different from those simple clothes one could buy at a bazar around the Land of Wind. The dress that Apheiya wore was torn at the end, leaving just four straps that didn't restrict the woman's legs. That suggested Mana that the Woman that Changed History must've favored kicks, that and how well defined Apheiya's legs were, they were as thick as the arms of a strong man.

Apheiya's body blinked in and out for a couple of seconds, she was just testing her new limits, the public roared in excitement and awe of the woman's rising speed and power just from the simple act of removing her clothes.

"Do not be surprised if you find yourself dead in a blink of an eye, girl, like this I could dash 20 000 meters in just a second, I feel light as a feather" Apheiya giggled with a blush. She was quite ashamed visibly of standing in front of an audience in only a dress but while the embarrassment was clear the woman also felt certain liberation first time in a while.

The woman's body blinked out, Mana leaped forward and for a brief moment both of the two disappeared. The two just blinked in and out, in and out, however neither was able to touch the other. The two were locked down in an eternal chain of Mana evading Apheiya's attack only to attempt a counter that was evaded and attempted to be countered only for Mana to start the chain all over again. In the end neither landed a single blow.

"That's it… You are using budojutsu" Apheiya smiled after the two leaped away from each other laughing. Neither of them managed to even touch the other offensively.

"I pretty much have to…" Mana closed her eyes, "Your speed is inhuman, no human being could stand up to it or react to it, even when using my style of combat"

"So the old fart did teach it to you" Apheiya wondered with an observation more than a question.

"Actually I sort of discovered what it was by myself. He probably doesn't even know I can do it. It's the physical portion of chakra. Chakra as a concept is divided into two parts: the spiritual and the physical. There are other conceptual energies in this world: the samurai use kenki which is essentially just another name for chakra, you martial artists appear to use what the old man calls "chi", but it's actually just the physical part of chakra we ninja use. It's a far cry from the real deal but the good thing is that it was always the spiritual part of me that blocked chakra, there appeared to be no problems in accessing the physical. I initially had my doubts about being able to use it but there were no problems really once I willed myself to it" the magician explained without as much as a huff.

Mana glanced briefly at the Sheikh's quarters, her ego was stricken with a great deal of pampering when she witnessed the excitement in the old man's face and how he leaned over the balcony and clapped like a little child. At the very least she wouldn't be executed specifically for disappointing him…

"You don't appear to be tired at all…" Apheiya observed with a sigh that was supposed to hide that she was a bit short of breath.

"Because I'm not fighting at the peak of my abilities, I can kick it up at least four times this much before getting winded" Mana shyly shrugged. Her chakra pool was always far beyond that of her peers because she specifically used to focus on that, it'd take days of fighting on end to tire her out when fighting at such an insignificant portion of her abilities.

"Hmph… I shall have to bring out my strongest moves in that case!" Apheiya declared as she flipped back landing on her arms. The woman's body burst with overflowing purplish shroud of pure physical aspect of chakra as she pushed her body forward. The woman then landed her feet firmly at the arena and kicked off of it destroying the arena and crumbling the whole thing down from the brief tap of her feet alone. Once Apheiya was at the peak of her jump, so far in the air that she couldn't even be seen from the ground with an intimidating battle cry she dove right at Mana. The debris around the woman was reduced into dusty stone powder in an instant right as the woman touched it or even passed within a short distance to it from the immense pressure of the chakra.

With a gentle foot tap to Apheiya's heel the girl sent the woman tumbling down completely repurposing her technique. Instead of blowing up the whole out of bounds grassland the shockwave formed an abyssal fissure that rumbled to the other end of the arena and cracked the building into two. For a moment Mana looked in horror as the building split but there appeared to be no people caught into it and the structure was cut in half beautifully as a cake, didn't even collapse, only left a couple of hundreds of fighters looking through the gap in awe.

The Woman that Changed History grunted and writhed around on the ground before rolling backwards and flipping back on her feet. Her dress and her flawless ebony skin was dirtied and bruised, some could say battle-worn. Mana crossed her hands on her chest and smiled, such slow attacks were the easiest to counter, it didn't quite matter how powerful they were.

"It was dangerous girl, you completely made me lose my balance…" Apheiya sighed with a smile.

"True, for a moment I almost cursed myself, if anyone in those buildings was injured I'd have hated myself greatly" Mana nodded in agreement.

"You mentioned being a ninja briefly, ninja of average rank are easily able to destroy this Earth if they do not control their strength. It might be wise, for our world's sake, to not trip them like that" the woman stood and cracked her knuckles. She leaped forward blinking out again, Mana's body blinked out as well.

The two clashed their elbows to each other, each using budojutsu augmentation to strengthen their endurance so that their flesh did not explode into particles and their bones weren't grinded into dust. Mana knew quite well how exhausting budojutsu augmentation was, she however stood most chance of controlling that tension since she was quite a prodigy at chakra control, something thousand times less refined shouldn't have posed much of a problem.

Apheiya gracefully and swiftly flipped, Mana leaned back avoiding both heels of her opponent and then witnessed a barrage of backflip kicks as the woman flipped so fast that the air pressure behind her heels allowed her to use them for leverage and backflip again. Doing so in rapid succession it appeared like a string of endless backflip kicks that quickly disappeared into the heavens splitting the nearest clouds and dispersing them. Had Mana gotten caught in that she'd have quite likely strained herself too much trying to survive it.

Something brief mumbled from way above where Apheiya had risen. Then a blindingly fast double foot stomp crash drove into the ground. Mana took a gentle leap back and then kicked forward with a hop, right into the woman's chest as her stomp opened up her upper body for counterattacks. The woman screamed in pain and slid a great distance backwards slamming into the protective wall. Despite the fact that both women stood on the grass below neither one was disqualified because the Gauntlet's battles were supposed to end in death, usually at least.

From the smoke and dust of the collapsing protective wall Apheiya's body appeared in a diving front kick position, she moved faster than lightning itself yet Mana, still using her augmentations leaned sideways and jumped up to kick Apheiya right in the back. Yet another wall got busted to pieces once the woman crashed into it. With a torn dress and messy hair the granddaughter of the Wind Temple Patriarch appeared from the rubble wearing a smile.

Mana shared that sentiment, "You are attacking without thought, just showing off random moves" the magician noted.

"That is true, you said that you were able to fight four times faster and stronger, meanwhile this is my limit. When we fight like this we can't touch each other as both of us are fast enough to evade entire armies trying to kill us but… I must say that you are better than me. I just wished to have my fun before giving up" Apheiya laughed, despite being tossed around by blows that'd decimate any man or woman and grind their bodies to dust she barely even appeared to be injured by it.

"I may have been lying…" Mana tried to help the woman she was beginning to respect more and more but the monk had none of it.

"If you had I'd have noticed. You're barely even wearing yourself out while I'm fighting my best. You weren't bluffing… I wish you the best of luck against the others" Apheiya sighed crossing her hands around her chest.

"Wait, wait, you can't surrender during a Gauntlet fight! Young woman, kill your opponent if you have the chance!" the announcer screamed out but Mana turned around.

"I have no such intention, she may surrender for all I care" the magician sighed out.

The announcer looked at the Sheikh who just nodded and waved his arms around frantically like a child who wished to move past the boring rituals and pleasantries to move on to the other fight.

The announcer looked back at the staff behind him. "Find another champion that wishes to fight this one"

"Sir, the young woman beat Apheiya by making her surrender, they decimated the arena and almost tore this whole complex apart, who in their right mind will…"

The announcer slapped the two around before the door in the barely functional living quarters opened up and the platform extended from it attempting to connect with the non-existent arena in the center.

"Someone has agreed to fight her!" the announcer yelled out in awe, apparently to the great surprise of his very self. The public roared in excitement as they have expected that after such a battle the Gauntlet would've pretty much been handed to this strange magician girl that rode in on a camel saving a local merchant's life. This whole heroic gimmick she was going for appeared to resonate greatly with the public which also resonated with the Sheikh above who was scratching his long grey beard and taking more and more curious sips of whatever fruity smelling drink he was having.

"Appear before us, champion who has answered the insolent challenge of this young woman! We call you forth!" the announcer screamed out slobbering all over himself and the two staff members he was talking to. Despite a rather disgusting manner of speaking the man was quite energetic and had the ability to speak louder than Mana has ever heard a man speak. He was charismatic if anything, at the very least.

One more step closer to Damij and to her goal…


	170. The Hitman Contestant

A tall and average built man stepped onto the platform and slowly made his way down it, staring at Mana from above the entire time right before he approached the end of it. He was a man who may have been in his fifties or his sixties as despite his prime bodily condition his skin and face had quite a number of wrinkles. He had a playful pair of moustache pieces that extended from under his nose and reminded more of singular black whiskers of a large cat than facial hair of a man. The most distinguished feature of his was the long braid of his reaching well over his knees with a bell-shaped iron weight attached to it. Much of the braid was tied around the man's head so it must've extended to three times that range… What a peculiar look he had.

"Ummm… I shall apologize but… You are not a champion of any events, contestant Quatal. Please make your way back to the quarters" the announcer shamefully announced. Mana's head turned to the side curiously. She didn't expect to be hated by someone to such extent that they'd walk out to fight her out of their turn. This man had no right to face her so why could he have been there, standing and staring at her from above on the safety of that platform.

"I may not be a champion, therefore unqualified to fight in the Ascension Gauntlet but I was paid by one and sent to eliminate this girl. Damij thought it'd be fun if I faced her and took her out" the man proclaimed, his face barely twitched, no emotion or soul beyond what he said but he kept his stare firmly on Mana's own eyes, staring the girl down as if eyes could kill.

"Just because you were vouched by a champ…" the announcer began to talk but Mana turned at him.

"I've got no time to waste waiting for one of the champions to grow enough balls to fight me. What does he mean "paid by a champion"?" the magician asked.

"Quatal here is a "Hitman Contestant". He himself does not participate in events however he takes out fighters that other fighters tell him to take out and pay him with food to do so, he requests those matches and interrupts other fights to take those undesirables out. He is quite the gourmet so his services are very pricy" the announcer explained.

Mana looked at the man curiously, she had never thought that this place would have a sanitarian like this one working here. This man behaved perhaps most how a ninja would out of all the fighters.

"Why do you do that? Is it because you feel bad for the fighters? Because they can't fight their own battles so you defend the weak ones?" Mana wondered asking the braided man who just grinned with half his face cockily.

"No, the food of this place sucks. I was raised on only the finest delicacies so those that can afford to satisfy my appetite can have the freedom to use my services. If I am called out to fight by the Sheikh, rarely as that happens, I just quickly dispose of my enemy and build reputation. Damij and his crew often feel too lazy to do their own killing so they give me food from the Agbarmahal for exchange of my dirty services" the man explained, his voice was strong but also flowed like some sort of a twisted lullaby. It was how a viper with throat cancer would've sounded like if given voice.

"In other words, you take material goods from the strong to bully the weak. Come down here, I'll take you down so I can fight Damij sooner. I'm growing more hateful towards that man with every passing second" the magician sighed and obeying her request Quatal leaped down.

"This is chaos!" the announcer yelled out, "Please cease this nonsense immediately" but his voice was drowned out by the crowd, the man looked at the Sheikh who was overly entranced by the cheers of the crowd and the hype for the upcoming battle as the previous fight had hypnotized the man. It has clearly been a while since the man had seen fights like that.

"Do not worry, no champion out there wishes to tarnish their reputation fighting this freaky youngster" Quatal mumbled, the man firmly cracked his neck to the sides letting his night black hair with several white streaks bounce to the sides weighed down by the small block of iron at the end. It appeared to have a tip at the end but it couldn't have possibly worked as a weapon, it was too heavy and round to be a thrusting weapon and too light to be a bashing weapon. Maybe that was why the Sheikh loved letting the man use his braid?

"Very well then, begin!" the announcer relented announcing the beginning of the following fight.

Quatal's head rapidly twisted and bent forward, the weighted braid of his shot forward like an arrow attached to a chain. Mana caught the strange attack by catching the braid and pulled by the braid but it only made the weight slip off the hairy bonds, within a brief moment, a fraction of a fraction of a second Quatal's elbow strike forced Mana to take a lean back and hop playfully back. Quatal was fast, so far a bit slower than Apheiya but leaps and bounds faster than Fajal or any of Damij's crew Mana had seen. Maybe there was a reason why the infamous crew left all the dirty work for this man after all…

The braided hitman caught the falling weight with the tip of his foot and kicked it up into his own palm, his body moved so fast, so efficiently! It was just like the old man that trained her except much younger, this hitman wasted no movements, his pure skill surpassed even the greatest martial artists Mana had seen up to that moment.

Swiftly with just a couple of slips of the fingers the man tied his braid back. He then smiled and dashed back a couple of meters.

"I must commend you, most I face die after this first attack" the man smiled.

Mana didn't honor the man with a reply. She had only seen a couple of his moves but she needed to quickly make a profile out of them, if she could get a couple more of his patterns she'd never be touched by this man unless she wanted him to touch her. The magician couldn't doubt the braided hitman's claim even if she wanted to, that braid flew and spun at her faster than a drill, it worked as a budojutsu technique by itself, naturally hair was a very potent material that easily transferred chakra. One could've called it a conductor of chakra. A hit like that could pierce stone, steel, diamond even. Given its chakra enhanced nature it'd probably drill right through any material, flesh was on the bottom of that list. Mana was lucky to have caught and stopped it before it got to her. Arrogance may have killed her…

The man started furiously wriggling his head around, his hair started glowing with a feint greenish glow as the faster than lightning attacks tried to overwhelm Mana. They were too rapid, some of them were feints. The man clearly didn't want her catching any of his attacks again. With soft and much faster taps Mana simply slapped the dangerous jabs aside sending the braid drilling through the ground as potently as a diamond drill would pierce a sheet of paper. Had the braid been longer it could've really left some deep holes in the grassy out of bounds area.

Quickly Mana's body blurred, she tried to attack the man just as fast as she attacked Apheiya just to see where the man ranked. Her elbow sunk right into the man's face sending him floating into the air before his braid hit the ground and the man dragged his body back down from being sent flying. He lost his concentration, he expected Mana to just stand there dodging those attacks until one of them tagged her and until they wore her out. Too bad Mana had no time for those disadvantages. She needed to put up a decent show for the Sheikh but once she thinks she'd drawn everything out from this man she'd finish him off. The magician felt capable of doing so.

Quatal shook his head and wiped the blood off his nose and his lip. Mana was genuinely a little surprised by how little damage the blow actually did to the man, she dashed at him at considerable speed and transferred all of that force into his face with just her elbow, that force barely spread throughout his entire face and was completely focused and yet…

"I see there is no use trying to attack you like those ordinary fighters. You are anything but, you are an anomaly capable of causing trouble for us. A worthy opponent even" the man admitted lowering his head and slipping his purple sleeveless gi off of his shoulders.

"This man is able to compete with ninja, I never thought it was possible for anyone but ninja to fight on that level. It appears we have been lied to in the Academy" Mana wondered looking at this man and remembering the absolutely overwhelming power of Damij and the woman she faced before. All of the dominant martial artists were on genin ninja level, some of them surpassed that level even. It took Mana cheating at martial arts training and devising a hack style of fighting as well as mastering the physical imperfect control of chakra to even fight them on the same level. The world was insane and full of wonders… Just in such a world a Box of Ultimate Bliss must've existed, Mana had no doubts of it.

The man leaped at Mana aiming an elbow strike at her face. His body disappeared, he quickly kicked his speed up to double of what he showed before as the feinted his elbow top strike into a low kick aimed at Mana's chest. It didn't matter if the man knew thousand or ten thousand martial art styles, if he had invented his own even… Mana leaned to the side to avoid the elbow strike but blocked the kick, sending her flying up from the sheer force of it. Quatal was quick to follow. Leaping right after Mana, striking from left and right but the girl's upper side moved flawlessly dodging every blow. Then the man flipped around like a vertical buzz saw and tried using his braid to slice Mana in half in the air, his speed and power hopped up a bit more instantly, such unstable leaps in speed and power left a cut on Mana's shoulder that shallowed out on the side of her neck – she was tagged. The girl realized it due to the strange fascination of small splashes of her blood being spilt from the audience's side. These people wished to see tension and drama.

Quatal was taken over by gravity, so was Mana. The man tried to hit her with more of his combinations. It was problematic dodging his attacks seeing how he had four limbs and then his long braid to deal with but despite it moving in an unpredictable manner, almost like a reptilian being with a mind of its own Mana was not touched again, not unless she blocked the man's strikes and proceeded to respond to his attacks. She was a bit slower, letting the man block her strikes just so the fight would be more entertaining for the observers. Once they landed the man tried to sweep her legs at the moment when Mana was at her slowest and relied on balance the most but Mana's own palm thrust made the man's knee crack and him shout out in pain before rolling back and flipping backwards a couple of times using only one of his legs for balance.

"You're slowing your attacks before they reach me" Quatal noted caressing his painfully pulsing knee as his face twisted in pain.

"And yet you still got hit. It'd be ironic to maim you so badly that the next "hit" you are ordered to do actually takes you out, be it a martial artist or a nomad" Mana replied angrily trying to burn the man with her eyes. She hated people like him, people who had tremendous power, people with talent, training and unmatched technique using that power only to oppress the weak further than life already made sure to do it. She wanted to hurt him and for once her goal of prolonging fights to make them more artistic to the Sheikh and her ideal of never actually taking a life allowed her to fight that way.

"I still have the ability to augment my abilities further, I'm still reserving my chi from completely overflowing my body, just like you are" Quatal tried to intimidate Mana, as if she hadn't noticed.

This man was the second man Mana has heard to call the physical aspect of chakra "chi", the old man may have referred to it a couple of times that way but he usually still used the term Mana used just to stay on the same page as the girl, the two were quite short on time.

Mana thought for a moment about how little patience she had to just stand and play around with this man. She needed to excite the public more, she couldn't stomach this fighting, it annoyed her more and more every second she did it. There must've been a quick shocking way to excite everyone so she could have ended this fight quickly…

"Show me" Mana requested, "I know that the smartest augmentations are those that utilize fifty percent of body's flow, give me all hundred, I want to see it"

It wasn't like the girl was excited for this supposed power she'd see. She hated it, she hated two people breaking their own bodies and abusing their own power just to entertain other people but this was her shortcut – trick her opponent into showing their all, showing so much power that most fighters would rather lose than to strain themselves so badly. And yet if once this fighting is over there will be martial artists who wished to engage in this brutal art of combat it'd be their decision, Mana just wished that no one was forced into this. That was the goal worth stepping over one's principles and grinding them into dirt for…

Purplish glow began to emanate from the man's pores, it was chakra, imperfect and very primitive and yet… Physical chakra was usually green or red, depending on how much it strained the body. The pure chi was completely salad green, any other color would've suggested either an unhealthy chakra system, imperfect chi flow control or great damage to the body that caused such unhealthy energy be put into rotation. Mana was sure that the man's chi had more to do with a great spiritual concentration being there, not yet potent enough to produce full out chakra but this man had potential to be a ninja, maybe he was trained by one at some point. Currently his "chi" was closer to chakra than Mana's.

The man dashed at the magician, he ducked down and punched Mana's gut lifting the girl's body off the ground before pummeling her gut some more. The man dashed behind letting his messy flowing braid wrap around Mana's throat. The man then caught his own hair and began angrily flailing Mana around with that braid. He slammed her on multiple sides, flung his braid into the air letting the magician's body to land on his strikes. Mana removed the braid off her neck because it was beginning to strangle her for real. The man span like a cyclone letting his braid slap her in the cheek, after a successful attack the man stopped and turned at the other side slapping Mana on the other side. Finally once the man's attack ended Mana stumbled back and fell on her back.

The public was completely outraged, it was a very healthy sort of outrage, for an entertainer at least. They were shocked and confused but Mana knew it was the sort of confusion that only added to the fight. None of them expected the man's full power to be so overwhelming, no one thought that the man was willing to bring his full hundred to the table and that it'd be this potent. No one expected the man to hit Mana who had evaded his blows just as powerful and as fast and previously easily kept the upper hand. The public was beginning to feel a bit worried that this new favorite of theirs was about to meet her doom.

Mana sat back up and laughed out. She wiped blood off of her cracked eyebrow that was getting in her eye and getting in the way, she checked her teeth and found that some of her gums were bleeding and her lip was cracked, that constant taste of blood was in her mouth. The magician hated it… Still, she was happy, she amused the public, she remembered that sensation of performing a good magic trick if just for a single painful moment. This time, just for a fleeing moment, she let the crowd believe she was losing. That she could actually die and that added much more to their excitement than an hour of her imitated fighting would've.

"You… You were faking it!?" Quatal yelled out angrily, even more shocked than the public was seeing Mana getting pummeled. Someone they saw being incredibly nimble and able to evade pretty much any blow.

"Yep, I was playing around, your hits were pretty strong, I had to devote some of my "chi" to augment my endurance so that they didn't cleave through me like butter. Had I been the girl that entered this arena I would've died but I'm not that person anymore. You cannot beat me, even when I purposefully sacrificed almost half my physical chakra to get beaten around and barely take any damage" Mana explained.

"Liar!" the man yelled out leaping at Mana and spinning around, trying to hit her with his braid again, hoping that it may have been just his own underperformance or some problem with his chakra system due to the strain.

A backhand slap disrupted Quatal's rush, knocked the white into his eyes and it appeared like it completely knocked the man out. Mana was not content with just that, she jumped kneeing the man into the chin and as he was lifting off into the air she grabbed hold of his braid and pulled him down, not wishing for him to fly too high up while unconscious, driving her palm into his face and slamming his head to the ground. This fight was over, truthfully it should've never even began, the man had never actual chance of beating Mana, it was just that the magician was so full of rage for how this man lived and how much pride he had in such a life that she felt content on stooping to that level to stop him. Maybe it wasn't the right answer but all that mattered was that he would not hurt or kill people who didn't wish to be there ever again. Once Mana changes this place he'll be left unable to kill and fighting only opponents that wished to be there and fight. That'd make all the difference in the world…

"My physical chakra is dwindling… To think that I've learned nothing from abusing my chakra augmentation against Hisako-san…" Mana thought clenching her chest as her heart made a couple of extremely painful pounds inside her chest. If felt like it was trying to knife its way out of her chest. This budojutsu was very primitive, very unstable. Still, Mana just needed it for one more fight, then she'd only use it for emergencies, the power that let people without chakra manipulation fight on the level of weaker ninja. It was a power she needed desperately until she gained her own identity back…

"Damij, enough! Come out and let me change this arena already by beating you, the symbol of everything wrong with the Sun Disc now!" Mana screamed out, letting the pain in her chest fuel her anger and the volume of her voice. She was worn, tired and she wasted time and physical chakra to make these fights a better show. She may have been powerful enough to beat Damij initially but her current condition may not have been…

The last fight where contestants fought as slaves of the arena was approaching quickly…


	171. True Meaning of Martial Arts

At last the moment of truth had come. Mana's worry and excitement was burning hotter with every passing moment, ignited by the gate to the living quarters rumbling open to reveal Damij standing on the other side. This moment was what she was preparing for. She trained long and hard for this moment, learned to recognize and predict patters and form profiles of her opponents, differentiate them into different categories and become efficient at avoiding and countering any attack. Mana wasn't sure if she was ready but one thing she knew for sure: she was as ready as she could've been during this moment.

Damij's figure appeared through the open gap, the man stood cocky as ever. Despite her certain degree of hatred towards the man, the magician had to acknowledge that he possessed some flare of charisma as the people appeared to eat the man up. His entire stature, his attire, his skin, his well-maintained hair and his perfect teeth grinning all showed off this man's success. He won every fight in seven minutes but not because his opponents were powerful enough to challenge him. It was because he played with them, not unlike Mana did currently but he did it for all the wrong reasons.

The man jumped off without using the cracked and broken up platform. His long black coat rustled in the wind before landing behind the man, the overly dramatic effort of this gent to look cool only pissed Mana off more. Maybe such dramatics would serve right in the new Sun Disc arena but showing oneself off when people were kidnapped and dragged here to die in an unfair fight was just scummy. The announcer began listing Damij's titles and endless events he had won in, not a single mention of the bodies he had left behind. Despite the mass murder he had committed he was still the public's boy, the beloved hero of the audience and Mana felt it. The audience that fell in love with her now wished for her to tragically fall at the final step of the Gauntlet.

"I didn't expect to see you fighting me so soon again…" Damij smiled with that despicable grin.

Mana did not respond a single word. Pain was forcing her body down on her knee, not now… This was the worst time to collapse. Shaking in pain and fury the magician fell on her knee. She felt the taste of blood in her mouth and despite her best effort let some escape down her lip.

"Well, well, what is this? Respect for the champion? I respect that, I'd like so very much that everyone I faced showed this much respect. After all seeing petrified faces of cowards is so much chaff and gets as boring as cardboard over time…" Damij shrugged. He didn't appear to be intimidated at the slightest, still playing the superior warrior just because he was a dropout from the Ninja Academy with the gift of chakra augmentation where everyone else fought on the level of a normal human being.

Mana screamed into the air, the public went absolutely silent. Damij lifted his eyebrow sarcastically, he saw her weakness, he knew that he was getting another free win by having his lessers wear his enemy down.

"I hate you. People like you. People with power who think they are above everyone else, people who use other people's lives as boxes to stand on to appear taller" Mana spoke wiping the blood off her lip. She didn't have much physical chakra left, her body was breaking down, she wouldn't last in the sort of combat that she excelled in. This fight couldn't go like she planned it to go…

Damij smiled and extended his hand taking a combat stance. "Well, since you've had the honor of surviving a fight against me, you know the drill, I believe? Seven mi…"

Mana's body moved before the man finished speaking. Her foot stomped Damij's foot crushing it entirely, every smallest bone in that complicated system of puny bones. Her palm drove right into Damij's face breaking his nose and cracking his lips and his eyebrows, her body flashed and disappeared even in the eyes of the champion of the arena before she dove in down thrusting her foot in Damij's gut and pushing it down, an explosion of erupting pressure started tearing the arena apart and rising smoke covered an area far beyond the Sun Disc arena.

"Three microseconds…" Mana grunted before spitting out blood as her body went over the limit again. She coughed up and fell on her knees again. She knew that Damij wouldn't rise, she kicked him with all she had, bursting out with all of her physical chakra, as much of it as her body could take and taking Damij down, dictating her own terms instead of letting a despicable snob like the champion do so. "That's all I'll spare on you" Mana finished her ironic mockery of Damij's fighting style.

The public was completely quiet, refusing to believe what had just happened. Every time he walked out in this arena Damij gave his opponents seven minutes and he always delivered, the fight always lasted seven minutes as he took time to play around with his opponents, use the tricks he had learned in the Ninja Academy to dominate everyone. This girl had just beaten the champion in three microseconds, exploding with unseen burst of speed and power out of nowhere. Mana's body was still glowing red streaks of evaporating ethereal energy.

"You could've beaten any of those opponents so easily?" Sheikh's voice came from the Sheikh's balcony talking to Mana. The girl raised her hand, it was covered with blood. Her chest hurt too much to talk to Sheikh, truth be told she was completely in his mercy. If the man decided to not follow the terms of the Gauntlet she'd most likely be powerless to help herself just because she tapped into too much of her physical chakra. Maybe she still wasn't ready to get the gift of chakra back? The moment she learned budojutsu she abused it the first time she had a chance to. Granted, had she stalled and played with Damij she'd have timed out and died against him, going full one hundred was the only way for her to win.

Black blurs made the public jump up and out of their seats. Three figures surrounded Mana with only their backs exposed, signaling that anyone that wished to cause harm to the magician would've had to go through them. One of them was a swordsman dressed in greenish raggedy cloak with uncut hair falling on top of his glasses. The second one was a young cheerful girl with a green tracksuit and what remained of her hand crafted armor still protecting the vital spots, the third one was a strong looking short medical ninja who kept on looking back at Mana and trying to determine her condition.

Meiko lifted Mana up and placed her on her own back. "Talk into my ear, I'll shout those guys' ears off!" she energetically exclaimed. Mana's lips faintly moved implying that the magician was weakly speaking.

"That's right, Sheikh-san, I could've beaten every single opponent I faced today within seconds but I spent time fighting them longer because I wished to entertain you. I wanted to show you something and if you truly felt entertained by it and wish to know what I tried to prove, please tell me so" Meiko spoke up yelling out well loud enough to reach the Sheikh's balcony, the blacksmith certainly had powerful lungs.

Sheikh leaned over the edge interested in Mana's supposed message and gestured for her to go on. Once again the magician coughed up in pain before finally being able to resume her speech which Meiko had to translate.

"I… Mana fought longer because she wished to entertain you, because she wanted to show you that battle that changed this place so long ago. She asks you if ever during those years you've ever seen a battle like the one she showed you in this Gauntlet?" the blacksmith shouted out, the public settled completely quietly despite this interference from three more people they had no idea the identities of.

The Sheikh shook his head up in his balcony.

"Well, I… Mana wished to show you that contestants that know what they are doing and wish to be here, wish to fight because they love martial arts or because it serves their goals, people who are martial artists because they love to fight and challenge themselves, not because they are kidnapped and forced to fight, are able to deliver such fights which you seek. As long as you shall force nomads and farmers to fight each other to the death, instead martial artists fight for the sake of their craft you will never again see a battle like the one you've seen today. People afraid of dying will never perform as amazingly and competently as happy people doing things that make them happy in the first place" Meiko finished vocalizing Mana's words.

The public stood up and started to rage in cheering, truth be told Mana would've had words with them as well. People that came into this arena to satisfy their need to see violence, people that cheered on senseless violence and death but she was too weak. There was so much more to say and do but… She was too weak.

"Mana, not to be rude or anything but you're bleeding over my last tracksuit…" Meiko laughed uncomfortably.

Mana smiled gently, "Sorry, my body is breaking down from inside, I don't think I need to say anything more today"

"Good, I'd like to have a look at you and see if you can recover naturally from this or if you'll need intervention. I don't want you losing physical chakra right after apparently learning to control it again" Kouta said looking at the fighters rushing out from the living quarters and into the gigantic crater that Mana's Spear Kick hitting Damij had made. Some fighters started kicking their champion around and his unconscious body disappeared into a cloud of fighters, there was enough violence that day, they knew better than to cause too much harm to the man.

"Hey, old man!" Meiko rudely shouted out into Sheikh's quarters making the Sheikh and his middle aged female companion appear at the balcony once again after disappearing behind the regal curtains. "My friend just fought to prove you something and she told you an inspiring speech, she deserves to know if you at least heard it!"

"Why you…" a loud scream of the female companion came from the balcony as the woman jumped onto the edge and prepared to leap at Meiko but the Sheikh stopped her.

"What you said makes sense, girl. The only reason I shall allow you to leave with your friends is because I am reconsidering my arena policies. You appear to know what you're talking about and I am tempted to keep you around and force you to fight some more but… That was what caused my downfall all those years ago, clinging to the past moments and forcing the people around me to recapture them again. No more… Sun Disc will become a sanctuary for martial arts like it was always supposed to be" Sheikh's reply came while the woman stepped down from the rail and fixed her clothes, still appearing quite annoyed with the disrespect shown by these headband wearing ninja.

Bult and the old man came up from behind and gently tapped Mana's shoulder, Meiko turned around letting Mana face the two, the magician saw Myrwa walking around somewhere in the crowd, trying to gently make his way to the next person to beat the Ascension Gauntlet.

"Holy shit, kid, you actually did it…" Bult laughed out almost slapping Mana's back in his congratulations but just barely stopping himself.

"I just hope that learning to control physical chakra will help you return the control of spiritual chakra as well, at least that it won't be repeating the same mistake that took your power away" the old man nodded, he had a strange expression to show his joy. Then again, maybe he wasn't that overjoyed by the promised changes, after all, the old man didn't fight too much anyways and he never saw the arena too often so it won't look much different to him. Just much less bloodied covered up bodies after events will be carried.

"So will you two leave this place?" Mana's weak voice reached the ears of the two, initially they weren't able to make out just what the girl was saying due to the great celebration from the public having just seen a successful Ascension Gauntlet and a promise for positive changes during an evening where countless people were supposed to die needlessly.

"Nah, the two of us are martial artists. I will be looking forward to those changes, not having death looming over my head will be a positive thing for a change" Bult much softer stroke Mana's shoulder trying to not hurt the girl any more.

"Heh, maybe I'll open up a gym in this joint, "The Gym of that Guy that Trained Both Goddesses of Martial Arts!"" the old man chuckled into his fist.

Mana nodded but then her face blushed a little, "I'm no "Goddess of Martial Arts", technically I still cheated. Not only did I use a style that trumps all other fighting styles but I also used budojutsu"

"Yeah but "Gym of that Guy that Trained the Goddess of Martial Arts and That Girl that Cheated" won't attract as many clients…You're terrible at doing business" the old man walked away after telling Mana his farewells letting Myrwa come closer.

"Thank you, young woman, thanks to you I may be able to realize my dream of becoming a healer, someone who makes a fortune and something of his life helping people" Myrwa scratched the back of his head, thanking people clearly wasn't something he did often.

"Whaaa, you're so weird looking!" Meiko screamed out in surprise but then laughed out rubbing her tummy, "Sorry, I have no control over things I say…" she added.

Mana nodded, she felt too weak to hear everyone's thanks. Maybe now these nomads will find a place to stay in Agbarah instead of being let go in the desert, maybe this could be the way in which Mana would make up for sending Fennec into a settlement raiding frenzy and leaving these people homeless. At the very least it'd be a start.

"You can treat your friend inside Agbarmahal, after all, as a champion of the Gauntlet she is welcome inside, I remember her wanting to send a message to someone but I'll just assume that those conditions changed and she no longer needs that… If you do, just go and do it. Champions are as welcome there as I am" the Sheikh waved before yawning and disappearing behind the curtains.

"Right, then that is where we'll go, then in the morning we'll get the Hell out of this place and this Country, I am getting sick of this stupid sand everywhere!" Shimo grinned nodding to himself and leading the way towards the exit from the arena. Mana looked back at the large group of settlers, fighters and anyone who fought in the Sun Disc arena waving at her, some people were even bowing. Softly and slowly she lifted her hand and waved them farewell. She could barely do that much.

The time spent in Sun Disc was truly something. It began like a nightmare scenario that appeared to suck all hope out, a depressing imprisonment at a place where people came to die for the amusement of other people, to please a misguided nobleman who wished nothing more but to relive the most amazing experience in his life again. Still, at some point during her quest to change that place Mana had grown some fond feelings towards it and people inside it. Even people that started as her enemies, people that tried to kill her. Now most of all, Mana realized just what the words "martial arts" meant. They weren't just a meaningless expression of violence, it wasn't about hurting the weak and everything she hated. It was about people doing what they loved, making new bonds and growing both as fighters and as people, gaining new experiences in the process. Now, most of all times, Mana felt really good about her decision to change this place instead of tearing it all down.

Kouta didn't take long to examine Mana's body once they were accommodated in a large and sophisticated gold and diamond encrusted room. He scanned Mana through with his Diagnosis Technique a couple of times before deciding that her body should naturally recover in a couple of days if she didn't strain it like she did today. Meiko probably would've had a lot to say about the Gauntlet she watched the whole time but she was too excited about the room they were placed in.

"Wow, maybe we should stay here and fight for stuff like this, if Mana got this for just that one Gauntlet imagine how much of this palace we could win over years!" Meiko kept obsessing over the exquisite craftsmanship and the sophistication of the place.

"Heh, don't make Mana-chan look bad, the first passer-by we described her to immediately directed us to the arena so she made an impression. We sure as Hell didn't expect to see what we saw though, that was amazing, Mana-chan!" Kouta congratulated Mana on her victory in the Gauntlet as well.

"It was impressive for a non-ninja but… Mana… I hope you know what it means" Shimo looked strictly at the magician, the girl sadly nodded.

"This isn't a substitute for my abilities, sure, I could just go back to the village and use budojutsu as my only mean of self-defense but that is not what I want. Worrying over breaking my body while playing ninja isn't what I want, nothing changed in the end. Nothing except the Agbarah Sheikhate" Mana agreed to Shimo's warning. Also she knew the secret meaning of his question – she couldn't fight like that the whole time. Using just physical aspect of her chakra was primitive and dangerous and terribly unstable, it was also weaker than using both sides of one's essence. She was taking higher risks with lower rewards every time she fought that way, but still, it was worth spending so much time just to learn this unique way of fighting as well as perfecting her style.

"I know you guys are getting sick of Wind Country and we're not too far from leaving it but… I'll miss this place a little" Mana smiled nostalgically looking at the Sheikhate through the large open window at the side of the room.

Meiko rubbed a silky majestically soft pillow all in her face. "I miss this place already!" she shouted out before beginning to stuff down whatever food they were served.

Despite growing rather fond of the place, Mana has grown infinitely fonder still of her friends and their odd habits…


	172. An Explosive Encounter

The next morning came so peacefully and almost majestically, after all there were no loud shouts, no smell of rotten food and sweaty men training overnight just to satisfy their inner desires to survive the next day. Mana's room was positioned, just like those of all champions of the Gauntlet, in a very comfortable position where Sun only barely let its rays gently stroke one's cheeks at only the later parts of the morning. Naturally, Sheikh probably had even more comfortable quarters but these were still much more sophisticated than any in which Mana has had the honor of sleeping in.

By the time Mana woke up, the fourth time that morning, everyone had already been up, eating or training or checking their kits and bags if everything was ready for the trip. It will appear so odd leaving this place… The reason why Mana had woken up multiple times that morning was due to inner pains, that so unfortunately always persisted the next morning after a fight, especially a big one, even more so when one had only their normal human metabolism. Mana tried to stay quiet about those pains, she didn't want to bother Kouta with what appeared to be a minor issue. The young man was already given more work than he signed up for, having to constantly drain his reserves almost completely dry.

"I'm surprised you're so quiet, Mana-chan" Kouta noted looking with a strangely happy expression at her pouty face still hiding under the covers, having just recently noticed that the magician was awake. "After all, after the beating you've taken yesterday the normal human metabolism should've torn you apart, I was plaguing myself with the idea of numbing your body today whole last night"

"I didn't take a beating…" Mana blushed, "That was the whole point of my training"

"Well what damage you've avoided from your opponents you've dealt to yourself by overdoing it as usual…" Shimo grunted still maintaining his sword and the hilt. The young Yuki appeared to have a new sheathe, probably obtained it during the time that Mana got separated from everyone.

"Anyways, I don't really feel that bad, it's similar to a cramp everywhere at the same time but I can really take it, I've been beaten up worse" Mana replied finally jumping out from the bed in a nightgown she borrowed from Meiko and took her rags to head for the bathroom to change.

"We should get you some new clothes, maybe you should ask those ladies around the Sheikh for some spares?" Shimo tried to joke.

"Huh… I forgot you used to be a child womanizer at some point…" Mana smiled back at his friend. "It's fine, I saw the Sheikh's servants having prepared a full wardrobe for us, I'm sure we can buy some refills in our kits here as well, on my way being arrested I saw some small weapon shops" she added.

"We've already replenished our supplies, that's why we came to Agbarah originally. We didn't know about the whole "woman hate" thing but Meiko's fists soon made everyone reconsider trying to enslave us, we only asked around for you because we did everywhere we went…" Kouta explained showing a cartoonish drawing of Mana they've made on a small piece of paper that had multiple coffee stains on it.

"That's a really lousy drawing…" Mana laughed before disappearing in the small part of the room that was meant to be a bathroom section.

"Well, it's Meiko's, strangely enough she was the best artist out of all of us, Shimo kept drawing stickmen with smiles and cartoon Sun on the corner that was also smiling, for a gloomy guy his pictures smile a lot…" Kouta began to explain but Mana heard a loud pound to the head interrupt the medical ninja. The clothes that the Sheikh had provided for them were quite fancy and they'd definitely stand out in most places they stopped in so they may need to go shopping once they leave the Land of Wind.

"The hardest part was restraining Meiko from drawing you a moustache, she loves to do that…" Shimo added trying to justify the sudden stop of Kouta's recollection.

Finally Mana rushed out with the colorful white dress provided for her with a silly and very noblewoman-like plaid red tie on top. She didn't feel very comfortable in it but it definitely served better than her ruined shirt that was just a bunch of straps barely holding together and smelled of demonic dog piss and ear wax cream.

Unexpectedly a heart stopping boom toppled the whole back part of Mana's room making Meiko's stiff training frame just fly in and slam against the wall where everyone currently was. Within incalculable fractions of a second, maybe just as fast as the flash of the explosion started Kouta leaped in and pulled Mana away from where he predicted the blast zone being, Shimo also prepared his blade for combat faster than the booming sound reached them but waited out for the small explosion to play out.

A shaking and dusty figure walked in, the man wore a denim jacket and ruined jeans with strange light brown stains on them, they had massive holes on them and his frame was still slowly singing with the residual flames from the explosion he just caused.

"What's up, little dudes?" the man chuckled stroking his messy beard that still had plenty of leftover food he had for breakfast, however based on the smell that breakfast could've been had a whole month ago.

"The fuck!?" a loud yell reached in as a man ran in after the locked up and slowly singing explosive friend of his. "I thought I told you to stay still!" he shouted.

"Relax, man… Like… You're clearly not like… One with the nature, man…" the bandana wearing bearded man who just blew up half of Mana's room smiled at his pursuer.

The man that chased after the strange looking explosive fool began to bow against Mana and apologizing, a little bit more and he would've began to lick her shoes. The magician pulled her hand out from his grasp before he began to kiss it and still completely confused and embarrassed about the whole thing asked to know what was going on.

The man who was holding the bandana wearing beardo began to mumble, he began telling some strange inconsistent series of events that suggested great shock and inability to lie properly.

"Yo, little dudes, you guys are like… The guys that killed my friends, right?" the bearded bandana wearing terrorist calmly interrupted the unintelligible mumbling of his companion.

"You shut up! You're a prisoner of the Kazekage, just a Shaphac dog so stop causing an internal matter, you're gonna cause another civil war inside the Land of the Wind!" the man who kept a close eye on the explosive gentleman grunted.

"Oh, so you're the Shaphac guy? I'll assume the one that caused the giant explosion that separated us?" Shimo angrily asked beginning to put together the details.

"Shit… I am a ninja of Sunagakure, please leave this matter to us. This situation is already complicated enough as it is, please do not get Konoha involved too!" the man who was in charge of this beardo showed his concealed headband inside his bag.

A bunch of guards started to swarm around the room, Mana raised her hand stopping their assault as they were already brandishing their scimitars and spears to murder the hell out of their newly met Shaphac member.

"So you wish revenge for your fallen friends?" Meiko cracked her knuckles taking an offensive stance and preparing to go at it. Then her eyes wandered lower on a giant hole on the man's chest and all of a sudden her skin paled and her eyes shot wide open, Mana had never seen her friend so serious and so afraid all of a sudden.

"So… It's like that…" she uttered turning around and trying to dash before Kouta caught Meiko, it was clear that the medical ninja had to use all of his strength to keep the blacksmith where she stood, Meiko started throwing elbow strikes and punches his way

"You don't get it, look at the corner of his chest, it's a part of a seal mark, he's gonna blow himself up!" Meiko shouted out angrily but the bandana man just scratched the back of his head.

"Nah… That'd not be really cool… You're a pretty neat chick for recognizing that seal from just a small corner of it, heh, even I don't know how it works really…" the explosive man laughed out, he didn't appear in a very vengeful mood that day.

"It has a fourth circle of sealing mark" Meiko grunted before pouting indifferently, trying to remain her composure, "I don't have to be a sealing master to recognize an S-Rank sealing technique…"

"It is a seal of some sort, however from what I've gathered it is set off by this gentleman's death and the Kazekage very much wishes him alive and in his cell, so please, can we go, Lady Ascended?" the man begged Mana bowing to her respectfully, the guards finally tensed down and lowered their weapons, still adamant to stand there and see the situation to its resolution.

"Ummm… I guess..." Mana scratched the side of her head, still quite confused about what was going on, the only thing she could make sense of was that this man was apparently one of the Shaphac, a terrorist organization working inside Sunagakure that Shimo bumped into and that, apparently was responsible for splitting them.

"Wait up, little dudes, like… I just wanted to let you guys know, like… No hard feelings and all, right? I mean… I was at first kinda bumped last night and kinda wanted to blow this place up to Hell and all because I saw you guys being alive and all and I figured you'd have ran into the Shaphac if you were so close, then this Suna dude got a message from his contact that I also heard that they were found dead and… Look, the point is… It's all cool, right?" the explosive Shaphac member tried to put his thoughts into words but it appeared that his mind was quite floaty and full of absolute hogwash most of the time.

"Ummm… Okay…" Mana encouraged him to go on.

"So like… I was like… "Whoa… Gotta blow these fuckers to hell", right? And then… Like… You gave that speech 'bout peace and shit, and man… Like… That's so damn tearful, man… I mean… Shit… If I ever spoke to those dolphins like one son of nature to another I'd like to communicate those damned words, right?" the explosives expert kept on rambling.

"Okay… Ummm… Very glad you liked it… Hope you continue to follow those peaceful ideals and change your ways" Mana tried to act like she knew what the man was talking about but she could barely tie all the knots together.

"You two should really go, stop pushing the Sheikh's patience" one of the Sheikh's guards angrily grunted out and so the Sunagakure ninja angrily yanked on one of the chains holding the Shaphac tied up and dragged him out of the half-blown room.

"Buh-bye, little dudes, hope to see ya some other time!" the strange bandana wearing man waved with his tied hands and laughed out as he was being dragged away.

"Okay, so in this goddamn place we've confirmed that the Box of Ultimate Bliss, a magical wish fulfilment artifact exists, we've faced off against people able to blow up the world and saw ancient insects that probably hunted during the days of the First People, we've saw a bunch of political bullshit and saw Mana, a normal human, run around sixty thousand times faster than sound without breaking a sweat but… That was by far the weirdest part of our visit in this Country" Kouta noted still standing in the middle of the rubble completely confused, meanwhile Meiko was busy wiping sweat off her face. That seal on the man's chest, whatever it was, must've been really scary to scare someone as careless and easygoing like that…

It wouldn't have taken too long for the team to leave Wind Country, it was just a couple of days away from the border from where the team was currently. That being said the team still decided to have a couple of stops on the way. Mana expected some more obstacles in their way, maybe some more raiders or maybe Fennec finally growing a pair and attacking them directly and not raiding defenseless settlements. Nothing of the sort happened. It was a peaceful trip to the closest pleasure town where the four could shop for some less snobby clothes and buy some spares for when theirs would inevitably get ruined again. They also bought some food, quite a lot in fact since the local merchants accepted some of their Audra steel chunks.

"So what are we gonna do about this massive bag of Audra steel? In an attractive ore shard form, no less…" Mana wondered feeling really bad about making suggestions since the last one was the equivalent of making a deal with the devil that seemed to have been resolved well but then blew up in their faces by escalating a desert maniac into a settlement raiding frenzy. At least now Fennec would finally get a serious look into by the Sunagakure's finest…

"For some reason the shipment got stuck, the only reason why that would've happened would've been if the shipment got intercepted in Agbarah, in which case it most definitely wouldn't have been done by ordinary martial artists, or the transfer system was ruined and sabotaged which is quite likely. Either way, something doesn't feel right here, it is best we keep the bag close and carry it home by ourselves" Shimo scratched his chin.

"Are you assuming that the Kazekage is dirty and playing tricks on us just to get his hands on something like Audra shards? I don't think he'd risk Konoha relations on something that can be beaten by ordinary chakra imbued metals" Kouta objected.

"It is a bit of a stretchy accusation to make, especially when it has a more politically attractive alternative, still, Sheikh didn't strike me as the type to need or know of Audra shards. I'd say the Kazekage's involvement is looking much more likely" Mana also joined in on the conspiracy theories as the four were leaving the small pleasure town they were in with their bags full of clothes and supplies.

"Alright! So our next steps are clear – march into Sunagakure and kick the shit out of the Kazekage!" Meiko declared energetically to which everyone laughed out loud.

"I don't think so, Meiko… I don't think so" Mana cut her friend's dreams down.

"Yeah, it was a good joke though…" Shimo cracked a grin as the group walked off into the distance.

Soon the sandy surfaces were becoming rarer and rarer, the rocky and clay houses as well as those of sandstone were soon replaced by small wooden settlements: Tulab, Berzes, Qsherith and countless more. Mana's heart spurted in happiness whenever the group walked into a settlement and it hadn't heard of Fennec's angry caprices or if they appeared to have an ample defensive force ready to fight back the raiders. Some border towns like Allzawam and Marut even had ninja stationed there and ready to defend the settlements in case of attacks. Having in mind how close to the borders these towns were, the Kazekage must've been really viewing Fennec's threat seriously as usually leaders only sent small squads to the closer settlements to defend the places closest to the heart of their ruled territory for those mattered the most.

Finally only a week later the first familiar and long waited for grassy crunch met Mana's sandal making her little heart shriek in joy. The sandy grounds of Wind Country desert were no more, no more raider camps, no more snakes hiding in the sand, no more creepy crawlies that hunted and creeped the magician out at night. The place they were in was a large country-like territory that was actually just a gigantic ninja village – Takigakure, also known as the Waterfall Village.

While the current scenery was that of desolate grasslands, soon the place would become a little swampy as some humidity would get introduced to the occasion, then the place would proceed to change again and again, until it finally becomes the beautiful land of waterfalls that Takigakure is known for.

Based on what Mana learned in the Ninja Academy geography lessons – Takigakure was a large complex of watery lands with small patches of grasslands and colossal towering trees, the land was also very dangerous for anyone using boats to swim around as it was full of waterfalls that weren't deep enough to kill most crews but they would've definitely been too complex to navigate and would've lead to loss of one's ship all the time. The places were ship and boat travelling in Takigakure was even allowed was very limited.

Takigakure also had a very impressive defense system. Each of those large trees was full of complicated systems of tunnels and rooms and buildings, this huge waterfall forest was actually full with trees each of which could've hosted a competent defensive ninja force. Each of these towering trees was also a building of various purposes all by itself. Takigakure was mostly a very neutral territory, it rarely involved itself in conflicts and when it did nobody held any grudges because invading such a territory would've been hard – the clampy and occasionally deep and falling waters that covered the ground, the towering trees that could hid anything one wanted it to hide, large enough to host an entire army inside it. Takigakure was mostly left to its own matters, the only reason it hasn't risen to the top of the ninja elite was because its ninja were actually quite average with very few making a name for themselves.

Mana hoped that the trip through Takigakure would be peaceful and without incidents, yet knowing their luck and how peacefully they left Wind Country once they left Agbarah to expect no trouble would've been optimistic and possibly even foolish…


	173. Tales of a Ninja Magician Annual 1

**I can't believe that the story is one year old already. A genuine thanks to everyone who kept reading. Hopefully I'll get to write another Annual next year. I know that I swindled three chapters away from you guys but this Annual is almost five chapters long. Hope that'll make up for the wait and hope that now you understand why I needed a hiatus to finish this :D The Annual takes place after the "Bliss Arc" so there may be some confusing story details that'll make sense once you read the arc to the end after I finish it. I know that the main thing that everyone hates is the lack of canon Naruto characters so just for this special occasion I decided to say "Screw it" and go a little crazy. Hope you guys enjoy the result!**

A black vastness of space. Darkness only of the natural variety surrounded five figures floating in the vacuum and staring at the spectacle of destruction that transpired in front of them. Planets devolving into molten burning hunks of rock, where once was life now laid only destruction and endless death of all that was alive in the universe. Stars going out and exploding, both close and far away however the eyes of these godlike figures saw it all, they saw stars going out both close and far. Soon there'd be no life left in the universe, nothing left there to rule but ashes.

"We came here to rule but they declared war upon us" the man in the middle declared. His speech was rather sad about the events that transpired but he was not riddled with guilt for this upcoming end of the entire universe, his voice just would have felt confused to anyone who was still alive in this sinking ship of a universe to hear it. He was the largest of the five, he may have been at least three to four meters tall, his hands were as buff and large as buses alone and his chest didn't look like it needed much armor to protect it from harm as it was pumped enough to tear any fabric worn around it.

"They always do. They always will" another man spoke, looking over the destruction and floating in the vastness of space, surrounded by stars and systems going out. This man wore a similar plated armor of elite craftsmanship, composed of emerald colored plates with blades on several pieces, namely the wrist and the shoulder pieces. "As Gods it is our responsibility to snuff these rebellions out without ruining our dominion. It appears we have failed this time, as we did the last time, as we will the next time"

"I can fix it" a raven haired woman declared, she didn't wear any armor and was the only one to do so. Instead she wore a long and majestic purple cloak with golden engravings and diamonds all over it. "I can reshape reality as if this war never happened, so that this planet shall not die so that we don't remain the ruined rulers of nothing. I can put thoughts of obedience into these peoples' minds. We can fix this, there is nothing impossible for me, the Goddess of Reality"

"No!" the large armored figure in the middle declared. "If we wished to rule a bunch of stupid puppets we'd have created our own subjects but a God who has no followers of their own free will is a pitiful God. We shall do as we have done for eight thousand years and travel the Omniverse looking for a universe where we find people willing to serve us, to praise us and pray to us. In return we will give them us ruling over them"

"I believe what sparked this conflict was when I used this universe's star reactor formula to boost my speed…" a short and scrawny fellow in an armor plated mask scratched his oversized hairdo. "Then again, it's tough to say, they always hated us"

"And yet, to hate us so that they would rather fuel the destruction of their own universe than surrender it to us…" the fifth figure – an armored woman with twelve arms and a myriad of weapons around her back gasped fearfully at the destruction transpiring in front of her.

"Which one of us shall do it?" the second man asked.

"I believe it is my turn, Mind, observe the universe for memories of its nature, we shall not allow it to go into oblivion entirely" the leading brute in the middle sighed sadly.

The man leaned back a clenched fist and disappeared, the "God" was known as Power amongst his pantheon of five. These people were travelers, coming from a universe of their own they long since forgot the way back to, it was eight thousand years ago when these men and women dumped their old identities and began travelling the complicated web of the infinite universes called the Omniverse and began looking for power, resources and knowledge. After a while of leeching what every universe had to offer each one of them became infinitely powerful. Maddened by their power these people declared themselves Gods and embarked on a quest to find an obedient universe that'd praise them, pray to them and so that they could rule it as the Gods that they were.

The middle one, the leader, called himself the God of Power, or Power, needless to say his pantheon of Gods were not short on power themselves but as far as the physical strength and physicality went, Power was unmatched. The second one, a normal looking armored bald man, with glowing indigo ripples as if his head had cracked in multiple spots was known as the God of Mind, or Mind. He had the abilities of omniscience, knowing all there was, is and even will be to know. The third one, an armored and quite physical woman of twelve arms, ten of which were made of refined solid star core alloy that shined brightly like gold, was known as the Goddess of Technique or Technique. She was the most amazing warrior and skilled combatant of all. A true goddess of battle, but also of every other skill one could learn in existence. She was a handy ally to have by one's side in more ways than one.

The other two may have appeared lesser and weaker than the almighty three, for they looked much smaller and scrawnier but they may have held the greatest amount of power in their hands. The cloaked woman with dark hair and glowing eyes was known as the Goddess of Reality or Reality. Reality could reshape everything around her to her whim, she could do anything she could've imagined to be done, she was omnipotent but her imagination and mind were quite human making her often require Mind's help to do her godly deeds. The woman acquired this power from an advanced civilization that could manipulate subatomic and even molecular matter as they pleased in a universe they've long since destroyed after it ruined itself much like their current one.

The last one, the scrawny little guy close to Reality was the God of Speed or Speed. As much as Power was strong, Speed was fast. Power often told to those he wished to subjugate that Speed's ability didn't make any sense as he could outrun the silliest and seemingly most impossible things. He could outrun time, space, any other being in existence, even Reality when she willed herself to be in another place when the two raced, one time Speed even outran a social label when the local inhabitants of a planet in another universe labeled them "False Gods". Speed ran so fast that he outran the social label and when he stopped he was actually praised as God in that universe. However this praise was a false and unclean one. Power could not stand it and destroyed that universe on the spot.

A bright vortex of light, larger than any human mind could comprehend spun in the center of that universe. Had any human had the ability to survive the incalculable heat and radiation of that place they'd have first went blind in negative time, breaking all known laws of physics and rules of how reality functioned. Such would have happened due to the immense booming of light and radiation, granted, if they didn't they'd have gone insane of the unimaginable size of the construct in front of them. Power turned at Mind for a consult.

"It is a supermassive… No… A terramassive white hole expelling energy and radiation out of it at an unimaginable rate. This flow of pure energy is so immense that it pushes the surrounding universe away, this must be what causes the universal expansion" Mind scratched his chin observing the whirling spacial construct.

"It is the center of this universe then?" Power asked to which Mind nodded.

"Why did we come here? I could've made the point we were in the center of the universe, Speed could've moved to the center of the universe in a negative time mark, you can destroy a universe from any point and place in time and space…" Reality began to mewl to which Power responded by slowly moving into the object, completely unaffected and unrestrained by its massive output of power and punching it.

A loud crackling sound was sent emanating from the white hole, it was like the entire universe was just a surface of a lake in which a pebble was thrown, no, a large boulder sending crashing and tearing waves so immense that they tore the reality itself apart and destroyed every moon, planet or a star, galaxy or a cluster or even a speck of space dust that it came into contact with. The pressure and sheer destruction were so powerful that they were actually emitting sound in the middle of a vacuum as the universe was collapsing, in its final agony the universe began breaking its own laws of reality and physics. Nothing was law in these final dying moments.

And then there was nothing. Nothing except the five Gods floating in nothingness.

And then from nothing began something once again. A loud and immensely powerful expansive burst of energy almost pushed Power backwards as it emanated pushing space dust and pure radiation backwards, beginning the expulsion process over and over again before settling down. A ruined universe turned into nothing which then turned into a newborn universe. Confused the Gods all turned at Mind for explanation.

"It is an anti-matter universe, we've seen some before. Nothing in this universe is not actual nothing but anti-matter. It is likely that this universe began when a wormhole was opened from another universe to here, which caused a large amount of matter to spill into this nothingness of anti-matter causing the birth of this universe due to the violent chain reaction. You've destroyed the universe but we are made of matter and so our matter caused another Big Bang…" Mind casually explained tending to his slightly crisped and scratched emerald colored armor.

"I see" Power closed his eyes and sighed. "Reality, can you make us all made of anti-matter once I destroy the universe?"

"It might cause a very violent and unpredictable reaction, the destruction of a universe is an unstable process, it was never meant to happen like this. We don't know what effect a reality shift in the middle of a destroyed universe would do to the Omniverse. Have you forgotten that damage to the fabric of reality that came two years ago from a universe at the edge of the Omniverse? That forced us to stay in absolute nothing for a while until you pulled the torn straps of reality and tied them together" Mind objected.

"You know I can just blink this universe and all of the Omniverse, if need be, out of existence, right?" Reality once again complained.

"No. As a father of our pantheon I must do this myself. I have failed those that were to sing me praise, I was not the God they wanted me to be" Power clenched his fist and punched at nothing. The universe roared in pain as tears and cracks began to glow brightly, it was like the entire universe was a big panel of glass which was hit by a rock but not yet broken, only cracked. And then it all went to Hell in shatters. Reality sighed and blinked her eye, a needless gesture as she needed no actions, just her will to use her immense power but she made the pantheon made of anti-matter so that they did not trigger another Big Bang and reset the universe they meant to leave destroyed.

Power thrust his fist forward breaking through the nothing and out into the Omniverse. Reality willed their existences to once again be made of matter but Mind shouted in regret. Something was wrong – that inconceivable small moment of existence that they had as anti-matter beings inside the complex out of universe bounds and inside the Omniverse caused the complicated structure to shift. Countless glass bubbles that were actually little universes began to burst spilling azure and magma colored rays of light as they disappeared.

Mind slapped his own forehead, "Told you, we've just destroyed over two hundred universes… One of these could've been a universe we were looking for"

Speed bit his fingernails creepily and looked at Power and Mind, "I can run back in time and…"

"No!" Power roared out angrily. "We have made mistakes as Gods. We must face them and fix them. What other effects did my persistence cause?" he asked Mind.

"It's a long story to tell. Countless universes altered, cataclysms transpired in others. At least three and a half million universes were affected in some way, do you wish to hear a detailed report?" Mind squinted at Power.

"Reality could make this whole time while you explain it last only a second in real time. Very well, begin…" Power closed his eyes and sat down in a meditative position listening in on Mind's report.

* * *

"Baaaaaah!" Meiko bleated standing on all fours in the middle of the training grounds as the girl in her own mind was a sheep.

Mana giggled into her fist for a brief moment before cancelling the genjutsu. Ever since she had regained the control of her chakra she could now be more efficient at training Meiko to defend against genjutsu and other mental attacks since some assaults on one's mind were so different from how a ninjutsu worked that they couldn't even be called that by any stretch of the mind. After having her fair share of laughs the magician cancelled her technique.

"Aw man… I've got a mouthful of grass!" Meiko mumbled out spitting a bunch of grass and dirt out. "Plus I felt having shit stuck on my ass, is that a sheep problem? How would I know it was?"

Mana smiled, "Maybe you've read it somewhere or worked on a farm in the Fire Country at some point during your childhood? Anyways, I'm sorry, my illusions have surpassed the common genjutsu, maybe they're too powerful for your early stages. I've adapted them to what I've seen those bug predators use in the desert ruins, instead of attacking your chakra flow and manipulating it, I attack your brain centers instead. It makes for a much more powerful and harder to defend against illusion"

Meiko fixed her messed up armor plates and took a defensive stance. "No, it's because of those insects that I've asked you to teach me that, it only makes sense to use empowered techniques based on their way of using illusions. It's just… It was so fast… One moment I saw your hand seals flashing and the next and I had a craving for grass…"

Mana proudly crossed her hands on her chest, "Well, don't snooze then, I'm no longer that weak and dependent little civilian you lead to the Box of Ultimate Bliss. I'm a ninja now and I've learned a lot from the experience. Don't look down or hold back on me or you'll end up consuming more grass than an actual sheep today"

Just before Meiko could initiate her assault, right as the blacksmith reached behind her to pull out some ninja tools a booming explosion sent her down, it was like air itself tore itself apart and in her shocking horror Meiko witnessed her own friend splattered all over the area in a bloody stain and her own hands and legs torn apart and shredded by the destructive force of the tearing of reality above her. Then in a booming howl both Meiko's limbs and Mana's body reassembled as a powerful stream of light pulled Mana in and the magician ended up disappearing into the void of reality that had just opened and closed again.

"Okay…" Meiko blinked a couple of times before standing up and cleaning her clothes. She never overthought anything too much so it was much easier to accept for her that her friend had just been swallowed by a hole in reality which initially almost decimated the entire training grounds. "The Hokage probably would like to hear about that…" the blacksmith thought to herself scratching her chin and rushing at a casual pace towards the village. Just what kind of mess could Mana have gotten into this time? Was the outside edges of reality itself capable of sustaining human life? What if Mana died right after being flung onto the other side? Maybe Meiko needed to call for some smarter people to figure out where the Box of Ultimate Bliss was again? Then again, having in mind what happened to the last person who made the wish with it…

* * *

Mana couldn't understand what was happening. Her very essence felt being torn apart and only her chakra augmentation allowed her body to withstand the immensely crushing and tearing gravity of the experience. By all means she shouldn't have survived that but somehow she did. Was this maybe what "chakra over matter" meant? Mana remembered reading about those immensely powerful beings having those extraordinary and legendary adventures during the times of the First People that she never really questioned how they could've done it. Maybe the "chakra over matter" principle meant that exactly – chakra could've only been overcome by a higher concentration of chakra, not a chakra-less force?

Another boom made Mana scream in pain and cover her ears as finally her sight returned to her. The experience of losing her senses was one that Mana had previously and not too long ago. That could've only meant that she had returned home, but where "home" exactly? Was this Fire Country, Wind Country, Water Country? The magician looked around and stood back up on her feet, she felt a little tired having just passed through what appeared to be a wormhole of realities in a way. She was in a forest, very similar to those of the Fire Country. So she didn't travel that far, it appears. Well, that certainly was a fun experience. One she'll enjoy greatly telling the others about…

"Who are you? What are you doing so far outside the village, kid?" a voice reached her ears as the girl turned around and faced a grown man, a very vagabond-like looking young adult man. He had shoulder long black hair and a hat that was wrapped in bandages and wore a black ragged coat. "You have the Konoha headband so are you on a mission? Where is your team, girl?" the man insisted on continuously asking Mana questions.

"Ummm… Actually…" Mana opened her mouth to answer but then her mouth opened wide, she finally put two on two together – the black hair and the pitch black eyes that didn't appear to differentiate the pupil from the iris – this man was an Uchiha! Mana wasn't aware that her village had such well trained and combat hardened Uchiha left.

"You're a weird kid… Wait…" suddenly the man's right eye opened up, Mana's jaw gapped even wider open when she couldn't really pinpoint the strange manner of this man's Sharingan. If it even was a Sharingan in the first place, it was completely crimson colored, just like the eye would normally be and the pupil was so stick-thin and centered meanwhile the iris was covered in circles with straight tomoe that surrounded it. It did possess the tomoe typical to the Sharingan but it wasn't the appearance matching the one Mana remembered reading about it being.

"Your chakra level…" the man uttered, Mana felt a strike to the face sending her down, she saw it coming from a mile away but she didn't expect this man to attack her so close to the village, the girl just rolled back and jumped back on her feet.

"Hey! How dare you attack me so close to the village!?" Mana screamed out jumping up on her feet, her chakra augmentation saving her from the immense damage that the attack could've caused, the man appeared to blink rapidly in surprise for a while.

"I hit you pretty hard and yet you just bounced back on your feet, any genin or a ninja your age would've been dead but I saw your chakra level, you're not even human so what are you?" the man angrily grunted grabbing the hilt of his blade.

"You're not wearing the Konoha headband, I'd rather first hear your explanation…" Mana angrily squinted at the man who had lost all of her friendship points once he decided to attack her.

"Tsk…" the man just annoyingly exclaimed as his body blurred, Mana effortlessly leaned to the side, weaved forward and backwards, to the sides as well, avoiding each and every sword strike. This man was really slow by her standards but he possessed that strange ability to predict where she'd be, where she'd counter and when so he was able to somewhat keep up with her counters. Not that Mana tried very hard to hit him. Then the man extended his palm and grunted "Almighty Push!"

Some powerful force hit Mana straight in the chest and gut, then her face pushing her away, like gravity itself hit her and send her tumbling backwards. This man wasn't that powerful by any means, not judging by the standards of the enemies Mana had faced before but… He had those strange abilities that simply defied anything Mana had seen before. His Sharingan allowed the man to keep up with Mana's lazier attacks despite there being no reason he should've been able to. The magician grunted and stood up off the ground, she was getting sick of being tossed around.

Mana's arms flashed through handseals, the man's eyes opened wide but it was too late, her inhuman hand seal weaving speed made him fall to the ground and writhe like a snake which he was for attacking her. Mana walked up to the writhing man but then fell to the ground herself. Suddenly she herself started feeling like a snake and writhing foolishly on the ground.

"Genjutsu Reverse… A Sharingan technique, it was foolish to attack a Sharingan user with a genjutsu" the man remarked placing his sword to Mana's throat. A mad burst of chakra from Mana's system broke her own illusion. The violent shockwave sent the man dashing backwards and clenching his blade. As the man's right eye activated again. A giant purple avatar of armor began covering the man and rising into the sky. Suddenly the man just flew up into the air and stood surrounded by a giant purple glowing suit of armor that appeared larger than the most colossal mountain ranges.

"You can't attack in that, you'll destroy the village! Everyone will die!" Mana pleaded with a scream aimed at the giant armor that then slowly began to diminish down.

"I see, so you are a kind soul then, worried about the lives of the villagers?" the man wondered as he walked out of the dissolving armor that disappeared in snuffed out purple flames as fast as it rose from the ground.

"I care about them more than I care about my own life…" Mana admitted lowering her head in shame like there was something to be ashamed of, she only felt bad because she just admitted her weakness to this strange man with lacking power and speed but impressive range of abilities.

"Why? Your chakra it's… Literally everywhere, it's larger than the Tailed Beasts' and yet you seem to think you're from Konoha, what's going on here?" the man wondered sheathing his sword and closing both of his eye techniques making his eyes return to the complete blackness that he once wore.

"I am from Konoha and… No, my chakra isn't like the Tailed Beasts' I've seen the power of the Tailed Beasts, even a weakened Nine Tails could've decimated all of my team in moments" Mana spoke.

"A dimensional traveler perhaps?" the man wondered, he removed a piece of paper from his large bag that he carried around his back. He drew a simplistic looking human shape with a small internal fire burning inside of them.

Mana squinted angrily, "I'm not an idiot, I don't need to be explained things by drawing, you can just tell me!" she shouted out.

"Sorry, a habit one acquires by training a dolt son of an even dumber dolt…" the man put the paper back in his bag, his apology didn't mean too sincere as his face didn't shift much. The man appeared to be completely void of any emotions except some brief flashes of worry and surprise when they were briefly fighting.

"My name is Sasuke Uchiha, I am… A ninja, a wanderer more like it, but my allegiance lies with Konoha. I believe you to be a displaced dimensional traveler, I've seen one like you before but… That one was a lost soul, you are much different. You see most of us are born with chakra here, chakra is passed down from the original ancestors that ate the fruit from the God Tree, your chakra is constantly overflowing, like you were a source of chakra itself instead of someone using it. Your chakra level disobeys the very laws of physics of our world which is why I assume you're from another dimension, a place where chakra itself is as common as air and where ninja are much more powerful because of it. The origin of your chakra must be different from ours" the man explained.

"Well… I do remember being sucked into a large… Thing. I was training my friend Meiko and then after a loud noise it felt like I was being disassembled on a molecular level and…" Mana explained.

"Hmph… You may not even be a dimensional traveler but something else entirely. I don't understand what you are but you don't seem like you're here to hurt us. I'm heading to train someone, maybe you'd like to come with and share some things on the way, maybe your insight and different point of view will help me get to that dolt?"

Mana shrugged and nodded. "I'd very much like to maybe return to my home at some point… If I'm even out of place that is…" she wondered.

"Very out of place…" Sasuke confirmed with a firm nod.

* * *

"Ey, Sasuke, you've kept me waiting, what gives, I mean!?" a loudmouthed young brat yelled out when Mana and Sasuke walked out into a forest clearing. The magician looked around dumbfounded by how identical this training ground looked to that of her own dimension or universe or time or whatever concept she was misplaced in. Most battlefield devastations weren't there but mostly the entire clearing was virtually the same. Perhaps what Sasuke said about ninja in Mana's home being stronger and more destructive was what lead to those more severe devastations back home.

"Also who's this brat beside you, I mean?" the loudmouth yelled out questioningly again squinting at Mana. It appeared that this youngster had some sort of a verbal tick, inserting an additive that didn't really make sense. He certainly didn't do it on purpose, it was something that just happened to him but it didn't appear to bother him so it was unlikely he'd seek help…

"Based on the looks of it I'm a year or two older than you, kid…" Mana replied coldly when Sasuke gently raised his hand gesturing for her to not engage into a quarrel with the young one.

The boy didn't look like much of a ninja, then again, Mana possibly wasn't the one to judge with her own overly showy magician's uniform and all. The boy was short but had a wild blonde hairdo that seemed to compensate for his lack of height, he wore a weird black and pink tracksuit that reminded Mana of Meiko's casual dressing style.

"This young woman is someone I need to watch until we can figure out where she came from and how she can get home, Boruto" Sasuke closed his eyes and cut the boy's outrage down with a single sentence. It didn't appear like this Boruto was very excited about this prospect as he pouted and crossed his arms on his chest angrily.

"I saw your Susanoo, Sasuke, what happened, I mean?" the brat asked.

"I picked a fight with this girl, her name is Mana, I needed to know who she was" Sasuke replied before stepping in forward and nodding his head, pointing his chin at a training dummy. Grunting with annoyance Boruto began hitting it.

"So is she at least useful to us? Can she help me train or something, I mean?" Boruto grunted as he swiped wildly kicking and punching around. Mana couldn't help but notice how inexperienced and sloppy his shape was. This kid just helplessly wailed his fists and feet around, even more, his strikes appeared to be half-assed and lazy. He had no actual martial arts training and his form just barely implied he even passed the basic taijutsu skill exams of the Academy.

"I've noticed something, neither of you appear to augment your abilities. Sasuke-san at least hit really hard but Boruto-kun isn't even destroying this dummy with a strike. Is it sealed with force absorption seals?" Mana inquired.

"Augment, I mean?" Boruto wondered looking at Mana strangely before running up closer to her with an excited look. "Show me, show me, I mean!" he yelled out. Mana nodded and slowly walked up to the dummy, carelessly flicking it with the tip of her finger and blowing it to pieces that then dissolved into pure sawdust from the ripping force. Sasuke carelessly "Hmph'ed" while Boruto screamed in excitement.

"Hey, can you show me how to do that?! I bet I'd kick my old man's ass, did she kick yours, Sasuke, I mean!?" Boruto began losing all of his composure just jumping around Mana while the magician scratched the back of her head uncomfortably making a total mess of her raven hair.

"Well, she is certainly leagues faster, stronger and more durable than me. She also has some weird fighting style that makes her near impossible to hit but she lacks experience and seriousness" Sasuke shrugged, it didn't appear like the man cared too much about who was actually stronger and was much more interested in where exactly Mana came from.

"That's true, your sensei has amazing fighting experience and a very wide myriad of techniques. While I wasn't really trying during our fight, mostly because I was worried I'd hurt him after seeing his strength and speed, I believe that without knowledge of those techniques I couldn't beat Sasuke-san" Mana shyly butted her fingers against each other before giggling silly "Then again, I'm not much of a fighter where I come from, I'm actually part stage magician…"

"You mean you're not even that strong by your dimension's standards?" Sasuke appeared genuinely surprised for the first time in a while.

"Oh no, I don't think I could take even a single punch from Meiko or Kouta-kun, I'd need trickery to beat them, also I'm still a genin" Mana shyly explained feeling less and less special with every second she was being questioned. For a moment there having been ported to this world where everyone was weaker than she was the girl felt exceptional, almost how an elite talent would've felt and she longed that feeling, she wanted to feel special but the more she talked about her home the more she remembered just how ordinary she actually was.

"Whaaaa!? A genin, I mean?" Boruto yelled out in excitement, "How could genin be so strong, I mean!?

"I'll remind you that neither your father nor I ever made it above genin and yet we are the two most powerful ninja alive…" Sasuke annoyingly twitched his eyebrow.

"That's 'cause my old man's a loser, I mean, and I'm gonna become a wanderer like Sasuke and kick his ass one day!" Boruto declared excitedly before giving Mana a thumbs up, "So, what do you think, girl, can you teach me that "augmentation" thingie so I can beat my old man with it?"

Sasuke's right eye flared crimson as Mana felt dragged into an illusionary world where Sasuke stood right in front of her. The world around her was an identical copy to the one she stood before but it was all colored in various shades of red, the sky was bright red, the clouds were dark murky red and the water looked like a river of blood. Sasuke's ability to use genjutsu without hand seals or any effort actually surprised Mana, it only made her realize the actual difference between their levels despite being so much stronger and faster than Sasuke.

"Don't teach Boruto augmentation" Sasuke asked Mana, "In fact, don't ever show it to any of us. Just say it's your natural strength"

"B-But why?" Mana wondered, "Boruto-kun appears to really dislike me and maybe it'd help him warm up to me a bit, maybe it'd help him view other people more than tools in his quest for power? Also if you learned chakra augmentation maybe you could fight off threats that you couldn't normally, maybe it'd lead to you saving your home?"

"Truth is that Boruto is an even greater idiot than his father. Both me and Naruto had our weaknesses. Naruto's was that he was simply too absent minded and rash, mine was that I was willing to cut corners if that meant getting strong. Unfortunately Boruto appears to have not only our collective strengths but also our weaknesses. He is talented naturally like me and just outright persistent and outrageously lucky like his thin hammer of a father, however he also is rash, unwilling to listen and he cuts corners to obtain power. Truth be told your power appears dangerous and I don't think even I could handle it, someone like Boruto would absolutely abuse it and tell me, can it be abused?"

"No…" Mana let her head down sadly, "I once used it to fight an opponent I otherwise had no hopes of beating and that cost me my chakra manipulation, for a long while I lived without the ninja part of me and I thought I had lost it for good"

"Unless you wish to crush Boruto's dream and go through what you went through, you won't teach it to him. Nor will you teach me it. The power does sound alluring but… I'm done with this mad chase for power at the cost of my own humanity. I believe the only one in the village who could handle it would be Naruto, if need ever arises you could show him how to do it but chances are he's too thick to listen to the end of your first sentence…" Sasuke cut Mana's dreams down as the illusion faded and the two remained standing in front of an excited Boruto begging Mana to show him the secret to chakra augmentation.

"It's ummm… I'm not sure how I do it, really… It's more like a native thing, we're born with the ability…" Mana quickly made up something. It was a relatively new experience – to lie for the sake of protecting someone. The magician didn't like lying, it made her feel dirty, made her feel like her own heart would've rather clawed its way out of her chest and spat in her face than continuously beat in her despicable cavity but… Such was necessary. Sasuke was infinitely wiser and more experienced than her, he knew what he was talking about.

"Aw shit, I mean!" Boruto cursed trying to imitate Mana's movements and mannerisms on another dummy.

All of a sudden Mana felt a cold feeling of a short sword placed by her throat and heard loud footsteps all around her, ninja were landing and rushing to Sasuke's aid.

"We saw the Perfect Susanoo all the way from the village and thought you needed help, Sasuke-san!" the ninja rushed up to the confused Uchiha. A young girl with glasses and a red top also ran out from the crowd of ninja and wrapped her hands around Sasuke's waist.

"Father, you've returned!" she screamed out as her eyes became teary. "Why didn't you come home to mother and me?" she asked.

"Oh… I promised Boruto I'd train him right after I came back" Sasuke replied then pointed at Mana and the ninja holding her hostage.

"I'd be careful if I was you, you could begin slitting her throat and she'd disarm and kill you before you cut through the second layer of her skin. With all that in mind she's a friendly" Sasuke said making the ninja stagger back and sheathe the short blade that he wielded.

"Hmmm? Who is this, dad?" the dark haired girl came up closer to Mana and leaned up inspecting her from top to bottom. Then her eyes opened wide as she screamed out, "Don't tell me she's my sister!?"

"I thought you're already done with the identity crisis, Sarada…" Sasuke annoyingly said with an awkward smile, "No, she's not your sister. You don't really have one, she may be your counterpart from a faraway universe but I doubt it, this girl is very little like you at all"

"Hmmm… She has darker skin than us, maybe she's related to Chocho somehow?" Sarada wondered awkwardly inspecting Mana like a scientist would inspect their subject. "You said she's really fast and strong but she doesn't look like much…"

"Really? Hit her with your best shot…" Sasuke smiled confidently.

Mana wondered why Sasuke would make her fight his daughter but she decided to just stand still, after all she had already made a habit of trusting Sasuke without question. Sarada leaned back and took a fighting stance before rushing at Mana with a spinning elbow strike. Mana effortlessly leaned back and avoided it, it felt like being attacked by a sloth. Sarada looked so slow to Mana's instincts that the magician had trouble dodging the girl's blows because she couldn't properly place herself into a rhythm. Dodging such slow blows was actually quite problematic because the timing was unusually off, Mana was used dodging hundreds of times supersonic attacks so dodging a really fast human girl was surprisingly difficult.

"Chi…" Sarada exclaimed like some sort of a curse. She then leaped back and made a couple of hand seals, the girl flung a series of fast shuriken at Mana that then quadrupled in the air making almost a rainfall of deadly blades.

"Multi-Shuriken Jutsu!" the girl chanted before quickly making through another series of hand seals and breathing in. While Mana's hand seals were faster by an infinite amount the magician was relatively impressed by Sarada's hand seals when compared to her sluggish fighting speed.

"Great Fireball Jutsu!" Sarada chanted breathing out a fireball of flames that quickly caught up with the shuriken and set them ablaze creating a combination attack of rainfall of small burning shuriken. Mana simply removed her top hat and lifted it up placing her palm on the other end, the hat started glowing with indigo colored light as the shuriken that would've hit Mana were quickly sealed inside her father's technique to be used by Mana on a later note.

"Goddamn it!" Sarada screamed out in anger, her eyes flared up red as the girl opened her Sharingan.

Mana blinked a couple of times in rapid succession, just how many Uchiha were there in this dimension? It appeared that Uchiha were more prosperous in this place than in Mana's home, while there were more numerous Uchiha in Mana's Konoha, these Uchiha appeared to be more prominent and more willing to actually train as opposed to feeling cocky about their natural talent.

The girl leaped so far into the sky that the magician found it tough to track Sarada, she used a very similar technique to chakra augmentation. It was actually looking more similar to Kouta's medical technique which augmented the user's strength, so this girl was familiar with medical techniques then?

"Chirping Blossom Crash! Cha!" Sarada roared out proudly as her hand began glowing not only with the blueish chakra of her medical enhanced strength technique but also got covered with Lightning Release chakra and she dived down crashing into the training grounds aiming her lightning enhanced punch right at Mana.

The destructive force of the punch was immense! The entire ground ruptured and became ruined, whole chunks of dirt and rock flew from under Mana's feet and all around, the ninja who came to Sasuke's aid all jumped back and hid in the trees while Sasuke remained observant of this brief struggle looking unimpressed. Once the smoke cleared Sarada appeared to believe that she had satisfied her hard to impress father but then she noticed that Mana did a vertical split kicking her flexible leg up and blocking Sarada's punch perfectly with her own foot.

Sarada jumped back and huffed, she clearly threw more than half of her usable chakra into this double assault and yet she had achieved nothing as Mana's lax kick perfectly counteracted Sarada's punch and cushioned the force right beneath the magician's feet.

"There's no way she's this strong!" Sarada grunted out angrily, "Dad, she has to be some sort of a nukenin infiltrating this village! No one can beat me without even trying!"

Sasuke walked up to Sarada and pet her head, Sarada turned around facing her father with surprise in her eyes, her Sharingan closed as the girl was too tired to not let her guard down. The Uchiha carelessly tapped the girl's forehead with two fingers.

"She's not my daughter, this girl isn't the one I am proud of. That honor will always belong to you – the successor of the Uchiha bloodline. Now go tell your mother I'm back and that I'll be home for dinner" Sasuke just barely and briefly smiled. It was an interesting thing when people who normally didn't smile smiled. It made that smile just worth a thousand times more than it was when someone like Mana smiled. The girl considered her own smile a gift to everyone so she continued to gift that present to everyone.

"It'd be for the best if Naruto saw you now. Maybe he'll know someone who can help you get back home…" Sasuke looked at Mana and started heading towards the village without uttering as much as a word. For a brief moment the girl just continued standing there but then she rushed after the Uchiha.

"Hey! How about my training, goddamn it, I mean! You ripped me off, old man, I mean!" Boruto raged on jumping and trying to stomp the ruined training arena even deeper into total destruction than it already was demolished.

"Fine… You're gonna be next on my hitlist, I mean. I'll beat my old man and then I'm gonna kick your ass, Sasuke, I mean it!" Boruto declared following after Mana, Sasuke and Sarada back into the village.

* * *

"Hmmm… So you think this girl might be from another dimension, you know?" another young adult surprisingly similar to Boruto squinted examining Mana. "Can't you tell which dimension she's from? With your Rinnegan, I mean you could track Kaguya, couldn't you, you know?" the blonde ninja with an orange tracksuit and a royal-like white cloak kept scratching his chin in a comical manner that actually cracked a giggle from Mana.

"Nope, I had no feedback, she's from no dimension that I have access to seeing. I thought I could track any dimension but I can't, apparently because this girl is most definitely not of this world. She says she's human but by our standards she's an "entity" more than a human" Sasuke concluded locking his hands around his chest and lowering his head. Now that the man had removed his bandaged turban his hair appeared to wildly flow around his face as Sasuke had shoulder length completely untrimmed hair. If he was wandering for a while, which he most likely has been doing there was no wonder he'd have trouble keeping his hair in check.

"Kurama is just as oblivious as you, you know…" the orange ninja sat back into his chair and spun around. Only then did it dawn to Mana that this man was actually the Hokage as he wore a cloak similar to that which Hanasaku had adopted lately and he sat in the Hokage's chair. However this Hokage's room was much more organized and had much less paperwork loaded so initially the girl wondered if this man could've been some sort of administrator of a high ranking.

"This must be Naruto, the father of Boruto…" Mana put two on two together remembering all the talking that Boruto and Sasuke did while no one really explained to her who this man was, while Sasuke did declare that bringing her to Naruto was his goal, to assume that this man was Naruto would've been a bit brave.

"She does appear to have a level of chakra matching my own, Kurama is a bit jealous, you know" Naruto smiled in a strange giggle and petted Mana's head like she was his child or something. "Don't worry, kid, we'll help you get home in no time, you know!" the man gave Mana a thumb up just like Boruto did in the forest, now Mana saw that Boruto was definitely the son of his father – the two had similar mannerisms and very similar taste in clothes and speech patterns. Both had nonsense words which they inserted into their speech.

Mana nodded, "I don't wish to be a bother, maybe I can be of any use to you?" she wondered, "I mean technically I am a Konoha ninja and I must obey the Hokage's orders, I'm not sure what the ninja protocol says about when a ninja shifts through dimensions but… I'm sure that my allegiance to you still stands, Hokage-sama!" Mana bowed lower than she usually did when talking to a person she respected, the degree of her bow suggested obedience and a degree of subordination.

"No need to worry, you know… We've just finished dealing with all crisis in our village so we can spare some time and manpower to help you, you know" Naruto laughed out.

"It would be better if she didn't stay at my place" Sasuke cut down, "Sarada appeared to have taken an extreme distrust in Mana, while Boruto also distrusts and dislikes her, he at the very least tolerates her existence because of her strength. Sarada is… Going through a difficult time, she's desperate for my attention and having my fatherhood standards in mind…" Sasuke tried to explain the situation but Naruto slapped his friend in the back.

"You're just saying you're a shitty father, you know!" he laughed out rubbing his nose.

"Not like you're any better, may I remind you that you dropped your daughter's cake last year when you decided to stay and work overnight during her birthday and sent a clone to congratulate her?" Sasuke squinted at Naruto, "Sakura can't have enough of telling that story ever since she heard it from your wife…"

Naruto appeared to settle down as the reply did hit him deep inside, "Well… It was… A difficult period, lessons were learned… You know…" he muttered out before Sasuke's lips just slightly tipped up implying that the man was just joking around.

"Good to have you back, you know, Sasuke" Naruto smiled.

"Maybe one time I'll come back without any world threatening events or any lost interdimensional travelers wandering to our world" the Uchiha also shared a moment with his old time friend in return.

* * *

"Well… This is where you'll be staying for a while, you know…" Naruto gestured towards a wide wooden door inside a modern looking house that still tried implementing the classical taste where it could. This Konoha was so different from the one Mana came from, files were stored in some strange TV-shaped boxes that reminded a lot of the revolutionary computer machines that were slowly spreading in her time. The buildings were completely different, some simple classical shacks were replaced by towering and futuristic looking towers of glass and steel and some of those sky reaching buildings had boards on them that appeared to function similarly to TV panels.

Mana did feel strangely shy about this whole deal. She just nodded her head and looked around the complex of rooms and corridors that Naruto lead her into. This looked like an entire mansion, she's never been in such a complex of large rooms, even Hanada Katsuo's mansion was more like a large house compared to this. This was just wrong. She got flung from her own time and space to this completely distant dimension or universe or space or maybe even time and now she had to trouble another family. She's already caused trouble for Sasuke who did his best to help Mana get through the situation.

Naruto slowly slid the door open and pointed for Mana to enter first but when the girl looked really hesitant to do so he entered first and declared that he's back home out loud. A loud childish voice could've been heard when a toddler-like little thing ran down from a nearby room, she was really fast based on how winded the little girl was, she must've dashed through multiple rooms to get to her father.

"Daddy!" she yelled out leaping into his arms, Naruto effortlessly lifted her in the air and placed her on his shoulders.

"Himawari, don't trouble your father, he's probably really worn out…" a feminine and really high pitched voice came before a woman appeared from the corner of another room. Naruto placed the girl called Himawari on the ground and rushed to his wife, wrapping his hands around her and lifting her in the air as much as the height of his own home allowed it. The little toddler remained staring at Mana with shining eyes and the cutest smile.

She was really a lovely kid, little Himawari had her father's face, even the same little whiskers on her cheeks, but her hair reminded more of her mother's, the kid was dark haired after all, differently from her brother and her father but on the pure cute factor she outranked every child Mana had ever seen. The magician couldn't resist smiling for the little flower.

"Oh, we have a guest?" Naruto's wife noticed before raising her voice slightly and alerting Boruto that the dinner was ready, judging from the smell that drenched the wooden frames of the house it must've been ready for quite a while and the family was waiting for Naruto to come home to eat it.

"Yeah, everyone, this is Mana, she's… From really far away and she's really lost. She's an ally and… It's tough to explain, you know" Naruto started scratching his own head trying to explain it to his family before Mana bowed to the Hokage's wife and tried to explain.

"I got displaced in time and space, I'm from Konoha but not this Konoha. I don't want to cause you any trouble, I just want to get back home" Mana uncomfortably rubbed her sandal against the floor.

The woman smiled and bowed her head slightly in return, "My name is Hinata, I am Naruto's wife and this is Himawari, Boruto told me a little about you. He mentioned that Sasuke has found another favorite. He was quite mad at you but I believe it was mostly jealousy, he can be quite demanding of attention" Hinata smiled awkwardly trying to see if Mana hadn't gotten a negative impression of Boruto already which must've been the case of most people that had met him.

"No, it's quite alright, I realize that my arrival has inconvenienced everyone so much so I should be the one asking for forgiveness…" Mana bowed again before feeling a warm grip around her hand, Himawari appeared to have grabbed her hand and started dragging the girl further inside.

"You're weird… Let's go eat" she laughed out.

Mana smiled trying to restrain a giggle but then she couldn't help it but laugh a little. Naruto rubbed his nose and laughed out as well. Considering all the circumstances of her arrival Mana was really surprised that she was trusted at all, had such a thing happened in her own universe the traveler would be stuck in the arrest house as a best case scenario or even accused of spying for another country as a worst.

After the family settled down around the table Boruto finally ran down from his room on the second floor, he looked significantly less happy about Mana's presence than the rest of the family. "What is she doing here, I mean?" was all that slipped out from his mouth but Mana noticed that the boy tried to at the very least soften his tone to try and sound a bit less offensive.

"This is Mana, she's weird and funny…" Himawari yelled out after eating a shrimp to which Hinata tried to reply with a worried stare. It was clear that the woman didn't like her daughter calling a guest "weird" even if it was more in a quirky kind of weird than a negative light.

"She's our guest Boruto, in more ways than one, you know" Naruto calmly replied closing his eyes and preparing for another outrage from his son.

Strangely enough Boruto just looked at Himawari who appeared to be quite fond of the guest and calmed down somewhat, he must've really trusted and treasured his sister to completely change his position like that. "I just thought she'd stay with Sasuke, didn't mean any offense, I mean" Boruto mumbled out before settling down.

Halfway through the dinner Hinata noticed that Mana had barely eaten anything, once in a while she placed some food in her plate but barely actually ate anything, just trying to move attention away from the fact by placing more and more food by small quantities.

"You're not eating anything, Mana, do people in your dimension not eat?" Hinata asked, it may have been taken offensively but judging from the woman's soft tone it was clear that such was not the intended meaning of those words.

"They do it's just… You clearly didn't anticipate that you'll have to feed a guest tonight. I don't want to be any trouble for you guys, you've been far more welcoming to me than anyone would reasonably be in this case" Mana replied poking the rice in her place with the chopsticks.

"Well, it's not like we have a very good record with travelers, I mean, one stole aunt Hanabi's eyes that one time…" Boruto said to which both Naruto and Hinata angrily replied with scolding glares.

"Toneri was not from another dimension, he was from the Moon, you know" Naruto angrily explained to his son and Mana.

"Yeah, but doesn't change the fact of that awkward dinner when he came to visit at the same time as aunt Hanabi, I mean" Boruto closed his eyes and took a sip of the juice from his cup. "Plus, even Sasuke doesn't know where she's from exactly, Mana being from another dimension is just his theory, last time I've heard dimensions don't have copies of Konoha in them, I mean" he added. It only made sense that someone angry at Mana would be suspicious of her story.

"Don't feel bad, Mana-chan, brother failed his written tests all the time in the Academy, he doesn't know about dimensions" Himawari giggled eating another shrimp. It was odd how easily this little one accepted Mana as an ally, having in mind the information she was given. It was clear that this Konoha lived in the times of long and prosperous peace. Naruto must've been a really good Hokage, together with a really strong roster of Kage in charge of the other villages if children trusted other people without anything tangible to earn that trust.

Mana stood up from her table and bowed for Hinata and Naruto. "I think I'll go for a short walk. I've caused enough tension for your family today" the girl replied almost running out from the house. On her way out she almost tripped on some wooden decorations due to tears that began forming in her eyes. Mana didn't want to cry but she had no control over it. She was lost in literally every ways one could've been lost, the only way home was to do what she didn't want to do – cause unnecessary trouble for other people.

The magician girl just collapsed by a wooden pillar and looked at the sky. She used to like to look at the sky back home, hoping for it to rain because Mana liked rains, they felt so sad but also they drenched one in water, they refreshed one's mind by washing away all the trouble and reminded of how inconsequential one's troubles really were in the scope of the larger natural processes.

Was this dark void filled with stars even her sky? Would this rain that just wouldn't fall despite Mana's most desperate pleads be her rain? The sky looked just as dark when it got dark, the stars glowed just as brightly but were they really her stars? Mana treated these people just like she'd have treated people from her own time or space or dimension or wherever she was lost in. First the girl hoped to protect her village before she learned of how vast the world was, then she extended her responsibility to beyond the village walls, no matter how badly they wanted to kill her. Now she was told that there was an infinite number of universes and worlds she had to protect and treat as her own as well… Just how many versions of Naruto were out there? Maybe the number of alternate versions of Mana out there was just as numerous…

A shuffling sound alerted the magician, someone walked out through the door and slowly tapped up to Mana in wooden sandals. It was Hinata dressed in a majestically gorgeous purple kimono with lotus and dragon motifs. The woman knelt and sat down to Mana and looked at the sky as well.

"I used to run to this pillar when I felt alone too. When I was a kid, much younger than you, I thought that this was just a normal pillar and I was the one that gave it meaning. Maybe that wasn't true, maybe it is mystical and actually is a sanctuary for people that feel alone if you found it as well. Similarly to this wooden pillar's meaning you're only alone and you only need to feel scared if you yourself make it that way, we're ready to welcome you to our home anytime you need it" Hinata spoke slowly and softly. She didn't ask or force Mana to return, the woman just spoke words that she thought could've helped.

The magician sighed and then looked at the woman. "You felt alone? But you're so beautiful and look so strong, how could you have ever been alone?" she wondered.

Hinata laughed out, "I've certainly never been stuck so far away from home like you so I cannot even imagine your pain but… You'd have no idea. As a kid I was a lot less confident, a bit shorter and frailer, also my own clan considered me a disappointment"

"How'd that turn out? How did you get over it?" Mana wanted to know.

"Well, I met a person I loved who showed me that I too can be strong if I want to, someone who showed me just how beautiful I was to them even if at first he was sluggish and it was difficult to tell, that person taught me to be strong but this pillar helped me get through the moments when all seemed hopeless and that person was really far away. It was a valuable pit stop on the way to inner strength and I'm glad it can help you as well" Hinata explained still looking at the stars. "Boruto doesn't hate you, it's important that you realize that, he doesn't have it in him to hate anyone. He can be really thick, just like his father but also just like his father he only sees the best in people. It's just that just like his father when he sees goodness and strength inside someone he gets jealous that other people don't see the goodness and strength inside of him too, jealous of the attention people give that person"

"Well, if that's the case he has nothing to be jealous of, I have it in me to hate. He is better than me in every way… All of you are. Being stranded in this world is like being stranded in heaven but wishing to be alive again instead" Mana's head sunk down.

Hinata looked at the magician before looking back at a light glowing on the second floor and loud yells. "I have a feeling Boruto once again took burgers with him to bed. That boy loves his junk food…" Hinata uttered to which Mana encouraged the woman to go.

"Just live your life like I wasn't here" Mana said, "You deserve a happy life for all the trouble you've overcome"

Hinata wanted to say something in return but loud yells and even louder banging noises suggested that Boruto started brawling with Naruto when he tried to take his burgers away again. The woman jumped up and dusted off her kimono before running indoors.

Mana looked at the Moon and sighed. "So people live on the Moon in this dimension?" she wondered remembering all the tales and scrolls she read about the Sky Clan that settled on the Moon and warred with the Earth Clan. Maybe the histories of these two dimensions are at least a little bit similar even if Mana saw plenty differences between them, for one the faces of this Hokage Mountain were completely different shape and look, they must've been totally different people.

A deafening sonic boom made Mana cover her ears, the magician felt her hands getting wet with blood that started running from them all of a sudden and the girl observed in horror as the Moon exploded into space dust right up in the sky, the space dust began falling down into Earth, it was so small and inconsequential that it actually looked more like falling ash.

Naruto in full ninja gear appeared right up close to Mana. "Stay here, you know!" he ordered before disappearing, or at least he would've disappeared to anyone else, Mana's eyes tracked the high speed movements perfectly. Naruto was even slower than Sasuke, all the time he spent being the Hokage must've left him a little weakened from the time that the two were working together. From how they interacted with one another the magician could only assume they were teammates once. Hinata, Himawari and Boruto ran out of the house and looked up into the sky. Hinata covered her mouth in horror seeing the Moon being blown up and tears started running down her face.

"Poor Toneri…" she uttered.

Mana wondered just who this Toneri person was, based on what she had heard so far he lived on the Moon and had once descended upon this world and taken the eyes of the aunt of Boruto and Himawari. He must've once been a bad person but redeemed, based on Hinata's regret of his supposed demise the magician realized that Naruto may just have been the kind of legendary hero she always wanted to become, one that inspired and protected people but also changed bad people instead of fighting them until they could move no more.

Boruto looked at Mana angrily, "This better wouldn't be an invading force and you better not be their scout, I mean" he said looking visibly affected by the loss of the Moon as well.

Himawari tried to push Boruto but she herself ended up stumbling. "Shut up! Mana is a good person!"

"Oh come on, we don't know anything about her but theories and the same night when she comes the whole goddamn sky blows up, I mean!" Boruto yelled.

Hinata looked at her son with that look that all mothers carried around hoping to never use it. The look that is basically the nuke of all looks that decimated any child's resistance and made them capitulate the moment "the look" became an option to a parent.

"I'm sorry… I mean… Toneri is probably done for, if he could've he'd have made his way down already and we're the only place he is as welcome as he can be, I mean" Boruto apologized, it was clear from his shaking voice that he also cared a bit about this Toneri person from the visit or two that the man from the Moon had made. Mana stood up and looked at the falling dust in the sky, then back at the village.

"I'm going" she said, "Maybe Boruto is right and I did cause this, maybe my very presence in this dimension is ruining everything, wouldn't be the first time I made things worse. I'm stronger and faster than anyone in this dimension, if I caused this, I'm gonna fix it"

Mana's body disappeared from sight right after she uttered those words. Boruto also closed his hands into a hand seal position and smiled confidently. "Alright, I mean, it's time Boruto, the great ninja hero, the man who would eventually become a great ninja wanderer like old man Sasuke joined the battle too!" he declared and launched his body into a wild run. A moment later a black nearly invisible blur brought the young man back to his mother and sister. To those without advanced reaction times surpassing the definition of a moment by millions of times it would've appeared like the young man just teleported back to his family.

"Holy shit she's fast, I mean!" Boruto yelled out in frustration but also admiration.

* * *

A glowing flash lit up the Konoha streets in feint bursts that went out as quickly as they ignited as the Konoha's Orange Hokage moved through the streets trying to look for a possible threat. Why would the Moon just blow up? There had to be something, a meteor or maybe another interdimensional being, maybe another leftover from Princess Kaguya's clan? After all, Naruto's way to being Hokage was covered with events where he had to deal with that infernal clan and people refusing to let go of ancient history and ambition.

There it was… Naruto noticed five figures floating in the air above the Hokage Mountain and examining its glory and craftsmanship. Within a single bound, moving in a flash the Hokage moved right on top of the Second Hokage's stony nose staring the strangers right in their eyes. His muscles twitched and his will begged Naruto to attack these men, they destroyed the Moon, that meant that Toneri was either dead or about to be.

"Greetings, I assume you are the leader of this community? Maybe even this planet?" the central figure, a hulking man at least twice Naruto's size with arms that looked like they could've wrestled with a Tailed Beast crossed on his pumped up chest.

"Actually he is the leader of this small city, however he does possess a unique charisma that makes him the closest this community has to a leader, even the leaders of other cities are willing to listen to this man" another slightly shorter and bald man covered with glowing cracks and markings over his skin and with glowing eyes informed the brute.

"That's right, I'm the Seventh Hokage of this village, Uzumaki Naruto, you know!" Naruto replied not liking at all that despite his presence these men still spoke to themselves and completely ignored him.

"Hmmm, never understood that split leadership thing. Worlds are stronger united under one rule…" the leader noted briefly closing his eyes that snuffed out two immensely powerful sources of the strange supernatural light that the bodies of these people were charged with.

"Rule? Is that why you've destroyed the Moon? To rule? What is there left of it to rule now, you know?" Naruto growled angrily pointing his fist at the large man in the middle whose eyes opened again illuminating the area they were in.

"For a mortal you show considerable understanding. We do not wish to rule ash and cinders however disobedience and insolence needs to be punished. The man on that small planetoid valued his home and his temples more than he awed at Gods appearing in front of him, he refused to praise us and even attacked us. We didn't attempt to kill him, taking his home away from him however felt just" the leader replied placing his oversized hand that looked colossal enough to crush Naruto's head like a grape on his chest.

"My name is Power, this is Mind, Technique, Speed and Reality. We are Gods travelling the universes and looking for a domain to praise us that we can claim as ours" the man began his speech with a black blur he was interrupted when Sasuke appeared besides Naruto.

"You're late, you know…" Naruto noted.

"I needed to see if the Moon's destruction caused any immediate threats. We can recreate it after this but it seems that several islands in Kirigakure were flushed away by tidal waves. The Mizukage will want a detailed report about this" Sasuke said glaring at the threats in front of him.

Naruto chuckled and with a confident and a little angry smile he looked at the enemy as well. Sasuke always was the more mature of the two, coupled with the fact that he also wanted to become the Hokage at some point, it made Naruto wonder if maybe Sasuke would've been a superior Hokage to him. After all he only reached for that post because of a dream and a bunch of declarations he made as a child and because he never went back on his word. Seeing Sasuke worry not about chasing the enemy but controlling the situation at hand before coming to Naruto's aid calmed the Hokage down and got him ready for combat, now his mind was clearer and more ready than ever.

"As I was saying, the five of us are Gods traversing the universes, looking for people that praise us. People always lash out and try to attack us which eventually causes them to destroy their own worlds in attempts to destroy us, either that or we become disillusioned with that universe and we destroy it instead. I sincerely hope that we can come to an agreement…" Power nodded his head. "All you need to do is bow before us and praise us. In return we shall act like all Gods act, protect you when we deem it needed, smite you when you misbehave"

Sasuke cracked a grin. "So you mean to say that in all of the universes you've travelled through no one ever praised you? Seems a bit unlikely"

"They did, but they never meant it. They only spoke that way but secretly harbored thoughts of rebelling or they only agreed to our proposition out of fear. Mind here knows everything that has happened, is happening and will happen, he knows literally everything there is to know about everything so he informs me when someone's intentions are insincere. However all the knowledge overwhelms him, he becomes lost reading and processing all of it so I have to ask him about something or else he shall remain absorbed inside of it all" Power explained as Mind just stood there staring into a blank point behind Naruto and Sasuke.

"Universes you say… Does that mean maybe that Mana is also from another universe and not another dimension?" Sasuke looked at Naruto who simply shrugged.

"Say, a girl arrived to our village recently, a short one with slightly darker skin and a strange uniform, wearing our headband and called "Mana", is she one of you Gods too? Should we praise her as well?" Sasuke asked momentarily playing the game, it was perhaps for the best that Power didn't test their faith at that moment, perhaps out of knowledge that usually faith took time.

Power bent his head around, engaged in thought allowing his silver hair to shift from one shoulder to another, slip all over his face, the man then caressed his own short silver beard in thought before relenting and turning to Mind.

"The girl you are referring to is from another universe, we've accidentally caused an anomaly of multi-universal proportions destroying over two hundred universes. Her universe was a remote one, at the very edge of the Omniverse but the universal shockwave caused a violent reaction of sucking her into the Omniverse itself, it is highly likely that she couldn't control herself and ended up stranded in your universe. The fact that she even survived outside the reaches of known reality is odd by itself, it requires some more thought about the subject" Mind explained.

"You've destroyed two hundred universes, you know?" Naruto shook in disbelief.

"Anti-matter particles slipped into our quantum wormhole which we use to traverse between the universes and the outside reaches of reality, they were brought into the collection of all universes – the Omniverse causing a violent reaction. It was something we did not think through" a woman with ten golden arms accompanying her normal two wearing an entire arsenal on her back explained. She was the one referred to as "Technique" during the introductions.

"That's terrible…" Mana's voice trembled from atop the Hokage Mountain, Sasuke and Naruto looked up to see the girl resting on top. Despite her immense speed the magician had no idea about the location where she was heading forcing her to slow down and ask people for directions as to where they've tracked Naruto's flashes of orange light. Mana's eyes accidentally caught Naruto's form of glowing orange light with strange tomoe symbols covering him. It must've been his own technique, something that granted him enough speed and power to become Hokage.

"It is, Godly power often leaves fallout, after all who considers the ants that die when two galaxies need to be merged?" the shortest of the bunch extended his arm, his eyes were the largest suggesting that he did feel some regret for what happened where the other "Gods" stood with rather indifferent looks.

"Mana, apparently you're from another universe. These people should be able to send you back though so don't worry" Sasuke calmed the magician down as the realization that over two hundred universes were destroyed was really breaking her down.

"So what is your answer?" Power asked. "Will you accept our offer? Please note that I will still check the sincerity of your answer with Mind"

Naruto's body blurred and left behind just flares of orange light, the figure moved lightning fast to his enemy slamming his arm into Power's chest, protected by the crimson armor plates. A howling sphere of wind chakra appeared in Naruto's palm exploding as his palm made contact, meanwhile twenty more arms appeared from behind Naruto's back, all of which created similar spheres and drove them into Power's body as they simultaneously exploded at once forming a powerful explosion that should've by all means decimated the village.

"Rasengan Riot!" Naruto roared in pride and rage of his defiance.

After the fallout cleared it was revealed that Sasuke held all of the combatants in his hand, the hand of a giant purple ethereal armor he once referred to as the Perfect Susanoo. The armor protected both the mountain and the village below from the blast. Power stood there completely unfazed by the attack, not only that, it appeared like the other "Gods" were also left without a scratch, even the woman who didn't even wear any armor and just wore a fancy cloak.

"I believe his answer to be fully sincere" Mind interrupted the situation.

Before Naruto could even notice Power's finger gently pushed the Hokage away, sending the man crashing back not only through Sasuke's Perfect Susanoo crushing it into million little pieces but also into and through the Hokage Mountain landing somewhere far far away in the Fire Country.

"Anything I need to worry about, Mind?" Power asked looking to the side.

"I do not believe so, the black haired one however possesses capacity for mental attacks of some sort however they shall not affect us as they only work on people who share the vital inner energy of these people, do not worry" Mind blinked indifferently.

Sasuke opened his right eye as blood burst from it, a burst of black flames enveloped the pantheon of five standing in front of him as Sasuke's Susanoo once again reshaped.

"Enough" the cloaked woman declared as the black flames around the pantheon disappeared. "This energy they use feels… Powerful and odd, what is it?" Reality asked of Mind.

"They call it chakra, it is very dangerous indeed however the concentration of it inside these "ninja" as they call themselves is irrelevant. It is not enough to hurt us" Mind calmed the woman down.

"Still, I've had more trouble removing these flames than dealing with beginnings and ends of universes, this energy feels unlike those we've met before" Reality continued to worry.

Sasuke grunted as his armored avatar grabbed Power and flew into the sky, angrily flinging the false god into the sky before a bow shaped Lightning Release chakra construct formed in its arms. It's been a while since Sasuke used that technique and it'd be the first time he'd be using it without the aid of the Tailed Beasts' chakra. It'd drain his resources considerably but if they had any hope of matching these gods it'd be it.

"Indra's Arrow!" Sasuke shouted out launching a large arrow shaped projectile of rainbow colored projectile. The entire sky lit up with a colossal lightning storm, with a roar Power dived through the electrical currents without as much as a scratch. He dashed up to the Perfect Susanoo's core and almost punched it but then restrained himself and grabbed the plates tearing them open like cardboard sheets. Sasuke began to plummet down into the village floor. A whirling indigo hurricane rose up, made by Speed running in circle to boost his momentum, close to the Hokage mountain and launched Speed from it with a raging punch that blew Sasuke crashing into the ground.

"Do not overdo it, we still wish to preserve something to watch over" Power sighed looking at Sasuke's beaten body still grunting and writhing on the ruined ground and the district of the village that his crash demolished. Mana looked over the scene in horror. She was physically stronger and faster than both Naruto and Sasuke but she didn't have their skill, their experience and they've been swatted aside like insects.

Mana rushed to Sasuke to see if he was OK. She covered quarter of the village with a single dash appearing beside the beaten and bruised man helping him up. "Darn it…" Sasuke cursed, "They weren't even trying and I'd have died without the Six Paths' endurance"

A deafening roar emanated from the forests of the Fire Country freezing Mana's heart solid. She knew that voice, that bestial roar that made everything around it cover in fear. Trees began crumbling, getting torn out with their roots and flung towards the village and mountain tops began popping like zits from the pressure of the sound wave vibrations.

"The Nine Tails?" Mana uttered in fear, over her journey to find the Box of Ultimate Bliss she had learned to fear and respect the beast.

"Naruto is a Jinchuuriki of the Nine Tails, since Naruto passed out the beast probably took the control over him…" Sasuke grunted, "In the older days it'd have been a problem, now the two are sort of friends so maybe it can help"

A gigantic arm of golden ethereal and transparent glow, comprised of pure Nine Tails' chakra extended over the village grabbing Power and dragging him in closer to the beast's location, slamming him into the ground with a shockwave that leveled the entire Fire Country forest and left a crater so deep that it would've been impossible to make anything out.

"Shit… Just one punch and I've got no more strength… And it wasn't even the strong one who punched me" Sasuke complained gently pushing Mana away to try and walk by his own. A horrifying shriek of exploding chakra and a violent shockwave of compressed air sent them both down shaking the ground beneath their feet as a black pillar of chakra blew into the sky destroying the ashes that were falling down to Earth and leaving a gigantic hole in the ash cloud through which the stars could still be seen. Then another one, another one and another one. A barrage of pillars like this before literal gazers of magma began to burst from the forest in wide arcs. All around Mana saw ninja attempting to rescue the villagers and move them to safe spots. The village was ready for such a disaster, Mana's Konoha wouldn't be... Just what kind of history does this village have to prepare them for such occasions, just how many times did these villagers have to evacuate to prepare them for this, to do it so efficiently?

"Tailed Beast Bombs…" Sasuke grunted, "If these don't leave a scratch, I'm not sure what could"

"Tailed Beast Bombs? I thought those had the power to destroy everything in existence?" Mana screamed out in fear.

Sasuke shook his head "No, I told you our Universe's Tailed Beasts are much…" a realization hit his mind as he pushed Mana violently towards where the explosions came from. "You have to fight them! Go! Now!" he shouted out. Mana crawled back away from Sasuke, afraid of his suddenly aggressive and angry voice.

"What?" she uttered in disbelief, did Sasuke really expect her to stand a chance? Didn't they agree already that Sasuke and Naruto would've stood a better chance and would've beaten her despite her greater speed and strength?

Power together with his pantheon appeared above the burning and broken Konoha showing them their unconscious and beaten Hokage. Even the Nine Tails' chakra wasn't even close to enough to leaving a dent in this man's armor or drawing as much as a drop of blood. Close to Mana a loud voice screamed in pain, Mana turned around only to see a young adult with crimson red and swollen skin and booming spiky black hair, pure green chakra of physical variety was firing off from the man's body.

"Seventh Gate: Gate of Wonder OPEN!" the man shouted out as his body disappeared. Power let Naruto's beaten body to slip out of his grasp falling weightlessly from the sky down to Earth but the gate user managed to catch his Hokage and lower him to the ground, placing him beside Sasuke.

"Rock Lee…" the Uchiha uttered before the green glow seating man flashed and disappeared breaking the sound barrier multiple times before planting a punch into Power's jaw, failing to force the man as much as turn his head. The gate user then flashed around, hitting and kicking every God trying to find weaknesses and if possible take out at least one of them but all of them were as tough and invulnerable as Power.

"Daytime Tiger!" the man referred to as Rock Lee roared launching at the pantheon in a tiger shaped chakra rush.

"Depower…" Reality uttered making Rock Lee black out and his Seven Gates to close instantly as the man fell from the sky as well only to be caught by another person, a smaller version of the man.

"Good, Metal Lee saved him…" a feminine voice followed with a sigh said from behind Sasuke and Mana. The Uchiha walked up to Mana and lifted her body off the ground outright screaming into her face. "Go there and fight! Come on! They'll destroy the entire universe if you don't!" the Uchiha began losing his cool before the woman that spoke before placed her hand on Sasuke's shoulder making the man calm down somewhat.

"Tenten, what are you doing?!" Sasuke grunted at her angrily before she walked up to Mana, it was a very attractive and quite physical woman wearing a white Chinese dress and wearing her hair in small round buns at the sides of her head.

"You don't know how to talk to girls, Sasuke, you're lucky that Sakura was all over you…" the woman sarcastically joked at the Uchiha before leaning up to Mana and placing her own hand on Mana's shoulder.

"Look, Sasuke is a really smart guy so he probably has an idea, I'm sure he wouldn't just throw you at them. You're too precious to all of us to be just thrown at them as a sacrificial pawn. He thinks you've got a chance, right, Sasuke?" Tenten asked for confirmation to which Sasuke completely calmed down and closed his eyes coughing out a weak "Well… Yeah…"

Mana quickly made some hand seals and activated her "Mystical Wings" technique creating a current of wind around her lower body that gently raised her up in the air and high enough to look at these gods face to face.

"My patience for your defiance is running slim" Power said rather quietly and coldly, "Do not make me destroy this universe"

"She wouldn't care" Technique butt in, "This girl isn't from this universe, remember?"

"Ah, correct… Well then she is an anomaly that needs to be destroyed!" Power screamed out in anger disappearing and reappearing in front of Mana so fast that it looked invisible even to the magician, Mana closed her eyes readying herself for a painful and gruesome death, imagining her guts and blood exploding all over the place and hoping that her death would somehow help this universe survive. Mana felt her body augmenting itself as much as it could out of fear of dying, after all those years looking for death she was still afraid of it after all. The punch was mighty! She barely felt a pinch.

Mana opened her eyes and saw Power and his fist planted firmly to her face but it didn't hurt her at all. The magician blinked a couple of times, Power swung more and more mad strikes, each of which emanated powerful shockwaves that leveled districts. Then the madman backed up and clenched his fist tightly, a golden light began to glow around it.

"Wait! Remember, Power, focus the energy into the girl, not the universe around her, with a punch like this you'd destroy this universe and all universes around it!" Reality shrieked out in fear, the first sign of fear coming from a goddess that day. Power's body blinked again in and out of existence before punching Mana. The magician felt force flowing through her body but it was similar to the warmth of picking up a hot tea cup during a cold day.

"Impossible! Insolence! How dare you not be destroyed!" the God of Power roared angrily spouting up excessive amount of slobber all over himself and his fancy red armor. "Mind! What on Earth is going on here!?" he yelled.

"This girl possesses a billion times more concentrated chakra level. I've already told you that the energy these ninja use is dangerous but this universe uses chakra at a much less concentrated manner, these ninja acquired chakra because their ancestor ate a fruit overflowing with chakra once, this girl is born in a universe where every single object, every molecule, every particle is sated with pure chakra. Only a more concentrated and more focused chakra can overcome her chakra. It's a law of physics in her universe and it appears like we've carried it through to this universe as well by pulling her out" Mind explained. "We cannot beat her, it's been six thousand years since we've encountered something we cannot beat but we must move to another universe, this girl has no power to follow us"

"Speed, Technique, Reality, smite her!" Power yelled out, within that same instant Technique launched herself at Mana striking a million times per each femtosecond using her twelve arms, each strike was powerful enough to blink out galaxies and yet Mana barely felt a thing due to her chakra augmenting her body. It was a novelty that she had learned that day, that things could only hurt her proportionately to their chakra level. That was why Sasuke's attacks were less effective but did damage her but Power's didn't – Sasuke did possess and use chakra in his attacks meanwhile Power used other energies, more primitive ones. Mana quickly shifted through hand seals sending a violent surge of Lightning Chakra through her own body, coating her very skin in lightning chakra, almost like turning her own body into a living taser

"Lightning Style: Magician's Touch!" she chanted out the name of a technique she learned recently. Seeing how all of Technique's hands were contacting Mana the woman screamed in agony and fell down being overwhelmed by Mana's chakra. Whatever godly endurance they had, these gods had no defense against chakra at all, at least not against the chakra as concentrated as the one Mana used.

Speed smiled, the man's body began running in circles and Mana couldn't really understand what he was doing.

"Mind, what is he doing?" she asked.

"He is trying to build up enough speed to outrun a law of physics and reality itself, namely the chakra over matter rule" Mind replied obviously too enthralled by all the magnificent knowledge available to him to realize that he was replying to an enemy, Power turned at Mind and roared in rage punching his friend in the face and knocking him out, making lifeless Mind fall to the ground.

Mana quickly went through another set of hand seals and a silent whistle filled the air before it transcended into Mana humming. "Genjutsu: Sweet Lullaby" she chanted out the name of the technique as her humming and whistling completely paralyzed anyone hearing the noise of the genjutsu.

"What's… What's going on…" Speed mumbled through a lot of effort as speaking alone was incredibly difficult, powerless to sustain flight all of the Gods tumbled down to the ground.

"I thought their mental attacks do not work on us because we don't use chakra!" Power huffed out through tremendous effort.

"My genjutsu is different from the basic techniques used here or even in my universe… You may be immune to genjutsu, even to mental attacks but as long as you have a functional brain – you're fair game" Mana incorporated her explanation into song to keep the enemy paralyzed, "I do not target chakra flow, I target the brain directly, instead of chakra affecting the brain centers making the illusion feel more real, more comfortable and less invasive by your own body making it harder to overcome"

Mana glared to the side and witnessed Sasuke piercing Technique's body with his sword.

"Shit, she fried our technology with that lightning technique!" Speed panicked seeing Sasuke walking up to Mind but before he executed the man Sasuke's sword lingered, the Uchiha must've wondered if Mind could've somehow been useful to his universe.

"Reality, take away her use of chakra NOW!" Power shouted out making Sasuke's face light up in shock and surprise, the Uchiha tried to race right up to Reality, he didn't even have enough time to think through the fact that his attack wouldn't have affected Reality because she was not affected by Mana's technique and her technology was not fried.

"May the girl's chakra disappear!" Reality spelled her will out, Mana waited frozen in fear, releasing her genjutsu out of intimidation of losing her chakra again – the possibility of losing that part of her identity again crippled Mana. The magician remained standing there for a while but then a smile covered her face.

"A ninja's chakra level is directly tied to their life force. If you stripped my literal chakra away I'd have died slowly of exhaustion and pain" she exclaimed picking up an emerald colored wand with a crystal-like orb at the end which lit up with lightning chakra.

Power lunged at Mana grabbing her collar and trying to lift her body up. Mana's palm quickly locked around Power's.

"Are you trying to carry me into the Sun? It is true that I would die and you would not but your power does not affect me meanwhile any effort I use to restrain you is multiplied exponentially because of your lack of chakra" Mana angrily pressed the man's arm making him shriek out in pain as it effectively and gruesomely snapped, if Mana dug her nails in deeper she could've severed his arm off completely. Power collapsed on the ground, writhing so ungodly.

"Each one of you were proven inefficient against me, leave now and never return to this universe and I will let you leave, remain the way you are and Sasuke-san will kill all of you" Mana said.

"Hmph… Girl… I know of your hesitance in taking lives, you'd never allow that man to kill us" Mind said having woken up from Power's punch.

"That is true, I do possess such a belief, however I do acknowledge that other people possess different beliefs. I will never take a life but I cannot force people to change their beliefs, only hope that they can understand my point and change by themselves. Therefore there is little I can do to stop Sasuke-san if he wishes to kill you adamantly. That is how Gods and heroes are different. That is why I shall never accept any God and only admire heroes" Mana turned and told Mind, the man kept his glowing eyes at Mana the whole point but then looked down in capitulation acknowledging that her answer was sincere.

"And you would give up your last chance to go home just to help people of another universe?" Reality wondered as her voice instantly became much more sensitive and twisted in disbelief.

Mana's eyes shifted to sadness, she thrust her emerald colored wand enhanced with Lightning Release chakra, "Magic Spark Jutsu…" she chanted out coldly hitting each god with a small fraction chakra that fried their own technology as well.

"I am a stranger in this universe, a freak who doesn't belong. That will never change, these people may act like they accept me but they won't really. They've bonded with each other, they've befriended each other and I cannot possibly hope to share that bond with them, I can't possibly fit into that circle. But if devoting my life to sadness and solitude and being lost is all it takes to save this universe I will do that without hesitating" Mana said looking Reality in her shining bright eyes.

The battle that day was over…

* * *

Naruto was laughing and shaking Mana's hand firmly, everyone looked cheerful and thankful to Mana who somehow managed to rescue their village and possibly even their entire universe. Mana wasn't sure just how important that feat was in the grand scale of things, after all, there could've been an infinity of different versions of Naruto and Sasuke just like these ones scattered throughout the Omniverse. Their eyes were opened to a whole new level of understanding which, to be quite frank no one was ready for.

Naruto, Sasuke and the others found that they were unable to sever the gods from their technology, it was so far advanced and combined from billions of devices and gadgets from millions of universes that they could've used that trying to understand them looked like dabbling with sorcery of some sort. Especially to Mana who still couldn't quite comprehend the technology that Naruto's world used in the first place. Her own Konoha was still a good ten or twenty years behind these advancements. Naruto did give some samples of their technology for Mana to carry home so that luckily that gap could've been closed. There weren't many scientists in her universe, not in a world engulfed in global conflicts and micro-wars all the time. Still, those few were tenacious and ambitious, had a real flare and Mana was sure could've understood these complex machines in no time.

The technology was fused to the body of the men declaring to be gods completely, trying to remove it surgically would've been impossible, it was imbued with them on a sub-atomic level as some gadgets were literally that small. That was told to Naruto and Sasuke by a strange large forehead having pink haired woman who must've been an amazing medical ninja for Naruto and Sasuke to trust her with these prisoners.

Ultimately Naruto decided to follow a plan made for him by a fellow named Shikamaru whom Mana only met right before leaving, however felt greatly thankful for salvaging hope of returning home with his genius mind. The plan was to ask Reality to create a mental block, without the possibility of removing it, preventing her from traveling to other universes right before asking Technique, who barely survived Sasuke's attempt to kill her, with Mind's aid, to build a primitive one-way multi-universal travel device, while they were always under Reality's bound promise to follow these orders and just those orders alone. They were to be sent back to the universe they destroyed where they could've lived their days out in solitude, hopefully in billions of years after the Big Bang they'd cause again entering it they'd no longer roam the infinity of space alone and encounter some sort of life again, hopefully by that time they'd have the mental maturity to stop acting like Gods…

Additionally, while the ninja were busy rebuilding and re-growing their leveled forests, Mana, as per Shikamaru's instructions, asked Technique and Mind to also build a device connecting her own universe and this one, one to be used by her to go home, but also so that Naruto could come at any time for help if somehow the complicated plan, crafted by Shikamaru, who just happened to be the Hokage's most trusted advisor, would've been outsmarted. Despite their technology having reset itself within a couple of days the Gods behaved until the final moments when they disappeared into the universe they themselves destroyed. In the end they would end up being the watchful protectors of that universe, just like they wanted it to be, except it'd be a lot less selfish with no one to see their might and sing them praise. No one knew why the gods behaved. Maybe they were afraid of being beaten again, this time permanently, maybe they were genuinely different people now.

Mana definitely wished to believe so…


	174. Affections and Extinction

It was that time in the morning when the most beautiful songs of birds would've been more and more likely to wake one up. Despite the fact that such a, in a manner of speech, rude awakening would've normally greatly displeased anyone in their fair mind, having these pleasant melodies accompany one through the day would've quickly fixed that foul mood. Takigakure was the home of many species of birds, some that lived and nested in the trees, some wingless species that roamed the watery grounds, lakes, rivers, swamps and never even dreamed of soaring above the thick layer of leaves that separated the sky and the dark and moist heavenly shade of Takigakure.

Mana was observing a hive of bees that was hanging on the eye level, stuck to one of the thick trees that could've only been hugged and wrapped around by a giant such as a Tailed Beast or an entity of similar size. The hive was being sieged by hornets, each as large as a kunai knife by themselves. Mana had never seen insects of that size, she did know the species however from pictures in books she read, she did know how poisonous their bites were in great quantities. For that reason she kept her distance, a respectable one at least.

Five to ten stings would be all that it'd take to force Mana to ask Kouta for some anti-venom, these hornets were that poisonous. Despite the fact of their wide spread across the land they didn't appear to worry the Takigakure people even if there weren't any in close vicinity, despite Konoha and Takigakure being in great standing politically the quartet decided to avoid meeting any locals unless absolutely necessary as the knowledge of three ninja moving through their lands may not have been a very pleasant one to the Waterfall Village.

The bees were getting trounced, the mighty jaws of these savage crimson red hornets were able to easily grab dozens of insects from the air and snap them into pieces, their thick chitin shells were impenetrable to stings, their evolutionary body temperature modification mechanisms, that allowed these hornets to survive and thrive inside both fire and snow, made them capable of withstanding the common bee defence strategy of heating the hornets by rubbing against them and covering them up. There was nothing the bees could do but perish, it was an insect genocide in its earliest stages.

Mana sighed, she closed her eyes and thought for a moment before opening her eyes and continuing to watch the scene.

"You may be a bit too close, Mana-chan. You want neither to get stung nor to use your newly gained power to avoid the hornets' stings, each one would provide unneeded trouble to us and drain your stamina needlessly" Kouta's quiet whispering voice reached her as the young man moved in closer to her and gently placed his hand on her shoulder suggesting that they'd move. Slowly Mana stepped back a couple of steps but that was as far as she would've went.

"I could stop that. I could avoid every sting of every hornet and crush them before they even clacked a mandible, before they even brewed their poison in those organs of theirs" Mana whispered softly looking at the hive.

"You could… For how long have you been standing here, watching this?" Kouta wondered, still failing to see Mana's point.

"Two or three hours, didn't feel too sleepy. Meiko did her best to place those seals that keep our tents afloat but… It'll take time to get used to this chilly shade and forest smells after just leaving a scorching desert" Mana replied still looking at the poor bees getting slaughtered. Still adamant to defend their home despite the fact that their mother had long since perished.

"So why don't you stop them? Why don't you kill these hornets? Is it because you're saving your physical chakra up?" Kouta wondered looking at the horrific scene of natural violence, not unlike millions of more transpiring in the world at that very moment.

"Because… I'm not sure if I should" Mana closed her eyes before once again peeling them open, almost like she was doing it by force, forcing herself to watch the endless death of millions inside that giant hive she refused to save.

"I'm not sure I follow" Kouta scratched his head, "We could use some of these hornets, their grinded shells make for a very nutritional additive and their innards are actually a potent anti-toxin"

"That's the point…" Mana closed her eyes, feeling the beginning of tears beginning to gather before she swallowed her pain away, "Most of the local species of bees build their hives inside the trees, the very steel hard tree bark provides them shelter. For some reason, be it because these bees are a foreign swarm that just moved here or because they don't have time before autumn to build a proper hive they've swarmed here, in an open ground outside the bark, just ripe for the taking"

Kouta looked at the hive again and back at Mana.

"These hornets do not have the needed bodily structure to gather honey or food, their mandibles are too large and only fit for killing. Their way of life and the only way of survival is to loot other hives, they were born this way, that is how they survive, by taking food from others because they cannot physically get any by themselves" Mana explained.

"You're wondering if interfering with the natural order is the right way?" Kouta finally got on the same page, "These hornets are just doing what they do to survive, to blame them for living by their nature would be to look at it from the bees' point of view which wouldn't be right. Autumn and winter aren't far away if these hornets don't stock up they're looking at massive losses, maybe even death of their entire swarm" Kouta slowly explained the same thoughts that Mana has been pondering on for hours.

"Normally ninja don't look at those sort of things. They have it easy – just follow the orders. I've, on the other hand, placed upon myself the responsibility to become a hero that'd change this world, the world of death and violence, every day somewhere literal genocides take place, entire tribes and settlements die out. I myself am the last member of my own tribe and my own blood will die with me… I need to have the answer for these things, because of my lack of answers I need to face this horror, to see it to the end" Mana spoke continuing to stare at the hornets.

"Tsk…" Kouta exclaimed as his hand extended to the side, within mere moments it split into a mace-like shape with the texture of his skin shifting into a more wooden appearance and hundreds if not thousands of beams of light fired off from the boy's morphed limb, piercing each and all hornets within moments and disintegrating them quickly with a mere touch.

Mana's eyes shot open with surprise, she glared questioningly at Kouta who shook his head.

"You're punishing yourself, forcing yourself to see the worst horrors you as a person can endure because of your character just because you don't have answers to questions that'll never have answers to. I, on the other hand care about you, I don't want to see you punishing yourself and I'll murder as many bugs as I need to just so I don't need to see you as sad and horrified as you were watching this…" Kouta said angrily as his hand shifted back, bees rose up from their hive looking at the two as a threat but they were hit too hard, somewhere between rising up and actually attacking they decided to better tend to the damage caused to their hive.

"There will be times when I'll have to have answers to these questions, when I shall see two countries warring with each other and I'll need to know what to do as a hero I want to become. I don't want to stare at a genocide transpiring by my eyes…" Mana whimpered out.

Kouta slowly walked up closer to Mana and placed his hand on her shoulder. "And you'll make enemies of them both, you'll unite all of them against yourself and it's my duty to make sure that you're strong enough to shoulder all of that hatred, hatred for preventing violence and people will hate you for it, my father taught me that much at least…" the young man looked away for a moment before hugging Mana full out. Initially the magician didn't resist but then something dawned to her.

"Wait, you said you "cared" about me. The context of that… You don't "care" about me as a VIP of your mission, am I wrong, it's more than that?" she said suspiciously.

Kouta's face blushed, he began shifting his eyes, grunting and making incomplete sentences and excuses before sighing. "Well… Yeah. I wanted to find a moment to talk to you about that the whole time. There was just so much happening and I kept on making excuses that maybe each and every moment wasn't the right moment, then you got lost, separated and… I just don't care anymore, if any of us gets lost again I want you to know that I do care about you more than just a VIP, more than just a friend"

Mana smiled and laughed biting her fist. "I really should've noticed in hindsight… I really kept on looking for signs but I also made excuses thinking that no sign I saw was actually a sign, that it was just my head playing with my wild thoughts"

"So?" Kouta asked, quickly jumping off Mana and moving away from the hug now that it became awkward.

"I… I'd love to it's just…" Mana coughed out pathetically.

"The identity thing?" Kouta asked before she could find the right words.

"Yeah it's just… I… Want to fall in love with you, if that's what this is but… There's just so much going on and I… Without my control I'm not me I… I know it doesn't make sense but I can't do this without being me, all of me" Mana explained uncomfortably. It was slowly suffocating her to say those words but she meant what she said. She did kind of like Kouta ever since meeting him, she always felt something weird for him, some odd affection that was more than just common friendship. That being said… Losing one's identity made Mana unsure of anything she did, anything that went on around her or even inside her.

"Well then… If getting you to go on a date with me takes finding the Box of Ultimate Bliss I'll take you wherever I need to take you for it" Kouta grinned awkwardly and fixed his messy hair lazily with a couple of strokes of his hand.

Mana giggled, she really felt bad about being so dumb and persistent and so unworthy of Kouta's affection in front of him. He deserved so much better than she was… It suddenly made her feel even more awkward around the young man than she was before when she just felt strange warmth inside of her she couldn't explain every time he was around.

"Hey! Are you two losers moving or what? I even packed the things despite it being Kouta's turn!" Meiko shouted from the distance riling the bees up, Mana and Kouta quickly made a run for it to pick up their bags and move. They still had around two days of moving until they reached the end of Takigakure, despite the fact that they could actually move all throughout the day and didn't have to worry about things like the desert heat anymore.

Meiko looked pretty happy about something, Mana really wondered what that could've been but then the blacksmith began to search frantically for something in her bag, making the girl wonder if maybe Meiko had lost something, something that made her happy. Finally the redhead pulled out a pair of stickers with kanji symbols on them that looked like sealing tags.

"There you go, Mana. You can stick those on your shoes and you'll be able to walk on water just like we can, you won't need to be carried anymore" the blacksmith laughed out. That was actually great! Mana was really getting uncomfortable about being carried around by Meiko all the time, also now that she finally confirmed her thoughts about Kouta all of the awkwardness when Meiko asked him to carry Mana now made sense, also it added additional awkwardness between them because now they both were on the same page.

"Are those… Bee stings?" Shimo wondered pointing at some bumps on Mana's and Kouta's faces.

"Yeah, Meiko's yelling riled up the bees but there were only a couple of handfuls of them left, we've decided to preserve chakra and stamina and just take a couple of stings" the medical ninja shrugged.

"Awww, there were bees!? We could've picked a lot of honey from a hive, those stings won't even get past the skin if we augment ourselves" Meiko shouted out almost begging the group to turn back and pick the hives.

"Ummm… Maybe we can find another, more prosperous hive, these guys really had a terrible morning already, trust me" Mana smiled like a mother telling a child that they'll buy the toy they want from another store because there it's cheaper. Strangely enough the effect was almost the same with Meiko just childishly humming something cheerful all of their trip onward.

"So… How do these work?" Mana asked seeing her shoes managing to keep her on water now with just these small paper tags attached to them.

"It's a simple low rank chakra storage seal, I sealed the technique inside it with a little bit of reserve chakra. I should regain it all in a couple of days so it's no trouble really, not that carrying a bag of bones like you was ever difficult to begin with" Meiko tried to sarcastically bite Mana who actually managed to buff her frail physique up a bit after her stay in the Sun Disc arena. The blacksmith noticed that Mana didn't look that cheerful and didn't play back the joke at all so she just continued daydreaming about the honey.

After a couple of hours of walking Shimo's hand slipped on the hilt of his blade. "Someone's close" he uttered when a woman leaped out from the upper layer of the treetops slamming her axe on Shimo's head, or at least trying to. The Yuki swordsman effortlessly drew his blade in time and blocked the swing, the entire force of the falling smashing cleave got expelled back at the woman sending her crashing through multiple trees back. The entire forest clearing was suddenly filled with grunting and well-armed and armoured men and women.

"Ugh! The fucker blew me away!" the woman grunted feeling her cracked bleeding head that was now spouting blood all over the woman's face. Kouta raised his hand.

"I can treat that, I'm a medical ninja, we're not enemies, we're a party of ninja from Konoha moving to our mission objective in Otogakure" the young man explained revealing their presence in the area despite their genuine attempts to avoid that.

A large man in the center who was strangely wearing no armor at all placed his gigantic gold encrusted sword on his back. These men didn't look like ninja, if anything they looked like some sort of royal mercenaries as their armor wasn't just the usual light military grade body armor, it was actually pretty sophisticated and well-crafted steel plates, despite their general expensiveness they looked pretty ancient, both the swords and axes they used as well as their armor was far too heavy and clunky to be considered modern. Current mercenary armor offered protection of nano-sized diamond chain links tied together and could repel even most powerful blows and easily stop a blade in its tracks. These weapons and armors were much older, larger and heavier but also offered much less protection. Mana instantly started feeling like these men may not have been mercenaries at all and felt suspicious.

"Very well then, we thought you mercenaries or assassins aiming to strike from our backs, we apologize most graciously and hope we can work this out, the direction you're coming from is suspicious however, you're not moving from Konoha or maybe you're lost?" the man exclaimed, Mana blushed slightly looking at him and even saw Meiko keeping a straight and even slobbering stare when looking at him. He didn't look like a warrior, if anything he was a model put in shiny armor and wielding a sword that would've fit in plays better than actual battlefield. He looked almost like a God, Mana tried her best to remain objective but she just couldn't, even Meiko who usually acted completely ignorant towards the manly shapes couldn't move her eyes away from these men.

"We won't tell you shit. We may have, if you guys weren't so shifty" Shimo noticed Mana's predicament and her unusual color of skin that must've annoyed him greatly. Kouta initially glanced at Shimo and tried to question the boy's distrust in these people but then Shimo pointed his shin at the girls who had completely lost themselves and suddenly Kouta also began acting quite cold and distant with these men. The women who were equally as well put together as the men were must've completely not interested the boys because of how muscular they were which didn't appear to be much to their tastes…

"Yeah… I have to admit a bunch of men and women gathering in large military force around a completely random and desolate natural reserve of Takigakure is highly suspicious, more suspicious even than a party of ninja moving by a neutral territory" Kouta agreed, "Before we apologize and treat the woman who engaged on us we'd like to hear something that'd make us trust your authority and conformity of your actions here with the Waterfall Village"

"I think they're totally jealous!" Meiko shrieked in Mana's ear leaning towards it and trying to whisper which resulted in a comically hilarious whispered squeak.

Mana turned away and walked back a couple of steps, this was completely irrational of her to act this way, to just freeze like that. These people were all really good looking but she had no reason to be this dense and primitive. The magician took a couple of deep breaths and looked back but then realized that it'd be difficult for her to speak to these men and women.

"We are Justicars functioning within Takigakure territory, Yuki Shimo, when you blame us for suspicious actions please remember that your name was also written on our lists and just because you were pardoned by Konoha doesn't pardon you by our code" the leading man with the golden sword and glowing armor and a purple cape suddenly took a large step forward as well as bowed his upper body all the way to Shimo's eyes' level.

"He's a Justicar, Mana!" Meiko shrieked out. Mana had heard of that title briefly, at some point Kiyomi may have mentioned it during their mission to rescue the perfume tycoon's son. "Isn't he awesome!"

Shimo's hand moved to his blade again. "Try your luck again, Justicar, me and sensei have stricken countless of you down, I did so as a child, let's see how many I can strike down now before you even blink. You operate without supervision, without authority other than that which you create with your swords. I could slaughter you here like animals and no one would shed a tear for you vigilantes" the Yuki growled. Mana wasn't aware that he had a bad history with Justicars. Despite her strange irrational tremble of breath and bodily quivers Mana stood in front of the two men.

"We'll try talking this through before we do anything stupid…" she exclaimed with a shaking voice. This had to be a technique of some sort, she couldn't have been reduced to such a pathetic trembling state just by the man's looks alone.

"Young lady, are you a ninja?" the Justicar inquired looking at her trembling with strange interest.

"No. I'm a person they must lead to Otogakure, you could say… I'm their client…" Mana spoke through great difficulty.

"Oh, then we would be wise to turn down our Intents. I must say I'm impressed by your willpower to still be able to function like this with so many Intents surrounding you… Most impressive. You'll have to forgive us, we use the Charming Intents because today we've been hunting a bunch of female rogues separately to our main objective here. Charming Intent is much more humane than Killing Intent but it disables people just as potently" the Justicar turned at his colleagues who didn't as much as twitch a muscle but within moments Mana's chest started moving normally and she could breathe properly. The presence of these men no longer excited her and made her feel and act weird.

"Tsk, using Intents like this…" Shimo angrily exclaimed, "This isn't a brothel you fucking pigs", he appeared to be completely oblivious of the fact that these men used a twisted version of the Killing Intent that ninja used to intimidate wild animals and low level threats, however where the Killing Intent made one scared for their lives this Charming Intent appeared to do just what its name suggested.

"Wait…" Mana suddenly realized something turning at Meiko, "You're a ninja with a functional chakra control, why were you all over those guys?"

"Because they're really damn hot!" Meiko shrugged with an innocent smile.


	175. Into the Darkness

The Justicars appeared strangely in quite a rush to speak about the situation they were involved in. This could've been due to a number of reasons but the fact that they concealed those reasons troubled Mana. The magician had read a lot of things about the order of Justicars over the years. It had many split factions, some were funded and supervised by the villages and countries meanwhile some worked separately with no supervision. Supervision technically was against the code set by the First Justicar several hundred years ago. Most of the time the Justicars, both supervised and unsupervised were just another kind of mercenary, one that didn't take money but only helped when they thought their code allowed it.

"I don't like this, not one bit. We have no obligation to speak with them, we could just leave right now and keep moving, we'd reach the edge of Takigakure in a couple of days" Shimo grunted, the young swordsman had a very fine reason to hate Justicars, most of the order despised nukenin and criminals and considered killing them their sole purpose. It may have been due to popular culture praising the Justicars that killed the nastiest and strongest criminals more than the code prioritizing killing criminals in any way.

"I don't know, we should hear what they have to say, won't hurt just to let them know who we are and where we're going, it might keep the Justicars off our tail. Remember that they answer to no one so if they think we're being shady they may attack us" Meiko spoke up raising a rather fair point even if her reasons of sticking around and talking to the ground were much more clear – these Justicars were just well built and developed people in general wearing ancient and gigantic looking armor and weaponry. Of course the blacksmith would've wished to stay and admire these men and women a bit more…

"I really don't care, on one hand moving quicker is better, we'll get to our goal faster and all that, on the other hand making sure that we don't have the Justicars on our ass forcing me to hold a certain amount of chakra in at all times, just in case I'll need to heal someone, does have its benefits" Kouta shrugged, of all people his opinion seemed most indifferent but also the most objective, everyone else had interests or history with these people.

"I don't even wish to think hard about it, after all, we can't know if they're not still using those Intents from before. I don't feel like they are but the thought is still scary" Mana admitted looking to the side, usually she was regarded by the group as the leader making her decision quite important in the actions that the group took. Now that she had removed herself from the decision making process the situation became more complicated.

The large leading Justicar walked up to the four letting them keep some distance before leaning in.

"We're ready to answer any questions you may have but also report the situation at hand. If you could be troubled for a moment we've decided you could be quite helpful" he smiled, Mana looked at his face and wondered if the genuine affection and warm feelings inside of her were still from the Intent that the man used on a much smaller level or if she, just like Meiko, was captivated by how attractive visually and well trained these people were.

"Helpful?" Mana instantly asked, whenever there was a way she could've helped someone and potentially saved some lives the magician was all ears.

"Yes, you see there is a system of rotten trees the tops of which were devastated by a battle that had transpired long ago. There trees were ancient and well over a couple of centuries old with rich entangled systems of underground roots. We've been hunting those criminals we've mentioned to you before for a long time and some of them we've chased to here used to hide inside those root systems, apparently they are completely hollow, almost like a tunnel. These people disappeared in those tunnels and naturally as Justicars we are very interested in this matter" the man explained.

"Isn't that a job well done for you Justicars? Don't you just kill all criminals you find anyways? Why are you so angry someone did your job for you?" Shimo angrily tried finding some problems with this man.

"I can see that a criminal like you would have problem with that…" the leader nodded beginning to get more and more peeved by Shimo's notes.

"That's the thing, I'm not a criminal, I never was. I was let go from the village with the Hokage's permission, I was a wanderer the whole time and I had to fight you losers off and never had a moment of peace and quiet. You don't hunt actual criminals, you label people you wish to kill and then proceed to do so" Shimo began losing it as well reaching for his sword, with the same degree of subtlety the Justicar's hand also reached for his blade.

"So you've never sent people down there? Your plan was to wait here and try talking ninja into going inside those tunnels?" Kouta scratched his head as the Justicar's explanation lacked some details that would've given it some more sense.

"We did send them, none returned, in fact, ever since quite recently we've even been getting attacked at night by something coming from inside these tunnels, someone that leaps out and uses the dark to drag people inside. None of those dragged into the tunnels returned either. We were planning a big time raid of those tunnels but then we've ran into some more mercenaries whom we must have killed at that moment following our code. Now we don't have enough manpower or weapons to properly raid it but our code demands to fight injustice or to die trying and so I'm prolonging the deaths of me and my men by as long as possible as any sensible leader would. Your intervention would be of great help" the leader explained.

These Justicars appeared to take the code even more seriously than most accounts Mana had read about them. It was true that some Justicars were outright religious with their following of the code but this group appeared to follow it like law where the leader was a master lawyer looking for holes in it that allowed the group to function better than a group functioning on centuries old rules devised by a violent forest hermit would reasonably be.

"Who do you think might be inside those tunnels?" Meiko wondered relaxing and stretching out. It was clear that she may have beginning to get bored of the ridiculously good looks of these Justicars and began feeling bored, knowing Meiko only being hungry could ever shift that boredom in a relevant way and a hungry Meiko presented more problems all of itself.

"Anything in existence, everything and anything lives inside these trees in those parts. Homes are etched inside, entire cities are built out of them, it could be people, it could be a very savage wild animal, it could be a little bit of both mixed in together…" the Justicar nodded his head in shame of not knowing just what exactly may have been killing his men.

"Very well, we will check into it…" Mana nodded. The team all looked back and raised an eyebrow or two remembering that the magician was thinking about completely sitting this one out and here she outright declared that the Konohagakure ninja would be looking into this small sidequest.

"We shouldn't be helping these men, nothing good ever comes of Justicars" Shimo looked at Mana, it wasn't a look of anger or even contempt, it was a look and advice of wisdom and experience that was supposed to encourage the girl to reconsider but the magician shook her head.

"I have a certain sporting interest into this. I've never heard of anything that behaves this way, I'm really excited to find a new species of animals or meet new people that behave in a way I've never heard about. I don't know much about Takigakure and this might help us get to know the place better, if it won't, it will still potentially save lives and give these people closure. I've never refused a person asking for help and I don't intend to begin today" Mana explained seriously with a little wink of excitement when she spoke about her sporting interest into this. She was genuinely intrigued by this story because it sounded so unlike something that'd normally happen in a place like this.

Some kind of creatures living inside desolate and ravaged battlefields underground, hunting people that enter those places and even leaving out during the night and hunting for prey outside. Mana's childish imagination began creating the most wild dreams and ideas of what these creatures could've been and this interest into this weird case fueled her decision, she may have agreed to help just out of the elementary need to potentially save lives and help but it would've never made her this excited to do so normally.

"I've never seen Mana-chan this excited before…" Kouta noted nodding in agreement to her idea. "She looks just riled up enough to go and look into it with or without us and I'd be a nasty medical ninja if I let her do that…"

Meiko shrugged, "Well, we've gotten this far already, to let Mana muck it up and fail would be really dumb, I wanna do this too, whatever interests Mana must be pretty cool to see!" she declared just as vibrantly as Mana did.

"Very well, I suppose if you guys decided to go I really can't say no to this… Shouldn't really take long" Shimo shrugged.

"Actually…" the leader stood up and released the iron grip he held around the hilt of his sword from back when Shimo tried to instigate a conflict. "We'd really appreciate if Shimo stayed here. We may have made a temporary truce having decided that he's not a criminal, for now, however if any of those lost Justicars in there are still alive and see him they may strike from the shadows making the mission unnecessarily more difficult than it should be. Please consider leaving him in our camp, he's done quite well fighting us off for entire years, there's no reason to think we could take him now even if we wanted to…" the man suggested.

Mana looked at Shimo expecting a lot of opposition to come from the Yuki's side in which case she may have cancelled this thing out. This would've looked just too suspicious but the young swordsman just shrugged again, "He does have a point, I could fight those guys off and take most of them out, it'd make no sense for them to attack me when I know they're coming, also, whatever danger I have a reason to expect they also have to feel placing me in their camp. I don't think they'll try anything funny, go and have fun…" the young man said.

Mana asked her team to prepare and warm up for a short while before she asked the Justicar a couple of questions, she was seeking for the minor insight and information that the Justicars had on these things she'd be looking for because in the magician's world knowledge and insight was everything that made all the difference. Same was with both fights and missions.

"Do you have any information about their typical behaviors? Anything at all that could help?" Mana wondered to which the leader only shrugged.

"Usually they're pretty scaredy, the lower layers of the roots are really thin and near impossible for the humans to navigate, you'd get stuck immediately and die of dehydration and starvation before anyone could pull you out of there. It might make more sense to attack during the night, when they surface and are on the higher levels of the root system" the man explained, "But due to their stealthy and extremely lethal nature we don't know much, all of this is just speculation"

"No, it's fine" Mana nodded before moving to her team and stretching out herself. She took off her blazer and laid it aside because it felt restrictive enough, if these tunnels ever got too thin she'd just cause herself unnecessary discomfort. It was alright to slightly discomfort herself in battle that way having in mind the advantages that her uniform granted otherwise but during an exploration venture it may have been just suffering for suffering's sake.

"We'll move in after the Sun sets…" Mana said, "During that time they'll be closest to the surface giving us highest possible chance to at the very least encounter them. We'll move together at all times, if at any point we find that we need to crawl we'll pull out. There's no use losing people here or getting too injured, remember, this is for fun, and a little bit of necessity just in case someone those things captured is still alive"

"Wow, you're getting confident enough to give orders, nice!" Meiko laughed out to which Mana just shamefully turned to the side.

"Just relaying the information I got" she tried to get out of the leader's label.

Once the evening went the trio that was allowed to move out creeped up to the tunnel and took some peaks inside. The whole system appeared just like a colossal stump that may have taken an entire sports field and covered with hollow tunnel-like holes wherever the roots went. Maybe the tree was so colossal that these were actually the places where it tried to absorb and move water through literally?

Mana took out a sharp tipped card before placing it back and asking Meiko for some kunai. Despite having similar cutting power in battle the magician simply trusted the kunai more in climbing ventures. Slowly the magician etched her knife into the rotten and dead tree and began climbing down, carefully testing how the tree held her weight because there should've been no reasons why the dead tree would even hold her weight in the first place. After seeing Mana disappear in darkness and not hearing neither a scream nor a splat the duo followed shortly.

Much to her surprise the tunnel disappeared completely pretty soon, wherever those roots lead to ended just as soon as it began with the tips of the roots looking like they were bitten and chewed off. Something definitely lived in here and it apparently ate the roots and made an actual stony tunnel where the mineral part of the soil began. They must've been pretty deep because usually the soil of Takigakure and similar swampy areas had to go pretty deep down before it became so hard and rocky, the moist and wet ground soaked all of the dirt and minerals all the way through.

There was this eerie sound of water clacking against the stony floor of the caves. This wasn't that unexpected since the entire place was actually a large system of caves located below a country filled with watery floors and waterfalls. Still, it really made the whole trip definitely a lot creepier. Mana felt uneasy the whole way through because the whole place was just dark and noisy with its dripping enough to remind her of the ghost stories of her youth.

Meiko stepped on her leg in the darkness…

"Sorry…" she uttered beginning to walk forward again normally, waiting just a short moment so that Mana could move her aching leg forward.

"No problem, just… Try not to step on it again, it really hurt, your armored shoes didn't help" Mana replied whining a little over the really disabling pain of Meiko's iron boots. If just small accidents hurt this much, just how badly would it hurt if the blacksmith actually stomped on her foot and meant it? Moments like this made Mana glad that the blacksmith was not her enemy in this case…

"Wait, were you? Quivering?" Meiko asked with a little quieter tone than normally.

"No! Don't make things up…" Mana almost shouted out embarrassingly in return. She really didn't wish to admit that she was frightened right after being so excited to go there in the first place and being one of the leading voices advocating their descent into the caves.

"You totally were!" Meiko laughed out childishly, "What's wrong, can't take a little darkness? I can hug you and hold you tight if it'll help, Mana-chan…" the blacksmith began making fun of Mana like a kid in the Academy would've.

"I'm… I'm… Fine, this place is just too much like those ghost plays, I sometimes stay after the shows in Konoha to watch some of my actor friends performing, ever since I was a kid I was stupidly afraid of ghosts, those plays were terrible and most of them used sound effects and sets just like this…" Mana spoke.

"Mana-chan is afraid of ghosts? That's an eerily specific and a silly thing to fear, I mean why would you be afraid of dead people? They've already been beaten, that's what killed them, right?" Kouta wondered to himself voicing his thoughts in a turtle's pace and manner of speaking.

"It's not dumb! They're really scary! I mean doesn't the concept of a malevolent spirit returning to exact its vengeance not frighten you one bit?" Mana began getting a little bit irritated. Both Kouta and Meiko shook their heads, it was tough making it out but the sounds of their clothes rustling and the brief dance of their shapes around the head area suggested so.

"We're shaking our heads if you can't see…" Meiko added once again giggling childishly.

"Maybe it goes deeper than just ghosts? Maybe Mana-chan is afraid not necessarily of ghosts coming after her but ghosts of people she failed to save because they remind her of her failures?" Kouta wondered when Mana outright screamed and leaped to the side after seeing a large cave spider.

"Nah, I think it's just ghosts… She's scared of ghosts…" Meiko awkwardly pointed at Mana trying to scare the spider away with a stick. "That's not a ghost, Mana, it's a spi-" suddenly Meiko's speech stop and the girl began shaking herself, Kouta also froze in fear forcing Mana to turn around and look at what scared them so.

Standing, or rather crawling in front of them was a whole group of wall scaling quadruped man-animal like things. People of no hair anywhere on their body and without eyes or any significant area of their faces except a really big and sharp toothed mouth. Strangely enough the very sides of the creatures' mouths had two really thick and blunt teeth that were also really long and tacked against the other half making the creatures express themselves in a chattering noise of tooth clacking.

Slowly the creatures approached Mana and the group, chattering their mouths and pointing their large claws that allowed them to scale even the rocky caves they lived in. Apparently there was a species living underground that Mana has never heard of before…


	176. The Tunnels Have Eyes

"Protect Mana-chan!" Kouta ordered waving at Meiko before rushing forward. His speed was incredible, even with all of her recently acquired mastery over physical chakra Mana had no idea what was going on or how fast the medical ninja was going. He just disappeared and reappeared with his elbow deep inside one of the creature's abdomen. He punched so hard that even with all the force absorbed the thing pitifully lifted off the floor giving Kouta a chance to follow up his offensive with a sideways jump kick flinging the creature aside.

The medical Juugo prodigy proceeded to bash and dominate his opponent with a combination of quick straight strikes to the creature's abdomen and only after the poor thing was down and out shrieking in pain and spitting up blood pathetically did some of the others get the idea to interfere, Kouta was taking them out and stringing combinations faster than thoughts manifested in the minds of these creatures, faster than their brains passed the appropriate signals around. Mana wondered if Kouta was actually augmenting his abilities the dangerous way.

There had to be some explanation to Kouta's incredible growth, before leaving the village the boy admitted to never having been able to morph his body once using the Juugo bloodline however after leaving he soon learned to do so and after a brief moment managed to control the ability quite potently. His medical skills also grown exponentially matching that of an average medical ninja whereas before they were lacking and only slightly enhanced the natural bodily healing processes. This strength and speed wasn't the medical ninja strength enhancement technique, it had to be Kouta betting his very chakra on the line, the very thing that cost Mana hers…

With a lightning fast combination of kicks Kouta kicked the whole bunch of these things around like ragdolls, kicking them up in the air before leaping up to them and whirling with his legs upright sending the cave dwellers crashing down into the cave floor. Several of the beaten creatures burst into clouds of smoke, some sort of self-defense mechanism that filled the entire section of the cave with smokescreens forcing Mana and Meiko to cover up themselves so that it didn't force into their lungs and make their eyes itch.

"Stop, you're gonna tear down the whole cave on us!" Mana shouted out prompting the rampaging medical ninja to calm down somewhat.

More of the cave dwellers began leaping off the walls of the tunnels trying to claw Mana's and Meiko's eyes out. Meiko easily caught them by their wrists slamming them together or swinging them around and tossing them before dashing from behind the flying things and kicking them downwards so that they didn't slam into the tunnel walls and further unbalance the tunnel system. She fought with such control and thought that it was scary to think that it was the carefree and goofy Meiko doing it.

"Mana-chan!" Kouta yelled out trying to dash up closer to her but Mana's kicks took the things pursuing her down after bursts of reddish chakra began coming out from her body pores. She had to tap into the physical chakra to defend herself, it wasn't something she wanted to abuse but it made her leagues and bounds beyond the abilities that these cave dwellers showed. After a couple of moments Mana memorized their moves, their primitive bloodthirsty leaps and turned her augmentation off allowing her natural flowing movements and pitch perfect prediction of these creatures' movements to allow her to perfectly avoid and counter each blow. With each strike an arm was broken at the joint, at each kick the base leg was tripped and the fallen body was stomped, with each attempted bite the head was caught between Mana's elbow and her knee. She didn't see their movements either, she didn't have to, even if their surrounding was bright enough to see her opponents more clearly their speed would've been beyond Mana's eyesight to follow and yet it made absolutely no difference.

"I don't need you rushing to my aid" she grunted at Kouta who looked in awe at Mana masterfully switching between the use of her physical chakra that allowed her surpass the speed she had even at her peak back when she was still a proper ninja and just sheer martial art skill.

"Clearly…" Kouta agreed with a smile as dozens of his kicks overwhelmed another crawler before his leg wrapped around its neck while another one kicked it after uncomfortably bending right in the middle knocking the creature out. The cave was dark to begin with and then there was all of this smoke coming out from somewhere… Mana had to admit that it was getting hard to keep up and yet she was probably doing the best despite being possibly one of the weakest members of the trio. Meiko and Kouta relied overly on their ninja senses and superior augmented stats to fare too well in such a battle so they began skipping some blows, getting marked by attacks they could've easily dodged if they saw them coming.

Mana shouted in desperation tossing forward a couple of her cards that unsealed as they touched the ground unleashing a flash of light that most common flash bombs used by most ninja could do. The creatures didn't look affected by it at all but when the light cleared Mana and her friends were gone.

"Why did we run? We could've won that battle…" Meiko objected with a gentle whisper while the three were hiding behind a sharp rocky turn.

"Something's odd…" Kouta objected looking at the wandering ground of the creatures while Mana nodded.

"It is, these things aren't the creatures we're looking for" she agreed.

"They aren't?" Meiko appeared completely lost, "So there are two different kinds of creatures underground in here?"

"No. These things must be fakes. What if someone transformed into these creatures using the Transformation technique for some reason, that's where the smoke comes from, usually you can keep the technique up after being hit but when the user is knocked out it ends in a puff of smoke that can't circulate in this depth. For creatures that lived inside a cave for most of their lives they didn't look that troubled by the flash of light which seemed odd to me" Mana was breathing heavily, she wasn't happy by how much effort it took her to fight those things as they weren't really that strong, it must've been the sudden switching between the physical chakra and back. It must've been more stressful to her body and overall exhausting to fight that way than to just fight using one of the two all the time. Or maybe she was afraid of her own new power too much to teach her body how to deal with that stress properly.

After a loud combination of clacking and rumbling sounds the creatures left. Mana breathed out more easily only to look at her side and notice another creature staring right at her – different and uglier than the ones they fought. This one hung onto the ceiling but looked more like a mixture of a human, a rat and a mole. It had rough patches of really greasy and nasty looking fur and its jaw as well as its snout were torn in multiple places making it look really deformed. It was much less refined and less well shaped and built when compared to the previous dwellers. These other ones were hunters, this one was a pitiful abomination that looked like it was going to die if left be due to its own pitifulness.

Meiko and Kouta simultaneously turned at Mana wondering about her silence before screaming wildly, after a brief moment the blacksmith shook Mana's shoulder wildly and asked.

"Why aren't you screaming!?"

"Told you, I'm only afraid of ghosts, not body horror" Mana shrugged resuming her match of stares with this pathetic caprice of nature that was soon followed by more glowing eye shapes opening up inside the cave. It appeared that the skins of these creatures were so rough and ragged and dong brown that they could've perfectly hid standing next to a wall of the tunnel while merely closing their eyes.

These creatures also appeared to possess eyes, the one that came up closer to Mana and decided to reveal itself first clacked up a series of twelve strange different toned clacks in a manner nearly identical to how those previous creatures communicated.

Kouta swung a half-assed punch at the creature hanging at the top of the cave but Mana's elbow met the boy's hand at its center. The girl cried out in pain as Kouta's physical strength even when he didn't really mean it almost tore her own hand out of her socket and almost dislocated her shoulder.

"These ones don't seem aggressive" she replied looking back at the highly curious cave dweller who met her stare and placed its nose closer to Mana's face, clacking rapidly right at her face by grinding its blunt dirty teeth together.

"Twelve again…" Mana mumbled to herself to which Meiko and Kouta just looked at the magician and back at the abomination trying to chew her face off apparently as its ugly mug was almost touching Mana's, several of its hairs rubbed against Mana's face making the girl freak out a little and close her eyes in disgust but she tried to keep up her composure.

"Spermatophyte – Holton – Pidgeon – Bagging – Snappy – Tarbes – Decibar – Outtorn – Incardinating – Rapeoil – Nondiathermanous – Etonian" she spoke a confusing jumble of words as the creature jumped back and scratched its malformed filled with random bumps head with one eye three times larger than the other closing its toothed clacking mouth behind the pair of rather luscious yet very unattractive lips.

"I lack the ability to clack like you, perhaps we can communicate in my language?" Mana asked speaking her words slowly and articulating them clearly to the short rodent like abomination that just scratched its head again peeling layers of skin off of it and sending it down onto the ground.

"Yes" the creature spoke in a very strange dialect, its pronunciation suggested it had just learned the language right now and was surprised by itself that it could speak it.

"What the?" Meiko's jaw opened wide, Mana smiled as she turned back at her friends.

"The twelve clicks that the creature said previously was the Woodarthon Code, a suggested combination of words that in theory is enough for a linguist to understand the speaker's language's basic concepts and teach it to them on a basic level. The creature moved in closer because it wasn't sure if I heard it the first time, these things are actually really smart for mindless things we made them out to be… Were you a linguist by any chance at some point?" Mana wondered looking at the pitiful creature gnawing on its own longer ear than its sister.

"Yes" it answered.

"No offense, sir, but you really shouldn't have tried it. Not everyone knows the Woodar… Whatever code, definitely not the kind of people that tread down here looking for trouble, that's for sure" Kouta uncomfortably smiled to the monstrosity.

"How you know code?" the creature whined out in a sorry voice to which Mana just awkwardly laughed and scratched her head.

"I read a lot during my free time, recently I've had much more time to read as I've been less occupied by… Other things… These things we fought before, ideally the two different representatives would exchange the code upon meeting each other and it consists of twelve words which may have any number of pronounced symbols so it might be pretty confusing to hear it at first. When I heard the creature speak the system of twelve differently pitched clacks I started to get it together but it didn't make sense that someone trying to kill someone would use the Woodarthon Code, the code of a man who tried to encourage peace and understanding between different nations and possibly even species" the magician explained.

"Almost like they were repeating what they heard someone else say…" Kouta brought up, "What if those things are actually someone trying to incriminate these dwellers for something using their patterns of speech that they heard during their first contact which was coincidentally the… Code thing"

Mana was surprised by how much sense the theory made but it still didn't form a firm foundation for an actual picture of just what was going on.

"The surface justice men make look like us to make us look bad" the dweller said unexpectedly.

"What?" Mana didn't really believe it at first. The more she thought about it the more sense it made.

"We met them when they came here first, down here, they no speak, just kill, kill all they see… They want kill all us" the rodent abomination spoke again making Mana more and more confused.

"But… We left Shimo with them, is he going to be OK? Why would they strike this deal with us then? What's their gain?" Meiko wondered but her speech was without much emotion, almost like she just wondering when she was going to get to the chance to fight someone again. All this hard thinking was probably getting to her already.

"They lead us down here and then lied about the disappearing party who in terms transformed into those creatures, the best they could do to replicate them. They may not have gotten a good look initially so that's why the two looked so different and why the Justicars weren't afraid of the light flash. They do wish for us to slaughter these things for them, I only assume that Shimo will be used as a bargaining chip in case their plan fails" Kouta kept on trying to help Mana understand what was going on.

"Logically they couldn't have foreseen us managing to find a common speech with the creatures, they counted on us being repulsed and afraid by their looks and strange behavior, it makes sense but why would they wish to kill these things?" Mana couldn't understand it, one answered or theorized question only raised another couple of them in its place. Things needed to be properly thought out before a definitive action could have been made or else Shimo or these people could've been in danger.

"Wait… Woodarthon Code is meant to communicate between different dialects, that was its main use of conception because our entire world speaks a single universal language, the one that the First People left behind for us. I'm not sure if it would've taught a being unfamiliar with our language's basic concepts the whole thing. You guys then said that one of you was a linguist at some point, just who are you guys?" Mana asked the rodent men directly, the dwellers just scurried and quickly gathered around the crew, Meiko and Kouta were slowly getting twitchy while even Mana, who was really tolerant towards their deformities was getting on edge.

"We livers of small wood houses. Settle-ments" the linguist spoke up. "One day, man come to settle-ment, say he heal pain and death, he did this to us. We could no live in the light, we run here and justice men run after us, chase us here and try smoke us like dogs"

"Livers? You mean settlers? Oh, so you've had remnants of the language in your head, it just took triggers to unlock them. Also… Heal pain and death? What could that mean?" Mana thought up scratching her chin almost to the point of irritation and minor bleeding.

"Whoever that man who came to their settlement was, if he's a rogue in the Justicars' sights, that'd make these people their targets too" Kouta voiced his thoughts.

""Thee shall bury any well spit in by a poisonous snake hag" says the Justicar code" Meiko shrugged. "Anyone touched or affected by the rogue's jutsu is to be slain in case some wicked seal was left inside of them that'd set off even after the user's death"

Mana and Kouta looked at Meiko curiously, they expected the girl to be the last person to know the Justicar Code by heart. It was a quite complex set of strange metaphors that was supposed to have answers to any situation. Just like that time when Meiko surprised everyone by knowing quite much about music the blacksmith proved that she wasn't really a thick-skulled idiot, just really distracted in matters she cared little about. Seeing how hyped Meiko was after seeing the Justicars even admiring their looks and the gear that they used it was of little surprise to hear that Meiko may have taken an interest in the order at some point and learned about it to an obsessive degree.

"Well then, let's get out there and kick their asses. Let's show them what real justice is all about" Kouta pounded his own fists together looking pumped to finally leave this cave, and to be honest these unlucky and miserable people behind. Mana looked down before kneeling up to the unfortunate monstrosities of science and ninjutsu and gently touched the linguist's face, Meiko twisted her face in disgust and Mana resisted the urge to do the same as it turned out that the abomination's face was really slimy and greasy.

"It pains me greatly knowing how many injustices in this world I am still too weak to fix… Fennec in the Wind Desert, that thing we ran from in Roiyaru road or those ninja that took on Kouta's father's squad. All we can do in our present state is run from those people and hear all about the atrocities they commit while we run but… One day, I promise there will be no more running. I will regain my chakra manipulation and become strong enough to have words with the man who did this to you so that he isn't able to do this to anyone else" Mana spoke looking at the one overly large eye and another squinted one staring at her creepily.

"Yes" the strange dweller replied looking at Mana more confused than he was sad or happy. Whatever that rogue did to them must've also meddled with their brains, taken away more than just their bodies but also their minds and personalities. There were times like this when Mana realized just how true Tanshu's last words to her was and how cruel and terrible the real world outside the village walls could've been to people who deserved it the least.

Mana felt Meiko's soft tap at her shoulder, "Come on, we have some good looking faces to bash in…" she asked Mana to move on and not get overly emotional over this horror. Sometimes Mana forgot just how kind and smart Meiko really was, the blacksmith saw how painful it was to Mana to see these things so she did her best to turn the magician further away from them despite her hottest desire to rub her face into the horror she failed to stop by not being strong and inspiring enough.


	177. Path of the Wolf

Shimo patiently and subtly ripped off a chunk of meat off of a lump of flesh he was given to eat. Most people would've already went to sleep but he simply couldn't. Despite the relatively strange degree of tolerance that the Justicars have shown him he still couldn't bring himself up to trust them. Not after chasing him and his sensei loosely throughout his entire stay with the man. Living without bonds to any particular affiliation made life a constant leaping contest between the Justicars and the hunter ninja coming after their heads, granted the hunter-nin had no wish to take his head as technically he wasn't really a rogue. Justicars simple did not care…

The young man tore another chunk of the already cold dead animal. He couldn't sleep because he was afraid that he'd be killed faster than his mind could perceive that something was wrong, he couldn't fight those people because he had no idea if they were even to be fought, they certainly didn't give him any reasons to fight them beyond being just all around assholes. Despite this world punishing even those sorts of transgressions, Shimo didn't fancy hurting people just because of that. The man he was now trying to become, this new identity he was molding himself after wouldn't do it.

The Yuki swordsman stood up and left his smelly tent, the man looked around and didn't see anyone outside their tents. He heard a bunch of sounds coming from some of the tents that he didn't want to really look into so the young swordsman walked towards the woods to check if Mana and the others haven't come back. If these Justicars by any means really did plan to kill him the return of the magician and the crew would've put a stop to that plan so in case of their malevolence these men and women would've been dangerous to the returning ninja.

"Halt…" a growly voice stopped Shimo in his tracks, the young man took a brief glance behind him only to notice a man in a chest plate armor but exposed meaty arms with a body covered with pelts of various animals malformed together into a sewing that reminded the pelt of a chimera itself.

"Where are you going? Silverton said you were not to leave the camp" the man threw orders around Shimo continued to walk forward as in his eyes the man didn't say anything noteworthy. He cared very little about what these Justicars wanted him to do, he would only follow his end of the promise as far as he wanted to do it, for as long as he believes it to be needed.

"You're killing them right?" Shimo asked the man without looking back, his voice began getting more and more feint as the young man was treading deeper and deeper into the forest.

"Huh? What do you mean?!" the man wearing an entire zoo on his back and shoulders growled out angrily rushing forward after Shimo.

"I mean those underground things, you're killing them? Before you lie to me remember that I was running from you for the longest time, no one knows someone better than its prey, a living prey can tell about its hunter more than the hunter's mother" Shimo stopped and turned back at the man facing him with a cold stare.

"The fuck are you on about!?" the Justicar slipped his pelt off leaving just a helmet decorated with a head of a decapitated wolf on top of the steel, the added chunk of flesh and bone may have helped protecting the dumb head hiding underneath against common scumbags but not a serious fighter who could've cut through the very mantle and core of the planet if given a long enough sword.

"One who is getting picked off at the night does not camp around their danger zone. This here is a siege. You're not the ones getting picked out during the night – those "tunnel monsters" are. I don't know just what they are but in your eyes they're criminals. Normally I wouldn't care too much but I've seen in first person how broad your definition of criminal is" Shimo replied. "Now will you attack me so I can cut you down? I've had no stomach for you scumbags this whole time so I'm gonna do those monsters a favor and deal with their dirty work"

The Justicar shouted out angrily flicking his hands back, metallic noises shrieked around his arms protruding steel claws around contraptions on the man's arms. The chimera wearing Justicar launched himself forward, he was quite fast, faster than most outsiders Shimo had seen, the swordsman leaned to both sides effortlessly avoiding the man's swings before jumping back.

"I thought you told me you'd strike me down?" the Justicar noted.

"You're no trash I mistook you for but you haven't shown me anything worth drawing my blade for" Shimo said, "As long as my blade is sheathed I am defending myself"

The clawed brawler launched himself at Shimo again, dipping his blades into the water and letting it splash around as the man ran on forward, pure chakra emanated from the man's body extending the length of his claws and shaking the body of water apart by splitting it open. Shimo took a couple of brave backflips finding himself a solid footing on the surface of the water, he didn't take any time to admire the man splitting the water into four parts, he had no time to spare, the water then came back together the way it was before it was split momentarily.

The Justicar launched another attack, Shimo dived down with a roll, finding support with his right arm and pushing his body up to deliver an upside kick to the man's neck. Despite hitting a vital the man just swiped with his claws opening a small gash on Shimo's leg. Slowly the young man realized that his body augmented itself so that his whole leg didn't get removed from his body – the man's claws may have only been that long but the chakra put into the chakra conductive tool let him elongate the reach and strengthen the cutting power to the point where there was no comparison.

"He didn't even budge…" Shimo thought to himself admiring the man's endurance or his chakra level. He had some training, it would've been ironic if it turned out that these Justicars were once actually ninja themselves, a ninja that served no village was a rogue and rogues were criminals. The Yuki had no doubts that these men were Justicars, they certainly spouted the same amount of bullshit.

"You can't take all of us on. Eighty trained fighters just as strong as me" the Justicar grinned. Shimo realized that the man was right – not even their combined group could take all of those men on. Still, to take out as many of them in an all out fight would've been a better fate than to hide inside a cave and get picked off one by one every night.

"I won't need to… I'll beat you, I'll beat whoever remains in the camp. I'll trust those that descended into the caves for tonight's hunt to my friends" Shimo replied checking on his bleeding leg, he may have put too much chakra into that wall – the wound was just a shallow cut similar to how he'd have gotten cut with broken glass but he had no control over that. His body must've panicked…

"Beat? You mean you don't plan to kill me, criminal scum!?" the Justicar shouted out rushing at Shimo, his body blinked out and flashed around the boy faster than the human eye could track. The Yuki moved his head when necessary, moved himself to the side when necessary, jumped to the side when necessary. Small scratches tore his dirty green top up and annoyed him to no end. The man was faster than Shimo could play around with.

It was a problem, an inner one that didn't let Shimo concentrate on beating this man. Was it something that his newly discovered identity would do? Before the boy lived his life merely for showing off to women, before he even realized why men usually acted that way. At some point he saw the relationship between men and women when his sensei fooled around in the small pleasure towns all over the places they've been in. Soon Shimo realized that there was little to no justification for acting that way, being an overly courteous person but only to women, it made no sense, he gave the ladies more respect than that… That left him with a hole.

A hole to be filled with his survivalist lifestyle, soon after reuniting with Mana the young swordsman saw the disappointment and sadness in his friend's eyes but he gave no fucks about it. Then he realized how stupid he was, that Mana has been looking for people to inspire and he himself was looking for an identity to adopt, one more fitting of a young swordsman looking to discover himself and so Shimo decided to wield his sword to protect people like Mana wanted him to. Would that kind of noble warrior fight such a battle?

The Justicar blinked out of perception again. His body flashed over Shimo's and the wolf wearing man appeared behind the young swordsman. Shimo just stood there, the mountains, trees and even water around them where the level rose above their current level split in two further than Shimo could see. Even the tents so far away that they were just barely seen by the boy all split in two where the man cut him. Blood burst through in a wild arcing splash from Shimo's exposed chest forcing the boy to cover it and stroke it with his hand while using his other hand to make a hand seal. Shimo froze the wound despite it not being too deep. It was still making him lose too much blood.

"Heh, what's the matter? Your chakra has taken a huge dip, you've just stood there and took the hit augmenting your body to just stonewall it. Are you that suicidal?" the man snickered revealing himself to be a sensor who could sense chakra levels and its nature in people. It was a rare ability present in some ninja, ten to twenty percent maybe if it was natural, ten to twenty more discovered techniques that helped them achieve similar effects unnaturally.

"Was I that fast for you, kid!? Couldn't even react!?" the Justicar continued to make fun of Shimo who just stood there with his head nodded down before fixing his glasses and turning around to face his opponent with an angry and cold stare. This wasn't the look of a man worried about his identity, this was a look of a survivalist in his head.

Shimo removed his sheathed blade by untying it off of the cloth belt and showed it to his opponent by raising his hand while still holding it sheathed. "No. I saw you making the first steps so I wondered what kind of attack it'd be. It was faster than the neuron signals themselves so I had to accelerate mine using Lightning Release chakra. Then I saw you take your left leg forward and lean on it with all of your weight so I instantly identified a spinning slash, I wondered if you were some sort of an idiot, revealing your back to me for an entire microsecond. I decided to finally draw my blade and block your attack so I did just that, then I noticed the unnatural concentration of chakra in your blade so I realized it was a weapon breaking technique, if I blocked it with my Audra blade it'd have caused a shockwave powerful enough to destroy this entire country because you're idiotic enough to not control your chakra and guide it through the body of your opponent because you like to show off. For that reason I sheathed my sword back and took the hit…"

The man stood there in awe listening to Shimo's explanation. "You… You did all that in the span of my attack!?" the man shouted out refusing to believe Shimo's explanation.

"It's true, no one would have enough time to react to an attack like that because it moves millions of times faster than the signals between neurons and the brain. No human or whoever that functions like one would respond to such an attack, that being said… That's why chakra is there, to enhance our shortcomings. A friend of mine believes it is a gift to us from some supernatural being, that we are to use that gift to benefit those without it. It's really kind of silly when you think about it but I chose to wield my sword in the name of that fairytale because basically I had nothing better to swear my sword to at the time" Shimo shrugged.

The Justicar screamed out into the air, he prepared to attack again but this time the boy was ready. Shimo sheathed his blade and flashed through a couple of hand seals before his opponent could even move his foot, those brief lessons from Mana when they were training came in handy at last, Tanshu was no fool…

As the two warriors dashed to one another a storm of howling cold winds surrounded them both. Covering both ninja in cold white veil that reminded of the coldest winters on a faraway planet, far beyond the reaches of light in its star, beyond the regions where humans could still calculate its distance from its star. Shimo's body instantly began to compensate for the cold, he was used to it, trained himself inside of such storms but his opponent was less likely to have done so.

"Wolf Bite Barrage!" the Justicar yelled out snapping his claws together and forcing them apart a couple of times in a barrage of attacks that would've grinded any flesh inside his reach into countless pieces but his steel froze solid, cracking and crumbling into snowflakes that covered the ground beneath his feet. Only then did the man realize in what immense storm of sheer cold he was standing.

"You call yourself a wolf and yet…" Shimo's voice reached the Justicar from outside the storm, despite being inside the storm the young man disappeared from it at the last moment.

"You don't know what the path of a wolf is, just because you can kill a helpless beast does not make you a master of its path" the voice once again intimated the man who began to slowly freeze solid in a chunk of crystal clear ice, the very humidity of the air around them began to freeze the man into a chunk of ice.

"You don't bother to guide your destructive force through the opponent causing damage to your own home, you show off trying to look stronger than you actually are by refusing to transfer your chakra only into your opponent like the code of a warrior compels you to. You're no wolf, you're the worst kind of scum there is. That chimera getup fit you better"

The man grunted and gurgled in pain as his body became completely numb, it took impossible to calculate cold to freeze someone who was so engaged in coating their body in chakra but Shimo did it easily.

"The path of a wolf is a path of loneliness, trusting only those you accept into your pack, the path of a wolf is a path of justice, ravaging anyone you feel being unjust and fighting for always doing what you think needs to be done. The path of wolf is a path of kinship, ultimately, not strength. I was always afraid of going to sleep when I was outside the village because I was afraid to hear the words of the Justicar code: "A wolf that does not gnaw its prey is no wolf", you know what it means – the Justicar must always kill who they consider to be a criminal without exceptions or excuses"

The man didn't shout or grunt or say anything, Shimo could only assume that he was already frozen solid. He didn't really wish to kill this man but he was dangerous, there were plenty of ninja that were able to destroy large chunks of all that exists if they were to unleash their power but the code of all kinds of warriors compelled them to guide that power only through the opponent. Anyone strong enough to destroy the world they were in had an obligation to only guide that force through the opponent, not only ninja followed this code: mercenaries, criminals, samurai, martial artists and even pirates. Everyone knelt to that code. A person like this had no right to remain alive, no right to become strong enough to destroy his own world.

"A wolf that does not gnaw its prey is no wolf" Shimo uttered under his own nose before his body blinked out and forced into the storm before appearing outside it. The Yuki swordsman sheathed his blade as the storm split.

"Ice Style: Ten Thousand Blizzard Cuts" Shimo chanted out the name of his technique as the blizzard exploded in sheer pressure dissolving immediately and the ice chunk which the man was encased in dissolved into countless smallest pieces to the point where no one could've even realized that there was once a body inside it.

"Not bad, kid" a voice alerted Shimo to a man standing right behind him. At the very same moment when Shimo turned around and drew his blade the two clashed their swords against one another. The awesome force of the man wielding the gigantic ancient blade sent Shimo sliding back and sheathing his sword again, preparing to use his drawing techniques.

The man standing against him was covered up with large clunky armor, one that come from lost pages of history that no one dared or wished to remember, it only could've fit a man the size of the Justicar leader who stood in front of him, the man with the silver glowing hair and a rough fatherly face wielding the decorated sword just an inch smaller than his own self, the Justicar leader – Silverton.


	178. No Holding Back

Mana, Meiko and Kouta were making a wild dash towards the exit to the camp. They decided to take their chances and bet on Shimo's distrust of the Justicars in general to make the young Yuki quite capable of not getting himself captured. Moments before making a turn Kouta's hand rose and rudely slammed Mana against a rocky wall making her grunt out in pain and almost question the young man's rude expression but then his hand continued to slam her mouth closed and cover it up. Meiko was too obsessed with staring strangely to speak a word but after a moment she got the clue and also hid behind the sharp turn. Slowly the trio walked back before they found multiple corners and crevices to hide in.

Within mere seconds after Mana hid into a small crevice just barely large enough to hide half of her petite frame a march of angry men running through the tunnel broke the silence as they rushed to the place where their comrades were soundly beaten. It could've been well over fifty men, all of them wore exquisite yet ancient and long out of production armors and weapons far too large for comfortable murdering.

"They're mobilizing…" Kouta silently noted.

"What about Shimo?" Mana wondered.

"He's a tough guy, he can handle himself" Meiko assured the team.

"We don't know if these men are here for us or the dwellers. If these are here to kill us and hide our bodies inside the caves that's one thing. If this is just a daily hunting party that means that the Justicars are still unaware that we know of their game, that would mean that Shimo is alright" Kouta tried to sum his thoughts up and make up a way that'd help them decide on what to do next.

What the young Juugo said made some sense, if they somehow could manage to find out just what the intentions of these men were it could help them a great deal. Furthermore it'd help them better make up a plan of how to save everyone. That was the goal, that was always the goal.

"We'll track them, see where they go, what they do. If they are actively looking for us we'll know that they're after us, if they attack the dwellers at one of their favorite hiding spots we'll know that our cover is still safe. I don't think that our brief encounter gave us up already, they have no reason to believe that we're onto them" Mana concluded.

Meiko and Kouta nodded and the three slowly began creeping at the general direction of the noises. After a short while they managed to catch up to the group. It appeared that far too many of these men was mobilized, Mana couldn't accurately tell but from a rough estimation she would've bet that this was most if not the entire group. They were preparing for some serious justice dealing. Or what these sick people made out to be justice, anyways.

"Mana-chan…" Kouta softly spoke up, carefully that his voice didn't echo hard enough through the caves to be heard by the Justicars on ahead. The magician soft and turned at him.

"Look, we found out some really sensitive and important information here – whoever is making people disappear close to the village is possibly also involved in whatever's gone on with those settlers. It's a decent suspicion and the village should know about it" Kouta whispered.

"Your point?" Mana didn't like the direction where this was going. She had a rough suspicion as to where the boy wanted to take it.

"Well… It means we have to prioritize our survival at all costs, we need to let the village know that the bastard may not be just a maniac who kills people or something. He's into some seriously messed up and important crimes" Kouta concluded.

He was right. Mana hated when people she disagreed with were actually right. She knew that not only according to the mission protocol but also a much more logical thing to do was to prioritize their survival at all costs. They'd potentially save more lives than just some ugly abominations of nature, monstrosities created by splicing science with ninjutsu or whatever that person did to them.

Mana didn't answer, she didn't want to go that path, the path of agreeing to condemn a bunch of unfortunate people to death just so they could save more people in the long run by shocking the village enough to take the threat more seriously. To send their best ninja after the perp and comb the forests, burn them and smoke the bastard out if needed. She couldn't in conscious mind tell herself that condemning those people could've actually been the right thing to do but deep in her heart she knew that it was.

"Why would they be so cruel" Mana wondered, "Why would they go so far to kill some unfortunate people that already had their lives ruined following some blind code?" that was when Meiko touched her shoulder.

"The Justicar Code" the blacksmith answered

"What do you mean?" Mana wondered.

"A wild cat that does not kill dies of starvation" Meiko quoted. Since Mana continued to stare at the blacksmith indifferently the redhead scratched her forehead and explained, "The Justicars operate with a bushido-like code. Those that do not serve their ideals must commit suicide. That's why in that lie that the Justicar leader made up he claimed that he was keeping the group frozen in procession, a state where they neither failed justice nor upheld it"

Mana looked onward as she noticed the feint lights began to disappear into the cave. The group picked up the pace a little. What sort of sick ideals were those? To live by such a stupid code? Then again, was her own conviction any better? Mana herself was ready to die upholding her own ideals. She had no right to judge those people or feel surprised when she herself gave up her life protecting a criminal just because she thought he didn't deserve death. To think that Kiyomi idolized these people just as much as Meiko appeared to… Why did people follow those blind icons of street justice when justice had nothing to do with what was right?

"It's the bees and the hornets all over again…" Mana laughed out. Kouta looked at her uneasily, he must've known that the magician's laughter was just a façade of her sadness and wish to know what to do. She thought up of a nightmare scenario and here it was transpiring right in front of her. Two sides that lived by what they did, one side that had to kill to survive due to their own foolish convictions and people who probably wanted to rather be dead due to what happened to them. To stop either side was to doom the other…

"I really hope you've found the answer…" Kouta answered trying to come closer to Mana and ease up her inner struggle but the magician slowed down a little, then stopped and sat down wrapping her head around with her arms. She was afraid, confused and had no idea what to do.

"Bees and hornets?" Meiko blinked a couple of times, stopping and following Mana before picking her up and carrying the magician in her own hands as if nothing happened. Her speed didn't even drop a tiny bit.

"A hypothetical situation, Mana-chan was worried that at some point she'd encounter a situation where she'd be stuck between two sides the survival of which hindered on exterminating the other. It's her worst fear because she placed the responsibility of troubling herself with every smallest conflict, she didn't know what she'd do in that situation…" Kouta explained looking at his collapsed friend. Mana looked really out of it all.

Meiko smiled cheerfully, "What a dolt, she can fight a full arena of trained martial artists wishing to kill her but she collapses because of something dumb like this"

"It's not dumb, it's important to her…" Kouta tried to object but then fell silent when he realized that the Justicars stopped. They must've found what they were looking for.

Meiko placed Mana on the ground gently and proceeded to close in on the Justicars, both ninja decided to utilize their element of surprise and get a drop on the enemy.

"That's it, freaks, you have nowhere left to run!" one of the Justicars yelled out

"You'll all be slain for your crimes of being tainted by a criminal! This world has no place for victims, only the evil and the justice that cleanses it" another one laughed out as followed with a metallic shriek he drew out his sword from a sheathe on his back, the swords these men and women carried were far too great to be carried by their sides so most of them carried their weapons on their backs.

"Why you kill us? What we do?" the dweller who has spoken to Mana asked walking out in front of his people, he appeared alone but Meiko and Kouta knew that all of the others were hiding with their eyes closed by the walls.

"Oh, look at that, they've learned to speak! Good, I could use some screams from the evil that I slay, clacking just sounds like I'm chopping wood" a large brute thundered out with a rocky voice as he removed his axe from his back and let its natural weight slam down onto the rocky floor shaking the entire tunnel structure. It may have weighed thousands of tons to have caused such a violent reaction to the integrity of the massive system.

"Heh, what did you do? You mean besides being pathetic and miserable ugly bastards who fell victims to criminal scum? All of you are just blisters of our society, you carry the ugliness of the injustice that touched you" a woman Justicar yelled out removing two long knives and brandishing them against each other.

The woman lunged at the man wielding her knives but with a reddish and black flash she was sent back crashing into a wall and shaking up the entire tunnel system again. At the very least it held quite firmly as it was based on some tough and quite ancient system of roots. Kouta stood up from his leg swipe position and looked at the rest of the Justicars angrily.

"Enough" was all he said.

"Ninja Style: Windmill Buzzsaw!" Meiko chanted out the name of her technique as she appeared out of nowhere and after a nasty flesh slashing sound a whole bunch of Justicars fell to the ground stricken down by two windmill shuriken that she wielded masterfully attached to string wire. With a flick of her wrist the armored kunoichi returned the shuriken to her hands and placed them back onto her back.

"You… Konoha ninja defend these freaks!? These monstrosities, these…" a Justicar opened his mouth to speak angrily gripping his large axe.

"Victims of a crime against humanity committed by a criminal? The man you all should be chasing instead if you had any integrity at all?" Mana's voice reached the group as it turned around to see the magician walking through their group and calmly joining her friends standing in between the Justicar and the tunnel dwellers.

"Mana…" Kouta acknowledged the magician's decision to choose a side whether she had an answer or not. To stand together with her friends when faced with her worst fear, her total nightmare scenario when no one in their right mind would've walked out there and faced their fears.

"Have you found an answer then?" Meiko looked at the magician questioningly.

"I don't think there is an answer. I've decided that no matter what situation I'll just always do what I think is the right thing to do. The one thing that would not be right is to let these people slaughter the dwellers just because they look ugly and are victims of a crime forced into hiding. The right thing to do is to break every bone in the body of every Justicar so that they cannot kill themselves when we stop them from harming these people" Mana calmly explained before giving each of the Justicars in front of her an angry stare.

"Thee shall bury any well spit in by a poisonous hag" a Justicar said taking a step closer and gripping his war-hammer more tightly in his hands.

"A wolf that croaks like the ugliest toad is no wolf and will drown when it tries to swim" another woman drew her sword and stepped forward. Mana didn't even need translation to the last line of the Justicar code, it was supposed to mean that they were now just as much criminals in the eyes of the Justicars as the dwellers were and if that was what it meant to be a criminal Mana would've more rather been the worst kind of criminal there was than let those poor people get slaughtered. A word criminal is an empty label when thrown around meaninglessly.

Kouta roared proudly in rage as his Juugo instincts kicked in, sending the boy into a furious rage, leaping into the whole bunch and pounding any Justicar that got in his way without restraining any smallest bit of his strength. Punching people through rocks and into the air and out of the tunnel system, throwing people around using the combination of his medical chakra enhanced strength technique as well as his unmatched chakra control that allowed him to augment his strength and speed more efficiently.

The young man's fists danced on the muscular and good looking bodies of the Justicar peeling through the hardest and most dense plates of armor, breaking their shields and weapons and breaking the body of each Justicar with a single softest touch, blowing away any attempts of these glorified mercenaries to augment their endurance as his physical strength blew away all of that. Just a single stare at the rampaging Kouta made Mana realize just how similar the boy was to his father. She even got a shiver remembering the man's face as he beat her down mercilessly back in the ruins of the Wind Desert.

And yet despite the awesome strength the boy began finding his match more and more amongst the Justicar, after a couple of the first moments of unstoppable rampage Kouta had to restrain his augmentations in order to not damage his own chakra system. So his blows no longer sent people flying, he had to attack more often, more skillfully, use taijutsu combinations, block, dodge and weave around using technical abilities and he wasn't always successful in doing so. A powerful mercenary cleaved through at least a dozen of Justicars just to land a shallow cut on Kouta, the man then rushed with his shoulder and grabbed the boy's face slamming it into his knee.

Meiko unsealed a one handed sword and a small buckler, the buckler was used more defensively as she charged around or tossed it as a projectile meanwhile her much leaner and more dynamic blade made most gracious art on the bodies of battlefield hardened Justicars. Sometimes Meiko hit something too hard to cut, sometimes blows and kicks or even slashes from those colossal weapons forced her own gear out of her hands. That was when the blacksmith showed her brute physical prowess that was just an inch or two behind Kouta's who was a purely physical brawler. Both Kouta and Meiko were restrained to some extent – Kouta couldn't use his Juugo bloodline chakra cannons in fear of destroying the tunnels, Meiko couldn't use her more destructive seals as well.

That didn't mean that the blacksmith didn't use her sealing abilities. With something as subtle as a hand seal with one hand and a touch of another with the ground or a wall the kunoichi formed explosive seals that exploded in relatively small power and disrupted or threw the enemies off balance. Oftentimes when meeting a hardened and heavy and clunky plate armor wearing person she didn't wish to bother with the blacksmith simply created a seal of explosive nature onto the person's armor blowing his armor to bits. Ancient armors meant to withstand the most amazing blows from the most powerful warriors of history offered little protection to a tall and buff she-devil blacksmith of Konohagakure and her crafty combination of swordplay and sealing techniques.

Despite being surrounded by fighters none of them managed to as much as lay a hand on Mana. The magician was burning her body out by exploding with as much physical chakra as she could – that was the only way because the speed of these Justicar was insanely powerful. They were fit to compete with lower ranking ninja, even blow most early career genin out of the water completely. They were able to move in immeasurable speeds, possessed unimaginable reaction time and each blow would've been enough to cleave through even the densest substances in the universe. Then again, Mana was not surprised by the immense strength of this army of savage murderers, they had to be this strong to survive killing criminals, people that gave ninja trouble.

At some point the magician noticed the Justicar asking for reinforcements, none of them no matter how hard they tried could land a blow and she was not responding in kind. Mana was using all of her tricks immediately, the combined fighting style of dodging, reflecting what she couldn't dodge and countering immediately after. She broke bones, disarmed and used the disarmed weapons against the users. She was fighting beings that would've been considered gods in other places and outnumbered severely and yet she was holding her own quite decently. If she was to ignore her burning pain that was already forcing Mana's heart to pound ten thousand times its normal rate, she was literally killing herself by breaking her own body. Despite not being hit once Mana worked up the maddest nose bleed as well as a headache matching the pain of having her head split open with one of those thousand ton axes. Her heart felt like it was trying to use explosives to blow its way out of the girl's heart and yet… She didn't care if she'd die, she just tried to do what needed to be done, what she thought was right. She was fighting in the middle of a battlefield without as much as a single injury, she was once again what she craved to be – a ninja. Even if it'd end up killing her, Mana didn't care how many years she was shaving off her lifespan with each dodged punch, one, ten or a hundred. All she cared about was that once again she was defending people that needed her help, people who would've been slaughtered for their horrible luck and their physical repulsive looks.

Such couldn't happen. Such will never happen as long as Mana's tearing and crying with blood heart still pounded in her chest cavity.


	179. Life Shaver

The leader of this Justicar group – Silverton was a tall and bulky man, not by any means overweight but packed with muscles that would've been needed to wield his sword properly. He was well outside his prime age but he had that notable draw of an elder man, his strict facial structure allowed this aura of maturity and justice to emanate from him. He'd have reminded to many a headmaster of their own Academy as men of similar stature and faces usually ended up guiding the young through their own example.

One was not to assume that there was nothing notable or just about Silverton. The man was no snake but his ideals were bent and skewered, rubbed against a stony wall and pulled until they bent and flexed like an actual snake. That being said, Silverton upheld his slithering ideals firmly. Devotion to a foolish extent was often attributed to Justicars. The man used to wear his silver grey hair in a rather tidily braided helmet of a hairdo, reminding more of a larger than life king than a head of a branch of a vigilante organization. Now Silverton's hair was messy and flowed all over his face all the way to where his neck began in spiky strands.

"You said you wouldn't kill my brother in arms and yet you cut him to icy shards the first chance you got. As expected from a criminal trash…" Silverton grunted angrily reaching behind his back and grabbing a bandaged hilt of his sword.

Shimo remained silent, looking coldly at a man he wished to kill for so long. A man who didn't wrong him per se but whose "brothers" gave Shimo and his tutor so many sleepless nights and hard times during his training. A man who represented authority in a mad order of self-executed justice, no responsibility or accountability. All the fun of killing whomever you call a criminal with no need to justify it.

There was no surprise that Meiko loved Silverton's armor, armors of all these Justicars as well as their weapons. The armor of this leader was certainly impressive and simply clawed at one's eyes with feminine overgrown crimson red nails at how ancient and majestic it was. An armor made entirely of lazulum, a strong mineral found in the bottom of vast oceans, only deeper than fifteen thousand meters with a shine of azure blue that rivalled that of refined sapphires, encrusted with diamonds and golden lines and mosaics making the man look like an aged seraphim thrown from the heavens without his wings to exact godly vengeance.

Shimo turned his side at the man, pushed his leg forward a little bit and steadied his breath. He knew that there was no need nor desire to talk his way out of this. No, to hell with talking. Still, Silverton had the heavier weapon but Shimo had no idea how swiftly he swung it. He was above falling for the amateur mistake of trying to attack a heavy armed opponent assuming they couldn't move fast. He'd seen giants wielding war hammers faster than Shimo could blink, noble ninja of Iwagakure that could strike a lightning bolt in two with a mace the size of a small inn. Assessment came first, not haste.

Finally Silverton's hand wrapped around the colossal blade on his back, it had a shining green orb, possibly emerald, Shimo didn't have a proper good luck to tell confidently, anything upper right up to the cross guard and the blade itself was wrapped in bandages, not fresh white ones, sweaty, piss-yellow ones. After gripping that part firmly Silverton unleashed his blade – a giant lump of gems, gold and some onyx-like looking black stone of unknown origins. That part scared Shimo a little – the only part of his blade he could not identify also comprised more than two thirds of the blade whereas the emeralds and the gold crusts were just visual enhancements.

Silverton yelled out like a madman, such loss of composure should've stricken any lesser foe as odd but to Shimo it meant little. Men went insane during and before battle, lost all semblance of humanity, else they were unable to take a life. It was not human nature to take lives, not really, to do so with skill one needed to shed humanity away, tear out of it like a butterfly shed cocoon, like snake shed its skin once the old one was outgrown. Similarly a man shed humanity when humanity was too childish of a thing for reality to be comprehended.

Shimo did not draw, he did not dare compare his skill against Silverton's just yet. The young man weaved a hand seal, barely in time. Had he not been tutored by Mana on how to weave those blasted things fast enough he'd be split in two like a melon.

"Glaciation Jutsu!" Shimo chanted in an instant. The water left over from the molten Justicar from before glaciated in an instant, Shimo barely felt any pressure in his chakra network. Techniques like this came as easy to him now as waving his arm.

Silverton slid forward, he had to maintain his composure to remain afoot, keep readjusting his balance. Shimo wanted to use that opportunity. The boy dashed past the hulking man, drawing his blade as the blizzard gathered behind him in a shape of a rabid white wolf with icicles for fur and larger ones for claws. A simple technique from Shimo's youth that would easily tested Silverton's capacity to take hits if not take him out instantly. The boy's feet slid so lightly, almost like they were feet of cherubs dancing in the clouds.

"Ice Style: White Wolf Slash!" the young proudly declared the name of his attack – a lightning fast slash that would've been difficult enough to block but the real deceitful killer came from behind the youth – a rampaging blizzard in wolf's shape that threw blade sharp icicles with all the might and speed of a rampaging highest possible blizzard winds cutting to the deepest vessels of blood. To a bystander it appeared like the wolf shaped construct of nature's wrath slashed with its mighty paws and the ice paws melted from the warmth of the crimson blood.

Crimson it was…

But not blood. Shimo sheathed his blade and dashed backwards carefully examining his opponent's supposed wounds, or where they should've been seeing only an intimidating red glow, a bubble of unknown origin that looked like pure chakra but it didn't burn the feint light blue like all natural chakra did – it was blood red. A forcefield of sorts of a bubbly shape protected Silverton perfectly shielding him from the slash.

Silverton grinned. "Did you really think that a tortoise swordsman like me would somehow not protect his own body?" he arrogantly quipped at Shimo's expense, or so he thought. After all the Yuki youth was well aware of Silverton's high experience and predicted some sort of trick being inside the void of blackness which was his sleeve.

"Slow?" Shimo wondered, "He considers himself "tortoise" slow… Was he really slow?" the young swordsman wondered to himself but could only realize that he may have gotten into a fight he could not quite cash with his blade. It was often a bad sign when one did not consider an attribute quoted by the opponent to be a glaring weakness as that weak to begin with. Yes. Silverton was slow initially, but somehow the more he swung his massive blade the more its weight accelerated the swing, gravity itself improved his speed. The leader of Justicars was by no means slow but he thought himself slow because he faced opponents that were fast comparing to him… If he survived such opponents Shimo should've had no hopes.

Silverton rolled forward, swiping upwards, Shimo leaned to the side avoiding the slash, now it was the exact opposite – when the gravity was working against the man his slashes de-accelerated the more they went, upwards swings were getting slower and slower each passing inch. The Justicar swung his blade around but Shimo dared not block it. Something looked way off here…

A cruel smile caught Silverton's face as the man twisted the edge of his blade and swung his stabbing sword to the side hitting Shimo with the blunt side and swatting him aside like a fly. A tree burst into millions of small shreds of wood after Shimo flew into it making the built up pressure blow it up. The youth felt chakra leaving his body so fast that his ears were ringing, a taste of blood in his mouth… Blood tasted almost like iron, Shimo knew for he had tasted both in his life…

A howling blizzard once again built up, one of few larger techniques still left inside Shimo's network. So far he has been fighting Silverton with child's play techniques, it was about time to show him something greater. The blizzard formed a massive vortex of raging winds and ice, the winds absorbed the eternal waters of the Takigakure floors and used it as an ice source. In places such as this Shimo was at his mightiest, his techniques could've been empowered with little to no chakra charge, usually taking water from the hydration of air itself was tolling somewhat all by itself. Using water was simpler and much stronger…

"Ice Style:…" Shimo whispered to himself since as loud as he could've been shouting he'd have never outshouted this mighty blizzard he had created. One that ripped trees and gathered water, one that would've laid waste to this entire battlefield but it mattered little to Shimo, no, in a way he wanted the mark to be left. He called out for help with this massive technique, help from anyone seeing it, help maybe even from Gods as someone from space would have certainly seen the massive twister extending well past the stratosphere and poking at Gods' eyes.

"Ten Thousand Blizzard Cuts!" Shimo roared proudly, wearing his Yuki heritage as a herald on his chest as his body disappeared into the madness of ice, wind and debris. His sword sliced this finger of God smiting this accursed patch of land exactly ten thousand times. The blizzard split into ten thousand and one piece, the air pressure would've torn anything and anyone apart. It was said that punches or techniques used by Chuunin and above would've destroyed the entire world if the ninja did not control the flow of their own power and transferred it directly through the opponent and not anywhere else… Shimo did not restrain his power, he physically couldn't and yet he only ravaged an area of five kilometres in radius, left a dirty destroyed wasteland of it as the air pressure evaporated the water instantly heated out from the ice he had made. Devastation at its finest…

Silverton stood confidently surrounded in his flaring crimson bubble. His grin was cruel, mocking almost… Shimo looked at the man and realized that he was too tired to respond to him, he needed to drag it out… Ten thousand times he slashed him with drawing strikes, the fastest and most powerful kind of swordsmanship called – iai. Ten thousand strikes in less than a moment and yet all it did was overwhelm the damned bubble with crimson streamers… A circular aurora borealis of blood.

Shimo sheathed his blade and leaned for another drawing slash. He acted strong and confident when his body was all but shaking. He knew how to fake strength, one's entire life was faking being strong and confident in the moments of weakness in front of people one wished not to appear weak in front of. He couldn't have mustered to draw his blade once, let alone respond in time.

Loud shrieking metallic clangs signalled Silverton's tapping on the chest of his armor. A red light glowed from the center of the man's chest, something of a heart of pure energy.

"Life Shaver… That's how this armor is called. Took me ten years to collect this armor piece by piece. I only served as a Justicar for fifteen, guess I'm as much an archaeologist as I am a man of justice" Silverton sighed. Could he have also been somewhat stricken with fatigue? What from? That crimson forcefield he erected every time Shimo successfully hit him?

"Ten years to become invulnerable in battle? Where's the fun in that? How are you "fighting criminals" when you're not even really fighting, when you're not really putting your life on the line?" Shimo mockingly and coldly exclaimed. He felt sorry for a man who fought not with skill but the ability to remain invulnerable.

"Oh, but I quite literally am…" Silverton remarked, honor must've been important to him as he stood adamantly to defend him, resisted an opportunity to attack Shimo just to explain his own honor to the man he considered criminal.

"You see, every ability of this armor comes with the price, it converts the very life force of me into these abilities. I can literally fire all of my life right at you in a beam of energy, disintegrate you in a microsecond but I do not because I intend to live and slay fools like you another day. I'd rather shave a little bit of my life to become invulnerable whenever things get dangerous" Silverton explained standing in an offensive sword fighting stance.

"I see…" Shimo noted, "So your ability allows you to pay a little bit of your literal life force to negate any damage. I suppose some may find such ability worth the effort it takes to collect this armor and assemble it…"

Both men yelled loudly into the air, a cold mist built up from Shimo's devastation of the area around them as they charged at each other. The Yuki felt like he was too injured to continue to avoid the man's blows. A searing hot beam fired from Silverton's chest, Shimo bent his knee a little repurposing his weight entirely onto his toes as the beam passed just barely missing him. His kimono got partially ripped, bandages and clothes incinerated in moments, concussive flesh tearing wounds opened on Shimo's chest, it hurt like literal Hell. Like rubbing one's own chest against pavement while passing it on a merry go round.

The two clashed their blades, Shimo felt a massive dip of his chakra – his body was protecting him from something huge. A screaming flock of sparks fired off and into the eyes of both men but each tanked the searing heat, the forcefield protected Silverton meanwhile Shimo's chakra continued to dip to protect the boy's eyeballs from shooting sparks. To one it may have appeared foolish to use one's chakra to survive sparks, to say so would've been to be oblivious to the number and mass of sparks emanated from the clash. The moment the blades collided emitted a sound heard beyond the reaches of the horizon, a thundering clash, the sparks were just as bright. If one did not bother to protect oneself from the barrage of sparks they'd have had to augment their eyes to somehow not get completely blinded by the all cleansing light.

"Heh, you fool! Few can match blades with me!" Silverton taunted Shimo by dragging and pulling his blade down and rubbing the sharpened edges of both blades. Overwhelming shockwave blasted from the contact point throwing Shimo back, the boy flew for so long that it appeared to him that he may have died and been punished to fly for eternity. Only the pain reminded the young swordsman that he was still alive.

The Yuki swordsman thrusted his Audra blade into the ground, normally such a mean of stopping one's flight would've utterly broken or ruined a blade at the very least. Since Audra was small part literal chakra it managed to survive any contact with any matter, chakra over matter was the common name to the principle. A single chakra infused cell would've guaranteed victory over matter, no matter how hard or invulnerable…

Shimo felt blood squirting from his wound, granted by Silverton blasting his own life force in the shape of a beam at him. It was a weak and meaningless attack, the boy could tell it wasn't focused but he also knew that the leader of Justicars could make it focused if he wanted to. Invulnerability combined with overwhelming power and now whatever that blade was… Why did it react to Audra steel so violently? Or maybe it wasn't really a reaction to the steel?

"Still alive out there!?" Silverton's voice yelled out into the distance, once the trees got ripped out by Shimo's whirlwind.

"You're the one beaming your literal life essence at me…" Shimo grunted, he knew that the man was quite unlikely to have heard but the Yuki just didn't feel strong enough to raise his voice loud enough. Once again that blasted forcefield absorbed any impact from the shockwave, any backlash of that amazing force of the reaction.

"This sword is called "Heavenly Justice" by those that crafted it" Silverton spoke up while calmly walking forward, this immovable object and unstoppable force combined into one man with the most incredible fighting gear on the planet. "It is called that because it has the mass of a literal godly star core, a material invented by the Kazekage some ten or twenty years ago but perfected recently – it has a small infusion of chakra and also the total mass of fifteen undecillion tons. Every time you block this your body is overwhelmed by blocking the most massive and dense stars of the Universe. I can only wield this blade by cancelling the damage to my own body using the "Life Shaver". Few survive blocking one strike, are you a Jinchuuriki by any chance?" the man wondered.

"Audra steel. It has small traces of chakra infused on a molecular scale. It's the second best thing to actual chakra imbued steel" Shimo huffed out displaying his sword by lifting it above his head horizontally preparing to fight back in a battle he couldn't possibly last any longer fighting.

"I see… Lucky you. Next time I won't be rubbing it against you, I'll be slamming it at you with all my might. We'll see just how far "chakra over matter" principle can stretch before crumbling" Silverton declared. "Justice prevails over measly principles, all other principles do not matter…"


	180. Stars Gone Cold

Shimo dashed at Silverton, he still had a couple of attacks left in him and now he knew all about his opponent's abilities.

"Dodge the beam…" he whispered under his own nose leaning under another life force beam sent his way, this time Silverton continued it twisting it and turning it around sending it after Shimo but as much as the boy's ribs ached he persevered and continued his dash. A couple of draw slashes, Shimo wondered if maybe the core of the armor remained exposed during the firing moments… A noble theory but it only lead to Shimo's blade getting violently torn off of his hands by the concussive beam's force after it bounced off the Life Shaver's forcefield.

Shimo leaned to the side, jumped back and backflipped a couple of times before vaulting up and over his opponent to avoid getting cut to pieces as he was disarmed. For a man wielding undecillions of tons weighing sword Silverton sure pushed Shimo's speed to the limit… The man roared and slammed his sword to the ground letting it split open. The black of the alloy the sword was made off glittered as the skies got torn violently open by showers of pure magma firing off from underground.

The Yuki swordsman's eyes opened wide, he didn't expect it, just barely did he made the several rolls back and only got a couple of splashes of the blasted thing on him. Shimo cursed as he realized he once again spent some chakra to keep his lungs from burning from inside his chest while he breathed the air so close to bursting magma gazers, the boy also peeked at some nasty swellings on his skin where it contacted with magma. Over eight thousand degrees of pure heat and he only got a nasty swelling similar to the ones he used to get when his brother playfully rubbed his wrist to leave an itchy wound in his childhood. He needed better control of his body's augmentations, if this continued he'd be grasping at straws pretty soon…

Shimo blinked a couple of times and looked at his blade, fifty meters away from him with Silverton grinning after placing that annoying chunk of steel he wielded on his shoulder. The soaring roar of breaking ground and crying earth as it spat its magma gazers into the sky annoyed Shimo, the sound was enough to drive anyone insane, if not deaf. The man was restraining himself, Shimo knew, that sword had the power to destroy the entire planet by just being placed down the wrong way. Without proper control just gently placing it onto the grass would've lead to the blade sinking right through the damned ground… Since when has his life become so mad?

Shimo's body blurred and blinked, he had little chakra to spare but he had to do what he had to do, within miniscule fractions of a second the Audra steel blade was once again in Shimo's grasp and loud deafening clangs overwhelmed Silverton's forcefield. Who knew that total invulnerability would've been such a bitch to fight. Now Shimo's plan was just to keep chipping at Silverton's life force and let him kill himself. The irony that his invulnerability was literally killing him must've flown right over Silverton's head.

The Yuki youth quickly went through hand seals creating a couple of small scale blizzards around the magma storms allowing them to instantly harden as the ice persisted until it touched the magma's core and melted into water hardening the thing. Shimo's brother kept scaring the boy saying that he would one day literally freeze the Sun and then the little boy won't have the sweet summer days ever again, that was his brother's way of taunting the boy into leaving outside instead of reading whole day. Only now did the Yuki youth realize that his brother could've probably actually pulled something crazy like that off…

Shimo's hands went through more hand seals. "Ice Style: Ice Wolf Pack!" the boy grunted as his breath became more and more erratic, blackened marks began covering and surrounding his eyes and sacks started to hang under them. Twelve wolf sized ice constructs formed, just like the likes his brother used during his days as a ninja before forcefully retiring. The wolfs howled and rushed at Silverton, the man swung his blade smashing six of them with a single swing but the rest evaded his strike at Shimo's command and jumped at the man, freezing him solid with a single touch. Just a single whisker touching the man was enough to freeze him entirely. All six of them jumped at him at the same time, if anything could've bypassed that insane invulnerability it would've been that…

With a maddened roar Silverton made the ice bubble explode with ice shards scattering all around them and melting from the immense temperature of the wasteland that their battle was creating. Shimo could barely believe it but he didn't show that. His best moves barely even stunned the leader of Justicars. Was each leader of each individual and independent group this strong? Sure Shimo's strength could only demolish a large battlefield whereas that of a chuunin's could've destroyed the world, that was the difference between Shimo's current level and the wall he had to reach and vault over to be promoted to chuunin. It mattered little, this man had to be brought down somehow… He had to pay for tormenting people the way Justicars had tormented Shimo and his sensei, the way that those Justicars fooled them…

The forcefield of Silverton's armor visualized, began to crackle and flare, for a moment Shimo couldn't believe it but then wild red flares and jolts of pure reddish energy began splitting off of the field and concentrating on his chest. Shimo tried to take a step back but he realized that he was too tired to evade something of that magnitude, he couldn't sense the chakra since he was not a sensor but he could tell accurately enough from the immense air pressure that whatever this man was planning was above his tired and beaten paygrade.

Shimo's hands quickly moved as his mind settled on a good old and cheap combination of evasive and defensive techniques…

A sky piercing beam of blinding light wiped the horizon open, in the center there was light so intense that any attempt to look at it would've closed one's eyes for good. As the beam went out from the center to its edge the energy got redder and redder, no more blinding light, only destruction. The beam expanded as it went forward, Silverton's literal life force, his embodied desire to punish and destroy evil expanded as it left the Earth's orbit. A pillar of power, authority and destruction passing by the Moon just barely avoiding its destruction, flowing lightyears away before it met the first planet in its way decimating it and continuing on that path to infinity and beyond.

A small puddle of water was laying where Shimo once was.

Silverton laughed out, his voice suggested certain pressure and fatigue affecting him from this immensely jaw dropping attack that continued to roam space decimating entire planets and overloading stars with energy, piercing them like a sharpened rod pierces human hearts before snuffing them out, instead of blood solar flares and pure energy bled of the stars before they went cold.

"Take that armor off…" Shimo's voice echoed from one of the hardened magma pillars.

Silverton began to madly look around searching for his opponent but Shimo's angered and horrified voice only shouted the same request out again. This power was too destructive in the hands of a madman like Silverton, Shimo willed himself to peel that armor off piece by piece if he had to.

"A criminal scumbag like you has no authority barking orders. Where are you? How did you survive?!" the hulking brawler in that destructive armor barked out.

"The oldest combo in the book – Water Clone jutsu combined with the Substitution technique. I created a clone further at the side and used the time-space aspects of Substitution to change places with it in an instant. What you've destroyed was just a clone" Shimo explained.

Dark clouds began to gather in the sky. Shimo angrily flipped his head upwards and saw the first signs of the impending Earth's death. The words of his sensei came from those boring days in the Academy when all he cared about was that the girls always left the classroom first and always got in the front of the line in the canteen. Back then their Academy teacher instructed them of the signs that the planet they lived on was not doing too good and that a fight transpiring needed to be stopped. Usually even the most heinous criminals surrendered after seeing those signs – dark clouds covering the entire skyline combined with raging thunderstorms was one of the first signs that the planet could no longer contain this battle and was suffering greatly.

Shimo didn't have much left in him, he clutched his aching sides and thought for a moment, his opponent didn't really have a way of locating him. That meant that the ball was now in the Yuki's court and that it was up to him to think up of a way of passing it without destroying his home world and screwing it up for everybody. He could only wonder if Silverton had any caring about the world he stood on. Knowing how insane and devoted to their code Justicars were, most likely not…

Most likely his armor would've kept him invincible long enough for the fool to float to another planet, somewhere where he could survive. The biggest scumbags always survived those kinds of things. Shimo's shaking hands went through a bunch of hand seals, he had no more water to manipulate, not that it helped him in any way to manipulate it. This was supposed to be his final answer before he had no more chakra left to survive Silverton's attempts to claim his head.

The humidity in the air around the man began materializing in the shape of icy plates. Icy plates of reflective and almost crystal appearance and composition. They reflected the light that came at it, almost like a mirror made of ice would've. Shimo felt the chakra pulsing out of his system in powerful bumps, he felt his system getting torn apart, overwhelmed. He still had this in him, he wasn't planning on dying with this but it was powerful enough to maybe dent the man's forcefield, maybe by now Shimo had already outlasted it?

"Hmph, if you're not showing yourself I'll continue decimating your surroundings. You care about it, don't you? You were so angry to kill a brother in arms just because he didn't care of properly channeling his power?" Silverton kept shouting into thin air, not even noticing the ice mirrors forming all around him. By the time he did notice rays of sun reflecting from them and falling right onto his eyes through a hole in the dark clouds it was too late.

Yes, Shimo cared about the planet, not like one of those mad environment lovers did. He was looking for his own identity this entire trip just like Mana wanted to regain hers, he even decided to honor his friend's dream and become the sword that protects, someone seemingly inspired by her dream. If this world got destroyed it would be the ultimate failure of not only his own mission but also Mana's. Truth be told, Shimo was a little confused as to why the Justicars looked so indifferent towards preserving the Earth. Didn't the criminal the leaped down from the Moon – Tsukinabe Watashiki surrender when he saw the Earth about to get destroyed from his battles with the local ninja alliances a couple of centuries ago? If even criminals wished to protect a planet that wasn't even their home, why would so called Justicars not care to this extent?

Silverton's forcefield erected once again. Violent ripples with crescent projectiles flaring out from it, it was a result of a simple swing of Silverton's sword. A simple swing created a crescent projectile that left massive cloud fissures in the sky. Shimo looked at each projectile go, each one of them sliced through any obstacles in its path, mountains, rocky passes before disappearing in the horizon. Each one of them made a star somewhere in the distance blink and disappear.

"Stop it!" Shimo roared revealing his position but it was too late. The ice mirrors had already formed around Silverton, the man continued to launch a couple of more crescent swings that way but they whizzed just right by the youth and went on to destroy a planet or a star, whichever it met first.

The youth leaped off of one of the hardened magma pillars he was hiding on and into one of the ice mirrors. His figure rippled and disappeared inside of them just like it would've if the youth had jumped into a large body of water.

"Ice Style: Crystal Ice Mirrors…" Shimo named his hidden technique. It wasn't a technique he used often as it was taxing on his body but it was perfect when fighting someone like this, especially when he had too little chakra for anything like this technique. The technique that created a mosaic of sorts, a mausoleum of mirrors made of solid Ice Release chakra around Silverton and allowed Shimo swiftly appear in any of the mirrors with his reflection also reflecting from each other mirror.

It was a complicated technique to pull off, he also had to know perfectly how to shape and place the mirrors to make his reflection reflect from each one of them, otherwise the difficult composition would not work. It was not a technique he liked for that purpose, he had the brain to assemble them into that formation but he did not like to twist that brain to the extent needed to properly pull it off.

Silverton grumped as he flung another projectile at one of the mirrors crushing it and letting it disappear in the sky, likely to soon reach a planet or a star that it could snuff out in its path.

"Stop it you bastard!" Shimo shouted out as he and thousands of images of his likeness appeared from the mirrors and dashed through Silverton in an instant, slashing and cutting him with each passing moment meanwhile the fake images confused him. The technique somehow managed to bend light, space and time inside it allowing Shimo to move at much greater speeds than he usually would've been able to while not inside the mirror formation. It was a secret technique of his clan and some of its secrets still evaded Shimo but this technique was his last straw to grasp.

"Tell me, oh great Justice Bringer… Where is justice in destroying entire planets, where is the justice in letting your destructive power destroy the very world beneath your feet!?" Shimo grunted angrily, his voice sounded hollower and much more husky as the sound vibrations passed through the bent light and space through the endless anomalies that these mirrors created inside the formation.

"It's simple… Most Justicars who have been doing it for long enough have already realized this and share my idea – the world itself is unjust. People are a nasty piece of work and cannot be trusted to do anything good. Even as we speak thousands of women are raped and killed, settlements getting plundered, people getting murdered all around us while our very children are being trained in finding more creative ways to kill each other. Even our own Justicars sometimes get out of control. No one can be trusted to not be as dark as our nature makes us to be. No one can be trusted to remain human, the very purpose of life is to be born an innocent human and then shed that humanity when meeting the real world you live in. People are unjust by merely existing, they shed their humanity at some point, all of them. For that reason no Justicar is afraid of destroying this pitiful cradle of darkness. The black vast nothingness of space is more hopeful and bright than the bleak sludge of crime and blood that this world of ours is..." Silverton explained, strangely enough he wasn't yelling, wasn't sprawling around and swinging his giant blade trying to catch Shimo's real copy in one of these mirrors.

He was just quietly talking and trying to explain his point of view but his voice wasn't passionate, the old veteran was… Depressed and disappointed if anything else. Shimo sighed, his chakra levels were beginning to dwindle, he couldn't sustain these mirrors for much longer and that wild dash with all of those drawing slashes didn't as much as left a dent on the man. Shimo didn't have it in him to outlast Silverton's invulnerability. He may have shaved more and more at the man's life but a single skipped attack crushed Shimo's own chakra and life force to way below the amount he shaved off to begin with. It was Sisyphean by the very nature of the task to try…

"That is why no Justicar would be shy for a moment to destroy this whole blasted universe if they had the power to!" Silverton yelled stabbing his blade into the floor and launching a mad burst of magma from below him. Shimo yelled out, he was worried for the lives of Mana and the others deep in the cave system which probably was overflowing with magma by now…

The leader of Justicars clapped his hands together with all of his power, each hand was powerful enough to cause damage to the other but his forcefield intercepted it, in a chain reaction each forcefield intercepted the other and forced a violent repulsion of red chakra out of the man's clap. A clap of explosive nature, infinite red light covered the entire ice structure cracking Shimo's ice mirrors to bits. Shimo closed his eyes to avoid the light. All was so… So bright…

The boy writhed on the ground for a while, he wanted to stand up, to keep fighting but his chakra level was too low. If he got punched just one more time, even without that blasted sword his chakra wouldn't be enough to survive it. He'd either die from the impact or die of losing too much chakra, the possibility of tearing apart his flow using chakra augmentation was also still there… Always there. Shimo couldn't move, his sides hurt, everything in him hurt. A single shockwave decimated all of his ice mirrors… How could a single man hold that much power?

Shimo's eyes opened. Only to see a large chubby man falling on top of Silverton's forcefield from above, bending and twisting his own fatty belly around the construct. Then a roaring arrow of Lightning Release chakra echoed as it tore through the forcefield, finally shaving too much of Silverton's life to sustain it. A young woman in a simple linen dress wearing a leather vest and strangely curled into buns braids punched Silverton straight into his exposed chest dismantling his Life Shaver into millions small pieces instantly. A tall man with a purple helmet with reddish blades attached to the sides of it horizontally and a dark purple armored vest worn on a green plate armor leaped forward with a whirlpool worn in spear shape around his arm, extending well over fifty meters in length that drilled right through Silverton's chest finishing him off instantly, the raging rotating waters tore the man's body around the drilled wound to shreds instantly before dissolving into a wet puddle.

A ginger man with a playfully looking red goatee looked over Shimo's face from behind where his head laid and smiled. He extended his hand forward to the Yuki helping get back up on his butt, sitting back up was the best that the young man could do.

"We got your "message", young man… Just next time you send these "messages" make sure to not nearly destroy a country… A hawk with a message might suffice" the ginger shinobi said before tipping his strange triangle hat and leaping into one of these magma holes to go after Mana and the others.

The ninja of Takigakure have arrived!


	181. Not Everyone

Mana had no idea for how long they've been fighting. These Justicars weren't just ordinary bandits. She hit them as hard as she could, they took all she could dish out and stood right back up. Every blow she dodged she attempted to counter in return. Ten or more people attacked her at once, none of them landed a solid blow, all of them got counters coming their way, aimed at their joints, their eyes or ears. Every time Mana thought she broke something, injured someone beyond recovery, even thought she may have gone too far the guy or gal just jumped back on their feet with bloodied faces or limbs dangling strangely and kept coming at her.

Just their degree of hate directed towards her was disgusting, it wasn't fear of violence from their part, physical violence was something Mana experienced for the most of her life. For a person who spoke of peace she was somewhat of a hypocrite as she was a child trained in combat since the days she could firmly stand on her feet. No, violence wasn't what scared her, not the prospect of being beaten or having her face caved in or her flesh exploding from being unable to withstand the force behind those superhuman blows. It was the more spiritual part that scared her.

These people wished to kill her, to an extent that was scarier than any of their beaten and battle hardened faces grunting at her, trying to scare her by staring at her to death because they could no longer land a blow on her. These men and women hated Mana because she could not allow any harm to come to those poor misshapen men and women of some settlement who were now doomed to spend their days in hiding, shy of their own misshapen forms. Was that so deserving of hatred? Why did these people come at her with such devotion, such ferocity? Was it not human nature to try and help each other to the best of one's abilities?

Maybe it was Mana and not these violent people who was misguided. Maybe she was the anomaly who didn't belong and deserved to get murdered in a cave deep below Takigakure waterfalls? Maybe she was wrong to change Kouta's life, to try and change everyone she met? Maybe Kouta was for the better as a violent spawn of his Juugo father, maybe the efforts of his mother to make a medical ninja out of him, a person not at all similar to his father were wrong? Maybe violence was the norm here for the sole reason that much more people accepted it as an option, not even that, a solution.

A flurry of kicks sent a wall of people crashing into the cave walls. Mana was fast, she was getting slower however. Avoiding blows was beginning to wear on her, her own body was beginning to break down for using so much physical chakra. And yet these people stood back up, they sacrificed just as much to kill her and then kill those dwellers trampling on Mana's dead body while doing so. They were just as devoted to their cause as Mana was on hers. For how long could she play this perfect protector of peace when she was the minority, how long until she falls and with her the last of this world's, what seemed to Mana, common sense?

Fury, previously unheard of rose inside Mana's heart. She became visibly more devoted to her strikes, more violent. She no longer felt content at pushing these men back, she felt angry, violent. She continued to strike, kick and push people even while they were down, she continued to dislocate, crush and twist their limbs, the more gruesome the noises came from them the better. She killed no one but killing was not the only immoral thing in the world. What was this anger she felt, why did she not feel content just pushing back? Maybe she had more of this world inside her than she thought, maybe she was no saint herself? No… There was nothing perfect about Mana, imperfect origins, average skills and now her disability…

A violent explosion ripped Mana apart from the twelve Justicars she continuously maimed and bashed at. Just barely couple of them didn't drown in… Magma? Mana felt blood rushing from inside of her, immense heat rising up before the physical chakra helped her deal with it. Augmenting her body… Physical chakra wasn't really working as potently as the real thing. Mana coughed up handfuls of blood and felt her lungs burning up. She almost got incinerated from inside by just breathing this hot air in. She heard loud yells, the Justicars were fleeing back, focusing on Meiko and Kouta instead as magma blocked them off.

That was when the girl saw figures emerging walking right through the magma like it was just water. Shrugging the burning sludge off, the blood of mother Earth itself felt no different to these four than spring rain.

"She's just a civilian, remember how she shook and quivered when we first met? Just turn on your Intents, make her beg for us to kill her" one of them spoke, finally… Actual fear was born in Mana's heart, fear not for the lives of others but for that of her own. The magician wondered just how could Kouta and Meiko have been doing. Then the magma cleared out, with a small peek the magician witnessed Kouta continuously firing at the overflowing torrents of magma that threatened to fill the room. If it had flooded the room it wouldn't have killed Meiko and Kouta, Mana knew that all of them could survive it but it'd wear them out, also it'd kill the dwellers that the three were so adamant to protect.

"Let's just kill her, those dwellers have nowhere to run, they're cornered, to squirm and hide pressing their furry misshapen bodies to the rocks is all they're good for. We'll bash their heads against the rocks once we're done here, only seems fitting" one of the Justicars spoke. Mana felt it – the burning feeling in her heart, that strange sensation she had only felt a couple of times in her life. Except now it was multiplied a whole thousand times. The girl's legs shook and crossed themselves, just barely could she remain standing once the Intents kicked in. She'd have much rather choked on her own lungs refusing to breathe in fear from the Killing Intent, this Charming Intent variation was actually incomparably more sinister.

"Look at her, shaking in her sandals, before she could fight all of us off without a scratch, let's see her move now, let's see her DANCE!" a Justicar lady screamed out with the same scary bloodlust in her voice as she kicked Mana below the belt sending the magician down and writhing in pain. She could not tell which was stronger, that burning pleasure in her heart that was overflowing and pumping throughout her entire essence from those blasted Intents that these people used, the sadistic twist on Tanshu's abilities that they've put or the pain from being beaten.

Mana tried to pick herself up, she realized that she must've looked pathetic, fighting not only the damage from that kick but also her own body that begged to stay down, just writhe and enjoy the pleasure that the countless Intents around her attacked her with. Before the magician thought that people that hurt their victims with pain were cruel but she had never previously encountered someone as sinister as people attacking people with pleasure. People who hurt other people, killed them while making them beg for more. Mana wanted to change the world but she realized that she had no idea just how twisted it actually was.

A kick right to her face sent the magician down again, she couldn't even move, the best Mana could do was not to give in to the vile impulses that the raging pleasures inside her provided. The Justicar woman began trampling Mana, stomping her viciously before kicking her around. The magician felt the taste of blood inside her but her body didn't listen, it loved every second of bleeding out in some tunnel that was slowly filling with magma. Mana's bloodshot eyes wandered onto the sight of Kouta firing his chakra cannons in overload mode trying to keep magma away from filling the tunnels. Where did it even come from in the first place!?

Meiko was the only one still actually fighting, Mana was just getting kicked around at this point and Kouta also was getting pummeled by the Justicars while being occupied keeping the magma at bay. Those suicidal idiots wanted to flood the tunnels, they knew that the dwellers would've been the only ones to die in it and that must've been their plan. Kouta fell on one knee, he roared in pain as he couldn't even protect himself but he held the cannon literally blasting the magma away from the entrances. New cannons opened on his back, branched off from his hands. Mana saw his muscles tense up so intensely that it tore his clothes apart, some of them tore and opened bleeding gashes all over.

The redheaded blacksmith was too busy to see Mana getting kicked around and grinded into stone. The magician could no longer feel the pain from the punches and kicks. Her body just broke down, her entire nervous system was tearing itself apart overwhelmed by pain and pleasure at the same time. Mana wasn't even sure just how badly she was beaten. It was then that a cold sensation came from above – something froze the magma and the tunnels no longer felt like literal Hell. It even drew the rampaging Justicars away from her, for a moment at least…

Then an arrow flew right through the eye of one of them. It must've been some strange, chakra enhanced arrow, normal arrows wouldn't have come close to sufficing. Then a flurry of crackling and chirping arrows covered with actual lightning chakra pierced several of them without any resistance, hitting the vitals and sending them down and dead. Mana looked at the side and saw a woman with hair shaped into buns tearing Kouta out of the hardened magma, just before it froze the young man must've been overwhelmed and drowned in it which made it harden with Kouta inside. He looked worn out and wounded, his clothes were singed off and he was bleeding all over. Almost like he'd have just survived literal war and that suggestion wouldn't have been too far off. The woman punched and kicked behind her a couple of times knocking out the Justicars that pestered her instantly.

The feet and fists of the woman glowed with the blue flares of chakra that Kouta had when he punched and kicked using the strength enhancements of medical ninjutsu. She must've been a medical ninja too, only made sense for a party to have at least one. Then another man launched himself at the group of Justicars trying to attack these new challengers, it was like he wore some sort of armor all around his body, a thick green and purple plate with bladed shoulders and helmet, the man carelessly swatted his hand aside with some strange ninjutsu technique, forming whips of lances of water in his arms that slashed the Justicars in two pieces like they were butter being split by a heated knife.

The Justicars did not falter, with each crushed intent and plan they tried doing something else, the few that remained split between trying to locate the camouflaged dwellers and slaughter them and focus on downed and beaten Mana. The ones that tried to find the dwellers got quickly gathered together into a bear hug and crushed into bloody stains by a colossal chubby who had half bald head and wore a pair of dark green tunics tied together with a purple rope around his waist and shoulders.

The ones that rushed at Mana got downed by more chakra imbued arrows as well as a short devil-man whose dance with knives must've been the fastest one Mana had ever seen and the magician has tangled with Hisako, the daughter of Yoruma, herself. She didn't even see the short man before, he just appeared out of nowhere and whirled around with knives in a blond flash as his spiky blond hair gave color to his blurry dance. Another color contrasting the blood red of the liquid that splattered on the walls. Whoever these ninja were they spared no one, no one except the Konoha ninja, of course.

The ginger man with a strange triangular hat looked at Mana, "Hey, Caitrian, I'd appreciate a look or two at this girl here, she looks pretty messed up…" he yelled out. Mana then felt gentle feminine hands picking her up and saw a gentle face of the woman with the hair buns who pulled Kouta out.

"Awww, she looks worse than that kid who went magma dipping… I'll get right on her but first let's get outside, this whole place is falling apart as well as flooding" the woman called Caitrian said.

The bald fatso playfully slapped at Kouta's body which he carried on his shoulder, leaning his head so that it fit into the tunnel. Meiko rushed and started shouting something, from what Mana's bashed around head could tell she wanted to get a look at the magician and felt curious if she'd be alright.

"Don't worry, she'll be fine, once Ivalgith here got both his arms removed by this large rogue ninja named Regiglan, he was a big cheese around those parts but Caitrian patched him right up. The girl's got a pretty tough face for a civilian though" the ginger goatee wearing man remarked placing his hands at his sides in a heroic pose. He must've felt really well about himself for his heroic deed. Mana's consciousness began to slip in and out, she could only remember bits and pieces of what followed. She remembered hot air passing through her cheeks, Caitrian must've been running. Meiko's silly grin kept smiling at Mana from above with green glow visible above her face – the signature light of healing being done. Bits and pieces slipped through and out.

Mana blinked and raised her head up, it hurt like she had just been beaten by a bunch of self-righteous fops but she was thankful to have survived, even better, thankful that the horror of the Intents ended. The entire time her will was being tested, she felt like her mind was violated which was a thousand times worse than just being beaten, as someone who gets beaten half to death on a daily basis, Mana would have known.

Meiko screamed in joy when Mana sat up, she was so glad that the blacksmith rushed at Mana and speared her with her shoulder with a hug of happiness slamming the magician and almost leveling her to the ground. Mana looked around, the place that once was a swamp-like paradise of falling waterfalls and larger than mountains trees was now just a barren wasteland of hardened magma and rocks. The magician could only wonder what could've happened here.

Kouta walked up and sat on his knees, he tried to hug Mana as well but then backed out of it when the two blushed and it began looking far too awkward. Shimo walked up to Mana, his kimono looked ripped up and singed, there very little green left in it, it was black as tar from being burned. He must've had his fair contacts with magma too.

"Looks like the Takigakure ninja noticed the destruction. This ginger man with the arrows is Connallhod, this large gent is Brendonk, the lady you should feel thankful for your life for is Caitrian. The little man I didn't notice before is Wilsamh and the tall guy with the rubber like hair and long beard is Ivalgith. I think I got it right? Those Takigakure names are a mouthful…" Shimo pouted looking at the Takigakure party curiously.

"That's right, we're the five currently active Takigakure jounin, pleased to meet our colleagues from Konoha. Even more honored to have the chance to give you guys a helping hand. Takigakure does take pride in its neutrality in inter-village affairs but when it comes down to rogues and self-appointed vigilantes all villages must stand united" the short ginger man called Connalhod laughed out to himself before noticing that the Konoha kids felt more devastated than cheerful.

"Did you save the dwellers?" Mana's voice grunted, her throat still felt crushed so Caitrian looked at the girl with a troubled stare and felt the girl's body up before asking her to allow for her throat to be healed. She was apparently getting strangled at some point, the magician could vaguely remember the details of what those Justicars did to her starting from one particularly painful point in time. In the midst of the healing Kouta shook his head.

"I'm sorry, they're probably all dead, magma is slowly filling the tunnels. The Takigakure ninja told us that eventually this place would be fixed and all the magma would be casted back into the depths from where it came but… Right now there's nothing to be done…"

Mana jumped up and pushed Caitrian aside. Of course the girl would have lacked the strength to do so if the jounin woman resisted being pushed aside but she did not object. Shimo and Kouta jumped after Mana.

"Wait, Mana-chan, you can't possibly… You won't even enter the system before it fills up with…" Kouta tried to object.

"The system is huge, it'll take you a hundred years to search it for each and every dweller, that's even if they even aren't camouflaging, Meiko said they're usually pretty careful about…" Shimo tried to stop Mana too.

"I'm afraid I must agree with your friends, fair maiden, whomever you are trying to save, you'd have to search these tunnels at impossible speeds to pick all these… Whatever they are " the tall towering man called Ivalgith who wielded lances of drilling water so efficiently before remarked, now his helmet laid off and on the ground and his funny towering hairdo was shaped by the helmet to look like the rubber end of a pencil which contrasted to his pointy long brown beard.

Mana's body flared up with red. She felt her eyes tearing up, her vessels bursting, her muscles tearing apart as her cells angrily flared with physical chakra. There were people in those tunnels. People who have already been wronged by fate, people who were looking at drowning in magma for their own desire to hide from the world that wronged them. No person was welcome nowhere, everyone must've had a place to belong in, somewhere there must've been a home for everyone!

A sharp pain interrupted all of the girl's thoughts, pain stabbing right at the back of her neck as her vision blurred. Shimo had dashed behind her with a cruel but restrained chop to the back of her neck while Mana was distracted. The girl crumbled down as all of her lights went out. The Yuki swordsman looked at the unconscious body of his friend, dried out blood stains still present on her torn white shirt and on her healed face where it was broken. The cave blew up from internal pressure spouting out hot sludge of magma out into the air before the holes closed up and the entire structure crumbled on itself.

"There was a slim chance she could've made it, probably…" Brendonk the large fat shinobi of Takigakure remarked bitterly looking at the scene of friends knocking friends out. "Had a solid microsecond of head start before the cave exploded, maybe she'd have pulled some people out"

"She's an idiot, a loveable idiot, but idiot nonetheless…" Shimo closed his eyes and places his hands into the pockets before sighing helplessly. "Her chakra system is torn up and completely non-functional, physical chakra is the only kind she can use. She's already broken her limits before and almost killed herself in the process. As her friend I'm not willing to see it happen again. Maybe she could've pulled everyone out in time, maybe she'd have emerged covered in magma while her body desperately tried to not let her burn and melt away, burning her physical chakra while her network broke again in the process… The bottom line is that I don't care. I won't stand and watch her kill herself trying to prevent others who have long since resigned from life dying"

"This won't be pretty…" Meiko closed her eyes and sighed, the sight of her incapacitated friend felt uncomfortable. It wasn't too long ago that Mana learned of another betrayal by her friends committed entirely out of care for her own life, if that time was any measure of future events the girl will be outraged and feel betrayed, her trust in her friends might falter…

"As her friend I am ready to accept that hatred and anger. If you're not, you were never really her friend to begin with. You may be one of the physically strongest out of all of us but you're a big softy, Meiko, you don't really want to get in Mana's way because you feel indebted to her for taking you on this mission and training you and Kouta is too worried to chase after Mana's affections to do it. I was the only logical choice to stop her" Shimo concluded.

The night sky was lit up by small patches of magma bursting out from the ground in gazers, fountains of Earth's burning blood bursting and leaking colored the sky blazing red, almost like the Sun hadn't even set yet…


	182. All Alone Again

Loud droplets of water broke the silence of the cave, the entire structure was dead silent which combined with the total darkness illuminated only by stalactites of azure crystal formed an eerie atmosphere. Once in a while gentle clacks of hardened and raised heels of Mana's sandals joined in, forming a lovely harmony with the aquatic noises. Slowly the girl was making her way through the cave, looking around as if running or being hunted by someone and afraid of being caught. The girl's actions proved rather fruitless as not a single heartbeat joined her in this search. Just a deadly silence, torn away by water and girl's sandals once in a while…

Come to think of it, Mana had no idea what she was running from, where she was or what she was looking for, what exactly could her destination have been or other similar details. Could this cave have had something to do with the seemingly endless quest to find the Box of Ultimate Bliss, maybe she was sidetracked once again, looking to save someone dear to her? To say that would've been to say that she was sidetracked to save absolutely anyone as the girl had probably the least selective process of finding heroic deeds that required her to push her own needs aside.

Maybe this cave held inside an easier pathway to the Box, perhaps it held salvation for someone Mana wished to save, either way the magician didn't falter but continued to walk that rocky crystal path. She did not notice how brief claps of red eyes colored the wall beside her differently, the color of hunt, the color of death, the color of danger. Mana called out into the eternal darkness in front but no one answered. There was absolutely no reaction to her voice, it fell silent and dead in fate's ears.

Eventually more and more eyes joined in the initial red blink, Mana was strangely aware of their existence, almost like they registered in her own mind but she couldn't see them. She could not hear them nor, sensibly, smell or touch them for they were abstract concepts. Yet she knew of them… The magician thought that maybe, for her own safety, it'd have made reasonable sense to turn around and look at those crimson bloodshot eyes examining her, measuring her limbs and her guts to wear around their necks as accessories. Somehow the magician was aware or at least suspicious of the ill intent of those lurking in the darkness.

As much as Mana ordered her body to turn, it did not, almost like Mana was part of a movie, a movie she was a starlet in. One of those revolutionary plays of moving pictures that Konoha recently received an influx of and Hiro's Hall was making a profit of, together with Mana's stage magic, of course. She must've had the role of the dumb pampered teen in one of those horror movies, walking inside the typical horror scenario despite having little to no means of protecting herself. For some reason this disability to affect the environment around her or protect herself from these demons lurking in the walls of the cave scared the magician a great deal. Mana could feel her own heart pumping, beating and clawing its way out of her chest, she couldn't help but command herself to utter a scream but… She was silent. Once again the magician ordered herself to scream, this time as loud as she possibly could, as loud as she would if a madman was trying to butcher her and she was helpless to defend herself but… The kunoichi's lips were shut tight, not a single sound was made.

Suddenly cold furry fingers wrapped around Mana's mouth, bent her head backwards uncomfortably bending her body by the back around the creature's knee. The rodent-like creature shoved its twisted and rotten face right up to Mana's, despite being scared to the point of death Mana couldn't wail or scream, couldn't wave her hands or try to fight this thing off. She remained frozen and helpless in the creature's arms. The girl commanded herself to fight, summoned all the physical chakra she could've mustered up but… She remained helpless in its grasp.

"You killed us…" the thing muttered right to the girl's ear before opening its mouth to crunch on Mana's neck. The magician closed her eyes, she could feel slimy taps of the creature's slobber running down her neck all the way to her chest and below, soaking her clothes. She could feel that putrid smell of dead meat in its mouth as if Mana wasn't even amongst the first bodies this thing had munched on that day… Or night… It could've been either one…

Mana screamed, finally she was able to, not only that her body burnt up, the girl summoned all of the physical chakra she could before realizing that she was feeling hot. Not just hot – burning. The magician lifted her hand into the air and glared at the flames burning her, her skin blistered, peeled off her flesh in layers revealing crisped and coaly substance below, before only bones remained and then… Only bone dust… It was like she could see herself from the side, her face, her skin peeling off and burning into nothingness.

"Mana! Snap out of it!" the magician heard a loud scream before her head was crushed by the rodent's teeth. However it wasn't the jaws of a cave dweller that chomped on her brain, it was Meiko's large blacksmith's hand that slapped her face, continuing to do so again and again and again.

Mana shook and shoved the blacksmith aside, feeling blood and swelling in her mouth – just for how long was she being beaten?

"Wow… That must've been one hell of a dream…" Meiko sighed before grinning and giving Mana a thumb up.

Mana didn't respond, she looked around, Kouta was kneeling nearby and staring at Mana, Shimo wasn't even looking, he was watching everywhere but at Mana's general direction. He may have been looking out for assailants but something told the girl that his reasons for avoiding her glare may have been much more personal.

"You had to be woken up, your body flared up with physical chakra, Meiko couldn't even hold you on her back as the pressure was that strong. I checked your heartbeat because your chest was literally twitching… Sorry 'bout that…" Kouta blushed after revealing that he touched Mana's chest. Naturally this whole situation with the team's medical ninja was bound to bring its own fair share of awkwardness… It was hard to postpone a romance when he had to touch Mana once every couple of days and his life essence ran through her body in the form of chakra every time he healed her. The two shared a much deeper connection than most medical ninja shared with their teammates especially due to how often Kouta had to tend to her wounds.

"Your heart could've stopped, your chakra network could've torn itself apart. You have the problems of a veteran ninja, Mana, and you aren't even old enough to drink yet…" Kouta tried to tell her something but Mana placed her hand on his lips. She wanted to hear none of it. If he had the guts to look at her and tell her that she had to quit then he misunderstood what this whole thing was all about.

Why would she quit, what was the point of this mission if she was ever to quit? What was the point of looking for the damned Box if she was to quit right after getting her chakra control back? She was a ninja stage magician, to be any of those two without the other was to live half a life and living half a life was worse than dying to Mana. She'd have rather perished than lived as anything less than what she wanted to be. As a child the magician continued to hear stories about people losing their limbs and their senses in battle and always thought to herself that she'd rather die than live like that. Needless to say her current disability was much more personal and emotional but to her it was the same regardless of the kind of loss she suffered. Either she lived up to what she wished to be, to the ideal she strived to become or to hell with it all…

Mana stood up and bowed her head to Meiko, the magician looked around and noticed that the four were no longer even in Takigakure – she must've been carried around unconscious for more than three days if they already reached the no man's zone known as the Mountain's Graveyard. The place where the Tower of Bones once stood, the place where a criminal named God-Eyes once gathered an army of criminals to take over the world because in his eyes possessing a godly bloodline of the Rinnegan eyes granted him the right to the world's throne. The fact that such a chair did not exist did not make the man any less determined, he merely decided to find such a chair or have one built for him once the world leaders kneeled in front of him. Mana had studied that story extensively in the archives, she read it more and more after Tanshu-sensei had passed away, or rather was killed in battle.

Once the Mountain's Graveyard was a deadland, a land of sludge as well as hardened magma that when taken one step cut one's feet open and made one bleed all over the rocky surface or swallowed one whole. Now the bones of all the animals and people claimed by the place emerged once more, forming a much more organic pass, much more grotesque, unfortunately, as well. Bones of wild beast and men littered the place as they have emerged from the ground and their minerals interacted with the ruined ground forming a black coal-like mass which was no longer so difficult to pass through but still stunk enough to invite one to vomit whenever they took the liberty of thinking about what they were smelling exactly.

"The Takigakure ninja wished us good luck and left us right after saving us. The fat one carried this large scroll with a jutsu that summoned soil and trees, they regrew that part immediately and the goatee guy filled it with water in seconds. I've never seen terraforming of such degree. It was like the battle had never happened, like magma never flowed in geysers reaching the sky…" Meiko began trying to explain what happened while she was out to Mana.

"We slowed down a little, even if you're completely healed, dipping in magma after being weakened in battle before really wears down on you… They say that the surface of the Sun is as hot as the hottest magma so I guess if we could survive a trip to the Sun we could one day land there…" Kouta laughed out awkwardly. Seeing how Mana had not yet uttered a word the two were worried about her well-being. Shimo continued walking without offering any words. The boy's top was completely singed off and he appeared to have no spares so he was walking with half singed top, half bare-chested. However not a single burn appeared to be left on him, his hair did appear a little bit shorter but whether it was from the boy giving himself a field haircut using a kunai blade or magma managing to singe some off when his chakra augmentations faltered remained to be known. Not that Mana cared… She liked Kouta, maybe some other day she'd have really cared, maybe some other day she'd have spent some time glancing at his strong well-built for his age chest and new more orderly haircut but…

"The dwellers all died, didn't they?" Mana uttered quietly killing all the light mood of her friends. Shimo faltered and stopped for a moment before resuming his step, it was clear - that he wished to say something, perhaps scold her for bringing it up, maybe apologize for what he had done to her but he didn't say a word.

"Yeah… Most likely, it is possible that a few escaped but… The cave blew up shortly before you were knocked out, if you had entered you'd have had maybe milliseconds before the whole thing went up into the sky…" Kouta spoke.

"You'd have made some of the distance…" Shimo's voice killed it. Kouta and Meiko looked at the young swordsman who slowly continued to tread forward. The Yuki didn't turn around, he didn't try to give Mana any looks or appear to be that troubled by his recognition.

"You were fast enough, your whole body was flowing with physical chakra, you'd have went in, saved some and saw the cave slowly exploding before you'd have carried them out. By the time you'd have noticed the explosion having begun you'd have made it out…" Shimo explained still walking on. Every couple of steps someone stepped on a brittle and long lost bone that cracked beneath their feet, it sounded a bit awkward having the topic of the conversation in mind.

"Then why…" Mana uttered, tears started to accumulate in her eyes but she desperately raced to swat her despair and sadness away. She shouldn't cry, she shouldn't… But could she ever get rid of the nightmares? Could any of them? Was Shimo even at all troubled by what he did!?

"Because you'd have suffered for it…" Shimo's head sunk down, his longer hair flowed freely over the young man's face covering it completely, his glasses kept on slipping off forcing the young man to fix them. "You'd have never saved all of them without killing yourself, you're not perfect, I'm not perfect… Even the Takigakure jounin who were billions of times faster and stronger than us and… It's not even a hyperbole… Even they acknowledged it was too dangerous to go in. As few as you have saved, you'd have hated yourself for failing to save everyone, in the process you'd have crippled yourself for life. I could allow neither of those things to happen"

Mana covered her eyes, she removed her hat from the bag and tossed it onto her head, forcing the tip of it to cover up her eyes. She didn't want to be seen crying. That was not the person she wanted to be, she couldn't be so… Weak… So human. She wanted to be someone who saved everyone, someone who was this amazing hero who inspired people to change themselves and change the cruel world around them.

"You had no right…" Mana said, she raced forward, widening the reach of her step, gracefully bouncing over the skulls and ribcages around the place before she overtook the Yuki and raced up right in front of him. She stopped right then and there forcing the swordsman to bump at her. The boy's head lowered so that their eyes could meet. Mana was quite a bit shorter than her friend so their stare-down would've looked quite strange and uneven.

"I had all the right in the world. What gives you the right to save whomever you want to save, to do all you do and sidetrack every chance you get to interfere with the affairs of other countries? Our behavior will probably be reported to Konoha soon and Fifth won't be grateful for it. If you have the right to throw stones at a Wind Country terrorist, annoying him to break out of control, if you have the stones to let loose a Tailed Beast of all things, if you dare attack a band of Justicars despite high public approval of those guys from most settlers and villagers, I had the right to stop my friend before she made a mistake she'd regret" Shimo coldly exclaimed right in Mana's face, the young man didn't even flinch, there was no regret in his face.

"Regret? What makes you think I'd have regretted it!?" Mana shouted out in her friend's face, he must've seen this quarrel coming, he must've known that if he stopped the magician from saving someone she'd blow up right in her face.

"Isn't this what's happening here? Regret? Don't you regret picking a fight with an opponent you couldn't beat? Bargaining your own life so you could win? Aren't you looking for the Box because you regret the decision you made? You said it, not me, you want the Box because you hope to get your chakra control back, you lost it because no one stopped you from committing utter stupidity. Because you had no friends by your side capable of standing your way and saying enough… Don't you regret overtraining and breaking your own body, rendering yourself weak and unable to stop Sugemi from…" Shimo stopped, finally he noticed that he was crossing a line. Mana slapped him angrily and began walking forward. She wanted to leave them, she wanted to just storm off her own separate way but that had already happened before and nothing good came of it.

She couldn't believe it! How could he claim that she was regretting a single action she made? Had it not been to those injuries that prevented her from stopping Sugemi she'd have not been as strong as she was after all those years, had it not been for her stepping in front of Hisako she'd have not saved a life of a young man, a misguided young man who wanted to be a criminal genius but because of her had his whole future to change his ways. She saved people because she's as stupid as she was. That was why she saved all those people, because she did things that to other people looked stupid. Her own friends didn't even believe in her…

How was she supposed to become this amazing hero who inspired change in people if she couldn't even convince her friends? The people who trusted her words, who should've trusted her at the very least didn't believe in her power to change anything. No one believed in her anymore, not even Shimo, not even the man she spent so much time training and growing with, not even her childhood friend… She was all alone, just the way she started it all. All those years and nothing changed, she grew stronger but people still mistrusted her, people still kept her from trying to do what she wanted to do. People still didn't believe that she was a hero who could save people instead of letting this cruel world claim them.

How could she stop people like the person who did it to those settlers if she had both the evil ones and her own closest friends to fight over it?


	183. Rivers of Apathy

"How many days has it been?" Kouta looked at Mana sitting further from the fire with a bowl of mushroom stew still in his hands. All the mushrooms the four had gathered in Takigakure were now compensating for the lack of notable settlements where they could've bought food and supplies in. That being said, if they were attacked by stronger bandits they'd have no tools to fight back with… Meiko's weapons dulled out from the past battles forcing her to have to resolve to fist fighting mostly, everyone's ninja kits had run empty except Mana's who managed to save up her steel tipped cards since discovering the ability to use physical chakra.

"Since Mana hasn't eaten? I dunno… I'm just kinda glad she's not cooking anymore…" Meiko tried to lighten up the mood but somehow her jokes fell on troubled ears.

"At some point I will need to force it down her throat. Her survival and well-being is directly dependant on our mission performance" Shimo angrily grunted looking at the fire lit sky. There were no visible stars, only murky dark clouds that could only be seen because of the flaring red fire of theirs.

"You're not the one to talk, you haven't been eating much either lately…" Kouta replied looking at Shimo with a raised eyebrow. "At this point it's clear that both of you are pissed at each other but also feeling guilty for something. When will it be enough of this self-imposed punishment?"

"You do need some food, you need to be strong enough to fight off someone that decides to go at us. Lately we've seen plenty of that…" Meiko added on to Kouta's remark. Since Mana was too far away from the fire, sitting alone in the darker corners of the Mountain Graveyard but not far away so that she isn't seen, the two decided to gang up on Shimo and make him eat at least half a decent portion.

"Yeah but I'm a ninja, I can live without food for months, Mana is a civilian, just physical chakra won't sustain a decent ninja metabolism, she needs just as much food as a normal person who walks intensely throughout the entire day does" Shimo fended off both of them coming at him at once. The Yuki appeared to have had enough of this bickering, he stood up and took his sword with him moving off further away from the fire to train. It was quite impressive that he could still move just as fast and split the ground beneath his feet open just as strong when he had only eaten a couple of mushrooms a day, just to sustain the illusion that he ate something. Still, that was a luxury compared to Mana. The girl didn't eat and she claimed angrily that she drank water but the trio had some reasons to doubt that. That big fight in Takigakure may have just ruined their team and no one felt sure if it could even be stitched back together.

Kouta looked at Meiko questioningly before taking another look at Mana who was just meditating further away from the fire. It was clear that she didn't wish to talk to them.

"How's your training been lately?" the medical ninja asked.

"I dunno, I didn't ask Mana to resume it, I just… She's just so cold and… I don't want to add up on whatever's going on with her with my shit" Meiko replied cleaning another bowl. Wonder of wonders, despite having extra portions of food left over from Mana and Shimo, Meiko was not content with that. She did finish the food since she wasn't sure how well the stew would've held up if left alone and Kouta's cooking was a bit better than Mana's but… The refusal to talk or eat of those two really troubled her.

"You should…" Kouta looked down at a dusty and cracked skull laying on the ground right beneath their feet by the fire. "She's probably suffering a lot over what happened, she thinks so strangely that I'm not sure if she blames us for what happened or herself. Either way, I'd like to talk to her myself but… Things are more awkward with us now than they have ever been, maybe you should ask Mana to train you and I'll talk to Shimo. Hopefully we can make those two eat together by the time we reach the Sound Village"

Meiko looked down and to the side before looking at Mana's straightened and proud back as she meditated. Approaching the magician would be a thousand times scarier now than fighting off a bunch of Justicars in a blowing up cave system with her friends potentially drowning in magma… The blacksmith wasn't really sure what Kouta meant by the whole "awkward" thing, she has noticed that Kouta and Mana were really sensitive with each other the whole time and blushed all the time when talking about each other or looking at each other for too long but didn't get it nor did she see what exactly could've changed about that. Still, if Kouta made it such a big deal, it was probably because it was… For him at least.

"Yeah… I'll try…" Meiko sighed standing up and loudly crunching and grinding the bone dust beneath her feet as she approached Mana. The blacksmith touched the magician's shoulder softly. She waited but Mana didn't react, Meiko clenched her fingers a little just to cause some slight discomfort but snap the magician out… Nothing. Meiko tried talking to Mana, shaking her or pinching her cheeks. Nothing snapped the girl out.

"Look… I know you're angry. We did something or… Rather didn't do something and… I get it, I mean, I don't really but… I get it that it was important to you and even if I don't understand your feelings, I never do but… We're really worried about you so maybe you can eat just this once and then we can train a little? Please answer…" Meiko exclaimed in a sad and soft voice, the blacksmith was almost whiny in how sensitive she got trying to get her friend to reply but Mana sat completely still without as much as opening her eyes. She must've been really mad. Come to think of it Meiko has never seen Mana get so personally mad before, sure Mana was always overly protective of other people and she did yell and attack people who threatened other people's lives but… Meiko couldn't place her finger on when the magician was angry like this, so personally hateful and completely shut in.

"Okay… Whatever I did… I'm sorry… I really am, we all are" Meiko slapped her forehead and walked off back to the seat by the fire rubbing her short hair that were beginning to grow out of control and now went past Meiko's shoulders a little and also wiping sweat and tears off her face. That night Meiko decided to train alone, just shadowboxing and some easy exercises just to let some built up steam off.

Sometime later Kouta walked back from Shimo's front. "Yeah… Shimo's not budging. He keeps insisting that nothing of consequence happened, he did what he had to do and says he's not even sorry. He is adamant that he did everything right and acted surprised that I still thought about it, he said he thought everyone forgot it already"

Meiko huffed as she punched air a couple of times before weaving around, dodging imaginary blows and then jumped on one hand in full armor set and did some one-handed push ups. "Ooof… If he did… Ooof… He'd have eaten his share… Ooof…" Meiko replied in an almost rhetoric observation as drops of sweat dropped from her forehead. She wasn't really using any augmentations currently. If she was using augmentations she'd actually improve much slower, it was a thing she noticed recently.

If one's power had a certain number and chakra augmentation was able to add a multiplier to that number, increasing the number instead of the multiplied version let her grow stronger more rapidly, it also carried no hidden risk of breaking her body and her chakra network so that was good too…

"Clearly…" Kouta scratched his elbow, it was strange how frail and small the young man seemed when he wasn't fighting and in full tension of his body, shaping and malforming his own limbs in battle. He almost looked like a simple rather short young man. "Any luck with Mana-chan?" he asked.

Meiko angrily shook her head without letting it interrupt her training rhythm. "She's silent, completely ignoring me"

"Yeah, she's by far the more hurt one. Or at least taking it worse… Shimo's problems lie with Mana and her overreaction, Mana's problem is somehow with all of us" Kouta scratched his neck, he was getting tired just looking at Meiko working out.

With a graceful leap Meiko flipped back on both feet and stretched herself out.

"Are we not all to blame? Sure the Takigakure ninja said it was a bad idea and didn't even budge but… We could all have joined in with Mana on the search, we'd have multiplied her chances a thousand times instead of just standing still and watching Shimo betray her" Meiko washed sweat off her face. She was feeling hungry but for the first time in a while she decided to ignore that instinct.

"We couldn't have all went in, we'd have gotten in each other's way, we'd have each other to worry about, we'd never know who entered, who was where and who managed to leave. Going back in there was the wrong idea, it was way too risky to be even considered too risky, it was a whole other level of risky, it was utter madness" Kouta annoyingly exclaimed without noticing Mana pass by and sit by the fire. The girl longingly looked at him as she passed by, hearing just all the wrong words in the process. Despite hearing Kouta openly discussing her intent to save those dwellers with dismissal Mana did not reply, she just sat down and wrapped her arms around her quivering naked knees wrapping into a little ball of suppressed pain.

"Look Mana… I didn't… Mean…" he tried to squirm out of an awkward situation but she didn't reply, she didn't even look back at him. Almost like she didn't even hear a word he said while she was looking right at him up close to him.

"You've been skipping your training, Meiko" Mana spoke up for the first time in a while, "Are you already satisfied with your results?" she asked almost like she was disappointed in Meiko if she made such a conclusion.

"What are you talking about!? I still suck! I was talking to you right there when you were meditating!" Meiko yelled back at Mana. It was clear that the blacksmith was beginning to get caught up in the major schism in the team. It wasn't like the team was just cracked in two pieces or camps formed or anything – anyone in this team no longer wanted to be a part of it. Everyone was angry at everyone and wanted to just end it all.

"Oh… Sorry, I don't really hear the environment very well when I'm in trance" Mana mumbled out in a somewhat apologetic tone. "I used to be able to perceive it just fine but… After I… You know…" she uttered out like a child trying to whimper out why she didn't read the needed chapter of "Trigonometry of the Shuriken Trajectories" in Ninja Academy.

"Oh… I… Didn't know that, I just thought you were mad at me" Meiko mustered out rubbing her neck uncomfortably to the point where the skin on the blacksmith's neck got swollen red.

"I can't be mad at any of you. You did the right thing, the situation was too risky, just like Kouta said. There wasn't even a 1% chance that someone could pull all the disguised dwellers out from the entire cave system in just microseconds left to the explosion and magma flood. I don't blame anyone that you didn't choose to go in. I'd have blamed you if you chose to try…" Mana replied.

Kouta and Meiko looked at each other curiously before looking back at Mana. "Then what is this all about? You not eating, not talking, just brooding in the corner separately from everyone else" Kouta called her out.

"I'm not mad about you guys not going in. I'm mad at myself, I'm mad because my entire life I wished to be a hero who inspires people, somehow who is a hero that inspires change in people, desire to change the cruel world around them. And yet my friends didn't change, they didn't even believe in me enough to let me try convince them, live up to my dream… They just knocked me out cold from behind" Mana spoke in a voice that was comprised of both bitterness of betrayal but also some anger and disappointment.

"That's…" Meiko opened her mouth to object but Shimo intervened as he was passing through, having just finished his training and smelling of sweat and rotten dead bodies as those kind of scents were often brought up when the substance Mountain Graveyard was comprised of was split open and all the skeletons were shown to the beholders above.

"Stop it. You can't reason with Nakotsumi Mana. That's one thing me and Sugemi have learned over our time working together. She'll always wish to be stupid but she'll scold other people for being as stupid as she is. She's just in a rush to dig herself six feet under, become a martyr. But guess what, Mana… There are people in this world who care about you, with all your stupidity and hypocrisy, you make those people give up their own lives and lives of other people for your survival so next time you be a little bitch, you ask yourself – is it right to react this way to those people when being like those people is all you want to do" he said before walking off and beginning to build a tent for himself to spend the night in.

Eventually Meiko and Kouta both stood up and went off, building themselves their own tents and going to bed. Mana remained seated by the fire, even long after the fire dwindled and went out, even while buzzing mosquitoes began craving her blood, even while the deadly and maddening silence of Mountain Graveyard that made one claw their ears open kicked in. Sitting. Thinking…

Next morning the group set out early. No one was surprised having found Mana just sitting by the dead fire, she needed some extra encouragement to get up and keep moving, they weren't too far away from Otogakure or the Sound Village. As the never changing views, plains and literal graveyards of the Mountain Graveyard changed and passed Mana began thinking about Otogakure, namely minding her apathy towards it. Her motivation to find the Box, her motivation to figure out the clue of the sphere they found in the desert ruins of Wind Country had greatly snuffed up and numbed.

Maybe before realizing the horridness of a whole settlement being experimented on by a madman before let loose as these misshapen tunnel dwellers, before being drowned in magma by intolerant men and women who masked with the social hood of justice Mana could've wondered what kind of place the Sound Village was, what kind of people lived there and just what obstacles she may have found in her way. Usually Mana made scenarios and plans in preparations for any possible obstacle, she was schemer, she loved to plan, to overthink and overanalyse things all the time but now… There was just little point in her heart, where once was love and compassion now laid only grief, regret and apathy.

"So, Mana, what kind of place this Sound Village is?" Meiko kept asking her, wondering about even the smallest details. Of course she'd ask Mana, someone who spent countless days in the archive reading of history and being an all-around curious young lady.

"Don't know exactly… Heard it has a rich musical culture scene. Whatever you know in Konoha to be entertainment, in Otogakure it's dominated by music" Mana mumbled out.

Meiko looked really weirded out, judging from Meiko's observations below the ruins of Wind Country the girl loved music. It must've been quite exciting for the young blacksmith to see a whole village the size of a small country focusing on music. An industrial and entertainment haven for artists, bards and traveling musicians. It was said that Guru Ayushi really loved the place and had countless funds raised to help the place grow and develop. There were few notable Otogakure ninja but the music it produced was chased after, the records originated in the village may as well have been made of solid gold…

In that moment Mana looked at Meiko's whistling and grinning, also immensely silly face and she couldn't help but crack a grin. Where once was apathy drowning Mana down under, where the bodies of the tunnel dwellers wrapped their long cold dead fingers around the girl's throat and feet and dragged her down in the river of madness and grief her simple minded friend managed to extend her hand for the magician overpowering all of those bad memories of the dead she failed to save. Yoinking Mana straight from out of their very cold dead fingers…

How could she not do so, she was Wakizashi Meiko, the young blacksmith kunoichi who was so ashamed of being disowned by her very own clan that she disowned her own last name and couldn't make up anything else but the name of a short sword. She was so simple minded but also so happy… Not a care in the world, none of the sadness and despair Mana struggled with and the magician thought just for a second that if there was anything to be done that Meiko would never have to feel the way Mana does every day, she'd walk to the end of the Earth to achieve that.

"Did you know that there's a ninja in Otogakure who is also a great composer and his tracks actually physically heal those listening?" Mana mumbled out with a slightly brightened tone.

"What!? Is that for real!? That's fricking crazy!" Meiko almost screamed out.

Shimo cracked a sideways grin.

"That is interesting, how does that work?" he wondered.

Mana sighed and tipped the front of her hat so that her face received little of the autumn Sun that broke through the eternally dark patches of clouded Mountain Graveyard sky.

"You do know that sounds are basically vibrations, right? Well the human body is composed of water so when those vibrations are infused with chakra…" she began a long explanation. Despite Meiko looking like the least likely person to listen to such long and overdrawn explanations she looked with the childish eyes of glee the likes of which Mana had not seen for quite a while. Explaining the magic of medical musical ninjutsu was just as exciting as showing magic tricks to little kids, a sensation and chills which Mana had long since missed.


	184. Clef

It wasn't too long before the obsidian rocky grounds of the Mountain Graveyard, contrasted only by the creepy bony remains of people who once died in this place, whether it was in the battle that formed the place, or in the power struggles between bandit gangs afterwards, changed into a more ground shifting and industrial zone. Once in a while the crew encountered a still working natural gas or oil pumping device or some sort of ground pounding pneumatic hammer of gigantic proportions that seemingly crushed one's ear drums from kilometers away with its crushing sound. It was like the goal of this gigantic machinery was to crush the ground all the way to the other side of the planet…

"It's grinding the rocky minerals into shards, I think… If I knew how deep the pressure pulse goes I'd probably shriek my voice out!" Meiko scratched her chin after examining the grinded dust that flew out in blinding clouds from under its rampaging pounds.

The change signaled that the crew was slowly approaching Otogakure. A once desolate place, a gentle grassland where animals roamed free and there was nothing but green plains as far as an eye could see. These plains were initially much larger than Konohagakure and belonged to Fire Country and the Fire Daimyo. That was before it was decided to find another ninja village here, close to Konoha, where the locals could be tutored by Konoha and fostered into another ninja village which would potentially grow strong enough to rival the Great Ninja Villages and in such case Fire Daimyo would have ruled over two Great Ninja Villages greatly expanding his influence through intimidation of great power.

The Daimyo then gathered a large number of ninja from around the land, excused some criminals that wished to reform asking of them to take important positions in this newly established village he called Otogakure or the Sound Village. The people who lived their lives as rogues knew very little of how to manage a village but they didn't want to resume their past shady lives, knowing full well that being so close to the Konoha borders they'd have ninja swarming the place and overthrowing them within moments of one shady action from their part.

Having no idea how to attract ninja to live and breed, creating a new generation of ninja in their newly found village the criminals simply attracted musicians and travelling artists from all around the world, asking them to tutor the youth who were supplied by Konoha Ninja Academy's exchange programs in the arts of music. The hopes were that once the young ones knew of the musical arts as well as the art of ninjutsu they'd eventually combine the two together. The result was not entirely a failure of this plan – a handful of young ones found a newly discovered love for the art and began a slow prospering tradition of combining ninja arts with music and sound in general.

The secondary effect which the newly appointed council of Otogakure could not have predicted was the musical culture that formed in the village. Common settlers who were accepted into the village freely as new villages, allowed to live in village conditions instead being forced to work the land under constant threat of bandit raids and rogue ninja playing with their lives like a pretentious child plays with the lives of ants beneath their magnifying glass. Those very simpletons became fascinated with the music they've heard as all the traveling musicians attracted to tutor the youth decided to make a quick ryo entertaining the locals.

Eventually simpletons of basic tastes became experts, in just years villagers became dabblers of the miraculous arts of music and began playing the instruments themselves. They began creating new styles of music, experiments and a musical celebrity culture unlike anything else formed in the village. A cultural awareness of such exquisite tastes could have only been found in the royal and elitist districts of Kirigakure which was known for its snobbish and posh tastes in culture and entertainment. However whereas Kirigakure devoured all cultural arts: film, theatre, circus and music, Otogakure simply became the capital of rather average ninja and amazing musicians.

It was a mystery how the village was still standing, they had very few notable ninja who have made a name for themselves. It wasn't because of how young the place was, it couldn't have been more than a hundred years old, by that time Konoha had produced multiple Hokage and Sannin level ninja. One would think that in this world of violence and war the village would have been swept aside like an unsuccessful experiment but strangely enough it wasn't even raided once. Maybe it was that even the meanest soul enjoyed the soothing melodies and recorded sounds of music hailing from the village, more likely it was the close distance from the powerhouse of the Ninja World – Konohagakure that prevented more significant raids.

This strangely devoid of violence environment allowed the Sound Village to amass great financial stability and riches, by the time the members of the first Otogakure council died out and the generations shifted the village was an economic powerhouse if nothing else. Producing millions of ryo per single record produced by a single of thousands practicing musicians of the place, even Mana was slightly jealous of the fame and great admiration as well as the rich celebrity culture of the place.

Such peaceful and prosperous environment attracted one great man to foster his dreams in that place – Guru Ayushi. The spokesman of peace and perseverance, Guru Ayushi hosted multiple fund raisers and publically spoke about how close Otogakure was to his dream of a perfect land – a land that grew ninja just as a symbolic notion and for respect of the ancient tradition, if anything else. A village that could've paid off any assailant harboring as much as an ill thought, a village that took more pride in its rich culture than physical and military power or a sleeping time bomb in the form of a Jinchuuriki carrying inside them a bomb of mass destruction capable of decimating the planet if they as much as sneezed the wrong way.

Guru's approval of the place only made its respect among the other villages and countries skyrocket. Even the more bloody Kirigakure would have never made moves inside the village walls, not publically, and any spies of Kirigakure caught in Otogakure would've been instantly disowned and declared working as rogues and under no orders from the village whereas usually Kirigakure would've taken great pride in such men and women who have worked inside the walls of a village for so long that they've amassed a fortune of information by the time they were captured and any loss of face or a treasured spy would've been inconsequential compared to the wealth of data amassed by these highly trained agents of deceit.

Finally, the dark evening sky was lit up by neon lights, a familiar crunch and sweet softness of home soil met Mana's sandals, gentle cold evening grass playfully tickled her feet as the coaly surfaces of the Mountain Graveyard were no more. It was strange how the team haven't met a single bandit in the place – usually the reputation of the place was that it fostered endless squabbles and power struggles between gangs and served as a shelter for the most dangerous rogue ninja hiding in the Fire Country. Usually one couldn't have taken two steps in the place without encountering a half-dead starving bandit trying to rob them with a knife made of hardened toothbrushes or fishbone.

"We're here…" Meiko shrieked out like a schoolgirl, Mana looked at her with gently glowing eyes, it must've been nothing short of miraculous for the blacksmith to finally place her foot in the sanctuary of the musical arts. Mana had to admit that despite the recent events making her insides bitter and making her feel half-dead she also had a certain flare of excitement to see the place of such rich celebrity culture. The magician wanted to see the place for quite some time, there was so much she could've learned from Otogakure as a rising fame of stage magic… Or has-been rising fame… She's been away for so long that the girl wondered if at least one child who walked into her shows with eyes of fire-cracking glee would've even remembered the young lady they've idolized in their youth, then again, it was just several months that she's been gone… Felt like forever, honestly.

"No guards at the gate?" Kouta wondered looking around, his dark brown hair flipped to the sides as the boy frantically tried to locate at least one guard trying to ask them for their identities or question their intentions in the place. Usually even ninja returning from missions in Konoha would've had to fill blanks and paperwork right after entering the gate. This was a little ridiculous, honestly…

"Hmph…" Shimo grunted before his eyes caught a beautiful and barely covered behind of a young lady, possibly an aspiring musician as she's been walking with some sort of a paper and reading from it, reciting what appeared to be lines of poetry, perhaps a song. Shimo instantly disappeared from the group, following the young woman. Meiko wanted to go after him but Kouta shook his head.

"Let him go, this place seems to be an entertainment center more than a military establishment. I could've never guessed. He'll find us, don't worry, let the guy have his fun, maybe the tensions between us will ease that way. It wouldn't be too bad for you two to have a little fun as well, there was little of that lately…" Kouta also pointed at Mana with his chin, signaling for the blacksmith that maybe it was better if Mana and Shimo didn't have to see each other for a while.

Meiko didn't really appear to have gotten the clue, she just jumped up and grabbed Mana by the collar of her shirt dragging her aside.

"Roger! We'll find Mana a male butt to stare at as well!" she chanted out much to Kouta's protest but the crowd around them was getting so thick and intense that the boy soon found himself lost.

"Wait… Don't… Show Mana any butts…" Kouta shouted out but his voice fell to deaf ears.

Shimo followed the young lady dressed in nothing but strangely glowing and shimmery dark purple leather into a small block of flats, it had a small waiting room before entering the staircase that lead to the actual flat complex where the young lady dropped down to sit on an overly soft armchair. Shimo dropped down nearby. He didn't care about making a move, all he cared about was opening the doors for the ignorant and absent minded woman and see to it that she returned home safely… Just like the old days…

Shimo finally drew his eyes away from the woman who didn't even know that Shimo gently walked in front of her to help her bypass at least four manholes and opened three doors as well as gently lead her through an arc she would've bumped into normally. She was so absorbed by her sheets of papers that she appeared to know nothing else but their strangely mosaic appearance and the symbols contained within.

"Thank you for walking me home, young man…" she spoke finally informing Shimo that his attempts to safely guide her home weren't completely ignored.

"I'm not a criminal, I just… I wanted to do the right thing, a young woman like you walking so absent mindedly in such a big village…" he spoke up

The woman placed the papers into a small handbag, folding them with little care for their integrity, even accidentally tearing the tip of one of them and laughed into her palm playfully.

"You are not from around here, are you? This place isn't known for its criminal activity, maybe further at the edges of the village where the industrial districts lay. The central area is controlled by the Syndicate" she said "Ever since those guys took over there isn't any street crime, no murders in the alleyways, no muggings or rapes. A woman is as safe in the streets as she could be around these parts"

"Wait! Syndicate!?" Shimo shouted up jumping off his armchair and instinctively grabbing his sword and pressing it tighter by his hip.

"Oh? You don't know? Yes, this place does not have an "Otokage" so to say, it never had because electing an Otokage incites challenge, it says to the other village that there is a ninja in this place powerful enough to call the shots and place themselves among the other Kage. There is only the council but having the history of the city in mind they are quite apologetic of criminal syndicates, their parents belonged to the rogue ranks themselves. The Syndicate runs the place, it's public news really. They control crime and they don't dabble or allow small time crime to happen. Small times who don't belong to the Syndicate and act up, all criminals of passion they disappear faster than you would inform an actual Police Force" the lady smiled as if she didn't just say that she was content about an actual criminal syndicate running her home.

Shimo grunted unintelligibly. "It's something for another day… Say, fair lady, maybe you'd know where and when a musician named "Notasa" performs? We need to talk to her"

"Oh, are you maybe a journalist? No… You wouldn't be foolish enough to carry a sword if you were…" the lady began pondering.

"I'd be most grateful if you stopped flirting and beating around the bush and answered the question" Shimo sighed moving his grey hair out of his sight as they have become long and unruly enough to obstruct his view at times. At times like this the boy wondered how Mana managed her hair as the girl never really appeared to cut or restrain them, at least she never bragged about it, most girls would, wouldn't they?

"A guy who followed me home asks me to stop flirting… Sorry, the people in this place are really relaxed and pleasure driven, I'll have to apologize if you find us odd. You seem to really be not from around… Well, Notasa is performing tonight in the Ponac Hall, it's couple of kilometers from here, just ask the people around and they'll lead you to it" the girl giggled, she really did look like she was relaxed enough to not care enough to lie.

"Wait… Can't you lead me to it?" Shimo hissed out in confusion.

"I could…" the lady giggled before bumping the young man's exposed and tense chest muscles with her playful frail finger and dragging it down, getting him excited before pulling her papers out and resuming her reading activities "But I'd miss the pleasure of seeing you stumble around, you're too cute that way"

Shimo has never rushed off awkwardly from a room so fast in his entire life. "People here are weird!" he whispered under his own nose as loud as whispering could be done.

"Meiko, for the last time, Kouta didn't ask you to show me male butts… Why would he try to get me laid, I mean… You know? Doesn't make sense…" Mana tried explaining it to Meiko who continuously dragged Mana from one good looking man to another shoving her imbalanced frame to their lower bodies uncomfortably. Mana was not quite sure which was stranger, that Meiko was interpreting Kouta's proposition to keep Mana and Shimo separate for a while this way, or that the men Meiko rudely shoved Mana in their faces didn't seem to mind. Strangely enough they were down for a potential advance but then Meiko dragged Mana elsewhere just like that leaving them confused.

"Hello there ladies!" a couple of guys tried to stop Meiko and Mana but Meiko dragged Mana away and finally gave the magician a chance to straighten out and fix her clothes from all the carrying and dragging around the Meiko has been doing.

"Why wouldn't Kouta want to find you a friend?" Meiko didn't appear to get it at all…

"Doesn't matter… We've lost both Shimo and Kouta. I'll assume that Kouta is sensible enough to find us a place to sleep in through the night and Shimo will… Hopefully not get himself killed or kill anyone. We should probably go look for this Notasa lady…" Mana concluded before she heard sly comments about her clothes from behind and looked at them.

She was all in rags, her black skirt was torn up and ragged in multiple areas, her sandals were completely worn out and basically just a lifeless lump of leather, her blazer was long lost somewhere along the way, most likely incinerated to the point where not a tread of it remained. Her shirt was nowhere near the color it began as and had multiple fist sized holes, one of which was ironically enough showing her undergarments which greatly shamed Mana having in mind that she was standing in the middle of a densely populated ninja village which reminded more of a pleasure town.

"Maybe… We should chill and get some new clothes and supplies…" she blushed trying to calmly move her shirt in a way that would cover up the pink slip of her undergarment covering the chest.

"Yeah!" Meiko shouted out excitedly grabbing Mana by her shoulder and running off so fast that Mana was lifted off the ground and comically floated up like a flag. Despite Mana's desperate pleads for Meiko to slow down the blacksmith just kept on running, with all of her inhuman speed, evading each and every single passer-by of this dense pleasure town which was probably as difficult as evading raindrops in the rain. Mana closed her eyes, her shame knew no bounds but then she realized that all this typical Meiko's antics made her slowly move on from other, more dire things she could be thinking about… Even if the alternative was thinking about the shame of her ruined clothing and being carried around like a bag of vegetables, spun and carelessly flung around…

Kouta looked around and sighed, realizing that he was left all alone. The boy looked around and tried locating the nearest inn. All of those buildings were so tall, each block was at least two or three times the size of Konohagakure's buildings as the village appeared to concentrate all of their villagers in the couple of large and modern if not futuristic districts where Konoha spread them somewhat evenly amongst its territory. Slowly and shyly the medical ninja approached the nearest villager and asked them for the location of the nearest place he and his friends could stay in.

"Shit, Meiko carried off the bag with all the material stuff…" Kouta cursed realizing that the blacksmith carried off the Audra shard filled bag with her which served as all of their bargaining chips in this village since they've long since ran out of coins to pay with which was impressive knowing that they once raided the bandit raider encampment…


	185. Ninja Noir

Kouta slowly and tediously roamed the industrialized outskirts of Otogakure. It was much easier to find a place that'd host them for what little remained of their coins than it'd be to find Meiko and Mana in that mad hive of people. These men and women appeared to be so insanely pleasure driven, the entire population of the village swarmed in the central districts and filled the endless shops, entertainment halls and gambling houses. The medical ninja found such excessive amounts of people exhausting, maybe it was just the sleeping warrior inside of him – it was much harder to anticipate an incoming threat when one had to check more people than their eye could register and count.

Yet another industrial district rotten and rundown inn refused to house Kouta and three more people, even if they flocked into one room for the price which the boy carried with him. It would've been so much easier to communicate a clear plan – who was responsible for what, who was going where etc. Had they been a well-oiled and running machine of teamwork they once had been perhaps that'd have been the case. Now everyone was so glad to finally get a break of the others that somehow the idea completely slipped from everyone's minds.

"And what if we returned with really pricy stones? Minerals unlike any you've seen before?" Kouta asked out of desperation, he's had enough aimless wondering begging inn keepers to slash their prices. It was about time he tried Shimo's way of the slimy tongued rogue. The Juugo has seen the Yuki at work when he spoke to the desert raiders and plenty more times, just how hard could it have been?

"I may, in theory, be interested. What are those minerals? Gold? We have plenty of that here, we live in an industrial district, boy. Every day gold ores reach me from customers too drunk to count ryo properly…" the man replied, Kouta barely restrained the instinct to curse, somehow Shimo made bartering seem so easy but when he had to do it, it just didn't work…

"Audra ore shards. Artificially crafted. A single shard could buy this whole damned establishment. You're making me question my own stupid decision to offer them to you of all people…" Kouta answered truthfully. Honesty was probably not the better trait of a trainee spokesperson.

The inn keeper laughed out loud so hard he clenched his fatty sides. He certainly looked like the kind who paid for their greasy food with gold ore instead of ryo. Kouta realized that the man distrusted him, perhaps he was not wrong to do so, after all, he lived in a shadier part of the place, also he was just told tales, by a teenager no less, of an ore of one of the priciest minerals in the world, one that was never supposed to exist in the first place…

"'Ey, boy!" a suited up gentleman with a fancy top hat, strangely not as fancy as Mana's which was surprising only because of how expensive the man's attire seemed otherwise, approached Kouta with some backup behind him. These gents all appeared to be formally dressed, the spokesman of the crew had black as oil mutton chops and a pair of moles on his face that looked almost comical. "Theoretically, if dose shards exist… How would you, allegedly, come into knowin' about dose?" the man mumbled out in a strangely familiar to the young man dialect.

"Syndicate? Here? Maybe it's some other band who just dress and act the same?" Kouta wondered. It couldn't have been possible, technically they could've been extending their influence zone but then why would they hang out in some rundown inn at the edge of Otogakure. It was a good twelve kilometers from the main city, Kouta had to use his actual movement speed to get there in seconds as opposed to the slowed down charade the whole team put up just so Mana didn't get left in the dust.

Ninja moved at great speeds, even Mana had the ability, in her current shape, to circle the planet a couple of times in just a handful of moments. Yet moving at such pace would've been foolish for a multitude of reasons. First of all it consumed chakra to augment one's abilities to the max, one would find themselves strained by the time they arrived at the destination they wished to be in, they'd also risk straining their networks too much moving that way. It was always wiser to keep augmentation down to the necessary moments in battle. Another reason was because of the chakra they'd emit, such a fast mover would flare up as a chakra signature for any nearby sensors or chakra tracking devices any mercenaries would wield, ninja wished to be quiet and discrete and it was much more so to travel quietly but slower than to flash to the location of their desire in a mere moment, attracting the attention of everybody in the process. Yet another reason was perception, it was troublesome to perceive miniscule objects in such hasty movements, when moving so fast one was begging to run into a trap or just blast through every tree, mountain and boulder in their way spending out more chakra on perception augmentation and endurance augmentation to survive such a nasty trip, also making much more noise in the process. Still, when moving in such small distances Kouta had little restraint from using his actual speed…

"That would be because I have them…" Kouta replied, "Looted everything what remained after the collapse of the Katabami Mine, right out from under the Syndicate's noses…" the boy added to the spite, checking the reaction of these men.

The men instantly reached for their weapons. They found none. Loud cracks and bits of pieces of steel signaled that Kouta had long since disarmed them and broke their blade firing pipes into pieces, the boy had to hand it to them that he was beginning to feel sweaty and his breath slowly picked up the pace, perhaps we was overusing his tremendous speed advantage. Maybe he needed some more food to replenish his stamina since his weakened and restless body was struggling to keep up with the boy's inhuman demands.

"Gentlemen, please!" the inn keeper shouted, "I pay protection costs, how different is it from racketeering if you brawl inside my inn?" he tried to reason. The Syndicate boys turned tails, but not because they were reasonable men or saw the man's point, no, they knew they were outmanned and outgunned by a single unarmed ninja. There were literally no tricks or ways in which they could've beaten Kouta, even with their guns all of their kunai would've simply bounced off of the boy unless the mafiosi learned of ways of enhancing their fired kunai with chakra somehow.

"Alright, guys, let's go, but our other boys will hear about dis, kid? We're gonna find you and yer friends, ye ain't hidin' in dis joint for long, ya hear me?" one of the fleeing gangsters tried to fire off empty threats at the medical ninja but Kouta knew that scum like the Syndicate only posed a threat to just starting out genin, not his skilled and experienced team, not a team who had already beaten the crew a couple of times and knew all their tricks. This time they won't have those Audra skin covered brutes to bail them out either, even if they would, by now the team knew how to beat them…

"Good, do me a favor and bring everyone in your organization to me, that way you'll spare me the trouble of looking for you" Kouta replied turning around and looking with a sorry glare at the inn keeper.

"Any chance this changed your mind?" he curiously shrugged.

"Not a chance, kid, if anything it enforced it, if you're picking a fight with the Syndicate, you're picking a fight with the whole damned village…" he rasped out angrily.

"Are you sure this is what girls wear around these parts?" Mana wondered looking at her leather jacket and skirt. She looked like a punk missing just a dirty pink mohawk and a bunch piercings. Meiko just giggled staring Mana down, she had little right to mock Mana having bought male clothing, the blacksmith wore a white zip-up tracksuit with black strips and trainers. This village had the oddest sense of fashion and Mana felt torn between the shame of walking around dressed in a button down with a leather jacket and a leather skirt and dressing herself in male clothing as well. To her neither of the options sounded reasonable.

"It'll be fine, we've been roaming the shops for a whole couple of hours, I never thought of you as such a shopping diva, Mana…" Meiko laughed awkwardly shoving her fist into her throat just to shut herself up from cracking into laughter. "It can't be that much more restraining than your usual clothes…" the blacksmith couldn't help but slip in a joke of a more biting fashion.

Mana sighed and flipped up her top hat, Meiko was right, the two wasted far too much time looking for suitable clothes and the goal was not to look good, it was to find something to change their ruined clothes.

"Fine, but we're not buying any spares from here…" the magician agreed and the two finally left out to look for this Notasa lady. They were in the central most crowded district and from what they already knew the kid they were looking for was by far the biggest starlet in the village so this must've been the only district where a star of such a level would perform. The question was just when and where exactly, also would she allow the team of ninja from Konoha to even approach her with the consult of what exactly the sphere said…

"Excuse me, would you know where Notasa would be performing, today if possible, we've come from another village and would very much like to hear her perform before we go home…" Mana asked a young man who just stared her down with the most awkward looking eyes, even when Meiko butt in it didn't help much. All they got were a bunch of sly remarks and suggestions to take them there if it was on a date. Ironically enough things weren't much more pleasant to deal with when the magician tried asking the opposite gender.

"Wow, people here are so weird…" she grunted slapping her own forehead, "Why would a girl ever suggest to take another girl out on a date?"

Meiko slapped her hands together a couple of times thinking about something in a deep corner of her mind before shrugging, "Yeah, doesn't make much sense… That's other cultures for you…"

Just before Mana tried to approach another pair of young friends walking down the busy street the two noticed a bunch of kids running down the alleyway. It definitely looked weird that someone would purposefully enter such a dark and cold looking place if they were as young as the children the magician saw but she was forced to write it down to the differences of culture. At this point when she was so overwhelmed by differences of two such close in their locations villages, it was tough to say what was weird and what was just a small cultural difference.

"Excuse me, would you know by any chance where…" Mana began asking but she heard a gut wrenching scream from the alleyway, the magician instantly dashed off at that direction ditching the group of young people she was trying to question, her worn out and torn up sandals quickly carried Mana's hungry and tired body through the paved stone streets and into the damp and dark alleyway where not even a single spark of light shined. The magician tried to follow the imagined location of the sound but the truth was it could've come from anywhere. Her new clothes squirmed and rubbed awkwardly but they didn't restrain Mana too much, much to the girl's calmness of heart as it was tough to say when she'd get a decent attire change.

Mana just had a whole bunch of people die on her watch, she wasn't about to let any more die, if there was one chance there was anything she could've done… Meiko shouted out the magician's name trying to call her to the blacksmith's location, her ninja's augmented hearing and perception must've allowed the girl to better pick up the exact location of the sound and Mana followed her friend's voice without hesitation or question. It was so dark…

By the time the magician reached Meiko, and in terms a source of light coming from an open window and a gathering crowd she was shown just who uttered the scream… It was so cruel when the last breath to come from someone's chest was a scream.

On the cold stone paved alleyway laid a little girl, she had a whole body riddled with small kunai blades but her face looked relatively calm, she must've died quick. Whoever wanted to kill her must've tried really hard to kill her and do it quick, still, the pain must've been too much for the kid to not utter a single scream.

"A murder? Here? I almost feel sorry for the perp…"

"The Syndicate will have the shitface's head for this…"

"Wow, I wonder who's gonna have it worse, this poor kid or whoever did this once the Boss gets his hands on 'im…"

"A random alleyway crime? Here? When was the last time that happened?"

"Look at that body… She's riddled with kunai, almost like it was a Syndicate hit, could it have been? Are the Syndicates doing this now?"

A whole bunch of wild banter reached Mana's ears as the crowd began gathering around the body. The magician girl's eyes squinted in anger and determination, she would find whoever did this, she didn't care if she'd have to lose an opportunity to decipher the strange ancient code ball from Wind Country in the process but the death of this little kid would not go forgotten… Too many deaths of too many children have in this cruel world and it seemed like the pleasure driven people of Otogakure were far more shocked by an actual reminder just in which planet they settled down than Mana was by yet another failure to save a life in need of saving…

Shimo angrily kicked a can so hard that it bashed into a stony wall of a building and exploded into tin shrapnel, scratching a couple of passers-by who just turned at the Yuki and then at the wall, one guy just angrily turned his index finger by his temple suggesting that the young swordsman may have had a psychological problem of some sorts, as far as that man's professional judgment was concerned anyways…

The swordsman had a decent reason to be moderately annoyed, he didn't manage to get any information from that young lady and she was so into sleeping with him that it somehow shook his wish to be himself off. He could never understand his sensei's wish to sleep with women he paid off to sleep with him. Nor could he justify being a gentleman and his usual self to ladies who acted so simple minded and pleasure driven as the women he lead to the block of flats before.

He had gotten a couple of hints about the name of the hall from the woman, however a name he had no association to meant very little to a young man who came to Otogakure from a different country. Only then did Shimo see a gigantic neon sign pointing out that the establishment below it indeed was the very same, one and only, Ponac hall. The Yuki swordsman may have underestimated the pompousness and sheer in your face attitude of this village. Even more, he was yet to see a single ninja in this ninja village, no one ever bothered to wear the headbands with the Sound Village insignia on it. They were either hiding their allegiances or… Maybe the Syndicate didn't like ninja and the folks were forced into hiding their identities? But Otogakure ninja couldn't have been that lame as to lose to a bunch of overdressed pretty boys with fancy blade cannons… This village held so many mysteries and it was so easy to lose oneself in one completely unrelated to Shimo's mission at hand.

"Ponac hall, huh?" he wondered looking at the crowd of people lined up that dragged all the way to the dozens of other halls. Just faintly his eyes could pick up a large poster depicting a pretty young woman, perhaps in her late teens to early twenties with fancy looking bright blue hair and overly pompous hairdo matched with excessive yet impressive make-up job for a teen of her years. So even kids were absorbed into this mad pleasure and musical culture… Shimo sighed realizing that he was to see many odd things before the night ended, even after seeing what he was about to see he'd still be lucky to get why the crew came to this darned village in the first place.

Shimo tried approaching the suit wearing gentleman standing by the door and wearing those insanely fashionable nightly shades that must've been so immensely comfortable and helpful at night, then again… The whole place was so filled with neon lights showing off one product after another that perhaps Shimo was the fool for not wearing something to block all this blasted light out from his eyes. All of the sudden he began understanding the point of all this odd fashion sense of all these local folks. Maybe by living the Otogakure dream for a while he'd understand a lot more about the mysteries of this place, then again, this place reeked of everything the boy was not overly fond of. Talk over action, visuals over content…

"Hey, back of the line…" the muscle mountain said rather gently pushing Shimo back

"With that kimono, stay at the back of the line…" his similarly dressed friend joked making both of them crack a grin. "Cosplay night is next Saturday, come back then, Musashi the Great Sword…" the first one laughed out from a reference to a popular manga series, maybe if Sugemi was here he'd have made some aware sly replies about it but the condescension just made Shimo angrily walk his way to the back of the line. It'd be hours before he was even let in, there was no guarantee that Notasa would even be performing then. He needed another plan of getting in, it was so convenient that he had attire problems and authority issues when he wanted to bust some Syndicate heads so badly…

Maybe Shimo was yet to get some enjoyment of Otogakure and how the life here was lived after all…


	186. Sound Village Stories

A strong, chilling to the bone evening wind blew past all of Kouta's defenses that his clothing offered meant to repel the cold. His ninja physiology allowed him great endurance of unfavorable conditions, one many times beyond what a human would survive. His entire body could've been frozen, every single particle of it turned into a frigid icicle and if unfrozen the boy would survive. Same went with the opposite spectrum – impossible heats were painful yet non-lethal to someone with good chakra control and ability to augment their bodies using it. None of those things meant that chilling cold or searing heat didn't feel absolutely horrible.

There were people that despised ninja, common villagers sometimes bantered among each other how they are oppressed by the ninja or samurai or the pirates or whatever the bane of society was that time, how their neighbor could hire one to kill their entire neighborhood if they had enough money and similar nonsense. It sort of made sense before one delved deeper into it – villagers were weak and afraid and weak and afraid people were the worst kind. They didn't care that ninja suffered burns and that they felt pain just like the villagers did – all they cared was that they weren't human, almost demonic people because being submerged into magma only singed their clothes off and left some small burns and marks where their chakra control was not at its best. Inner world, pain and feelings mattered little to those who were afraid and weak.

Kouta gripped his sides harder, rubbing his elbows to fend off the cold at least a little. He had some backup rags remaining so losing the majority of his ninja tools and his clothes meant slightly less than it potentially could've, still, it was an event worth some regretting at the very least. He felt a little proud in himself, proud of his own abilities. He knew that father would've been proud in him as well – five thousand or so degrees of superheated primal sludge bursting from the ground was a feat to withstand for a ninja his age. It must've been the sleeping Juugo clansman in Kouta that took pride in these meaningless achievements. Even with all of his might, with all the Justicar he took on or out, with all of their attacks he withstood he couldn't help Mana, and that was what counted.

Kouta took a short while surveying the industrial districts. He took hours upon hours of bartering to buy as much as a kunai blade, desperate monetary situations called for very convincing and lengthy negotiations… Still, he had to possess some intimidation inside of him, he managed to buy an entire handful of used blades for the price it'd have taken him to pay for one. A couple of successful hourly barters like that would've refilled his ninja kit, even if it was of secondary importance to the boy, having his fighting style in mind.

It used to mean a lot to Kouta – he used to be a lot shyer on the battlefield, he used to fear his own inheritance from his father's clan, he disliked his own power because the people who used it historically were mad and brutish. He couldn't wrap his head around it that it was the person using the power and not the power itself that could've been evil and distasteful. In a way he was not unlike those weak and terrified villagers afraid of ninja and samurai or pirates and their godly battles, namely being caught in their crossfire…

A young woman writhed on the paved floor, in the industrial districts the floor was less stone and more tin and metal. It clanged as the boy walked towards her over the old and rusted metal plates. Despite of the noise he had made the woman did not react. She remained conscious as she was moving, or so her movements could've been described as even the most pathetic writhing of a caterpillar was, in a manner of speech, movement. There was some icky light brownish sludge laying besides the woman, it had traces of blood in it, quite large ones, in fact which troubled the medical ninja part of the boy. The sight of blood in any bodily fluid was something to be troubled about…

Kouta stood in front of the downed and incapacitated, possibly even drunk or drugged, female. She could've easily been a trap set by the Syndicate, trying to exploit his heroic side, trying to force him to lower his guard so that these fools could think they've found an opening in Kouta's defenses. It would've taken a moderate amount of chakra to maintain his defenses at their strongest throughout the entire procedure of checking this woman… He could always rely on his bodily reflexes to enhance his body if need be but Kouta didn't want to, the enhancements could've been smaller than his intended or needed ones, they could've also been lazy and quickly slapped together and costing him much more chakra in the process…

Kouta sighed and kneeled by the woman placing his hands above her wet blue dress. She looked like she may have been in her nightgown preparing to sleep but somehow ended up on a faraway and desolate industrial district of the village. Even so, her appearance was odd – it was clear that the woman was in her mid-thirties, early forties perhaps, her bodily condition and her appearance alone would've suggested her being in her late sixties however – her skin was wrinkled and yellow in its shade, even through the messed up and washed off make-up of hers it was seen that something was incredibly wrong with this woman. Her heels may have looked impressive ten or so years ago, or a certain amount of nights of rubbing them into the pavement but now they looked pathetic at best, the fewer said about her sticky and messy blond-like hair the better…

A blueish bright glow emanated through the boy's hands as he uttered "Diagnosis Jutsu" to himself as there was simply no one conscious enough to hear it or make sense of his words. The young one scanned through the woman's body suspecting assault, maybe she was attacked, injured with a kunai blade or maybe shot by one of those Syndicate's kunai firing gadgets they carried around. Soon the young medical ninja's eyes shot open wide before squinting just to protect his white as early winter snow eyes from the pouring rain.

"What say you, Doc, how much I got left?" the woman uttered, having her condition in mind it was surprising that she could even speak, blink or think. Kouta felt like being truthful with her may have been a bit too cruel, he did not know this woman or her story, he had no proof that Syndicate was even involved or her own role in that damned organization. He knew so little about her but she had so little time left that Kouta decided to spend his night with this woman… Right until her last.

"I'm going to heal you up, it won't cure you of what's wrong with you, that simply cannot be done, not by someone of my skill level and not by anyone in Otogakure. We'd need to see some specialists in Kirigakure or Konoha for that. I'll be as honest as human decency allows me to be – you don't have long… That is why I'll resort to healing you in the first place – any hospital would consider your case hopeless but you don't have enough time to snap out of this… Alcohol or drug induced… Whatever you're going through so I'll have to heal you partially just so you don't spend your final moments being high" Kouta replied as the light emanated from his hands changed color, turning salad green in the process.

He had no money or place to go until he was found by his friends. Human decency begged him to stay by this woman's side until her final moments…

Mana kneeled by the body of the young girl on the ground. She carefully observed the stabbing wound on her chest – whoever wanted to kill this kid meant it, wanted it. It was strange how straight and unbent the angle was, so pretty… Almost like the girl didn't resist being stabbed. The scream that escaped her mouth must've come after she realized how painful being stabbed in the chest actually was, Mana would've known, after all. It's not something one brushes off, even if they fully wish it and for some reason intend of accepting the injury.

The people around the two girls began to grow bolder, some asked questions if Mana and Meiko had anything to do with this, some felt angry that the magician took examining the body into her own hands. Truth was that this wasn't even close to her team's jurisdiction, her mission was to find a place to sleep over in and then find Notasa, question the performer about the sphere, proceed to the coordinates written on it. This was something Mana took up to do because it felt like the right thing to do, Meiko just stood by carefully shoving anyone trying to get into Mana's face back.

"Mana, maybe you should hurry up with whatever you're planning to do, the Police Force could be here any minute, that'd get us in trouble, unless you plan to spend our night at the arrest house, in which case it's a pretty desperate idea…" the blacksmith grunted as the flow of people gathering around them intensified. It wasn't that they were strong enough to push Meiko aside, far from it, however their sheer numbers made seeing all of them and tracking their moves difficult.

"Coppers? Here? There is no Police Force in this goddamn place, maybe they'll come in an hour, maybe in two, just to play a charade that they still exist and are doing something…" someone in the crowd informed Meiko and Mana which calmed the magician down, that meant she had ample time to think and understand what could transpired here. The girl had always had a certain flare for strange and unexplainable, this murder certainly sounded like it.

"Since the Syndicate took over the streets there have been no murders like this, not for a while… What's even gonna happen?" some of the villagers raised questions.

Mana stood up and sighed. "This is… Weird. This girl wanted to get stabbed, she offered no resistance against her attacker, the stabbing angle is neat and pretty like it all went just like it was supposed to, based on the angle of the stab I'd say the killer was barely this girl's height, the stab was upfront, a thrust, the person just raised their arm and drove it in…" she concluded.

"And?" Meiko wondered, "So we're looking for a bunch of kids killing other kids? Is this some sort of a game?" the blacksmith wondered.

"Yoruma have similar initiation rituals – playful duels where each contestant shows off just one move at a time trying to clash wits and techniques between each combatant. Or it could be a rite of passage of some sort but… This girl doesn't look like a Yoruma or a ninja in general – her hair color is bland and bright, she has no Yoruma tattoos, she doesn't wear a ninja kit or a headband…" Mana scratched her chin examining the young girl further. This peculiar and depressing murder intrigued her and it made the magician sick of herself to no end.

"Maybe the killer is a little guy, you know… Like has a growth problem or something, he makes himself out to be a kid and weaves his web around the kids, telling them lies and complicated psycho mumbo jumbo until the kids wish to die so they do not resist?" Meiko gave her own shot based on the information provided. Even genin straight out of Academy would've been able to analyze a body this way, make theories of what could've happened. Usually the dead bodies would've had eviscerations, dismemberments, decapitations, blunt force or burn trauma suggesting of an exchange of ninjutsu. This body laid silent.

Mana looked at the side and pressed her fingers against a bunch of mud on the watery stone paved floor. She calculated the width and distance between steps, it could've been anyone's steps honestly with all these trouncing people but… The steps were those of a child or, as Meiko suggested, a very short person acting like one. They were surrounded by other footsteps that differed in width and angle as well as distance. That suggested that there may have been more kids accompanying the killer, the strange manner of the placement of the feet implied that the kids may have been skipping and prancing around. Or maybe it was just the drizzle disturbing what little respectable clues remained?

"This isn't good, this is a work of a group, that may mean that more kids would die today or some other day. We need to snoop around and try to pick some traces up… It'd be good if we had a sensor with us… Maybe there'd be a residual chakra signature if one of the killers was a ninja or at least an Academy student. The way things are now it's too complicated to be sure of anything…" Mana concluded standing up and walking away from the blood covered alleyway. She had left her fingerprints as well as her footprints in the pools of the girl's blood. If the Syndicate or the Police Force actually wished to apprehend them they'd have their work cut out for them, especially if anyone in the crowd recognized her as Konoha's Sorceress, that was not outside the realm of possibility…

"And we have to do this?" Meiko asked placing on and securing her wristbands as well as shoulder pads and boots, the blacksmith kunoichi was gearing up for war, or so it seemed…

"I've already failed to save those cave dwellers. I need to do this, I failed to save that girl but maybe we can still track whoever did this to her and prevent more dead children laying butchered in the alleyways" Mana answered with a sad and unconfident tone. Problems with confidence was something Meiko was quite familiar with, what with all of her problems controlling her chakra and properly executing ninjutsu techniques and all… Mana knew that deep in her gut, whatever complicated thought processes understandable only to Meiko herself transpired, she'd agree with the magician.

"Alright. Let's do this!" Meiko punched her own glove excitedly blasting out a small shockwave that picked up papers, wrappers and rubbish in its wake, flipping over several trash bins around. The blacksmith must've been excited about this, why else would she lack any restraint of her chakra flow like that? "The guys will most likely be really pissed at us…" the blacksmith peeked at her backpack filled with Audra shards, something they should've used to secure a room to sleep in…

"After all this time working together you should know that I am the last person to care about what other people think of us…" Mana answered looking up into the dark sky and feeling the intensifying downpour pelting at her weak, depressed and restless face.

"Ye'll hear about dis!" a Syndicate goon shouted out before Shimo's punch clocked the mafioso out. It only took an hour or two of waiting for the Syndicate goons to start showing up, willing to engage in some of the world-known Otogakure musical cultural activities. Not just any, in fact, the very best! These guys were no Audra brutes from way back, Shimo was not the strongest puncher and yet… The men crumbled even from his weakest and restrained fists.

"Shut up and take that jacket off, yours fits me much better than your friends' do" Shimo roughed out pointing at the long black and striped four button jacket with shoulder pads that the goon wore. Carefully Shimo assembled the whole set of clothes out of the Syndicate goons he beat up: black fancy leather boots, black trousers with stripes to match the suit, a shirt and a tie as well as the strange looking tie. Carefully Shimo picked off the hat off of one of the Mafiosi and a cigar out of the guy he just knocked out.

Carefully the Yuki examined himself in front of a large puddle – the weird and faintly lit image suggested that the shirt was too tight and the jacket was way too large for him, either way – it looked acceptable enough to try his luck again. He may not have smoked but smoking would've added him some extra credibility as a cool Syndicate mafioso looking for evening entertainment. Slowly and a little unconfidently the young man walked up to the bouncers again overhearing a quarrel between a group of arguing individuals.

"I'm the goddamn Much Money Cred – a rapping sensation, you stupid piece of shit! This whole fucking place, this goddamn evening wouldn't fucking happen if I wouldn't perform my life changing lyrics of my neat rhymes!" a gentleman proclaimed his self-imposed importance to the bouncers who looked like they were pulling the rapper's finger. The man looked way darker in his skin tone than anyone around, much darker even than Mana who at times looked a bit exotic compared to people around her. He wore a strange orange and white vest that covered his chest and left his muscular arms covered with tattoos open.

"Much Money Cred? Ey, Brock, you heard of this guy!? I sure as hell haven't…" the bouncer once again playfully exclaimed placing his arms behind their back and nodding at the back of the line with their chin.

"Nah, never heard of 'im, oh, sorry, maybe from the countless of interviews this guy gives in the papers and can't shut up about how he's the "New sensation sweeping all the nations", is that how ya call yourself?" the other finally revealed his game.

"I'm the most successful musical project in the history of mankind! My agent will hear about this, I'll bury this place under, UNDER I tell you!" the dark skinned gentleman began wildly swinging his hands so frantically that he dropped his pink shaded glasses. Shimo has heard of the appropriate expression before but he had never seen someone actually wearing such glasses…

"Ey, whatever ya say, punk, just please don't tell your wife about it, she'll just tell you what kind of a type-A personality you are and then you'll end up beating her up again, big man" the bouncer snickered into his fist as the atmosphere became a little more serious after this event was mentioned.

"Or wait, did you do that last month already and this month is drunk exhibitionism time, I get the wife beating month confused with the last one…"

"Always happens, could happen to anyone, really… Sometimes Cred himself is so drunk he mixes them up" the bouncer's friend simulated genuine pity.

"The thing is, Much Money Cred, that we know who you fucking are and we know what you do to keep your "Most Successful Musical Project" rep around these parts. Guess what, you ain't even that important, we could just say that you came here naked again and yelling some religious babble while spitting at everyone and we didn't let you in and no one would bat an eye… Also, I work as a fucking bouncer, to me a job in a fast food joint would be a promotion, oh, sorry, Mr. Natos, you go right in…" the bouncer started giving his huge moral of the day before noticing another performer, a large man covered with blond hair and facial hair like mane on a lion carrying a colossal sized guitar with him, and letting him in.

"What the fuck was that!?" Much Money Cred outright shrieked out after another singer was let in while he was forced to stand outside in the rain and listen to what those bouncers tried to tell him. "He sings fucking country, COUNTRY and you let him in! Who the fuck listens to country anymore!?" Cred began rampaging around knocking over trash cans and tearing his vest off his body. At that point Shimo decided he's had enough, slowly and more confidently the young man strolled up to the bouncers who were calming Money Cred down and tipped his hat.

"It's a fine evenin' fellas…" the young man spoke trying to emulate the dialect and the accent of the Syndicate guys, it appeared like the Syndicate rep here was flawless as he was let in without as much as a hitch.

"What the literal fuck, that guy is a fucking mobster! He came here right after murdering someone for money, for fuck's sake!" Much Money continued his anger fueled rampage. It'd probably take some long time of stopping the line before the guy was let in. Honestly Shimo started to think he should've slipped in faster since the rapper came pretty close to ruining his mood for the day. He was beginning to think that he had just about enough of those musicians for a day or thirty…


	187. Until Dawn Breaks

"So… How does this work, will you just stand by me until my last croak? That's what you call "decency"?" the woman spoke.

Her attitude annoyed Kouta, this expression just furthered that impression. He was wasting time with a patient that no medical ninja would take. He healed her enough to give her time maybe until the morning and wasted a whole bunch of his chakra in return, greatly weakening himself in the process. If she really was a trap flung by the Syndicate his way she offered no effort to hide it. Actually she was a bit too bitchy to be a trap, then again, Kouta hasn't met many human traps.

"I've diagnosed you, I've healed you… As best as it is possible given the circumstances. What else do you want?" Kouta grunted out, he was tired, weakened and annoyed. Not his best hour to speak to a person who would've died at any point normally, now given more time to waste on… Whatever brought her to this condition.

"Well, first, maybe explain what's wrong with me? I've seen many medical ninja but none of them bothered. All of them just sung doomsday sonatas and tossed around empty warnings and threats…" the woman asked.

"Your body is incinerated from inside. Your organs and insides, even blood are boiled to a sludgy mush that stuck together into one giant clump. The best comparison is – your gut looks like you drank a bottle of pure magma. You'd have died at any moment if I didn't heal you, now only my chakra sustains you. You maybe have till morning, honestly, given the injuries at hand… I'm surprised you're even alive, you barely had a working cell in your organism" Kouta replied brushing his hair with his own hand and wiping the sweat off his forehead. The young man felt his body flaring up with a small fever and saw his vision blurring. He must've wasted more chakra than he planned, he was used healing Mana, sometimes the others, maybe he missed some chakra nodes that were misplaced, after all, all bodies were unique…

"Holy shit… You make it sound much gloomier than the other whitecoats, you've got a knack for that, kid. Someday you're gonna make a pretty and sick gal cry real bad, nice job" the woman pressed her forehead against her ruined and badly done fingernails. As the rain covered her hair and face and washed some of the filth on her away, Kouta thought that she may have been an attractive woman once, maybe even that same beauty placed bread and butter on her table?

"Well… My first instinct was to hold back but… I know what those injuries are from, kind of… I suspect at least, having in mind how the doctors "warned" and "threatened" you. I guess ultimately I am as much of a simpleton brawler like my father, just like I am a medical ninja… My medical discretion asks to be discrete, my warrior side tells me to say it how it is" Kouta replied. He wanted to spend some more time with the woman, at least until her final hours but now he prolonged the time she had and so prolonged the time decency made him stick around her.

The woman smiled revealing a mouth of ruined yellow teeth, something the young medical ninja hadn't noticed before.

"Well, something I've come to learn is that it's easy to choose a side, an identity, when you suck at everything else, it is when both things stick to you, when both things are part of your identity and define you together that the really tough choices have to be made…" she said.

"I have a friend who's struggling with similar issues. Maybe you've found a solution to that problem? It's tough to tell your real age, I suspect you look far worse than you actually are, no offense, one thing for certain is that you have more experience" Kouta asked wondering if he could obtain some of this woman's wisdom in the matter before she passed away. She just smiled once again with that terrible keyboard of rotten teeth and shook her head.

"Not unless you can help me find the answer until dawn…" she uttered.

"I wish I could…" Kouta said, "Would that be the only matter left unresolved in your life? That very same girl is also very afraid of ghosts and spirits so I'd like to not spawn another one…" he tried to joke but realized that it may have come off as really rude. Then again, when one's imminent death was concerned morality and lines that weren't supposed to be crossed blurred greatly. When a person was about to kill you it was OK to kill that person, a person had no obligation to help another one until that another one is in mortal peril. Death redefined everything.

"Oh no… There is one regret I wish I could have resolved but no sane doctor would advise me…" the woman spoke longingly.

"Oh?" Kouta couldn't decide how to ask her to elaborate so he just uttered it, seeing how the woman fell silent, maybe wondering how he'd react and if he'd help her last request.

"You know I wasn't always the ruined lady passed out in the puddle. As a brat I was curious and ambitious, my parents and grandparents kept telling me I'd rise high, that I'd be a businesswoman or maybe a great musician or at least someone of the first generation of the village's great ninja. I guess for kids curiosity, ambition and high hopes are all that matters. All curious kids are supposed to go high, right?" the woman asked, she fell silent so she must've expected a reply.

"I guess…" Kouta answered, for a moment he thought about his own childhood, not having been an aggressive kid, not having been the curious or overly ambitious one. He just wanted father and mother to stop fighting, he just wanted to make both of them happy but that was until he realized that both of his parents wanted him to be different things. Satisfying them both was impossible, choices had to be made…

"So then when I grew, my curiosity didn't fade, I had to go everywhere, do everything. That's when it became a problem. My parents now hated how I spent all of my time in various training missions and…"

"You were a ninja?" Kouta asked, there was little wonder in the question, had she not been she'd have never survived total incineration of her innards into a large clot of puss and gore.

"Sure, at some point. Then, as all people, I've had to make choices. Curiosity isn't nearly as precious for teens and young adults as it is for children. People expect curiosity to die and be replaced by devotion at some point, even sacrifice… Well it didn't, not for me, nevertheless, I had to make choices, I didn't choose becoming a ninja, I became a musician instead. All because of the ambition, the high hopes of rising high… That same curiosity lead me to becoming the passed out lady in the puddle. I rose high initially, I was the kind of person Notasa and Hipler are like now" the woman said.

"So what happened?" Kouta wondered.

"Fame… Fame and a lot of jackbang" the woman lowered her head.

"Damn…" Kouta whispered to himself. Jackbang was a similar drug to the hat'ash of the Wind Country but much more aggressive, much more toxic. Where the hat'ash wasn't technically addictive, just the sensations it gave were pleasant enough to seek some more, similarly to how food that tasted good begged to be eaten again, jackbang was highly addictive and ultimately lethal in most cases. When ingested it burnt up and blew up like firecrackers, it filled one's mouth with chemicals that forced the organism to secrete pleasure hormones while their body was being blown up and burnt from inside. It also was addictive to the degree that addicts licked off the foam that the substance exploded into once it escaped the user's mouth. Sometimes the addict's body became so ruined that their entire bone and flesh structure became as flammable as the substance they took, then the person was set on flames from within and spontaneously burnt up to a crisp. Kouta suspected that drugs were involved, maybe jackbang, maybe chillpill, hat'ash would've been rare in these places but obtainable by a starlet which this woman once claimed to be…

"You know… All I wish is to nib on one more cracker of actual pure hat'ash before I go… The brownie that started it all… My downfall to the bottom of the shaft" the woman whimpered after a pause of silence.

"Absolutely not. It's a relaxation drug but it's a drug nonetheless, it may not harm a normal person much but it might kill you" Kouta objected, his professional judgment could barely even contradict that idea.

"I'm already dead…" the woman spoke longingly for the life she once had.

"From how you've lead the conversation to this point I assume there's a specific person you wish to nab it from? This was all your plan, to ask this of me all along?" Kouta suspected.

"My manager, who then became my dealer once I didn't make like I used to, who then started croaking with the Syndicate once he made more than I used to, but we've no hopes of getting to his nest, not with all the other Syndicate dogs barking around him" she sadly exclaimed.

Suddenly Kouta realized what Mana would have done in that situation. Usually the girl made the impression of a strict and by the book kind of person but actually she only followed rules when they were valid and acceptable from her own prism. No… Mana had the potential to become the world's greatest nukenin based on how little she thought of rules. At this point, when a dying person asked for a last smoky cracker from a dealer that may have had a hand in ruining her life… There was only one answer to give her. All she wanted was a little pleasure before her inevitable death, pleasure of tasting something pure, pleasure of seeing the empire of the men that supplied the substance that ruined her life burn down to ashes. Mana would've rolled the joint out of the largest bill of money the sucker had herself… Kouta admired Mana greatly and wanted to be more like her, he wanted to be with her, he loved her…

"We've got time, if anything else…" he suggested with a hopeful tone and a smirk.

Mana and Meiko wandered the streets. They had little if any clue about where they could've found anything solid. They had a suspect, they had a modus operandi but they couldn't pinpoint the person, their location or where their sick and twisted murders would occur again. Mana slapped her forehead and grunted angrily. The leather jacket and skirt she wore may have protected her from rain rather competently but the silk shirt she wore below that was getting soaked and the rain was literally dripping off her long hair wrapping around her skin and under her clothes. Her hopelessness sickened the magician.

"No one's knocking me out now…" she uttered. "No one's in my way, no one to struggle fighting without killing them, no friend standing in my way freezing me to inaction… And yet still I can't save anyone" she complained.

Meiko looked down and then up into the pouring sky, she did not avoid or even try to avoid Mana's curious glares. The blacksmith was attempting to find something, she saw her friend tormenting herself over something she didn't even understand and so the redhead continued to order herself to figure it out for her friend. Not because the matter pleased or was important to Meiko but because it was important enough for Mana to care. All sadness and depressing tears disappeared or got stuck somewhere in their forming steps as Mana became taken over by surprise and gratitude for her friend, just for a brief moment, not long enough for Meiko to notice but long enough for Mana to realize how fond she'd grown of the blacksmith. She was certainly not wrong to plan this trip, Meiko would hold the legendary artifact in her hands if it was the last thing Mana would do…

"The villagers said that the police force only functions as a façade and that the Syndicate thugs are the only "investigators" with real knowledge… You'd normally speak to the police force to get some details, right? Why don't we substitute one for the other?" Meiko asked something that sounded so foolish when she said it but the more Mana thought about it the more genius it sounded. When one met the blacksmith a common first impression would've been that she's primitive and dumb just because she was a bit awkward, noisy and quirky but the truth couldn't have been farther away. Meiko was just as smart as she needed to be, she just thought differently.

"That's… Actually pure genius, I am surprised…" Mana blinked a couple of times in rapid succession staring at Meiko in surprise, just like with the blacksmith's knowledge of music, the redhead surprised Mana by how smart she sometimes could've been.

"Yeah but… We won't be able to just waltz in and talk to them, I mean those guys probably know us and hate us, right?" Meiko thought for a moment.

"Are you or are you not a ninja?" Mana smiled proudly. How could've her friend who just suggested such an amazing idea now not realized how easy the solution was.

"Right… Transformation technique…" Meiko thought scratching the side of her head. "I wouldn't bet on that though, I mean you can't even use that, can you?"

"Hmph… If only I had my chakra control back we could use Combination Transformation Jutsu, I'd use my skill with ninjutsu and you'd supply the chakra and the idea…" Mana thought scratching her chin. Strange almost comical ideas of hiding under the same coat began dawning in her mind, even someone as optimistic and whimsical as Mana saw how silly these thoughts were and swatted them aside.

"How much do you like being tied up?" Meiko smiled.

"Have you even seen my show?" Mana smiled back as the two finally settled on an idea. There was no way that Meiko could've asked the right questions as her strangely working mind focused on completely other things entirely so Mana had to be there but she couldn't use the Transformation Technique, also wiring Meiko with a microphone would've been too risky and expensive, also no one even brought along the hi-tech pieces of the ninja kit since they were looking at a sandy trip along the vastness of the Wind Country deserts…

Finally a plan was made, the two would find out the truth and catch the person responsible for this gruesome murder until the new day dawned…

"Hey wait… I forgot your face, you'll be rich, I tell ya" a mobster laughed straight into Shimo's face once the youth made his way into the hall. The schedule hanging in the hall suggested that Notasa's concert was about to start and the curtain was still closed, it was a lovely red suede cloth with a white star embroidered on it with a nice gold colored "Notasa" signature hanging on top of the star. This lady was much fancier than Mana's show, maybe if the magician charged more she'd also be much more pompous, just like this lady…

"Whachu talkin' bout, it's Jonessy, from the neighborhood!" another drunk mobster wiped his nose. These two must've already had quite the night since the fat and small one who had just spoken was already quite blushed from alcohol's daze and had lost his fancy striped jacket somewhere, his white shirt was torn and unbuttoned halfway letting his fat chest and belly slip more and more out and siege the rest of his buttons with pressure they slowly relented to.

"Yeah, ye goomba, how could you not know me, Jonessy, from the neighborhood!?" Shimo yelled out playing his act out and slapping the tall slim one in the back of his head making his top hat slip off and fall to the ground. The slim one didn't even bothered picking him up, he just laughed out and blushed.

"Sorry, I drank too much to tell guys from the neighborhood apart… What neighborhood are ya from though?" he asked.

"What difference does it make, the bastard married Ariadne Jetson, the fuckin' actress! For fuck's sake Petey, you're embarrassing the neighborhood! He's from the neighborhood I'm telling you…" the fat one once again outright shouted into his friend's face and settled down locking his fingers together and slipping into a lovely alcoholic's slumber.

"Did you really marry Ariadne Jetson?" the slim one asked leaning over his sleepy friend right up in Shimo's ear, the swordsman pinched his nose and placed his sword against the seat in front of him.

"Oh… Wait… You're the guy who uses the sword we recruited right? What's his name… Damn, I forgot, he's from no neighborhood though, he's from… Damn… I don't even know…" the slim one scratched his chin with a small stubble of a couple of hairs wrapping around each other.

"Does it matter? I just wish to see the show, can't we just listen to the show?" Shimo grunted facepalming himself angrily. He was seriously considering changing seats but that would've alerted the two drunks that he wasn't enjoying their company or attracted too much attention so close before the show started.

"Wait… Wasn't Jonessy supposed to bring the money today?" the slim one complained again.

"The money?" Shimo asked.

"Yeah, the money for gambling!" the slim one shouted out alerting everyone around them but the Sound Village inhabitants knew better than to object the silence broken by the Syndicate.

"You're drunk. Stop picking this fight, you'll lose…" Shimo replied, "It wasn't my turn, it was this fat pig's" the Yuki replied slamming his elbow into the fat drunk's sleeping face. The chubby remained asleep, a disgusting snot slipped out from his broken and hooked nose.

"Yeah… You're from the neighborhood alright…" the slim one smiled slapping Shimo's back rudely with a laughter that spread more of his stench throughout the whole hall.

"But are you?" Shimo angrily squinted at the slim one back with an angry stare.

"How dare ya! I bet you ain't even married to Ariadne Jetson ye goomba!" the slim one jumped up rolling back his sleeves. "I was born in the neighborhood long before you, raised in it and kicked my ball with the neighbohoodest of them all! And even if I wasn't, I was playin' outside with the others way earlier because I was a late bloomer!"

"An early bloomer…" Shimo replied crossing his hands around his chest and extending his legs so that they were lifted onto the seat in front of him. He was taught of the criminal ways good by his second sensei when he left the village temporarily. He had the chops to Syndicate all around this joker…

"What?" the slim bastard complained dragging Shimo's face closer by his collar and winding up his punch. Shimo accelerated the chakra flow to break the dirtbag's fist when he decided to punch.

"An early bloomer, if you'd have been a late bloomer you'd have joined the neighborhood crew later than normal, your point is that you've more neighborhood cred than Jonessy of the neighborhood and you simply do not. One does not outneighborhood Jonessy of the neighborhood! I knew all the neighborhood warriors! If I started naming them you'd know none of them, that's how many warriors I knew!" Shimo smiled shrugging.

Finally the fat slob woke up and tore the slim Petey off Shimo making the young swordsman fix his jacket and sit back down in his seat. The chubby shook Petey violently.

"Stop! You're ruining our cred here, yer picking fights with Jonessy of the neighborhood! The guy can pee so hard he pees through a marble toilet, right fucking through! Pick yer fights carefully because if Jonessy gets as much as one drop of sake he'll kick your ass and then steal your woman!"

"But he's married to Ariadne Jetson, isn't he? What does he need my Hunney for?" Petey began to sob. The fat mobster shook his friend violently and slapped him around before pushing him back into his seat.

"You've had twelve too many rice whiskeys… Look at yerself, Petey… Picking fights with the neighborhood… Just look at yerself, Petey…" the fat slob finally settled back down.

Finally the lights turned off and the curtains opened. The Notasa's show finally started and Shimo hoped to catch the little starlet after the show, just like most fans kept Mana busy after hers…


	188. Things we Have to Lose

Kouta was moving slowly, looking back every couple of steps to see how his newly met acquaintance was doing. The woman was moving, stumbling and needed wall support every couple of steps but she was moving which was much more than what she would've had, had the medical ninja not stumbled upon her and decided to be crazy and questionably unethical and brought her back. While the two were moving forward to a location that the soon to be departed lady continuously pointed out a new question came up for the Juugo ninja.

He healed the woman and went along with her request thinking that it was the right thing to do, after all, was healing people and bringing them back to life, whenever possible, not the purpose of the entire medical ninja profession? On the most basic and primal understandings of its linguistics and true meaning behind the word it was. However there was a much deeper abyss of ethical and practical understanding which took arguably just as long if not longer to understand than the actual art of bringing people back to life using one's own inner power.

Was it ethical letting this woman stumble and wheeze through her final moments? Live as a burnt, rotten shell with knowledge that she'd eventually die anyways? Was any of those things even close to touching the line that defined the medical ninja? The rules and practices of "pointless patients" were not vain ones, despite them sounding cruel to the uneducated eye. Just because Kouta could give this woman some hours of conscience and life he didn't ask the question "should he"? When the boy's chakra emanated through the woman's system he was sure it was the way to go, right now, seeing her struggle to even walk straight and wheeze, cough up blood… Kouta was not so sure anymore.

"So where are we going again? You just said that if I was to fulfil my promise to help you realize your last wish I need to get ready, you haven't spoke of this place in much detail…" Kouta asked, he was so absorbed with the ethical questions of his actions that he suddenly realized he stopped living here and now. He had heard of similar problems plaguing the stronger and higher ranking ninja, when one held the power inside to destroy the entire world one was plagued with much more complex questions than just if there was dog poop where they were stepping.

"My old friend's place. He used to be an actor in Konohagakure, now he's somewhat of a dabbler in blades and firepower for those unassociated with the Syndicate. In his earlier life made a living for himself, even something to buy a fancy painting once in a while and a nice ring for his wife… I kept telling him that living in Otogakure was the real life: love, delicious foods and drinks and all the pleasures one could dream of. Eventually he took my advice…" the woman spoke, leaving the last sentence to come after a long pause and also to be uttered in an overly depressed and longing tone.

"What happened?" Kouta asked for more details, he wanted to know if there may have been bad history between the two, if there would've been he'd have had to fight someone that day and he'd rather not have killed a civilian in other village territory, even if that was in defense of another person. He had enough ethical questions for one night…

"Jackbang…" the woman uttered with disgust, understandably so as she was talking of the substance that dug her an early grave. "He became obsessed with the Otogakure lifestyle, every day he took his wife to another musical, every day they dined in restaurants each more sophisticated than the other to the point where words "where will we be eating today" substituted "I love you"… He became addicted to pleasure, stopped working altogether and when he found out that I was doing something that provided momentary simple pleasure not unlike listening to a good musical would've to an artist… It was too addicting to resist"

As a medical ninja in Konohagakure he had not heard that many stories like this. Konoha had its fair share of crime and death but people were too afraid of dying in attacks by enemy ninja to waste their time on drugs. The expected lifespan was so short that often people only became old enough to drink right before their passing. Obviously during times of peace the situation somewhat began to fix itself but drugs weren't a really big problem in Konoha, that was to say that with the village mentality in mind it was sort of an unattractive market.

"Seeing the village like this… I always thought that pleasure seeking was not bad by itself but… It ruined a lot of lives, hasn't it?" Kouta wondered.

"Seeking pleasure is not bad. After all, happiness is what we all strive for, is it not? However too many people confuse happiness and pleasure. Happiness is our ultimate goal and pleasure is just a stop to prevent us from going insane on the journey, our sustenance. My friend whom we will soon see found that his wife left him after an overdose of jackbang exploded inside and set him ablaze, firecracking from inside searing his flesh off. His wife left him, no play or one of those moving picture productions will ever hire him again. Do you think that pleasure brought him happiness?" the woman spoke up. Kouta didn't look back at her avoiding her eyes for a moment. He had taken the lady as much less wise and experienced than she actually was, perhaps it truly was those that suffered the most and lost everything that had the most lessons to teach.

A loud shout stopped Kouta in his tracks, the boy looked back and saw the woman pointing at the house that they've reached. This must've been the place. The Juugo youth examined the place and had to hand it to the friend of the woman – he chose the most typical drug den to live in that possibly existed. To describe it with words would've been to simply ask one to imagine the worst kind of rundown building infested with lowlifes and people ruined lives and no hopes of bouncing back, searching for a quiet corner to die in. The house at one point just gave up at being serviceable just like its inhabitants must've. Even a dying man would've at the very least placed a cardboard sheet on top on the massive holes in the roof. One corner of the house was just simply blown up and didn't even exist.

"There is no fourth wall to break in this one…" the woman snickered looking at Kouta but she saw that the boy didn't get the joke.

"Yes, I can see that the fourth wall is missing but…" Kouta began but the woman's scratched and rough skin pressed against his lips as she shushed him.

"Forget it, it was a joke my actor friends always laughed at, sometimes I forget that those days are long since gone…" the woman said disappearing in the darkness of the corridors of the block. Kouta sighed.

"We all get nostalgic sometimes…" he tried to lighten up the woman's mood but having the fact that she's about to die in four to six hours it was insanely hard to imagine being possible.

Mana scratched her forehead, Meiko, in her transformed state, complained with great anger in her voice.

"Mana we've been over this, you're tied up, stop getting out of my knots!"

"There was some sort of a bug on my forehead, if it landed on my nose it'd have went itchy, no one likes an itchy nose…" she shrugged apologetically.

Meiko tried to transform into a dark brown haired middle aged man. She ended up with a red headed elderly chubby woman. The reason why the magician asked her friend to describe her transformation using words was because she had already seen Meiko fail at Academy level ninjutsu and wondered if it was imagination and focusing issues or actual physiological problems that was the problem. Based on Mana's theory, Meiko wasn't unskilled at ninjutsu that required precision and good chakra control, she was simply not focused enough to maintain the needed level of skill and slipped up on occasion.

And so Meiko described a fatso in a messy black suit, large cheeks, twisted sleek eyebrows, barely seen facial hair and squinty thin eyes that had a distinct cold stare – the eyes of a bandit that helped Mr. Imaginary Thug rise the imaginary mobster ranks to a skilled street enforcer cracking drug crackers and living large with women, much ryo and earthly possessions. His choice in clothing included nothing but the finest, albeit a little aged, suits. The man was supposed to wear a black double-breasted jacket with slightly darker stripes and slick and shiny black leather shoes. To be fair, Mana was impressed by how well Meiko described the person to her and began feeling like her theory was going to blow up as soon as it was conceived.

The result was a short and chubby mixture of what was described and Meiko's actual image. Mana sighed for a moment and stroke her forehead but realized that her depressed reaction may have been rude to her friend whom the magician greatly appreciated and would've never wanted to hurt. Sadly her slow instincts tipped her off in the right way – Meiko began sobbing like a little child as her large loveable eyes filled with tears bursting over and rushing down the wrinkly cheeks of the old crone she had become.

"No, no! It's fine, it'll do!" Mana pleaded for Meiko to stop crying. "I didn't think you'd change the image you described at the last second, I mean… That was the point of describing it, ha ha ha…" the magician playfully tried to make it appear like she was not aware of Meiko's failure and thought that the blacksmith in fact changed her appearance that way on purpose. Strangely enough it worked for Meiko and her sobbing face eased up a little. And so the first female mafioso the team had ever seen was born, luckily Meiko's transformation and the fat sausage-like fingers of the woman didn't impact the blacksmith's mastery at tying people up. Not that it mattered to Mana as she had escaped on multiple occasions. The current one being one of many.

Meiko angrily readjusted the knots, she used to make the strongest knots she knew as a blacksmith, the ones that were used to tie armor pieces together, ones that could take a good sword blow and almost snap but hold. None of that mattered when Mana's crafty fingers and her career as a magician often performing escape tricks was concerned. At this point the blacksmith must've started to think that no knot or binding known to man could've held the magician tied up as she only placed a simple triple loop knot in several places.

The much harder part was finding a Syndicate establishment, it was mostly wandering through the streets aimlessly trying to find one. Luckily the whole town was taken over and infested with them, the runts were breaking into the very infrastructure of the village and so every other building had some of the Syndicate thugs standing around and talking. Some of them tipped their hats or even whistled at Meiko, or more accurately, her changed shape. That Mana found really odd, these mobsters were grown men of varied ages, was this kind of woman really the best they could've strived for? Honestly the magician was a little offended that she wasn't harassed instead of Meiko's abominable redhead grandma.

Meiko turned corners and lead the magician into an establishment that the goons blocked passage into. Just as the two were passing the two tipped their bats and crossed them blocking the way.

"Who the fuck is dis? Who da fuck are you?" the mobster spat to the side. This one didn't wear a suit but just a bit more fancy casual attire of the locals, it was clear that this was a low ranking goon which Meiko planned to fool with this charade and yet it would've been unlikely that they knew anything about this case or the people involved. These were lowlifes and yet the bigger fish may have yet seen through the bait.

"Ey, Jimmjon how the fuck yer talkin' to a lady, da fuck's the matter with you? Can't you see she's wearin' the soldato drapes? She outranks ya, yer lucky she didn't whack you right fuckin' 'ere, get what I'm sayin'?" the second tracksuit goon objected to his partner's rude behavior.

"Yeah… Don't you know who I am, sonny, I'm…" Meiko got a bit confused as she was bad of making up names, given how the last name she gave herself after dumping the clan name was "Wakizashi" it wasn't hard to get to that part.

"Yeah, she's the infamous Sarady "Bazooka" Choolip, I wouldn't have been captured by a lesser foe!" Mana playfully acted out a vengeful stare from a defeated foe she so often had seen in the plays she had seen before or after her shows. She knew a lot of the actors acting there and all the artists in the hall had a friendly relationship letting the others see their shows and get the chance to a professional critique. Making up the name was easy once Mana remembered all the history chapters dedicated to the village she had read.

"Oh shit, hear dat Jimmjon? She's got a nickname, granny's packing serious heat!" the mobster began genuinely worrying.

"Well we dunno whachu want from us, granny Bazooka, dis 'ere is just a simple establishment, couple a lowlife brothel managers count their money 'ere, you see?" the one who was so fired up before now became tranquil as a sheep and bowed his head repeatedly in apology yet he still couldn't be troubled to utter the words.

"Kay, dis bitch 'ere busted my kunai dispenser, I'd appreciate a replacement…" Meiko nodded trying to keep a serious face because for some reason, possibly the name, made her cringe which bloated the woman's already chubby and very pinch-worthy cheeks and forced her to fight the cringe within.

"Good call" Mana whispered to Meiko's ear, whenever they approach a serious establishment with more chances of intel being leaked they would appear much more credible with authentic weaponry instead of nothing resembling Syndicate's kunai dispensers.

"Well we dun have much… But I mean if it's Sarady "Bazooka" Choolip asking…" the Syndicate goon scratched the back of his head and disappeared inside the small room, from what little Mana had seen the place they guarded was a glorified basement and little of actual value transpired inside. They could've wasted the whole night chasing and shutting down the brothels that placed their income there and never would've even scratched the surface of the operations… It was best they didn't stray off their path.

Soon the goon appeared and handed Meiko one of the big rapid firing kunai dispensers, one of the likes that the Syndicate leader used in the Katabami mine scuffle.

"Dis 'ere is our last heat-tube, it'd be a real treat if ye didn't break it and vouched for us when we get slack that it disappeared. Believe it or not, the Boss is really displeased about any firepower we lose because that means someone in the streets can get popped by someone that isn't us and that's bad for business…" the man explained.

"Happy people buy more whores, happy people buy more drugs, happy people order more hits to keep being happy…" the other added as a mantra which the first joined into.

"And no one's happy if there's disorder in the street…" Mana uttered without her own control to which the criminals only glared at her.

Meiko slapped Mana with a backhand which really hurt, no surprise probably, given the size of the hand…

"Shut the hell up, ye… Bitch…" Meiko tried her best mobster dialect since she's only heard what she's heard on this trip to find the Box.

"She is right though…" one of the goons shrugged.

"We don't have anywhere to contain her if she's a prisoner, if she's alive so long that means the Boss wants her alive, that means ye better take 'er twelve blocks east to a bigger joint… Ya know… Ta see what she knows" another added trying to speak politely and carefully. Meiko having a nickname added to her name must've really intimidated them, must've been some sort of sign of achievement amongst these people…

"Right, then that's what I'll do… Dis bitch 'ere will know how terrible Sarady "Bazooka" Choolip is before the night is over" Meiko got really into her role. Despite the bloodied mouth Mana couldn't help but crack a grin, seeing her friend so excited and enjoying herself had that effect on her…

Shortly after the quarrel with the two mobsters ended the curtains moved aside and the show could begin. A short and slim girly walked out from the side with a violin in her hands. She was so eerily similar to Mana's build however whereas Mana's skin was of a slightly tanned shade the skin of this young lady was milk white. Her hair was worn in two playful ponytails that extended above and formed a horn-like shape, had they not been a combination of light blueish green and dark purple in color they'd have appeared like a demon's horns or angel's wings sprouted on her head.

And when the girl began playing Shimo observed in awe as her lovely yellow-iris eyes closed in sublime serenity the heart of the young man danced in his chest right alongside the divine melodies that the young lady played. The young woman, who appeared to be in her late teens if not early twenties was energetic with her playing, she danced, leaped, flipped and shook her head violently, rhythmically, the violin was no instrument, her entire body was molded with it into a harmony of music and dance that was hard to wake up from. After she was done her white sleeveless shirt was tucked out and messed up so the young lady fixed it and her plaid skirt without a flinch and placed the instrument on the ground pushing it towards the audience and bowing like a samurai bowed against his Feudal Lord offering his sword and his services.

"I shall require a tune…" the young woman uttered and despite her weak voice the whole audience heard it, it could've been that there was something magical about her voice, or maybe it was the great acoustics of the hall they were in. Either way, at that moment Shimo realized that if this lovely girl ordered him to jump off a cliff with a song he'd jump off the edge of the world itself. Then again, in a moment of regained composure the young man realized he wasn't that tough to impress by the weaker gender…

"Ajisa's 4th sonnet "Moon of the Heavens"!" someone in the audience suggested, it was a strong manly voice, without a doubt it came from a well refined and culturally educated gentleman, the typical crowd to attend such events, together with the Syndicate goons, obviously.

"Overture to Redemption by Muhanovski Yuya" another suggestion came from the public.

"Ode to Snow Tulips perhaps?" an alluring feminine voice from the public suggested.

"I like that last one…" the violinist admitted leaping up by flipping back and using only her left hand for balance while grabbing her violin with the right one before playfully bowing and nodding while picking up the bow off the ground. "I shall improvise a musical piece out of all three of these together…" she declared placing the violin under her chin and preparing to play.

What came out next Shimo could barely comprehend. He had never heard either of these three pieces but he could swear that he heard a unique harmonious piece comprised of three different musical pieces. It was like this young woman created a unique musical piece on the fly out of the unique properties of the suggestions given by the public, such musical genius surely must've been impossible, how could one just create a perfect harmony of notes and tunes out of all that's best of previous geniuses' best works, using them like nothing more but primal and useless notes in her performance. Shimo was no musical expert or even that much of a fan, nowhere close Meiko's fascination level, however what he heard amazed him to no end.

"Impressive, ain't she?" another mobster leaned in from the other side speaking up to Shimo while the young lady decided to take a break as she played so immensely that her hair burst out of the bindings letting it all loose, unleashed into an ocean of purple and green majesty.

"She does that every time, every evening she performs… Notasa… But she's off limits if yer interested in her loins. She's got a nasty guard dog protecting her. He'd pull out yer fucking throat with his own teeth while pulling yer balls out with his bare hands. I'm tellin' ye as a Syndicate soldato, he'd plow through our ranks like no tomorrow and leave no able or willing man to even give her as much as a rose. I mean… It's the goddamn Carnefici Satsu we're talkin' 'bout. Out of the slammer right to guarding Notasa's back door" the mobster went on and on as the young lady bowed and finished her performance. Her forty minutes of pure musical magic…


	189. Things we Seek to Gain

The stairs beneath Kouta's feet thudded firmly and layers of old dust got picked up and whirled around and down as the two carefully and slowly made their way to the fifth floor. The woman rammed against the door, seemingly because of the effort she had to put into simply moving. Maybe it was just the fatigue as the woman was breathing heavily using the door for support. Having her condition in mind such momentary signs of weakness could've been forgiven.

Slow thumps and foot dragging noises signaled to the two that someone was coming to the door. A large man in a brown leather jacket and a torn up, hole covered black t-shirt opened it, he didn't look like one of the Syndicate guys but he most definitely could've kicked some ass. His hair was messy black and long while his facial hair could've definitely used some trimming. The man moved aside and signaled for the two to come in after he saw Kouta's new female companion.

"Is this how it is nowadays Frankes, a minion to oversee your needs and scare old friends away?" the woman teased someone the two still had not seen as she raised her voice so it could reach the more remote rooms of the crack den looking apartment they were in.

"You know how it is Jeandette… I don't leave this place much these days" a cybernetic sounding voice reached the two followed by the large leather wearing guy. The voice came from a room several steps past the corridor the three were in, telling Kouta the way and saving him the trouble of having to stumble around a place he didn't know.

"A voicebox?" Kouta squinted questioningly at the woman who was now named by her old time friend. Before the young man didn't have a name to pin on her face because names simply didn't matter. As a medical ninja he was used to look at the ailment, at the problems and the solutions he took to solve them. Names were bad, names identified someone, names gave them a feeling, personality and… Names made things difficult. Made tough decisions difficult.

"Don't worry, he won't know if you stare…" the woman nodded with a reply that was supposed to sound like a joke but her tone was so dull and tired that it wasn't particularly funny, it was less fun still when having in mind the subject they were discussing.

Once the three entered the room the leather wearing man positioned himself at the other end of the room and crossed his hands on his chest, carefully staring at Kouta as he was the only odd part of the equation which the man had no idea of. The man sitting on the only old and sophisticated looking piece of furniture in probably the entire block, an old armchair, was supposed to be the owner of this apartment and the man of the hour.

As a medical ninja Kouta was used to seeing weird shit, even gritty shit but his face and body was on the different scale. The boy even couldn't help but shake a little the first moments after seeing the man. His skin was singed off to the flesh, based on his appearance it was clear that he must've been covered with third and fourth degree burns and required extensive medical assistance. The worst part was the center split of the body, it looked like someone had lived inside the man and just decided to leave him by peeling the man open like a cheese stick from inside. His face was burnt and mangled, also his flesh opened from inside and suddenly Kouta understood why the man needed his voicebox to speak. The sounds that came out of him naturally made him slobber over himself and just came out as unintelligible murmur and mumble.

"I've brought a friend" Jeandette spoke up first pointing at Kouta, it was just common courtesy of informing a blind man of the presence. The seated man just carelessly shook his head around trying to locate the young man but then stopped as his remaining sensory organs picked up nothing from Kouta's side.

"I don't care about who you've brought with you, I care about why you're here, Jeandette. It's been too long, neither of us is a person we've once been. Neither of us is exactly a number one hit anymore… The star of the show" the disfigured man whom Jeandette called Frankes spoke.

"True. Soon I'll perform for another crowd, one either of ogres or angels" Jeandette sighed lowering her head and moving up closer to Frankes softly touching his cheek and rubbing it. It was clear from the man's curious and indifferent reaction that he couldn't feel it.

"Consider yourself lucky. Maybe one day you'll do the soundtrack for my picture…" Frankes sighed as the aggressive intake of air forced him to cough, whatever flaming inferno he must've endured most likely also burnt his lungs and the protective membrane to shit. Even breathing must've came to an agony to this man nowadays.

"Maybe…" Jeandette sighed and moved back to Kouta before turning around.

"Don't fool yourself, we're not performing to any angels. We've taken a loan from the demon king and gave up that right with the first cracker we gorged on, we both read the contract of this life of pleasure and fame and we both signed it. I hope you didn't come here to cry on my shoulder because I will neither feel your pain nor have I signed a check I cannot cash with my ass. Can't you see, Jeandette? I've been practicing, practicing living in an actual Hell and I've had plenty of practice. The devil will find no fear or pain or hear no begs to stop when his hooks will tear my flesh, he'll only see a man with terribly bored eyes…" Frankes growled, his cybernetic voice made a low pitch that made the voice sound almost demonic.

"Ah, but that's your worst hell, isn't it? Boredom… I feel like the ogres will be content with just boring you to death. That's why you didn't kill yourself when this happened, that's why you don't have the guts to end it before it ends… You like the pain, pain is just opposite side of pleasure and none of the extremes terrify you, just the golden middle. Balance of the scales" Jeandette replied to which Frankes almost burst into laughter. His body shook violently in the armchair and spat out green slobber from his mouth as the voicebox dangled stuck to his mouth.

"Laughter" it translated.

"I'm playing a role, Frankes. The very last one, one that'll let me pass peacefully, a good one, decent one, one for the angels. You can help me and possibly share my place in purgatory or live miserably with eternal boredom lingering in the future. Maybe the angels will let you live in pleasure, live your old life again with your wife, like the old times…" the woman explained why she came, something that appeared to be quite stumping for the disfigured man as he had asked about it multiple times. These two must've not seen each other for a long time, Jeandette must've not been a common guest in these parts.

"Last role to play? So you need weapons then? Humor me, what can be so humbling that it'd wash off your sins, what could be so generous and holy that it'd give you a chance that the angels would waste their time?" the man asked, his cybernetic tone shrieked as it reached a high note, must've signaled an ironic change in tone.

"We need ninja kits, as many as we can have, I'll take what's left of them as compensation for my help" Kouta spoke up hoping that the man would agree to the terms and supply the weapons for the remained of their mission, all the way until the Box, if the other manage to decipher the sphere, that is.

"Young man… I am the only non-Syndicate affiliated black market dealer. I chose this path because I don't give a shit if I live or die, no, I actually wanted them to kill me, torture me and pull me from this world of boredom. To this day no such thing happened. It's either because I'm that good or because they leave me as is on purpose, just to get back at me. There are many who wish my weapons, weapons unaffiliated by the Syndicate…" Frankes began his complex refusal but suddenly Jeandette's voice rose up again.

"We are going after "Silver Dollar" Croquette and "Black Widow" Mortenson" she spoke killing all speech for a moment. Silence of the graveyard took over, wrapped its long rotten fingers around everyone's throats. Finally Frankes managed to peel and break those old crone's fingers off his throat.

"I'll give you whatever you need… Not because I believe in you, you'll most likely die but… If you kill the bastards and burn their operation to the ground I'll hear about it and laugh, oh how I'll laugh… If you don't they'll know you got your weapons from me – they'll finally have no right to ignore me and they'll come, cut me into pieces, maybe burn me to cinders… It'll shake some excitement into my life for once" the poor man wobbled like a nostalgic war veteran longing for his lost buddies.

"Do you have any steel tipped cards? Hopefully, not artificial steel, actual living chakra conductive steel?" Kouta wondered

"What? Who the fuck plays with steel tipped cards? They'd shred your hand like paper shredder unless you know what you're doing!" the cybernetic voice shrieked again in the high pitched tone.

"Very well… Ten ninja kits shall suffice…" Kouta nodded feeling a little bummed that he won't be able to bring Mana back some spares.

Mana huffed and grunted. She was tied to a chair with a Syndicate goon beating her up. One thing the magician didn't and couldn't possibly have predicted was how the Syndicate would react to an unknown mobster marching up to their establishment with a pretty wanted face tied up and handed her over to them. Meiko, or rather the comedic shape she now took, was lead to the leader of the establishment, Mana managed to slip some questions before she was taken to the other room to be tortured and at some point killed. She just hoped that Meiko would get her answers before the killing part came. Mana could've escaped being tied to a chair in two seconds flat without her chakra control, still, fighting a grown and pretty brawny man would've raised noise and that'd have ruined it all. The little girl stabbed in the heart would've slipped into oblivion, as would the other future victims.

She could've maybe used some physical chakra augmentation, tanked those blows to the point where they didn't feel like all that much. At her peak she could probably take a punch from a Chuunin without dying but the problem was not the power of the punches, it was the extended duration. At this point Mana was being punched around for maybe fifteen minutes with guys changing a couple of times. She decided to only use minimal augmentation, see that their rings didn't crush her eyeballs, see that she didn't lose too many teeth because she hated the painful process of regrowing them.

The guy pulled out a fork and ran it by Mana's face. The magician had to hand it to him, her head felt whoozy and the whole body hurt and felt bruised pretty badly. She saved herself from a lot more terrible injuries as she'd have long since been pounded meat if she didn't augment herself. These guys hit harder than most people, hard enough to grind stone and punch through steel without a doubt. They must've been beginning to get suspicious why the girl's face didn't change into minced meat by now. Still, the general rule was that forks hurt… They were also slow and messy, Mana was not looking forward to that at all.

Sharp pain in the left shoulder, Mana grinded her teeth trying not to scream. It might be difficult to still do her mission after this. She needed as much functionality as she could muster but if she augmented her body too much she'd risk losing her physical chakra again by breaking the network or revealing the extent of her abilities to these jokers. In fact she loosened her augmentations from the punching phase, letting small tips of the fork to slip by her flesh. The last thing she wanted was to break or bend the blasted thing and force the guys to get more inventive.

Mana wasn't sure how much time passed. She felt sharp pulses in many points of her body and she was passing in and out, her conscience was fading and coming back. She had to persevere, she had to for the little girl that was murdered, if they managed to get a little bit of info from all of this it'll be worth it, it'll be worth getting skewered by forks and burnt and beaten… Mana would suffer a thousand times more if she could bring that poor kid back but she couldn't… Such was the curse of the human life, no way of rewinding and fixing the faults of the past, only moving forward and making sure those mistakes meant something, that something was learned from them… Mana began humming a song in her mind, slowly she began slipping into meditation, she felt more stabs coming her way but her mind was gone, how come she didn't think of it sooner?

A cold shower made Mana's mind snap out. She looked around and noticed that she was drowning, the magician stopped breathing and coughed out some water she prematurely inhaled. Fear scurried into her heart. That was just a side effect of drowning, Mana calmed herself down, her meditation must've made her move far away from the torture and made her slip away. Those Syndicate goons must've thought she was dead and dumped her body, still tied into the chair which was also tied to rocks… Mana felt her ears screaming – the pressure was getting to her. Her calm hands quickly worked wonders of the sloppy knots, it only took moments to escape her binds. The magician tried to swim up.

"Shit" she thought when she realized that the stones weren't tied to the chair – they were tied to her leg. A couple of extra seconds to escape those binds and then just float into the light… Pain… So much pain… Mana had no idea her meditation could help her withstand any torture, she had never thought of it that way. Now that she was back however everything those men did to her caught up with her. The only things in Mana's mind however were questions: if Meiko got any useful information and if she was OK.

Mana's naked body swam out into the dirty shores. She dragged her body across the stone looking at the trail of blood she left behind. Ice cold water ran down her body, freezing the girl and forcing her to grunt in pain and cold at places, easing the pain with its freezing presence in some others. Tracking the wounds on her body she must've been stabbed more times than the magician could count but these were shallow wounds. Shallow but they were just numerous enough to be worrisome, the magician's semi-normal human body was already failing. Blood was rising and coming out from her mouth, that despicable bloody taste in her mouth… Mana wrapped into the rags she was brought here in, Syndicate may have had immunity from social stigma or persecution but they wouldn't have dragged her through the streets butt naked.

Slowly Mana crawled forward, on her knees when she couldn't walk and on her feet when she felt hopeful. An old man ran out from a small shack nearby to the lake she was dumped in and dragged her into his home. He tried treating Mana but the girl pushed him aside gently and asked for clothes and bandages. The old man disappeared for a moment and brought her similar clothes to those Mana wore, the way he explained it they belonged to his daughter. He also brought a large brown bag with medical supplies.

"So women here do wear those things…" Mana thought to herself examining a slightly more worn and older version of the attire she wore, despite being worn, this one had a fortunate advantage of not being soaked in blood and didn't have any stabbing holes in it. It was an almost exact replica instead small inconsequential details like the jacket's zippers being colored golden instead of silver and the shirt having purple lotus motifs on it. The leather jacket was also decently torn in some places like the woman was dragged on the ground in them. Mana decided to rather not ask about the details of that and thanked the man.

"My girl likes to get wasted and she's rarely home, only whenever she can drag her drunk frame through the pavement back home. Whatever I can do to help I'd be glad to do…" the old man nodded and bowed his head.

The kunoichi removed the bandages and quickly rounded herself up in them wherever the fork wounds still bled, once applied the bandage stained red almost instantly. After putting the bandages on her limbs, abdomen and some on her forehead to cover up the knife cuts she got at some point Mana got dressed, thanked the man with a low and respectful bow and ran out. She still had to find Meiko now…

Shimo slowly walked around the endless corridors of the hall after the show. The public just all jumped up and left right after it. It began clearing up even before the end of the show, most of them left right after Notasa's performance and for a moment Shimo also wanted to do that. Leaving would've been a mistake, Notasa also performed together with some other artists so she was clearly not leaving until the end of the whole show so the Yuki decided to sit the whole thing through.

Loud noises emanated from the end of the hall. Shimo looked around and then casually began strolling towards the direction of the noises as he was looking around like he was just minding his own business and just happened to run into the brewing situation. Something really bad was brewing, Shimo could tell just by looking at the number of Syndicate goons rallied around the large preparation room with a large bright blue note on it where "Notasa" was written in all the colors of the rainbow.

"Look, kid, yer a good gal, ye pay your protection fees. We don' have a problem with ya, see? We got a problem with yer bodyguard" one of the Syndicates spoke as Shimo joined in on the rally to see what the big fuss was about. The hall outside had a good twelve men gathered and there were four more inside. Or so it seemed initially, when Shimo peeked inside something, or rather someone, he knew made him open his jaw wide.

It was a short man, used to be short, anyways, also he merely used to be a man. What once without a doubt was the man Shimo knew was now an abomination of nature and science. The very mob boss they've brought down an entire gold mine on was standing alive and kicking in the center of Notasa's chamber, his flesh must've been crushed and peeled off his skin and reassembled, it had many scars that didn't have blood and meat inside of them, instead it glowed with the purplish glow of the Audra alloy. Got a much fancier black with white stripes suit after the last fight too, picked up a knack for smoking indoors as well, his black tie had a red Otogakure symbol on it symbolizing the true "Otokage" of the village…

"I don't care if you have a problem with him, he was attacked and harassed and that's why he had to do what he did. He didn't even kill your men, he's not the monster you make him out to be!" the lady who was for now only known to Shimo as Notasa, and as such was immensely important to the youth screamed out through distress and tears.

"Lady, this guy right ere is none other then Carnefici Satsu, you may be too young to know what he used to do in his day, see?..." the boss spoke up, his tone and voice was a lot shallower and huskier, also much calmer. If Shimo had to guess nervousness must've broke his stitches and tore his flesh off the Audra core he had under it.

"I don't care what he did! He was recently out of prison when I hired him, he's my bodyguard!" Notasa once again was losing her composure – a bad thing to do when talking to a bunch of lowlifes like the Syndicate.

"How many settlements did you plunder? How many women did you rape and murder? How many ordered hits did you complete? How many children ninja did you slaughter in your days, Carnefici, or should I call you "Carnage Fici", do you still answer to that nickname? The old lady tales say that your headbutt once killed fifteen people, one exploded just from the force of it, the others died of the air pressure around it…" a mobster close to the Boss spoke up. The large man close to Notasa remained silent despite being asked a direct question.

He was an average sized, well aged fellow, wore a suit and shades, similar to those that the bouncers wore. He had no weapons on him and had shoulder length brown with grey streaks hair that weren't supposed to be that long, they merely ended up being that way due to lack of trimming and supervision. He also had a neglectful stubble that may have been a couple of months old but his eyes were the worst. In those eyes one could've found fear, aggression and desire to rip one's throat out and shove it up the other end. A scary fellow through and through…

"I remember them all. Every poor man, woman and child I did wrong to. I've been thinking, dreaming and remembering what happened to every seventy thousand fifty two hundred of them. Shall I list them by names or is my word enough? I do not have the tongue for foreign names so I may disrespect my legacy by speaking their names however…" the man spoke, he had a voice similar to the noise a man made when they had corn stuck in their throat.

"There will be no need, as someone who has paid her dues each and every bloody month I request you cease this at once! This man may have done terrible things in the past but he has already answered for them, you've no right to treat him like an animal!" Notasa spoke, now much calmer yet also much stricter.

"You dare ya, ye little bi…" the man's throat was crushed by his Boss lifting the mobster off the ground by grabbing him by the neck and lifting him effortlessly in the air before throwing him aside. The mobster was lucky his Boss didn't feel sadistic or else he'd have easily snapped his neck with just a tip of his thumb

"Yer right, kid, see? You paid your dues, see? But we are paid to protect you. That means that this man here, see? A killer of over seventy thousand and pillager of thirty nine settlements and two villages is a security flaw, see? As someone paid to protect you, we can't allow this monster to be beside you, see? So, "Carnage Fici" Carnefici, you gonna bow and let me kill you quick or are you gonna go for a few rounds?" the Boss grunted.

All the Syndicate thugs standing outside flew back knocked out by Shimo's strikes. The young man drew his blade and gently tapped each and every one of the thugs with the end of his hilt before they could as much as blink. They needed to be killed, they deserved death but… Shimo declared that he'd try and model his sword after Mana's ideal as much as he could. He killed only when necessary, he was a sword wielded to protect and so he claimed lives only to protect.

"I wouldn't mind a few rounds myself, Boss…" Shimo grinned confidently when the man's face shook violently, his flesh and blood dyeing the mobster's face completely purple in rage.

"You!" was all he huffed out.


	190. Love in the Dark City

Moving around while carrying multiple ninja kits was difficult. While Kouta requested more kits than he could possibly need to take out a Syndicate establishment the young one thought that it'd be useful to stack up for the future. After all they were close, close to the Box, after all this time! It seemed like once Kouta cleaned this last matter up and caught up with his team someone would have already found a way to decipher the sphere and they'd have one final destination to head to. And then… Mana would finally get her chakra mastery back and maybe cheer up for once.

Granted, just as the lovely magician was selfish to leave on this mission merely to restore her chakra control and reward her blacksmith friend with an adventure, Kouta also had similarly selfish causes. Mana said she liked him, she said she wasn't against the idea of trying to make something of it… That was Kouta's driving force because he also greatly admired the girl. He was still hesitant to say "loved", he knew very little of what that word meant and just what sort of feeling hid behind it.

"You doing okay?" he checked on Jeandette who was slowly creeping behind him, granted she was doing better than someone with molten together innards would've normally been doing but it never hurt to check.

"Yeah…" she uttered softly and continued to limp forward, sometimes fixing Kouta's direction by telling him to turn the other way or giving him directions up front in case her mind blacks out.

Love… What a strange word with an even stranger phenomenon hidden behind it. Ever since he was a young boy Kouta heard countless songs, saw many plays and read a multitude of stories of love. He didn't particularly fancy them too much but love always played a central part in any story. Some may have argued it was a much more important feeling than the justice delivered to the villain of the story. It was a more integral part of the story than killing the bad guy. That always confused Kouta. It was almost like killing the villain of the story was sinful, almost like by killing them the hero lost their humanity but love somehow was not, love redeemed them and helped the audience and the hero to move past the murder.

Love was idolized, praised and raised to the heavens without an end, without an equal in the handful of feelings standing beside it. Anger, justice, empathy, apathy, happiness even… None of these, or any others, received the appraisal which love got. Ever since his youth Kouta felt like he was blessed for once having a chance to feel that exalted feeling. He thought surely he'd feel this divine elevation of character and mood, his heart would without a doubt claw its way outside the chest once he got this majestic monarch of all feelings.

Such a thing never happened… When Kouta looked at Mana it felt like he was ready to forgive her anything, like everything the girl did was perfect and everything she touched turned to gold. He wanted to spend time around her and talk to her and laugh at the things she say or make her laugh, eat something delicious with her and watch her enjoy some gourmet dish for the first time just to see the happiness and surprise in her face and yet… Where was this divinity, this elevation of the human essence. This was no royal, heavenly feeling. This was very primal and human, it felt like a sin even. Every time Shimo used to tease him about it Kouta blushed and denied everything, he was even ready to pick a fight with the swordsman just to prove a non-existent point, to prove nothing but his own foolishness because this foolishness was something Kouta would rather have than this strange earthly pleasure of… Love?

The boy's confusion was even deeper now. Now that he was in Otogakure and saw all around him people gorging and indulging in the sweetest pleasures. Men and women disappearing in the alleyways or scantily clad youths giggling as they disappeared in the inn rooms. Kouta may have been young and naïve but he was no fool, the innkeepers preyed on that youthful love and lust, that desire and hunt for pleasure by raising the room prices for a night… That was why he couldn't get a room for the life of him for a below average pay that would've earned him a roach infested joint anywhere else in the world, at the very least.

If these people engaged and chased for pleasure, would they end up like Jeandette and Frankes ended up? Does pleasure and living for one's desires always necessarily lead to their fate? Is pleasure nothing more but a fire for the human moth that feels so warm and pleasant but burns them up in the end, sometimes literally so.

"Jeandette-san…" Kouta addressed his newly met friend by her name for the first time.

The woman laughed and shook her head. "Spare the pleasantries, I lost the right to a honorific the moment I bartered my life away in the most ridiculous gamble. The ignorant deserve no praise nor honors, only serves them right to spare them the honorifics as well"

"I just… Before we reach the place we're headed to and I make a proper plan of assault I… Wanted to know something" Kouta spoke slowly and hesitantly, he had little desire to actually finish his thought but he needed to know. This inquiry was so similar to his feelings for Mana – hesitation to admit them and fear of what it'd bring but also a great desire of the fruits of that labor.

"Well? We have a lot of time until we reach the Messalina Plaza, go ahead…" she encouraged Kouta to speak, "I quite literally don't have whole night…" she added only to invite giggling from deep in her own chest.

"There is this girl I like very much… I'm not really sure where it leads to, what it is and… Seeing this village for what it is, what it turned out to be when people do and get all they want by just snapping their fingers, when they indulge voraciously in all the earthly pleasures…" he began trying to shape his question but he felt a cold and sweaty hand of the woman wrap around his neck and pull him in closer.

"Never be afraid of getting what you want. Never be afraid of aiming high or trying your damn hardest to live a life of pleasure. Love isn't jackbang, even if sometimes it looks that way. A moth that burns in the fire is a thousand times happier to that which hides in the darkness of the woods and ends up in some stinky basement. I may look like a lot of things but one thing I know is that I am happy for everything good that happened in my life. If we pull this shit off, I will die happy. That is more than most people that want something they don't try to reach for and end up hating their object of desire in the process can have. My advice is love. Love with all your heart. It doesn't matter if you die tomorrow or in a thousand years, what matters is that you are happy and content in your final moments"

Kouta looked down and scratched the side of his head, he mumbled out an expression of gratitude for the woman but he just couldn't completely understand the mixed message. Everyone he saw in this village craved pleasure during every moment of their existence with every fraction of their being and yet this woman, someone who had burnt from this mad quest for bodily pleasures and someone who knew people with lives ruined by the mad chase for pleasure advised him to love.

"Love isn't jackbang…" he uttered under his own nose, if anything this felt like just one more line praising love beyond what it actually was. Blast those poets and playwrights, musicians and directors for deifying love. It made such a mess of all things… There were more meaning behind those words than the boy had initially realized, the woman may have revealed what he needed to know. Chasing a happy and pleasant life was not wrong, nor did it lead to ruin, it was chasing the wrong, momentary pleasures ignoring the things that really mattered. "Love isn't jackbang…" he repeated to himself.

Love was one of those important pleasures, love was a long time investment, it was a joyous and simple earthly pleasure that granted one a lifetime of happiness spending time with one they loved. Jackbang was a cheap imitation of a relaxation drug from another country, something that gave a short termed flare for the cost of slowly, or immediately, ruining one's life. No, love was no jackbang indeed and that made it worth chasing…

"Hey, loverboy, we're here…" Jeandette giggled grabbing Kouta by the back of his head and turning his head at a large French fry shaped tower of glass and steel, an example of architecture that was fairly decent, the likes of which the commoners called "a skyscraper"

"Messalina Plaza…" the woman's face grew nostalgic, serious, sad and longing within a span of a second as her eyes gazed at the modern miracle of architecture.

Mana stared into the sky with a blank gaze. She could hear unrest and shouts nearby, most likely emanating from the raging fire that lit the night's sky nearby, likely invisible in the further industrial districts. People shouted and gathered at the spot, a powerful blast echoed as the air around the lit night's sky formed a round pillow that apparently burst from the speed and force of someone quickly approaching Mana's direction. The magician continued to stand and wait around, focusing a tiny bit of her physical chakra into her eyes, making them flare up with a reddish glow at the irises and began to notice some familiar shapes in the sky.

A young yet tall and well-built red haired lady flew right at her current location, covering great distances in but a mere moment before the blue flare at her boots began to fade before completely going out. A loud comical shout of a falling Meiko could be heard as her boots turned on again with a last flare propelling her forward letting the blacksmith adjust her position upright and slam into the ground from at least two hundred meters in the air and causing a large cone of drilled out dirt as she slid towards Mana. As the blacksmith finally finished her improvised landing she just stroke the back of her head and apologetically grinned with her full teeth smile before jumping up and beginning to check Mana.

"Oh my God, Mana! I'm so sorry, what did they do to you!? They didn't tell me anything at all about what they were going to do to you and I was so worried and then one shitbrain slipped something about you going to "swim with the fishes" and I thought it was nice of them to let you swim in their aquarium but then they all began talking of you in past tense and…"

Mana placed her hand on Meiko's shoulder and nodded.

"It's fine, if I wanted to, if I ever felt like the pain was more than I could have handled I'd have busted out in two seconds flat. I just wanted to give you all the time to get as much information as possible. Did you get any?" Mana wondered.

"Yeah, some…" Meiko nodded still looking at Mana and her bandaged head with a sorry stare, it looked like the blacksmith was about to break into tears at any point. She seemed to have a soft spot with people she had grown fond of and gotten friendly with… Perhaps she was lucky to not see the rest of Mana's body, only her bandaged face, Mana pressed the collar of her shirt more tightly together so that it concealed the scars and still fresh bleeding wounds on her body.

"There have been several incidents like that all over the village, strange incidents of violence. Here look at this…" the blacksmith removed a piece of broken wall with something drawn on it with blood.

Mana looked at Meiko questioningly.

"When they let me know they tortured and apparently drowned you I got really mad at them and left no smug face unpunched and not a stone on stone in their headquarters. I blew it up with a really good punch, almost lost control there and destroyed the whole district…" Meiko admitted with a shrug. Mana noticed that Meiko had a really scary side somewhere deep, probably one fueled and built up of her awkwardness and strange trait of completely misinterpreting and misunderstanding things.

"So first I asked them to point out all the similar cases of random unsolved violence, this is what they showed me, the locations may be wobbly, most of the conscious guys had broken fingers and busted wrists" Meiko smiled with a little guilt revealing what all those blood stains meant.

So all of these points meant some sort of violent random outburst? It must've been too random for the Syndicate to pinpoint. They seemed to be quite fixed on maintaining order because the whole village was their own business playground and they wished to run a tight ship here. They must've despised those random sparks of violence more than anyone else…

Mana took Meiko's finger and placed it at the sheet of folded and mangled, blood stained paper.

"Draw" she asked.

Meiko closed her eyes doing her best to focus and mumbled "Finger Carving Seal" as her finger lit up with a blue flame and left a smoldering drawing mark wherever she held it, just strong enough to be seen but not wide and hot enough to ruin the paper. Mana slowly moved and guided Meiko's seal drawing finger across the paper connecting all the dots into a strange sign that appeared the combination of a slightly rotated S combined with a punctuation slash.

"Holy shit! It's a "segno" mark!" Meiko shouted out, frankly Mana had no idea what the mark meant so she was greatly surprised by the blacksmith's affinity for shocking the magician with her intelligence so soon after she shocked the girl by just how goofy and naïve she was.

"Segno?" Mana asked playing with a streak of her hair as she was a little bit jealous that Meiko knew something that the magician did not.

"Yeah, it's a musical sign used with "dal segno", another sign that tells the musician to repeat something starting with the last "segno"…" Meiko excitedly exclaimed looking at the graciously drawn and quite beautiful looking mark that truthfully symbolized places of great random violence.

"So then the sign is complete?" Mana wondered looking at Meiko curiously, "Will these random events of violence no longer happen?" she asked the question she wished to know the most.

"Oh no, it's still missing three signs, namely dots here, here and then maybe a more perfect finishing stroke of this line…" Meiko pointed at a couple of spots.

"Well then, at least we know where these events will happen, we don't know when though… If anything we have time, at least until Kouta or Shimo finds us" Mana closed her eyes realizing that it was now her responsibility to prevent these future events of violence. With so many dots filling the Otogakure map there was no reasonable doubt that whoever is doing all of this will want the "segno" completed sooner or later.

The man whom the Syndicate wished to kill so much – Carnefici Satsu flipped the toothpick in his mouth hesitantly as his tongue played with the small wooden pick. It must've been the nerves, or maybe he no longer felt nerves before a fight? After all, a man of his notoriety… Carnefici's name was not entirely unheard of by Shimo, he faintly remembered reading it long ago as a kid in the papers. There was a huge deal, back then, some sort of public outcry when ten years after his capture Carnefici was still not executed. The punishment was delayed due to a big outcry about which prison Carnefici should've been imprisoned and wait for his execution in. The quarrels lasted for so long that eventually the sentence was changed altogether into life imprisonment… Apparently somehow "Carnage" Fici managed to avoid even that sentence.

Two Syndicate thugs rushed at Carnefici. The man blew air lightly by his tongue shooting the toothpick clean through the eye of one of them, a small squirt of blood shot out before the man collapsed on the floor, shaking in pain. The other stroke at Carnefici with a concealed blade which disappeared entirely in Carnefici's body. The scared shitless mobster tried to pull his hands out from being stuck in the body of the most terrifying murderer and pillager in recent history who did some of the worst crimes recently recorded for the sole reason of being bored. Carnefici dispatched of the man with a backhand slap sending the man down on the floor.

The Boss rushed at Shimo throwing a barrage of blindingly fast punches the but swordsman had apparently improved much more than the Boss did since their last encounter as he was no longer where the punches were thrown. Shimo's blade danced in ten, sixty, two hundred, four thousand and even twenty thousand cuts in just a blink of moments as a deafening barrage of clangs unified into a singular shrieking sound forcing Notasa to cover her bleeding ears. Twenty thousand shockwaves erupted from where Shimo's blade met the Boss' tearing the corridor and most of the building apart, blowing off the roof from the built up pressure and tumbling down its walls while raising smoke and falling debris up in the process. With a careless glance Shimo looked back to check if Notasa was not injured but the frail body of the pale girl was covered by that of her bodyguard who had debris and pipes penetrating his body all over.

The Boss looked all over his body, looking over his ruined suit and at the spots where Shimo's blade danced on his rebuilt from scratch body with a cocky smile. The man then flicked himself in the fist and in the forehead laughing out loud.

"Pure Audra skeletal frame and lower skin layer coating! I'm fucking invincible, punk, see!?" he laughed out in a husky tone.

Carnefici jumped up from Notasa pushing all of the debris away from his back, he then noticed that the young lady's shoulder was cut and noticed that one metal bar went right through his skin and into the young lady's shoulder, shallowly true, but still injuring her. The angered bodyguard pulled the broken piece of debris and slammed it at the distracted by gloating Boss' face holding the rock by the metal bar and sending the invincible man flying beyond the point Shimo could even see him.

"Go be invincible somewhere else, cocksucker" he angrily grunted in a voice that, Shimo would've most definitely agreed, belonged to a mass murderer. "You fuckers can scram too… Go cry to your flying Boss and ask for his titty" he then lashed out on the downed and injured mobsters that scurried away rather quickly.

"You okay?" Shimo asked him looking at Carnefici but seeing no actual bodily wounds on the man, just his ruined hole covered and torn up suit.

"I'm sort of a gum kind a guy…" Satsu reached for one of the more recent wounds and spread it with his fingers revealing a gooey inside that looked more like bubble gum in which organs floated in than human flesh, more so, the synthetic rubber was rapidly sticking together. "You don't get to kill as many people as I did if any fucker with a fancy suit and a knife can just stab you" he added angrily growling at the end.

Shimo tried to slowly approach Notasa, he still needed her help but Carnefici's hand pushed him rudely at his chest.

"Thanks for not trying to kill us, now bugger off" he growled again with that annoyingly husky growl.

"No can do, I need help from your young lady so that I can help mine and let me tell you, I pissed mine off real bad. Backing off is sort of not an option…" Shimo grinned slamming his forehead right into Carnefici's lowered staring face. Both warriors stood one against another, Carnefici had to bow his head all the way down to stare at Shimo's level even if Shimo was quite tall for his age.

"Well then, we seem to have a problem then…" the past mass murderer hissed.

"You haven't killed one man today which makes me believe you've not killed since you left prison, you've gone soft, Carnefici…" Shimo taunted the man again. While he only needed the help of the young lady he was protecting some part of the Yuki was excited about the chance to fight someone so infamous. Some part of him also wished to show off in front of Notasa as if her approval of his macho stupidity meant absolutely anything. Notasa moaned in pain forcing Carnefici to jump back to her aid. The feared monster, the man that escaped justice was now tending to a flesh wound of some pampered little girl like he was her mommy… Shimo looked at the situation and his excited bloodthirsty stare softened somewhat.

Things could've went much worse, all things considered. "They'll be back…" Shimo said almost to himself.

"Of course they'll be fucking back, where did you get your genius degree, kid?" Carnefici growled tending to Notasa's wound using some of his own shirt and a napkin he carried in his pocket to cover up the relentless flesh wound on her shoulder. "When one invincible fucker meets another they have an instinct to bash their heads against each other until one of them stops being invincible and gets his head mashed…" he said in a somewhat calmer and more passively despising tone.

"Shit…" Shimo cursed realizing that he probably won't get Notasa's help until the Syndicate gets off her back.


	191. Staircase to Inferno

A man in a sophisticated suit was leaning over his table, his slight hunch now shot out much more clearly displaying a heavy emotional weight which the man carried on his shoulders. With a sleek rubbing sound of rubber making out with stainless steel of which the man's table and its sections were made of he opened one drawer and removed a couple of handfuls of murky green cookies placed in a vacuum sealed cellophane package. With a careless swipe to the side he tossed the treats sideways both to the left and to the right. At least two dozen men and women crawled out of the shadows that the man's office was covered in.

These were men and women of addiction, naked, starved, their hair ran rampant and their fingernails looked long enough to scoop one's eyes out with a spoon. Their teeth were ruined, their skin was almost bony in its consistency and they dug their rotten, leaking with green slobber mouths into the cookies. An explosion of purple smoke erupted from their mouths. As the slaves of addiction chained to the edges of the room fought for the mana from the heavens of their owner's mercy they bit each other, bashed and kicked, clawed and tore the flesh off one another despite having promised the other to never lose their humanity no matter how deep the hole addiction spirals them down in just couple of weeks ago.

A couple of these zombies of addiction began screaming in inhuman voices. Their bodies were burning up from inside as their bone tissue covered skin no longer regulated the temperature or sweat, their skin no longer helped secrete toxins out of the body either, the unfortunate ones of that day died whining as they had too little strength left to scream. The man sitting at the table right up to the window sighed and continued to stare at his subjects. He opened another drawer and removed a knife placing it on the table right in front of himself. The owner of the giant skyscraper he was sitting in the top floor of lifted the knife up to his eyes, placed the tip so close that his left eye teared up from fear of the blade slipping too close. The tip and the blade travelled higher all the way to the man's forehead leaving no cut on his face or touching his skin even once. With a deep depressed sigh the man placed the knife back to the drawer and removed a brush with a couple of face painting tools.

After opening the bottles up the mobster dipped the brush inside and turned around in a luxurious leather chair only to be faced by one of the most industrious and culturally relevant villages in the world, the most glorious panorama of the whole world opened up from where the man was sitting. Yet the shockproof thick glass reflected on the man's own image somewhat, at least the more colorful parts.

His shoes made of hardened skin of his own drug addicted victims. The ones that ate the "jollyjack" brand of the crackers, it seemed to be a bit less lethal and explosive than the jackbang brand but it eventually hardened one's skin to the point where it was thick as bone yet flexible as leather. Only made sense to make shoes out of the victims his drugs claimed… Where else would he have put all the bodies of those hopeless victims of fifteen minutes of pleasure ending up intoxicating and ruining their kidneys as their skin could no longer vent all the toxins in their body or regulate its temperature effectively cooking the poor souls from inside.

His fancy suit with a white vest of diamond buttons bought from the money made of selling slow death to the curious. It was hard profiting from suffering and death but truth be told those that called him anything but the businessman of tomorrow did not understand his merchandise. Yes, "Silver Dollar" Croquette was a merchant of death but not because he sold something that stupid fools misused to make death out of something that wasn't supposed to make it. No. He sold only death. Death and suffering itself and each day he invented new amazing ways of selling more painful suffering and slower, more agonizing death.

To the uninitiated it may have seemed like a terrible thing but those were the literal hatchlings in the life's pleasures. They were the old crones who had no idea how radio frequencies or moving pictures worked, they infuriated Croquette most of all. Yes, he sold death and torture to those that came begging but only because it was so genius to do so. Death and suffering tasted horrible, they felt even worse and yet… To those to whom pleasure was boring and no longer entertaining it was a new angle. If only those fools saw the women moaning in pleasure as they carved their own bodies in front of him for another cracker, if only they saw the men that hung on the streets because they wished more of the pain and death they could not buy from Croquette. Pleasure was getting boring, pain was the future of marketing.

Croquette's bloodshot eyes finally gazed upon his face, rather his facepaint as the brush "carved" another scratch on his face. He tried to harm himself, he tried to give himself the pain and death he gave his clients but he never could. Mortenson, that sneaky bitch, thought he didn't want to get high on his own supply but he wanted to. All this talk behind his back, all those fear filled eyes from the other mobsters, people who literally tortured and killed people made him feel guilty, made him feel unclean, somehow evil for what he did… It shouldn't have, but it did. Maybe just one cut, just one chopped off finger would redeem him somehow? But how could pleasure redeem him? Redemption needed to be sour and bitter, it needed to be something one feared like the plague but what was there to redeem with when both pleasure and suffering equally pleased one?

Croquette's finished painting another scar on his face. By now his face looked like he wore a mask of some sort. He ran out of space to draw his mutilation paintings two years ago forcing him to shave his head. By now he had to draw himself new eyes to mutilate with paint and imagination. He couldn't cut himself, he couldn't take any of his own poison so he had to just imagine he did… For now it was the best redemption "Silver Dollar" Croquette could hope for… Each stroke of his brush felt like the sharpest knife painting a smile on his face, each light tap of the brush felt like another eye getting poked out, blinded forever.

With a loud bang Croquette's door opened and a mobster ran inside. As he showed his face in "Silver Dollar's" twisted office of madness endless tirade's of weeping and moans came from the shadows that covered the left and the right sides of the room. The chains that held the addicts began to shriek and clang, bone snapping noises could've been heard as the poor tortured souls tried to bite the chains with their rotten teeth snapping and breaking their jaws or broke their long pale fingers trying to peel their collars open.

"The mask!" Croquette ordered out loud moving a large kunai dispenser coated in silver to the angle it would've required to pop one kunai blade with into the fool's skull.

"Oh, sorry, sir!" the mobster bowed his head and removed a red demon's mask placing it on his face. He did look quite grisly and scary with this lighting and how his deep blue eyes popped out from all of that darkness and the little light that the neon lights from outside provided danced in his irises.

"How many times do I have to tell you, these people have lost their humanity and seeing someone beautiful and undamaged just makes them… Jealous and uneasy. They become difficult to manage!" Croquette growled in an angry tone, he didn't raise his voice but his subordinate clearly heard it as he bowed several times repeatedly.

"Yes, I know, I apologize, it won't happen again!" he bowed again and again before slowly walking up to the table of his boss and placing a tape right in front of the man. The mobster's walk was greeted with growls and snarls from the darkness to the sides of the room.

"Why do you even take it off in the first place?" the drug overlord growled angrily, his subordinate bowed again.

"Well, with all due respect, Sir, they're creepy as fuck…" the man added. Croquette thought filling the fool's body with blades but reconsidered as quickly as he thought of it. He didn't want another sin on his conscience to atone for. He only gave people what they wanted and this fool was too numb skulled to wish the pain he had for sale.

"What is this?" Croquette asked calmly pointing at the tape.

"We've recorded something… Interesting. Sixteen people all knocked out in a single frame. We can't make out what it was…" the mafioso explained before Croquette stood up with the tape and used a button to lower a moving picture projector, slowly walking up to a recorder and stroking the head of one ruined woman chained nearby the device, she kissed his hand, she laid by his feet when he wished her to. Such was the cost for pleasure, such was the cost for the mercy of death he had all the capacities to give. These men and women had all that they wanted but no future… They had all the pleasure but none of the happiness.

Croquette carefully examined the recording and sighed. He could see nothing more but a dark blueish blur in the single frame that managed to capture whatever took out these men. Then a woman stumbled in and through the bottom floor carefully stepping over his knocked out guys. The owner's eyes carefully looked over the floor seeing no blood, whoever did this was foolish enough to not kill anyone. If someone was this fast they were probably a ninja, a really tough ninja fully capable of devastating a whole country if their power was unchecked and undirected. They could've at the very least blow those puny mobsters up in a blast of blood and guts but ironically enough this assailant had no guts themselves to do such a thing.

"I don't care what everyone is doing, make everyone mobilize as quickly as possible" Croquette ordered by just staring at the frozen recording that ended its run, freezing on the wheezing and collapsing of the woman in a ruined night gown, those blond locks he could've identified anywhere and just some years ago – so could everyone else in this fucking village.

"Excuse me, Sir, but maybe you could tell us who this woman is?" the uneasy masked mobster asked.

"She's a nobody, she's just an Otogakure whore, she's got someone to help her, that's the one you should be worried about" the drug lord still spoke with his head tightly fixed on the sights on the projector that still didn't change having finished the recorded run long ago.

"Tell Buonafino Sangrant to take his post and stop doing whatever he's doing, I'll need his tight grip on the situation…" Croquette added while he looked down at the twisted face of bony skin still locked in the expression of agony on his shoe, the face must've died in that expression and gotten stuck that way when it was peeled off with a spiral drill.

"And Miss Mortenson?" the mobster inquired shortly before he was about to close the door and leave.

"I don't care who that fucker is, whoever decided to fuck with me, they won't get a drop on Mortenson. Her knife is always in your back, not the other way around. The back of that woman is never exposed long enough to slip a knife in it" Croquette replied with a lazy backhand motion. The mobster finally ran down the stairs to alert everyone on the upper floors before running to the elevator to look for Buonafino Sangrant. He was an odd man of even odder tastes and it was tough to say where the man would've been in this plaza of many pleasures.

"You sure you can move, Jeandette?!" Kouta exclaimed with a worried and much louder tone than he'd have wanted.

"I'll be fine. I'll live as long as I'll have to, I'll see that fucker burn…" the woman grunted standing back on her feet before coughing blood all over her night gown and onto her palms.

"We can take a break, you know… I spent a lot of chakra healing you before, I also used out a lot of it taking those goons out right now. It's safe to say I'm only at a fraction of my abilities" Kouta explained.

"Look at me and tell me, looking me straight in my eyes, that I have enough time for a break. That I won't die before seeing that bastard breathe his last while I have my last smoke" Jeandette grabbed Kouta's collar and pulled the young man closer to her face looking him in the eyes with passion and burning rage.

Even if his worry did not flicker for a moment the medical ninja bowed his head and turned towards the long staircase. Jeandette realized she was getting desperate and sighed.

"If you're tired we can have a short break. Make no mistake, "Silver Dollar" Croquette makes enough money to sustain one third of Syndicate's grip on this village. He has no moral or any other kind of qualms with what he does. He has the whole army of goons at his disposal, each one of them was tutored in the art of combat. When we move up, it's gonna be war out there…" the woman explained trying to tell her comrade how it is.

Kouta's arm shifted, morphed into a long tube that fired a glowing blueish ball of pure chakra blowing up the door on the ceiling that blocked off the entry to the other room.

"Catch up to me at your own pace… I saw some elevators nearby so don't make me wait too long" he whispered to the tired and dying woman, the one to whom he promised that he'd show her the empire of the man who built it on top of her life by stepping over her as painfully as possible crumble. The one to whom he promised that one last cracker before she goes. That one last cursed smoke emitting only devil knew what sort of chemicals inside of her body.

Kouta's body blurred and disappeared. The woman did not lie, the other room was flooded, each and every corner of each and every room was full of these masked mobsters, some of them wore their demonic colored mask by their belt, some of them had them on. They were just leather or plastic, they offered no protection from Kouta's blows. He punched and kicked to the sides, he moved swift like a falling star and he hit hard. These men were no ninja, Kouta was forced to weaken his blows just so he doesn't cut them down like hot steel wire through butter. They did have a certain degree of training – humans trained by corrupt rogue ninja in the paths of superhuman physique. Still, physical superhuman training could only build one up to a certain point, to surpass the human limit was only to hit the superhuman limit in the skies above. When Kouta felt his head bumping against the superhuman ceiling…

Piles of mobsters elbow dropped him from above, endless crowds more fired upon him with those kunai dispensers piercing some of their own but also leaving shallow cuts and stabs on the boy's own flesh.

When that superhuman ceiling becomes unbearable… Kouta only tears it down. The boy yelled out opening up his body and making his skin shift into holes, four on his back, six on each of his legs and arms, four on both his palms and feet. Chakra beams blasted from each one of it. Powerful enough to blast the mobsters off of him with the combined shockwave tossing every single mobster aside. The beams erupted through the walls and the windows shooting off a blue pillar beam from each hole it blasted through.

Kouta's tired, scratched and bruised body continued to punch, knock out each of the men that fired upon him, when the floor was clean he moved up. He knew that Jeandette was climbing the steps behind him, he had to move quick but sometimes exhaustion slowed him down. Sometimes those odd large camera boxes on the ceiling and in the corners managed to catch a glimpse of him, just blur, very rarely identifying him as something human. He did not wish to appear human to these people, they've built their entire lives trouncing humans, stomping all over their lives and dragging their faces in the mud. No, to them Kouta was no human – to them he was a force of nature, a wild tornado of hellfire that would burn this whole building to the ground in its wild blaze.

The toughest part of fighting these endless hordes of mobsters and evading each and every kunai blade their fired was that the young medical ninja had to hold back – he had to quickly adjust his speed from his peak to slower, he had to use significant skill to avoid all of those attacks at once but he only had to try his very least to knock these men out without murdering them. This ballet of adjusting his speed and strength was the toughest part. Kouta felt what little already remained of his chakra quickly get sapped from his body, his shoulder felt a cold breeze as one of the Audra alloy coated kunai had already grazed by his skin damaging his clothes by the shoulder. The strap of cloth got in his way but it didn't matter. It wasn't like these simpletons could capitalize on it even with their superior numbers.

At one moment the young man stopped fighting, he looked around and saw nothing but knocked out and hardly breathing bodies. Men knocked out cold or grunting in pain as a force of nature hardly picked up by any of the endless cameras ran over them getting all of them out of Kouta's way. Kouta looked around seeing only a swimming pool and a sauna complex behind him. A tall and relatively bulky man walked out of the sauna with a towel covering his chubby frame and another pink towel wrapped around his head like a turban.

"Ah… You're quite fast… I was just told of your arrival six point eleven seconds ago" the man whined out in a masculine voice yet the line was delivered at such a whiny tone that it greatly annoyed Kouta and creeped him out a little.

"How many floors are there in this complex? I do not wish to hurt anyone but if I continue moving like this I am bound to slip up and punch a hole in someone…" the medical ninja inquired.

"Oh, if I were you, I'd not worry about that. You see, you're staying in this floor" the man's black curly moustache twisted as he smiled and extended his hand to the medical ninja. "Buonefino Sangrant, pleased to meet you, boy!" he laughed while keeping one hand on his towel that held his junk covered up.

Kouta slowly and carefully approached the man, with a simple handshake he could inform him that the boy was not in any mood or power level to be trifled with. By simply crushing the man's palm he could finish this quick and move on to the hundreds of floors above.

The young man's hand was dwarfed by the gigantic palm leaf that was Buonefino's hand the two pressed against each other and Kouta found that crushing the man's arm would not be as easy as he had thought. The pressure from their arms began to crack the pool tiles below but neither of the two gave way.

"You're an impressive young man, you've went through war and came here with a couple of scratches and grazes. Each one of those Syndicate goons are as strong as one of you genin right out of the Academy" the chubby chuckled as Kouta felt his feet leaving the ground.

Buonefino swung Kouta around, slamming him against the tiles a couple of times before swinging him around his head and launching him out the wall to fall out of one of the several hundreds of floors, wherever the two were located.

Kouta's feet quickly morphed into the Juugo signature chakra cannons bursting with blue chakra flares just like the boy had seen Meiko do, the blacksmith sealed chakra into her boots to release in a time of need so that the release would give her some acceleration and propelling force in mid-air. Just like that Kouta burst back into Buonefino's room. He could've just flown up to the top but he would've wasted a lot of chakra flying hundreds of more floors up, also if Jeandette ever stumbled into the room, whether travelling by stairs or the elevator, where Buonefino was she'd get killed and Kouta couldn't allow that.

"Ah, you're back, young boy…" Sangrant laughed slapping his belly, it appeared that he switched his towels out for long spandex tights and a dark red full body suit that had a wide cut in the front to allow his chubby frame to breathe more freely. Now that the pink towel slipped off Sangrant's head his bald egg of a head could've been seen. The thing was shaped like an ellipse surrounded by streaks of black curly hair that started from his nose and wrapped around his bald head in the shape of circular and thick waves of facial hair.

"They always come back… They always do…" the man smiled after, his eyes betrayed it, he finally decided to take it seriously.


	192. No Such Thing as Magic

Mana's face was twisted in pain as she and Meiko traversed the streets of Otogakure, running quickly through the streets instead of using the roofs and the wires on the upper levels for transportation as ninja would've normally done. It would've taken Mana a minimal output of physical chakra to be able to traverse like she used to be able to once – like a real ninja but combined with the intolerable pain from her wounds from the torture it would've been an agonizing trip. Even moving as fast as the two did, which was to say at a sluggish pace, Mana was twitching and trying to conceal just how bad her injuries were, or at least how badly they hurt.

It was really stupid to take Kouta's ability for granted like that and treat her own health in this much disregard and disrespect. By now Mana had gotten used to the young man healing her whenever something like that happened so she forgot what moving around injured even felt like most of the time. Now when Kouta was somewhere else, probably too far away to be found and asked for help, Mana had a painful reminder of just how stupid the idea of taking all the torture was. She probably could've protected her body using chakra augmentation but then she'd have risked losing it all again…

After she managed to somehow regain the ability to use physical chakra and at least dabble in some of the things she used to be able to do, at least play being a weakling ninja instead of feeling absolutely useless, Mana dreaded losing it all again more than she feared her own death. Just a small taste of the identity she once had and lost made the magician addicted to it again, losing all of it would've been absolutely unacceptable. It would've sent Mana spiraling down the pit of darkness again, she'd have done stupid things and thought even dumber thoughts and the magician knew it.

"We're moving really slow…" Mana whimpered in pain, clutching at her sides, Meiko asked to take a look but Mana pleasantly refused.

"It's OK, we have no idea if those guys will even strike today, we're just checking those areas and… There's really no need for us to rush" Meiko smiled to Mana so genuinely that either the blacksmith was a really good actress or she really believed it.

"They will…" Mana closed her eyes as her feet refused to move and she sat down by a dumpster. "If that map you've shown me is right they've hit over eighty points already, now they've only got several more. They'll be getting desperate, whatever they're trying to achieve with this coordinated string of pointless violence they already have it in sight and that makes people desperate, it makes them rush and hopefully make mistakes" the magician explained her stance on things and stood back up starting to slowly pick up speed again.

"I… It's probably gonna sound really rude but… You said you can't feel anything while meditating and that's how you probably withstood that torture for so long but so can't you just do it now? Filter it all out?" Meiko asked of Mana, probably fully realizing that if Mana had any way of avoiding this pain she'd have done it. Normally the magician was never afraid of suffering or even placing her own life on the line but this time her pain was actively stopping them from reaching the goal and that was dangerous.

"I can't. If I was sitting still I could but not while trying to move somewhere. I can't both move and meditate" Mana replied coldly.

"I could carry you, then you'd just tune out and not feel any of it" Meiko suggested again with a voice that suggested pity for Mana's pain.

"It's fine. I'm not going to make you carry me around and even if I would I may slip out so hard that I won't be able to snap out when we arrive. Last time I only woke up when my body was being dumped and everyone thought me dead, after losing my chakra my meditation mastery is a bit wobbly. I can't do anything right…" Mana shook her head. All of this temptation of ways she could've avoided dealing with the pain she accepted so easily without fully comprehending the consequences made her jumpy and her rude tone may have revealed that to Meiko already.

The two finally arrived at where they previously pointed the next outbreak of violence to be. Just from the first look the magician realized that it has already happened – they were too late. There was this chilling stench of blood and death in the air, the alleyway, not unlike where the little girl was murdered previously, was dead silent. Only someone's final resting place let out signs like that.

Mana limped around clutching at her gut and sides, hoping that she didn't open any of the bandaged little wounds that she had and examined the place. There was a creepy and serene dripping sound coming from a nearby dumpster so the magician called her friend and asked to have it opened. Meiko looked at Mana questioningly only for the girl to blush embarrassingly.

"I don't want to get any garbage on me and risk infecting my wounds" Mana said. Her own weakness disgusted her but she'd rather have betrayed just how useless she was than risked getting infected over something that stupid. After the explanation Meiko appeared to have no problem with doing as she was asked to do, she opened the dumpster and pulled out a man placed inside. Both girls covered their noses before realizing that the man must've been dead for at least an hour.

Mana knelt by the poor soul and examined him. He reeked not only of death but also of garbage so it was tempting to throw up the horrible lunch she had that day every moment of examination. Still, Meiko probably lacked the sharp attention needed to pick up the right details and by now the blacksmith realized that with her getting the pulling the corpse out of the dumpster part she actually got the easy part.

This time there were signs of extreme resistance. Whatever happened here clearly indicated that the man wanted no part of this and didn't just accept his cold blooded murder like the little girl before did. His palms and knees looked crushed, some of his joints were awkwardly twisted and snapped. The man's face was also strangely bloated and had a nasty color. Mana had to ask Meiko to drag the corpse closer to a bar light nearby to properly examine the color aspects of the cadaver.

The worst part that there was no way of telling if the two were chasing ghosts or not – this time the angle of the stab appeared to be inflicted from straight up but if the man was knocked down it could've easily still have been done by the same short person they're looking for or a kid. It could've been just a random victim of street crime or a part of the string of murders. It could've been this ritual of death thing or just a random accident, one unlike those that happen every night in the alleyways of the large villages.

"So is it another one?" Meiko asked leaning up closer with her nose still pinched. A smell like that would've knocked out or at the very least forced to throw up any uninitiated and Mana was glad that she had a weaker nose than most her peers.

"Tough to say. If we were Police Force officers we'd have no solid proof attributing this to anything else but common street crime but…" Mana stood up before noticing another detail beside the man – tracks of blood that mixed into the mud, made clearer when the man's body began to bleed all over the mud and the difference between bloody mud and just the ordinary black dirt was clear as day.

"The Syndicate goons told us they're really strict about maintaining public order unless its them disrupting it" Meiko finished Mana's sentence somewhat questioningly, as if asking for a confirmation that it was what Mana meant to conclude at.

"Exactly…" the magician concluded slowly walking up the steps into a turn to a dead end alleyway. Slowly, step by step, the magician crept into the total darkness, opening her ears and eyes and hoping that her bodily instincts to crank her chakra augmentation up when in trouble was still functional after she regained her physical chakra use, at least in some limited capacity…

"Please don't kill me!" a loud whimper of a cowering elderly man came out, the poor soul was hiding behind another pair of dumpsters placed side by side and in the pitch total darkness he was completely invisible. It made sense that if he slipped away here he'd have been totally lost by anyone tracking him if he didn't betray his position like he just did forcing Mana to jump up in surprise.

Meiko ran right up to Mana, worried that the magician may have been attacked before noticing a man with a cracked head slowly bleeding over the dumpsters and the mud he was sitting on in a dark alleyway but too afraid to leave. Maybe that same fear saved his own life tonight…

"We're not here to hurt you, we're here to stop whatever's happening, did you see what happened here? Did you see what killed that man?" Mana asked a couple of time wondering if she came out a little bit too persistent and demanding. She had no chance but to be that, there was no time for the man to shower and warm up, they needed to move on to the other remaining hotspots or else, at the very least, two more people would get murdered tonight or tomorrow night.

"It's… They were a bunch of kids but they were so… Weird…" the man covered his face up, his tone suggested that he was weeping. It looked like the man didn't want to appear cowardly and the magician knew how much male ego meant so she stood patiently until the man could continue. "They assaulted that man and tried stabbing him but he overpowered them. I was just pissing right here, I was drinking at the bar tonight, you see. The kids then attacked the man, clawed and bit at him, brought him to the ground and used rocks to break his joints and his hands and feet. They bashed him around before finishing the job. One of them tossed the rock right into my head as they were laughing and passing by me, the buggers could've murdered me too but they just ran by…"

Mana scratched her chin trying to make sense of things. "It's alright, sir, it's safe for you to go home now. Could you please just tell us how were those kids weird to you exactly?" she asked.

"I don't know, their eyes had that strange glow in them, they were shining brightly with some sort of black symbols, like hieroglyphs on them for irises and they kept babbling about some "ritual" or "summoning" someone…" the man kept on whimpering, Meiko asked for more details making him aggressively jump up and begin rushing away from them.

"Look, I was drunk and I don't know anything. Whatever's happening here, those kids are gonna get it. You don't just kill people like that in the Syndicate's village. That's all the comfort I need… You kids better not wonder in no alleyways and wait until someone finds the bodies of those brats with Syndicate's signature all over them in a dumpster just like that poor guy. I fucking knew him… He was a regular at the bar… We even went out to pee at almost the same time" the man continued to talk to himself as he disappeared outside the alleyway exit and into the larger main streets.

Mana rubbed her exploding head and grunted angrily before asking that Meiko crossed off the area from the map. So whatever these kids were doing was not sensual, it was some sort of a stupid ritual so it obeyed no common sense or logic. Rituals never did. What kind of nonsense were they trying to pull off? With all of her history knowledge the magician knew of no similar strings of murders, if anything she could've sworn this was a more serial killer thing than a religious or ritualistic string of murders.

"We need to go, we've got two more spots left so let's hurry up. If they are really a bunch of kids we can go to the next spot and then if they're not there even to the last one faster than they could. I mean kids have short legs, don't they?" Meiko tried to lighten up Mana's mood when she saw the magician being stumped and even rubbing her forehead against the wall hard enough to tear away the bandages off her forehead.

"No…" Mana replied stopping Meiko in her tracks.

"Wait, what? Come on, Mana, don't give up yet, we can still stop this magic whatever it is…" Meiko kneeled by Mana's side gently pressing on her shoulder and pulling the magician's head off of the wet and cold brick wall she was pressing it by.

"It's not magic… I'm a stage magician, Meiko, I of all people know there's no such thing as magic. They're just murdering people out of delusion. They're kids. They're probably just religious kids or just kids that heard a pretty fairytale so there's no way predicting what they're thinking. I thought I was smart, I thought I could figure this all out but ultimately there's just one thing to do now…" Mana mumbled under own nose.

"So which point do you think they'll pick? It makes sense they'd pick the point one, right? It's closer and the other one's on the whole other side of the village… Wait, you said they make no logical sense so then we go to the other one, not the obvious one, right?" Meiko began flipping the man over and over again trying to make sense of anything when she had not yet realized just how insane the situation was. It would've taken a person of equal of greater insanity to figure out just which point those kids would've picked.

"We'll split up. That's the only way, you take the further point because you can get there in just mere seconds without me slowing you down, then you examine every corner of that area and if you find nothing you return to the point I am checking" Mana explained after getting off her knees and standing up.

"Wait… No!" Meiko shouted out. "You're wounded, what if you get attacked, you're moving to the closer point, there's a bigger chance of you getting attacked" she argued but Mana shook her head.

"That's the only way, there's no way to be sure where they'd go and there's just one way to make sure that no one else dies today. They have no chance in hell of killing you and I will make sure that they kill no one else, even if I have to die in the process. No one else dies, not to this senseless babble" Mana angrily explained before beginning to firmly walk towards the point she was supposed to cover, the one closer to where the latest murder was. Meiko looked at her with sad eyes and then departed to her faraway location so fast that she completely disappeared from the magician's vision.

Nothing about this made any sense. The murders were committed for no reason but mindless ritualistic violence. That was why nothing about those murders made much logical sense, that was why the little girl wanted to get murdered – they found no quick kills there and just killed one of their delusional own. They just wanted to kill people at every point, disguising that madness in some stupid babble about summoning something, in some stupid ritualistic magic thing. Mana, as a stage magician, was really angered by such a treatment of the beautiful childish illusion of magic. Magic was supposed to be an art of mystery and illusion, something so mysterious but natural that it appeared to be impossible to be explained by common means so it was just dismissed as magic. It was never supposed to be the means of disguising insanity and pointless murder.

Whether it was some strange religion, like that string of Jashinist murders a decade ago or some sickness that plagued those kids, they had to be stopped. It hurt to move, at Mana's current shape she'd have a bit of trouble even keeping up with kids. If they were crazy and aggressive enough to beat down a grown well-built man she may just have her hands full but it didn't matter. Even if she had to prove it to these kids that their silly rituals were nonsense by dying herself and sparing someone of the same fate, she'd stop them and their silly ritual.

A couple of minutes later Meiko arrived at a small industrial district corner, it was not an alleyway where the point was placed on the map. It was right in the middle of a small neighborhood, surrounded by block of flats right in the middle of the street. The blacksmith looked around and began scanning each and every nook and cranny for clues but nothing could've been found, the girl began getting nervous as she was wasting precious time that her immense speed granted her by allowing to get there so quickly. The blacksmith swiftly jumped up and raised her arm up to block an attempt to slit her throat from behind, Meiko was perceptive, she was a ninja after all and it would've taken an actual ghost to sneak up on her. Her armored gauntlet had not a single scratch left from the pathetic kitchen knife used in the attempt to claim her life.

The blacksmith grabbed the little childish arm trying to pull the brat's frame up her body and flipped it before kicking it so hard into the back that it hit a steel dumpster flying away, hard enough for the container to bend of the force at which the child slammed into it. Despite the fact that she was attacked the blacksmith was happy, happy that Mana would not have to deal with these kids in her current state. It was only then that it dawned to the redhead that if she murdered someone it would probably count towards the goal of these kids and they'd simply scatter in the alleyways, sewers and streets making it near impossible for Meiko – a foreigner to this village to track them all at once. It'd have been better if the blacksmith played along with the rules of this ritual for now.

The blacksmith turned around only to see a bunch of kids with rocks in their hands, launching all of them aiming at Meiko. The blacksmith didn't have to even react. Mere rocks had no chance of scathing her, it'd have taken inconsequential amount of chakra augmentation to withstand such a blow but Meiko lazily grabbed each and every chunk of rock tossed at her before letting them slip and tumble down on the pavement.

"I wonder if I should knock those kids out or what… It's not like this place has a working Police Force establishment to place them in and giving them to the Syndicate just feels… Wrong" Meiko thought to herself as the kids attacked her from multiple locations each wielding a small shard of glass or a knife. Carefully and holding back every sense of her being the blacksmith lightly and effortlessly flashed behind each of the kids and tapped them at the backs of their necks knocking each of them out and then looking around for more kids that may have slipped and ran away.

If at least one of these little bastards killed themselves or each other Meiko's entire effort would've gone to waste so the blacksmith sighed easier to herself and even clapped her hands together playfully. Then she heard a dreaded sound of steel clicking against a larger tube of steel – a loading sound of a kunai dispenser. Terrified Meiko turned around only to witness a barrage of endless kunai fire.

"Let the little fuckers have it!" the Syndicate goon commanded his crew as the bunch unloaded the whole supply of their firing blades at the unconscious kids with Meiko as their only protector – the mobsters must've also figured out who was behind the tumbling of their sensitive card house of order maintained through fear. The blacksmith's arms moved quickly as she blocked each and every blow of thirteen lined up mobsters firing barrages of endless kunai strings from the dispensers. Meiko's armored gauntlets deflected so many blades fired so strong that they bounced off into the darkness besides the blacksmith, the endless clanging of her blurry movements deflecting the endless blade fire in pitch black darkness almost deafened Meiko's ears. In the end not a single hair fell from any kid's forehead.

Meiko dashed forward hitting one of the goons from her elbow right in the gut. An upwards strike from her arm punched another mobster in the air with a hook that launched him a great distance up. Her foot moved and pushed the dispenser right into the face of the third as her headbutt took out the fourth crushing the man's nose and the whole face. All faster than any of the mobsters could even register. More blows to the mobsters' heads and guts, all of them incapacitating shots that would've killed any lesser man but Meiko knew that these men were no slouches, she had fought those Syndicate goons before and knew they had the appropriate skill of a fresh genin ninja. Within a couple of seconds the entirety of Syndicate's goon squad was sent down on the stone paved street cold and unconscious.

Meiko turned around only to see the heart stopping sight of a kid choking on bursts of blood, some of it escaped his mouth and splashed onto the street. It took the redhead a while before she realized that the kid had bitten their tongue off and was now bleeding out. Slowly but surely. Within mere moments the kid died with a smile on its scary twisted face, it was unclear when exactly the kid had done it but there was little Meiko could've done for them with her limited supplies and medical skill. The rest of the crew who were still able to stand dashed for the possible exists, all the nooks and crannies, open manholes, alleyways and street exits, giggling and scattering faster than a caravan of a hundred horses. She had no idea how the select group of the kids recovered so lightning fast from being knocked out. It was almost like their bodies were not even governed by their own brains. The eyes of these kids glew so bright that they were like little candles with just a small hieroglyph which Meiko could not understand covering the glowing whites of the children's eyes. These were no normal kids, these were little demons wandering the streets out for blood and they were aggressive and thirsty for blood, desperate to complete their infernal ritual.

Meiko scratched her eyes realizing what just happened.

"Mana will probably want to know…" she thought to herself. There was no hope for her to capture each and every child, they disappeared in the darkest alleyways, the most confusing and narrowest of the street turns and even inside open manholes and into the sewers. Maybe Meiko could've caught some of them but her crushed self-esteem was preventing even that achievement from being realized.

She failed… It went bad so fast and then she managed to do so good but then… It all failed. Meiko pounded the stone floor causing it to rupture as the blacksmith could barely contain her own chakra output in anger and frustration. She failed her friend and now Mana was in danger… Meiko would better move. A loud roar emanated from Meiko's stomach signaling the blacksmith that she hadn't eaten anything for a while but as much chakra as she spent on protecting those kids from all that firepower, as much of it was spent even getting to this desolate neighborhood… It won't matter. Meiko looked onwards with determination and began heading towards Mana's direction, it should only take mere minutes to move to the other side of the village in Meiko's current worn out and hungry state but it would have to do… It will have to do. Meiko would not fail her friend again!


	193. Freak Like Me

Shimo was going through a new set of feelings while he followed Carnefici and Notasa around. The tall man effortlessly moved aside the massive debris and pushed it over, making a comfortable corridor for the young singer and composer to pass through. Several times he even smashed the debris with a single careless flick of his wrist reducing the whole structure to dust. Carnefici was certainly a powerful man, as a person who walked with his heart by his sword Shimo inevitably tried comparing himself to the once famous mass murderer, pillager and mercenary pack leader. He wasn't so sure if he could take the man on if the need ever rose to.

"Did you lose something?" the man huffed out rudely aimed at Shimo's direction. The young swordsman just tsked his tongue, he wasn't sure about what was the best course of action for him. He needed Notasa's help but he didn't know how to approach the shocked and afraid young artist and how to get Carnefici by his side as the young lady appeared to hold the man's opinion and advice in high regard.

Slowly the Yuki walked up to the young lady and looked her in the eyes, waiting until the girl raised her head to meet his eyes. "I need the young lady's help. I must insist, we don't have much time in this village and… It's really important" he spoke to Notasa directly. Ninja were taught minimal psychology basics in the Academy, people were always more likely to give a positive answer and help when they were spoken to directly.

Notasa wavered and for a moment wondered if she should go out of her way to help this youth. Shimo took this waver for a sign of interest, "You see we've found this interesting golden sphere in the Wind Country desert, it has ancient symbols on it that are phrased like a musical composition but it has missing notes and pieces that only a skilled composer or a musician could fill in. Your talent in improvisation and composition is without peers, as I've already had my chance to find out. I am sure that you'd be able to help…"

Carnefici pushed Shimo away with his broad shoulder, his angry eyes stuck on a strict wrinkled face threatened to burn the boy alive with but a stare.

"Fine, give your sphere to the young lady here and now, she'll give you her consult so you can leave the young lady alone" he hissed.

Shimo stroke the back of his head further messing up his already hectic hairdo. "I don't… Really have it on me right now. My friends have it in one of their bags and… Well… I got separated from them tracking a young woman" he explained shyly realizing how dumb his position sounded.

"The young lady was just attacked by the Syndicate, a criminal group that holds this whole fucking village in their hands and could squish it like a dying sparrow at any point. Every transaction in this village, every person draws breath only because the Boss allows it. The young lady is no longer in the favor of those men and they will come after her again, the safest place for her right now is her own mansion which I've ensured to make into an iron fort. No Audra boned motherfucker will ever step on her backdoor mat without having their ass blown up. That is where the young lady will go and not a single step sideways…" the hulking bodyguard angrily explained to the annoyed Yuki.

Shimo couldn't allow Notasa to get locked inside some mansion. If she did there would be no reaching her for who knew how long and he wouldn't dare to piss Mana off any more by forcing her to wait. If he knew the magician as well as he thought he did, she'd just blame herself for every world war happening during the time she tried to find the damned box and get her chakra control back, something like that will only make his friend spiral down into darkness further and Shimo has already lost one friend to senseless and poisonous grief, the kind that corrupts all and makes comedians bloody their hands and flip their grins upside down.

"She didn't piss anyone off, you did…" Shimo angrily grunted out, a bit louder than he may have wanted to, almost immediately he realized that he was over the line but now that he had committed to a strategy he had to go on, he was in no position to falter. He had to go on the set path till the end of it.

Carnefici and the young lady looked at him curiously, for a moment it appeared like both of them were ready to burst into laughter but they just continued to stare at him like Shimo was a bum who just flashed in front of them.

"I mean, they didn't have a problem with Notasa, they had a problem with you and it's a reasonable one at that. When I was a kid there was a huge outcry when you weren't executed, hell, I'm surprised there wasn't a loud enough outcry when you left the prison at all. You were pretty much the big bad wolf back then, the worst of the worst, mothers would've scared their children with you if they weren't so damn scared of your raids themselves. If they were to protect Notasa and maintain public order as they claim to be doing, they would never allow someone like you to stay in their village" Shimo explained his position, if he made Notasa question his bodyguard's legitimacy and ability, maybe even his morality and his personality she could be left alone with no one to protect her, in that case she'd be under Shimo's care and open to his suggestions. It was a dirty play but it was the only play as well.

"It's not about fucking protection, it's about control. The Boss is really darn happy about his new fucking bones and body so he goes around telling every merchant to ditch their doormats and change their curtains, he demands the dumbest things because he wants to see people do them just because he says they have to. It was never about fucking safety…" the bodyguard began speaking but then Notasa butt in.

"Didn't you hear what Carne said? Get lost!" she angrily yelled out in Shimo's face with ferocity the young swordsman had not seen coming from the musician. Just what the hell could've been her problem? Just how close could those two have been?

"Wait… I was wrong to take their side… I mean… Damn, whenever someone sides with the Syndicate they're on the wrong side of the argument. That being said, I'm still pretty tough myself and I can provide decent enough protection. Maybe if I helped you two get rid of the Syndicate's tail for good you could help me with our sphere?" Shimo looked at the two questioningly when Carnefici just sighed after giving Notasa a stare. He really didn't like Shimo but he happened to place the girl's well-being really high up on his priority list so he sort of had to factor it into his decisions.

"Fine…" he grunted annoyed by his own decision.

Shimo looked farther into the city center hearing screams, yells and seeing smoke in multiple districts. Was this village always this hectic at nights? It was like the whole damned place was going insane. There was one building that looked toppled down and just outright on a raging inferno of flames whirling up to the sky as if trying to heat God's own marshmallows. There was another – a sky reaching one that looked like it was about to be toppled at any point. The boy had not noticed it before but now that he had time to look around it really stuck out.

"So why are you wearing that fucking getup? You fought the Syndicate in it so you can't be a Syndicate goon, are you from the Diamond Hand?" Carnefici asked, Shimo squinted at him questioningly.

"Diamond Hand?" he wondered.

"It's another criminal organization, similar to the Syndicate, one of many, actually, Diamond Hand is mostly based in Shukuba though, they don't spread out much, still they're conflicting with the Syndicate the most so I thought…" the man explained.

"No. I'm a Konoha ninja and I tried to go see the hall but I have neither the money needed for the ticket, nor the threads needed to be let in by the really sassy bouncers. We've already clashed with the Syndicate once, toppled some of their bases of operations actually, I didn't know they had multiple large operational locations like this…" the boy told the truth, something told him that in his current position the last thing he wanted to was to lie.

"Yeah… Mobsters are like weeds to ninja, they're too small time to be priority in their mad world of exploding stars and protecting the fucking world but when they're ignored they get out of control too fast. The only reason I was even able to slaughter and pillage so many was because no one gave rat's ass until I killed the wrong family, then everyone was on my tail all of a sudden…" the man's reply made Shimo curious. He wanted to know a little more about how a mass murderer and the very definition of evil ended up bodyguarding a talented musician in Otogakure.

"So… You not killing, what's all that about?" he asked quite simply.

Carnefici sighed, "When I was finally captured there was this huge outcry, suddenly every Kage and every village wanted to execute me according to their laws and on their soil, they almost went to war for it. The conflict actually went on for so long that I was just staying imprisoned in Jigoku without a sentence or even a word of my execution for five years. At some point the Hokage decided that executing me at all would be wrong and that while my actions were inexcusable, injustice from the side of the Feudal Lord would've been equally inexcusable so they switched the sentence to life imprisonment. Still, not until I was actually let go from my cell after getting my pardon signed by a lot of influential people almost a decade later did I wonder about what I was supposed to do with my life. All of my accomplices were already littering the fields of battle with their dead bodies. I decided to be born anew and thought that killing people was not something I wanted to do. I lied to that scumbag, I don't really remember everyone I hurt, I think that would be impossible but I feel bad for the fact that I don't. I don't get haunted by those I've killed over the years during my nightmares and I feel like I should be, those few times I do dream of the final moments of those people I feel like there should be more corpses clawing my eyes out… I'm a piece of shit, always was and always will be, but at least I can be less of a piece of shit by keeping this kid safe and kicking all the right asses this time" the man spoke for a while and it was clear that his voice wasn't used to such tension, he was a man of few words usually and now that his breath was working overtime his voice broke in couple of places and felt really shaky in overflowing feelings coming from the man's chest.

"I was looking for a bodyguard when I started out. Carne was getting rejected by everyone and couldn't find a job no matter what he did. Everyone treated him even worse than he once treated his victims and the worst part was that he had already served his time. People who have paid for their sins and redeemed themselves should never have to prove they've paid for their sins or pay for them again. Everyone does bad things, everyone's guilty of something, Carne is guilty of probably some of the worst things ever… Still, he's my bodyguard now and that's all I care about" Notasa explained adding to her bodyguard's speech.

Shimo continued to walk in silence staring into the murky sky, it was really late already, the night was probably reaching its peak and yet the flames and smoke as well as all the neon lights coming from the central district made it seem like the morning was about to break at any point in time, like the Sun would rise and a new dawn would come for once, lighting up this blasted village for once and giving it a new chance only for it to fail its chance. Again and again and again… But was it really doomed to only fail? Did it really have no chance to be something more? Mana would've probably believed that as long as there was chance that the village could fix itself somehow, maybe even by the same honest people trying to fix it, the same pleasure driven selfish bastards that lived here, that it deserved another chance. Carnefici was not the problem in this village… There was one sentence Shimo never expected to utter in his life.

"So what made you into bubblegum man?" Shimo wondered, "It's clearly a ninjutsu of some sort but it's not any ninjutsu I've ever seen, seems like a bloodline but it's not a bloodline of a clan I've ever heard of…"

"Carne is what ninja call many names: "mutate", "freak", "reject"…" Notasa began to explain but the man spoke up himself to explain it properly, it was clear why the young lady wanted to speak for her bodyguard – it was very clearly a painful topic for Carnefici.

"My father was from a ninja clan and my mother was not, usually clan members need to inbreed with their other clan members to carry on the bloodline, when the other side of the coin is not of the clan the bloodline may be carried within the baby or may not be. On separate occasions another matter entirely happens…" the man explained.

"So you're from a clan?" Shimo asked to clarify a little.

"Hozuki clan from Kirigakure, usually Hozuki members are able to liquefy their bodies at will using a Hiden technique that also requires one to have the proper bloodline and heavily modified DNA traits of a clan member. I on the other hand was born a freak, sometimes when the… Union… Is impure the result is a unique twist on the ability, I on the other hand to my clan members cannot liquefy my body but I turn it into liquid plastic, an oily substance instead of oil, my clan naturally rejected me and tried to kill me multiple times, as is the fate of all like me. I suppose that hatred ever since I was able to walk helped create the Carnage Fici…" the bodyguard concluded.

"So turning your body to bubble gum is some sort of a twist on that ability? Like how Yuki are capable of creating ice out of any water source or even air humidity you can form that gummy substance from your oil?" Shimo scratched his chin admiring the ability of Carnefici, naturally he was a little surprised as usually twisting one's natural abilities like that was more attributed to ninja that devoted their entire lives for their craft of mastering their abilities. For it to be accessible to a common mercenary with a lucky birth defect… Carnefici surely was a unique man in the tides of history, it was just sad that he turned out the way he was, people would've loved a talented lowlife rising to the top story…

"What about you? Who's that "young lady" of yours you're so desperate to help?" Notasa asked with a little curiosity and that silly winking behind her voice, changing it to try to imply that she meant something more than she actually meant.

"My client… Also… My teammate… Also a really good friend" Shimo tried to explain but Mana's place in his life sort of defied any single word or explanation.

"You seem lost about her place in your life…" Notasa winked and laughed out making Carnefici laugh out much more crudely and loudly.

"Yeah… That's the running theme of my life. Ever since I was a child I thought I knew who I was – the young man who would make every woman in the world happy…"

"I like that dream…" Notasa butt into his explanation.

"Naturally…" Carnefici sarcastically added.

"Anyways, then my sensei died and… It changed everyone, my teammates became different and suddenly both of us lost our way, Sugemi became angry and frustrated, he just decided that killing all criminals was the way to ensure that no one else had to suffer grief such as our own. I just lost all traces of who I was, I did something stupid and had to leave, try to find who I was…" Shimo finished his explanation.

"Did you?" Notasa curiously inquired.

"Ironically enough, not until I came back. I realized that Mana was the only one of us three who hadn't changed after sensei's death. If anything she became stronger in reaching for her dream and I admired that, no matter how hard she's hit she always falters and wavers, flails like a pushed pendulum as she is affected by those blows and suffers greatly. But she always swings back before returning to the balance point. I realized that she wanted to inspire people and I wanted to be inspired and find my dream, my identity. And so I've decided to be more like her – a sword that protects but…"

"Swords ain't for protectin', they're for poking" Carnefici added.

"Right. I saw those bunch of Justicar scumbags just casually fighting without restraint, not caring about the homes they'd destroy fighting like that, casually blinking out stars out of existence and drowning entire systems in eternal darkness and cold. Don't people like that deserve death? I just don't know anymore... I think a sword that protects is not a sword that does not kill, I think that I am different from Mana, I think that sometimes I see no other option. But then… If someone like me was in charge I'd have beheaded Carnefici the first chance I got and he'd have never met Notasa-chan…" Shimo tried to argue with himself at this point, the young man was sinking in a river of confusion.

"You would've probably been right to do so. People like me don't deserve second chances… I'd kill me if I had the blade by the fucker's throat" Carnefici grunted.

Notasa wrapped her arms around Carnefici's large slammer and pulled him towards her possessively. "Don't ever talk like that, Carne! Maybe redemption for a person like you is impossible, hell, I'm pretty sure people made up that word to call a concept they themselves invented and the people who did that are long since dead… What matters is that you're alive and you've got people dear to you and people who hold you dear have you! That is all that matters!" Notasa whined out. Her voice sounded really strong and womanly and not at all as childish as when she sang. It was always so strange to hear a musician speak casually…

"I'll help you, Shimo-kun! Once this all is over, I'll help you, if I'll be able to!" Notasa declared jumping off of Carnefici's arm which she was holding by herself a moment ago. Shimo didn't know how to react, he merely nodded, finally things seemed to be moving somewhere…


	194. The Most Electrifying Brawl in History

With a violent roar Kouta leaped at his opponent, his fists ran rampant and blurred in their lightning fast crushing barrage that was stopped by the gigantic bear-like paws of his opponent. To every change of pace or angle to his blows, his opponent kept up. Buonefino's face was twisted in a mad smile, he was enjoying every moment of Kouta's assault, it was like he ate up the boy's passionate desire to move the large man aside and pass through.

Suddenly the medical ninja felt a tight grip lock around his fist, Buonefino slammed the young man forward and backwards making Kouta yell out in pain and struggle to keep his chakra augmentations up. He had spent so much chakra that day – healing Jeandette to the best of his ability and using his chakra jets to both return to Buonefino's floor and dispatch of the endless hordes of the Syndicate mobsters.

Buonefino flipped the boy around like a softened steak and tried bear hugging him to grind the young man's bones, his face ate only the medical ninja's feet as with a graceful backflip Kouta retreated from the danger zone established by the powerhouse of the Syndicate. This man was different, he was on a whole different level than even those Audra skin wearing brutes from Tanzaku and Katabami mines. He was a solid threat for a decent genin to face, in his refreshed and rested state Kouta would've beaten the man with quite some effort but now he was not so sure.

"Playing hard to get, are you?" Buonefino growled out in a strange husky laughter, shaking his strong thick fat so hard that he had to wrap his hulking arms around his own belly so that Sangrant did not collapse.

"Sadly my heart belongs to someone else, Mr. If someone saw me in your grip it'd prove too much trouble explaining it to that someone" Kouta answered with humor to the man's strangely twisted humor.

Sangrant charged at Kouta with a running clothesline, the man's wide opening allowed Kouta to dash right behind him. He would not strike just yet, his father taught the boy better martial arts than that, Sangrant would've expected a fake-out but not a double one. Kouta's image blurred and appeared right in front of Buonefino right after it did the same and appeared behind him. The hulking brute had only just turned behind him to try and protect himself from assault from his back when Kouta was already hitting the man's front with full force.

The boy had no idea how many strikes he landed. May have been at least sixty to the man's abdomen, Sangrant staggered when the medical ninja switched up positions and began assaulting his face. The Juugo's assaults ran rampant on Sangrant's face, knocking a couple of teeth out and achieving a small nosebleed from the man's stumpy thick nose. With a diagonal kick Kouta sent Sangrant flying to the side of the deep pool so strong that Buonefino hit the ceiling and got stuck into it.

"It'll take him a while to escape that… I would be wise to use this chance to put some distance between me and Jeandette's elevator…" Kouta thought as he launched himself towards the staircase climbing it to the best of his ability. A couple of stick wielding mobsters tried to stop him but with a single hurricane kick he dispatched of them all before they could even wind up their bats. The young Juugo sincerely hoped that there would be no more opponents on the level of the fat wrestler by the pool.

The door burst open with a deafening clang, Kouta did not open it nor did he kick it out, he just ran past it letting it break from his own toughness ramming it. It was like moving through a paper veil… The boy leaped onwards dispatching of a couple of gangsters that immediately fired upon him, Kouta felt warm squirts of blood on his chest and shoulder – those kunai must've had some Audra alloy infused in them which made them more penetrating to a chakra augmented body, they could scratch him which was already troublesome. At this point trying to withstand the barrage of fire would've been a suicide pact as his chakra would disappear in front of his eyes.

Luckily his medical ninja trainee evasion served him well, he was actually the one who taught Mana the art of evasion and while the magician had the advantage of having studied under Shimo's rogue ninja martial arts and Meiko's art of redirection as well to create an amazing combination of defensive moves, Kouta was still the superior evader. With rolls and spinning upside down kicks and vaults the medical ninja utilized his environment perfectly cleaning the room as fast as possible and as much as he needed to pass. Kouta's body slowed down as he began huffing heavily, this was really not being taken well by his tired body. If only he had more time to rest up before storming the tower but time was a luxury Jeandette did not have. Forward, just forward…

A tight grip crushed Kouta's chest as the young one found it impossible to draw breath, within moments of seeing the size of hands locking him still the boy knew that it was the creepy wrestler from below.

"There was not a young boy born to escape Buonefino Sangrant!" he yelled out in pride and jumped up so high that both of them hit the ceiling with their heads leaving a wide hole. Sangrant's frame flipped upside down as the duo crashed through the floor and then into the water, spinning and crashing through more and more floors. Blackness and pain, feint star-like lights popped in and out and the young Juugo found it so incredibly difficult to stay conscious. Suddenly he coughed up and realized that he was stuck in water… Then air again entered his lungs – Sangrant was crashing them through the pool and below.

He was losing chakra quickly, if he crashed all the way down he'd lose everything, one of these floors could've cost him too much chakra and killed him or maybe one of them made him pass out and then a slam like that would completely snap his neck. The more Kouta's tired and half-conscious body tried to resist its captor the more he realized it was pointless. The boy's body was being dropped through more and more floors. That was it…

"No…" he thought to himself. An image ran past the young Juugo's mind, an image of Jeandette reaching the top only to be greeted by a crowd of armed mobsters that gunned her down upon sight. Another one of Mana crying over his dead body and looking at the tower with those eyes… That angry stare she used to give Shimo when he stopped her from entering the caves back in Takigakure.

A loud snap followed by a booming crash emanated through the whole building coming from Kouta's head butting backwards and smashing into Sangrant's nose forcing the wrestler to release his prey. Kouta saw Buonefino struggling to stand back up – he was just as shaken as Kouta was by the fall and the young Juugo planned to give him no time to get his act together. A punch from the right, another winded up and charged all the way from the left. A knee strike right to the nose and all that Kouta could muster up exploding onto the man's thick chubby and hairy gut. A two handed slam to the man's head to send him down. Kouta jumped above his downed and bleeding opponent and forced his feet to turn into cannons, he unleashed a powerful jet of chakra firing him upwards while it blasted Buonefino even lower below. Kouta felt and saw the building struggling to stand as he whizzed by the endless floors that he was tossed down through.

The young one could take no more, he thudded down on one of the cleaned and destroyed floors to catch a breath. There was immense pressure below Kouta's eyes and his vision was getting blurry, he struggled to catch a single breath but even as he swallowed more and more air, tons of air, it just wasn't enough. It was like feeling hungry in a vault of food. It couldn't have been the heights… He must've been feeling shortage of chakra. Or it could've been both at once.

A strong pull forced Kouta's weightless body down to the lower floor, someone grabbed his leg from below and dragged the boy all the way through the floor and into the lower one. Sangrant's face was bashed up, his bald egg of a head was cracked in a couple of spots and his nose was bashed upwards and slowly but relentlessly bleeding. The man's snake-like facial hair curve was now messy and flowing all over his lower face and his colorful wrestling spandex was torn up in most places and covered with stains of blood.

Buonefino roared charging forward with a slap, as Kouta jumped and staggered back evading each and every slap thrown his way the floor beneath his feet crumbled and fell down leaving gapping holes in each floor and dropping the unconscious bodies of each knocked out criminal present in that floor. Sangrant threw a direct punch to Kouta's gut trying to force the boy to pass out but the staggering frame of the medical ninja allowed him to gain enough momentum for a falling overhead kick to his opponent's neck. The boy's experience as a medical ninja allowed him to identify a pressure point in the brute's neck and attempt to shut the giant man down.

Dazed and confused by the rampant nerve pain all throughout his body and an overwhelming desire to shut out Buonefino just stumbled around before focusing himself once more and charging at Kouta with a powerful tackle, pushing the young man outside the skyscraper wall where both of them almost fell to their deaths, only barely clutching at the edges. While shouting in passion to win and utter unadulterated rage Buonefino twisted around trying to crush his opponent with a backhand smack but was unsuccessful each and every time, hitting only concrete and glass since Kouta jumped up and up scaling the seemingly infinitely tall building.

The passionate giant launched himself at Kouta's location but the medical ninja just flipped back and drove his feet into Buonefino's chest, utilizing the man's own momentum and breaking the man's arms up aiding his thrown Kouta rolled in and tossed Buonefino into a floor smashing him through multiple conference tables and decorative walls and office glass. Leaning on his right foot as a glass dug deep into his back Kouta walked on forward, he pulled out the glass and quickly patched his back up using medical ninjutsu, feeling his already dwindling chakra level dwindle even more.

"Don't drop the soap on me yet, boy!" Buonefino yelled out grabbing Kouta by his foot, appearing from a pile of wreckage in all of his disgusting wrestling glory and locking him in for a piledriver and slamming Kouta's face into the floor. The knocked out medical ninja just laid there wondering where he was and what was happening, he had no idea how much time had passed or where exactly Jeandette may have been in her elevator trip to the top floor.

Buonefino grabbed the barely conscious opponent by his trousers as Kouta's top was completely torn down and bloodied, the wrestler just spun the young man around and tossed him up through the hole they made while crashing down, jumping right after his opponent before kicking Kouta in the back as they've arrived at the pool floor and slamming him in the chest and gut with a double handed slam crushing and grinding the young man's body to his knee. Before the gravity took over Sangrant's body the wrestler tossed Kouta aside hoping to have knocked the young man out and grabbed the edge right before falling down. Sadly the building's floor crumbled making the large man tumble down a couple of floors lower giving Kouta some time to recuperate.

With huffs and throwing up blood the young man rolled into the water and dived down. He felt the cold and refreshing waters of the pool wipe away the pain from his countless bruises and wounds. No matter what he did, he just couldn't pass around this man, he was like a living wall. It was a miracle that Kouta was even conscious to begin with. He had grown so much stronger since leaving the village with Mana… Before he could barely treat simple cuts, after worrying over the life of a girl he loved he soon learned to treat dangerous life threatening injuries through desperation and willpower alone. Before leaving he could not even phase his father and could never have landed a punch on him but now… While worrying over Mana's life he could do anything.

Kouta's elbows shifted and dislocated, bone pierced his flesh and soon molded with it forming tubes, tubes that appeared almost wooden in shape and texture Kouta's eyes opened but they were no longer the eyes of a timid and reserved young man, they were the pitch black eyes of a maniac Juugo barbarian, only a golden ring would grant sanctuary in this vast blackness of his eyes, now serving as the golden iris. A stream of golden chakra fired away from Kouta's elbows sending the boy upwards… A whirlpool of leaking water to the lower floors was slowly draining the pool and dragging Kouta down towards the hole, there wasn't much time.

"Rising Piston Fist!" he shouted out the name of a technique he had seen his father use time and time again, a fist of overwhelming power, sadly Kouta's current condition would've made his fist infinitely weaker than that of his father's so no one would be flung out of the orbit but at the very least he dreamed of hurting the man standing in his way.

There he was… Standing by the edge of the pool and wondering where his opponent had went. Kouta's intentions were no longer pure, he was no longer trying to save anyone or prevent anyone's death, he no longer wished to benefit anyone but his inner fighter's instinct and that made him strong, stronger than he would've ever become. He was a true son of a Juugo clansman, only rage and wish to hurt someone, not a wish to save someone would've granted true power and the medical ninja finally realized the darkness within himself.

The Piston Fist technique dug straight into Buonefino's face flinging him upwards higher and higher through countless floors. Kouta couldn't even calculate how high he went before his trip ended prematurely in a small indoors garden but Buonefino continued his flight the stream of dark purple chakra emanating from Kouta's elbow tubes had long since ended and his eyes returned to normal, the patches of skin that had begun to morph into a strange wooden like texture forming a demonic shape out of the young man had passed and returned to normal. Buonefino slammed into the floor and forced a hole in it before falling back down nearby where Kouta had landed. All the mobsters had long since fled from the destruction, at this point they may have realized that no matter how much money their boss would've flung their way, they'd have never been able to fulfil his demands. This was a world outside their reach, hell, until Kouta again discovered the selfish desire to fight and win, it'd be out of his reach as well…

"Father… So that is how you fight…" he wondered to himself observing his crushed opponent. Slowly a couple of lingering mobsters began to fill the room hoping that maybe Kouta was weakened to the point where they could've finished him off. They began closing in closer and closer and Kouta felt too weak to even fight them off.

"Shit, that fucking faggot got his ass handed to him…" one of the mobster cursed as he raised his kunai dispenser aiming right between Kouta's eyes.

With a loud bell ringing noise the mobsters were interrupted by an arriving elevator, as the door opened Jeandette unleashed hell from a kunai dispenser she held in her arms gunning down both mobsters trying to cash in the prize that most had already fled from.

"Made a couple of stops along the way, visited some old friends… Settled some differences…" she shrugged with a weakened and pale smile. She didn't have much time left…

"I have failed… Kill me. There is no redemption for me, I was never man enough to beat you…" a sobbing cry came from Sangrant's side, the damned bastard was still conscious just beaten beyond the point of moving.

"Man enough? This had nothing to do with anything. I just had a stronger reason to fight for and more training… If you asked me this style doesn't suit you, you're too agile for these stiff movements and slams, I've never seen such an agile fatso, honestly…" Kouta huffed out sitting nearby his weeping powerhouse of an opponent.

"Now my cousin Winsel will never release me from the family, he's the one who taught it to me hoping that such a manly fighting style would make a man out of me…" he wept and wept to the point where he grabbed his face to restrain the influx of manly fist sized teardrops bursting from his face.

"Being a man is not about the manliest style. It's about doing what feels right to do and never backing down unless backing down is the right thing to do. It's about always doing what you think is right, not because someone else tells you it's right, it's about leading the way. You're a little wimpier and softer inside than most mobsters and you've got a kind heart, you've got questionable sexual preferences but none of those things are something to be redeemed for. It's what you are, being a man is not about changing what makes you you, it's about changing what you don't like about yourself while telling everyone else to suck it up and deal with the real you. Being a real man is about never having to prove that you're a man to anyone. Now learn to dance, learn to jump and kick and do sick spins and pirouettes and then let's fight again, I've learned more from you than I've learned from a thousand of "real men" I've faced today" Kouta raised his fist by Buonefino's face only to be greeted by a soft fistbump.

Staggering and stumbling over debris Kouta and Jeandette struggled towards the staircase to the next floor.

"Only two floors remain… The elevator won't take us any further, you ready?" she whispered to Kouta. Truth be told he was never less ready than he was at that moment, however he just grinned and gave the woman a thumb up, a dying woman craving for absolution had no business of seeing anything less from him.

"Are you ready to have the best tasting hat'ash you've ever had?" he asked confidently heading towards a floor sunken in total darkness. The floor where "Black Widow" Mortenson lurked for a careless prey that wandered into her lair


	195. The Beacon of Blood

Loud footsteps and sounds of people talking greeted Mana's ears when the girl finally had reached the spot where the next ritualistic murder was supposed to take place. A little surprised and in a rush to hide from being seen or noticed the magician slammed against a wall, a bit too rude for comfort as her recently gathered array of wounds flared up with painful impulses emanating all throughout her body and forcing her to clutch for her sides again. There was no way she'd have took on a group of people at the moment without having to rely too much on physical chakra augmentation.

Leaning by the side the magician took a small peek, the people inside were mobsters, Syndicate mobsters. It was only natural that they would get in her way – after all they were the ones to gather the information first and they wanted those children out of the streets and stopped from murdering their precious happy cash cows. These men carried much more impressive kunai dispensers, even from as far as Mana stood she could notice the difference between the weaponry used in the Katabami mines and these.

The ones in Katabami had wooden frames and pieces where the steel couldn't have been worked to be so small and delicate. They had no targeting systems or any visual aids so it was up to the user's skill to hit the mark. Naturally it was of little matter to a ninja who was trained at accurately slinging blades and shuriken at their enemies but to a mobster with limited training it would've made for a poor weapon to rely on. These dispenser tubes had comfortable leather holsters and a strange aiming aid that was meant to assist the mobster by having the user peek through it and lock down on the target. Mana had seen such aiming systems worn as eye prosthetics on some mercenaries back when she and Kiyomi fought Hachi's crew.

The magician slowly tried scaling the wall she was close to, it was to no avail, the wall was too slippery and wet and she couldn't use chakra to just run up it like a ninja could've. She was growing more and more desperate, she needed to get in closer, if the kids came in contact with these mobsters it'd be a slaughter and it only took a single simple death, an insignificant fraction of a second that it took for a fired blade to pierce someone for Mana's wish to stop this violence to blow up in her face, for the ritual to apparently be completed. The kids only needed one death, after all, they ignored the cowering man from before and only claimed one life, that meant they only needed one death for the succession of the ritual.

Mana saw a metal ladder nearby, this whole place was a construction site but it was still the middle of the night so all the materials and climbing aids and safety tools were left around. Why wouldn't they be? If someone stole something not under Syndicate's orders they'd be quickly dealt with. To Mana such justice system sounded mind boggling but people here seemed to agree with it. There was something that troubled her as she slowly crept up to the ladder, ducking under various unfinished brick walls and carefully treading around abandoned tools just laying on the ground so that the silence of a peaceful conversation between the Syndicate was not disturbed.

People appeared so happy with such systems. The systems were the people disobeying public order were just killed, it didn't matter whom they were killed by. Just like that time during the Fourth's funeral, during Tanshu-sensei's funeral… People all got behind Sugemi's anger and grief ridden words, they would never trust her and her ideals, seeing how well they responded to momentary pleasures silencing their consciences and just random crooks killing their perpetrators not for justice, but because they were in the way of their own plan of making money. At that moment as she reached for the next step of the ladder Mana felt the most lonely she'd felt for a while. Why were people so opposed to chance for redemption? Why would they rather see criminals skewered by other criminals than dealt with by the book?

"So did anyone actually read that note that "Momma" Zulfia left us?" one of the mobsters asked the other group carelessly smoking up a cigar and blowing it right into the air, Mana could finally make up something that these people were talking of since she was carefully positioned on a rail right above their heads.

"I dunno, sounded like a bunch 'a mumbo jumbo. Blah blah, rituals, blah blah some ancient Gods or whatever" the other mafioso, this one wearing a black and white kimono with lotus and dragon ornaments replied also puffing black tar smoke into the air. The smoke had little time to disperse and it was really annoying Mana's lungs as it hit right into her face by large clouds and in the darkness of the night the girl had few options of avoiding it.

"Not "Ancient Gods", I think it's something about a Lesser Demon…" yet another one intercepted correcting his friend.

"Meh, Ancient Gods, Tailed Beasts, Lesser Demons, Snow Country… I don't believe in any 'a that shit…" the first gangster sneered at his pals blowing out an increasingly annoying and irritating to Mana's chest puff of smoke.

"Snow Country is an actual fucking country ya goomba!" his suit wearing pal slammed him in the back of the head so hard that the mobster's hat fell off.

"Uh-huh… That's what they tell you" the bullied naïve mobster nodded sarcastically before leaning down to pick up his hat. "I mean it could be a real country, you could be right, it could be an actual country right south from Kumogakure… All I'm saying is that I don't believe you. It could more likely be just a big lie! I mean how could a country be freezing cold right south to fucking Kumogakure, I mean Kumogakure is like a rocky scorching wasteland of mountains so hot you could cook an egg on their surface… And it's supposed to be north of the Snow Country? Na-ah, I'm not buying it… It's all a conspiracy, see"

"Conspiracy?" all of the mobsters got interested and walked out into the light, Mana noticed that her shadow was visible from where she stood, reflected by the small lamp that the mobsters had positioned in the center of the abandoned construction building.

"Oh yeah. They say it's a country with like its own snowy fields and shit… But actually it's a secret training facility of Kumogakure's where they're training dolphins with sky piercing laser beams designed to nuke entire countries" the first one explained.

"Oh, shut up ye big palooka, Ole Pa Bonztail is the only guy with a pool of skypiercin' laser wearing dolphins. That's cause he specifically ordered them to be bred. I even was on a mission to bring him goddamn dolphins from Kumogakure Archipelago myself. Bought them on the black market from "Zombieface" Yoruma Yoshiaki…" the kimono wearing mobster angrily dismissed his peer before looking right at Mana's shadow. The magician's heart gone cold as every single mobster also caught the sight of her shadow, now only narrowly seen as the magician was trying to move out of sight as slowly and stealthily as possible, unsuccessfully it seemed.

"We've got a tail, pop it!" one of the mobsters yelled out, jumping and turning around only to launch a barrage of blades at Mana's direction, the magician had no other option but to jump away from them, she had to be fast, these blades were being fired faster than the human eye could track them so she tried flaring up her physical chakra so she could move out of the way, the magician tried flipping off of the rail but her side tore up in pain forcing her to scream out and trip over the rail falling down onto a bunch of sawdust raising a large blinding cloud that was irritating to the eye.

Mana felt up her gut and felt a sharp blade somewhere in her gut, she dodged most of the barrage but her wounds made her skip one… Or at least she thought she only skipped one as the pain from the wounds was so crippling that she would barely even be able to feel anything else, even if it was a blade fired into her body at high speed.

"Hey, Mik, there's some blood over here, I think we got em!" the mobster shouted out. Mana realized that they were dangerous close, she was too weakened by her wounds to consistently beat them at hand to hand, even if they were blinded by the sawdust that was slowly settling down. She could barely even run… Mana's little fragile fist grabbed a brick and pressed it hard by her chest before she stumbled out from the corner tossing it haphazardly and carefully at the general direction of the noises. She could hear someone screaming in pain and deafening clangs of blades being fired at her direction that just bounced off of the walls she was hiding behind.

There was no use, she was too weakened and slow, now with that wound in her side she could barely even move around fast enough to be anything else but a wounded prey waiting to be tracked down. Mana prepared for what seemed more and more like her last stand but she could hear no more yells, only a brief gurgle of blood killed the silence forcing the girl's heart to freeze and her eyes to open wide in shock. As the dust cloud settled down the girl moved out from the cover to see the mobsters all stabbed to death messily and a bunch of children grasping shards of glass so hard in their little hands that they bled profusely.

Mana's hand slowly moved on her side gut wound, she gripped the kunai stuck in her gut which she had not pulled out since it'd start an inevitable process of her bleeding out. That was the only weapon she had besides her cards but with her body as frozen and crippled in pain she'd lack the precise and skillful movements needed to sling cards.

"Mother?" the children asked someone still remaining hidden, turning around frantically.

A loud wooden tick at the floor helped Mana narrow down the location of this "Mother" that the kid were looking for.

An old woman dressed just like any other old lady would be dressed in the streets, if a little drastic with the number of woolen scarves she wore, walked out and examined Mana's broken body with her elderly eyes and a strict wrinkly face.

"Sacrifice?" the kids asked in a monotonous tone looking questioningly at their leader, the elderly woman scratched her chin, she appeared somewhat indifferent and hesitant to utter the words.

"No need, my deacons, the ritual is complete anyways" she uttered the words from her wrinkly and chewed up and torn skin covered lips. The woman wore a nasty scar that covered her face diagonally which the magician only made out once the woman walked out more clearly into the light.

"You've killed them… You've killed them for nothing. You've killed so many people for what? For absolutely no reason at all!" Mana shouted out in anger clutching her burning ribs and lungs from the pain that stressing the chest summoned.

"I killed them because of my faith. Faith that the lives of my sons shall be avenged, faith that redemption will come to the wicked" the woman said indifferently turning away from Mana and walking away into the endless swarm of little kids, some of them could've been as young as eight, some of them may have been as old as Mana. All of them had strange and haunting glowing white eyes with only a black piercing glow of a hieroglyph shaped iris in their eyes.

"Redemption? I see no redeemed here, only corpses…" Mana replied quietly as she lamented all the people that died because of this woman and her "faith". "Nor do I see any Gods… Your ritual was a dud"

The woman stopped in her tracks and looked around ecstatically. She was so hyped about something, so fired up that her nameless God will be summoned. "No, girl, the wicked ones will be redeemed, the Goddess will descend, I've told her where by drawing the beacon of blood. Then they'll become one and I can wipe this city clean, no more Syndicate, no more mothers losing their children to the night!" the old crone screamed out slobbering over her face and onto her own children that appeared indifferent to the old woman's nervousness. She waited for a while, waited and waited but to no avail. No Gods descended upon the Earth.

"The infidel is right, the Goddess did not come… Something must've been wrong, the holy monk told us she'd descend if the beacon was drawn, something must've been wrong, these sacrifices must've been unclean, sacrifice the girl! Let me do it, maybe you did something wrong!" the woman ordered pointing at Mana. The children all launched at the magician at once swarming her, Mana swung back haphazardly, she was afraid in her heart of hurting these kids. They looked… Haunted… Possessed, not in their right minds. And yet…

They crawled all over Mana, made a human pile on top of her clawing at her face and dragging her by the hair, tearing at her clothes trying to flay her skin off before Mana could suffer no more and pushed the especially ferocious ones away. She had less than a fraction of her strength left and she wasn't even using that. The magician may have felt easier about fighting back normal opponents after Guru Ayushi's lessons but fighting possessed children just felt wrong. She was just wailing in a nailed down coffin, as good as dead, as good as sacrificed…

Mana was forced to the ground and her hands broken behind her. The girl screamed out loud of the pain and slammed her head at the ground to concentrate on that pain instead of that of her both broken arms. A kid peeled her face off the ground by her hair and lifted her up just enough to reach the old priest's knees.

"Higher, no more throats, I need her heart! Her essence is in the heart!" the woman shouted on her children. For a woman that claimed to do all of this unspeakable horror for her children she seemed to completely lack any compassion or love towards these children, viewing them as her pawns. A soft and lovely poem left her lips yet her hand held firmly a hooked knife. Mana looked the woman in the eyes, determined and not yet broken despite the fact that she absolutely was.

"You showed remarkable mercy to my deacons, did not even hurt them much, those Syndicate dogs didn't give my children that luxury, they covered their beds with blades for nabbing some expensive things from their store… Your sacrifice should light the beacon" the woman spoke.

"The Beacon of Blood" the kids simultaneously repeated in their lips in a coordinated fashion.

Mana blinked rapidly, "Fine. Pierce my heart, murder me right here but no Gods will come. I'm glad to prove you wrong even if dying is what it'll take to do so" Mana defiantly spoke up.

A loud thud followed by the woman's scream and a crash into an unfinished wall greet Mana's ears and not the pain of being stabbed. That pain she knew all too well and yet… At no moment did it come. Meiko's grinning face stared at the restrained magician just before the blacksmith got serious again. She looked at the kids that held Mana captive, some of them still held broken shards of glass in their bleeding arms refusing to let go of it.

"Guys, don't do this. The old hag is an old fart and she doesn't know what she's doing. Don't kill Mana, she's a kind person and you've killed too many…" Meiko got really engaged in her hostage scenario speech.

"They're not gonna kill me, Meiko, the old woman ordered to let her do it so they're waiting for her to kill me" Mana interrupted with a pain ridden voice. Quickly the blacksmith moved in and tackled a large group of kids away from Mana before picking her up and moving away from the swarming group of possessed children.

"No… No… The monk told me that the Gods would come if I light the beacon, he even gave me the means of gathering followers! He couldn't have lied to me! Why have the Gods abandoned me!?" the old woman moaned spitting up blood in the broken wall that she busted through. She didn't talk very loud so a lot of her senseless psycho cult babble came out as hardly comprehensible.

Mana wanted to clutch her aching chest but her broken arms didn't move. The magician just asked Meiko to move her in closer to the old woman, the blacksmith hesitantly agreed and jumped off the platform she had settled on top of and slowly approached the woman.

"I'm sorry for what happened to your children. No one should ever be murdered like they were, no matter if they stole something or not. But you have to understand that you behave in no way differently than the killers of your children. Gods don't come for people like that, the more I see of this life, the more I realize there may not even be Gods there to come for us. There's no divine retribution or redemption but the one we make for ourselves. Trusting a supernatural force to solve all our problems is naïve and vain, especially when one does it with these abhorrent methods" Mana uttered with a whiny and weakened voice, her skin started becoming pale from the blood she'd loss after being shot with a blade and attacked by the children that opened the old torture wounds.

"You… Ignorant, infidel little whore!" the old woman screamed out clawing at Mana but her body was too broken by Meiko's strike to leap at Mana, she only wailed at the magician as Meiko's grasp where Mana was ended up far too tall for the broken old hag to reach. "You dare preach your heresy to me!? I'll claw your eyes out and when my Gods come I'll bring you back only to claw them out again!"

A deafening sonic boom knocked Meiko off her feet tossing both Mana and Meiko in different directions, the old crone began screaming in pain and shock but her mad screams were snuffed out by the absolutely dominating sound of the white flare of light that began emanating immense gravitational waves followed by even more loudly roaring sonic booms as each one passed. A couple of children were thrown away through multiple brick walls upon even coming close to a single wave, as close as fifty meters to one. The pressure inside one of them must've been immeasurable by a human mind.

Inside the ravaging and ground opening waves of sound booms and gravitational anomalies was just a beacon of purple light that lit up and revealed a figure standing inside of it. It was a feminine figure with two long appendages at the end of her head that extended well past her bottom and up to her knees, she wore a white bodysuit that appeared to be part of her skin, almost like a living armor tissue covered with pitch black and almost cybernetic looking black symbols and motifs, the entire armor was covered with ornaments except for her open cleavage and her face which were the only parts of the entity's body uncovered by the armor tissue but instead purple skin, the creature's mouth and eyes glowed with vibrant dark green lanterns that finally became apparent as the lightshow ended.

"Mana?" Meiko looked at her friend horrified.

"So… The ritual is… Real?" Mana's absolutely frozen in shock face just barely twitched enough to announce to her friend who just gulped observing the magnificence of the entity that appeared in front of them.

The Goddess has descended to where the beacon was lit…


	196. Demons of Our Own Making

The second to the top floor was completely sunken in darkness, save for a handful of long glowing lines on the floor that extended to the end of the room. They appeared to glow similarly to those neon lights that were becoming so prominent in Konoha's nightly ads and vendors. Navigating such a room was difficult especially when the two were worn out and wounded and had no idea just where the staircase to the next floor even was. Jeandette was already breathing heavily and took a couple of stops to cough for quite some time with gurgling sounds that Kouta didn't like as a young medical ninja.

It was during one of those coughing sessions that Jeandette exclaimed a surprised yell and fell to the ground. Kouta jumped up and wanted to rush up to the woman but he noticed a shadow moving through the briefly lit shadows of the floor's corners. Could someone have snuck up on them? That should've been impossible, Kouta was a ninja! He was the one who was supposed to be the one sneaking up on people if he had enough time to waste on stealth. How could this one assailant possibly sneak up on a ninja? Maybe his low chakra resources greatly impacted his perception?

"It's Mortenson… Don't come any closer…" Jeandette cried out in pain. Whoever this "Mortenson" was, she must've wanted to lure Kouta into lowering his guard helping Jeandette so she could take him out as well. She was a fast and sneaky one, fast and sneaky ones usually couldn't do well in an open one on one fight which must've been Kouta's only chance.

"Jeandette, you old crone, couldn't die alone in a puddle somewhere?" a feminine voice emanated through the room, taunting both Kouta and his new acquaintance. "Do you really need an old acting friend to deliver the killing blow? Did you become sentimental in your wilting years?" the woman kept on talking but she was constantly moving, by the time Kouta would've made his way to the location she was speaking from she'd have moved once again.

Sharp pain hit Kouta in the gut, it was a fist-sized round sphere of iron that must've been launched at high speeds, possibly from a kunai dispenser, the sphere sent Kouta tumbling backwards and hitting the wall after it blew up close to his body and sent him off his feet. It wasn't an efficient weapon, he had very little chakra augmentations left and his endurance was slowly approaching the simple point of whatever his body offered without any enhancements. If the explosion didn't incapacitate him it'd probably not kill a normal human, it must've been a weapon of displacement and torture rather than murder, then again, it wasn't like kunai dispensers were the most lethal of weapons unless a whole barrage of blades were fired or a vital was hit.

The medical ninja instinctually rolled to the side avoiding a couple of more blast shots opening up the wall behind him and breaking the lighting situation by forcing the building's emergency lights to flare up and lighten up the room.

Mortenson cursed from the other side of the room spitting the cigar from her mouth to the floor. She dressed similarly to the other Syndicate goons but with a more slick and feminine version of the outfit, her hat was more compact and rotund in shape and she wore classy red shades that probably helped her see in the darkness of her room where she saw everything that transpired in the room. Then again, all of her secrecy and stealth must've been pointless, after all any assailant would've been gunned down or beaten long before they reached Mortenson's floor so it must've been just her way of life.

The female mobster played with her dyed blood crimson hair with streaks of blue on them. Once again she pointed her long and complicated looking kunai dispensers at Kouta forcing the medical ninja to bite his own lip and fighting through the pain evading her shots and seeing them leave large gapping holes in the walls and the floor. If he got hit by that again he'd probably be down for the count, just waiting to be finished off so Kouta decided to just not get hit.

The two clashed, Kouta's elbow slammed into one of the long kunai dispensers, Mortenson swung the other, lifting her knee upwards aiming at Kouta's crotch. The young man met the woman's attacks with an upwards block from his arm and a block of her knee strike with his own. The two exchanged close distance blows again and again, occasionally firing a shot or two to try and tag Kouta some more. Mortenson appeared desperate to aim at the young man and fire away at him at point blank range.

"You've done your girl in, old hag Jeandette's been stabbed in the back with my signature poison, she'll be dead in an hour or even less, right now her body is being torn apart from inside, every cell is being corrupted and corrupts the others. If a cutie like you had anything in that big hairy head of his he'd bolt just about now…"

Kouta tried disarming the woman, grabbing her kunai dispensers and just pulling them out of her grasp, maybe pulling them apart or disassembling them by pulling out the sensitive and needed parts. It didn't work, Mortenson was just too skilled for that, she was well trained, well enough to match a low ranking ninja without chakra augmentation hand to hand, she'd have completely dominated someone with no skill at taijutsu. Had it been not for Kouta's skill of evasion he'd have been tagged long ago and had his limbs blown off.

The young man realized that he'll score no hits up close, the woman was just too well trained and skilled, he was just too injured. He took a couple of backflips and rolls to avoid any follow up attacks and made some distance, it'll be easier to dodge her at a distance than point blank. By that moment Kouta realized that he was fighting a lost battle, he could only fight off his own death, her nails had traces of blood on them, it was likely what carried through the poison. Maybe if Kouta could inflict injuries on the tips of Mortenson's fingers she could get poisoned by her own supply? Then again, it'd probably never work, he's having his hands full just trying not to die and even if Mortenson got poisoned she'd still take an hour to die…

A couple of whizzing sounds interrupted Kouta's train of thought, Mortenson grunted in pain and slowly shook as she turned around to face Jeandette. The woman held a kunai dispenser in her hands and fired at her old friend from behind. Mortenson turned around, shaking in pain of kunai being lodged in her back deeply. "I'm dying anyways, you dumb bitch" Jeandette exclaimed as the poisoned musician fired a couple of more series of blades at her old friend taking her down, slowly Jeandette approached the downed mobster and fired at her again just to be sure. At some point the kunai dispenser broke down, it was overstressed while being empty. Such a strange and unperfected weapon…

"I didn't know you did acting…" Kouta huffed out looking at the unfortunate turn of the friendship of the two women.

"In a manner of speech. I was so bad it technically wouldn't count as "acting". I was desperate at one point. I was already into crackers and I was losing my artistic flare. That's where I met Mortenson, she was already a beloved girl of the Syndicate… Back then she wasn't an actual mobster, just their plaything, must've picked up a thing or two during the years we've not seen each other" Jeandette complained falling to her knees.

"We're almost there!" Kouta shouted out taking the wounded and dying woman up on his back and slowly carrying her to the staircase to the top floor, now that the shining lights of the village and the moon with the stars came into the artificially darkened room the staircase was revealed and the final stretch could've been made. Jeandette was pressing at his shoulders, breathing heavily and coughing. She must've been in a lot of pain as her own sickness as well as the poison must've been doing theirs. The woman never intended to make it, it was always just the top of her bucket list, the only thing in it, actually.

The top room was better lit, round lamps spread beams of light diagonally inwards to the room's center. The floor was covered in rich purple heart wood tiles and the room extended seemingly into oblivion as the sides of it couldn't be seen. Something rustled and whined in the darkness creeping Kouta out to no end. The young man just kept on walking because Jeandette had more courage than he would've thought it was wise to have at that moment and did so as well. The ceiling also appeared to be sophisticated and it was made of marble and extended into large and very wide marble columns descending from the top and connecting to the rich wood tiles below. It certainly looked like the top floor was bought for numerous human lives. A room which the devil bought from profit made of human souls.

"If you wanted more crackers you could've just called. Then again, you would know all about how to get crackers, there hardly is a substance in this rotten shithole you have not tried yet…" a loud and somewhat husky tone came from the most northern parts of the room where an expensive leather chair laid turned at the massive glass structure and brief details of the man sitting in the chair could've been made out. Gruesome and creepy details.

"It's done Croquette… Remember when we last saw each other and I begged you to help me up from the puddle of vomit and rainfall I was in? You admitted to me then that you wished for redemption, that you never liked this line of work… I've come to free you from your nightmares" Jeandette declared looking at Kouta who placed her on the floor and looked at her questioningly, the ruined woman remained kneeling and didn't even try to stand up.

"It's true… I never liked this, any of it. I mean I understood what I was doing, buying and selling death for those to whom it felt pleasant… But I always knew it would be something to keep me awake at night" the man sitting at the end of the room named Croquette admitted.

Loud whines and cries, both sad and angry came from the sides of the room. Ruined bruised and rotten arms appeared from the shadows, Kouta jumped up after seeing that horrendous view. At the ends of the room there were people, saying people was only a very strict definition to be applied in this case as they were long past the point where they could've been defined as such. These were ruined living corpses who were still not told that they were dead, grey and torn up skin, smelly putrid flesh and bloodshot eyes, fallen out teeth that still laid by their side and lodged into their own flesh when these unfortunate people stepped or laid on them.

"Wh…What is that?" Kouta exclaimed angrily demanding an answer from Croquette, so far he had little beef with the man, all that he knew was that the man did bad things to Jeandette once and that he worked for the Syndicate. Now he had a much more terrifying and personal reason to despise the man.

"That is a reminder of my sins. They weep, cry and beg for death but I don't grant it to them because I crave their punishment. They keep me awake at night, they remind me every living moment of my rotten life that I am ruined to the core and deserve a fate worse than theirs. They are my conscience!" Croquette shouted out as he turned back at the two and leaped off his chair pushing it back so hard that it slammed at the window and bounced off it leaving small dents in it.

Croquette's awful facial tattoos and paintings that imitated self mutilation being seen right after the nightmare of putrid awfulness that he held in his office was too much. Kouta pressed his fists and launched himself at Croquette, at this point even Mana would've done it, even she'd have exploded in rage after seeing someone so ignorant and wicked. Someone who wished to repent and be redeemed but did not change themselves or move past their sins, someone who still did what caused them internal pain and the realization that their life was that of sin.

The man flipped the table angrily tossing it at Kouta, the boy was too slow, too wounded but he managed to slip under the flipped and flying table but right into Croquette's uppercut. Then another punch, then another one and another one. The man continued to beat on Kouta before kneeing him in the gut and kicking him aside.

"I saw your ventures, I saw you take out my men and so I hoped you could also kill me and bring me to my personal Hell… I suppose that my personal Hell is living this life of mine until the end of time" the man shrugged. Kouta felt the taste of blood in his mouth and heard shrieks and cries of these ruined men, he felt their nasty breaths, he could almost feel their broken and ripped nails digging into his flesh but they were just an inch too far. Whatever they were, their humanity was long since lost…

Croquette pulled out a large stick from under his long jacket and swung it backwards and threw it forwards playing out a hard hit.

"If you won't kill me, I guess I am doomed to play this role of the salesman of death longer. The Syndicate has heard of you and your friends, we remember you from the Katabami mine, well, not those that have been there, those guys are probably all dead and buried. You're just as rotten inside as me, you know?" the painted face man swung his bat hitting Kouta's sides and cracking something loudly. Kouta had no more strength left to either oppose the man or heal himself to make himself able to, both his chakra and his stamina were gone. His only hopes were to somehow bait out a mistake from the man and catch him unprepared or to die a quick death.

"I actually hoped you'd come for us, I mean we knew you kids were dumb but the other Capos said they'd take care of you guys and that I had nothing to worry about…" Croquette swung his stick again hitting Kouta right in his hands that were wrapped around his head. He may have broken them… Kouta was in too much pain to differentiate bruising pain and bone fracture pain.

"And here you are… I never hoped that you'd come with Jeandette though, I mean why would you? These stories of my life are absolutely separate right?" Croquette slammed Kouta with his bat again and again, "And then I see two of my demons combining their forces and there I saw my reckoning, my death and redemption… Finally I'd have a chance to wash my sins away and maybe be reborn a new man in whatever afterlife I went to…"

Kouta's consciousness almost blacked out. He flung an explosive note he found in his pouch in the air and detonated it, that was about the extent of the chakra levels he could work with. Croquette leaned backwards avoiding the blast but the heat and smoke of it forced water to begin running down from the fire alarm systems. These ones must've been really extensive and rebuilt to be triggered more easily, for all the talks of redemption Croquette was afraid of hellfire, literal or otherwise.

The falling water began soaking deep in Kouta's broken bones and busted body, cold shivers began joining that wretched pain but in a way it felt refreshing. His blood ticked down in small streaks of droplets onto the building up puddles of water on the rich wood tiles below. The medical ninja noticed some paint slipping into his blood, that must've been the facial paintings and tattoos on Croquette's face washing off. Finally from all those drawn fake injuries and burns his fleshy and sharp cheekbones emerged. He was no demon but a ruined man…

Then Kouta realized that he had one chance, Croquette pulled out his long one handed kunai dispenser from the pocket of his jacket and aimed it to finish Kouta off but the young shinobi had disappeared in the darkness only to be followed by the man firing blindly into it, the knives bounced off the walls with only small scratches being left on the gem incrusted surfaces.

The young man knew what lurked in the darkness but he'd have rather been eaten and murdered by those poor people than killed by someone as disgusting as Croquette. Maybe before his death he could set the poor men and women free? The Juugo moved swiftly up to each and every lock and bashed at it with the bounced off kunai. Croquette stood at his end and did not move into the darkness for he feared his own demons. His refusal to let go of his sins and move past them leaving them behind would be his end…

Slowly one by one Kouta set every single one of these ruined men and women free, Croquette's weapon cringed and coughed as it failed to fire any more blades into the welcome embrace of the darkness of his own room. His lamps offered no illumination, no sanctuary for his terrified soul. Kouta extended his hands to the side and felt those men and women caress his face, they were feeling up his bumps and blood, his countless scars and wounds he had gathered throughout the day.

"Mask… Mask… One of us…" they uttered and let go of Kouta, suddenly these poor souls decided to leave their limbo of darkness and rebel against their demonic overlord. Croquette stepped back, then back again and again touching his window that laid behind him and marked the end of his fleeing line.

"Wait… I'm… I have my mask… I wear my sins!" he screamed out but realized that his facial markings were all washed off from the bursting water system he himself tampered with. Irony became Croquette's undoing as the addicts tore into him, Kouta didn't wish to see the details, slowly and stealthily he slipped out of the darkness and slipped Jeandette into it so that she also did not get mauled and beaten by those men and women. They were ruined and tired but they were many and they were angry. Croquette was armed and he was strong but he was alone and he wished his own demise and redemption. Maybe he'd get what's his in the afterlife and his desire would be fulfilled…

After having their way with their overlord the addicts let go of him, they tried to open up the drawer where the man must've held his crackers but they failed to do so. They quickly bolted out the open door realizing that there was nothing more there for them, just painful memories of being less than what any man deserves to be treated as – a man.

Bleak rays of the rising Sun began peeking in the horizon as Jeandette was laying by Croquette's table and crunching on a hat'ash cracker, Kouta was sitting by the other side and looking back at the woman and then at the Sun. These were the woman's final moments and she wished to spend them in silence enjoying the purest form poison that ruined her life. Mortenson's poison took away entire hours of her remaining time but at least Jeandette would pass contempt just like she always wished to. This was a woman who never restrained herself from pleasure because she knew she'd not live forever and she'd have rather died that very same day feeling happy than died a thousand years later sad that she didn't do something she could've done. Maybe there was something in that everyone could've picked up from it…

"Mana…" Kouta thought to himself before voicing himself out loud. "You know, I thought for a while that maybe your way has something I could learn from, Jeandette. To always try everything it feels right to try and never purposefully not take the shots I could take. Then I realized that this is just what Mana-chan meant… No people are unnecessary, most people would've thought you were when they saw you, you laid ruined and looked like you'd given up on life. And here you were teaching me something important… Thank you, Jeandette" Kouta blinked a couple of times before looking back at his companion, she remained silent so the boy crept up to her feeling her pulse and checking for other life signs.

"I just wish you could've heard my thanks…" he uttered before standing back up and walking out of the building. Suddenly a powerful ray of light burst from a point in the city piercing the dark dawning sky. Kouta pressed his aching ribs and looked at the purple beam anomaly, wondering if his friends had anything to do with it. Either way this phenomenon was the only lead he had about the location of his friends. Slowly but assuredly Kouta left the collapsing building behind him, walking towards the purple beam of light and the inhumanly loud rumbling noises, fissures and quakes coming from that direction.


	197. An Invincible Man VS An Invincible Man

Based on the experience gathered during his days as a ninja, both serving the Leaf village and as a rogue, Shimo suspected things to go wrong. In the ninja world plans rarely went without a hitch, planning was obviously wise as having a general chain of possible actions in mind always ended up benefiting any venture but one would've been a fool expecting those plans to always work as predicted.

Similarly to that experience, right as the group of three comprised of Notasa, Carnefici and Shimo approached the supposed fortified mansion of the young musician that was supposed to keep her safe from any threat a line of men in suits with a familiar abomination of flesh and steel standing in the center informed the trio that their plan was predicted and as good as useless now. The Boss of Syndicate managed to gather his people and regroup before Notasa could've been brought into a safe environment making harassing her further completely pointless. Now Shimo and Carnefici had a fight on their hands, one they would've rather avoided since Notasa was also to be involved.

"Step aside, little canary, you'll be singing in the Syndicate's cage from now on, see?" the Boss grumped out with his crushed windpipe emitting a very husky and low pitched tone, the man's eye twitched as the flesh surrounding it was only held by sticky molten mass of Audra that hardened around it.

Notasa looked at Carnefici with worry, the aged man blinked calmly and nodded his head for assurance. "Don't worry, young lady, I will allow no such thing. I'll kill them all before they'll lay a finger on you" the mass murderer of the past days grunted with annoyance and determination.

Shimo curiously squinted at the man, "I thought you don't kill anymore…" he wondered as if this group of mobsters with a near-invincible man leading the fold meant nothing.

"You said it, not me. I just don't do it as often and never hurt people who don't have it coming" Carnefici replied carelessly as his flesh began to flow as if he was made of gooey liquid, the color of it did not change, the man still stood firmly but the texture and consistency of his skin became droopier.

"Heh" Shimo cringed imagining in how much trouble these Syndicate fools were.

"What are you two goombas waitin' for?! Come at me all at once! I'll fill both 'a ye full 'a holes!" the Boss shouted out vigorously shaking his twin kunai dispensers and firing them rapidly into the air making it rain blades at the general vicinity of the trio, Shimo grabbed Notasa in his arms and moved away from the rain of blades, Carnefici remained standing and letting the blades get stuck in his oily body before firing it back from his gut right at the Syndicate mobsters, some shouted out in pain before pulling the lodged blades out, several collapsed on the spot as their wounds were just too great.

Carnefici looked at Shimo and nodded approving that the young man protected Notasa. Shimo just grinned in return confidently, no, arrogantly even.

"What are you waiting for? I've already kicked this asshole's ass once, I've no hype to fight him again. He's all yours, an invincible man VS an invincible man, I'd like to see that fight. I'll keep as many of the small fry off your back as possible and watch Notasa-chan" Shimo replied taking a defensive sword stance and preparing to protect the musician from any attacks. He needed Notasa's aid so that the golden sphere got deciphered. So that Mana would be happy again and maybe the two of them became friends again.

Silently and without rushing things Carnefici began walking up to the Boss, his texture and consistency changed again with the man returning to his normal state and stopping all the drooping of oily goo all over the place. Syndicate goons rushed at Carnefici but they were quickly stricken down in a blur, the bodyguard's hands turned to the bubble gum pink colored shapes of axes, swords and disc saws made of gum that cut almost like the real thing striking any man foolish enough to attack him down. During that moment Shimo saw the horror of Carnage Fici reborn again and directed at the people aiming to hurt his young lady, the person he had sworn to protect, the person that granted this reformed criminal purpose. They were as good as dead the moment they stood against him…

Carnefici's back blew open letting go elongated gummy tentacles that impaled and tossed the gangsters around, they even grabbed a couple and tore them right in half. This was the scorn of the world which Carefici was… The Syndicate's medical plan must've covered injuries like this, the Boss was completely crushed by long layers of stone and Audra ores and yet he was standing here completely rebuilt. One could only wonder if whatever wonderful medical ninja worked on the Boss would've worried themselves with common crooks like the ones torn apart by Carnefici.

Shimo looked back at Notasa, "I promised your bodyguard to keep the small fry off of him, I'll do my best to keep up that promise and protect you, you'll have to trust me" he mumbled out to which the young artist just nodded hesitantly.

The Yuki's hands blurred through a bunch of hand seals creating a small scale snowstorm of freezing temperatures pelting at the criminals and slowing their movement speed and intensity exponentially. Even Carnefici's gummy body began covering with icicles and snow, the man grinned with a cruel and cold smile, "Oh, I like that!" he declared throwing a punch in the Boss' way.

The quick punch lifted the shorty with an oversized steel filled head off his feet and sent him down. It appeared that Shimo's ice ninjutsu granted Carnefici's attacks enough chakra coating to break through Audra steel and deal some damage. Still, Shimo had no time to just stand there and keep freezing the murderous bastard's body, he'll have to deal with this on his own. At the very least he could hold his own until Shimo finished with the lowlifes and could focus on helping him beat that short bastard up.

Carnefici's hands couldn't elongate or change shape once they were frozen, the man continued punching wildly while taking a moment or two to evade the counterattacking bursts of kunai blades from Boss' kunai dispenser before pummeling the man again and again. With an almighty finishing blow of the combination Carnefici sent the rebuilt man flying and crashing straight into Notasa's mansion. The body of Notasa's bodyguard leaned forward as if falling forwards but then his muscles tensed up at the last moment using the momentum of the fall to jumpstart his dash and bolt towards the mansion. He had some business to finish with the Boss and Shimo had no objections with that.

The ex-rogue swordsman dashed around the battlefield cutting down every single Syndicate bastard that dared to do anything else but shiver in the cold air created from the technique he used before. Shimo's hands went through another combination of hand seals creating a raging vortex shaped blizzard around the area before the young man's body disappeared in the fray.

"Blizzard Cut: Three Hundred Twenty Slashes!" Shimo mumbled as his figure appeared behind the raging blizzard that was cut over three hundred times and the vortex opened up in the spots the cut was delivered. Overwhelmed by the difference of cold air inside the blizzard and the warmth coming from outside of it the vortex imploded and dissolved in on itself leaving nothing but beaten and cut down bodies. The Boss would've needed more than fifty man to cause problems to Shimo at this point… Numbers made little difference here, skill was needed to combat ninja.

Carnefici rushed into the ruined mansion, his right hand which was frozen solid and he used to pound his enemy with this winded up full powered strike was busted into pieces, drops and puddles of goo gathered around Carnefici fusing with him and recovering his missing arm.

"Hydrification technique" the man mumbled to himself testing out his new arm. A barrage of blades came whizzing his way, a handful of them missed him and whizzed right by his ear, a couple of them lodged into his chest and face but were expulsed by the pressure of his oily substance. Carnefici placed his arm against the wall and grinned.

"I am the bodyguard of Notasa, the greatest child musical genius of our time, we are in her estate and you are now in my sanctuary!" the man declared making a hand seal with his free arm.

"C-Rank Seal Release!" he chanted activating a floor of spikes shooting from below and supposedly impaling the Boss on them. The spikes just scratched at the man's flesh and tore open his clothes where they cut him, sparking and breaking in contact with the man's deeper layers of Audra alloy skin.

"B-Rank Seal Release!" Carnefici chanted pressing his hand against another location as the walls opened up letting out spiraling marble pillars with blades on them rotating diagonally right at the man aiming to chop him to pieces. Being hit by such a thing would've been the equivalent to being tossed into a human shredding machine.

And yet the Boss persevered, the blades screamed as if they were capable of suffering pain in contact with the toughened deep layers of the man's skin and broke, tearing off only the chunks of the artificially regrown and put together fleshy parts of the Syndicate leader. Angered by the endless traps the Syndicate Boss dashed forward in a fist swinging frenzy breaking through walls and tables in his path.

"A-Rank Seal Release!" Carnefici shouted opening up a wall besides him and turning it in a way that covered him and became enhanced with pure chakra lacking of any elemental affinity. Creating an efficient barrier that stopped the Boss' advance.

"D-Rank Seal Release!" the bodyguard set off another trapping seal that activated chakra infused magnets on the walls trapping the Boss inside by forcing his Audra infused frame to slam against the walls completely paralyzed and unable to move.

In a blindingly fast pace Carnefici dashed to the end of the mansion, through the endless kitchens, bathrooms and guest rooms straight into the main hall and stopped by the exit placing his hand onto the doorway opening the door that lead outside. "S-Rank Release: Sayonara Protocol Release…" Carnefici declared removing his hand from the doorway as the entire house blew up tossing the bodyguard outside its range and a large light blue flame bubble contained the explosion inside. The missing chunks of the incinerated body of Carnefici soon reformed as he continued staring at the explosion.

A half-naked singed figure burst from the smoke swearing bloody murder and whacked the bodyguard straight to the face sending the man backwards leaving a large trail of ruined road where his frame slid backwards. Notasa ran up to Carnefici and tried to help him up.

"There was an equivalent to a teratonne of chakra infused TNT in that explosion contained in that bubble. We may have a problem…" the slightly fazed Carnefici exclaimed looking at Shimo.

"Does this mean you're asking for my help?" the young man asked with a ridiculing smile to which Carnefici responded with a one mirroring it.

"Just telling you to not hold your breath" he replied before dashing right back into battle, swinging his axe arms at the Boss that simply bounced off the revealed purple layers of skin that laid underneath the man's flesh that was placed on top but now completely incinerated by the explosion. His current appearance was a demonic sight to be honest, a half-naked purple skinned man with blood red eyes exploding with anger.

The Boss continued to wail his arms around pounding at Carnefici but his fists only left holes that quickly patched up or splattered the man only for him to reassemble. This battle would've expanded for up to infinity more so Shimo had to do something. The young man formed a couple of hand seals with all of the increase of speed that training with Mana allowed him to acquire.

"Water Style: Water Assault Jutsu!" he chanted out spouting out a small source of water which completely drenched Carnefici. Then Shimo made another hand seal.

"Glaciation technique!" the young man shouted out as the water drenching Carnefici froze solid creating an armor of chakra tough enough to leave lasting impact on the Boss' Audra steel alloy layered skin. Carnefici's elongated tendrils that expanded before the man was drenched stabbed at the Boss piercing his shoulders at the back. The murderer's fists ran rampant upon the Boss' face and entire body – even having all the considerable power of the man's blows in mind it was evident that the Boss of the Syndicate wouldn't go down just like that. His entire face was filled with bumps and scars that testified of his long experience of having his head bashed and crushed. The man certainly could take his fair share of punishment.

With a shoulder tackle the Boss blasted through Carnefici's body breaking it into pieces and making the frozen man shatter all around the place. The mobster then pointed his finger at Shimo, at least where he remembered Shimo to be but the man was already gone by the time the Boss looked for him.

"Ice Style: Haze Blade!" Shimo's voice ran rampant as clones of the young man danced all around the Boss making the man angrily attempt to swat them aside only for them to be revealed as mere mirages caused by cold air playing games with the warm air around the place.

Since his opponent was finally open Shimo descended from the air drawing his blade with all of his might and speed. "Ice Wolf Jutsu: White Wolf Slash!" the young swordsman chanted out the name of his technique as all the sounds around the battlefield had grown silent just to be reset again after a howling stream of white air cutting through the Boss with the avatar of wolf made of solid ice appeared behind Shimo delivering a slash from its icy paws in addition to Shimo's drawing slash.

A violent shockwave erupted demolishing the surrounding buildings and sending Shimo rolling sideways, even Notasa who was standing quite the distance away was knocked off her feet and thrown backwards through a large vendor window and into the shop itself.

"Shit… Forgot that happens when two Audra alloys clash together…" the young man complained standing back up, covered with bumps and bruises. Only then did he notice the form of Carnefici reforming.

"Let's not do that ice thing. It works but not worth the hassle, we won't leave any lasting damage like this…" the ex-murderer exclaimed with great annoyance in his tone.

"Got better ideas?" Shimo wondered looking at him.

"Does that mean you're asking for help?" Carnefici teased him before launching his assault forward. Shimo couldn't understand just what the man was trying to achieve just rushing like that, he could keep attacking whole day but until they met the exact concentrated percentage of chakra enhancements they wouldn't bust through the Audra layer of the man's skin. If the stored explosive power of billions of explosive tags containing a teratonne of explosive power couldn't break through, it was hard to imagine what would've.

"Come on! Come at me fuckers! I'll take all 'a you on!" the Boss angrily roared out before Carnefici signaled Shimo for his follow-up. The young man clapped his hands together after forming a bunch of hand seals and once again activated his Ice Wolf Jutsu, wrapping the avatar of ice around Carnefici's body with the wolf's jaws shaping around the man's fist. Carnefici leaned under the Boss' punch and delivered a finishing jaw buster that flung the Boss down.

The bodyguard leaped right on top of his downed opponent and began bashing the man's head with his only remaining arm as the one wearing the Ice Wolf exploded into thousands of crystal-like pieces of ice upon the crashing impact. Carnefici was ready to cause carnage as he pounded and pounded away at the Boss' head shouting and roaring proudly, he did not tire, he did not give in, the man just kept on bashing and bashing the Boss' head before the mobster's eyes rolled back and white slobber began running down from his throat and get coughed out through the mouth with traces of blood.

"His outer layer may be near invulnerable but his brain is still mushy soft. If it bashed against his tough skull from inside enough times it'd still cause a concussion" Carnefici explained turning back at Shimo who just looked confused at the bodyguard.

"Wow…" the young man had to admit that Carnefici had superior fighting instincts and skill. It'd have taken a ninja capable of fighting on a Chuunin or Jounin level to possess enough percentage of chakra enhancements to beat the Audra steel layer of his skin and yet the bodyguard managed to find out a weakness that helped him beat such a foe.

The two rushed to Notasa helping the young girl up. Carnefici looked completely ruined as he looked back at the mansion he worked so hard to make an invincible fortress, a place where his treasured young lady could feel safe. Now it was in burning ruins and had not a single stone on top of a stone. This whole district looked torn down.

Then as everyone thought that the danger was over the ground shook violently, a purple beam erupted piercing the night's sky as an overwhelming roaring sound of some primal untamed beast made everyone grab for their ears that burst in blood. Shimo looked on into the glowing beam of purple light and began slowly walking towards it. Notasa's soft hand grabbed the swordsman's elbow.

"I have no more home and no more place in this village. That gives me a chance to tour around the world, which means that I have a chance to start a new life without Syndicate. You helped me acquire that life so I wish to fulfil my promise to help this young lady you hold so dear, just like you helped Carne help me. Please…" she asked.

Shimo nodded and pointed at the colossal beam of light stabbing at heavens themselves. "If I know my troublemaker friends, it's likely that we'll find them there. My young lady is an idiot and keeps making the most insane enemies, be ready to suspend your disbeliefs…" he warned before looking at Carnefici.

"Are you going?" Shimo asked.

"Yeah, wherever the young lady goes, I go to watch over her!" the man declared with a firm nod.

The trio began heading towards the purple beam of light booming into the sky, engraving its possible location in their minds as it could've disappeared just as out of nowhere as it appeared.

"I've found Notasa… Just hold on, Mana, she'll crack that stupid sphere and we'll find that Box for sure…" Shimo thought to himself looking at that beam that looked like Hell itself was making its way onto Earth.


	198. Cosmic Elegy

Struggle to comprehend the insanity transpiring right in front of her astonished Mana to the point where she could barely respond to the stimuli around her. Right in front of her in a beam of sky piercing light stood a supposed Goddess, one summoned through a ritual of seemingly senseless ritual of murders most foul. Her appearance was unlike anything the magician had ever seen, she did not look ancient at all, in fact she looked almost futuristic and majestic but not in a godly way. She was beautiful but her beauty was vastly overcrowded by her futuristic accessories and motifs, some of them appeared dysfunctional almost to the young girl.

"She's not a Goddess… She can't be…" Mana mumbled to herself under her nose. Her mind returned to the state it was during her infant years, being unable to comprehend basic facts and relate them to events transpiring in front of her.

It was like all those years of meditation, all that time she spent overcompensating for the mental disorder by studying and aiming to understand and relate all facts to every known transpiring event even in this crazy world of hers never happened. Her mind returned to the primal state of affiliating every matter to non-existent made up Gods and magic. Rain fell because Gods wept, lightning crashed down because they were angry, people loved each other because of magic. How was she supposed to relate any fact to any event if an actual Goddess stood in front of her.

The white armored entity examined her own body, her hands and observed her white outer shell before looking at a puddle of blood where her brightly colored skin reflected off of it. Mana shook in the absurdity of it all. Her feet trembled before taking a step forward, then another one. Meiko glared at Mana in shock and surprise that the magician dared walk forward towards this Goddess descending from the skies.

"Kill me…" Mana spoke silently before repeating it momentarily louder and then louder still.

The Goddess curiously lifted and twisted her neck to the side examining Mana who was slowly approaching her. It was clear that the entity was more curious and stumped about the world around her than harboring any intent, malicious or decent.

"Mana!" Meiko shouted out taking a couple of hasty steps forward and grabbing the magician's shoulder rudely, trying to yank her back to her place. Back before the magician did something she usually did – stupid and unjustifiable to anyone but herself.

"If she's an actual Goddess that can only descend in pools of blood showing her the way… If that is the way Gods operate, I do not wish to bend to such Gods or live in such a world" Mana explained looking at Meiko angrily.

The blacksmith examined the tearful look of the magician, she saw her friend's face enraged and greatly saddened, overflowing with tears of sadness, almost like the ex-kunoichi regretted ever being born on such a world. Meiko was determined to do anything it'd have taken to protect her friend from such sadness and such a meaningless death.

"Yes! Yes! Show me your power, Goddess that descended from the sky!" the old crone screamed her lungs out from where she laid knocked down, unlikely to ever rise again due to her injuries. "Do that and then let us join together! I shall take the power to avenge the Syndicate for my sons! Show me your power before becoming a part of me!" the old woman shouted, the Goddess' hand lifted off and her palm extended at the old woman who answered by lifting her old crooked hands and extending them back.

A silent sound wave emanated from the Goddess' palms blasting all particles that the woman had and dispersing them away. In a frozen moment in time nothing remained of the old crone, even her blood particles vibrated so rapidly, moved by the frequency of the Goddess' sound vibrations that they simply ceased to exist. In a cruel smile of fortune the woman was erased from existence in all but the memories of all who knew her.

"I am Melobi… And I want to live…" the almost futuristic looking Goddess exclaimed in a loud, cybernetic sounding synthetic voice of a female.

"She's… She's not a Goddess?" Mana's eyes shot wide open as she jumped back and reached for her card pouch. "She's a…"

"Goddess or not, she hurt my friend and I'm gonna punch it for that!" Meiko shouted out finally reacting to the descent of the godly being by rushing at it with all of her speed, all of her strength and wish to hurt this divine being all channeled into a single punch. A strike like that could've punched a hole through the planet itself if it wasn't properly channeled but Meiko didn't worry, her effort concentrated into channeling all of that energy right through the Goddess and nothing more. All of that energy, all of that ill intent will only flow through the Goddess in front of her.

Grungy yet once again absolutely silent shockwave erupted from the Goddess' body without any of her conscious effort blasting Meiko away and sending her crashing through a multitude buildings behind her. The shockwave passed through the entire district toppling multiple buildings over meanwhile the magician girl tossed forward a card with explosive tags which automatically detonated on impact. The explosion sent Mana flying back just narrowly avoiding the brunt of the shockwave that sent Meiko flying, anything to injure the blacksmith at the peak of her augmentation would've splattered Mana without any remains.

For a good couple of minutes Mana's world was all pain. The magician looked at her shaking covered in blood hand and felt warm streams of blood running down her face and sticking her hair together in clampy strings. Grunting and crying out in pain Mana flipped over revealing to herself a couple of small rocks that dug into her flesh painfully, the kunai that had been fired at her was now lodged even deeper and gushed with blood momentarily before the pressure of the blade stopped it. By now it was clear that a single yank of the knife out would've opened up a wound that'd kill her in moments.

Never in her life has the magician felt so powerless, so completely blown away and unable to help her friends at all. Even in the face of defeat such as when she fought the Demon of Kirigakure she managed to damage the young man's armor assisting her friends in his defeat, even when she was attacked by Sugemi in the arrest house Mana managed to wound him helping to calm the old friend down and wear him out. Now one of her best friends could've died right in front of her and the magician had no idea what happened nor did she stand a way of helping Meiko.

"No more physical chakra… No use in redirecting or dodging anything… No logical angle of this to analyze… I'm so useless…" Mana grunted slamming a rocky chunk of debris in front of her.

"I went at her with all of my speed, all of my strength, all of my chakra augmentations kicked up to the max…" Meiko's feint voice emanated through the ruined remains of a building that both girls ended up in. The magician crawled painfully to her collapsed friend and looked at Meiko's devastated armor and broken body, her arms and legs laid in awkward positions – likely broken. When Mana tried to lift the redhead's head up to look her in the eyes Meiko shrieked out in unheard of pain. It was like the entire body of her friend was broken in just one careless backlash of the white and purple Goddess descending onto the beacon of blood.

"I didn't even break through her aura. The chakra of that thing is so immense, so immeasurable that it radiates this… Aura of chakra pressure… I didn't even get past the pressure of it with all of my strength. She hurt you Mana, she hurt a friend of mine and I just wanted to punch it because that's what I'm good at. I don't deserve to hold that Box…" Meiko teared up, Mana hadn't seen this sensitive side of her friend, not since the last time that the redhead screwed ninjutsu and chakra control up.

Mana carefully placed her sunken in blood hand on Meiko's bent and peeled off shoulder plate leaving a couple of bloody prints on it.

"You tried to punch a God because it hurt my feelings? Some would say that is worth the journey we've travelled all by itself…" Mana tried to smile, she faked a smile because she knew how hopeless the situation was. A loud rumbling sound alerted Mana forcing her to stand up. The magician saw a pillar of ice being erected further away – that could've only been Shimo!

"You said she wasn't a God?" Meiko asked as Mana began instinctually stumble forwards towards the battlefield.

"No. Melobi is a name of a Lesser Demon. An ancient remnant of Ten Tails' first rampage and the immense chakra it irradiated during its lifespan before it was split into the nine Tailed Beasts" Mana looked down watching as her blood slowly dripped onto the messed up and demolished district. The girl felt countless itchy wounds on her body that must've been infected, her chances didn't look too good but Mana wished to at the very least do something about this Lesser Demon before confronting her own human mortality.

A powerful shockwave shook the ground beneath Mana's feet. The girl cried out in pain and fell on her knees, her cracked ribs and knees had no chance of withstanding quakes, she just wondered what could've caused this violent rupture. She had no chance to beat this thing, Meiko got knocked out instantly and the entity wasn't even trying. With a single conscious effort it could kill them all and destroy their entire world. Lesser Demons were much weaker than fully powered Tailed Beasts but they still were too much for anyone except ninja of legendary power. A team of Sannin or Kage level ninja perhaps, skilled jounin maybe…

The magician screamed out seeing the sight of battle, Melobi had broken out of Shimo's pillar of ice trying to freeze her solid and held a tall suit wearing and shoulder length hair having aged man of cruel facial features in the air in some translucent shockwave of pure sound. Melobi's hand twitched sending ripples through the soundwave that tore the man into smallest pieces forcing Mana to shout out and get the demon's attention before it could go on and kill Shimo. Melobi extended her hand but before the devastating wave of sound could splatter Mana all over the pavement leaving a deep drilling hole and disappearing in the vacuum of space the magician felt Shimo's hands wrapping around her and moving her away from harm.

"I know this won't make you forget what I've done and that we're still far from the friends we've once been but… That girl right there is Notasa. She can decipher the sphere" he whispered to her ear.

"That man…" Mana's lips shook in the overwhelming sensation of a girl who swore to protect all life but now saw them being casually taken left and right.

"He's not dead, he's a freak of some sort and he can reform using chakra to create bonds between his tissue and cells, sort of like a bubble gum man, like the stretchy chewy candy…" Shimo explained before pointing at the white and purple entity asking for explanation without uttering a word.

Mana saw Kouta further on passed out. She rushed at the knocked out young man, Melobi stood in her way but the magician didn't care, the boy she promised her attention and time, the boy she loved laid there knocked out without a sign of life!

Curiously enough Melobi turned aside and let Mana pass, observing the limping and stumbling magician curiously. The girls hands wrapped around Kouta's unconscious body with her blood sticking all over his innocent peacefully asleep face. Mana saw the paleness of his skin and the bags around his eyes – he was short of chakra just like it happened to her in the archives during the first big mission she was in.

A rumbling noise alerted both Mana and Melobi towards it, Carnefici reassembled himself from just the faintest cells into a pool of oil before taking his gooey and slimy shape. After the reformation was complete the man began panting heavily on his knees, reassembling himself from just smallest particles must've required emulating endless bonds and completely wiped out his own chakra reserves. A young girl who was apparently the Notasa they were looking for, according to Shimo wrapped her hands around the man's neck and ran in front of him shielding the tired man from Melobi's sight.

It was so strange… So far Mana has not seen Melobi attack or purposefully try and kill someone, always attacking in response to being triggered. She certainly had the power to do so, she could've destroyed the planet multiple times over before any of the surrounding ninja villages formulated a response team and sent it over here to defuse the situation. This was so peculiar that from deep within her chest curiosity arose and pushed Mana's sadness and despair aside. There was no chance fighting this entity, perhaps the magician could learn to at the very least understand it?

"You love this young man?" Melobi asked first before Mana could utter a word.

"I… I think I do" Mana replied looking back at Kouta and urging herself to stand in front of his body so that she could shield all of Melobi's scary strength if the entity decided to kill them both. "No! I know I do!" Mana replied much more firmly, without the fear that standing in front of alleged Goddess invited into one's heart.

"I'd like to love. I've only been alive for moments and I haven't felt much of anything… I'd like to love someone one day" Melobi replied with strange warmth in her voice.

"Wait, what are you?" Mana asked curiously, she asked the question that was intended to be asked the whole time before Mana was interrupted.

"I am Melobi, I was born when Ten Tails was born from the bridge extended between Earth and the Moon by the Princess. The Progenitor of the Tailed Beasts that was born of the mightiest of all bloodlines and the mighty Princess' spruce connecting Earth and the sky. I was born of the Progenitor's roar, the chakra in that sound emanated through the universe connecting and bonding with every sound ever to be made since that point. Thusly I became the embodiment of sound" Melobi explained.

"But… You said you were born just now, the Ten Tails first roared centuries ago and was soon split into the Tailed Beasts" Mana's eyes began feeling dizzy and her body shook almost falling down onto the ground. Melobi's curiosity only grew seeing the magician's condition.

"Are you dying, human girl? Please do not die, being born is such a happy feeling, I wish to share it with everyone" Melobi's face shifted into what closely resembled the way humans smiled. Her face did not shift, her muscles didn't twitch. Melobi's mouth simply disappeared on her purple synthetic skin and reappeared shaped into whatever she felt at the time, similarly her eyes stopped glowing before changing their shape while being dark and enlightening again.

"That is not… Something I have control over…" Mana replied as she fell to her knees feeling the powerful draw to pass out, she must've lost too much blood. Pity. There was so much she still wished to know about Melobi, about the world really… So many promises she still hadn't fulfilled: the promise to lead Meiko to the Box, the promise to go out on a date with Kouta once this whole Box journey has concluded… She still hadn't forgiven Shimo for what he did in Takigakure… Dying while holding grudges was a bad omen, that was how ghosts came to be and Mana despised ghosts.

Melobi's hand extended into another shockwave, it enveloped Mana and began glowing salad green. The magician felt her wounds closing up, she felt her chakra resources resurging and suddenly Mana felt like newly born. This was just like that tale she told Meiko of medical ninja in Otogakure using sound ninjutsu to heal people instead of the usual medical ninjutsu. Melobi must've functioned with the same principle, she controlled sound itself because the Ten Tails chakra infused roar fused itself with all of the universal sounds. She could mold chakra and strengthen the technique's intensity by strengthening the sound wave. She could've blasted one with all of the sound vibrations emitted by a supermassive black hole or used a healing wave of the same intensity. The kunai lodged in Mana's body got disintegrated into smallest pieces and scattered in the wind as her ruptured blood vessels patched themselves together with Melobi's healing soundwaves.

"There. Isn't being born better than dying?" Melobi smiled like an infant, in all meanings of the word she probably was.

"Thanks but… My friends are all also hurt, could you maybe help them as well?" Mana asked trying to determine if whatever line there was between her and the Lesser Demon was not overstepped, after all, she had only met the Nine Tails before and that monstrosity was in no helping mood.

"I can heal everyone in the vicinity… I could probably heal everyone in the world and on the Moon… I could maybe make everyone who's dead reborn again! That's be glorious!" Melobi shrieked in excitement clapping her hands and forming a heart shape of her appendages present on her head.

"Wait! A vibration of such immensity would tear a black hole open and kill everyone, it'd consume our entire system. Let's just… Help anyone nearby, okay?" Mana asked calmly trying to contain Melobi's excitement. The Lesser Demon nodded and another pleasantly harmonious shockwave of chakra infused sound erupted from her body passing through everyone and into the horizon. The magician saw the building further away explode from the pressure with Meiko jumping out from under the debris and rushing to where everyone was and the elderly man which Notasa tried so hard to protect standing back up and examining his newly resurged strength.

Hands tied around Mana's belly firmly holding her in place, the magician's heart froze before realizing it was Kouta hugging her from behind.

"I was so worried…" he whispered into her ear.

"Just this once, I didn't screw everything up and helped someone…" she smiled in excitement. After remembering about the kids which were used by the old woman Mana looked around only to see them scattering, they moved differently, this time they were afraid. They had emotion behind them which must've meant that whatever tricks the old religious woman used to force them do her bidding must've been undone.

Melobi knelt to the ground and felt the dirt beneath her feet. She looked so sour and disappointed.

"Why did you kill that old woman, Melobi-san?" Mana asked uncomfortably, to her all life was precious and she didn't want to ruin this moment but she did really want to know why of all people the Lesser Demon murdered the woman that ended up summoning her.

"When the Progenitor first created me, rather the mass of evil anomalous chakra I came to be from, all I wanted since then was to live. You see, the bridge of the Princess was malevolent in nature, it was gracious in its intentions but the Princess felt anger and hatred towards the Moon people so deep in its core the World Tree was rotten, that's why the Progenitor was evil in its nature, why its voice was evil and why I formed in a cosmic mass of evil chakra. Like a planet being born of space dust my conscience opened itself in absolute evil. All I wanted since that moment was to live free of my roots, free of the evil of my origins… All I want for is to live!" Melobi's face once again changed into that of sadness, as she spoke the appendages on her head began letting streams of air escape from its crevices at the tips. The escaping air formed a sad and lyrical melody, it was the most harmonious and yet longingly sad sound Mana had ever heard.

"And the old lady wished to imprison you again by becoming your Jinchuuriki" Mana concluded the thought freeing Melobi from having to speak those words. Poor Melobi was such a tragic entity, she was born from the voice of ultimate evil the world has ever known, she was confined to just be a consciousness inside all of the world's sounds, from the musical melodies to the screams of death and begs for help. She was labeled a "Lesser Demon" before having a will of its own to earn its demonic label. Her very birth process included the need of countless murders to draw the beacon of blood so that Melobi could concentrate her efforts and take shape where the beacon was drawn. She was not malevolent yet her entire existence was wrapped in evil and she needed evil deeds to even be allowed to be born.

That left one question in Mana's mind – the monk which the old lady mentioned. Someone with such deep extending knowledge of mythology and history of the world to know who Melobi was, to know how to give her birth, something Mana would've never known. Who could've been this behind the scenes mastermind playing the old woman and why would Melobi's birth serve his needs? Everywhere Mana and her team went there seemed to be deeper mysteries and questions that raised only more questions!

"Your appearance is odd, it is not primal, you look very different from other Lesser Demons or Tailed Beasts. No Lesser Demon I'd seen appears so… Synthetic, cybernetic and attractive by the human standards" Mana remarked observing Melobi's attempts to feel the dirt beneath her feet by filtering it through her fingers.

"My looks are representative of music. They are what music currently represents, I thought by choosing such synthetic and visually pleasing look I'd appear casual to people highly educated in musical crafts at this moment in time" Melobi sadly explained. There must've still been something that troubled the entity.

"You sound really sad, is something the matter, Melobi-san?" Mana wondered carefully.

"It's just… I am now alive and yet I can feel nothing, no love, no pain, no sadness and the happiness of my birth is fleeting away. There is no meaning to my existence if I cannot feel. Perhaps being evil is my nature? I feel great jealousy of living things, maybe my nature is to destroy all living things? If I cannot truly live, no one should be able to!" Melobi declared with the volume of her synthetic voice rising higher and higher.


	199. Cadenza

The crew around Melobi stood uncomfortably, wondering if they may have misunderstood her last words that appeared to declare war on life itself. If someone of the Lesser Demon's might would decide to eradicate life there'd be little anyone could do to stop it. Sure there were a handful of ninja or samurai that may have stood a chance at outright beating it but they were far away.

"You said that a shockwave encompassing the entire planet of the meaningless intensity I've shown before could swallow up the entire system in its aftermath? Just the Earth and the Moon have any signs of life so wiping all life out would be easy…" Melobi mumbled under her own nose like a child that didn't get a toy for her birthday.

Shimo and Carnefici took fighting stances and prepared for their seemingly inevitable last stand to protect their world and life itself but they did not attack. It was because in the depths of their hearts the two knew that they stood no chance even leaving a scratch on the Lesser Demon and once they attack – it'd be all over, the demon's decision would be set in stone and everything anyone would say following it would fall on deaf ears.

Tendrils of sludgy gum mass expanded from Carnefici's back standing in a shield against Notasa through the side of which the scared musician decided to peek at the unfolding situation that took a rather drastic turn. The girl then turned at her bodyguard who nodded and gestured that she should stay behind the shield even though they both knew that if the recently taken shape Lesser Demon decided to do something no shield that the man seeking redemption could provide would do any good.

"W-Wait… You said you felt joy before. The joy of birth!" Meiko uttered realizing that Mana ran out of things to say to Melobi and wishing to buy some time, just talk to the darned spoiled demon so she doesn't eradicate all life.

"Hmph… I guess… But that feeling was so short and now I'm over it. I want to feel again, something, anything… I just can't. Things are passing through my mind but I can't understand them, I think some things I feel are emotions but what do they mean, really? I can't feel the sand passing through my fingers, the chilly breeze that musicians sing off only invites sensations I can't understand and really know feelings" Melobi answered pressing her hands together, Mana saw pebbles and dust accumulating around her hands as a translucent shockwave sphere formed inside of them. Had Melobi wished to eradicate all life she'd have done it instantly – the demon was hesitating, there must've still been hope!

She had to say something, she had to somehow make Melobi reconsidering ending all life. That was what heroes did, they delivered huge speeches and they made situations better. They made bad people wish to change. And yet… Nothing momentous came to Mana's mind, she couldn't come up with anything that would've helped Melobi, nothing but her own selfish desire to save all life in the universe was in her mind and the sound demon wouldn't have understood it. Life literally meant nothing to it, it was only a cradle of feelings which the demon craved but now that it got a taste it thought them stale and lacking. Life did not meet the demon's thousand year hype…

"Maybe it is your shape?" Mana spoke out the first stupid thing on her mind. "I mean that white armor tissue on your body and over your skin, maybe it shields you from feeling something? You said you took shape of what music meant currently, that is you decided to embody music, why that sound specifically? Maybe embodying another sound would help you feel something?" Mana tried to reason to the best of her lacking skills, she couldn't speak on point like a hero, she couldn't have been one.

"I embody music because music is the sound that invokes feelings. If I embodied something like the sounds of black holes or quasars it'd be meaningless, I'd simply fade into nothingness existing as shapeless mass again or look like a giant monster or something…" Melobi angrily complained slowly walking up to Mana's face and looking the magician right in the face.

For a moment the two looked at each other eye to eye. There was an immense pressure emitted from Melobi's body, almost like the chakra contained within the impish newly born Lesser Demon was so great that it projected a repulsive field of aura pressure by itself just like Meiko described and if the blacksmith's descriptions were to be trusted even Meiko's top attack couldn't break through it. Mana felt the pressure pushing her away from the demon but she stood tall and kept her eyes open and even to Melobi's to the best of her abilities.

"Do you wish me to not live again? To float in space craving for being alive? I'll know if you're lying…" Melobi asked seriously.

Shimo and Carnefici looked at Mana with terrified glares, the Lesser Demon claimed it'd know if Mana lied and the magician was no good liar despite being quite a prodigy at the art of illusions. As far as spoken lies and not visual or auditory ones were concerned, Mana was one of the worst liars there may have been. All life could've been screwed, at that moment everyone would've told Melobi that they wished that she disappeared into Hell.

"No…" Mana replied. "I wish you to be alive and happy, not because you're beautiful and powerful or because I'm afraid of your majesty and might. It's because I wish for that to everyone. You've not lived for a single day yet, you have no idea what life or feelings are all about and alone it'll take you a lifetime to figure them out and you don't strike me as someone with a whole lot of patience. All I know is that if you destroy everything you'll be alone again. You'll be dooming everyone for a fate similar to that you were given – fate of not being alive while you and every other Tailed Beast, Lesser Demon and elite ninja remain. You know that pain the best of everyone in the universe, do you wish to inflict it to everyone truly?" Mana asked in return.

Mana's eyes didn't hesitate, the pressure coming out of Melobi made Mana's eyes tear up, it was like standing in front of a raging hurricane that no one else could see or feel but Mana's convictions and will were strong. She was no longer strong and able like she used to be but her inner strength and desire to persevere was unwavering.

"No… No I don't" Melobi concluded. "You are not lying, it would seem but you speak nonsense. How could I learn about feelings and life without actually living it? Would you really trust me not to destroy all life? You appear to be quite adamant of protecting it, why else would you have asked to heal everyone around you?" the demon began digging deeper into Mana's own core. It was like it wanted to expose Mana's own worst fears and force them to play against the argument of preserving Melobi and its life.

Mana looked to the side and noticed that everyone was scared of Melobi and they were right to be. Truth be told the magician was petrified as well, she was afraid of not only losing everyone she held dear and all the concept of life – the ultimate failure of her dream which she'd be responsible for. Mana also feared for her own life, something that usually she never experienced. Melobi's ancient and massive chakra must've played games with Mana's sleeping chakra network, flipped it and twisted it to its own means and ends like an illusion would've.

"Ummm… I could teach you" Notasa's scared but almost screaming in desperation voice spoke out. Shocked by the girl's bravery Mana turned at her and witnessed the musician walking out from behind Carnefici's shield which returned to its maker's body fusing with him.

"Your voice… It's soothing and beautiful" Melobi noted. "But how would that work? Do you wish for me simply to trust your words? How do you mean to accurately portray the experience of life, of all feelings in words? Words are but currency which we use to portray feelings to the best of our abilities, but even music – the most sensual of arts does not accurately and consistently play our strings to the perfect extent"

"You could become Melobi's jinchuuriki" Mana's firm voice suggested out of the blue. The blushed magician felt everyone's stares turn at her.

"It is much easier for Lesser Demons to be sealed inside humans. Plus if you enter her body willingly there'd be no need for a complex high rank seal to keep you in her and if you for any reason leave her body she will not necessarily die like she would if you were a Tailed Beast. That way you'd experience her feelings and the way she lives her life, both high and low, by yourself and you'd have access to Notasa-san's heart and all her experiences. You'd quite literally share a body and mind" the magician explained.

Notasa nodded and looked at Melobi. "I make music, perhaps I could use your aid to become more artistic and create even greater masterpieces for everyone to hear. We could not only experience the world together but we'd also give birth to new palettes of feelings inside people's hearts!" the girl confidently agreed with Mana's suggestion.

Melobi's head appendages floated and waved in the air as the demon thought for a while before her glowing eyes looked right in Mana's own.

"I would love that. I'd be able to protect dear Notasa from all threats so we could live forever and experience ages of life as one body and mind. I am also curious what sort of feelings lay within the heart of a musician, someone who bends sound to their will just like I do. We are, as ones say, kindred spirits. Would you please seal me inside her?" the Lesser Demon directed her question right at Mana. Crushed by the reminder of her own disability the girl lowered her head pathetically and shook it.

"As I've said, a simple C-Rank seal would suffice since we're not forcing you to be contained, we're just going through the formality. We would require your aid with the chakra portion as containing someone of your power will require inhuman chakra reserves but the sealing portion can be performed by Meiko, she's the best seal user of the team… Sadly I cannot use even such simple techniques" Mana concluded closing her eyes and barely containing her own sadness from having to confront her own weakness inside.

Meiko walked up to Notasa and Melobi standing in between of the two and asked for the Lesser Demon to stand right behind the girl and touch the future Jinchuuriki. Once the sealing process began, initially there appeared to be some trouble as Meiko's body began weakening and paling right in front of Mana's eyes but once the three-way channel between Notasa, Melobi and Meiko was established and the Lesser Demon's immense chakra began leaking into Meiko's body the seal erupted in dark purple colors and suddenly the majestic Melobi began to fade away before her shape began becoming one with the bursting beams of light erupting from the seal on Notasa's back.

"Combination Sealing Technique!" Meiko chanted out the name of the technique before forcing the process onwards. Despite the technique being a relatively simple matter, placing a weak seal which Melobi would have little to no problem of breaking given the need or desire to do so, Meiko was still greatly strained due to the needed cooperation of the Lesser Demon. Combination techniques were difficult if the two weren't in sync. Right before the beam completely absorbed the essence of Melobi Mana walked up to Notasa placing her hand on the girl's shoulder but looking straight at the twisting and fading shape of Melobi.

"If you wish to truly be alive then you will need a name. Melobi is not your real name, it is how you are called. Usually Tailed Beasts share their real names with their Jinchuuriki after establishing trust" Mana explained what she read of Tailed Beasts during her increased off time in the archives. The interviews and tales from past Jinchuuriki that described interacting and working together with the Tailed Beasts to achieve great things. Mana was no legendary hero, she had nothing special to set her apart from the others and now she had even less. However Melobi and Notasa may just soon possess power great enough to fight off Tailed Beasts if needed. These two may soon become legendary heroes like those that embody the hope of humans and Tailed Beasts working together.

"I have not been given a name… Ten Tails did not know of my existence before it was sealed and I was not given a name since I was never technically "born" until now" Melobi's voice spread ethereally through the ruined district of Otogakure they were in.

"Well, perhaps you may begin thinking of one to give yourself now. It is something that you and Notasa-san should do, you two are now closer than siblings, closer than spouses, after all…" Mana replied taking a couple of steps back and giving both the shapeless existence of Melobi and Notasa a firm and warm glare.

"I'd love if you named me, magician… If it weren't for you I'd have never been given another chance at life, if it weren't for you treating me as something more than something given birth by evil incarnate and then reborn through bloodshed I'd have never become one with Notasa" Melobi's voice, now significantly weaker echoed.

The magician smiled before gently laughing out, "Well, I always considered musical names incredibly lyrical and quite beautiful, something like Sonata or Symphonia would fit you just fine"

"Synth…" Melobi's voice echoed, quiet as a whisper but spreading wide and far. "I am not of natural birth, I was created by Ten Tails and then given birth through unnatural means. Despite my wish to be born I was never really born, I was created and then given direction to shape myself in. I am artificial but just like you, I choose to embrace it. Honoring your preference I'll be named Synth…" the entity completely disappeared into a beam of light that got absorbed into a seal hieroglyph on Notasa's back before blinking out. Just like that the sealing was over.

Notasa nodded and thanked Meiko and Mana. It must've been a great opportunity and joy for the young woman, Mana could only imagine what it'd be like to have an embodiment of magic for a stage magician, must've felt similarly to how Notasa felt right now.

"Just for the record, I still couldn't manage to find us a place…" Kouta scratched the back of his head laughing uncomfortably.

"You lazy dickbag!" Shimo grunted out rubbing his knuckles against the young man's head and hair forcing the young man to shout out in pain as he was bullied.

"Well, my home was also destroyed…" Notasa looked around realizing that a large portion of the district was devastated as well. Once the village finds out that Melobi resides inside Notasa it'll really make the girl lose some popularity points. Then again, the Syndicate shall be a threat no longer.

"I have some old acquaintances I can call favors from" Carnefici grumped out in annoyance. The man must've had mixed feelings about the girl carrying the Lesser Demon inside of her, on one side it was dangerous as if at any point Melobi wished to escape she could've greatly weakening and injuring the musician. On the other hand it also made him quite useless as once Notasa learned to harness Synth's power she'll become near-unstoppable to any but the most elite threats.

Notasa wrapped her hands around Carnefici's. She must've felt the man's worries.

"I'll leave my protection to you then, Carne-san!" she exclaimed. Carnefici's face softened almost immediately after seeing that the young lady still didn't consider him useless and didn't toss him out like yesterday's garbage. Treatment like that was what the old wolf was used to so seeing actual human kindness and friendship at work must've warmed his heart.

Mana walked out to look through the balcony of an ancient classical home of an old painter whom Carnefici knew from his old days. It was odd that she and the ex-murderer had no falling outs or problems, oddly enough Mana never even spoke to Carnefici about his past despite somewhat hazily remembering the outcry of his incarceration and the huge rings of rumors and conflicts that it caused during her early years when she was but a child. Then again, was she not one now? She was. A child who took over the responsibility to talk down a Lesser Demon from destroying all life in a blink of an eye, both Earth and Moon…

"I've no idea how you did what you did…" Notasa smiled walking out from the same room where Mana and Notasa were housed to sleep over the remaining hours until the morning becomes day. It was once everyone rested that the musician promised to take a look at the golden sphere and reveal its contents so that Mana and the others can leave before they overstay their welcome in the village. What they did in Otogakure in just one night would shake its very foundation, Melobi's power shook ground far beyond Otogakure's walls and the other ninja villages will ask questions. Soon Otogakure's criminal structures will be revealed and without so many leaders that fell that night the Syndicate will be eradicated by walking out before more trouble is made than they can scoop out. "Talking to a Lesser Demon like they're just another friend of yours…" the girl concluded about what was admired exactly.

"Neither do I, my hands are still shaking…" Mana replied looking down. "I mean… Just a couple of years ago I was filling in paper tests and going to the Academy, now we had to prevent the destruction of everything that's alive. Sometimes I look back at those days and think of how easy I had it back then, I get nostalgic and jealous honestly of that little magician brat with chubby cheeks" the girl smiled before Notasa joined her at the balcony and looked over the smoking panorama of the village.

"Yeah… Now that me and Synth are one… I just get the feeling like I'm wasting my time, like I should be studying her and that we should be partnering up and befriending each other as fast as possible and then… I don't know… Saving the world? I mean… It's similar, isn't it? Given all this power and being taught to use it, it's just like graduating from the Academy, suddenly you wish to do everything, to fix the world…"

"It's different…" Mana replied, "You have the ultimate power but that doesn't mean the ultimate responsibility. Ultimately the only responsibility we answer to is the one we take as our own, the one we place on ourselves or one we accept. I placed the ultimate responsibility on my shoulders and I barely even managed to stop one person from doing the wrong thing before dying once. I think part why I managed to think of the whole sealing thing and talk Synth-san into it was because I believed you could be the hero I could never be… Someone who could do whatever she needed or wanted to do, who could fulfil any responsibility they would accept as their own"

Notasa stood leaned over the balcony silently for a while, Mana wondered what was that all about but then the girl turned at the magician and smiled.

"Synth says she's never seen a hero so she may be wrong but someone that protects all life from a big baby such as her deserves to be called that…"

Mana smiled acceptingly before longingly looking at the garden two floors below the balcony and looking back at Notasa.

"Be careful with the seal. It's paper thin, one disagreement, one big fight with Synth-san and she may just break out. It might be no problem but if you're fighting at that moment Synth-san may just end up hurting someone. You should discuss finding a stronger seal user to strengthen the seal one day with Synth-san, she might view it as a betrayal of your trust or you locking her up so you need to be sensitive about it. You two need to become friends, just using or controlling her will never work" Mana advised before turning around and walking back to bed. It was tough to think that she could sleep after just going through the most fearful experience of her life. Once again she'd remember the painful experience of nightmares and stress of ninja life keeping her awake.


	200. Leaving Sounds of Silence Behind

**Hey, everyone, don't know if you noticed but it's Chapter 200 ALREADY! Enjoy a double sized chapter due to that special occasion :) (Hope you enjoy it)**

By the time that Mana woke up the day was well past its middle. One could've expected at the very least that much from how the team spent the whole last night doing a great many things that ended up leaving the Sound Village pretty shaken up. The sight through the balcony was an intimidating one, the one of the largest, towering skyscraper buildings in the village was brought down, the whole district where Synth was summoned last night was in smoldering ashes even though the Lesser Demon saved all the injured as well as kept the dying from going over the line when asked by Mana to do so.

For the first time in a while Mana didn't feel a crushing leftover of past wounds, the pain that made it difficult to imagine how the rest of the day would go. By now, having been just a normal civilian for months the magician had gotten used to the frail human body. It was tough to imagine how she could've taken the ninja metabolism for granted during all those years. Luckily enough due to Melobi's effort Mana could make the bed she slept in and get dressed without any pain. Having in mind the literal torture she went through last night it was impressive.

By the time Mana got dressed and descended to the main guestroom below where everyone was having breakfast and, it appeared, waiting for her, everyone was already ready. The things were packed and stacked close to the door, everyone was just sitting around and looked happy to see Mana finally woken up and ready. The magician was a little scared to be entirely honest.

They've been chasing this box for so long. The four have been in so many places and experienced so much throughout all of this time and now they had all the cards they needed in their hand. All the four needed to do was to make the play and find out where the Box was exactly. Mana settled down and had some pancakes for breakfast, eating something made by an actual housewife who knew what she was doing felt really odd somehow, tasty nevertheless. It made Mana think about how much she missed cooking herself. Everyone hated when she cooked on the road because, frankly, Mana wasn't as good as she told herself she was. The young one lacked experience, something she could hopefully fix in time.

"It was strangely affectionate of you to show that much love last night… You've never hugged me openly before" Mana smiled to Kouta during the session of small talk when each member of the team recounted their adventures in Otogakure. The girl, of course, referred to when Kouta hugged her after getting back to his senses and over his injuries. While the two did awkwardly talk around the topic of their feelings towards each other neither of them made an actual step to illustrate their firm intentions towards those feelings.

"Yeah, well… I met a woman last night that helped me open my eyes. Helping her cleared up a lot of things for me" Kouta replied with a smile stuffing another pancake. Meiko and the medical ninja continued to eat the second breakfast using Mana needing breakfast-company as excuse to stuff their cheeks full of food. These two were quite the heavy eaters when they had plenty of access to food…

"It might not be wise for us to stick around this place for much longer. Right now the whole Syndicate chain of operations is unstable and it is highly possible that they're losing their public grip on the people. The village officials will view it as an opportunity to take their village back" Shimo tried to hurry everyone up and leave the village. There was a lot of truth in his words, they were ninja of completely different village after all. If the village re-established order and found them scooping around or made connections between them and the destruction last night the Hokage might have some explaining to do. Ninja have been suspended for far less than this.

"Well, we've made messes everywhere we went, we're in a whole stew of them anyways" Meiko cheerfully chuckled grinning with a full teeth smile like a monkey making fun of something.

"Still, might be better to avoid making a public mess here. Just because we've got a nasty record already building up doesn't mean we should keep adding to it when there's chance of avoiding it" Shimo concluded to which no one appeared to object.

"Well, you guys are welcome to stay here as long as you need. I've ran my own art smuggling operation for my gallery so if I was caught by the Syndicate I'd have been screwed big time. You gave everyone hope that those fuckers will be kicked out, maybe one day I'll actually open my gallery publically" the painter and the owner of the house that everyone was staying in affirmed that there was no rush to leave.

"The public likes Syndicate…" Mana looked down placing the roll of pancake and syrup down on her plate and pushing it away. Remembering her inner pain made her lose all appetite. She had never thought that she'd see the day when people supported criminals running the whole ship just because they openly killed any criminals unassociated with them. The very thought that such a system would be acceptable to the public made Mana very sad and whacked her hope of someday making her dream come true right in the head.

"That they do… You have to understand, they've been controlled by a band of criminals ever since the village was founded. To them the Syndicate is just another political party…" the artist nodded looking at Mana with a sad stare as if pitying her sadness before standing back up and leaving towards the kitchen.

"Well, we're not staying for too long anyways…" Mana concluded standing up and walking down the hall to pick up the bag that had the sphere inside it. The magician carried it back and placed it to her feet before drawing the little ball out of it and rolling it in between her open hands, examining the craftsmanship in it.

Notasa looked at Carnefici it was evident that she wanted to say something but was a little hesitant to do so. It must've been tough – having two minds inside one's head and constantly having to speak for both voices. Usually the powerful seals used for Jinchuuriki sealed the beasts away deep and had to be loosened for some of the beast's consciousness to leak out. Communicating with the Tailed Beast required great mastery over the seal, one's own body and great experience communicating with the beast as well as good relationship. Notasa's seal was thin as a bride's veil, Synth could've broken out at any point whenever she wanted to and could seemingly freely communicate with Notasa at any point.

"I've ran this past Synth and we agree that finding a master to strengthen the seal would be the right idea…" the musician spoke to Carnefici who just closed his eyes.

"There are no sealing masters in this village, it's a relatively unpopular branch of specialization and it's a dangerous world out there, my lady" he warned.

"Yes, I know that but… A journey like that would help me understand Synth and it'd get to understand me, it'd be a bonding trip but also it'd finalize our union. Synth doesn't want to hurt me or kill me if she ever broke out of the seal, plus, with our powers combined what could we possibly have to fear?" the musician gave her bodyguard a hopeful smile.

Carnefici just shrugged, "You're the lady, I'm just your bodyguard. If you wish to find a sealing master then I'll follow you wherever you go. Although you underestimate what transpires outside these walls. Maybe it would be a good experience for you to step out for once and see this world for what it truly is"

"Before that, I believe I've made a promise" Notasa smiled to Mana and picked up the sphere from her hands. The musician observed the sphere and looked around it flipping it and rolling it around to see all of its angles, she then asked for a pen and paper to write some things down. It took the young woman a good half an hour to finish the puzzle and write everything she needed down.

"It's quite a simple puzzle to any musically literate person, just a quite tedious one" she admitted. "You see in the ancient times music was written down with numbers and not notes, each note and symbol represents a number and this sphere has a grant total of ten missing pieces that represent the numbers you need"

Notasa handed the paper to Shimo who just rolled his eyes and put a couple of slashes with the pen in between the numbers. Separating the numbers into two groups of four and one group of two.

"It's coordinates… Some pretty exact ones and they can't be that old, less than a hundred years old for sure because they use the Guilman's method of writing down coordinates" the ex-rogue concluded. Once he took a more accurate look at the coordinates his face shifted in annoyance as he rushed to the bags and pulled out a world map placing it on the table after taking all the plates and cups and utensils off of it.

Kouta stood up and compared the coordinates to the map.

"Oh no… It's in Kirigakure…" he whined out, with good reason, the current standing of Konoha and Kirigakure was less than exemplary and even though Shirona's rebellion was long since cut down its roots and united Kirigakure loyalists remained strong in the village. Even more, they were more than ever united in their hatred of the other ninja villages now that they've taken away Kirigakure's autonomy.

"Not quite… It's in the north-western part of the Archipelago. I think it's in the Tako Reach region" Mana pointed at the supposed area with her finger. It was within the central area of the region which may have been the most dangerous.

"Awww! Sick! We're gonna fight ninja pirates!" Meiko shrieked out, "I'm gonna go and get ready!" she yelled out and ran off and grabbed her bag running into the yard to do whatever she thought of doing.

"Tako's Reach is a dangerous place, Mana. If I was you I'd think very carefully about just how much you wish to find that Box…" Carnefici added "Even when I was still who I was, we rarely treaded into the oceans, when we did we paid our dues to every sick pirate bastard we encountered. We'd have rather hungered to death than fought in the middle of the ocean. You do know that the Eight Tails is loose somewhere in the Archipelago living in the depths and sinking ships left and right. You have to wonder if whatever you wish to obtain is worth eight kilometers of journey to the bottom of the largest ocean in the planet in the grasp of a gigantic octopus-ox. It's either that or chakra infused sword to the gut by some random pirate, make no mistake those sea-dogs are no slouches, they were all proven ninja before they went rogue…"

"Even if by any chance you do find that Box, I hope you know the dangers of using it?" Notasa added. "There is an opera written about a man who left his home as a child and was raised as a monarch, only to return to his rundown country with his uncle in charge. Witnessing the suffering of his people he made a wish to the Box but the spirit of the Box took his soul away and sealed it in the Box instead. It's called "Murasuke's Trial" and it's about the selfishness of our own inner desires and the hope that they come true without any effort from our part. I've performed bits and pieces of it many times"

Mana's eyes sunk to the floor and she thought for a while. She had no wavers in her heart except when things expanded to her friends. She wished to show Meiko the legendary Box of Ultimate Bliss, she also knew that without her chakra control back the magician had no point of continuing her life. And yet even knowing all those things Mana didn't really wish to lead her friends into peril. She didn't want to doom them just because she did something as selfish as asking the Box to fulfil her wish.

"Truth be told I have no other choice. I know that everyone left on this mission not because they wanted to but because the Fifth would've never let me go without them. I know that it is selfish of me to wish for my chakra control back but… Without it I have no point of living. Life without any hopes of ever accomplishing your dream just isn't worth living to me. At any point you guys can go home and just label me as gone rogue… I will walk the distance till the end, wherever it leads" Mana replied looking at her friends who didn't reply at first.

"You're not bailing out on your promise that easily…" Kouta smiled before getting off the armchair and moving on to the pile of bags by the door.

"I know I hurt you a great deal back in Takigakure and I still think that I was in the right to do so. Sometimes the only right thing to do is the one that hurts the most. I still want to be your friend, Mana. And friends watch out for one another, we've been through a lot already and this one may just be the big one. I still want to be the sword that protects because only that kind of a person can eventually become the Hokage. A Hokage doesn't back down on missions just because things get a little crazy, especially when their friends walk into them with their heads up high" Shimo followed by standing up and picking up his bags as well as Mana's and left through the door to wait for the magician outside.

"The redhead already left, she's the most energetic about beating up ninja pirates out of the four of you…" Carnefici quietly roughed out through his teeth with a relatively warm grin.

"Before you leave, may I just ask you one question, as one artist and friend to another?" Notasa asked to which the magician nodded.

"Have you ever truly wondered why your chakra went away? Meiko told me that you can use physical aspect of chakra but not the spiritual, which means your own mind is blocking it off. Before you make a wish to the Box that steals people's souls have you ever really looked into yourself and asked if that was the only way?" the musician asked with worry and desperation behind her voice. She must've really believed that opera and its story, to Notasa whoever asked for a wish to be granted by the Box was as good as gone.

Mana's eyes closed as opened half way as she avoided the musician's stare. "I hope for all the best to you and Synth. I'll be looking out for any epics written to praise your kind deeds as well as for posters of your upcoming tours in Konoha. Look out for me, I'll be sitting in the front row" the magician just bowed and walked out the door into what was supposed to be the final chapter of the adventure to find the Box of Ultimate Bliss. That was it, they knew where the Box was supposed to be. It was now just a matter of walking to the shores and setting off through the largest ocean in the world and into the most dangerous and pirate infested part of the Kirigakure Archipelago where deep underwater, rumors said, the Eight Tails may have lurked after his last Jinchuuriki died years ago all the way in Kumogakure and the beast was chased into the ocean abyss of Land of Water.

Had Mana truly spoken to her own mind? Had she really meditated and looked deep into her own psyche asking the question why did she forbid herself to use chakra on a mental level? No. She never once did. Truth be told the magician was even going as far as to completely avoid her own subconscious and never peek around those parts of her mind. She always categorized and dealt with conscious thoughts, ones she could control and manipulate but what transpired on a deeper and much more intimate level made even Mana herself fear setting foot in there.

How could she not be afraid of understanding herself? There had never been a more suffocating and crushing experience than losing her chakra manipulation and throughout all of this time the magician knew, on some tiny inconsequential level, she imagined, that she was the one to blame for her own misfortune somehow. After all, she herself was the architect of the entire incident. She was adamant of facing Hisako, a vastly stronger opponent alone. She was completely fearless of losing her own life if it meant doing at least one heroic deed in the end. If it meant giving her existence and birth some sort of meaning even if it was giving a juvenile crime lord a chance to redeem himself.

Looking inside her own heart and asking herself of the reason why she was stopping herself from reaching the full potential and getting back on the road of running towards her dream required the immense effort and strength which Mana didn't really feel she had. As the magician rejoined her friends and acted like all was well and they slowly began to tread towards the edge of the Sound Village and towards Yugakure further down east before they reached the port that'd have taken them to the Archipelago she realized that she was more likely to face an almighty demon of wish fulfilment and look into his sinister soul sealing eyes than look into her own heart.

"So… Yugakure is our next stop" Kouta said with a slow and low pitched tone looking into the midday sky.

"Don't hold your breath… The place hasn't seen any action since the Second Great War. Ever since they stopped dealing with ninja and became just a large settlement instead of a ninja village" Shimo replied, he was right, of all places Yugakure, the village with little to no walls or protection and residing in between long stretches of port towns from the east and Konoha and Otogakure from the west needed the least protection or competition in the ninja game. Neither were there hopes of seeing some action there.

"War strained many villages. Maybe it's for the better that some villages decided to call it quits before the fate of Iwagakure and Sunagakure followed them and they were sacked to the ground" Mana finally pushed Notasa's words away and got into the trip and the discussion at hand.

Leaving Otogakure was not as simple as the team would've predicted. After they entered the village there was hardly any observation or control over their actions while they were there. Had such control been established many of Syndicate's operations would've been in peril therefore it was not beneficial to the men and women of the Syndicate in charge. Now that Syndicate's iron grip on the village loosened the officials began instantly reapplying that of their own.

After making their way through the damaged and smoky village districts where they had the misfortune of fighting last night the team finally reached the more industrial rocky plains with large machinery working the exhausted ground and supplying minerals and natural gas residing below the village. The loud and towering machinery worked right on the other side of the street of the poorest residential districts making living there very cheap but virtually a living hell of machinery noise. The depressed workers had nothing to lose so they drank in the local bars and brawled like there was no tomorrow. Maybe the men wished that there'd have not been one. After they woke the next morning with the heads still pounding from the beers and the literal pounding they had in their last night's fights they'd have wanted to die more than anything. Especially so knowing that they had a full working day ahead of them…

Mana, Meiko, Kouta and Shimo were stopped by the borders. It was odd seeing control over the village reestablished virtually overnight and the four may have been in a little bit of trouble as their identities would've been established and the officials would've known that ninja of Konohagakure meddled with their affairs which would've been a public nightmare for Konoha and possibly spelled out "suspension" for all of them. Luckily enough Shimo knew one guard from his time training during his rogue days so they weren't shaken much, the team was let go relatively easily right after Shimo paid for the man's beer and spared some time for a refreshing catching up talk.

"Wow, they've established control pretty much overnight…" Mana scratched her head being genuinely surprised by how fast Syndicate's grip on the village slipped after just one night and multiple ruined operations.

"Maybe the officials really didn't like their Syndicate overlords, maybe the rebellion was always in the works and the Police Force was waiting for the mobsters to slip up so they could reestablish control. Then again, Syndicate had some amazing fighters amongst their midst, tough to imagine the Police Force stopping any of them" Kouta replied remembering his tough time in the tower. Usually the Police Force was comprised of low ranking ninja, reformed mercenaries or rogues that legitimized and started working for any given village. Sometimes there was one or two chuunin amongst the Police Force but they were usually the elite and commanding officers. The higher ranking ones rarely fought because they couldn't properly control their chakra augmentations, common chuunin had the destructive power to ruin the planet with a single punch making controlling their immense power part of the ninja training.

"Make no mistake, they didn't do it because of good intentions… The Police Force just saw Syndicate slip up and wanted to take over. At this point they're no better than another criminal band. What else would you expect from a village founded by giving a bunch of criminals pardon and giving them high ranking positions in the village government…" Shimo laughed out ironically making fun of the high hopes of his friends.

"What's wrong, Mana?" Meiko asked looking at the magician's sudden change of mood. The ex-kunoichi really looked on the down, more so than it would've made sense given what had happened.

"It's just…" Mana began wondering how better to put it, "We've travelled through most of the world in a straight line, walking across it and we've seen so much but… Even when we stopped to help nothing changed for the better" she pinned it all on the results of their travels instead of her own inner struggle and the question asked by Notasa in Otogakure.

"We had no chance of changing anything. Syndicate is implanted too deep in Tanzaku and Otogakure, they're expanding even faster still. We had no chance of stopping the goddamn Nine Tails and Kouta's father and those other ninja in Sunagakure were just too powerful for us. It was far too early for us to try and change anything but we still tried anyways, we did some good too. All those Justicars in Takigakure were casually destroying star systems and ready to destroy the whole damned world if it meant destroying all they deemed evil. You also softened the Sheikhate up changing its ways, remember?" Shimo tried to calm Mana down. He usually never tried so hard, it reminded Mana of how they were in the beginning, before both Shimo and Sugemi got tired of her and the way she always was.

It was just a couple of days of travelling before the team reached Land of Hot Water. It was a peaceful and varied land, it had no dominant appearance as it had both mountainous regions, plain grasslands and sandy beaches leading into vast and crystal clear lakes. If anything the natural views and untouched beauty of Mother Nature was glorious to watch and sleeping by the open sky in Land of Hot Water was similarly unmatched.

Mana continued to train Shimo in the art of quicker hand seals. She had to admit that the young man was a talented one, every time the swordsman performed a jutsu faster than Mana's eyes could track a single handseal she saw that prodigious kid that graduated in the top percentages of students in the Academy. They barely even really spoke, what Shimo did in Takigakure just hurt too much and Mana helped his training just out of respect for Tanshu-sensei's final wishes. Shimo then asked if Mana wished he returned the favor by keeping her own fighting skills sharp but the magician always found an excuse to politely refuse.

Meiko became Mana's sanctuary in these excuses as to why she couldn't train. It was always the promised training of Meiko. Mana began training Meiko longer and longer and push her friend to strive higher and higher. At this point Meiko was far higher in the genjutsu defense tier than most of her peers but just because Mana didn't let up. She needed to be occupied the whole night so that Shimo got off her back and stopped asking if she wanted to train and so she pushed all of that on Meiko. It was cruel and the redhead was struggling but she thought that it was all to her favor and that Mana was just being a strict teacher so she bent to Mana's pressure and as a result improved in leaps and bounds. Her chakra control was still incredibly unreliable, sometimes Meiko pulled off quite impressive feats of concentration and sometimes Mana fooled her with a simple finger redirection or Meiko messed up even the simplest chakra molding exercises that an Academy student could've pulled off.

"You think you could teach me to meditate, the way you do?" Meiko one night asked her. The team was pretty close to Yugakure that was located in the center of Land of Hot Water but they decided to set camp and sleep over instead of reaching the village in the middle of the night.

"I don't think you could reach that stage in a reasonable time frame. Your concentration is still too swimmy" Mana tried to be honest.

"Swimmy? What does that even mean?" Meiko's puffy lips pouted like those of a toddler being told that they couldn't have the cookie.

"It means that you're swimming around aimlessly when you need to float. You need to stop thinking about anything, you need to achieve total clearness of mind and… I'm talking to myself again, huh?" Mana noticed that Meiko's eyes were chasing a glow-worm that flew around in the distance near the small river where a whole group of them were concentrated. The glow-worms here were like miniature light bulbs by themselves, their shining bellies were the size of a human fist making them effective distractions but ones no meditator should've been distracted by.

"Sorry…" Meiko laughed out smiling just like a toddler again. "Though you know, if I tried and failed at least I would realize how far I am from that level and I'd stop asking you to teach it to me…" she noted a fair point.

"Look… I'm not gonna show you how to meditate!" Mana grunted out a bit more angrily and desperately than she'd have liked to. The magician knew that Meiko would've wished to see Mana's meditational stages and now that Mana deeply feared delving into her own heart and had that fear engraved within her mind she'd definitely delve there while entranced. It couldn't have been controlled. A single slip of her mind would've taken Mana deep within her own body and made her face the reasons why her chakra was taken away, why Mana couldn't confront her own spirituality and obtain the spiritual chakra control part back.

"Oh… Well… Then back to the concentration exercises?" Meiko asked looking at Mana with those sad puppy eyes as if she did something wrong and Mana was hurt by her words. The magician sighed, she couldn't handle those eyes. She couldn't handle the thought that her own friend was hurt by her own words. Meiko shared that same feeling with Mana and the rest of the team where each feared hurting their friends the most of all things. Even when they had falling outs they still felt really bad about it and felt like they were to blame inside, all except for Shimo, that young man blamed himself for nothing…

"Look… Fine. I'll… I'll show you how it's done but I can't talk. Talking and explaining it to you will only distract me and I'll have to think about things to tell you and then it won't work. You'll have to observe me and understand what's happening without my aid" Mana softly explained feeling sorry about her own fears making her too edgy and distancing from her friends.

"Sure!" Meiko barked out raising her fist into the sky energetically. She then peeled her wide eyes open and continued to keep them peeled and staring at Mana like the magician was about to show an actual magic trick.

Mana closed her eyes and took a meditative position by crossing her legs and straightening her back, the magician completely relaxed and pushed away all thought letting her mind slip into trance almost immediately. She used meditation so often as a child and even now that by now it came almost like an alternate dimension she had easy access to. Like a dream world she lived in but couldn't quite yet bend to her will.

A black void encompassed Mana as she realized that she's slipped into her own consciousness. The girl saw her own body in front of her as a map of sorts with stars and small planets symbolling her organs, systems and chakra network. Just as expected the blasted thing looked operational and fully capable of supporting proper chakra control. Mana had even accumulated leftover masses of chakra in those nodes from her time training and using physical chakra which could've expanded her chakra pool beyond her wildest dreams if only she could force them out and into her normal network flow. If only she could control any darned part of her life…

"Ummm… Space baby thing?" Mana asked around ethereally trying to find out if maybe that huge space entity she once encountered as she was dying was still there. No one answered, it either didn't survive Mana's dying process or was blocked off from her consciousness. Just another part of her body the girl couldn't control. It was like her own body blocked her off of it.

"I guess I deserved it…" Mana forced her mind to materialize her in front of the ethereal imaginary map of her body and looked down. The girl just wanted to see her own body, both conscious and unconscious parts and speak to it. Just heart to heart, she didn't care if her own body listened and if it cared or if it continued to hate and stay angry at her.

"I mean I've done nothing good my whole life while I had chakra. Most of the things I did were accomplished by other people while I was just there foolishly risking my life. I always try to help but then I set free the Nine Tails or… Things just don't go how I want them. I used the chakra control recklessly, I endangered my own body and almost paid my own life as the ultimate cost in return. I guess I don't really need to talk to any of the imaginary space babies inside of me to understand why what happened, happened. Just… Maybe one day… When I'm worth it and when someone I love is in danger, consider really hard and if I deserve it at that moment and… Please make me strong again…" Mana spoke to her own body fully knowing that no one was listening, she was quite literally talking to herself. At least last time there was a Space Mana to talk to, the two had a fruitful discussion that convinced Mana that her life was not in vain and that she could make it mean more still if she saved her own life.

Now she was alone… All alone.

Mana's eyes shook and opened again. She whispered a question at Meiko asking if the blacksmith got anything from the demonstration but then she noticed Meiko sitting with her head rolled back and her drooling mouth open. The fact that the blacksmith was still sitting upright proved considerable restraint and wish to actually understand Mana but the blacksmith just couldn't beat her nature of being the world's cutest goof. The magician just sighed and gently placed her friend onto the soft grass.

"She went asleep like fifteen seconds into it. It was amazing really…" Kouta whispered into Mana's ear.

"It's okay, I didn't expect it to go any other way. Meiko is an ass kicker, not a self-reflector. She can punch a Goddess right in the teeth then never question herself and sleep like a baby afterwards" Mana smiled looking at her friend before pressing her head against Kouta's rough cloak that protected the boy from the night's chills.

Kouta's hands wrapped around Mana and pressed her firmly. "You looked pretty nervous about meditating? Any skeletons in the closet you wish to talk about?" he asked quietly as the two moved past Meiko leaving the blacksmith kicking about while asleep like a little puppy dreaming of chasing other little puppies across the great steppes.

"No, I've confronted those skeletons and I think we've started anew on… Better terms. Hopefully they can move out of my closet once I make enough to rent them a place elsewhere" Mana replied with an even greater smile resting her head against Kouta's shoulder as the two sat to look at the running river and the dancing glow-worm swarms downhill. The magician had no idea when exactly she had fallen asleep. Kouta must've just laid her head down on the grass and laid down just a couple of meters farther from her as that was the position she found everyone after waking up in the morning.

Yugakure was a disappointment. Not a depressing one but a strangely glad and liberating one. The village itself was completely unprotected from either side. It wasn't even much of a village as it no longer fostered any ninja to make its riches from murder, theft and other unkind deeds ninja usually made money out of. It reminded Mana more of a small but sophisticated and rich pleasure town offering services and low quality entertainment like lesser known actors and musicians. A fine place to stop and relax and enjoy the pureness of the surrounding nature.

Mana somewhat expected that a Konoha representative may meet them there and ask for them to return back home. She even tried imagining a fighting scenario and thought about the best ways of escaping the representative, the magician thought of various chuunin and jounin she knew of that may have been sent to retrieve them. Analyzing the parts of their skillsets she knew and trying to come up of ways to evade them long enough to lose them. After getting into so much trouble and making so much noise Mana expected there to be some sort of consequences afterwards but it appeared that their involvement into Otogakure's affairs remained unidentified and a complete mystery. For all anyone knew it could've been just a random Syndicate outfit wearing swordsman, just another leather jacket wearing young woman and just a random mercenary-like looking armored brawler that caused the public outcry and destruction of several important buildings as well as a whole district.

Just a week later the team was already close to one of countless small port settlements that made a living out of fishing the great ocean that opened up and ended only on the other side of the world at the most western sides of Land of Wind as well as taking people to the endless islands stretching throughout the ocean. The ocean itself had no known name, it was too vast to name it. Several sections of it had names however. All the way in the north-western parts laid the Tako's Reach – a region of two hundred and fifty thousand kilometers in length and about hundred and forty thousand kilometers wide where ninja pirates reigned supreme and prospered.

More to the south there was a safer but longer path to the Archipelago, most of the smaller and unprotected ships often took that path but those were torturous and long trips around the more straight but dangerous path. Then to the east laid the Land of Water and its Archipelago, the collection of islands both small and large that were too many to count, somewhere in the center of the Archipelago laid the greatest and the most famous island – Kirigakure, one of the past Great Ninja Villages with a bloody reputation.

The air in the port town was very humid and somewhat salty, the structures had signs of erosion and moss typical to such humidity and the rising and fleeing tides. Mana decided it'd be wise to get used to that salty smell and humid air – it was there to stay for quite a while…


	201. Salt and Quince

In a campsite close to one of the small port towns selling ship related services and whatever else port towns profited from and did Meiko and Shimo were sword-fighting. The two were seriously going at it even if neither of the two was particularly angry at the other or wanted to kill their partner. The fight had nothing hinging on it, it was a playful spar that happened to grow into something more intense but just as contained and within the bounds of common sense.

Mana was calmly eating by the side and looking at the incomprehensible mess of flashes and blurs she wasn't even able to comprehend. She knew how these sort of fights took place, hundreds of hits and blocks connected before she could even see a single red and green blur from Meiko or a damper green and silver blur that her old time Yuki teammate left over from his movements. Even those flashes were afterimages, mirages of sorts, reacting to them was to react to the sound of your own cut open flesh. May as well not even react at all…

At this point the magician had gotten used to not being able to make out much of anything when her teammates really went at it. Before they used to restrain themselves, maybe the wound of Mana's disability was still fresh and they thought that she suffered greatly seeing by just how far she got left behind. It was true, even at the peak of her physical chakra augmentations that would've slowly broken her body even more than it already was when used the magician would only barely be able to keep up to the sloppiest of her friends' attacks.

Here and now the two went balls out, they didn't aim at where the other was not blocking, the two purposefully tried to train each other by giving the other some time to defend themselves and develop their own style. They were training like two comrades in arms should have – beneficially to one another and honoring the sparring opponent. The downside was that with the other blocking each and every blow the sounds were abhorrent. The clangs and thuds conjoined together as another one started before the first sound could properly kick off making a terribly loud cacophony of steel and thuds that sounded like they were splitting the Earth in two.

"They're not really restraining themselves…" Mana noted to Kouta who was just sipping tea and observing the spectacle. Without a doubt the medical ninja could see it all, he wouldn't have been half as entertained by it all if he couldn't.

"Why would they be?" the medical ninja wondered distracting his eyes to look back at the magician who looked at him while she spoke to the young man.

"I don't know… They used to do it…" Mana blushed looking to the side, she didn't want to talk about how uncomfortable this whole difference in strength made her feel still.

"Yeah, because you were really stressed about being a civilian again. Now you're much better at dealing with it, right?" Kouta asked casually walking up to Mana and sitting by her, gently he wrapped one of his hands around her back.

"Sure…" she dismissed the topic without explaining that being better at hiding something was not the same as being better at dealing with it.

With a wild howl of the passing wind currents the fight stopped with Meiko falling on her butt scratching her forehead. Shimo's arms and exposed thighs were twitching and blood red – he must've been pushing his body to the limit if his muscles were that tense just from the workout and not from being hit. His clothes were torn and cut open in many places – despite his speed Meiko must've had plenty of close marks on him that cut his kimono and trousers open but didn't quite tag the boy's skin.

"Wow, you're really damn fast…" Meiko shrieked out in surprise and followed it with a playful laughter. "You hit me like four times before I even raised my hand to hit you"

Shimo closed his eyes and stroke his twitching and tensed up muscles. "Yeah, well… If you hit me with at least one of your blows I'd have been out for the count. You going for my feet was particularly nasty… Feet heal funny"

"You've got chicken feet, they're small and slippy so I wouldn't have stomped on them in a million years, I figured I'd go for it since there was no chance on landing a hit there" Meiko smiled playfully wiping sweat off her face. "Your technique is just really amazing, we should do this more often!" she shrieked out in excitement before picking herself off the grass and rushing off to the small lake on the other side of the campsite to wash herself behind the bushes. Meiko had little shame in her own nudity but after one or two really close calls she at the very least bothered to not bathe in plain sight.

"I have to say she's right, I haven't seen sword wielding skills this smooth in a while…" Kouta also commended his friend. "You're on a higher level altogether. The Chuunin Exams should be smooth sailing for you"

"I've had tough teachers…" Shimo answered falling down onto the grass and stretching his overworked body out.

"I thought you said your teacher was careless and lost his arm to a vengeful courtesan?" Mana smiled teasing the young man.

"Every swordsman I clashed with on this mission was a teacher of their own. Every movement they made, every block they used to protect against me taught me a thing or two. Your training in handseals also helped, I've never had wrist movements this fluid…" Shimo replied, "Still, I don't want to underestimate Hachiro-sensei's lessons. He was a competent swordsman on his own feet and a pretty amazing man, his philosophy lessons were also quite remarkable and his charisma was second to none"

Shimo and Mana looked at each other before the two turned to the side avoiding each other's gaze.

"Obviously he's a poor replacement for Tanshu-sensei, then again, no one's good enough to fit those shoes…" the young Yuki concluded.

After a short while the four finally reached a port town that seemed somewhat functional and had ships actually leaving. The team had made a mistake of finding a port town that was directly leading ships into Tako's Reach and, as they were informed, only accepted ships and hosted and sold shipment that arrived without sending anything away. At least this port town had ships actually leaving which was one step closer to successfully departing into the great unknown of the largest source of water on the planet.

The four wandered through a couple of normal looking port houses, not too shabby nor too sophisticated, looking for departing ships that went into Tako's Reach. Despite the place being a relatively large region of the ocean, apparently not a single captain risked departing, even with the motivation of the Audra shards that the four still had with them. Confiscating as much as they did from the Katabami mines really did turn out a good decision in the end, the shards were really pricy and helped numerous money problems where the four would've had to resort to more ninja-appropriate methods under other circumstances. Still, the bag served them jack-squat.

After a while the team decided that maybe checking out normal looking places was the problem, after all, a less selective captain may just have been crazy enough to depart to Tako's Reach but just as the four showed any captain the map and the exact coordinates everyone turned them down. It was almost like all the meanest looking marines feared a little piracy, most of the seamen in the port town looked like they could've handled themselves in a fight.

"We should just steal a ship ourselves at this point…" Kouta complained.

"Yeah, that's what piracy basically is… Plus we don't have the manpower to handle a ship, we may have the physical strength but we'd need the numbers as well. Shadow Clones would only get us through one or two chores but we couldn't keep it up whole day and night" Shimo exclaimed annoyed by the lack of success.

"Plus we'd need supplies and food, ships present at the port wouldn't be loaded with that stuff unless they're about to set sail…" Meiko naturally complained about food.

Just as the team was discussing their further chain of actions a ship docked into the nearest docks and a bunch of overgrown and brutish-looking men began rushing out from the marine vehicle like lambs from the slaughterhouse. Mana managed to notice the crimson, still fresh in some occasions, streaks over the backs of the sailors. Then some of them looked like they hadn't eaten a thing for days, some of them had virtually no teeth and still spat out blood from time to time onto the planks that kept the small port town afloat.

"What happened to them?" Mana wondered.

"Why do you think sailors turn to pirates?" a middle sized man asked the young girl having crept up to her from behind. He was above average aged and about average build, wore pretty nice looking clothes but they looked pretty old and raggedy, torn in some places.

"Because they're dicks?" Meiko answered the question for the magician, basically representing the girl's point of view quite decently.

"No, because being a sailor or a marine hunter-nin is the worst career choice ever. No food or career opportunities, tough manual labor with little to no reward and a thousand lashes as the supervisor's gratitude. At least a pirate can live and die with some dignity, as much as a common criminal can have of it, anyways…" the man replied honoring the two young ladies with a seaman's laugh, the stench of beer and smoked fish escaped his mouth with every breath. That was still not talking of the general smell of salt and quince all around the place as well as the humidity of every breath.

"Okay… Like before I wasn't sure but at this point I have to ask, by any chance, are you, sir, yourself a pirate?" Kouta inquired attempting to be as polite as possible as to not reject a potential sailing buddy who could help them sail to the middle of Tako's Reach.

"Yeah, you do seem a little "piratey" to me" Shimo seconded this question.

The man laughed out again and gestured in a rather very feminine for his incredibly masculine look kind of way. "Like me?! A pirate?! Why I'd never, I mean I talk to pirates and serve them fish and beer when they dock and don't talk about their special status all the time because if they did I'd have to refuse service. I've served as a cabin-boy on a pirate ship during my childhood years and read plenty 'o books about pirates but I myself cannot in any way affiliate to the noble yet devious pirate order…"

"Okay… So do you have any idea how we could get to the center of Tako's Reach?" Meiko wondered feeling completely content with the answer.

"I absolutely doubt that any sailor coming from this side of the ocean would voyage through the Tako's Reach, not that deep inside, anyways. The threat of getting tossed overboard with one's ship and payment for the voyage kindly confiscated by pirates is a little bit of a deal-breaker for any sailor" the man replied appearing in a chatting mood whereas most port town inhabitants seemed most untrusting of the strangers with headbands asking questions and wanting to venture into the most dangerous centers of the most pirate infested waters.

"I don't get it… Aren't those sailors like really tough? Aren't at least some of them capable fighters or trained in chakra manipulation at some point?" Mana stressed out, she was visibly getting annoyed over the lack of progress in this small port town that all obstacles were aside and only claiming the Box was needed of them.

"Most sailors from Kirigakure are outright ninja on a mission to serve a certain number of years as sailors aiding the village economy, most of our own know how to throw a good ole flimflam themselves. Still, the only pirates worth a mettle are all ninja without exception – ninja sailors that were sick of being treated like lowlife trash and decided to rather go rogue in the seas than serve some fancy pretty boys onboard. You shouldn't treat a pirate any differently you treat a rogue ninja, missy" the pub server replied smiling with his greenish yellow teeth.

"Pirates that are ninja too?" Kouta whistled out crossing his hands behind his head, evidently the medical ninja still wasn't taking the threat too seriously.

"Yeah, ninja-pirates!" the server concluded before apologizing and informing the crew that his break was over and he had hungry seamen to bring beer and smoked fish with quince filling to serve. "If you guys want to get to Tako's Reach your only chance would be to find a pirate ship and ask them but them pirate kind aren't too welcome here. They're bad rep and common folk just beat the shit out of those they aren't scared of to fight, that's just how tough a pirate's life is – lowlifes don't make it too far" just like that the middle sized beardo disappeared in a nearby pub from whence he came.

Meiko looked at the team with wet puppy eyes.

Shimo drove his open palm down on her head shoving her puppy eyes down. "No" he uttered.

"We're not becoming ninja-pirates ourselves, Meiko, we can't cause that much trouble to Lady Fifth on a simple C-Rank mission…" Mana replied stroking her tired eyes with her fingers.

A loud boom made the team instantly turn their attention towards a nearby pub, the very same one where the server that spoke to them before entered. A bunch of twenty something aged ruffians got tossed out and a whole bunch of local chaff began gathering in a circle and rolling up their sleeves. Such was never a good sign.

"You fucking pirate trash! You dare sit and drink in our little port town!? You only bring trouble and local attention, we've already got Konohagakure ninja scooping around looking for ways to get to Tako's Reach!" the lot began quarreling with the pirates and simple early signs of a big fight were beginning to form.

"How can you live with yourselves!?" one of the younglings suspected of piracy yelled out, a vagabond-like dressed fellow, one someone would suspect being just that – a bum rather than a serious and scary ninja-pirate. "Seamen and marines both live like dogs, abused by Feudal Lord hired supervisor scumbags who don't know a thing or two about the seas! I didn't graduate the Kirigakure Academy for this!" he began shouting at the group.

One of the larger men picked up one of many decorative cannonballs laying around in a pile, they were at least four times the size of an actual thing and began riddling their pitiful wooden ship until it was nothing but busted planks and sawdust floating on the salty sea. Despite the hulking size of the cannonballs the man tossed them faster than an actual cannon would've fired them so the flimsy wooden construction stood no chance and got grinded to dust after the first pair of man sized balls of steel crashed into its sides.

"If these men are afraid of the ninja-pirates, I get the butterflies myself…" Kouta admitted.

Mana stepped onwards but Shimo's hand on her shoulder stopped her.

"We have to stop this, these men can't be trusted to deliver fair justice" Mana mumbled out.

"And what? Didn't you hear it? These guys admitted being pirates, this place has no court or tribunals nor can these pirates be delivered to the nearest ninja village. They're ninja-pirates, they'll slip out of any binds the first chance they get. You also don't know their story, they may be heinous criminals. Even if they're not – piracy is a heinous crime in of itself…" Shimo replied.

There the two were at it again. Conflicting at where Mana wanted to intervene and Shimo just wanted the nature to run its own course. Suddenly Mana saw the beehive situation again. The whole thing with killer wasps slaughtering the whole beehive with Mana having to decide if she was to interfere and spit at the natural order.

The locals began beating the young pirate group up. Luckily enough they didn't kill them, if they tried Mana would've stepped in even if it meant compromising her mission, the group just beat the snot out of them and tossed the guys into the water. A minute or two later a bunch of sailors came up and picked the pirates up bringing them into their own ship.

"This isn't right! Being confined to poor working conditions in the seas was what these young men and women ran from, now their grandkids are gonna slave it on that ship with menial labor. They're not tried, they don't face any Tribunal, they'll just work until someone thinks they've had enough. I've seen enough to know how long that'll be…" Mana lowered her head, her whole body was shaking but she didn't interfere. Had she done so her whole team would've been labeled as pirate apologists and would've never left the harbor. Then again, they may not have known what these young men and women have already done as pirates, they had plenty of pride in their lawlessness too, but the way they were treated wasn't how a human deserved to be treated like. It wasn't like normal sailors got treated much better either.

"The world isn't right. That's what you're fighting against, isn't it?" Shimo asked with a slightly softer tone understanding how torn his friend felt inside.

"Apparently, not anymore…" Mana replied shutting deep inside of herself and making it abundantly clear that she was in no mood to talk anymore. She and Shimo hadn't even moved past the events that transpired in Takigakure yet and now there were new things stacking on top of that.

A loud shriek alerted the team of ninja, a tall man with long curly black hair and a worn out brown hat was literally chewing on his own hand, the only one he had. The man's eyes flared red for a moment and after pulling his hand out of his own mouth he reached for one of his coat's pockets before being calmed down by the fish vendor.

"Calm down, sir, this isn't a dolphin, I mean it barely looks like a tuna, how did you even make that conclusion?" the fish lady looked pretty confused but the coat wearing gentleman calmed down after her explanation, somewhat at least…

"I just… Can't be too careful, you know? I mean didn't you read about what they're doing with those dolphins and those chakra laser cannon thingies in Archipelago!? It's scary! And how they're placing explosive seals on wild gorilla training them to be suicide bombers… That man looks awfully like a gorilla, I'm not paranoid, I'm just saying…" the man buying fish from the lady complained without an end in sight.

"Aww shit…" Shimo covered his own face but apparently not fast enough as in his shaking fearful twitch the man turned his eyes to the side and noticed Shimo looking at him.

"You thief!" the long coat wearing man shouted out, "You liar and thief!" he screamed his lungs out again lunging at Shimo at incredible speed and maneuvering right past the confused passing by townspeople.

Shimo leaned to the side frantically avoiding the man's endless strikes delivered with a single hand. For a guy who only had one arm the curly blackhead was incredibly fast, his single hand kept Shimo completely overwhelmed and unable to deliver a single counterattack.

"You lied to me and stole my sword!" the overcoat wearing weirdo declared after getting off Shimo's back for just a moment so both of them could breathe.


	202. Wounds of Words Made Flesh

The team looked questioningly at Shimo who was both engaged in observing this acquaintance of his and busy looking ashamed.

"Wait… I thought your rogue sensei gave you your sword because he had no use of it anymore?" Mana asked for clarification confused. Her question sent the overcoat wearing man in a frenzy of unadulterated fury.

"What!? I mean yeah, I lost an arm!" he shouted lunging at Shimo and delivering a blindingly fast flurry of one hand strikes which Shimo avoided by dashing around his past friend. Despite the man's blinding speed it looked like his lack of a right arm was interrupting with his balance and hindering the man's speed making it possible for Shimo to run circles around his acquaintance.

"Yeah, I really have no use for the damned thing!" the man shouted again striking backwards with an elbow, using his instinct instead of his lacking balance and perception to catch Shimo unprepared and crack the young man's eyebrow opening it up and sending a torrent of blood down his face.

"But as if I'd just give anything away!" the man finished his sentence while continuing his relentless assault. Grunting in pain Shimo rolled back only to see the man dashed up right to his face and delivering a knee strike to his cracked and bleeding eyebrow. Meiko and Kouta leaped in from the sides so fast that to Mana it looked like her friends were warping time and space, standing beside her one moment and aiding Shimo the next.

The functional arm of the mysterious assailant crashed into the wooden floor flipping his body over as he delivered a whirl of spinning kicks sending all three young ninja into the water. This man may not have had the physical ability to keep up with the three ninja in fighting ability or Shimo for that matter however he had considerable skill and experience fighting with his hindrance that compensated for it. Whoever this man was, he was experienced and above the team's rank in strength.

The man dashed up to Mana, the magician's senses sharpened as she felt her body overflowing and exploding in red physical chakra. Mana's acrobatic and redirecting skills turned on to as much as she could crack it up to as her upper body leaned to the sides avoiding every blow sent her way and gently pushing them with her palm to where they posed no threat. Mana's eyes, failing to keep up with all of the man's movements, instead noticed his glowing red eyes – the Sharingan of the Uchiha. Her style lingered and failed to notice his flip backwards stopped by his palm and repurposed strength into an upwards kick. Mana could already feel her skull exploding from pressure, a kick like that would've blown her head right off!

A rough shoulder tackle sent the magician further and out of harm's way as Kouta grinned at her. His entire body was wet and smelled of sea weed but his face was still all sweaty, the two smelled completely different – the medical ninja must've strained his skills to the limit to save Mana in time.

"I don't know who you are or what your beef with Shimo is but… Don't touch Mana-chan. She's a civilian and she can't fight on our level. If you hit her even once she'd die for sure!" Kouta shouted out a warning to the man through his fleeting strength and exhaustion.

"Hmph… Could've fooled me" the overcoat wearing man cracked a grin while his eyes ran around him looking out for threats that he predicted would come at him from the sides.

"Just who are you?" Mana asked scratching her head and feeling up her chin as her heart still pounded relentlessly in the girl's chest – she almost had her head blown off. It was something she was slowly getting used to but close calls like that didn't help her young heart rest easy.

"I'm Hachiro Uchiha – I used to teach this ungrateful little shit!" the man shouted out turning at Shimo who was slowly making his way out of the water and onto the wooden platform that held the whole section of the port town afloat. The Uchiha dashed right up to Shimo and tried kicking at the young man's face but Shimo blocked the kick with the hilt of his sword. The force still sent Shimo flying back into the depths of the sea. A little farther Meiko climbed out of the ocean covered in sea weed and pulled a little sharp looking shattered seashell out from between the pieces of her armor where it lodged into.

"Hey, scaredy-sensei, the debt collectors from Iwa have found you!" Shimo's voice yelled out after the young man's head came out of the water. The feet of the young swordsman began glowing feint blue as he stood on the surface of the water using the simple Art of Water Climbing technique most genin learned at some point to master their chakra control. It was a simple technique that slowly chipped away at one's chakra reserves and allowed one to walk on the water's surface and it was ideal to train one's chakra control since when one trained while forgetting to use that technique it taught one's body to multitask and manage multiple chakra using processes at once.

The man began cowardly looking to the sides, his Sharingan became more formed out as the three-tomoe symbols he had on it became more evident – the man was focusing his vision trying desperately to locate the potential threat.

Shimo's hands flashed through hand seals and extended the man's way. "Ice Style: Ice Assault Jutsu!" the Yuki chanted out the name of his technique while a large wave of water rushed towards the only functional arm of Hachiro and wrapped around it freezing in place and leaving the man restrained. The water that surrounded the wave covered the areas around the frosted arm completely restricting the man's movements.

"I see you're a scaredy-cat as usual…" Shimo grinned before jumping onto the wooden platform. "That's the problem with you, that's why I left – you awakened the final tomoe of your Sharingan when you were afraid that the ants that were biting us were working for your debt collectors and you needed to keep up with all of them. You're a paranoid fool!" the young man shouted out lashing out rage that was clear to have been built over a long stretch of time.

"Oh yeah, Shimo, Hachiro-sensei really was an inspiration… A real charismatic guy, this one…" Mana teased Shimo walking up to him and flicking his forehead. She was a little glad to see a chance to bite her friend in a bit more friendly manner rather than the more serious quarrels they've been having lately.

"Shut up!" the Yuki swordsman's cheeks dyed red remembering the tales he spun to his friends while training and locked his hands around his chest.

"Okay, okay, I'll just piss off then, just let my hand go and I'll be on my way" Hachiro smiled slyly. This man truly had the facial features of a sly weasel yet his build was quite suitable for combat. It was likely that he had the skills to protect himself from the life outside the walls and his cowardice was merely a tool adopted by choice.

"You shut up too! I felt really bad about not telling everything I felt to your face so now you'll stand here and listen!" Shimo yelled out walking right up to Hachiro's face.

"Do we have to stand here and listen?" Meiko lifted her hand up asking.

"You lied to me though, everyone told me you were working for Konoha and that you were a ninja spying on me and I didn't believe them! I bet you don't even share a house with twenty three virgin girls…" Hachiro appeared to also share some spite towards his old apprentice.

"Oh course I fucking lied to you! I never even told you my name for fuck's sake and you trusted me from the start! Then, when we were spilling our hearts out in that raider camp in Suna, I said my name was "Noteh Reelname"! You bought into everything anyone told you ever and as a result you live a life of a coward and I got sick of you! Then you lost your arm and had no use for your stupid sword because it's a two-handed sword… I just couldn't let it fall into the hands of the first debt collector that caught up to you!" Shimo was outright screaming it into his mentor's face, Hachiro looked a little shocked and offended by his student's words.

"Wait… You mean your name isn't Noteh Reelname?" the man's eyes began tearing up. "I thought we had a connection there in that camp, tied up to that pole and waiting for the bandits to sober up so that they could kill us…"

"We only got caught that time because you refused to pee in a public bathroom before entering the desert and then hours later just HAD to pee right onto the wall of a bandit camp…" Shimo sighed slapping his face and turning his back to the man he was taught by for a couple of years.

"Wait, you told him you lived with twenty three virgins?" Meiko scratched her messy red hair and fixed her headband that was beginning to slip on her eyes and nose.

"It was a phase in his younger days…" Mana smiled to her friend who then began cringing into her fist.

Truth be told the magician was really glad to see Shimo spilling his emotions out. This whole time after his return he wasn't like he used to be, he was more quiet and reserved, he always acted cool and rational and it was evident that he must've had a weight on his heart. This revelation that he abandoned his sensei and stole his blade in the night returning home with it made so much sense now. The change of his personality also made a bit more sense having in mind how evidently Shimo was the one taking care of both of the two wandering rogues and was the voice of reason. Someone responsible for their survival. Pressure like that changed people…

Shimo made a hand seal and released his mentor's arm, the man just roughly rubbed his freezing cold pale wrist before looking back at his past pupil.

"What are you doing here anyway? I thought that horror-man in Roiyaru road terrified you and you didn't want to move, did you just walk around Konoha so you could come here through thick forests and roads unfit for travelling?" Shimo asked finally gathering the courage, or rather calming himself down enough, to face his old teacher.

"Yeah, this whole continent is not safe anymore, debt collectors in Fire Country, raiders and that stupid Fennec idiot in the Wind Country looking to carve my eyes out for a transplant, then the madman is roaming all over the place – rumors say he's looking for something in Iwagakure. Probably that boy Honda is out of organs he can use already… I need to move to the Archipelago and maybe even Kirigakure" Hachiro revealed his intentions, "This one time this guy walked up to me in the forest and he just opened his coat to me, I think he wanted to blow himself up with me but he forgot the explosive seals, apologized and ran away…"

"Goddamn it, he was just flashing you, Hachiro, if you came here through the backroads those parts are filled with nutjobs, mercenaries and bandits!" Shimo grunted out, evidently he had to deal with similar cases of paranoia before for a couple of years.

"Then that one time someone shot me in the face with a kunai dispenser, they have those new optical devices that use some sort of lights for aiming but they wash off with water…" the man kept on explaining his paranoid delusions to everyone but it didn't look like anyone understood anything that was going on at this point.

"Those were kids, they were shooting berries in your face with those slingshot things. Goddamn it, scaredy-sensei, you were THAT close to the village!?" Shimo was beginning to lose his mind.

"Well… The madman was getting closer, I heard loud roars in the forests and then that one time I used a public restroom…"

"That's a first… Weren't they full of shit-goblins that grabbed you and dragged you down into the crapper?" Shimo sarcastically asked.

"Well… Yeah… But I had no choice, it was either going back to Roiyaru or into the village which would've been too risky, I could've been recognized and the guards would've killed me on the spot for my bounty! I've been hiding for so long that I must be worth a billion ryo by now!" the man completely lost his train of thought and began chewing his fingers in fear. It was tough to believe that this man just almost killed Mana with his single strike…

"Goddamn it! Sensei, no one even has your face in the Bingo Book because you haven't committed any crimes for decades! You're just hiding and visiting geisha and courtesans during your free time, that's all you do, neither of those are crimes!" Shimo exclaimed before waving his arm in ignorance and walking away, gesturing for his team to do the same. "Whatever, we're done here…"

Mana looked at the pitiful man who was wearing too much clothing because he was afraid of catching a cold and a man who wore a huge hat because he wished to shield his eyes and skin from the Sun. She felt a little sorry for this man who was so evident to be afraid of everything but tended to get a little impulsive and defensive when cornered.

"So… What did you hear, back when you used the public restroom?" she asked softly.

"Eh? I heard two ninja patrolling outside the village, they spoke about how more and more people were disappearing from inside the village. The worst part was that no one knew anything. It's slowly becoming a problem that can't be dismissed but the Hokage doesn't know what to do… Big problem… It's all that madman I tell you!" Hachiro grabbed Mana's shoulders and shook her, the magician leaned back a little afraid of the man but slowly she noticed that he was more afraid of threats coming from her than willing to hurt her.

"Come on, Mana… Let's go. We've got an inn or something to find, I doubt we'll find a ship to sail in until dark…" Meiko turned back and urged the magician to follow her friends.

"Wait, you said you wanted to get to the Archipelago, then why are you here? Are you planning to go all the way through the Tako's Reach? You could've chosen any of the port towns more to the south-east and paid much less if you plan to go around it…" Mana just wanted to ask one last thing. It just made little sense for a man afraid of everything to traverse through the middle of the Tako's Reach or pay so much more to sail around it from the central port town it was a massive detour that required so much more food and supplies that the client must've paid for.

"Yeah… Right through the Tako's Reach…" Hachiro replied with a nod. Shimo turned around and walked up to the man standing on his toes so he could look the man right in the eyes.

"Aren't you afraid of the stormy seas? Pirates? Sea-sickness? The Eight Tails sleeping in the abyssal depths of the Tako's Reach? The sea winds? Rain? Anything in existence? Did Hachiro Uchiha perhaps grow some balls for a trade?" Shimo asked, his tone was more surprised than offensive even though it was evident that the Yuki wished to spend as little time with his old time mentor as possible.

"Well… To be honest the winds this season bring killer colds with them and you know my nose always bleeds when I get a cold and I'm pretty afraid of the sea-dragons dragging me overboard when I'm asleep and pirates and… Don't even get me started on…" the man gulped heavily "The Eight Tails… Still, I'm afraid of the madman more than all of those things combined. I need to get to Archipelago as fast as possible and Tako's Reach is the fastest way there. That man will topple the world, you'll see… Every time I hear his beast crying in the night I almost pee in my bed" Hachiro admitted.

"You do pee in your bed all the time, that's because you never pee before sleep when we pass the public restrooms because you're afraid of the shit-goblins…" Shimo grunted out. His eyes met Mana's gaze and suddenly the boy realized just what his friend was thinking about. Angrily the Yuki began shaking his head in disagreement.

"No! No! Absolutely not! We're not hitching the same ride as Hachiro!" Shimo angrily yelled out.

Kouta and Meiko looked at each other curiously and walked right up back. "It's a good idea though, if Hachiro has any plans for a ride we could just go with him…"

"That's like… If I even want you guys around me!" Hachiro shouted out.

"Do you?" Mana asked.

"Well… I mean it does get pretty scary at night when the lightning begins cracking loud…" the grown man looked shyly at his shoes.

"For fuck's sake, you can summon lightning at will, I've seen you do it!" Shimo shouted out. "How the hell do you even plan on finding an idiot dumb enough to sail through the Tako's Reach!?"

"Well… I thought of asking some pirates to take me. Think of it, it's genius, when you're afraid of pirates – just join a pirate ship. What are the chances of pirates attacking a pirate ship!?" Hachiro laughed out as if he had just found some mystery of the universe that confused the scientists for centuries.

"Actually pirate wars are very frequent. In fact, pirates often attack other pirates when they feel territorial or just have power struggles…" Mana explained with a warm smile. The man's easy-going and goofy nature was becoming to grow on her.

"Awww man…" Hachiro scratched his head so frantically that it began to seem like he'd claw his long and messy black hair right off with his scalp.

"Then again, all we need to do is join a really strong pirate ship – one that is less likely to be attacked, such a crew would also be more likely to set their foot on this port town as they'd be completely ignorant towards the public dislike of the port town towards pirates…" Mana replied looking at her team.

"I'll still need that sword back though… I believe my acquaintances and services are of need and I'll need compensation for my worries" Hachiro began speaking much more seriously when talk turned to money.

"All of your "acquaintances" want to kill you, we'd be better off saying we don't know you…" Shimo replied rudely.

"Well, in that case, I'll tell them I do know you unless you give me my sword back, if you do I can tell them I haven't heard of you specifically and very convincingly!" Hachiro began persuading Mana whom he viewed as the member of the group he could play. The magician sighed.

She stood up on her toes and whispered something in the Uchiha's ear, she unzipped one of the bags and showed him an Audra shard before placing it back and zipping the back again. The man scratched his stubble and nodded hesitantly.

"Fine, I guess that makes sense…" he said.

As Hachiro began making his way towards a specific inn further away from the shore Shimo leaned up to Mana asked her what she promised the man in return.

"I told we'd give him more Audra shards than the sword is worth" she replied.

"That's not too many, four maybe, seven at most…" he replied tapping her shoulder a couple of times, "Good call" he commended his teammate. It was odd hearing compliments from Shimo, maybe confronting his rude departure did actually turn out for the better to him?

"Want me to take care of that cracked eyebrow?" Kouta suggested.

"Shut up" Shimo replied with an angry stare but still cracked a little smile without being able to help it.

The future remained to be seen, as it always tends to be…


	203. Into the Ocean of Dreams

A sound of disturbing kitchen noises woke Mana up. She was the only one willing to share a room in an inn with Hachiro, the others appeared either untrusting or unwilling to sleep anywhere near the same room as if the man was made of plague. Meiko however, despite her lack of desire to share a room with the man slept close to Mana and Hachiro just because she wanted to watch the man and keep him from pulling something dangerous on them. The blacksmith wasn't too devoted to the cause though as she got knocked out by the Sandman and remained in that state until the morning. Not even the countless rustles Hachiro made through the night could as much as make her wiggle her nose.

Mana's tired eyes examined the room, her heart was not as troubled as it once was. Naturally the girl was afraid of being in danger the first couple of times she was woken up, now it was just annoying. Finally the magician's lazy and floaty eyesight fixed on Hachiro standing by the window and drinking yet another glass of milk. For a man powerful enough to hold his own against their entire team the Uchiha sure was paranoid. Mana was the only one of the group to take his ramblings seriously and as such she didn't get mad at him for pulling this sort of thing, at first, at least...

"Is something wrong?" she whispered, without a worry of waking Meiko up who was sitting near her bed and guarding the magician like a guard dog. Despite being in a rather intimidating protective position Meiko's head was cocked back all the way and she was drooling all over her chubby cheeks while the blacksmith slept like a baby.

"It's just... I thought I heard someone talking outside..." Hachiro smiled, at least Mana thought he did. A sharp stench of sweat stabbed at her nose revealing that the man may have been playing brave while his own body played games on him.

"I don't think there's anything to worry about, when you open the fridge the light is flashing right into my eyes..." Mana tried to tell the man she was becoming very annoyed by having to wake up every five minutes because he had to drink some milk or place some ice cubes into his glass.

"Do you think I have inflammation of the pancreas, girl? I feel kind of nauseous..." the man wondered after looking back through the window.

"No, I don't think so. It's no wonder you're nauseous, you've drank at least six glasses of milk so far, maybe it just gone bad?" Mana wondered flipping onto the other side to try and sleep up. It was a possibility that she'd be sleeping on a ship the next night and that meant she may have not slept too good, the magician had never been on a ship before and new sensations were a poor catalyst for sleepy nights.

"Oh it is bad... I wouldn't drink good milk, no one would slip in poison into bad milk, I mean why would they, no one drinks it..." Hachiro mumbled to himself. "I want to pee, can you maybe go to the bathroom with me and guard the door?" the man asked.

"I won't. There's no such thing as a shit-goblin, or any other sort of goblin for that matter, I'm sure Shimo told you this plenty of times before... No one watches the inn bathrooms, they're not public" Mana grunted a little more aggressively than she'd have wanted.

"Oh... Okay..." Hachiro replied as if her answer disappointed him and shaking as if he was heading towards certain doom he began heading towards the door. His voice was whiny and overwhelmed like that of a baby being told that he was responsible for filling in the taxes for the whole family and that he won't get any ice cream until he does.

A grunt came from under Mana's cover, the girl flipped her cover off and jumped out of her bed.

"Fine... I'll watch the door..." she replied annoyed.

It was tough to say just who made Mana wish to break her no killing rule more – Hachiro with his paranoid waking up routine or Shimo with his declaration of moving out. The scaredy Uchiha was already waiting by the door by the time Shimo banged on it and ran out immediately after the young ninja woke everyone up. Mana could barely peel her head off the pillow. She felt sorry for her own miserable and sleepy face when she examined it in the mirror. After Hachiro left Mana began changing out of her PJs since if she decided to snooze for one more minute she'd have gone right back asleep.

"So what's our plan? Are we gonna wait for a strong pirate crew to dock or are we gonna try and bump into it in the seas?" Kouta wondered after the whole morning routine was concluded and the breakfast was finished. Hachiro sadly said goodbye with the ryo coins he paid for the room and the breakfast as they left his hand. For some reason the man wanted to pay for the rooms and the food, Mana wanted to believe it was because she was as nice to him as it was humanly possible to be with such a man but she couldn't have been sure. With this man one could've never been sure...

"Well, we may as well wait for years until a strong pirate crew docks here. I mean technically the central port town does have the highest chance of seeing a pirate ship dock here for supplies and cheap accommodation but still... Pirates often spend the whole year in the seas" Shimo thought out loud. "I say we hire a weakling ship any stupid pirate with a kitchen knife could capture and lure a crew in, then hit them with our parley and beat their shits in if they don't agree"

"Didn't everyone tell us not to underestimate the pirates? Weren't they like crazy strong?" Meiko wondered to herself still munching on some snacks she snagged from the inn.

"Every pirate from the captain of the crew to the deck scrubber are at least as strong as a good genin ninja. They'd never survive out in the seas otherwise..." Hachiro repeated what he told them yesterday.

"Well if we sail out then we run into the risk of having our ship blown up before we can parley even. What are the guarantees that the pirates won't just blow us up, or that they won't just beat us, rob us and leave us for the dead in the middle of the ocean? They rule the seas so bargaining with them in the middle of their dominion is the dumbest decision we can make" Kouta provided his point of view, the team looked at Mana who just yawned and scratched her eyes with a knuckle before licking an unruly string of her messy bed hair back in its place.

"Mana?" Shimo asked for her opinion.

The magician sighed. "I don't know... I don't think I'm in any condition to be the swing voter here" she admitted.

"Well, in that case if we can't find a crew today, we'll set sail first thing tomorrow" Kouta suggested a compromise.

"That sounds reasonable enough, we've no luxury to wait around indefinitely" Shimo agreed.

"Yeah, I need to get to the Archipelago as fast as possible!" Hachiro reminded everyone despite everyone's general disinterest in the man's agenda.

"Hachiro-san, didn't you plan on asking a pirate crew to take you there? Didn't you have a deal of some sort before coming here?" Mana wondered.

"Yes, those young whippersnappers that got their butts beaten and tossed into the water were my plan..." the Uchiha admitted.

"Wow... You're just... You're just the worst at life" Shimo scratched his eyes angrily.

"I've never imagined it being this hard to find someone willing enough to do something for more money than they can spend..." Mana sighed before yawning again only for her open mouth to be slapped closed by a woman in a long blue coat standing right in front of her.

"Did someone mention money?" the woman smiled flicking her pompous black hat and letting some of her eye-gougingly ginger hair to flow out from under it. She was a relatively young lady, maybe just a couple of years older than Mana and yet her clothing suggested high social status and a possible already pre-existing possession of more money than one could spend. She was short, shorter than Hachiro and Shimo and almost as short as Mana, her skin was also almost as dark as Mana's except it wasn't because of natural causes – the woman was just tanned.

"We need to get to the middle of Tako's Reach as soon as possible, we're willing to pay enough to buy you a mansion" Mana's sleepiness instantly went away after the magician realized that she was standing in front of a potential solution.

"Strange you just happened to bump into us, lady, and with a proposition and willingness to work with us..." Shimo suspiciously mentioned squinting at the short, aristocratic looking, young lady.

"I may have heard from some of my subordinates that they've been beaten up and about a bunch of snotty kids looking for a sail and throwing money around... Tell you what, we blow this fucking town to the crapper and we can set sail for a million ryo or twenty" the woman smiled with her hat slipping on top of the woman's face as her crimson red dyed lips twisted into a smile. The way she held herself and spoke suggested not only power and influence but also a pirate status.

"Subordinates?" Mana wondered, "You mean those kids that got beaten up yesterday and tossed into the sea? They work for you?"

"Didn't you know, ninja girl? The life out there in the seas is just the same, here ninja answer to the Kage who dance for the Feudal Lords, out there pirates all answer to their captains who in term obey the three Pirate Lords. There is not a single captain out there not answering to one of them. Together they govern the triangle of the seas called the Tako's Reach" the woman explained "The Eight Tails sometimes drags a crew down under into its tentacle locker, I suppose you could say the old horn-head is a chaotic-neutral de facto Pirate Lord too"

A bunch of men laughed walking out from the alleyways around the team. Mana shook her head and stepped out from behind her team in front of the blue wearing woman.

"I'll pay extra if we depart immediately. I'll pay double if you seek no satisfaction from this town and leave it standing. I imagine you've a reputation of a ruthless pirate lady to uphold but I hope the money you'd make out of it would quench and compensate your bitterness of not burning this town to the ground" Mana removed the bag off Shimo's back and unzipped it showing it to the woman. Upon seeing the purplish glow from inside the bag the pirate lady's eyes shimmered with greed. She pulled a sword out that shot up in the blueish chakra colored imbuement and rose up to Mana's neck to where it touched a throbbing vein.

Shimo and Meiko prepared to attack, Mana had no doubts that the two could break the woman's face after her brain issues the command to cut Mana's throat open but before it is done. Even if she was fast and skilled, her hand was occupied with an executing motion which would've granted her team an advantage in this first exchange of blows.

"Tell me one reason why I shouldn't kill you, blow this town up and then just take your bag and sail into the sunset" the woman smiled, her eyes had no bloodlust in it, they were almost testing Mana just to see how the girl's guts worked.

"You could, you could even kill my team in an outright brawl, I'd bet. However your losses would hardly be reasonable. I've no chakra control and I've survived the Sun Disc arena in Agbarah, my team may not be strong enough to beat you but they'd thin your ranks up just enough to leave too few men to sail fast enough to outrun any marine hunter-nin vessels chasing you. You'd have all the money in the world and yet they wouldn't buy your head back on your shoulders" Mana replied calmly, while she did maintain a poker face at all times her heart was pounding and blood was rushing so intensely that the girl thanked the fate that she could barely comprehend the situation she was in due to her sleepiness.

The blue chakra flare went out and the pirate lady sheathed her blade. Her expensive blue coat with golden weavings and buttons jingled and rustled as her hand raised for a shake to conclude the deal.

"Shit, you're the kid that was in Agbarah? Old fart Cheng said he saw you in the coliseum, he would love to meet you no doubt. You're a strong little lady, I like that. We ass kicking women need to look out for one another, I'll take you up on your deal and charge you hundred-fifty percent for it, consider it as a fifty percent off offer... Just hand us thirty million ryo or... Twenty seven shards now and the same after the trip" the woman said as her men looked at her questioning her devotion to this new plan she made.

Mana unzipped the bag and calculated the shards in front of the woman giving it to a tough looking carrying mule she sent out of her crew of pirates. Looking at the lot of pirates she lead it was tough to imagine each one of the small-timers being worth as much as Hachiro swore they were worth. They looked no different from weakling bandits but apparently each lowlife there was able of beating down a trained low ranking ninja all by themselves.

"Hey, Read, what the fuck!? Do you think Ollonais is gonna stand for you dragging his reputation through the mud bargaining with a bunch of kids? What message does it send the ungrateful port fu..." one of the pirates spoke up but before he could conclude his sentence a sword plunged his chest coming out from the back of the pirate lady's coat as if she had hands out there. The odd thing was that both of the lady's hands were stuck out and dealing with Mana.

"I can tolerate young ambitious studs wanting to match swords and wits with me, what I can't stand is insolent little fucks referring to a Pirate Lord by name as if they're beer guzzling buddies..." she spoke out coldly as the man collapsed to the ground. Mana looked in complete awe – if these men were all rogue ninja that meant they had chakra augmentation, similar or greater degree of it that genin had. Mana saw Kiyomi protect herself from Hisako's stab using it once, accelerating the chakra flow to such an extent that it created a force field like presence and made one's skin seem impenetrable...

How refined this woman's chakra control and sword mastery should've been for it to completely bypass that man's chakra augmentations as if he had none at all? Even if his perceptions were outsmarted or simply slacking he'd have still had instinctual augmentations that were wasteful but even more powerful. Not only did this woman possess chakra mastery impressive enough to coat her blade in chakra on her will as if it was an extension of her body but it also pierced right through augmentations.

It was evident that the rest of Mana's team was just as impressed by the woman's display of speed and power. A stab like that could've broken even through Audra imbued skin or any substance or flesh lacking chakra properties, no matter how invincible and dense.

"Oh well... Ruined my favorite coat now with that sword hole..." the woman smiled at Mana grabbing the magician by the girl's elbow as if the two were classmates and gesturing for the magician's team to follow.

"That was..." Mana began to speak up but stopped in the middle of the sentence. She was genuinely afraid to finish that sentence because the speed and power of this woman literally tore to shreds any notes and ideas the magician had of how powerful ninja could get, she could've listened to tales of how the Justicar swings blinked out entire star systems from Shimo but seeing this down to Earth feat of precision and finesse left her more in awe than any degree of senseless destruction ever could.

"Impressive? Well, it's my sister – Bonny... We're sort of stuck together, you see" the woman laughed out "My name's Becky Read, I'm a captain of my own crew and a proud vassal of Pirate Lord "Green" – Hideo l'Ollonais" the woman began casually chatting to Mana ignoring the magician's bitter expression she couldn't help but wear after seeing a man casually get murdered in a single meaningless moment in time.

"Ruthless, actually..." the magician replied.

"Oh well, you know, back before Kirigakure Black Ops beheaded him the Pirate Lord of the last generation "Black" Soba Teach used to say "Insolence today is a mutiny tomorrow". He ran a tight ship and was never betrayed. All of his crew went down with him, I sometimes wonder if his old head doesn't look too wrinkly and doesn't reek too bad on the Mizukage's trophy stand? The bastard must be wondering if the smell is worth the honor of hanging those greyed out, once raven black locks on his stand" the woman nonchalantly dismissed Mana's remark, she appeared to take offense less strictly from people who were doing business with her instead of her own crew. The image of strength and unwavering loyalty must've been the core values amongst the scourge of the seas.

An awkward silence reigned as the magician's team was walked aboard Read's ship and showed around and lead into their quarters. Bonny must've been quite the socialite as she was adamant to break that silence, asking Mana a bunch of questions about her trip and the time in the Sun Disc arena. The magician went into more detail about the arena so that she stuffed time and details into things that she had the luxury of going into more detail about and moved the attention away from the things she'd have rather kept secret. The last thing Mana wanted was the Pirate Lords declaring war on one another and the world for the Box of Ultimate Bliss.

"I'm just a history fanatic, I love reading all about the lore, legends and myths of this world as well as real history. That's why I want to see Tako's Reach" was all that Mana told Read about that subject.

"Oh, you love history? Boy do I have tales for you!" Read shrieked like a shopaholic let into the mall during a sale.

"They do sound interesting but I'll have to ask you to reserve them for dinner, I've had very little sleep today so I'd like to make up for that..." Mana admitted honestly.

Read's face got strict and stone cold as her hands clapped emitting a thud that only two bulls clashing with one another at full speed could've let out.

"The man who wakes this young woman up will lose his fingers and the middle one's going up their arsehole!" she shouted out from the top of the captain's deck to her crew and asked for someone to show Mana to her quarters. One of the rough looking brawling types rather gently lead Mana to a small but pretty expensive looking room that looked compact but had all the necessities as well as some more luxuriously sounding objects especially in the sea.

"We'll set sail once we get some supplies, and refill our stocks. The captain wished to assure you she'll be buying them and not looting, honestly plundering ports isn't very praised by Lord "Green" anyways..." the pirate spoke the first and possibly the last words he'd speak to Mana and left her alone in her quarters.


	204. Two Questions for Each Answer

That evening went surprisingly tamely. Mana would've imagined pirates being some drinking and plundering brutes, a lot like the stories, both fictional and historical, she read. Despite their fear of portraying weakness in any way, demonstrated by Read's booming desire to kill anyone showing any disrespect to avoid a mutiny, the pirates were behaving rather civilized compared to Mana's imagined stereotype. While meditating in her small but slightly more pompous than Mana would've wanted quarters, filled with plants and multiple bookcases filled with both educational atlases and books of fiction to keep the girl company, the magician heard no loud cursing or brawling. Only occasionally someone passed by her door accidentally bumping into it with their broom while they scrubbed the deck.

The young magician wished to make no premature conclusions but perhaps the description of the pirates as just rebellious sailors wishing to be treated like human beings and running a humane if a little illegal ship was justified? After all she had seen with her own eyes the scars on a marine's back, the cold and lifeless zombie-like eyes that each marine carried. It wasn't tough to see the allure of a pirate's life, a life where you were treated as a person as long as you stayed within your own bounds and respected the pecking order. After all, it wasn't tough to imagine similar punishment befalling any sailor questioning the order of their superiors. If anything on a legitimate ship the sailor may have been questioned and tortured before being executed, dragged through the whole tribunal charade.

After confronting the emptiness of her own soul Mana was no longer afraid of meditating. There was nothing out of ordinary in her body, at least there didn't seem to be, all was working normally, as long as one had Mana's disability in mind. Her body was still intentionally withholding the ability to mold chakra, the girl felt like she knew why, it was because of how she treated that gift. It was a self-preservation mechanism that her body placed on itself, choosing to never regain the full grasp of chakra control since the magician constantly risked her own life with it. She'd have fought Shimo to save those crawlers, she'd have fought the pirates to save that misspoken fellow who was killed that day… She'd have lost both fights. It was a scary thing to know that one's subconscious made more rational sense than one's own conscious mind.

Mana opened her eyes and stretched her tired body out over her own compact bed. She felt rested despite only having meditated and not slept throughout the whole time. She was such an idiot for not having done so during the last night, after all, if she had placed herself in a trance she'd have remained oblivious to Hachiro's antics and had a good night's sleep. Just like Meiko did. Except Meiko was no meditating genius, she was merely a really good and almost comically deep sleeper.

A loud thud alerted the girl's attention and she hesitantly walked to the door opening it. There stood a chubby elderly man wearing a bandana and a torn and dirty shirt.

"Captain Read would like to see you at the dinner table, she's quite excited to tell you the stories you so wished to hear" the man bumbled out in a voice belonging without a doubt to someone's grandpa. The pirate's tone and voice was so soft and low pitched that it seemed like everything he said was an educational journey with rich rewards of experience and knowledge. It was the most grandpa voice Mana had heard.

The ex-kunoichi just bowed her head leaving through the door and following the man to a staircase below captain's deck.

"Forgive me for the messy shirt, young lady, it's just that I was fixing some gear-work before this and had no time to change, the captain looked urgent with her call for you" the round bellied pirate smiled looking back at Mana picking his drunkard's red with pulsing blood vessels nose.

"It's really no problem, why are we going downstairs? Aren't we going to dine at the captain's deck?" Mana shook her head once before inquiring.

"Oh no…" the man chuckled grabbing his slipping out belly and stuffing it back into his oily trousers. "The captain dines with her men, we all eat at the same time by the same table, I can imagine it to be a bit confusing as marines cannot imagine such a luxury…"

The magician and the chubby grandpa pirate descended into a lovely little room lit by gas lights instead of candle light which must've been due to the fire hazard. There were plenty of wooden parts on this ship despite most strong military vessels being made of water chakra particle infused hardened steel that had floating properties. This allowed ships made even of toughest alloys to float like wooden ones. Read must've been unable to afford such a ship, reasonably so, a single good military vessel like that would've been the pride of the country's entire navy.

"Well, sit down, why don't you?" Read smiled through her teeth before Mana's gaze stopped on a rather grotesque detail on the woman's exposed body.

Read was sitting not on a large and soft suede cushioned chair but on a backless stool with a soft red pillow on the seat. That was because now that Read had removed her coat her sister Bonny was in full vision where before she was concealed enough to just look like a fancy accessory of the coat or maybe a small hunch of Read's.

Bonny was a frail and pale thing, a truly grotesque and a little miserable addition a bit less than half Read's size to the point where Bonny's miniature hands and legs dangled helplessly and the women were connected just by their backs. Where Read's head was completely fiery ginger, Bonny's shade was a darker pink one approaching a shade of purple even. The twin's face was completely invisible as it was hidden in the flowing ocean of untrimmed hair that also did its best to cover up Bonny's private parts that were completely exposed and it didn't look like Read bothered to dress her sister.

Mana realized that she was staring for a little too long for both of their comfort so she rushed to the nearest seat she could find. The girl's attempt to hide her discomfort seeing the seemingly lifeless twin of Read's was unsuccessful as the pirate captain just lessened her grin and pointed at Bonny with a thumb.

"Yeah, I guess seeing my sis' for the first time is a little… Something, huh?" the woman asked. Before Mana could answer she gestured for every present pirate and Mana with her team to dig into the food served. There was plenty of chicken, pork chops and beef. Some smoked meat and desserts. Such commodities must've been available solely because they were at a port town.

"Not really, I've actually seen a similar case. Sadly the sibling of that man was dead all along but he didn't want to let go of his brother, he used physical chakra to manipulate his brother's corpse like a limb" Mana replied remembering her time in Agbarah and the people she met there. Had she not had that memory to fall back on she may have caused some discomfort for both herself and the captain.

"So sad… Well Bonny is alive and well, she sort of sleeps most of the time but she's quick and really sneaky when she wants to be. I love her a great deal when she isn't just dangling on my back…" Read nodded appearing interested in Mana's memory of the Agbarah coliseum. "Anyways, here you are telling me stories…" the captain realized after taking a large chunk of meat and ripping it off the bone.

"I wouldn't like to trouble your meal, captain, but if it's not too much trouble I'd love to hear more about the Pirate Lords. Since me and my team are heading right into the center of the triangle we'll probably have to deal with them or their people at some point" Mana asked politely waiting for the woman to finish chewing. The magician tried to ignore Bonny's slithering arm reaching for an unfinished bone and moving it towards its pile of flowing hair where its head would've been.

"Well… The Pirate Lord that I am working for, working for being a pretty loose definition, is Pirate Lord "Green" Hideo l'Ollonais. He doesn't really bark out any orders, my primary concern is to uphold his code wherever I can and pay him a share of my earnings every year. Of the three active Pirate Lords he is possibly the most passive, after a gruesome massacre he survived while covering himself in blood and guts of his slaughtered crew he despises conflict and only justifies it when defending his honor, such as you would've seen today. He is quite a swift and skilled swordsman from what I've seen but he prefers it as a sporting interest instead of a full on art of murder…"

Mana saw the evident discomfort of talking of l'Ollonais amongst her crew, after all in a way the man was both Read's and the whole crew's superior so it would've been difficult to speak of him any ill and not expect retribution from the crew. Especially if this "Green" was so fixed on protecting his name and honor as to letting his subordinates decimate a port town in his name because the port town beat up on his own subordinates. Out of the three Mana expected to be mislead about Green the most seeing how subjective Read had to be when describing the man.

"The other one is Pirate Lord "Blue" – Aomura Flint, he is more of an adventurer than a pirate. It is rare that one hears of Flint's crew plundering anything, he doesn't care that much of his name either. From his history serving in other ships he is an amazing fighter having travelled the world and mastered a great deal of fighting styles. He surfaced couple of decades ago, before that he served in Pirate Lord "Black's" crew and when his master went down he wandered about training with the samurai of the Iron Country as well as the ninja and the martial artists. Hell, piracy may just be another page in his diary…"

The crew roared out and flipped their beer pints emptying them for a great pirate being described. It was unlikely that any marines or marine hunter ninja displayed such respect for anyone who wasn't their direct superior. Even if they did so it could've been merely a façade and a feat of respect.

"The final one is Pirate Lord "Red" – Akimichi Francho. I'm not sure how one can describe "Red", he is typically a pretty stereotypical pirate, plundering and chasing any treasures he can find, he also goes after his booty himself unlike l'Ollonais often risking his life. He isn't one for honor or good name, he has left his own men to die and allowed his captured captains rot in jail and get executed under several occasions and has committed acts that codes of no other Pirate Lord would permit. I don't think he is a tyrant or a mean guy he just… Wants to be on top of the world and doesn't let himself go down with his loyal men before he gets there" Read finally got some time to stop talking and have some beer. Bonny's freakily flexible arm bent backwards by the elbow and smacked the woman in the head making Read spill some drink all over herself and begin coughing angrily.

The pirate captain reached the glass back and handed some to her sister. When the conjoined sibling was awake she appeared to be quite the handful and had a personality befitting a pirate captain.

Read continued to tell stories of her plunders and jobs that she had pulled off until the dinner was over and the night was suffocating the last breaths of life of the day before. Some were of her childhood and how she tricked her childhood friends into joining her into piracy. Some more stories detailing how each and every friend she ever knew was captured and executed by Kirigakure marine ninja and Black Ops. One story of how Read escaped captivity while pregnant and giving birth under heavy cannon fire…

"What? You have a son?" Mana shouted out in surprise after that revelation which initially appeared shocking but the more the magician thought of it the more casual it looked.

"Sure, the little rascal's growing up in Kirigakure, a lot of Green's captains visit him so he's quite the popular brat…" Read grinned as wide as her face allowed, Mana's surprise entertained and rekindled the flame of storytelling for the pirate captain.

Mana had long since lost count and there were some stories the validity of which was questionable but the girl honored her hostess by letting her engage in storytelling, simply choosing to nod and drink tiny sips when the captain gorged down her whole pint after each story or mention of a treasured friend.

Mana's head felt a little woozy, she had made a decent effort at barely taking in any beer handed to her, unlike Meiko and Kouta who got completely hammered under the table. Shimo on the other hand could certainly handle his alcohol. The young man easily drank with the experienced pirates doing his best not to slip down under the table where the scrubs of drinking slept peacefully. Even if she only wet her tongue sometimes the magician still felt a bit wobbly on her feet and while she couldn't call her condition tipsy, her head was still a bit dizzy. Or maybe it was just the wobbling of the ship and the sea air forcing to summon the best of her effort not to throw up like some pirates that were throwing up into buckets that laid around everywhere.

Normally they'd have been too young to drink in any village however pirates cared little of such pesky laws and in the sea there was only their law, the code of the Pirate Lord one enforced upon their captains. There was also the matter of emancipation and being declared a legal adult once one completed the Academy and became a genin. A ninja would've needed to buy and consume alcohol or use and carry around weaponry as well as make deals and sign contracts even in their earliest years. For that reason the fact that Meiko and Kouta got so bashed or the fact that Shimo appeared to have acquired both taste and experience over beer worried Mana least of all things.

A known face stared at the endless ocean blocking Mana's path as it was neither pressing against the ship's wall nor leaning over the edge. Hachiro just stood right in the middle of the path to Mana's quarters and looked into the darkness with endless waters in the horizons wherever one's eye could see.

"Ummm… Can I pass?" Mana asked politely.

Hachiro jumped up after the magician's voice broke him out of a trance of his own – a deep immersion in his own thoughts forcing him to move back and press himself against the ship's wall. The man grunted as an exposed screw of an illuminator dug right into his elbow.

"You're not drinking or eating?" the girl asked while passing the Uchiha.

"Most dinners and parties I've been in ended up with too much murder for my taste. I don't like getting drunk, getting drunk equals getting your belly or throat opened out there… Darn this ship, maybe I should stick to the quarters, if the Eight Tails' tentacle grabed me from here it'd drag me tens of kilometers deep and crush me like a roll of toothpaste!" Hachiro began mumbling.

Mana leaned over the edge which scared the Uchiha to no end, it appeared bold and challenging his own way to the extent that he even screamed out something unintelligible to her.

"Aww… You care, how cute…" Mana smiled to him kindly. "You know, an important part of security is trust. If you won't trust some people you'll just make enemies out of them all and no matter how careful you are, even you can't defend against all of them. Trust is just as important as carefulness in security" she tried talking to the Uchiha even if she knew there'd be no changing his ways.

"Well… You have your ways, I have mine. There's no way I'm trusting anyone after my own idol fell from grace. Not with that madman out there…" the Uchiha replied surprisingly most clearly he has spoken in for a while.

"When you speak of this "madman" you speak of someone exact. Every other enemy or threat you create is abstract, it's always "them" and something "might" happen but with the "madman" it's real for you, isn't it? Shimo lied to us about you being careless and aloof and I can see why but he was right about one thing – whoever that madman is he seems an actual threat you wish to avoid at all costs whereas you speak of being captured and murdered as almost a joke. Like you did back then with Shimo" Mana spoke with a degree of interest into Hachiro and this "madman" he kept speaking of. Initially his ramblings seemed very paranoid and mad but the girl was curious if any of them could be forced to make some sense.

"Shimo didn't lie about me. I am careless and aloof, that is why I became so… However I am over the years. When people out there see your goofiness they see how they can exploit it, get poisoned enough times and you'll learn to avoid poison, if you can't tell what poison is you only start eating and drinking what you personally can vouch for. Everything else is dangerous, but everything fades compared to him. If the world we live in is a table game he is going to flip the table. All the figures shall play by his rules or fly off… He's doing whatever he wants to do and he has the ability to achieve every mad goal he wants to. Kidnapping people right out from under the village's noses without them getting as much as a sniff of him…" Hachiro finally began speaking to Mana in a voice and tone resembling that which he used when the man was angry and fought the team of genin.

"I see. You wouldn't happen to tell me the madman's name or something to identify him by?" Mana asked just in case, something like that prophecy this man made would've been valuable info for the village.

"I can't… If I would he'd sink every island in the Archipelago just to get back to me. He'd wield the fury of all the Tailed Beasts and blow the chunk of planet I'm in off the total package" Hachiro shook in his boots and where he was slowly approaching the rail Mana was leaning over he stumbled back to the wall again.

"Why would this madman fear exposure so? If he is as mighty as you say?" Mana wondered curiously.

"No. He fears nothing and no one, he doesn't want YOU to know… Mana…" the man spoke before freezing up as if he had just told something incriminating and ran off as a paranoid old man he probably was. The magician just stood there wondering what those words could've meant. Why would she be of any importance to that man? Did she perhaps know that so called madman? The magician struggled to remember any name matching the description of such a man.

Slowly and carefully as to not fall over and into the uneasy oceans below Mana stumbled back into her quarters. It appeared that the surprises would still not cease as inside her quarters Shimo was waiting and he didn't look easy or calm. He was pretty fired up about something. Mana looked at the Yuki for a moment before his drunk mind let the fact of her awkward staring become evident.

"What are you doing? With all of this?" he asked her straight, all the beer he did that evening must've helped with the straightforwardness.

"What do you mean?" Mana asked the swordsman to be a little less straightforward.

"I mean Read… Bonny, whatever she is… You promised her a decent chunk of our Audra. You've heard today the jobs these men and women do, you know what they'd do with it. Promising Hachiro a couple of chunks is just fine, he won't..." Shimo appeared to have been practiced this speech for a while. It was evident that the whole deal troubled him greatly but he feared confronting Mana until he was totally hammered and had no qualms about doing pretty much anything. Their fighting over moral matters must've interfered with it, Shimo didn't want them to fight like they used to back in Otogakure. He clearly wanted things to be like they were back when they were friends. They clearly still were friends, just neither one of them wished to admit it and apologize for their fighting.

"Calm down…" Mana whispered, she thought about her following words for a good while before leaning up closer to Shimo.

"Back off, I'm not kissing you…" the young man pushed her rudely, "What would Kouta say if he saw you!" he mumbled out in a manner that suggested too many beers five beers ago.

"I'm not gonna kiss you!" Mana punched him in the arm shouting out. "Are you sure you've not been followed, can we talk here?" she asked.

"We can't be sure of that ever. Any place can be filled with noise recording seals, also a ninja of superior skill may remain invisible to a lesser skilled eye no matter how hard they try to find them. I mean goddamn Black Ops can remain unseen even in plain sight to anyone but ninja of similar skill if they damn please. There could be five Black Ops in this room right now and we'd not see them unless they wished to be seen. If you have anything to say just say it…" the boy grunted angrily but despite his drunken stupor he had a point.

"I don't intend to pay Read…" Mana answered awaiting for the lightning of consequences to strike after these words were uttered.


	205. Shattering Wicked

The next morning after the overly indulgent dinner there was a certain period of cooldown where Meiko and Kouta took their time recovering after overeating and enjoying far too many drinks. Impressively enough the ninja metabolism eliminated most signs of hangover after one and a half hour at worst but the whole day Shimo kept on whispering something in the ears of his teammates, something that slightly troubled Mana for she worried that her declaration may be overheard or intercepted in mid-delivery.

After lunch the magician's team gathered in Mana's quarters. They only barely all had a place to settle as the place was not meant to fit more than two people inside, while the rooms were certainly costly they were not overly spacious after all. Everyone began speaking at once filling the limited space with verbal rubbish which wouldn't have been intelligible to even the most devoted listeners so Mana just gently calmed everyone down and sighed trying to explain as much as she could to her team.

"Wait, Shimo said…" Kouta began speaking again, this time alone.

"Don't finish that sentence. It's not safe to utter those words in captain Read's ship" Mana jumped up pressing her hand against the boy's mouth.

"So is that true? What's your plan?" Shimo asked angrily rubbing his temples. While Mana was sure that internally the young swordsman was completely with Mana's idea he wanted to act out like he needed persuasion. The reasons of such rebellious behavior eluded Mana's mind but she had long since passed the point trying to reasonably explain the boyish ego.

"Look, all I can tell you guys is that… Yes, that's true but I can't discuss it. It's too dangerous" Mana answered.

"Don't worry, guys, I'm sure Mana has a plan, she'd never endanger us or doom us for a confrontation like that unless she has a foolproof plan" Meiko grinned leaning back on her arms without a care.

"Actually… I haven't figured that part out yet. I only have small parts of an actual plan because my actual plan is very dangerous. It has about fifty-fifty chance of success and everything can go wrong. I don't want to leave the fate of my team to chance, I want it to be a full hundred but… I simply see no other way than my plan" Mana admitted looking down and then turning around to look through the illuminator.

"Well… At least you have a plan" Meiko tried justifying Mana's words but then the magician turned around and shook her head sitting on her bed and staring at the expensive carpet beneath her feet with apologizing and guilty eyes.

"I'm really sorry, guys. I just can't give captain Read or any single Pirate Lord that many shards. I have no problem paying Hachiro-san or any wanderer who probably wouldn't have much use to it but what if Read melts the alloy and coats her ship with it? It'd take a miracle to sink such a ship. And what if she coats her cannonballs with it or learns to manufacture it after handing one to Green? I know this is the same argument we had in the desert but I've learned my lesson, we all must've. These shards are coming back to Konoha, I'd rather die a thousand times over than give this many of them to Read or any other pirate" Mana tried explaining herself, she spoke quietly and Shimo constantly stood on the watch peeking through the illuminator. Technically they've only expressed very abstract ideas yet but they'd still sound suspicious if the wrong ears overheard them.

"You paid Read half of the share already" Kouta said.

"I'll take it back" Mana cut down in a tone that implied she was not going to discuss this any further and has made up her mind already.

"What's the plan?" Shimo asked.

"We're going to send a message with coordinates to another Pirate Lord, we're going to spark a fight between the two pirate crews and do what we came there to do before fleeing. We're ninja, doing our jobs and fleeing are what we're supposed to be good at" Mana explained pressing her shaking hand against her face, she knew how bad that plan must've sounded and how much risk was involved.

"Send a message to a Pirate Lord from the ship of a captain loyal to another Pirate Lord?" Shimo snickered.

"How are we even going to contact him?" Kouta added salt to the wound.

"Wait, that's why you asked the pirate lady about the Lords yesterday?" Meiko pressed her index finger to her lips as her forehead wrinkled really hard suggesting some complicated thinking processes transpiring in the redhead's mind.

"Yeah… I wanted to know which one to contact, I wanted to know their personalities and their skills. I had assessments to make" Mana admitted "Obviously a bit of personal curiosity was also involved but I'd have never been so persistent to talk about them onboard if it wasn't for my plan"

"You did all of that without consulting us? You know, you'd make a fine Black Ops ninja…" Shimo cursed squinting angrily at Mana. "You're talking to us about something and yet in that complicated head of yours you're constantly weaving plots. You're no different from most scumbags we've seen on this mission. A real blossoming ANBU…"

Mana's blood began to boil and she wished to shout something rude out, offend the young man and tear him to bits but… She contained that rising storm, her fingers dug into the sheets on her bed and she allowed her raven black hair to run down her face and cover her rage up. Once her mind calmed down and Mana realized that she had some blame to own she wiped that hair off and faced her friends again.

"I know and I'm sorry" she admitted, "But I cannot allow that much Audra to fall into Read's hands. She is no world conquering maniac like Fennec or that bad of a person from what I've seen but… She's still a pirate answering to other pirates, if her Lord gets a sniff of power that'd help him dominate the seas – he'd eat his own face off to obtain that power".

"Starting a pirate war just to escape with your hide… That's so sneaky and… So…" Kouta looked at Mana a whole different way, his disdain stabbed at Mana's chest the most.

"Ordinary people may get hurt, such clashes would spark a war, they always do. Civilians suffer the most during wars, that's' why generally wars suck. Obviously it'd make the villages take pirates more seriously, maybe eventually they'd even be eliminated freeing the seas but are you willing to make that call?" Shimo asked Mana sitting near her and placing his hand around her.

Mana closed her eyes and covered them her nails almost dug into her own eyebrows from how hard she trembled and pressed at them. This wasn't fair. She had a mission objective, one that wasn't really her responsibility, she was a client and yet she was a client who has taken up to own that responsibility. If she made that call people would die in the pirate war, without a doubt, then the pirates themselves would be eventually eradicated by the angered villages combining their forces. If Mana rolled back on her plans then one Pirate Lord would acquire a great deal of Audra and rule the seas eliminating the others, the optimal power balance would be broken. It was impossible to say if the Lord would rule with a just fist or an iron one. Either way, people would suffer and die because of Mana's call.

This wasn't why nor was it what she became a ninja for. Mana wanted to change the world, to reduce the suffering around her not to control it or choose between what exactly would be the cause of it. This wasn't fair at all.

"I'll need a great deal of chakra. Meiko can place seals on a bottle working in a similar principle to the seal on her jet boots, it would release a small output of chakra every couple of seconds and send it propelling through the water. I can drop it during a cold evening and no one would suspect a thing…" Mana finalized her decision.

"Alright!" Meiko grinned giving Mana a thumb up, the magician had no idea if her friend realized the thoughts that went into making such a decision and just what would be the fallout from making it.

"Well, the village will be proud if we make it, we'd have gone through great deal of trouble to grant it those shards. Well done, great hero, you!" Shimo sarcastically "commended" Mana and left her quarters. The magician sighed uneasily, she knew that deep inside he agreed to her call, he just didn't want to be seen agreeing to something like that nor did he choose to own such a decision up. He was right, Mana would earn major extra points with the village higher ups for such a stunt, that being said these people were not the kind of people she wanted approval from. These were the leaders of liars and killers, people who managed and had their own personal armies of assassins and thieves. And Mana would be their wonder child…

A couple of hours later Shimo returned with Hachiro. Mana had finished up writing the message to Pirate Lord "Blue" – Aomura Flint.

"Here, I brought cowardly-sensei so he can fill your seal's juices up. He agreed to fill her up for two extra shards…" the swordsman mumbled out indifferently staring at his sensei who walked up to Meiko asking if she was ready.

"Can you really transfer your chakra through me?" Meiko asked, it wasn't like the Uchiha was some sort of supernatural being like Synth who could freely grant or take its chakra away from people. Usually chakra couldn't be passed around like water from a bucket, unless with a use of some sort of technique.

"No need for that, it's a simple seal, I can simply duplicate it with my own chakra input" Hachiro grinned, "Is it a secure bottle, won't I get any cuts from the glass?"

Shimo smacked the man in the back of his head, "I've seen you take hits that'd split the planet in two with your stupid face, it's not like your huge chakra augmentation levels can't compensate for a little cut"

"Yeah, but if I insert this much chakra my flow may be interrupted and not work properly. What if I secretly have hemophilia I know nothing about and I bleed out and die!?" Hachiro began freaking out more and more. Kouta walked up to the man and pressed his hand against Hachiro's forehead.

"Hemophilia Identification Jutsu!" he chanted out a made-up technique. "No, it seems you do not have hemophilia, otherwise my hemophilia identification technique would've found it…" he smiled like a doctor smiled handing a toddler a lollipop.

"How much chakra exactly do you have, old man?" Meiko wondered.

"Oh, you'd be surprised…" Shimo grunted in annoyance. "He's a pretty amazing fighter when he's not scared, his chakra level should be at least lower tier jounin level…"

Meiko's mouth gapped in surprise while Hachiro placed his hand on the bottle and made a couple of seals.

"Chakra Eruption Seal!" he chanted opening the seal up and leaving a sealing hieroglyph onto the bottle before beginning to pour his chakra inside.

Shimo looked at Mana who still looked like a walking ghost, it was clear that the magician was crushed by the weight her decision placed on her shoulders and that she approved of none of its aspects, the decision she made was just apparently the lesser one of the two evils.

"How do you even plan to find this Flint guy? It's not like we know where he or any of his ships are…" the swordsman wondered.

Mana's pale hand rose to point at an enlarged version of the Archipelago with the oceans and seas surrounding it hanging on the quarter's walls, it had three centers connected with straight lines with "Tako's Reach" scribbled in the middle. Together those three colored centers made up a triangle. That accursed triangle most ships barely dared to tread inside of.

"So?" the Yuki asked for some clarification.

Mana's fingers pointed at each of the centers, her lips barely moved upon pointing at each one calling the color of each circle representing the center. "Red, green, blue"

"Oh…" Shimo finally understood the meaning of that map. It would've made little sense for each captain not to have multiple versions of such maps hanging all around the ship – it detailed where exactly the current territory of each Pirate Lord identified by their codename color was. When treading inside another Lord's territory meant being plundered and sunken to the bottom where the Eight Tails may have lurked, one had to make sure that as many crewmates knew just where the accessible territory was and just where their Lord's influence ended and another's began.

Hachiro sighed heavily and moved his hand off the bottle. "There, I made four seals on each side of the bottle, if one burst of chakra takes one fifty or so meters this should take the bottle to Flint's territory and beyond easily, even if it does run out of juice it'll float where the guy can find him…" the Uchiha explained.

Mana nodded and thanked the man handing him two shards for his trouble. Hachiro really did look like he was sweating heavily and almost like most of his blood was drained. It must've taken a great deal of effort for this strange plan to work and it was a very unusual mean of delivering a message in the ninja world. Everyone scattered and went back to their rooms meanwhile Mana continued to sit around rolling the bottle and the message contained inside between her hands.

All of a sudden her door burst open with such intensity and unexpectedness that the girl just dropped the bottle down in sheer surprise and scare that such unexpected and swift entry gave. Just barely did Mana's foot manage to break the bottle's fall so that it didn't break, the blasted thing just bounced off her foot and fell onto the carpet rolling around there for a while. The visitor that entered Mana's quarters was Read herself. This could've ruined everything! Mana's foot hooked the bottle and rapidly pushed it to the end of under her bed!

"Oh you!" Read squinted at Mana making the magician's heart tense up and her blood begin pumping hard for the second time that day, this time out of sheer petrifying fear. "Don't think I didn't see! You're a naughty young lady!" Read smiled maliciously. Was Mana's plan discovered!? This could've ended everything. Read was fast enough to murder Mana before she could make as much as squeak and then silently kill her unsuspecting friends while they're asleep!

"Drinking alone, aren't you?" Read smiled and extended her arms to the sides. Her coat ruffled and slipped off the captain's shoulders. For a moment the woman battled her sister for the right to keep the coat on, the poor sister must've been suffocating beneath that massive thing and wanted some fresh air.

"Yeah… Sorry. I can pay for it if…" Mana began admitting her "crime", Hell knew she had enough guilt in her heart to look convincingly sorry even if she was a lousy liar. Sometimes she lucked out just enough so that circumstances allowed her to technically tell the truth and get away regardless.

"Nah, don't sweat it, still, kinda feels wrong that someone's little girl gets hammered on my ship in secret, you know. I mean… I guess… If you're allowed to go outside the village walls you probably can but… Still, those fucking moral principles, right?" Read smiled.

"Yeah… Moral principles…" Mana nodded slightly in agreement. "Well, I really feel bad about doing this, I'm sorry, I won't do it again" she "swore".

"Nah, no big deal, I mean if you were my crewmate I'd whip your ass cheeks till they reminded the bars of a prison cell you'd eventually rot in but you're not – you're a paying customer so drink up, it'd just be… Calmer for both of us if you did during the times when everyone's drinking, you know" Read walked up and sat near Mana on the bed. Instinctively the magician shoved the bottle further with her heel.

"I understand… It's just… Those expectations, you know. I have to be a nice little lady and nice little ladies don't drink… It's tough" Mana made something up, by now her lies were beginning to stop appealing to the hardships in the girl's heart so her voice began to tremble and it must've began to become apparent that something was off.

"Oh, girlfriend, don't even go there! I totally get you! I mean, you're talking to a female captain of a pirate ship for fuck's sake! Don't bow to those fucking norms, be a bitch if you want, you're the only one whose say matters" Read slapped Mana's shoulder so hard that the magician almost felt her arm fall off. The captain then stood up and tipped her hat before leaving.

"You know, you'd make a really good pirate captain one day… We'd be the Trinity of Sea-Bitches, you, Bonny and me! Think about that" Read smiled before leaving Mana's room. The magician breathed out a heavy one. Her heart almost jumped out through her mouth during that brief talk.

That night the oceans were pretty rough but they weren't exactly stormy. Mana was careful in her silent and slow paced walk to an edge of the ship. She carefully looked at her compass and determined north, luckily enough it was on the side of the ship she was on. Had she needed to sneak passed actual pirates she'd have failed, after all most of them, if not all of them, could mold chakra. Mana would've been discovered the moment she breathed out her first breath and peacefully lead to her room. The second time she'd be discovered would also be the last…

With equally as troubled and stormy feelings Mana tossed the bottle as far as she could. The splash it made was silenced by the roaring waves and soon the bottle completely disappeared into the horizon nowhere to be seen. So she committed the most heinous act in her life – started a pirate war between two lords… That's only if the plan succeeds, Flint gets the message and everything goes as planned. Flint only had a couple of days to get the message and gather his crew, after all, that's how long it'd take for Read's ship to reach the Box's coordinates.

Mana felt a hand press her shoulder, scared the magician turned around only to see Kouta. The boy hugged her and pressed her head against his own as hard as he could. Mana could feel her wet and soaked by rain head press against his and raindrops falling from his hair fall onto her head and down to her neck where it sent shivers down her spine.

"Why Flint?" he asked.

"Flint is an adventurer, one mention of the Box and he'll be all over the information. I mentioned that if he didn't hurry up the other two would get to it first. One thing adventurers wish is to be first to discover something…" Mana replied looking down. Usually the magician loved the rain, usually it washed down her heavy thoughts but now it somehow felt like it was the heavens dooming her.

Kouta kissed Mana's forehead softly getting a sip of rainfall in his mouth in the process.

"You're really smart" he replied as the boy turned and began leading Mana back to her room.

"Devious one should say…" she replied hating herself with every essence of her being.

"There was no way to avoid the fallout, you could only direct whom it hit first. These people aren't exactly saints, you know" Kouta tried to calm her down.

Mana gently pushed him further from her door gesturing that she wished to spend the evening hating herself alone. Sometimes that was the only way to cope with difficult choices, to just be sad about it and embrace that sadness, to let it run its course so that the next morning there was no sadness left and only everything that sadness was not could take the control over.

"I used to not make that distinction. It used to be a way in which murderers justified their casual death sentencing…" Mana replied closing the door and realizing that she was the only one who heard that last part as a strong lightning bolt silenced her final words. The magician always used to believe that she was someone special, someone who could delve into all that darkness and remain unchanged. Was the truth actually different? Was she slowly becoming what she hated the most? Would that mean that to truly change the world around her eventually she'd have to end her own life?

Mana dragged her lazy feet to the bed and covered up her head. Failing to fall asleep she sat back up and observed the raindrops falling outside. The lightning barely troubled her anymore, only the rain… That one true friend that always calmed her down and reminded what she was fighting for. Only the rain…

Only the rain…


	206. At the Box's Doorsteps

"Land, ho!" a scout sitting on top of the tallest seat on the ship declared. Soon all twenty five crewmen gathered around and Read, wearing her Bonny hiding captain's coat, appeared to scope the island ahead.

"Get the girl" she ordered turning at one of her pirates who began rushing to Mana's room only to meet the girl halfway there as Mana darted onto the main deck to observe the island by herself. The pirate nodded his head and gently lead the young ex-kunoichi to his captain.

"Is this the island?" Read inquired coldly, she wore no smiles and appeared to have taken a professional almost business like attitude towards this whole event.

"It appears to be… What are the coordinates?" Mana asked before observing a number of incredibly familiar murals and mosaics on a pyramid far ahead in the distance, right in the middle of the incredibly overgrown with vegetation island. "Never mind…" she stopped the squirming little man desperately trying to write down the exact coordinates.

Meiko, Kouta and Shimo gathered nearby Mana. They've reached island a whole day early, the four had not precisely coordinated their plan. The three young ninja kept on squinting at Mana trying to determine if the magician would proceed with her defiant plan or if this change finally made her reconsider.

"Well, I suppose we'll pay up and be on our way…" Mana smiled looking at Read, "I'd appreciate if for pleasant goodbye's sake you'd give us lifeboats to get to the island…" the young lady asked.

"No… We're going with you. Whatever you're looking for here, for pleasant goodbyes' sake, we'll help you with that for no extra pay" Read smiled back at Mana which made the magician's eyes sink in suspicion and a little bit of fear. What kind of game was Read playing? Did she wish to find out what Mana wanted of this island and then snag the Box away from them and bring it to l'Ollonais? That most definitely fit the description of what a pirate would do, helping a bunch of kids for no pay at all however did not.

"That will not be necessary, I do not wish to trouble you any more than we already have" Mana attempted to politely refuse the woman's offer, "Our quest here is dangerous and might cost you men, I would feel terrible if you lost valuable crewmen in a charity job"

Read scratched her chin and nodded. "Fair enough" she waved for the small chubby grandpa like looking pirate "Long Smith, please ready lifeboats for fifteen men, me and the kids. We won't trouble the kids any longer but we can make sure they land ashore successfully at the very least…" the woman ordered. The short elder began running around and ordering the men to prepare the ordered lifeboats.

Soon enough the young teens were placed in lifeboats and rowed to the luscious island. After setting their foot ashore everyone sized up and evaluated the island with their eyes. It was a relatively small but incredibly overgrown island with thick forests of ancient looking sky reaching trees. The jungles inside and past the thick layers of leaves appeared to contain their own hidden dimension of shade and mysterious evening glow at every point in time. It looked oh so very similarly to the Forest of Death except with much more mystery and charm and a thousand times less death.

"Strange… I've never seen this island or known of its existence, did you, Long Smith?" Read finally broke the silence.

"Well… No, it doesn't appear to be on any of our maps, I assumed the kids wanted to be let go in a random patch of the ocean. I never thought for a moment that there'd be an island here. Maybe the villages have some sort of knowledge of the seas we do not have?" the old man mumbled out in a strangely dazing and sleepy jingling tone.

"Well, anyways, we'll just have to issue an order for Maximillian to nail this island on our maps. We may just get some sweet piece of land for l'Ollonais. Something like that could nail us some sweet booty, maybe we should pick up paying hitchhikers more often. That bastard Flint kept on adventuring and discovering all those new islands, serves him right to be behind at least once" Read wondered out loud speaking to herself but the entire crew ashore shared a laugh after that last sentence.

"So, is our mission objective in that pyramid?" Shimo whispered to Mana's ear.

"There's no way Flint would help us now, this is bad…" Kouta joined in making a mumbling cacophony of whispering as the voices of both young men got mixed up and began confusing the young magician in her mind.

"The crew is split right now, maybe we can take this many?" Meiko managed to slip in a pretty violent and risky but an alluring idea.

"OK, let's get the rest of our men here, Smith, order our cartographers and scientists down here. I want every man exploring every nook and cranny but not getting in the kids' way" Read ordered, Mana saw Smith reaching up to his torn up denim trousers and pulling out a scroll which he opened up. An inky stream of chakra guided black goo fired off into the sky and formed a heart with two rapiers crossed beneath it. Must've been the signal for the crew to get down there and judging from the sight of men throwing themselves overboard and swimming to the island with blades in their teeth, thinking they've been bamboozled, it was an effective signal.

"Now… How about we get down to business?" Read turned at Mana. The pirate looked pretty happy about the whole situation, it was just about time for that control of Read's to begin slipping.

"We won't give you those shards, Read, even more, we'll take what we gave you to begin with" Mana calmly revealed her plan.

A deafening tirade of laughter echoed throughout the growing crowd of pirates as the crew that was left on the ship soon rejoined the crew present on the small strip of sandy beach before the mysterious green realm of unexplored jungles started.

"Oh? That's a good one, now give us the…" Read smiled through tears but then a loud clang emanated from her two sabers clashing with Shimo's drawn sword as the boy dashed in unimaginable speed at the woman with a jumping slash aimed right at her neck.

"Don't make fun of Mana or her word. She explained the deal to you, now follow it up!" the young man shouted out clashing with Read's twin sabers a couple of more times.

The pirates surrounding Read tried to surround and skewer the insolent young man but Meiko and Kouta made a bunch of hand seals in sync to each other. It was astonishing to see how well the team began to work with each other over those months they've spent travelling around the world looking for the Box.

"Earth Style: Mud Wall!" the young man exclaimed as a powerful rocky structure rose from each side of Shimo creating a canyon of sorts from the side and making it impossible for the lowlifes to surround the young swordsman.

"Pimple Blast!" Meiko yelled out stomping the ground beneath her feet as the jet seals on her boots blasted a powerful burst of chakra through the fissure her stomp made and sent it behind the mud walls blowing every single pirate, Read included off their feet.

"Pimple Blast?" Kouta looked at Meiko questioningly.

"I'm still working on the name, I just made this technique up recently and it reminded me of pimples. It builds up and then pops after a while just like a pimple" Meiko grinned scratching the back of her head a bit ashamed of the association she made.

Shimo blocked a couple more of Read's attacks before taking a wild leap back because he'd have skipped a pretty nasty cut at his chest which may have sent him down. The Yuki grunted just how much more skilled and experienced the woman was compared to him, it may not have been a good idea to challenge these pirates.

The lowlife crew of pirates began picking themselves up off the ground, looking dirty, slightly scratched up and wearing several small but evident scars and beatings but mostly just pissed to no end. With a single blow the two walls of chakra erected by Shimo were brought down.

"The people in the port town were right, these aren't some lowlife thugs…" Meiko suddenly got serious and took a fighting stance getting ready for a brawl of her life.

"Yeah, any unaugmented thug would've stayed down after a blast like that" the medical ninja by her side agreed. He then looked back at Mana.

"Mana-chan, please sit this one out. These guys may be too fast and strong for you to handle" Kouta advised but Mana shook her head and stepped forward between the two teammates.

"I got you into this mess. We're already overmatched and we don't have the luxury to have people sitting this out" she admitted.

The pirates began a mad rush onwards, faster than a greased lightning bolt, Meiko and Kouta blocked the first strikes, doing their best to defend against the flood of fists, boots and blades coming their way. Each single thug pirate was capable by their own, each one would've been able to beat down an unexperienced ninja who just dabbled at chakra augmentation.

An unexpected uppercut Meiko couldn't even see opened her defenses up and a rushing in pirate hit her with an elbow strike from the side while five others rushed at her punching and kicking the blacksmith wildly and while Meiko was definitely feeling those hits she didn't go down. The redhead pushed her feet back and tried regaining some footing and pushing the offensive back but it was just too intense. Each single pirate hit with the force needed to blow up a large mountain and each of them moved at least a couple of times faster than a strike of lightning. Their strengths and speeds weren't the same, some hit harder, some moved faster and some attacked slower and weaker but this many opponents of this level pushed Meiko back too hard. A barrage of knife slashes with some bouncing off her armor and some leaving shallow gashes sent Meiko on her knees and a direct strike sent her down.

The blacksmith pushed her body off letting her augmentations burn as wildly as they could, Meiko knew she was pushed beyond her limits and had moments before burning out but she did her best to keep up. Right as she was beaten down the girl flipped back and on her feet only to receive another beatdown, sometimes tagging one or more pirates, sometimes even sending one or two down for good but the blacksmith fostered no false hopes of victory.

Kouta's legs shifted into jet boots and blasted off the ground, his fists shifted into giant fists that looked more like hammers than human fists which he used to punch madly at this one persistent pirate but the vulture of the seas just put up a daring block and withstood his assault. Two others leaped over their comrade and kicked Kouta in the chest cancelling his body morphs and sending him rolling back. The boy felt his chest crack even through his augments so while he was sent rolling through the waves he placed his palm against his cracked ribs and quickly patched them up as well as battlefield conditions let him.

Battlefield healing was dangerous and not generally advised, it could've done a sloppy enough job that surgery was required and could've left cracks of bones in one's system that needed to be removed. The usual Mystical Palm treatment usually disintegrated those wild bone pieces which was why it was superior in every way to the sloppy healing technique for beginners that Kouta used on himself.

Using his morphed jet feet Kouta quickly travelled the water surface he was sent piercing back through and rejoined his assailants in the whirlwind of battle. He used wide swings and kicks, pounded the ground with shots of his chakra cannons which let out wide arcing explosions that kept those scumbags away from his back but the medical ninja knew that he had little chance of surviving all those pirates constantly attacking him back. A single one of them would've made a moderate challenge to his abilities. When facing almost half of the crew at once he could only keep them away from overwhelming him and killing him fast. He prioritized avoiding the armed ones while quickly doing his best to patch up injuries that would've kept him down or held him back too much. This was a losing battle and everyone knew that.

Five pirates branched off of the group that fought Meiko and Kouta and dashed at Mana. The magician couldn't react to their impossible speed all at once, they surpassed her limit by a good couple of times. The first couple of strikes almost finished her off alone sending Mana down to the ground. The magician didn't see where she was attacked from or whom she was attacked by. These guys just blurred as they moved almost completely invisible.

"I can strike and move just a bit slower than lightning in battle… These guys have to be able to fight at least four times faster than my peak." Mana calculated their approximate speed. There was no use fighting back, there was no use using her physical chakra as it'd just burn her out faster, unless of course she could trick them into evening the odds for her. These men by now were fully aware how massively they overpowered Mana, they knew she was just the client to begin with so they didn't try too hard. A quick but shallow slash here and there, a quick and weak punch to her gut to drive the air out or to her lower legs to send her down and reduce what little defensive abilities she had.

"Enough toying around, just take her head and lets go aid the others" one of the pirates suggested ramming Mana to a tall and thick tree with his elbow. By that point the magician had no air in her chest already so her vision was instantly getting blurry and she felt blacking out not too far in the distance.

"Now…" she ordered herself exploding with all the physical chakra she had at once. At the moment when her opponents guard was at its lowest Mana decided to just go wild with her full one hundred and then see what the future held. Mana's thrust palms slammed wildly into the pirate's ribs at the moment when the pirate was commanding his body to hold his strength back. Usually the body instinctually augmented one's abilities to protect their life but such was not the case when the opposite was the intention and the order. With a crushed chest the man collapsed with whited out eyes after throwing out some blood.

The remaining four attacked Mana with their abilities amped up. Now that the speed of her opponents surpassed her only four times instead of the immeasurable difference there was between them before she was able to use the combined style of evasion and redirection to her aid. Gentle taps to redirect the strike of one pirate to their comrade. Acrobatic rolls and flips, tapping their opponent's open weak points just like she was taught in the Sun Disc arena.

Mana gripped her burning chest and coughed out some blood as her physical chakra augmentations ended prematurely. Her body was breaking down because she was unreasonably pushing it again. The magician collapsed on her knees, she was short of air, injured and her vision was fading, her head was getting dizzy. Luckily enough her opponents collapsed, one with a stab wound in his gut left by his own comrade, the other one with a twisted leg that he unsuspectingly placed so much weight on that it turned off his consciousness with sheer unrelenting pain. The third and fourth ones had their faces busted and their noses broken and decided to tactically retreat. Mana played it smart, played it as skillfully as she could but she broke past her limits long ago. Her subconscious was right, she was dumb and reckless…

Farther away Shimo did his best to keep up with Read's wild swings. He had little downtime to as much as weave a hand seal, the pirate's technique and moveset was well put-together. She didn't give him many chances to catch his breath, always wildly attacking and always on his back. Augmenting his speed more than it was smart to Shimo dashed back and sheathed his blade taking a wild leap of faith onwards to his opponent preparing to draw his blade at the last second.

Read's style was an all-out offensive one. She had two sabers both of which she used to press on advantage which left many openings but while close in and overwhelmed with her offensive Shimo had few chances to exploit it. Using his Audra blade made a fat lot of nothing – Read's blade was coated with chakra imbuements and glew as if it was magically enchanted. Such blades would've cut through common steel and lesser chakra augmentations like paper and Shimo imagined his own sword would've broken soon enough if he tried to block all of her endless attack strings.

"White Wolf Slash!" Shimo roared out attempting to strike at an opening he spotted at Read's lower body as she made a wild diagonal strike aiming at his shoulders. It would've made no sense to attack him that way, she must've been less skilled than the Yuki gave her credit for. Drawing techniques were simply faster than simple naked blade slashes. He had the green light, he had the advantage, he could've won this fight quickly and went in to aid his friends! Even if Flint's intervention plan failed, they could still win!

Shimo's attack stopped in mid-air right at Read's face and the young man's face changed into an expression of surprise and pain. A roaring headache matching the pain coming from his chest soon joined Shimo's list of problems. The Yuki looked down with his slowly fading out trembling eyes and saw two smaller sabers piercing his body from Read's sides. That blasted sister of hers…

Read's diagonal slash reached its goal and opened a wide X shaped gash on Shimo's chest. Bonny's small and frail arms resheathed the two extra sabers she wielded and clapped. The way in which the little sister wielded those sabers like daggers, holding them backwards made it seem like Read had four arms. Truthfully it was two separate bodies fighting with two separate minds – a real nightmare for any swordsman to face. With an angry unintelligible grunt Bonny slipped the captain's coat down and giggled like a little child as sunlight danced across her cheeks.

"What a newbie mistake…" Read grinned to herself.

A loud clang with immense force made the woman bend on forward – she was attacked from the back but luckily enough Bonny's deceitfully fast frail arms managed to pull the extra set of swords and block the attack. Further away by the edge of the shore laid an unconscious pirate dreaming in a Sharingan induced genjutsu while Hachiro Uchiha joined in on the offensive after shamefully being left in the ship all by himself. A polished puppet arm was present in the place of the one he had lost before, one found on the pirate ship likely indicating that the man intended to need both arms for this scuffle.

Bonny's clenching blades cut through the simply uncoated blade like scissors through a lean twig but Hachiro was long since gone. As two pairs broke off of the pirate groups beating down Kouta and Meiko and went on to finish off slowly losing her consciousness Mana, Hachiro butt right in and jumped in front of the four. With a single flare of his crimson Sharingan the man sent the pirates down after placing them in a powerful illusion of being impaled with large stakes.

"You're so foolish to ignore the danger of fighting these men in your state… Didn't you know attacks of people stronger than you can kill you?" Hachiro asked in a sarcastic tone.

Mana did her best to smile but the burning muscle pain and bone fractures she had kept her from doing so. The girl just looked up at the man who decided to butt into their business despite wishing nothing more but to get to Archipelago, a collection of islands under Kirigakure's control thousands of kilometers away. A rogue ninja stepping out of their path to do something so selfless… It was not a bad sight to die seeing. Mana just hoped that she wouldn't die of injuries so close to the pyramid that had the Box she sought to find for so long.

"I must've skipped that one…" Mana replied playing down her injuries and fatigue.

"Sit tight, I'll free the hands of the medical ninja so he can help you and Shimo, we'll need everyone to take on Read and Bonny" the man carelessly explained.

"But… Why?" Mana asked as one passing question before Hachiro began doing what he did.

"Because you were nice to me and helped me out, also if they kill you they'll take all the shards and my sword. I can deal with Shimo wielding it but some lowlife pirate is a bit too much for me to worry about" Hachiro gave her a small rise of his cheekbone that reminded of a smile.

"Right… The whole world's a danger" Mana smiled. A Pirate Lord having all those Audra shards in their possession must've threatened the peaceful life Hachiro imagined in the Archipelago. There may have been some selfish and fear triggered motives in the man's action but at the very least he had some care for their lives. Selfless acts like that was the source of Mana's strength, it was why she stood up to do what had to be done despite her injuries.


	207. Shabby Steel

Damp and silent raindrops just barely ticked as they were falling and being absorbed by a raggedy cloth hood covering the shoulders of a large man who was wandering the rocky streets of the port town during a downpour. For a second the man's large cape topped off with a face covering shady hood split by his body after the cape was blown back by a strong gust of ocean winds, the gusts brought with them a sour smell of salt and blood. For a brief moment that the man's muscular arms were revealed a white tie with messy red dried out blood stains could've been seen tied around one of them.

The man walked alone, he had a company of a dead young woman before yet he submitted the cadaver to his home village instead of giving it to the bounty hunters that paid much better. The Hokage was quite thankful for the contribution and apparently the dead body he carried on his shoulders at that moment was immensely valuable. The DNA of that woman must've had some really weird strains or something, she was a freak of her clan and the dead bodies of those mutated freaks were always priceless. The man's muddy reputation was almost redeemed and with his request he was reinstated to his previously held yet suspended rank and given another mission – to retrieve his son and bring him back to the village.

Apparently after a long while the village was becoming a little curious as to what happened to the team sent after the Box of Ultimate Bliss. The last report that reached the village expressed interest in seeing an artist in Otogakure in order to decipher some strange clues the team had picked up. That could've been several weeks ago and to a ninja moving at a careful but elevated pace it would've taken much less to travel a quarter of the world. The Administration suspected that the team may have continued their mission as mentioned in the report after the clues have been deciphered. There were some that feared the young teens going rogue on the village… The hooded man accepted this low ranking mission but not because he did low ranking jobs like that, not even because the mission target was his son. It was because he had another hidden agenda.

The hooded man walked up to a merchant selling fish by a lowly inn. He moved his hood up a little so that his mouth and some of his face could be seen if the man preferred lip reading to auditory speech recognition.

"Have you seen an Uchiha, preferably with the Mangekyou set of eyes. Last time I saw him he had just one working eye" the man asked but the old man just scratched his head.

The words "Mangekyou Sharingan" would've said nothing to a lowly fish merchant, they may have sounded funny, as if some myth or a legend to others. To those that knew what it was it may have invited excitement or a sip of respectable fear. It was a set of eyes unseen for quite some time, someone using those demonic abilities from those accursed eyes would've stood out like a sore thumb.

"Mange-what now?" the old man giggled, "I just sell some fish, want some trout maybe? Don't tell me, you look like a salmon kinda guy to me" the man chuckled again. His manner of speech and gesticulation suggested low intellectual capacity.

The hooded man's arm shot like a viper through the air, moving almost instantly. Fractions of a moment itself, if given a set of eyes and a soul wouldn't have been able to track the man's movements. After gripping firmly at the man's collar the hooded man picked the small elder up and pulled him up closer, to an eye-to-eye level but the murky skies and dark rain clouds helped the mystery man's hood form a shadow around his eyes.

"Think hard, old man, did you see a man with red demonic eyes teleporting around. He may have had just one eye, maybe carrying his dead sister around… Think hard and answer truthfully" the mystery man grunted out angrily, he almost roared the words out right into the petrified elder's face.

A collection of loud thuds and whizzing blades interrupted the conversation, or rather interrogation, as a barrage of small knives bounced right off the mystery man's back and head as if the man's skin was made of impenetrable armor alloy. Truthfully he was merely immensely tough, but a man of flesh and bone like any other.

"Fuck off, pirate scum!" some drunkard yelled out pointing a defective kunai dispenser at the towering mystery man who slowly let the old man go, letting him fall down onto the damp and muddy ground, shaking in fear.

"Even if I was a pirate, you'd not scare me with an unimbued metal trash like this" the hooded man's lower face showed teeth – he was grinning sadistically, slowly walking towards the drunk fool who took him for a pirate and opened fire. Likely a weapon snagged from a lowly pirate anyways. Anyone with a sense of irony would've found a pirate hating town fighting pirates off with snagged from pirates weaponry a tad bit hypocritical.

"What? Get away!" the drunk shook in his boots letting the defective weapon drop from his hands only for the hooded man to pick it up and crush it into pieces in his single hand.

"Let me teach you a thing or two about weapons, idiot, if you want to hurt someone with a stupid blade firing machine like this, you need to make sure the blades are artificially coated with chakra by a blacksmith or do it yourself. Otherwise it's only good for scaring children" the man winded up his fist for a finishing blow that'd without a doubt have blown off the drunkard's head off.

"Wait! Wait! Mr. Hood!" the fishmonger screamed out in panic. "I remember now! There was this red-eyed man, he fought a bunch of kids from Konoha looking for a ship that'd take them to the Tako's Reach. They took off in a large ship heading towards the center of Tako's Reach! He had two eyes though, I'm not sure if it's the same man you are looking for" the old man shouted out, after being told everything he wanted to know the hooded man's grip loosened letting the drunkard slip from his grasp and fall onto his butt. After being saved from a most gruesome end the fool only crawled away to fall asleep in an alley somewhere.

"I see… Well then…" the hooded man appeared to grow on sight, then his feet emerged from under his coat deformed and almost wooden in texture appearing like some sort of jet boots. Lightly and gracefully the man took off with a backflip off the platform under which was only the shallow sea and the jet cannons on the man's feet fired weak beams of chakra that propelled him like an ocean piercing arrow, booming so loudly and flying off into the horizon so fast that every house rich enough to have windows had them broken. Just like every pint, glass and bottle of beer in the entire port town exploded from the booming sound pressure of the hooded man.

Hachiro angrily squinted at the pirates that for a moment stopped beating down on the young teens. The Uchiha's goal was to save the medical ninja first before he got beaten to death. It certainly looked like the young teens were already halfway done in. Shimo looked almost lifeless in his accumulating pool of blood, stabbed by two slightly curved swords because he was so reckless. So defiant and not like his sensei at all. There was a reason why Hachiro feared everything unless completely cornered… It was so that mistakes like those of that defiant little brat weren't made.

The Uchiha's body blurred as he rushed onward at the five still standing pirates beating down on the medical boy. As expected his wide lightning fast swings were blocked. The cowardly swordsman was seeing the cracks on the shitty pirate sword he snagged already with his naked eye. A thrust from an ignorant but having more power than he knew what to do with pirate tried to pierce his flaring red eyes. Hachiro's figure disappeared leaving not a single dust to be felt from his previous existence, instead appearing right behind the aggressive pirate and slamming his blade into the back of the pirate's head with the blunt back of it. The impact was so shockingly loud and powerful that the sword outright exploded into shatters. Shoddy steel indeed…

The pirate who was slammed by this overwhelming force only stumbled forward, his eyes were completely whited out but these men could've been hit by the Moon falling on their heads and they'd still have stood their ground. Hachiro weaved a hand seal and his own baby appeared in his arms.

"Partial Substitution Technique" he uttered replacing the shattered blade handle in his hands with the Audra blade that Shimo wielded before he was cut down, hopefully not lethally. The Yuki had no use for it at the moment anyways. Just like the Substitution Jutsu replaced a ninja with an object instantly, the Partial Substitution Jutsu replaced any object of theirs with that of another.

Drawing the sword in an instant in a wide reaching motion Hachiro attempted to cut down as many as he could, his movements fast enough to confuse and disorient even these speedsters capable of outracing greased lightning bolts. All of the pirates lifted off the ground leaping into the air. The crew flew up so high that it would've been difficult to see them from the ground floor. The ears of the cowardly swordsman picked up a ceaseless tirade of booming sounds – the sounds of kunai dispensers firing off fist sized capsules filled with makibishi spikes that exploded upon impact.

Hachiro's Sharingan could've screamed in excitement of being able to show off his handiwork, calculating the exact trajectory of each capsule, letting him see each and every one of them flying down at him at about 500 m/s. It only brought a smile at the cowardly man's face as his sword was resheathed lightning fast and a barrage of kunai followed the capsules detonating them early and making the spikes rain and scatter harmlessly in the water and the sands being washed away and into the depths of the ocean. Now the Uchiha wished to do something about the descending pirates.

After a chain of hand seals Hachiro lifted his arms up to his mouth and breathed out hard through a gap between his fingers that made the final hand seal.

"Fire Style: Rising Dragon Flame!" he shouted out as his lungs blew out hot chakra infused air which ignited and shaped into a spiraling roaring dragon swallowing the pirates and letting their smoky and singed up yet only unconscious bodies slam into the ground like ragdolls dropped from the heavens. Hachiro held back the intensity of his flames. He had no need or wish to kill these men, there was a very specific reason for that – the girl he did this all for, the young magician girl.

The pirates beating down on Meiko kicked the girl's bloody and bruised but still conscious and still fighting back body aside and began shouting at Hachiro but jumping around like barking dogs, hesitant to move onwards and attack him.

"Heal yourself, heal the Mana, heal the blacksmith, heal my stupid student" Hachiro ordered Kouta in a voice without tremble or hesitation, this wasn't the voice that the Uchiha wore usually. It was a voice of a man who controlled the situation, a man who chose to involve himself to save the crew he cared about.

Kouta and Hachiro lunged forward at the same time. As Hachiro's sword once again left his sheathe the medical ninja darted off aside and gracefully flipped around his pirate opponents only to pick up Meiko and move her aside. The medical ninja then began looking for an opportunity to pick up Shimo who was laying unconscious and slowly bleeding out right in front of the pirate captain who just observed the situation – she didn't look like she'd let the Yuki be moved however…

Hachiro fought off all the knife and scimitar wielding pirates at once. He was like a raging lion of battle. His blocks and dodges came through moderate effort and it was not an easy clash for him but he persevered! The Uchiha kicked one of his pirate opponents in the groin after blocking all of the initial attacks and rolled over his shoulder driving the back of his sword into the unfortunate fellow's back. The other pirates attempted a counter attack to stop Hachiro's further rampage but they all were treated to a slam from the side of his Audra blade that knocked most of their teeth out – a blindingly fast wide arcing swing.

Now that the other pirates were dazed and stumbling about Hachiro closed his eyes to concentrate for a moment – after his eyes opened his Sharingan issued a warning as the time dilated around him. The warning almost burnt his nerve endings in pain – the medic was rushing at captain Read trying to move Shimo's bleeding and unconscious body out of her reach and into where he could be healed. Hachiro leaped at the woman to give her something to work with, his sword clashed with the two of hers but then her blades blurred – the four sabers dancing in symphony, dropping wild swings and X shaped slashes, attacking high and low at the same time. Hachiro felt a warm splash of his own blood cover his face.

"Why don't you put them under a genjutsu!?" Kouta shouted out before a kick from Read sent him tumbling back, at least the attack gave Hachiro some time to dash back and examine his own wound.

"My eyes are not Mangekyou Sharingan, I've placed just about the limit of people I can place into an illusion, if I placed any more the ones I've placed in it before would be released. In addition Read's mind has a sense of duality to it. She and her sister share aspects of their bodies so one could issue her chakra to the other breaking the sister out of it" Hachiro grunted seeing the pirates slowly recovering. Read and the pirates all lunged at him at the same time. There could've been no helping it!

"Body Flicker Jutsu!" Hachiro roared out through pain as his body became energized by an overflow of chakra sending him to Shimo, grabbing him and then back to his initial place before grabbing Kouta and moving him to Mana in just about exactly an instant. Body Flicker was an instantaneous movement technique, it consumed a great deal of chakra and Hachiro may have mastered its intricacies but not the control of its chakra demands. Still, in that situation it was needed.

"Coward! Come on and face us!" Captain Read shouted out swinging her blades about just as Bonny did the same. That troublesome sister of Read's was so immensely flexible, capable of dislocating her joints and snapping her arms backwards to defend Read's front or defend the pirate captain from the back in her normal state.

"I intend to…" Hachiro took a small moment to regain his breath after the taxing use of Body Flicker. He felt completely drained and he must've admitted that he'd need the brats' help if he was to survive this encounter as was his full intention. Hachiro's body flashed in a black and brown blur dashing straight at the still standing pirates but careful enough not to get within Read's reach. He was still faster than the woman even if he was two limbs short from being able to sustain a swordfight with her. The smart thing to do would've been to pick off the small fries first.

Kouta's hands touched Mana's shoulder and tried to gently force her to lie down. Mana shook her head and pointed at Shimo who was bleeding profusely.

"Please…" she begged her friend to prioritize the more severe and much more useful to the team's strength comrade.

"No way! I'm gonna be your boyfriend, remember? Plus cow… I mean Hachiro was incredibly precise about me treating you first" Kouta began to argue.

"I'm just gonna lay down here and bleed while you argue… No pressure…" Meiko butt into the conversation, she was right – arguing only postponed Kouta's stressful duty to see to it that everyone makes it.

"I'm weak… I can't help you beat anyone now that I've nearly broken my chakra network again, Shimo can. Come on!" Mana begged Kouta who just closed his eyes and sighed placing his hands onto Shimo's chest.

"And here I thought you two were at each other's throats…" he sarcastically added.

Further away Hachiro shouted out in pain as the two pirates rammed his ribs with a powerful coordinated shoulder tackle sending him flying through a bunch of trees opening up an entrance to the jungle leading to the pyramid containing the illustrious Box of Ultimate Bliss. The man grunted in pain and spat out some blood from his mouth.

"Trees can leave splinters in my skin, those can get infectious and then I'm looking at gangrene or even death! You bastards! I'll kill you!" he shouted in his familiar cowardly and paranoid manner. The pirates began the assault together with their captain teaming up on Hachiro just like any smart team would've. The Uchiha's eyes worked overtime, fists and blades were everywhere moving at flashy speeds, the man bent his body in ways that it wasn't supposed to bend, swung his sword around doing his best to block as many attacks as he could.

Pain, sparks of pain followed by warm splashes of blood running down the hit spots. A strong combination of kicks and strikes from a pair of lowlife pirates sent him through another bunch of trees backwards. Read leaped in kicking him through yet another tree and slashing wildly at Hachiro's body, the dazed Uchiha could barely lift his sword up in time, his body was taxed by the Body Flicker and his head was all stingy from being punched and kicked so many times and bashed through ancient tougher than rock trees.

Luckily enough with a sly slide Hachiro managed to dodge the final decapitating scissor swipe and knock Read on her voluptuous bottom. With a quick dash through the confused pirates, fighting off the pain and the screaming head Hachiro pushed his leg onwards to repurpose his force and backflip with a slash at the closest pirate to him. The man screamed like a pig as the Audra steel left a gashing mark on his face, chest and belly. The Uchiha did his best to follow up his attacks but they were then all blocked. Luckily enough a small tunnel of downed trees let him avoid getting surrounded and made fighting his way back to the beach a little easier.

The clangs from all the blades and thuds from their knees and kicks clashing became bothersome and taxing for the cowardly swordsman's ears. He felt the soft beach sand beneath his feet again, taking no luxury to check on Kouta's healing process. It was highly unlikely he'd get any help from the kids for a while the way it was going.

Hachiro's hands went through hand seals slamming his hands together he breathed in deep and spat out a large collection of water just at the same time as he flung a flock of shuriken at the pirates. His body was screaming and he was pushing himself like never before for this magician girl but he had no choice. She couldn't die, if she was to die THAT man would be severely infuriated and then there'd be no place on Earth or the Moon that'd hide Hachiro from him after the madman found out that Hachiro was there and didn't stop it. Mana assumed that the Uchiha was a selfless brave hero… Truth be told the red-eyed rogue was just looking out for the world and more importantly – himself. As long as the two were travelling together the young lady had to be peachy and happy, that was in madman's best interests and that meant in Hachiro's interests as well.

"Water Style: Avalon's Kiss!" the man shouted out as the chakra infused water from his lungs and mouth expanded absorbing the humidity from the air and surrounded the shuriken with mass of watery liquid. The pirates covered up themselves to defend against the upcoming barrage and got their bodies and faces full of shuriken covered with water that blunted but strengthened the hits walloping at their stamina and endurance augmentations. Most of them tried to block using their blades which shattered them instantly due to the fact that simple shoddy swords weren't meant to compare themselves to ninjutsu. Disarming those men was his intention. Read herself stayed behind her puppets and avoided any damage, pity.

Hachiro cursed, these lowlife pirates were tough, even after all the punishment they were put through – the fight that the blacksmith girl had in her, the multiple attacks from Hachiro himself and now this… They still stood on their feet ready to come at him. They were fazed, injured and staggering, on their last feet but still willing to go. What trouble fearing for his own life got him into this time!?


	208. Survive!

Kouta wiped the sweat off his face. Judging from his calm and satisfied expression and a relieving sigh he managed to stabilize Shimo's condition. Mana had hoped that the Yuki would just pop back on his feet the moment he was healed but that didn't appear to be the case. The swordsman remained downed however his face changed acquiring certain tranquility and peace as if the young man was just catching up on his iffy sleeping schedule.

The magician thought to herself that if Kouta didn't immediately switch the healing targets he must've spent a lot of effort to heal Shimo. Mana looked at Meiko who had loads of bleeding injuries, swollen beatings and bruises. She may have given those pirates one hell of a fight but she came out of it on the pyrrhic side. Whatever small victories the blacksmith had earned couldn't have been worth the beating she took. The redhead needed attention but not as urgently as Shimo needed it.

Kouta realized Mana was staring at her friend and rolled back on his butt beginning to patch Meiko up, instead of using medical ninjutsu the young medical ninja used bandages, compresses and patches soaked with herbal ailments. That told all that Mana needed to know about how badly Shimo was hurt, Kouta may have improved during this trip by leaps and bounds compared to the shy boy who could barely treat a cut in an acceptable timeframe but he was still no miracle worker. No. He actually was, it was just that Mana's definition of a miracle may have been stretched out to the limits.

"I'll get to you soon, Mana… Just hold on… Do those injuries hurt?" he huffed out.

Mana looked at Shimo, the knocked out lifelong friend of hers with that horrendous X shaped scar on his chest stretching out from his shoulders to the hips. Kouta must've not even bothered with the aesthetic aspects, medical ninja could've patched scars up to where they were barely even seen by an untrained eye but it was unnecessary hassle in the middle of a battlefield. The young man must've prioritized the internal injuries, the lacerations on Shimo's organs and the big blood vessels. Containing the bleeding must've been a handful all by itself.

The magician's sight wandered to Meiko who looked like an angered war orphan who just barely made out in time from a city siege. Her face was halfway bandaged, bits and pieces of her armor and her tracksuit cut, torn to pieces and mixed with mud and bashed. The redhead looked like a mess who was torn out of an actual war. Then again, looking at the ruined beach and the broken into jungle scenery it looked like the blacksmith had brought some of the war to the pirates as well.

Finally Mana's sight met Kouta's tired and hazy eyes. The girl realized the severity of the situation – Shimo alone drained his chakra pool more than the boy had dared to admit and there was no way that the two of them would get treated properly. That meant the worst outcome – Shimo won't be able to rejoin the battle because of his still incapacitated state, Kouta was too worn by his duties as a medical ninja to fulfil those of a capable fighter and Meiko was just barely sewn and patched together to keep her from dying. A rough bump could've reopened all of those wounds. The team was done with the battling or at least so it seemed…

Mana picked herself up on her feet and extended her hand to Shimo. "Give me a needle and some of your medical string, a couple of bandages and patches…" she asked him firmly, she tried to sound strong but the pain must've made it evident that Mana was both afraid and in pain.

"You can't be thinking of fighting?" Kouta just barely breathed out, judging from his voice he had just ran around the world a couple of times.

"I'm thinking of doing what we came here to do – I'm going to use the Box. Hachiro-san needs our help, he won't win alone" Mana concluded giving the fighting Uchiha a small glance to reassure her statement to herself before she made any brash decisions.

"You know…" Kouta said quietly as he removed the requested items from his bag and handed them one by one to Mana who just gulped imagining the process of quick self-patching that was still ahead. "I think there may have been a reason why Hachiro-san asked me to heal you first. I don't think he intended the rest of us to make it. He probably doesn't intend himself to make it…" Kouta uttered much to Mana's surprise.

She gripped the handed items and stuffed them down into her redundant pouch, emptying all of her cards onto the floor. She wasn't fighting an opponent that could've been scared by some sharp card tricks so there was no use of them.

"Don't belittle Hachiro-san's sacrifice…" Mana replied turning away and slowly making her way towards the forest. She hoped that all the fighting would help her move unnoticed, her chakra level was reduced to that of a normal civilian and she was stumbling to the jungle very slowly. Just maybe with a little luck she could've pulled it through… Just before she moved far away that her normal voice could barely be picked up by Kouta she turned back to him and Meiko and smiled to them.

"Don't die and make me use the Box to bring you back…" she joked, still, if matters came down to that she'd have sacrificed her life as a ninja and her chakra control for the lives of her friend without hesitating. It'd draw unfortunate tears for sure, it'd cause so much pain for her but it wouldn't be a blaming game, it'd be the natural pain of misfortune. That sad and completely insufferable regret of a situation that just couldn't have been helped.

The magician looked at the cut on her side, it was by far the most painful wound she had sustained in the brawl with the pirates that was more a torture where she just lucked out than an actual fight. Slowly while in mid stumble Mana pressed the needle against her skin, she couldn't patch using chakra like the medical ninja, she had to use the ancient stitching method on herself just to restrain the bleeding and the troubling pain in her side. There were countless of smaller wounds but that needed to be taken care of first.

Mana bashed her head and back against a strong bamboo tree and screamed out in the air as the pain finally hit her. It was something that completely kicked the chair out from under her promise to herself not to raise noise, it was something that completely busted the knees of her wish to keep walking. There was only the pain, that selfish lonely child that demanded all of the attention.

"Where do you think you're going!?" Mana heard a loud exclamation from one of the pirates. She couldn't recognize which one it was, a tall and quite well-built one wielding a small but well put-together blade. It was fancier than a battle use knife, similar to the short swords used by some ninja but even shorter than that. It must've been used for torture just as efficiently as it could've been used for opening up arteries and bleeding the enemy out in moments.

Mana relaxed letting her body slump on the ground just barely making the pirate miss with his thrust. They still took her for a weakling civilian and played around with her, then again, this guy looked like he had taken a couple of hits as well and couldn't have been in his full capacity. If she had her physical chakra use she'd have possibly been able to give this guy a fair fight but now she was just a pig at a slaughterhouse.

The man's body flared up for a moment, usually chakra augmentation was almost invisible unless used on momentous levels of augmentation where one intended to move mountains. Also it flared up like that when it was used unskillfully, that was more likely the case, possibly the pirate was taught not by a qualified sensei in an Academy but another pirate. A loud clang made Mana open her eyes and realize that she wasn't dead. A swift thrust of Hachiro's palm smashed the man's face into a tree breaking it down and then slamming it into the ground so hard that the magician felt her body lift off the ground from the quake. The rumbling sounds of trees falling in the distance made the girl realize just in what world of power this fight was. A world she was forced to leave behind…

"The kid didn't heal you!?" Hachiro angrily asked placing himself in between Mana and the upcoming rushing pirates, the few that remained.

"I asked him to heal Shimo first. He'd have died if Kouta didn't heal him first" Mana told him. Hachiro grinded his teeth withstanding a scimitar slash opening up a wound on his chest. She stumbled back witnessing the pirates surrounding the aged rogue and starting to just kick him and beat the man around, completely oblivious to Mana who was laying on the ground nearby. The pirates flashed around, whizzing by Mana's ears leaving downed trees, blood trails and destruction in their wake. Some of Hachiro's blood fell on Mana, even on her face.

"Fuck all of you!" Hachiro screamed swinging his sword in a wide circular arc and sending all of the pirates off of him bashing through trees. The battle was well into the jungle again. Causing untold destruction and sadness to a place that appeared to be completely untouched by man before.

"Run! Survive! Whatever you do, just survive!" the Uchiha yelled looking Mana straight in the eyes with those bloodshot crazy Sharingan eyes of his. The man's hands flashed through hand seals finishing the chain of seals with the clone hand sign.

"Water Clone Jutsu!" he chanted out erecting two identical copies of himself that stood close to him. The three attacked the remaining pirates together at once, finally somewhat evening the odds but by the cost of further chipping away at Hachiro's already worn out chakra reserves.

The water clones were strong, each water clone made by the Water Clone Jutsu carried about one tenth of the original's strength, speed and endurance. They could only augment their bodies to the equivalent of the chakra pool granted to them by the user of the technique. Judging from the beatdown each clone delivered to their pirate of choice it was considerable. Hachiro must've decided to win this battle but give up trying to win the whole war with Read. He was too injured and far too worn out to beat her clean anyways.

Mana escaped dragging her pathetic body through the tangled rising roots of the gigantic trees that made this jungle. The jungle that lead up to the pyramid in the distance, the pyramid where the Box of Ultimate Bliss was. She could hear the noises of Hachiro's grunts and water splashing sounds, the clones mustn't have lasted long. It made sense. Read alone could've dispatched of someone like that in an instant, it was just barely enough over the edge to kick those lowly pirates around.

It was all her fault, she did all of this! She doomed her team to fight a battle they couldn't have won when it was clear that Flint won't be arriving to occupy Read's attention in time. She caused both the next Pirate War and the death of her team. Mana wasn't sure what entity she spoke with inside of her own body back when she was dying but it was wrong. She did make everything worse just by existing, just by trying to protect as many people as she could she doomed everyone. She directly caused pain and death by trying to avoid pain and death of other people. It'll all be hopeless, the sacrifice of Hachiro and her friends will be hopeless unless Mana uses the Box. The last thing she could've done right was to ensure that a wishing device didn't fall in the Read's hands, or those of Flint, if the Pirate Lord or any of his sent captains arrived later.

"I have no right to ask for my chakra… I need to use the Box to fix all of this" Mana realized. Horror and regret began seeping in her heart but she knew firmly what had to be done. She knew that she had to undo what she had done… Otherwise her chakra won't mean a thing, she'd never redeem for the horrors she'd caused here that day. The greatest thing she could've hoped for was to grant her friends another chance to not get involved with Mana. To not suffer and die needlessly because of her mistakes.

Only then did the magician note Hachiro's final words to her – he was solely interested in her survival. It was just like that time in Read's ship when she spoke to him about the madman. Whoever that madman was he wished Mana alive, but who was that man, who could he have been? What sort of man instilled such fear that the people knowing him obeyed his wishes even when this madman was nowhere to be seen or heard of? Then Hachiro was acting out of the interest towards his own well-being and there was no sacred story of redemption and desire to help… She changed nothing, her nice attitude towards the man changed nothing about him. He was still just being paranoid over his own life choosing death in the hands of some pirates over dying in the hands of that man he dreaded so much.

As Mana treaded further and further into the jungle Hachiro continued to fight off the remaining barely standing pirates and Read. Giving them enough of his own personal hell to keep them occupied and their thoughts focused on him so that Mana and her agenda completely faded from their attention.

"Just survive kid, don't make it worse on all of us…" he mumbled under his own nose.

The rogue screamed in pain as he felt a thundering flash of pain hit his back, a familiar sensation of being slashed deeply. As Hachiro fell his senses numbed down, he saw the tree he was sticking onto the side of falling by him and a pirate rushing after him. The Uchiha regained his composure and blocked the follow up strike intending to finish him. His body as well as the body of his attacker clashed, sonic booms exploded all around the general vicinity downing more and more trees as the two clashed again and again in the air before both of them reached the ground. They clashed tens, hundreds and even approaching a thousand times in a single collision of their booming flashes. This was a whole different level of swordsmanship and the Uchiha had to hand it to these pirate scum – he was impressed a single small-time soldier could sneak up on him from the back as well as take what he had to throw like that.

"My thoughts are too occupied with that girl and my own survival, with that man… I need to be here and now!" the rogue realized before his body flashed in blinding speed even to the speedster pirates opening up an immensely deep gash on the airborne pirate's side so large that it almost split the man in two completely. Only a brief string of flesh held the cut down pirate together as the body hit the jungle floor.

The Uchiha's assaults did not cease, he went after the two last remaining pirates. A wide gash opened up on the body of a chubby powerhouse pirate soldier, all the way from the man's shoulder to his hip splitting the man almost in two just like his comrade before him. Now that Hachiro was serious and focused, now that he was holding nothing back, fostering no false hopes of keeping strength for the final battle with Read, knowing full well he'd not beat her he was golden.

The third pirate – the one Mana noticed before and nicknamed him "grandpa pirate" clashed successfully stopping Hachiro's momentum. The chubby elder slammed his shoulder against his blade pushing the rogue away from the clash. Both the beaten and bleeding old man as well as the approaching exhaustion Uchiha just huffed at each other preparing for the following strike but then the sharp command of Read's interrupted the brief notable clash of the two.

"Smith, return to the ship. Send a message for assistance, we've lost enough crew here!" the captain ordered stepping up close to her subordinate and gently tapping at his side with the blunt side of her sword and pushing the man further. Without hesitation the old man just nodded and bowed his upper body and clutching at his wounds began his painful stroll back to the ship.

The pirates used a seal message system, there were several different communication scrolls that upon being unsealed opened up and fired off an inky goo substance into the sky that formed a large symbol. That symbol was intelligible from at least the edges of each Pirate Lord's territory. Usually it wasn't too wise to use such symbols as they were trackable by both the ships of other Lords as well as the marine hunter ninja. Now Long Smith's only objective was to use it and call for any nearby allied captains to arrive to the scene of battle and aid the crew to navigate the ship to the nearest safe island or port town.

Hachiro stared at Captain Read and her sister in arms – Bonny. He wasted so much effort, so much chakra and spilled so much blood for a bunch of kids. The man looked at the multiple wounds he had sustained with a short glance down, his raggedy and dirty clothes were all covered in mud and blood. The Uchiha knew he could've cut the old chubby shorty down, his Sharingan noticed that the old man dislocated his shoulder with that last stunt of his. If pressed from that side he would've been open for a finishing strike.

And yet they were both lucky that Read called that conclusive fight off. After all – she needed men to sail her ship and Hachiro needed to conserve as much chakra as he could to give this woman enough trouble to mess up her day. The man thought back on seeing Mana's injured body wander into the jungle, that meant that his silly student was prioritized by the medical ninja. Maybe if he prolonged this battle as long as possible he'd be able to have his student join in and aid him. Hachiro was still not completely sure about the level of Read's skill but with Shimo's help they just could've pulled it through…

Read. Read was the final obstacle and a fine looking and even finer sword wielding obstacle she was…


	209. The Scared and the Betrayed

Mana sighed observing the path that supposedly lead to the pyramid. The patches and temporary medical aids she applied on herself held and allowed her to at the very least postpone dealing with the wounds sustained in that last squabble. Truth be told it was less a squabble than a torture session… Once she reached that pyramid and found the Box she had the option of regaining her strength, to once again be able to dream of changing the world.

Then again, was she confident enough in her full strength? Could she really be arrogant enough to believe that with her full strength and chakra control regained she'd be able to change anything? The much more surefire solution was to ask for the Box to solve the problem at hand: to move the pirates far away or to transport Mana and her team back home. It'd be a huge waste of time to just ask for the Box to return everyone home after the journey they went through to find it. Still, if it saved her friends it'd be worth it a thousand times over.

These final stretches of the jungle were tough. It couldn't have been more than a couple of kilometers away and yet Mana's troubled by her wounds pace slowed the rush to a turtle's pace. So many thick trees and bushes she had to walk around, so many rivers and suspicious looking lakes she decided to move around. Mana would be lucky to not get lost by the time she arrived… Then again the pyramid was so large that moving towards the island's depths would've automatically lead to it. The history buff within Mana wanted to see the pyramid from within, to explore it in depth and see the architecture and the brickwork. She may not have had time for that.

If only she could've scaled those trees and all those complicated entangled networks of branches and vines up in the upper layers of the jungle leading up to the ceiling of sharp and thick branches and endless clouds of leaves stuck together in a clamp. She'd reduce the travelling time to nothing. If only she was as fast as other ninja and wouldn't have torn up her chakra network again by using the physical chakra she'd make this dash in seconds…

Finally the clash between Hachiro and Read began. Both warriors lunged at each other ready to cut the other down. Bonny's frail legs and arms twitched creepily as they turned to the other side by the joint ready to assist her sister's defense. The two moved so incredibly fast, by the time the sand particles rose up from the air gusts blowing off each of the combatants the two had already concluded their mad dash towards this clash.

Neither of the two desired this battle, Hachiro fought because he needed for Mana to stay alive if the madman was to be kept on his leash of sanity, what little of it that he had. Up to now the mysterious figure was working behind the scenes, some kidnappings, some mysterious assassinations and thefts of scrolls from the countries he's been in. The only thing was clear, the only name the man mentioned to whomever he spoke to was that of Nakotsumi Mana of Konohagakure. Clearly this girl was important to that man somehow and Hachiro had to place his precious life on the line to keep the girl alive. Otherwise his escape to Archipelago would mean nothing…

Read on the other hand felt betrayed. She most definitely intended to strengthen l'Ollonais' military power with those Audra shards. There were few pirates that couldn't imbue their blades and kunai dispensers with chakra. However the ships could've used chakra armaments, made invincible to anything but the most concentrated chakra attacks. The cannonballs of Green's ships could've been made of the Audra alloy by melting those shards and making them penetrate any pathetic attempts to shield other ships. These shards meant her Lord's superiority in the oceans and she felt betrayed by these brats for them not following up to the end of their bargain. True, they were ninja after all, slimy assassins good for only their missions and silent murder. Still, even pirates didn't stink this foul.

The feelings of each swordsman translated into their movements. Hachiro aimed for no openings, he moved graciously and his Sharingan was pushed to the overtime keeping up with all four blades of Read and Bonny combined coming at him. By abandoning any false hopes of ever tagging the woman and realizing just how densely and masterfully her blades were imbued with chakra allowed Hachiro to stop relying on blocking and instead move aside and redirect the woman's blocks where he couldn't avoid them. Each one was flashing almost instantaneously all over the place leaving small patches of blood and deep craters in the sand from the shockwaves of their deflected strikes. Once in a while a bunch of trees finally caught up to the reality of being cut down moments ago and fell down rumbling in the distance.

Read's movements were fueled by her rage, by her sour taste of betrayal and deceit. Not only did these brats play her and her Pirate Lord for fools but they also dared to beat them back and strike down most of the woman's crew. The magician brat was right back then – if the two groups would've clashed back in the port town they'd have won, however they'd have won just having a bare minimum of able handed men. Certainly not enough to sail the seas. That was one disadvantage of Read compared to the children – she needed men, a significant majority of them and she couldn't have afforded to lose any of them and yet… Here it was. She let them play her, let the rage blind her so much that she let her men fall for her, abandon her in the moment of need. The worst part was it was her fault as a captain, she got played into letting her men fight these kids…

Hachiro's body blurred after it was cut in two, it was just a mere afterimage left by the man's swift movements where the man himself had leaped away. Rustling cloth sounds reached Read's ears too late, it was like the man's movements happened faster than the sound betrayed them happening. The Uchiha swept at the pirate captain's legs sending her down on the ground. Bonny screamed in rage since she had to relocate her arms back into the joints to defend Read from the back again which apparently needed a moment. The captain got sent tumbling down, Hachiro's arm slammed into the sand flipping his whole body to the side while his kick crushed into Read's chest and slammed her to the ground with his sideways kick.

Bonny's arms finally spent the moment they needed to relocate and tried swiping her sabers sideways at the Uchiha rogue but the swords only cut through a large stone which Hachiro used as substitution for his Substitution Jutsu. He had planned it all ahead, his Sharingan observed the movements of the little sister, those barely intelligent and more instinct based swordplay equivalent of unintelligible rambling and he created this short term plan of attack in a middle of a clash. That was the scary potential of the Uchiha clan, once widely regarded as the ninja elite but recently spoiled by their own strength. Rotten in the sauce of arrogance they laid in.

Hachiro spared no luxury of standing around, just as the unfortunate stone he used as replacement was cut in two cleanly he used the chance for a follow up attack. Bonny shook uncomfortably on Read's back, she readied her swords but the silly sister felt confused that her opponent would attack her head on – after all Bonny and Read demonstrated superiority in combining their minds and attacks into one symphony of bladework. Why would an inferior swordsman attack a superior one so blatantly?

In the middle of the rush Hachiro's speed slowed down to about the degree intelligible to a human eye and his hand weaved a handseal.

"Body Flicker Jutsu!" he chanted dashing past Bonny and instead kicking at Read. The pirate captain shouted out in pain as her body lifted off the ground from the force of the kick. Hachiro wanted to continue his onslaught but he noticed that his kick was blocked by the blunt sides of the swords crossed together to stop his leg. While Bonny's arms were still centered on Read's back the Uchiha gave a couple of deceptive and lightning fast taps with his blade looking to poke something fleshy and soft but his efforts were in vain – Read protected against them despite her offense concentrated style.

"I see… So that's why you're such a scaredy-cat?" Read grinned wiping her flaring red hair out of the way of her eyesight with a cocky grin.

Hachiro felt his muscles twitch in painful pinches – his Body Flicker technique never came very cheaply and it was best used for out of combat scenarios such as travelling, where one had plenty of time to rest up afterwards. Using it in a middle of a battle was possible but it needed some cooldown time and it also strained one's body, using it in rapid succession was even a greater strain. Maybe if the Uchiha trained more since his prime he'd have been able to sustain a swordsmanship style focused on Body Flicker, the way things were now jutsu like that were better left for the younger and better trained folks.

"Being worried about your life isn't something new, it's quite commendable really…" Hachiro flapped his mouth back in return, trying to catch some breath and some time before he can fight at his full after using that jutsu that Read was so generously giving him.

"Not like you… Not avoiding eating or drinking if it comes from someone else, not distrusting your own crew, not covering your own door with furniture while you're on the ship. By the way those doors opened to the outside…" Read continued to mock Hachiro's paranoid lifestyle.

"Well… You'd still need to push that cupboard away and step over the armchair even if you do pull the door open. Of course doing it myself when I had to take a leak was bothersome…" the man scratched his head before returning to a fighting stance.

"Those red eyes… You're an Uchiha. I've met some of your kind, killed some of the brash youngsters of your clan myself. Most of them are amazingly talented and that's their undoing. They get cocky, they begin believing like the whole world is just a play in which they're the main characters and like they have no limits. I know why you're so paranoid over "shit-goblins" and all that bullshit. It's to keep your own ego down. You constantly rate everything around you as a threat to your life so that you arrogance never does you in like it does most Uchiha. I'm right, am I not?" Read confidently laughed out before pushing her rampant ginger hair back over Bonny's face. Angrily beating around like an enraged forest spirit the young and frail sister kicked and beat around until she pushed the hair of her sister's off of her own face.

"Frankly, lady, I think you're crazy for underestimating shit-goblins…" Hachiro grinned before launching another attack. Read's blades pushed Hachiro's sword out of the way. The Uchiha prepared to deal with the two blades of the younger sister before realizing that Bonny held no swords. His knees and feet trying to kick at Bonny's wrists only hit empty air. Read's upfront stamping kick to Hachiro's chest sent the man tumbling backwards and sliding over the rocky and root filled jungle floor.

Suddenly Bonny's arms cocked backwards with that heart stopping cracking noise holding two kunai dispensers that opened a barrage of fire. Hachiro's blade spun around as the man thought he could easily deflect anything that these lazy tools tossed at him. A single bump that emanated through his wrist probably cracking it in the process sent the sword swinging back through the forest and into the jungle grounds.

"Chakra infused?" Hachiro wondered as a couple of kunai pierced his chest and sent him down onto the jungle floor. Trying to keep up his momentum and not to get caught up in the whole barrage of blade fire the Uchiha continued to move doing his best not to have his mind be absorbed by the burning pain in his chest and shoulders where a handful of kunai blades were lodged in deep.

Bonny giggled out loud, the younger sister appeared to not speak but emit grunting sounds and creepy laughter. She couldn't have had mental problems, she clearly thought on her own and abused the weaponry arsenal that Read had on her freely. The only ways to telepathically share thoughts were to be a Jinchuuriki and share thoughts with the Tailed Beast or to be of Yamanaka clan and possess the clan's hidden techniques. Read clearly was neither of those things. She also didn't relay any message for Bonny to switch up her style, the Sharingan would've picked it up… Bonny was thinking and acting by herself, quite intelligently one might have added. She noticed patterns and signature moves in Hachiro's style and went around it by switching up her own style and timing. These were moves of a very skilled and intelligent warrior.

Hachiro coughed out some blood and examined the blades stuck in his chest for a moment without removing them. The way they were stuck they let out a small handful of blood once in a while but if removed they could've really let the red juice loose. Hachiro needed some time and he would have had none if he let himself bleed out like that. These kunai blades launched off of the dispenser were also imbued with chakra separately, actively by Bonny or Read. That was why the Audra blade was launched out of his hands and why his chakra augmentations got completely torn up like cooking paper.

Read and Bonny lunged forward, Bonny unleashing a barrage of hellfire from her dispensers and Read desperately tried to lop Hachiro's head off with her wide swings and overwhelming offense. Hachiro's hands slammed together as he felt his very finite chakra resources dipping as another water clone rose from a small jungle river nearby rushing to his air. The clone got riddled with kunai blades but it had greater endurance than a simple shadow clone, it was once Read completely shredded it to pieces with her blurry blades slashing the poor thing into a liquid fillet that the water clone met its end but by that point Hachiro had retreated into the depths of the forest and drawn the blade out from where it was stuck in, ready to continue fighting back.

Hachiro took his blade and leaped up into the upper layers of the jungle. Running along the trees as he sheathed his blade and removed a kunai from his pouch, one of his hands ran by a combination of hand seals.

"Fire Style: Rooster Flare" he chanted out breathing out a small tongue of flames that enveloped the steel of the kunai leaving the handle untouched. The Uchiha pulled out his other kunai stuck in his body and pressed his body against the tree feeling blood squirting out from the wound and running down his body and down onto the tree he was on. The man pressed the heated blade against his injuries creating a molten chunk of flesh, similar to a pinkish colored molten cheese in consistency, that completely sealed the wound but would leave a pretty nasty scar that would've needed a high level medical ninja to remove.

A feeling of weightlessness caught Hachiro unprepared as he felt the tree beginning to tumble down – Read must've found the tree he was on by seeing the blood running down it. It was fortunate that the Uchiha did not count on the tree for anything else but providing a temporary sanctuary for him to seal his own wounds on. Hachiro's hands went through another collection of hand seals in mid-fall.

A strong sensation of burning pain interrupted his string of hand seals as the rogue felt a piercing pain in his shoulder – almost like hot glass driven under his flesh. Bonny's firing skills must've finally got to him… While Hachiro's fading consciousness looked to his side in mid-fall the man noticed that Bonny and Read switched weapons. Probably for the best having Bonny's crazy overgrown long hair in mind…

Hachiro slammed into the ground hard. The man felt his hair beneath his body get sticky from the pool of blood behind his shoulder wound. This kunai was so precisely and masterfully imbued with chakra that it went right through his body without getting stuck. The man picked himself up and began crawling a bit further away, he needed time, a bit more time so that he could gather his thoughts and make a plan for properly fighting this woman back. She was making him have his hands full…

Hachiro's eyes began to fade and his head started to feel dizzy. The man tore off a large chunk of his attire and hastily tied his wound up. Read opened fire upon the surrounding area trying to pin the Uchiha down or hit him with a lucky stray shot. The rogue knew it'd end up similarly like this but he rolled around causing some ruckus in the bushes just to cause a struggle. Hachiro felt like he could still fight, he had to still fight. He had to give this woman more of a fight. After all, he was fighting for his dream. He was fighting for his chance to live freely in the Archipelago without having to look behind his shoulder and dreading to see that man stalking him. In a way he was fighting for the fate of the entire world, that man was mad enough, a little more of a push past this point would've sent him way past the edge and then it'd be a pretty sour party for everyone…


	210. Dancing with Pirates

The fingers of Hachiro's mechanical puppet arm twitched emitting barely intelligible squeaks. The darned thing was busted up and cracked, a little bit more beating it into Read's chakra augmentations would've busted it into tiniest shatters. Slowly, to the degree where the Uchiha was unable to sense its flow, the puppet limb, borrowed from Read's ship, was sapping his chakra. The loss was miniscule really, not at all something to worry about. A civilian may have been troubled and exhausted for wearing the thing throughout the day but someone trained in managing chakra and building their inner pools up wouldn't even have noticed such miniscule losses. It wasn't the chakra spending aspect of the puppet limb that worried Hachiro, more the near busted state of it.

The Uchiha was having his hands full with the pirate captain. If once again he was left one handed he'd be crushed much faster than he'd run out of stamina normally. Still, it was a losing battle either way. Hachiro knew it for a long time but he was just not fond of either alternative: letting go of the battle and dying went against every instinct of self-preservation he had developed over the years and moving aside and letting Mana die would only make his death come later and incomparably more painfully, even more – more sacrilegiously. The madman was known of not respecting death or the dead. Hachiro's rest would not be eternal in that case…

"Your stolen arm looks pathetic. Matching its wearer I must add!" Read tried to mock the Uchiha, without a doubt she tried intimidating him and making him end this fight early by fleeing. She still must not have cared about the Uchiha that much and just wanted retribution from the Konoha kids that played her.

"Coming from a woman who has her sister literally stuck to her back this is rich…" Hachiro replied back stretching the squeaking fingers out. This was bad, the speed of his two handed hand seals would've been greatly diminished just when he regained the ability to weave them again. One handed seals rarely worked on high ranking techniques, the more complex the technique the less the probability it'd work.

A loud bang interrupted Hachiro's battle planning – a chakra imbued kunai pierced through the tree behind her. Slowly the large natural pillar of wood began toppling on top of the two. This was just a distraction, these two moved so astonishingly fast that a falling tree would have posed no threat. It may as well have been a turtle's pace.

Hachiro's body moved aside only to see Read moving in from the side. The Uchiha's eyes were too fast tracking and analytical of every smallest happening on the battlefield for him not to notice the woman dashing in from the side.

"Tortuga Sword Style: Dance of Kali" Read announced the name of the technique as her blades attacked all at once, both Read and Bonny slashed at their opponent fast and precisely in lightning swift and wide reaching strikes that left little to no chance for evasion. It was a total overwhelming of the Uchiha's Sharingan sensory inputs. Four slashes with trajectories so wide and all reaching and coming so fast that anyone would've taken at the very least a single deep and conclusive slash.

Hachiro's body got severed into several large chunks that then instantly turned into water and collapsed watering the jungle floor that the water clone was cut down on. It was a thing of technical beauty – weaving the hand seal for the Water Clone jutsu and then quickly substituting oneself with it. Everything transpired so fast that not even a skilled swordswoman striking at speeds that make a bolt of lightning look like a snail moving in tar was able to pick anything up at all.

Now was Hachiro's chance – the woman was occupied with her attack, her highly coordinated and synced up with her sister dance. Now that her momentum and body was invested fully into the attack was the rogue's opening. Hachiro's hands went through a tirade of hand seals. The mechanical puppet arm on the man's arm worked a couple of corks slow and fired off sparks emitting very troubling sounds that may have alerted the woman, not that any of it mattered.

"Water Style: Lernaean Dragon Jutsu" Hachiro chanted out as strong streams of water rose from the puddle the clone made upon its collapse as well as the multiple small rivers and streams nearby watering the rich jungle soil. Even a stream or two coming directly off of the shore of the ocean came into a round sphere of water in front of the Uchiha that quickly took shape of a dragon's head and fired itself at the open behind of Read.

With a scream of pain the pirate captain was sent tumbling off her feet after the roaring waters collided with Bonny's desperate cross shaped chakra imbued sabre block. The pirate got sent crashing back through trees tearing down entire towering wooden structures just by getting tangled in their endless and thick vines. As an additional follow up to the attack the water did not scatter however, instead remaining static in its splashing in mid-air stage resembling an aquatic snowflake or a spiky sea urchin made entirely out of water.

Out of the static sphere of water additional eight water dragon waves formed rushing at Read. The woman finally managed to pick herself together and land her feet firmly on a rocky structure, kicking herself and Bonny off of it so hard that the rocky wall collapsed into smallest shatters. The woman rushed right past the chasing dragons of water slashing the waves as she past them and blowing them up into splashes of water that finally settled down.

Read huffed out together with her opponent who launched such an incredible technique. It must've been greatly taxing at Hachiro's overall chakra reserves but the man still impressively enough stood on his feet even though one side of his body looked drawn to the ground.

Read's pouting lips changed into a teeth grinding expression of anger, she swiped her blades to the side before forcefully sheathing them. The woman was soaking in water and carrying quite a large number of bruises and cuts from the technique and the debris she was crashed through. Both arms of Read as well as Bonny pulled out their kunai dispensers.

"Tortuga Sword Style: Dance of Asura" the woman mumbled under her own lips, a pronunciation which Hachiro's Sharingan was able to pick up just from the way her lips moved alerting the Uchiha to prepare for the woman's comeback attack. It was another one of her peculiar swordsmanship dances, she leaped onwards spinning in pirouette and firing off in each and every direction.

Hachiro leaned down and witnessed that the rocks and trees that were supposed to provide him cover did no such thing. The woman's attack shred right through them making the cover explode into a hell of rocky and wooden shrapnel. Then there were all the stray kunai blades fired and the blades that bounced off of other blades changing their trajectory in mid-air – a classic projectile throwing technique.

While the Uchiha's Sharingan was able to register each and every shrapnel, every wooden splinter coming his way and every stray blade, hear and see every blade bouncing off of another and realize that his dash needed to change direction he was still unable to move fast enough to avoid every bit of damage. The blades were just too fast and numerous for his tired body to move out of the way, the rocks bashing into his bones busting them into dust were far too numerous and coming from every direction and the wooden splinters lodging into his flesh occupied his pain sensors too much making avoiding the rest of them almost impossible.

Hachiro collapsed on his knee but as he soon found out Read was far from finished with her attacks. The dance continued as both Read and Bonny pulled out blades and assaulted him with madly fast and precise thrusts coming from every direction. The Uchiha pulled out an explosive tag and slammed it to the ground, redirecting his weight and falling backwards before he set him off and interrupted Read's technique and sent both of the opponents to different sides of the field.

The rogue's ribs were pulsing with pain and his lungs burnt up as he drew breath. Still, the fear of the madman's vengeance upon the world if the girl he admired for some reason died the Uchiha picked himself back on his knees and looked around. Breathing heavily and wiping blood and sweat off his face desperately trying to find his opponent. He was on his last legs, final stretches of his chakra pool able to take only several augmentations before giving in or one or two good techniques. His body was about to give in on him. Hachiro glanced at his trashed puppet arm and spat blood to the side.

"I need to give her everything and go down, no use prolonging this at this point…" he thought to himself forcing the broken and stiffened fingers of his puppet arm into the position that resembled the hand seal he needed.

"Water Clone technique…" he chanted out creating four water clones. Splitting what little chakra he had into four separate pieces. It was fine, they'd share their chakra input for using that final technique of glory. The magnum opus that would make him going out worthwhile. The last thing Hachiro ever wanted to be was a hero but technically he'd go out as one. He'd have rather lived more as a coward than died as a hero…

One of his clones smacked the back of Hachiro's head.

"You bastard, why are you just prancing around splitting our chakra?" he quarrelled with the original. Technically they were extensions of his own mind and personality and they were just as lacking happiness of going out as heroes as the original was. Still, they were not made for combat, these clones were made for a singular jutsu after which they'd collapse. That was all. That made the clone technique a little lighter on how much chakra it took and how taxing the clones themselves were.

"Shut up and do what we have to!" Hachiro ordered beginning to weave hand seals. One of the clones was dedicated solely for adjusting the hand seals of Hachiro's original body's puppet arm while the clones all performed the same technique one handed.

"Water Style: Idyll of Avalon!" Hachiro chanted out as each of the clones performed the water chakra infused shuriken barrage technique from before launching numerous barrages of shuriken infused heavily with water chakra. While technically it reduced their penetrating power the opponent's body would've had to spend more chakra on augmentation to compensate for the additional water chakra imbued on the weaponry. That made the technique more exhausting and damaging, more in the blunt way, to the opponent.

The multiplied barrage of shuriken directed at a wide arc left a wide clearing that soon made a small pond of water. Read and Bonny repurposed their arm position fully to deflect the oncoming water projectiles.

"Tortuga Sword Style: Dance of Aegis!" the woman shouted out loud as she and Bonny both spun their blades vertically forming two defensive spinning discs of bladework resembling a chakra infused shield that began deflecting the overwhelming onslaught of tools coming at her. One after the other the shuriken began falling on the ground and those thrown by clones dissipated in cloudy poofs whereas those thrown by Hachiro himself stayed. The water coming out of the imbued water chakra began accumulating faster and faster, each shuriken bashing at the defensive formation made such a deafening and powerful shockwave that the crater which Bonny and Read were in began enlarging and deepening. The woman had to activate the Art of Water Walking jutsu, a very primal and basic chakra control technique that was more of a training exercise than an actual technique to stay afloat.

Still, as powerful and rapid as Bonny and Read's defences were they began skipping blows. The shuriken blew the swords out of the hands of the women and began pummelling hard and painfully against Read forcing the woman to clench her hands and cross them in front of her face to cover up from the full onslaught of damage coming at her. The woman stopped her water walking technique to sink under to avoid the overwhelming barrage but as the shuriken collided with one another they got sent into the water as well. Even underwater there was no escape.

Bubbles rose up from the pond combined with small stains of blood rising from where Bonny was. Hachiro didn't foster any hopes of having beaten his opponent. Those shuriken may have been strong enough to pierce through and destroy anything, no matter how dense and thick but they could've been blocked by an equivalent or stronger chakra defensive augmentation. That meant that by throwing enough chakra into it Read could've escaped with grazes and scratches. Still, she'd have spent a great deal of effort and that was what mattered. That for a single moment the woman was crapping her underwear that just maybe she'd not survive this…

Bonny and Read shot from the water and into the sky, farther than Hachiro could even see. She must've used some sort of technique to be flung off this high. Either that or she reached the very bottom of that manmade lake and kicked off of it to leap up properly from what seemed like ten meters deep, piercing tons of water to be blown off into the skies above.

"Tortuga Sword Style: Dance of Thor" she chanted, Hachiro's Sharingan tracked the woman's lips even all the way up there. She had made a clone that spun the four armed and legged fusion of sisters right down, piercing the air and the heavens themselves and making a strong gust that propelled up and down in a manner similar to a beam. Above it opened the clouds surrounding the area and parted them leaving a giant gaping hole that enlarged with each passing moment only to completely clear the skies of any visible area. On the lower reaches all the way to the ground it formed a powerful air pressure that locked anyone unfortunate to stand inside of it down with a seeming sensation of immense gravitational pull surpassing hundreds of thousands of g's with sheer air pressure alone.

Together with wiping away the clouds the air blast also cleaned out the signal sent from Read's ship. The one that attracted any friendly crews to assist, a sort of SOS signal for pirates. The entire symbol that appeared to be made from sky clogging smoke got blasted away and cleansed. If anyone was coming to the island they should've had to have gotten the direction and the approximate coordinates of the signal to follow it now. By now the signal had formed a heart with two swords shaped around it and a lonely otter endlessly running around diagonally. All of that artistic flare wiped out in an instant.

With her blindingly fast fall from the skies Read rushed down onto the seemingly paralyzed Uchiha. Despite the near impossible to humanly determine speed of the woman to the Sharingan wielder she moved so slowly… It was like the man could see his final moments and sense them out, he saw the woman move every inch, cover every last meter of her skyfall. It would've been a motherlode of all aerial sword techniques.

The red Sharingan in Hachiro's eyes flared momentarily paralyzing Read's movements and forcing her to slam into the ground face first just a couple of meters away from where her target was. Further away pirates that were paralyzed by genjutsu previously started to pick themselves together in a sleepy rage clinging their blades and shaking fists at Hachiro. The Uchiha fell to the ground with one of his eyes closing down in pain. It's been a while since he used his Sharingan so extensively and while he was born with the eye and did not have it transplanted, which was known to cause immense chakra taxing on the body of the receiver, it was still beginning to wear him out.

As expected Bonny seemed to be able to aid Read in recovering from genjutsu and the woman stood up and cracked her knuckles and neck before picking her swords back up off the ground.

Hachiro looked at the handful of pirates that looked bloodthirsty and ready to beat him to a pulp. Read dismissed them with a gesture and ordered them to return to the ship instead. The woman was a little pleased that she got more of her men released from genjutsu and that they were in somewhat able condition to take care of a ship.

It hurt… Everywhere and everything. The rogue knew that he won't be able to move, even before, feeling crushed by close to a million g's of pure air pressure in his worn out and tired state completely kicked the breath out of his lungs. He didn't expect to do this good. Looking at Read she was bleeding, cut up and bruised. She wasn't doing well herself and just the smallest stretch could've actually changed the entire outcome and yet…

"What's so funny?" Read asked swinging her own blade up to Hachiro's throat, while the woman approached the rogue couldn't even pick himself off his knees, remaining in his undignified and humiliating position of kneeling in front of the captain.

"I actually expected to get trounced worse than this. You really had trouble with this, didn't you? Big and mighty pirate captain…" the Uchiha thundered out a powerful laughter from the depths of his chest. His Sharingan closed revealing pitch black tired eyes in its place.

"Don't overrate yourself, I've only shown you the side of my skill and power that everyone knows. You've pushed me far for this percentage but I am still holding back a great deal - a much more risky power-up" the captain smiled before raising her blade up in the air and preparing for the execution strike.

The woman's face bent over from a strong blow right in the center of her face. Her body got sent flailing comically back rolling and smashing through trees and rocks until it fell into the ocean waves and began sinking down.

"I suppose this is a lucky shot then…" Shimo commented on Meiko's punch as the young blacksmith made highly offensive gestures and improper faces towards the spot of the ocean where the pirate captain got sent.

"Don't expect me to help much…" Kouta huffed out. The medical ninja had just finished the healing process and felt completely drained after it, still, he joined the battle together with everyone else. The team went through everything they faced, the craziest odds together. They would have to face Read and Bonny together as well, no matter how tired or beat individual members felt.

"I guess Mana's stupid kindness worked out in the end, huh, Scaredy-sensei?" Shimo sarcastically tossed back a remark back at his beaten and kneeling sensei who just handed the Audra alloy sword back to the Yuki swordsman.

"It would appear so… Had she not prioritized your lives over hers I'd be dead meat" the man admitted.

"You did great, old man, now you can go and be a scaredy cat again… We'll take it from here" Meiko gave the man a thumb up and a playful grin.


	211. Take it Over From Here

Just barely noticeably enough to track Kouta's fingers moved to his pouch. This clash with the pirates emptied his pouch and medical bags up quite nicely, giving a handful of medical tools to Mana so that she patched herself up on the run didn't help either. The boy removed a blue round candy-like looking pill and tossed it into his mouth cracking it with his teeth and carefully chewing it. It was a Chakra Resource Medical Pill that he ate. After spending so much chakra treating his friends he needed a little boost.

There were countless different food pills and medical pills that the medical ninja used. Food pills were usually just toned down and less risky versions of medical pills. Due to the higher risk of aftereffects of a medical pill ruining the mission the medical pills were usually prescribed by a medical ninja and usually all intake of them was strictly managed by the squad's medical ninja. This was a rare occasion where the medical pill was slightly less dangerous and carried less risks than food pills.

"Are you gonna be OK?" Meiko asked turning back at Kouta who was still taking deep breaths and wearing the black rings and bags around his eyes and the pale skin proudly.

"Just ate a chakra boosting food pill, it accelerates my chakra rejuvenation rate from day or two to an hour or two. As long as I don't take another within two to four days and have some time for some of my chakra to return I'll be fine" the young ninja confirmed his condition.

"In the meantime stay behind and do some supporting from long range, don't give her a chance to murder you" Shimo suggested.

A powerful blast of purple and red rotating streams of bursting chakra flares blew out from the ocean. The rotation of these jets emitted an intense shockwave around its center creating an everlasting barrier of shockwaves that continuously grew larger and larger splitting a large crater in the salty waters.

"I didn't think she'd still have that much chakra…" Shimo mumbled out to himself mostly, his words did carry some semblance of sense. Read was well worn out by her battle with Hachiro and the continuous injuries she had sustained throughout it. The fact that her body was so greatly injured, cut up, beaten and bruised while she still had such immense chakra resources left could have only meant that she was holding it back this whole time.

Read's body surfaced slowly rising over the surface of the water as the shockwave began to allow the split waters to gather below it therefore rising the bubble of concussive force separating it. The purple and blazing fire red streams began to come closer and closer together before they made a singular translucent pillar of chakra, almost like an aura surrounding Read.

The sight of the three ninja observing their emerging opponent moved more to the half exposed chest of the woman as her busted clothing offered poor protection from curious eyes and yet the nature of their stares had nothing to do with naughty thoughts. It was more intimidating than erotic as a glowing hieroglyph meaning "Release" began glowing on Read's exposed belly and suddenly the bodies of Read and Bonny began to merge together. The merging only stopped at Bonny's head which remained dangling on the back of Read's lower neck area.

"Meiko, you're the sealing expert in our team and that looks like a seal, any idea what happened?" Kouta looked at the troubled redhead who just shrugged.

"It looked to me like a Limiter Seal. Some ninja get so absorbed into their battles that they seal off parts of their chakra in case they forget to leave some for survival needs. The "Release" hieroglyph must mean that the seal is released…" the blacksmith theorized.

"She must've sealed off her sister's chakra so that the two didn't mingle together making it harder to control her own chakra. This seal release must've opened the floodgates and let their chakra mix together" Shimo deduced. "Let's see just how much chakra she'd regained and how useful it'll be for her injured body!"

With those words the Yuki swordsman quickly weaved some hand seals and slammed his fist to the ground.

"Ice Style: Ice Pillars!" he chanted out the name of his technique as triangular almost cone shaped pillars formed in his path leading up to Read. The woman weaved and dashed aside sliding over the water graciously using the Art of Water Walking jutsu.

Angered by the assault Read dashed into all three youths, the woman thrusted her sword forward in a wild stab.

"Gatling Thrust!" she shouted out as another arm appeared right above her arm wielding another saber, just like Bonny used to when the two were separate. The pair of arms began rotating around each other like an actual Gatling gun creating a drill like thrusting attack.

Right before Read's attack finalized the shape it took Meiko reached for her boots touching the seals on them. Jets of chakra flames fired out off of them launching the young ninja onwards and attacking Read from behind. A strong kick right to the back made Read flinch out of her attack right after it formed giving Shimo some time to move aside from a much less dangerous and conclusive attack.

The woman may have gained more chakra and new abilities to mesh with her sister and readjust her position on Read's body but the pirate captain's body was still injured and getting injured even more. The three genin felt the possibility of victory right from the start of the battle. Kouta did his best to support the team rushing right at Read and Bonny but dashing aside right before stepping within reaching distance to the woman. The young man distracted her attention and lightly tapped a couple of areas he passed leaving explosive notes that soon began to get covered up by the sand and the remains of wood that he rose up with his speedy movement.

Read flipped over her front and switched her focus onto Meiko while in mid the woman began kicking with a stomping motion at the redhead blacksmith while the captain's legs multiplied by letting Bonny's legs branch out and off of the flesh of Read's own. Forming a bombarding and blinding assault of stomping legs.

"Gatling Stomp!" Read yelled out.

Meiko shouted in pain as the immense force from the woman's kicks crushed her into the sand and the endless barrage of relentless and astonishingly powerful kicks began kicking her deeper and deeper into the ground leaving a wide hole inside of which sand and water began to fall into. The captain didn't even fall into the hole after the crater began to deepen and widen up, she just continued to stomp erratically while the blasting air waves coming from her kicks continued to keep the woman afloat and crash at Meiko with half of the kick's strength.

Shimo's hands reached closer to his chest and tensed up, in a combination of muscle tensing and relaxing he flashed through the combination of hand seals formed in less than a measly moment in time. A howling gust of wind came into from the sea bashing violently against Read's side and attempting to break her focus, it did not work, the woman continued to kick and stomp at the blackening crater that had extended who knew how deep.

The gust of wind was completely freezing, so freezing that snow and slightly larger than usual icicles began following it and piercing right through the captain's flesh and skin. The frigid absolute zero temperature began to slowing down her movements to the point where the woman could no longer kick fast enough to sustain her floating and all the shockwave bombardment. The captain was forced to descend firmly nearby the endless abyss she had created.

The very moment that Read's feet touched the ground they were frozen. The woman's entire body began to freeze up more and more. Shimo launched himself at the frosting and completely overwhelmed by the unbelievable and unearthly colds woman, his hands reached for the Audra blade and that skin tingling and heart freezing steel squeaking noise signaled the pinnacle of his drawing techniques coming.

"Ice Style: Ice Wolf Rampage!" Shimo roared out feeling the pressure that the chakra cost of the technique placed upon his body. The blizzard continued to rage and cut open new wounds in Read's body, an icy wolf rose right above Shimo's body materializing itself and being shaped by the user's chakra shape manipulation and being sustained by the raging blizzard, thrusting its claws an immeasurable number of times at the freezing woman.

Read screamed out as Shimo passed her by slashing at her while the ice wolf with its solid icy paws slashed her a great number of times. An immense explosion of the resulting shockwaves and air waves clashing together rose up forcing the seemingly lifeless body of the woman to lift off into the air and rotate like a ragdoll tossed around by the eruptions of chakra leftovers around her. Just like that the absolute zero storm dissolved into nothingness after getting sliced down like a colossal loaf of bread.

Shimo sheathed his blade and turned around to look at the woman. Pools of blood began gathering beneath her body. It had to be over, his drawing slash alone would've been strong enough to finish anyone of Chuunin rank off, having in mind that Chuunin frequently sparred with people of world breaking strength it was no small feat. Then there was his wolf comprised of pure ice style chakra, the bloodline of his clan forming a solid and hard as steel avatar of frost that cut and bit with both its fangs and claws so fast that no one yet in history could perceive the exact number of times it attacked. This was not a technique he invented, swordsmanship users of his clan used it before him but it was a technique Shimo made his own!

Overwhelming pain! A loud screech killed all of the sound of the rushing waves or the seagulls around them. Shimo coughed up blood as the overwhelming sense of pain completely turned off his consciousness. His mind faded away before he could realize that Read had jumped off the ground and thrusted her blade at him, together with Bonny using their "Gatling Thrust" technique amped up to eleven. A technique that thrusted so fast with such ravaging force that it created a drilling air wave passing by anything in its path. Shimo's body was lifted off the ground and sent down on his back.

Read huffed, she was on her last legs but holding her own. "You idiot. Your own sword drawing technique is so fast that you didn't see Bonny's hands appear from my abdomen and block your sword strike. That ice wolf of yours hurt like hell but at least I didn't get cut in half…"

"Shimo! You stupid idiot! Get back on your feet, I just healed you!" Kouta yelled out trying to taunt his friend, still unaware of the exact condition of his friend.

Read coughed up blood, her body was covered with blood to the point where she appeared like one large blood demon standing in front of her opponents. Her body was completely covered with shallow scars and cuts that she managed to survive thanks to the newly released Bonny's chakra augmenting Read's body. The ice wolf really did its damage but it didn't finish the job, they let their guards down too fast!

"Man, shut up!" Shimo's voice finally broke the eerie silence. "Do you have any idea how this hurt?! Shit, right through my chakra augmentation!" he cursed.

"Impossible! The airwave of my "Gatling Hell Arrow" is powerful enough to pierce anything within its reach travelling well beyond Earth's orbit, well past the Moon even!" Read screamed out in disbelief.

Shimo sat up on his butt and wiped the blood off his mouth giving her a crimson daredevil smile.

"You were too messed up by my ice wolf to aim right, you missed my heart by like a mile. Ninja get stabbed and impaled and messed up bad all the time. Next time wait for your eyesight to line up straight before shooting…" he taunted the woman.

"Your body is at the limit, Read, please surrender already. If you end up dying of your injuries it won't matter how much chakra you have left. Your chakra augmentations can only sustain a dying body for that long. If you die, Mana-chan will feel bad for you and I don't want that" Kouta shouted out trying to reason with the pirate captain.

"Yeah, I guess that silly friend of ours really did chance us a bit… Normally I don't hurt nice ladies and actually look out for them, but I'd have never shed a tear for you if I'd have never met Mana. You're done, give up!" Shimo shouted out clutching at the fist sized hole at his abdomen surrounded by crushed bones all around it. His chakra augmentations would sustain him for a little while but it'd be for the best if he didn't fight. Losing focus on sustaining one's own life would've easily lead to the wound killing him.

"Yeah, Mana had probably already found the Box by now and maybe even regained her chakra. I sure would've wished to hold it in my hands but… Soon there'll be another ass kicking genin joining our ranks" Meiko nodded staring at Read with a serious expression on her face.

The woman spat some blood aside and grunted in pain before erupting in a wild fit of laughter. That creepy and disturbing laughter of a dying person that then ceased just as eerily as it started.

"Sure… You messed me up badly. But just because my body is dying doesn't mean that both of us are. I'll just have to make Bonny take it over from here while I feast on your chakra and heal" Read continued to clutch at her eye-gouging ridiculous wounds as she laughed as hard as her state allowed her. The same jets of purple and fiery red chakra erupted from the woman's body, the "Release" hieroglyph began to glow and other hieroglyphs began running down her beaten and bloodied body in lines. Enough to form an entire poem…

A hand erupted from the glowing hieroglyph. The hand then slammed at Read's chest and began pushing it, almost like forcing more of something through a hole. All of a sudden Bonny's entire head burst from the released seal, then the other hand which then began to force the entire body out of the seal.

"l'Ollonais fought hunter ninja and marines for days on end and was attacked by the worst of the worst. I'd be a fucking letdown of the greatest crew in the world to die like a filthy dog now! Take it over from here, Bonny!" Read screamed out in pain as finally Bonny's entire body appeared from the seal with only a small patch of Bonny's skin being connected to Read's chest still. This Bonny was different – larger, better formed and more athletic looking, she was covered in blood like she had just finished swimming in a bloody pool but then the color just stayed on the woman's skin as the blood all disappeared falling into sand-like dust onto the ground beneath her feet.

Read's body began to wither, slowly the injured and battered pirate captain became frail with her crimson flaring hair covering up the woman's face entirely as she began resembling a ghoul who had just risen from its grave. A smile covered Bonny's face as both women lunged forward. They were attacking Kouta – the least injured and yet the most tired member of the group.

It made no sense for the two to attack the least busted up opponent, did they not wish to win? Kouta was so unprepared for being the target that he not only couldn't focus properly on perceiving the movements of the two sisters, not that he could even if he did having his current chakra level in mind, but also properly defend himself. Meiko dashed in between the attacking women and deflected their attacks, the blacksmith used her armored plates to defend against the attacks but they were entirely inefficient, the young woman just grunted and flinched in pain as the blades opened up wounds easily busting through her armor.

The two were different, more ferocious and almost like their remaining chakra was evenly split amongst the two. Having Read's injuries in mind that was probably why the two weren't able to just kill them before they were even seen moving as normally Read's abilities surpassed those of the squad of three by far. This wasn't an actual power up – the speed and strength of the two downgraded but their fighting style became even more aggressive and ferocious. They didn't maim or dismember with a cut nor did they kill instantly, they left shallow cuts because they were so impatient to attack again instead of committing to an attack.

Meiko tsked with her tongue and touched her boots letting the chakra flares send her forward and tackling both of the sisters carrying them off on Meiko's shoulders. The blacksmith turned up to the skies and after lifting off as high as she could she gracefully maneuvered herself in a loop of death before slamming right into the crater that Read's kicking previously created. Meiko could feel immense heat before, she could feel the magma so close to her the last time so she counted on the thin earthly remaining layers to crumble.

Both Meiko and the two sisters submerged into searing hot sludge below firing off a gigantic gazer of magma bursting from the amazing body-slam into it. For a moment longer the ground continued to shake more and more. Meiko must've been fighting the sisters or at least committed to punching them some more while completely submerged. A couple of more gazers began to open up throwing arcs of magma out of them. Kouta ran towards Shimo and moved him out of the way because the swordsman was just too injured to move out of the way himself. It would've only taken a small push in a battle to incapacitate the swordsman.

The bodies of the two sisters burst through the mantle and out into the sky. As they fell down Meiko with her ruined armor and singed clothes followed. The three appeared to be almost evenly matched and luckily enough it looked like the sisters had lost their swords in the struggle beneath the mantle.

"Go, you're holding us back, do your thing" Bonny commanded the other sister speaking for the first time, her voice was much more sounding like that of a little boy, tomboyish and playful yet with a peculiar feminine flare that still made it obvious that it was not a little boy but instead a woman sounding like one that was speaking.

Meiko tried to intercept the freefalling sister that was slung and thrown at Kouta's and Shimo's general direction but Bonny occupied Meiko's attention by trying to overwhelm her with a barrage of punches and kicks. Luckily enough while Bonny was skilled at hand to hand, she was a much better swordswoman than a martial artist so Meiko was easily able to hold her own, despite the fact that she missed one sister rushing at the tired medical ninja and the injured swordsman.

Kouta clenched his fist tighter, he felt a semblance of his former strength seeping back, not enough to make a real difference but just enough… The young man flipped over his front and slammed his foot against the sister's head driving her into the ground. Only now did the medical ninja get to see this strange technique of the two, whatever they did dyed their skins completely red and made their eyes glow with the light blue shade of the typical chakra color. It also made their hair turn black and change into a more hedgehog like look than an actual hairdo.

Right before the two hit the ground Meiko finally found an opening and broke Bonny's guard sending a kick to her jaw making the sister rotate and fly sideways like a ragdoll. Just as the blacksmith's foot touched the ground she chased after the sister but right before it looked like the redhead was almost within the reach for a good kidney punch the sister blurred and disappeared from sight.

"Shit!" Meiko cursed throwing her feet forward and forcing the chakra jets to change her direction a full 180 and back at where Bonny was rushing to her sister's aid.

Kouta's eyes wandered off and onto the oncoming threat, it was too late, there would've been no way that he could move to react in time given his current chakra level. Shimo's figure dashed in front shoving his sheathed sword right into the chin of the demonic looking sister and throwing her into the air.

"Thanks…" Kouta smiled, "Try not to get hit again" he added.

"I know, Mom!" Shimo grinned maliciously trying to bite his friend verbally. Despite his painful injury the young swordsman managed to interfere just in time.

"Who could've thought the two would still give us trouble, after the crazy battle she and Hachiro had…" Kouta grinned looking with surprise at the two sisters picking each other up off the ground.

"We're having trouble… We need to use that! We need to infect them!" Bonny shouted out angrily at her injured sister who kept on bleeding out onto the sand and barely manage to pick herself up. It appeared that some semblance of Read's past injuries were still maintained in this form.

Read only nodded while the two picked themselves up and took an offensive fighting stance meanwhile Meiko finally rejoined her own team and prepared to once again give the two sisters something to think about.


	212. The Devil's Parasite

The squad took all the sweet time of a brief cooldown between the sisters' attacks to discuss the flow of the battle. It was certainly much tougher than they expected it to be. After that clash with Hachiro everyone just assumed that Read and Bonny would be done. Who could've known that they would have so many tricks up their sleeve and such refined mastery over their combined bodies. Reshaping their position, then even splitting completely and functioning as two separate bodies…

"Scaredy-guy is gone…" Meiko noted after taking the luxury of a brief glance.

"Must've wandered off somewhere safer, good for us, he won't be a potential target" Kouta replied breathing a little easier.

"No. Those two are definitely trying something. Something big…" Shimo grunted clutching at his wound. Kouta had the option of healing it but it'd have completely drained what little reserves he had regained up to now. It'd render him from a potential combatant to a helpless exhausted weak link. As long as Shimo could at the very least fend off for himself the two would've agreed that keeping the wound the way it was would've been the best option.

"Yeah, I don't like this sudden transformation one bit…" Kouta agreed with a nod, "I mean why would these two withhold such an ace from Hachiro? She'd have beaten him much easier using all these crazy moves"

"Because she thinks something about these techniques is risky. Both of these changes in her body must have significant purpose. The first burst of chakra and fusion with her sister must serve as a short term boost, something to use when there's absolutely no choice because molding two different chakra into one system makes controlling it problematic. This second transformation… It's… Different. They're not fighting openly, almost like they're trying to do something, this one's risky because it exposes both sisters to danger. If Read uses this move she risks losing her sister for good instead of having her close, her intelligence also seems to degrade to instinctual dribble" Shimo attempted to analyze this transformation.

All of a sudden the bodies of the two sisters moved forward, blurring in and out of perception the two tried to deceitfully sneak up on the young ninja aiming at Meiko. They must've switched up their strategies again. Bonny lunged forward with a strike, Meiko ducked under it and then rolled backwards avoiding the wrist spikes as the sister turned her arm trying to slash at Meiko's face using the bony red spikes on her wrists.

The two demonic sisters leaped forward and backwards zigzagging with each other and cross slashing Meiko as the two switched together but the blacksmith was fast enough to lean out of the way of the blades they tried opening her up with. A couple of weak punches and kicks did land raising the battle into the air.

"Above you!" Shimo warned Meiko at the very last moment where the blacksmith just barely managed to look up and cross her arms to block the punch from above aimed at the back of her head slamming Meiko into the jungle ground toppling a couple of trees.

"They've switched their strategy again!" Kouta shouted out in frustration. He was agitated that a transformation that appeared to diminish one's intelligence still had the pirate captain hold secrets in her fighting style from the ninja.

"No. It's the same… They just want Meiko out of commission. Must be because she always butt into their attacks standing in their way" Shimo shook his head observing Meiko angered comeback flailing her fists since her armor with all of the seals was broken or molten off during the dip in the stiffer mantle before.

"They seemed to prioritize me before, though" the medical ninja noted, "It's crazy, they're tired and underpowered, why would they target the least injured member?"

Shimo looked down at a puddle of black as tar puddle of gooey blood. Whatever this strange transformation was it transformed the entire bodies of the sisters.

"Unless… It's exactly what they want! They need their target with as little injuries as possible – they intend to heal off of your own life force!" Shimo realized shouting out loud enough for Meiko to hear.

Bonny smacked Read at the back of the sister's head hard enough to open up a grievous wound that splattered the black goo in a wide arc farther away.

"See!? Now they know what we're up to! Now we'll never land the blow we need! This Yuki is as smart as his master" the pirate managed to both commend Shimo and belittle her own sister at the same time.

"I see, so that's why you've slowed down. Whatever you intend to use to leech life off of Kouta with to regenerate your sister must require conscious effort, intense concentration which is why you can either fight with wild speed or slow down when you wish to set off your technique" Shimo smiled finally seeing through the sisters' plan and realizing the increasing odds of victory.

"True, true… But don't fret, we'll wear you out and hit you eventually. That is all we need, a single concentrated and focused hit. Then our bodies can infect you like a virus, we'll become one as our cells absorb your very essences, your whole life force slowly and painfully on a molecular level. You inflicted great pain upon my sister, but you will pay it all back!" Bonny shouted out followed by a mad laugh afterwards.

"Hmph. Surely you do realize that now that we know your intentions we won't let you hit us with those kind of blows. The only way you can match us is if you fight at full speed. Time is also against you because soon Mana will set off the Box and return at full strength, also in an hour or so Kouta's chakra will return. You're done, get back to Read's body!" Shimo smiled, finally he was beginning to see the end of this intense battle. Mana's gamble may have just payed off in the end after all, pirates may not have the chance to get their hands on Audra alloy shards after all.

Bonny just hissed with an inhuman voice pointing her wrist blades at Shimo's general direction and showing her newly grown fangs. The woman's skin began covering with sharp spikes, same with Read. They were beginning to take an even stranger shape still, one more like a mold of a virus cell and a human. The faces of the women faded away as their skins became covered with a thick protective spiky shell and the black sharp spiked hair they wore broke through and erected walls of spikes all over their bodies. Then a crack opened up at the central facial area where now only thick greyed out dull and faceless space was, red bursts of light revealed odder processes still transpiring on the inside.

"Careful, they must've prepared their technique for use, don't get hit, we don't yet know if their jutsu has an antidote of some sort" Kouta grinded his teeth preparing for an attack.

Mana breathed heavily walking the endless steps of the pyramid. She was here. At the peak of this structure must've laid her salvation, the object of everyone's desires for it granted them all. The Box of Ultimate Bliss, the artifact that materialized one's own dreams. The thoughts of regaining her identity kept the magician going, only they kept Mana on her feet after such a grueling and bloody run through the jungle and a seemingly endless climb. The girl tripped up and looked down to where she came from just barely managing not to topple up and roll down the steps.

There was a streak of blood where she went. The wounds she had bandaged haphazardly must've still bled through the bandages and left a feint track of blood. Maybe this was even better. A testament of what Mana was willing to give up, what she was willing to offer as return for fixing this all. She caused this madness, she wasn't sure if Hachiro was able to fight the pirates off but it would've been irresponsible of her to just fulfil her wish, would it not be?

Before the magician reached for the final step pulling her body over it and standing back up she realized that now that she was closer than ever to the Box she had no idea what she was going to do. She was at a dilemma, whether to use the Box for what she wished to use it for to begin with or to ask for her mistakes to be fixed. This dilemma tore her up from inside. Maybe she'd be able to help her friends fight the pirates off once her chakra was brought back. She had learned a lot as a civilian, she basically picked up enough tricks to fight superhumanly strong warriors as a normal civilian, once her chakra returned she'd be much stronger than she previously was…

Then again, it was arrogant to assume she'd be able to even the odds. Especially when Mana didn't know what the odds were in the first place…

"I wish you'd have had the chance to hold it in your hands, Meiko" Mana smiled to herself looking at the narrow passageway at the top of the pyramid. It was a small point of entry, the tip of the pyramid was lifted off and held up by ancient looking columns.

And yet… Mana saw nothing out of the ordinary, she looked around and saw no altar or nothing to stand out, no boxes or other pricy artifacts. No treasure at all nor any bodies to be sealed off. This made no sense, it didn't frighten Mana one bit. Structures like this were not built in vain. There had to be some use, some point to this place if it was manmade. The Box was here, Mana just couldn't feel it! She knew it, she could feel it.

A strange feeling of fear took her over. An all-conquering desire to bolt, get out of here and just survive. Yes. An overwhelming feeling of wish to live sparked up in Mana's heart as an only flicker of flame in an all-encompassing shroud of darkness which was present in this place. It was an ancient self-preservation mechanism. The evil that was present in this place was so ancient and so evil and reviled by the most ancient people that it instilled a generational mechanism of fear within the very human DNA. Every man, woman or child stepping onto these stones would've been taken over by fear, such was the very nature of man. To fear this place, or something hidden inside it.

And yet the fear told Mana that there was more to it, more to this place than she was lead to assume. The magician stepped onwards and further into the darkness removing a card from her pocked and shaking it in the air, as it contacted with air particles the card lit up like a torch. Mana pointed it at several points of interest before realizing that there was nothing in this darkness – nothing but ancient history.

"No… NO!" she shouted out beginning to throw a tantrum but then the ground left her feet. Mana realized that she was standing on absolutely nothing and just her reaction catching the ledge she slipped off of saved her from plummeting into obscurity and dying alone, forgotten and afraid in all of this primal fear inciting darkness. The girl let go of the card letting it fall down and down and down. Then it hit something. There was surface below, black and… Beautiful. Alluring even. Attracting Mana to let go, plummet and dye that onyx beauty with her blood, give it color and make it even more beautiful!

"Wait… What?" she suddenly realized the madness beginning to loom in her mind. "This place… It's just… Evil" Mana realized pulling herself up and looking down at the slowly diminishing flame at least a dozen of floors below her. Mana's took out more cards and swiped them in the air, setting them ablaze and letting them fall before removing a pair of binoculars out of her bag and looking down.

What she saw made her heart jump up and down in both grandeur and absolute joy. A demon head engraving was present on what seemed to be the floor in that abyss. The magician knew that sight, that same illustration she saw in the history books recounting the numerous appearances of the Box in human history. The walls of the Box each had several of these demon heads showing their ugly mugs and those detestable fangs to any traveler who stumbled onto the Box of Ultimate Bliss.

"So this pyramid was built surrounding the Box… My God, it's so large!" Mana spoke to herself. "The Box appeared or was moved to this island and so that it didn't attract attention a pyramid was built around it and whoever moved it here must've known that this island didn't appear on any maps"

Then another scary thought came up – why all this secrecy? The quest for the Box began from scrolls in the Forest of Death of the Fire Country detailing its nature and existence. Then the tracks lead to the Wind Country and the desert ruins where the sphere was. Hundreds of years ago the country where the most skilled musicians were would've been Kirigakure of the Water Country and the Tako's Reach was built equally far from both Kirigakure and Kumogakure of the Land of Lightning.

Centuries ago travelling through all these locations would've been even more dangerous – the countries were constantly at war as none of Fourth's peace decrees were yet signed. To expect someone to be able to convince all of those countries to allow someone to pass and quest for the Box in their territory… It was as close to impossible as it got. Such a man was either never born or a legendary hero whom every country trusted. Such secrecy would've only been used to protect against a terrible evil, that and all this darkness Mana feels inside this pyramid and close to this Box… Just what is this thing?

"Just how will I get down there? And more importantly… Should I get down there?" Mana wondered.

Meiko continued to throw shuriken and kunai avoiding the strikes of the sisters. Sometimes one of them split off of the group and tried attacking Kouta or Shimo but Meiko quickly intercepted them. The blacksmith got sick of her ineffectual long range attacks, the ninja tools just bounced off of the thick armored spiky shell. Meiko leaped off the ground and pointed her foot at Read.

"Sorry, Mana, I'm borrowing your move! Spear Kick!" she shouted out slamming her foot into Read's shell. A splash of blood fired out of Meiko's thighs and gut as the thin spikes extended to four times their total length and pierced through Meiko's legs and her abdomen. The girl grunted in pain and coughed up some blood before attempting to force the spikes out and flipping back on her feet.

"Heh, heh, heh…" a mischievous laughter emanated in the girl's mind as suddenly the spike began disappearing and Read's body began blurring out, stretching like a spaghetti before being absorbed inside Meiko's body completely. The girl screamed out in pain as her spine began to feel like it was being pulled outside her body. The blacksmith collapsed on her knees and began bashing the ground beneath wildly from the pain until her knuckles and hands bloodied up.

With a heart-stopping bone cracking sound Read's head began to emerge from Meiko's back, dangling helplessly almost as if she was always supposed to be fused to the girl's body.

Bonny's husk crunched and twitched creepily.

"I see… So you've chosen a more worn out vessel? Oh well, after we suck her juices out nothing's stopping us from killing the others…" thoughts materialized inside Meiko head. The sisters must've had some mental connection with each other and now that Read was inside Meiko's body and mind the redhead was functioning as a make-shift receiver.

"Get out of my body!" Meiko screamed out in the air. Bashing her head against the roots of the trees and the stumps below her, grinding them into floury sawdust upon each impact.

"Gladly, after I take your life force" Read's voice appeared in Meiko's mind as if Meiko herself would've thought of it in her invader's voice.

Meiko felt her very cells being slowly drained. Nausea was forcing her breakfast, second breakfast and all four lunches out from her stomach, her bones all felt like they were being slowly broken into billions of pieces and she felt a horrendous fever taking over as her body attempted to kill the invading virus.

"Meiko! What sort of a jutsu is this!?" Shimo grunted out in frustration that despite all the good looking odds things still hit the shitter.

"Has to be some exotic clan technique. It acts like a bloodline, one these two are very adept at" Kouta noted attempting to approach Meiko but Bonny's husk just blurred and dashed in between them and the struggling friend. She couldn't speak at the state she was in but the intention was clear – stay back from the regeneration source and wait your turn or die fast.

Kouta clenched his fists together, he felt a semblance of his past strength running through his veins but it definitely wasn't enough to put up a competent fight. Neither was it for Shimo, he was just one good hit away from passing out and then just a push away from dying. Angry Kouta screamed out in the air. Letting all of his anger, frustration and despair out.

"Is that my whiner son? Whining as usual as his ass is kicked by some losers?" Kouta's cry of despair was broken by a familiar voice. As both Shimo and the young Juugo lifted their heads in the air they noticed a familiar hooded figure floating in the air, the man removed his hood revealing wild orange hair that spiked up behind his head leaning into an upwards curve. The man's buff arms broke through the cover of his raggedy cape. He floated in the air on jets emitting chakra bursts from his feet, the man's legs were reformed into literal chakra cannons.

"Father…" Kouta spoke up in surprise.

"Yeah, we definitely needed more of this guy in our lives" Shimo hissed angrily at the man whose allegiance was tough to predict as he switched from a friend to an enemy in a finger snap.

Meiko screamed out in pain feeling more of her actual life force being sucked away. At this point Read must've regained quite a handful of her strength back. Definitely enough to stand her own and beat the kids.

"Please… Get away from me!" Meiko screamed out. "They want you now! You're the least injured of all!" she tried to warn everyone.

"Oh, don't mind me…" Kusagoro locked his arms crossing them on his chest and dismissively laughing out, "I'm not gonna interfere, this is my son's fight and if he can't save his friends – he doesn't deserve them. Try to attack me though, and I'll obliterate you in a femtosecond, you spiky bitches!"

Kouta's eyes, full of hopelessness, only gapped widely as the young man couldn't believe the cruelty and ruthlessness of his father. The young man knew that to his father a battle was everything. He enjoyed showing off his destructive power and wanted his son to be the same way instead of doing something stupid like healing people.

This was not the time for his father to fool around – the life of his friend was in danger!


	213. Metamorphoses

Mana glanced over the shimmering at the bottom abyss. The treasury of malevolent vibes that attracted her to take a careless step, do something reckless and something that without a doubt she'd never do anywhere else in the world. A couple of times Mana examined the contents of her bag trying to determine a suitable course of action.

She had some explosive cards in her pouch, the blast would be strong enough to leave holes and crack the entire surface of the walls she'd be scaling down. Then again, the blast would quite likely shake this whole place and Mana didn't like the odds of starting a small explosion inside an old pyramid. It seemed like a good kick would dislodge some of the bricks in these walls. The thought of getting crushed by the whole roof of pyramid collapsing began strangely attracting Mana, her arm reached for the cards but then the magician fought the evil impulses that surrounded this place.

It was like the box itself wanted to see its finder kill themselves trying to reach it. The ex-kunoichi browsed her bag some more and noticed she still had some old bandages left, if she tied several layers together she'd possibly have something quite strong to descend down with. Then again, looking down it seemed unlikely that she'd have enough bandage to last the whole trip down. It was much closer to reality that she'd run out of the makeshift rope and then panic, maybe the evil impulses making her wish to end her own life in this place would get the better of her… It was way too risky. Then there was still the risk of the bandages being too old and worn out and tearing halfway down. That would without a doubt excite that infernal box.

Mana crept up to the edge, courting death so closely that half of her feet lingered off the solid ground and her body wavered freely above certain doom. Just one weak breeze would've tipped her over the balance and sent the magician tumbling down. The girl's conscious returned making her jump back in fear so fast and without care that she tumbled over and opened some new bruises bumping into a wall behind her and tripped over a small crack in the floor. This place was evil, either this pyramid had some strange curse seals placed on its walls or that Box emitted some immensely powerful chakra, evil and vile chakra. As a civilian Mana was much more affected by it just like she was by the Intents of those Justicars.

"Wait… I'm not thinking clearly, there's a passageway halfway there, there has to be. I'm looking at the Box from the top but if it's the basis of this whole pyramid then I can approach it from the sides instead from the top" Mana realized. This evil presence within these walls made the magician completely struggle to think a single rational thought. This was perhaps the clearest idea she had in a while, what with all those crazy attractions to the countless ways she could've died in this place.

"It's just another protection mechanism. There're no traps here, that's because the owner knew the Box could protect itself…" Mana kept convincing herself, "You can handle it. You want this, more than anything. It's the last hope to get your life together… You want this!" the girl tried to pick up all of her remnants of will and stick them together into a plaster castle that could hold back the water flooding at its walls. The difference was that it wasn't toy soldiers that were at risk – it was Mana's life, in a way also those of her friends as well.

The thought of the people fighting for her making this final stretch invited strength back to Mana's mind like nothing else. This newfound burst of will made the magician almost slide down the staircase edges until she thought she'd reached the necessary height. Mana tossed a couple of explosive cards after swiping them in the air, usually ninja tools required a fantastically simple ninjutsu technique to set off but Mana's cards were supposed to activate upon coming in contact with something after they were activated by swiping them. This deck was, at least…

A deafening boom shook the bricks beneath Mana's feet making her flip over and tumble down the basis and onto the jungle floor. The magician slowly picked herself up and examined her re-opened wounds looking at the nasty marks of blood she left on the rocks as well as the grass she was standing on. She'd need some serious disinfectant treatments after this…

As expected several layers of these large bricks cracked and collapsed, Mana moved aside as small pebbles began to roll down making way for the larger constructions. Finally the upper corner and part of the edge of the Box of Ultimate Bliss was exposed to the clear and fresh jungle air. Mana observed that malicious and yet equally beautiful obsidian black reflect sunlight off of it like a pitch black colored gemstone. The box looked almost like it was made of dark colored marble but Mana knew that it was merely a matter of appearances. It was old and most likely made of only the First People knew what… Also only the First People knew what sort of seals and contingencies were placed on this Box. If its purpose was as a wish fulfilment device, there should've been no purpose in traps being placed on the Box itself though…

Mana approached the Box step by step scaling the ruined yet still climbable staircase and touching the Box gently. The girl stroked its edge and its surface and yet… Nothing happened. This was certainly the Box and it looked old and evil enough to be the real thing and yet… Nothing happened still, no matter how gently or hardly she touched it or if she thought about her wish to save her friends or her wish to gain back her chakra control. Nothing.

"Shit… It wants chakra to be set off. It needs chakra to be activated" Mana realized much to her despair and sadness. To regain what she had squandered away she needed the very thing she lost… The cruel irony of fate must've been having the day of her life!

"Dad!" Kouta shouted at the direction of his father who continued to stand around hands locked on his chest granting more of his attention to the spiked demoness fighting his son than his actual son.

"I've come here to extract you. Technically my objective includes saving all of you but if you let them die by being a little bitch – it's your problem, not mine. I'm gonna get paid one fourth of my completion reward anyways" Kusagoro closed his eyes and explained with complete seriousness and disgust in his face.

Meiko screamed out in pain clawing at her arms from the shoulder to the elbow. Sweat and blood began pouring out of her pores in immensely troubling amounts. The blacksmith was put through agony unlike any other, one that would force idealistic fools and clever opportunists alike beg for quicker death. Anyone would've chosen absolute death over what the redhead was going through.

"Every moment you beg for my help your friends suffer. You're disappointing your wench for letting this kid die… I can't wait to see her eyes when she realizes her boy-toy is a huge disappointment incapable of saving anything" the father cracked a grin through his disgusted face. Bonny remained observing the amazingly odd situation transpiring in front of her. A man just descended onto the scene, one that looked quite strong and fresh but he refused to fight her even though the young boy she and her sister aimed to drain dry was his son?

"Fine!" Kouta grunted out clenching his fists together. Rage began pouring out the boy's eyes in the shape of teardrops, not numerous enough to disturb his vision but certainly prominent enough to be seen. Kouta's pores began opening up, what little chakra he had regained began pooling up and exploding in a wild demonstration of expelling all of his chakra in a single burst. "I'll save Meiko myself!" he shouted as some wet rag he tried to smack in his father's face.

The boy kicked off the ground rushing at his opponent – Bonny. He didn't care if those spikes penetrated and infected him, he barely even cared if he died. His own father took him for some little experiment, his own father showed such unspeakable disgust in his own son! Such examples of fatherhood were unforgivable, Kouta would be everything his father was not if given the chance of parenthood.

The boy's body tried changing shapes, he tried to expand the size of his toughened wooden textured fist or to create a chakra cannon and blast it up close right in Bonny's face but his body barely changed its texture or size. His hands did not change at all, rather his own body cancelled the technique upon realizing it'd be too costly. It was a subconscious attempt of Kouta's to not kill himself trying to impress his father even though he wished to show his father that technique he acquired in Otogakure… The Rising Piston Fist.

Kouta's punch moved in between spikes just at the last moment, oddly enough Bonny did not extend the spikes which would've skewered the boy and made him a human pin cushion. The punch turned the woman's face almost a full 180 and sent her off her feet. In mid-air the boy flipped over his front and tried stamping Bonny into the ground, maybe, just maybe his feet would change now and he could fire the chakra cannons off his feet as he stamped the woman to the ground?

Bonny's arms shot up and into the ground breaking her fall, using the repurposed momentum the virus demon she had turned into kicked off the ground driving the spiky feet right into Kouta's gut mashing his organs to a fleshy porridge and forcing the boy to throw up blood. The spiky devil did not follow up on her assault however letting Kouta slide back to where he attacked the woman from.

"Hmph… You're too weak to attack and fight her head on. Whatever damage lucky shots inflict she'll heal back at the expense of your friend" Kusagoro explained, somehow his twisted mind assumed that his son would still give a crap about what his father had to say at this point after slapping him in the face like that and refusing to use his world shaking power to help.

"I may hate his guts but he's right, Kouta…" Shimo said, his voice was weak, still husky and pain ridden but silent. It sounded like his friend had already accepted the hopelessness of the situation. Like he knew it was all over and was now ready to give up already.

"No! It's not over! I won't let Meiko die! I want to become a medical ninja because that's what would spit in my father's face the most and medical ninja don't let other people die! What would Mana-chan say to me if I let her friend die!?" Kouta roared out, his eyes were almost whited out as he was trying to find resources of chakra to use for augmentation that simply were not yet there. His pill was slowly forcing his chakra network to rejuvenate and metabolize it all faster but the rate at which he wished to come back was simply too fast even for the medical pill he had taken.

Suddenly the boy's eyes returned to normal. His mouth opened wide in shock before shutting into an expression of anger as he grunted and grinded his teeth in frustration. The boy realized what he had to do – what his father wanted him to do. Father must've known that Kouta had grown enough to use his clan techniques at a basic level however the tremendous leap he wished Kouta to perform in order to save Meiko… Still… It was the only way.

Kouta's body straightened out, his hands weighed down and twitched as he portrayed his own helplessness to his opponents. Bonny's spiky shelled head twitched as it eerily twisted and cocked back and forward, sideways and back. The sister must've been confused about what all of this was about. Shimo's eyes sunk to the ground, he saw the acceptance of demise in his friend's refusal to stay in his fighting stance, in how much blood dripped from Kouta's mouth and the wound in his abdomen.

"I know you don't want to infect me…" the young Juugo's mouth moved finally breaking out of acceptance and shock. "That's why when you kicked me you didn't possess me like your sister infected Meiko, that's it isn't it?" the boy asked.

"No! Read says that their bloodline allows only one sister can only possess one person at a time, she ordered you to stay quiet and await Shimo's turn!" Meiko screamed out the message that her parasite whispered into her mind.

"With every passing moment your friend is being leeched dry. She only has minutes left in her current state, she's half dead already. Make the play or let her die, the difference between your power and that of the sisters is already too great and getting greater every second" Kusagoro warned Kouta as if the medical ninja needed further warning.

"I see, so you didn't possess me not because you did not want it but because you literally could not. But it's me you'd like the most, right? I am injured now but I am still the least injured out of us all, my father excluded, he'd be too much trouble for you, huh?" Kouta asked staring at the spiky parasite with a serious and cold expression trying to think through the ways in which he was to do what had to be done.

"It would be impossible! Your father would protect you!" Meiko screamed out relaying the message, slowly her skin was beginning to pale more and more and her voice began to weaken, death's cold and long fingers must've already began to wrap around the blacksmith's throat.

"No, because I agree to grant you my body as an exchange for Meiko's life. Spare her and I'll let you drain me. I have a feeling my father follows me and won't interfere…" Kouta replied, "I am still kicking hard enough to feed you back to full strength, you know that right? How much more power will Meiko's injured and tired body grant you? Why would you nibble on fish-bones when you can eat a whole set of sushi?" the medical ninja tempted the parasite to reveal herself.

Meiko's body shook and chilling bone cracking noises followed as Read's head disappeared inside Meiko's body. Creepily the poor girl writhed on the ground before a spike protruded from her chest making her scream out in pain, a malevolent stream of chakra fired off of that spike as the whole protrusion exploded into a black liquid which seeped out of Meiko and then took the same spiky virus shape which her sister took except blazing red hair broke from the back side of the demoness' neck.

"Just for clarification, I don't give a fuck if the parasite revealed herself, I'm still not helping…" Kusagoro whistled carelessly crossing his hands behind his head with a grin on his face.

"Come on in then…" Kouta taunted the parasite ignoring his father's attempts of misguiding the boy. Read's body blurred as the woman charged at the young man, her body stopped to acquire the needed focus but at this point she had leeched off so much strength and life out of Meiko that the Juugo couldn't have opposed the woman even if he wanted to. Read's spiky arm slammed right into Kouta's forehead peeling a nasty bruise open as the woman was absorbed into the young boy's body instead. Meiko just laid completely passed out from the unholy pain she was just through.

The body of the young medical ninja bent over and almost fell onto his knees. Kouta closed his eyes and tried to single the pain out, ignore it while the affliction was still in its baby stages. He had to pull something inhuman off, something so evil and so destructive, something that while completely despicable made him accept his legacy as a Juugo – just what his father wanted.

Kouta could no longer single out and tolerate the pain. His body weighed down but the boy clutched it up as hard as he could doing his best to stay on his feet as his muscles tensed up and his whole body shook in pain and focus. The boy closed his eyes and felt the taste of blood in his mouth deciding to focus on that. The absolute rage aimed towards his father, that complete and focused desire to bash the man's head in with something big and as heavy as a planet. Also Kouta chose to focus on the bloodlust he felt towards the woman currently afflicting his body and leeching off of it like some demonic parasite. Someone who possessed a bloodline just as abhorrent as Kouta's but spared no second thought about embracing it… She had to die.

Die!

Kouta's chakra simply blew up, dark purple streams of chakra erupted from the boy's limbs soon fusing into a singular aura explosion of dark chakra. Black spots began accumulating all over his body covering his skin and once the boy's eyes opened he realized that the transformation into an ancient and primitive bloodlusted Juugo warrior had already begun. His mind was somewhere else, fading into the package of thirst for blood, carnage and fighting. He had set off the part of his bloodline he had hoped to never touch – the Cursed Seal that his entire clan carried in their DNA.

Kouta's eyes began wandering off since there was no one in charge of his body anymore. He could hear a wild scream of murder but not the one like the millions of voices in his head screaming bloody murder. This one was different, familiar somehow. Almost like Read's own mind and cells were screaming as they were destroyed on a level too small to comprehend inside of Kouta's body. As blood began to run down Kouta's mindless shifting eyes and the boy collapsed on his knees roaring in rage and bloodthirst the head of Read's that appeared on his back after he was possessed turned to a wooden-like statue and then dispersed to dust into the raging winds caused by Kouta's malevolent chakra leaking out.

A mouth broke open in Bonny's lower part of what seemed to be her sealed again face. The shell covering that part crumbled and slowly began growing back as the transformation was supposed to cover her up completely.

"What… Did you do? Where is Read? No Read… Only… Silence… I'm alone. All alone!" she screamed into the sky before seeing Kouta's chakra fade out and his evil transformation time out while the boy collapsed onto the sand.

Kusagoro's face was shifted in surprise and disbelief. "H-He actually did it… I didn't expect him to do it… I thought…" he mumbled unintelligibly under his own nose before Shimo asked him for a clarification of what happened.

"You may not know yet but everything in this Universe is brimming with chakra. From every human being alive to space bodies and stars burning in the skies. The Juugo legacy is to be able to absorb the chakra around them. To store that natural chakra like a battery and being able to use it for these destructive blasts. However the natural chakra is evil, it is primal and basic and it changes us. Makes us angry and bloodthirsty, when we consume too much of it, when we deny us restraint it changes our very bodies. That's why our bodies change like they do" the man began the explanation as he walked up to Kouta and picked him off the ground, the man placed a blue food pill into the boy's mouth and forced him to grind it with his teeth.

"Yeah, so let's say that's how your bodies change and how you're able to waste all that chakra in those blasts you do, but what was THAT?" Shimo asked.

"That was what happens when we allow that change to affect our entire body, when our chakra pool becomes one third natural chakra our whole body begins to change uncontrollably. What Kouta did was only the first stage – he absorbed chakra around him until the chakra he absorbed was approaching the majority and it began affecting his very cellular structure, his essence became that of someone else entirely. A warrior thirsty for blood" Kusagoro concluded looking at his son as he opened his eyes and his wounds closed up from the expensive food pill he had just consumed, inferior only to the black medical food pill – one of the priciest ninja tools one could carry in their kits.

"Father…" Kouta whimpered as he struggled out of his father's grip and stood back up beginning to dust his clothes.

"Why? Why did my sister disappear?" Bonny still wept on her knees, in a grieving way only a loving sister could grieve.

"Because we are what our chakra is. If a man's chakra pool was somehow obtained the chakra of a dog, replacing his own, he'd become a dog, not just appear like one, he'd be one. Your sister feasted on my molecular structure, my very life force which was filled to brim with natural chakra of nothingness. In the end, since she was no Jugo she became what she ate – nothingness" Kouta concluded his father's speech without knowing it was made in the first place.

"That is the curse of being a Jugo. That was why our clan was banished and hunted by Otogakure to near extinction before they realized that their unique bond with nature around them could've helped them practice restraint from their bloodline. That they could focus on their bond with nature and all living things instead of fighting…" the medical ninja said as he looked at the shocked face of his teammate as Shimo was handed a green food pill by Kusagoro which he then consumed. The Yuki's body began slowly regenerating some of the heavier wounds it had sustained.

"It's over, Bonny…" Kouta slowly and with profound sadness in his voice for what he had to do exclaimed.


	214. Hell Hath the Fury of a Father Scorned

Kouta, Shimo and Kusagoro continued to stare at Bonny who was still weeping over the loss of her sister. Truly after a lifetime of sharing a body and a mind this feeling of solitude and silence would've been unbearable for anyone. Loneliness was something that crippled even the strongest ones, even Kusagoro changed greatly after losing his comrades in the Wind Country desert. It granted him a desire for revenge, a purpose.

Bonny's body disappeared, Shimo and Kouta's eyes opened up in surprise as the boys struggled to breathe a single gasp of air in before they would've been stricken down by the woman. At this point there was nothing that they could've done, even without Read, Bonny possessed sufficiently replenished chakra level to finish off both of them without breaking a sweat, especially since Kouta's lacking chakra level and inexperience made him lose his Curse Seal transformation straight after acquiring it.

Bonny's body appeared back into the visions of the young men as her thrusting spiky arm was stopped by Kusagoro grabbing her wrist right up close to Kouta's chest where it'd have penetrated the boy and pierced his heart with a single hand thrust. Bonny's virus form wriggled and tried to escape Kusagoro's grasp but the man appeared to be able to restrain the captain without much effort. The arm erupted in elongated spikes that attempted to penetrate the jounin's hand but the armor shell just shattered into pieces revealing soft and fleshy glowing red scar tissue beneath it.

"Don't touch my son!" Kusagoro cut it short as he slung the woman over his shoulder and slammed her into the ground with shocking strength, enough to crack the island open and cause violent quakes that reopened the earthly scars and made the lava gazers erupt again dancing in graceful yet searing hot arcs. It was as if Earth herself bled dry from just a brief introduction to Kusagoro's strength.

Right after completing the slam Kouta's father slammed Bonny to the other side cracking her shell open and causing the island ground to rupture again, water began rushing through the island's cracks creating multiple smaller islands that would eventually be split and sent drifting aimlessly through the ocean from sheer water pressure or drown if they were unable to make their stand against the raging waves.

After completing to assert his total dominance over the remaining captain Kusagoro pulled the crushed and broken captain out from the ground flipping her into the air like a flappy pancake out of a pan. Bits and pieces of her spiky shell began to fall as the pair of slams she received were sufficiently powerful to completely crush the woman open like a shellfish fighting against a pneumatic press. Just as the battered Bonny would've hit the ocean water and likely drifted away to an unknown fate of solitude and silence Kusagoro's kick right into the center of her back sent the captain flying aside to an island at the very least five thousand miles away cutting the oceans she was kicked through like an arrow cut air.

Kusagoro's body blurred and disappeared flying aside his opponent appearing onto the island he sent her in an instant to only to slam his elbow to the flying by Bonny's face and then driving her to the island floor with both of his hands in a double handed slam. The force completely demolished the entirety of Bonny's armor and left her disabled and broken. It would've been impossible to tell if there was any life left in half of the pirate captain sisters but Kusagoro was a man taking no chances. His foot tightly stepped on the torn and busted scar tissue of the woman's face as his hand morphed into a cannon aimed right at the ground beneath his feet.

"You're a tough bitch, I'll give you that, pirate. Let's see you handle this… An attack matching the power of the largest dying stars, all focused and controlled to flow purely through your body so that you're the only thing getting erased! Hell's Wrath!" Kusagoro shouted out as his single aimed cannon emitted a powerful white beam that created a flash of light temporarily blinding people on the other side of the world as the island the two were in got completely disintegrated into nothingness.

The blast of the attack erupted underground into multiple smaller beams that all shot out and left the Earth's orbit creating beacons of light. The ancient legends told of people living on the Moon, if that was true even they would've been terrified of those blinding flashes of light passing through their little homeworld into the oblivion of cold and dead space. After the dust cleared out Kusagoro just sighed and flew back to the island in a blink of an eye right back to his son and his friend.

Kouta and Shimo had already begun rushing towards the pyramid with Kouta dragging the weak Meiko along. Kusagoro blinked in nearby the two as if he was never gone to begin with slowing his unbelievable speed so that it matched that of the young ones.

"You killed her?" Kouta asked coldly.

"So the pot developed a sense of morality against the kettle?" Kusagoro smiled carelessly.

The ninja carefully leaped over the fissures that were separating the jungle island into separate islands. It was hard to believe that even completely restrained power could cause such aftermaths, ninja were warriors of subtlety, a single chunin may have been strong enough to strike with world breaking strength but they always controlled their might so it only affected their target and never the world around them. A powerful ninja hit with the power of Gods and yet not a sign of their presence was seen to testify the presence of a ninja, to think that even with such restraint and control the power that Kusagoro possessed still caused such immense destruction…

"I gave you a blue food pill. Your friends can have some orange ones…" Kusagoro said nonchalantly looking at his son with a moderate sense of pride towards the young man. Even in his wildest dreams the jounin couldn't have imagined seeing his son show such potential while being tested by his father's cruel ways.

"I was fine, I could've been good with the red one. Shimo's injuries are more severe, he could've used the blue one, or Meiko, she almost got killed!" Kouta grunted out angrily at his father. "We already explained this to you, father, me and mom: the blue one is the most powerful one, it heals any wounds without compensating any chakra back like the black one, the green one is good enough for a single dangerous wound, the orange one is elementary battlefield patching and the red one is for small wounds and bruises"

"I know, still, you're the one I care even remotely about…" Kusagoro shrugged, "Anyways, I heard you guys were travelling with an Uchiha" he added.

"It's my old sensei" Shimo interrupted Kusagoro's impending question.

"I see, so not the man from the desert then…" the jounin snapped his fingers in regret.

"No, I don't know what happened to scaredy-sensei anyways, knowing him he bailed on us the moment this island began to fall apart…" Shimo remarked angrily looking at the sky while he cracked a food pill and handed another one to Meiko.

"You guys should ease up, one can't just fight for days on end by just eating food pills! Your hearts would give up on you. It's a temporary solution, not a second round measure" Kouta warned as Shimo felt up his gaping hole wound that was beginning to close up from the pill. It was likely that wound alone would consume all the beneficiary effects of the pill alone.

"So are you here to kill Mana again?" Meiko whined out with a weak voice as her eyes opened and fell onto Kouta's father.

"Not really, I'm kinda ordered to bring you kids back home. The village is worried because the boss lady hasn't received a report from you in weeks, some of the old farts in the council thought you may have gone rogue… Knowing that magician wench I wouldn't have been surprised" Kusagoro shook his head looking on ahead at the pyramid in front of him.

"Stop calling Mana-chan that! She's a strong and loyal person, she'd never pull something like that nor would she drag us into something as reckless as that!" Kouta shouted out at his father angrily.

Kusagoro smiled.

"That girl is really good for you, you'd have never yelled at your old man before. Also this mission lead to improvements both to your girly healing skills and your ability to throw a punch. I'd have never thought you'd achieve the first stage of the Curse Seal in your entire lifetime, knowing how puny you were and yet you leaped such insane bounds in these couple of months it's tough to believe…" Kusagoro admitted with his eyes closed as if he was ashamed of his pride in his own son.

"Wait, did you just compliment your son?" Shimo wondered, "Now I have seen everything…"

While Kouta's face suggested some embarrassment over being praised by his father for the first time in forever, in public, nevertheless, the young man remained quiet and simply looked on ahead. They weren't too far from the pyramid anyways.

Mana made her way down the pyramid staircase and sat down against it. Hopelessly she dragged her hands stroking her sticky dark hair and forcing it behind her back instead of its usual messy state. So this was it then? She was unable to interact with the Box and save her friends because the Box needed this one thing she wished to gain back in order to work? Mana closed her eyes and let her mind linger away almost like it used to when she meditated.

"Please… Just this once… I know that the spiritual chakra is everything I lack, I know that you're keeping me away from it because I'm being reckless with it but… Just this once… Please…" Mana begged her own body to let her use the spiritual aspect of chakra that was shut down from her. Her own mind trapped Mana's identity within a prison of its own making. Just how twisted and cruel was that? To live within the prison of one's own mind and knowing that you're your own worst enemy. To have to search the whole world through and through just to avoid having to deal with one's own inner demons?

"You're not gonna help, huh?" Mana's busted lips twisted into a weak smile as her eyes remained closed and her mind kept floating as if in another plane entirely. "That's why you won't help – because you feel betrayed and hurt after realizing that I'd rather look for some wish fulfilment artifact that talk to my own body…" the magician spoke to herself realizing her own mistake.

"The thing is that I'm not the one at stake here… Meiko, Shimo and Kouta are! Hachiro-san too…" Mana tried to reason with her own body so that her hidden spiritual chakra side would be unlocked. It was to no avail, her own body stayed silent and closed off from Mana. It was like talking to a capricious child or a difficult teen, once they've figured out they've been lied to they'll shut off and won't talk to you again.

Suddenly Mana felt something being forced down her throat and a violent slap at her cheek. The magician's mind snapped out of the procession into a deep meditational stage and back into reality seeing Meiko leaning over her and having forced a food pill down Mana's throat.

"You had to make her crack the pill with her teeth, Meiko…" Kouta rubbed his forehead in annoyance to the redhead's ignorance with first aid.

Mana coughed as her throat was annoyed with the large pill and upchucked it back to where she actually chewed it up. It tasted like seaweed that had spent months in old soy sauce, smelled sort of like that too. The magician licked her lips and tried summoning some saliva to wash away the weird taste out of her mouth but it was stuck there. Still, she could appreciate the pill helping her wounds even if she wasn't sure where this medical resource had come from.

"Yo!" Kusagoro awkwardly raised his hand up introducing himself to Mana, the magician jumped up and began backing up in fear of the man that almost killed her multiple times but then realized that her friends were both alive and completely unalarmed by the man's presence which meant that there must've been something she did not know.

"Don't worry, Mana-chan, dad isn't here to kill us or anything… He's here to bring us back home but he won't care if he does it now or a bit later after we get what we came here for. We thought you'd have evacuated like Hachiro once the islands began to split… Finding you here took some time" Kouta tried calming Mana down and switching the topic away from his father and his deeds in the past.

This was the first time that Mana had heard about something happening to this island, Mana looked around and witnessed the island being shattered into hundreds of smaller islands all of which slowly drifted apart as the shifting waters that began seeping in between the landmasses started breaking them off and drifting them away. The magician wanted to wonder who may have done this but… It was almost obvious it must've been Kusagoro, then again, the food pills that made her friends look almost in fighting shape must've also come from him as well.

"I'm grateful you helped my friends" Mana awkwardly bowed her head for the man in gratitude. It looked like the tall warrior was not used to such courtesy as he just scratched the back of his head.

"Oh, well, you know… I didn't break my back or anything…" he tried figuring out how exactly he was supposed to be nice to a girl whose guts he kind of hated but who helped his son grow which automatically meant he wanted her around.

"You most definitely didn't…" Shimo squinted angrily at the man.

"Anyways, Mana, why didn't you activate the Box, I hope it wasn't because that whole "I promised you'd get to hold it in your hands" thing…" Meiko asked Mana looking at the busted up pyramid and her friend with great worry and care.

"It's a bit larger than I thought so… That part may be troublesome" Mana smiled but then her face got back to sad again, "No, it was because it needs some chakra to set off whatever seals are placed on it… I'm so useless I can't even take my goal once it's right in front of me" the magician looked away completely crushed by her own disability.

"Oh, well… We're all here, aren't we?" Kouta smiled.

"What happened to the sisters?" Mana asked, her eyes still carried a small speck of hopeful flares that maybe the pirate captains were still alive and her plan wasn't a total failure.

"Oh…" Kouta looked at his father awkwardly realizing what he had to tell the magician. The young man she promised to give a shot at dating her and his father just killed someone – someone dangerous and yet still they did a thing she hated most of all. It'd have really put a shaky start to a relationship. Kusagoro looked at his son curiously wondering why did his boy have such trouble owning the fact he beat the enemy. With such amazing transformation, no less! If it was Kusagoro's victory achieving the first stage of the hidden Jugo power he'd own up to that all the way through!

"I killed them both!" Shimo declared out of the blue. "There was no other way. They were too strong, Kusagoro's appearance bought us some time and I used that chance, have a problem with that?" he rubbed it into Mana's face completely shifting the black mark away.

Kusagoro's face began undergoing some weird transformations, the man struggled to comprehend the complicated social processes that transpired but looking at Kouta's strangely alleviated face he realized that it was best for his son's case if he kept his mouth shut and didn't declare the swordsman a liar.

"Well… I'm sure you did your best to find another way" Mana replied trying to hide away her disappointment. It wasn't a disappointment in her friends, it was self-loathing. The feeling of pathetic self-pity that made Mana hate her own guts for coming up with this plan that almost lead to her friends dying and made her trick a pirate captain and her crew only for things to lead up for the pirates to getting killed.

"Wait… So you used a pirate crew to sail you here and then killed them? Holy shit, that's some real ninja work!" Kusagoro whistled after finally getting the hang of things that happened. "Shit, girly, you're gonna get promoted, sure as fuck, that's ruthless as all hells! I mean, if you straighten the whole powerless situation…" he added which only made Mana feel worse about herself. This whole trip revealed so much to the magician about herself and her own incompetence that she was beginning to doubt her own worth of even acquiring her identity back.

"Yeah…" she uttered lifelessly standing back on her feet and beginning to walk towards the edge of the island that the team was standing on. A small stretch of land surrounding the pyramid.

"Wait up, Mana, what about the Box!?" Meiko shouted out.

"Lift it, hold it in your hands… I promised you that much. I don't want it, I don't need it. I don't deserve it" Mana replied waving her hand back after sitting at the edge of the island and letting her ruined sandals submerge into the bloody and foamy sea water below her feet.

"Wait, what!? It's yours! Stop acting like a child and claim your wish!" Shimo shouted out angrily walking up to Mana and grabbing the magician by her collar. The young man began dragging her towards the pyramid against her will.

"Do you really need this in your life?" Kusagoro stretched out carelessly while turning at his son. "Your mother is a lot like that too, it's why I spend so little time at home" he smiled as if he was describing something to be proud in.

Shimo began dragging Mana up the stairs as the magician kicked and wailed around trying to land a blow or get out of her friend's grip she may as well have been stuck in the gravity field of a black hole. Shimo didn't even budge and it only made her knuckles hurt.

"Take this wish, it's YOURS!" he shouted as his hand reached for the black exposed corner of the box ready to activate the seal.

A violent explosion sent Shimo and Mana away from the pyramid as it cracked open and several more structural pieces collapsed revealing more and more of the Box before the entire construction fell to bits revealing the Box in its glory. The skies became dark and thunderbolts started lighting up the night's sky, the bolts of purple light, the lightning of evil chakra surrounding the Box being unearthed once more.

The magician landed in Shimo's grasp as he wrapped himself around her covering the fall and protecting Mana from any shrapnel or wild wandering bricks from crushing her after they slid away. In the visible horizon a colossal ship was approaching the island from the other side blasting right through the smaller islands, one of the cannon blasts must've hit the pyramid sending the young ninja down on the ground.

Mana looked at the ship and the black sail that carried the symbol of a large chunk of meat wrapped around a bone horizontally to the mouth of a skull that was tearing a large chunk off of it. The ship was dyed red and was at least twelve times larger and better armed than that of Bonny's. In the presence of such a juggernaut the surviving members of Bonny's crew must've quickly fled for their lives if they could still manage sailing a ship.

Pirate Lord "Red" – Akimichi Francho came to claim the treasure promised to him by a message in a bottle he had intercepted.


	215. In a Heartbeat

As the colossal juggernaut of the seas approached the shocked Konoha crew continued to awe at the upcoming terror. Everything went completely wrong with Mana's plan. Granted, there was little of any better planning to be done as everything that went wrong went wrong not due to her poor planning but more because of a series of unrelated coincidences. For some reason it was Francho and not Flint who got her anonymous message, also Read's ship found the island much faster than anticipated leaving so much free time on their hands before the messaged ships arrived.

A rotund tower of a man stood on the main deck of the ship. He was so tall and so thick in stature that as he stood at the front of the ship half of his body was visible from ashore and his wide shoulders with ancient oak sized hands could've covered the whole ship from one side to the other.

Just like his name implied Francho wore a red, gold and white coat with decorated shoulders and bunch of looted off medals and awards decorating his chest. On top of his head his long brown hairdo was only restrained by a red bandana with a bunch of cut up bent and broken ninja headband protectors stuck up like armor plates for his makeshift classic style helmet. The Pirate Lord was of his later years – well into his fifties and had a dominating beard presence that covered his entire chest which would've looked rude by how strongly it burst from his shirt tearing his own apparel apart. Hanging on his belts were not handheld kunai dispensers, those were literal cannons with mechanised fuses.

Akimichi Francho was a man who found a way to make the weapon title "handcannon" sound more literally than anyone who came before him. Strangely enough the Pirate Lord wore no swords, a man of his wealth must've had access to plenty of them so this implied that Francho didn't like that fighting style. It wasn't tough to understand why seeing how tall and round of stature the man was. His short yet thick arms would've moved quite awkwardly and failed to cover his entire body protecting himself from sword blows.

"Which fucking dog told me to arrive one day earlier to beat that slimy sea-dog Flint to the punch?!" the man shouted out in a voice more common amongst hobos of more humid settlements than a decorated and feared Pirate Lord.

"It was Mutt!" a wave of shouts echoed amongst his crew who looked so tiny yet only because of contrast with their Lord that it was so.

Francho's arm moved to his belt removing one of those massive handcannons and blasting it aside so fast and strongly that one half of a man got completely blown off while a whole bunch of men besides the poor soul got tossed aside and visibly injured. Then again, the full extent of their injuries was tough to assess with the poor "Mutt's" blood covering them.

"Why didn't anyone tell me this fucking ghost island had native savages? Who delivered this message to us!?" the Pirate Lord continued to thrash angrily throwing the whole towering ship off balance and shaking it in the seas it sailed on in the process.

"It was an anonymous message!" the crew once again rustled fearing for one of their lives since this time no one was actually to blame and therefore none of them deserved being blown to bits. "We intercepted it after leaving Flint's waters from the Parley of the whole Nukata port incident" someone yelled out intelligibly only to those ninja that still could augment their chakra.

"Your message got intercepted before it reached Flint by Francho" Shimo explained turning his head sideways to Mana. Despite having somewhat healed most of his wounds with the pill given to him by Kusagoro the Yuki was visibly worried and angered by the appearance of this ship. They had just finished dealing with some of those seemingly invincible pirates and now it appeared that there not only was more of them but that they were being lead by one of the strongest pirates alive. One of the Pirate Lords.

"Eh, whatever… Kill those landlubbers and bring that Box aboard! I'll try to think of a wish to ask of that bloody thing!" the man thundered out loud enough even for Mana to hear and his voice was powerful enough to disturb the seas of the already stormy water. The clouds continued to get murkier and darker as the purple lightning storms got more and more intense. The exposure of the Box to the outside world appeared to be tearing the Earth itself apart. It probably needed to be used soon…

The men on board shared a laugh with their Pirate Lord. "Aye!" some of them thundered back in return.

"All of these guys are wearing captain coats and triangular hats, just like one on Read's ship. Most of them must be captains loyal to Francho, the guy must've been prepared for a full out war with Flint after coming here!" Kouta angrily noticed before giving his friends a troubled look.

"We may be better but we're not even in our prime shape. There's no way we can take on a crew of captain level opponents" he added.

As Francho extended his hands aside a bunch of pirates leaped out from the various decks and floors of the massive ship and aimed to land of the island. It was a literal siege of men throwing themselves at the island with the intention to murder everything at the very moment that their feet touched the ground. Having their individual and combined powers in mind it was quite likely they'd do it.

Kusagoro sighed, "Well, I guess they're trying to kill you guys, me included. Us dying would make completing my mission a bother. I'll kick their asses so we can finally go home" he noted as his body was no longer on the island floor after the man's words finished ringing in the air.

One of the pirates charged his body up with blobs of magma and threw meteor sized fireballs at Kusagoro who simply backslapped those heated mountains of rock and fire aside shattering them and protecting the small mini-island beneath his feet. After the meteors proved fruitless the magma blob wielding captain launched a blazing beam of fire at Kusagoro. The man just covered his face up as his jump launched the jounin past the beam splitting it apart like an arrow.

With a crunchy head-butt the magma captain's body was crushed and a bony snap noise suggested that Kusagoro's head broke the man's spine and was just inches away from piercing the man's whole body apart. The Konoha jounin backflipped kicking off of the corpse's falling body and his feet morphed into small cannons that slowly emanated controlled chakra flames just powerful enough to keep him in the air.

Another pair of captains around him weaved hand seals in an instant. Kusagoro's body covered up in a crystal cocoon turning him into a pillar of diamond as the captain's arms shifted into diamond blades slicing and dicing the diamond cocoon into small shatters meanwhile a physically strong looking fellow besides him bashed the remaining chips to dust. After a couple of slices the diamond blades got stuck in something and Kusagoro broke himself out of the diamond with an angry yell, with an easy flick of his fingers he cracked the diamond blades and the man who had shifted his own body to take the shape of the pink crystal he wielded to dust which the wind scattered.

As the powerful comrade of the diamond man launched himself at Kusagoro the man's body disappeared in thin air reappearing behind the powerhouse and kicking him in the back area of his neck instantly snapping it. Black tendrils began tying up Kusagoro's body that swung around and slammed him into a nearby mini-island destroying it completely. All of the captains landed on the ground activating their Art of Water Walking techniques while Kusagoro launched himself out of the water punching the head off of the Nara clan member that tied him up and attacked him before.

A whole bunch of captains tried to overwhelm the jounin one by one but as they were less and less successful as the wave went on they began piling together onto the man. One captain wearing a large white coat and wearing shades together with a hood that covered most of his head slammed his hands together unleashing a wave of attacks on an invisible scale. Another powerhouse with six arms as a result of his clan's bloodline attacked Kusagoro head on, yet another captain focused the light around him and fused it with lightning chakra into a concentrated beam that if launched carelessly would've easily disintegrated the entire planet. Another captain summoned a shark-like monstrous creature that disappeared underwater before syncing up its attack with the rest of the captains as they worked at slowly chipping Kusagoro into nothingness.

And yet the jounin appeared barely affected by any of those attacks. His body bloated up as miniscule nano-sized Aburame insects flooded his body and tried blowing it up from inside but with a battlecry of great fury Kusagoro forced the insects to grind together and overpowered them reducing his body back to normal. Then with a single elbow strike backwards he broke the six armed man's face and sent him underwater only to not surface. He placed his hands in front of the light beam pushing it right back at the man who launched it shaping his hands like a scoop that reflected the beam's tip at the user and disintegrated half of the man's arms. Then Kusagoro kicked the beaten captain down underwater. Kusagoro punched the shark creature right in the center of its nose as it emerged sending it spiralling to the bottom before it disappeared to never resurface

As another captain multiplied creating hundreds of shadow clones he tried to use to overwhelm Kusagoro the Jugo's body created cannon's on the man's back and sides that launched simultaneous beams of chakra and as the man rotated his body around the beams cut down each and every clone before removing large chunks of the original's body and killing him almost instantly. Then the man fused all of the cannons together into a larger singular beam and aimed it straight up since another Akimichi had expanded his body at least fifty times and tried to crush Kusagoro with his oversized foot, instead he got the foot blown off and joined his fellow crewman in the ocean gods' locket.

A female captain finally finished forming her handseals erecting colossal chunks of manipulated seaweed from down under and forming tendrils out of them trying to tie Kusagoro down into a cocoon and snuff him out by suffocating him or dragging him underwater. The jounin barely tried to resist as the tremendously oversized leaves coming from straight underwater tied him up and began to drag him deep into the bottom. Then with a powerful shine and a violent explosion erupting from underwater the man revealed himself and punched into the captain's gut, her chakra level failed to augment her body enough and Kusagoro's punch ended up going right through the woman's body. With a violent stomp to the back of her head the man sent the woman where she attempted to send him just moments before.

"Fire Style…" another captain tried to chant out the name of his technique before Kusagoro's firm grip locked the man's throat stopping him from naming his technique and holding the giant fireball inside the man's lungs where it blew up momentarily sending tongues of flame and smoke from the man's nose and eyes and killing him by tearing his insides apart momentarily.

"Wind Style: Staccato" a woman shouted out behind Kusagoro as a crushing barrage of air waves began bumping at his body but it only served as a mean of pissing the jounin off more.

"Allegro! Brioso! Adagio! Crescendo!" the woman continued to rank up the intensity of the crushing and cutting sound waves but Kusagoro just continued to walk past them without much care. The last couple did tear some of his clothes apart reducing them to smallest chunks and the final technique did open a couple of cuts on the man's face and the exposed half of his chest sending narrow streams of blood trickling down. Still the man grabbed the woman's neck and snapped it without much effort.

Ten more captains surrounded him beginning to bombard him with attacks. One of them summoned a strange reptilian monster creature and performed a combination transformation that made him into a gigantic lizard that tried to crush Kusagoro. Another one yet used floating plates with seal glyphs on them from which he unsealed powerful bolts of lightning. The third captain was a taijutsu user that tried to pummel Kusagoro with quick and barely visible flurry of blows, his arms were so swift that they left afterimages quick enough to make the man strike at eight spots at once.

The fourth one focused chakra into his palms shaping his hands like the jaws of a wild beast and trying to drive them like a sharp tool into Kusagoro's flesh. The immensity of chakra emanating from the man's hands made the air around it bend and flicker in peculiar ways the likes of which the Konoha jounin had never witnessed before. The fifth one had bandages wrapped around his arms and tried to tie Kusagoro down only to crush his bones with sheer pressure or to keep him in place for his friends to soften the man up so he could finish the jounin up himself.

The sixth captain wielded a long metal staff which broke into four pieces and moved by itself forming a square around the battlefield. The staff then attracted some of the purple lightning bolts and shaped a forcefield which then began to close in on Kusagoro trying to crush the man or to shock him lethally by the voltage of the mystical purple lightning which the Box emanated on the nearby island where the completely awed genin stared at the combat festival transpiring in front of them.

The seventh captain tried to capture Kusagoro in a genjutsu which was initiated by the harmless lightning technique. Once the lightning flash concluded Kusagoro felt his body go numb and his vision darken making it impossible to properly assess the battlefield or respond to any attacks. Then he felt the weak lightning signals intercept his own neuron signals attempting to take control over his own body. The eighth captain flashed through a bunch of hand seals covering Kusagoro in a highly corrosive goo while the ninth placed his hands in front and tried to use some strange telekinetic jutsu to pull Kusagoro's very particles apart one by one dissolving the man into dust.

The tenth captain went through his own share of hand seals while pointing his hands at the bottom of the ocean. An island sized chunk of solid rock erected up in the air kilometres further and travelled straight above the battlefield extending all the way to the island where the Box and the genin were located. With a careless wave of his arm the captain ordered the whole battlefield to be smashed by this island sized structure.

"Enough!" Kusagoro yelled out propelling chakra through every pore of his body as a miniscule beam which fused into a powerful expulsion of chakra breaking the bodies of every single captain and disintegrating every one of their unique manners of attack to nothingness. The overwhelming pressure of the technique even killed the genjutsu user that attempted to take over Kusagoro's mind by manipulating his nerve signals instantly ending the genjutsu. Even the island sized rock above everyone's head got grinded into ash-like stone that began raining on the battlefield.

The remaining several dozens of captains rushed off after the kids remaining on the island but they weren't nearly as fast as their solitary very angry opponent. The Konoha jounin dashed past the deceitful captains and stopped them in their tracks right up to the island where his hand shifted into a cannon and pointed at them.

"Chakra Shotgun!" he yelled out as the chakra beam fired off from his arm spread out like an outwards cone obliterating every remaining captain.

Despite the fact that the kids got blown back by the immense destructive force of Kusagoro's blast the man himself didn't appear to be much affected by the backlash of his own attack. He just coldly turned at the Pirate Lord who continued to think to himself about the wish he'd ask for the Box to fulfil only noticing far too late the destruction of his entire crew. Only the few servicemen needed to run the ship properly remained in Red's ship, contrary to the pirates that had little choice, the Pirate Lords rarely used servicemen for combat.

"Your crew is dead, go home…" Kusagoro shouted out before turning his back and looking at Mana and the others who only now realized what had happened. This entire battle transpired so fast that both Mana and her friends were equally stumped and clueless about what transpired in front of them and where the whole crew of captains went.

"And you, little missy, go make your wish, this place is starting to piss me off" the man grunted at Mana angrily. While the rest of the young ninja still struggled to understand just what happened in front of them Mana stood up on her toes and looked right into Kusagoro's eyes.

"I told you, I don't want it, I don't deserve it! Now let's go home!" she outright ordered the man.

The Jugo just sighed and scratched the back of his head stretching his muscles out a bit. "Fine, if you don't want that Box, let's go home…" he grumped out under his own nose but then his feet got separated from the ground by a tremendous earthquake emanating from the giant juggernaut ship on the other size of the Box. Akimichi Francho had jumped down from the deck of his ship down onto the island fully willing to join the battle.

"Her Box!? Her Box!?" he shouted out spitting up chewed shellfish and caviar all over his rich brown beard, "This Box and this whole fucking island is MINE!" he declared pointing at himself with his brick sized thumb as his red whirly tattoo wearing cheeks twisted in a confident smile.

The conflict with Pirate Lord Red was pretty much unavoidable now…


	216. Pirate VS Ninja

After looking at the standstill of Kusagoro and the Pirate Lord weighing each other and measuring their opponent, comparing them to themselves, Mana couldn't help but glance sideways at the fully exposed and shining with malevolent and twisted chakra Box of Ultimate Bliss. Occasionally a pair of purple thunderbolts interrupted her train of thought and made her snap back into the frozen world of reality.

"What's wrong?" Kouta asked Mana noticing her turn at the Box one too many times for it to be dismissed as being normal.

"I need to use it…" she uttered. "Before your father gets hurt, before it all gets even worse, before I somehow screw it all up even more. The Box needs to be used, then Red will have no more reason to be here" she whimpered out in desperation.

"Don't be foolish, the Pirate Lord will kill us with even more focus and hatred if we squander the Box away. If you activate it and try to use it, there's no telling who'll speak their wish out first. We're still not sure how this Box works but as long as an enemy of this scale is present it may not be smart to activate it" Shimo cut Mana down before placing his hand on her shoulder. "I know you want everyone to make out of here and you feel it's somehow your fault, you always think that way but now our best course of action is to hope that Kouta's messed up father can kick this guy's ass hard and far enough for him to be as far away from here as possible"

"So you're gonna use the Box?" Meiko curiously got her hopes up as her saddened and feeling for her friends lips finally tipped sideways in a manner somewhat resembling a smile while her cheekbones protruded like a hilt of a concealed sword under cloth.

"No. You're just going to touch it, like I promised you, and we're heading home, mission complete, the Box's location confirmed… The world is better off with me staying the way I am" Mana shook her head still staring at the ruined ground beneath her feet.

Kusagoro finally leaped directly at his opponent, he did not try and employ any typical ninja fighting methods like trying to scope his opponent from a longer range or hiding – if he got out of Red's vision there'd be nothing standing in between Red and the young ones. The Pirate Lord needed to know that Kusagoro was a persistent pain up his ass as long as the long haired beardo continued to mess with his mission.

The jounin decided to scope his opponent's strength out, give him a single powerful punch to the gut, not focused and unchained enough to slow him down but without any conscious effort of holding back. An actual strong and tensed muscle blow. Kusagoro was pleasantly surprised when his punch dove deep into the beer and rum belly of the Pirate Lord lifting his huge body off the ground slightly and making the man slobber up.

With quick precise blows that had much less force and focus but more speed behind them the ex-ANBU operative tried picking his opponent off, wear him out for a heavy finishing blow at the end of his attacking string. While the Pirate Lord did take damage from Kusagoro's blow, even spat up blood suggesting internal injury from the get-go, the fact that the man's body did not explode into fleshy bits slightly alarmed the Konoha veteran. A punch of such intensity could've accomplished wonders, killed chuunin or weaker jounin ninja with a single blurry and almost invisible shot. Dozens of times more than it took to break a world to rocky shatters, leave nothing but space dust of an entire planet and yet all it did for this oversized hobo was make him bleed.

Akimichi Francho covered up his face and tensed his immense belly up, Kusagoro's blows landed, his roaring as they cut speed of pierced air, raced light itself combinations of blows bombarded the pirate's defenses bouncing off of the man's body without leaving much permanent damage. Just bruises, blunt trauma and small bumps. No fractures, no crunched up to porridge organs or a bloody symphony of a weakling's body exploding from the pressure of chakra transferred through their body surpassing their own many times over. Then all of a sudden Francho took a punch to the jaw twisting his face to the side and losing a couple of teeth and a squirt of blood enough to fill a sake cup.

At the same time the man's hand reached for his sides pulling out one of his massive handcannons that were many times more massive than any cannon any ship Kusagoro had seen carrying. This man was a walking heavy cavalry all by himself. Francho, still dazed and overwhelmed by Kusagoro's quick jab to the jaw which he purposefully skipped to free up an arm for a counter, fired off a wild cannon blast at Kusagoro's direction. It fired off into the distance meanwhile Kusagoro's body danced in a blurry spin on his dominant leg placing the ninja behind his opponent with a finishing elbow strike to Francho's back sending the Pirate Lord away through the seas like a flat pebble skidding over the surface of a lake crashing into an island a good twenty thousand kilometers away.

The cannonball which Francho had fired blasted off into the distance, past into the horizon and then silence… Absolute white covered up the sky completely blinding anyone on that hemisphere of the planet. Far away in the cold vastness of space the rogue cannonball hit a space body completely devoid of a chakra network detonating in its full intensity unleashing a blast zone of at least fifty thousand kilometers as a rampant shockwave emanated throughout nearby planets shaking them up and causing untold cataclysms throughout. Deafening blasting noise tried turning Mana's eardrums to chalky dust but then the magician recovered seeing her friends covering her eyes as well as her entire body up with a human dome as they synced up their chakra focuses forming a protective formation.

Kusagoro looked into the sky with great annoyance. For a moment Mana could've sworn seeing surprise in his eyes but then it was passed down to Kouta and Shimo who just stared off into the skies above.

"That cannonball…" Shimo uttered in respective fear and uncertainty.

"Yeah…" Kouta nodded before turning at the blood stained main mast of the giant juggernaut ship in which the Pirate Lord rode. Now it made perfect sense why the poor captain got completely obliterated by one shot from that handheld weapon.

"What if that was a planet it hit?" Meiko stared off into the sky, augmenting her visual senses using chakra trying to peek into the destruction the cataclysmic detonation had caused.

"It did…" Kusagoro grunted through grinding teeth before looking into the distant drowning rubble of an island he sent the Pirate Lord through. "It hit a moon and completely blown it to bits, the blast shockwave must've decimated the surface of the planet of that moon. I can see the damage on that planet from a fair distance visually, the whole thing is coloring blaze red…"

"Father…" Kouta tried opening up a topic but Kusagoro closed his eyes and yelled out interrupting his son.

"I can take what he can dish out. Don't worry. This is nothing" the man tried calming his son down but there was still some unclear anger in Kusagoro's eyes.

A rotating brown ball covered up the Sun before beginning to spiral right at Kusagoro who just extended his hand at his opponent stopping the oversized man cannonball that just bounced off after Red realized that he would not hurt his opponent this way.

"Human Bullet Tank!" the Pirate Lord shouted out after the human rolling cannonball returned to his normal oversized colossus of a man form.

"Well, well… A lousy pirate learned some tricks from the ninja ancestors that gave him birth?" Kusagoro grinned for a moment before resuming his pissed act.

"Just before setting sails for this island I was busy visiting a sea-god Ishirrinbu temple. Monks there dismiss all of their previous allegiances so my elders carried no shame with sharing their clan secrets with me for a price… That being said, this technique I've learned long before I deserted the Island of Serenity's navy" the Pirate Lord huffed out after wiping a drool of blood running down his nose and his lip. The man was glad that he was given this chance to catch some of his breath.

"That cannonball. What is it?" Kusagoro asked pointing at the still fiery skies as the clouds were absolutely wiped away from the tremendous sky pressure momentarily wiping away the dark dread brought by the Box, showing only burning skies above before the Box's evil chakra once again took over the climate ravaging the skies with purple thunderbolts and thick endless layers of dark clouds.

"Antimatter. Each cannonball holds one ton of it sealed off with chakra seals in a hardened shell. One group of seals is supposed to contain the antimatter from all the matter within the shell while the other one is designed to forcefully transfer all that force right through the object it is aimed at and not blow up the half of the world I'm in every time… I'm not that crazy" Francho grinned popping his cannon open by swinging it downwards so that it tossed out a large ball which he caught and showed off for the young ones and Kusagoro. It didn't look much different from just another cannonball and yet the destruction it carried within was untold and tough to even imagine.

"Are you interested in this weapon, ninja?" the Pirate Lord laughed out mocking his opponent.

"Nah, don't care about that. The Boss-Lady might though… If my boy brings back both those pricy shards and those shells back it'll score some points with her" Kusagoro explained in contained excitement.

"Heh, whom are you trying to fool? Everyone can smell yer crapped up pants from here!" Francho thundered out in a wild fit of laughter.

"Hmph, not really…" Kusagoro shrugged after punching his own palm a couple of times in frustration, "It's just that after seeing you take my honest punch and seeing all that destruction you can dish out you got my hopes up but truth be told – you're too weak to compare to my best despite pushing me there"

It was clear that the jounin's remark properly pissed his opponent off who suddenly reached for both of his cannons and pointed them at Kusagoro preparing to unleash hellfire. After both of the Lord's hands were moved away from his torn up and now unbuttoned military coat the darned thing opened revealing pockets and holsters filled with the cannonballs leaving almost no space on the inside of the coat.

Kusagoro fired himself off at his opponent, breaking off any leashes and completely letting himself off the chain. Fights like this annoyed him so much – when his opponent was strong enough to really challenge him and make him not need to hold back any more but not strong enough to compare to the very top percentages of power he had to show.

With a wild battle cry Kusagoro's fist dug deep into the pirate's jaw throwing a couple of more teeth off into the distance. With another swift motion the jounin pressed a switch on the cannons letting all the balls just fall off from the cannons and scatter along the floor, all twelve of them were now rolling around and getting lost in the ocean waves through the cracks of the breaking apart and drifting island.

Kusagoro's fists began to soar wildly, blurring, laying siege on the Akimichi's defenses but Francho merely once again covered his face and head and started turning around with his upper body blocking the upper aiming strikes with his elbows or the sides of his arms meanwhile the lower punches while successful in being landed only appeared to deal temporary damage. For a man his size Francho definitely took as many blows as his height and weight suggested he'd be able to.

"Open Hand Slap!" Francho yelled out skipping a couple of blows to his jaw and nose only to land a powerful thrust from both his hands that blasted Kusagoro away into the horizon. Had the man met any islands in his ocean splitting flight he'd have demolished the entire natural structures just like his opponent did before.

"Don't think this is over!" the Pirate Lord yelled out, his hands momentarily became too blurry to see and the young ninja realized that the Pirate Lord reloaded his cannons in the smallest microsecond before most of them could even realize what was happening. The giant turned his weapons at the young ones but then reconsidered aiming and opening up hell at Kusagoro's general direction.

Much smaller blasts emanated in the distance. Mana had imagined that shells strong enough to decimate a faraway moon of some distant planet and decimate the surface of the said planet would've made a much more lasting explosion but the blasts seemed not much louder than nearby thunder and the actual blast zone barely even discomforted Mana as the light looked so far away.

"Amazing! Father's body is absorbing all of the energy in those explosions. He's actually taking those shots" Kouta realized exclaiming in shock. Even Mana, someone who was trained by Tanshu himself found it difficult to comprehend and believe.

"How about some of this then?" the Pirate Lord screamed out in childish glee as he quickly emptied the rounds of his cannons, eleven shells each and then reloaded them in a blink of an eye doing the same over and over again. The Pirate Lord emptied his cannons again and again reloading just about fast enough to fire another barrage.

After the tirade of fire and destruction began to bore Francho he lowered his weapons and holstered them by his side. His coat now looked much lighter which was understandable seeing how before it was weighed down by all those tons of cannonballs in his pockets. Now the man's coat looked floaty in the evening wind suggesting that he may have emptied most of his arsenal.

"Now, kiddies, how about you tell good old Pirate Lord Red how to activate this thing and how it works exactly?" the Akimichi giant smiled looking at the young ninja.

"You bastard! Firing away blasts like that so easily, you could've destroyed the whole world if something went wrong! What if you missed and didn't hit Kouta's father!?" Shimo grunted out, ignorant fools like the Pirate Lord who wasted their power without control or restraint, caring not what ruins they leave in their wake annoyed the young swordsman greatly. They reminded the Yuki of the old Mizukage Daikon who made his family have to flee, the kind of person he wished to protect the world from.

Only a thundering laughter from the depths of the Pirate Lord's chest followed the young one's question.

"What do I care? I've got the ultimate wish fulfilment tool in my reach. Once I get my hands on it I'll ask to… Ummm… Immortality? No… That'd be boring… To remake the world with me as its king! No… I don't want to stop plundering… Fine… I'll ask for absolute power unrivaled by any ninja, samurai or any other kind of warrior in the world. I will be the scourge of the seas, no more of this triumvirate of Pirate Lords! The seas and the world by extension whenever I will wish it shall be my Dominion! If the world has to blow up before I ask it, so be it, if I have to cross any lines to do i…"

A powerful hook to the jaw sent the Pirate Lord away knocking the handcannons out of his hands and completely lifting the man off the ground. The blow was so powerful that even the previously landed blows that failed to lift the Pirate Lord off his feet paled in comparison. Even if Francho had dodged the punch the air waves from its wake would've blown the man away all by themselves no matter how many tons he carried under or over his belt.

"You just won't shut up, will you?" Kusagoro grunted with one of his eye closed, momentarily the veteran opened his eye wiping the trickling blood from his forehead away. The jounin's ninja vest was singed up and his clothes were greatly damaged suggesting that whatever chakra augmentation he used to form a forcefield of chakra around himself skipped a little of the blast through.

"Hundred forty seven…" Francho yelled out shaking in anger while wiping the dripping blood off his cracked open lip and busted nose. This time he managed to control his flight and not fly off into the distance, he could only risk submerging that many islands before he finally caught the marine hunter-ninja attention. Fighting off all of their fleets as well as this Konoha ninja would've been problematic and even the lacking modesty Pirate Lord knew it.

"Hundred forty seven fucking antimatter cannonballs you owe me!" the Akimichi screamed out like a madman lunging into battle. Swinging his fist like a total loony without any aim or reason behind it. His style was that of a drunk bar brawler or at least it was the style that the Pirate Lord had chosen for this specific attack.

Kusagoro lifted his hand opening up a vent right in the center of his palm instead of changing the entire palm.

"Chakra Pistol!" he shouted out firing an arm sized laser blast comprised of concentrated chakra he had sapped out of himself as well as the environment around him.

Francho's head cocked back after the blast hit and exploded right in the center of the Pirate Lord's face with enough force to not only break the balance of the towering man but also flip him over himself a couple of times while in the air before Kusagoro's leaping kick stomped and crushed the man to the dirt.

"Do you know why despite the immense power the ninja possess no one is banning their entire order or hunting them like freaks?" Kusagoro calmly began to explain while he nonchalantly hopped off the downed and awkwardly laying upside down body of his opponent.

"That's because our power is proportional with our chakra levels and as you know – chakra is a combination of both one's physical as well as spiritual sides. Just getting blown up with muscle or reading a billion books won't do – you have to obtain both. That means that with each addition to a ninja's chakra level they become wiser in using it. They know the world ending scenarios they could cause and so this planet continues to float in space for millennia… That's until fools like you decide to trick the natural order – fools with a world ending weapon or too much physical power acquired fuck knows where but none of the wisdom, none of the control. I don't care if you support the sensitive balance of temporary marine piece, I'm killing you here, that much I can promise you!" Kusagoro declared looking down at his opponent confidently.


	217. Spinach Before Chili

As the purple thunderstorm raged on and the dark clouds continued to encircle the Box of Ultimate Bliss, making what used to be a paradise island coloured with unique gloom and grit, the ninja, the civilian and a pirate alike managed to ignore the picking up gusts of wind. Being the one most sensitive to environmental factors Mana wrapped her hands around herself and tried warming herself up. The insane battle transpiring in front of her, of which she could rarely perceive anything at all, seemed to slow down. This gave the magician a chance to analyse both combatants.

"Your father looks wounded. His uniform is busted up and some of his open wounds aren't looking too good. I thought he said he was too strong for Francho…" Mana spoke out loud only for Kouta to notice her concern and try hugging her for warmth but after the medical ninja saw the uneasiness and sadness in Mana's eyes he decided to just gently place his hand on her shoulder and try calming her down.

"Father is keeping a lot back, maybe he thinks he can win like this, I'm not sure…" the Jugo mumbled out uneasily. It appeared that Kusagoro's lacking attitude towards this fight worried him somewhat as well.

"What do you mean by holding back? Wouldn't his body instinctually use as much chakra as needed to withstand that damage? Doesn't the fact that he's taking more damage than dishing out suggest his shortcoming?" Mana worried.

"Don't worry, Jugo clan folk have a pretty nasty secret weapon up their sleeve. I'm assuming that Kouta's father is keeping it there because he doesn't want to lose control of himself but he can kick it up a whole lot of notches" Shimo revealed while coldly continuing to observe Kusagoro and Francho exchange blows. The Pirate Lord took a lot more blows than he even tried dish out, in terms of technical martial arts proficiency he was a guppy in an ocean fighting a leviathan. Still, whenever Francho did land an occasional hit it looked like it broke Kusagoro's whole combinations and forced the jounin to back up and catch his breath.

"What does that mean?" Mana shook her head. "Just how much power is your father holding back?"

Kouta closed his eyes as if he was admitting something he wasn't overly proud of, "Back there while we were fighting Read… We got into a pinch, I was forced to use something I thought I'd never use. You see, Jugo can absorb natural chakra, the chakra present in the environment around them. They can then use that chakra to morph not only their limbs but their entire body. Usually such natural chakra would be unusable but our modified over generations DNA shifts our own chakra to better accommodate the natural making us primal and enraged but also powerful. There isn't an actual name for it, this transformation but to me it sounds like a curse. A Curse Mode if you will…"

"It raises too many questions but just answer this, how much more powerful does this Curse Mode make a Jugo?" Mana relented, the historian and lore buff inside her wished to question her friend excessively until she knew everything there was to know. The ability to tap into the power of the nature around one, to be one with the world around you sounded amazing! Still, the situation at hand was too dire for research and legends, she needed to know if Kusagoro could use that to beat his opponent if need be or if she needed to work on a backup plan.

"Well… I'd say the first stage would make father at least more than twice his original chakra level. The first stage just prepares one's body for the unnatural transformation. He'd have to replace at least half of his resources with natural chakra" Kouta admitted.

"First stage? More than twice stronger?" Mana shook both due to the cold chills of the air around her as well as awe in the amazing bloodline power up that a clan ninja had over common ones like her.

"You have to understand, tapping into the fundamental forces of nature makes a person unstable, primal and enraged beyond control. The first stage is just the beginning, however it is the easiest to work with, the user still retains some control over their actions but those violent urges become really powerful. I would never risk going beyond the first stage…" Kouta explained as he saw Mana being under the illusion that it was a power up to be thrown around left and right. "Father must keep it hidden because he values control and style over raw physicality. Even a brawler like him feels that way…"

"You seem to really dislike that awakening of power, I'm sorry you had to use it" Mana apologized as she was de facto giving orders and had the definitive say in the team. She couldn't help but feel responsible.

"Back in Konoha I hated my father's clan heritage. That much is true. I saw how kind my mother was and how bitter she felt about father's life choices. I saw how much good being a medical ninja could do and so I ignored that part of me. But out here, throughout this journey I've come to realize that, just like you, by ignoring that part of my identity and overcompensating on others I was incomplete. That was why I was so weak both as a warrior of the Jugo clan and as a medical ninja. I hate that power, sometimes I dislike my father's words or actions but… It's a part of me, I need that power to protect people just like I need my skills as a medical ninja to do the same. It's because of this journey and this mission that I've learned to appreciate it and tapped into it, it's because of this journey that my identity was mended, as was Shimo's. All of us have reasons to feel grateful, Mana, grateful to you" Kouta bravely admitted just standing and trying to tell what was going on in that mad flurry of punches ahead.

"Shut up…" Shimo mumbled out pouting his lips as if his brave façade was threatened. "Be ready to help your father out whenever you find an opening. We are so weak in this battlefield that it's completely inconsequential but our skillsets may yet serve some use" the swordsman ordered.

A loud booming sound combined with a deafening shockwave instantly demanded the youths' full attention. Francho's hulking frame was awkwardly twisted as his neck extended well over its intended length after Kusagoro's focused right hook dug deep into the man's jaw. The Pirate Lord rocketed into the oceans beside and crashed into another island decimating it and crushing it to such extent that the poor landmark was beginning to slowly submerge underwater.

"Don't!" Kusagoro shouted out, "Don't get in my way and make yourselves targets!" he ordered. Usually the man carried an aura of levity in all of his violent and often terrifying approach to things but this yell was totally serious. The warrior of the Leaf village was after his mission objective to bring as many of the youths home as possible.

"Human Boulder Yo-Yo!" the Pirate Lord yelled out triumphantly as his oversized frame shaped itself into a human ball and rolled at his opponent at immense speeds fast enough to cover the distance between the island he was sent to and the one he was sent there from in moments.

The first strike knocked the wind out of Kusagoro lifting him high up in the air while the still rolling "human boulder" leaped in the air and began bouncing off rocks, trees and even the Box for continuously assault his opponent in the air. After landing a hit or two the user of this peculiar rolling technique just rolled aside or bounced right off any surface and rushed at the opponent again and again. The finishing attack was a downwards dive of the oversized human ball that crushed Kusagoro into the ground and began seriously damaging the island.

As the young ninja fleeted the slowly disappearing island Kouta grabbed Mana in his arms and ran up the Box's surface. For a moment the magician was worried that with the ninja scaling the mystical artifact the chakra used for wall scaling would activate the Box but it wasn't so. The summoner of the Box's mystical powers must've required a conscious effort to unseal its legendary properties.

This time the Pirate Lord kept track of Kusagoro who was slowly drifting underneath and sinking to the bottom of this seemingly abyssal ocean covering the distance between the mainland continent and the Archipelago of islands as well as Kirigakure.

Right after Kusagoro surfaced, Francho opened his military coat's inner pockets revealing hidden sealing glyphs which began to glow in the feint blueish glow. Kusagoro wiped the blood coming from his broken nose and his busted open mouth, the man looked pissed and despite the Pirate Lord's overwhelming assault Mana was beginning to realize that all Francho was doing right now was pulling the moustache of a sleeping titan about to wake.

Francho's hands unsealed a bunch of cannonballs from the storage seals and instantaneously reloaded his handcannons pointing them at Kusagoro. The Pirate Lord began firing unleashing literal hell but Kouta's father simply lowered his head and forced himself through, with a powerful battle cry that only a pissed ruthless warrior could exclaim Kusagoro's fist clenched and morphed into a cannon of the typical primal Jugo skin texture which the warrior slammed right into Francho's face running right through the man's barrage of destructive shells.

"Chakra Shotgun!" Kusagoro roared out firing a blast right in Francho's face. Mana could hear her friends scream in joy! An attack that completely disintegrated a captain level pirate, fired off from point blank range by a pissed Kusagoro. An attack of such magnitude surely must've succeeded! Mana realized that she was cheering and shouting together with her friends. She didn't like or trust that man, she had her reason and wasn't unjustified in her lack of trust – the man attacked her more than once and almost killed her a couple of times. Hardly a suitable future father-in-law material and yet…

Francho stumbled back appearing from the cloud of smoke. Kusagoro slid back gripping his own shoulder and painfully breathing trying to control the pain of the damage that the attack inflicted back on him.

"How on Earth did you take that standing?" the Jugo bruiser huffed out looking at smoked up and bruised but smiling, if a little toothless, face of his opponent. "Your hands were in your coat's pockets, you couldn't have blocked that…"

"They were in the pockets alright…" Francho laughed up removing his hands out from his pockets and revealing a pill case to his opponent. "My clan's ancestors tried teaching me their ninja arts but they were unsuccessful. There was too little time and I was never good with that technical side of the ninja arts. Instead they gave me these pills and said to ingest them when I need my clan's blessing, despite my ineptitude they are what can win me any battle!"

"So you flicked a pill and cracked it at the very last second…" Kusagoro smiled, he spent some chakra on that attack and wasn't too excited about that overly durable approach of the Pirate Lord.

"That's right, the dark green – Spinach Pill which multiplied my power ten times for just a brief moment allowing me to augment my body with ten times the usual chakra augmentation. Two planets could've been smashed together with me in between and it'd have felt like an autumn leaf falling on my face!" the Pirate laughed out frantically before suddenly freezing in place and shaking in pain.

Kusagoro began laughing at his opponents discomfort, he raised his still morphed hand and aimed it at the suffering Pirate Lord. "What's the matter, didn't your clan elders tell you all power ups come with a cost?" the Jugo mocked the pirate before grinding his teeth angrily. "Your shells blasted away the tie of my friend. One that meant the world to me and whose memento I carried tied around my arm. I will never forgive you for that!"

"Chakra Shell Barrage!" Kusagoro shouted out as his morphed arm lit up with chakra being channelled inside.

A combination of chakra waves fired off from the cannon rushing at the paralyzed and injured target like bullets. The blasts spread off widely and continued to blast various parts of Francho's body, it was fortunate that the man was such a tremendously large target. Even as the blasts continued to assault the pirate, Francho stood on top of the water surface maintaining the Art of Walking on Water technique even as his body was bombarded with intense chakra blasts. Each single blast of this endless wave was as powerful as a single "Chakra Pistol" technique used by Kusagoro before.

After the technique concluded the Pirate Lord was standing but he didn't look that conscious or willing to keep going. His coat was ruined beyond the point where the seals in the inner pockets could've been used. His whole body was covered with burns and bruises where concentrated pure chakra blasted him.

"It's a stalemate now… Kouta's father may have taken a lot of damage before but he dishes it all back with benefits. Even without this Curse Mode he can still win" Shimo briefly smiled as seeing Francho withstand Kusagoro's "Chakra Shotgun" attack scared the youth in the beginning.

"Yeah, but Francho showed five pills of which he had only ingested one" Mana reminded her friend.

"That's right, that fatso can still pull off miraculous crap like he did before with those things!" Meiko shouted out in surprise.

"Not just that, I've read about the Akimichi clan and they are only known for using three pills during dangerous situations. It is even said that the final pill actually kills the user by forcing the body to burn itself out. There's no telling what those other two unaccounted pills are or what they do exactly. I am quite glad that Kusagoro-san still has hidden aces because this is a dangerous situation" Mana explained her point.

"I don't think the Curse Form is very reliable at the moment…" Kouta looked Mana in the eyes seriously. "It dawned to me why father may not be using it even if it means an easy victory. The form unleashes violent urges, the rampant desire to kill, something my father feels even in his normal shape. I think he may be afraid he'd hurt you, Mana, you or the others, maybe even me. That is why he's holding back and grasps to maintain full control over himself…"

"Wow, you're just having a bad day, huh?" Meiko tried to lighten Mana's mood after the supposed theory that her presence may have been the reason why Kusagoro held himself back. After all, the guy just didn't overall like her to begin with due to the fact that she was closer to his son than he ever was. That was why the man never felt too shy about beating her up near to death even when he was fully restraining himself.

"Kusagoro-san! Please don't mind me, I don't care if you kill me, just win and bring everyone home!" Mana shouted out to the huffing Jugo warrior who was gathering his strength for the following inevitable clash between him and the Pirate Lord.

"Don't flatter yourself, brat. If I think Curse Form is necessary to win, I'll use it without hesitation. I don't have to bring all of you home anyways, just some. Plus if I do end up killing you I do have some interesting things to tell the Boss Lady about you and your intent of using the Box against her orders, not like it'll trouble me at the slightest…" Kusagoro responded.

Francho stumbled around finally regaining something resembling semblance back to his shaking and temporary paralyzed body. Just after the pirate's consciousness kicked itself back into it the large man tumbled and fell on his knees before his shaking hands proved too weak to maintain the man's balance and lead to the man just face-planting into the water just barely maintaining the focus to keep him on the surface.

"You're lucky the Box fucking floats… If I had to use that thing from the depths… I'd have asked it to bring you back so I could kill you again!" Francho roughed out as he picked himself up and put himself on his feet again.

It was only then that the young ninja noticed that the Box was perfectly floating on the surface despite being tough enough to withstand all those shocks and nearby battle explosions without any damage whatsoever. It must've been emitting some sort of permanent chakra pulse which kept it afloat just as if it was using the Art of Walking on Water technique.

Kouta tried calming Mana down, "Don't worry, father will definitely win and he didn't mean harm. That's just the way he talks to people. No need to feel bad about yourself…"

"I'm not…" Mana admitted, "Well, OK, I am but it's a lot of different things that I will most likely never get over. Right now I'm just really interested in this Box. I wonder if it floats permanently and can never appear underwater or inside mountains or under snow, maybe it has a set dimensional height as a part of the coordinates?"

"I thought you're a magician, not a scientist…" Kouta softly laughed out feeling lightly amused by Mana's enthusiasm through all those dark and sad feelings she had.

"Well… Stage magicians need to understand the world around them better than most, they use their great knowledge and skills to fool others for their own amusement, remember?" Mana replied with her cheekbones bending in a somewhat smiling shape if only a little bit, first time in quite a while.

Francho shouted out loud unleashing a powerful aura of emanating chakra being molded inside his body. "Finally, that paralysis and cramps are gone! Now to kill all of you!" he laughed out as the usual red returned to his cheeks and his almost toothless mouth twisted into a mad yet jolly smile.


	218. ---And A Bottle of Rum

As the purple lightning continued to provide limited illumination to the overall apocalyptic gloom emanating from the skies above the Box it seemed like there'd be no end to this incredible battle. At least there was none in sight. The two opponents had thrown immensely powerful attacks against each other that'd have decimated any opponent not on their unbelievably high level and yet these two only brushed the damage off despite its world shattering proportions.

Finally the Konoha jounin decided to make the first move after Francho had regained his freedom of movement. It was risky to attack the man head on however Kusagoro wanted to scout out just what Francho's current chakra level was as the warrior suspected that the pills may have boosted the man's chakra pool tenfold for a brief moment but it also may have reduced the pirate's power afterwards. Such was usually the nature of such risky power ups. The payoff usually made the benefits not worth the hassle if the opponent survived the sudden explosion of power.

Francho decided to not wait until his body and face got pummeled by Kusagoro's ground shattering and impossibly fast combinations of punches. The hulking brute threw a powerful straight punch which landed right in Kusagoro's extended hand. The blow however wasn't simply stopped by the crafty shinobi. A silent popping sound suggested a more complicated strategy being in play. The brief smile on the jounin's face only strengthened this theory…

Suddenly Francho's fist, Kusagoro's body and then his face and the entire area got swallowed in a cloud of smoke as Francho's crushing blow cracked a smoke bomb which the ninja had held in his hand having carefully removed it from his pouch while his opponent's attention was fleeting.

Loud thuds and cracks emanated from inside the smoke cloud. Francho must've been caught unprepared in a pretty devastating beatdown as the loud thundering blows and the shockwaves coming after them quickly dispersed the dark smoke cloud. Francho's stumbling body looked around not being able to see his opponent anywhere. It was clear that the Pirate Lord had received quite an ass kicking inside that cloud, his bruises and severely busted nose, eye and lip testified it. Now Francho's greatest concern was finding his opponent.

Without alert or taunting Kusagoro crashed on top of his opponent from high above. Dashing from above the layers of black as tar clouds so swiftly that the emanating airwaves split a gigantic hole in the skies letting a brief ray of sunlight in before it closed down again, fueled by the malicious chakra of the Box. Francho's jaw gapped wide open as his throat was crushed by Kusagoro's elbow and drove to the ground so deep and with so much force that it split the waters wide open and went well into the abysmal crater at the bottom.

After a brief moment the waters snapped back like the jaws of a monster crushing the two fighters underneath them, making it very unclear what was transpiring below. Finally Mana witnessed a bunch of astonishingly wide beacons of light, signaling the upcoming devastation to follow and finally beams of white light shot out from under the oceans into the sky, each at least fifty meters wide or larger and didn't seem to weaken as they left Earth's atmosphere. The ground beneath was shaking and erecting crashing waves that reached the very upper layers of the heavens above and yet standing on top of the Box seemed to absorb any shocks from down under. Almost like the Box had a protecting force field around it that only living avatars of chakra could pass and not destructive forces of nature around them.

Kusagoro appeared from down under after jumping out from the bottom of the abyss he had crushed his opponent down in. The jounin was struggling to breathe calmly, he appeared grasping for air but then his breathing sort of equalized and the man's hands weighed down. After the life returned to the shinobi's arms he lifted them back up and stretched his numbed up muscles out.

"Scared me for a moment there… Almost destroyed the whole damned planet" Kusagoro jumbled out as he grinned while looking down at an unseen point deep underwater as if he could see his opponent. Even through his remarkable restraint, even transferring all but inconsequential percentages of his chakra right into his opponent wasting none on the world around them the planet was suffering, both from the malicious effects of the Box seeing the light of day and from the cataclysmic battle transpiring before it.

After a moment of awkward silence Kusagoro blinked rapidly a couple of times and scratched the back of his head uneasily. Shimo and Kouta looked at each other wondering if the Pirate Lord will even surface. Surely he must've perished after an attack like that?

"That attack was Hell's Gate - one of father's strongest, he directs the majority of his available chakra into a singular beam that devastates his opponent and grinds them into the ground exploding underneath and erupting back in the shape of countless beams that leave the Earth's surface and travel away. I'd assume that when the attack detonates it doesn't hurt anything living… It's required because most bodies can't take this attack and may die too soon, leaving most of it for the world to handle" Kouta's face began shifting into a smile. Slowly the boy was becoming more and more confident that the opponent must've been destroyed.

"Or he ate another pill in desperation to survive… That means that right now he is cowering and suffering the after-effects and your father is wasting his time to finish this" Shimo shrugged, as time went on and on it was becoming apparent that no one would surface. Then Francho simply blinked into existence just twenty meters further from Kusagoro as if he was moving at completely untraceable speeds.

The Pirate Lord was injured, solid chunks of flesh had peeled off exposing his muscle and bone in several spots of his body and large areas of his body were burnt up or singed. At that moment his coat had completely been torn off and incinerated so not a single string of cloth remained. His black tank top had gaping holes exposing the wounds or twitching tense muscle tissue under it. Yet somehow Francho found the time to pick up his captain's hat from wherever it laid in the battlefield. Most gruesomely a beaten body laid in his weighed down arms halfway drowning as Francho barely had the chakra to hold himself on the water's surface at that moment – it was beaten and unconscious Hachiro.

"Not sure what this landlubber is but I found him on my ship trying to sail away…" Francho grinned lifting Hachiro's unconscious body up and showing it to Kusagoro who just indifferently shrugged.

"I've no idea who he is either. So you've wasted time running to your ship then? Should've covered your tail and ran while you're at it… I really hope you're not planning on using this unconscious Uchiha trash as hostage?" the jounin coldly replied.

"I guess not…" Francho tossed the Uchiha aside letting him float with his head down and under forcing Kouta and Shimo to move forward. While Francho's eyes traced the two younglings he did not attempt to intercept them, it could've been quite dangerous to direct his attention to kids and ignore a pissed off opponent he could barely handle already.

"Yeah, sorry 'bout that, just had to fetch some rum and then pick up my hat, it was floating sea miles away. I kinda need this thing, it's my pride as a Pirate Lord!" Francho explained pulling out a bottle with chestnut colored drink which he flipped up and shook his face rapidly as his cheeks began to blush and his nose dyed red. The Pirate's eyes began to roll around as if he was chasing wild fairies or something.

Francho tripped up over his own feet beginning to stagger around in a manner in which a drunkard staggered around. Kusagoro punched his own palm before taking a combat stance and rushing at his opponent attempting to take him out. After that last attack there couldn't have been much fight left in the Pirate Lord. The two had been dishing out inhumanly powerful attacks at each other and finally it looked like one of them was taking actual damage. Francho's movements were different, he had to retreat to his ship and fetch a drink all of a sudden – this was not a behavior of a fighter who thought himself in a good place with solid chances of winning.

The Akimichi weaved back in a wildly unstable manner avoiding Kusagoro's punch. The brawler's eyes wildly shot open in surprise, who on Earth dodged that way? Just weaving back allured one's opponent to just step forward and extend their hand further, to bash the unprotected head. Weaving right back was just a careless move, Francho was wildly untrained in martial arts but not this bad! Then, in a sudden outburst of speed and ferocity, the pirate just tossed his upper body onwards shoving a fist in Kusagoro's face and making the jounin slide back on the water's surface grabbing his bursting with blood busted nose.

The pirate let a silly hiccup out as he continued to sway onwards and backwards, weaving to the left and right as if struggling to keep his moves straight.

"Tsk… You had to go ahead and pull that old thing out, didn't you?" Kusagoro complained scratching the side of his head and feeling up his nose until his elemental in battle ninja healing factor took care of his rapidly bleeding nose to the point where it didn't stand in the way of him continuing the battle.

"Lurrned it from an old haaaag in Neigong island up north…" Francho grinned slurring in a barely intelligible manner.

"What are those weird moves?" Shimo wondered annoyingly staring at the staggering pirate as he kept embarrassing himself in his drunk sway.

"The Drunken Fist Style" Hachiro weakly exclaimed as his eyes slightly peeked open looking at the battlefield. The Uchiha eyes must've witnessed this fighting style in the past or at the very least heard of it, it didn't appear to particularly surprise the man and he happened to identify the style immediately having just woken up from his knocked out state.

"So… You learn how to fight when you're drunk?" Kouta scratched the back of his head looking confused, "That doesn't match what we were taught as medical ninja…" the young man added scratching his chin. To him such a style happened to be a total mystery, it wasn't easy to pick up that the young man has never had much experience with drinking or seen himself get drunk. His wild party on Read's ship may have been the young man's first experience with alcohol…

"No. You get drunk when you're drunk. However some people, very few – just barely enough to fuel the legends, do not get drunk like they usually would. Instead they awaken a hidden style of martial arts hidden within their genetic code. Something that only very few inherit in any given generation" Hachiro explained slowly picking himself off the top of the Box and sitting up before trying to stand up but collapsing on his knees.

As the injured Uchiha attempted to explain the style to the young ninja Kusagoro desperately tried to land a single blow on his opponent but the patterns of the drunk pirate were impossible to predict. Right after avoiding a series of strikes the pirate weaved back and delivered a flurry of swift and strong blows in angles and combinations that he must've been making up on the fly. Kusagoro flew back getting blown away by the unpredictable and impeccably odd movements of his opponent.

"I once tried copying such a style from a wandering ninja who possessed this ability. Even my Sharingan couldn't predict it or copy it. It could easily copy the movements but simply doing that wasn't enough. It just needs that drunkenness and that wild unpredictability factor that only poor resistance to alcohol grants. It's a style only people born into it can use, at any point there can't be more than a handful of people with this ability" Hachiro continued to explain as Kusagoro launched another series of attacks.

This time Francho leaned back so wide that the fatso tumbled down raising a huge splash of water that washed the opponent away. Once the Jugo finally gathered his focus back the Pirate Lord suddenly jumped up recovering from his peaceful drunk slumber and began wildly kicking the shinobi up in a rapid succession the likes of which he could not pull of sober. Francho was a strongman, he swung wide and tried to hit slow, for a ninja, but insanely strong hits. Such speed and rapid combinations were unseen from his sober state and tough to believe, even tougher to survive…

"The worst thing is that the moves cannot be predicted, the user's emotions cannot be read because they change too wildly, even the user doesn't know their own movements, they just act… Because of that even if a Yamanaka would attempt reading their opponents' minds they could not accurately predict anything to come from such an enemy" Hachiro concluded his explanation before clutching to his chest wound. Kouta sat down and began treating the man once in a while turning at the battlefield and checking on his father.

"Wow! I never imagined such a style existed!" Meiko shouted out in disbelief, her manner suggested that the redhead was more excited to see it than scared of Kouta's father losing. "How does one fight it?" she wondered.

"You must snap the user out of it. Just like their easy access to the style through minimal ingestion of alcohol they also enter the state of heightened awareness easier. A strong blow or drawing of their own blood should do the trick, still, it's easier said than done" the Uchiha lowered his head letting his hair flow all over. The man must've been in a lot of pain and yet his attempt at an escape using Francho's own ship felt a bit dirty. Mana realized that the Uchiha may have only cared about them because of that strange belief that this man he was afraid of wanted Mana alive. She suspected this before but wasn't completely sure, this attempt only helped her make sure.

Kusagoro shouted out in rage. His feet morphed into jets that fired off chakra flames sending the man forward in manner greatly surpassing his normal combat speed allowing him to boost not only his speed but also the weight behind his punch. The man's hands switched into enlarged fists, almost like gigantic hammers held on human arms.

"Father…" Kouta mumbled out, "Don't overdo it, you'll enter Curse Mode unwillingly if you morph too much of your body at once"

Just as the jounin got close to his opponent the pirate leaned back just as he usually did, without a doubt even with his empowered attack there would've been little success to Kusagoro's approach however the brute was smarter than that. Instead of trying to hit the pirate with his enlarged hammer hands he slammed them together unleashing a mad shockwave bubble that extended wide beyond the battlefield raising crashing tsunami waves. Shimo and Meiko had to intensify their chakra flows to form a protective aura of chakra around the young ninja or else they'd have been blown back for tens of thousands of kilometers away.

At least the attack succeeded, while spitting off blood from his busted up nose and lips Francho rolled backwards tossed around by the shockwave. The young ninja cheered for the jounin that fought one of the three most powerful pirates alive to bring them all home. Such an intense blow powerful enough to raise tsunami waves that drowned hundreds of small uninhabited islands all around the ocean thousands of kilometers away should've knocked the Drunken Fist right out of Francho's head.

Kusagoro dashed back and raised his arms up for a competent defense, he wasn't completely sure if the Pirate Lord had the Drunken Fist beaten out of him. He decided to play it safe just in case.

A wild yet slurry laughter pierced the skies and air overpowering even the sounds of purple thunder lightning up the heavens above. Francho wiped the blood off his nose before taking another chug from his bottle of rum. After taking a large enough gulp to send streams of rum down his mouth, beard and all over his belly the Pirate Lord stood on one leg extending one of his arms forward as if he held a cane. Kusagoro's confused expression made him involuntarily tilt his head up. The shinobi was confused as to how the Drunken Fist style could still remain in the pirate's system.

"This Drunken Fist isn't any usual Drunken Fist. I've honed my style. The martial artists on Neigong call the uninitiated style – Loopy Fist, mockingly of course. The honed style is referred to as "Zui Quan" because it focuses on imitating and honoring the eight greatest masters of Drunken Fist of the past. Now you've just killed one of the immortal masters within me – Lu Dongbin, forcing me to change into Li Tieguai – the one-legged cripple master!" Francho's drunken laughter once again erupted out loud so loud and annoying that it almost made Kusagoro cover his ears.

Kusagoro grunted angrily before pointing his arm at the opponent. Francho grabbed one of his feet bending his leg up beginning to hop on his other leg as if he was about to fall.

"Chakra Grenade!" Kusagoro yelled out building up an excessive charge of chakra into a sphere sending it flying slowly at his opponent, trying to confuse the drunkard with the awfully slow timing of the unstable explosive sphere. The Pirate Lord awkwardly stumbled around leaping on his grounded foot before he bent down and tossed a swiping kick with the dominant leg, tossing the bottle of rum in the air and letting go of the weak leg. The grenade got kicked aside before it detonated. Normally the blast would've still blasted the pirate away and busted him up pretty badly but just before detonation the drunkard appeared to tumble over his own leg right after he lifted it up to his own hand and rolled aside swiftly and covering some great distance in seemingly no time at all.

Kusagoro didn't notice the blindingly fast rolling human meatball as it deformed back into the drunkard that was fighting him using a kick with his dominant leg which Francho didn't bother bend and lift up holding. The powerful kick sent Kusagoro flying back and bashing violently into the Box that absorbed all of the force of impact. Then the pirate simply bounced back on one leg to his initial location only to grab his bottle of rum and tease his pissed and bleeding opponent with it.


	219. The Drunkard's Comet

Francho taunted his opponent leaping on one of his legs while he held his other leg bent and in one hand imitating a one legged cripple, or at least a drunkard's version of one. For a brief moment a thought had occured in Kusagoro's mind to target the bottle of rum which his opponent held in his hand however it seemed too much trouble. The brawler already had trouble hitting the illusive drinker, targeting such a small target would've only made it proportionately more difficult.

Regardless on if Kusagoro would target the bottle or not, there was no denying that alcohol was integral to the style's successful use – the Jugo had noticed it. A sip was required to switch between these "immortal masters of old" that the Pirate Lord slurred of before. To a less skilled mind such a fact would seem irrelevant however the Jugo quickly combined it with the previous knowledge of his opponent and realized he could use this style to his own advantage.

The inseparable part of this style was the user's inability to take their alcohol meaning they got drunk much faster than any other person without the ability to use Drunken Fist. That meant that each successive sip must've intoxicated the user more as well. To any solid drinker eight sips of rum would've been a good and dizzying drink however it could've lead to someone like Francho being completely wasted, maybe the stupid fatso would even pass out? Even such a victory was acceptable to the Jugo rather than resorting to his Curse Form…

It wasn't that Kusagoro despised the Curse Form, his son hit it in the head right before, he didn't want to lose control unless no other way of winning was possible. Not when that darned girl was in his near vicinity. He hated this girl for quite a long time, she was a distraction for his son, she was a young thing with a head full of retarded ideas and she was instilling those stupid morals to his son too. However when he saw his son achieve the Curse Form before it all changed – somehow despite being so different from the Jugo this magician girl made his son embrace his origins more and more making her presence quite useful for Kusagoro's wishes for his son to come true. He would've killed her if he transformed, most likely, such an outcome couldn't have been let to happen – Kouta would never forgive him after it and his transformation into a true Jugo successor, not the sissy pacifist current ones but a true Jugo of old, would've been ended then and there.

Kusagoro's hand morphed into a dark coloured cannon and the man aimed it below him.

"Chakra Revolver!" he shouted out firing a precise and thin beam of chakra penetrating the waters open and reaching deep below. The brute ended the beam before it pierced the core of the world and exited on the other side. A distraction was all that he needed for this. A strong explosion tossed a powerful splash of water up messing up the water's surface and erecting powerful crashing waves rushing at the drunk.

"Huh?" Francho slurred as the water beneath his feet shook violently forcing him out of his second Li Tieguai stance into a drunken stagger desperate to stay afloat and on both feet.

"Rising Piston Fist!" Kusagoro yelled out triumphantly as his figure blasted out from under water with a powerful morphed fist aimed right at the Pirate Lord's jaw aiming to throw the man into the air. Falling backwards the drunkard evaded the punch however a cannon opened up on the rising Kusagoro's elbow firing off a separate stream of chakra aimed at the evading opponent. The explosion missed again, thanks to the amazing rolling evasion of the drunken master. Still, the explosion caused a large amount of water from underneath the rolling pirate to toss him in the air. This stance appeared to favour strong one legged kicks and rolling evasion, by lifting his opponent in the air Kusagoro would make sure to deprive the pirate of any ground to roll around in.

The Kusagoro that used the rising punch technique dispelled revealing himself to be just a clone. The real Jugo veteran surfaced from below as well looking up and preparing his attack.

"Earth Style: Titan's Drill!" Kusagoro roared out focusing his chakra so intensely that his entire body lit up with erupting jets and streams of chakra that couldn't be contained inside his body. It was a technique so powerful that it could've been used to create entire mines underground, a fist so powerful and focused that no material of any density could've put up any defence and stopped its user.

The Jugo's body blurred and disappeared into thin air. Mana's eyes couldn't have even dreamed of following anything. She felt completely oblivious to anything transpiring and this whole battle felt like a larger than life event shown to her in skipping fast forward motion. Something impossibly vaster than the limits of her comprehension transpired and then the combatants stopped for a breather or to prepare their next attacks. She was oblivious to all of it!

Kusagoro's fist dug in deep into the Pirate Lord's gut sending the man flying up in the sky. Meiko and the other younger ninja together with the greatly injured Hachiro looked up. For a moment it looked like they were able to perceive just how far the Pirate Lord had been flung by the fist, just how immense the punching power was but then everyone just closed their eyes. Meiko first, then Kouta, Shimo and after a moment even Hachiro's Sharingan eyes closed.

"I can't see it…" Meiko sighed in frustration.

"Not a damn clue…" the Yuki swordsman agreed.

"Now I see why Hokage-sama stopped father when he tried using this technique on Shimo back in Konoha" Kouta smiled with the right side of his face.

"That was a much inferior version of this technique. This just may have even pushed Lady Hokage back a little too…" Shimo scratched his tired eyes.

Kusagoro didn't let his eyes up from the sky for a moment. Then he turned at the Uchiha and yelled out.

"You! I thought you were running away, hurry the fuck up! Take that ship and leave. If the type-A little lady decided to use the Box I suggest you do it now too"

Mana blinked rapidly a couple of times, surely he couldn't have suggested that the Pirate Lord still had chances of returning anywhere close to Earth's orbit. Kusagoro scratched his wrists before carefully caressing them and letting the blood flow stabilize as his arms were beginning to feel numb. It was refreshing to finally see an opponent who could actually force him to fight without restraint. It would've been a bit more refreshing to actually use his Curse Mode, as little as he wanted it, in a way Kusagoro wanted to be pushed to that point in a sadomasochistic sort of way… Well… Maybe another time.

Hachiro stood up and began running towards the ship in a brisk pace. Shimo followed his past sensei with his eyes before something popped into his head.

"Hey, old timer, don't forget the ship is still full of workers the Pirate Lord kept behind. You sure you don't need help?" the Yuki swordsman asked before seeing Hachiro shake his head and stop for a moment.

"Nah, they're all on my genjutsu, even the most powerful foes rarely invest in a powerful defence against the illusionary arts… As for this trip, I'll say farewell to you four!" the Uchiha tapped his forehead with the index finger before beginning to rush towards the colossal ship as fast as his injured body allowed him. Kouta did manage to patch up the most severe injuries and Hachiro was actually in a halfway decent fighting shape, still, he was too much of a coward to stick around and see how this whole pirate affair ended up.

"So, what now?" Meiko wondered.

"I'm not using the Box, if that's what you meant. I thought that I couldn't protect everyone and change the world by an example of kindness because I was weak, but the truth is much more cruel… It's what's here that's keeping me back" Mana sadly answered by pressing against her chest with her bruised and covered with blunt force trauma marks hand.

Shimo nodded, "If that's your decision then let's go home, I suppose this way the mission will be completed so it's not a total waste of time. That's a new record with you…" he remarked somewhat rudely.

Kouta turned at the swordsman and grabbed him by the torn rags of his kimono pulling him in closer for a punch.

"The hell is wrong with you? Mana-chan is just sad her careful planning and decisions ended up this way, there's no need to rub it in her face. She had nothing to do with the streak of bad luck we're in. If we did nothing we'd have a Pirate Lord just like Red up there wielding an arsenal of Audra alloy coated weapons! Whatever Mana-chan did, it's still a lesser evil than what could've been" he explained his stance. Mana looked aside, her eyes were beginning to water, it was happening again. Her teammates fighting with each other. Kouta's position was so obviously loaded since the two had feelings for one another.

"I'm sorry, Shimo… I just can't restore my chakra using the Box under my right mind. It's just not the right thing to do" she explained quietly.

"Mana…" Meiko pressed her hand against the magician's shoulder.

Shimo looked completely devastated for a moment before switching back to his angered state almost like this complaining and annoyed Shimo was a persona he was playing.

"Yeah… Because you always know the right thing to do! Better than everyone else, sometimes I wish you'd get off your high horse…" he complained in a tone that heavily suggested he wanted to end the heated exchange that way. "You've always had such strong ideals, even when we had to fight Tanshu-sensei you stood up for them. Tell me just one thing – why are you giving up on your dream now? What kind of hero gives up on their dream?"

"That's the thing. Over the time of this journey I've come to realize that my dream will come true if I stop chasing it much more than if I am after it. My involvement is just that damn intoxicating. If I wish to leave the world better than I've found it, I must stop ruining everything" Mana shouted out in his face. The two had been at each other's throats ever since Shimo stopped her in Takigakure. Now it seemed they've openly began challenging each other again and it seemed like things were at their worst now than they've always were. Shimo didn't even honour the magician with a reply, his surprised and somewhat disappointed expression just looked away at his rogue ninja sensei boarding the tremendously large ship and preparing to leave.

Mana turned away from everyone, she had to shut herself in because she'd have broken down if she didn't. She didn't understand why her long-time friend and a teammate she saw so much together with was complaining so much, what possible right did he have to blame her for anything? She was asking that they only did their mission objective, that they successfully completed the mission instead of failing it for Mana's sake.

"We just want you to be happy, Mana…" Meiko tried adding her own two cents.

"After everything that happened I'd be the most happy if you guys completed the mission, got paid in full, scored some points with the village and kicked ass in the Chuunin exams. Just do this whole ninja thing, do it right. I'll be cheering on you from the backseat" the magician forced out a smile. Kusagoro turned around and leaped the whole distance between them in a single bound landing right up next to the young ones.

"You guys ready?" he asked before curiously looking at Mana, he must've known that look on her face, maybe he'd have seen it in his wife's face a couple of times but he realized it couldn't have meant good, Mana saw it in his eyes. The look of a person lost and in need of guidance about to make the worst decision of their lives that looked so alluring at the moment. The girl was made sure of it when the father pinched Kouta's shoulder painfully enough for the young one to complain. Still, the medical ninja was oblivious to his father's relationship related clue. He left Mana alone, maybe it was for the best, after all her worst beef was with her own self, the cruel body limiters that restrained her own spiritual chakra control from herself.

"Well then… How 'bout we head home?" Kusagoro sighed out but then his eyes widened once again after a booming splash interrupted the reaction of the genin nearby. Quickly Kusagoro turned back and looked at the tall fatso surfacing bottom up from the bottom of the ocean where he had slammed heavily from high above.

"Impossible! I saw your body leave the solar system!" Kusagoro yelled out in annoyance. He may have enjoyed fighting the Pirate Lord in the beginning but then when he realized that his own full abilities were blocked off as long as Mana was around the fight where he had the potential to unleash his full and have his fun but couldn't due to outside conditions did nothing more but annoy him more and more with each passing moment.

Slowly and lazily, less than graciously, the Pirate Lord flipped over and pulled his half-down pants up so that they fulfilled the purpose which pants were originally intended to fulfil. He slapped his own temples a couple of times before wiping the blood off his beaten face and busted nose and spat a couple of teeth aside. A cruel and slurry, wandering, toothless smile covered his face.

"That was a pretty mean punch there… I had to take another sip outta my bottle there to get my shit together. Have you heard of the immortal Han Zhongli? The man of amazing strength that decimated his opponents with cruel tackles? He gained his momentum by using his powerful legs and his curved bottom!" the Pirate Lord emitted a powerful thundering laughter by mockingly slapping his own buttcheeks.

"You mean you farted and jumped your way back to Earth's orbit!?" Kusagoro grunted as all those immortal masters whose styles and variations of Drunken Fist his opponent inherited pissed him off to no end. He just wanted to beat that nonsense style out of the Pirate Lord but that was just the kind of approach that the Drunken Fist worked best against.

"Yeah, bit of both, almost ran out of air on my way back…" the Lord laughed out from the bottom of his lungs but then got serious as he switched back to his usual Drunken Fist stagger, before switching up the variation again. Now the pirate held his hands extended almost as if he held a giant cauldron in his hands lifted up and staggered as he carried it completely wasted.

The Pirate Lord kicked off the ground rushing head and shoulders first at Kusagoro who just leaped into the air and then morphed his arms by extending cannons from his elbows that fired off sending Kusagoro diving head first diagonally straight into his opponent. The Jugo kicked his tackling opponent underwater as the Pirate Lord got careless with such an easily telegraphed attack. If the veteran jounin ended up in closer range however it must've been quite amazing…

Francho surfaced again holding one of his palms against his bottle's top, the man had pressed the bottle of rum to his flappy fat belly so that it didn't burst under pressure where the man commonly ended up after being kicked around. The man popped the cork out and flipped the bottle up again getting drunker each passing moment, a single sip may not have gotten a common man that much drunker but Kusagoro could feel his opponent getting absolutely trashed. That was what the brute wanted – make his opponent use out all of his immortals and then pass out…

"Lan Caihe!" he shouted out in a drunken slur as the Pirate Lord began dancing a strange belly swaying dance which reminded Mana of the dance which the dancers in Agbarah danced for the Sheikh as entertainment, a highly sexualized dance at that which made the sad Mana crack a grin before she couldn't contain her laugh anymore and began cackling for real. Even if the magician feel embarrassed for laughing out she could hear her friends barely restraining similar reactions whereas Meiko didn't even try. The redhead's laughter was matching the drunken pirate's in its absurd volume.

Kusagoro launched himself forward setting off the jets that chakra cannons at his feet fired off. He knew that such an obvious attack would've been blocked or avoided but he wished to scope out just how much more drunk his opponent got from switching a couple of his different masters' styles. Before he could easily avoid almost any physical attack but now it should've been different.

Kusagoro's fist collided in the air with Francho's hip which the Pirate Lord lifted up to interrupt the brute's punch before the hulking brute pranced around and deflected the Jugo's punch with a playful bounce slam from his another hip. Kusagoro tried punching and kicking a couple of more times before setting off a chakra jet at the leg he wasn't kicking with.

"Chakra Rocket!" he yelled out naming his super-powered kicking technique however it too was deflected by Francho's playful hip swing and his sexually ambiguous dance. Kusagoro braced for upcoming impact but the Pirate Lord's hips hit him with so much force that he couldn't possible expect sending him crashing back into the Box.

The brute coughed up and threw a large spit of blood dyeing the water below him crimson from both all of his wounds bleeding up on it and also this slam into the Box that must've cracked a couple of ribs all by itself. Kusagoro began to hate that thing, he'd have much more rather slammed into a meteor, into an active volcano and bathed in lava, into an island destroying and sinking it in the process, flown off into the goddamn Moon, anything but this Box. It was like this Box absolutely refused to be moved front or back or to the side. It just stood its ground without being affected by anything transpiring around it, just emitting its evil chakra everywhere around it and poisoning the Earth without taking any damage or budging one bit.

"Ho-ho-ho!" Francho laughed out in a ridiculous feminine manner.

"T…This bastard!" Kusagoro cursed. He felt another upchuck of blood coming up from his crushed and mangled innards, that last hit must've busted through his amazingly powerful chakra augmentations and dealt some real damage. If he held back any more he risked actually getting hurt. He needed to get this fool sober or to get him completely wasted, this in-between was killing him and his son…

"Well, at least you're not going anywhere…" Kusagoro smiled pointing at the direction of Francho's ship. The Pirate Lord turned around realizing that his own ship had sailed off, it was just barely seen at the tip of the horizon far far away.

"Oh no!" Francho covered his mouth up in a comical manner more akin to a courtesan being told that she won't be getting paid than a respectable and feared Pirate Lord, one of the three unquestioned rulers of the seas.

"Now that there's no way for you to run away, now that you went out of your way and pissed me off I can stop holding back! I've had enough of this little game! Even if I end up accidentally killing all those annoying brats, if I just kill you and spare my son, that'll be fine!" Kusagoro declared extending his spine out proudly and smiling. Purple glow began shining from his entire body, overwhelmingly dark chakra began emerging from Kusagoro's body as black marks began covering it and the man felt immensely powerful dark urges overtaking him inside. Curse mark sealing glyphs began enveloping the whole body of the violent warrior almost like tattoos.

With a final swipe of his pumped up and toned, muscular arms Kusagoro emitted a powerful scream of rage and pride, also joy that he would finally kill his opponent. The blast force from the warrior's transformation let out such a kick that Kouta grabbed Mana and moved her hiding her behind the Box's upper edge as the rest of the team couldn't help but also hide. Francho got blasted off his feet and rolled back feeling completely sick and just barely restraining his hurls. Kusagoro's arms also slowly transformed into colossal stumps of dark bone-like seemingly wooden material that formed gigantic fists extending all the way to the warrior's elbows. The man's hair elongated and stiffened extending a bit past the Jugo's neck while curling down in a crescent-like fashion instead of standing up like he usually wore them all curled and messed up.

Finally Kusagoro's first stage of the Curse Mode was unleashed!


	220. Sobriety at Last!

After a brief moment the raging outbursts of chakra emitted from the wild and unpredictable Kusagoro's transformation settled down somewhat. The transformed shinobi did not attack or look prepared for defending himself. He just stood calmly and hunched forward with his head staring at the water surface that portrayed his transformation with uneasy murkiness to the dark waters. The full reflection was blocked off by the dark skies and only briefly illuminated once the lightning bolts lit the heavens.

"Kill…" Kusagoro mumbled to himself under his nose, the young ninja observing the insane battle from the top of the Box of Ultimate Bliss, an artefact that proved itself to be quite a reliable source of safety in this absolutely crazy battle, couldn't even hope to hear a single word.

"Huh? What wazzat?" the Pirate Lord slurred out, he would've normally had been very surprised by the Jugo's transformation, his immense degree of drunkenness currently blocked off any primal instincts of self-preservation and the drunken fool was just looking for a good fight. He was totally oblivious to the fact that he pushed a much more dangerous opponent slightly over the edge by resorting to that of his own.

"Kill… The girl… No… That's not right…" Kusagoro continued to mumble incomprehensible verbal garbage to himself feeling completely torn apart by an overflow of mad thoughts seeping through his head. The violent and sadistic urges were impossible to tell from one's own love of bunnies and sunshine. It was a fine line between madness and unrestrained power with the tipping point being as sensitive as flipping a coin.

Kouta's face looked like that of a serious gambler observing the roulette. Slowly his hands began reaching for Mana and wrapping around her. The magician didn't like it and tried to object but after looking at Kouta's face her own grip loosened and she let him press her closer to himself.

"This is bad…" he uttered to her. "I remember that feeling, I was completely unable to move when it happened to me. I won not by overpowering the enemy but by simply being insane enough… Every movement is like negotiations with billions of psychopaths inside your own mind. I had thought that father may have found an answer to that problem but… I think he used this transformation so few times that he's still working with that" he continued talking as if talking was the only thing to keep the fear away, his way of keeping himself afloat in an ocean of fear and uncertainty.

Mana looked at Kusagoro and she could feel for Kouta's worries. She then realized what she made this gentle soul she fell in love with do. The young man she was falling for was forced to cross that line, embrace his clan's cruel origins, that which the current Jugo members had locked under seven seals to never be let loose again. The transformation that caused so many deaths to happen and made Iwagakure hunt Jugo for decades like animals for their cruelty until the warrior clan found peace and adopted their love of nature.

"I'm sorry you had to do this, Kouta" she whispered in his ear but the young man acted out a smile for her. Despite the fact that those emotions of certainty were false and completely faked the magician appreciated the young man's strength, his devotion to smiling for her when his eyes trembled in fear. It was something she used to do back when she still had the power to change anything at all. Or at least thought she did. What was transpiring below was an actual battle between immensely powerful warriors, the level at which actually relevant forces that could have changed the world fought each other.

"You won't have to do this again, not for me, I promise" she added.

"Kill… I'll kill someone… The first girl I see, I'll kill…" Kusagoro jumbled out nonsensical dribble to himself as his eyes looked up and examined his opponent, for a moment the warrior looked confused by Francho's ominous movements but then they switched until they met Meiko.

"No… Wait… I'll kill the closest girl to my son I see… Yeah… Kill that…" his confused and dazed by the overflowing thoughts of hatred and murder mind switched as his head continued moving after staring straight at Meiko. Kusagoro's body blinked in and out of existence until it had made its mind as to whom he would kill first.

Kouta wrapped his hands around Mana pressing her hardly against his chest, the girl could feel his body trembling in fear and yet he acted out a façade of certainty and control. "You are at your weakest and at your least confident and yet you make promises like that. That's why I like you" he whispered at her ear before Kusagoro's frame flashed right behind the two. The man's gigantic arm was already winded back for a killing blow but then the man saw not the girl he wanted to kill in front of him but the back of his own son.

Lightly the man's feet landed on top of the Box and looked at his son protecting this magician girl. Without uttering a word Kusagoro turned around and looked at his next opponent.

"Kill something else…" he mumbled out just barely loud enough for Kouta and Mana to hear. Only then did they realize that the man was so close to them. It was nearly impossible to describe how silently and how fast this ninja moved. It transcended the feeble human understanding of speed and time. Kusagoro's body blurred and flashed again moving right in up close to Francho.

The Pirate Lord tried to place his hips together and to block the opponent's attack but a colossal morphed fist slammed right into his face, chest and lower body sending the Pirate Lord away beyond where he could've been seen in the horizon. Francho continued to try and stop himself by kicking off islands that whizzed by or driving his arms and feet into the ocean but each time the island he tried to use for leverage exploded from pressure into rocky chunks and the passing water sawed at his arms like a buzzsaw opening grievous wounds.

Francho took a good gulp of his rum observing how quickly the bottle was getting emptied. Suddenly his legs moved far and wide and he kicked off the ocean covering hundreds of thousands of kilometres in a single leap. Despite nearly having circled the world after the single punch Francho in his drunken state decided to return back the way he came using the powerful leaps of his next immortal's style – Zhang Guolao.

The drunken Pirate Lord covered the whole distance back in four good leaps. Kusagoro just lazily observed his opponent breathe heavily for air and then try to throw up only to realize that he had nothing to throw up with instead of chucking up air before his gag reflex calmed down.

"Zhang Guolao!" Francho shouted out leaping at his opponent with a powerful dropkick that emitted a vertical disc shaped shockwave upon impact with a simple block of Kusagoro's gigantic morphed arms that absorbed the entire attack. Cannons appeared on Kusagoro's back emitting brief but relentless tongues of chakra flames that counteracted the force coming from Francho's dropkick and prevented the shinobi from being thrown around.

"That single punch…" Francho slurred out as he awkwardly tried to pick his drunken frame off the disturbed and raging waters "That single punch before was stronger than that sent-me-space-flying blow! Just what is this transformation!?" the Pirate Lord shouted out in frustration but Kusagoro followed it up with another punch. Right at the moment of collision the fist instead entered inside the giant stump on Kusagoro's arm and left a deep cannon hole.

"Piston Fist: Style One!" Kusagoro yelled out in an inhuman and terror inciting voice. More jets opened up around the man's elbows firing off chakra which only increased the speed and power of the warrior's punch. Right as the cannon collided with Francho's face a powerful blast of chakra fired off from the cannon leaving a wide opening in the ocean's waters. The intensity and power of the beam was so immense that it left Earth's atmosphere in moments and whizzed away into a point far away in the oblivion of space.

"Cao Guojiu!" Francho's voice interrupted the brief moment of silence that took over once the beam concluded as the Pirate Lord fired off a flurry of quick blows aimed right at the lower joints of Kusagoro's. The first couple were aimed at the arms' joints but due to their transformation these left not a single mark and just bounced off the thick and hard morphed skin.

Kusagoro yelled out in pain as the blows to the softer spots of his legs were successful. He had counted on that last punch connecting and Francho's head being blown off, the Pirate Lord certainly was close to that state and yet he kept on fighting. The darned fool took a punch from Kusagoro's cannon but toughened up and managed to avoid the blast. While the chakra cannon raged on the drunkard somehow chugged down more of that rum of his.

"I know what you're doing!" Francho yelled out after he leaped back a couple of steps before vaulting over Kusagoro aiming at the ninja's softer area right before his flesh molded with the morphed tissue, the place where the strain of controlling these changed arms should've been the toughest. Kusagoro felt astonishingly painful stings in the joints and couldn't help but emit a cry of pain. His legs didn't respond, neither did his arms now.

"All that water that washed my face back when you punched me before helped me think this through clearly… You're trying to force me to switch the immortals rapidly so that I pass out from being too drunk, huh?" the pirate slurred out barely controlling his tongue anymore. "Well… Let me tell you this! Now that I know your plan that is never, ever…" he began shouting something but then his body just tuned out and belly flopped.

A loud dominating laughter of Kusagoro's fired off into the distance. The man's lungs must've been quite powerful as even Mana, someone with much duller senses than her ninja teammates wanted to cover her ears. After a good fit of laughter Kusagoro just laid beaten and on his knees for a good minute before beginning to once again get the feel of his joints, finally the shinobi's legs fully supported his weight again, finally his gigantic arms could move again.

"You're a pretty respectable man. Living for the thrill of plundering and the adventure of roaming the seas as a free man. That I can respect…" Kusagoro spoke out as his eyes appeared to calm up, the glyphs that covered his entire skin together with the black marks began to move away slowly but didn't fade completely, just gave way for a brief moment of saneness. Then, in a blinking moment they closed back up letting the madness return.

"I'll only be that much stronger and more respectable than you if I destroy a man like that!" the Jugo declared grabbing the giant man's head and lightly throwing the pirate up into the sky and while the sleeping drunk landed back down prepared his attack. Kusagoro winded both of his morphed hands backwards opening and branching out a network of smaller cannons that enhanced the velocity and power of his thrust.

"Chakra Lupara!" Kusagoro roared as his palms shifted into cannons and upon impact with the falling sleeper exploded in a diagonal upwards blast of chakra that extended all the way to the upper layers of the atmosphere and lit up the environment around so immensely that it would've completely blinded Mana had she not been moved away from the line of the light. It was so fast that she would've never had enough time to react normally, she was lucky that Kouta was so close to her.

Kusagoro looked up in the sky and cursed.

"Even that wasn't enough to blow you to bits, huh? Well, what you have with your tough head, you contrast with piss-poor alcohol tolerance…" the shinobi declared cancelling his transformation. Seeing how she was pressed hardly against Kouta's chest the girl felt firmly the boy taking an easier deep breath like a stone was just rolled off of his chest.

"I'm glad father can at least switch it on and off at will…" he explained after letting go of Mana. Despite feeling a bit awkward by the amount of time she spent in the young man's grasp the girl just nodded and looked away trying to move her focus as far away from the medical ninja as possible. She didn't want to blush or do anything that'd betray her awkwardness felt over the situation.

"W-What's that?" Meiko's shaking voice then shifted Mana's focus onto something truly unbelievable. Right after seeing it the magician's mind's reach expanded so wide trying to comprehend this larger than life sight that she felt migraine kicking in and forcing her to close her eyes and rub her temples to ease the pain. And yet, the blacksmith's voice was more enthusiastic than afraid – at this point Mana barely believed that the redhead felt anything else than hype.

"I think that's… A hand… Two in fact…" Shimo gave his version. Mana then reopened her eyes and looked into the sky, it was quite impossible not to notice that epic sight but Shimo hit the nail in the head quite nicely.

Up in the sky two gigantic palms covering most of the skyline were closing in on the Earth, Mana could already feel the air getting heavier and it wasn't because her shortness of breath over seeing this sight. It was unquestionably because of the problematic entry of such an object to the planet she was standing on. It looked like those impossibly gargantuan hands covered the span of a large city each by itself, maybe even one of the larger islands.

Kusagoro nonchalantly activated his transformation again letting black marks cover up even more of his body meanwhile the curse mark hieroglyphs took over the paler patches of his skin. The hair once again curled the same way like before and the hands wrapped in the transformed hardened tissue. The shinobi lifted his palm up in the air and extended his hand catching a dragging drop kick by re-entering orbit and crashing like a meteor Francho. The emanating shockwave sliced off the chunk of the ocean like a lightning fast ninja cutting a watermelon, the immense pressure sliced deep into the mantle surfacing streams of magma.

Kusagoro's crazy Curse Mode state smiled with excitement, without a doubt under any other circumstances he'd have grunted with annoyance that he still didn't get rid of this pesky pirate.

"I absorbed more than ninety percent of the shockwave, you'd have sliced a chunk of the Earth off like an onion with that thing alone! Your stupid enlarged hands could've squashed entire villages if you tried! What kind of a stunt you're pulling here!?" he yelled out in excitement. The violent urges present in the reset transformation demanded that Kusagoro bashed his enemy as violently as possible and squished him like a tomato.

With Francho's body recovering, his elongated and enlarged hands returning to normal and snapping back in place the Akimichi curled into a human boulder and rolled aside to what he thought as safe distance before uncurling himself and clutching his kicking knee and his chest. The man's entire body was trembling and he breathed heavily. It was obvious that he was in indescribable amount of pain. Together with Kusagoro's previous technique there was the strain of re-entry as well as the backlash of his kick being stopped so suddenly focusing in his busted knee. The kneecap there must've been a handful of bone dust...

Meiko shouted out pointing at the pirate. Right after calming her childish shriek of joy after witnessing a clash like that she noticed an important detail – the Akimichi pill case given to the pirate by the monks he spoke of before. Francho was holding it in his teeth. "Look, there are only three pills left!" she shouted out.

"Yeah, he must've taken another pill to successfully expand his body like that… It's a feat of Akimichi ability mastery and chakra control beyond a simple pirate's reach" Shimo nodded.

"How is he even alive at this point?" Mana couldn't fathom.

"Father shouldn't have thrown him into space again, all the cold air while he left orbit must've refreshed his head and after a while he must've woken up…" Kouta shrugged, he also had trouble understanding how both his father and the Pirate Lord were still going at it. If the Pirate Lord had the might to match his father's when the former held back, how come after taking so many hits from the Pirate his father was as fresh and good to go as he was? The endurance and power of both combatants was almost impossible to believe.

"Now! Father, strike now while the pill's after-effect is working!" Kouta shouted at his father who just looked back at him and then turned back at the Pirate Lord.

"Wait!" Mana shouted out, "Look at him, his body is ruined, stop this meaningless fight and just let him leave!" she begged the man who was as likely to listen to her begs as pigs were to retell poems by heart.

Francho stood back on both legs, struggling to do so and coughing up blood, clutching at his burning sides and looking in a mean and banged up state, missing more teeth than he was missing when he appeared before them and with a well busted up nose.

"The brat's got a point. The second pill's after-effects are permanent. It allowed me to partially expand my body to as large as my chakra pool allowed it to go but I need meds to treat my condition now…" Francho laughed out while clutching at his gut after the laughter got much too painful.

"And?" Kusagoro asked taking a fighting stance, "Am I supposed to care about any of it? You just admitted your loss to a man who did his best to restrain charging at you recklessly"

Francho thundered out in laughter again before clutching at his aching ribs once more. "Make no mistake, ninja, I make no requests to spare me, I just inform you why my hand is as forced as it is to do what I must…" he said after opening up the entire pill case and removing the third red pill and lifting it to show.

"This one's tricky, it is said to boost my chakra and my body more than a hundred times over but it'd also kill me as a result afterwards… It's the final Akimichi pill – the Chili pill, the rest are custom made, each a treasure all by themselves" Francho looked at the red pill in awe. Kusagoro prepared to throw a good punch at the central section of the pirate's body and crush his innards to a gooey mass inside. Right in the midst of this momentous concluding blow Francho's fingers crushed the pill and grinded it to red dust that the stormy ocean winds scattered.

Kusagoro stopped in the middle of his charge confused by his opponent's behaviour. Maybe Francho didn't know that his odd stunt just saved his life, maybe he did so on purpose but the pirate just removed two other pills and showed them to Kusagoro who was just good four meters away. The ninja could've possibly snagged those pills away and crushed them just like Francho did before with the Chili pill but it would've demanded total focus of Kusagoro's mind which he didn't quite have. Right now the confused mess still tried to process Francho's actions as well as control himself from lashing out at his allies.

"I don't want to win and die afterwards, nor do I plan to waste the Box for just keeping me alive! Such is the behaviour of heroes or cowards! I am neither, I am a pirate! A Pirate Lord, one of the three ruling the seas and such death isn't fitting a man like me" Francho flicked the fourth pill to his mouth crushing it between his teeth.

"A Pirate Lord just wins and takes what he wants, doing with his booty whatever he wants!" Francho announced laughing out.

"Father! Stop him from taking the last pill!" Kouta yelled out and his son's voice finally broke Kusagoro out of the negotiations with his own mind. The man leaped in to remove the pill from his fingers faster than any movement he had made thus far but a strong blunt force shoved him away – Francho's arm enlarged and extended again slamming Kusagoro into the Box and holding the man to it. The Pirate had no ability to hold the man down as the Jugo simply broke the arm with a powerful slam and moved on but it bought just enough time for Francho to pop the last pill.

A moment of silence kicked in before the switch of the two different stages of battle. Between a battle fought to win and a battle fought to survive!


	221. Mass Matters

Despite his opponent's greatly boosted confidence it didn't look like Kusagoro feared the ingestion of two pills at once coming from his opponent. It may have been due to complete madness coming out from the Jugo's transformation being completely unable to process what had just happened and correctly predict the boost in combat efficiency that the pills may have granted or it could've just been great trust in his own strength being able to overcome anything in Francho's arsenal.

Kusagoro's body blinked, the lines of the entire morphed body of the Jugo became blurry and hard to discern as the man charged right at his opponent. Francho placed a quick block, whatever those pills did, they at the very least completely overcame the negative effects of the previously used Curry Pill that previously had completely broken Francho's body.

The Jugo's raging uppercut broke through the Pirate Lord's block tossing the Pirate Lord high up into the air from the immense force even if the main source of attack's strength was blocked. Jets of chakra flame erupted from transformed feet of the shinobi launching him right after his opponent. Francho recovered from the initial shock and force of the impact and extended his hands aside disappearing from Kusagoro's strike completely.

Kouta's father stopped and began floating in mid-air, furiously looking around as his bloodshot and thirsty for carnage eyes wandered trying to find his opponent. Shimo and Kouta opened their jaws up wide from disbelief. They couldn't discern the exact events transpiring in front of them and could only tell what was going once the fighting halted momentarily, Mana on the other hand couldn't even tell those brief microsecond breaks that the two combatants took to regain their strength and throw a line or two at each other – the whole fight was like a flash to her that only made sense once the two seriously backed away from one another. She could only tell what was going on from what she was being told.

"How could Red be possibly faster than father? He never hit me as a speedster type, just what kind of pills were those?" Kouta grunted out quickly telling Mana what happened, she could now perfectly see Kusagoro floating in the sky but not the Pirate Lord who seemingly disappeared in thin air.

Suddenly loud thunderous shocks began emanating from all over Kusagoro's body. Initially the four young ones thought it must've been the raging thunderstorm but then they noticed that the lightning flashes weren't consistent, it was like gattling gun fire of explosives blowing up all over Kusagoro's body: his face, chest and abdomen, even around his joints and the four could both feel and see the immense shockwaves emanating from those areas almost like the veteran was being pummelled.

"Enough!" Kusagoro yelled propelling small sparks of chakra from each of his body pores creating a small blueish forcefield around him that extended supposedly blowing any close range attacker away. "Don't think you're hurting me with those lame attacks of yours…" he taunted the invisible Pirate Lord. It wasn't just empty taunts though, the shinobi was standing and taking all of the punishment nonchalantly shrugging it all off and ignoring the strikes as if they weren't even happening. That was why the four young ones found this peculiar assault so confusing.

Up from a barely intelligible point of air Akimichi Francho materialized, no… He expanded from it almost like he didn't disappear before but instead minimized and now returned to normal size. The Pirate Lord just laughed in Kusagoro's face.

"Well then… Perhaps I should try hitting you even harder, huh? I'm just playing around with these new techniques of mine, you'll have to forgive me…" Francho spoke up before laughing out loud again. For a man who just hit millions of free strikes in mere microseconds without inflicting any damage on his opponent the Pirate Lord was immensely confident and joyful.

Kouta began describing what was happening to Mana and suddenly the magician began piecing this peculiar manner of attack together. It wasn't that tough to do, Kouta told her of the visual aspects of this odd invisibility aspect and knowing Akimichi clan hidden techniques, as someone who hailed from Konoha, a place where Akimichi were dime and dozen, and being someone who read about the subject before, Mana could easily put two on top of two.

"He's not fast… He's not teleporting or anything, this isn't Body Flicker. It's size and mass manipulation of an uncanny degree" Mana concluded.

"Makes sense…" Shimo nodded, "Akimichi techniques do have a lot in common with size expansion and mass gain. They are in fact a chubby lot. That being said, if these pills unlock such incredible ways to manipulate one's size and mass it could be trouble…"

"That's not even the problem" Kouta interrupted, "Father is too reckless and bloodthirsty in his current form to think this through, he won't understand how to fight this enemy" he worried.

"Is there even a way to fight someone manipulating their size and mass in an instant at will?" Meiko wondered, she looked the most lax and carefree out of the four and looked at the fight like a spectacle of fireworks more than a fight that determined her fate and mission completion.

"She's right…" Mana agreed, "If Francho can freely manipulate his size and mass at will he can just increase his mass to a number as large as the human mind can muster increasing his hitting strength, he can also reduce his size to the size of an atom and be virtually invincible while hitting strong enough to shake the very fabric of reality"

"That's only if Red has no limiters to these abilities, all Kouta's father has to do now is stall until the negative effects kick in and the pirate is done for, there's hope yet…" Shimo continued to stare at the two combatants who didn't attack, just continued to float in the air as Francho must've reduced his mass to the extent where he could've freely floated in the stormy ocean winds, manipulating it just enough so that he didn't get swept away by them like an autumnal leaf.

Without saying a single thing or seemingly thinking his plan through Kusagoro charged onwards. Francho once again reduced his size to a totally invisible amount while he appeared right behind his opponent expanding the size of his hands at least several dozen times. The Pirate Lord clutched his hands together crashing his enlarged hands downwards at Kusagoro but the veteran simply lifted his own arm up and stopped the immense crash. The shockwave that was emitted from this smashing attack was immense, Mana saw the oceans split open and rage even more than they did before, the bottom ground beneath the waters split open revealing large gazers of magma as everything besides the Box got carried aside. Only because the four were on top of the Box did they avoid having their flesh peeled off their bones from just the pressure of the air alone.

"Wow, not even five nonillion kilos can budge you, huh?" Francho laughed out but Kusagoro pushed the pirate's hand back before they returned to normal size and Kusagoro prepared for a counter-attack having just provided himself with an opening.

"Chakra Shotgun!" he yelled out slamming cannon arm against Francho's face and firing off a blast of chakra of amazing concentration and force, focusing its entire might right into being transmitted through Francho's body and not a single flare got lose, as if it did it'd have decimated the entire system.

Kusagoro's body blurred and moved behind where he had perceived the Pirate Lord to be, roaring out with great fury behind his powerful voice the bloodthirsty shinobi slammed his other arm and repeated his attack blasting at the back of the Pirate Lord's head.

"It doesn't seem that such a simple technique can break through the mass of fifty nonillion kilos of handsome pirate goodness" Francho's laughter thundered again as the pirate's size decreased again disappearing in thin air. Kusagoro's body began moving rapidly, his movements were so incredibly fast that the shinobi managed to avoid all of the strikes delivered by an opponent as small as an atom whizzing all around him transformed into a human boulder and desperately trying to decimate Kusagoro's defences. After having seen this manner of attack once, the Jugo could now see and attempt to defend against his miniscule opponent's attacks.

The Jugo dashed backwards and descended back at the settling down oceans below, avoiding strikes delivered on such a miniscule scale greatly wore him out, he couldn't even comprehend how his opponent was freely reducing his size and mass at will and buzzing around like an atom sized bee trying to sting him with a punch delivered by a man weighing as much as a large black hole. He had to calm down the transformation to some degree, calm himself down a little…

The glyphs all over Kusagoro's white skin began to fade as the blackened skin marks started retreating leaving more and more exposed skin. The shinobi's black eyes began clearing up and his iris became more like his usual self, being of the combined color of the golden iris he had when transformed and his normal green color.

"What's the matter, running out of juice already?" Francho laughed out frantically clutching at his fat belly as he almost shook in triumphant childish glee.

"Just worried about you, if those retarded puny pills before almost got you killed, I'm worried these definitely will" Kusagoro replied with enough confidence and snark behind his voice to fuel the illusion of being in control.

"Father! Watch out, he can manipulate his mass and size freely!" Kouta shouted out from the top of the Box having found a moment when his father's mind somewhat cleared from the sadistic and murderous urges of his transformation where he was literally unable to think clearly.

"I see…" Kusagoro uttered to himself.

Francho laughed out again before smacking himself in the face, "Oh well, it seems I've been found out… That is true, taking the pills beyond the third cures the negative effects of the first or the second pill. In addition the Aleppo pill removes the natural limiters of the size manipulation of the Akimichi clan techniques while the Cayenne pill does the same for mass manipulation. They also automatically unlock said techniques and use it for the user being only tied to the user's chakra pool"

"I have to say, for a lowly pirate who is barely an acquaintance of the complicated ninja arts and chakra control your mastery over these techniques, even with those pills, is impressive" Kusagoro noted.

"Well… I couldn't really learn all those hidden techniques by myself, but if those dumb monks have a pill for that and I could bypass that weakness by just training my overall chakra pool what does it matter? Isn't ninja a person who bypasses their limitations, someone who goes underneath the underneath? In that sense I'm more of a ninja than all of you!" Red proudly declared pointing at himself with his thumb while cockily smiling.

This time it was Kusagoro's laughter that killed the eerie silence.

"You cocky little shit, you think you've studied for what, a day, a week, a year or two and that makes you a ninja? Even those brats down there studied until they were barely old enough to speak properly and express their wish of becoming ninja. You've just adopted the ninja arts, you've no idea about the responsibility wielding such power carries. Because you, a lowly pirate, dare make such stupid claims while popping pills all the way to power, I will kick your ass!" Kusagoro yelled out angrily as chakra began pouring from his powers, all the evil thoughts he had, all of the malevolent impulses of the Curse Mode and all the primal chakra flowing through his network was focused as Kusagoro resumed his mindless destructive transformation.

"Dad! You're risking crossing to the second stage!" Kouta shouted out visibly having lost all sense of composure and completely in fear.

"What happens in the second stage?" Mana asked.

"A total loss of control, the first stage is all about negotiating with one's primal side awakened by natural chakra. In the second stage it takes over completely" the boy exclaimed in fear. "All this power father is fighting with, it only doesn't destroy the planet, the system, the galaxy or even several because father skillfully controls and guides his output. If he loses control… There'll be none of that"

Mana's eyes widened in fear realizing what it could've meant. Now all the fear and hunting of the Jugo clan made so much sense. All the fear and hatred and prosecution of this violent clan of warriors by Iwagakure, all the senseless murder began approaching the realm of lazy justification of genocide. Naturally Mana would've never understood what could've lead a village to the bloody edge which Iwagakure crossed with the Jugo clan but she was beginning to see where their lazy justifications could've hailed from.

"Barrage Piston Fist!" Kusagoro yelled out as his body simply flashed right up to Francho in a literal instant, or at least the difference between it being an instant and any inconsequential part of time having passed was so miniscule it barely mattered. Francho even with all of his acquired might. Kusagoro's fists disappeared deep inside the cannon-like structures which looked more like floating battleships than arms. However instead of cannons the Jugo's own fists were fired from inside at incomprehensible speeds creating a barrage of punching madness.

Francho simply stood still as the punches blasted his chubby body and bounced off of him. Initially the hulking Pirate Lord was peeing his pants seeing the intensity and might of his opponent's punching power and the speed at which each successive punch was thrown but then Red realized that with a high enough mass increase he could simply absorb all of the force behind this barrage of fists sent at him. Even as Kusagoro's world shattering blows entered the count of sextillions Francho's body continued to stand like a tower taking machine gun fire of pebbles.

"Father is stronger and faster than Francho but… That stupid ability of his…" Kouta cursed seeing the powerful shockwaves coming out from the barrage of blows blast against the Box's forcefield and get deflected by it. Soon the skies above the four young ninja was no longer dark, illuminated by the purple thunderbolts but dyed bright blue by the color of Box's forcefield protecting them from Kusagoro's power.

"Now, how about my turn!" Francho laughed out leaning forward and throwing a quick barrage of blows – the pirate minimized the mass of his arms to miniscule amounts so that they flew through the air without resistance, fast as greased lightning and then maximized their mass to the weights approaching the weight of a small star right before the moment of impact maximizing both speed and power of these blows. Kusagoro's body blurred and disappeared from this barrage of blows. The veteran reappeared right above Francho driving his elbow right into the top of the Pirate Lord's head sending the man into the chaotic ooze of magma, sunken islands and rocky bottom minerals and boiling water below.

For a brief moment Kusagoro observed just how his opponent would react to this attack but then he witnessed Francho jumping out of the watery and magma grave covered with molten rock and minerals only to wipe them off and prepare for an attack.

"Is that the best you got?" Francho taunted his opponent but there was no laughter or mocking behind the pirate's voice. He was speaking offensively but his voice and tone was anything but, full of fear and strange respect for his opponent.

"No. This is…" Kusagoro spoke closing his eyes. "I'll show you the amount of power a true ninja can wield, what he is responsible for. Did you know that the residual energy from the explosion that jumpstarted our very universe is still present all around us? The Jugo can tap into that power as it is the most primal and natural chakra available…" the shinobi explained as his transformation ended.

Kusagoro cancelled his Curse Mode because he needed maximum restraint, total control and mastery over his actions because he was about to wield impossibly ancient chakra that was present ever since the beginning of the universe itself. He'd reach all the way to the ends of his comprehension of space and time and borrow as much of it as he could. If that did not decimate his opponent, and probably much more than that… It was tough to imagine what could have.

Kusagoro continued to fly up and up until he bypassed the dark clouds and continued to fly upwards through the crimson red sky above observing the sunlight far away in the horizon. Then the sky darkened and darkened but not because the Sun disappeared behind the horizon – it became larger and more prominent as Kouta's father travelled to the most upper layers of Earth's atmosphere where everything around him was smothered by darkness and the only light came out of the Moon's reflection of the solar light as well as the faraway stars and the Sun itself.

"All of it… Take in all of it I can reach…" Kusagoro thought to himself closing his eyes and letting his entire skin open its pores and absorb the bright as atomic sized stars balls of primordial chakra, the very first particles of energy, the very first object in the world containing chakra. The Jugo's hands changed into the shape of cannons as he pointed them right at the area he rose from below. His eyes still tracked of the Pirate Lord who didn't bother to run or hide. That fool must still have believed in his pride as a Pirate Lord and ability to survive this. Long pipe-like structures extended off of Kusagoro's morphed up back through which he still channeled the primordial residual chakra that was leftover from the Big Bang aimed right at his prideful and incredibly stupid opponent.

"Chakra Omnipulsar!" Kusagoro uttered to himself as there was no one as high up as he was to hear it. After a moment of silence a blindingly bright flash of light fired off from both of his extended cannon arms and the two beams rotated around one another only to collide together into a singular blast of immense size.

The beam went on and one reaching the Earth's surface in mere seconds before a pulsing shockwave, still visible in its almighty destructive bright glory extended in a circular expanding motion throughout most of the ocean raising crashing waves and outright decimating most islands in the Tako's Reach. A flashing and pulsing inferno of light was left within the reaches of that sphere and yet Kusagoro felt confident enough that the kids survived the destructive aftermath of the attack. Kusagoro's hand changed back into their original shape and the jets on his feet began slowly run out of chakra flares to keep him in the air.

The tubes on his back through which he absorbed and channeled excessive amounts of primal chakra also faded and got absorbed into his body before becoming skin and flesh. Kusagoro's arms began feeling heavy and the ninja began slowly descending back into the world, large portion of which he shook with his attack even if he perfectly concentrated the flow of the beam.

"Shit… I did it perfectly but I get the feeling I won't hear the end of it from the Boss Lady…" he complained to himself as Kusagoro slowly descended back to where the skies were crimson red and disappeared into an open continent spanning hole in the dark skies. Even his chakra resources were beginning to run thin, and here the Jugo veteran thought that he could fight forever… Then again, he never had to tap into the residual chakra from the Big Bang itself to win a fight.

Now only to see the results of his last resort…


	222. The Price of Being Whole

The sound of her own unsteady breathing made Mana weakly raise her eyelids to check if her eyes wouldn't feel like getting stabbed at the mere attempt to glimpse at the immense light. The magician slowly opened her eyes and looked around, there was only an aftereffect of the unimaginable destruction that transpired before. If Kusagoro perfectly transferred the chakra behind his attack into his opponent, then how destructive an attack had to be to still devastate an area so large?

Mana looked around, the shielding that the Box provided to itself still was lighting on, yellow particles of unknown origin or content still floated outside the protective cube shaped field, like a swarm of glow-worms. Only after finishing witnessing these spheres of light that slowly dissipated did Mana notice the aftermath of Kusagoro's attack. Namely that she couldn't really see anything, the entire world around her, as far as the horizon stretched and who knew how much farther beyond was nothing but total blackness, not even a single matter was present.

The black as tar clouds thundered on, momentarily illuminating the abyss that covered the entire distance of a portion of the world blown to nothingness. From where the girl was standing it looked like the entire world was either destroyed or dying and about to go off, however from the rather stable eerie quiet of this destroyed landscape she could tell that the destruction must've still been contained. After the protective chakra fields dissipated around the Box the magician took a curious peak down the corner. Her eyes could not see what remained of the ground and if there even was a ground beneath her feet. For all she knew there could've only been the very exposed core of the planet somewhere deep deep down.

"No way…" Mana heard voices nearby and what she first took as an expression of surprise over this fearsome annihilation soon was found out as what it actually was – frustration and disbelief. Further away on a sole remaining pillar of dirt that was slowly sinking into the black oblivion below stood Francho, battered, bruised and singed, entire patches of his beard and his hair were missing and what remained of his clothes had also, let alone few exceptions below the waistline burnt to nothingness.

How could a man survive such an attack? Mana was almost certain that anyone would undoubtedly perish in such a blast, well, maybe not the Kage or Tanshu-sensei, these categories of ninja were described as being so far ahead the level of the rest they barely even compared but… Seeing the devastation around her made such statements difficult to believe.

A bright blueish glow caught the magician's attention – Kusagoro slowly and carefully descended from the layers of think tar-black clouds. The man was breathing heavily and one side of his body was without a doubt drawn to the ground, the Jugo's eyes wavered as they examined the destruction and it looked like the man was fighting himself over not collapsing or passing out.

"Even if we survive this, I don't feel like the Hokage will praise us from blowing up the entire Tako's Reach, probably even beyond…" Meiko spoke up killing the silence, the usually carefree and eternally hyped genin now sounded worried and almost in grief over the blasted to smithereens world she once lived in.

"Yeah, it'll take some serious work by the terra-forming ninja to repair this, it'll have to come out of Fifth's pocket if her involvement is suspected… Then again, few people venture into the Tako's Reach it may just be played down to a pirate war gone wrong" Shimo replied. Judging from Meiko's reaction the blacksmith may not have even known that ninja such as the terra-forming ninja existed. Special squads in each village's arsenal that possessed large scale Earth Release or Water Release abilities and even Wood Release users from each village, even if those were far and few in between.

"Might take weeks if not months to repair this…" Mana finally spoke up looking in profound sadness at the ruined world and the oblivion above which the Box still floated.

Francho's grunts ordered that all attention got directed at him. The man shook off a bunch of accumulated ash and dust off of him and stretched out his numbed up muscles, he felt his hands and arms and bent his joints a little to stretch out.

"You look like this blast really drained you… Then again, surviving it drained me as well" Francho felt his significantly shortened hair and beard up letting cindering hair fall off of it and down into the abyss below his feet.

"How did you survive it? I thought I pulled it out right…" Kusagoro finally gathered the strength to ask, Mana knew that Jugo techniques were immensely taxing all by themselves which was why for the larger part of his life Kouta couldn't even perform the simplest ones. Until he trained and grew stronger both as a warrior and a medical ninja in this trip, at least. Still, the degree to which the Jugo struggled to stay floating in the black nothingness instead of plummeting below surprised Mana, seeing Kouta's father exhausted was a new and frightening experience.

"I can freely manipulate my mass as well as the areas where it increases. I can compactly fit a great deal of mass into the tiniest of particles you wouldn't even see with those fancy ninja eyes of yours…" Francho smiled displaying his mostly missing set of teeth, a bloody drool ran down his nose and began tapping at the exposed chest and fat of the man as well as what little remained of his rags.

Kusagoro slowly floated on top of the Box where he sat down and stretched his back out. "I still don't get it…" he mumbled out so quietly that only the young ninja were most likely to hear him unless Francho still wasted chakra on augmenting his perception.

"What he describes fits the description of a black hole – a compact enough smaller than an atom particle of excessive mass bending the fabric of time-space, it would've funneled most of your technique into it like water spilt into a small and compact hole absorbing most of it" Shimo explained, Mana looked at the young Yuki with surprise. After a while she had forgotten that the swordsman started out as the one of the highest grade students of the Academy.

"A black hole, no matter the size, would've went out of control, swallowed the entire planet and that's if we're lucky…" Mana tried to argue, it was hard to believe the extent at which Francho's abilities allegedly extended.

"Well if it's made from chakra and it's sufficiently small it is possible that Francho merely contained it and focused the destruction just like skilled ninja do with their attacks…" Kouta shrugged.

"That would require tremendous mastery and chakra to control to pull off, it'd take a jounin level ninja with great training and restraint at the very least" Mana spoke to herself staring at Francho who just confidently stared at the young ones and his worn out opponent, without a doubt the Pirate Lord needed a breather similarly to how Kusagoro did, otherwise he'd have quickly dispatched of his opponent and interrogated the kids.

"Didn't he say before that the pills simply unlocked the full mastery of his clan's abilities and the only reason he's using them is because he's too bad at it to master them himself?" Meiko brought up a fair point. The only reason Francho was even capable of pulling such a stunt was because of his pills. He couldn't have known all of the different uses of these abilities, he most likely just wanted to maximize his mass to increase his chances of withstanding the technique when he noticed the effect that saved his life.

"Shit… The pills' aftereffects didn't kick in yet" Kusagoro angrily cursed trying to stand up but realizing that his body felt too numb and tired. After the extensive battle he went through it simply was impossible to blame him, the chakra pools both of these ninja had were massive. "I think I may be in no condition to keep going" the man admitted. Looking in his eyes Mana saw the blazing rage and pain that admitting it took but Kusagoro wanted to fulfil his mission objective now most of all so he had to lay it straight.

"In that case, if Francho really did absorb most of the technique, that means you failed to properly control it, father" Kouta angrily looked at his tired father, "I thought a controlled technique was barely supposed to cause destruction and this heavily funneled off jutsu caused too much devastation to be properly controlled, you'd have destroyed everything if Francho didn't save himself the way he did"

Francho finally finished stretching out and pointed his finger at the young ninja as if taunting them.

"So, I assume you're ready to tell me how to use the Box now, huh?" the Pirate Lord asked, "I may just let you go after my wish is fulfilled, the kids as a sign of gratitude, the big guy because fighting him was just so much fun and once I get my wish I'll really want to do this again sometime!"

Kusagoro and the others looked at each other, then their eyes began wandering between Mana and Shimo as the two were usually bickering about every decision each made. Together in a unison the two shook their heads, agreeing and working as a unit just like in the old days.

"He has to be really worn out now, I'm not sure how much juice he still has and when exactly the pills will flip the tables on him, he's already been buffed by them for a longer period than the other two combined. I'm beginning to suspect his pills aren't related to time and have more to do with his overall chakra pool, if that is the case he certainly is on his last legs, he can't have more than a several more tricks" Kusagoro encouraged the kids.

"Stand back, Mana-chan. We'll do our best to finish Red off!" Kouta declared gently moving the magician behind him while he stepped in front of her.

Francho's deafening laughter overshadowed the evil lightning cracks going off everywhere at once.

"Finish me off? Just who do you think you're talking about, brats?" the Pirate Lord raised his arm up as a miniscule black beam of total darkness extended from his palm into infinity. The black beam created from all light in the controlled width and length being absorbed by the bent fabric of space and time – another microscopic sized black hole created and controlled by the Pirate Lord.

The beam pierced through Shimo's chest attracting the young man to the pirate faster than Mana's eyes could comprehend. The magician couldn't even hear the fateful snapping noise that went out when the young swordsman's body, already broken by the immense gravitational pull hit Francho's closed fist at the end. The only gruesome sight the magician's eyes could even pick up on was Shimo's lifeless body held up for their sight by the Pirate Lord by the young man's neck before being flung into the black oblivion below.

"S…Shimo?" Mana's lips whimpered as she waited for the body to somehow be a mirage of cold air or a clone or… Shimo having survived the blow creating a path of ice that he climbed back up on.

"It looks like the Box doesn't really protect things that leave its field" Francho coldly stated before lifting his hand up and smiling with a cruel smile of a filthy pirate who had just murdered a young ninja and disposed of a body in a way ensuring that it'll never be found or get a proper burial.

"W…Why?" Mana's cold and expressionless face continued to stare at the black unintelligible point in the abyss waiting for her friend to return. It may have taken an eternity to see that moment but at that time the young lady was ready to wait that eternity if it meant her friend coming back to her.

"Why? Well, I had to show I'm serious and clearly it had to be a warning shot, else you pieces of ninja shit would just shut down and stop cooperating accepting your dooms, it had to be someone completely irrelevant. I saw the orange haired brawler freeze before he hit his boy, also I saw the brat protecting you which meant both of you as well as the big man were out of the question. You three have some weird bonds between you, I still want you believing that you can be a little family if you just tell me how to work the Box, after all… It was a fifty-fifty choice between the redhead and this guy and frankly, the redhead was having way too much fun and excitement before for me to snuff her out so I'm happy with my choice" Francho began elaborating on his twisted logics before repeating his request to be taught how to use the Box.

Mana kept on staring at the bottom she could not even see, her slowly slipping away and wandering between a billion different things, still trying to cope with the death of her teammate, mind tried its best to deal with the pain but… Instead it just shut down. The magician could feel a couple of tears running down her cheeks, two or three drops hit the corner of the Box before running down its surface.

"He killed him…" she spoke to herself, completely without a care if the surviving team heard her or understood what she said. Mana's face then looked up into the thundering black sky. She could feel being shaken rudely and once Meiko's scared eyes entered Mana's direct floating line of vision she realized whom she was being shaken by.

"He killed Shimo… We never even made peace with one another, I never told him that I've forgiven him for every rude word he's said to me, that I understood why he did what he did in Takigakure… He died thinking I was mad at him" Mana spoke to herself before slipping down on her knees so hard that the fall busted them open at the sharp edge of the Box.

"Mana-chan, it's OK, we'll ask the Box to bring him back, we'll… We'll think of something just don't do this to us!" Kouta began shouting trying to reach Mana's head but the magician's mind was so far away from where his yells could reach her that his voice sounded to her like she was deep underwater from where she's being yelled at. Just a meaningless, muffled babble from the mouth of a young man she loved. She was drowning… Grief's black rotten hand was pulling her down, firmly holding her ankle.

"Still feeling hopeful then, huh? I wonder if I killed the redhead…" Francho lifted his arm up and pointed it at Meiko. The blacksmith's watery eyes, similarly shaken by the death of her friend froze open in fear. She knew that she was about to be killed and that the death would hit her faster than she could feel a thing. Meiko wished to say her farewells but couldn't force herself to do so in time…

Francho's arm lowered after a strange inner realization hit him. He didn't execute Meiko for reasons only known to him. Instead his black hand of death reached to scratch his bald patch on top of his head, wandering about something.

"Well… I guess if I killed you all one by one it'd take too long, be too much of a bother. How about we end these games?" Francho frantically screamed out before slapping his hands together. The Pirate Lord's size began expanding more and more, he expanded from being two or three times a man's size to the size of a large ship, then further on. In mere seconds his size surpassed a large mountain and soon the Earth itself couldn't hold him together on its surface anymore.

Kusagoro, Meiko and Kouta trembled looking up well over twenty thousand kilometers up to see their enemy with his hands surrounding the entire Earth sphere. They were far too much awestruck to reply or even comprehend the sheer massiveness of their opponent – the limit not of his ability but that of his feeble untrained mind of how large he could grow. As the worn out Pirate Lord wheezed he created sandstorms in the deserts and tsunami waves unlike any the planet had ever seen in their history.

Yet even with his massive size in mind, nothing prepared the witnesses, of which there were now the entire planet looking up in the sky or to the north as well as to the south – where the two hands towered ready to squish the Earth's ball like a pesky grape, for when Akimichi Francho spoke. His voice echoed in deafening shockwaves only failing to tear everyone's ear drums apart due to how far away the man's head was. His breath and yells suggested great difficulty of having his words heard and spoken but the volume would've never revealed that.

"Come now! Tell me how to activate the Box of Ultimate Bliss or I will crush this planet with my own bare hands, all centillion of tons behind each hand. Is this Box really worth the entire planet?" Francho's voice echoed around the world.

"He's delirious! He must be desperate! He didn't think this through because if he crushes the planet we'll survive inside the Box's field. He's not bargaining with anything" Kusagoro yelled out angrily wondering if his voice was even heard by the cosmic size opponent.

"That must it, he didn't kill Meiko because he felt this was the last jutsu he can use – he bumped into his wall so killing Meiko would've left him dry and hitting the negative side effects. That's why he tries to settle this with as large of a mass and size increase as his mind can muster – he's afraid!" Kouta declared what he thought of his opponent's actions.

"Still, what can we do to him in his current state? Even if our chances to win are the largest now than they've ever been, what difference does it make?" Meiko collapsed on her own knees, clutching at her chest and breathing heavily, the girl's mind had trouble comprehending the size and mass of the Pirate Lord and even beginning to remember how close to dying she just was made her eyes get wet again. The blacksmith just looked at Mana, hoping to find solace in the mad and lifeless eyes of someone who was broken just the way she was…

Mana sat down there with her eyes closed, her feeble knuckles were grinding together in a shaking with anger fist as the sound of her grinding teeth could've been heard. Tears burst through Mana's closed eyes even if the girl tried to stop them. She bypassed the feeling of helplessness and now only felt rage, she felt anger for the man who killed one of her best friends, somehow who was there with her since the beginning. She felt anger at her own weak and pathetic body and her own helplessness in this situation.

A bright light inside Mana's own mind flared up, a dark blue figure shaped just like Mana appeared in front of her as the inner spacial baby's eyes opened in the shape of stars. Mana's own body responded to her and no longer shut itself away. After Mana looked into the entity that occupied her mind, entity that didn't know what it was exactly making Mana's hopes of understanding it miniscule, entity Mana herself may have created as a visual construct representing her inner spirituality, her own body, a voice echoed inside Mana's mind. Strong, loud and dominant, louder than the sound of stars boiling and blowing up visually inside Mana's mental world.

It was Mana's own voice: "Just… Maybe one day… When I'm worth it and when someone I love is in danger, consider really hard and if I deserve it at that moment and… Please make me strong again…"

Mana's eyes shot wide open, burning with rage as blue flares of spiritual and physical chakra molding together to create something new and amazing, something lost and reborn was burning inside her. As the limiters her own body placed on itself faded, regretting the decision ever being made, the magician's chakra control returned at long last!


	223. The Bigger They Are

Kouta and Meiko continued to observe Mana's leaking and overflowing bursts of dark blue chakra flares in shock and awe. To them it was tough to understand or even to believe that their friend had after such a long time regained the ability to use chakra, augment her abilities and use ninja techniques. While normally the two would've felt relief about such an event and that Mana's troubles of identity would've been solved now they were far too stumped to feel such a thing. Maybe it was because of the excessive amount of events transpiring and piling up on one another: Shimo's death, Francho's colossal expansion and weight increase and others.

"Okay, now I'm totally lost…" Kusagoro flipped his hands up before smacking his forehead.

"Mana, your chakra is back! The shock must've forced your body to remove the mental restraints!" Kouta yelled out triumphantly. It took a brief moment for the young man to finally catch up with what had just happened. To understand all of the implications of this revelation but he was happy, the girl he loved was finally whole again and he'd get to know the side of her he had never seen before.

"Your chakra is leaking outside your own body – its size must be massive! Just how powerful were you before losing your control?" Meiko laughed out in surprise. The blacksmith must've seen this revelation as something to pull the team out of a tough spot, something to save them and the joy of finally regaining hope was getting the better of her.

"It must be all the training I've been doing without my chakra. I've strengthened myself so much that my physical chakra increased at least ten times in the Sun Disc arena, I can still feel my spiritual chakra growing right now to meet the physical chakra size and balance it out…" Mana expressed her own surprise after looking at her body which was expelling rays of darker sapphire blue flames, it was a much darker colour than the typical light blue chakra colour which was another mystery of its own.

"It doesn't matter, Francho might just be ten times the size of the Earth and just his hands possess mass larger than the human mind can comprehend. He's as good as invulnerable…" Kusagoro grunted making the hope inside Kouta's and Meiko's eyes slowly dim before dying out completely.

"Oh no…" Mana shook her head angrily, her entire body began to tremble overflowing with the newly regained chakra, her whole essence was pretty much soaked with the augmentations that the new chakra could provide her. Yes, Mana knew it was immeasurably inconsequential compared to the force Kusagoro hit Francho with which appeared to be inefficient at best at much lesser mass of the Akimichi's body but Mana was a different kind of ninja.

"He killed Shimo. He doesn't get to hide behind his invulnerability. I'll beat him down, and just this time… I'll kill him!" Mana shouted out letting all of her built up chakra out before her hands went through a combination of hand seals, one that she had only used once and then lost the hope to master. The magician was seeking use of the illusive technique that she was attempting to control and use properly during the most of her ninja career but lacked control as well as chakra pool size.

"Sweet Lullaby Jutsu!" Mana exclaimed after setting her hands in the position of the final hand seal and then emitting a soft and sweet melody from her lips in the shape of a whistle. The gentle whistling tune filled the air and then Meiko, Kouta and Kusagoro fell to the ground grabbing at their abdomens and blushing. It appeared like their bodily temperature had risen almost like they had a fever but their eyes were wide open because their whole bodies were paralyzed with pleasure.

Finally, after regaining her control and drastically multiplying her chakra pool dozens of times Mana managed to pull the Sweet Lullaby off. Now that her body and mind were both as one after Shimo's death, now that both her conscious and unconscious parts wished nothing else but vengeance and justice for her friend's passing, stopping this maniacal Pirate Lord before he destroyed the whole world in his desperation.

"What… The…" Kouta uttered as her closed his eyes covering them as the sights he must've seen were too much for the boy's composure. "And it smells so good…" he continued to whine in his delirium meanwhile Meiko was jumping in joy and rolling around on the box by wrapping her arms around her legs like a human cannonball of joy.

"Swords, swords and food everywhere!" the blacksmith screamed out in glee still blushing while the young redhead's eyes raced around looking at one illusionary artefact after another.

"No way… What a powerful illusion, even I don't have the chakra in my current state to break it!" Kusagoro shouted out in surprise as even he was grasping at his heart as if the pleasant smells and sights were threatening him with a heart attack. Eventually he too was forced to fight with himself and close off his senses.

Mana looked back at her friends and felt a bit bad about not letting them know about this illusion. It wasn't meant to be used as a mean of battle, it was supposed to be something she used on his father, something she worked on ever since he received those injuries in his final mission. Something to alleviate his pain and change it with pleasure. Eventually the magician understood that she would never manage to hold such a technique focused on him forever and so it could never be used that way. Still, other uses of it were still possible.

Francho began yelling into the sky, he wailed around frantically tossing his immeasurably heavy arms around through empty space just narrowly avoiding hitting the moon which would've shattered it to pebbles. The Pirate Lord then grasped his abdomen as if trying to clutch at a very irksome spot and began crumbling down as if he was about to crash into the Earth but then his size began to drastically decrease.

The Sweet Lullaby technique overloaded one's senses with pleasurable sensations, stimulating all of one's pleasure points and affecting pretty much all of the humanly senses. The affected were all who heard the sweet tunes of Mana's which she emitted after casting the illusion, they saw, heard, smelled and felt whatever gave them most excitement and pleasure. In addition Mana's voice began sounding like an alluring song of a siren making it heavenly and alluring making it immensely difficult to even wish to cancel out the illusion even if the victim had the ability to do so.

Just as the minimization ended and Francho got reduced to normal size the tall and fat Pirate Lord slammed on top of the Box right onto his face spreading his disgusting filthy murderer blood all over the Box's top surface. Mana turned around and looked at him with burning fury, one only seen in the eyes of a person whose comrade was just killed right in front of them.

"How did he… Hear that from up there?" Kouta continued to struggle to even be able to talk as his body was paralyzed and drawn to the ground from sheer intense pleasure just like Francho's.

"Figured his stupid pills also augmented his senses amongst which was his hearing since he assumed he'd have a way to hear a positive answer from us even from all the way in space. Augmented senses can be used by the enemy just as potently… Because his sense augmentation was purely pill induced he couldn't have limited it even if he wanted it" Mana replied coldly while she walked up to the beaten up and broken Pirate Lord. The man was shaking in pleasure and didn't even try to resist or pick himself off the ground in the highly undignified position he ended up in after being face-planted into the Box. After a couple of moments passed since Mana stopped whistling the illusion ended by itself.

Meiko and Kouta struggled to pick themselves off the ground as they had never been so effectively disabled before. Even Kusagoro still huffed on one knee as his muscles twitched after such immediate end of such intense overload of pleasant sensations.

Francho still remained on the ground, writhing as none of his bodily parts seemed to work. The pirate must've finally hit the after-effects of the pills now that after getting hit by Mana's illusion he was unable to maintain his mass and size manipulation techniques and had to overload his abilities to return to normal size and weight.

"Mana?" Kouta asked with great worry behind his voice after seeing the magician slowly walking up to the pirate and just standing in front of his undignified and broken pose.

A lightning fast punch dug right into the pirate's face throwing the man rolling to the other side of the Box and close to plummeting below to oblivion. Mana pulled her fist back and caressed it shouting in pain as she wasn't used to just punching and the damage it did to her own hand, she rarely used her fists but this time it couldn't have been helped. The magician looked at the messed up bloody pulp which was left from the almost completely drained of chakra Pirate Lord as he helplessly writhed on the ground. He didn't say anything or even shout in pain, he just laid there like a goddamn vegetable.

Mana grabbed him by what little remained of his hair and pulled the man's face up closer smacking him from the sides, slapping him a good couple of hundreds of times in rapid succession. While her speed was unlike anything Mana had even seen her own body pull off before the magician didn't care to admire her own growth. She just worked out of pain and instinct. Mana grew sadder and broke into more and more tears with every smack she gave the Pirate.

Finally the barely resembling a man mass of flesh in Mana's arms slipped out of her arms after Mana loosened her grip and collapsed on her knees breaking into tears. She didn't do it, she didn't kill him. The magician could still hear difficult wheezing which made bubbly mix of blood and air still escape Francho's nose, or at least the part of his body where it was supposed to be. Kouta walked up to Mana and hugged her from behind, the magician turned around and hugged his abdomen in return pressing her head against his chest.

"He killed him… Shimo's dead… But I couldn't do it. I still don't want to" she whispered in tears still struggling to believe it.

"Yeah…" Shimo nodded and looked at the beaten pulp of a Pirate Lord laying in the pool of his own blood. Depending on the fact if his unnatural metabolism provided by the ability to control chakra remained he'd just barely pull it off and recover. There was little doubt in that fact – Akimichi Francho was a tough one. What state he'd return in would be a different matter entirely…

"Mana decided not to kill him. It'd probably be for the better if you didn't…" Meiko looked at Kusagoro asking him more than ordering. The veteran Jugo just shrugged.

"She beat the guy, she owns the laurel of pulling all of our asses through. I'll just have to deal with it and respect her claim to that fucker's life" Kusagoro replied after walking up and spitting close to the messy pulp of flesh that Akimichi Francho was.

"You hear that, you vegetable-ass-looking fucker? She owns your life now and any time she will want to take it, I'll lead her to the depths of hell to find you and help her claim it" the Jugo exclaimed taking a moment to enjoy standing atop of the man who proved so difficult to beat all by himself.

It was true, Akimichi Francho used out all of his tricks which were meant to shift the power balance between the Pirate Lords and move his crew on top in an all-out war. In that sense the Pirate Lord didn't just fight Kusagoro, he waged war on the man and used out all the tricks he'd have used normally to win the war with the other Lords. He used up all of the aces up his sleeve just to beat one experienced jounin from Konoha and still he failed. History would remember this man as a failure even if he was so immensely powerful. He had the power to literally hold the world in his hands and yet by using that power he ruined himself and got torn down to nothingness.

"Kid" Kusagoro referred to Mana while still looking at the grave-like silent oblivion of total blackness that surrounded them only briefly coming up with the illusion of being lit up by the purple lightning storm when they stroke. "We should probably head out soon, if you want to use the Box to bring back your friend, I'd advise you to not waste any time. That trick which Francho pulled may have alerted a lot of people – cosmic size beardo's usually do that. While I doubt any villages will rush into a cradle of pirate territory a lot of marine hunter ninja might, it'd be troublesome to explain yourselves and reveal your mission objective to them, even if you do – the Fifth's face will be instantly tied with this battlefield"

Mana slowly stood up and felt Kouta's grip loosen, she stepped out of his embrace and nodded. She understood Kusagoro's worry, after all, if the Fifth is tied to this place she'll have to pay for any damage caused for this area and she'll have to repair this place out of her pocket. That's more zeroes coming out from a village's budget than one could count on their fingers. Also it'd be a nasty stain on the village's reputation. Ninja weren't heroes, few people would care if the Konoha team just saved the world from a threat they themselves escalated, many more would lose faith in Konoha's subtlety at handling things.

The magician placed her hand on the Box's surface and allowed some of her chakra to leak out. Normally people couldn't just transfer their chakra from themselves into other people, even medical ninja couldn't pull of such a seemingly simplistic feat and yet something told Mana that the Box would be different. She didn't care if this mission would be a failure. That much she and her team had decided on since the very beginning. Shimo deserved a second chance seeing how his first was taken away from him because of Mana.

Was it though? Could Mana really blame herself. As the magician's chakra leaked out through the crevices of the Box lighting the whole structure up like some intricate mechanical wonder the young kunoichi wondered if she was actually to blame. Wasn't that the whole point Shimo tried to portray before his death? Wasn't it what pissed him off the most about Mana - that she blamed herself all the time about everything?

After all, could Mana really have controlled any of the consequences of these actions? She couldn't have predicted or within reasonable thought had seen any of these events coming. Them arriving to the Box sooner than foreseen, Hachiro's aid giving them false hope about having chances to actually win this battle with Read's crew, Francho intercepting the message in the bottle meant for Flint and rushing to the location triggering a confrontation. She played it all right, none of her choices were wrong… Then why did she feel so terrible? No pirate crew will end up with a full bag of Audra shards now and no Pirate Lord will wield the power of the Box and yet Mana felt like a sobbing loser.

The chakra present and lighting the Box of Ultimate Bliss dyed black with bright white edges to light the darkness around the black shape that the entirety of chakra began to take. Mana had to hand it that she felt more drained than she had hoped, it felt almost like she had just donated a good portion of her own blood. Together with her chakra she had given this Box her very life force a good portion of which was drained out of her to give life to whatever this Box would conjure. How would it work? Was Mana supposed to say her wish now or…?

The chakra leaked out, twirled and rose in vortexes and jets, expanding greatly until it took shape of a gigantic bird like creature. It looked very primal and bestial in its lower body features as its legs were covered with black feathers that were similarly coloured as the dark chakra leaking out from the Box. The oddities started from where the lower body ended – it appeared like the entirety of the creature's spine was extended like a long dragon and barely covered by the black skin covering it but it was very clear that the bird-like creature had no muscle or digestive tract there.

Right on its chest laid a round sphere which was evidently supposed to be the creature's head as it carried four closed eyes with sets of two on each size and a mouth-like opening that had bones protruding from it in a manner similar to how teeth would protrude. Similarly bones were protruding from its back as well separately even to its all reaching immensely wide black wings that continuously shed black gigantic feathers of chakra that faded into ashes before they fell to where the ground level was supposed to be.

The creature was mostly black yet its paws and feet and the claws protruding from the tips were mostly dirty brown. Despite its majestic size and pose the creature was actually quite pitiful and sickly looking as its tail reminded of a broomstick tied to a long string of cloth. Where normally one's head would be there was just a measly stump, similar to the remains of a beheaded chicken had their heads just healed up after their death and remain as a lifeless stump.

After the entity finished its strange creation ritual it spread its wings widely firing off the feathers far far away, the ninja could see and hear the feathers exploding with all destructing power but they didn't really have much to destroy as the battle that was waged beforehand had finished destroying everything for it.

"I am Satori!" the entity spoke in a voice that would've belonged to a young man, maybe one in his early twenties or late teens. "What would be your wish?" it went straight to business.


	224. Selfishness

"Wow, the wish granting spirit of the Box looks kind of… Sad really…" Meiko turned her head trying to properly etch the portrait of the very shady looking monster that was given birth by the Box taking in Mana's chakra.

"Fruit of the First People's pathetic tinkering with life, you are a poor judge, sinful one" Satori spoke up in the same voice of a deep and almost singing like masculine voice of a young man, one that was so soothing that it would've made the Two Tailed Cat purr. "Now, shall your primitive minds have any questions or do you wish to state your wish?"

Mana smiled with a flaring spark in her eyes. She was now witnessing someone that spoke like it saw the First People interact with humans which would've made it almost as old as the oldest life on this planet. As a blooming buff of history and legends there was so much Mana wanted to ask Satori. It pretty much dug its own grave by asking this question.

"What exactly are you? You say that you know our origins and relation to the First People but it is merely a speculation of what that relation was. What is your relation to the First People?" Mana asked. As much as she wanted to just ask Satori breathe life into Shimo's body, first she had to scope the entity out and find out if she wasn't stepping into a trap of some sorts. The Box had numerous legends spun about it and many more descriptions of how it worked. There were no confirmed survivors that had found the Box and used it successfully, many claimed to have done so but their stories were inconsistent. There must've been a reason for this…

"There is no "speculation", you are merely a product of the First People wishing to create life using chakra – your very existence is a crime against nature. However just like the First People sinned against you by giving you your pitiful lives they've also sinned against me by trapping me in this Box for eternity" the winged demon spoke out waving its black wings and making more feathers fall off and get incinerated from being separate from their master.

A booming pillar of flames burst behind Mana, Satori pointed its wings towards the ninja surrounding them in a dark purple force field and protecting the ninja from taking a very unpleasant dip into the blood of the dying planet.

"What was that?" Kouta yelled out as he witnessed endless more pillars of magma shoot out from underneath and reach out into the skies spilling the searing hot blood of his planet – the molten magma as well as jets of actual scorching flames.

"I was a bane of the First People, a demon so vile that my very presence is slowly destroying the Universe. That is why the First People thought it necessary to jail me, do not dare pity me, however, to one such as me eternity is just a heartbeat away if loathsome humans didn't interrupt my jail time every once and again" Satori giggled as its upper body which shaped a makeshift mouth turned around in a shape of a smile skewering the whole shape of the entity.

"How could a Lesser Demon be so powerful?" Mana scratched her head feeling confused.

"I come from a time before the Ten Tails, before it was split into the Tailed Beasts. Back in my days demons had more pride than to be categorized, I am neither lesser nor higher or tailed, I am me!" the demonic entity appeared to get offended by Mana's question as it moved in its massive brown claw right up to the magician's chest as if meaning to impale the girl on it but then it just lightly touched her as if playing with her. There must've been safety hazards installed into the Box preventing from Satori escaping or killing anyone after release.

"So you said we are just to call any wish and you'll make it true? Isn't that a bit too generous of you? What is the purpose of this Box and why are you doing this?" Mana asked a more direct question realizing that she was not nearly as competent of a historian to comprehend the time or the nature of this beast in front of her. It claimed to come well before the time which was considered a dark age of legends and only has skewered points of view of specific landlords recorded as history. It came from well before the time when history was at the very best unreliable.

"You heard me correctly, human, I am trapped within the Box and it is fueled by chakra. One supplied by people sealed into the Box. The Box uses that chakra to protect itself but also to keep me contained. I was forcefully given a function to grant wishes in order to fuel my own jail. That is the nature of your progenitors, human! The ones you speak of with respect and call – First People" Satori answered.

"I knew it! It's going to seal us into the Box!" Kouta yelled out angrily taking an offensive stance which also triggered Meiko's fighting response as she also unsealed a sword from a sealing glyph and prepared for combat.

"For someone who is such a pitiful failed experiment of a creature thinking itself competent enough to create life you assume yourself incorrectly within your bounds while interrupting me. It is for such transgressions that I consider First People's successors a pathetic waste of space and sad even compared to the "Gods" that gave them life" the demonic entity hissed in fury mocking the divine word as much as its manly voice allowed it.

Mana bowed and apologized to the demon asking it to continue its chain of thought.

"The rules are simple, you name a wish and if it is not selfish I grant it. If I deem it selfish you who opened the Box shall be forever sealed within the Box fueling my torment and forever watching your own kind stumble and fail to live up to the legacy of maggots that created them" Satori explained, his voice began sounding what the legends described a devil sounding like – conniving, malicious and very tempting. A minute more and it'd have begged Mana to sell her soul.

"It's too risky, let's seal it back and go home, if we won't use its wish granting properties it won't change its location, the mission will still be completed, right, Mana?" Meiko gently placed her hand on Mana's shoulder trying to move her friend away from the Box but Mana remained rooted in place.

This Box was without a doubt demonic and evil in nature, so much Mana knew after seeing its very design. She knew so much just by seeing what terribly evil chakra it leaked out into the surrounding world turning the sky murky and black and unleashing a violent thunderstorm of evil lightning bolts. It claimed now that just its very existence would destroy the whole Universe if it is let to remain in its halfway sealed state. But… Shimo didn't deserve to pay for Mana's mistakes with his life. No one but she did.

"You are very wrong, girl. If a wish is not made I shall remain half-sealed here continuously destroying the Universe just by being alive, within six hours I shall destroy the Earth, within a day I will destroy the solar system and within a week the entire galaxy, after three months there shall be nothing but empty void and me in my imprisoned state as the end of the Universe will not harm me one tiny bit even in my sealed state. Are you ready for this sacrifice just to remain noble and free? Shall you validate my spite for humankind by dooming me for eternal loneliness as everything around me is decimated to cinders?" Satori raised its voice trying to reach out for Mana as well.

Only now the magician realized what sort of cataclysm she had unleashed. If she did nothing the entire Universe would be destroyed, if she asked for a wish she risked being sealed into the Box, doomed for the similar fate to that of Satori. She'd be remaining alive within the Box fueling the Box's need of chakra like some sort of a milking cow. It was a fate much worse than death but one much more favorable compared to the end of all things.

Such was the cruel irony of this world – in her noble intention to save her friend Mana unleashed the devil itself who wished to make a deal and if Mana refused she'd sign the death warrant of all existence. However if she did ask for Shimo's return the Yuki would only be alive because of this evil chakra running its course. There was no positive outcome to this.

Kusagoro grabbed Mana by her collar and pulled her closer to his face, the man's smelly breath was blowing in her face heavily as the man sneered and growled at her. "You're a fucking witch of a girl, whatever you fucking do ends in everyone around you dying and paying the price! Why the fuck haven't you cut your wrists yet!?" Kusagoro shouted out. "Right now while you comprehend your own existential problems this creature is destroying the Earth, name your wish and sacrifice yourself, have some guts to do the actual right thing for once and stop stalling just to appear high and mighty!" he yelled out before throwing Mana at the Box over his shoulder.

Satori's bubble of dark purple chakra stopped Mana in mid-air and gently placed her on the ground. "As expected, the sniveling human is wrong. After the wish is made my power shall reverse all destructive effects inflicted by the Box or my presence. You are in absolutely no rush as you shall be protected as long as you are within the Box's protective field. Everything beyond it is relative, even as the Universe itself crumbles there is nothing absolute, I can and will undo everything. All I need is a wish but if your wish is to talk that I can do for free. This girl is wiser than the lot of you for wishing to scope the possibilities first. This is literally the most important decision in your miserable existences" the demonic entity explained.

"How is this possible, how can you actually have enough chakra to grant any wish in existence and then undo the destruction of the entire Universe if need be?" Mana asked in awe.

"I am the one who opposed the First People, the ones that were capable of taming the very chakra of which the Universe is composed of. You are aware of the "chakra over matter" principle of nature, aren't you, girl? As such an entity there is nothing I cannot do. I can destroy the limitless and indestructible and I can create the impossible, I can tame what is yet to be or will never even be, eternity and infinity are but feathers in my angelic wings" Satori explained.

"You mean…" Mana tried to wrap her head around the complicated and unimaginable might of the First People but was interrupted by the sad looking entity.

"Yes, the entire Universe and everything inside it is made of chakra on a spiritual level. That very chakra is just another energy which can be tamed and the First People were creatures that could tap into that power. They could manipulate that very energy which the Universe was made of, both the chakra that comprises matter and the one that comprises the dark matter, that of energy and that of dark energy. If you wish to accomplish something within the universal boundaries you simply shape the universe as you see it by tapping into its chakra. The concepts of ninjutsu were made for humans so that you inferior creatures could learn how to properly use chakra but you remained stuck on the training wheels" Satori continued to elaborate on just what kind of creatures the First People – the progenitor of the current people were.

"So… The concept of ninjutsu, as a technique that gets one specific thing done using chakra is just a first step to manipulating the very existence? The way the First People did?" Mana elaborated on the true meaning of Satori's words which was so mind blowing to believe. Ninjutsu was like using a specific set in stone spellword to cast a spell, like the wizards in stories and legends did, the true nature of chakra manipulation was to accomplish anything one pleased. The closest metaphor to such a being would've been a god but if the entire population of people were gods, then no one was.

"Exactly. I hope this helps you understand how primitive and failed you are as spawns of the First People's wish to create life using chakra. You were named as their successors after their own hubris swallowed them and gave the Earth and the Moon to populate, to inherit it. And yet you struggle to live up even to the scale of your expectations where you'd be considered a colossal failure. Your miserable lives are lost in battle or due to your pathetically short lifespan and rather than to record your progress and let your successors inherit it you cling to it and drag it to the grave because it's a "village secret". You are pests that feast on the excrement of flies that feasted on the First People excrement – never assume to be more than that while humans remain to be what they are now. Now I'd hear out your wish unless you still want to torment me with your human stench?" the demonic entity almost sang out as it often did when matters concerned belittling humankind.

At that moment something snapped in the magician's mind, almost like a realization had hit her on the spot about what was going on. Mana lowered her head and clutched at her fists so hard that she felt her own fingernails etching deep into the flesh of her hands causing it to bleed quite potently. She was almost shaking in anger before her head lifted up and stared right at Satori as if she hated the very guts of the being. "You… I've never thought there'd be the day when I'd wish to end a life of another being and today I've seen two such instances. I should wish for your end, you twisted, rotten and hypocritical piece of filth!" she lashed out at the demon greatly confusing her team that stood behind her.

"Mana, is something wrong?" Kouta tried to reach out to Mana but her hateful eyes that were drowning in tears turned back at him staring with such intense rage that he backed up overcome by fear of what the magician might do. Even to the young man she claimed she loved.

The magician's body erupted in chakra as she launched her body at Satori diving with a jumping kick, "Spear Kick!" she yelled out after her kick simply bounced off of a protective field that surrounded Satori and she backflipped back on her feet going through a bunch of hand seals and extending her hands forward.

Mana continued to rampage going through each and every ninjutsu technique in her arsenal breaking each one of them with a barrage of punches and kicks before the girl fell flat on her butt and couldn't stand back up. It pained her chest to even breathe but she wished to destroy this foul thing with every fiber of her being. It was such a cruel thing that toyed on the death of her friend by its twisted game and selfish desire to seal anyone that opened the Box.

"Mana…" Meiko spoke up with pity for the suffering that her friend was going through, "You know that sometimes I'm slow to catch on but… This creature clearly caused you great pain but… I don't understand it, you know I am your friend so tell me how it hurt you so I can kick its ass together with you" the blacksmith walked up to Mana and lifted the girl back on her feet helping the magician stand on her feet.

"Don't you get it Meiko? We can't bring back Shimo – he's dead for good and there's no force in this Universe to bring him back to us! This filthy demon is tricking us…" Mana shouted out with a voice of a sister that lost her brother and it sounded almost like she projected that pain on Satori and not the actual man that killed him.

"I… Don't understand…" Meiko still shook her head.

"Can't you s…" Mana stood back on her feet but then a sharp pain made her fall back down. Someone from behind her knocked her down and ran in front of the Box. Mana tried to lift her head up and she heard Kouta and Meiko rushing towards the perpetrator but he was desperately running towards Satori.

"Listen up you stupid crow-man! Make me the most powerful pirate in the world roaming the eternal seas with limitless adventure and booty for me to plunder! Fill this world with danger and excitement so I can be the greatest pirate ever!" Akimichi Francho shouted out through his crushed face barely intelligibly spouting out bursts of blood with each word but it was clear that the creature understood the pirate's words.

"I see…" Satori spoke as its mouth opened and suddenly the darkness around the world began seeping into the open abyssal gap that dragged Francho in with the darkness. The entity began shining with dark purple light as it dissolved into a vortex of evil lightning and returned to the Box. The ground beneath the Box was restored, the island was rebuilt and all was just like it was in the morning before the Box was even uncovered except the pyramid the Box was inside of was no more.

"I… Don't get it… What just happened?" Meiko shouted out in total confusion, the blacksmith must've been losing her mind as events she couldn't justify or wrap her head around were just stacking up on top of each other.

Mana got back on her feet and looked at the closed Box.

"There is no wish that can be made. The answer was in front of us the whole time, I should've known earlier… We can't ask for the Box to fulfil a wish that isn't selfish because the very idea of someone fulfilling your wish mystically is selfish. The Box was designed to trick greedy people into fueling Satori's prison for all eternity. Dreams are something that we must strive towards and wish hard enough to motivate us to never give up reaching for them" Mana spoke up bursting into tears as she slammed her hand into the white sand of the beach she was standing in.

"So there is actually no way of bringing Shimo back to life, that's why you were so mad at Satori…" Kouta finished her link of thoughts.

"Oh… Mana…" Meiko finally understood everything and wrapped her hands around Mana so hard that the magician almost suffocated from her friend's embrace and tapped the blacksmith's shoulder asking to be let go.

"You better hurry, in a moment it will disappear until it runs short of chakra and needs to be refueled and then it'll manifest itself somewhere randomly in the world, claiming more victims until there is no living thing to fuel it anymore in perpetual circle" the magician managed to break out a small smile by turning up her cheekbones. Meiko shook her head in confusion but then remembered Mana's promise.

The redhead ran towards the Box and moved her fingers under the sandy surface trying to peel the colossal pyramid size Box off the ground. Now that it used no chakra to protect itself and was perfectly refueled Meiko managed to lift the whole three hundred meter tall and wide Box above her head. The blacksmith huffed and struggled to maintain her grip but then the Box became lighter and lighter as it slowly faded and dissipated into nothingness one glowing particle at a time, collapsing into a sandstorm of small glowing particles that then got carried away by the wind and Meiko didn't hold anything in her hands anymore but empty air.

The redhead grinned to her ears and rubbed her nose with the index finger shyly, "Well, I guess that's that…" she concluded.


	225. Long Voyage Goodbye

The pale moonlight lit up the restored by the Box's powers oceans that ruthlessly and recklessly bashed against the small boat in which the Konoha crew travelled back. While the oceans were as disturbed and capricious as the powerful winds and uneasy weather would've normally made them the servicemen aboard didn't appear bothered by the little uneasiness and shaking.

As much as Mana wanted to be by the rails observing the uneasy storm and the calm nightly drizzle she wouldn't have liked to be seen. For someone with so much angst and inner turmoil observing the beloved raindrops roll off the illuminator of her small cabin was as good as it got.

The magician had no more tears to cry for her fallen friend. A life so treasured and taken for granted, one tied with so much kinship deep inside and made bitterer by the constant conflicts on the outside. Not crying at any given moment made Mana somehow feel bad, almost like somehow she wasn't grieving enough, like she was as bad of a friend to her one of the most beloved teammates in death as she was while he still lived.

There were so many lessons to be learned from this trip. Every step of the way Mana tried to plan things, she tried to create little maps and problems for her intelligent and curious mind to solve and yet every time she was proven not as overseeing and clever as she thought she was. Even more, every time her plans gone awry, there were very few instances where Mana could correctly guess the reaction of the world around her.

Sitting on her overly soft bed that felt like a drowning abyss, not unlike the shaking and roaring waters outside, swallowing her body every time she placed her weight on it, and watching through the window Mana moved her legs closer to her chest and wrapped her arms around them. The first reaction to what happened was to shut in, let go of everyone around her before she could properly wrap her head around what had happened.

It felt so similar to her childhood – back when Mana still had the mental disorder preventing her from associating facts with event. Back when mysticism and divine intervention were the only explanations she could understand. Maybe it was for that reason that after overcoming the disorder Mana became so planning, so eager to understand everything around her placing it into shelves with names on them, categorize and plan everything out?

The world couldn't be planned, the real world couldn't have been prepared for and the only way to know world was to be released into it. Walls had to be bypassed or toppled in order for one to experience life, to experience freedom however life and freedom were scary. Sometimes it felt so much more reassuring to believe in purpose, believe in mysticism and not even bother with explanations because explanations lead to the cruel realization that there was no purpose but that which we ourselves cause, name and attribute.

To some walls and constant shelter, protection from the real world – baby wheels of life, so to say, were the most attractive. Living sheltered away from the world outside the village walls, places where one's treasured and taken for granted lives were picked off like flowers under the feet of fire spitting dragons. Knowing what she now knew, processing what she had just seen Mana couldn't blame them in her right mind.

People keep children away from the reality as long as possible. After all, we ourselves sometimes fear confronting that grim purposeless world beyond the village walls so how could we subject our young and fragile to it? Even after Mana had discovered her purpose people continued to treat her as a child who had never experienced "real life", even after she left the village walls and had seen more death than some villagers will throughout their entire lives people still said that. People feared confronting reality and saying things how they were so much that they silenced others who did it for them out of fear.

Fear that these loud and brave talking people will force that confrontation, maybe fear that these people will somehow appear taller and better for lacking that fear. Fear of fear itself, fear of those brave enough to defy it. Fear of courage? Mana closed her eyes and burrowed her head in between her knees hunching her back so hard that it began to hurt. She wanted to wrap into a ball and just lay on her bed, let her thoughts take their place and settle down. They were like tea herbs after the water was poured on it, twisting and rushing all around.

Mana was an only child, she was often left alone in her home when her father was in missions and her mother was working managing her pretty popular and yet small café. Maybe her experience being alone was what invited that desire for solitude in her life's problems, maybe that was just an instinct of comfort being alone to face her thoughts and reflections?

The door to her cabin slightly opened with Meiko's curious eye peeking through the gap. The blacksmith visibly tried to enter unseen and while she was much better at stealth than Mana due to her general playfulness and lack of use of chakra in the matter she looked more childish than silent.

"Hey… How're you holding up?" Meiko asked carefully treading the minefield of emotions. By now the redhead knew how difficult it was to talk to Mana without the magician finding something to fret, obsess or blame herself over. The magician was someone who was too smart and mature for her age and yet because of that she felt it was her responsibility to foresee and control the world around her, just like it was her responsibility to help the people weaker than her just because she was a ninja.

Mana sighed, she didn't want to come off as a bitch but… She just didn't have anything to say, she didn't know what to reply and she knew that she'll be taken the wrong way. That was just how people were, every single time silence was taken as arrogance, as refusal to interact with a lesser one instead of genuine pain, shyness or just not knowing what to say.

The magician's eyes widened in surprise and then squinted with warmth when she felt Meiko sitting beside her and shifting the weight of the whole damned overly soft bed. The blacksmith was a better friend to Mana than the kunoichi ever deserved. Maybe it was her playfulness, her childishness or her, at times, comedic immaturity that made Meiko stick to Mana despite how badly the magician must've treated her friends… There was no logical explanation to friendship, to that force that made friends stick together even when the friendship was as lovely as two venom spitting snakes wrangling over one another.

Friendship and bonds couldn't be explained, couldn't be predicted and put rationally just like the world. Mana's too smart for her age yet not genius level intellect failed to understand either, failed to predict and categorize either. Differently from her mental disorder childhood days she had no answers to the questions raised by those subjects and it hurt. It was a new realization – that the most logical and what seemed the right way didn't have all the answers, couldn't predict and categorize everything to differently named jars.

"So… Kouta's father said we're going to Land of Hot Water after arriving at port, from there it'll be a peaceful couple of days trek back home. We're pretty strong and with Kouta's beast of a dad with us we'll be safe" Meiko smiled to Mana, the magician saw that lovely and innocent smile on her friend's face reflecting from the illuminator lit by candle flame.

"Oh… That's…" Mana tried to reply literally anything on her mind just so she didn't hurt the one person stepping over herself to still be her friend. Shimo's death and general depressing thoughts were all over her mind but Mana had to step over herself just like Meiko always did for her. The first instinct of anyone meeting Mana would be to stay as far away from that ball of pain, failure and blame. Mana owed at the very least her best to Meiko for how much effort the blacksmith put into it.

"You're probably still affected by… Yeah… I've never felt anything like that so… I don't know how to help you" Meiko admitted looking away, Mana saw in the girl's reflection the smile fading and changing into sadness. The magician turned and hugged Meiko from behind.

"Shimo was a friend to all of us. I wouldn't dare say that you don't know how I feel because all of us are feeling the same pain" Mana spoke up finally finding words that she wouldn't feel embarrassed sharing. It's already been a good couple of days after Shimo's death and ninja got over such events much faster – people came and left their lives like snapping the fingers.

After her head slowly raised to look at Meiko who stood up and turned around Mana was shocked to see the blacksmith smiling through tears. "You're the best friend I've ever had! Thanks for fulfilling that promise, that Box was really huge and soaked with chakra so I doubted I'd be able to lift it but… I'd rather have torn my body apart rather than failed to lift it after how much you did to get us there!" the redhead raised her fist up to Mana's face to which the magician wasn't really sure how to react. Appreciating her friend's presence Mana decided to be truthful. She looked away into the dark stormy sky looking at the drizzle intensifying into a full on rain.

"You know, I tried to blame myself… I tried to find something I could pin on myself and hate myself for but… I couldn't really. I think I've done everything I could to avoid anyone dying, there was nothing I could've done to predict anything or change anything. I did everything I could and I can't find what to blame myself for, what to hate myself for… That may just feel worse – the knowledge that things would've went this way no matter what you did" Mana said expressing her thoughts truthfully. Meiko grinned with that excited full mouth smile, so hard that the redhead's eyes were shut closed just so her mouth could curve like that of an excited monkey.

"Good! I'd be worried if you did hate yourself. We did everything we could, we didn't hold anything back and we did our best. We all know you did your best, when the Fran… Fran…" Meiko appeared to get stuck by the Pirate Lord's name making Mana helpless and breaking out in a giggle, "The Pirate Lord prepared to kill me my last thought was that I couldn't die there. Not until I justified my presence by your side after everything you did, everything you've sacrificed to make your promise to me come true – that's what it all started from, right? The promise…"

The magician was about to burst into tears, both those of some of the blacksmith's excitement rubbing off on her and those of built up sadness, but Meiko's hopefulness and excitement and heroic posing forced the magician to smile and break into restrained laughter. The blacksmith was a small anchor to humanity and sanity that Mana still had. That was a little ironic having in mind how weird and childish a neutral spectator would've found Meiko to be.

Seeing Mana fight over her own emotions the blacksmith decided to leave while she still saw the magician smiling. Mana awkwardly gasped just before Meiko left making the redhead turn around curiously. The blacksmith had that strange trait with her face that she only could have one clear feeling and thought being present at all times – it was almost like she could not possess complicated thought or history of feels nor could she hide anything but she was feeling. If Meiko was sad – she looked sad, if the girl was happy – she was happy no matter what was going on around her. Meiko was simple, Mana's life was anything but. Maybe that was why the magician felt this strange attachment to her friend and a newfound appreciation.

"I guess the mission is failed now…" Mana said with a strangely raspy voice from all the crying she's done over the last couple of days. "I mean… I may not have used the Box for my own personal gain but…" she tried to stroke her messy hair to at least remind more of what hair of a normal human being looked like instead of the stack of black hay stacked on the head of a ninja magician.

It was beginning to look like Meiko was getting really angry, more in a playful way, sure, but still… "Didn't we already tell you? That was the deal the whole way. We all knew what we were getting into and while the journey was something greater than any of us could've imagined or prepared for – nothing changed!" she declared bravely and out loud.

"You guys…" Mana began getting a bit touched by Meiko's words as her nose got caught by a nasty case of sniffles.

"Before you try and make up excuses for hating yourself, remember this – by kicking Francho's ass when no one else could. By fighting him with illusions and quick thinking and… I guess some revenge brought fighting frenzy you've saved the world. He could've cracked the whole thing into a bunch of space rocks, he held the Earth in his hands but with a single illusion you disarmed him knowing he'd have no defence against it. Give poor Nakotsumi Mana a break for once…" Meiko winked before walking out and leaving Mana to cope with her thoughts alone. Meiko had it in her to grow up to be a great hero, one for the history books, she knew exactly what to say and when to leave someone to make the best impression. Mana knew none of those things, she was no hero, she struggled to even say the worst things and always refused to leave someone alone even if that would've been the right thing to do.

In a cabin west to Mana's Kouta had just returned after wandering the decks looking for Mana. The young man wanted to see if Mana was handling what had happened alright but he didn't want to just budge into her cabin. He wanted to be a good friend, maybe even a good boyfriend but he just felt too shy to be too persisting. His father was much cruder and yet he always said and did the right thing. He always spoke his mind which worked out both just right and completely wrong but when it did he simply didn't care.

"So did you find the girl?" Kusagoro spoke up laying stretched out on the one of the two beds and staring at the wooden drippy ceiling. It didn't look like the man was even thinking about anything and yet his questions and interest suggested something of the sort.

"No. A couple of days and I've never seen her leave her cabin for anything but eating or…"

"Pooping?" Kusagoro laughed out.

"Dad! Well… Yeah…" Kouta shrugged after getting pretty heated up at his father. "Why would she? Did you even hear what you told her back then? She saved us at the very last moment, if it wasn't for Mana-chan the whole world would be floating as a gigantic cloud of rocks"

"I stand by my words" Kusagoro closed his eyes. "That girl is something totally different from what I thought she was, from what you still think she is" he added.

"I will still be her friend! Hopefully, if she forgives me, maybe even more…" Kouta shouted out angrily at his father.

"Oh, I've got no qualms about that. So far she's done more for you embracing your true heritage than I did through your whole childhood. Her presence is useful, if anything, for now" Kusagoro spoke up looking at his kid with a thumb up.

Kouta laughed out in a bit of relief. "Wow, I thought you'd insist on sparring with me again so you could kick my ass for being so stubborn…" he admitted.

"Well… Sparring is the best kind of training, especially when you think you can die at any point for real" Kouta's father smiled vibrantly.

"Fair enough but… Can't you just apologize to Mana-chan for what you told her? It looked like it really weighed heavily on her. Over our time together I've figured out that fists don't keep her down as well as words do. The worst enemy of hers is she herself" Kouta expressed concern looking at the damp wooden floor with profound worry in his eyes.

"Tsk… Trust me, maybe it's for the better if that kid stays down. I can't stop thinking about how she pulled us out" Kusagoro said turning his head up and continuing to stare at the ceiling.

"Yeah, wasn't it great?" Kouta smiled.

"From a warrior's perspective it was perfect – she knew that her opponent was self-taught and unskilled at chakra control so she attacked him with illusions. That one thing that can only be beaten by focus, clear mind and impeccable control… She perfectly dismantled that man, it was scary, if anything. All of that summoned from deep inside just out of sheer rage over a killed friend" Kusagoro spoke calmly and with a shallow tone, respectfully even which was a novelty.

"How unlike you…" Kouta raised an eyebrow reminding his father of how much less restraint he's been showing after the death of his team and how annoyed he got after Remashi's tie got burnt up to a crisp off his arm.

"Yeah but… She speaks one thing – she says she's a protector of life and that she doesn't like fighting but once she gets ticked off she's so good at it it's genuinely scary. She's also a ball of sadness and depression. If a person so skilled at utterly dismantling any opponent becomes powerful and loses their mind… I bet the Boss Lady would love hearing about that. Everyone keeps laughing at that kid talking about how she will change the world but… I may now be a greater believer in it than anyone else, after what I've seen – she'll either kill everyone and take over, ruling with an iron fist of scorn or kill such a person" Kusagoro closed his eyes again, Kouta looked at his father's face and felt really uneasy about how serious his face looked.

"Mana-chan doesn't kill, she didn't kill Francho, remember? She thinks no life in this world is given unnecessarily and it's not up to her to take them…" Kouta spoke up but father's raised arm interrupted him.

"Yeah, but for how long? Did you not see her eyes after she reawakened? She was going to kill the Pirate Lord, those were the eyes of a tyrant in the making. She's dangerous and that's what makes her interesting" Kusagoro admitted.

"Is that what you saw in mom?" the medical ninja teased his father after settling down in his own bed.

"Sure, your mother was a kind and supporting woman but she had a murderous stare just like that brat's. As a medical ninja her scary eyes were even scarier – that was one woman who knows how to take life lightning fast or torture someone for days"

The father and son shared a laugh together before an awkward silence set in. For the longest time only the raindrops bashed against the illuminator could've been heard. The nature's lullaby.


	226. Love and Obstacles

After regaining her full chakra control Mana had to once again deal with the enhanced attributes of ninja. Her metabolism shifted drastically to the point where she could no longer properly rely on her sense of hunger to tell her when to eat or her thirst to inform her of an appropriate time to drink. Ninja could remain without food or water exponentially longer than normal humans but it didn't mean they should. For that reason the magician found herself having to remind herself when to eat or drink, or so to say, when it would be appropriate to do so.

Similarly her physical strength, speed, perception and pretty much every other aspect of her body increased greatly as well. Naturally ninja's physical stats did not augment much beyond the might of the absolute human limits unless they were stressed or the body deemed such empowerment needed to survive. Due to Mana's erratic power up the unconscious decision to augment her body was in fritz. It took the girl almost a whole week to stop breaking things and begin to actually feel pain, her body used to augment itself just to withstand getting cut with a kitchen knife

Once again the magician found herself at the mercy of her abilities of meditation, hoping they could help her control what was going on with her mind and body and put everything into place. Mana sat for entire hours contemplating on the complicating processes transpiring in her own body, while she did see representations of her body appearing as space bodies she could no longer feel or hear the mystic entity she once spoke with right before her near death experience.

It didn't take long for Mana to identify a blazing gigantic star at her core – the representation of her heart. It looked brighter and hotter than ever and no matter where Mana tried focusing her attention she could never avoid the star's flames and energy bursts. It wasn't particularly surprising, after all, Mana's been dealing with a lot these days and it only made sense that her heart burned brighter and stronger as it was affected by dozens of different feelings.

"Did you hear about Mijo's ship? Last night it got dragged to the bottom by the Eight Tails, I hear…" Mana heard voices while in total trance. It made no sense, she was supposed to be completely absorbed into herself and only been aware of her own body and mind. There should've been no one speaking in her mind!

While the magician expected a partial increase in her meditational effectiveness after her chakra control returned it was never supposed to be like this. She should've been more absorbed into herself and more capable of identifying physical or mental problems. This felt like something new entirely.

"Yeah… I guess it's an occupational hazard sailing around Tako's Reach. I'm glad we left that piss-hole behind" another voice replied. It was a strong masculine voice, drawn out as if slowed down in time. Due to the slowness of each word being delivered Mana almost got bored listening to this one sentence even if this was a new event she was dealing with.

Totally curious by her newly discovered ability to better perceive the environment around her Mana tried reaching out to the voices. Let her mind float free and extend beyond the edges she previously thought of as her limits. Much to the girl's great surprise she could hear and perceive dimmed and blurry images beyond her own body almost as if she was there. These were no premonitions, they felt more like an expansion of her own body.

It was an impressive ability which could've been shaped into a whole different state of meditation. If Mana subconsciously or consciously perceived of a smell or a noise her mind expanded upon it, identifying the source from her previous memories and experiences and painting a very imperfect image of what may have been transpiring. It felt very mystical but it was merely an extension of her own senses. Mana was not sure when exactly this ability was born or where from it was acquired but it must've been something she knew for some time but couldn't use due to her impairment. It currently felt too well defined and perfected to be a new discovery.

Loud and rhythmic footsteps alerted Mana's attention. Her mind raced and borrowed from her chakra resources to process the noises and smells at breakneck speeds. The intensity of the sound of the person's feet hitting the floorboard suggested their possible weight and mood, the pitch of the sound suggested a possible angle of their steps which helped the magician's racing mind perceive a possible height of that person and also their gender. It was known from the Academy when they were taught to read footprints that males had a wider stepping angle compared to females and these steps were undoubtedly those of a relatively short male.

"Kouta…" Mana realized as her mind turned off all of the meditational stages and returned her to reality. If her highly educated guess was correct she needed to do something. The magician felt a great urge to not confront the young man as for some reason, unknown even to the girl herself, she did not wish to see him. Still, asking him out would be terribly rude and the last thing she wanted to be to her friends, people who stuck out for so long with her and her problems, was rude.

After just a couple of moments a pair of weak knocks could've been heard on Mana's door and after another brief moment the door slowly opened with the boy's cute face peeking in through the gap. The Jugo youth looked around and allowed half of his body to enter Mana's room without stepping a single step inside. The medical ninja looked around and then sighed with sadness and disappointment.

"She must be out somewhere…" he uttered to himself gently closing the door and walking away.

With a loud poof followed by a cloud of smoke Mana's shape became visible as she stood with her back against the cabin wall. Her hands were at the hand seal position having just used the "Cloak of Invisibility Jutsu" that every Academy Student learns at some point and yet very few use successfully or see coming. The magician didn't notice how the bed cover she used to cover herself up and disguise in front of the wall slipped out from her fingers.

It was possible that Mana would've tried simply hiding under her bed and forgotten about this simple technique herself had she not used it as a part of her magic show a year before. As someone just recently out of the Academy the magician had very few tools to trick the audience with during those days having to resourcefully use and manage what she had.

With a depressing sigh Mana picked up the cover off of the ground and dusted it off, placing it back on her bed and fixing it so that it looked tidier. She had no idea why she'd rather resort to using ninjutsu to hide than see the boy she had to admit to herself she still liked. Or maybe it was that she knew the answer but didn't want to confront it, finding it much easier to just hide from confronting him or her answer.

That night Mana did have to move out from her cabin, as usual, to dine. Unlike with the pirate ship the crew and the voyagers or high ranking officers did not dine together and had different quarters. The higher ranking officers dined with the voyagers in the upper captain decks where the servicemen and the rest of the lower ranking crew dined just above the engine rooms.

Desperate not to meet Kouta Mana decided to slip out and eat with the crew instead of dining with the captain of the small ship and the others. Needless to elaborate it was a smelly and pretty loud venture. The crewmen quarters stank of manly smells such as sweat and even contents of someone's stomach as the sailors had a nasty habit of throwing up into their own trash cans or even right onto the machinery in the engine room when they got seasick or drunk.

The food was not something to write home about however since Mana was not much of an eater anyways she decided to suck it up and eat a couple of smoked sardines and the really moldy looking and smelling bread with quince jam. The sailors were a decently loud lot as they often complimented their poor diet with alcohol which Mana found made them much more talkative and jolly.

In just an hour or so the crew were singing songs and even dancing which, having their very questionable balance and stuffy quarter space in mind, was rather impressive. Despite not feeling comfortable in the presence of these jolly loud sailors Mana decided to sit it through and wait until the dinner was actually over so that she didn't risk running into her friends or getting seen by them as generally one could see the entire main deck from the captain's quarters where the high status officers and guests ate.

Despite the very friendly and generally icky but affectionate drunk uncle-like behaviour from most of the sailors who quickly began looking at Mana like the little sister of the room the magician didn't feel like returning all the friendliness she received from the sailors. She was simply not in the right mood, truth be told, she doubted she'd ever be the same again after what happened. Then again, that was what she thought after Tanshu-sensei's passing as well…

"Oy, you stinking sea-rats! Stop harassing Mana-chan, she just lost a friend out there, captain said! Something with that huge man appearing in the skies…" one of the less drunk like a slipper sailors barked out angrily instantly shifting the mood to more nostalgic and lyrical. In just mere seconds the entire room began recounting those they've lost along the way. Mana was surprised to hear that pretty much everyone from the lowest ranking deck scrubber to the more refined maintenance specialists saw many more friends of their gone.

"And then the Eight Tails just squished poor Rachi like a paste tube… It wasn't a sight for the little ladies, I'll tell ya that!" a round sailor with a dad-stache recounted. It even forced Mana to squint her eye imagining seeing something like this.

"Rachi always liked to press his belly for a good fart, always made the table laugh that guy…" someone sadly recounted the deceased.

"Well it wasn't a fart that came out from his ass when the fucking squid crushed him, those fucking tentacloids of his have crushed entire armoured battleships, poor bastard just blew up" someone yelled out from under the table.

"Hey, would you mind passing out in silence? We've got kids by the table!" the round sailor kicked the man down there and stomped on his gut but only received slurring giggling in return.

At some point Mana realized that the men were not going to stop honouring their dead with bottom-ups so she simply excused herself to thin alcohol smelling air and left the quarters. Right after she walked out into the salty and damp sea air the fresh air rushing into her intoxicated with putrid smells lungs made her cough and struggle to keep the contents of her stomach inside.

"You OK? I don't think you should've drank for Shimo, I don't think he'd have liked it very much" Meiko's gentle joking voice alerted Mana.

"No, I didn't drink, it's just that… Those quarters really stink, the food is awful and everyone has more friends at the bottom of the ocean than living. Makes you understand why piracy is so rampant…" the magician replied looking at the black cloud ridden night's sky.

"You know… We really missed you at the table. Kouta's beginning to really make this disappearing act of yours a big deal and I'm not even sure how my training is going without your supervision" Meiko tried bringing the topic up. Mana had never expected Meiko, of all people, being capable of social subtlety.

"Yeah… I just… Everything that has ever happened with my life, both good and bad. I'm used to dealing with it alone, I had very few friends, no siblings or boys chasing after me and giving a shit. I just feel like I can only make everything fall into place by my lonesome, just like I always had" the magician replied staring longingly into the distance.

"You know…" Meiko began a sentence she realized she wasn't sure she wanted to finish halfway, "As someone who joined in to the whole Academy generation halfway through the studies as a newbie, I never really got why you didn't have a circle of people around you. You just always ran off into the village centre to do something right after the end of the school day. I could always understand why I wasn't too hot, I was a newbie trying to fit into an already built circle of friends. It was almost like everyone was afraid of you or something…"

Mana sighed, "Yeah, I always had a reputation of being a bit weird before joining the Academy. It could've been the mental disorder thing, I'm not sure… Once I asked of this girl whom we used to be close friends with before what happened to us. She said that the other kids were just awestruck by my performance in the village streets, everyone looked at me like some sort of kid celebrity and were afraid to talk to me. Maybe they thought I was a diva or something, my focus solely on my own magic shows didn't help that image either".

Meiko grinned before tapping on Mana's shoulder.

"That's so weird! You're weird!" she said out with a laughter. She could've just been sarcastically referring to the magician's reputation as a kid in the Academy but Mana doubted that Meiko would use sarcasm as a tool. She was most likely referring to how Mana's troubles always were not the usual things people had trouble with, it was rather something usually only Mana understood making her hard to relate to.

Mana smiled for a first time in a while looking down at the capricious waves smacking against the ship's side making it bob and weave around. "For the longest time I told myself that it was because of my slightly darker skin or because my mom was from another village. Foreigners always have a stigma with both the kids and adults. I think I thought that way because it was easier to accept that it was someone else's fault of being stigmatizing than my own of pushing people away unintentionally" she said.

"I dunno, you're still doing it. You keep talking about protecting and helping everyone, may at the very least enjoy the people you help. I'm more of a blades and armor kind of person but I always take time to test the babies I make out and have a blast while doing it. What you're doing is like cleaning the floor but not eating the cookie mother promised" Meiko shrugged.

Still awestruck that Meiko actually used a metaphor in a conversation, Mana heard someone calling out her name from behind. She turned around seeing Kouta standing right behind her. He didn't look angry, more concerned than anything.

"Look, I just wanted to examine your network, your chakra control was dormant for much longer than usual and its re-emergence may have caused some issues. I just want to see if you're fine" Kouta mumbled with slightly pouty lips. He must've began to think that Mana was thinking highly of herself and avoiding him on purpose, just like the kids in the Academy used to.

"I'm fine" Mana cut down before looking away and blushing, she needed a reason to slip away. The magician grabbed Meiko's elbow and began dragging her away. "I'm sorry, I need to check up on Meiko's training. I was told she hit a slump"

Meiko cried out in pain as Mana's abilities must've augmented themselves unwillingly pulling on the blacksmith's arm way too hard. Judging from the blacksmith's reaction and jump in pain her arm would've popped out of the socket if the redhead's body didn't augment itself.

"I didn't tell you anything like that!" Meiko began complaining out of pain as well as confusion, the fact that Mana was making it up must've slipped over her head.

Kouta closed his eyes and lowered his head like preparing himself for a big blow. "Mana-chan… Are you avoiding me? You spoke to Meiko, you spoke to my father once and even to the servicemen and the sailors but somehow you always evade me"

Meiko pouting due to Mana's rude push slipped her elbow out of the magician's hands and walked away. She clearly gave a message that this didn't concern her and while the blacksmith was literally incapable of holding grudges she showed quite clearly that this was something Mana had to deal with herself instead of avoiding.

"Well… As much as I'd want to dismiss that… I actually was avoiding you" Mana admitted looking aside and rubbing her elbow in embarrassment like a child confronted by her parents about a broken vase.

"B-But why?" Kouta looked at her confused.

"It's just that… I promised you that we'd be together once I put all of this together, once my chakra control is back and…" Mana felt her eyes getting wet again but she desperately tried pushing all of her sadness deep down, all of her feelings of unhealthy grief. "I do like you, I really do but… I don't want you to be with me when I'm like this. I want that there'd be no obstacles for us but now… It's just too difficult for me"

Kouta's head unwillingly turned aside like that of a confused puppy. "I never really wanted to confront you about that. I would never pressure you into anything, I don't care if it's a promise or whatever. I just wanted to help you with what you've just lived through, I wanted to see if you're healthy, I wanted to be there for you. I don't care if it's as a friend or whatever you want me to be. Frankly I even forgot about any "promise" of yours" he joked laughing uncomfortable as he rubbed the back of his head messing even more with his already messy hair.

Kouta's curious attempt to lighten the situation up a little didn't appear to help so the boy's face expression softened as he gently touched Mana's hand. "I know it's tough for you and I just want to be there, to keep you from being alone in something like this. Also, one piece of advice – love isn't a business, you don't remove all obstacles from its way before giving into it. Love is the force that removes obstacles and you may just be suffering so much because you try to fight both it and what you think keeps you away from confronting yourself"

Mana's forehead pressed against Kouta's chest before it raised up and looked him in the eyes. The depressing gloomy mist in her eyes was somewhat clearer as she whispered in his ears. "Did they teach you that in the medical textbook?" she tried to joke before reaching out her lips for a kiss.


	227. Home, Sweet Home

„Farewell, Mana-chan!" the lower ranking sailors yelled out at the crew of Mana, Meiko, Kouta and Kusagoro while only the magician saw the departing ship off into the horizon with her eyes. It was a while before the ship totally faded in the misty morning gloom and the all too familiar smells of rotten wet port wood and mashed quince met Mana's nose.

The mornings were the messiest of all times of the day for small port towns like the one the team was let go in. Fish stands had no time to promote their newly resupplied stocks as they were too busy selling the dead and sometimes still gasping for air marine life of all sorts.

"Awww, they think the moody savior of the world is cute and they'll miss her, isn't that just adorable!?" Meiko teased Mana pinching her cheek which made the magician laugh out in the sudden painful shock and hit Meiko back with her elbow. By now Mana was used to not hold back when hitting Meiko – the redhead didn't appear to feel a single thing and it didn't look like she used much augmentation. Must've been the natural toughness of the blacksmith.

"No, seriously it's a little strange though… Am I the only one thinking it's strange?" Kouta scratched the back of his head curiously looking back at where the ship could've been at that point in time as the crew made their way through the port town. Soon they'd hit the long stretching forests and the surroundings won't change all the way until they finally reach Konoha.

"Lowly sailors shouldn't talk to a ninja that way, they should be afraid she'd be sent after them. It's pathetic, really" Kusagoro noted with disgust.

"Eating with these "lowly sailors" does wonders. I think the pirates had the right idea there" Mana replied feeling really uncomfortable about having to defend her stance on more humane treatment of low ranking sailors. It's almost like the lessons of seeing where these inhumane conditions lead washed off of her team completely. Despite her abhorrent dislike of the conditions below the deck where these men ate, she visited those quarters several more times after that one time just to show those men some magic tricks and keep them company before they drank each other under the table. It just felt like the right thing to do at the time.

"I dunno, I'd like to set sails again some time, really tear through the oceans, maybe kick some more Pirate Lords' butt when we get stronger but for now, I'm really sick of the sea and this damp weather. All of my weapons and armor pieces are getting rusty and I didn't think my alloys gathered rust" Meiko pouted looking at a couple of her reserve shoulder pieces. Despite repairing and rebuilding her armor out of the spare parts she bought along the way constantly Meiko found herself unable to keep a stable set on her without it melting or being busted to pieces.

"Pirates only have the right idea when they hang their own damn selves. They're lowly traitorous criminals and they're only good as dead meat" Kusagoro began angrily taking glances at Mana's general direction. It was like built up tension between the two was erupting over a totally unrelated issue.

"That solves the symptom but not the problem. Pirates only become pirates because of how badly they're treated as legitimate sailors. All they want is to live in dignity and a little respect. They want to make enough money to live and to see their own families once in a while. Those men in the engineering basically make the ship sail and yet if they wish to provide food for their families they have to be away for whole but one week year. They're constantly abused and have no idea if they'll make enough for a living or won't get murdered by pirates the next day. What kind of a way is that to live?" Mana replied becoming more and more annoyed that meeting Francho and Read apparently taught nothing to her team.

"You're just sympathizing with pirates, justifying their stupid excuses for killing and robbing people. Sailors need to suck it up, if they go rogue – they get killed just like a rogue samurai or a rogue ninja" Kusagoro cut down crossing his hands on his chest.

"Except ninja or samurai are treated as high status warrior classes, the servants of the Feudal Lord whereas the sailors are treated like nothing but worthless trash, unworthy the fish fat they rub onto their own ships to their high ranking officers. Ninja never get beaten or bled out 'till near death by their superior officers if they fail an assignment" Mana became more and more passionate. She wasn't really even talking to Kusagoro at this point, she was talking to each and every deep rooted fanatic of the old rotten murderous order she wanted to change. To everyone who couldn't see the bleeding social issues behind rogue ninja, bandits and pirates and only enjoyed the given excuse to kill them and satisfy their own deluded bloodlusts.

"That can be arranged…" Kusagoro grinded his teeth raising his fist up and blocking Mana's path. The girl's eyes met his as she stood on her toes to better level her own face to his. She didn't shake or avoid his stare when she was depowered. She'd never back down now.

"Yet I'm not the only one who failed my mission" Mana managed to find somewhere to bite the veteran in the ass, even if it meant remembering her recently deceased friend. One who has been with her from the start and now just wasn't… Will never be again, in fact.

A loud and uncomfortable spilling sound alerted the two conflicting ninja to an unsightly horror of Meiko throwing up on a nearby oak. After the two just stared at the sight confused and witnessed the blacksmith's skin dye green before returning to pale white worry began setting inside Mana's chest and Kusagoro and his criminal slaying agenda was completely on the lower level of her priorities.

"Guys… I think I'm getting land-sick" the redhead complained before throwing up again. Kouta ran up to her and quickly did some tests, flashing his Diagnosis Jutsu over Meiko's body before sighing in relief.

"Her body is out of balance, she must've gotten used to the sea and how it shakes beneath her feet so now that the ground is solid beneath her feet her body needs to get used to it. She literally is "land-sick"… Meiko must've never sailed on a ship before" Kouta laughed out softly as he had never encountered such a condition before. He barely thought it possible and yet that was the only explanation that made sense since the redhead was completely healthy except for her balance and uneasy stomach.

Mana and Kusagoro soon shared a laugh together, one so powerful that they were unable to remember what exactly they were arguing about before.

"It's not funny, you guys…" Meiko complained before smiling and cracking up a weakened laugh herself

"We may stay here for a while, Meiko really shouldn't have eaten all those dozens of repeated portions while on the ship" Kouta scratched his temples.

Land of Hot Water was a natural wonder, however it was not all too different from most locations around that region. Tree lines and seemingly all spanning forests as far as the eye could see. There were large Snow Country mountain ranges far away in the horizon to the north but they were actually at the exactly opposite direction to where the team was heading. Up north would've lead the quartet of ninja to immensely long and tall mountain ranges that separated the forest covered eternal woods of the Fire Country area and the coldest area of the world – the Snow Country.

There wasn't really a single ninja village in the entire region however there were also too few rich settlements for bandits and rogue ninja to rob. Up to Mana's historic knowledge and overheard rumors there were several that were outright taken by rogue ninja and used as covers for their shady businesses but to divert her attention to those would've been senseless. Kusagoro would've never tolerated another diversion, also the other rogue ninja were the worst enemy of the rogues. The cruel conquerors would've been long toppled before the team even reached a single one of them. Or maybe the hunter ninja would get to the desired bounty first liberating the settlements for a brief period?

Travelling was incomparably faster with Mana's full abilities back. Even with all the amazing power ups she had received after regaining her full chakra control Mana found herself a much slower traveler than her peers. Her reaction time may have been more sophisticated and effective as she trained it as a normal civilian but her body failed to keep up with her efficient predictions and vision. Usually ninja didn't travel at too flashy speeds because subtlety and silence was of great importance, also a ninja travelling faster than sound would've bumped into literally everything in their path if their reaction didn't keep up which would've drained one's chakra pool to keep it augmented.

"Say, Mana. I see you and Kouta mended things" Meiko noticed slowing down a little so she could talk to Mana close and silent enough that the males running on ahead couldn't hear them clearly.

Mana smiled a little feeling a bit shy to talk about it but over the time of the trip Meiko slowly became a friend she trusted greatly and it wasn't like Kouta's father avoided making awfully rude remarks about the friendship of the two blossoming into something more…

"We kissed, actually" she replied, "Back on the ship when we talked"

"Wha-?" Meiko's jaw opened up, the extent to which this surprised her friend made Mana cheer up a bit from the monotony of travelling in the upper tree line. "You kissed a boy? Ewww? Why would you do that?"

"Wait, you mean you don't kiss with boys? I find that hard to believe…" Mana returned a question to a fairly odd one of her friend's. Meiko may not have fit the image of the perfect girlfriend material or looked like much of a sensitive princess but she was definitely attractive enough for the magician to believe in at least moderate success of the blacksmith in the dating scene. She also made armors and swords and weaponry of other kind which would've made her automatically ten times cooler in the eyes of the male gender.

"Me? Nah, sometimes when I make a really good sword or a really sturdy plate or an alloy hardens just right I peck it, hell, I peck it a million billion times, even if the alloy is still hot and then my lips swell up and I look like a starlet with lipstick for a while. I've even used a silver bar as a teddy to sleep with as a kid but boys? Nah…" Meiko grinned and began shaking her hands as if Mana asked her of something embarrassing.

"Honestly, I'm not sure what I was expecting, walked right into that one…" Mana sighed. It was just like Meiko to obsess over her tools and weapons and steel over the attention of boys and Mana should've known better than to assume otherwise at this point. Still, the amount of surprise that the fact of boys and girls interacting with each other with love and affection had with Meiko still didn't cease to leave Mana in awe. Her father looked like a real honest and headstrong man, could he have never explained that sort of thing to Meiko? It looked like in the blacksmith's eyes Mana was somehow perverting the natural order by finding boys attractive.

To be honest, a lot of boys and girls really rushed that sort of thing. Especially in the ninja line of work. There was something of great urgency in love and family matters having in mind how the population needed to sustain itself and very few ninja lived until the age when the civilians usually settled down.

"So, what's next? How will this kissing thing with Kouta work?" Meiko asked a surprisingly mature question having her relative lack of experience or understanding in the matter work. Maybe this hidden maturity of the question wasn't intended and the blacksmith didn't even realize just how correct this question was.

"Not sure, it's not something you think about in those moments. I think we're just going to date for a while off-duty, when it's not getting in our way and then… I honestly don't know" Mana thought looking the other way. Despite not seeing the incoming trees the magician navigated around the obstacles in her way just by hearing Kouta and Kusagoro ahead change directions. Even while Mana's mind was on completely other matters and questions she was still being competent and quick on her feet – she used to miss that a lot before.

"That's awfully irresponsible of you, young lady…" Meiko joked grinning at Mana and suddenly killing the tension that was beginning to creep up to Mana's heart once again. Right after the matters were beginning to look good, right after she thought she'd finally dealt with losing one of her best friends and found young love… She realized just how shady and uncertain the future was and those cold long fingers of Lady Fear began wrapping around and strangling Mana's heart and gut.

"Gee… Sorry, mom" Mana let it all off as a joking matter on the outside while making a mental note to interrogate Kiyomi once they return to Konoha. After all, the Yamanaka must've obtained experience what with that secret-not-so-secret romance with a certain rehabilitated Quack of hers. Mana already had problems balancing her life as a ninja and a stage magician. Her mind was begging for some more magic in her life and longed for entertaining an audience. It craved seeing that sense of wonder and excitement in a child's eyes when it sees a magic trick and even the behind the stage antics with the other performers.

Seeing the Konohagakure gate after such a ridiculously long time felt like an actual dream. Mana's already messy hair had gone outright unruly and desperately begged for some trimming, lately actual hot showers were replaced with the cruel sea storms and its salty drops pelting at Mana's face so hard that it felt like it was washing away her very soul. Soaking her clothes in such a short time that the freezing dampness of the sea felt like the literal reverse interpretation of what living in hell felt like.

The team was stopped after entering the gate. The guards did an elementary headcount and recorded something in their notes. Almost immediately Mana's eyes wandered off into the board of announcements right up to the gate. The girl's heart froze over in horror as she saw the board flooded with reports of missing people, one on top of the other.

"You're missing one head here…" a guard pouted squinting at the squad.

"Yeah…" Mana replied forcing her voice to talk even if she felt like the reminded of Shimo had grabbed her by the throat and tried to squeeze the tears out of her like she was a paste tube. Her reaction must've tipped the guards off.

"Oh… Well, I'm sure that Lady Fifth would like to hear all about it, you guys have been missing for a long time" the other guard spoke up as the first one froze. Despite taking even remote interest in Shimo's case Mana thought that the two looked a little too used of losing young souls to the outside world.

"She'd particularly like to hear about the man in the sky trying to squish the Earth between his gigantic space hands" the first guard angrily squinted at Kusagoro who just smiled and shrugged it off.

"Yeah, the rumor says she almost leaped into action herself. That woman could've just jumped up into space and punched that guy to the other side of the universe, I'm guessing, but you know…" the guard adopted a much more casual tone as he was basically discussing rumors.

"Hokage working in neutral waters… Yeah… Bad precedent" Mana replied knowing full well why Lady Fifth was nowhere to be seen despite being fully capable of circling the world many times in a single blink of an eye. If a village leader actually involved herself in the neutral waters it'd have sent a nasty message, especially so close to Kirigakure and Land of Waves territory. Those areas had huge government troubles as talks of re-establishing autonomy were beginning to dawn, pretty much every sailor was talking about it both on Read's ship and that which brought them home. If the Hokage settled matters in neutral territory close to autonomy negotiation grounds it'd have sent a disrespectful message and suggested Konoha's hesitance in recognizing international negotiations and Kirigakure's soon to be reborn autonomy.

"Say… What's with all the missing people?" Kouta also happened to notice the board which scared Mana so much.

"Oh… It's old news, really. I think about a month ago the disappearances really hit the fan, the rates skyrocketed but then they just ceased. Nowadays not too many folk go missing but those that did way back were never found. No bodies or anything, no one even heard of them. If they'd have been kidnapped someone would've been already asking for favors by now, if they were just killed why go through so much bother to make them disappear so thoroughly. A real weird case this one…" one of the guards replied nonchalantly before the two returned to their post implying that the conversation was over.

"Well… Let's go. The Boss Lady is waiting for our report" Kusagoro sighed, he really looked like he wasn't looking forward to that part. Something about the veteran Jugo facing an actual Pirate Lord with great excitement being afraid to face Lady Fifth greatly amused Mana. Then again, she had to debrief the Hokage about failing the mission.

"Two parties returning at the same time, both failing their mission… This is not gonna be pretty" Kouta sighed. Mana wrapped her arms around his neck and pressed her forehead to his. While the young man was surprised by this sudden expression of affection the two really lacked any recognition of what happened on the ship and what that exactly was. This was an official confirmation that they'd be facing whatever's coming together, not just as momentary teammates but also as something much more personal and bonding.

Mana heard Kusagoro's grumpy annoyance behind her after seeing this public expression of affection and she felt great about that man getting annoyed. With all of his physical might reaching near invulnerability she found one area she could really make him hurt while remaining truthful and within her moral code. Opportunities like that didn't present themselves often.

The magician shouted out in surprise followed soon by Kouta when she felt ground leaving her feet. Kusagoro lifted the two up and separated them from each other up in the air, carrying them like two fragile boxes. Mana could hear Meiko laughing behind them and following the party all the way to the Hokage Mountain where the Konoha Administration building was located. While the reporting part wouldn't be pretty, at least the blacksmith could enjoy the trip there all the way…


	228. Until We Meet Again

More and more villagers found their eyes unwillingly settling at Mana's face for longer durations of time than they'd have considered polite which made most of them lower their stares right after they've been noticed. Almost everyone present in the central areas of the village noticed that Mana's features were familiar however because it's been a while since her last show they couldn't put their finger on it. After they've realized who exactly they've been looking at it embarrassed those that stared forcing them to quickly look away, rinse and repeat for too many people for Mana's company to ignore.

"Everyone's staring at you, are you sure that you didn't get in trouble before leaving?" Kusagoro asked with seriousness in his voice. He may have technically only partly completed his mission by failing to save Shimo but he still had sway debating that his mission was three fourths complete which was still a significant degree of success. Ultimately the judgment of success and failure depended entirely on how the Fifth Hokage would be taking the debriefing. He was genuinely getting worried over Mana's safety due to the degree of uneasy attention coming from the villagers.

"Not really… I'm sure that my status as a well-known entertainer is catching up to me. It's been a while since my last magic show so they must be confused" Mana pressed her elbow uneasily. Her messy appearance will surely invite rumors which would hurt her attempts to resurrect her shows after months of absence.

"Wow, I never thought you were this famous…" Meiko whistled in surprise as the attention that Mana appeared to get in her home village amused the blacksmith. "I mean I thought that some people might know who you are, not literally everybody…" she corrected herself since her own family was not entirely oblivious to Mana's second inspiration.

"Wait… You're a ninja and a stage magician? Are you serious? You're a member of a secret order that fulfils missions and lurks underneath the underneath and you're a star of entertainment?" Kusagoro looked at Mana almost begging for the girl to explain herself as his prolonging face was beginning to suggest madness wrapping its long fingers around the veteran's neck.

"Well… You see, not many people know me as a ninja yet. I've not done anything noteworthy as a ninja and while people know me as the Konoha's Sorceress, no one ever suspects me of being a ninja. I've actually used my status to help me blend in in the past so it's more helpful than hindering…" Mana tried to explain herself but there was little of explaining that she could have done.

"Tsk… You have to be fucking kidding me" Kusagoro found little solace in the magician's explanation, apparently. Mana could actually empathize with his point of view. Ninja were supposed to work secretly, they often blended in, did disguises and adopted different personalities, did some real investigative work which a career as a widely known entertainer would've greatly gotten in the way of. The girl could almost see what little shadow of dignity she had with her boyfriend's father scatter away like a handful of feathers during a windstorm.

"You can be this nasty about any profession, father. I mean I plan of becoming a medical ninja soon, that means that if I get really good at it people will also know who I am throughout the village and a lot of great medical ninja like Guru Ayushi are known worldwide" Kouta tried his best standing up for Mana but judging from Kusagoro's angry glare he didn't really succeed.

"Yeah, but you'll be known for something worth wasting your time with, like being able to keep people alive which while a girly ninja art, is also a very useful one. Your friend on the other hand will be known for load of bullshit like stage magic. The only enemies she'll beat with her reputation alone will be those she'll force to laugh at her to death" the Jugo actively tried to trigger another quarrel with Mana. The magician however just closed her eyes and decided to ignore the man. She's been treated this way for the better part of her life, both for her ideals to preserve life and her profession. While it always hurt to be belittled by people better at your job than you are, nothing hurt nearly as much as being belittled by Tanshu-sensei. The clash of ideals with one of the most powerful ninja to have ever lived almost neutered Mana's trust and dignity.

"I'm glad that the village is looking better. Kusagoro-san's attempt to prove something to Shimo shook the ground quite excessively" the magician found another area to bite Kouta's father in while also making a pleasant observation that all destroyed buildings were rebuilt and all craters repaired. Truth be told that could've been done the very same week it happened.

"Pffft… It was just a couple of fissures. Nothing skilled terraformers can't handle 'till lunch break" Kusagoro shrugged any semblance of guilt off of himself.

The Administration building was relatively empty. As empty as it could've been during the middle section of the day, usually by this time most missions have been issued and they would usually not be completed until later through the day. The four approached a young woman administrator who handled advanced rank mission debriefings and asked her to inform the Hokage that the team was ready to debrief two separate missions.

"I'll let Lady Hokage know…" the woman smiled with a nod pressing a button which should've informed the Hokage's assistant of a team waiting for debriefing. These were relatively advanced pieces of technology. Usually ninja relied on Yamanaka clan members and their mental link abilities to communicate however for incredibly short range transmissions they have several technological marvels capable of accomplishing simple tasks like radios and simple transmission devices that lit up lightbulbs when a button was pressed nearby. While unreliable on the field of battle these technological wonders did great for office work accomplished on a single building.

The team rushed upstairs and stopped by the closed door, after a short wait the door opened and a bulky and tall ponytail and glasses wearing man with a Kirigakure headband tied to his arm, matching Kusagoro in height left the Hokage's office. The man had an assistant with him, a short and frail elder man with long facial hair and shriveled face but quite fancy attire made of expensive silks by fine dressmakers.

"I can't believe how lightly Lady Fifth is taking this matter, this is Guru Ayushi we're talking about, he's nowhere to be found and the last place he was seen in was Konoha about two years ago!" the tall ponytail man expressed his concern completely careless if he was being heard by Mana and the team or some other ninja sitting on a bench nearby.

"Well, she is a controversial politician, only temporarily holding the seat. Apparently, it shows…" his assistant nodded while playing with his long moustache between his fingers and trying to balance the stacked books and files in his other hand.

"As a ninja I have nothing but respect for Chestnut Hanasaku but as a…" the speech of the two faded as they walked away and began descending down the stairs and frankly Mana had no interest in tracking their conversation due to her own personal disdain for Kirigakure ninja.

While Mana thought herself tolerant and caring for all life, her family's own personal history with Kirigakure made her really feel a bitter taste in her mouth and struggle with a heavy gulp of salty tears whenever she saw one of them in front of her. What right did these people have to criticize Hanasaku when it was the Mizukage that caused the incident that ended her father's career and destined the man for a painful life or anger and burning suffering? How could they even dare utter the name of Guru Ayushi or expect his visit when it was the Mizukage that caused the death of the Fourth and her sensei?

"Please come in…" the assistant peeked out through the partly open door and nodded with certain boredom despite seeing very unusual and long unseen visitors by the office's doorstep. Lady Hokage on the other hand took almost no time at all to notice the missing person in the squad.

"This has been a very long morning so if you won't mind I'd like to ditch the procedure and just ease this debriefing through. I have a very sensitive investigation to track involving Konoha's image in the world arena so…" Hanasaku pushed aside a huge pile of files letting them simply fall off the table. The woman's chestnut colored hair was messy and looked like stacks of hay piled one on top of the other and her eyes suggested that she's been overworking herself and sick of her high status. Frankly her being the wrong person for the job didn't help things…

"I have successfully completed my mission to extract the team sent for the Box of Ultimate Bliss. There were some complications as the team insisted to first complete their mission before heading home and pirates from Tako's Reach got involved" Kusagoro began trying to put together the debriefing that would most likely end up in the total crapper. Had the Kage in charge been more tyrannical the four of them would've likely ended up committing suicide to salvage their family name or behind bars.

"Lady Fifth need not be debriefed about that which she saw herself through her office window. She would like for what she didn't see to be elaborated on, however… Also you have been sent to retrieve four genin and yet there only stand three, if my Konoha High education taught me to count correctly, that is…" the Hokage's assistant had to weave and direct the conversation to the direction he wanted it to go as he was filling the mission report by hand whereas the Lady Hokage looked to be in a state between listening to the report and napping.

"Well, the pirate that…" Kusagoro began but then Mana interrupted him.

"Lady Hokage, this question concerns our mission debriefing more than Kusagoro-san's. You see, we had solid clues to believe that the Box was in an unmapped island deep in Tako's Reach and the only way to get there without threatening civilian lives was in a pirate ship so we bargained with this…" Mana opened the shining with an indigo and purple glow bag and placed a full bag of Audra shards on the floor. What followed that was the explanation of what happened and how the shards were acquired in the first place and who had any number of them as necessary resources for accomplishing the objective.

"So essentially what you're telling me is that you've freed the Nine Tailed Fox from its captivity, fought Sunagakure ninja on neutral grounds protected by a peace treaty and then possibly started a war between Pirate Lords to find the Box but ultimately you failed your mission?" Hanasaku's face appeared to begin tense up and blush as if it was literally boiling as the woman clutched her hands into fists that were so tightly clutched together that they instantly made the air in the room heavier.

"That is not entirely correct, we did not fail, the Box turned out to be a trap – it was built to automatically absorb anyone making a wish upon it into the Box, no matter the wish. By confirming that we saved a party of high ranking ninja you'd have potentially sent to retrieve it, Lady Hokage" Mana bowed her head in apology despite having a good excuse for her actions. The girl was overly respective with pretty much everyone so the Hokage deserved the upmost courtesy from her part.

Hanasaku sighed as she rubbed her face angrily. It was clear that the woman was not having the best day and that it wouldn't be easy finishing this debriefing.

"You insolent youngling!" the Hokage's assistant shouted out, "You've released a Tailed Beast into the wild, one of the most powerful and destructive one, at that. One that we have lost track of! It would've been a better call to simply leave it locked up and give us its location for future tracking! Then you started a squabble between Pirate Lords by removing a whole piece off the sensitive power scale! The whole world saw that stunt that Pirate Lord "Red" pulled, it's all over the news of every village and every settlement with at least two people in it has one telling the other about it. The whole world is still feeling shaken by it. Lady Hokage herself just barely restrained herself from jumping up and punching that fool to another galaxy! She almost shattered Konoha's reputation due to fallout of your actions!" the young man continuously scolded Mana but the magician didn't falter.

She obediently stood bowed half way and took the verbal abuse. Frankly, Mana sort of wanted it. She almost wanted to get some sort of penance for every call she took it up to make during the mission, for letting the Nine Tails free, for interacting with Sunagakure ninja in neutral grounds and seeing the ruins destroyed and many more.

"Enough!" Hanasaku yelled out with so much power and authority that her assistance jumped up and visibly almost filled his pants, his skin paled like he was just grabbed from behind by a malicious spirit returned to life for vengeance.

"Just tell me this, Mana… Your friend… Did he die before or after the Pirate Lord threatened the Earth and enlarged himself to cosmic proportions?" the woman asked and Mana realized the nature of her question.

Lady Fifth wanted to know if Shimo could've been saved if the Hokage leaped into action ignoring every sensible warning and every subordinate of hers telling her not to. Hanasaku was blaming herself for Shimo's death to some extent. It was something Mana knew and fostered deep in her heart, a dark shadowy grip that never stopped choking her and she wished no such thing to befall anyone else – friendly or otherwise. Luckily, just this time she didn't have to lie for that.

"No…" she sadly shook her lowered head struggling to speak through premature tears. "He couldn't have been saved, Lady Hokage, it happened before any of us could see, he created a miniature black hole inside his palm and focused its gravitational stream on Shimo alone. It happened before Pirate Lord "Red" increased his size and mass"

Some light returned to Hanasaku's eyes as she was easily pleased by this revelation. The woman was having it pretty hard in a chair she didn't belong in, the last thing she needed was having the death of a young prospective ninja on her conscience.

"I see… Well then, I suppose technically you all did not fail the missions completely. A failed mission is a very frowned upon mark in a ninja's ledger, it is a mark of complete failure that impacts their careers in a huge way and I do not believe you deserve this mark considering your performance. While you acted out of line asserting your influence as a civilian and a client, Mana, I can't even give you a failed mission evaluation because you're not even a ninja on a mission. The Box's location and nature was confirmed and it was also neutralized so that an unsuspecting party did not trigger it again, you've also provided the village with intelligence about this legendary artefact which is info of great value. Wakizashi Meiko and Jugo Kouta, for these reasons I declare your mission hereby completed!" Hanasaku issued her decision to which Kouta bowed and instinctively pressed Meiko's head down because he just knew in his gut that the blacksmith would not follow courtesy.

"As for you, Kusagoro, I expected a higher degree of success from someone with your experience and skills. Still, three out of four extracted ninja, all things considered, is a decent outcome for any single ninja sent to such an assignment, however I am disappointed that someone like you couldn't do better. What is exemplary of anyone else is only tolerable when coming from you, I hope you remember that in the future" the Hokage almost smashed her stamp of approval into Kusagoro's file confirming the completed mission. With the Lady Hokage's lifted hand letting the team go everyone excused themselves by bowing on their knee again and leaving. Mana stayed behind.

"Will there be something else, Mana?" Hanasaku asked lifting an eyebrow.

"Actually… In this mission I've… Reawakened my chakra control. If I finally have my health examination by an expert in Konohagakure Hospital can I hope to return to active duty?" Mana asked fostering some hope in her voice.

"Mana…" Hanasaku's voice softened, "You've just lost a teammate, you are allowed some time to deal with this. Ninja live and die with their teammates, they bond together with their teammates more than they do with their own families. It is not uncommon for ninja to even retire after a loss such as this and I know you two were particularly close. My answer is yes, but please do not rush into certain doom, as alluring as it may sound to you…" Hanasaku replied and once again flicked with her hand signaling that Mana can go.

Slowly the magician turned around and left the office.

"Lady Hokage! The way you talk and act around that girl is highly unprofessional!" the assistant began complaining about something which must've lead to yet another fight. Mana's eyes closed as she sighed easier. She was glad that she fostered no dreams to ever be Hokage, she'd hardly be able to handle that job. She'd be making decisions such as she made during that mission the whole time.

After Mana descended downstairs and left the building Kouta and Meiko met her, Kusagoro had gone off somewhere. When asked where Kouta just looked to his right and sighed.

"Probably the Konoha Memorial, he was also quite close to his team…" he said.

"Oh… Well, I have some business in the Hospital, I need to get examined so that I can get my license unsuspended. I'll be seeing you guys…" Mana waved farewell before realizing – this was an actual farewell. For the first time in months she'd spend time completely independent from her team and completely all by herself without having other lives and opinions to consider. This was actually the end of the mission…

"Yeah…" Kouta nodded.

"I'll try to see one of those shows of yours, but if it's boring I'll hold up to you treating me to a lunch!" Meiko waved goodbye for Mana with that silly full-mouthed chuckling grin of hers.

Everytime Mana saw that, it made her smile back and laugh.


	229. Affections

The Konoha Hospital looked much calmer at this time of day and this particular point in time. Mana had little time to research any news or petty rumors floating around but it appeared that Konoha had relatively good political relationship with every functioning ninja village and no Feudal Lord felt like screwing up the other making the four old and rich men function almost like a small shogi club of aged gentlemen.

While there was an occasional youth injured on a mission or a victim of an accident waiting to be treated in the corridors, usually Mana was used to seeing a lot grimmer sights. Ones of mothers and other family members crying, either that or sitting and contemplating the events in silence and emotional moderation. Still struggling to comprehend the ramifications of whatever event ruined the family's day. It wasn't too long ago that Mana herself suffered through such a nervous night…

"Maybe I should've waited around outside? I'm sure that Eiju is most likely poisoning himself, in one way or the other, still…" the magician thought to herself as she took an illogically long path to the floor she needed to reach. Mana did not simply ascend the eastern wing staircase, she ascended one floor and then entered it, passing all the way to the western wing staircase and then ascending higher. It was just her way of getting accustomed to her home village and seeing which sections of the hospital were having a busy day.

It was odd how Mana used to actively avoid and dislike seeing Eiju right after the Quack abused her heroic personality for his own gain. While the magician didn't directly blame the rehabilitated medical ninja she still got a bitter throat full of sadness every time she saw him. Now she was actually seeking for the old companion. She figured that Eiju would understand and only bother with the most necessary tests when all the cards would be put openly on the table. Even faking a protocol check-up by filling up documents out of facts extracted from the clouds wouldn't have been too much for a bored ex-Quack.

"Wow, what have you done with your hair?" a familiar snark-filled voice reached Mana's ears making the magician grin and close her eyes before turning around and facing the old acquaintance. Unexpectedly enough, Eiju was not popping pills or smoking anything, in fact his eyes and face looked clear enough to suggest a lack of any poison having been used or taken by the young man.

"Nothing, really" Mana stroke her hair knowing that it was her past companion's way of complimenting.

"Yeah, I can see that… I believe that's the problem… Not that you would be troubled by having a mouth full of your hairy self when you fight" Eiju popped some pills out from his coat's pocket. Mana had hoped that together with his much tidier hair, his freshly shaved face and visibly more athletic build the rehabilitated Quack had adopted a more healthy style of life but maybe it was a hopeless expectation.

"So… Still racing your sickness as to who kills you faster?" Mana tried to return her friend's offensive snark, or at least, one that would've been offensive had the magician still lacked her chakra control and by extension the ability to fight on the ninja level.

"Nah, lovely, these are supposed to slow that bugger down. I think that qualifies as the exact opposite" he explained showing the much more legit looking container of pills that even had the prescription on them. Before the young man just held his medication in pretty much anywhere he could place it.

Mana hugged her old acquaintance which greatly surprised him. "It's good to see you having grown to be a responsible adult…"

Eiju began tapping his right foot impatiently until the magician let go of him and then he eerily squinted at her. "I was just about to make a sly remark about your smell but… After that expression of fondness I suppose I'd be a rude cunt if I did. Still, I'll allow myself the luxury to ask if there's a point to your visit to this particular floor of the Konoha Hospital this uneventful fine noon?"

"Actually I was hoping you could validate that fine coat of yours and do the examination on my chakra network, I'm looking to get my licence back" Mana smiled enjoying every moment of the medical ninja's shifting expression. Last time she met Eiju she noted that the medical ninja did feel some semblance of blame for what happened to Mana and did feel bad about her predicament. That may have been why he was eager to continuously slowly kill himself abusing his access to hospital's medication.

"Wait… You… It came back?" Eiju actually laughed out in surprise.

"I fail to see what's so surprising, didn't you say it often happens after a certain amount of time?" Mana tried to cheek her old friend and drag his past guilt through the gutter.

"Well… I mean… If it does, it usually happens within a week or two but… In your case I was certain it wouldn't" Eiju scratched the back of his head, "I mean I still didn't have a chance to do a proper exam after your chakra network stitched itself together after the tearing you gave it, lovely, but… I suppose that much I can do right now"

Mana thankfully nodded and followed her friend a couple of floors down to what appeared to be his actual office.

"I hope you won't feel bad if I skim through it and not bat an extra eye? I really am not one for procedure and it's just your life that's at stake?" Eiju jokingly winked at Mana before gesturing for her to lie down.

"Frankly, I would've been offended if you didn't swerve a few ethical lines for me…" Mana replied. Seeing someone of her old friend helped her mood a great deal, she could only imagine what actually returning to her casual life and seeing her parents would do.

"Okay, lovely, take your clothes off…" Eiju said.

"I'm not that dumb… I've had my network examined before but I can't rely on that person to write the check-up because technically he's not yet a graduated medical ninja" Mana laughed out.

"Didn't hurt to give it a shot…" the medical ninja shrugged.

"Are things with Kiyomi so bad you're asking other girls to take their clothes off now?" the magician found a potential topic for a conversation while her network was being checked. Mana had hoped to talk to the Yamanaka herself but Eiju clearly had more experience with relationship, to the ex-Quack it came so naturally and it was so casual that there may not have been a better person to ask.

"Nah, it's the phase where we're never seeing each other again for eternity to come. It was like that for two weeks now, I'm surprised one of us hasn't apologized and made up yet" the blond youth replied. While he tried to portray a rather casual tone Mana felt his voice getting a bit more serious, it was odd seeing Eiju, of all people, getting his mind and body invested into a single relationship instead of weaving entire webs of them. The ex-Quack just reminded Mana of a master web-spinner…

"Well… That's a pity, I wanted to talk to her about something, figured you'd know where to find her or maybe you'd be able to help with it yourself?" the right side of Mana's mouth slid down diagonally in a disappointed stretch of lips.

"Oh… Judging by the brought up topic - has the precious little Mana finally discovered love?" Eiju stopped the procedure just to look his friend in the eyes as he asked the question as the answer to that question was just that ground shaking to him.

"Could you not interrupt that? I've been told by the medical ninja on our team that interrupting a check requires a complete redo…" Mana objected just trying to stall before she gathered the inner strength needed to admit that she may have actually been into someone.

"Well if that bloke is such an authority on your medical knowledge, you should just marry him…" Eiju tried to act angry as he resumed his work. For a moment an uneasy silence loomed over the room before the blonde finished his check up and stared at Mana's uneasy and crimson blushed face.

"That's… Kind of the plan… Somewhere down the line…" she uttered.

"I see the condition of the great problem Nakotsumi Mana can't solve, I still don't see the actual problem…" Eiju reset his check-up for the second time still cringing, "I mean… Unless it's… It isn't some… Projection thing, is it?" he lifted an eyebrow trying to suggest a much deeper psychological connection between Mana having peeked into another medical ninja.

"You know it's not…" Mana's embarrassment over the matter was changed into a somewhat demeaning, in a more friendly way, retort. "While Kiyomi may be into that "bad boy" thing, I'm not" she added.

"Trust me, lovely, no girl is immune to a bad boy…" Eiju casually let out while still feeling the response of Mana's chakra system. Like a bat the young medical ninja emitted a weak shock of chakra that was supposed to be reflected by Mana's own chakra emitting a backlash pulse. Feeling the nature and frequency of that pulse and recording it was of great importance and enhanced ninja perception was needed to fix on even the smallest changes from the norm.

"Well… You see, the problem is… I was wondering if I can balance all of my lives. It already isn't easy being a ninja and a successful stage magician at the same time, if I add being a good girlfriend to the mix… I'm not sure I can be all those things" Mana put her concerns into feelings. Eiju was just giving so few shits in any given conversation that he was much easier to talk to about sensitive matters. He attached no stigma and felt no particular way about anything which made him perhaps a better person to ask such a question than Kiyomi. Plus, having in mind that the Yamanaka and Eiju were on a break, it was quite likely that Kiyomi would've given a loaded answer.

"Sure, it can be done… No matter how many lives you live, relationship doesn't get in the way of any of it" Eiju answered nonchalantly like an axe cutting down a young linden.

"Just like that? Sounds a little bit too easy and made-up…" Mana laughed out softly in disbelief.

"Well, I may not quite relate to your problem, I'm not the overthinking kind, lovely. Can you blame me for making it up? You really need to get laid, lovely" the medical ninja sighed after he pulled his hands off of Mana and turned off his technique used to scan her network. Eiju then kicked off and rolled to the table with his chair beginning to scribble something down in the document he had on his table.

Mana continued to look at him with a bit confused eyes that clearly portrayed how totally unhelpful that reply was. Upon slightly peeking at the infinite confusion in his friend's eyes Eiju sighed and turned his attention back at her.

"Look, this whole relationship thing isn't even remotely this magical experience you make it out to be. It's pretty much as casual as changing your bloody socks. The blondie-clan-princess pretty much ends things between us every other Thursday. Relationship is a compatibility check, a lot of flipped coins need to land the right way for it to go right and you're bound to make some very bad calls. Stop giving it meaning, stop making it seem like it means anything more than it does. Just go for it, see how the coin lands and then decide if that's fine with you" Eiju explained with much more truthfulness and fantastically less sarcasm behind his voice and tone.

"I see…" Mana turned her eyes away, while Eiju's answer provided clarity it pretty much burst the bubble she had blown up. To Mana love really was something special, something greater than anything else and something that was supposed to push every other thing she thought meaningful out from her life instantly making them all meaningless in its infinite and exalted presence. As usual, finding a simple and experienced answer to any given question made the whole thing much more boring and casual.

"That's as much as I can give you with all of my invaluable experience, you need to live your damned life, lovely, if you don't – what's the point of bloody anything? Saving lives of a classroom of kids won't mean jack squat if you can't listen to them laugh for one bloody second and enjoy it" Eiju turned back at the piece of paper and scribbled something with much more nerve and even less shits given. After that the medical ninja just stood up and fixed his coat and his shirt collar before nodding at Mana.

"You don't need to trouble yourself, lovely, we'll send this right to Lady Fifth" he confirmed, "It looks like you're back from… Something. So go home and have some rest… Also, by bloody god, cut your hair and just burn these clothes"

Mana laughed out softly before giving her old friend one last hug and waving farewell as she left his office leaving Eiju sitting in his chair. The magician then rushed through the floors of the hospital without seeing the endless wards and countless people waiting in the queue to see a medical ninja passing her by. She was in a whole different dimension mentally.

This whole time Mana kept on making excuses as to why she couldn't date Kouta, why she couldn't do anything she wanted or even remotely feared. Again and again she was told that those excuses were dumb and meaningless and a lot of Mana's problems would actually be made easier by the presence of a certain someone she could actually fall in love with. Now when someone with such profound experience in the matter confirmed it Mana had decided for the one and final time – she's going to do it.

She's going to be a great ninja – training and meditating like she has never done before but also knowing her limits so her body never breaks like it did before. She'll be just as great at stage magic as she was before, she'll expand her own fame by upping the ante with each successive show. When Mana had lost her chakra control and decided to focus on being simply a stage magician she was reckless and constantly played with death, she'll keep on doing that a hundred times more intensely but this time with purpose and no subconscious desire whatsoever to perish or get hurt.

She'll also be a good daughter. She'll work with her father on more extravagant and sophisticated trap constructs for her to escape on stage fuelling his inner trapster he once was. Mana will also do her best to be honest with her mother, the poor woman had enough pressure on her hands as a manager of a small but popular café to also worry her head about her daughter's little secrets.

Despite the still lingering and bitter as ever grief that Shimo died before he could see Mana bloom again, the magician did just that. Despite all the fighting the two did shortly before he was killed they always supported each other and each knew that the other felt that way. Shimo was always ready to take the blame for Mana's bad calls and he was always ready to say just what needed to be said, he was always there when Mana needed someone to restrain her wild and infinite need to help everyone around her in a way that made her not lose purpose. He always brought her light while at the same time channeling the one Mana shined.

The magician heard the whole house rumble from the disbelief in her parents' faces when their little girl finally rushed home through the main door. Father leaped straight out of his armchair so strongly that the whole damned thing almost flipped up. While the girl leaped straight into his father's arms she just wished that her mother wasn't working at this moment and could be here to greet her. It would've made this return that much more exciting and fulfilling.

It was surprising to feel father's hands wrap around her. They weren't soft or controlled movements as his arms were still shaking and very rude in their movements but they appeared to not even pain her father even remotely.

"There's so much I need to catch up on…" she noted, father noticed that Mana was looking at his arms when she said it.

"I found some new herbs that really help with the pain… Welcome home!" he shouted out hugging Mana again so hard that the magician released her scared bodily augmentations that raised her endurance thinking that a bear may have caught her and tried to snuggle all life from her body. The girl wished to feel her father's affection in its entirety so she purposefully kept her chakra away from enforcing her body even if it meant going through a little pain and suffocating a bit.

As much as the magician wanted to postpone telling her father about the mission and how her chakra came back and everything about what she sacrificed and what she experienced and what she lost… Her father was just too persistent to hear it immediately. There were some things like meeting Kouta that Mana wanted to keep on telling again and again to as many people as possible but there were some, like losing Shimo, that she only wanted to talk about once and only to people that really needed to hear it.

For the second time that day the girl went through everything she and her team had experienced through the past months. She saw emotions shifting through her father's face every step of the way and once it was clear that Mana took the heavy mantle of being the leader in the mission he immediately understood what made his girl's eyes so sad at times and why her head sunk from being so heavy on her shoulders at other times. He was a Chuunin before the accident, he knew what it was like to lead and he understood the toughness of making a choice. He also got visibly angry whenever the magician told him for Kusagoro and how he changed from hindering their trip to finally having a decisive role in saving them. While it was clear that her father disagreed with some choices that Mana had made but it was so exciting so see someone live through the same adventure she just went through.

"Just wait 'till your mother hears of this… Especially about that Kouta guy…" father smiled, "You think fathers are tough on boyfriends? Just you wait…" the man joked and father and his daughter shared a laugh after just being reunited after a long time. Mana jumped at her father wrapping her hands around his neck and pressing her head against his for the longest time until she got over how much she had missed the man and her home. Usually the magician was not one for affection, she rarely expressed it so openly, being rather much more reserved about it.

There was just something in losing someone so close that made one careful to never let anyone pass on without knowing how much they loved them…


	230. Golden Child

A deafening wave of applause and a standing audience followed the conclusion of Mana's stage magic show. The magician bowed as always and waited for a sign from offstage assistants that the mirrors that surrounded her had been removed and she could freely leave. Had she not done so she risked walking right into a mirror screen bumping both her nose and her pride. She made that mistake during practice, turned out Mana was rustier than she'd thought.

It made sense that the public ate her return up. After all, Mana's sleight of hand improved immeasurably during her time training with the martial artists of Sun Disc arena. Her perception and general motor control was actually multiplied billions of times after training with Meiko and all of those improvements were multiplied incalculably still when Mana's chakra control returned. The limits of her current abilities still remained untested…

After the worker offstage gave Mana a thumb up the magician carefully and slowly bowed again and again while catching one of multiple roses thrown on the stage and playing with it like a playing card, letting it shift through her fingers. At this point she was just showing off. The girl took a moment to sigh in relief after she left the stage and entered the corridor leading up to the small cabinet she used for prep before the show and trivialities after it.

Mana was glad that the audience ate her show up like never before, while the audience was much smaller compared to the heights of her magician career it was to be expected – it was her first performance in many months and with events like those happening in ninja world distracting the common villager she was bound to be forgotten until she made an actual lasting legacy.

"Wow, kid, gotta say… Wow!" Hiro – the owner of the hall where Mana performed clapped for her after letting himself enter the cabin. Normally he'd have risked running into a performer changing but by now he knew that the magician didn't view her uniform as a stage accessory but actually like a part of her daily attire at times. Mana took her craft seriously, she was a stage magician on the stage, off of it and on the battlefield as a ninja.

"I'm glad you liked it, Hiro-san, how did we do?" she asked with a smile while putting her various still functional stage props into a large duffel. It probably weighed a ton but to Mana it was barely anything. The more her chakra control advanced, the more casual enhancing her body seemed.

"Well the audience was smaller than usual but… It was to be expected from a return performance. If your show today is any indicator – the whole village will be talking about you pretty soon. Just don't go missing for such a long time and you'll be world-famous" Hiro began singing her praise, while some encouragement was usual for people making Hiro money but he didn't usually praise someone thusly. Mana sensed a speech coming up. She waited for a "but" but it didn't come, the magician just turned her chair around and crossed her arms on her chest looking curiously at the hall manager.

"Look… Here's your payment for the show" Hiro scratched the back of his sweaty neck that made his flowery Hawaiian shirt seem like it was submerged underwater for a good minute or two as it ran down lower to the short and chubby man's body.

"That's not how we usually do things. I thought you're paying my mother, not me. She's managing my funds. Did something change?" Mana curiously asked just looking at the large pile of cash right in front of her face.

"Well… Not really, your mother is a brilliant manager, you'll know what I mean one day but… You're really important here, just wanted you to know. I gave you this smelly dark cabin when you started, just a kid in a flowery dress doing silly magic tricks. During this whole time you could've left, found a better place where you'd be respected but you didn't. Now when you got pretty big… You're kinda my big moneymaker, even when you're not around people know my place mainly cause of you. I just wanted you to know you're being appreciated and… That, as stingy as I am, I appreciate loyalty from my entertainers" Hiro uneasily explained just shaking the thick pile of money.

"This isn't even how much money I actually make, I think it's like… Eighteen times more. Just pay my mother, just like you two decided to do business. I perform here because I love entertaining people, sure, certain things about this smelly cabin make me feel nostalgic and I do feel a bit loyal towards this hall in specific but… There's really no need to change things between us, I'm not going anywhere" Mana assured the man smiling to him wholeheartedly and bowing her head respectfully before running off. Hiro wanted to object and say something in return but then he just scratched the back of his head.

"But this is the usual amount…" he just uttered to himself after he realized Mana ran off.

"Nakotsumi Mana?" a firm masculine voice interrupted Mana's daydreaming as she was planning to leave the hall and head home. She still planned seeing Kouta for their potential first date that day so she wasn't in any mood to host any of the usual after-show sit downs where she met anyone who came to her show for a nice short chat or answered any questions. Due to those reasons the girl hadn't expected to be stopped.

"Yes, I suppose if you saw the show you may also…" Mana opened her mouth for a response.

"No, I'm sorry, I am not calling you by your stage name – I am a firm fan of calling things how they are" the man politely interrupted the magician by shaking his hands in disagreement. His voice was strong and deep, the kind that inspired people but the words that actually came out from his mouth were not overly inspirational for Mana.

"Very well" Mana nodded uncomfortably rubbing her elbow behind her back.

"That was quite a show, young lady, I have to say I was impressed despite not being a fan. For observing something I do not like, I was fairly impressed by your skill of doing that thing" the man continued to send twisted messages as Mana was not sure if she should be defending her craft or respectfully expressing her gratitude for the man's praise.

"Um… Thank you, I suppose" she decided on the latter.

"I must ask, I'd like to know how did you do that rabbit multiplying trick, you didn't actually use ninjutsu, did you? I believed I'd have noticed a genin using sloppy ninjutsu on stage which surprised me greatly when I did not" the man once again confusingly commended Mana while offending her at the same time. One of the things the magician liked the least was being treated as normal, casual, average. At the very least her craft should've been treated as unique, leaving the definitions of good or bad aside.

"No, it was just a mirror trick, the mirrors were edited to hide the rabbits while showing you the stage, almost like see-through glass. I often incorporate ninja techniques into the show but this one was just smoke and mirrors. I popped a light bomb and a smoke bomb from my ninja kit to conceal the actual trick, not that most people would follow my hand movements… It was purely for the visual effect" Mana admitted, while Hiro actually tried suggesting her to stick to the secrecy of how her tricks were done rule, the girl had no intention of making it a consistent rule she lived by. Something also told her she'd better tell this man what he wanted to hear.

"That is… Impressive, for a genin. I mean you are misusing ninja techniques for silly entertainment making fun of the old and respected profession but… You do it in style" the man admitted nodding his head, his cheek bones remained sharply protruded and his chin was almost like a stone sword pointed at Mana. The man didn't feel like smiling or showing any amount of warmth towards her and appeared rather on the offensive about the subject but it didn't look like he was looking for trouble.

"Excuse me, is this supposed to be… A review or…" Mana began losing her composure, not because her craft was attacked, more so because her time was being wasted on shifty and unclear messages. She could take criticism, she could take being called a good for nothing loser who brings shame to the ninja profession but she couldn't take being held up without knowing what this man's intention was.

"Oh no, just wanted to meet the young lady that attracted the Council's attention. Those old fools are so quick to forgive and forget such transgressions towards the respected age old traditions of the ninja order, I am not so sure, even after seeing a quite impressive, for a kid, show" the man shrugged slipping out from under a raggedy cloak. He was certainly a well formed and trained individual, his shoulders were probably the broadest and scariest Mana had ever seen. He could probably punch a head off of a bear without even augmenting his abilities.

"Council's attention? Am I being investigated? I don't see how my actions during my licence's suspension are valid for an investigation, even if they are, what am I facing from the Ninja Council? Double suspension?" Mana began forming some spikes, it may have been just her teenage immaturity but to her it felt well justified at that moment.

"No, different kind of attention… They are quite impressed for some reason: busted a crime ring around the small towns surrounding Konoha and Otogakure, brought home Audra shards worth a large town built of solid gold, finished off a Pirate Lord saving the world, travelled to another universe and brought home technology ages ahead of our time as proof. You are like a little five golden star princess in the eyes of the council and I wanted to see such a girl in person" the man explained.

"I didn't beat Red alone, it clearly states in the report that Kusagoro-san did the actual fighting" Mana found a flaw in the empty and bitter toned flattering that the man began listing.

"True, but that is what a ninja is essentially, isn't it? Not the one that fights in an open battlefield, the one that slips a knife in-between the weakened enemy's ribs. I have to say what you did was pretty impressive, even how most of the Council believes your story about… Different universes, omnipotent Gods and… Whatever else, just because you brought a bunch of tech that will spiral us ages ahead in just a couple of months. I know what you are, Nakotsumi Mana, you are no golden child, you are useful. The council loves you because you brought them use, more of it than most bring in their entire lifetimes. You stumble into things that are golden eggs for the Council, that is your sole talent" the man began bitterly speak and the magician started to doubt she was even supposed to be the target of his monologue.

"Well, I'm glad you have it all figured out, Sir. If you forgive me, I have some matters to attend to" Mana tried politely excusing herself.

"By all means, I wouldn't like keeping you away from your date…" the man crossed his vehicle sized muscular hands around his chest before flicking a string of hair that began falling in his eyes.

Mana did her best to conceal the fear and surprise that the man knew all about her plans. She suspected that he even knew about Kouta in particular, who he was and just what his relationship with Mana was like. Just how much research has this man done on her? Suddenly the girl began remembering the crazy mumblings of Shimo's old rogue teacher about mysterious man being very interested in Mana. Could this have been it? Maybe he was just assuming she was heading to a date? After all, most girls Mana's age were already well into the scene… Such an odd and mysterious man!

The upcoming meeting with Kouta went just about as bad as it could – the two just uneasily stared at each other and exchanged awkward and cliche phrases before settling down in silence. They spoke of weather, of every single building or tipsy gent wandering off around them. Hundreds of times the two told each other how their day went. This meeting was just about as far from a date as dates got. Mana had that scary and strange man in her mind this entire time and fear and suspicion of his hidden agenda or what he may know or do made her mind be somewhere else.

With her long awaited date getting ruined and supposedly postponed to another day Mana decided to go and let her steam out the next morning with training. It's been a while since she trained alone in the training grounds, maybe that time with Meiko when she was absorbed into the universal anomaly that made her slip into Naruto and Sasuke's universe? It was tough to say… Crazy events like that made remembering the simple things quite difficult.

Mana began just fighting the standing dummies, the first couple of attacks she forgot to place the seals on them that protected them from physical harm so she busted a couple of them up into small shatters. Feeling ashamed and just all around bad the magician placed the protective seals onto another dummy, while it was no big deal and things like this happened, somehow it affected her more than it should've.

It couldn't have been breaking the actual dummies itself, nor could it have been the fact that she forgot to place the protective sealing tags she bought on them. It was everything added up: the audience of her shows not being what it used to be before Mana left, meeting that shady tall man and how that whole conversation with him went, how awkward and stupid she was in her date with Kouta. She should've suggested that they'd do something, she shouldn't just have phased out…

Things felt so optimistic before – even if dealing with Shimo's death was difficult, Mana had reawakened her chakra control, she'd saved the entire world by stopping Francho and giving him enough of a beating to feel better about Shimo's death making it somehow not feel completely unresolved. Then she even was thrown into a whole other universe expanding her understanding of what the world around her was, she met all those amazing ninja of another universe and helped save it. She brought technology from that place that'd help patients in Konoha Hospital, one that'll improve the primitive computing technology and propel the village ages into the future…

And yet… Here it was again, things beginning to rot, slowly, creepily the pale fingers of wights under dark cloaks began creeping up Mana's neck. She could almost sense it – something bad was about to happen, things never just stayed the way they were. She's been getting the good hand in this card game for far too long…

"Hey!" a strangely familiar voice reached Mana, the magician hadn't noticed that after throwing a powerful punch she leaned forward and slipped into trance. Somehow she managed to slip into a deep meditative state in an uncomfortable fighting stance which made Mana's muscles feel numb after she recovered from it. Hearing that voice sounded odd, not because of who it belonged to but where Mana heard it – in the training grounds!

"Good morning, Lady Hokage!" Mana bowed having turned around and faced the most powerful and important ninja having approached her from behind. What could this woman have possibly wanted from Mana? Maybe it was about this whole ninja council thing?

"Oh, no need to use that title, I quit the office today!" Chestnut Hanasaku and ex-Fifth Hokage smiled with a full smile so eerily reminding of the monkey-like way Meiko used to smile all the time.

"W-What?" Mana shook her head and rubbed her tired eyes with her swollen knuckles.

"Yeah, I was always supposed to be just a place holder anyways… I feel like the council forgot that after all this time. The big chair was never meant for a numbskull like me" Hanasaku laughed out loud as if it was something to be taken proud of.

"Well, you are wrong, in that case. The title of Hokage is still used even if the Hokage is not in office. You will be called "the Fifth Hokage" the whole way through and even after your passing" Mana's facial expression somehow softened up when she informed the woman more than twenty years older than her of this fact.

"Whaaaaat?" Hanasaku's jaw dropped, it was clear that the woman didn't have a clue that the title of Hokage would follow her long after her short stay in the big chair would be concluded.

Mana couldn't keep a chuckle in but when her companion shared a laugh the two women laughed at each other's laughter before Hanasaku raised her arm and clenched it into a fist.

"I never took you for a puncher, your hands just looked too cute and fragile to punch invincible dummies" the woman smiled pointing at the protected with chakra dummies. Slowly Hanasaku crept up to them and flicked the thing barely even touching it with her finger. The protective chakra coating burst like a popped balloon and the dummy exploded into a vortex of barely visibly sized sawdust.

Mana's face shifted in disbelief, the seals were supposed to use a perpetually fuelled protective coating of chakra that was supposed to render those small inanimate objects completely invincible to physical force, even augmented with chakra. It didn't look like Hanasaku put any effort whatsoever in her punch but she destroyed infinite and self-sustaining chakra coating with a single flick of her finger. She barely even scraped the thing with her fingernail!

"I'm not really…" Mana managed to get herself together and express her thoughts in an actual reply. "I just had a lot of pent up feelings inside that needed to be let go, can't say I like punching things though, I guess I'll need to keep looking for a better way. Your punch though…"

"Don't ask me how, my strength defies logic" Hanasaku laughed out shyly stroking her messy chestnut coloured hair stack. "Then again, I suppose I should've taught you something with this, I do plan of teaching you after all…" the woman then twisted her lips pouting them and pressing her thinking finger to them.

"Teaching me?" Mana leaned her head sideways in total confusion like a puppy does when he sees a new concept too big for his little cute puppy head to wrap around.

"Sure, now that I'm no longer the Hokage I'll be putting a team of genin together. Seeing how you're the student who was so precious for Tanshu, I was really hurt to not be able to teach you sooner. Now I can finally fix that mistake – you're the first pick for Team Hokage!" Hanasaku shyly rubbed her nose like wiping a mean sniffle, "Do you like the name, I came up with it myself, now that I know the title will stick with me it's even more fitting" she giggled.

Mana was wrong, things won't be getting hard or dark again, they would however get inexplicably weirder!


	231. Try Not to Die Too Fast

It was said by many that becoming a ninja made a young soul mature and grow up way too fast. Maybe it was for that reason that graduating from the Academy made one emancipated and therefore considered almost an adult. Mana could certainly feel that sort of maturity she'd have likely never had if she hadn't become a kunoichi. For example when the Hokage approached her talking to Mana about taking her under her wing in a squad, all that the magician could think of it were the implications of what was told to her.

"Wait, so now that you quit… Is the seat empty? Will the Council place a substitute soon enough?" Mana worried about the political state of her village more than about the exciting possibilities that being taken in a squad by the Hokage provided.

"Wow, you're really weird, I've just told you that I'm gonna train you and all you can think about is all that boring political stuff…" Hanasaku pouted like an offended child, one who was promised a lick of their favorite ice cream but given none.

"Sorry… It's just" Mana tried to explain and apologize but she just didn't know how to explain the importance of these things to someone who while sat in the big chair for so long didn't appear to know the importance of it. The ninja villages were in the middle of discussing the Kirigakure autonomy, if the Hokage suddenly disappeared from these negotiations their opinion and history would undoubtedly be overshadowed by the interests of other villages.

"It'll be fine. They've found a suitable substitute. He'll do just fine, even if no one even knew he existed until like a month or two ago" Hanasaku waved her hand like it was no pressing matter, where the woman began stretching out like preparing for a workout right at that moment after witnessing Mana's puzzled expression she explained.

"You see, he was a Black Ops operative. When he joined it at a very young age his records were wiped and he had very few notes to begin with in his file. One day he just waltzed into my office and declared that he was ready to take over if I was willing to do the right thing and resign. Going from a Black Ops operative to a public office seems pretty extreme but he looks competent enough to handle it, more chances than I ever had…"

"Can't anyone else see how shady that is?" Mana scratched her temple feeling a bit confused, more so that no one else batted an eye where she saw tons of problems.

"Maybe, the Council likes him, they wouldn't have minded me staying a bit longer or maybe even serving full term but… That place was seriously beginning to strangle me" Hanasaku shrugged, "Now can we fight already?" she almost begged Mana.

"Wait, fight!?" the magician yelled out in surprise.

"Obviously! I'm enrolling you into my squad, unlike Kiyomi who will be the second member, with you I only have Tanshu's vouch to go with. I need to know of your abilities to decide about how the squad will function, what I need to teach you and who the third member should be" Hanasaku slammed her own fist into her palm raising a strong gust of wind that made Mana clutch and struggle to stay on her feet. This woman was not only inhumanly strong, she was illogically strong even by ninja standards, judging from rumors, even by Kage standards.

"I really see no use for that…" Mana said uneasily, it wasn't that she was afraid of the woman, on some internal layer she was, the most important feeling was the absolute confusion as to why this clash was even necessary.

"If you don't fight me and show me what you can do I'll just pick Yoruma Hisako as my third member" Hanasaku blinked as a tease.

"Wait, I have no qualms with that. Hisako-san is a great kunoichi and an amazing swordswoman. Plus while she is… Rather… Odd, and curses a lot… I feel like the two of us had bonded a little" Mana smiled as she still refused to take a defensive battle stance.

"Didn't she stab you which almost killed you? Thoughts throwing her name around would tick you off but it appears to be harder to do than I've initially thought" Hanasaku cocked her head to the side baffled by Mana's feelings towards the Yoruma. "Anyways, I was bluffing, one of the main goals of my squad is to pass the upcoming Chuunin Exams. They were supposed to happen in a couple of weeks but due to the whole Hokage switch they'll likely be postponed for a couple of months more. Hisako is already a chuunin so she's not a suitable candidate"

"Great, then we don't really need to fight, you've undoubtedly seen my file and you know all about my abilities. You're just making up reasons to fight people, Lady Hokage. During my time in Wind Country I've come to understand the importance of martial arts and sparring, and I know that paperwork was suffocating to you but neither of those are reasons to brawl needlessly" Mana turned around and began leaving the training grounds. While she did wish to join Chestnut Hanasaku's team and be trained by one of the most powerful ninja not only of her time but all time she just saw no reason in fighting this woman.

"Earth Style: Staircase to Heaven!" Hanasaku shouted out slamming her fists at the ground, Mana turned around in shock that the Hokage would just attack her. Didn't the Fifth know the immense difference between their strength? If Mana got hit by a single technique of this woman she'd undoubtedly die unless Hanasaku restrained herself to a barely understandable by the human mind degree.

The rumbling of the ground beneath her feet made the gravity feel like it was multiplied hundreds of times. Mana wished to step aside, roll aside, jump sideways or otherwise avoid the technique but the quaking ground simply kept her firmly stuck on the shifting dirt. Sky reaching pillars made of dirt and rock shot up throwing Mana up in the air, the girl knew that Hanasaku purposefully aimed to erect the pillars right beneath her feet just so Mana didn't get hit by them, just thrown upwards.

Mana's hands went through a collection of hand seals quickly trying to activate her Mystical Wings technique and form a wind current beneath her feet which would allow her to carefully float and land without needing to augment her body to withstand the fall.

"Careless!" Hanasaku's cruel shout interrupted all of Mana's thoughts as her downwards slam sent Mana's body helplessly slamming into the ground. The Hokage moved right up to Mana's face at such inconceivable speed that the girl had little time to even process her thoughts, reacting was another matter entirely. With a cloud of smoke what first appeared like a broken and dead body of a young kunoichi was revealed to only be a broken off piece of the rocky pillars as Mana quickly substituted her body with the chunk of rock.

"She'd have really killed me with that… That force of impact was all transferred perfectly through the dummy's body" Mana realized as she looked at the stone dust blown off of the crater by the rude noon winds.

"Wind Style: Ozone BB!" Hanasaku shouted off as she landed on her feet, transferring all the force of her landing into a quick diagonal kick. A slicing wind projectile fired off from her feet, a concentrated blade of pure wind pressure cutting through the whole artificially grown forest of the training grounds. Mana leaped up and hopped around the falling trees before landing in the open. The immense cover that the forest gave her was now demolished with a single kick.

Mana breathed out intensely a couple of times before fixing her clothes and dusting them off. She hadn't had such a needless and extensive workout for a while. While Hanasaku was holding back, with each attack she was actually trying to kill her. If those rock pillars had hit Mana they'd have busted through right her weak childish chakra augmentations and crushed her body into mush. If she was actually hit by that slam she'd have exploded into a bloody stain that'd have dyed the ruined rocky surface of the training grounds crimson red. That wind projectile was powerful enough to slice through millions of Manas with same chakra augmentation power.

Even if she held back while at the same time hitting just hard enough to completely obliterate her genin opponent, the woman actually attacked slowly, she didn't overwhelm Mana, she timed her offenses giving the girl just enough time to formulate plans, to evade. In her own twisted way Hanasaku must've actually been observing the responses to every attack from her potential student.

"Not bad, any genin would've gotten hit already…" Hanasaku smiled with a monkey-like full teeth grin.

"Wait… You mean you were actually trying to hit me, you weren't testing me?" Mana blinked a couple of times in shock.

"Sure…" Hanasaku shrugged, "Obviously I'm holding back as much as I can but… I'll hit you soon enough if you don't counterattack"

"B-But… Those hits would've killed even a chuunin. If you didn't correctly transfer the strength and carefully angle of that kick it'd have split the whole planet in two…" Mana slapped her forehead.

"Huh? Really? Oh well… I guess I was out of the teaching game for too long" Hanasaku once again goofily smiled. Kiyomi had a lot of weird tales to tell about this woman during their time working together. It was very clear that the described incompetence of this woman which made the Yamanaka princess grow up as strong as she was wasn't overblown.

"Had I not been taught advanced evasion techniques and superior perception of enemy attacks by Kouta and Meiko I'd have never even seen those hits coming. They're at least fifteen times faster than the fastest punch I've seen a martial artist throw in Sun Disc arena and Lady Hokage is still just fooling around. This woman is insane…" Mana began getting more serious and in a far-off layer of her heart fear for her life was beginning to spread like a cancer.

Mana prepared herself, took a proper defensive stance just like she was taught. She had never expected to become this good at not getting hit, granted, had she not been this good she'd have met her end.

"You're really tense…" Hanasaku's voice once again surprised Mana as it came right from behind the magician.

"I've no time to evade…" Mana closed her eyes, she had too much fear in her body, it was like she locked herself down under ten thousand locks. In fear of death her body began augmenting itself on top of the normal layers of chakra. She knew it was all useless. Hanasaku just tapped Mana on her shoulder…

"Don't worry, I've messed up much worse on my other students, this one time I've split this Uchiha kid clean in two at his abdomen with a much weaker kicking technique but I patched him up. Eventually… I'm not as good at treating others as I am treating myself" Hanasaku laughed out.

Mana threw a wild elbow strike back at the woman's nose. She knew the extremely sensitive spot where the nose always broke, no matter the augmentations it was a certain weak spot. Defenses always worked at butchered rates when hitting certain vital points and when Kouta taught her about evasion it was brought up as a potential counterattack target.

Her elbow just felt like hitting a brick wall. Mana even screamed out in pain as she couldn't even feel her arm and Hanasaku didn't even look like she cared much. The magician leaped up and kicked with both of her feet right at the woman's chest trying to use the force to kick off and further away from the woman, once Mana did so she performed a roll and examined her shaking in pain arm.

"That was a sensitive point, wasn't it? I'm a medical ninja too. I know certain vital points are only augmented at 25% efficiency compared to other body points. But if your opponent is aware of your attack target they can simply augment their weak spot with more chakra to balance it out" Hanasaku taunted Mana.

"See? You didn't want to fight and ran away from the fight. That is why I took an early advantage and now you're fighting on my terms" the woman began explaining to Mana in a motherly tone. "I know you don't like fighting, I know you…"

"Shut up!" Mana shouted out, Hanasaku's eyes widened in surprise that she was so rudely interrupted but then the magician regained her composure, "Hokage-sama" she added the proper honorific.

"No!" Hanasaku's voice once again rang right behind Mana, the magician turned around throwing another wild swing, a slick sound of steel slipping through cloth of her sleeve betrayed the hidden steel tipped card in Mana's sleeve. The magician aimed at the woman's eyes, to blind Hanasaku, the woman was told to be able to regenerate lethal injuries to the extent that she barely ever bothered to dodge on any battlefield. She accepted all harm and dished out it back a thousandfold to the confused and scared opponent.

Hanasaku wasn't there!

Mana felt a firm grip slam her head to the ground. The Hokage predicted her successfully predicting that she'd once again shock the magician with her speed and once again blitzed the magician by moving right in front of her, now behind the counterattacking magician. Lady Fifth was just as invisible to Mana as a ninja, as ninja were to her as a civilian.

"No… You need to hear this. You cannot avoid fighting altogether. We ninja are tools. That means we do what is told, we serve the purpose of any tool that the client needs. Sometimes that role is of a blade, sometimes we need to fight, we need to kill. I know that my thick younger brother tried hammering it into your head…" the woman tried explaining the lesson she'd heard a million times already. Throughout her entire childhood, throughout the Academy, from Tanshu-sensei and her own teammates. They all said the same and a part of their ideology Mana had accepted and taken as her own – she always needed to come at their opponent with full force, intending to kill but never finishing it.

Mana slapped her hands together right in front of her face that was being shoved into the dirt, with her bleeding forehead being grinded into the soil Mana's free lips began to whistle a melody.

"Sweet Lullaby Jutsu!" the magician shouted out and she felt Hanasaku's grip on Mana loosen. The girl lifted her head and slipped it out from the woman's grasp rolling aside and removing another steel edged card placing it right up the woman's eyes. Even while holding this advantage, even when she appeared to have won the magician knew she hadn't. It was clear as day that Mana would never finish Hanasaku off and the woman was infamous for her skill at using medical ninjutsu on herself exceptionally well. Even while the Hokage was paralyzed, even with Mana holding a blade by the woman's face she had lost. Mana's only options were to wound the woman nonlethally and see her heal herself or to stall for time and waste chakra prolonging the illusion. Both kunoichi saw that so the magician relented.

Mana cancelled the illusion.

"You are telling me nothing I have not heard a thousand times before. I've learned that sometimes I need to fight, I've learned that in order to respect my opponent and win sometimes I need to not hold back and fight to kill, I always do. I have no problem with fighting, no problem with hurting my opponent, maiming or disabling them but I will never cross the line, I'd rather die. No life is unnecessary, that is my nindo, my Ninja Way!" Mana calmly explained to the surprised woman.

"Well…" Hanasaku smiled in pleasant surprise as her eyes closed and looked down, the medical ninja picked herself up from the dirt and gently wiped the dust and dirt off of her kimono. "It appears you've greatly matured from your experiences. While your refusal to take lives will always make you one step weaker from what you could become, because somewhere in the back of your mind you'll always have voice begging you to hold a fraction of your strength back, to have mercy, I believe you'll still make a fine ninja and a great addition to my Team Hokage" the woman admitted.

Mana bowed with the upper half of her body.

"But we need to talk about that honorific…" Hanasaku almost begged Mana playfully.

"Well, if Hokage-sama is troubling to you, I suppose I can relent and call you Hokage-sensei" Mana smiled and bowed her head, as a first submissive act towards her mentor. This was the best possible solution to her not having a permanent and stable team problem – with Team Hokage's formation maybe she'll even have a shot at the Chuunin Exams…

"That's fine enough, I suppose" Hanasaku shrugged her shoulders still clearly feeling uneasy about the way she was being addressed. The woman didn't appear to have trouble being called Hokage when she actually possessed the title however once she quit being called Hokage must've not felt right.

"Those illusions…" Lady Fifth once again asked for Mana's attention with an inquiry. "They were unlike any genjutsu I've ever encountered, I know how to defend against genjutsu just fine but… I felt like that technique completely disarmed me. I couldn't just dispel it as easily as the others…" the woman noted recalling the experience.

"During our trip in Sunagakure we encountered a sort of ancient insectoid creatures. They used strange primitive kind of illusions, instead of targeting chakra networks and shifting their flow the creatures attacked the victim's brain centers. I began learning such manner of illusionary attack even before I regained my chakra, I've been working on it more still now that I am at full strength. As long as someone has a functional brain my techniques will affect them, the smarter the person is – the more convincing and potent the illusion as the target's own brain is more efficient at fooling them" Mana explained feeling excited about talking of her progress in the field of genjutsu.

"Hmmm… But people say I'm not that bright…" Hanasaku scratched her chin in confusion.

"And yet you still had slight trouble fighting it…" Mana nodded. "Ninja have evolved too far and this primitive manner of defense is very effective, something I've learned from my trip to another universe – it also works on beings without chakra quite flawlessly"

"Can't imagine seeing many of those…" Hanasaku replied. She was right enough, it was fair to expect that fighting omnipotent and omniscient god-people from another universe was a one-time occurrence.

"So… Kiyomi had quite great grades in Academy. That eliminates one genius requirement, you had average grades which means that I still need a dunderhead" Hanasaku was working that fairly slow brain of hers.

Mana smiled, "May I suggest someone fitting that description? I know that most ninja teams are composed of two males and a female but we already have two females and… This girl perfectly fits the physical brawler who can take a couple of punches or be dipped in magma and keep on swinging need of our fragile team"

Hanasaku clenched her fist and raised it up energetically looking excited, "A girl-power team, I like it! Give me a name and I'll look into her!"

"Wakizashi Meiko. And… It would be quite kind of you to not tell her I recommended her. Meiko often feels a bit self-loathing when things don't quite go her way and knowing she made onto a team because of her friend's recommendation would really make her feel bad" Mana said before jumping high up in the air and carefully and subtly landing on a still barely standing log and settling down in a meditative position. It appeared that Hanasaku had seen all she wished to see and was going to leave the magician to continue her meditation now.

"Got it!" Hanasaku confirmed it and disappeared with a loud popping sound followed by a puff of dust and smoke leaving Mana alone with her thoughts in the training grounds.

Mana had a lot of training to do if she was going to excel in a team of peers she admired and respected so much and Lady Fifth herself!


	232. Autumn Garden

"Are you leaving, Mana-chan?" one of the janitors asked the magician as she was packing her things and walking through the empty hall. The magician felt a bit embarrassed to look the man in the eyes as she had often asked him to postpone doing his job when she wished to meet her fans after the show.

"Yeah…" Mana nodded.

"Won't be meeting the fans this week?" the man asked with a wide smile that made his black and rich moustache line bend like an upwards crescent moon.

"I guess not" the magician shrugged, she just didn't feel uplifted enough to show her real face to the fans just yet. There were so many things happening all around her, both present and the past. Acting on the stage was easy, forgetting loss of a friend on the stage was not too hard but off-stage, when your life isn't pre-planned and practiced to perfection anything could've happened. The girl just felt quite likely to burst into tears if certain notes of her deeper psyche were played.

"That's too bad… People may start thinking you're avoiding them…" another voice came, one from a man who had recently entered the hall as Mana hadn't noticed him during the show. The face of a man she actually tried avoiding, one she should've seen but didn't because it'd have been too hard. The face of Shimo's father.

Mana blanked out, she felt that her mouth was wide open and that her eyes were gapping to the extent that they were beginning to itch. Still she couldn't find a word to say, luckily she didn't have to.

"Maybe we can talk outside?" the man asked after removing his top hat and pressing it to his chest. It made the magician remember how she saw the man when he picked Shimo's unconscious body up after a grueling mission cleaning the dishes. Now the man's hair was rarer in the center, beginning to grow a bit balder and decently greyed out – the stress of losing one of his heirs didn't help…

"I uh…" Mana lifted her thumb up pointing it to the back exit, trying to make up an excuse to just run away and leave the man behind but she realized that it wouldn't be fair, not to him, not to Shimo. She was there when this man's son died, she asked the Hokage for the mission where he died, she made a lot of calls that lead to the young man's death. Mana didn't really blame herself for her friend's death directly but deep inside she was looking for reasons to do it.

"Sure…" she relented and followed the man outside wrapping a scarf around her neck and buttoning her coat before leaving the hall.

"You didn't come to visit, we didn't see you at the funeral either…" the man started, Mana just closed her eyes and lowered her head. If the man had something negative to say to her, if he felt like she had some far distanced role to play in his son's death she'd accept that. Maybe it'd finally be a reason to hate herself, hating herself, blaming herself would've been simpler. Much simpler than to accept that something so terrible just happened because of a call she had no say in, because she had no possible way of saving her friend and it was something just meant to be.

"I couldn't… I wanted to come and see him off but…" Mana looked down at her rubbing her boots at the cold and rough road. It wasn't a willful motion, just a mindless instinct. A childish one.

"I wanted to ask you how you're holding up but… It's like we've feared. Does the other young man know? I'm sorry, I forgot his name…" the man shook his head asking, his eyes were warm and kind and Mana felt a bit confused, betrayed even by how lightly he was letting her off.

"Sugemi? I'm not sure, last I've heard of him he was still imprisoned but from what I know it's not a mandatory imprisonment. He had a couple of chances to have the prison administration oversee his case but didn't, I think he may have grown fond of solitude and imprisonment" Mana replied awkwardly, despite no negative intent or words coming out of the man's mouth she still felt like she was somehow an enemy of his family.

"You've been back for a couple of weeks now and… I hope you're not blaming yourself or think we blame you for what happened, right? We kept waiting for you to come and visit us, thought we could help you cope with your loss, having experienced one of our own but you're just… Shutting yourself off, not unlike your imprisoned friend. Having lost plenty of people in my youth, this isn't the way to deal with it, back when we lived in Kirigakure neighbors, entire families living nearby just disappeared. That tyrant was overthrown because all the losses only made people grow closer together, had he driven us apart he'd have succeeded" Shimo's father said.

Mana felt warm tears running down her eyes and down her cheeks, warming up the dead chilled face of hers. She felt angry, sad and all sorts of boiling emotions she couldn't even comprehend, her clenched fists shook as the magician grinded her teeth so she didn't break down in tears. The man hugged Mana with one arm, like her own father used to do, and she pressed harder against his chest wanting to explode in a confusing fit of emotions but even she was scared of the lack of clarity of what exactly would come out of it.

"Nobody blames you, for any of it. Even more, you gave us a sense of resolution by seeing to it that the bastard got what's coming to him. Just know that you're always welcome in our house if things get too rough, you seem to be doing quite well financially so I'm not quite sure what other help we can offer. We're grateful to you, Mana, not blaming you" the man's own voice was beginning to shake, clearly it wasn't easy for him, must've been a thousandfold worse than it was for Mana.

Shimo's family had lost their son for the first time when he just upped and left on a journey of self-discovery on Hokage's authorization. Then so shortly after his return the young man left again without giving his family more than a brief hello, barely showing his growth off or talking to his folks. How could these people talk of resolution? What did this primitive form of payback possibly solve? To Mana it was completely inconsequential, the only thing she liked about Francho being sealed away into the Box of Ultimate Bliss was that he'd be unable to hurt anyone else. She looked for no resolution or revenge in his defeat, despite her feelings at the time saying otherwise.

"We kept fighting, for a long time before Shimo died. We bickered about everything. I just wish I could've told him… I'm not even sure what… I just wanted him to know that he's still my friend" Mana cried out doing her best to weep silently.

"He knew, give my boy more credit than to hold grudge on a young woman. He always must've had your best interest in mind, he cared about you and the mission objective most of all. He couldn't have blamed you or hated you, not my boy…" the man persevered even if he clearly had trouble keeping his composure. Shimo's father was a successful businessman in the village and had a reputation for cold and cool-headed, accurate decision making. Still, it was clear that his family meant a great deal to him, it became clear at that moment that he'd give his vast wealth away just to bring his boy back.

"If I had a chance to bring Shimo back, I would've. Even if that meant sealing my own soul away, I would've…" Mana looked the man in the eyes swearing it like a promise.

"It wouldn't have stood well with him, that boy would've waltzed right back to afterlife and dragged your soul back down" the man smiled followed with a bittersweet laugh. Mana wanted to share that laugh but it was too painful at that moment to even put up a smile.

Having received no message from the Hokage about how testing Meiko went or if the blacksmith was even being tested Mana wanted to meet Kiyomi again, talk about this whole team thing. The magician waited for the Yamanaka to come to one of Mana's shows but for some reason neither Meiko nor Kiyomi did. The magician had a couple of guesses as to why, she didn't think that her friends thought lowly of her skill, more likely they didn't wish to distract her. Maybe they knew that they'd be let in for free and take someone's seat, someone who would make Mana money normally.

Mana didn't attend the Hokage inauguration ceremony that week, her show was quite crowded that day which meant that people were in festive mood. The newly chosen candidate must've been loved by the village if the mood was so good. Once the kunoichi saw the man's picture in the papers her father read she was shocked – it was the same tall and wide shouldered gentleman who saw her the week before after the show belittling her craft and talking about how "he had Mana all figured out". Knowing who the man was made the girl a bit hesitant about visiting the Administration building.

Throughout her relatively lengthy walk to the Yamanaka district the magician heard plenty of rumors and hearsay about the new Hokage – the Sixth. She had read his name in the papers with a little of backstory which was greatly expanded upon by all the rumors and overheard conversations. As a ninja Mana was able to hear it all and process all of it in her head with slight effort and extension of her senses.

The man was called Ogame Okoto, he belonged to no clan, which was an oddity. Usually non-clan ninja didn't amount to much.

"Did you hear about this new Hokage? Says he was an ANBU for a long time. Probably killed his fair share. First time a Black Ops sits in the public chair"

"I like it – a man who can kill any filthy thug in his village, someone with a zero-bullshit policy. The village can definitely use it!"

"Did you see his shoulders? His strong arms? Probably can snap a bad guy's neck with a flick!"

"Something trustworthy in a guy who's been killing threats to village security for decades!"

Various opinions reached Mana and most of the villagers talking about the Sixth just ate the man up. The girl had always felt herself a part of the village but now she couldn't help but feel like a black sheep. She had no trust to hand for a man who was a licensed killer, he was lying, acting behind everyone's backs, spying and killing as an ANBU for decades. ANBU had very limited accountability and the only thing to worry with these people was that they got their job done: torture, murder, deceit was not above a Black Ops operative. A lot of people may have thought of ANBU as heroes while thinking of the Black Ops from another villages as some sort of monsters.

Mana thought of herself as someone elevated above the simple minded patriotism. To her such a man was not inherently bad, ninja killed, not all were as pro-life as the magician and it would've been stupid to distrust someone just because he was a cold blooded killer in this world. That being said, while it didn't take away one's trust it should've granted none either. This was a man who for the longest time convinced the village that he didn't even exist, killing solely by the orders of the ANBU captain who was accountable to the Hokage but barely revealed the full roster of his men or the magnitude of the Black Ops' operations.

Just being hated by the man didn't make Mana hate him in return, she could take being disliked or distrusted. A man she looked up to as a kid and looked at as a father-mentor figure most of the time shown only disgust in her ideals and dislike towards her personality, after all. Still, after feeling so secure and safe and trusting towards the Fifth, it'd take some time to get used to the man's strict square face. It didn't help that Mana didn't approve of his supposed "zero-bullshit policies". Wars have been won by rehabilitating criminals and giving out second chances in return for their services. This sudden realization that her own political beliefs differed from those of the wide village majority awakened new thoughts and feelings inside Mana. She was rarely the one for political banter but maybe that's why the grownups always bickered and fought over these things?

A couple of chuunin vest wearing blond haired and bright blue eyed guards asked Mana if she was looking for someone or something. It was odd of them to do so, it wasn't forbidden for outsiders of the clan to walk around the Yamanaka district – after all, the district was filled with fresh vegetable stores and flower stores making up most of the clan's profit. For some reason the most skilled mental ninja in the village were also amazing gardeners.

After replying to them that she was looking for Yamanaka Kiyomi the two pointed Mana at the direction where the main residence of the clan elite was. The magician didn't really feel like she'd be allowed to wander around those parts being an outsider of the clan and a relatively unimportant ninja but then the magician heard a sarcastic joke about her aiming to get the clan out of business having brought the village superior communication technology from another Universe. Judging from the giggling faces of those grown men they were goofing around but to Mana it brought an influx of new thoughts.

The Yamanaka clan probably had all the reason in the world to look at her with actual hate. The fact that these two even knew who she was as a ninja was surprising but a clear example of how impactful new communication technology was for the Yamanaka clan, the clan who took pride in their telepathy jutsu wielding ninja. Granted, they'd be out of their minds to blame Mana for anything – the magician hadn't brought anything that could control or read anyone's mind which were the signature and by far the better known abilities of the clan.

After looking around Mana pushed the wooden chest-tall fence gate open and entered the estate. She wasn't stopped or attacked which actually made the magician feel weird and a bit worried. This was the home where the future heiress of the clan resided, a tall and exquisite classic marvel of architecture and expensive furniture using only the finest woods as its materials. Why wasn't it better protected? Then again, it only protected a simple yet luxurious household and a brilliant garden surrounding it that lead to rows of hills of flowers behind the house.

"Ah, Kiyomi's friend…" Mana heard a soothing female voice to her side where a woman was tending to a garden of heavenly smelling flowers that spread their gracious present to the world whenever the cold autumnal breeze blew their way. It may not have been the best weather for these flowers but they appeared to be holding their own.

"Excuse me for trespassing, if I am… You seem to know me. I am trying to find Kiyomi" the magician bowed to the woman without clearly knowing who she was.

"Ah, my daughter is actually out. She planned to move to train in the clan's resort further east. Not the best time to visit the beach but she said she wouldn't be looking for a tan" the woman smiled before returning to her gardening. Mana was not sure what Kiyomi's mother did with the soil of these flowers but they appeared to be holding up like it was the middle of June. "I am Yamanaka Mei, by the way, Kiyomi's mother, nice to meet you. My daughter told me enough about you to identify you by your chakra alone, leaving your entertainment career behind"

Mana was about to bow again and leave but then she felt curious, "You're a sensor ninja, ma'am?" she wondered.

"Yes. While initially I felt troubled by the size of your chakra – it felt like it belonged to a grown up ninja and not a genin, you have a certain… Calmness to it and Kiyomi always noted how calm she felt around you despite your naïve and childish nature. I think you may develop a very notable signature in the future, one of the colored ones" the woman explained before finishing tending to a patch of flowers and wiping her head, she then gasped after realizing that dirt got on her forehead and began cleaning it erratically.

"It's just chakra, just like anybody else's…" Mana shrugged with a slightly lyrical tone, she didn't make much of her own chakra signature seeing how she wasn't anyone important or amazingly talented in this world.

"Not really, while chakra is a universal construct, present in anyone and anything, in a certain state, in people it sometimes grows to resemble the people it is found in. Scary people feel like dark swampy abyss, swallowing you up and making you fear for your life and gasp for air, kind people feel warmer and make you wish be around them" the woman revealed looking at the merciful autumnal Sun gracing the cold soil with some of its warm motherly embrace.

"Am I kind? Do I have the signature of a hero?" Mana wondered.

"No. Your signature is not yet developed fully. It feels different, it has a very deep abyssal feeling almost like that of murderers but… It isn't a bad feeling, more like soothing. Your chakra feels like a crystal clear cold lake on a hot summer morning. It's refreshing and nice to be near. You should visit more often, Konoha's Sorceress" Kiyomi's mother explained, it was clear that she didn't wish to elaborate on Mana's signature and its nature but she saw the pain and disappointment in Mana's eyes when the magician was told that her chakra didn't feel even remotely heroic or warm.

"I will… I should be going though, nice to meet you, Mei-san. I will try to catch Kiyomi before she leaves the village so I need to rush" Mana bowed and excused herself to which the woman nodded before planting a sprout of some sort to the ground, could she have been planting flowers in autumn? Then again, who was Mana to question a Yamanaka gardener?

"You may not manage, if you don't try to catch up to her on the road. The resort is a good four hundred kilometers east on the Ceylon road. It's surrounded by small cafes and houses and thick forests so Kiyomi is unlikely to speed too much" the woman suggested.

"Thank you for your help, ma'am" Mana bowed once again and ran off. She was in a rush to catch up to her friend and speeding around the village would've raised too many curious eyes and too much of a ruckus. It was a really odd feeling being able to move really fast, fast enough to get to another side of the world in minutes, but then being unable to use that speed most of the time…

Still, Mana had to catch up to Kiyomi before the blonde left the village. Chasing her around on the way to the resort would've been much harder as the kunoichi would be unsure about the speed her friend was moving in or if she decided to stop for rest in one of those small inns and cafes on the Ceylon road.


	233. Gentlemen of Luck

Konoha was just about reaching the point where it was at its peak of activity. That was mainly why Mana tried avoiding the big streets in her rush for the village gate. Too many people would've recognized her if she ever appeared in the main central districts, an entertainer appearing on the entertainment districts where people went to relax would've made the magician never leave that place unscathed. Sure she could just deny all requests and questions but she was way too nice for that. Mana knew that if someone asked her something or to do something she'd most likely do it, it was just the kind of person she was.

A couple of weeks after Mana brought all the things Shikamaru gave her to bring home from another universe the intelligence division of the village devised a new device. Similar in many ways to the clumsy and large devices used to take pictures but much smaller, dozens of times lighter and naturally some tech shop obtained the license to sell it for commercial use. People recently were almost demanding Mana to take pictures with them which while entertaining to see and do would've taken too much time.

The magician stopped suddenly and moved into an alleyway between two living blocks, closing her eyes and focusing. Maybe if she could just filter out all this noise, all those talking people… She was fast enough to have stopped and moved faster than they could track, something she was painfully familiar of having her currently troubles in mind. There was no one close enough to disturb her but a part of trouble of being ninja was the higher degree of perception.

Finally Mana achieved total clarity, after a slightly longer than usual pause the magician managed to successfully convince herself that the noise of the active and pulsing with life village was just as usual as the silence and comfort of her own room. The magician couldn't sense anything, she wasn't sure what exactly she was looking for. Maybe Kiyomi would've spoken up to someone, maybe she had a particular Yamanaka garden smell to her? A smell of those strange autumnal blooming flowers. Nothing.

Mana dashed off once again disappearing from the eyes of the villagers. Avoiding bumping into anyone took the most of her concentration at that speed. It was like speeding through a forest at dozens of thousands of kilometers per hour with trees and rocks coming in from every side but Mana was nimble and graceful, also desperate and in a hurry. Had it not been for Kouta's training in evasion and Meiko's training in perception she'd have never been able to successfully cover most of the village in such a short amount of time.

Mana stopped right by the gate to see if she was stopped, moving at her breakneck speed would've been a detriment to her goals. After all the guard ninja were of higher rank than she was which meant they were most likely stronger, faster and could perceive and react to much faster things than Mana. They'd have stopped her and she'd have been in too much trouble to even bother speeding out the gate for. In the middle of the day people weren't stopped from leaving the village. Maybe that was why there were so many nukenin wandering the outside walls? The village hardly tried keeping ninja in, what worried Konoha the most was keeping those they feared of out.

In a casual and slow step Mana left the gate and looked around. She remembered being told that Kiyomi headed the Ceylon road to the east. It was troublesome having only one exit from the village, only one gate. The magician sighed and began heading forward right up until the cross. Mana rushed it, her pace was unsteady and her breath was chasing but her newly reacquired ninja stamina held it. She could've fought at her peak for hours before running out of breath…

Mana stopped by the cross sign examining the signs directing at the different roads: Rooibos, Roiyaru, Ceylon, Pu-her, Oolong and others. Just as the magician decided to take the Ceylon road her foot stopped – something was wrong. With a quick backdash sliding across the sandy surface of the forest road Mana avoided a long streak of shuriken flying at her from the bushes. It was ballsy for bandits to lurk so close to the village walls, they must've been inexperienced or very desperate. Mana could've taken on anyone who had so little experience so she calmed her racing heartbeat and listened in.

"Shit, the fuck did you do that for? I told you this wasn't the Yamanaka girl! Are you fucking mad? She looks NOTHING like her!" a voice came from the bushes as no bandit came out to claim their prey or their belongings as their own. Mana's eyebrow rose up in confusion. These guys were really bad at this whole robbing people thing.

"What the fuck do I know how that Yamanaka brat looks?" another voice replied the first one's question completely ignoring Mana's confused stare into the void, despite looking at a bunch of leaves the magician could clearly tell where her assailants lurked.

"You wouldn't just carry on, by any chance? We're waiting for someone else…" a third voice finally addressed Mana finally returning the entire matter to humanity.

Their aim was fairly decent, the ninja tools cut through quite deep – they were a bit more competent physically and skill-wise than they were mentally. Maybe it was a bad move to take these bandits on alone but Mana realized that they may have been talking about Kiyomi.

"I'm looking for Yamanaka Kiyomi, do you know anything about her? I get the feeling she hasn't passed here yet…" Mana elevated her voice to reach the three gents lurking in the bushes. There was a fourth one, much less skilled scaling the tree and aiming to drop on Mana from above. He was as quiet as a non-ninja could be but to Mana he was as clear as a drumming loudmouth chimp.

"A fellow lady of luck, huh? Well your luck isn't doing that well right now, ever since the bounty on the lady's head was put every scumbag tall and short is after her. Go away, this is our spot!" the bush shook as those lurking within were growing uneasy. Finally the fourth one decided to drop on Mana, kunai in his right hand aiming to stab at her shoulder – a fair try, had he successfully hit her with enough force he'd have maybe hit an artery. Luckily enough Mana raised her right leg up with her foot digging deep into the man's gut while her wrists stopped the blade wielding wrist of the assailant, with a quick throw with her leg the magician flipped the man over her head and down on the ground.

So there was a bounty on Kiyomi's head? That was news to Mana, she'd have wished to normally find out all about that, who put it there and who exactly was after the bounty but now she had no time. Mana wanted to meet up with Kiyomi before the Yamanaka reached the resort, a place where Mana was unlikely to be allowed to be in without a Yamanaka friend. All higher ranking ninja normally had bounties but this reeked different, more… Personal.

"You're through!" one of the bandits declared as the group jumped out from the bush. They were pretty swift, moving in a blur – Mana wasn't ready for them to be that fast. The spotted scarves and face rags suggested that they were from Kirigakure, or at least dressed like people from those parts. One of them wore goggles that were meant to help one see through thick mist. Something inside Mana flared up, she wanted to beat these people without caring if she let Kiyomi get farther away.

At this point it wasn't quite clear if these men just missed Kiyomi passing by or if the blonde still hasn't reached this place. Odds were that these guys were just dumb and missed her. After all, Mana would've noticed Kiyomi going up to this place.

Their knives thrown for a cover up were pretty fast, Mana's hands flashed through a couple of handseals as she activated her Mystical Wings technique moving her out of the way just in time. The girl covered up her head as she put up her technique so hastily that she was thrown up and through a cover of branches that scratched her up shallowly. Her chakra didn't even bother protecting Mana from something as trivial as branches, the magician on a deeper level feared losing her chakra again making her very hesitant at using chakra augmentation where it wasn't needed.

The rustling leaves suggested that her enemies were following her, the magician took a moment to look at the side only seeing a badly camouflaged body flash by. Mana canceled the technique and redirected her legs upwards so she drove them into a charge of a diving bandit. The guy was pretty quick for his size, he could've been a good two times Mana's size but the magician allowed the force of impact flow through her legs redirecting it into a leap back and down on a stronger branch.

Just like that the bounty hunters were gone again. Mana had underestimated them at first. Each one of them would've posed a decent challenge to a weaker genin so they weren't completely hopeless, still, they were far too weak to be bounty hunters. They were either new or the vulture kind – chasing weakened or just young prey. Not all bounty hunters wished to be famous, to be legendary assassins taking out high ranking ninja. Some just liked killing little important kids or taking out the sickly or wounded.

Mana's ears desperately tried to pick up at least a smallest hint, her lips slightly smiled at the left after she realized what to do. A feint tap at the wooden upper branches alerted her of an upcoming attack, the magician's hands went through a collection of hand seals.

"Lightning Style: Magical Shock Jutsu!" she chanted out extending a long beam of concentrated lightning at where the sound came from but it only set a strong branch ablaze and hit no one. It was a fairly weak technique so even if it hit Mana was hoping for a painful shock and a temporary stun which would've made the others flee and given her a chance to move in on the unfortunate fellow she hit.

Two bandits moved in from the side, Mana flipped back launching herself off of the branch and onto another allowing the two to miss her. She did her best to keep these two goofballs in her eyesight, now that they moved out she won't let them disappear again. Mana's hand moved out from her inner jacket pocket launching a large amount of floating explosive tags in the air. The kunoichi's hands went through two hand seals launching the whole flock of seals at her opponent.

"Friendly Gust Jutsu!" she chanted as the wind gust carried the explosive notes at the general direction of her opponents. A deafening explosion echoed followed by loud screams. Mana jumped up and followed her falling enemies allowing her steel wire to tie up in loops around a bunch of tree branches before she swung over a lower branch and let her unconscious enemies hit it. It probably left some internal injuries but it was better than hitting the ground in their speed. Mana looked at the complicated web of steel wire she made and the duo stuck on it, lamenting the loss of her entire steel string from her kit but it was worth it, human life was always worth using all of her wire for…

The magician turned behind her. She could hear the last remaining bounty hunter painfully grunting and trying to figure out if attacking Mana was even worth it. It was a pretty wise question, having in mind how easily she dispatched of his friends. Truth be told the moment right after the explosion was some of the most fear that the magician had – she figured that these hunters may not have dodged her attack sufficiently to survive it which would've really ruined her day. They took it all head-on and only got knocked out and badly burnt. That was better than dying…

"That explosion alerted the village guard. You have very slim chances of outrunning me with those injuries. You had pretty decent ones before – I'm not too physically fast or too strong but you wasted your chance. Tell me what you know about Yamanaka Kiyomi, where is she, who else is after her?" Mana yelled out but the Kirigakure bounty hunter began running. The magician's foot twitched to give chase but then she stopped and looked at the unconscious enemies hanging on the steel wire.

Mana grunted, instead of giving chase she ran up the tree using the Art of Tree Climbing technique and hung on top of the branch where the steel wire was attached to. Knowing she'd regret it Mana removed the ointment from her pouch meant to treat chakra burns and rubbed it on the more severe burns on the bounty hunters' faces and chests, their arms also.

The magician looked up and noticed guards moving in. She could only notice the signs their environment left as they passed by and not the guards themselves.

"You okay?" one of the guards remarked before noticing the webs of strings Mana had weaved to prevent the unconscious bounty hunters from getting killed of a long fall.

"We almost missed you – Dojiro kept telling me about his aunt and how she's seeing aliens looking through her windows and ghosts in the cemetary. Good work here, you beat them so quickly!" the other guard complimented Mana.

"Shut up, auntie Tonture is a saint! Anyways, maybe these guys are the guys making civilians disappear. I guess they attacked you without knowing you're also a ninja, you were lucky, Sorceress…" the first guard smacked his friend at the back of his head before smiling at Mana while trying to calm her down.

"No, they're bounty hunters. They spoke about Yamanaka Kiyomi. I was actually looking for her too when I ran into them" Mana explained.

"They look like they're from Kirigakure… Just when that pisshole started talking of autonomy!" one of the guards crossed his arms on his chest before tying both of the men up and placing seals on the ropes that made the ropes use chakra from the seal to stay strong and not just be a rope restraining a strongman.

"Every place has bounty hunters, I doubt anyone will make much of a fuss over this. We need to inform the village, Yamanaka Kiyomi needs to return home and stay inside the village walls under our protection" the first guard looked up.

"You guys need to go back and keep watching the village gate, I'm going after Kiyomi, you can send someone after us too but I can chase after her now. I know where she's going. Once the village puts a team together they can come to our aid" Mana suggested.

"True, village gate is our priority!" the second guard nodded.

"Good luck, Sorceress" the first one nodded in agreement and the two disappeared faster than Mana's eyes could even fully track them. They were just two green blurs blending into the forest green perfectly.

Mana looked onwards at the sign and began rushing onwards across the Ceylon road. She had to reach Kiyomi in time, she still didn't know where Kiyomi was but when Mana reached the first small bar or resting place she could ask the locals if they had seen her, if not that meant Kiyomi hadn't passed through there. The blonde was tough to miss. In that case the guards had likely encountered Kiyomi on their way back and told her to return. Then Mana could head back while carefully looking for her lagging friend. It was much more likely that Kiyomi was yet ahead, Mana was already behind her friend and now she gained an even larger lead after the young kunoichi was inconvenienced with this battle.

The magician continued to run onwards until her thighs began aching. Mana's main fighting style was kicking so her legs were strong and durable so the fact that even the magician's legs were beginning to hurt alarmed her. How much longer could it have been since the next stop?

"Holy shit! Mana, is that you!?" Kiyomi's shrieking voice came from the bushes. The magician looked aside and saw her friend all messy with her skirt lazily pulled up and her hair messy.

"Were you peeing?" Mana asked in confusion, all questions of assassins and bounty hunters just left her childish mind.

"Well… I couldn't take it, the next stop was nowhere to be seen! Peeing in a forest for a girl is such a hassle!" Kiyomi complained.

"Whatever… We need to go back – there's a bounty on your head" Mana began explaining before Kiyomi jumped up and hugged Mana. The magician's worried face shifted to a friendly smile and the magician's hands wrapped around her friend as well.

"It's been a while" Kiyomi exclaimed vibrantly after pinching Mana's cheek after letting go of her. "Your cheeks are still soft and chewy like the innards of a cucumber!" she declared.

"Look, we really need to head back, we can catch up after you're safe…" Mana got worried again.

"No way! We're heading to the Yamanaka resort – at this point it's just about as far away as the village and it's much safer there, also more fun!" Kiyomi objected.

"It's gonna get dark in a couple of hours, we need to go back" Mana stood her ground.

"I'm older than you and I was genin two years longer than you!" Kiyomi playfully pouted her lips into a duck-like beak. She was clearly not taking this seriously.

"Look… It's better to keep moving onwards, as long as we're moving. We can't stop, we're just sitting ducks then" Mana relented for Kiyomi's great glee.

"Yay, we're going on a vacation trip!" she smiled.


	234. Two Against the World

As the two friends continued to walk the same path on and on Mana was beginning to get really riled up about the lack of a stop in sight. There were supposed to be small inns or just vendors selling junk and supplies everywhere. Maybe the world was just bigger than Mana had imagined it and where she expected these vendors and stops to be everywhere, placed as tightly to one another as they were drawn on the map, there must've been a really long walk between each of them. As someone who took such a brief time returning to the village after leaving the ship the magician had to admit to herself having forgotten what simply moving at a casual pace felt like.

"Hmmm… You're being really silent. That's really not like you" Kiyomi pouted still looking to be in a playful mood and completely unaffected by the fact that someone put a bounty on her head and someone wishing to claim it could've been right around the corner.

"I'm just being careful. You appear to be completely unaffected by the whole damn world wishing to kill you so I must be watchful for the both of us" Mana replied still tense and doing her best to perceive and properly analyse their environment. Just being careful took the better part of her available effort, being social on top of that would've been impossible.

"We can talk like this…" the cheerful Yamanaka winked at Mana after establishing the mental link between the two.

"I'd rather not. Talking, while really distracting, is easier than filtering my thoughts and struggling to hide what I don't want you to see" Mana sighed before realizing that her friend would simply not relent and begin properly evaluating the danger to her life.

"Oh? There's something you don't want me to see? Now you're making me even more excited!" Kiyomi grinned like a little monkey having seen a simple bait and switch magic trick and questioning its primitive understanding of reality.

"Personal things, both embarrassing and painful" Mana answered trying to hint at painful memories she didn't wish to be brought up. Kiyomi somewhat settled down having gotten the hint.

"So… That mission you left on, wandering the world completely powerless, were you looking to get yourself killed? Right now your pinchy munchling cheeks are all covered in scratches and your eye is tearing up constantly like you've been making an onion cake or somthing, what happened? I'm just being so needy for being social because you offer none of it" Kiyomi asked with a bit more seriousness.

"It's nothing. I've regained my chakra control and got my licence working again. Now my only worry is to not lose another friend, I've already had a run-in with a bunch of bounty hunters looking for you" Mana explained.

"Wow, a bunch of vultures did these scratches? What did they throw at you, a colossal chainsaw wouldn't leave a scratch on a ninja worth their mettle…" Kiyomi shrugged.

"It was trees, they were pretty fast so I flew up and I think I did it too fast and carelessly, the branches scratched me up, one even hit my eye making it itchy" Mana recounted because she knew that her friend wouldn't back up if she didn't. To the magician it seemed like a career in the interrogation division was pretty much guaranteed for the Yamanaka heiress. After all – she could extract information even without using her clan techniques.

Kiyomi began cackling in a childish laughter. "Branches did this to you!?" she grabbed her abdomen in actual physical pain that laughing herself off to no end brought.

"I'm glad you find my pain hilarious" Mana couldn't help but smile, her warm and friendly feelings for the blonde broke through the worry for Kiyomi's well-being.

"Well yeah! People are learning to control their punches and fireballs so that they don't blow up the world their whole life and the great and mighty Konoha's Sorceress gets scratched up by some branches! I've not had a laugh like this in years!" Kiyomi kept on laughing.

"I've already lost my chakra control once, I don't want to strain my network to save me some nuisance level pain. If a world-breaker power ninja punches me I'll be sure to clench myself, I won't risk losing it all again for a bunch of trees" Mana explained why some fledgling wood managed to leave scratches on her.

Kiyomi's face straightened out, the blonde must've remembered how broken and desperate Mana was back when she still had her network torn. All of the hilarity and fun gone in a poof but the magician knew that it was only because her friend could somewhat empathize with the pain that Mana felt and understand her almost paranoid wish to never go through that again.

"You know, if it was your life that was in danger you'd not be overly worried either, I know you better than to believe otherwise" Kiyomi gave Mana a sweet and subtle arc of her lips in the shape of a smile.

"If it was my life that was in danger I'd move as far away from the village as possible – I'd wish to confront my killer alone, with no one to be caught in the crossfire" Mana admitted seriously.

"Well, in a way, that's what we're doing right now. You're just too considerate to leave me to face it alone. Truth be told, my stay in the Yamanaka resort will be that much better with you there with me. Plus once we reach it it'll be full of some of the most powerful mental annihilators in the village – no bounty hunter will dare mess with us" the blonde nodded subtly.

A little bit after the sky had already turned dark an establishment came into view not too far away. Despite the fact that the two kunoichi were in no rush, with Mana being worried that if they moved at full speed they'd easily get ambushed and be unable to react in time, the magician had expected to reach the Yamanaka resort that Kiyomi spoke of sooner. Staying in an inn was far from her idea of hiding from a possible bounty hunter attack of choice.

"Where are you going?" Kiyomi's voice reached Mana forcing the magician to stop and backtrack a little, closing half a kilometre in a couple of graceful leaps and landing nearby her stopped friend.

"We need to keep moving. We can't stop here, if any bounty hunters are still looking they'll check the inns first and this place doesn't look even remotely secure" Mana tried pleading to her friend's sense of reason but judging from Kiyomi's face she wasn't very successful.

"Yeah but we do need sleep. We can take turns watching like the old times" the blonde smiled.

Mana squinted angrily at her friend – the Yamanaka knew perfectly that the two could stay without sleep much longer than normal humans could. Food, water and other necessary supplies were less necessary to a ninja. The two girls could certainly make it to the resort before their bodies actually begin demanding food or water or sleep.

"We must move, by staying here we'll endanger other people" Mana turned around and tried to move slowly making her friend follow her but then she noticed that Kiyomi was standing still. Angry after realizing the fact that Kiyomi didn't need Mana and it was the other way around she turned around and returned to her smart-face wearing friend.

"Forgot something?" Kiyomi grinned making fun of Mana.

"Come on, this isn't a game! Staying here isn't smart…" Mana tried pleading one more time.

"I thought you said you are supressing your ninja metabolism and supernatural physique. That means you need to eat, drink and sleep right. Staying here isn't smart, that's why most bounty hunters won't expect us do it" Kiyomi smiled and ran up to Mana grabbing the magician's hand and dragging her inside the inn.

Mana closed her eyes doing her best to maintain composure. Why was her friend in such a rush to get killed? Why did she view this supposed forced field trip as something to make fun on instead of actual danger to her life? The worried magician observed Kiyomi fool around in front of the inn keeper and pay him with a clearly oversized wallet.

"You're carrying this much ryo with you? It's like you're asking to get attacked" Mana rubbed her tense and pulsing temples.

"It's fine, you can take this chance to stretch your legs out and rest, also you can examine your wounds" Kiyomi clapped her hands before rushing to the second floor and finding the room she paid for. Mana hesitantly followed.

Upon entering the room the Yamanaka future heiress just fell on a bed and stretched out yawning and scratching some uncomfortable and itchy spots before settling down like she was ready to go to sleep.

"Kiyomi. Do you know what sort of dangerous game you're playing?" Mana was getting tired to sing the same song but she had finally realized what her friend was doing. She finally understood why Kiyomi purposefully made every mistake to get herself killed in the middle of the night.

"I don't know what you're talking about, now… Did Hanasaku-sensei approach you with the offer to join the team yet? I must've really gotten annoying to her with all my nagging that she quit her post and decided to lead our team herself. I just really wanted to rank-up, you know? I feel like I'm ready to become a chuunin already!" the blonde deflected the question.

"You're trying to lure the bounty hunters out. Whoever is after you – you're trying to make them actually try to kill you so you can beat them out in the open. Do you know who is coming for you? Do you have grievances with that person? Why are you acting so reckless?" Mana revealed Kiyomi's plan and that she finally caught up to it. Honestly she should've gotten on the same page sooner but the plan was something so silly that the magician just didn't expect her friend to go for it.

"No idea. All I know is that they're criminals. Criminals deserve to die so when those bastards come after me I'll kill them. Figured after I kill a couple of them the others will reconsider their life choices." Kiyomi replied with seriousness and little emotion past her greatly diminished fun.

"You know I won't let you do that? You must've known all along, so why would you have me join you in this?" Mana asked as that particular detail didn't make sense to her.

"Yeah… I knew. I guess if you get in my way – that's fine. I just really wanted to have some fun and see you after all this time, even if you insist on imprisoning those scumbags instead of killing them. This is still just like old times." Kiyomi admitted. This was perhaps the most truthful she sounded and looked this whole time. It meant a great deal to Mana that her friend was both completely truthful with her and ready to change her approach to justice temporarily just because her friend didn't agree with it.

"Yeah. Hokage-sensei did approach me, I even recommended the third member to her. She seemed serious to start training for the Chuunin Exams soon…" Mana replied leaving the topic behind and trusting Kiyomi to handle this. The magician didn't know if Kiyomi was looking to meet someone specific in here or if she just wished to slay criminals as was always her way of life. Trust brimmed in Mana's heart, trust and the decision to support her friend and future teammate.

"So…" Kiyomi smiled again, "Who's this third one you've recommended? Is it a boy? Is he cute?"

"You should just wait for a while, I'm sure you'll mend things with Eiju again. The third one is another kunoichi I've met on my last mission" Mana laughed out sitting down on her bed and crossing her legs and assuming the meditative position. She'd be pretty wise to try and use her increased perception and awareness while meditating to help Kiyomi avoid getting herself killed over her bloody sense of justice.

A large white owl rested on a branch of a tall oak outside the inn. The well fed and groomed bird was scratching an itchy spot beneath its wing and continuously scanning its environment. It had already successfully caught a little mouse that day, the owl was looking for something larger but it would've been pretty fine with what it had. It was just sheer primal greed and the animalistic urge to live and eat better than one already was.

A quiet and lightning fast kunai blade whizzed right past the beak of the majestic bird making the poor thing fly away in terror for its own life. The godly white beauty had assumed that it was quite lucky having a hunter miss his or her mark which would lead to them going to bed hungry that night. The truth was that the hunter did not miss. Instead the blade was aimed at someone further away from the bird – a second floor wall of the inn in which two girls were settling down in.

The hunter was prowling on another branch parallel to the one where the magnificent bird was residing in previously. Despite his rather heavy chest armour and a sophisticated helmet with various hi-tech, constantly switching, visors, telling him things ranging from temperature to X-ray vision and similar sight aids, the man made no sound as he moved through the trees. His pitch perfect smell could pick up the smell of blood in the veins of the blonde he was after and there was no way that any of the two were expecting his attack. They couldn't possibly have seen him coming.

The whizzing blade got stuck in the wooden wall making the bounty hunter go through a collection of hand seals launching a blaze of fire nature chakra to run down the steel wire tied to the other end of the kunai which accumulated speed and size by absorbing the air around it and making it fuel the flame further. Once the fireball reached the inn's wall it made the top of the building explode like the top of an erupting sealed volcano.

This wasn't how he was trained, how he was told to kill and it crossed every principle of a stealthy assassin. He usually hit swiftly and left no trace of his attack, he was a true hitman, he was faster and more graceful than a big cat, he was stealthier than a ghost and he never missed his mark. This however, this job was personal, it invited feelings of angst and rage into the hunter's heart which would've made him normally refuse such a job. Truth be told he wasn't even doing it for the money – he just wanted the Yamanaka girl dead.

Looking at the debris flying around the hunter noticed the two girls. He knew both of them but he had hoped that his attack would kill one of them. He had no idea about how powerful this strangely dressed darker skinned girl was, she looked frail enough to be killed by his diversion attack. He must've miscalculated.

"What the hell was that? Couldn't you have warned me?" Kiyomi yelled out as the blast had thrown her through the wooden wall and slammed her into the Ceylon road leaving a good fifty meters spanning trail.

"I did… We were too slow" Mana grunted in pain as she forced her body off the ground. The blast had deafened her ears and would've torn her body to pieces if she hadn't used augmentation. The attacker was insanely stealthy – the magician couldn't sense him or her moving, even in her meditation she was completely caught unprepared – it was only once his kunai hit the wooden wall and alerted her that Mana yelled out for Kiyomi to move. The following explosion caught both of them but barely left any lasting damage.

This was just the scenario Mana had feared this whole time. Being caught unprepared, being unable to know that they were being attacked. Luckily enough they managed to survive this diversion attack and it didn't appear to do anything but blast off the second floor of an almost empty inn. The owner ran off into the woods covering his head, jumping out of the first floor window.

"This isn't a game, this bounty hunter has killed people just to piss you off" Mana grumped out. She was beginning to get really riled up and hate this stealthy killer's guts.

"Yeah, and he'll pay for it. He'd have killed many more if I don't lure him out and kill him here and now" Kiyomi replied, it was clear that the blonde was regretting staying in a more public place than a random camp in the forest. She wasn't really to blame for any people who may have died in this attack, not as much as the bounty hunter himself, but she still felt bad.

"So how about you find that guy? I thought your meditation was supposed to help with that?" Kiyomi grunted as she was really getting annoyed by the fact that the bounty hunter had clear and open sight of them whereas the two of the girls had no idea where the killer was.

"I'm trying – he's too quiet" Mana was feeling more and more desperate as with each passing moment the probability of being attacked by a stealthy opponent increased.

A loud snapping sound scared the magician half to death, she must've stepped into something as a loop tied around her foot and dragged up, leaving her hanging upside down with her leg tied to a large oaken branch. Mana saw her ninja tools fall out from her open ninja kit, she heard a whizzing sound she feared the most, steel tipped cards shot from under sleeve and in a swift motion Mana deflected several bladed discs aimed right at her neck. Their trajectories were very deceptive as they twisted and turned, travelled in an arc but Kouta taught her better than to get decapitated like that.

Mana felt taps at her back before strong chakra coated steel wires tied around her restraining her from the shoulders to her thigs. The hunter had moved in behind her during the time she took to protect herself from getting beheaded. The man landed on a weaker branch right besides Mana and grabbed her by the hair, pulling the girl's face in closer to his helmet. He must've been checking on who Mana was and if she was the prey he was hunting.

"Stay put" Mana heard grungy and raspy voice of the man inside. Then with a louder roar he disappeared in the shadows of the night, circling around and looking to score a cheap and swift kill on Kiyomi.


	235. Defining Insanity

Kiyomi clenched her kunai blade tightly. Her body ached from the little bruises she got from being thrown around by a compact yet immensely powerful explosion. Whatever that combination was – it was made to kill ninja. Crafted to overload a small area with awesome explosive power, created to exploit the moment of downed guard. An exploitative measure.

"Mana?" the Yamanaka uttered, her voice was too weak to reach anyone in the thick forest surrounding her and the slowly burning inn behind her. Kiyomi was too worried over her friend's well-being to have her voice listen to her commands.

The only reason her friend even got involved in this was because the blonde was so desperate to kill those that placed a bounty on her head herself, as well as those that came to cash in. She was no lousy target for anyone to put a price on, she was someone who wanted nothing more but to punish people like those that put a price on her head and those that allowed their moral norms to be suspended indefinitely just after seeing a bunch of zeroes with a ryo mark close to them.

Still, even if Kiyomi didn't see her fault in all of this she felt bad, she felt like Mana's disappearance was somehow on her. The absurdity of it all only added to her anger, her desperation. She was a cornered animal who was both afraid and angry at the same time. Maybe that was why this assassin didn't dare show their face?

Kiyomi turned aside to avoid a kunai thrown at her from a dark upper layer of trees, the firelight danced on the steel blade's surface giving her a visual cue, the Yamanaka knew how this technique worked, it was just like before. She had seen an Uchiha teammate of hers use such a technique in the past. It was supposed to be one of their signature Fire Release techniques.

The blonde grabbed at a point slightly further away, farther from the tip of the kunai grabbing hold of steel wire and with a confident smile she wrapped it around her arm. Concentrating all of her anger and feelings she yanked the steel wire augmenting her palm so that the steel wire didn't cut into her flesh opening up grievous wounds. With that gut wrenching sound of reeling string a figure flew out from the trees flying straight at her.

Kiyomi made her set of hand seals, her speed having improved enough to allow her perform several hand seals fast enough for the yanked ragdoll of an opponent to reach her.

"Wind Style: Great Breakthrough!" she chanted out releasing a powerful gust of wind blasting straight in the assailant's face in concussive force strong enough to dent even the toughest steel or that with chakra augmentations inferior than the strength of the technique. A loud bang sound made anyone in the nearest vicinity want to cover their ears, the sound of concussive force from the gust of wind blasting the enemy away with enough force to grind toughest minerals of the mountains into dust hit the armor of the bounty hunter.

"Die!" a cybernetic sounding voice, edited through artificial sound enhancers, without a doubt came from the attacker's body. Kiyomi realized too late that it was too easy – why would she get attacked from the front? Why would the attacker maintain hold of the kunai string if it got caught? The bounty hunter made too many amateur mistakes to be forgiven, they must've been made on purpose to lure her in.

Only then did Kiyomi's lagging perception notice that her gust of wind wasn't blowing at the assassin's face or chest – he had lifted his knees and pressed them against his chest slamming into the wall of concussive winds with his boots. The bounty hunter pressed against a specific trigger on his boots making a crimson sealing symbol light up on his boots.

A powerful deafening explosion sent Kiyomi and her attacker away. The bounty hunter had sealed a Fire Release technique into his boots to use as a make-shift jetpack, by unleashing it right at the last moment when his boots hit the powerful Wind Release ninjutsu technique the bounty hunter ensured a volatile chain reaction – one he must've felt like his armor could withstand whereas the light treads of the Yamanaka heiress would not.

The bounty hunter stumbled back on his feet, the blow really hit his armor, it shook his body inside of it like canned meat inside its container. Screeching noises and bleeding ears, dizzy head and lack of balance, blurry vision – all of those things were battlefield reality, one the man had been used to already. In the brief patch of clearing smoke the man saw his prize – the unconscious Yamanaka heiress, her clothes torn up suggesting that her chakra augmentations were pierced through, her face half singed.

The bounty hunter didn't rush, he examined his own armor before activating wrist blades that extended into claw-like triple blades, two from the upper wrist and one from the lower wrist. Calmly the assassin approached his knocked out prey examining her face, he needed no confirmation, even if half of this young woman's face was peeled off to the bone and burnt off – she was Yamanaka Kiyomi, a face he had plenty chances to commit into his memory, like a torturer's blade cutting that dreadful image of deceitful beauty into his brain.

The bounty hunter thrust his blade piercing nothing but air as the unconscious young woman disappeared in a cloud of smoke. Before the assassin got a chance to react the ground beneath the dummy's previous location split open allowing Kiyomi to leap out.

"Earth Style: Hiding Like a Mole Jutsu!" she yelled out giving the man an uppercut after revealing herself having performed an elementary Earth Release technique – shifting the dirt beneath her feet to become light and shifting like quicksand until it swallowed her up – allowing her to leave a disguised as unconscious clone of hers behind.

The bounty hunters upper body continued to commit to his previous stab, now clearly aware of the fact that he overcommitted to what was supposed to be the execution move. The girl's attack was clever, it preyed on him overcommitting and opening himself for her counterattack – the moment right before the finishing strike was when the winner was the most vulnerable. However he was taught better than to let this young woman bully him around like that…

The bounty hunter's body kept moving, shifting his weight and lowering his head, turning around her uppercut and delivering a swift spinning ground kick while throwing his free hand forward and slamming it against the ground for support – else his supporting leg would've snapped from the force and the weight placed on it by such a risky and very exotic martial arts maneuver.

Kiyomi grunted as she was tossed back and slid back before tumbling down into the same drag marks she left before.

She was surprised by this game of chess. This bounty hunter was incredibly skilled, she had underestimated just how crafty the people coming after her may have been. She expected bandits, lowly thugs too dumb to take the hook and pissing off one of the most influential and powerful clans in Konoha, scratch that – the world. Even in Kirigakure the Yamanaka clan branches were in most councils and seats of power, what little power the village still kept to itself or salvaged after its fiasco. No bounty hunter with enough brain to be a challenge should've taken this job!

A good fifty meters farther from the young lady the bounty hunter was scolding himself for appearing to his prey. He underestimated her in his hatred for the young woman, he had reveled in how much he was taught since the two had last met, back when he was but a fledgling kitten, unable to hunt even a sickly little bird. Now he was trained by the real deal, he was supposed to be better than this, better than to assume such a tremendous gap in the skill between the two.

The bounty hunter's visor initiated, a bunch of numbers ran down displaying his prey's stats, the rough estimation of rank of her leaking out chakra, analyzing her fighting stance and suggesting a possible angle of attack. Searching information from the database to display on the Yamanaka clan, their techniques and how they could have been combatted.

The girl's breathing was irregular, her heartbeat very intense – she was afraid, she was tired by the sudden outburst of action right after a moment of peace. A lot of ninja knew how to fight for days on end but only if the strain was stable and balanced out, many hatchlings fell for the strain if it came suddenly and overtaxed their abilities all at once. Or maybe she was worried about her friend? Maybe disobeying the professional ethics of his order and taking the girl's life would've been the right thing to do – before his visor suggested that there should've been no one in the second floor, no one else but these two. Maybe had he showed this Yamanaka the head of her comrade she'd have lost her sanity and ran head first into a trap?

No. His order and his teachings did not kill those that they were not paid to kill. To kill someone whom he wasn't supposed to kill was to take away the potential business offer. What if that oddly dressed dark skinned girl was someone of profound worth in the future? What if her own bounty grows to make for an exciting hunt in the future? If he killed her here his superiors would be disappointed in him, his training would end prematurely and he'd no longer be able to delve into these secret teachings – he had to know more. The magician girl had to live.

Both combatants raised their hands up going through a bunch of handseals, the bounty hunter's visor analyzed the hand seals and worked to extract the technique hidden behind them from the database. That was useless to the man behind the mask, by the time the search would've concluded the exchange would've been over – it would've been too late to make a proper response. He was better off going with his gut and countering her strategy than analyzing her technique before acting.

Kiyomi threw a bunch of shuriken moving sideways, rushing for the forest. Clearly an intent to look for her teammate, as a running target she was much more to the bounty hunter's liking. The bounty hunter's image blinked and glitched allowing the ninja tools phase right through him, he had dropped a little ninja tool which he had activated forming a hologram-like image.

The bounty hunter appeared right behind Kiyomi thrusting the bladed glove through her back and opening three deep wounds, with a powerful downwards swipe he opened up grievous wounds that were only fixable by more advanced medical ninjutsu – not something this young lady would have access here. She screamed in pain as Kiyomi's body split open in three parts where the blades cut her body apart but then something unusual happened.

The body exploded with a loud pop, crescent projectiles of slicing wind bashed right into the bounty hunter's armor as he was too close to the clone's dispelling radius. This was a different kind of clone – one not only capable of using simple ninja tools but also possessing the Wind Release nature of dispelling counterattack. While he was thrown off balance and felt warm blood squirt from a couple of wounds where the chakra cut through his armor the bounty hunter fired off a grappling hook that zipped him away from his location to where he could examine his wounds and recover.

Now he had no idea where the young heiress was. She somehow managed to slip out of his line of sight, she outsmarted him by leaving that highly advanced clone behind. That must've been at least a B-Rank technique to create a clone with a dispelling mechanism such as that. It was capable enough to cut through his armor and leave painful wounds – something that the bounty hunter hasn't experienced yet – he has taken blows from chuunin tough enough to punch a hole all the way through the planet, the steel dented but never tore like a tin can… That technique was controlled, concentrated and focused. This blonde was beyond the level of a genin, so far beyond that the intelligence he was given would've compelled him to retreat and reconsider his strategy. Make another move later.

He couldn't do that.

He couldn't do that.

This young woman had resisted him just like she did back then. He was supposed to be stronger than her back then and he underestimated her back then. He lost back then and he's doing the same now. With all the immense training he did, all of his power-ups he had acquired all those crazy skills he had honed and he still couldn't change that outcome! How was this possible? No matter how much better he got, she still outplayed him. Her growth in this time period couldn't have possibly rivaled his!

"Hey asshole! You're standing in fire! Aren't you hurt at all?" Kiyomi shouted out looking right at him.

No way! She couldn't have seen him, she couldn't have seen him, no one saw him when he moved – he was the stealthiest of all in the order. No one, even the far more skilled assassins moved quieter than him! She couldn't have seen him… She must've been bluffing or…

The assassin placed his arms together in a hand seal. "Dispel" he shouted out revealing that the tree he was standing on was just an illusion – he had zipped right on top of the building he had blown up before and landed right in the open – in the middle of a raging flames consuming the wooden structure. His body was so honed, his remaining armor was so durable that he couldn't feel being burnt alive. Only once he saw his body standing in fire did the bounty hunter realize that his body was augmenting itself to protect him from the flame.

"You are pretty skilled but you fell for a genjutsu as simple as False Surroundings technique… That's a pretty low ranking illusion. Mana really hit the nail on the head when she began focusing on illusions, people just don't know how to deal with them" Kiyomi taunted him. She taunted him of all people. The bounty hunter emerged from the flames and landed right in front of her. This made absolutely no sense – she should've stood no chance against him. The assassin clenched his steel gloves allowing them to once again pop out his wrist blades preparing to bathe in the girl's blood but then he closed his eyes and calmed down. It was how he lost to this girl before.

The bounty hunter popped back the claws and raised his wrist, Kiyomi prepared to counter attack but her bluff was already analyzed by his armor. She was bluffing, that last technique made her body irradiate more and more chakra meaning it was in stress – she was afraid, both for her life and that of her friend's, she was also now beginning to feel physically tired as well as running out of gas to go on. That clone technique before really must've cost her…

A barrage of small explosions made Kiyomi jump on her feet and look around in panic – a bunch of small but loud modified smoke bombs that the bounty hunter had concealed in the bushes blew up covering the place in smoke. The Yamanaka began holding her breath – she wasn't sure if this was some toxic gas or just simple smoke. The smoke was a weird mixture of purple and black suggesting that it had some toxins in it. The typical teaching of Hanasaku – a medical ninja came into the girl's mind. Any poison affecting a chakra user is colored purple or a shade of it meaning that the fog definitely had something shady going on with it.

Kiyomi leapt up, began running up a tree trying to fake out an attempted escape – she knew she'd get attacked so she backflipped off of it half-way and for good measure – the tree exploded getting hit by the same combination that took off the roof of the inn. The genin went through some hand seals of her own.

"Wind Style: Great Breakthrough!" she shouted out feeling her chakra begin to sap out, the smoke began clearing as the technique emitted a strong enough gust to completely scatter the smoke and any semblance of gas away. Any Wind Release user had a natural counter to smoke bombs or gas based techniques.

What Kiyomi was not prepared for however was her opponent appearing right in front of her – using the dispelling clouds of smoke to creep up to her completely undetected with a wild upwards slash. Instinctively Kiyomi leaned back and tried to jump back and avoid it. A painful sensation on her chest let the girl know that she got tagged, the feeling of warm blood running down her chest and smoking her clothes was similarly a very unwelcome feeling.

The assailant continued to press on an offensive raising his blade up and aiming for Kiyomi's eye. The pain and shock of getting cut made her body freeze – it disrupted the natural flow, she was good enough to hold the hunter back for a moment but not match him hand to hand. The Yamanaka smacked his hand away leaving a painful and pretty deep cut on her cheek instead of having the blades lodge into her face killing her instantly.

The manner in which these blades were cutting her like butter – without resistance. The assassin must've been imbuing his blades with chakra - that was a pretty advanced technique. At least he wasn't doing it on a powerful enough level for the enhancement to be visible. Kiyomi could still work with this. Her hands worked overtime, desperately moving any strikes away from vitals where the assailant was aiming.

She ran out of options – the man closed in the distance and locked her into a lethal dance of blades she was destined to lose. She had no way to match his skill, she could just redirect his blows where it left painful gashes and cuts but didn't outright kill her. By keeping this dance up the man was torturing her, disguising it like a battle. This was no battle – it was a dragged out execution. Kiyomi's mind raced trying to find an opening or a way to get away from this flurry of blades and her own blood covering the bounty hunter's armor and weapons.

"Get away! Just get away!" she almost began yelling at herself but the man didn't let up.

A card lodged into the man's helmet, right in the center – had the man's visors not been tougher it'd have went right in between his eyes and through his nose. The assassin leaped back with a cracked visor and banged up helmet. Kiyomi looked back clutching at her bleeding injuries so enjoying this moment that she almost shouted out in joy. Her friend had finally decided to come and help!

"I locked you up in twelve bolas with the capacity of each to adapt to strain – no force in the universe can peel them open with strength alone, be it a being of infinite strength" the cybernetic voice finally once again graced the two young women with its presence. Now it was messed up, broken and even huskier, the tones and strength of the volume shifted. It was clear that whatever tech the bounty had with him was beginning to fail him.

"I'm a stage magician" Mana smiled benevolently. "Escaping traps is what I do for a living, I could've escaped those mecha-bolas when I was four years old"

"Yet you couldn't have done it sooner?" Kiyomi complained but truthfully she was glad that her friend was alive and well.

"I'm a magician, not a miracle worker, plus a good entertainer keeps the suspense alive" Mana shrugged with an apologetic expression. "Seriously though it was really dark in there…"

Mana and Kiyomi finally were a team again and it seemed like there was no one they couldn't beat when working together!


	236. Fears that Keep Us Down

A handful of sparks fired out from the cracked frontal part of the bounty hunter's helmet. The man covered his face before realizing that his interface was broken and that Mana's card penetrating the thing made it more of a hindrance than an asset. The large fingers of the man clicked at a pair of switches on the helmet releasing a trio of thick cords, he then carefully removed the helmet allowing his face to be seen.

Inside the advanced partially armored set of technology that'd probably have made Meiko swoon all over it for an hour was a strong and bulky man. That much could've been told by parts of his limbs that weren't restrained by the heavy and bulky armor. His dread locks fell out from under the helmet, the sides of the man's head looked freshly shaved allowing a more professional look for the bounty hunter as compared to a wild hobo-esque appearance he'd have had if his sides were allowed to overgrow his head with hair like his top and back did. The man's face was covered with scars and one of his eye was cut grievously and closed forever.

"It's you!" Kiyomi shrieked out in surprise, Mana looked at her friend in confusion. The magician had expected there to be more fear in her friend's voice if she recognized this man. From the tech he carried and the skill he had he certainly deserved some respectful fear.

"That's right…" the man admitted with a slow affirming nod before throwing his helmet away aside. As the techy sphere hit the dirt the visors shattered to pieces. The man reached behind him and pulled out the trio of cords that were still spitting some sort of gas throwing them aside as well.

"Can I get a little bit inclusion into the conversation, maybe?" Mana squinted at her friend feeling a bit offended that the blonde didn't bother explaining it.

"What? You mean you don't remember this guy?" Kiyomi snapped back at her friend, "He almost killed me twice! You're just the worst, seriously!" the Yamanaka crossed her arms around her chest.

"Nekomata Roe, one of the unlucky souls tangled in Yellow's plan, one of the insignificant pawns you've trampled over in order to subdue the monster that ruined my and my sister's lives." The man finally reminded Mana. He then stared at her with his single functional eye trying to see if the sudden realization would somehow make her feel a bit apologetic at the least.

"Well I barely even met you… I've only really seen your figure in the dark, really…" Mana blushed a little after a shrug, "Kiyomi fought you both times, didn't she?"

"So you came here why exactly? Do you wish to restore your pride? Do you somehow hold me responsible for your sister's death? That was Hisako's doing, not mine" Kiyomi began defensively question this man, his presence did apparently affect her, Mana wasn't sure if it was fear or some sort of mental scars, however.

"Pride? No. I've moved past those things. My pride was torn to shreds, just like my flesh after I escaped your trap by tearing chunks of my body off. Even if the order that trained me sewn my flesh back together like a jigsaw puzzle, my pride was always left behind in that bunker. Pride is something an assassin gives up on, a hunter leaves such petty things aside. I am also fully aware you didn't kill my sister, I also don't care much about vengeance for her life. She was your enemy, the nature of combat is to destroy the enemy." Roe grunted out, it was clear that it wasn't easy for him to speak, whatever grueling training he went through with this order of assassins he spoke of, whatever injuries he had sustained by forcing out of Kiyomi's trap in the bunker must've damaged his throat and made it harder for him to speak. The cybernetic voicebox now made more sense.

"So then why? Why are you here? Is the bounty it? Are you now so pitiful as to fight for a bunch of money? If so I can pay you more, you know…" Kiyomi asked again. Mana looked at her friend with a bit of confusion, she had never expected to see her friend try to compromise with someone who was essentially a criminal. Her friend was very adamant in ending the lives of criminals. Maybe the two had some shared feelings of respect hailing from their battle in the bunker before?

"Tsk, that is all my order cares for. I am different. You represent to me a wall, a barrier I cannot overcome. Had I beaten you that day, had I had the capacity within me to leap over that wall – my sister would still be alive. It's as easy as that. All I want to do is kill you so that I know if I can leap over that wall now." Roe explained with some trouble breathing as his hands weighed down and he took some pauses to huff and hyperventilate the whole way.

"Do you maybe know who put the bounty on Kiyomi's head?" Mana asked trying to be polite, she didn't know the man's story or his history for Kiyomi but it was clear that the Yamanaka didn't really wish this man a brutal death as she did for most criminals. The blonde looked devastated to find out that she couldn't reason with this man.

"Sure. I did…" Roe nodded before fixing his wrist gauntlets and checking the functionality of his wrist blades and taking an offensive stance.

"Wait, what?" Kiyomi broke out.

"Yeah, the order that trained me only cares about hunting down the bounty. I knew that they wouldn't approve of me just going for you, using their hidden hunting techniques to chase after personal demons. This was the only way of going after you" Roe explained before lunging at the two girls.

Kiyomi dodged the straight jab of the man's blades, then the secondary swipe by leaning under the blades and rolling over the lower strikes. Mana felt like it was her chance to attack the man now that he focused only on the young woman he wished to destroy so she threw a couple of lightning fast kicks at his exposed back. The bounty hunter flipped over Mana by gently grabbing her shoulder for support and then pushed the magician at the Yamanaka making the two slam at each other.

Roe tapped at his chest removing a fist sized steel capsule and pressing a button on it for it to expand into a sharp steel rod. With a violent husky roar the bounty hunter tried impaling both girls with a single spear. The rod penetrated through Mana's back and Kiyomi's chest together but the bodies of both girls evaporated into thin air right after Mana cancelled the illusion the hunter was under. Once the hunter realized that he was standing still under the influence of Mana's illusion this whole time it was too late – once the magician's genjutsu ended and both girls stood in front of him with their punches sinking into the man's sewn together face sending him flying back into the trees.

"Fancy Trick Jutsu!" Mana chanted out the name of her illusion. Truth be told she counted on Kiyomi being more receptive to the man's attack but her breathing greatly troubled the magician – she must've spent a lot of chakra on fighting him before which was why the younger kunoichi had to take the defensive initiative.

"H-How… I didn't even see the hand seals…" Roe grunted out after spitting out a bunch of teeth and blood aside. Mana's palm strike, even if connecting to his face wasn't that tough but together with Kiyomi's left hook it clearly did some damage.

"If you did – I'd be disappointed in my hand seal speed" Mana smiled politely to the bounty hunter. "A good magician never lets the audience see the moment when the reality ends and the illusion begins."

Kiyomi looked at Mana and nodded in both approval and gratitude. It was clear that the blonde wasn't really prepared for the cat-man's attack. Her chakra pool must've been dwindling which meant that her physicals weren't at their best, her reaction speed may have been unstable.

"I'm sorry, Mana, I know you don't like us fighting this man, truth be told I'd like to settle this with him by myself but… He's too strong for that, I'm too tired" Kiyomi admitted. This was probably the first time in a while that the magician saw her friend shed the goofball approach and be serious for once.

"No problem at all. I'm willing to help out while I'm here, just know that I won't let you kill this man" Mana nodded in approval.

"To be honest, I don't really want to kill him myself, he's a lot like me – someone who wants to manage his own clan with virtues he sees as right. Back in the day he reminded me a lot of my brother, except Roe was careless towards his own sister. It seems now that was only a façade but I don't really wish Roe's death, he's not like the other criminals, he's just misguided, made a lot of bad calls and was just unlucky his whole life" Kiyomi admitted, it was clear that it was this cat-like man that made the blonde shed her outer layer of joking and carefree approach to things.

"No, that would make him just like most criminals I've met" Mana shook her head.

"Don't you dare talk about me with pity and assume superiority while I'm here!" Roe yelled out charging at the two young women with his wrist blades ready for attack. He was really fast – Mana realized in the middle of his charge that if the man is initiating the attack, at certain point she had no chance of interrupting him with her own technique. To this man a lightning bolt would've been as slow as dripping honey. If she was to interrupt him with an illusion she needed to not be caught unprepared, to start her hand seals in early stages of his attack.

Kiyomi leaped in front of Mana redirecting the man's attacks. Observing her friend's skill the magician was impressed, she thought that her training in redirection made her unique but Kiyomi appeared to have natural skill in it despite, most likely, never having went through that martial arts training. Mana with all of her experience of being trained in martial arts in the Sun Disc arena saw that Kiyomi had considerable skill in taijutsu, well above that of her peers, still, that would've only been comparing Kiyomi to someone she had long since outranked in true skill as she simply didn't belong on the scale of other genin.

The Yamanaka heiress threw a couple of quick jabs of her own, her misguided attempt at trying to hit a faster, stronger and more skilled opponent was greeted with only hitting empty air and opening herself up for an attack. Still, the blonde must've known that now she could afford such luxury, she had her friend having her back. Roe moved like flowing water, acrobatic and swift, moving under, over or aside from the blonde's blows and positioning himself for a perfect shredding slice at the Yamanaka's kidneys.

With a poof Kiyomi disappeared where Mana appeared instead, facing Roe and seeing the nature of his attack from behind. The magician used Substitution Jutsu to replace herself with Kiyomi, near instantaneously, having observed the attack from behind and knowing how the blonde was attacked. Mana used the training of both Meiko and Kouta, also all she was taught in the Sun Disc arena to hit the man's wrists lightly and push them away from her body. This odd manner of attack combined with a peculiar game of switcheroo appeared to completely astound her foe.

Once again the two switched places using the Substitution Jutsu, this time Kiyomi replaced herself with Mana positioning herself right where the magician was after redirecting the man's strikes and ready to hit him. The blonde gave a couple of quick jabs aiming at the still working eye of her opponent, Kiyomi undoubtedly tried to swell it up and rob her opponent of vision. Using her opponent's disadvantages to her own advantages like a real kunoichi would. Right when the moment appeared to be a triumphant one her blows phased through an illusionary hologram of her opponent.

A loud thick from above made Mana quickly raise her head only to realize that at some point in between the switches their clever switcheroo combination was found out and Roe realized he had no chance of beating it. The man moved above slipping away unseen while he left a hologram behind him. It must've been before the final switch, right before Kiyomi wished to make her attack. The sound coming from above was soon to be revealed as Roe firing his long wrist blades at Kiyomi from above like projectiles.

These projectiles were as slow as a kilometer per second, around the speed of one of those kunai dispensers the mobsters around Fire Country carried around. Mana felt like she could work with that and she knew that Kiyomi invested too much weight and momentum to do something about those incoming blades. The magician's hands went through a collection of four hand seals and pointed forward firing four projectiles of lightning chakra shaped like short swords.

"Magic Skewer Jutsu!" she chanted out after the lightning projectiles blasted each one of the fired blades away. One of the projectiles didn't hit anything but Mana in her distress fired off four even though there were only three blades. She still had to learn how to work efficiently under stress when her friends' lives were in danger.

Kiyomi leaped back finally having recovered her balance and nodded in gratitude at Mana. Both girls knew that they worked well together, they had history working as a team and fighting pretty strong opponents together. They've fought alongside each other under numerous occasions. Even a strong as stealthy opponent like Roe shouldn't have been too much to handle for the two of them working together.

"He's quick and slippy, quiet too" Mana blinked as she was troubled by these things moderately.

"Yeah. I couldn't keep track of him slipping in and out of shadow back then, I doubt I could even now. I thought before that your whole meditation awareness thingie was a joke but now I see that you could've never picked him up. He doesn't exist unless he wants to, that's how stealthy he is" Kiyomi nodded clearly feeling similarly annoyed by her opponent's skill.

Suddenly a sharp explosion of pain made Mana want to scream. She was so shocked by the speed and how totally unexpected the attack was that she didn't have enough breath in her chest to even scream, her mouth just gapped trying to catch breath to scream but the pain didn't let her. Her body lifted up, she couldn't help it, the magician looked down only to see the tips of the bounty hunter's wrist blades sticking out from her gut.

"Mana!" Kiyomi screamed but her scream was silenced by a quick spin kick sending her back.

"I told you to stay put" Roe husked out and grabbed Mana's neck from behind only to snap the wrist blades from his gauntlet and leave them sticking out from the girl's body. He didn't want her to bleed out, he didn't want the magician to die but she was too dangerous and had far too effective disrupting abilities to be allowed to keep on fighting. She had to go down first. "Keep those blades in and don't move. You'll live" he grunted at the magician's ear from behind before tossing her body aside.

Mana's head screamed, loud shrieking noises, like two metal bars being grinded against each other on and on again. The more time passed the more of them joined in. Her vision was blurry and kept on whiting out, the magician knew that her temporal awareness was wonky as these white outs robbed her of a couple of seconds.

"This is nothing… Ninja keep fighting with worse wounds. You need to get this in order…" she tried talking to her own body, she couldn't meditate and actually talk to her own body, as would've been the most efficient way. The pain and the mess inside her own mind made concentrating impossible. Could ninja actually have fought through with these sorts of injuries? Mana had read so much about legendary ninja and samurai fighting through hundreds of swords sticking out from their bodies but now it was tough to believe.

"Focus your augmentation. Ignore everything else, fight the pain and the bleeding" Mana kept on repeating in her mind like a mantra. The pain was slowly beginning to settle down, she's been stabbed before but this was different. She was careless, she was letting down her guard. She wasn't augmenting her body to withstand such attacks because she was afraid to lose her chakra again. Kiyomi undoubtedly had her body hardened and ready for an attack, she'd have never had those blades penetrate her, at least not the full way through.

Mana pounded the ground with her fist. She hated herself right now. She hated herself so much, because of her own personal fear of losing her chakra control she now let herself get taken out, Kiyomi was left all alone against an opponent she had no chance of beating. The raven haired kunoichi pushed her body off the ground and watched a small puddle of blood drip off her gut onto the dirt. Her grip weakened and her body hit the dirt again. How? How did those strong ninja fight through this?

Loud clangs came from further away, Mana looked on and saw Kiyomi once again locked down in a fatal chain link of attacks. The blonde could barely fend off each successive attack with her kunai. Mana's shaking and covered with blood hand moved to her thigh opening up her ninja kit and removing a roll of bandage. The other hand moved to the slowly but relentlessly bleeding stab wound. Mana's breath intensified.

She needed to pull out those broken off blades.

That'd unleash all hell, a motherlode of all bleedings.

Kiyomi needed her help.

It'd bleed a lot. She'd need to be quick.

She could manage it, augment her body to leak a constant small amount of chakra and keep the blood away. She knew how to keep herself alive by just changing up her chakra flow.

The pain would be immense, it might make it difficult to be precise.

Kiyomi screamed in pain – she must've been cut… Mana needed to move!

"Move!" she screamed out scolding herself and damning her stupid fears, Mana's shaking bloody hands moved to the sharp broken off blades and gripped them tightly. The blades were still so sharp, just touching them cut the magician's hands. Mana didn't want to augment her skin, she could withstand some pain, a couple of cuts…

The magician wanted to just yank those blades out but her hands shook and stayed on the blades. What if once she pulled them out and started disrupting her flow, repurposing it again… What if it stayed that way, what if she lost her chakra control again? What if this time it was permanent? She'd be useless again…

Another scream of Kiyomi's reached Mana's ears, her friend must've been getting murdered out there!

What if Kiyomi died, just like Shimo did. Did the magician really have any right to stay down and worry over her chakra control at the expense of her friend's life? No. No she couldn't. She'd give up her gift, everything special about her in a heartbeat just to save any one life. Mana calmed down her breathing, wiped her tears off with her bloody hand leaving a streak of blood around her face.

It was better to live as a useless cripple knowing that her friends were alive than to pay for being special with someone's life.

Mana yanked two of the three blades out letting blood storm out of the wounds. Her terrified screams killed all the other noise around, the sounds of battle transpiring nearby were snuffed out by her own pain. Her sacrifice.


	237. Mana's New Way

Kiyomi clutched the middle section of her arm and raced her opponent to get some air back in her lungs. Her chest was burning and her muscles felt so weak, so numb – she was fighting to survive and her entire body was running out of juice. She was facing an opponent she couldn't survive fighting alone. He had already placed several nasty injuries on her, with each small cut like that, even if Kiyomi manages to contain the damage by augmenting the affected area and making the passing blade leave just a shallow cut, her speed dropped down even more, her will to fight on lingered due to the collection of pain all over her body she was in.

Her opponent was no longer fooling around, he was no longer trying to slip into the shadows as there were too few of those left in the surrounding area – the several small fires he had caused took care of those few shadowy corners, he only relentlessly tried to strike his target down. He was succeeding, slowly but assuredly, one cut at a time. There was one particularly nasty cut on her back, obtained shortly after Mana was stabbed from the back, that Kiyomi couldn't even reach, that warm sensation of sticky clamps of blood running down her back annoyed the blonde to no end

"Mana, where are you?" Kiyomi wondered to herself without trying to reveal to her opponent that the Yamanaka still counted on her friend lending a hand here. The magician got caught from behind, her injuries looked pretty gruesome but it wasn't anything a ninja couldn't keep on fighting with. It would've continuously leaked chakra to keep her standing and in fighting shape but it would've let Mana fight. The blonde knew that her friend wished that more than anything. So why was she not up?

Roe pointed his wrist at Kiyomi grabbing it with his other free arm, the blonde knew what it meant so she rolled aside to avoid another trio of the bladed projectiles coming at her. The bounty hunter obviously predicted her roll and rushed in from the side trying to kick her in the face – force Kiyomi to waste more and more chakra on keeping her body from breaking down so that when more cuts land on the target's body she'd be caught unprepared by a chakra shortage.

Kiyomi blocked the kick with her healthy arm while spinning around, using all of the momentum granted to her by the kick and all the weight behind it to her disposal. With a kunai knife in her hand the girl turned around trying to stab at an unprotected spot on her assailant's wrist – if he got careless and didn't notice the knife, if he didn't augment his arm to minimize the depth of the cut, he'd get a nasty injury, one worth retreating for.

Roe's wrist disappeared from sight, Kiyomi suspected that he'd try to counterattack, she didn't really see his attack clearly so she predicted that he'd go for her abdomen. After her knife swipe missed its mark, swiping only empty air, responding to the counterattack became the priority. Lifting her knee was the only action she had time for, anyways. A deafening boom followed by a shockwave that tore leaves off the trees and shook the ground beneath the duo's feet erupted as Roe's quick jab to the gut collided with Kiyomi's knee. Suddenly the blonde felt a huge upsurge of momentum sending her back and utilizing it she flipped back delivering a weak and weightless jab with her feet at Roe's chin.

Furious due to the fact that he skipped a blow exchanging fists with a weaker and slower opponent the bounty hunter roared in fury but didn't quite lose composure or rush at the blonde.

Kiyomi's eyes widened a little as her eyes shortly glanced at where Mana laid. Now the girl knew why the magician was taking so long and expressing so much pain over her injuries – she wasn't augmenting her body when needed. She wasn't trying to protect herself from that backstab, what would've normally been barely an inch of steel breaking her skin now went all the way through like a heated knife through butter. Kiyomi wanted to feel anger but her eyes only shifted diagonally in compassion – she felt Mana's fears and somewhere deep inside she understood them.

The magician once got burnt from overstretching herself, walking past her limits and ignoring them outright. Chakra control meant to Mana more than her own life, it was quite literally everything to Mana. The magician only cared about her dream – to protect all life, make the world change into a world which treasured life through example. Without her chakra control she couldn't achieve that. By extension possessing chakra control meant being able to reach out for her goals. Losing it meant losing her goal.

A spine-chilling scream of pain unlike any Kiyomi had heard before reached her. This time even the bounty hunter looked at the magician in awe.

Mana was standing on her feet, her knees and lower legs still trembling as drops of blood weak yet numerous ran down them. The raven haired kunoichi's eyes wavered and shook, dazed yet bloodshot. Right in front of the eyes of the two the girl reached in and pulled out the third blade slightly above where the previous two had went in.

"Mana…" Kiyomi tried to utter, she tried to shout out, to scream that she understood her friend's dream and why she was so afraid to use the gifts she had regained recently to their fullest.

"What use is my chakra control if I can't live my dream out with it?" Mana shouted out as the wounds in her gut stopped spouting out blood and began steaming as the passing chakra flow aggressively restrained the wound and kept Mana on her feet and running.

Kiyomi nodded, her friend's made her decision and that decision was understood loud and clear. Frankly knowing that Mana had conquered her fears by disassociating them from her dreams made the older kunoichi a little bit calmer. Still, she would've been foolish to confuse Mana's chakra augmentations for actual regeneration – the magician wasn't healing herself by pouring senselessly large masses of chakra into her wounds. She was merely postponing the harmful effects and once her chakra resources grew dimmer and dimmer still she'd have to pay up what she had postponed paying up.

Mana followed her friend in their offensive. The two had finally recovered from getting caught off guard and pressed their offensive back onto their opponent. Kiyomi jumped in right in front of Roe, jumping into the air with a jumping cross punch. Roe crossed his blades but didn't protect from this attack. He was being smart – ninja did not come out into the open like that, Kiyomi was slower, weaker and running out of chakra, slowly but surely. Attacking in such a clear manner would've been suicidal and so Roe kept on the lookout standing prepared for a follow-up attack.

With a thunderous boom Kiyomi's fist connected to the left cheek of the bounty hunter spinning him around in the sheer force going through it. Kiyomi had snapped her leg back while throwing her cross increasing the punching power greatly – the Yamanaka's taijutsu game was on point. Roe's eyes whited out as the bounty hunter couldn't comprehend how bold such an attack was, he could no longer think clearly as pain and confusion muddled up his perception. Strategies and battlefield thinking no longer worked right.

Mana threw a jumping kick to the bounty hunter's chest, her gut wound coughed up a couple of droplets of blood forcing the magician to use her hands trying to clutch her wound out but she wanted to not waste this opportunity. The kunoichi rushed onwards after her sliding back opponent with a combination of kicks from her right leg, she hit multiple areas both plated and unprotected. Where armor was hit it bent and tore like cardboard, where unprotected limbs were hit bones cracked and snapped. Roe may have been stronger than each one of them individually but he wasn't stronger than their teamwork. Far from it.

Kiyomi jumped in with a combination of punches, each aimed at the chest or face and switched up from jumping crosses and diving punches to standing firm boxing-like jabs and hooks. Roe finally regained his composure and managed to stand his ground carefully blocking and avoiding each strike before he noticed Kiyomi leaning and Mana rolling over Kiyomi's back with a stomping barrage of kicks. Roe roared out proudly, like a true big cat of the northern wastelands and slid his wrists in to block the attacks. His wrist protection and all of the wrist blades he held inside the armored gauntlets peeled off and shattered like delicate porcelain.

The bounty hunter was disarmed and greatly distressed. He continued to grunt as blood gathered on his lip and ran down his mouth and chin beginning to pool on the ground beneath his feet. Surely by now he must've realized how well these two worked together and that he couldn't possibly hold his own against them both, not even until one of their augmentations fail and they collapse from their wounds. These two young girls were just too accustomed to one another.

Mana thought that it would've been the moment when the bounty hunter began to speak. The exact manner of speech sort of depended on the kind of man he was, some liked to brag about how losing was a part of their plan, their full intention. Some liked to deny being beaten before they were actually beaten even if the fact was being seen well before that point. Surprisingly enough that wasn't the case, Roe just shouted out a wild battle-cry before slamming at his chest.

This desperate motion revealed a strange one time function of his armor. Each remaining and functional armor piece peeled off its steel and positioned in a way that made it a cutting tool, having obtained this improvised hedgehog layer of armor blades the bounty hunter leaped into battle.

Mana and Kiyomi were prepared for his attack but not for how fast it was. Kiyomi pulled out two more of her kunai blades in desperation to try and deflect as many of the attacks aimed at her vital points, like her neck, as possible. Mana threw a card with a sealing tag out that erupted with a gust of wind chakra. She had hoped that the cutting winds matching a weak Wind Release jutsu would've stopped her opponent but it merely slowed him down as Roe powered through it. Still, the initial shock and awe of his speed and killing power was greatly diminished. After the wind gust was broken through Roe simply dashed past the girls in a blurry flash appearing behind them like an honorable samurai having cut down all of his foes before they could blink an eye.

The eye of the bounty hunter glanced at his prey, Kiyomi appeared to have successfully blocked most of the strikes and avoided with minimal injury what she had not blocked successfully. She had a couple of scratches and blood stains over her grey dress and her fishnet which was beginning to get completely torn down and becoming a hindrance over the multitude of small injuries and damage to her clothes sustained through the scuffle.

Mana, on the other hand stood completely still. Her gut then trickled with red, spitting out more blood a couple of times before the augmentations restrained the bleeding again. The magician's skin paled as she stumbled forward a couple of steps. A smile covered Roe's face as he noticed the signs of a ninja being cut down right through their augmentations, ultimately augmentations functioned either like a reserve of one's life force, one's very vitality, taken from one's chakra, or like a makeshift coated force field but either use had a finite amount. A punch with more chakra augmentation would always break through a defense augmented by a lesser amount, similarly with blades – a blade with more focused and stronger augments would always break through the shield of a lesser augmentation.

A smile, matching that of the bounty hunter, then followed up on Mana's face as the magician quickly turned around and wiped downwards with her fingers as if they were a fan. Roe instinctively rolled aside avoiding a bunch of his own armor scraps slamming into the ground, potentially with enough strength to impale him while his augments were down. Only after avoiding the armor pieces attempting to cut him down did the bounty hunter notice a shining string of steel wire attached to them.

Mana felt proud in her own follow-up, even if it had failed – she had acted out getting hit by the injury, momentarily weakening her chakra sustaining her life and letting some blood out from her wounds for a more dramatic effect, to make her act more believable. She managed to use another card from her sleeve – one with basic ninja tools sealed inside. One of these tools was a good dozen of meters of steel wire which she managed to attach to parts and pieces of the man's loosened and sharp armor. Once the attack concluded Mana only had to swing the dislodged pieces and fling them at the opponent while he lowered his guard.

"Wow, working with you is gonna give me a stroke one day…" Kiyomi complained, she was clearly distressed by Mana acting out her own demise again. While Mana did do that a lot, to lower the opponent's guard and kick them right into a false sense of security, she only did it so often because it always worked. It was too bad that the opponent was too fast this time…

"Sorry. I just like sometimes bringing my stage performance on the battlefield" the magician smiled through her pale and weak face.

"You've lost a lot of blood, you need a medical pill? I've got a handful of green ones and a couple of yellow ones in my kit" Kiyomi suggested, those would've helped a great lot with Mana's injuries, maybe even stopped her bleeding completely. The magician nodded happily. The Yamanaka began burrowing in her pouch attached to her thigh but Roe shouted out in rage before jumping at the distracted Yamanaka heiress – he was clearly set to not letting the two exchange items.

Mana weaved a single hand seal. Kiyomi felt a card appear in the hand where she held the medical pill so she swiped it in the air, making a simple hand seal to unseal what was inside of it. An explosion of confetti in ridiculous amounts covered up Kiyomi making the bounty hunter's swipe at her with his feline claws miss his mark. While Mana cracked the yellow medical pill in between her teeth and chewed it up Kiyomi emerged from the ridiculous cloud of confetti and pummeled her confused opponent before kicking him hard enough to roll back.

"Nice substitution, I wasn't sure what this card you gave me was, we need to really practice this move more" Kiyomi gave Mana a thumb up without losing a track of their opponent. The blonde referred to the substitution technique which allowed Mana exchange a card in her sleeve with Kiyomi's medical food pill without Roe's attack interrupting the exchange.

"That's why I fight in my uniform – I know which cards are in which compartments and which pockets. It's almost like an extension of my own body" Mana nodded with a smile, now that her pain eased up and the wound on her gut closed but didn't yet disappear she feel much further away from dying. The yellow medical pill was a far cry from the rare but miraculous black pill but it actually managed to heal one serious injury at the least or a whole bunch of smaller injuries.

Kiyomi then clenched her fist and pointed it at Roe, glancing at Mana.

"Well, ready to finish this, then?" the Yamanaka smiled at Mana surely alarming their opponent who had almost stripped completely naked with the last use of his armor. Roe had used most of his tricks by now, his gear was not meant for extended confrontations as he was a bounty hunter – an executioner more than an assassin.

Mana politely shook her head.

Roe squinted at her as the magician walked out in front of him, standing up in between Kiyomi and him. She looked into the bounty hunter's eyes as seriously as she could, for a moment there she could even see the hunter's eyes wavering – in those few stares, prematurely broken off, she understood that her opponent knew he had little hope in fighting off both of the two kunoichi, not with them working together so well and having battlefield experience with each other.

"What is the name of your "order"? Surely it doesn't just call itself "order", right?" Mana asked a simple question.

"We don't tell our name to anyone but to the other hunters and our targets, our name does not matter, only what we do" Roe growled out like an enraged dog.

"Sounds like an impressive organization, I don't particularly like an order centered around hunting people for money, one day I'll be sure to end it. But for now… You're done here." Mana composed the entirety of her inner strength and looked her opponent right in the eye, chasing after his fleeing eyes even as they wandered off. He had to know she was serious.

Roe laughed out, Mana heard dirt clamping behind her – Kiyomi must've taken steps at her to move her out of the way or away from the bounty hunter who could've only been bested by their most impressive teamwork and not any one of them alone.

"Our elders do not tolerate retreat!" Roe growled out with much more fun behind his tone and voice as Mana's suggestion must've entertained him.

"Mana, there's no need to bargain with him, we can beat him, both of us!" Kiyomi encouraged the magician to keep on fighting.

"No more." Mana shook her head, "This entire confrontation is taking place because you fought him before. Fighting your enemy and even defeating them, even killing them does not resolve anything. I've fought and beaten enemies for too long, I'm going to try another way" she spoke without moving her eyes away from Roe – a single microsecond of her attention fleeing could've lead to her instantaneous death or grievous injuries as Roe clearly didn't wish to kill her – as per his organization's rules.

"Bounty hunter, do your elders tolerate defeat then? You said the point of this encounter is seeing if you could leap over the barrier of Kiyomi's strength. You've done so. You've marked both me and Kiyomi on our backs – the greatest injury to the pride of shinobi and kunoichi alike. You've shown your superiority to us clearly, we've shown you that we can survive you, however, so I say we end this. You proved your point to yourself and us, we've proven that we can ultimately stop you together" Mana strictly laid down her thoughts. She wished a compromise, the only way to permanently silence an opponent was not killing them. That would only incite his kin to strike back on their behalf, the only way to silence the enemy was to let them win. However that victory had to be on your terms, those that you dictate them but those that do not cross their own terms. That way everyone won. It was how Mana wanted to end all conflicts from now on…

"I see…" Roe closed his eyes, breathed in and… Out. He laughed out before his eyes opened again but those were no longer the eyes of a killer. "You know I can see there's no way to kill my target now, if I walk away with my freedom intact I'll face my organization's punishment but only grow stronger from it, as I've grown from hardships before. Whatever scolding I receive for failing to kill my target is not worse than that of defeat and shaming the organization. You're smarter and stranger than your peers, magician girl. I'd be careful if I were you, people tend to dislike your kind and one day you'll be the target of one of us"

Kiyomi blinked a couple of times in rapid succession, "What?" she uttered in confusion surprised that Mana's bargain worked. It had never occurred to the blonde that convincing the enemy he got what he actually came for would work. Roe may have been ordered due to the bounty but he actually fought not because of his organization's rules – he fought to know if he had what it takes to leap over Kiyomi's barrier of strength.

"Oh well, I'll deal with that person when he comes for me" Mana smiled with a friendly nod at the assassin. "For now I can only feel thankful that you see reason" the finger she held at her cufflink button which would've slipped a card into her palm, one she could use to finish the fight off if Roe decided to recklessly attack her, loosened and moved away from it.

Roe turned his back at Mana and prepared to pounce away from sight. He stopped and turned around.

"I must warn you before I go. I was not the one to actually place the bounty, I lied… It was a Yamanaka clansman, one from the Kirigakure branch of the clan" Roe revealed much to Kiyomi's surprise.


	238. Predator of One's Superiors

Both kunoichi stared at the bounty hunter for a while after the revelation was made. Kiyomi tried objecting first, effectively entering the denial stage, she couldn't really be blamed though. Being told that one's own distant relatives from another village were responsible for trying to have you killed was a tough pill to swallow.

"Wait, I thought you said you did it? It made sense – you placed a bounty on my head to justify coming after me in the eyes of your organization." Kiyomi objected.

"That is true, it's a much more believable scenario" Mana nodded in agreement.

"I lied, it was to raise a false sense of security, let you think that you've rid of the only threat you need to care about. It is a common trick amongst assassins, even if the other killers had nothing to do with me – it's only common courtesy between us throat-cutters. I am no longer tied to the Nekomata clan, I do not have the resources needed to rile up every bounty hunter and assassin organization to kill a child, let alone a future heiress of one of the most important clans of Konoha" Roe growled by lowering his lower lip, clearly annoyed that his revelation was even being questioned.

Mana stepped up and extended her hand to touch the man's shoulder and try calming him down, she saw that they acted slightly out of line for the courtesy they were shown. When one receives sensitive information like this they shouldn't try and make the one betraying their principles look like a liar. The bounty hunter showed his teeth to Mana in a primal show of aggression making the magician's hand freeze in the middle of the reach and withdraw.

"We are grateful that you let us know this. This information may have saved my friend's life and that leaves us in your debt" Mana tried to show that the bounty hunter's effort to walk into the clear was appreciated, she even bowed her head for him, a common cutthroat.

"It's fine, if you have any valuable substance in those heads of yours, you'll head home to Konoha and will not leave the walls until it all brews down. There are many assassins skilled enough to operate inside village walls too so don't even approach the door and hire only the best in the biz to watch over you. With a little luck we can match wits and blades again one day" Roe growled out but this time in a more melodic and friendly tone. Just like that the bounty hunter's silhouette blurred and disappeared completely as he pounced high up into the treeline and disappeared from sight or any other manner of senses. When the Nekomata wished to be unseen, they remained hidden.

Kiyomi looked down, she was shaken by the news that her own clan was trying to get rid of her. The magician felt for her friend. She had no idea how it must've felt knowing something like this but she has felt undesired and hated in her life, she has felt like her very existence was hated and that her birth may have been pointless. Such dark thoughts never lead to anything good, she once almost gave up on herself because of them.

"Were you close to the Kirigakure branch? Do you have any potential suspects in mind?" Mana asked, while she wished to leave the matter alone and lead her friend back to the village, something like this had to remain in the centre of attention at all times. Kiyomi could never again underestimate this challenging time of her life or else it'd be the last time of her life to remember.

"Not really. We're relatives only by last name and some distant bloodline. Some Yamanaka in Kirigakure fled during the wars because they supported the village's stance, some of them moved because they weren't important in the clan's hierarchy here and wished to build something new… Some of them in there are pretty close, brothers and sisters of our parents meanwhile others are distant cousins of our uncle's fathers and so on. It'd be impossible to tell who did it…" Kiyomi recounted what she knew, still totally confused.

"I see…" Mana cut in after the silence became too awkward to tolerate.

"Seeing you getting injured like that, risking your life for me… Now I know how you feel all the time, if you care about every life as much as I care about yours. I've seen enough, let's go home" Kiyomi uttered as her eyes began to dampen and it became apparent that the older kunoichi was going to break down.

"Can you find out who did it from inside the village? Do you have archives, records of your clan in there maybe?" Mana asked looking at the slowly getting incinerated and falling apart inn that Roe blew up and burnt to a crisp.

"No. The archives inside the village only have records on the members that are part of Konohagakure. We couldn't allow the sensitive information on members working in other villages to fall into the village hands, even our own village, our loyalties lie first to our bloodline, then to the village administration because people in charge change and our family stays the same. Records on the clan members in other villages are in the other archive in the Yamanaka Resort" Kiyomi explained while whimpering and struggling to talk straight over her great emotional distress.

"Then we shall do no such thing. We will go to that resort and find out who is responsible, we'll go through every member of your clan and see who would have the most believable motive to see you dead. We have no time to leave this investigation in the village's hands alone. That would be to do as genin do things – follow the objective, do what is told. That's how children live their lives. We are no longer children, we're ninja! Ninja take such things into their own hands and as your friend I'll support you the whole way through" Mana firmly explained looking onwards the cold and broken road of fallen and burning trees ahead.

Mana felt painful pinches on her cheeks that began pulling them off like an alligator trying to tear flesh apart from bone.

"My soft-cheeked friend!" Kiyomi laughed out through her tears before hugging Mana from behind. The magician was a little bit shorter than her future teammate making the entire scene seem like an older sister embracing her younger sibling while teasing her at the same time.

"Cut that out!" Mana cried out in pain, "I was having a cool moment there!" she complained before smiling in sync with her friend. A painful sensation made the magician examine a couple of bruises and cuts that didn't get treated solely from the medical pill.

"You'll need to patch that up, can't just medicate yourself until all the smallest scratches are healed" Kiyomi worryingly exclaimed.

Mana grunted out in pain after Kiyomi finished sewing up the final untreated cut on her body. Thankfully the medical pill she had taken almost completely patched up the backstabbing wounds, save for the scars that will probably stay as a reminder for a long time to come.

"You know most cucumber-cheeked girls don't have kind teammates to sew their wounds for them, you should be more grateful, really" Kiyomi winked at Mana before settling down on the other side of the fire. The girls weren't too far away from the resort, maybe a good four hours more in a casual pace. They could've most likely reached it faster but too much chakra was spent on fighting off Roe. It would've been dangerous to augment their abilities further just for travelling purposes.

"I guess, but you really don't have a steady hand, you know. You'd make a terrible medical ninja!" Mana complained looking at the strangely crisscrossed wound on her shoulder.

"Yeah, I suppose even my sober sewing hand won't come close to drunk as balls Eiju's sewing hand… Maybe his drinking was the key?" Kiyomi made a playful thinking face before settling down on a rotten log on the other side.

"Nah, it was the problem…" Mana smiled finally moving her eyes away from her wound and back at Kiyomi. The girl picked up her shirt and got dressed as the autumnal nocturnal breeze was too chilling for her undershirt to fend off alone.

"One he often solved with more alcohol" the two girls replied at the same time as if they were thinking the same thing. The coordinated manner of finishing the same sentence made the two laugh out loud for a good couple of minutes.

Kiyomi's uneasy look broke Mana's fun and lyrical mood. Once the blonde noticed that the magician was curious about what got Kiyomi so riled up the Yamanaka just wiped her nose before pointing at Mana.

"You got a whole bunch of scars in that fight. You'll get to visit that douchebag in the Hospital…" Kiyomi noted, Mana looked down at where Kiyomi was pointing and noticed cuts and bruises everywhere where her uniform was damaged and she didn't even have the bravery to see the scars on her back and her gut where Roe's blades came out.

"Nah, I don't like removing scars unless they're a bother" Mana shook her head before uncomfortably looking away, "Feels like a waste of the medical ninjutsu you know. A ninja uses their chakra just to remove a cosmetic problem when there are people they could help with it instead…" The magician's mood then quickly fixed when she remembered Kouta, "Plus I'll have my own guy in there soon, no need to see that self-destructive Quack"

Kiyomi laughed out, "I guess that's one way looking at it, Hanasaku-sensei was always pretty understanding about fixing wounds on females, then again, me and her were the only girls on the team… Plus, I wouldn't trust that woman on my broken nose in a lifetime, for an S-Rank ninja she's actually terrible at treating others"

"Yeah, Hokage-sensei nearly killed me during our first meeting. I'm kind of worried for Meiko… Whereas I am careful in combat that one likes to match her opponent fist to fist, she has the skill and brawn for it. The two are very similar when you think of it" Mana laughed out imagining the two fighting.

"I wish the Gods to be merciful on any fool matching Chestnut Hanasaku fist to fist, didn't you hear about that guy she punched outside the known Universe during the war? Who knows what the hell happened to that guy!?" Kiyomi waved her hands before placing them on her temples as trying to imagine and calculate the woman's strength made the blonde's head hurt.

"Actually I've been beyond our universe. I've been in another one even. Even in there they've got ninja, we've faced guys from even another universe. Apparently they didn't have chakra in their universe so as powerful as they were they couldn't damage me even through the smallest chakra augmentations. I've always thought "chakra over matter" principle was sort of theoretic, I've never seen it hit so close to heart." Mana recounted, for a moment there Kiyomi sat in awe and even respectful disbelief of Mana's story forcing the magician to retell the tale of her being affected by a multiversal anomaly and sucked into what she only thought of as "the Naruto Universe".

"Wow… That's a… I'd really doubt that story if it wasn't so crazy that I'd doubt the capacity of your imagination to make it up!" Kiyomi exhaled in disbelief. Her entire world was shaken that day with her being told that someone of her own clan wanted her dead and that there was an infinite number of other universes out there, some of them didn't even have that singular universal force that stuck everything together and made everything work, the force obtained and mastered by the First People and handed down onto humans.

"So what do they use in those other universes? How could those "Gods" of those other universes be so powerful without any chakra at all?" Kiyomi shouted out in disbelief.

"I don't know," Mana shrugged, "Apparently they were just really strong, they also had those weird concepts like "negative speed" and stuff like that on their minds… It was pretty confusing, plus even the ninja in that other universe knew science like I've never even seen before – that's where all that tech came from recently, I was given some samples by Shikamaru-san to bring back to my universe so we could catch up a bit"

Kiyomi had a devilish grin before revealing what made her so happy, it was a biting thought really. "So it's cause of you every stupid lowlife has a visor analysing and giving them information and all those hi-tech gadgets, huh?" she tried to annoy Mana.

"It's not like it was impossible to get before, thanks to our very own Hokage-sensei" Mana grinned as the two kunoichi remembered that time a mercenary group leader started snagging a whole bunch of military technology from caravans coming to Konoha and due to the Fifth's poor paperwork management skills this thievery got lost somewhere and went completely unaccounted for.

"Ladies…" a loud and confident voice broke the friendly conversation making the two jump up and direct all of their attention into a briefly lit forest path where a suspicious and well-armed and armoured man was walking through.

The man was pretty tall but not nearly as bulky as Roe, even if he was just as well-equipped and looked like bad news in general. Mana and Kiyomi instantly prepared for combat as this man couldn't have been anything other than another bounty-hunter. His approach however was foolishly arrogant – to prance out right in front of them and declare his presence was very stupid or very bold. It was either a very foolish approach or he simply thought very little of the two kunoichi when compared to his own skill.

"Now, I'm only here for the head of the Yamanaka-hime, you little lady can sit down and consider yourself lucky." the bounty hunter finally revealed his nature by continuing to slowly advance towards the two girls, completely careless to move his hands onto any hidden weapons. It was like he was just having a stroll, so confident and so scary, something about this man projected fear. He was fear itself. A lot like Tanshu used to be like but nowhere close as potent.

Mana's hands began going through the hand seals, her hand seal weaving speed was second to none, even the higher ranking ninja she had met rarely compared with her on that regard.

"Ah, an illusionist…" the bounty hunter uttered quickly weaving a single seal.

Mana looked at her hands as they began floating around, suddenly she felt awfully dizzy and nauseous as her balance brain centre must've been hit. She tried dispelling the illusion as she fell down but the man closed the distance in an instant. Back when Mana was a normal civilian, in terms of her strength, she saw movements of ninja as flashes and blurs, now this man's moves looked like instantaneous movement to her enhanced perception.

The man stopped right beside Mana as the magician collapsed on her knees. She felt a bloody taste in her mouth but she held her mouth down while on her knees so that she didn't throw up. The man hit her balance centre, as well as other centres, that she actually threw up making her incapable of uttering the needed "Dispel" words to dispel his illusion. It wasn't really an illusion even, it was a genjutsu technique however, similar to the brain targeting techniques Mana used. A tad bit less advanced however, Mana felt like she could conquer them as while they targeted the brain they didn't exhibit any illusionary effects, only crushed her balance and made her feel dizzy and nauseous.

The speed of that man's seals was impossibly fast – Mana realized that he must've been a high ranking bounty hunter, nowhere close Roe's league. This was the man who would've been sent to take out Chunin or Jounin. This was running in with the predator of the higher league, it was a completely unfair match up!

Mana wanted to scream for Kiyomi to fight or run or… The bloody vomit just kept on coming, the magician couldn't focus on anything but that as she was completely crippled, too much to even properly dispel the genjutsu affecting her. It couldn't have been high ranked genjutsu, it would've had more differing effects if it was, it was low ranking yet effective.

Kiyomi tried to move but the assassin closed in so fast that it could only be described as an instant, even by Mana's supernatural senses. The man grabbed the girl's elbow and shoved it gently placing the kunai that the Yamanaka was about to pull out back in its pouch and punching the girl lightly in her gut before pulling out a broad yet relatively short sword with teeth-like spikes on the side, made for cutting and maiming and not stabbing, without a doubt.

Mana closed her eyes and focused, she was a genjutsu specialist, she'd not be conquered by a genjutsu technique so primitive! Her focus paid off as she made her body rapidly burn through chakra in order to accelerate its flow, blow off the cork that the man placed on her chakra network by opening all of the floodgates – break his illusion through superior understanding of her own chakra network, through greater skill.

"Mind Body Switch!" Kiyomi shouted in panic, pointing at the man point-blank and trying to switch her mind with the man's but by the time her corporeal form moved out from her body, at the speed of a thought, the man was no longer there. The bounty hunter locked in Kiyomi's arms with one hand and kicked her in the shin sending her on her knees just like her teammate was so ungraciously positioned.

With a rude and strong pull on Kiyomi's hair in the moment of weakness before the Yamanaka's mind wandered back into her own body the bounty hunter exposed Kiyomi's neck ready to saw at the blonde's neck with his peculiar blade.

Mana appeared behind him with a kick, she moved as fast as she could, kicked as hard as she could augmenting her body just at its limits but the man blocked the kick by raising his hand up without even having to see Mana behind him. Only once the man came in closer to the fire did the magician see his surreal features. Covered in black hi-tech armor, light enough to move around but durable enough to withstand weaker blows and attacks without much damage. His face must've been severely injured at some point in his life as it was now just a plate, some strange mesh of steel, technology and mangled human flesh. Almost like a mask made by infusing what once remained of his face with some living metal alloy. It made the perfect skull-shaped structure look that more ghastly and terrifying.

Without uttering a word the bounty hunter turned around and smacked Mana with his elbow driving her body to the dirt in a small crater.

Kiyomi recovered and wrangled out of the man's hold, rushing to her friend who looked unconscious, her eyes white and rolled back and blood still coming out from her mouth from the crushed internal organs damaged by the back of the bounty hunter's elbow.

"What a kindred spirit, about to die and worried over your teammate?" the man curiously looked at Kiyomi, hesitating to kill her once her back was exposed and he was handed a chance to do so.

"She's not involved, she doesn't deserve to die! It's me you want!" Kiyomi cried out trying to desperately find signs of life in Mana.

"Agreed. That is why I just knocked her out, just because I hit her hard enough to split the planet doesn't mean she can't take it. You two are about Chunin level, correct? That's what the intelligence said, a higher skill than her rank Yamanaka heiress with a possibility of some low ranking ninja getting involved" the bounty hunter estimated before lowering his sword and looking at the crushed bounty he was about to collect. Now that the girl had given up on her chances on beating this man there was no rush to kill her.

"It doesn't matter. You're just an unreasonable scum who only cares about money, so go on and kill me! Just know that you're killing a future heiress of the Yamanaka clan, a woman with honor and more money than whatever faggot paid you off, know that you kill the source of your inspiration for a lesser source. Go for it now!" Kiyomi shouted out after standing up and extending her hands, exposing her chest and her neck for being cut open. It was a brave statement, one that the bounty hunter must've appreciated as he sheathed his sword behind his back.

"Go on…" he growled out.

"What? You want a better offer? What sort of scumbag backs down like that? Kill me while I am generous enough to give you a chance!?" Kiyomi shouted out like a little berserker.

"Eh, I usually charge so much for my services that not many can suggest anything better, I suppose if you're a princess or a clan heiress or something, you could. So can you give me say… Fifty billion ryo? At least a hundred thousand up-front?" the bounty hunter stood there static yet the Yamanaka knew that he could draw that sword and shred her body in half with that odd thing before she could realize the pain of that motion.

"Yeah…" Kiyomi nodded removing half a million ryo from her wallet and slamming it into the bounty hunter's face.

"Well then… I guess this is your lucky day, I'll come to collect the rest in the Yamanaka Resort in two days then. Enjoy what few hours remain of your second birthday" the bounty hunter saluted Kiyomi before slowly collecting the money off the ground, turning around and walking away.

Shaking in fear Kiyomi collapsed on her knees and broke into tears, she remained curled into a ball until the fire died out, then picked herself back up and took Mana's unconscious body beginning her slow and gruelling walk towards the Yamanaka district.2


	239. Kiyomi's Aku-Soku-Zan

Kiyomi's speed faltered a couple of times during her trip to the Yamanaka resort. She was given two days to pay up the bounty hunter but that wasn't a problem. As an influential figure in her clan she'd be able to access even more sizeable resources than she was asked for. That was what troubled Kiyomi – to place a large enough bounty on her would've taken a really influential figure. Granted, knowing the amount of influence one had to have to place a bounty sizeable enough to interest even hunters gunning after Chuunin and Jounin also tightened the loop around much fewer throats of potential suspects. The location of Kirigakure did so even more.

Mana didn't look good, she wasn't bleeding excessively or vomiting blood anymore but she was simply knocked out, her skin was pale and her weight changed from being difficult to drag around to being light as a feather – Kiyomi's own faltering chakra levels must've influenced the dramatic shift in the weight she carried. It was unlikely that the magician herself shifted her weights so drastically.

It was because of her that Mana got involved, the magician just wanted to meet up with her future teammate and catch up, maybe train a little together seeing how the two would end up in a team in the future. And then she got dragged into this whole story of bounty hunters of varied power levels, all going for the outrageous bounty on Kiyomi's head. Even more, the magician already placed the responsibility on her shoulders to keep everyone around her alive at all times. As long as Mana could help it no one was supposed to die. Feeling as Mana's older sister made Kiyomi take up some of her silly "sibling's" responsibilities on herself as well.

There it was, the Yamanaka resort – a giant district of classic buildings built around a large beach resort, like an entire port town all by itself. One main stone paved street extended throughout the grassy plain and then over a sandy hill that lead to the majestic beach. It was, in a way, a halfway point between both branches of the clan – Konoha and Kirigakure and while there may have been Yamanaka in other villages in small numbers, their numbers weren't important enough to warrant such sentimental architectural decision.

Two guards rushed up to Kiyomi and took Mana from her hands. The duo almost instantly recognized the young lady who may possibly one day inherit the rule of the clan and be the most important person. Even if she did not fulfil that role, that was to say she'd have gotten married or there would've been someone else with a better claim to be the clan's heir and rightful leader – her influence would still be immense.

"Please make sure Mana is OK…" Kiyomi managed to utter before losing her footing. She didn't pass out, that'd have been too much of a mercy for her on fate's part. The blonde wished to pass out but she remained downed on the ground, huffing and struggling to breathe with a painfully pulsing chest that hurt evermore with each draw of breath.

One guard picked the unconscious magician up and rushed her away, the other one called for reinforcements and carried Kiyomi away to have her taken care of.

"Can we muster up fifty billion ryo for my holiday funds?" Kiyomi cheeked at her carrier who just smiled back at her.

"That is excessive but not beyond reasonable. We'll talk of it later, Lady Heiress" the Yamanaka ninja nodded.

By the time Mana woke up it was morning. A male Yamanaka ninja was watching over a bunch of medical machines that surveyed her condition and ran through various diagnostics without requiring the medical ninja spend an ounce of chakra. After the medical ninja noticed that the magician was awake he turned around and nodded.

"Well, it seems your recovery went smoothly, Lady Heiress shall be glad to hear it" he noted. "Granted, it was so close to being the opposite case entirely" the man complained to himself.

"Wait… I almost died?" Mana asked, if her worst fears were to be confirmed she wanted to know just how injured her chakra network was. With it having been completely torn to shreds once it was probably very susceptible to being damaged once more.

"Oh, no, your injuries merely knocked you out. Lady Heiress did not tell us you've ingested medical pills at least a day before, meaning any further attempts to chemically treat your condition would've lead to excessive kidney damage and poisoning of your entire body. It would've required an immediate transfer to Konohagakure Hospital which, I assume, Lady Heiress doesn't want" the medical ninja bowed his head slightly to Mana informing the girl that she had some moderate respectful standing with the local folk, likely due to being a friend of their elite figure. The man then left to attend other patients and inform of the updates on Mana's condition

Mana relaxed and closed her eyes, laying her head down and preparing to meditate a bit, maybe find out if her chakra system and her body didn't take any damage the medical ninja missed. After all, her Ego stage of meditation allowed her to examine her body perfectly, seeing any damage it has sustained, the state of her chakra network etc. If only she could reach the space entity she once spoke to in her own mind, she'd have a direct contact with her own body, almost like it was a separate entity.

Mana continued to meditate and look for wounds in her body but there didn't appear to be anything notable to spot. She may have missed some minor aching spots or healing small-time wounds but even while her careless glance over wouldn't pick them up, they weren't nearly notable enough to care about them.

Only a moment after her meditation concluded did Mana remember what knocked her out in the first place – a bounty hunter with a skill rank high enough to go after Jounin and Chuunin. Someone who toyed with them and didn't even bother acting like a real assassin. He was the first to underestimate Mana and not regret it in the end, he was so powerful and experienced that even while underestimating Mana's skill he still beat her. Mana clutched her fists together but then relaxed – the Yamanaka medical ninja spoke of Kiyomi as if she was still alive – that meant all was OK.

Being the strongest meant little to Mana. She didn't care if she lost a fight or was not the strongest ninja around. She had almost no pride in her power and carried no ill feelings to those that bested her in battle and yet she felt pathetic recalling that encounter with the steel faced bounty hunter. Whatever his mask was made of, whatever the exact level of skill the man possessed, he was certainly beyond anything Mana had seen before, save some exceptions that would've applied to any powerful ninja. He was capable of matching high ranking ninja and able of accurately calculating and showing just the amount of strength and speed needed to best his opponent. It felt painful having lost to him, not because he was stronger but because Mana failed to protect her friend once again. Why was it that she only managed to surpass her own limits once her friends died, why were revenge and rage her strongest motivators?

Kiyomi walked into the ward pushing the door rudely with her shoulder and leaping up to Mana with a single bound. Mana's body braced for impact with her excited friend but then Kiyomi just stopped right up to the magician's face. Kiyomi just grinned.

"Happy to see you're OK!" she declared, "Welcome to the Yamanaka Resort!"

"I feel kind of dirty…" Mana admitted politely, "It's not the amount of luxury I am used to or deserve"

"Oh, shut it!" Kiyomi laughed out, "Don't even go to that "I'm just a clanless ninja, no one important" bullcrap, you're my friend, that amounts to something, right?"

"I guess, are you OK? I assume you've beaten that bounty hunter? If so it makes for a pretty interesting story." the magician desired to know.

"Hell no, that man was on a whole other world, not quite Hanasaku or Sannin level but way above my or your paygrade. I remembered what you told me – all that talk about your new way" Kiyomi scratched her elbow nervously, it was likely that she also felt some moderate embarrassment over losing to that hunter, even if he was immeasurably more experienced and stronger than the two put together and elevated by the nth degree.

"My way?" Mana looked surprised, she viewed Kiyomi as someone who would've never agreed to make her opponent think they've won, she was someone much more likely to just overpower them and be done with it. The blonde was a kunoichi with a very prevalent sense of justice after all.

"Yeah, you know, when you beat your opponent by letting them win on your conditions. I paid the bounty hunter off" Kiyomi admitted looking even more embarrassed by how that ended up. To someone who took pride in the might of justice eradicating villainy and killing the scumbags alike to those that killed her brother such outcome must've been worse than death.

Mana tried moving up and hugging Kiyomi. "It's OK, you found out what motivates your enemy and you used it to beat them while making it seem like they've won. That's being charismatic for you, that's how you'll have to solve situations as a clan leader in the future. You beat that man, you hold power over him now – money. He acted on your terms. Is that not the same as catching him in one of your Yamanaka techniques?"

"Wow, you're crafty, you should be a saleswoman or something… Seriously, I bet you can make a surrender sound like a dominating victory" Kiyomi appeared to cheer up somewhat, even if it was more because of Mana's personality than improving her thoughts of how the bounty hunter in her way was beat.

"So, for how long was I out?" Mana asked, she wanted to know everything she had missed.

"A couple of days, my chakra returned by now so yours must've as well. We're paying the bounty hunter tonight, he's a pricy little shit, asked for fifty billion ryo, could buy a whole bag of black medical pills for that much, or a pretty good house" Kiyomi coldly explained.

"Oh…" Mana looked away still feeling bad herself that she was so weak that her friend had to resort paying the enemy off. Heroes weren't like that, while Mana would've been completely fine by paying a cutthroat off to avoid hurting someone, when her friends had to do the same it was somehow different. It felt like it was all Mana's fault. It was just how Mana was – everything always seemed like her fault and like she could've done something to change it. Truth be told she couldn't have known how fast and strong and skilled the assassin was – it was quite possible that he'd have infiltrated Konoha and killed Kiyomi in her own home as well. His skill implied he had the capacity to do so.

"It's fine, some of my more pompous clansmen spend more per single weekend spent here. Once my uncle gambled away ten times more and got into trouble with the clan elders. Yamanaka are one of the most influential and powerful clans in Konoha – we can handle paying a single expensive cutthroat. I mean if one of us in another village, without access to the clan's funds could do it – it won't even be a mark on our budget, I guess." Kiyomi tried mending Mana's foolish guilt.

"So you're not gonna try to take him out or anything?" Mana asked surprised.

"Nah, I also thought that catching him would be the right idea but… The clan elders even wanted to give him a counter-offer to off whoever hired him. Either way, he's skilled enough to make paying him the better option to do. I don't want the ire of someone like him hanging over my head – better to pay and be done with it" Kiyomi admitted once again feeling really dirty about the whole deal. Paying the bounty hunter seemed like a really dirty and cheap thing to do, even when it was anything but cheap in a more common meaning of the word.

"Oh, also your clothes were ruined, we have some of ours here, it's not quite what you wear but… No one really wears what you wear so… You know… Don't go all diva on us…" Kiyomi laughed out, Mana looked aside and saw a lovely light blue kimono with depictions of a lovely lakeside with pink lotuses and cherry petals. Mana knew that it would render her tricky stage magician maneuvers useless as the girly kimonos had no pockets in general and they were too loose to fit any of the hidden compartments from her uniform in it. She'd just be made more reliant on her ninjutsu and genjutsu in battle as the kimonos were also not too comfortable to fight in.

"Sometimes I ponder why our clothes are so shitty to fight in when at least one third of ninja are female" Mana sighed, "It's really beautiful though"

"True, it was made to be beautiful though so… Try to use it for its intended purpose, you shouldn't have a problem with that, despite your chewy cucumber-cheeks you're a pretty sightly girl" Kiyomi sarcastically tried to bite Mana while pinching her cheeks again. At this point Mana didn't even got riled up as she had gotten used to her cheeks being called "cucumber-cheeks" whatever that meant in Kiyomi's mind.

"So have you found out who actually wants you dead?" Mana wondered just due to curiosity, after all, in the resort her friend was totally safe. Or at least was supposed to be – no one would've dared to invade the resort of a clan notorious for their techniques that made them take over one's mind at the speed of thought.

"We've got a couple of possible contenders. One of them is Yamanaka Tenma, a nukenin that hates our clan. He's a real handful though, extremely dangerous so it's unlikely I'll even be involved when they go after him… We're not sure if he's in Kirigakure currently but he's a nukenin so he could be wherever he goddamn wants. Makes more sense than accusing an important village figure too." Kiyomi shrugged

"Could he have paid that much though? Sounds like a lot for a nukenin…" Mana faded into thoughts.

"The elders said that Tenma was capable of mental control far beyond the Yamanaka level. He has cybernetic augmentations and surgeries implanting his brain with chakra signal emitters that makes him able to control other people like their brains were his own. He was working on some forbidden experiments for years and he had the whole clan and the village fooled by just playing a game of puppets with the officials watching over him. I think for someone like that controlling rich settlement landlord would be as easy as peeing on two fingers, the elders share that thought… Maybe not with the same metaphor but… You get the idea…" Kiyomi shrugged.

"Wow… I never would've imagined that someone like that could've existed! Makes me wonder just what kind of world is still unexplored out there…" Mana looked through the window and admired the jolly Yamanaka Resort in a festive mood.

"One more reason to rank up to Chuunin and get access to the Bingo Book, huh? Everyone with a bounty on their head in your fingertips… Just imagine that" Kiyomi dreamingly looked away, sharing Mana's dreamy attitude.

"Wait, so that's why you're so hyped about ranking up?" Mana suddenly returned to reality, "You wish to have access to the Bingo Book to treat it as a kill-list?"

Kiyomi shook her head, "Don't be stupid, Bingo Book has both good and bad people in it. Criminals put bounties on village ninja, people they fear and village officials put bounties on scum. I'm only after the scum. Slay-Evil-Immediately doesn't sound that bad to me."

"Slay-Evil-Immediately? That's the principle hunter-nin used centuries ago during the war, when prisons were overstuffed and the war made it difficult to give people courts and properly execute justice. It was a dull principle of the time – Aku-Soku-Zan" Mana tried reminding her friend of the origins of the principle, she was horrified that her friend strived to go to such extremes in her hunt for justice. She wasn't really sure which hurt more – the fact that Kiyomi was striving for Aku-Soku-Zan or that she was perfectly within the limits of the law to do so…

Kiyomi rubbed her temples and shook her head in a raging headache, "Can we continue this existential debate some other time? When you feel better I'd like for us to chill out, have some fun. Visit the resort and really let it rip, then maybe tear through the beach. May be our last childish days, plus we don't get to just kick back and relax too often" she suggested.

"Childhood died long ago… I don't think I was ever a child after tying up the headband protector and wearing the Konoha insignia, despite what people tell me." Mana lowered her head recalling her earliest days and how difficult they were, even if the present was infinitely more so, now Mana was more experienced and stronger. She had seen plenty of the ninja life so it was merely a matter of adapting. "Though visiting the resort and experiencing your clan's culture is too alluring to refuse" she then bowed her head in gratitude for the offer.

Kiyomi smiled, happy to see her friend so hyped to experience her clan's culture and see the rich and relaxing Yamanaka Resort which was the resting ground of choice to anyone able to access it.

"Great, now I just need to take part in meeting that bounty hunter, I assume he'd not show himself unless he sees me." Kiyomi breathed in uneasily, she was clearly a bit intimidated by the upcoming challenge.

"Oh, I would like to participate as well. I want to see that man again, see what makes him so strong so I could match his strength if I ever had to protect anyone from his like again. Also I'd really feel bad about it if I was not there to help out, even if I'd be completely out of my league" Mana smiled politely asking her friend who just shrugged.

"Fine, that's in the evening though, what do you say about some training until it's time? There are a bunch of dojo that are open and all ours – very few come here for the training facilities anyways…" Kiyomi suggested to which Mana agreed, getting up and slipping into the lovely and slick silky attire she was given. The magician's hands froze for a moment while she was trying up the belt but Kiyomi butt in to remind her that she'd be given a gi at the dojo and needn't worry about the clothing.

"This is a holiday resort after all – if you need more clothes you can always buy any you like" the Yamanaka stretched out like she was trying to hug the entire world. A busy day of training awaited Mana right after she woke up, granted she'd not have woken up if she hadn't been completely recovered. She still felt a bit rusty and aching on the sides but a ninja had no luxury to slack about. She was just shown how little she meant in this world, it was Mana's duty to catch up and tell the world otherwise!


	240. Making Senpai Notice

The dojo owner lifted his arm up preparing to call the beginning of a sparring session. Usually Mana would've politely refused from a sparring session but after her experiences in the quest for the Box of Ultimate Bliss she had learned to appreciate its value, as well as the value of martial arts in general. Before Mana thought of it only as an art of hurting people – something completely opposite to her ideals. It took a lot of hardship to change that around.

The magician prepared for a tough battle – Kiyomi was a fellow genin who was actually above the rank she was in. Apparently she was supposed to have already participated in the Chuunin Exams but missed them due to unfortunate circumstances. That all by itself made it completely impossible for Mana to underestimate her friend's abilities. The whole time the blonde held that precious role of Mana's elder, almost like an older sister or an upperclassman, in a way.

True, this was not an actual one on one battle, the two merely wanted to train which meant that they won't be trying to fight each other – they'll just be using moves and abilities that they wanted to try out, compare or perfect. That was much different from how real battles went. Still, it would give Mana a rough idea as to where exactly she stood in comparison to other stronger genin which made her feel a bit intimidated. The magician was rarely excited by a challenge, she was more of the kind to feel fear of challenge and tackle them with their best, respecting it as something of great importance and not some sort of a game.

Once the dojo owner lowered his hand declaring the beginning of the sparring session Mana and Kiyomi bowed to each other before making an honorable hand seal of confrontation which symbolled that they've challenged each other to battle they proceeded to go through hand seals. Mana completed her set the first by a significant margin – that made the magician's intimidation fade a little bit, she began realizing that she won't be a weak underdog in this battle completely overshadowed in every way by her superior by age and experience.

The magician removed a blunted blade which the dojo used for training and pointed it at Kiyomi. Despite the fact that the blade was made of rubber, unless it was specially insulated through specific chakra sealing techniques it couldn't at all insulate lightning techniques. Knowing that quite well Mana pointed it at her friend who was still working through her set of hand seals. The entire exchange of techniques would've happened almost instantly and completely unseen to a neutral civilian bystander but to Mana each fraction of the millisecond felt like entire minutes.

"Magical Shock Jutsu!" she shouted out channeling lightning chakra through the rubber blunted kunai that fired off a beam of lightning chakra aiming to shock and paralyze her opponent. While it wouldn't have left much lasting damage on an actual ninja, the pain and paralyzing properties of lightning chakra would've given Mana time to properly setup her following attacks.

The beam extended on and on, moving just a tad bit slower than natural lightning but Mana's worried eyes began feeling a bit bored by seeing the crackling sparks extend out from the beam as it extended towards her friend.

"Earth Style: Reverse Hacksaw!" Kiyomi finally finished her technique right before the beam of lightning hit her right in the chest, such an outcome would've burnt right through anyone without the ability to control chakra like a civilian, unless Mana specifically weakened the technique. Knowing the skill level of her opponent the magician pulled no punches.

Kiyomi leaned down, the beam crept up closer and closer until to Mana it seemed it was almost touching her gi. The blonde's palms smacked into the ground erecting man-sized rock pillars from the ground that lined up and headed towards Mana. The very first pillar blocked Mana's beam breaking it down completely. The ball was now in Mana's court and understanding that as well as wasting no time for being surprised that her friend successfully protected herself from Mana's attack, breaking her ninjutsu like it was a brittle breadstick, the younger kunoichi prepared her own response.

Going through a pair of hand seals in a flash, Mana began turning around her axis like a ballet dancer making a graceful and complicated pirouette. "Rebellious Twist Jutsu!" Mana shouted out as the wind vortex generating around her from Wind Chakra got hit by the sharp looking stone pillars that tore through the dojo ground but instead of busting through and hitting Mana the two ninjutsu counteracted each other for a moment before the stone actually broke through Mana's technique, surprising the magician.

A moderate painful blast to the chest sent Mana sliding back and almost hitting the back wall of the dojo. The collision of her own protective Wind Style technique and Kiyomi's ninjutsu weakened and shattered the stone a fair amount making the hit only sound and look strong but the actual ground shattered upon impact before leaving much lasting damage. Only a small red swelling was left that would soon disappear without a reminder of Kiyomi's impressive ninjutsu showing.

Kiyomi went through a bunch of hand seals, ready to hit Mana with another ninjutsu technique but the magician prepared her own response weaving a single hand seal many times faster than her older peer could do the same.

"Friendly Gust Jutsu!" Mana chanted out the name of her technique releasing a strong gust of wind at Kiyomi that would've knocked a person off their feet or propelled any projectiles or paper tags at the opponent as well as hitting them with enough violent wind force to keep them rooted to the ground for things to come.

"Wind Style: Great Breakthrough!" Kiyomi shouted out as she herself concluded the hand seals to her technique, once again, just before Mana's picking up speed and strength Wind Release technique rushed at the blonde counteracting Mana's technique, not only that but completely overwhelming it and sending a double powered gust back at the magician as if the blast of wind absorbed the speed behind Mana's own technique using it to accelerate itself.

Mana grinned, she had planned this and was ready for it, her hands flashed through a pair of hand seals before the overwhelming gust of wind reached her blasting her through the back of the building and toppling it. "Spellword Jutsu!" she shouted out before gathering air into her lungs and blowing it out in large force, strong enough to blast an enemy back and overwhelm him completely, maybe even crack a few ribs through wind pressure alone. The techniques collided right up close to Mana and at first the magician's gust pushed Kiyomi's back but then both techniques erupted into a violent outburst of windy eruption and sent both kunoichi on their backs and slamming into the respective dojo walls.

"Your ninjutsu skills are superior to mine…" Mana smiled admitting it through a little bit of broken pride in her chest. The young kunoichi knew that her teammate had already known in but she wished to express her decision to move on to another area of expertise as there was nothing to gain from continuing to launch ninjutsu nukes at each other.

"Not entirely true…" Kiyomi shouted out scratching her aching back and coughing out dust and air that filled her lungs after the violent windblast. "The strength of my techniques, as well as their overall mastery, is greater on my side. However you can launch them much faster as well as in greater numbers – you've launched two times more jutsu than me and we both seem to be at the same state. Our similar degree of exhaustion suggests that your much higher chakra level allows you to fire off a bunch of weaker techniques without bothering much about how much chakra they take"

Mana's smile disappeared and was substituted by a respectful expression of surprise. Kiyomi truly had more experience and a much more skilled eye to analyze a battle with. That didn't mean that she was smarter than Mana or a more skilled strategist, necessarily, it merely meant that the Yamanaka could focus better on the things she was supposed to notice first. The magician had to admit that she had noticed those things as well, she merely didn't focus on them, choosing to single out the fact that Kiyomi's jutsu were simply stronger.

"I must admit, I've never heard of your jutsu. Great Breakthrough is a very common Wind Release technique, it's simple to use as well, don't you know it?" Kiyomi scratched the back of her head.

"I'm pretty sure I've told you that already when we first met, I don't like using someone else's techniques. I invent all of my own techniques and build up my arsenal myself. A good entertainer doesn't rip off the techniques of other people! That still hasn't changed about me" Mana smiled while rubbing her nose with her index finger. Her own personal principles influencing so much of how she fought embarrassed her a bit.

"That's weird… You should just read up some textbooks and learn some generic elemental release techniques" Kiyomi suggested.

"Nah, I'm fine like this. It has its own advantages – no one knows my techniques when I invent them all by myself, they may be weaker but they also teach me a lot about the concepts of ninjutsu and genjutsu. Practicing and making new techniques teach a whole lot more than some book would – I'd know. I've read most of them." Mana laughed out.

Kiyomi answered Mana's smile before beginning to go through a bunch of hand seals. She couldn't believe that with all of Mana's impressive hand seal weaving speed built up from specific training as well as her skill of being an impressive stage magician with second to none sleight of hand she still set up her technique first. The younger kunoichi must've lowered her guard and she'd pay for it!

"Genjutsu: Haze!" Kiyomi shouted out as a bloom of flower petals carried by a gust of wind that appeared from out of nowhere spun around the dojo's inner fighting mat. Mana's eyes began greying out as both her irises and her pupils became dulled out and grey. A flowery clone of Kiyomi's separated from the kunoichi's figure and leaped at the magician, exploding into a blast of cherry blossom petals upon contacting with the magician.

Kiyomi almost shrieked out in glee of catching her fellow kunoichi off her guard but as the petals cleared something felt odd. Mana's frame was leaning back like some sort of a malevolent spirit or a serial killer from horror movies, the girl's body then snapped back snapping her spine and exploded into a burst of light that blinded Kiyomi.

"What? Am I the one under illusion!?" she shouted out in disbelief after seeing clones of Mana come out from the ray of light that appeared to create a glowing portal on the mat. Kiyomi wanted to prepare to dispel the technique but she knew that often times if completely ignored the illusions may cause their negative effects after the illusion successfully goes its course. For example once the created clones hit their target, or created weapons hit the opponent, just because they are illusionary, it doesn't mean that these attacks should be ignored for who knew what sort of negative mental effects they could've had…

Kiyomi jumped up kicking one of the clone into two pieces with a tornado kick and then rapidly dispatching of multiple more through awesome footwork and sharp and precise elbow, knee and fist work. A single connecting hit split the clones into bursts of light but even as the Yamanaka heiress dispatched of the clones quite fast she wasn't anywhere near fast enough – those clones appeared from the glowing hole in the ground faster than she killed them. At that point the Yamanaka decided to take the risk, she placed her hands in a hand seal position and let her chakra flow faster and more rapidly, burning more of it in the process.

"Dispel!" she yelled out spending a bit of chakra to cancel out the illusion but much to her surprise the clones continued to come at her. When the clones hit her it didn't hurt, but her lungs strangely faltered as if it did – her breathing became erratic which was slowly choking the Yamanaka. How could dispelling a genjutsu not work? Unless Mana didn't actually target her chakra flow… She must've… To achieve such effects she must've targeted her brain specifically, hitting certain brain centers to emulate these effects.

"Dispel!" Kiyomi shouted out blasting another outburst of chakra straight at her brain's vision center. Being a genjutsu expert herself she knew fairly well of the brain centers and their locations. Had she not had the knowledge of genjutsu she possessed, dispelling this illusion would've been close to impossible.

Finally the hole in the ground disappeared and all of the clones faded out. Only a smiling image of Mana holding the rubber blade to Kiyomi's neck was left. As expected, the magician's illusionary skills surpassed those of Kiyomi's by far. Whereas Kiyomi's ninjutsu was superior to Mana's in power and skill, as well as experience of their use, genjutsu was an area where Mana had few equals, not only amongst genin but amongst older ninja as well. The illusionary craft was not a popular one and very few dabbled in it. Even the more famed village's genjutsu experts could only use illusions categorized at B-Rank at most, some nukenin could surpass that. Soon Mana would hit the wall that the strongest illusionary ninja of Konoha stopped at and it impressed the Yamanaka greatly.

"Wow, my illusions are no good at all…" Mana worked herself up putting her blade away. "So far I've used them on you and Hokage-sensei and yet both of you broke out of them" she got distressed over it.

"Heh, well, I have to say I wasted… More chakra than I should've trying. As far as Hanasaku-sensei is concerned - I'm not even sure she has a limit of chakra to hit at all. That was amazing – you caught me in an illusion before I could even initiate my own illusion giving yourself more time to act on me while I was out of it. Your genjutsu expertise is seriously gonna carry you through those Chuunin Exams, I'm not even kidding" Kiyomi complimented her teammate. The blonde was a fairly decent illusion user herself so she knew just how far ahead Mana's skills were.

"Really? Guess that makes up for you beating me at ninjutsu…" Mana smiled shyly blushing over the compliment.

"Seriously, I couldn't even see your hands move and do the illusion!" Kiyomi continued to obsess over the exchange of techniques. She was just so dumbstruck that Mana hit her with an illusion without seemingly moving.

"That's because I used one-handed seals, one of my hands was crossed under the other, that allowed me to cover up my already fast hand seals…" Mana revealed the secret by locking her hands up just as she held them before the exchange happened. Finally Kiyomi could put together what had happened.

Suddenly the laughter of the two kunoichi was broken – Kiyomi's elbow strike whizzed right up next to Mana's cheek opening up a strong gash. Such a blow, if uncontrolled could've caused violent earthquakes, just the air besides them could've created entire tornadoes and the shockwave from them could've been felt at the other side of the world. Yet Kiyomi perfectly contained the chakra inside the hit and only meant to transfer it to Mana, as a ninja willing to throw such strikes around must. That was a close call.

Kiyomi followed it up with a blindingly fast flurry of strikes, Mana's head and upper body moved equally as fast. Both Kiyomi's limbs and Mana's upper body began blurring and disappearing from sight to the dojo owner who continued to observe the battle. He had little time or reason to look surprised – he had seen much older and more powerful ninja going at it, after all.

Soon Kiyomi's legs joined into the fray. Mana could dodge them – the evasive training by Kouta as well as deflection training with Meiko, with the added bonus of martial arts training of the Sun Disc arena allowed Mana to avoid every single attack no matter how skilled and fast it was. However she was so taxed, so immensely troubled by Kiyomi's offensive pressure that she had no hopes of responding. The blonde was simply stronger and faster physically and while Mana could easily deflect or evade a strike she couldn't counterattack – it was a deadlock.

Kiyomi kept on striking, her strikes either only hit thin air, or were gently pushed away from their intended targets by Mana's own palms or feet, or were caught or blocked. Blocking Kiyomi hurt – even through chakra augmentations so Mana tried not to do it. The blonde was seriously insanely strong behind those lightning fast strikes, she hit at least five times faster than the fastest person in the Sun Disc arena, she also appeared to have some taijutsu training giving her decent martial arts background. Enough to keep Mana busy and unable to respond.

Finally Kiyomi grabbed the collar of Mana's gi attempting to slam her friend to the ground and shove a fist close to her face. This slow manner of attack allowed Mana to go through a pair of hand seals propelling her palms down and shooting a stream of wind chakra that blew Mana up into the air and Kiyomi down on her butt.

"Twist of Fate Jutsu!" Mana chanted out before kicking off the ceiling so that she didn't hit her head into it and landing on her feet.

Kiyomi stood up, Mana turned around and the two approached each other. They made the seal of reconciliation to signal the end of a sparring session. No one really beat anyone but now they knew the extent of each other's abilities first hand, they knew where they were compared to the other which was invaluable experience. Knowing that she was no weak link compared to Kiyomi made Mana's own self-confidence bloom. She was beginning to believe that she would never be the weak link of a team again, she'd never need saving and her peaceful intent would never again cause her team's downfall or any of her friends to get hurt.

"You're a better hand to hand fighter, Kiyomi…" Mana admitted.

"Maybe, still, I couldn't hit you once. That's some weird style and some pretty slick moves!" Kiyomi nodded.

"Still, my physical style requires counterattack, exploiting openings given or created. You gave me some, I created more, but you were too strong and fast to exploit them. If we were to fight hand to hand we'd be fighting forever – either you'd tire trying to hit me, or I'd tire evading causing the first to tire to lose" Mana shrugged.

Kiyomi weighed her hands down and bent up to her knees as her sweat began dripping on the ground excessively.

"Wow… Speaking of exhaustion! Wanna go grab something to eat? It seems this sparring session wore me out!" Kiyomi declared, looking surprised that Mana didn't wheeze anywhere near like that.

"The illusion you were in made you swing at thin air, you were not fighting just in your mind. All the effort you put into it got transferred through your body and mind which is why you're so exhausted" Mana explained to which Kiyomi only shrugged and nodded. The two friends rushed off to the showers before heading to get something to eat. The evening was approaching rapidly and it would definitely not be a pleasant one for either of the two…


	241. Night on the Rooftops

"Wow you really don't eat that much, do you?" Kiyomi grinned at Mana while the two slowly advanced towards the old Yamanaka mansion where the meeting for the money that was promised the bounty hunter was supposed to take place.

"I guess not, I was pretty famished too, haven't eaten anything for days, I needed that" Mana replied with a smile, she was used to just barely finishing a plate meant for one person, no matter how starving she thought she was or what giant animals she imagined being able to eat at those moments of weakness.

"It's kind of odd how you can even fight as good as you do, I mean ninja should probably be eating a whole lot given how strong they are" Kiyomi wondered about the relation behind the wonderous things ninja did and the amount of calories that they consumed.

"Maybe, then again, I don't think chakra has anything to do with calories, it's just a force our universe has" Mana shrugged with almost utmost indifference.

"Wait, you said there were also ninja in that other universe you went to, what was that all about?" Kiyomi felt pretty curious about Mana's tale of her adventures in another universe, invaded by godlike people from yet another universe.

"I'm not sure, I think Sasuke-san said that our universe was special, he looked really surprised by the amount of chakra I had. Come to think of it he mentioned something about some fruit, I think that ninja on that universe are merely descendants of someone who took a bite of a chakra fruit, whereas our universe is overflowing with it which is why they were all so surprised by my chakra level" Mana did her best to recall the experience, strangely enough, it wasn't something she tried recalling that often. She kind of missed all the people she met on that adventure and thinking of what happened made her miss all of them even more, as a result Mana just filtered it all out of her mind so that she wasn't reminded of that painful farewell.

"Hmmm… That's pretty weird." Kiyomi bellowed delving deep in her thoughts, trying to imagine a world as described by Mana. "I wonder if we got stronger if we went back there and ate some of that fruit?"

"I think every fruit is chakra fruit here. Just eat an ordinary apple or something…" Mana smiled.

"I think eating too many fruits is the problem as to why I'm feeling so heavy right now" Kiyomi complained tapping her full belly while breathing out her final easy breath.

Not too long after the view of the classical large Yamanaka mansion came into sight. Even from the ground level the ninja waiting for the bounty hunter could be seen. Most may have taken the presence of hooded ninja as an offensive gesture but truthfully it was a welcoming one. For a ninja to just wait around, out of the hiding was some of the most welcoming gesture they could've showed the bounty hunter. Hell, he wouldn't have been too off to think of himself as an honored guest being greeted like that. Mana and Kiyomi quickly ran up the endless flights of stairs until they found the exit to the rooftop.

"Lady Heiress…" some Yamanaka bowed their heads a little or at least noted Kiyomi's presence. Some others still didn't even bother. Truth be told Kiyomi wasn't an actual princess or her inheritance of the clan's leadership wasn't completely confirmed. Even if she did inherit the reins of the clan, she could still surrender them by getting married, even if she didn't marry someone from the clan.

"Who is this young lady?" one of the hooded ninja inquired directing their eyes at Mana. The bright blue eyes of a Yamanaka clansman shined bright even through the evening chills and gloom. Many of the ninja had such rich and thick blonde hair that they didn't stay in the hoods and ran wild out of the cover.

"She's my teammate, she fought to protect me from this bounty hunter, she deserves to be here. Seeing to it that I'm OK is her personal interest, you see." Kiyomi pointed her chin at Mana who just bowed her head for the collected circle of Yamanaka ninja.

"I do not think little of your ability to protect your heiress' life, I just wish to be here and if possible do everything I can to help you fulfil your duty and protect my friend." Mana affirmed the ninja who just at first appeared quite interested but then ultimately didn't seem to make it too big of a deal.

"Well, the transaction would've transpired with or without heiress herself, seeing how her participation is optional, there's no harm in letting one more optional participant stick around." one of the folk noted.

The wait for the bounty hunter proved not as entertaining as anyone would've hoped, then again, it was not quite reasonable to assume that waiting for anything at all to happen was to be entertaining in the slightest. It felt a lot like waiting in an ambush – one of the more boring and seemingly pointless experiences that then excited one for a brief moment before returning to being boring and pointless.

"So, how do you find our resort, Konoha's Sorceress?" one of the Yamanaka hoods asked Mana while turning at her. The bright blue eyes and blonde hair of the man slipped out from under the shadow of the hood and from the pearl-like shine of the man's teeth it could've been reasonably assumed that he was smiling.

"It's really astonishing. I am a big fan of classical architecture therefore it is all quite breathtaking. Not only it is very nicely preserved but also quite functional and appearing to be flourishing even…" Mana replied politely, still uneasily looking around for the slightest sign that the bounty hunter was approaching.

"Oh, you're spoiling us. Are you familiar with the asphyxiating traditions of the Yamanaka politics or are you speaking from your heart?" the man asked again.

"Politics? I'm sorry, I have no political agenda, Sir. I am not of any clan so I have no favors to gain from yours." Mana politely turned her head sideways a couple of times. "I truly am loving these sights, the Yamanaka district is perhaps the second favorite of my seen classical sights, I would say that the Uchiha clan district slightly surpasses it but it may just be because of the circumstances of the visit. Worrying over the life of my friend may not be appropriate situation to absorb all the heavenly sights this place has to offer"

The man laughed, "Do not tell the heiress that, she fosters a great distaste for the Uchiha. Can you really blame her though? Whenever one is in the company of one, they let everyone else know how graced they all are to be in their presence."

Kiyomi stepped in closer to the two squinting suspiciously, "Hey, are you two talking about me?"

"How not unlike someone else…" Mana tried to cheek her friend a little, it appeared that the man enjoyed that notion somewhat and gifted the magician with another smile.

While the conversation was about to continue the arm of a Yamanaka figure raised up all the way from its elbow signaling for total silence and attention. The figure then extended their hand and pointed at a blurry sight with its fingers. Far in the distance Mana could make out the blurry movements of a very fast and silent ninja who was so overly worried over being silent that he was not nearly as fast as he had the talent to be.

Finally the bounty hunter appeared in all his glory, stuck to the ground with one hand on his blade. After a momentary scan of the environment the bounty hunter noticed that no one was responding to his appearance which gave him an answer as to why exactly these ninja were rowed up thusly. He had been wondering for a long time as to which option it was – were they ready for battle, or business.

"The dark skinned girl is here too, I assume she is assurance that you will play nice, therefore I'll kill her in an instant if you misbehave. None of you will be fast enough to protect yourselves and her at the same time" the man uttered in a confident and masculine voice, one that Mana dreaded quite a sizeable amount.

"You assume a lot, bounty hunter, just be grateful that we decided to play nice" one of the hoods took a more aggressive step forward and towards the bounty hunter who straightened out in all of his size. Mana noticed a very peculiar visor device, almost like a pressure helmet that had various symbols and numbers appearing on it. The man didn't have anything like that before – it must've been a sensory device that allowed the bounty hunter to survey recorded chakra signatures if he didn't possess innate sensing abilities.

"Play? With what toys?" the bounty hunter laughed showing the man's ninja pouch in his hand. He moved completely unseen not only to Mana, but as the magician noticed even other ninja present at the location which confused the magician even more. There had to be a decent handful of Chuunin and at least some Jounin or Special Jounin here. For them all to fail to pick up a single movement… It painted a very sad potential picture of a failed scuffle.

"Silence! You've demanded a price that was too large for our future heiress to carry on her own. After some discussing we are ready to pay it, however. Please accept from us forty nine billion, nine hundred ninety nine and a half million ryo as the price you've named" another Yamanaka hood butt in before the younger hooded ninja could escalate a conflict further.

The attention of the bounty hunter turned at the more reasonable hooded man who was holding multiple suitcases filled with ryo.

"My deal was with the Yamanaka girl, she will be the one to pay me, even if the money is yours" the bounty hunter declared after a brief moment of silence.

"It makes no difference to me who delivers our end of the bargain to you." the Yamanaka relented moving away from the suitcases after stacking them on the ground. Kiyomi approached them and lifted them up, briefly examining them with her eyes and sizing their weight with her arms. She then approached the man and placed them on the ground, opening each one of them, one by one.

"You don't have to go through all of that. I'll trust that the Yamanaka clan won't risk tarnishing its just reputation and risk the streets of their resort being dyed red. You've got better things to do than to wage war against a bounty hunter like me." The man affirmed with a slow gesture of his hand.

"Nice fishbowl…" Kiyomi bit the man after standing up and turning her back, then walking back to Mana.

"Paid by your pocket money…" the bounty hunter nodded before tapping the firm helmet he wore. He then turned around and walked up to the edge of the roof, ready to take off.

"Wait!" the Yamanaka hood shouted out, he took the luxury of taking a couple of steps further, before the realization hit him the bounty hunter was looking him right in the eye with his hand holding the grip of his strange spiked saw-like sword.

"Unless you're willing to make further business, I recommend you to consider your words very carefully" the man grumped out.

"It is, actually…" the Yamanaka hood nodded before removing his hood, the long hair and another, even longer string of bright hair flowed free in the windy autumnal night. "We want you to kill Yamanaka Tenma!" the man declared.

"I see, so you finally figured out who is messing with your clan, huh? Well, sorry, I can't help you there…" the bounty hunter turned around, sounding genuinely sorry to have to decline the offer for another business opportunity.

"What? Why not? You're a bounty hunter, are you not? Tenma is a known nukenin of Konoha, we are willing to pay you his bounty twofold!" the Yamanaka ninja delved deeper.

"The creepy dude's got some really influential circle of friends, the sort I wouldn't be willing to mess with. Even if I managed to enter Tenma's nesting grounds with my mind intact. He is a man capable of shattering one's mind or taking it over without you even knowing of it, he could be giving me orders without my knowledge. What makes you think that he hasn't planted a program within me to kill your heiress on sight? Right here and now? That is the man that is Yamanaka Tenma, if you really think he's the one you need – leave it alone. That's my professional advice, free of charge." then without listening in on the tirade of angered shouts and people yelling over one another the bounty hunter turned around and blurred before disappearing again. Mana couldn't make out his image reappearing even once for him to leap off of another building, his speed and presence was incredible. When he left it was like a giant boulder was off everyone's chest.

Kiyomi grinded her teeth in anger. It must've pained her to not be able to dispatch of this bounty hunter. She didn't want to use him for her own gain, judging from what Mana saw blazing in the blonde's eyes it was like she'd rather kill Yamanaka Tenma with her own hands instead of sending someone who kills for money after him. Hunter nin were different from bounty hunters, they hunted just those unfortunate enough to have their faces etched in the Bingo Book and only criminals, nukenin and such… Bounty hunters killed whoever had a sum of money on their head, common kill market or black one. A man such as this one didn't sit well with Kiyomi's moral principles.

"Well, at least this is over… You should stay here for a couple of days, let the heat loosen up somewhat. Once the rumor that even this guy refused to kill you spreads in the shadowy circles you'll be golden…" Mana tried cheering Kiyomi up.

"That's too bad, I'd like a bounty hunter face to punch, right about now" Kiyomi breathed out as well looking equally pissed off as she was relieved.

"Do not worry, Lady Heiress, we know the black market dealer that holds the bounty money. We'll make him an offer he can't refuse to remove that bounty or lie that it has already been claimed. We've got people looking over it even as we speak." One of the hooded figures assured Kiyomi. Mana was glad to hear that this matter would be resolved so effectively and so fast. Had her own head been evaluated so highly, she'd have no family to speak of to turn to, she'd be on her own… That was just one of many advantages of being of noble origins of a well-known and respected clan like the Yamanaka.

"Oh well, let's hid the beds then. Tomorrow will be a much brighter and more relaxing day now that this whole bounty hunter business is off our minds…" Kiyomi shrugged, pushing all of the hatred and unresolved anger issues into another compartment deep inside. "I know that you ran after me right after finding out of this bounty issue, but why did you want to see me before that?" she asked.

"Well… Wanted to see you, most of all" Mana smiled, "Then there were things I wanted to talk to you about, many of them we've discussed already such as our common team and all that. Then there were still things I wanted to talk about and work out. I'm glad we've had some time to train together before – it was also on the agenda."

"Well, we can talk about what would keep you awake at night on our way back. Now let's go, remembering dealing with that dirtbag makes me feel sick." Kiyomi playfully acted out a vomiting gesture before turning onto the passageway that lead back to the main parts of the building.

"We can escort you back, Lady Heiress, if you wish one of us can even carry you two home in an instant. Our ninja know this area well enough to move at full speed even inside this resort, they won't be restrained by their lagging perceptions!" another one of the Yamanaka hoods butted in but Kiyomi shut him down with the gesture of her palm.

"There'll be no need for that. Mana and me have things to talk about and I have a feeling they are of the girly variety. We're just going to use these lovely layered with stone streets as they are meant to be used – by having a lovely and peaceful nightly stroll. We'll be perfectly fine…" Kiyomi calmed the hoods down.

"Be informed that there exist bounty hunters capable of sneaking into our resort, there are some that would sneak into even Konohagakure. While this place is the safest one you can be in – you won't be completely safe until we receive knowledge that the bounty that Yamanaka Tenma put on your head has been removed." One of the hoods warned the blonde before the two girls set out. The streets of the Yamanaka resort at night were almost too divine to believe. The autumnal chill was also possibly one of Mana's favorite weathers that only seldom reminded the two that it was slightly too chilly for their chosen clothing.

The short trip home would undoubtedly be enjoyed, especially when it was lit by the crystal clear shining crescent shape of the moon in the sky, as well as the local sources of illumination such as still open and glowing brightly with neon colors street vendors and various sources of relaxation, entertainment and similar purposes. Was it not for the classical architecture the nightly Yamanaka resort would've reminded Mana so much of her own beloved Konoha streets at night.


	242. We Are the Imarizu

Mana threw a stone allowing it to splash further away, as far as her normal strength allowed her to throw it. Kiyomi followed Mana's example but hers flew beyond view, far away into the distance to where neither of the girls could pick up the stone anymore.

"You could've done better than that…" Kiyomi teased Mana.

"I didn't throw it to fly, I threw it to disturb the water" Mana replied observing the uneasy waves washing away at the resort's sandy beach surface.

"This may not have been the best time to visit the beach." Kiyomi admitted and in a way she was right – the beach was closed and it even if it wasn't there'd be absolutely no allure in swimming around in such cold waters.

"Depends on what you are seeking to gain out of it. A beach is a great place for reflection any time of the day." Mana calmly replied.

"Still, we should visit some warmer time, take that third teammate with us too." Kiyomi shrugged and tossed another stone, trying to make it skip but the stone sunk like a brick after hitting the wavy surface.

"Yeah, Meiko would love the beach, she's a lover in general, loves most things actually…" Mana nodded her head with a restrained smile before picking up another stone, tossing it around in her hand and then letting it fall back down as she didn't want to throw it. The magician turned around and just began to walk across the beachside.

"You still haven't spoken to me about what you wanted to speak with me yesterday. We'll be heading home whenever we get news that this whole bounty business is over and we'll be absorbed into our training and missions and all that stuff so… What are you waiting for?" Kiyomi asked following after Mana.

"It's just… I'm not sure I need that question answered anymore." Mana shrugged.

"Did you find out the answer yourself?" Kiyomi didn't let it go, strutting behind Mana.

"Well… Kind of. I figured out I don't need that question answered." Mana looked down uneasily, remembering her talk with Eiju after she came back.

"So it was just about hanging out with me, training and all that? You won't ask what you wanted to ask me?" Kiyomi looked up at Mana curiously.

"Well… I just met this young man, Kouta, in the mission I was in. We like each other but now that I've got my chakra control back I just… I don't know where things fit in anymore. I do stage magic, I'm a ninja… Can I really be a girlfriend too?" Mana finally admitted what she wanted to talk to Kiyomi about originally. Talking to Eiju sort of cleared it up for Mana but Kiyomi was in a much closer position to Mana's so it sort of made more sense to talk to her about it.

After all the blonde was a future possible clan heiress, a bride of another elite clan member, a ninja as well. It was quite possible that she had more on her plate to deal with than Mana. Eiju's answer was inspiring but Eiju was well… Eiju. He did things without thinking, future consequences may as well have been a tale to scare kids away from drinking. He couldn't have cared that much about balancing the many things he was, he acted out of pure impulse, all he was looking for was pleasure and feeling happy. It didn't matter if such desires were within his grasp or if what he was doing would even grant those goals, doing, moving ahead was what mattered with him.

"Yeah, that sounds like something that'd trouble you…" Kiyomi lowered her own eyes, she was probably hoping for another question which intrigued Mana a bit more than what she herself was going through.

"What's wrong?" Mana asked turning around at Kiyomi.

"It's just…" Kiyomi began speaking but then cut it off.

"What?"

"I just thought you'd ask of something different but I guess you're… You." Kiyomi smiled.

"Oh… Well…That's the only person I know how to be…" Mana tried talking, speaking anything instead of nothing just to kill the awkwardness between the two but then she shook her head and just stopped trying to talk when nothing came up.

"No it's… It's a question I never really asked myself." Kiyomi admitted. "I mean, I've always had plenty weight to juggle myself – when I was dating Eiju my clan was pissed beyond explanation. I was supposed to be the clan heiress, I was supposed to marry some big cheese suitor from like… Inuzuka clan or something." Kiyomi scratched the back of her head.

"Really? That whole princess forced to marry thing? That sounds pretty cliché" Mana smiled.

"Nah, it's not like I mind. Those Inuzuka guys were always pretty hot so it's not like I care if I have to marry one of them. After spending some time around Eiju I pretty much stopped believing in love, that guy just makes romance seem so… Down to Earth" Kiyomi took a stone and angrily hurled it past the horizon, speeding ahead like a bullet. "Before it looked to me like some magical thing but he treats it so casual. I don't really get intimidated by arranged marriages anymore after seeing that."

Mana laughed out loud, at first restrained, then her fit grew stronger and stronger still until the magician had to stop walking and bend over because her laugh actually began hurting her cheeks and make her run short of breath.

"It's just what Eiju told me…" Mana replied, "He made me realize the same thing he made you realize, he told me to not care and just go for it – if it didn't work just break it off."

Kiyomi smiled lyrically looking at the horizon and the setting Sun.

"You're a big girl, Mana. You can handle juggling those responsibilities and if you see you can't, you're the only person to accurately judge that. You're also the only one capable of recognizing if it's better to end a relationship. I think Eiju's a big asshole but in this case he's kind of right" Kiyomi shrugged.

"Yeah, it's pretty much what I figured you might say. I didn't expect you to say the same things that Eiju told me but… I figured that chasing after you wanting to ask you about it was pretty stupid." Mana admitted picking up a stone and hurling it beyond the horizon just as Kiyomi had done before. She was a bit angered by having to admit that it was stupid, this time she wanted the stone to fly and keep flying. It was also certain kind of training of control. Spending just a little bit of chakra to augment her strength and teach her control as well as proper self-control.

"It's not stupid, honestly, I feel honored you decided to ask me that. There's nothing wrong in asking someone for advice or for help. You know, I was pretty pissed when I heard you left on a mission without asking me if I wanted to come!" Kiyomi lightened up the mood after the two kunoichi turned around and walked towards a stone staircase that lead outside the beach and back to the resort.

"Well, we needed specifically a medical ninja, the rest of the roster just sort of… Built itself up" Mana shrugged.

The two spent some time wandering the resort districts, admiring the classical architecture, the busy streets and the pretty sights. All the lights and glowing signs. The stone paved streets, the classic buildings of wood, silk and only the most basic material and craftsmanship instead of modern technology. According to Kiyomi some of these buildings had not a single nail in them and used very few tools to build. None of them used more advanced tools like those more modern laser measurement tools used in building those taller buildings that were beginning to pop up in handfuls in pretty much every bigger village.

A ninja in standard Konoha uniform and headband landed right in front of Kiyomi kneeling in front of her. It startled both of the girls but only because of how calm, peaceful and safe they felt in the resort. There was only one person the kunoichi saw sneaking inside of it and even that one person was allowed to enter. Obviously it didn't have complicated tracking and protective seals like Konoha but its sensory protection may have just been more advanced.

"Lady Heiress, the deed is done. The black market dealer that was to pay the bounty was convinced to pay it up to us and has cancelled the deal. It is now completely safe for you to go back to the village whenever you wish to leave." the Yamanaka ninja reported.

"Do we know who put the bounty in the first place? Was it Yamanaka Tenma?" Kiyomi asked the man.

"The dealer said he didn't know. We read his mind and interrogated him thoroughly there was no memories of the man, it is possible that his mind was altered by a high ranking Yamanaka ninja. No other clan can mess with one's memories and wipe one's mind like that." The man answered without showing any reaction.

"So the only thing we know for sure is that someone wants you off the picture, someone who is a Yamanaka." Mana looked at Kiyomi.

"Yeah, at this point I pretty much got over the fact that my own blood wants me dead." Kiyomi clenched her fists and shook in anger before calming herself down with a deep sigh.

"It's a rogue, there is a reason why this scoundrel acted in secrecy, it's because his ambition is not shared, that much is sure, Lady Heiress! We won't stop looking into it until we find that man, be he from Kirigakure or Konoha we'll find him and make him face justice." the ninja rushed to assure Kiyomi.

"Oh well, I'm sure you guys will figure it out. Let's go back, Mana, we've no more business here plus I'm sure that Hanasaku-sensei will be gathering us all together soon. We've overstayed our welcome here, not literally." The blonde encouraged Mana while adding the last part to calm down the ninja who jumped up to butt in and assure the Yamanaka that she was very much welcome to stay for however long she wanted to.

Mana hesitantly followed Kiyomi back to the large building the two spent days at. It was a hotel-like establishment built to guest only the rich or the more elite visitors. It had countless Yamanaka ninja whizzing around non-stop. The two girls had decided to hit the showers as they had been training pretty intensely that morning, they made their way down to the dressing chambers, Mana was glad to hear that her friend was just as willing to engage in small-talk as she usually was.

"Look, I know my music taste isn't very popular one but…" Kiyomi shrugged.

"Not popular? What's wrong with Konoha-Pop?" Mana stopped undressing for a moment just to peek at her friend.

"Wait, you like K-Pop? I thought you'd be more of a… You know, classical girl?" Kiyomi laughed out.

"Just because I take my magician act way too seriously doesn't mean I like classy things all the time. For your information I like my popcorn smelling of only the most putrid butter whenever I go to the movies!" Mana shared a laugh with her friend.

"Can we stop agreeing on everything? Can you tell me that you at the very least hate Waru Kashisetsu, give me an excuse to claw your eyes out for once!" Kiyomi waited around for Mana to finish getting undressed.

"Sorry… If I did I'd drop dead and make my Tori-Chichi poster disown me." Mana made a guilty expression and followed her friend into the steamy shower room and the two entered into the nearby shower cabins. Both gender shower rooms were split by large oaken walls separating them.

Mana began sniggering when Kiyomi suddenly broke down in a song in the middle of showering.

"Is this a test? I do know my Tori-Chichi!" Mana shouted out before joining in.

Right after the second chorus ended and the song was supposed to go sad Kiyomi's voice didn't join in. Mana chuckled at her victory outlasting her friend and knowing the lyrics better but then the deafening silence began feeling eerie. The magician peeked from her cabin and looked into the shower vapor that was all over the place. The shower rooms had specific seal marks on the ground that accumulated water vapor from hot showers much faster, it was one mean of combatting peeps.

Mana squinted her eyes looking into a specific floaty shape in the fog before she realized it was far too large to be in the female showering rooms. Quickly the magician swiped her towel and tied it on her. She suspected something really fishy. Mana took a leap on and looked into Kiyomi's showering cabin seeing nothing but a small blood stain being slowly washed away. The magician rushed out to the dressing room and quickly got halfway dressed, barely stopping for a second, before rushing off, following the feint trail of water that Kiyomi must've left behind.

Right after the magician opened the door leading out of the showering complex a fist greet her. Large and dark one but not fast enough to catch her off guard, the magician leaned to the right letting it slip and just barely scratch the pin that held her hair together letting it loose. Standing right in front of her was a tall and muscular man with peculiar red and gold gauntlets that had blade tips at the knuckles. A weapon like that obviously used chakra to keep those tips from breaking off and used shock absorbing seals to protect the man's own knuckles from those hard impacts.

Having found herself diagonally below the man's extended punch and right up in his face Mana launched her own counterattack smacking him right in his mask which looked like made of some sort of steel micro-chain alloy. Sort of like chainmail but the links were so small that they were like threads. Mana's chakra augmented palm strike tore a small section of the man's impressive and undoubtedly expensive mask off exposing the lower part of his face – namely his jaw.

The man had dark skin, much darker than even Mana's exotic tan making the magician stop for a moment. This skin tone was native mostly for people north to the Snow Country – the Land of Lightning and the Kumogakure. Why would a bounty hunter come here to kill someone without a bounty on their head, or did this guy just not get the memo?

Having landed the first strike and successfully cracked the man's lip open making his lower jaw bleed profusely Mana felt confident in her ability to save her friend but… She wasn't here. That realization made Mana's moves stiffen up – this man wasn't the sole assailant. Someone could've been carrying Kiyomi away this very moment but why? Why kidnap her instead of killing her there and now if they were associated with the bounty that was placed? There was something about this attack that didn't quite add up and that terrified Mana – she was in the absolute dark.

The man was surprisingly skilled, now that he had adapted to Mana's counterattack and the battle officially had set its pace he successfully evaded the magician's attempts to exploit her opening. He also quite persistently covered up her attempts to leave him behind and rush further on, right to where Kiyomi was. This man was insanely skilled at hand to hand, his fighting style was unlike what Mana had seen before – he solely used his arms and fought with jabs, hooks and uppercuts that hurt the kunoichi from sheer air pressure around them by sucking air right from her lungs. Soon Mana found herself running out of air.

A painful jab right to her shoulder opening up a gash. Why did it hurt so much? Why did she feel so much warm blood running down her shoulder? These men either had such overwhelming chakra condensed and focused into their strikes that they broke through Mana's chakra augments without them offering much opposition. The blades on the knuckles cut right through her flesh and made her scream as they cracked the bones they touched. The pain completely took her over. Mana tried to adapt, she evaded a couple of quick kidney shots that'd left her bleeding out on the staircase leading to her friend.

Loud steel clanging sounds made fear tear through her chest and out in the open with steel claws, gripping at her throat and making her moves sloppy. She saw a pair of similarly dressed men swing over the staircases from the floor above kicking her down. Their kicks didn't feel nearly as hard but Mana still got taken down. She was outnumbered. There were three assailants now… Her shirt soaked with her blood began sticking to her skin and it was beginning to make avoiding the combined assaults difficult. The trio didn't relent, they kept on jabbing at different angles, trying to slip through Mana and get behind her so they could relentlessly beat her down with their bladed knuckles. The magician didn't let them. She got her thighs and shins sliced wide open a couple of times when she tried restraining the rushing assailants with her kicks.

Mana had to think of something, she had to fake an opening, she had to move ahead because she couldn't handle the game of attrition. Her heavy bleeding was beginning to cause blurry vision and dizziness. There was no augmenting herself to survive these blades as they sliced through any chakra augmentations. Maybe eventually someone would come to her aid, she needed to make noise! Mana jumped aside lining against the wall and forcing one of the fists to smash up a stack of dressing lockers. There were no clothes there – no one was here but the two of them at that time. They were too numerous and overwhelming to try and slip an illusion in. Maybe if she was fighting one of them but not all three at once…

Mana felt sharp and crippling pain in her back. She fell on her knees and glanced back. The fourth assailant stood behind her holding Kiyomi on his shoulders. The Yamanaka looked unconscious but she was also injured as her blood was running down the assailant's steel bodysuit.

Mana decided to go for it, fighting through the pain and feeling blood literally pouring from her backside where she was hit she ran through her hand seals but a strike intervened, it forced her to lean aside. The four surrounded her and didn't give her any time to do anything else but try to survive. They circled her like vultures and continued to jab and jab and jab at her. Mana moved to the best of her ability, she could possibly avoid one or two of them, now she was surrounded and injured, bleeding out. She couldn't see the angles of their strikes because her vision was betraying her. Mana couldn't remember when she stopped fighting back, all she could remember was the stickiness of her own blood all over the floor.

Mana's eyes wandered off to the back of the assailant who was carrying Kiyomi, she noticed something that breathed life into her. Something that forced her to remove all floodgates and rush chakra through her network, force it just to survive. Mana flipped over on her back and sat up, pointing at the attacker's back.

"That sword! Where did you get it, it's my friend's!" she slurred out with unclear and fading in and out tone. The assassin was clearly interested, he turned back and walked up to Mana.

"Let's go, we're too loud, we'll be spotted and taken out!" one of the others shouted out in a clear Kumogakure accent.

"You wish my blade? Have it…" the mysterious man spoke, his speech dulled and slightly silenced by his bodysuit as he pulled Shimo's Audra blade and pierced Mana's chest with it before her failing reflexes could react. Mana fell back, even if she could still feel a cold tear of irony run down her cheek after being cut down by her friend's blade, she couldn't feel the blade getting pulled out as her senses were beginning to fade, even her unusually large chakra pool was beginning to run dry having to keep her alive through such extensive injuries.

All Mana's fading consciousness could make out was footsteps, ninja rushing in and a violent clash. That and one word, screamed out as final words or uttered in fear before the accumulating squads or ninja uttered before being stricken down.

"Imarizu"


	243. The Girl Who Just Kind of Was There!

"What's wrong, daughter? You are acting like you are ill today, not working at all…" Meiko's father noted.

The young kunoichi had heard him enter her workplace, it was quite impossible not to hear such a tall man wearing steel gauntlets, shoulder pads and boots enter. Especially so for a ninja. His voice did not sound angry or complaining, he was mostly concerned. Meiko folded the letter she held in her hands and put it down near her unfinished work. A bunch of screws, bolts and gear work, all disjointed and scattered across the workbench.

"I'm sorry, father. I'll get to work…" Meiko tried to act like she took her father's words as scorn, maybe that way she could have avoided talking about what her father really may have wanted to know?

"I did not mean it that way, daughter, I hold no grudge for a child who doesn't finish her old man's work. I am just dumbfounded by the lack of enthusiasm in it. You are working on a model of an entire tower operating on gear work. Eccentric clients like that used to get my little sparky all fired up!" Meiko's father energetically gestured accidentally taking down a pile of steel plates and tools. Caught in embarrassment the man quickly piled it all by pushing the mess back into a pile with his boot.

Meiko looked down and picked the folded letter up, extending her hand up and bending it over her own shoulder as if gesturing for her father to check the piece of paper out.

"This little speck of documentation is making my daughter upset!?" the man roared out like a lion angered by a too bold approach of one of his cubs. The tall blacksmith smashed his hands together blowing air through his palms.

"Fire Style: Ash Cinder!" he yelled out as small cinders came out from his lungs and focused into a burning stream of incineration that burnt the letter to a crisp and also singed Meiko's upper body from behind leaving a massive layer of ash on the younger blacksmith's body.

Meiko angrily shook her upper body shaking off the layer of cinder, she didn't even have to augment her body to withstand a pitiful D-Rank technique that was unpleasant at best. Her father always had a habit of reacting excessively even if he usually stroke the first impression of a cold and unemotional giant like a nail to the head. That trait was multiplied tenfold when his family was in question.

"That letter actually contained the problem!" Meiko vibrantly yelled at her father who just apologetically shook his hands trying to avoid his lovely redhead's wrath.

"Really? What problem troubles my little daughter? Who dares send problems to my child!?" the man snapped back beginning to look for the author of the letter as if the man was waiting in Meiko's workplace the whole time just waiting to leap out and reveal themselves like a villain in a bad spy movie.

"The Hokage… I mean… The Fifth Hokage" Meiko replied quickly remembering that shortly after her return the Hokage had changed. She had managed to miss the final days in office of the Fifth Hokage. That certainly put the temporal length of her journey in perspective.

"Are you leaving on another mission, my little rabbit in fox's colors?" the man shrugged trying to wrap his quite thick head around the possible problem that could've troubled his daughter so much that she stopped enjoying what usually breathed great enthusiasm into her.

"She asked me to meet her today. Said she wanted to interview me for a position in her team." Meiko explained with a degree of sadness that was very much unlike her.

"But munchkin, that is great! Are you perhaps not aware of the honor of being in the Team Hokage?!" the blacksmith charged at his daughter, grabbing her into an uncomfortable hold that would've undoubtedly squished even a strongman civilian into bloody mush but Meiko just uncomfortably squirmed until her head finally appeared from the mountain range of her father's muscle and then allowed herself to push herself out of her father's hold working from the head down.

"That's the thing…" Meiko returned to profound sadness once her feet landed firmly on the ground. "Team Hokage is always composed of the most talented and amazing students. Usually genin that are in the Team Hokage are expected to either become Sannin or Hokage themselves at some point. I failed the Academy graduation exam once and I've been ditched from way too many teams to think of myself as Team Hokage material…"

"But do you not think that Lady Hokage is more perceptive than that? Maybe she sees the little fighter in you and acknowledges that?" Meiko's father lightly tapped Meiko's chest strong enough to punch a man's heart out but barely fazing his little daughter.

"I… What if the Fifth actually acknowledged Mana? I mean she was the one who finished off the Pirate Lord, not me. What if I'm just being judged unfairly just because of what our team has accomplished? After all, Mana was the one who put the team together, she schemed the entire adventure as an expression of gratitude for our services and us helping her out with her magic shows. I was just always… Kind of there. They don't give awards to people who were kind of there…" Meiko began digging deep into her insecurities.

The massive blacksmith tapped her shoulder with all the subtlety of an extinction level event and laughed out giving his daughter a thumb up.

"Even if you are just a "Was Kind of There" kid, you are the best "Was Kind of There" kid ever and you go show that woman that you are ready to just kind of be there wherever you are needed. You are late already! Go! Confront your fears, ask her about it. Don't just sit this out, do you think you'd have gotten where you are now if you sat your puny magician girl's mission out? Making a thousand shoddy spoons is better than to refuse your client at all, at least in the first case it makes you better at making spoons!" Meiko's father encouraged his daughter and for the first time in a while the redhead's face was finally dyed with a beautiful and dreamy smile.

"For the record, I really didn't get that spoon thing you did… I do get that I'm late though!" Meiko laughed out before grabbing all of her scrolls needed to armor up and fight. She expected some sort of test to follow this invitation to a team, such was always the case and Meiko quite often failed tests of both the paper and practical variety.

"I'm sorry I am late!" Meiko shouted out landing right in the middle of the described training grounds that had a bunch of empty and barely standing buildings put together to emulate a settlement environment. The new Hokage has done his best to revamp the entire ancient system – revamping the training facilities was one of the first things he did as he was a firm believer in good training improving the mission success rate.

"Well, I was late as well. I've never really figured out how those weird new display clocks worked, things were much simpler with pointy arrows and numbers…" Hanasaku smiled in a monkey-ish smile mirroring that which Meiko often gave Mana. Seeing this simian smile made Meiko understand that maybe being picked by this woman was no mistake. Maybe she could just fit right in?

"So, Wakizashi Meiko, what say you if I picked you as the third member of my team?" the woman boldly declared pointing at the blacksmith who was still feeling uneasy about this whole spectacle.

"Ummm… Actually… I was really wondering if it was the right idea…" Meiko scratched the back of her head messing up her red short hair to where they looked even messier than she usually had them.

"No. Initially I was really wondering if it was the right idea!" Hanasaku declared clenching her index finger into a tight fist and giving her recruit a daring and expressively confident smile. "Then I realized just how similar you are to how I was as a child! Your grades in the Academy are terrible, so terrible that you'd never pass with the current revamped standards in mind. You've been booted out of multiple teams you were assigned to for various reasons. One of which being that a lot of sensei didn't want to work with a student so inept at chakra control."

Meiko jumped up and began to develop a certain puppy look to her eyes as she was desiring to sink into the ground after each belittling word coming out from her sensei's mouth.

"In many ways you're more of a loser than I ever was! At least I had my honorable clan name to hide behind, you are from the "Wakizashi" family which has no ties to Konoha, it's not even in the archives!" the Hokage kept on going after which Meiko finally wanted to butt in.

"Actually… I made that name up, I was told that I was allowed to dismiss my clan name and make up a different last name when I had my license made. I am actually a Kirikuzu clan member." Meiko shyly explained rubbing her foot into the sticky dirt.

"Oh? I was not aware of that!" Hanasaku curiously exploded in surprise, the woman had no composure or restraint behind her emotions and seemingly just erupted like a volcano any time she wanted to emote something. To a woman like this it would've been literally quite impossible to tell a lie.

"I just… I don't…" Meiko tried to put her feelings into words but then Hanasaku interrupted her.

"I have also dismissed my own heritage. I was nothing like my other clan peers!" Hanasaku cheered out seemingly viewing Meiko more like a good friend than her potential student. This matching detail made the strange student-mentor relation between the two fade entirely, at least on the Hanasaku front.

"Actually you kind of should've known that fact, it's sort of in my file." Meiko pouted, she wasn't that knowledgeable of bureaucracy or paperwork of any matter but she knew at least that much. "Wakizashi is so clearly a made up name, it is literally the name of a short blade…" the redhead suddenly realized that this strangely ignorant woman in front of her was in charge of the entire village. More so, people were praising her in the last year for the immense maturity and growth she had displayed while governing the village yet she couldn't see a fake name even if it was spelled out in front of her.

Hanasaku snickered cheerfully while apologetically rubbing the back of her head. "Yeah, I guess I didn't notice that…"

An awkward silence took over the training grounds before Hanasaku finished her smiling and chuckling and took a fighting stance.

"Now, before I accept you and add your name to the file officially, I'd like to test your abilities." The woman declared.

That was something Meiko feared, being exposed as being as inept as she felt being inside. Then again, judging from the highly physical stance of the woman she was a purely physical combatant. That was a front where Meiko excelled in and made herself look that less incompetent.

"Look… I think this is all some kind of mistake… You clearly are silly enough to make such a mess up and accidentally check a different name on the list." Meiko's fears were beginning to wrap around her throat but then Hanasaku just kept staring at her.

"Yeah, it's possible, that's why I'm testing you, that's how tests work – they test. You know, you're not that bright, in reality." Hanasaku snickered in a very unrestrained and monkey-like manner again.

"Coming from you that's rich…" the blacksmith thought to herself and pulled out a couple of seals from her back pocket. The young woman extended them and made a hand seal unsealing her armor pieces.

"I didn't have much time to get dressed, I was really late so hopefully you won't object if…" Meiko tried to explain but then she noticed that her possible future sensei was no longer there. Being involved in the field of physical combat Meiko knew both what that meant and how bad of a sign it was.

Meiko caught the fist of Hanasaku while slapping her shoulder guard. It was pure luck that the blacksmith even guessed the right position to block in – she merely deduced it was the most alluring opening to not exploit. Suddenly a gigantic air pressure shocked Meiko in her boots and blasted her away – the force behind Hanasaku's punch was immense! The redhead had thought she had caught the punch but the actual force behind it was so immense that it took greater time to be transferred.

Meiko felt the whizzing air in her ears, she felt weak and powerless as her chakra was burning away, like billions of small flames burning their brightest before going out. Her body managed to augment itself successfully to survive the rushing force but it cost her a great deal of her chakra reserves. Not that she was that good at carefully managing what she spent and what she kept, accurately putting just the necessary amount of chakra into each augmentation like really skilled ninja did.

Tight hands locked in on Meiko's throat and wrapped around her head. The blacksmith felt immense pressure pressing against her throat and from the top of her head as the clutch pressed on, was the woman trying to crush the whole planet or just her head!? The blacksmith wanted to scream out by how much force was put out by the Hokage – it was like the woman was really trying to kill her!

The blacksmith felt her consciousness slowly fading away, the air so high up was dense, the pressure from Hanasaku's clutch was enough to press juice out from a diamond… Meiko would've screamed if she had enough air to do so in her lungs, or if there was anyone at all alive in this altitude to hear her. This crash will definitely kill her, definitely! Was this woman crazy!?

Then again… Those were always the odds. Mana survived these odds even as a civilian, she faced the Nine Tailed Fox while being completely powerless, she faced the Pirate Lord while he was holding the entire Earth in his hands and was fully willing to crush it. Right after he had killed her friend like it was no big deal, right as he tried to kill everyone else… Meiko's hands were completely free to bend and make hand seals. The blacksmith shoved her other shoulder guard which was still in her hand back on and made a hand seal.

"C-Rank Seal: Release!" she shouted out but her words fell to deaf ears due to the rushing air. Her eyelids were becoming difficult, her head felt like it weighed ten billion tons and was dragging her to the bottom of the ocean. A powerful surge of chakra erupted from Meiko's shoulder pads from the sealing glyphs she had placed all over her armor. The chakra worked like a jet mechanism slowing down the fall completely – seeing how it opposed no force from Hanasaku's behalf, only the natural velocity of two objects falling down.

The crash felt more like falling out from bed than being driven down from high above by a crazy murderous woman trying to recruit Meiko into her team. The unleashed stream of chakra slowed down the fall to where crashing into the ground barely even mattered.

Hanasaku jumped back and released Meiko from the clutch, she looked like her shoulder had taken some damage but then a moment later any accidental injury she had sustained had disappeared. Meiko stood back on her feet and charged at the woman. Hanasaku didn't even try to defend herself. However Meiko's attack was not gunning for her sensei – it was aimed at the pieces of her armor still laying around. She needed her weaponry, her seals to survive. She needed all of her skills, all of her craftsmanship just to survive!

Success! Meiko reattached her shin guard and quickly fastened it to hold. The redhead could feel her opponent's presence right behind her, she touched the shin guard and fired off a jet stream of chakra she usually used to fly her around like jet boots. Charging at the couple of remaining armor pieces Meiko extended her arm, she just needed to grab this and then glide up, give herself some time to suit up in the air!

Hanasaku's laughing image blurred in right in front of the armor piece but it was too late. The woman ruthlessly kicked Meiko up and piercing the sky again. The clouds in the sky exploded like a heavenly arrow would've just burst them away like troublesome pests when the redheaded girl blasted away and into the blue skies above. Meiko recovered halfway in the air, she clutched herself together and forced her feet behind her so she could redirect herself and go right down, swoop down and grab the necessary armor.

Now Hanasaku was toying around with Meiko – she was hitting with enough force to murder a genin tens of times over. She would've hit hard enough to blow up the whole planet with just a punch, nevertheless, she was clearly restraining herself still. The Fifth's speed was fluctuating and she was getting hundreds of times faster than the last time Meiko saw her with no visible strain. She was being as fast as she needed to be to make her visualized move a reality.

Finally! Meiko's desired armor piece was in her hand and the blacksmith steered up, desperately trying to flee into the sky where she could place the piece where it belonged. A firm clutch didn't let Meiko take off. Hanasaku slammed Meiko into the ground creating a small crater. Meiko could feel the taste of blood in her mouth, her vision was getting blurry and nausea was beginning to set in – her power was also steadily increasing. This woman lacked any semblance of control to her inhuman abilities. She was a monster, if Meiko had any brain matter left uncrushed in that head of hers she needed to give up and quit!

Meiko's vision finally returned, the girl realized that she was looking at her own bruised and bloody hand while she was writhing in a small crater of her possible sensei's making. More and more chakra was fading away with each augmentation desperately trying to keep Meiko alive. Training with Mana helped Meiko's chakra control somewhat but she only had about a third of her resources left. She wasted chakra just to survive, she had none to spare for actually attacking her opponent! More so, if she lost that same amount of chakra, the second third, she'd need the rest to stay alive! That was the necessary amount she couldn't spend and if she was hit by those ridiculous punches and kicks again, how would she not end up a bloody stain?

"Why don't you substitute?" Hanasaku asked almost mockingly, but also with a hint of curiosity. "I mean even a dropout of the Academy knows the Substitution Jutsu, you could've saved yourself a great beating if you used it at least once…"

Meiko didn't reply. She felt completely powerless and her insecurities were burning her up from the inside. If Meiko used that ninjutsu of the most primitive level and failed just like she botched the Transformation Jutsu in the Katabami Mines or how she botched the Art of Wall Climbing Jutsu in the desert ruins nearly getting Mana killed, how would the Fifth react? She'd not only cancel this test, she'd tell it to the current Hokage and demand that Meiko's license be terminated, Meiko would go back to the Academy again… Struggle with those stares of people making fun of a failure, making fun of someone who failed the graduation test, someone who failed at life and came back to the Academy…

She was better off just giving up…

Just give up…

That wasn't what she had agreed to do. That's not what her father told her to do! That's not what Hanasaku, Mana or anyone she had ever met and admired would do. Meiko shouted out in pain after she picked her tired body off the ground and met Hanasaku's stare.

She needs her armor back together…


	244. Limits of One's Field of Vision

Meiko stayed down, sprawled out in the crater she made after getting caught by her foot and slammed to the ground. Somewhere slightly farther away a weak and wobbly building collapsed. Those were mostly for show decorations of the training grounds and served no practical use and were not particularly considered as something of great quality.

The blacksmith wanted to simply rush for her armor again but she knew better. Her opponent had plenty of strength in her resources to multiply her speed and strength a hundred fold. For a while the redhead had wondered as to how exactly Mana passed this test as she lacked physical prowess beyond her evasive and redirectional skills and counter-attack based fighting style but now the answer was beginning to formulate in the girl's mind – Mana was crafty.

"Megaton Punch" Hanasaku roared out as she jumped down at Meiko aiming a clearly telegraphed punch right at the blacksmith's chest. The attack was far too showy and slow for it to be meant to connect. Hanasaku must've wanted the blacksmith to avoid it – the master wanted her potential student to best her internally but she still didn't lower her level to where it would've been insulting to Meiko.

The blacksmith made a hand seal and focused. All she needed was to replace herself with her empty backpack. Just change up her chakra flow, move to the backpack nearly instantly and changing the two objects up – leaving the backpack in her place while she stayed there.

"Too slow!" Hanasaku shouted out after her fist dug deep into Meiko's back as the redhead tried to move away. The Fifth Hokage managed to track Meiko's movements and intercept her Substitution Jutsu which meant that it wasn't performed correctly. If done right the switcheroo trick transpired instantly. Something was missing! Meiko screwed up even the most basic Academy technique again, just like in the Katabami mines and in the Wind Country desert.

The moment Meiko's crushed into rock body finally braved up to draw her first breaths a burst of blood blasted from the blacksmith's mouth – a sign of a grievous internal injury and a requirement to pay chakra to sustain normal functioning. Meiko looked at her shaking bleeding arm and tried to figure something out - this was stupid. Her race for the armor was too predictable, she was trying to fight Hanasaku at her own game while gunning for a far too predictable goal.

"C-Rank Seal!" Meiko smacked her arm at the crater feeling the dirt soak up from the blood coming out from her wounds. Even the few armor sets she had put on had been bent up from the shockwaves of Hanasaku's fists and her slams.

"This is disappointing. I'm trying to see you do what ninja do – I'm trying to see what makes you different from a tool. All I've seen is you fearing to even try to do that… This won't do. Won't do at all!" Hanasaku scolded Meiko before crossing her arms on her chest, "We're done here, go and get some treatment and go back to the basics." The woman cruelly declared before turning her back to Meiko and walking away.

Meiko's hands went through a single hand seal.

"Displacement Seal!" she shouted out feeling her body sucked into the sealing glyph she left on the ground.

"What?!" Hanasaku shouted out, the Displacement Seal Jutsu was quite familiar to her as it was a basic trap sealing technique that worked similarly to the Substitution Jutsu but in reverse. It instead transported the opponent to the location of the exit seal, through the entrance seal. It had tremendously short range and it could've been broken with precise and powerful application of chakra that disrupted the sealing technique but it was the first attempt of the blacksmith to fight back.

The Fifth's head instantly turned at the backpack – it would've been a clever move to use the Displacement Seal to transport oneself right to the armor but if such a tool was in the redhead's arsenal why didn't she use it earlier? Only then did Hanasaku realize Meiko's plan, she tried to turn back her attention at the entrance seal before a headbutt lifted her off the ground and knocked the Fifth down.

Using her jet boots Meiko whizzed through the past Hokage and right to the pile of her remaining armor pieces. The redhead never exited through the exit seal because her armor had none, she tricked her possible teacher into thinking that they had but truth be told they were far out of the range of being displaced to anyways. All the redhead did was temporarily get sucked into the entrance seal before it dissolved and spat her out.

"String Reeling Jutsu!" Meiko chanted out pulling on several steel strings that held on her armor pieces and pulled them right onto her own body where with a couple of quick flicks of switches the blacksmith had finally assembled the full set. It was a risky idea to try and trick her opponent like that but ninja usually lived by the principle of always trying to look ahead, sometimes when one looked ahead they missed the fundamental details.

Hanasaku picked herself off the ground and smiled as she wiped a small streak of blood from her lip.

"That wasn't bad, I even didn't dodge your attack just to give you the gratification!" the woman grinned with a full smile clearly entertained by Meiko's attempt.

When the opponent didn't know what the blacksmith was working towards, when they didn't know the full plan of getting there either – that was when Meiko stood a chance against her opponent. Still, it was bad fight to pick for her. Meiko fought at close distance and her sealing techniques were mostly for support. It also gave the blacksmith an idea for the future – to place the exit sealing glyphs on her armor just for easier access.

"It was pretty dirty move though, you attacked when I ended the battle." Hanasaku complained switching between feeling gratified to looking disappointed in a moment.

"You attacked me while I was getting ready too." Meiko snapped back. The blacksmith was still trying to work out a way how to attack her opponent as she saw no visible way of trumping her opponent here.

Feeling that her jet boots had wasted enough chakra stored into them and were running low on supply Meiko slowly landed on the ground. She raised her hand up and pressed against her chest plate where a sealing hieroglyph lit up in crimson colors.

"Sealing Technique:…" Meiko began chanting out the name of her technique before her opponent attacked. It was evident that Hanasaku had reconsidered her refusal to accept Meiko now and decided to continue the test now that the blacksmith began to fight around her weaknesses and insecurities. Using what she did know to achieve what she couldn't or what would've been risky with her lacking chakra control.

"Mandala Arrows!" the blacksmith finished her technique, feeling sure that her technique will do what it had to. The redhead's armor lit up with sources of light all over it, similarly to a swarm of glow-worms as arrows sealed inside the armor previously fired out from the light sources. With Hanasaku having moved in so close she virtually had no time at all to avoid these arrows but the Hokage did more than avoid them, one by one her blurry and invisible arm had gathered all of them. The woman pushed her previously bent foot to stop her rush and repurpose her rush onwards into a charge backwards giving her more space and time to gather every single arrow.

The right side of Meiko's lips arced into a lovely smile as her hand finished a one-handed hand seal activating the sealing tags on each one of the arrows. A deafening explosion picked up dust and rubble from the floor as each arrow carried the explosive power of a simple explosive tag that most ninja used. Gathering all of them in one handful may have been the worst thing to do.

Meiko cheered for herself but then after her eyes rose up to track a moving object up above she froze in respectful fear – Hanasaku had outraced the explosion after it started but before it damaged her. Something like that should've been impossible – Meiko clearly saw the woman still hold the arrows in her hands and look at the mandala sealing marks on them, even as the explosion set off Meiko saw the woman still holding the arrows and there was nothing in the sky for her to substitute to.

Hanasaku landed on the ground smiling like a toddler with a new toy dangling above its cradle.

"W-What did you do!?" Meiko shouted out in disbelief after the woman landed.

"What do you mean? I looked at the explosion and the rate at which it expanded and thought that it was a bit too troublesome to augment myself to withstand. Can't go on augmenting yourself all the time, you know, that can leave your network all messed up. So then I kept on watching, thinking what to do, I thought for a microsecond that maybe I should let it hit me and then heal the injuries back. The problem was that I felt a bit squeamish to get chunks of me splattered around so I settled on just outrunning the explosion in general…" Hanasaku explained with a lovely and gleeful face as if she was telling the most adorable baby a bedtime story.

Meiko's eye twitched erratically.

"You can't do that… Even ninja can't do that. I mean you wasted too much time analysing the explosion, I was sure I saw it hit and envelop you – it'd have taken something far too fast for the ninja limits to surpass it." Meiko still couldn't believe it.

"Oh… I'll know from now on that I can't do that." Hanasaku nodded. Her image then blurred before she rushed onwards. Meiko wasn't ready for such a speedy attack and yet. It was nowhere close the speed of a being capable of outracing explosions right before they hit them.

The blacksmith tried to decide on what to do to not get utterly splattered. Her mind slowed things down for her perception to keep up, undoubtedly costing the blacksmith more and more chakra. The redhead flicked a switch on her gauntlet releasing her armor and scattering it in a round formation as the kunoichi took a wild leap backwards. Right after Hanasaku moved in and through the range of the still airborne armor pieces a rain of kunai was unleashed from the defensive mechanism on the armor.

Meiko grunted in frustration seeing Hanasaku evade every single kunai fired at her faster than any kunai dispenser she had seen the ninja mob use during her journey. Even surrounded by these defensive mechanisms and having kunai fired at her at untraceable speeds this woman perfectly evaded them all.

"You can't do that either!" Meiko shouted out as she formed another hand seal.

"Entrapment Seal!" she chanted as the sealing marks on the kunai, dodged and etched into the ground, lit up with currents of electricity that formed a makeshift chakra barrier around the woman they surrounded. Hanasaku's body powered through the barrier and delivered a punch to Meiko's jaw.

Meiko punched the ground in anger and spat out a bunch of blood together with a couple of teeth. Regrowing teeth always hurt, just like most other bone associated treatments in the hospital.

Hanasaku shrugged, "Why are you so upset? Was I not supposed to do that either?" she curiously looked at Meiko and the blacksmith stood up, wanting to yell it all out in this insane woman's face but then she froze. Looking at the innocent face of her possible future sensei she realized that Chestnut Hanasaku honestly didn't know if ninja could move under the Entrapment Seal.

"No… Actually ninja can't move under the Entrapment Seal for a very limited duration of time. They can however break out of the sealing technique by supplying it with a burst of chakra matching its own content. However you didn't do that, you broke all known rules and limits! Just like ninja can't move after this! String Reeling Jutsu!" Meiko shouted out pulling on a string of steel wire that collected all the strings stuck on the shot kunai and formed a big and powerful trap of steel wire that wrapped all over the Fifth.

"You got caught?" Meiko seemed surprised herself.

"Wait… This isn't something special at all. It's just normal strings, I can move after this, in fact…" Hanasaku realized before she flexed her body and tore the steel wire to shreds, leaving just a couple of shallow scratches over her body and clothes.

"So that's why you're so special…" Meiko began figuring her opponent out, "You literally don't know what people and ninja can and cannot do which makes your body and its strength, speed and chakra level completely unpredictable. Not only that, if you are too dumb to know your limits, you'd never feel like you've hit them during training. This is such a stupid trait that it's awesome!" the blacksmith declared in childish glee as she began running around the confused Fifth and check out her injuries, pinching her skin and trying to bite the woman or wrestle her just to test her theory.

"This test is over." Hanasaku smiled before pulling Meiko off the top of her head like a stray kitten and gently placing her down on the ground. "I'd have never thought a simple genin would've figured my secret out. I'll have to ask you to keep it a secret, otherwise too many people will know and too many people rely on me to be who I am to protect them."

Meiko made an improvised zipper gesture on her mouth before resuming her strange analysis of the woman's body.

"My goal here was to see if you are more than a tool. I have seen enough to draw conclusions." Hanasaku explained.

"What? Why would you think that I'm a douche? I'm the nicest person ever!" Meiko replied before checking how Hanasaku's arm bends and if it does so the same like the arms of all the other human beings do.

"No. You don't get it, not that kind of a tool. You see, when a person needs something done they can either use weapons and tools to do that thing by themselves or they can hire a ninja. That suggests that a ninja needs to be more than just a tool, more than they are meant to do. They are more than just tools, they are living and breathing, flexible specialists that accomplish a task and can do so in many different ways. They adapt, they survive, they go underneath the underneath. That is what a ninja is. They needn't be strong and firm enough like samurai, they follow no principles and rules other than those of their own or their village's unlike martial artists and yet they have ancient traditions and principles to uphold unlike pirates or rogue ninja. I can tutor anyone, but I will never tutor a tool. Tools bend under pressure, they corrode and break – ninja do what needs to be done, they think on their own and surpass tools." Hanasaku explained.

Meiko nodded energetically wondering if she maybe should've written it all down.

"You have a lot of insecurities about you and I saw why – your ninjutsu and chakra control are wobbly to put it generously. You are also just as much of a thick-skulled idiot as I am which isn't the greatest, but as you've seen, an idiot can often accomplish what a smart guy would never even try to…" Hanasaku's speech was cut short after a face familiar to her landed from the treeline besides her and whispered to her ear.

"It seems our lesson will have to be cut short. My friend told me that your future team ran into trouble – one of them has been kidnapped…" Hanasaku spoke up before her friend in standard Konoha ninja uniform once again whispered to her ear.

"Could we… By any chance make this go any faster, I think I'm… Losing a lot of blood…" Meiko complained feeling her aching gut where some degree of internal damage was rapidly burning through her chakra resources.

"Of course, I need to treat you immediately! It appears also that the Sixth doesn't want us to know this information because he thinks we'd make a mess out of things…" Hanasaku finished retelling what she was told as she settled down close to Meiko to treat the young lady's injuries.

"You know, Lady Fifth, I didn't tell you all that only for you to retell it to a genin!" the man who was once the Fifth Hokage's assistant complained only to be dismissed by a careless gesture and affirmed that the woman was grateful for his loyalty and the information.

For a good minute Meiko felt relieved while Chestnut Hanasaku treated her injuries. Then a dominating feeling of nausea took over as the blacksmith bent over to the side and threw up. Hanasaku used the Diagnosis Jutsu to scan through Meiko's body to determine that a lot of things were really messed up.

"Ooops, this may not be the best time to tell you this but… I'm not the best when it comes to healing other people. My own body is much more durable than that of others so I sometimes really get confused by how other people's bodies work… Sorry!" the woman apologized making an innocent puppy face before picking Meiko up and rushing to the Konohagakure Hospital with the barely conscious and pale skinned genin in her arms.

"But… I thought… You were… S-Rank medical ninja…" Meiko whimpered out weakly as she was beginning to feel really dizzy and her fever was beginning to really kick in.

"I'm really good at healing myself, as I've said, I can heal injuries no other ninja can survive but sometimes I mess things up unless I heal myself. My body works a lot different from that of other people so I'm not used to your weakling bodies." Hanasaku elaborated as to how exactly her high rank was granted to her.

"Well… There appears to be a set of perfectly functional teeth in your liver, your broken rib has now relocated itself inside your left lung and is poking out from it, also your stomach content is now inside your kidneys… Seriously, how and why would anyone put it there!? I'd say you're lucky to have survived this long and no way you're going anywhere this week!" the medical expert concluded after looking at Meiko's test results in the hospital.

Hanasaku blushed and with a guilty pair of eyes pulled the collar of her sleeveless shirt as she was beginning to sweat a little. As numb-skulled as the woman was, even she realized that she had messed up pretty good here.

"I can help!" she suggested to the medical ninja a good couple of ranks lower than her.

"Please don't!" the medical ninja rudely replied. This mustn't have been the first case of this woman's patient that he has treated. His eyes were looking at the results of her healing far too casually and forgivingly and he was treating there excessively strange injuries like they were a common occurrence.

"Aw, come on! I'm the only S-Rank medical ninja in the village. Even I get my things right most of the time! This hasn't happened to me in a really long time, I'll have you know!" Hanasaku desperately pleaded to which the medical ninja just sighed and reluctantly agreed.

Just like that the Team Hokage was finally assembled and all its members were tested and decided on. Had Meiko not been peacefully asleep after her actual treatment of her treatment had begun she may have been more concerned about the state of the rest of her team. Something that completely slipped out from Hanasaku's mind after she got so embarrassed by messing up Meiko's treatment so badly.


	245. Life is but a Wheel of Cheese

A heartwarming melody of a song, sadly sung by a less than exemplary singer, broke through the bone chilling embrace of death. Pain equal to that of a bear trap snapping onto her skull worked hand in hand with the overwhelming grace of sunlight peeling Mana's eyelids open and showering her briefly opened whites with its almighty beauty. A feeling containing all the subtlety and softness of acid being poured into her eyes and working its way through the girl's nervous system right into her brain. Living often felt worse than dying in the first moments of one's rebirth, Mana should have known, of all people.

The girl jumped up and covered her body up with the cover she was snugged under. She was in a wooden cabin surrounded by smoked fish and meats, cheeses and homemade apple wine. The old man who was singing as he worked his butt off peeling layers of old wax off of his wheel of cheese noticed the girl and turned at her, seeing the knife in his hand Mana's body twitched energetically, life rushed back into her body and the magician felt her chakra being at its peak – a bad sign. She must've been out for a while for her network to repair itself completely.

"Don't worry, if I wanted to hurt you, you'd have already been hurt. Been laying here for quite a while…" the old man said in a rough and masculine voice, his eyes didn't waver or display the slightest sign of fear or weakness, on the other hand his chest did move quite ecstatically suggesting that he may have even been relieved of the magician's awakening.

"Where am I, why am I alive?" Mana asked. She was no fool, remembering the exact sort of injuries she had sustained was immensely painful for her recently awakened mind but she definitely realized that she should have died of her injuries. The men working there made sure to leave no one alive, they were fast, efficient, professional and more than anything – strong. "What use can I possibly serve to you?" the magician assumed that she was somehow useful to this old man if he salvaged her dying body and nursed her back.

The old man calmly laughed out with class and restraint. He was clearly an old gentleman in control of his emotions, at least those he displayed in public.

"Well, you'll keep me alive, for one…" he appeared to try and jest but seeing Mana's confused expression he just sighed.

"That's what I feared, you're completely oblivious to what you've been involved into…" he spoke.

"Wait… You're… You're not Yamanaka Tenma, are you!?" Mana suddenly jumped up and on her feet, beginning to frantically look for her weapons and clothes.

"Your things are on that chair, luckily enough, you weren't wearing most of your clothes when… Whatever happened hit you. Those are some fancy robes though, you don't look like a Yamanaka snob to me. I'd really like to hear your story but I'm afraid it's more than it is my business to know…" the old man returned to tending to his cheese wheel, slowly peeling the wax off of the gigantic mountain.

Mana grabbed the clothes that were on the chair and got dressed while the old man worked, she was surprised to find pretty much everything she had on her at that time intact. Even whatever pocket money she had was completely untouched.

"I am beginning to believe that we both don't know anything of what's going on here, that means there's a third party involved, something connecting us. Mind telling me all that you know? All I remember is bathing, getting ready to go to bed and leave the Yamanaka Resort in the morning, go home. That's when we got attacked, my friend was kidnapped. I should've been killed – it's clear those men meant for me to die. In fact they should've meant for Kiyomi to die too, at this point I don't understand anything at all…" Mana admitted.

"You've been brought here by a man, a hooded figure, his head was the only part I saw and it was covered in bandages – he said he had a whole bunch of fresh tattoos made and his skin was sensitive or something. He healed you completely back to life, you didn't look like you even had hopes of making it when he got you here. He said that you were lucky he had found you, anyone else would've not been able to help you. I was told that he did everything he could have and that you'd live, he told me that he'd kill me and everyone I have ever met or as far as exchanged glances with if you died. Apart from some very impolite talking, he was a pretty nice and exalted man. Said he was heading for Iwagakure… Not much more to tell you." the old man told Mana everything he knew.

The magician sat down and wrapped her arms around her knees, she had no idea what this old man was talking about. Who could've cared enough about her and not all those poor Yamanaka ninja getting slaughtered by the people that got Kiyomi? Who was Mana to deserve such a rescue? It all tied back to what she was told by Hachiro – the rogue Uchiha mentoring Shimo. All those fearful tales of some extremely terrifying man with an interest in Mana.

"Do you know anything of the accident in the Yamanaka Resort? The one that left me dying?" Mana asked politely, she needed some extra pieces to complete the puzzle, she felt like she was getting close but she was missing a good handful. Namely what exactly was the group involved – the Imarizu, what state they left the Resort in and who they may have been affiliated with.

"Not that much, a handful of good strong men got themselves killed in an attack. If you had actually died, that'd have meant everybody died. That mysterious man appeared to care very little of anyone else but you, I asked him if he caused that attack but he said he was just passing by. I don't think he liked what you were involved in." the man finished peeling cheese off, he went off and picked up a large bowl from the corner as well as a grater, returning to his mountain of cheese with those tools.

Mana stood up and flexed herself, she appeared to be back into a fighting shape – she must've been out for at least a good couple of days.

"Do you know anything about the Imarizu, by any chance?" Mana asked.

"Not really, no. Are they the ones that left you like you were? May not be a good idea to run after them in that case. Remember, for a while, our lives are interconnected…" the man calmly explained. It didn't seem like he was overly scared of the mysterious man's vengeance. It was just an unfortunate option he tried to avoid, something he felt obliged to remind Mana of but not something he preached.

"They have my friend, they have my dead friend's sword. I can't let this go. My friend had a bounty on her head and frankly, I'm surprised they didn't kill her. Did you hear about the line of succession of the Yamanaka being passed? Living close to the Resort you should've heard of something major like that." Mana inquired.

"No." the old man shook his head, "You're right, I should've, usually clan matters are the evening rumors for old spinsters around here. I've heard no such thing."

"That means she has to be alive, which is incredibly strange. I don't know what's going on here anymore… But I will figure it out or die trying, that's my duty to Kiyomi as her friend and to my deceased friend's memory. That sword needs to rest by his grave." Mana combed her hair in front of the mirror and sat back down on the bed, crossing her arms on her chest and closing her eyes to think.

"Those men have a long head start on you. If they left when you were injured they may have already achieved what they wanted to do." the old man suggested.

"No. Kiyomi is a future heiress of the clan, that cannot be a coincidence. It would've been something major like… A marriage." Mana suddenly realized.

"Marriage?" the old man appeared to be curious while sounding incredibly indifferent to anything but his cheese at the same time.

"It makes the most sense why those men wanted Kiyomi alive. Whoever put the bounty was no rogue ninja trying to spite the clan – he was in the line of succession somewhere. By removing Kiyomi he or she would've skipped ahead, then at some point after trying to kill her went nowhere they must've realized that marrying may have been a superior option all along and they changed their approach." Mana spoke to herself trying to make these events around her make sense. She made brief pauses, browsed her mind trying to put things together and weave all of this complicated web into something that resembled something with motives and goals that would've made sense.

"Well, that's just great, you really shouldn't do anything yourself though. A young kid like you will just get yourself killed. Yamanaka folk would love to hear about this." The old man suggested.

"No. I can't know for certain who's a suspect yet. I know nothing of their line of succession and who's loyal to whom there. Also I'm pretty sure they would never let me leave the Resort after I enter having survived that attack – I'd be their first suspect and it'd cost me too much time to resolve that. I won't let Kiyomi get married!" Mana jumped out from the bed having determined her next course of action.

"That's mean." The old man shrugged.

Mana sighed, "I will need to make a valid strategy for fighting the Imarizu again, I will also need to examine the Yamanaka documents and know who's the most viable to make such a heinous move in the line of succession. That means I'll need to… Wait… You're not gonna report this to the Yamanaka are you?" the magician looked at the old man questioningly.

"I don't need to report anything. They could just read my mind if they wanted to, then again, to do it they'd need valid proof they are not just wasting their time reading some old farmer's mind. There are thousands of small farms like mine in these parts. They'd take a literal hundred years scanning through everyone – they've got better things to do." The man smiled.

"You sound suspiciously sharp for a farmer…" Mana squinted.

"I was a writer before I got my farm here. I wrote Academy textbooks, you should've heard of me if you ever bothered to read the author's name on the textbook, my books even have the bio on the back with my picture – I am Aporius Noregin." The man turned back at Mana with a small grin expecting to be recognized.

"No. They have upgraded your books already. This generation is studying from Tate Ashuoka's books." Mana let the old man know, she had only stumbled on the old man's name while having a pleasant history read in the Konohagakure archives and she had never seen a single textbook written by the man. She just assumed the whole time that the update was a significant improvement.

"Heh, Tate was a very skilled kid, a bit flashy but quite bright. He was never meant for physical side of ninja work but I always expected him to teach the Academy students or to head his own discipline someday. Quite an eccentric kid as well, always wore shades indoors and a green and purple jumpsuit which he never washed." The old man recalled wiping a tear off his cheek when reminded of his old days. "So you were about to tell me how you plan on sneaking into the Resort and obtaining information on the line of succession, weren't you?" the old man asked Mana.

The magician jumped up in surprise. "How did you know?" she asked.

"Simple. That's what I'd do in your shoes, if I had no other choice. But you must know that you've no chance of accomplishing that. If you really wish to save your friend informing the clan, even if it means getting imprisoned and being suspected yourself, would be the smartest thing to do." The old man advised.

"No. I still have hope this can be resolved without killing anyone, plus I cannot allow my friend's sword to fall into anyone else's hands but mine. Yamanaka wouldn't let up owning an Audra blade." Mana shook her head before sitting back down on the bed she woke up in. "Although you are right, I'll need help in both beating the Imarizu and obtaining the needed information."

"Who can you turn to? Whoever you see will advise you to turn yourself in, who can possibly be crazy enough to help you with this? Strong enough as well…" the old man put down the grate and pushed the bowl of grated cheese away from himself with his foot, turning back at Mana.

"A question for another time. Right now I need to get stronger, I need to invent a technique that'll help me beat the Imarizu. Luckily enough, I had the honor of seeing how they fight, how they kill… I know just what I will need." Mana wondered scratching her chin as she delved deep into her thoughts.

"You've no time, girl. It takes weeks to even make up a concept of a new technique. Mastering it might take months if not years, some ninja take entire lifetimes to perfect a single jutsu. Luckily for you I know a thing or two about jutsu and ninja arts – I quite literally wrote dozens of books on it. I can help you." The man suggested.

"That'd shorten the time-span of my training. But why would you do something like that? What's in it for you?" Mana wondered.

"Every moment you stay in my sight and train is a moment you aren't getting yourself killed. If you take a good couple of more days training maybe that crazy stalker of yours will stop blaming me for when you do eventually get yourself killed. I'm quite literally saving my own life here. You've no reason to suspect me of being a slimy man." Aporius explained.

"Well then, I need a genjutsu technique – quick in activation, one hand seal, not more. One that'd allow me to disperse into an illusion after my physical body gets hit, I've read of such illusions existing. One to make me completely invulnerable to a head-on reckless assault at close distance, luring my opponent into a chain of endless illusions that I place them under while they think they are fighting me. A technique like that would cripple all of the Imarizu, the problem is that they are too fast, they don't let me weave more than one hand seal before they overwhelm me so I need a middle piece of the chain, one that'd allow me to cripple them all at once and buy me time." Mana explained.

"You should've spoken to Budonoki Cheri, she is the strongest genjutsu using ninja in Konoha. One of the prodigies I heard about from my own students once they started teaching students of their own. She possesses the technique you need - Genjutsu: Flower Petal Escape." Aporius smiled, his eyes looked up into the shoddy roof above the man's head as his mind fleeted into his memories.

Mana blushed and looked away, she felt a bit embarrassed about what she wanted to say so her lips pouted unwillingly. "I can't do that. There's a rule I follow, part of my ninja way – I don't use techniques that are not my own. Truth be told, I have used simple Academy techniques before but those were moments when lives were in danger. This technique would give me a good replacement for the Substitution Jutsu to use."

Aporius sighed. He was clearly looking disappointed and feeling like he was wasting his time with Mana. A sentiment that the magician saw in many teachers' faces when she was a child.

"Very well. Then perhaps a similar principle but a different result? A technique that would be undoubtedly immensely similar but not quite a case of artistic plagiarism?" the old textbook writer suggested.

Mana, feeling guilty that her own personal principles and artistic integrity of viewing the battlefield like the extension of the stage she performed on was getting in the way of her quest, nodded.

"Alright. I expect you to stay here until your technique is polished. In that case I would appreciate some help with…" the man began asking Mana before the young girl fell on her knees and bowed her head in front of the man.

"Can I please cook?" she almost begged the man. The magician had always wished for the opportunity to improve her cooking, after the endless snappy remarks made by Shimo, Meiko and Kouta during their quest for the Box of Ultimate Bliss. She never once found time to practice her cooking extensively and this man looked like quite the treasure box of knowledge. His cheeses smelled sophisticated, his wines had fancy looking names and his meat looked well-seasoned and preserved – Mana's clothes were well seeped with the smell seeing how they were placed in the same room.

"I know I shall regret this decision but… I believe there's nothing wrong in allowing a young lady learn to prepare a proper meal. If you're bad however I shall be stricter as a cooking coach than I shall be as a genjutsu trainer. You also have no time to slack around – those Imarizu punks are making their way towards their goal with your friend as we speak. It is fair to assume that they'll reach their destination halfway through your training so no slacking off!" Aporius laid down the rules.

Mana bowed again. "I would never forgive myself a moment of levity!" she affirmed the man.

"I will also only eat things from this recipe book. I am a very sophisticated taster, after all. You have the finest ingredients and recipes so making anything less than a perfect meal and the perfect genjutsu technique will be your failure as a ninja and as a young woman trying to learn how to cook!" the old man pointed at an old book with trashed and ruined cover.

Mana nodded. She had to work hard to earn back her return to life, one amongst many, the exact count of which she had lost long ago already.


	246. No More Books!

Mana rubbed her closed eyes a bit too excessively. The pressure inside her skull was getting uncomfortable but she refused to put the book she's been studying for over fourteen hours down. She stopped a couple of times only to make a pair of meals for Aporius and herself, only to be belittled for her lack of experience in the matter and be treated like a child. She was used to training by herself, when there was only her to scold herself because she thought she knew where to bite to make it hurt.

The knowledge inside this book seemed ancient to Mana, outdated and irrelevant compared to the ones she had read in the Konohagakure archive or the Academy textbooks. It did contain detailed and needlessly long explanations of the human brain, how it worked and how application of chakra to specific brain points worked. It did contain some impressive knowledge like techniques meant for taijutsu users – applying chakra to their own brain centers to increase their own potential or temporarily boost their abilities without suffering the drawbacks of chakra augmentation.

That was mainly why Mana was still reading the book – every time she thought that the book was outdated and irrelevant, describing needless information in excessive detail she discovered a thing or two to keep her interest. Most of it was revision but once in a while, for a good four or five minutes the magician found herself studying about an area of the brain she knew nothing about or stories of ninja who had a very unique understanding of the genjutsu subject.

Despite those far in between interesting attention grabbers Mana felt like her limited time was being wasted on a book. The next morning Mana cut into her finger with the humongous kitchen knife and it was only because of her reconsidered stance on chakra augmentation that she was left with a shallow cut instead of parting with her whole finger. The old man only laughed at her and belittled her saying that her finger would still have needed weeks of being smoked and seasoned before he'd have considered putting it on his sandwich.

Despite Mana's growing frustration and feeling of wasted time studying a stupid book while her friend was being taken no one knew where for a deduced marriage that could have not even been a marriage to begin with, such outcome was only the most probable, Aporius suggested to help the magician with lunch. His help would've come included with actual example of how a good steak is cooked, steaks were not something of the sort Mana was used to cooking so the kunoichi's frustration grew even more – she was wasting time on things she never thought she'd need while her friend's kidnapping made time a luxury.

"No. I'll do it. I'll do it right this time. I still have reading to catch up on!" Mana rudely shut the old man down and gently placed her palm on his chest, never pushing but keeping him away from where the meal was being made. Aporius looked at her with strange suspicion, almost like he realized the magician was responsible for a murder somewhere but he soon relented and sat down on a criminally short and rusty metal stool.

"Don't forget the garlic. Rub it into the fried bread as well as the meat…" the old man croaked as if he was just forcefully sat down.

"The way this room reeks of garlic, I won't need to…" Mana mumbled under her nose as she had to bend her head down every time she entered the kitchen due to garlic hanging everywhere. It was a highly preferred seasoning and ingredient of the man as mentions of its necessity came with each passing lesson of the man.

After the lunch, surprisingly without a single complaint or demeaning remark from Aporius, Mana finally got a couple of hours to devote to the second book she was given. She hadn't yet finished the first one but she had to do something else, had she not tried a new book she'd have found a way to cut her veins open with a page and tore them out with her teeth if that meant liberating her from another book.

The old man entered her room, he didn't look too good – his usually slick grey hair was now messy and his bowtie missing, his shirt sleeves rolled up and his vest improperly buttoned as if it was done in quite the rush. One look at the man's pupils gave Mana a clue she didn't wish to tread deeper into. When the old man opened his mouth however it didn't appear to affect his mood at all, whatever made this effect on the man's meticulousness was no drug, at least not one that Mana was warned or aware of. The fact that she would rather recall the effects on the user's mood of all drugs she knew of showed how sick she was of studying people's brains and the art of illusion which was infamous for being gruelingly difficult both in theory and practice, especially compared with the rewards it granted of being able to create illusions.

"Did you finish all the books yet?" the man asked. Mana looked at him wondering if he was kidding. She was handed a good dozen of books, each of which had well over five hundred pages of some of the driest text recorded on page. Sometimes the magician was so baffled by entire paragraphs that she had to research the medical terms in a whole other set of books, oftentimes those books left references into other books and like that without an end in sight.

"I did not, not for the lack of trying though…" Mana admitted.

"At least seven chapters into the first one?" the man changed his question up a little curiously. He clearly knew of the amount of work needed to finish these books – the fact that he almost pinpointed the exact place Mana was in at that time was a living proof of it.

"Eight, a good four hundred pages in, I really couldn't take it anymore so I started this one, two chapters in…" Mana reported showing the man the second book, one centered on genjutsu meaning much closer to heart subject which was much more accessible to the magician.

"Good. That's just about what you need to start working on the illusion. Start being the key word…" the man sighed, he managed to sound disappointed even when his sigh was a more of the relieving kind.

"You aren't going to teach me? Don't you have the needed knowledge? Don't you know all these books by heart already? You have to, how else would you have selected them and known so much about where I was in given the time spent studying?" Mana felt like her frustration over the lack of progress and the passing time was becoming clearer, in fact, it was beginning to leak over and into her casual speech.

"No. I think you can do it yourself. You've gotten far in sufficiently to know about the subject enough for the invention of a powerful illusion by yourself, especially given your experience on the subject, having created your entire arsenal from scratch as a child…" Aporius shook his head and turned around preparing to leave the room.

"Wait!" Mana shouted out, she could feel her blood boiling and coming up through her neck, had anyone cut her throat now they'd be washed away by the excess of rage fueled blood that dyed her skin red instead of the usual far northern tan. "You're lying, I've researched it sufficiently to know that I'd never pull such an illusion off without finishing these books and I'd never finish these books in an acceptable time frame. It's like you're avoiding training me like we decided on, what's the matter?!" she yelled out.

Aporius sighed. "You're right. I'm having my reservations about training you myself, devoting my knowledge to where it'd be wasted… I'm a practical man, if what I do would not matter – I refuse to do it. I wouldn't help you put your head into a noose unless I'm absolutely sure you can get out of it."

Mana took a trembling step back. She wanted to yell something out in return for the man's words but the sadness kept her words stuck somewhere in her throat. Instead she just snapped her mouth closed, her teeth rows smashing against each other like a guillotine that'd have separated her tongue clean off had it gone stuck in between them. Anger and despair made the magician's muscles twitch, she was feeling confusing feedback to the old man's words. He was treating her as a lost cause, he felt like helping her was to waste his time which both infuriated her and made her feel like breaking down into tears. The young teen inside her clashed with the friend who felt obligated to assist her friend in need.

The kunoichi just sat down on the bed and looked around. She had nothing of value devoted to this room, nothing would've stopped her from just getting up and leaving. Doing her best to mastering the illusion on her way, failing and confronting the Imarizu unprepared, probably dying in the process… There was simply no other option, Kiyomi needed her and any other attempt to relinquish the responsibility on her shoulders would've ended up in someone dying. Mana was the only one who cared enough to make everyone involved walk away alive…

"Look, today I saw you for the kind of person you were. You refused my aid with the lunch and it was terrible, better than before but still terrible. You're absolutely obsessed with taking responsibility and I know what you're thinking deep down – after you learn the technique you want to learn you'll just face those Ima-somethings alone, that's what you are planning, aren't you?" Aporius softened his tone up trying to clear up the exact meaning behind his words.

Mana looked down as she realized that she had nothing on her. The magician stood up and started walking towards the door from the little writing room stayed and studied in and into the living room. She fully intended on leaving.

"So what?" Mana uttered as the old man didn't move out of her way and stayed in the middle of the passageway leading to the living room. While she was enraged she fostered not a single idea of forcing the man to move so she was stuck standing in front of him and confronting his verbal beatdown on her immaturity.

"You asked for my help. You thought this was some kind of a deal, didn't you? You use my study, read my books and do it all alone and you payback your end of the bargain by cooking your subpar meals for me and sometimes cleaning my terribly messy place. You are being kind but you never allow other people to be kind to you by taking all the weight over from them, by treating the people around you like the kind of people would inhabit this monstrous and cruel world. This is not and never was a deal of equal exchange, I want to help you and your friend, I want to help a young woman learn to do what she wants to do. Make your future husband and kids happy by making you better than to poison them with your food. I'm doing what I always did as a writer – looking out for the future generation." Aporius irradiated with a certain shade of kindness and calmness.

Mana breathed in to reply something but she couldn't, at some point holding her breath in was too painful so she wheezed it all out, probably making herself look like a stupendous idiot.

"You're right…" Mana finally spoke looking away with an uncomfortable feeling of shame. "I can't do it without help, with or without the jutsu. Not that I have people to turn to at this moment…"

"Spent too much time pushing them away, like me?" Aporius smiled lyrically

"No one within reach I can think of… Unless…" Mana suddenly looked up with a hopeful realization. "I guess I'll be rolling the die twice… But I won't be rolling anything unless I hurry up and finish this pile of books." The magician sighed before settling down by the pile and flipping through the pages of the first book.

Aporius sighed and pushed the pile of books off the table letting their messy and barely holding together pages split off and scatter all over the study floor.

"No more books! You have the essentials and we can begin. You have just about the same theoretical knowledge that a common genjutsu using ninja has, even more practical knowledge than most users. You are no longer just a genin in that subject, you are well into the category of being an intermediate. Let's put those essentials to good use together!" the man smiled at Mana with trust she never saw this man have.

The two spent the entire evening trying to create the concept behind the illusion. Making it the way Mana wanted it to work – to make her disperse upon impact to her body as if it was a substitution was immensely difficult by itself. The real problems presented themselves soon enough with them beginning to delve in deeper. To make an illusion beyond the power of the certain point required hand seal input, creating the illusion affecting so many brain centers of many people around her while making such an illusion work would've required well over twenty hand seals. While it meant barely a fraction of a second to the magician, it would've alerted the opponent to the trickery. Also it would've been impossible to pull off around speedy opponents, having no time for hand seals was the problem Mana lost to the Imarizu the first time – they simply beat her down and interrupted her before anything could have been done.

More to that bag of troubles, to reduce the number of hand seals meant increasing the chances of failure. Either that or weaken its power – making it affect a single person at a time instead everybody she wanted to would've cut a good seven hand seals off of the complicated chakra moulding process in order to properly execute the technique. However that also couldn't have been accepted – Mana wanted the technique to be as powerful as she needed it to be, affect exactly the number of people she wanted it to affect.

The difficulties were not also that theoretical and conceptual. Last time Mana worked on a high power and area of effect sound transferred genjutsu she took literally years to complete it. Now she had days to be generous. At this point the magician had settled that making it sound based would be too out of the realm or reality. She had to somehow make it focused on being something else entirely. Maybe it could've been transferred through her eyes like the most of her illusions, while such a focus for illusions could've been figured out, at least exploiting it would've required a second chance which the magician didn't plan on giving the Imarizu.

As the day ended in nocturnal darkness, ultimately fruitless, Mana's sadness and frustration grew more and more. After refusing to eat her next morning's breakfast Aporius noted it.

"You are growing impatient, child. Hurry will only lead to mistakes, mistakes will lead to a worse outcome than you doing nothing." The man said after calmly making his own sandwiches for breakfast.

Mana had to be reminded continuously not to rush things but she couldn't. She had spent multiple days sitting on her bottom and wasting time. While she was growing stronger and smarter in all the right subjects, ultimately her training was fruitless.

The next morning after that Aporius returned after tending to his potatoes outside and it appeared like he was hiding something from Mana. The man was uneasy the whole time and the magician kept on pressing him, even to the point of being terribly distracted from her training just to find out what her mentor was being so secretive about. Deep inside the girl feared that bad news came and Kiyomi's body was found somewhere having been disposed of or that the marriage had already transpired in secret and it was too late for Mana to change anything about it.

"It's… I've heard rumours from the old spinsters living in the farms around – Yamanaka Inomame is apparently arriving to the Land of Waves from Kirigakure. It is unknown why, he has little reason to do so, frankly. While a big cheese in Kirigakure and a possible candidate for the post of Mizukage, when the Kirigakure autonomy is restored, he has no power in the continent." Aporius explained.

"He's the one." Mana stated almost like it was a fact, like no further research was needed. "Think about it – a powerful Yamanaka in Kirigakure and the Archipelago with no power in the continent marrying a future heiress of the continental branch of the clan. He'd be a pain in the ass to deal with in the world politics – Yamanaka are the intelligence of each village they are in: the best interrogators, the best sensors, the best surveillance ninja… Everyone would be kissing his royal buttocks just to get on his good side, he'd be more influential than the Fourth Hokage ever was… Where Mizukage Daikon ruled his own land through suffering and terror, Mizukage Shirona looked to conquer the world through war – he'd rule the world without actually having the crown or moving a single finger for it."

Aporius nodded, "I see you are my equal in historic and political understanding of this. The situation here has grown to be too dire to make this your personal matter, you must give up on this and share this with the Hokage, the Yamanaka Resort – everyone. The political balance of the world cannot depend on this personal pilgrimage of responsibility."

Mana sighed. The man plotting to marry her friend forcefully was making his move and here she was nowhere close to doing what had to be done. She had no knowledge on who exactly the Imarizu was, they certainly were no common cutthroats, having bested so many Yamanaka ninja on a whim. She was not even close to mastering her technique which would've helped realize her plan on fighting those people off. She had no one there behind her back to help her and even her mentor was no longer aboard this personal quest of responsibility. Mana cared less of the politics of the world being shifted and more about her friend. Politics shifted every day, what Mana wanted was Kiyomi marrying whomever she wanted to marry, not a kidnapper plotting to use their clan for his own influence.

Even if her friend did not share that sentiment…

After another day of fruitless training, now with both Mana and Aporius being out of the game, in the morning after entering Mana's room the old man only found a brief note of gratitude and no sign of the magician that wrote it – the last daughter of the wandering ninja. Just like her slaughtered ancestors the kid had no allegiance towards any political alliance or village, even that of her own home. She only had attachment to people – her own kin whom she would've considered her tribe. Ultimately that was what lead Mana to leave the training and the old man behind and leave towards her next destination without mastering the illusion. The old man couldn't help but weep after realizing the mistake this young child had made. He got dressed immediately and left his own ways. Not to his knowledge, but completely opposite ways to where Mana was headed.

The magician just hoped that the dice roll in Eden Prison complex would be less of a trainwreck than the one behind her training…


	247. On the Way to Eden

Mana playfully swung her arms around and over her head directing them to her top hat allowing the invisible extra thin steel strings direct all of the floating in mid-air and bent over spoons to disappear into a storage seal inside her hat. She heard a bunch of applause from random passersby inhabiting a small settlement region. A quiet little town east of the Yamanaka Resort and Aporius' farm. Judging from the looks of things they were all people with things to hide or run away from, just allowing themselves a brief subtle stop to admire the magic tricks of a young girl on a cardboard box.

To the magician girl it was just like it all had started – she performed without a stage, with no preparation or assistance. Just her own ninja tools, quick thinking and a little bit of healthy magician's improvisation. She was one of the first to perform magic, judging from what she had heard, after her thing in Konoha had taken off there were plenty of people picking up the craft but most of them didn't really threaten her secondary job or her success.

The kunoichi had gathered a fair amount of money and after a couple of polite bows to her audience the message was out that the show was over and the passersby continued to float away like disturbed spirits on a quiet November night. A single chain of clapping did not cease however. Mana looked at the audience member who didn't try and fade away with some curiosity, this was either a man who lived and quite enjoyed his time in this small murky town or someone who had no particular place to go.

Either way, that meant that he was beyond the typical understanding of a law abiding citizen. Mana was no romantic fool – she was well aware that for this grey and muddy urbanistic setting adoring settlement to thrive the majority of its providing activities must've been less than legal. To be a successful settler in such an environment was to be a criminal in some way, maybe to have dealings with weapon and illegal supply traders and smugglers or to cut some throats for coin. If this man had no shame and no desire to walk away and hide his face he was a man to be feared.

"Now why would you take money from struggling and starving settlers when you can just make it using magic. Did you not pull a bill from a fellow's ear, all folded and mangled, just now?" the man curiously inquired. Judging from his tone he was just messing around, having fun. It was a twisted feature in its own way that he managed to still have inspiration for fun after returning to the gritty and murky reality of the settlement around him. Mana did her best to distract the settlers from what was around them but she was no miracle maker…

"It's a trick. There's no such thing as magic – I need to make my bread somehow and I don't feel like dealing with smugglers" Mana smiled putting the hat her father had given her and covering her brightly colored eyes. While she did not do the best job at concealing her face most of the time she had no need of being identified as Konoha's Sorceress in here. She was lucky no one had even identified her up to now.

"And yet you just put your hat back on like it's nobody's business, that same hat you just shoved a handful of bent utensils into…" the raggedy man didn't back down and followed Mana a bit further after she had stepped down the improvised cardboard and tin stage she had found for her show, just something to make some money.

"It's an efficient way of proving someone wrong – agree with them yet show them something that denies them at the same time. It's a form of aggressive sarcasm, some would say – offensive…" Mana replied beginning to feel a bit annoyed that the fan decided to tag along with her. She usually displayed no ill feelings towards fans, even when they got overly excited but this time she was in a rush. She needed that money and she made it the only dignified way she knew how, fighting and magic was all she knew and her magic show was already over.

"Oh, well I'm not that easily offended, mind if I tag along, Konoha's Sorceress?" the young man asked Mana, before he mentioned her stage name the magician was almost fed up to the point of more aggressively asking him to back off but after being noticed she just stood there with her mouth halfway open to yell out something ever cruder.

"That's right, plenty of folks around here know who you are. Have to say, I'm kind of a fan… You inspired me to pick up your thing too. I'm a magician as well, nothing like you, obviously – street level. Just a hobby." Mana's fan pulled out a bunch of cards and played around with them showing off his quite fast fingers and relatively impressive wrist control. His sleight of hand was beyond that of a normal human so he had a certain degree of chakra manipulation which troubled the magician.

"While I could use some help, I'm not sure I want to pull you into what I'm getting into…" Mana replied with her tone having softened. She had no idea if she had any right to ask this rough looking street rat to join her seeing how she little to no understanding of the level of his abilities.

"It's fine. I'm a Konohagakure ninja, also not unlike you. I'm working in the Eden prison complex, it's sort of my internship towards getting to work in the actual village protection service." The ragged youth calmed Mana down somewhat as if quickly having caught on to her fears.

"Explains why you know me…" Mana smiled with her right cheek realizing that it wasn't her fame that allowed this man to recognize her. His job was to gather rumors and prevent possible attacks and breakouts from the Eden prison complex. That meant that he must've known about Mana's relation to one particular prisoner still detained inside. After all, she was a possible threat to that prisoner's detainment if she ever showed up so close to the prison.

"You're visiting this place?" the undercover Eden guard wondered after seeing Mana enter a small book store. "Could this be what you were gathering money for today?" the man wondered out loud.

Calmly the magician walked up to the desk and smiled to the clerk before gently asking him to stack all the classic essentials of manga he would recommend to a begginer she could buy for the money she had assembled with her street magic. After she had bought the manga and sealed them inside her hat the young kunoichi headed for the door. What she saw outside slightly surprised her.

The undercover ninja she had just met was standing surrounded by a bunch of children showing them smalltime magic tricks. He wasn't overly impressive – just simple card tricks and elementary sleight of hand illusions but there was some charm in his simplistic approach, also it appeared to better appeal to his crowd.

"How long have you been standing there?" the man asked after the kids scattered and the magician approached him with a happy grin.

"Couldn't interrupt your little magical moment." Mana replied before pointing at the man's deck. "Are those steel tipped?"

"Why would they be? Isn't it a health hazard?" he wondered.

Mana pulled out one of her multiple steel tipped and elementary chakra storage seal and explosive or storage seal covered cards and showed them to the street magician.

"Nah, I keep my hobbies out of my ninja life. These look neat but they also look like a load of work…" he shook his head after admiring the magician's tools for a moment. While Mana used to use the typical genin ninja kit she had long since changed most of it for different steel tipped cards with several of them having elementary sealing techniques placed on them.

"Wait. You waited around for me. Does that mean you're gonna let me tag along with you?" the man smiled.

"I'm a bit confused as to why you'd do that but… I don't think I could stop you without feeling bad afterwards." Mana shrugged.

"Well… You went in there to buy manga, didn't you? That means that you're actually going in there to see him. I assume you'll want to free him, no? While Eden prisoners are not dangerous to society and are mostly detained for their own protection, you'll need an officer's permission and company to allow him to just waltz out of there." Mana was surprised by how perceptive the man was and how quickly he got the general grasp of things.

"You're right. I'll need his help and help of anyone else I can get. I am acting as the first response squad and I need to intercept an event that the Hokage would without a doubt wish to interrupt but there'd be no time. I need to stop a marriage from happening, one that would grant a Yamanaka from Kirigakure unlimited influence over the other villages." Mana explained. She knew quite well that first response action usually was covered by a very tight grip of rules surrounding it, rules that she did not entirely follow and so much would've been clear. It was clear, the magician knew it from her companion's eyes and his smug and confident grin.

"Aburame Yanagi, pleased to meet you, Sorceress…" was all that the street rat replied.

Mana was reading through the various manga she was handed. Analyzing the tropes, storylines and characters. She had to prepare meeting him again, the last time their paths parted it didn't happen on the kindest of conditions. It was quite likely that her friend would be hostile towards her, even more so after she tells him about Shimo. The two actually had respect towards one another, unlike him and Mana. Odds were that he hated Mana's guts. She'd need something more than just nostalgic memories and promises of freedom and a good fight to get him to help.

"Okay, I'll bite. Why are you reading all of those? I thought they'd be for him, not for you…" Yanagi wondered finally taking off his black tinted diving googles and stroking his blonde beard out of curiosity.

"No. He's an otaku, these are essentials – classic manga, he undoubtedly already has them in his collection so gifting them would be useless. I need to know how he thinks, I need to talk to him on the same level he once was on, I need to understand his ramblings of plot clichés and character tropes. Once I thought he was quirky if bordering a bit crazy, I need to be less lazy than that to get him to help me." Mana explained temporarily pulling her attention away from the story of damsels in distress and young teens beating each other up. Seeing these simplistic yet appealing to feelings of various specters stories made the magician better relate to how Sugemi and Shimo acted before. She wasn't relating to them or justifying their actions but she now thought she knew why they did what they did.

Boys were expected a certain degree of manners, strength and gallantry. It was almost demanded of them to act a certain way and such expectations were seeded within the very cultural roots of the society around them. That was why Shimo and Sugemi could relate and understand the Demon from Kirigakure and why they could perfectly express their feelings through their fists. Violence never expressed any other feelings than anger or hatred but having a rich cultural background these two were able to obtain more from their violent confrontations than anyone else could have.

"What about you? You clearly know that I have broken several rules of a proper first response. As of now I have not informed the village of the situation and I do not plan to do so. I am also, most likely, criminally underqualified to enter that battlefield. A group called the Imarizu is involved, they have easily beaten me before as well as a whole bunch of more skilled Yamanaka ninja. Why haven't you apprehended me yet, why are you encouraging my quest to self-destruction?" Mana spoke while still calmly reading the colorless pages.

"Because I myself have an agenda. That is something that makes everyone trust each other around these parts – knowing that the person they just met has their own stakes in something. I wish to work in the village protective service but I am stuck doing the dirty work here. I've been doing what I'm doing for years, saving the world for once is my chance to be noticed, to be the wheat in between a bunch of chaff. Is that not enough to trust me?" Yanagi asked looking at Mana hopefully.

"I trust people quite easily. All I need to trust you is you telling me you're tagging along." Mana replied calmly without pulling her eyes away from the manga. By that moment the candle inside the lantern used to illuminate their little forest camp was beginning to run out and setting a bigger fire up would've been a bit like asking for trouble.

"Although I am a bit curious why exactly you are doing what you're doing. Why go after the Imarizu, why bother about all that political stuff, I remember myself as a genin, I was more bothered by doing the dishes at Ichiraku Ramen properly…" the Aburame wondered. His tone was not suspicious in the slightest but it did appear like he genuinely wanted to know Mana a bit better.

"My friend was taken. She said she doesn't mind being forced into a marriage but I won't let her get married to a man who placed a bounty on her head and is only marrying her because killing her didn't work. I can't let the village know because I've sworn to never take a life, to me all life is sacred and I know that if the village got a wind of this they'd aim to slaughter everyone, people would be lost on both sides. I cannot allow that." Mana replied closing her eyes and pulling the manga away from them. Slowly the girl began feeling real sleepy which wasn't that odd as she hadn't had a proper sleep in a while after waking up from her injuries.

"That is odd – a ninja trying to preserve life. At some point you'll be sent on an assassination mission. Your beliefs will be put into question and on the stage of the higher rank missions failing would be equal to treason. I pity you for the dilemma you'll have to face." Yanagi replied crossing his own arms around his chest and settling down to a tree, the man stopped playing around with his cards and placed them inside his inner jacket pocket.

Mana smiled with her eyes still closed and her consciousness still fading. To her it was quite amusing when her companion thought she'd actually live long enough to make it to the high ranks. That was a rarity all by itself. While her Academy teacher didn't really hate Mana or think she was a bad student per se, the man did believe that unless her beliefs changed quickly she's headed for a quick death on the battlefield. Suddenly her eyes opened up and she looked at her sleepy looking companion.

"Wait, do you know about the Imarizu?" Mana asked curiously as the man appeared to mention their name casually without really wondering what that group was about.

"Yeah, they're a sort of a hit squad. More like casual Black Ops. They can operate with the Raikage's permission without a bunch of paperwork and they aren't too worried about the rules, most of them are just impressive criminals trained to fight by the village." Yanagi replied slurring a little bit as it was clear he was getting sleepy.

"Did you say Raikage?" Mana asked to clarify.

"Yeah, the Imarizu are from Kumogakure exclusively. There's nothing like them in any other villages and they are almost public knowledge to anyone into recent politics. In fact, the formation and the constant use of the Imarizu services is one of the scandals that added up to the downfall of the Fourth Raikage." The Aburame explained.

Mana sat up and crossed her arms around her chest in frustration. This was some pretty important information. How exactly could Kumogakure have been involved into all of this? Did the Raikage even know of what the Imarizu was doing? Judging from what Mana had read about the Fifth Raikage, the woman was not really a manipulative or that malicious of a leader. On the contrary she was quite honor bound and very old fashioned. Could the reality truly differ so greatly from the stories and reports?

Mana went to sleep with a highly uneasy heart. There were still a good one day of travelling before they reached Eden. Truth be told, if they used all of their inhumanly speed the duo could have reached the prison complex much faster but Mana wanted one more day to be devoted to training while calmly progressing on the road. After all, she needed all the time she could get to maximize the hopes of learning that blasted genjutsu technique.

There was a certain blunder in Mana's sight. She had figured out how to make the technique work while she was processing it in her thoughts. The realization came after the magician had wondered if she was left to use the Substitution Jutsu while her replacement was still in the works. All of a sudden the kunoichi realized that the same principles behind the Substitution Jutsu could've been used to transfer the illusion much faster right into the necessary brain centers without any hand seals being made. However the Substitution Jutsu was a slightly limited technique in its use. First it needed something to replace the object one was to use it on, second – it probably would never work on pure chakra like the genjutsu technique… That meant that Mana would have to replace the object with something and it was quite likely that there were no suitable targets for replacement in her opponent's brain.

While this idea was a step in the right direction in Mana's quest to master her new illusion – it was far from the decisive one. After all, if the Substitution Jutsu worked like that no one would bother simply fighting, everyone would just replace their opponent's brain with something else effectively murdering them. The Substitution Jutsu was a technique on a physical level used on objects within one's reach, in a way it was a simple bypassing of the primitive space laws and speed limitations. Mana's plan on the other hand was of a more mental manipulation, directly transferring a mass of molded chakra straight into her opponent's mind.

It was becoming more and more clear to the magician before sleep finally claimed her that she was too far from completing her training and that it was quite likely she'd be facing the Imarizu unprepared and needing to rely on her companions. Just like the old man Aporius taught her…


	248. This is so Meta!

Mana feasted her eyes at the oversized base, seven hundred and fifty meters long and one third of that wide. Covered with smaller buildings, office complexes and metal domes. Eden looked much more like a military base than a prison complex. Further in the distance two main spherical shaped buildings with large rotund roofs stood out – likely the bulk of the imprisoned population was held there as well as the prison administration.

The massive steel gate closed behind duo's backs making the magician feel strangely locked in for a moment but once her eyes gazed upon the massiveness of the prison complex in front of her she somehow felt much more free and epically overwhelmed inside the massive deforested containment base than she ever did in the endless forests of the Fire Country outside of it.

Hooded figures in capes and metal masks with red visors gazed at the two visitors from the top of the steel wall that separated the void of trees from the cradle of industry and civilization – almost a small village or a large settlement by itself. Mana breathed in and out looking around. She didn't see that many uniformed or restrained prisoners walking around – mostly just ninja in typical ninja attires and body vests.

Usually ninja put their own spin on their attires, some wore additional clothing under the chuunin vest. Some acquired their own unique models of the same vest as it wasn't that strictly regulated. People in the prison dressed exactly the same, strictly abiding the uniform rules which made Mana feel like a standout. Honestly even her companion who actually worked in the place stood out quite decently.

"Well… Are you going to gawk about or are we going to see him?" Yanagi wondered teasing Mana's overwhelmed reaction to seeing the inside of Eden. Honestly, the place didn't look like much of a prison. The magician voiced that impression right after being spoken to.

"Oh, it isn't a prison by the strict definition, it's more like a "detainment community". The reason why this place looks like a militarized settlement is because it is – it has its own laws, administration and sort of its own military but those contained here aren't technically threats to the village. Some of its most precious prisoners are actually not here to protect everyone from them but for the exact opposite reason." Yanagi shrugged looking around with some pride and a warm smile, emoting was not something Aburame did often so seeing the man acknowledge the size and uniqueness of this place was just as priceless as the place itself.

"So I've heard… Two Jinchuuriki?" Mana mumbled to herself almost as if afraid she was going to be heard. Sugemi told her that much right before being taken away.

"Yeah… Look, getting to your friend is going to be a pain in the ass, plenty of check-ups and stuff like that. For the size of this place it has a very strict "go here if you want to go there" ruleset to it – if you want anything done this century we may want to move onto the check-ups right there, beside the staff accommodation area." Yanagi pointed at a greenish metal tinted dome surrounded by simpler block buildings that supposedly housed the ninja watching and running the prison complex for the duration of their stay.

Mana nodded and the two passed on and through the door. Yanagi wasn't kidding. The magician had to register all of her weapons and tools and it was becoming so bothersome that she simply opted to leave her jacket and all of the spring mechanisms of her uniform by the checkup rather than having to go through the confusing and tedious trouble to register her weapons. She also dumped all of her cards since registering each custom placed seal on each card would've taken an eternity, especially if each check-up would have to happen multiple times as multiple areas had increasing levels of security and something that would've been allowed to have in one area was forbidden at the other.

"I'm surprised to see how easy it is for you to disarm… Most ninja would greatly fear abandoning their weapons." Yanagi noted after Mana rubbed her elbows and her shoulders as walking around in a sleeveless shirt alone was a bit too chilly for her.

"My mind is the most resourceful and powerful weapon I have. I'm not a kunoichi that relies on her weapons, they merely supplement my arsenal. You'd be surprised how often I do not expand my chakra augmentation force field wide enough to cover my clothes and they get singed. If that would get under my skin I'd probably have died long ago…" Mana noted. "What about your weapons? You just left your ninja kit at the check-up…"

"I am an Aburame, Mana. My weapons are swarming and squirming inside my body and I would die without them as they would without me. The ninja here understand that." Yanagi looked at Mana with a bit of a shaming look which was only visible from the way his eyebrows were curved as his actual eyes were still covered by the strange darkened swimming googles.

A brief pause followed, Yanagi spoke first, clearly frustrated that something he wished to hear was not said.

"The concept of thousands of insects living inside of me does not creep you out? That is a common reaction…" he asked.

"It is kind of icky, I am not overly fond of insects but if that's your thing – it's your thing." Mana shrugged with an honest smile directed at her companion.

"I am beginning to like you." Yanagi smiled back.

"How so?" Mana asked.

"Over our course of common history you've not called me "bug-guy" once." The man looked away pointing at the next building the two had to check-up in so that they gained access to the containment facilities and left the office part of the complex where all the tedious paperwork got done.

"Well, in everyone's defense, you are a guy and you do use bugs. However I like to be original so I am glad to differ from the rest in at least some way." Mana replied fondly as she filled yet another form.

Yanagi snickered in a rather contained manner as he quickly and lazily filled in his own form leaving endless blanks, the staff member overseeing the paperwork simply clacked their tongue and began correcting the man's papers.

"Hey, Yanagi-san… It asks here "Have you come to Eden with malicious intent such as causing a prison break or doing criminal activity within its compounds". Do you think I should check that? I mean – we are planning to leave with him, aren't we?" Mana bit the other side of the pen, she could almost feel the sweaty forehead of the staff member sitting behind the hardened glass and sense his annoyance and confusion.

"This question was asked multiple times before. Why are you making a deal out of it now?" Yanagi slapped his forehead.

"Well, first it's a really dumb question, second I want to fill the paperwork right. Paperwork is really important, you know…" Mana complained, "Still, who in their right mind would admit to having intent to do crime here or break people out?"

Yanagi snapped his fingers and stole the paper right out from Mana's little extended platform where it was supposed to be filled up and quickly gave it to the paperwork person to check up and fix.

"It's a trick, there's an article for lying on a public form about criminal intent. They're trying to get you into more trouble. That's what got Aluminum Lee – the famous gang enforcer caught. The Ninja Tribunal stated there wasn't enough evidence to lock him up for murdering people as all the witnesses were dead but he once lied on a public form like this one and that put the guy into Eden. From there on in a stronger case got built, a bunch of the supporters started believing Arumi wasn't invincible anymore and testified for a bunch of other charges getting him transferred all the way to Jigoku for life." Yanagi explained annoyed before opening the door leading into a massive containment facility and gesturing for Mana to go on.

"The devil is in the details, I suppose…" Mana wondered rubbing her chin and trying to wrap her head around the complicated Tribunal work and the difficult profession of actually prosecuting living criminals. In her perfect world there would have to be a perfect legal system. One that would make persecuting people more valuable than just cutting them down and being done with it.

Having seen a fair share of moving picture productions in her life, the magician expected that there'd be bit more noise inside a functional containment facility but no one was banging at the chakra force fields keeping them inside their cells. In fact, most people inside the containment facility were quite indifferent to Mana and Yanagi wandering about and minding their own business. That was so incredibly odd to the magician that her step slowed down somewhat expecting to get noticed and at least one horrible verbal remark being slung her way but nothing of the sort transpired.

The duo ignored any stairs and just continued to walk onwards to the further parts of the first floor until Yanagi suddenly stopped in front of a cell. With her chest burning up from excitement and her breath whimpering Mana walked up to the cell and looked through the dark purple glow of the chakra barrier keeping her friend inside.

"Hello, Sugemi…" she uttered having found no better way to start the conversation. "Is there any way that this barrier can go?" Mana asked Yanagi who simply placed his palm at the center and through great effort channeled a shockwave that sent ripples through the barrier breaking it down like a broken window. The falling shattered chakra constructs slowly dissipated in thin air beautifully in their synchronized destruction.

Slow taps emanated from inside the rather well decorated and very reminding of a simple living room cell. From the shadows Mana's friend emerged – thinner yet also much more athletic and balanced looking, hair greatly lengthened. Most Nara had their hair very long but wore them in ponytails or tied and restrained in some way. Sugemi didn't appear to care that much. Feeble and childish remnants of facial hair were beginning to dawn on the young man's face.

"I seem to remember telling you that if I saw you again – it'd be as an enemy…" Sugemi recalled with his left foot standing suspiciously similarly to an offensive stance as if the young man was readying his body to pounce on his old teammate.

"That's not true – you said we'd eventually clash. You didn't say it'd happen when we next meet." Mana's cheekbones turned up as she shook her head gently.

"Oh… Well that'll be an anticlimactic reunion of old friends turned rivals!" Sugemi shouted out in frustration snapping his fingers angrily. "Are you sure there's no reason for us to fight for a while to establish tension between us and exemplify our very human flaws?" he asked.

Mana sighed, "We may go that way, however we are not legitimate rivals. I am the female romantic interest in the team formula which means I cannot be your equal rival in skill. That'd be Shimo. Also the protagonist's rivals who fight weaker female romantic interests are really looked down on in the popularity polls, they generally are known to killing their entire series. I do not recommend going that way. It would also dispel any mystery for your exact power level after such a sudden reintroduction into the story."

Sugemi stood for a moment in awe.

"I may have done some homework just to communicate on the same level…" Mana shrugged her shoulders with some playful and acted guilt in her eyes.

"You are right. My manga would dip in sales if I had the main character fight you." Sugemi wondered scratching his chin.

"Wait, you're the main character in your manga? You're completely destroying the shounen genre tropes for the main character, also there're entire arcs where you're just imprisoned doing nothing. That'll bury your manga, I heavily suggest being a rival character to Shimo." Mana objected.

"Oh… Yeah, as if you're a perfect example of a female romantic interest! Last time you subdued both of us instead of being weak and useless and you are not particularly romantically interested in either of us! You're also far too soft to be a masculine female badass character written as if the author would write of a male because they think a female character that is manly and strong is the same as a strong female character! You're completely breaking the genre yourself so we can go for the parody approach as our story isn't really smart enough to be the trope breaker…" Sugemi replied crossing his arms on his chest and smugly looking at Mana.

"Yeah. But we're not particularly funny so we can't parody anything either… You need to reinvent your character. Leave on an adventure with me to save an actual damsel." Mana suggested.

Sugemi looked interested playing with his hatchling soft facial hair stubs.

"Damsel in distress would boost my character alignment I could use scoring some popularity points…" he mumbled to himself.

"Actually… The damsel wishes to get married, you'd be kind of kidnapping her from her kidnapper and stopping her from getting married despite her absolute indifference to the matter. I don't think she's in any particular distress…" Mana fixed him making Sugemi pout even more.

"Wait a second!" the Nara suddenly realized. "If the damsel is not in distress she isn't a useless weak shounen trope! Although, her rescue from a marriage she actually wants would give my story complexity: am I a hero saving a young lady from a bad choice she'll regret in the future, or am I a monster kidnapping her from a loving groom!? My manga would get some complexity! Complexity, Mana!" Sugemi shouted out jumping in joy and clapping around. He even began packing his things. "As long as you're aware of the fact that we will eventually have to fight, I want our previous dialogue to be foreshadowing for a really wicked volume spanning fight with transformations and very inspiring quotes that, given the context, are absolutely meaningless! That way my story will seem more intelligent than it actually is – making meaningless details into foreshadowing ones tends to do that."

"Oh, don't worry, I'm sure we'll have an overblown fight over food that makes no sense since none of us really love food that much or a misunderstanding over vague statements or prophecies. Or one of us will get mind controlled at some point…" Mana playfully shrugged. "We are going to deal with Yamanaka so…"

"Here's to hopping…" Sugemi firmly nodded his head. "But then it leaves only one question… What about my imprisonment?"

"Oh, do not worry about that, I'll arrange a temporary leave with the administrator…" Yanagi butt into the conversation politely assuring the two past teammates.

"No. He means incorporating it into his manga… I'm sure you can make it a timeskip training arc. It'll save paper and also allow you to make-up hogwash power ups and techniques without the need of actually establishing them or any character development that would come with learning them." Mana suggested.

Sugemi sighed cocking his head around like he was not overly fond of that idea but then he decided to just go with it.

Quickly guards following a chubby short man filled the containment building and surrounded Mana, Yanagi and Sugemi.

"We've detected a barrier breach. What is the meaning of this?" the chubby officially dressed man inquired rudely but Yanagi approached him to bargain out a deal for Sugemi's temporary leave on a first response squad. Mana and Sugemi stayed behind and watched over the conversation, judging from the manner in which Yanagi addressed the chubby man, the Aburame was outranked by the man and yet after a brief exchange of words and explanations the man hesitantly agreed to let Sugemi go on Yanagi's watch temporarily just as reinforcement to the first response squad.

"That was impressive." Mana complimented her companion on his impressive conversational and legal skills. Not many people could barter out a deal like that on the spot quoting actual prison statute and various rules and decrees.

"Scratch that, teach me how to communicate with that Nara guy. He was annoying to deal with sufficiently that the people he was placed with consistently tried to kill him and then pleaded distress." Yanagi replied looking curiously at the athletic and tall young man following them with a large satchel of things he took from his cell. The trio headed to recollect all of the items they've left behind so they could move on to the Land of Waves.

"You know, we should've taken Deiji or Nanaba with us too… Don't we still need people for a complete rescue team?" Sugemi inquired. "Maybe Shimo should've come with us too? Three people reunions make for pretty powerful moments that can be illustrated on the cover of a volume or even on the movie box if my manga ever gets adapted…" the Nara shrugged.

"No way, getting a Jinchuuriki to come would've been incomparably more difficult. They are almost always an exception to each leniency rule. They must stay safe and indoors at all times, that's the policy Konoha has adopted since the Fourth Hokage declared it so…" Yanagi objected.

"Also… Shimo died, on the last mission we were in. I was pretty sure you were sent a notice with a permission of attending his funeral so I thought you'd know…" Mana sadly informed her teammate.

Sugemi looked down in confusion, his eyes wandered around the forest surrounding them and the Eden prison complex that was quickly fleeting their view and disappearing in the horizon.

"There goes your suggestion making him the hero… Did he at least die a sufficiently heroic death that the fans wouldn't petition to bring him back and have closure?" Sugemi wondered. It appeared that after the initial cold shower of Tanshu's death nothing made Sugemi abandon his manga-centered personality. It appeared to become his cover from pain, sadness and the cruel world around him – everything was just a manga story to him now. Mana was not entirely sure which version of her friend she liked more but at least she could somewhat communicate with this one.

"He did, but I suppose he could make a good surprise timeskip revelation to end the first post-timeskip chapter on… However you handle it, Shimo died a hero and his death mattered." Mana concluded trying to hide her own sadness behind the adopted manner of speech she had to use to communicate to her friend. She had never in a thousand years thought that this manga trope world she was studying would become the only way to reach her friend now. It was really a good thing she had studied it extensively before approaching him.

"Yeah… It'd make a real shocker twist. Even if fans do make a fuss, in my manga no one will come back from the dead… Just my way of establishing some realism into this crazy world…" Sugemi mumbled out clearly affected by the news.

An awkward silence took over the better part of that day's trip. The ever lingering presence of death and everyone remembering all those they have lost. It was clear just looking into Yanagi's dark and expressionless face that somewhere inside those dark googles he understood the reason behind Sugemi's current rambling state. It was the best way the boy had found to deal with the world around him. This change was his only way of not becoming the villain of his story. He likely still fostered those cold views of wishing to eradicate criminals and hating on Kirigakure whether they were criminals or not. Still, the way things were now it was tough to say how much of the old Sugemi or the darker Sugemi still lingered in this young man…


	249. Inspiration from Most Unexpected Places

The familiar sound of breaking waves hitting the shores greeted Mana's ears together with the salty sea smell. This beach however had no fishing settlement or port town on it, just a couple of separate shipping establishments selling or renting boats together with rowers. The beach appeared to begin suddenly, at some point the endless horde of trees just stopped and a fist sized extension of grassy plains extended bit further before running into a rough sandy beach.

"So do you have money to rent out a boat?" Yanagi wondered looking at Mana suggesting that he was broke.

"I don't feel like rowing, maybe we should pay a rower?" Sugemi complained stretching out. He must've been getting soft in the prison as early mornings hit him right below the belt.

"We can't afford to waste time. We're already a couple of days behind the Imarizu. We need to travel to the other side instantly – as fast as we can. That way we'll save one and a half day and possibly still be in time to interrupt the marriage." Mana firmly stated looking at the misty and calm surface of water extending into the horizon. The thick mist made the sea look almost infinite but most people living in the Fire Country knew that the voyage to the Land of the Waves would've taken a bit less than two days.

"I can do it…" Sugemi smiled smugly looking at his companions with some arrogance and condescension. "Can you though, without running into stupid filler shenanigans?"

Yanagi nodded, he was a bit intimidated by the challenge but his face besides a shade of seriousness didn't betray any shade of fear. Just the healthy bit of respect for the challenge.

"Won't even break sweat…" Mana closed her eyes before stretching out her legs and cracking her fingers.

"We will. I hope you've taken it into consideration – we'll spend a lot of chakra pulling something like this. We'll be at a disadvantage during the fight, I doubt the Imarizu would've pulled something like this." Yanagi looked at Mana questioningly but the kunoichi didn't answer his gaze.

The magician leaped up into the air allowing her hands to flash through a bunch of hand seals in a mere moment. A chilly breeze blew the team's way leaving Mana suspended in mid-air.

"Mystical Wings Jutsu." she chanted out before leaning forward and supercharging her jutsu, the imbalanced super-powered wind current launched Mana shooting like a sky soaring arrow through the ocean. Crossing the entire distance in a bit less than a couple of seconds.

Once the magician's feet firmly landed on the ground on the other side she breathed out uneasily. Mana had to admit that supercharging and struggling to maintain her technique cost her more chakra than she had wished it to, then again, it was still better than trying to leap over the sea just using simple chakra augmentation. The young woman stretched out her numb and aching muscles and closed her eyes trying to calm down her erratic chakra network and her rushing heart.

A powerful blast shook the ground beneath Mana's feet raising a wave of sand so immense that the magician had to leap sideways to avoid it. Sugemi was smiling in his showy landing pose in a giant crater of sand blasted away from under his feet, his skin was swollen red, blood vessels shot out and pulsing as they struggled to sate his slowly dying muscles with oxygen. A moment later the gates that Sugemi had opened closed down relieving his tense muscles and returning some cheerfulness into his cheeks. The young Nara's gate mastery appeared to have increased, it came off much more casually to him now. He must've still been training in prison, pretty hard from the look of it. It was good to know – they'd need all the skill they can get pretty soon.

Seconds passed by before a darker image appeared in the fog and then closed in – Yanagi was riding a cloud of large insects. These weren't the usual Aburame parasitic insects, these were a whole another breed. Where the usual parasitic insects looked somewhat like black small beetles, these massive ones reminded Mana more of locusts or grass hoppers with large buzzing wings. While she was genuinely creeped out by the display she did her best to hide it as while she was not a fan of creepy crawlies she didn't want to offend her companion. Somehow the impression hit her that the Aburame bonded with their symbiotic crawling friends which would've made expressing disgust really offensive.

After Yanagi leaped off the massive cloud of insects and landed on the messed up beach allowing the insects to disappear into his sleeves and behind his collar like they were never there he just fixed his raggedy coat.

"I've had my insects eat some of my own chakra to get them fast enough… It's clear that none of us are at full strength. Do you really think it smart to look for a fight now?" Yanagi voiced his impression.

"It doesn't matter. It was not a fight I fully intended to win anyways, as long as Kiyomi doesn't get married I'll be fine with whatever happens." Mana looked at a small settlement in the distance.

Land of Waves had no hidden villages and no ninja to protect them. It relied solely on the mercy of other ninja villages and there used to be a big struggle between Konoha and Kirigakure as to who will grant the island the most favors. Influence here was well desired and, frankly, that made little sense. Mana was sure that it was mostly fueled by rivalry and not actual economic or military benefit. Land of Waves had little to no military power other than its settlers, none of them were really soldiers either. If anything, it was sort of useful as a comfortable communication tower location – the signal from here would've covered all the way to Archipelago and Konoha. Still it hardly was worth the massive conflicts and hidden spy warfare that transpired in this poor peaceful island.

"Crime is a massive problem in Land of Waves…" Yanagi noted, it didn't really sound like a warning or like anything of great meaning behind it. Must've just been a simple observation without anything the Aburame wanted to say with it.

"Yeah. But the criminals here reign unchallenged. Without challenge they never evolve. Their MOs are ancient and outdated, they are weak and no threat to anyone but a peaceful settler. I don't think we have anything to worry about…" Sugemi shrugged. "I don't think they are even worth mentioning in my manga. They'd not be strong enough to serve any role – too weak to be a surprise twist villain, not even strong enough to be filler fodder."

"It's strange, isn't it? How numbed we are to criminals – as long as they pose no threat to us as a military unit ninja tend to ignore them. That's what leads to them thriving and leeching off of poor peaceful people that want nothing more but continue their lives without having to deal with criminals." Mana closed her eyes sinking deep in thought. Something about this ghastly poor settlement reminded her of all the locations she had visited affected by the Syndicate. The magician wanted to do something about all this but it wasn't why she came there, unlike when she was looking for the Box, this time she was racing with time.

"So you know the threat, right?" Yanagi asked Mana directly.

"I've faced the Imarizu before. I lost." Mana replied directly.

"Well, now you won't be alone, it'll be fine…" Sugemi arrogantly waved his hand at her.

"I wonder about that… I was training a special technique which I was sure would've granted me victory over them. They are exclusively physical combatants – fast, strong, their punching focused style is brutal and tough to defend against. Even a single Imarizu would give me trouble, I remember barely being fast and slippery enough to evade two of them." Mana wondered.

"So why did you stop training? If you finished your training maybe you'd have stood a better chance?" Sugemi asked, "I mean, I get it – unfinished training builds up tension before the big battle. It establishes a real threat and if you just mastered a perfect counter technique to the enemy's abilities it'd be way too convenient to allow sufficient tension. Still – it would be a handy tool and a new technique always mixes up the boring repetition of a shounen manga." The Nara shrugged.

"I don't see myself as a character of a manga, Sugemi. Nor would I see myself as the main character. I belong to no clan, there's nothing special about me and I don't like fighting that much, I only do it out of necessity. I like to be ready – challenge doesn't excite me. I'm in no way different from any of my peers. I want to be a hero but I don't assume I'm anything special like being the main character of my own story…" Mana looked at the wet and sludgy mush of mud beneath her feet.

Yanagi wanted to speak up, say something encouraging but he stopped halfway, the raggedy young man saw a little dirty kid playing on the street and walked up to her. The little girl looked in no way scared of a stranger which just looked so sad. Almost like the kid accepted the inevitability of death and didn't care if the people talking to her were malicious or good people.

"I'm sorry, young girl. You wouldn't by any chance know about a wedding that has to happen here, would you?" the Aburame inquired trying to make his face as kid-friendly as possible. Still, it would've been impossible to make a face of an Aburame with those silly black swimming googles not look suspicious. The hilarious expression on the kid's face almost made Mana cheer up a bit right after facing her failure.

"Oh yeah… It'll happen tomorrow in the northern beach at thirteen 'o clock. The whole arrival of the groom will happen in the morning, it'll be a big celebration. We don't see much of those…" the dirty cheeked kid looked down.

"Wow, Mana. You're gonna be good to go as the villain when you crash that wedding. Ruining your friend's wedding, ruining a celebration for the whole island." Sugemi whistled with his attempt to tease Mana.

"I'm fine being the villain. As long as I do what is right." Mana cut down. "I kind of expected to get into a fight today though. I don't want those Imarizu holding Kiyomi hostage any longer than they have to, I know Kumogakure's history well enough to know it's not a great idea to leave them with a foreigner for too long…"

Sugemi chuckled.

Yanagi shook his head. "No, this is good. We'll have some time to rest a little bit. None of us are fresh and we'll need to be in our best possible state to win this."

"I'll have some time to practice my technique…" Mana sighed.

"You still haven't explained to me what you're exactly trying to do. Maybe I can help you out?" Sugemi shrugged, "I'm trying to score points for the next popularity poll and the unlikely antihero savior scores pretty good with the target demographic."

"It's a genjutsu, cast as fast as possible, a couple of hand seals most. The target is to make a superior faster Substitution Jutsu replacement." Mana explained.

"What's wrong with Substitution? It's a pretty good bail out from writing yourself into a corner…" Sugemi shrugged. "It also makes for a decent fake-out tool if you want to freak your audience out with a fake death."

"It's too slow and clunky. It needs me to focus on what's around me, on things to replace myself with. It is also an easily learned universal technique meaning my opponent can pursue me with it or use it against me. I want something faster, more confusing, something that'd buy me time to lock my enemy into a chain of illusions." Mana explained.

"Oh, so you're like Chip Sipper from My Battle Bikini Goddess. You're looking to stall the plot and annoy both the reader and your opponent." Sugemi smiled.

Right before the trio reached the inn they decided to stay in Mana wondered why she ever thought that Sugemi could help her. Genjutsu was one of the most sophisticated ninja arts, probably right up there with medical ninjutsu. Sugemi was one of the poorest grades having students, he had little to no genjutsu knowledge. His constant ramblings about manga and tropes that reminded more of madness than something making any semblance of sense.

After just barely managing to scrape together enough money for one room to stay in overnight everyone was so tired that Sugemi and Yanagi hit the beds. There's been a while since any of them slept in a proper bed, jury was still out on Sugemi's case as Mana didn't have any experience with prison beds. However if she proceeded with this tradition of caring more about her own moral principles and well-being of people dear to her than rules she'd soon find out all about it…

The magician closed her eyes and tried to meditate a bit. Try and figure out a solution to her iron wall that prevented all of her progress. She had one night to master the illusion. Still, the very same limitations plagued her: she couldn't pull off the technique like the one she wanted fast enough, if she could wrap her head around a sufficiently speedy technique it was too weak. That substituting of an illusion formed in her own mind idea she once had was grand, if only it was any closer to reality, not quite there, just far enough she could see it and reach for it…

"Chip Sipper, huh?" Mana wondered to herself after forcefully breaking her trance.

She just couldn't meditate right – she was afraid, for both her own life and that of Kiyomi and those of her companions who had agreed to come with her. Too afraid and asking too many questions to either sleep or meditate – she was such a wreck. When she regained her chakra control and helped beat Akimichi Francho somehow she believed that she could somehow make a difference. Be an efficient ninja instead of a failure she had been for so long and yet… Meditating used to be this thing she was very good at and she couldn't even do that anymore.

Crawling quietly on her knees the magician got to her puffed up bag and examined its contents. For some reason she still carried around all the manga she had bought. It may not have been all of them but she at least carried around most of them – who could've said, she wasn't careful enough to guarantee one or two chapters didn't get lost in the forests she roamed the past couple of days. Slowly Mana's fingers pulled out a bunch of manga and zipped the bag, as quietly as she could.

A rough sound of Sugemi kicking his cover and flipping around in his bed scared Mana a bit attracting her attention but then the Nara just fell asleep. The magician began running her eyes through the covers and the titles. There were plenty in this pile she still hadn't read but the name Sugemi had mentioned sounded familiar. Finally the magician's eyes stopped at a very questionably dressed young lady with a beach ball fighting what seemed like the most oddly dressed clan of ninja, then again, who was Mana to judge the attire of other ninja.

"My Battle Bikini Goddess…" Mana mumbled under her nose almost immediately regretting looking into its contents. She thought she had heard of the name Sugemi mentioned in some huge crossover manga she read when she was researching the crossover subject. This title in specific seemed far too lude for the magician's interest and she tried to postpone researching ecchi battle manga for as long as possible.

"Kiyomi and Meiko would probably enjoy this…" Mana sighed after finishing the whole volume of some of the weirdest read she had in a while. Apparently as the summary on the back claimed the title in question was a long time classic of the ecchi battle manga genre. While Mana lacked the experience to tell if this manga specifically was the best of anything as she had not properly researched any more ecchi titles nor did she intend to do so in the nearest future, the magician could see some similarities between her and the previously mentioned perv Chip Sipper.

Something was wrong. Mana's seated frame froze in fear as her chakra flared up, she rolled sideways using her arms as aide to elevate her into a standing position as a black figure burst into her room through the wall. Differently from the all black dressing ninja from My Battle Bikini Goddess who fought exclusively little underdressed girls (who were continuously stated in footnotes to be over the age of eighteen by the author) in hot sandy beaches, this assailant was perfectly blending into the natural darkness of the night outside.

A loud popping sound informed Mana that the light bulb got poppet as she guessed that more of the assailants were gathering. Luckily enough the loud entrance raised her companions. It was clear to Mana from the shining blades on the attacker's knuckles that the strike was aimed at a vital on the back of her neck – she was meant to be taken out quick leaving the other two struggling to fend off unknown assailants in the dark right after waking up.

Mana's hands reached in to weave hand seals but more figures flooded in through the hole blown by the attacker as the rest of the Imarizu flooded the room making it too stuffy for showy evasion or overly destructive techniques. For the second time Mana was caught unprepared, it was more than likely that they sensed the really loud arrival of the three and decided to hit before they were hit. While their initial attempt at Mana's life was unsuccessful it was now only a matter of time. The room was completely dark making Sugemi's techniques almost useless as he couldn't form a shadow in total darkness without leaving outside and looking for a light source there.

This fight for their lives couldn't have found them at a worse time…


	250. The Lowest Point

Right after the three of Imarizu barged in they proceeded to carry out their objective. Without a doubt they intended for Mana to die immediately. Judging from how devoted the Imarizu was in their initial clash to keep Mana from making hand seals they must've known or at least suspected some of her skillset at least and for one reason or the other considered it important to not let her perform a single jutsu.

Immediately the three Imarizu, dressed black as the night that gave them cover and wearing only blank dark masks that removed any semblance of their humanity, charged at each and every ninja remaining alive after their attack. This time Mana did not bother performing hand seals or trying to pull off techniques – she knew it would've been just time wasted as she'd have gotten interrupted again. The magician leaped and rolled over the beds that crowded the room and all the small bedside cabinets that made it difficult to properly evade.

Just like Kouta taught her, when there wasn't enough space to evade, Mana utilized that stuffed space to put objects between her and her opponent. If the room did not allow her the luxury of evasion she made sure that it also got in her opponent's way but with a single powerful hook each object sent their way got bashed and grinded to sawdust with a single chakra imbued knuckle duster strike. The blades on the bladed knuckle dusters the Imarizu all used sliced through wood like a jet of fire made its way through paper.

Mana offered herself the foolish luxury to care for her friends and see how they were doing. Sugemi, impressively enough, was moving in a way similar to her. The magician was terribly wrong to feel surprised about his skill in close range combat. He was a taijutsu user, if anyone amongst the three of them could keep up with the Imarizu it would've been Sugemi. However Mana saw it. None of them were close to being on the technical level of skill to match fists with the Imarizu. All of them fleeing, moving away and desperately working to stay alive. This fight would not end well unless they changed something up.

Then there was this sparking thought of the fourth Imarizu. Where was he? Lurking somewhere waiting for their ace in the hole chance to strike for a kill. One good hit would've been everything it'd have taken to kill. This time there was no mystery man to bring Mana or anyone of her companions back from death. It was just what she was willing and capable of doing to survive.

"Sugemi!" Mana shouted and she felt her friend grab her by her abdomen and move her away as he flipped beside her, letting a potentially heart piercing strike punch through the floor.

Her friend lit up like a candle, the young man activated his first gate effortlessly without even taking a moment to channel his chakra. The first gate now came off that naturally to Sugemi.

"Do it!" he affirmed Mana that he had it in the bag.

As the magician worked with her hand seals one of the Imarizu pointed their knuckle dusters at her and Sugemi who stood in front of her ready to block or deflect any attacks coming her way. The Nara grunted out loud in pain as he bashed the knuckle duster aside with the back of his palm, getting cut in the process. The tension and strain that the First Gate placed on his body made blood spout out from the Nara's wound like an upchuck of vomit.

Mana's hand seals concluded. A sweet melody filled the air as she gently and softly hummed out the tune of her genjutsu activating the Sweet Lullaby Jutsu. The lifeless and almost demonic looking Imarizu twitched and began shaking. Their bodies utterly overwhelmed with pleasure, sadly Mana saw Sugemi and Yanagi be affected by the same illusion. For a moment a relief of a possible victory took Mana over but then a sharp pain in her abdomen interrupted that feeling.

The magician groaned in pain and her eyesight blurred for a moment making a complete and utter mess of the shadow sunken room she was fighting for her life in. One of the Imarizu was leaned down on his stretched out back leg and kneeling on their front leg while they threw a powerful low-aimed punch right into Mana's gut. The magician felt the rushing taste of blood in her mouth as she realized that the Imarizu that punched her was still wearing his knuckle dusters. She instantly devoted a fair flow of chakra to keeping her gut stab wound bleeding as little as possible.

She heard feint taps of blood but it wasn't hers, it was too far away to be hers and then she saw it – knives stuck in each of the assailants' thighs. They stabbed themselves in their moment of weakness, after being captured in her illusion, to allow the sudden outburst of pain to overcome the pleasure – that allowed them the needed concentration to break the illusion and right after it was broken they moved instantly with the cover of the shade around them. Too fast for Mana's let down guard to keep up with.

As the Imarizu all prepared to pounce Mana realized that they were going to focus all their attention on her – she's been marked as the sick and weakened animal and they had their highest chances of taking her down if they all focused on her. It was like knives stuck in their thighs barely even slowed them down or affected their thoughts at all, almost like pain did not exist for them. Mana couldn't do this any longer! She'd remove those masks and expose their humanity, their pain ridden faces if it was the last thing she'd do. The demoralizing sight of those steel masks on their faces was too much…

The kunoichi lifted her hands up, Imarizu jumped at her but then they, too late, realized that she was not weaving any hand seals. Instead the card spring devices in her sleeves slipped a hand of cards in each of her hands which she threw right at her assailants. The Imarizu leaped over it and landed their feet firmly on the ceiling of the room, kicking off of it they aimed their knuckles right at Mana but Sugemi interrupted two of them, punching so hard at them and stopping halfway that the air pressure would cushion and block the attackers' blows. The pair relentlessly bombarded the Nara with their taijutsu combinations moving in and out, switching between themselves just to give the young one not a moment of rest and it showed. Sugemi skipped more and more blows and was being tossed around.

A chirping and squirming wall of bugs protected Mana from the bladeless Imarizu but she could have sworn she heard a thick. Like some sort of a switch was being pressed and after hearing the steel string reeling sound she rolled aside only to get another quadruple gash on her back – like a cheetah leaving its marks on the girl, smacking her with its clawed paw. It appeared that the assailants' weapons had the option of being returned to their user after they were used as long range projectiles via string reeling mechanism. Yanagi's bugs continued to swarm wherever the Imarizu who now regained his knuckle duster tried to rush in on Mana, shielding her with their collective effort at their master's command.

The magician pulled her hands back revealing the steel strings being attached to the cards she had used as the light from the floor below shined through the ground hole made during the missed strike of one of the attackers, illuminating the strings. With her other hand she weaved hand seals, just barely fast enough now that she had the assist from Yanagi's creepy crawlies. Even as they protected her from being skewered to death the magician still felt glad that there was barely any light coming into the room – else she had seen the nature of insects that were protecting her life right now.

"Magic Bullet Barrage!" Mana shouted placing her steel wire holding hands in front of her and expelling an intense barrage of small balls of lightning chakra. The lightning chakra spheres rushed right at where they were pointed at, the Imarizu member she was aiming them at easily flipped and vaulted aside but Mana pulled her steel strings trapping the man. The lightning balls transferred their charge right into the steel strings almost like fusing with them – the steel strings attached to Mana's cards directed the lightning chakra spheres right into the tangled Imarizu member who finally displayed a sign of humanity shook in immense pain as his entire body twitched and contracted under immense lightning shock. Even when exposed to such incredibly painful attacks well beyond the voltage needed to kill a normal man the Imarizu did not shout or grunt in pain.

The magician could smell a tense burning flesh sensation and the brief rays of light from below transferred through the hole the Imarizu punched earlier as well as the countless holes Mana left in the wall with her technique briefly illuminated the streaks of smoke coming off of the Imarizu member and his torn up and damaged black skinsuit and halfway broken mask.

Sugemi meanwhile slid back after a strong shoulder slam broke the wind out from his lungs. He grinned after realizing where he was located as the Imarizu duo charged at him. The Nara clutched himself together…

"First Gate: Gate of Opening! Open!" he shouted out opening his first gate with much more focus, molding up incalculably more chakra and becoming just briefly fast enough to match the Imarizu duo blow for blow. The Imarizu simply displayed bad positioning trying to approach their opponent in the straight line but it was not their fault – it was Sugemi's more clever positioning getting them in between another partner of his or a wall, not letting the two surround him.

Finally as a massive influx of insects bashed at the wall cutting the Imarizu off of him he could weave his hand seals.

The two Imarizu members took their time to backflip out of danger of being overwhelmed with whatever kind of parasitic chakra devouring insects Yanagi used.

"Shadow Tendril Barrage!" Sugemi shouted as the light coming in from below was sufficient for him to form a very short shadow, at long last, and unleash a powerful barrage of strikes with the shadow constructs branching out from the ground.

Sadly the Imarizu were too skilled and evaded the attack, bobbing and weaving from each strike, an impressive feat of agility as the strikes appeared almost simultaneously, before moving too far away for Sugemi's weakened technique's range to even reach them. The Nara's offensive comeback was cut short. Mana looked at her opponents carefully surveying them and their utter silence really was getting to her. They weren't coordinating any plans with their own teammates, they weren't expressing any emotion. They were just acting. They knew their plan, they knew their objectives and could sufficiently enough work together to understand their motions from half a thought.

Angered by his lack of success Sugemi reached into his back pocket. The Imarizu lashed out at him not feeling overly enthusiastic about allowing the youth to properly utilize his arsenal. A flock of knives and blades enveloped the Imarizu who just in time managed to swing and throw his companion away from the same fate. Surprised by the turnout Mana realized that it was Yanagi's insects that each carried a small blade with them, clutched by their numerous legs sharing the weight effort. It was almost like a storm of swarm minded knives that enveloped their opponent and cut them at the same time as they feasted on their chakra, as most Aburame parasitic insect breeds did.

A strong gust of wind sent the swarm of knife wielding parasitic locusts away. It was a powerful strike with Wind Release chakra forming a shockwave around it, strong enough to either tear apart a body hit by the initial strike or blow away something like the swarm of insects surrounding the Imarizu member at that moment.

Bleeding and torn up, with his mask cracked the second Imarizu also leaped back into safety. Suddenly a powerful flash of light surprised Mana – Sugemi set off his flash bomb that most ninja carried in their ninja kits. It was a small pellet like sphere that when cracked emitted a brief flash that lasted a couple of times longer than an actual flash of light – the light emanating from it persevered for a brief fraction of a moment longer than an actual flash of light.

Having been given a chance to use his Nara hidden shadow techniques, Sugemi went through his hand seals and shouted out.

"Nara Clan Hijutsu: Shadow Yggdrasil!" he roared out as his body tensed up to point where it seemed like at any point it could burst in blood. With the whole room being enveloped in a flash of light providing him a faster than a lightning bolt chance to use his technique Sugemi unleashed a gigantic beam of darkness on the floor that was like his own shadow expanded dozens of times from which a colossal pillar of solid shadowy construct came out blasting the two Imarizu who were lined up to one side of the room out with an impressive explosion as the room could no longer contain the battle inside.

The expanding shadow pillar then morphed into a horizontal tree-like shape of fists that kept on assaulting the two Imarizu members and trying their best to do as much damage as possible. The third Imarizu member just looked on at Sugemi blowing his two teammates away and saw his chance right after the flash of light faded and the Nara's technique was abruptly ended. He leaped at the weakened and exhausted Sugemi but only heard a shout from his side.

"Spear Kick!" Mana yelled out right as her foot collided with the Imarizu's block. The magician was impressed that the assailant managed to block her attack without actually seeing it coming as she did not chant out the name of her taijutsu technique before it was already blocked.

After the Imarizu member slid back and bashed his way through the shoddy wooden wall unable to stop from the inertia, falling good two floors down in the process. Mana rushed after him but saw nothing. The trio waited on trying to anticipate the next attack but there was only the cold chill of the night and the howling misty winds rushing through the numerous holes in the battle damaged building.

No one came at them… The Imarizu disappeared just as fast into the night as they attacked.

Mana, Yanagi and Sugemi wandered the gloomy streets of the island. After the inn got completely trashed they could obviously no longer stay there. That being said, they had nowhere to go to nor did they have any options. They were worn out, made to bleed and sweat before their big battle and that was only the second to worst possible outcome. Even when they lost the Imarizu won…

Obviously their intent was to kill the three quickly and efficiently, with a single strike take out Mana – proceed to take out the sleepy duo the same way. Even if the three were still drawing breath they took some pretty nasty blows. All three of them were cut up and bleeding as one couldn't just block the Imarizu's blows. Mana's gut felt burning up even after she had applied an ointment that was supposed to help her wound heal. Sugemi looked like he was attacked by a wild animal with the claws of steel, Yanagi was also decently scratched up but out of the three he looked the best. Probably because he had his bugs protect him most of the time. Their blade using defense was efficient enough to keep him alive.

The three did not speak to each other. Just like the Imarizu did not speak with their companions but it wasn't for the same reasons. They just knew that the attack left them weakened and battered, they knew that even at full strength they stood little to no chances of survival. Right now they almost got taken out by a squad of Imarizu that was missing the member with Shimo's sword.

The trio found a calmer alleyway to turn into. Slowly they wandered in and scared away any smalltime criminals counting their nightly profits from mugging and casual gambling scams. Mana used the seal in her hat to remove some emergency supplies out of the pocket storage space inside it and began changing her clothes behind the cover of a corner alleyway to the one her companions were doing the same in, she also refilled her deck compartment with a couple of cards she was missing. The My Battle Bikini Goddess manga fell out but she carefully shoved it back inside. Mana's eyes shot out wide and she straightened out, looking back, then at her friends.

Sugemi accidentally slipped in a look at Mana before she was finished getting ready – her slip into her thoughts caused her to not get ready as fast as her looking away male teammates would've thought it to take. Swiftly Mana finished getting ready and placing the decks into their compartments, checking the seals on the decks and seeing if the spring devices still worked. She put on her top hat before letting a handful of blue sparks shoot out from inside it signaling that the seal still worked. Seeing how Mana was no sealing expert and only knew the basics taught in the Academy such checks were often needed.

In the Land of Waves it was tough to say when exactly the Sun rose up. It was constantly misty and near impossible to see anything at all. However at some point in time from the absolute pitch black murky darkness the day turned into just the casual everyday depressing gloom.

Slowly, yet at an accelerating pace, Mana, Yanagi and Sugemi moved onto the northern beach location. No one was quite sure what would come out of it but Mana wasn't about to stop. She couldn't allow her friend's sword being used to kill, she couldn't allow one of her best friends to get married to a kidnapper who tried to have her killed nor could she allow Inomame gain untold influence over the world. Someone who used power and influence like Inomame did couldn't be allowed to have that much power and influence.

Yanagi didn't slow his step either. The Aburame was determined to rather die than continue being a smalltime undercover over-glorified prison spinster whose job it was to catch and filter through rumors of when a smalltime criminal of even smaller importance would be tried to be broken out. He wanted to move past it and the man knew that the path to where he wanted to get laid in something exceptional, often in risking his life.

Mana was not entirely sure of what Sugemi was thinking, honestly. He looked equally determined to have another arc added to the manga about his story which would one day inevitably be written. Maybe that was all it was about, the magician was not sure, but she herself liked to think that there was another reason to her friend's presence by her side. Maybe he wished to genuinely redeem his youthful mistakes of the past, maybe he only used those silly mad speeches of tropes and meta-sounding madness as cover for his true intentions? While her short introduction course to manga didn't allow her to state it for sure, as a believer in all the best in humanity, Mana wanted to believe that…


	251. I'll Have it Three-Way!

Like in a dimension straight out of a seashell the foaming and turning waves continuously rinsed the rocky beach of the Land of the Waves. A large crowd had gathered to witness the arrival of Yamanaka Inomame – a famous and powerful persona even in the farthest away reaches of the great ocean. It would've been rare for any one man who spent most of their lives shrouded and hidden in secrecy to be so well known past not only Kirigakure but the entire Archipelago.

The crowd was layered, almost like filtered and lined in the row of their importance as various criminal minds gathered themselves and their crews as far in front as their influence allowed them for they truly ran this island. The poor and the ruined stood at the end even if their despair demanded entertainment and cheerfulness of a high class wedding the most. The more the crowd went on the more influential, rich and powerful the people were and one did not get luxury and influence in the Land of Waves without stepping over someone's corpse.

At the end of it all, leading the celebratory fray stood the Imarizu four. The three that carried injuries still stood there with their black as night bodysuits torn and damaged, their masks half broken revealing the dark skin underneath. While people of such dark shades of skin were very common in the warmest circles of the northern part of the continent all the way in Kumogakure, here they were standing out and quite exotic. The darkness in their skin, while not surpassing that in their hearts, was a full spectrum darker even than Mana's, who already looked quite exotic amongst her native peers.

The foreigners standing at the end of the line stood out greatly. Even as their torn bodysuits showed off the athletic perfection to which their bodies were brought and peak shape they upheld at any given time, there were those who got riled up. A tall and bulky man, one whose body was built for managing sails and fishnets or hurling boulders, not combat approached the four.

"You four look mighty shad…" the man opened his mouth before his eyes shot wide open in painful surprise. Blood began spouting from deep in his throat and as the man wandered back through the crowd the caved in cavity made anyone the giant staggered to step back in fear of being covered in the man's grisly and overly showy demise.

"Do not assume you have the right to speak to us, pale-skin…" the Imarizu wearing a sheathed Audra blade on his back spoke having crushed the man's throat faster than anyone in the audience could see it happen. The speed at which the giant's fate was sealed could've transpired hundreds of thousands of times slower and still would've been completely unseen by any given islander.

After a good pair of minutes of coughing and drowning in his own blood the giant collapsed, likely choking from inability to draw breath than bleeding out. Strangely enough the grisly sight of murder did not affect the wedding's cheer in any way for the islanders up to the most snotty-nosed and dirty-faced orphan were used to such sights.

After casually killing a man for daring to speak to them while wearing the wrong colored skin, one they were not accustomed to in the faraway corners of Kumogakure the Imarizu continued to stand calmly. Standing by them was a blond haired girl wearing just a flimsy and torn brown dress that reminded more of rags that a child from a war-torn country would wear. Despite their distaste for pale skinned people the girl was not touched and had not a single sign of beating or injury on her body – she was an important part of the Imarizu's plan so their strict and historical dislike of pale skinned people had to be swallowed most bitterly.

At long last a glorious ship appeared in the horizon, the brightest and most angelic, smooth as a marshmallow cloud wood encrusted with only the finest gold worked in the mines of Iwagakure long ago. Such a ship could've only belonged to a man powerful enough to buy it and extravagant enough to flaunt his power with it – Yamanaka Inomame. The Imarizu's strict and unwavering eyes did not falter. The few eyes visible through the broken masks did not grow excited for their ultimate goal coming closer, their convictions did not waver. Nor did they feel any pain from their bandaged thighs, their lips did not pale and their eyebrows did not betray their pain. These were men whose minds were honed and sharpened like the finest blade.

A platform slammed down from the colossal juggernaut letting down a party of equally extravagant smaller boats. On one of them stood a miracle incarnated in a man – beautiful, long and flowing golden hair and firmly symmetrical facial features. Long, unbent and unbroken even once nose and thin as they were long glossy lips. While Inomame may have appeared effeminate to many, no one could've denied in their right minds that the man was absolutely flawless in his looks. His black and white, diamond incrusted cloak of his sleeveless coat flipped and flattered behind him as the boats were quickly being worked to the shore.

Accompanying him were a bunch of similarly dressed men – armored bodysuits of black chainmail covering their faces. Their eyes whited out as they were honed to absolute darkness yet altered by cutting edge medical advancements to work in the light as well. Faces covered by their bodysuits up to the noses and eyes and what little was being caressed by the light of day was covered in pale skin tissue as it was clear these men have all gone through hell and back to accompany this highly influential and enigmatic man. The Kirigakure Demon corps that were supposed to be disassembled, probably were rebranded but functioned under some capacity still, apparently, even more, they stood in front of the Imarizu elite, outnumbering the Kumogakure ninja a dozen to one.

"You've brought men with you?" the Audra blade carrying Imarizu affirmed of the sight he was being exposed to.

"I see no men here, only Demons…" Inomame snarled before changing his strict face drastically to allow himself the luxury of snickering to his own joke. "Surely you didn't expect me to come to such an event, to claim my bride brought to me by an order of Kumogakure criminals without an army to back me up? Granted, the Demons have been long since disassembled so training new ones is a pain in the ass, especially with the secrecy needed. Though what they lack in skill, these youngsters make up for with their wish to match their legendary predecessors…"

"Do not test our patience if you don't mean us to test the durability of your nose." one of the battle worn Imarizu growled. Kumogakure was a village that was walled off of the surrounding world by the vast and frigid wastelands of the Snow Country, they had not yet gotten used to seeing different skinned people, those who have been dealing with the more diplomatic side of their work may have gotten more used to the sight of different looking people but the Imarizu didn't appear to want to change their old ways.

"Oh, yes, threat of physical violence… To be honest, I am as surprised to see my lovely bride intact and unharmed as I was to hear that the highly shushity-shush Imarizu of the Cloud decided to help me out to obtain said bride…" Imarizu bowed in front of Kiyomi who just rolled her eyes.

"She did not offer much resistance once she woke up. Despite our most honest wish to hurt her she gave us no reason to." The Imarizu holding Kiyomi spoke up slightly nudging her farther on to be shown off in her full beauty.

"Hey, I'm not against getting married, I figured seeing where this thing goes, seeing if the groom is alright… Just mostly curious…" Kiyomi shrugged.

"Oh my, no one smacked her, I am so honestly shocked!" Inomame snickered to himself. "Have the terrible Imarizu finally gotten over their outdated racist ways?"

The implication was met with complete silence.

"Oh well, can we get on with the wedding then my part of the bargain shall come afterwards." the show-off Yamanaka shrugged taking a couple of steps back.

It all transpired in a fraction of a moment, one microsecond the Imarizu was standing as he was and another he was behind Inomame, aiming his knuckle duster at the back of the Yamanaka's neck. None of the Demons were fast enough to interfere, they were all moving in to intercept the strike but none of them were fast enough to prevent the attack, all of them were hitting just to kill the Imarizu member post-factum. As the frozen moment in time resolved each of the violent combatants found themselves completely frozen in movement.

"Shadow Possession Jutsu!" Sugemi chanted out from the crowd as his hood slipped off. Seeing how they were forced to expose themselves already, Mana and Yanagi removed theirs as well. Upon seeing that a big battle was about to dye the shores blood red the crowd began to flee, it wasn't the first time that a promised festivity broke out in a deadly confrontation so the eyes of even the fleeing poor children were more disappointed that they won't get to see a wedding than afraid for their lives. Even these poor young ones knew that if they were killed in the fallout they wouldn't lose much, only as much as life in such a dump was worth…

"Mana!" Kiyomi shouted out, glad not that her friend came after her but to see that she was alive.

"See? Just as I told you…" the Audra blade wielding Imarizu reached for his sword hanging on his back and took a combat stance just to see if he could move. Upon finding out that Sugemi's technique didn't branch out all the way up to him he prepared to make sure that he wasn't captured.

"You said she was only half-pale so you only half-killed her! I had no idea what that even meant, you creep!" Kiyomi pouted crossing her arms in annoyance.

"Let's go, Kiyomi, you're not getting married…" Mana calmly stated approaching Kiyomi slowly as the Audra wielding leader of Imarizu stood in front of the Yamanaka heiress to protect her for the groom.

"That's mean!" Kiyomi shouted out.

"That's what I told her…" Yanagi smiled with an innocent shrug before tapping Sugemi's shoulder. The young Nara was glowing in translucent air pressure emanating from him as his skin dyed red and blood vessels shot out on his forehead and his muscles. The Nara had to use the weaker instant version of his First Gate just to keep the group captured and immobilized.

"I hate using this jutsu… I'd much more rather kick their ass, shadows are for punching people, not holding them in place!" Sugemi yelled out as holding so many strong ninja was stressing him greatly.

"Walk away…" the Imarizu protecting Kiyomi warned Mana, he appeared to feel somewhat softer about killing her as the magician's race was a bit more exotic in a way that was more recognizable for the tradition led organization.

"I can't do that. You have my friend whom I will not allow to get married to a man who wanted to kill her recently, you have a sword of my friend which you use for killing people, disgracing his legacy, and you're apparently trying to kill Yamanaka Inomame. While I do not have a personal affection for this man, I cannot allow him to die." Mana calmly explained as she continued to walk onwards towards her friend.

The Imarizu moved like a black lightning bolt, piercing through the air and covering the distance between Mana and him almost instantly, the athletic and well trained arm of the killer tensed up as it drew the shining glade sheathed behind his back and striking at the magician with the same swoop, fully utilizing the force behind his drawing strike beheading the magician almost in an instant. The Imarizu's blade only cut through thin air as what appeared to be the magician at first dissolved into a storm of cherry blossom petals scattered by the wind.

"Flower Petal Sanctuary" Mana calmly chanted as she continued to walk onwards towards her friend.

"What kind of ninjutsu is that!?" the Imarizu shouted in surprise before chasing Mana again. The blindingly fast assassin skewered the magician's shape with lightning fast stabs from his Audra blade but the skewered and misshapen shape of the magician only dissolved into flower petals again.

"Ninjutsu?" Mana's voice ringed in the man's ears before the magician reformed farther away from nothing but a wind carried stream of petals.

"It must be! Our mind is honed like the finest edge of a blade, we are immune to mental trifling like that of the Yamanaka, we cannot be attacked by illusions. Our minds are iron!" he grunted gripping his blade as the man's shape faded away and continued to slash at thin air, his body moved so fast that it was almost invisible. Only dark purple flash of the dancing Audra blade betrayed that the man even existed.

"I do not care about your immunities, I do not care about your strengths. As long as you have a functional mind, I can trick it. That is the ancient way of illusions." Mana's voice again rang in the man's ears who continued to slice and disperse each reforming shape of the magician.

It was a psychological attack, if anything. It cost Mana some chakra to keep the genjutsu loop resetting every time her illusionary self was hit. She concealed her true shape, replaced it with the illusionary self, allowing the Imarizu to only hit an illusionary trick, the entity that dissolved into petals every time it was hit. Even if it cost chakra every time it was hit, it was an effective psychological trick to make the Imarizu look vulnerable, confused.

She had figured out what she was missing before. She hit the nail in the head when Mana realized she could substitute illusions, she only couldn't fully realize that she needed to substitute the real deal with something. That meant that she had to create a harmless illusion – a genjutsu with no real effect that could be cast faster than an instant for it had no effect to it, then she formulated the real deal in her mind and with a single careless hand seal substituted the two illusions, transferring the harmless one to her own mind while she placed the ones brewed in her own brain right into any surrounding functional brain carrying a harmless and almost costless illusion. In a way this genjutsu technique was an actual spiritual successor of the Substitution Jutsu just as she had intended it to be.

And to think that a panel of My Battle Bikini Goddess helped her figure it all out, an undressing chess game played by one of its characters, of all things…

Sugemi grunted out. Mana's eyes turned at him and she saw a wide bloody gash on the young man's back. The angered Imarizu decided to attack Sugemi instead of continuously resetting Mana's loop, Yanagi tried to interfere but his mental link with his insects was too slow for the immensely fast and powerful opponent. The insects only gathered to the Nara's aid once the Imarizu raised his sword to finish the Nara off blocking his blade and forcing the angered assassin back.

"What's going on here?" Kiyomi wondered looking absolutely baffled as she could barely understand how the genjutsu used by Mana was still visible to her and everyone around her. She also couldn't understand why the Imarizu would attack the man she was about to marry.

"The Imarizu were never planning just getting you to marry Inomame. They were always working for the Raikage, looking to kill Inomame and preventing him from acquiring the power and influence." Mana explained, this had only became apparent to the magician once she saw the Imarizu attack Inomame. They must've been still loyal to their village which meant that they were in to reduce the Yamanaka's influence and kill Inomame the whole time.

"The Raikage would've never approved of so much killing… But yes, our aim is killing Inomame. You've impressed me, child. You can still walk away, fighting on two fronts is pretty troublesome, you know." The Imarizu with Shimo's sword sheathed his blade as Inomame's Demons prepared to protect their master from the Imarizu.

"I can't do that. I won't let anyone die. Too many people have already died for this affair." Mana angrily declared as she looked at Sugemi and Yanagi who nodded in support of her decision.

Kiyomi shrugged, "Meh, that Inomame guy was a bit of a sissy anyways…" before taking a fighting stance besides her friend.

"Can I finally hit someone!?" Sugemi shouted out in frustration. Having just stood back up and clearly spent a great deal of chakra to survive the strike to his exposed back.

Mana sighed before nodding.

This was a problematic battle, a bunch of newly formed Kirigakure Demons who were always more skilled than their rank. Also the Imarizu on top of that. Granted they weren't all fighting the Konohagakure team directly but they were each a considerable force on the battlefield. These Demons looked pretty young, their bodies were more fit than athletic and buffed, they couldn't have been much stronger than the Demon Mana, Shimo and Sugemi faced early in their career. The magician had improved leaps and bounds compared to that level of skill. Still, she spent a fair deal of chakra on that psychological trick she pulled before abusing a single technique again and again.

That was when all hell broke loose! The Imarizu, Yanagi's insects and Sugemi's shadows, the Kirigakure Demons all charged at each other. Just like Yamanaka Inomame, Kiyomi and Mana stood behind the main fray. Ready to support the exploding and rumbling mess of explosions, fists, insects, blades and ninjutsu techniques firing left or right from behind and aiming to control the fight to their own ends. That wasn't to say that the two kunoichi were completely out of the battle, many looked to engage the two in battle as they took the two girls for a weak prey that wanted nothing to do with the three-way battle in the beach.

Mana swiftly avoided all attacks coming her way while countering with swift palm strikes at the openings that displaced and broke the attacking limbs at their joints. An efficient combination of the fighting style taught to her by Meiko, Kouta and the old man in the Sun Disc arena. Kiyomi was handling her own side of things with a much more brutal and hands on approach as while she would've been battered and broken by two Demons attacking her simultaneously she managed to keep one in between of the other while she took care of them both, one after the other with swift strikes to their faces and abdomen.

By the time the weakened Demons rose up they were overwhelmed by the ever-moving and hectic battlefield, that whirling madness of fists and feet that drowned the weak and injured leaving them broken and crushed.

While not at all a traditional wedding, it was not out of ordinary ways public events in Land of the Waves went…


	252. The Great Land of the Waves Wedding

The seas were getting visibly more unsettling as the battle ashore kicked into a more intense gear. The foaming waves were dyed blood red as the constant aquatic washer tested and filtered the conscious and capable to fight and the beaten ones. Only the capable managed to withstand the alluring pull to the ocean's depths further from the beach of the withdrawing waters. The rippling outbursts of chakra created massive whirlpools that roared with all the might of a divine beast expelling geysers of water and throwing some of the washed away bodies in the air. Several were actually woken up by this aquatic baptism of the bloody foams.

Mana pressed a trigger under her sleeve firing off a bunch of cards from the deck compartments in her sleeve. The magician grabbed the handful of cards so she could utilize her own strength instead of the spring mechanisms and unleashed the storm of cards at several Kirigakure Demon trainees in her sight. Two of them used Substitution Jutsu replacing themselves with some of their fallen comrades and letting them take it for the living, another three took a pair of steel edged cards etching into their backs, bending and twisting their spines in pain and opening themselves up for the Imarizu's or Sugemi's counterattack.

Even if Mana wasn't fighting on the Imarizu's side, the dark skinned agents of death from Kumogakure were certainly eager to exploit the openings given to them by Mana. The magician moved her hand into an inner pocket of her jacket only for a splinter squad of Demons to branch out and rush at her from the side. Reacting to this attack, Mana's hand made the hand seals by itself firing off a mad air current below her and lifting the magician in the air as she rode it like a platform. Rising above the battlefield Mana unleashed a handful of steel tipped cards with chakra sealed inside of them, upon weaving a hand seal the cards released their contents exploding with the power of multiple explosive tags.

As Mana's eyes wandered behind her shoulder they fixed on a pair of rushing attackers. The pair of Demons used steel wire trying to latch onto Mana but missing and grabbing onto a top of a palm tree which elevated them well beyond the tree level. Quickly the kunoichi's head twisted sideways letting her hat slip off of her head and down her shoulder into her palm. The magician placed her hand onto its upper end setting off the seal and firing off a storm of various different cards sealed inside. Cards charged with Lightning Release chakra emitting a painful shock, cards with simple chakra lacking elemental nature that simply exploded or those with various ninja tools sealed inside. One of the Demons used the Substitution Jutsu to successfully evade the mess of epic proportions while the other braced for impact and plummeted back down.

These Demons were tough. Each one of these trainees was above the level of a common genin and while to an observer it may have looked like Mana and the others were fighting them all off, what was truly happening was they were merely postponing their confrontation – annoying the Demons, leaving injuries and blasting them back but not putting them down for their chakra levels allowed for sufficient enough chakra augmentation to make a compelling opponent for one of the Konoha team – each and every one of them.

A gut wrenching flesh piercing sound followed as Mana's gut got pierced by a hooking mechanism attached to a chain. A Demon below yanked on it pulling the girl down for a finishing strike but the shape erupted into flower petals that gently descended upon the battlefield. As the confused Demon wandered where the real Mana may have gone while she slipped into an illusion the magician kicked the man from behind at the back of his neck, just as the old man taught her in the Sun Disc arena, sending the Demon asleep.

This was troublesome – this trainee Demon forced her to move right into the fray of attacks, right into the middle of the messiest battlefield where fists and ninjutsu attacks were exchanged which the magician may not have been ready for. Mana uneasily looked around. And realized she's been noticed. One of the more battle damaged Imarizu followed a Kirigakure Demon as the two combined their effort in order to bring the elusive magician down.

A black shadow creeped along the battlefield – death incarnate in the shape of the Imarizu. The muscular and battle ready leader of Imarizu carved up his deadly art on the enemy bodies desperately looking for his target – Yamanaka Inomame. If the Yamanaka was smart he wouldn't have moved an inch – moving outside the battlefield would've exposed him, running away would've only revealed his back for the black viper to strike at it and sing its deadly fangs.

The Imarizu wielding the Audra blade charged at the northern edge of the battlefield slashing at the sides. Blood splattered wherever his ghastly blade danced its deadly tango, blood splattering all over the Imarizu's face and chest but the mask protected the eldest Imarizu veteran from flinching as splattering blood usually did. He was unnerved by how resilient these Demonlings were. For trainees their degree of endurance and chakra augmentation was surprising, if nothing else…

A foot shoved forward stopping the eldest Imarizu's charge and repurposing his force into a graceful backflip as his sword painted a crescent shape slashing at a Demonling that was pursuing him. His sword was successfully blocked, successfully meaning, obviously, that the defending chain wrapped gauntlet shattered into a million pieces. This Audra blade was something else. And to think that the Imarizu would've found it on a hit mission taking out a black market informant that lived in ancient Archipelago lapis lazuli mines. How on Earth could have a sword like this ended up so deep underground, like the Earth had swallowed it herself…

Suddenly, much to the surprise of the eldest Imarizu the Demon was blown back by an overwhelming shock of air pressure as a rampaging young shinobi attacked the man head on. Sugemi's fist was blocked by the assassin's blade effortlessly but his troublesome shadow extended from underground and punched the elder up in the air.

"Shadow Tendril!" Sugemi shouted out as the shadow materialized again attempting to wrap around the airborne Imarizu's leg and bring him down for another, more focused uppercut.

The Imarizu struggled but couldn't break out of the shadow's grasp. He could only block the upcoming strike with his knee but then Sugemi's hand seals flashed before his very eyes. The Imarizu rushed in to interrupt them, as he had interrupted the girl before. He had to hand it to the little magician, her hand seals were some of the fastest he had ever seen, almost as fast as that of adult ninjutsu specialists. Interrupting this chump's, however, was another deal entirely.

With a triumphant smile the Imarizu lowered his blade having grabbed the young man's hand and interrupting his hand seals. A swarm of insects blocked his blow, a deafening chirping sound made the Imarizu clutch his ears as the sound of thousands of small knives clashing with his sword was too much for the human ears to sustain without erupting in a bleeding frenzy and shrieking for an eternity to come.

With a roar that went unheard, deafened by the sounds of battle around them Sugemi rushed out, enveloped in a translucent glow of his erupting chakra and tensed up and swollen body as his open First Gate put pressure on the young man's body. The Imarizu elder's mask cracked as the man was sent flying back. Knowing of the nature of his blade the man stopped himself by thrusting it into the rocky beach floor, knowing that the Audra blade was eternal, broken only by pure chakra and not some pesky environmental factors or rust.

"Nara Hidden Technique: Shadow Yggdrasil!" Sugemi roared out as a straight rising pillar of shadows blew out from the murky and blood covered floor aiming to blow the elder Imarizu up in the air.

Focusing all of his hidden physical strength the Imarizu leaped up into air, aiming to rise well above the tallest point the kid's shadows could reach. Then those pesky insects interfered again forming a sphere around him. The sunlight faded from the assassin's view as he was enclosed in a sphere of nasty locust-like creatures and stopped right where the beaming pillar of shadows blasted him out of it.

Overwhelming physical pain. Nothing the Imarizu couldn't survive. The shadows hit him with such intense physical force that had they been aimed downwards they'd have cracked the entire planet into two. Yet the Imarizu did not grunt or shout in pain, expression of pain was an expression of weakness. The concussive force tossed the Imarizu leader up into the sky as the pillar of shadows branched out into thousands of separate fist constructs each of which continued to rain its assault separately from the others. Absolutely overwhelming and bombarding the leader of the elite Kumogakure hitmen squad with unmatched precision and power.

Sugemi's hands weighed down. He was breathing difficultly as this attack took some life out of him – combined with the nasty injury he had sustained before it was really beginning to drag him down. The constant attacks by the Demonlings were also beginning to wear him out. Luckily enough for a moment or two Yanagi continued to stand by his companion back-to-back and fend off the upcoming assaults by shielding him with his insects.

A young Demonling, eager to prove himself rampaged across the battlefield, attacking multiple targets. He saw a young fancy dressed magician girl fly above his head and tried to catch her with his chain attached steel clawed gauntlet, sadly he had missed his mark as one of his kin had attacked her from another angle interrupting her natural progression in the sky and making him miss his mark as the Demonling had aimed a little bit onwards. Right where the girl would've been had she not been interrupted and not where she was.

The young Demon shrugged and rushed onwards. He saw an exposed back of one of those dark skinned Imarizu assassins from the Cloud. Seeing how they were the only threat to their client, since the Konoha party wished nothing to do with him, they were the priority target. Rushing through the battlefield, leaping over the tripping kick of another Imarizu and then rolling below a rushing swarm of insects from aside the Demon leaped at his opponent with his iron gauntlets reattached and ready to tear chunks of flesh out of his opponent. The Demonling pressed a trigger on his wrist setting off the hidden seals inside his gauntlets.

Flaming balls of blazing suffering formed on the central part of the palm area. Ready to envelop whomever the iron claws of the gauntlet weapon pierce in hellfire, a taste of the eternity to come for them in the afterlife. The Imarizu member turned almost instantly, lifting his hand up and clenching it in a fist, smacking it back like he had anticipated an attack from behind. He was so deceitfully fast! An absolutely devastating impact crushed the Demonling's mask, everything whited out and the young man no longer felt any pain, he just felt so weightless before his consciousness faded…

Inomame stood still, at the northern edge of the battlefield in between the field and the row of boats that lead to his colossal ship. He was more intelligent than to flee and turn his back on a buzzing battlefield full of people aiming to kill him. There it was! One of those pesky Imarizu rushing at him… The Yamanaka's hand seals went off, luckily enough one of the Demonlings engaged the Imarizu in hand to hand combat before the racist bastard could even reach him. As trusty and loyal these nameless Demon trainees were, they were no match absolutely for the dominating speed and might of the Imarizu.

"Yamanaka Hidden Technique: Art of Phalanx!" Inomame chanted out spreading his hands out wide and taking over the minds of multiple Demonlings on his side. Together the young shinobi who had surrendered their identities, their futures and their lives for their village and its glorious rebirth assaulted on the Imarizu. Inomame was well trained in all of the ninja arts: Taijutsu, Ninjutsu, Sealing, Genjutsu, Weaponry… He had the theoretical knowledge and only a body lacking of the ability to use some of them. That only meant that he needed pawns to control, pawns with the skill to use those abilities of which Inomame knew more than the pawn did… Luckily enough he had his hidden Yamanaka techniques that could fix such a situation.

The Imarizu member exploded in a flurry of fists. An uppercut to finish off the beaten and broken Demonling he was working on before. Sending the young one down with a crushing hook swollen like his face was festered with tumors. A combination of wild and near-invisible even to Yamanaka Inomame strikes dispatched of two more Demonlings as it crushed their chest cavities, blew up their hearts, crushed their throats and skulls all at the same time. Even having lost his deadly bladed knuckle duster the Imarizu was lethal, able to kill even an experienced ninja in five different ways and angles in a mere microsecond.

Inomame grunted in annoyance as his eyes wandered for more targets for his technique. The man worked his hand seals while the Imarizu was still busy, aiming to take control of more of his own pawns. Sadly he was beginning to run short of those… If only it wasn't for that thing the sword wielding assassin slipped out – that anger ridden statement to that strange magician girl from Konoha about their minds being tempered like steel to resist mental attacks. The influential man didn't even try taking control of the Imarizu… However if only he could get access to one of those Konoha brats…

"Yamanaka Hidden Technique: Art of the Crimson Valentine!" Inomame yelled out taking control of his already beaten pawns. The men removed their explosive tags and slapped them on their chests launching themselves like human explosives at the Imarizu. Visibly distressed by the upcoming disaster the Imarizu backed up, giving each of the rushing unconscious human explosives a strong hook to the punch that sent them back exploding further away from him.

Inomame leaned aside to avoid the upcoming pawn hurled right at him. The flying trainee hit the smaller boats and exploded together with them, incinerating all of them to a crisp, up to the smallest wood chip. That was when the Imarizu finally closed in on Inomame with a powerful right hand blow that without a doubt was aimed to take the Yamanaka's head clean off.

Slapping together just a single hand seal, fast enough to not be interrupted, Inomame replaced himself with another one of his Demonling trainees allowing every bone in the young man's body to be turned into dust upon the Imarizu hitting him with the blunt force of his enraged blow.

Inomame, having found himself right in the middle of the battle cyclone wandered around, constantly body shielded by his Demons and protected as his eyes wandered around looking for his target. Someone he could use to more effectively get rid of any rushing Imarizu…

Kiyomi was taking on one of the Demons hand-to-hand. She wasn't sure just how potent these guys were, she saw plenty of them take quite a beating and even jump in to take a beating for their sissy master. And to think that Kiyomi ever felt curious about checking him out and seeing if he was cool to marry her. At this point the Yamanaka just wanted to punch some Demons for being Kirigakure dicks, some of the Imarizu for killing so many of her innocent clansmen and that Inomame's ass for trying to have her killed. She may have forgiven him if he was a dreamy groom but the way things were escalating he most certainly wasn't.

The Demon leaned out of Kiyomi's attack, it may not have been the smartest thing to engage these guys hand to hand after all, then again, Kiyomi was hungry and thirsty, she also had no ninja tools on her so she couldn't make a proper long distance attack without taking down one of these guys. Using her Yamanaka techniques was dangerous as she'd be leaving her body exposed for prolonged period of time in a middle of a battlefield as it was beginning to encompass her.

Even Mana, who tried to stick on the outside edges of the raging battle got enveloped into all of that mess. The Demon leaned under her right hand strike and dug his fist right into Kiyomi's gut before kicking her back. The Yamanaka slid back holding the Demonling's ninja pouch in her left hand, she felt her chakra rushing into the wounded spot keeping her conscious and in the fight. Now she had some weaponry on her and was able to fight back properly.

A whole bunch of Demonlings jumped out from the waging war and joined in on the attack. They hit fast and weak – a clear attempt at taking her alive as she was a precious target of their client. The Yamanaka tried fighting off all four of them, moment from moment her eyes wandered off to see if any of her friends will help her out. That Nara guy was busy fighting the Imarizu, the bug guy was busy keeping him alive while he foolishly engaged an Imarizu all by himself. Mana was twirling around like a magical princess again… Kiyomi hated when she did that…

One of the Demons socked her right in the jaw, another one kicked her in the gut the third swept her supporting leg and the fourth vaulted over his pal and slammed the Yamanaka into the ground with an overhead kick. These guys were seriously good at working together. All four of them attacked her at the same time while she was down but Kiyomi flipped back evading the attack. She saw Mana getting blown out from the sky as well, the Aburame and the Nara were also having trouble deeper into the whole mess.

While Kiyomi was glad that Mana wasn't condescendingly pulling her ass out, it would've been way better not to get cornered and picked off by a bunch of Kirigakure Demonlings right now…

The Yamanaka heiress grunted in pain as she was caught by her long hair and pulled in for a good couple of strikes to the face. Angered she pulled the handful of hair off and kicked the Demonling right in his chest. The Yamanaka then placed her hand on the ground and channeled her chakra through the hair making a hand seal.

"Chakra Hair Trap Jutsu!" she chanted as the Demon strangely jerked and stood perfectly still. The other three rushed at her looking to beat the ever-loving crap out of her but as she was getting tackled to the ground the blonde placed her palms up and pointed at the frozen still assassin.

"Art of Valentine!" she chanted taking over the man and compelling him instantly to attack the nearest ally. Blood squirted all over Kiyomi's face as the Demonling punching her downed body while sitting on top of her got skewered by the claws of the steel gauntlet piercing his body from behind. The other Demons quickly pulled back and attacked their friend. They didn't play around snapping the young man's neck.

Tired, with a bleeding nose and battered bruises all over her body Kiyomi shoulder tackled the two and ran into the insanity of the battlefield to hide. She needed to regain her composure, get a decent fighting plan together and stop underestimating these Demon trainees like they were some cannon fodder. Each one of them was a valid opponent to her alone. This was a battlefield she fought in to survive… She was wise not to forget that…

"Mana!" Kiyomi screamed troubled over her friend's questionable mean of landing she witnessed shortly before she was occupied by fighting for her life.


	253. Appetizer for War

The feeling of weightlessness, so ethereal that it was strange to even describe it as a "feeling" as its consciousness was a matter of great debate, was all Mana could sense as she plummeted down from above. Something big, blazing and explosive had hit her while she was scouting the battlefield below her. She had never experienced war before, she has read plenty about it but now had Mana's mind and eyes been conscious she'd think she's experiencing the feeling of war first hand.

The feeling of powerlessness, the roaring, confusing whirlpool of madness shedding blood all around. The sensation of fear, for one's own life and those of one's friends and loyal companions. There was no control in war, about as much of it there as there was in madness. Madness couldn't have been controlled, contained or studied. It started, it ran its course and it ended – it was like a force of nature. No one was safe, everyone died. That was war.

Mana's eyes snapped open, open from shock, a thought so small and insignificant, so spark-like that it was generous to even describe it as a thought. Once the magician's eyes were wide open, the thought grew into a smoldering blaze of fear. In war, people died. In her world there could have been no war, no one was supposed to die. Mana couldn't force her world into being, she couldn't force the people to stop killing and accept her ideals. She could only make them change themselves through example.

The magician clutched as she slammed into the ground. She could feel her bones leeching off of what remained of her massive, for her age and rank, chakra pool. At this point it cost less chakra to plummet to the ground, clutching to minimize the damage and chakra consumed by forceful augmentation of her body subconsciously as it was damaged, than to do anything else. War was economy, counting one's resources, calculating if after firing this shot one could still wage war for as long as it was waged or if death would be one's only option.

An uneasy feeling made Mana look behind her, sprawled on the ground and wide open for an attack, an Imarizu was ready to punch her right between her eyes with his bladed knuckle duster. Knowing how intensely coated with chakra those things were – Mana's fleeting chakra resources would offer no resistance. She's as good as dead! A blade came out from the Imarizu's back, all the way through his abdomen making the tanned man spit out blood on Mana's face as the dangerous invasion of her personal space was abruptly ended when a Demon used his signature chained gauntlet to pierce through the Imarizu's gut and pull him back to him, away from Mana.

War was decisions. Planning before the battle and then planning during the battle when none of the plans worked out. All those little thoughts and decisions one made when all of their plans failed. Those golden thoughts made in a moment's notice that made one be the winner and preferably a living one. Being a winner was not what Mana wanted, she wanted to be a hero. If dying would've made her a hero she was fine with that. But dying in this battlefield would not make her a hero, she'd only be another name, another file shredded in the Administration, one of dozens that hypothetical day. That didn't sit with Mana. Feeling burning infection in her knees and elbows, bleeding all over the rocky beach Mana stood on her feet, stumbling like a baby deer during its first time on its feet.

She needed to bring this in front of him, she had a way to resolve anything – her new way. It was about time she broke through the ranks and walked up to that man. It was about time she offered him a way to win on her terms. That was her way, the new way. This was no more the time to hold back, no more the time to preserve her chakra. Mana wondered if she had enough chakra for her Sweet Lullaby Jutsu, most likely not, even if she used it the Imarizu would simply maim themselves and escape it. Neither the Demonlings nor the Imarizu looked too feeble in the face of pain…

The shrieking and crunchy sound of insects swarming behind her alarmed Mana as she noticed Yanagi's barrier of his living symbiotic partners protecting her from the returning Imarizu. Likely the ex-criminal had already dispatched of his opponent. In his current state, beaten and bleeding profusely Mana could take him. There was no time! She needed to stand in front of Inomame, she did not yet know what she'd say to him but… Heroes needed the right thing to say. Always! That was something Mana was yet to learn.

"What are you waiting for!?" Yanagi shouted when the Imarizu continued to punch and the Aburame built up more and more insects to protect the magician. His own partners since birth were dying by thousands and it was seen on Yanagi's pale and pissed face. Mana nodded, made her hand seals and soared up again, locating Inomame further away from the fray and diving at him like a pelican at the sweet, succulent flesh of fish.

"We need to talk! This has to end!" Mana shouted trying to reason with the man through the deafening noise of grunts and screams.

"I have no idea who you are or why you're protecting me girl, but I couldn't agree more. Hand me my bride and I shall get married somewhere in the Archipelago, away from the Cloud's reach…" Inomame smiled at her looking at Mana like he was in any position to order her around, a condescending stare which Mana had seen from her peers many time before and of which she was sick to death already. This was no time to be mad…

"No! Enough of this! I need both of you to walk away from this, I need to stop everyone from dying and I'll either appeal to you or to Imarizu. Trust me, you do not want to hear my offer to them!" Mana's voice spoke more quietly however it hit visibly a more sensitive chord with the Kirigakure politician.

"It is I who has a proposition to you…" Inomame smiled, ever the condescending looker. One thing war was not, was the field of negotiations. War was a manner of action which occurred when negotiations had failed, Mana should have known that on a deeper level. If only she wasn't that hopeful, that optimistic about people…

"The Demon trainees are running thin! Step aside and let us do our job!" the Imarizu warned Yanagi one final time. Usually pale-skins deserved no warnings before being taken out by the dark assassin but the Aburame had deserved his own fair share of respect. He was fighting to protect his comrades, obeying the young genin's word like it was law and placing his own life on the line. That was what intrigued the Imarizu about the girl, the fact that a higher ranking ninja listened to her commands.

Maybe it was just proof that pale-skins were an inferior race deserving to be ruled by the northerners? If only the Raikage was not so soft-toothed…

Yanagi lifted his arm up, a swarm of black as night chakra devouring locust-like insects scoured from his long sleeves and rushing in a mad frenzy at the Imarizu. The black assassin began bobbing and weaving madly attempting to avoid getting surrounded and overwhelmed. Insects were more troublesome to evade, even if they had one commanding mind, even when following their swarm mind mentality each and every one was a separate being and they were not afraid to split their formation to land and attack the Imarizu.

The ruthless assassin was introduced first hand to the painful swarm of blade carrying and chakra devouring locusts. Witnessing that there was no way to evade this crazy swarm, the Imarizu flipped back while forming a pair of hand seals.

"Cloud Style Taijutsu Art: Pressure Cross!" the assassin shouted out as his powerful blow created a surrounding area of air pressure which blasted the swarming insects away. That was his own natural advantage over the Aburame, insects were light and easy to manipulate using stronger wind or air pressure techniques. Luckily enough the Imarizu successfully practiced a style of blade boxing which came with just that kind of techniques – penetrate the opponent with a bladed knuckle, disabling their chakra augmentation response and tear their flesh apart with air pressure around the punch. It was not an efficient assassination technique, but a good fighting style to rely on when one was exposed.

The Imarizu began bobbing and weaving again, dodging blows from an imaginary opponent in an almost hypnotic dance that kept him moving. That was essential in any battlefield. He was already weakened by stray Demons attacking him from aside and that battle last night. Yanagi moved back, more chakra locusts came from under his coat lifting the Aburame off the ground lightly and moving him back rapidly, moving him in between fighting units that would've gotten in his way and allowing the Aburame to focus on what was in front.

"Cloud Taijutsu Art: Glass-Jawhammer!" the Imarizu forcefully threw all of his air from his expanded lungs while throwing a powerful air piercing blow in the direction of the Aburame using his right hand. The surrounding air pressure once again pushed all the insects away, while the taijutsu technique did not connect with its target by a far mile, the air pressure knocked the Aburame off his feet.

The Imarizu's image blurred, in just a fraction of a moment he appeared right on top of Yanagi's knocked down frame throwing a punch right to his exposed neck, aiming to cut it open and leave the loyal ninja bleeding out in the battlefield. As Yanagi leaped back on his feet throwing up a defense from his living barrier of insects the Imarizu appeared to only be an after-image. It was not a technique, just a natural occurrence of the immense speed of the physical combatant.

A weakened tap connected to Yanagi's shoulder from behind. The insects failed to completely block the attack as they only rushed in from the side to redirect the blow and not absorb it. The Aburame felt warm blood rushing down his exposed shoulder, a sensation that disappeared somewhere down his elbow where the blood was absorbed by his raggedy cloak.

The Imarizu member no longer offered any words. He was beyond reasoning at this point and any attempts to do so would only squander his advantage. The taijutsu using assassin leaned his fist back and prepared a powerful and focused cross. Since the mask which the Imarizu normally wore to hide their humanity no longer blocked the sight of the man's face it was quite clear how his thick lips twisted in a smile just a millisecond before the punch connected. The Imarizu's biceps tensed up all the way applying massive pressure on his shoulder muscles that simply exploded from his barely still intact bodysuit through sheer flesh pressure on the cloth.

Instead of connecting with the singular blow, the Imarizu's arm cocked back again and repeated the same strike as a combination with ten thousand times the same striking speed. It was almost like after softening the opponent's defenses the taijutsu user exploded out of nowhere instantaneously with an impossible to see, block or avoid combination. The first blow being a checking strike for blocks or parries or simply an opener for his combination.

"Cloud Taijutsu Art: Technical Rabbit Combination!" the Imarizu yelled out as time appeared to freeze around him and his opponent. Yanagi's body began exploding from inside, like each of the strikes carried a small explosive tag which was shoved deep inside the opponent's flesh, but was actually just built in air pressure "injected" into his opponent, pressed so hard that it erupted and made the body implode.

However where blood and guts was supposed to shower the battle hardened Imarizu an overwhelming and unexpected flock of insects only came at him. It was like Yanagi bled those blasted insects but as the body dispersed it became apparent that the Aburame was only a clone comprised entirely of insects – a clever trap placed to surround the close distance combatant with his worst nightmare.

Standing further and giving a careful glance at his shoulder wound Yanagi went through a combination of hand seals.

"Parasitic Insects: Swarm!" he chanted releasing a ten times larger swarm from under his torn clothes than before. Unleashing his symbiotic insects with much greater intensity and carrying enough blades to leave nothing but softened cut up chunk of flesh from his opponent.

Dashing back the Imarizu began evading the attack, having regained some distance on the Aburame the Cloud assassin began scouring the battlefield and allowing the insects to surround and attack whoever they got their mandibles on. There was no way he'd evade this whole swarm without some dirty trickery. Usually he'd try a smoke bomb but he was aware that these Aburame insects had sensory abilities for they preyed on chakra and so were able to sense it without their smell or sight. He had killed enough Aburame to know that much…

"Cloud Taijutsu Art: Pressure Cross!" the Imarizu repeated the attack a couple of times to blast the incoming swarm of insects further and then to try and nab his opponent with one or two good aerial long range waves.

Yanagi clenched himself overwhelmed by the aerial pressure of the continuous combination of taijutsu techniques by his opponent. The Imarizu found his opponent. Placing his palms together in a position of a modified clone hand seal he created three shadow clones, all of whom dispersed throughout the battlefield. The Imarizu himself also charged at Yanagi with his clones rushing in from aside. This time it worked out!

Yanagi's body bent up and twisted in awkward manner as multiple clones connected their hits with his body, luckily enough not possessing near the amount of chakra coating to their imitated knuckles as the real deal. Still, upon impact the Aburame's body let out a gut wrenching sound as more blood was spilled all over the worn combatant. Focusing his insects on the real deal, following him the whole way and keeping him away from his body the whole time was a good choice of strategy if one wished to prolong their suffering needlessly. Had the Imarizu connected his central attack together with the clones the Aburame would've been assassinated instantly and almost painlessly. There was no use for this kind of bloody and gruesome battle…

"Parasitic Insects: Cocoon!" Yanagi shouted out in pain as the insects moved in from behind and pushing the Imarizu together with his clones in closer. This obviously gave the assassin a chance to take out his opponent but fearing of what the technique would do if he didn't bother defending from it the Imarizu performed another "Pressure Cross" technique on the approaching and increasing in thickness wave of insects from behind. It was barely efficient – Yanagi figured him out! He let the insects leave some space between them allowing for easier air passage in between the swarm and greatly reducing the pressure force on the overall swarm, given the added weight of the carried blades now the air pressure was almost ineffective…

The insects closed down in a bladed and spiky cocoon and finally the silent and all-cool Imarizu shouted in pain as both his body and his chakra pool were attacked at the same time. It was so impossibly difficult to augment one's body when one's chakra was being sapped at the same time. It was possibly the most difficult damage to protect against and so the Imarizu assassin was tormented both physically and spiritually. Chakra was both spirit and body therefore getting it attacked directly affected both one's body and mind, no matter how hardened by cruel training it was.

Through sheer pain hardened force the Imarizu burst out from the cocoon. Carefully crawling away as the insects returned to their usual formation. Finally Yanagi regained some manner of control over the battle and so he commanded his insects onwards. Raising his hand in a hand seal position, "Parasitic Insects: Hive Pop!" commanded as locust-like parasitic insects rushed surrounding the Imarizu. These ones had explosive tags on each one of the blades. Ready to create a whirling vortex of living swarm around the opponent before detonating and completely annihilating them.

Suddenly the insects dissolved from their formation and rushed in to protect their symbiotic partner from an attack by a pair of Demonlings from the side. The Imarizu smiled as he had ran out of options at the moment and he may have been in trouble had it not been for the inclusion of his secondary targets into the equation. Yanagi fell on his knees struggling to keep off his attackers. An overwhelming air pressure sent both the Aburame shinobi and his assailants to the sandy floor on their knees. Powerful shockwave emitting thuds sent both Demonlings down and out from behind.

Yanagi stood up and looked around. He couldn't see his opponent anymore. After taking out the pair of Demonlings the Imarizu had fled. That meant that he was lucky enough to match up against one of the Imarizu and survive, even if he did have the natural advantage as a long range shinobi going up against a mostly physical combatant… Yanagi smiled to himself, feeling prouder of himself than he has ever felt. Everything hurt and he was beginning to seriously weaken from his bleeding and internal injuries but it was something he'd have never seen or felt working in Eden Prison Complex. This was what real ninja did and felt. This was the road to doing something great, something he always dreamed of doing to make a mark on the world…

These guys may have looked surprised that he tagged along with Mana, that he allowed a little girl boss him – an outranking ninja around. Truth be told she gave him what he always wanted – a chance to experience an opportunity to leave his mark. He'd have followed a baby to war if that baby spat out its soother and promised this chance!


	254. What was Promised

While Mana possessed no gifts of chakra sensory, these were born with and developed at some point during teen years, she didn't need them to sense the destruction and massive numbers of lost lives in the vortex of battle transpiring behind her and the Yamanaka. She wanted nothing less than to hear any propositions, this had to end. Sadly her reasonable mind, as crushed by her emotional part as it was, suggested that this very offer may have been just such a mean to end this bloodshed.

"Kill the Imarizu for me." Inomame smiled arrogantly.

"This isn't a proposition, this is a demand." Mana coldly mumbled out as she clenched her fists, hearing the grunts and shouts behind her made her more and more impatient.

"Well… More like a… Insisted suggestion…" Inomame shrugged, his smugness faded from his face once he got defensive for just a blink of a moment. "Do you know why I've achieved what I have and what I am? It's because of weakness. Because I do not possess the very common amongst the Yamanaka gifts of sensory. I was unfit for the battlefield, not as one of the elites, anyway. Being anything but exemplary was unacceptable to me, I couldn't stand it. It's me we're talking about, how could me, of all people, not be the focus of conversation?"

"Shut up…" Mana intruded upon the upcoming monologue, she had no time to waste on monologues, not while lives were being taken behind her. She turned her back to the cocky bastard who tried to have her friend killed, then forced into marriage, which for some crazy reason Kiyomi was not overly objective about.

"You like monologues? How about this one? I will tell the Imarizu that I'm ready to stop opposing them. That I made a mistake and my mistake cost more lives letting you die would've cost in the first place. I'll get out of their way, it'll be a surrender from my part, yet I'll come out the victor – my friend will be by my side again and you'll be dead." Mana finished as she began walking back into the battlefield at a casual pace. She still had chakra left for a couple of clutch petal escapes, if needed, before she reached the Imarizu.

Suddenly her body stopped, Mana forced herself into motion but she could only muster a twitch. The light blue glow from below revealed that she was caught by Inomame's hair trap technique.

"You'll offend your principles, won't you?" Inomame asked her, his tone was not desperate at the slightest.

"My wish is to save everyone, sometimes that's impossible, I'm too weak to do that so for now I'm satisfied with saving as many as I can. I'll grieve, despair for a fair amount of time, ultimately I'll decide to grow stronger so that the next time I can protect everyone and inspire people to change the world around them into one where all life is respected… I'll somehow deal with it, I've lost plenty and I always deal with it and come out stronger." Mana replied. She felt uneasy, she had no idea what Inomame's plan with this was. He looked completely careless about the battle in which his men were being killed. His play here was still a mystery to Mana.

"That's fun. You've got spirit. Breaking the spirited ones is always the most fun." Inomame shrugged, even as he expressed his intent to break Mana he didn't move.

"Go ahead, kill me, it'll be ultimately useless to you. Just like, I assure you, the battle will be over by the time torturing me will give you anything useful." Mana encouraged the man with a brave tone. The only hints of intimidation she had were not due to the imagined death or pain she'd experience, they were because of the fact she still had no idea what Inomame intended to do with this. If it was as easy as she imagined it to be – pain or death, he'd still lose so it had to be something else.

"It's true, my Demonlings are tough. They won't survive the Imarizu though, maybe pick a couple of 'em off but not all four working as an ultimate fisting machine. You on the other hand… You've survived them before. I can use you for that very same purpose, use you to kill them. Tell me wouldn't you break seeing blood on your hands and cold dead bodies beneath your feet? It is your mouth that burnt its owner, not mine…" Inomame chuckled to himself before placing his hands up. Mana's eyes whited out, she tried desperately to break out of the hair trap but she failed to do anything but twitch a muscle here and there.

"Mind Body Switch Jutsu!" Inomame triumphantly shouted out.

Sugemi tripped over something as he rushed towards a Demonling. The ranks of the Demonlings were beginning to thin out. The Imarizu and the Konoha team were hitting them too hard, it was too early to let them into a field of battle. The Demons were exceptional assassins and duelists, not that incredible when used as footmen, scapegoats sacrificed for their master's ambition. They were being used as cannon fodder and that's just what they were. Still, even then they asked no questions or rebelled against their master's will.

After quickly leaping back on his feet the Nara whirled his legs around upright kicking the rushing in enemies aside before looking at what tripped him. It was a body of one of the Imarizu, still bleeding out and some life still present in his eyes despite the man having been dead for a minute or two already. Sugemi looked around. Before all he saw was the bodies of the Demonlings, he had never considered that the scuffle they had with the Imarizu before could've served as something to bring the assassin group down ultimately…

Mana dashed right past him, clearly ignoring a dead body and Sugemi's reaction to it. Something was off… The magician was sentimental above everything else. She'd have cried, whined about how she was somehow to blame about it all. Unless… It wasn't Mana in charge of her own body – just as the magician promised him. That fool, could she really purposefully surrender her control to a Yamanaka madman just to fulfil a stupid promise to him. Then again, that promise was hastily made during Sugemi's less gracious periods. He was an angsty little shit affected by grief, promising to fight Mana to the death at some point. Just because he thought Mana's beliefs were wrong, because everything around him was clearly at fault for sensei's death… Everything was culpable to the eyes of a distressed teen…

Liberating her friend from such a stupid promise would have certainly not been above Mana's level of sentimentality. Then again, if she did surrender her body and he didn't fight her – that'd be just mean. Not giving the magician a chance to liberate him from a promise he barely took seriously anymore, not that she knew that, would've simply been really crappy of him. Needless to say, it wouldn't be the finest moment of the protagonist of his own manga…

Sugemi dashed after Mana. The magician was simply running, dashing around Demonlings and quickly disposing of them if they attacked her. For some reason her attacks were different from Mana's normal attacks. Sugemi had seen the magician fight, even after their parting. She kicked a lot, dodged and crippled just so she didn't have to inflict too much damage. She finished brawls fast, a light tap at a joint to dislocate it, a stronger focused strike or kick at a weaker open bone to crush it. That's how she fought in the beginning of this very same battle. This Mana was ruthless but also really sloppy, she just punched and kicked, damaging her opponents without purpose or soul behind it. Her goal wasn't to disable her enemy and stopping them from resisting anymore, it was to just hit them.

Sugemi's muscles tensed up as he quickly opened up the First Gate and rushed after the magician. His body was beginning to sore really bad, he hadn't abused his gates, only using the First one most of the time and only when he needed a quick boost in speed or power. He always turned off the tap when he didn't need water anymore.

"My love! You're okay!" Sugemi shouted out behind Mana to attract her attention but also to test the girl, hoping that the mind invader would give himself away.

"What are you talking about, Sugemi? We're just friends, not even that good ones. I've just freed you from prison…" Mana replied turning at him with a smile. The Nara dashed in to defend her from an attack by one of the Demonlings who were then quickly occupied elsewhere by an Imarizu member. The ruthless assassin happened to completely ignore the kids as long as they didn't attack him, pushing the Demonlings back at the direction of their master.

How could this be? How could Mana act normally but feel so off at the same time!?

A painful blow to the back of Sugemi's head knocked the Nara down face into the dirt as he heard Mana's sandals running through puddles of wet sand and blood all over and around her as loud beeping in his ears deafened him together with the pain keeping him down momentarily.

"You stupid idiot!" an unfamiliar voice yelled close by. "A Yamanaka can access the mind they displace into, it's like a library. Why do you think they're some of the most treasured intelligence officers and interrogators!? I thought Nara, Akimichi and Yamanaka knew everything about each other, knowing how often these clans work together." the voice was very annoying, mostly because of how right it was…

"Hey, you're that… Yamanaka we've come to save, right?" Sugemi wondered after getting up but not before mocking Kiyomi's pretentious manner of speech with an overblown and silly facial gesture.

"Still, Mana's mind is really determined and strong, it shouldn't be easy for Inomame to hold her down like that. Why is he so easily ordering her around and reading her like she offered no resistance? He must've told her something that broke her mind before taking her over… This guy knows what he's doing." Kiyomi scratched her chin.

"Maybe Mana is letting him control her. I once told her a really stupid promise and technically this would free me of it…" Sugemi wondered.

"Maybe, still, I doubt Mana would allow herself to be controlled during such an upheaval. That Inomame is just a really shitty asshole for doing something like this to her. I should really kick his ass for messing with us like that! Mana's like my little sister." Kiyomi pouted crossing her arms around her chest. The battle around them was beginning to slowly fade in intensity as most of the Demons were stricken down and stayed down or kept getting knocked down and weakened. At this point the entire scuffle moved north, that must've been where the Imarizu were centered and the remains of Inomame's forces were focusing them down. Neither side engaged the Konoha forces unless they were engaged on, the Imarizu's target was Inomame and technically the Konoha kids were fighting on the Demonlings' side so the masked killers thought twice before jumping on them and prioritized the Cloud assassins before returning to the children.

"I'll deal with Mana then…" Sugemi nodded. "If she wants to free me of whatever promises I've made, I'll let her think that's exactly what she's doing."

As Mana rushed madly towards the center of the repositioned battle, where it seemed like the remains of the Demonlings were all jumping onto a single opponent Sugemi passed by tired and injured Yanagi. He didn't stop to check up on the Aburame's condition, he didn't quite care, to be honest. He may have cared more if the temporary companion looked worse. Now he just looked like he just had enough battling for one day.

"Shadow Possession Jutsu!" Sugemi shouted out irritated. For the second time that day he had to use his technique to stop someone where he usually used his techniques for fighting.

Mana's body burst into a shower of flower petals scattered by the wind. The Nara rolled onwards before the girl reformed right behind him with a kunai in hand. He wasn't used to fighting a Mana who would've been fine by just slitting his throat like that. Shouting in anger the girl attacked him, even her voice was different – not like someone else's voice came out of Mana's throat – it was her own. The thing was that the anger and tone used by the young magician was completely different to how she used her own voice.

Sugemi easily leaned sideways from Mana's strikes and drove his knee into the girl's gut expecting to easily disarm her. The magician's figure blasted into flower petals so intensely that they all bashed and pelted against his face forcing the Nara to flinch and take steps back. A couple of strong kicks hit Sugemi's back driving all air out from his lungs – the bastard must've figured out from using Mana's body for a while that her kicks were much more effective and stronger than her lackluster upper body strength.

The mind-controlled magician used the blade she held in her hand striking at Sugemi's neck but the Nara quickly switched his First Gate back up to simply blitz out from her view like he was never there. Dashing behind the magician Sugemi continuously delivered a powerful combination of blows before blitzing away again. If he broke Mana's body without killing her it'd end the threat before she'd be forced to do something she didn't want to do. A tear ran down Mana's face which distracted Sugemi temporarily. Her body exploded into petals again before reforming further away and throwing some cards from her pockets. Sugemi deflected the carelessly used and clearly telegraphed attack with the back of his wrist just barely getting cut. This man had no finesse or sleight of hand of Mana's, reading his moves and ninja tools was a piece of cake.

"I'll beat you, you know? You can't fight as Mana for shit even if you do have access to her mind… Reading a book during a battle tends to distract you." Sugemi taunted his opponent, expecting his invading mind to hear and comprehend what was being told. "Mana would've never been so easy to read because she never goes in for the kill, the "what would I do" method never works with her because no one fights like she does. You always go for the open vitals – that's the easiest thing to read." Sugemi explained before his transparent chakra burst from him again and his muscles tensed up overflowing him with the painful fatigue, with a back handed smack he tossed his elbow towards Mana's face as he had predicted the girl to be there, having used an illusion to sneak behind him.

Both the clearly visible Mana figure as well as the one sneaking behind him dispersed into a whirlwind of petals. Sugemi grinned, Mana would've done differently than this fearful fool – she'd have substituted herself with the illusionary petal entity at the last moment attacking right from where she was not expected to come – from the front. That was how she would've left damage on him – Inomame just ran, creating multiple illusionary images and having all of them come at him.

A combination of rock hard kicks met Sugemi's lowered attention after his friend's body appeared from the front – just like he imagined Mana would have done except using a double fake-out instead of substitution. The man had some insight into her mind but it was clearly limited, both by what he could access as well as his own mind. Inomame must've doubted Mana's mind, thought he knew better how to utilize her skills, his cockiness was why Sugemi could stand on equal ground with Mana while holding back.

Sugemi picked himself off the ground and examined his blunt trauma. Mana's kicks left some marks on him – his gates must've greatly softened his body and weakened his augmentation. Mana was tired but so was him. A loud thud focused all of his attention on Mana. Inomame's puppet slammed on her knees so hard she had busted them open. Mana's entire body shook as her skin paled, dark bags began forming around the magician's eyes as blood vessels shot out on her pale skin, looking all the more creepy because of it.

"Hmph… That's what you get for abusing the only technique you saw Mana do." Sugemi smiled with a playful shrug.

"The only useful one…" dismissively and arrogantly the man declared. "Lightshow and mirror tricks is all this trash is good for! How did she survive the Imarizu with this useless arsenal!?" Inomame yelled out in great distress for being beaten in a body he placed so much hopes in. "Each successive use of the only good illusion in her arsenal makes each successive use consume more chakra, it's getting exhausting. Soon it'll sap as much chakra as an actually useful high rank jutsu! Useless, this body is goddamn useless!" Inomame's mind forced Mana to keep whining as he pounded the ground.

"It's true, Mana would tell you that her arsenal is all about how she uses it, not about how good it is. Truth be told it does suck to everyone but her, somehow she makes it work, though… That's why it's much better to use people as pawns by having them work for you, not controlling them yourself. You're only you, you're limited by your stupid narrow perception, even with direct control there are things Mana sees that you don't, even if you're in her body." Sugemi smiled. He realized that for whatever reason Mana's mind blocked out any thoughts about the Sweet Lullaby jutsu from Inomame's mind, else the Yamanaka without a doubt would've called it a worth using technique as well. Had he successfully used it Sugemi would've been in a real pickle.

It was then that Sugemi realized just how Mana aided him – she didn't resist Inomame to the point where he had access to so much of her thoughts that he thought she didn't resist at all and he had access to everything. That allowed her to conceal small bits of her mind from him without him realizing. The magician was crafty and slippery even when being mind-controlled which broke a grin out of Sugemi.

Mana's body began shaking in uncontrollable laughter as it stood up and began walking towards Sugemi.

"What are you doing? I'm gonna strike you down, can't you see how low on chakra Mana is?" the Nara wondered in confusion.

Inomame kept commanding Mana to walk forward towards the closing up battlefield where the battle was approaching its conclusion.

"If you use that petal illusion again – you'll risk tiring Mana out! She'll die!" Sugemi tried reasoning with Inomame before he realized it – that's fine by the mad Yamanaka. He risked nothing as his own mind would've just retreated back to his own body at the last moment avoiding any repercussions that damaging Mana's body would inflict upon the controller's body.

Sugemi closed his eyes and realized that he didn't want to end up killing Mana. He may have talked some pretty mean things to her back then but he never really intended to kill her. He felt like she was his friend, she may have thought differently than him but she was no criminal. It wasn't her fault Tanshu died, it wasn't her fault Shimo died. She blamed herself for everything bad that ever happens and to blame her for those same things was to be inefficient as there would've been nothing one could say to her she didn't say to herself at every moment of her life, it would've also mean that he was as mad as she was for accepting this much responsibility…

Mana hugged Sugemi out of nowhere. The Nara's eyes opened up in surprise as he looked at his friend who was finally free of Inomame's control. The two stood there for a moment allowing the moment of rekindled friendship to become awkward before splitting up.

"Wow you're just a… A goddamn asshole…" Kiyomi uttered looking down on Inomame's bleeding and writhing in pain body as she stomped on him some more, just barely avoiding the spot where her kunai was etched in Inomame's subclavian artery.

"Still, you're just too cute and funny to kill… Be a hunk and don't pull that out." Kiyomi winked before sitting down close to the incapacitated Yamanaka and kicking her feet up. She figured she'd better keep an eye on her supposed groom for a while before this whole thing settled down a little and someone took him over from her or it was safer to leave him alone.

 **P.S. Happy Holidays, you guys!**


	255. Principles

Only after the brief outbreak of ecstasy did Mana realize how absolutely sapped of chakra she was. Mana tried to move her hands away from Sugemi but she couldn't both stand separately from her friend and successfully walk by herself. While the magician felt like she just needed time to get used to this pale weakness, a feeling likened to that of having most of one's blood drained completely, she still felt embarrassed needing her friend's help to walk.

"I didn't… Do anything, did I?" Mana wondered looking at Sugemi with barely kicking feeling of hope in her eyes.

"You didn't kill anyone, no. It's fine, the blonde must've gotten to Inomame and hurt him strongly enough for the technique to end." Sugemi replied looking onwards to the whirl of limbs as the Demonlings circled around the Imarizu.

"Do you have chakra left?" Mana wondered looking at her friend.

"Not for all of them…" Sugemi shook his head. While normally he felt excited about beating up a bunch of people with a perfect excuse to kick their collective asses, currently he weighed his chances as quite slim.

"That's where I can come in…" Yanagi smiled through pale skin, his case however was not due to chakra loss, it appeared to be much more physical.

"We really shouldn't save them, they'll probably just kill us." Sugemi tried complaining but then after remembering those pathetic begging eyes of his magician friend he just sighed and helped her down on a large rock before sitting on one knee and weaving the hand seal.

"Shadow Possession Jutsu!" she shouted once again using his clan hijutsu in a way they were intended to be used and not how he wanted to use them.

"Parasitic Insects: Cocoon!" Yanagi smacked his open palms together in a hastily put together hand seal surrounding the entangled Demonlings with his locust-like parasitic insects that at the same time used their carried blades to inflict numerous cuts and lacerations as well as feasted on the enemy chakra.

"I thought Aburame don't use hand seals…" Sugemi looked back at his companion once the Demonlings collapsed from injuries and chakra loss.

"We don't have to, but I think they look kind of cool." Yanagi blushed with a foolish grin before stroking the back of his head as if he was ashamed of this revelation. "I can control my Tabekaichu with just a mental command but I'm a big fan of Super Sentai Space Panties."

"I feel like our journey home will be much more entertaining, my friend!" Sugemi smiled fist bumping with his companion. For a moment there Mana began feeling really threatened by a full journey of these two discussing their pervy manga and while, in a way, she owed a lot to one specific pervy manga a whole journey of it sounded like anything but entertaining.

Then she noticed the grisly sight in front of her – the eldest Imarizu member standing in the midst of the battlefield which was now eradicated by Sugemi and Yanagi's teamwork. The man's arms and legs were shuddering, his bodysuit torn in most parts and drenched in his own and blood of his opponents where strings of the suit were still connected to each other and not just hanging like pathetic rags. His mask busted and grinded to dust with only a cloth piece dangling on his chin and the right part of his face, revealing a face covered with blood, beatings and still breathing in violence and breathing out punishment.

"Think we can take him?" Sugemi wondered.

"If the Yamanaka kid joins in, sure. He's undoubtedly barely on his feet already…" Yanagi affirmed with a serious nod.

Suddenly the Imarizu's face turned at the three Konoha ninja, still twisted with rage and with completely whited out eyes. These eyes were the only part of his dark face that weren't completely swollen or covered with blood and for that they were that much more intimidating. The man's figure bent backwards twisting his entire body in ways it shouldn't be twisted before his powerful thighs sent him soaring at Mana and Sugemi with a single bound. Sugemi's knee hit the old man in the chest sending him up in the air a good couple of meters before Yanagi's insects formed a fist shape and slammed him into the ground, with each moment of contact draining more and more chakra and stabbing him continuously with the small blades that each insect carrier with their small but powerful limbs.

"Stop!" Mana tried to shout out but her voice was too weak. "This battle is over, we've captured Inomame, we beat all the Demon trainees for you. I'm sorry for the loss of your friends, it doesn't seem like anyone else of your group made it…" Mana concluded that last sentence with bitter sadness as she herself felt her throat getting choked by grief for people that she didn't know and who tried to kill her a couple of times, almost succeeding both of those times.

"The mission is to kill Inomame Yamanaka. I will complete it!" the old man roughed out through his teeth spitting out blood with each word as blood from his damaged internal organs sprayed through the filter of his barely remaining teeth.

"My mission is not completed either. Yet I'm willing to compromise – keep Shimo's sword but give us Inomame. He is no longer a threat to your client, you can let him run free and still what happened here will incriminate him for his last underwear. He tried to kill a Yamanaka heiress and then force her into marriage, he used the Yamanaka influence to obtain even more power and now because of that influence the clan will see to it that he meets justice. Don't derive lady irony of her moment." Mana tried to reason with the assassin, she thought that giving him something for something would've made her win. Not just win, but do so her way, win by giving her enemy something to be satisfied for, something she could have afforded to lose.

The Imarizu stood tall and straightened his back, upon more pressure being placed on his tattered bodysuit it tore with a loud tearing sound and left him bare-chested and staring at Mana within an extended hand's reach. Still, Mana's eyes didn't waver, she continued to look the assassin right in the eyes even as he reached behind his back and pulled out the Audra blade, lifting his closed wrist and showing her the blade right in front of her eyes, so close he could almost swipe the blade and leave Mana blinded forever.

"This sword has meaning for you, doesn't it? Back then you begged me to leave it with your corpse, when you thought you were good as dead, now you use it as bargaining chip of great importance. I feel like I can do the same… I'll flip your offer around – fight me, one on one. You win – I back out and give you this sword, I win – I kill Inomame and no one moves a finger to stop me." The Imarizu looked at Mana face to face, his dark brown eyes were so deep and scary that it was tough not to get lost in them. It was clear that the dark skinned brawler meant it.

"Wait a goddamn second!" Yanagi objected, "This isn't fair! Mana is almost drenched of chakra by Inomame, she isn't a close range combatant, that's your specialty!"

The Imarizu assassin lifted his still athletic and cut up arm, tensing his muscles so hard that blood squirted through his wounds and drenched his fist.

"I am injured as well. Also, it was her idea to defend Inomame – the man who cost her this predicament. It is an adult thing to accept responsibility for one's own choices. I do not speak so many words often, make no mistake, I am no bargaining with these filthy pale-skins, I am bargaining with you, my half-equal." The Imarizu rudely cut back at Yanagi making the Aburame visibly pissed and itching to kick the assassin's ass. Still, attacking the man in his current state would've been just taking a man out of his misery.

Mana still stared deep into the Imarizu's eyes, her deep stare wandered between his own brown abyssal gazers and the Audra blade – the legacy of her good friend which needed to be placed at his grave, it was Mana's responsibility to do so.

"Very well, I understand…" the Imarizu nodded, finally folding, "You seem to have uttered this belonged to your friend at some point. Someone who has passed away? That means you wish to return this sword to his grave, it has meaning to you. That's admirable, very well – even if you lose, I shall still surrender this blade to your friends after Inomame is dead. What will you…"

"I agree!" Mana instantly replied interrupting the Imarizu so fast that the old assassin's eyes widened in surprise. The old killer took a couple of slow leaps back to place distance in between him and Mana, Sugemi and Yanagi jumped in to object to the magician's decision.

"You'll die!" they both shouted out almost instantaneously.

"If I die, then Inomame dies – it'll be because I was too weak to uphold my ideals. I'll be a failure but it won't matter. I'll just realize that I was always meant to fail in the end, what good are my ideals if I'm always too weak to uphold them?" Mana replied, "He's right. It's my choice to protect Inomame, I need to accept all consequences of that choice – that's what I told Tanshu-sensei all the way back then, remember?" the girl smiled to Sugemi before taking a defensive fighting stance.

"You're an idiot, Nakotsumi Mana!" Sugemi shouted out, just like he used to get mad at her before. Seeing her friend get so protective again made the magician nostalgic and while he meant well, his feelings were wrong. His friend just made a life-risking decision and the best he could do was to blame her, instead of supporting her. All of a sudden the magician felt like she was standing alone and small in front of the Imarizu leader as well as all of her friends… It made her sad.

The Imarizu stood up and looked at his opponent. Mana did not attack, she was no attacker, at least not physically. If she tried attacking the man using ninjutsu she'd just pass out from using too much chakra. That would be useless. Her best advantages, all of her strengths were taken away from her. Still, she couldn't afford to lose. Deep inside Mana swore to herself to not stop fighting until she either died, that is was literally unable to protect Inomame anymore, or she won. No matter how many bones were broken, no matter how irreversible the damage to her health. Just keep fighting. As long as she could feel her own heart beating inside her chest, just keep fighting…

The Imarizu darted onwards, leaping at Mana at such impressive speed that had her mind wavered she'd have never even seen him coming. An immeasurable fraction of his true speed, however still barely visible even to an enhanced eye. Luckily the magician didn't squander her preparation time, she focused herself, went through a pair of scenarios in her mind to prepare her mind for a faster attack than she could react to. All she needed was to determine an archetype of an attack, one of the various the old man in Sun Disc arena taught her about, then just intercept it!

Mana leaned aside to avoid the strike aimed right in between her eyes and nose – something like that would've crushed her skull and killed her outright. It'd have cracked entire planets in two. Tired, so tired… Mana felt air disappearing from her lungs just after leaning aside. She shoved her palm in to tap the Imarizu's elbow, force his right hand to be displaced in a position where he couldn't counter and would forcefully squander his weight center. To force full conscious overexerted effort into this strike from her opponent but his arm was no longer there!

The magician lifted her knee – he was coming for her gut, she knew it! In her current state she had nothing to stop herself from not having her innards blown up and mushed into slimy mass of blood and gore. It would've been an efficient and very painful way to take her out for good. The girl screamed out in pain when the man's near invisible fist hit her knee cap. She predicted the strike but it still was too painful to block him – she needed to parry, to find an opening, to counter. That was hopeless, avoiding took all of her air out. All she could do was stand there and get pummeled.

Maybe if she gets pummeled for long enough her opponent will die of old age?

Mana fell back on her back, hitting the sand and feeling the sticky puddles of blood covering her hair. The kick aimed at the side of her neck didn't hit her, it did send massive airwave that decimated Inomame's ship far away. The girl pressed her hands above her head to push her body up. The assassin tried to sweep with enough force to separate her body from her legs where his iron kick broke her bones. Mana vaulted over him and stumbled away, gasping for air. Her muscles were burning up from exhaustion. She had never fought having so little chakra left, just the bare necessities to survive, a single drop more and she'd pass out or even die… She had to keep telling her own body to not augment itself for a single moment, just use her natural evasion and redirection skills, somehow survive… Just survive…

The Imarizu rushed after Mana attacking her from behind. He favored a combination of quick jabs, dominant right hand, aimed for the left side… Having his fighting profile in mind the magician avoided his textbook combination by leaning aside without turning at him – perfectly avoiding his strikes by just sheer memory of his combinations and his fighting style and pure prediction. She was taught to fight that way… So many movements and so much acrobatics cost her too much air again. Once again she was gasping after turning back at her opponent again.

"Fight back!" he shouted out, good, he wasted air for taunts. Mana avoided his uppercut and tried kicking in his back leg, the one where all the pressure and weight was placed on. Somehow the assassin placed his other leg in the way taking the kick but not falling. He was just as skilled at defensive moves as Mana. The kunoichi leaned from another cross and tried elbowing the man's teeth out, then avoided another uppercut for a downwards stomping kick at his nose. If he couldn't breathe – he couldn't fight. In terms he'd give her time to both avoid and counter, instead of having to use all of her last gasps of air to not get blown up by his incalculable strength.

Both of her hits got blocked, repurposing his devoted hammy strikes into blocks at the last second to block her attacks. It was clear that Mana's strikes lacked the oomph of the Imarizu's strikes – he could block her no problem but Mana couldn't do the same for him. Blocking would demolish her limbs which in terms would cripple her speed and nail the final nail in the coffin of her hopes to someday counterattack successfully. She needed damage to win!

The Imarizu threw a couple of weak jabs, so immensely fast but weak enough to be blocked. Right when Mana covered her face so that it wasn't mashed into pus and gore by them she realized their purpose – they weren't damaging blows, they were meant to keep her grounded and in place so that he could then finish her. By the time Mana looked back up her enemy was already in the air. Using his back leg to snap it back and increase the strength of his cross.

Mana leaned aside letting the floating brawler pass beside her. The magician felt pressure and tearing muscle fibers in her side from how much her body bent. Her spine began pulsing with pain but she forced it on. There it was – her chance! Mana snapped her leg up, falling backwards due to how tense and twisted her body was, she could hold the pressure no longer so she fell with a kick right into the Imarizu's ribs. The bare-chested assassin slightly lifted off higher from the magician's kick as she fell on her back and rolled aside only to somehow pick herself back on her knees and hyperventilate for air.

She actually hit him! Just like she was taught… Meiko, Kouta and the old man would've been so proud! Mana herself didn't let her momentary lucky shot get in her head but at least she proved herself that she still had the chance and that she didn't walk into this fight just to die a martyr of her own cause. She was fighting for everything she stood for, she was no longer a kid or someone who dreamed of the future as the source of their strength. She fought to protect her ideals here and now!

Once again, Mana assumed a defensive stance. If she attacked she'd get destroyed. She had no offensive experience and needed to simply find another opening and hope that this time it wouldn't come at such a painful cost of twisting her own body uncomfortably, something that left some damage on Mana's side. She was just as crippled with pain as the Imarizu after a successful shot at his broken ribs.

The assassin attacked again, kicking right at Mana's head, switching up his style from a very punch-heavy to involving kicks. That was what made this specific Imarizu member so dangerous – a testament of his experience. The magician leaned down, placing her palms on the ground and delivering a cartwheel kick. Her foot ruffled some air. After Mana's body straightened out and landed on firm ground her eyes opened wide and she realized that she devoted too much weight and effort for this counter.

A straight cross was flying right at her face. With her side still aching from the uncomfortable bending of her body before and her weight still in klutz, Mana had only one possible way of avoiding a sudden planet cracking fist demolishing her skull like a watermelon hit by a sledgehammer. She gently leaped up like a rabbit while bending her back backwards, rolling her arms and legs around the Imarizu's extended arm and positioning into an armbar. She had never had the chance to resort to this, she always had better opportunities…

The Imarizu yelled out loud, lifting his arm up and shaking it before preparing to slam Mana's body into the ground. Something that would've undoubtedly driven all air out from her lungs and left her just like a wheezing fish thrown ashore and waiting to be finished off. Mana let go of the arm at its highest swinging point and then kicked off the back of the old man's head with her feet, rolling aside and farther away from him before clutching her burning side muscles in pain.

The Imarizu grunted in annoyance, he was having a lot of trouble tagging this little girl he never doubted he'd beat easily. It wasn't like he wanted her death, he disliked killing his own race, plus the girl showed a lot of promise for growth. If she was more ruthless she'd have made a fine Imarizu one day. The old man smiled before stopping in his hasty assault, instead he hopped around letting some air return to his lungs. This slippery and jumpy little rabbit was making him all worked up, rushing to catch it. This critter nearly lured her own hunter into their own bear-trap with this impressive evasive display.

Both combatants stood still for a moment, taking the brief moment of tranquility to draw more breaths into their lungs. Earning the precious currency for each movement, each punch and each dodge – oxygen.


	256. Live Hatin' or Die Lovin'

It was beginning to seem to Mana that upon landing the hit on her opponent she may have given herself an opening that'd have allowed her to counterattack with more success. Still, she was hesitant to proceed and open herself up by allowing herself the luxury of being aggressive. After all, while her opponent didn't look too good and was barely staying upright, she herself hasn't fully yet recovered from the battle with the Imarizu last night or this recent craziness that left a trail of destruction and some dead bodies in its wake.

The Imarizu moved his hand behind his hip. Mana's attention sharpened, she began trying to read the man's movements but they were actually slow enough even for a normal man to see, such lack of speed or attempt to trick her eye, which ironically resulted in Mana's eyes being tricked, knocked the magician out of the rhythm. Her eyes needed to roll back the rate of her perception as to perceive such a movement in her top perception rate would've taken an eternity. It was like the Imarizu's hand moved a light twitch every hour.

That was undoubtedly the assassin's intent and Mana's mistake, right after slowing himself down, knowing full well that the girl won't risk attacking him. The Imarizu dashed onwards at Mana. Fear sparked in the girl's heart but as she braced herself for impact she realized that she was going to make it – her perception took some precious microseconds to return to its former rate, she took some time to place up her blocks as she was clearly not going to evade this, still – survival was well within the realm of possibility.

Black cloud of smoke hit Mana right in the face as instead of attacking her head on and injuring Mana's blocking arms and shins the assassin dashed past her, instead popping a smoke bomb. The gust of air accumulated from his movement gathered the cloud of black as tar smoke and bashed it right at the magician's face and into her breathing system, had this been toxic Mana would've been in trouble. The magician turned back to defend herself. It didn't work – she couldn't see the Imarizu's movements but she could read them, predict them – attacking one from behind was textbook manner of advantage utilization.

Her body froze in pain, Mana's side burnt up from the pain inflicted on herself from before. All the gut injuries from last night all acted up at once forcing the magician to gasp surprised in pain. Then the irritating and burning sensation in her lungs completely flipped the tables on her. Not only was the substance in the Imarizu's smoke bomb highly irritative to Mana's lungs but also to her eyes, instantly making the girl tear up. This pain from the sum of her injuries ruined her defensive measures.

A light tap to her central facial area opened Mana up for a follow up attack, it stiffened her body and lightly lifted it off the ground. A following cross to her abdomen was completely impossible to block or defend against, evasion was long since out of the question. This assassin was smart above all else, he not only had an immensely overpowering level of power and speed, martial arts mastery but also a true assassin's mind.

Mana's eyes whited out, she would've screamed out in pain had she anything but toxic gas in her lungs. She only breathed out a light whiff as the final stored semblances of air left them forcefully. Her opponent moved sideways placing his extended arm to stop the magician from falling down, since Mana's mind blacked out he was in complete control of his combination as well as the magician's responses to it.

The old man pushed Mana's body with his extended arm not letting it fall down, then giving it another quick jab before following up with a strong cross at her lower chest area and then hooking at her head from below. The magician could feel no pain. At some point her mind was subconsciously convinced that it was over – she was dead, however the very fact that some semblance of consciousness was still retained and she didn't just completely turn off tipped the magician to bet on the other outcome. Maybe it was because of difficulties for her opponent to breathe as well, maybe it was because of the broken ribs and countless other bones and severe bleeding but he couldn't hit Mana nearly as hard as he had the potential to.

Mana's eyes regained their sight and she regained her control in the middle of a graceful flight, up in the air and just about to hit the ground from the power of the hook that hit her in the chin. That disgusting almost rusty iron-like taste of blood in her mouth and something gooey but matching the taste reminded the magician of the dirty and cruel reality of fighting under these conditions. She wasn't built for such fights, she had no chance…

Sharp pain made Mana gasp out in shock of pain again, the Imarizu smacked her ribs as well as her back from behind her breaking her fall and lightly tossing her back up from the force of the impact. He winded up for another blow, this one was a sluggish cross aimed right to Mana's temple – an off-switch. It would've made a blood-shake out of her brain and it couldn't have been allowed to connect. All of the time around the magician stopped, her perception delved as deep into its ability as it could, deeper than the Imarizu's current state allowed him to. Mana wanted to dodge it but she realized that the weight and positioning wasn't right, no way could she properly repurpose the balance in order to pull off something even remotely dodge-like.

She needed to attack!

The magician's thoughts lingered, stopped and directed at what was at stake – a man's life. Not by the longest stretch an innocent man's, in any children's fairytale the magician would be the villain, someone protecting a man who tried to have a young heiress of a clan, almost a princess, murdered and then when that didn't work out he tried to marry her! Protecting such a man, even if protecting him from death to deliver actual justice the way Mana saw it was a villainous act in the eyes of the way everyone around her saw the world. Not her though… Death was never justice, death was the end, a point from which nothing mattered anymore and justice could never be irrelevant. It was the only thing that Mana wanted at this point, it was something tangible and very much material. Inomame needed to live in order to see justice done.

She needed to attack!

A deafening crack made Sugemi and Yanagi squint, the Imarizu member's eyes whited out as his neck snapped back, the man's head tossed backwards gruesomely from Mana's fastest elbow strike right to the lower left part of the old man's skull. As the assassin stumbled back with his teeth bashed in the ugly mixture of blood, gums and teeth scattered around him as well as all over the already bloodied and battered assassin's body.

The man kept on standing. His wish to kill Inomame was equally great to Mana's desire to keep him alive. Two people, young and old, optimistic and realistic, with two different ways of seeing justice done. No. The Imarizu couldn't have cared less of justice, to them Inomame was just a mission.

Mana stumbled back, grunting in pain and groaning like a stomped and kicked around dog. Her knuckles trembled, her muscles burnt inside and twitched around begging the girl to stop exerting herself. Both of the sides kept on standing and struggling to breathe at each other, mind over matter. The old man's body was all sweaty, he similarly to Mana groaned and grunted as his lungs burnt equally painfully to Mana's – he had breathed in the same gas forcefully that Mana had to. Finally the smoke cloud cleared out.

"What the…" Kiyomi gasped upon seeing the gruesome sight of a man trying to kill a young woman so he could kill another man and the young woman trying to survive. The Yamanaka looked questioningly at the rest of the team. She knew that Sugemi had a past of some sort with Mana and just assumed that there was a bloody good reason for none of the two interfering. Inomame covered his face as he couldn't stomach the sight of bodies surrounding the two barely standing ninja fighting it out for his life.

"Mana agreed to this – fighting the Imarizu dirtbag for Inomame's life. If she wins the assassin is relieved of his contract, if she loses – her name gets added to it, either way Shimo's sword is granted to her, whether her hands are warm enough to hold it or not…" Sugemi explained coldly as he watched the needlessly violent battle in front of him. He could see that there were numerous times Mana had sufficient enough opening to kill the man, her elbow strike could've been aimed a bit further down diagonally to the left and hit a sensitive neck weakspot killing the assassin instantly. She could've also killed him during the first onslaught of attacks she was so careful to dodge. Then again, if she was aggressive enough to go for the kill it was hard to predict how successful her defenses would've been, maybe her killing intent would've resulted in too many blows on her front being skipped…

Still there had to be a better out than this…

"And we're expected to just stand around and see her kill herself!? What if she dies and the Imarizu decides to kill this little shit? Are we to just let him do it!?" Kiyomi flipped out rolling back her sleeves.

"It'd be Mana's final will. Our lives are too short to disrespect our final wills. We are under no orders to keep Inomame alive, we'd be violating nothing. Your return is the only thing the village cares about and that is already in our hands, if we recover the Audra sword for the village it'll just be a cherry on top… Even if Mana died, we're all heroes in the eyes of the village, she'd be taking any blame from our reckless actions as an impromptu response squad and all fruits of our labor would be ours to claim credit for. She's acting like a true ninja should…" Yanagi explained calmly placing his hand on Kiyomi's angry fist and softly lowering it back down.

"Maybe for the first time in her life…" Sugemi smiled looking down at the bloody sand beneath his feet.

"Do you guys want to know what I think?" Inomame wondered before being smacked by Kiyomi.

"No!" she shouted. Lightly pulling a steel string tied around her fingers on one end and Inomame's kunai etched in an important blood vessel that was bleeding very slowly until the kunai would have been pulled out. Even if the Yamanaka possessed an immense chakra pool he'd not have prevented his bleeding out for too long. Kiyomi had him like her puppet.

"Had I known this would turn out to be such an abusive relationship I'd have not tried to marry you…" Inomame grinned through twisted in pain lips as the yanking of the blade in his body locked him down in great pain.

Neither Mana nor the old Imarizu spoke to each other. They simply didn't believe the matter being worth anything to say. It would've been a waste of their air, something that was more worthy than gold at the moment. Their wills have been sharpened and tempered like the finest steel, clashing against each other like the ancient swords of great heroes. Things to say would only be silken handkerchiefs trying to get in the way of these sharpened weapons.

Suddenly Mana broke out in a battlecry. Her expression of pent up feelings and aggression greatly surprised the bystanders as her body rushed at the Imarizu angrily prepared to beat the old man down. Equally surprised by the young girl's aggression the Imarizu took on the defensive and took a very passive stance, placing his weight all on his back leg while backing out of a more engaging clash with the rushing at him force of fury.

Mana knew she was making a mistake, providing the man with endless openings to kill her by exploiting, she didn't care. All she wanted was for fate to finally choose its victor and be done with it. She had pent up feelings that she needed to let soar free with her strikes before she died, if she was to be chosen as the unfortunate one that day.

Mana's knee strike was blocked successfully, the pitch perfect two handed block completely absorbed all of the force put into it. The other leg of the girl extended and wrapped around the Imarizu's neck, as gravity took its toll Mana yanked it down flipping the man over and slamming him into the ground. The old assassin repurposed the inertia that would've ended his resistance in a powerful slam at the bloody sand into a roll that minimized the damage he'd have taken. He shook and writhed as his broken ribs were slammed into the ground and bent for a roll but he didn't scream or shout – trying to fight pain was the Imarizu way. Hiding away one's humanity irritated and psyched out one's opponent.

Mana didn't wait for the Imarizu's stance to perfectly be rebuilt from after his evasive action. She rushed right at him with an onslaught of kicks preparing her back leg for a strong jump and her front leg for her signature kick to top off the combination. The first attack successfully displaced and unnerved her opponent, it was a very confusing throw that came out of nowhere since Mana never utilized throws and clinches. She never clashed with the opponent head-on using neither strength nor force of their own. That was why her attack worked as effectively as it did.

Bobbing and weaving away the Imarizu avoided her lightning fast blur of kicks before quickly responding to a quick upwards jab as a counter. Mana leaned down, she knew that if she took the man's bait and avoided the jab by jumping back she'd lock herself into a devoted movement she couldn't dodge the follow up from, her weight would once again be on the wrong leg and positioned right in her leaning back. There was only a back vault that was available from that position and the skilled and experienced assassin likely had a response prepared for that evasive maneuver.

The magician's palm tapped the Imarizu's striking arm placing it upwards with his entire right side open. She jumped up with a spinning kick that she prepared to repurpose into a whipping leg grab of the man's neck again. There was no way she'd jump off the ground and give up the advantage of a firm ground helping her build up a stronger kick otherwise. The Imarizu, surprisingly enough did the same as Mana did before, grabbing her leg with his other hand, his raised striking arm locked down in the air in a fear inspiring preparation for a crushing downwards elbow strike.

The man's elbow slamming down pierced what little air remained between Mana's caught firmly leg – her kneecap and where it was deflected to in fractions of a moment. It was like a lightning strike ended not by an overwhelming roar of thunder but by a smacking sound. The Imarizu assassin's eyes widened – he had expected a loud and equally thunderous as its metaphorical speed and power bone crack that would've broken Mana's leg backwards and finished the fight.

The man directed his attention at the elbow that was cushioned by Mana's palms absorbing all the force. The magician's lips were bent downwards and twisted, her skin pale and her eyes black and baggy. She was in a lot of pain however her leg was not broken and the two stood in that deadlock for what seemed like an eternity.

Then Mana's palms slipped out from under the elbow, her body bent backwards throwing her feet up in the air arcing back like a dancer as the magician's feet rose up and smashed at her opponent staggering him back while Mana vaulted back and repositioned herself in a proper attacking stance, running back at her opponent with a combination of kicks in mind. Her speed was so sluggish – her leg still aching even if the elbow strike was muzzled by her palms, it was like she was limping… Such unacceptable speed and yet…

Mana threw a cross, she knew that she couldn't kick right with her aching and worn out by the dash leg. The Imarizu was faster shooting his own, much longer armed cross and punching Mana straight in the face twice faster than her hand could connect with his already crushed jaw.

The girl flew back like an arrow rolling through dirt, blasting through other killed or defeated bodies like a rolling heavy ball blasted bowling pins away. The magician's body flew like a weightless sack completely devoid of life and thrown backwards by the awesome force of the strike. It was so powerful and fast, nearly instant in execution that the Imarizu stumbled forward after Mana's body got blasted away.

The old assassin stayed on his knees with only his broken punching arm and bones that were already visible through his busted up knuckles and his own tapping into puddles blood running down his body and face as his only visual consolation. His head suddenly turned sideways as he heard a very alarming sound of feet kicking off the bloody wet sand.

Kiyomi was rushing at him, ready to punch the life out of him but then the young blonde's body just stopped in mid rush. The blonde's eyes looked down to see a foreign shadow locking onto her.

"As someone who saw how actions similar to yours end… Don't. Even if Mana is to die here and now, she'd like to die as your friend rather than live on hating you. She's someone who has no capacity for hatred in her heart. Don't give her a reason to hate you, don't ruin who she is and what she stands for!" Sugemi yelled out angrily as he held Kiyomi tied down with his Shadow Possession technique.

Inomame's eyes shiftily looked around but Yanagi's voice calmed down his raging ambition to run away.

"I wouldn't do it if I was you…" he said.

At that moment Inomame noticed a very loosely focused swarm of scattered insects all around the area, ready to close down in a cocoon formation around Inomame at the faintest desire to do so by the Aburame clansman.

"We are adamant to uphold Mana's will, she is a girl who has granted me what I always wanted – a chance to become something more than an average prison guard. For that I will see to it that her will, even if it is to be her last will, is fulfilled!" Yanagi shouted with enough intimidation and conviction behind his voice to convince even the shifty Yamanaka.

Kiyomi's body began shaking and twitching uneasily. The Nara member didn't even try restraining those feint movements but then he noticed the girl's chest lift up and down as it became apparent that the blonde was simply weeping.

"She's going to die… What if she's already dead?" Kiyomi whimpered out but Sugemi met her question with silence as he adamantly reminded himself of his intention to hold up to Mana's will. He couldn't allow Kiyomi to interfere and ruin Mana's wish to place Shimo's sword back on his grave, he couldn't allow the blonde to butt into the deal between the two.

Had it not been for friends doing what they thought was best for their friends, Team Oak would not have fallen out. If Sugemi was allowed to kill the Demon from Kirigakure as he had intended, Shimo and Mana would have never gotten into trouble, Shimo would still have been alive… Who knew… Maybe same will soon be fair to be said about Mana as well. The Demon would not have escaped captivity either. Mana's will had no place there for friends who thought who knew better what was best for their friends… That was Sugemi's decision. A tough call to make that would've made a conflicting twist for a main character of the manga that'd inevitably be written about him in the future.

Even if Mana died… He wouldn't let her dream die, he'd record everything she said, everything she did, everything she stood for and allow her ideals to live forever. He'd make his own manga great enough for many people to read it – just as many as Mana would have wanted to reach. That was his call, for too long he had ignored what Mana wanted, for too long he had ridiculed her. He decided to hear out what she decided to say with her actions, give her a chance at the very least… One that friends ought to give their friends.


	257. Blood in the Eyes

"Let me go…" Kiyomi cried out burying her anger and frustration deep in her chest, trying to sound calm and reasonable so that Sugemi freed her from his jutsu.

"I will. Once I see you have no reason to charge at the Kumogakure assassin who may have just killed our friend." Sugemi mumbled out carefully observing the wreckage of wood and rocks where Mana's body was flung into after the incredibly fast and immensely strong blow by the Imarizu. Even Sugemi found that man's speed to be tough to see at times. It was almost like his attacks were delivered in an instant from his point of perception, they accelerated steadily but then at some middle point of movement they just went out of control.

"I won't interfere!" Kiyomi shouted out in a way that made it seem that she will absolutely interfere.

"You shouldn't pick a fight with that man, young lady." Yanagi huffed out still clutching at his own aching sides from a clash with one of the Imarizu. Granted that one was fairly fresh and nowhere near torn down and broken as the leader of the group was right now, still, the unbelievable acceleration of their punches was just as dangerous and deadly. "You should feel lucky they didn't kill you the first time they got their hands on you, usually when people deal with the Imarizu they feel lucky having escaped them and never interact with them again."

"I am to thank for that, I believe, and also - you're welcome…" Inomame smiled in a manner not unlike a way cartoons depict vipers twisting their anthropomorphic lips. "I could've had the Imarizu kill you at any point but I made sure you were captured alive!"

"Don't rub yourself, it's only because you were afraid the line of succession would be altered after your plot was found out. Posthumous line of succession alterations are nothing new and the discovered plot of heiress' murder would've been all the proof the clan needed…" Yanagi replied calmly. Being a member of a highly overlooked yet prevalent and important clan he knew the intricacies of clan inner administration well.

"It's why I don't like it when people focus on the details…" Inomame complained poking his chin with his index finger.

The whole right side of Mana's face was sticky and warm, the magician tried opening up her eyes but the stench of blood and the taste of it in her mouth was too strong. She had to spit out some blood and teeth aside, only after her right eye did not open did magician realize that something was wrong. Right after her head was lifted up at least in a diagonal position a weak yet relentless streak of warm blood gushed out from her cracked forehead down the right side of her face. None of it reached Mana's eye, the blasted thing was either gone or swollen.

Usually the magician may have felt troubled about the fact that teeth were painful to have regrown using medical ninjutsu, that replacing lost eyes, if that was indeed the case was astoundingly expensive as a new one had to be cultivated by highly treasured specialists using not just medical ninjutsu but actual organ cultivation through flesh modification with cultivated Senju cells. Right now only Inomame's life mattered. Ignoring the blood and her blurry eyesight Mana got back on her feet and stumbled forward.

Kiyomi's crying eyes when she looked at her were painful. Mana wasn't sure just how badly banged up she was but the fact that seeing right was difficult and her head was dizzy enough to throw her around if she tried just walking straight told the right answer. She'd not be doing any flips or graceful acrobatics any time soon. At least she didn't pass out… Not just yet… Had the magician not suppressed her body's subconscious instinct to augment heavy damage she'd certainly have been comatose right now from chakra loss.

Mana had seen so many die. Not all who have fallen here today have died. Most of them were just out, whether from being knocked down and not properly finished off or due to their own augmentations being overworked causing them to pass out from chakra loss, just like there was a decent chance for this fight to end for the Konoha magician. She could've died here but she wouldn't let one more person die, not if she could flex one more muscle, move one more finger and throw one more punch to possibly prevent that. No matter how heinous the man she was trying to save, Mana firmly believed that killing was not justified. It was an escape from justice.

"I must say I thought you'd walk away from this at some point." the elder Imarizu uttered his first words in a while. "I believed that the next generation couldn't fight with such devotion to their beliefs. That it wasn't nearly as persistent as we used to be. Waging wars for days and weeks on end…"

"Same was thought of your generation by the previous one. It is the solace of the old belittling the young to make their past days mean something more in the present, build oneself up on the expense on those who are strong enough to take it." Mana uttered, she could feel the weakness in her voice. She tried to say something that tied around her tongue and thoughts felt messy in her head, unrelated memories began flooding her mind and getting in the way of the here and now. The girl desperately tried pleading her body to endure, weakness at this moment meant death and not only that of hers. Surely the end of it couldn't have been in her body's prime interests? Then again, knowing the punishment Mana always put it through…

The old man began bobbing and weaving aside, his speed was slow initially but it picked up, just like his instantaneous punching techniques did. His punches were not like anything Mana had seen in the Sun Disc arena which was a compliment by itself. Still, she knew what she was hit by. The man threw a punch with great amount of chakra built up in it, focused into a slow power strike but then he removed all of that chakra to accelerate the strike to no end before returning a small fraction of it, just to give it some extent of its former power back. The speed of the blows was irrelevant – they were so fast the speed may as well have been instantaneous and there was no point dodging them without predicting where they'd be coming beforehand. The old man from the arena would've been really pumped up seeing this striking technique…

Just like with his punches, the Imarizu's image blurred, his moving-in self began playing tricks with Mana, leaving afterimages, whizzing by her and toying with her like all was already over. For a moment there the magician thought it was just her one barely functioning eye playing the trick on her – showing blurs and afterimages instead of clear vision. No – it was on point. At least Mana could still trust her left eye, it was beginning to swell but the bleeding into it was still controlled by her eyebrows and long hair that soaked most of the stickiness.

The girl bent up from behind like an arc. It felt like ten billion volts had hit her, like she had fallen from the heavens onto a mountain of sharp and heated glass that went through her skin. What an immense jab, so swift and yet still strong, stronger than jabs usually are meant to be. Mana couldn't stay on her feet, falling down on her knees so hard that they opened up again. Another seemingly instantaneous blow punched her so hard that she began whirling weightlessly, like a lifeless sack towards her friends. As Sugemi commanded the held captive Kiyomi brace for impact and move out of the way, Mana's flight was stopped by an uppercut of the Imarizu who has moved in a blink in front of the girl who was about to smash into her friends.

Mana couldn't feel that last punch, the pain and shock of it escaped her. She only remembered that she was arcing in mid-air and about to smash into the ground. Piercing the air like a precise arrow the finishing cross sent Mana back into the messy pile of rocks she rose from. Honestly the magician had no idea how she was still alive. It must've been a punishment from some cruel deity. That was the only feasible explanation that made sense anymore. It wasn't like the magician was religious to begin with… While at some point the kunoichi had realized that her opponent had wasted too much chakra already to be augmenting his abilities to the point, it no longer mattered to her. She was just standing up to get knocked back down, harder than before.

Her reads no longer worked. She could predict the following combinations in her mind, base it on the archetype of the sort of martial artist her opponent was placed in but she couldn't precisely compare the angles of blows to her own position letting her decide how and where to dodge them. Where before she could dodge the man's blows without even facing him, now her mind was too dizzy to imagine in her mind's eye her own position to her opponent's and correctly guess the angle and point of her opponent's strike even if she was looking right at it. Had it been a fight just for the kicks Mana would've known it was meaningless to stand up. Sadly a life was at stake… Not just her own life though.

"Mana, stop this!" Kiyomi shouted out from the depth of her lungs when the magician stood with her wobbly and shaking legs once again. This was no longer a fight, it was in the beginning – a fight where two people clashed their styles, compared their experience and skill. Now Mana just stood up to get hit and see if she was alive enough to stand up for another serving. There was no longer even a meaning to it – usually when one didn't draw the right card they just stalled the game, folded their hands again and again, knowing that the right hand was still ahead. There was simply no higher card in the deck – the game was meaningless. Mana only stood up to lose more until she had nothing more to lose.

"You said that you wanted to protect a life! How about save your own in exchange of this scumbag's!?" Yanagi joined in hesitantly. Even the Aburame was beginning to feel uneasy watching this one sided beatdown continue. He was told that a prison guard should never be squeamish but honestly watching over Eden was slim pickings – people there were criminals only by a very strict meaning of the word. A lot of them weren't even sentenced with anything, they just used Eden for their own protection. He had seen more blood and guts, taken more than he could have imagined it was needed to. If being great meant doing what Mana was doing – Yanagi would've rather been a watchman of Eden until the end of his days.

Mana didn't reply, not because she didn't know the words, because she couldn't physically utter them loud enough. Memories flooded her mind, useless ones, not the kind that would've helped her get out from this fight or this predicament. Those of angry people, during the Fourth's funeral when Sugemi cried for deadly justice. Those condescending eyes that wrote Mana down to being just the same as the people that killed their Hokage after she opposed Sugemi's views. Yes, she thought criminals deserved to live, everyone deserved to live. She thought that after justice was served they deserved a chance at redemption. Carnefici from the Sound Village was a mass murderer long ago, there was no "but" to add or justification for his actions. And yet he lived his current life for a young girl who showed him kindness and faith in him, even while he knew there was no redeeming what he had done, believing in Hell and knowing that was his place he still protected that person dear to him to the last of his breaths. Ones that'll hopefully never come…

Those very people Mana loved more than anything would've had no problem sentencing her to death just because she thought Inomame must have lived to see justice done. She was just as worthless of a life in their eyes as Inomame himself. For that reason she didn't see her own life as something worth treasuring, saving up for some special occasion. This was the special occasion. Mana had no regrets dying hated for what she believed in.

Slowly the magician began stumbling onwards, her eye still allowed her to perceive that her opponent lingered onto her. Stumbling and weaving not because of his confusing movements but because he was tired. There were no more lifted up hands, no more protecting his busted up open and bleeding face. No more moving left and right, hopping back and forward to confuse and lure out needless punches from Mana. The man was just lingering like a village drunkard on his evening walk home. The two ninja met on a collision course in a couple of moments…

Mana threw a light punch, the dizziness in her head made her barely contain throwing up as her body weighed down into her opponent's embrace. Pushing her off of the clinch the Imarizu threw a diagonal downwards cross aimed at putting Mana down on the floor. The man hoped that at some point the magician would fall and physically be unable to get up. Unable to properly respond the girl stumbled and dived down under her opponent's punch hitting the man in the abdomen with her head as she fell. The assassin didn't shout but he flipped up and rolled on the dirt in pain as his broken ribs burnt up before standing back up. Hearing the taps of her blood hitting the sand Mana forced her busted face off the sand as well. She was crawling at the man more than walking.

The girl kicked off the sand, trying to tackle the man with her shoulder, use the natural force of gravity pulling her down to stay down. A force that at the moment seemed infinitely strong to the kunoichi. The Imarizu turned around and fell backwards delivering an overhead kick that hit the magician at the back of her head. It wasn't a kick as much as it was a fall of his leg, fueled by nothing else but gravity as there was little to no energy left in the assassin to fight properly. He had been hitting and killing people whole day, he lacked the needed strength to kill instantly making this young girl suffer more than she needed to and that was something the old man was regretting as he roughly shoved himself staggering back up and down on his knees.

Mana threw some blood up. All the movement made build it up, she must've had a pretty bad concussion. The Imarizu rushed at her trying to tackle Mana down, he intended to sit on her chest and just pummel the girl's face until she didn't move. He felt enraged that even as she danced right at the edge of death waiting below she still defended this pale-skinned target of his. If he played with her any longer he may not had the strength to even hold up the sword he intended to execute the man with. Mana didn't try to resist, she just fell on her back raising her knee and kicking the man in the jaw as the two fell.

The Imarizu straightened out on the sand completely immobile besides Mana. The two just huffed heavily with their eyes closed, twitching in exhaustion and pain, wandering which one will gather their strength quicker to climb on top of the other and finish them off.

Mana flipped up onto the bruised and bleeding chest of the old man, it felt as slippery as a submerged rock covered in sea weed. The magician's back straightened out as she still staggered struggling to keep herself from falling off his chest and throwing up more blood on the sand. If she stopped struggling she'd fall asleep, falling asleep meant death, not only for her but Inomame. Falling asleep was unacceptable! Mana swung her palm wildly slamming it at the left cheek of the Imarizu elder, blood and teeth spilled out. The magician repeated the motion from the other side again and again and again and again. Until one final slam from her palm right at the man's nose completely busting it open, until Mana saw the old man's eyes swell up in front of her and she was sure he couldn't see anything from how much of his own swollen flesh was in his face. Then the magician fell, smiling and peaceful.

"You didn't kill me…" the old man wheezed from his busted up lungs.

Mana wanted to whimper "Never" back at him but she couldn't. Her lips wouldn't move, air wouldn't pass her lungs the right way, her tongue wouldn't flip like it had to. If she died then and there it'd have been fine. A loud pop broke Mana's one working eye wide open as she realized that black as tar smoke began filling the air.

"No!" she thought.

A loud and metallic string reeling sound followed. Mana flipped on her front trying to grab at air, hoping to stop the second wind of the assassin before he ruined his own integrity as a man, but no one was there. That was it – Inomame was probably dead! As the smoke cleared momentarily Mana saw Kiyomi, released from Sugemi's technique at last, Yanagi and Sugemi with their kunai out protecting Inomame who was sitting with his hands around his head. Mana's troubled and frozen in fear face returned to its usual tranquility of saving a man's life, she looked at her side and saw that the assassin kept up his side of the deal – Shimo's sword as well as a small pouch laid there, right beside her.

Kiyomi's angry and crying face intruded Mana's limited and reddening field of vision.

"I'd hit you really hard right now, but I'm afraid you'd die!" she shouted erratically. Trying to find anything in her pouch that was of any medical use. Yanagi checked the sword, pulling it out and letting the Audra steel shine in the afternoon sunlight. He then sheathed the sword and checked the little pouch left by the assassin.

"It has some yellow medical food pills in it. These may keep Mana in stable condition until we check what amounts to medical care in this place…" Yanagi said.

"Huh? Why didn't the bastard eat some of those himself before the fight? He would've mopped the floor with Mana if he had even the slightest amount of chakra more left…" Sugemi wondered pouting while he looked around for where the assassin may have zipped off to with his string reeling technique. "Heh, he must've used the Academy Cloak of Invisibility Jutsu… Remarkable use of an Academy technique…"

Mana closed her left eye as she was in too much pain and too tired to do anything but that. So the old man played fair – both of them being injured was one of his conditions, it was a stipulation he upheld to the end. Had he consumed one of the medical food pills and supercharged his metabolism to heal him up a little bit it wouldn't have been a gamble, it wouldn't have been a fair deal so it was out of the question. After he felt like he had no more strength left he simply used the smoke bomb for escape, covering up with a primitive disguise ninjutsu technique until a medical pill healed him up enough to reveal himself and return to his village… An elite assassin through and through, the Imarizu elder never intended to join his comrades in the afterlife – reporting on his mission to whomever hired him was his goal all along. The gamble was the only question.

This day fate chose Mana as the victor!


	258. The Red Pill

The skin felt irritated and eerily sensitive as the bandages rubbed against it. Once Mana finally returned to her senses she felt up her bandaged face before letting her hands feel below her neck. As the more painful wounds instantly alerted the magician not to be touchy she quickly pulled her hands away from them. Mana looked around seeing a bunch of red medical pills laying around in a little decorative bowl as well as a couple of cups of water. Seeing how one was in a purple plastic cup decorated with flowery motifs Mana sipped from it barely finding a spot on her bandaged head to do so.

There must not have been much to the Land of Waves' medical specialists seeing how she was still bandaged and very much in pain. Arguably feeling a lot worse than she did during the actual fight, granted, back then she had the advantage of slowly fading consciousness that didn't rag her about how much everything hurt and how nauseous she was. Even a small sip of water, arguably one of the worst problems of waking up after a long period of resting sent the girl's stomach into a full-blown strike mode.

Trying to rub her tummy to please it somehow Mana laid back down. She really didn't feel like walking around. The magician peeked at the medical pills wandering if she was allowed to take them, that is to say, if they were left there to be taken when Mana woke up, as the water was. Knowing how potent those medical pills were, also the risk of taking too many over too short period of time Mana sort of kept herself from it, despite the pain and unrest. Even if they were the red ones, some of the least potent ones, they still would've helped her tremendously.

The door screeched as it opened revealing a curious middle aged man walking in. The man had a curious case of bushy facial hair, very thick glasses and wore a typical light blue medical ninja non-combat uniform.

"Ah, you're awake… What's wrong? You didn't take the food pills…" the man curiously inquired as he made a hand seal bending to the other side of Mana's head allowing the seals with her medical information to reveal themselves to him.

"I'm… Nauseous. My boyfriend is a medical ninja so I know these aren't too healthy to have too many of." Mana replied quietly, hearing how soft and weak her voice was and how slurring her speech came out.

The man smiled and waved his hand indifferently, "Don't worry, we don't have the really high risk-high reward kind. Red ones won't hurt too much even if you take one too many. Your liver and your digestive tract were completely grinded to mulch, healing that took a dozen of medical ninja, sadly we don't have any higher ranking specialists here so we had to pool our efforts. You're lucky you're a Konoha kunoichi, even luckier the Hokage specifically asked to have you treated as a very important patient."

"He did?" Mana wondered remembering very little after what had transpired in the beach. She was under the impression that the man utterly despised her, even more than the girl was willing to accept as being reasonable. People disliked some other people, it was just the way things were. The Sixth however really looked like he was out to get Mana the last time they met. She had figured that the man would be completely out of his mind after hearing what she had pulled – going into such a battlefield alone without informing Konoha and all…

"Oh yes, a Konohagakure party came in yesterday and took that Kirigakure gentleman away. All of the Konoha Sannin were here, all ready for a fight! It looked like a scene from an epic novel, I tell you…" the medical ninja smiled after handing Mana a single food pill, being wary of the girl's concerns of being careful with the medical food pills. The magician softly opened her mouth – as much as her sore and cracking jaw allowed her and chewed the slimy and chewy red pill that tasted like tomatoes with herbs in some gooey and milky substance. The taste certainly could've been improved.

Almost instantly the magician felt some of her pulsing pain hotspots ease up and her thoughts began being more intelligible and came more clearly. That must've been a sign of her fever going down. Her sheets smelled relatively fresh but Mana had imagined that she may have been pretty uneasy the last couple of days and sweat her fair share. Brief flashes of pain and uneasiness, the feeling of sluggishness and slipping control of her body as she rolled around the bed feeling heavy and wet… Like a whale out on the beach unable to move or save itself from drying out.

The magician felt a little bit curious as to how exactly Konoha was informed. After all, she acted as a less than legal immediate response party. Intercepting the wedding was her primary concern, not informing the village. The prison may have sent a quick note to the Hokage about Sugemi being freed temporarily, still, what would that have mattered to a man overworked from a completely bonkers amount of paperwork? Such a silly meaningless note likely wouldn't have even been read for days, if at all. It must've been something more solid, proof bearing and important.

Maybe the Yamanaka contacted the village? It was certainly a possibility but Mana would've called that they would've been more likely to send a third party of their own to take care of things. Clans had a certain freedom of inner administration of themselves and they just loved exercising that freedom. Whenever they had a matter of purely internal affairs on their hands they always acted like big and independent organizations, often sending their own assassins or hired guns after the problem…

"How are you feeling?" the medical ninja inquired generally before turning to the door, assuming he would receive the answer before he'd reached it and hear it out before leaving. Surprised that one didn't come in time and interrupted his quick and efficient rhythm of movement the man froze and turned back at Mana with a curious raised eyebrow.

"Hurt but… Not the first time, probably won't be the last either." Mana shrugged before biting her own lip in pain when something really loudly cracked at her shoulder area.

"Well, that's to be expected. We are a small island and our medical facility is centuries behind that of Konoha. I was told you're the girl who brought a bunch of technology from… I won't even be troubled to try and explain – you know better than me, anyways, we are yet to receive a single screw or bolt from that. We may as well be praying people to be well…" the medical specialist shrugged before leaving.

Mana sighed before feeling the overwhelming amount of bandages wrapped around her head and face. She could see with the other eye again – that meant that it wasn't completely destroyed or just the flesh around it had swollen excessively during the fight. Still she wondered about the extent of her longer lasting injuries. Just how much of this would stay to haunt her? Usually skilled medical experts could remove traces of injury, heal it in an out of combat situation quite quickly however a person's body could only be treated without a trace a limited number of times before it broke down. Before cracks began to show in the constantly re-forged and re-crafted set of armor… It wasn't that Mana bet about making it to being hundred years old, still, it was just a case of curiosity.

The door screeched again as its hinges begged for attention. A pair of people entered the room – one of the two people who had entered was quite familiar to Mana, the other one was yet to be introduced. Her own sensei – Chestnut Hanasaku was being accompanied by another man. A tall and fit middle aged man with darker purplish hair that arced on the outside a bit past his neck. He wore a pretty fancy looking white coat over his ninja uniform and the armored vest on him had some small custom additions to it. Mostly it looked like jewelry but it could've been anything. A lot of sealing techniques could've been conveniently placed into jewelry if one felt like being overly cliché about their arsenal.

"We were told you are awake. I wanted to talk to you…" Hanasaku uttered sighing uncomfortably before pulling out a chair from under the hospital bed with her foot and sitting down. The woman looked quite tired, then again, maybe she was actually better than she was when she was temporarily taking the seat of Hokage. Her hair was always pretty messy so trying to tell her condition from them was relatively tough.

"Way to ignore me… I waited with you until the girl is awake, splitting from the rest of our group." the woman's companion smiled with his complaint.

"That's because you insisted on coming. I wanted to talk to my… Student and you just…" Hanasaku began voicing some complaints of her own before being interrupted by her friend.

"I was worried you'd be overly passionate with the Sixth's new pal." The man shrugged before bending his passive foot and wrapping around his stronger leg, clearly the man had stayed standing around for quite long and wanted to sit down. As his leg moved it allowed a sword hilt to slip out from under his coat. And another one. And a couple more…

"She's my student. I have all the reasons to be strict with her, I believe all of them are pretty sound!" Hanasaku raised her voice and stood up facing the man. Curiously enough he didn't flinch or blink when the short she-devil measured up to him, most men would've.

"What your sensei meant to say was – "this is Zairyo Jitensha – otherwise known as Zairyo of the Wavering Grass, a Konohagakure Sannin". Now that the pleasant introductions are out of the way, please – morals away!" the man rested himself down on an empty bed nearby and extended his feet over another chair below the bed he settled himself down on.

Mana had never heard of this man. The very fact was incredibly curious as there had to be reasons why a Sannin level ninja was completely unknown to her. Usually ninja of that caliber were sort of celebrities which, while defying the very essence and meaning of ninja, could barely be helped. One could only avoid the fame of their own fine work for so long…

"I need to be straight with you – I'm incredibly disappointed with you." Hanasaku strictly exclaimed. Mana looked away but then her eyes met with Zairyo who was in her direct line of fleeting eyes.

"Hey, don't look at me, this is between you two! I will get my own beating for one reason or the other later on…" the man shrugged indifferently as if this was a joking matter of some sort.

Mana looked down, she knew that something like this was coming. Truth be told she knew it all along, ever since the plan first came to her head, these consequences were accepted and taken for certain. Now they just needed to be faced.

Suddenly the atmosphere became heavier, an incredible shortness of breath took Mana over, the likes of which she had never before felt. The girl's bloodshot eyes wandered onto Hanasaku's clenched fist which shook in anger.

Out of nowhere Zairyo's back was in front of Mana and his hand gripping Hanasaku's shaking fist. The man stood coldly staring at the woman and calming her down with just his eyes. After Hanasaku's eyes looked down in submission he wandered back to his resting place.

"No need to come with me, you'll just get in the way, she said…" Zairyo shrugged making fun of the entire thing like it was no laughing matter. Truthfully to Mana it meant a great deal – one of her most beloved and appreciated icons of the ninja world expressing disappointment. It was just as painful, if not more so, than back when Tanshu-sensei belittled her and treated her as a future failure. "Are you trying to crush this kid's chest cavity or something, ease up on the killing intent…" he advised more seriously looking at the woman as if actually scolding her.

"You've left alone, without letting the village know or formulate a plan, to go after an enemy far beyond your reaches endangering the life of your friend. A person of great importance to me with whom I have a long reaching history." The Sannin angrily began moralizing Mana. The magician really wanted to look more affected, she wanted to cry or blush or do anything but look at the ground like an idiot but truthfully she had known this was coming all along. She had told all of that to herself already thousands of times and for that reason the actual scolding was infinitely softer compared to what the magician had told herself.

"Had it not been for the old man, the writer you were staying with, informing us of what you've done, we'd have never known about what was going on until it was too late. Even with his message we barely managed to smell the ashes of the fire. The Sixth actually thought you showed initiative, he's impressed with what we've been told of your actions. That's because of his history in the Black Ops – being a shadow accountable to no one is what he knows and appreciates." Hanasaku finally answered the question that lingered in Mana's heart, about how exactly did the village find out about what was going on. It'd have taken a pretty long time for small-time rumors about the wedding to reach the village, just like Hanasaku had concluded it'd have been far too late to do anything about it then.

"I didn't want anyone to die. If the village went after Inomame they'd have killed him before even trying to subdue him, they'd have killed the Imarizu too, every Kirigakure Demon trainee as well…" Mana replied, she knew that it wasn't going to fix anything, she knew it was just a pitiful excuse but her mentor was sort of owed at the very least such an elementary courtesy of knowing Mana's reasons.

"And how did it end up? We've found a bunch of bodies sprawled out on the beach, signs that two or three times more just scattered once they woke up. Inomame was picked up, granted – alive seeing how you've already captured him, three out of four Imarizu also died. The fourth is nowhere to be found." Hanasaku asked before summing up the fallout.

"The kid does have a point though, Yamanaka are too dangerous to be tried and taken alive – we'd have likely killed the bastard the first chance we got…" Zairyo shrugged before pulling out a donut from the drawer further from the bed he was occupying and digging in after wrapping the damned confectionary out overly loudly.

"I am this close to punching you!" Hanasaku yelled out showing the man her fist with an approximate measurement of the imaginary gesture size system of how close she was to punching the man with the other hand.

"I know I failed you and disappointed you and messed up in general." Mana admitted as surprisingly enough her eyes remained dry in one of her saddest moods in a while. Even the immeasurably heavy emotional boulder on her chest couldn't bring out a single tear, it would've easily had made her feel better, after all – crying was venting. Crying would've helped deal with the situation in a way.

"Frankly I did it because it's just who I am. I know this won't help but given the chance I'd keep doing it again and again, I'd feel bad about it, I'd regret letting you down every step of the way but it's just what I've sworn to do." Mana explained.

Hanasaku grinded her teeth before flipping out her hands in the air and walking away to the window. The woman looked through it and observed the people coming and going to and from the little Land of the Waves hospital trying to remain some semblance of composure.

"I really liked you at some point. I liked what I thought I saw in you. Figured that this respect for life and everyone else's beliefs would've made you a fine ninja, one that transcended everyone else. You were an exact opposite of what little bro Tanshu was so I figured I may introduce you to the pack someday, maybe it'd make you a Sage… That's an amount of hopes I've never felt for any other student." Hanasaku cried out as she placed her forehead to the cold glass in frustration. It was clear that she wasn't just angry at Mana, this wasn't like mothers were angry at their children for a couple of minutes before it all passing.

It was clear that where Hanasaku had massive hopes for Mana, the magician shattered all of them with one thought over action which only hurt that much more because of how much greater they were.

Zairyo jumped up and rushed to the woman grabbing her by the shoulder. "Wait, a Sage!? So you mean you know where one can actually become a Sage!?" he shouted out.

Hanasaku remained silent. Zairyo sighed and walked up to Mana before pointing to a sword resting besides her. The magician hadn't even noticed it being there but it was resting in a very unflattering position, almost like it had fell down from Mana's bed and wasn't moved since.

"Would you, by any chance, agree to making a deal about that blade? As a great collector of various artifacts and swords and a traveler I can see great value in this magnificent craftsmanship." The man's eyes literally ate the sword alive as he pulled it out halfway examining it and allowing his eyes to run down its edge admiring it like a pervert admired the gorgeous body lines.

"I can't. I need to bring this sword back to its owner." Mana firmly cut him down. It didn't appear like Zairyo was angry or overly disappointed. The man just smiled and sheathed the sword placing it in a more dignified and important position closer to Mana's cupboard.

"I see…" he sighed before he walked up to the door, "Well, now that you two warmed up to each other, I guess I'll leave you two to sort this out alone." He said almost like he'd have done it to himself. Soon the rather sophisticated and strong looking shinobi disappeared leaving Mana and Hanasaku by themselves as he said he would.

Hanasaku finally moved away from the window and was about to leave as well before she turned to Mana.

"I know you need rest. I could heal you a bit better than this, even if I sometimes mess others' bodies up. If I did, however, you'd not learn your lesson. I would kick you out from my team after such a massive loss of trust. I need to believe at all times that you are there to back me up as the team leader if needed and I simply no longer believe that. I think that you're a selfish brat who while takes everything into consideration in the ends only acts upon her own beliefs and interests. The only reason you're still on the team is because I want for Kiyomi to finally get past the Chuunin Exams, she deserved it years ago and there's simply no time to find a replacement or use in a fresh out of Academy genin to take your place. You're still on the team but I won't train you!" Hanasaku thundered out before slamming the door behind her.

Finally Mana broke down into tears… Despite wanting some expression of emotion to finally break out and stop all that guilt and sadness from bottling inside of her it somehow didn't feel a tiny bit better. It just felt like a woman she had admired for the longest time ever, and still is, had expressed her disappointment and dismissal. It felt like being a disappointment to herself because she was a disappointment to the people she wanted respect and warmth from.

Most of all, it felt like being alone all over again…


	259. Blood Soaked Tears From Our Fears

Mana's thighs still shook in pain and burning exhaustion as she made her way downstairs to the lower parts of the hospital. The weight of her backpack dug into the girl's shoulders and whereas, normally, the pain would've only kicked in a good hour or two in, now it began irritating the magician's skin almost instantly. Fixing the still bandaged swellings on her face and moving one band away from obstructing her eye Mana looked around trying to find her friends.

"The young Yamanaka lady left with the Konoha party already. It looked like the young lady wanted to wait for you to recover but the Sannin were insisting that she left with them. Chestnut Hanasaku insisted that the prisoner boy was returned to Eden as well, as soon as possible, so, I'm afraid, you were left alone to return home." The medical ninja explained to Mana, looking a bit proud he had successfully predicted the girl's predicament like some sort of genius of inductive reasoning.

It made sense, while a little disappointed with it, Mana didn't really feel angry about it. Kiyomi was the person around whom this whole story rotated, it made sense that Konoha would want the girl back immediately, that the Yamanaka clan would wish only the strongest ninja immediately secure the well-being of their future potential heiress. Still, Mana only departed from the village originally to see her friend and get to spend some time with her. While the two did mess around for a while in the Yamanaka resort it was all surrounded by the drama of bounty hunters being sent after Kiyomi which didn't let Mana lower her guard for a moment.

The magician just sighed looking around for any friendly face but then seeing none, even with the medical ninja scurrying away to check some emergency, she just shrugged and headed for the door. On her way there the magician checked her pockets feeling a couple of clanging coins, not nearly enough to hire a rower back to the continent.

"Hey, where the hell do you think you're going, all alone!?" Sugemi's angry voice made Mana turn back rapidly as she was shocked to hear a young man she heard having left her behind not too long ago.

"I thought you guys left?" the magician asked with a longing and still a bit banged up and raspy voice.

"Our clones did…" Yanagi smiled walking out from the canteen with a dumpling and a cup of soda being suspended in air by a briefly intelligible swarm of black insects. "I made a pair of insect clones to follow the mean lady and her friend and make it look like we left with them…" he spoke barely intelligibly as bunch of his food he was still munching flew out from his mouth as he spoke.

"You couldn't have fooled the Sannin with such a trick…" Mana looked away sadly wandering if her friends got into trouble.

"Obviously they weren't fooled, still, they didn't mind either. If they did find Yanagi out they didn't object so it's basically the same thing as them letting us stay…" Sugemi waved his hand at Mana's concerns before wondering what was next.

"We head back, I need to put this sword by Shimo's grave…" Mana declared with determination even if her voice was still weak and wavering. "What about you two? Are you going back to Konoha with me, Yanagi? If you showed your face around the Administration maybe you'd get noticed and considered for promotion."

Yanagi embarrassingly rubbed the back of his messy hair, "Nah, I've had my fair share of trouble. I thought that by becoming someone important despite not being the kind of person whom everyone usually considers important while reaching out for recognition I could be free. You know, the whole nobody becoming somebody thing, it felt like true freedom. Truth be told, I guess deciding what you want to do, ignoring the public expectations for you to succeed, even if you want to stay where you are for a while, is the true freedom. Being pressured and expected to achieve greatness is really the greatest prison of all. I realized that after some while of being pummeled by the Imarizu out there… If I ever want to reach out for a more intense life, I'll just ask to be transferred to a higher security prison complex whenever I feel like it." The Aburame declared.

"Maybe you'll come with me back to the village?" Mana turned at Sugemi, "It didn't look like they were adamant about keeping you in Eden. You could ask yourself to be signed out of there, I mean you're not even a real prisoner there. I know you want to see Shimo's grave at the very least…"

"No. I'm going back to Eden. Maybe I'll participate in the Chuunin Exams, though…" Sugemi laid back and looked away. It was obvious that he didn't feel comfortable discussing the way he felt around Mana. "If the audience gets too much of the main character they'll get bored. I need to let the supporting cast get some development. Plus it's about time for my mysterious off-panel training arc anyways…"

Even if her whole face hurt and felt like a buzzing beehive Mana couldn't help but smile if only faintly.

"You know, I really feel like you should just write that manga yourself, instead of waiting around to have it written later on. It could be a work in progress even if you don't know the full story yet…" Mana suggested as the two turned for the exit while Yanagi stuffed the food he had bought in the canteen into the bag.

"Nah, I hate filler. I'd rather know the full story before adapting it instead of having to fillerize the damned thing. Do you want my story to get cancelled like "Samurai Tights"?" Sugemi angrily snapped back at Mana before both friends shared a laugh.

At least having some company on her trip back to Konoha made the journey more exciting. It also allowed the three to band their funds together and hire an actual rower to get them from one shore to the continent. There was absolutely no way for Mana to fly over the small streak of ocean separating the Land of Waves from the mainland. Not in her current shape. In her ninja pouch she still had some pills given to her by the medical ninja in the hospital to take on her trip home. That way what would've taken almost a full year to heal completely would only take a week at most.

After the team finally reached the continent and approached Eden Yanagi and Sugemi split from the group. The group said their farewells with Sugemi promising to Mana to see her during the Chuunin Exams by asking to be released around then. The magician wasn't totally sure as to why Sugemi would insist on staying in Eden instead of returning to the village. There was no official decree or punishment imposed on him, at this point he was just punishing himself. The girl couldn't help but smile realizing that she herself was not unlike her teammate. After all, she could've planned a trip to the Konoha Hospital first thing back – have her wounds completely healed and even her scars removed completely. Maybe she'd do so eventually but somehow suffering through her injuries did feel more right to Mana.

Maybe it was just her way of punishing herself. It didn't sound right – doing the thing she absolutely had to do while knowing that she'd be punished for it. It was like being created to be sick but commanded to be well, a great injustice logically. Still, in a way it still only felt right. As much as the magician searched for a reasonable explanation for her behavior of punishing herself for something she considered the right thing to do, she couldn't. Maybe it was because emotions and inner worlds couldn't have been rational by their very nature. It wasn't like Mana, of all people, was suitable of a reasonable analysis of her character.

The trip home was rather uneventful. Granted, wishing for it to be something exciting to happen may have been treacherous. In her current injured and recovering state Mana was completely unable to defend herself from any threats that lurked outside the village walls. The very thought of molding chakra or trying to augment her body in any way made the girl's head dizzy and her stomach nauseous. She still had a feint fever whenever she ate, her liver must still not have been completely healed as abdominal pains were quite often.

After a long trek home, finally, the familiar white wall surrounding a large and epic looking village of towering buildings with colorful rooftops and wires leading uphill to a hulking Administration building and the Hokage mountain met the magician's sight. When she left even in her wildest dreams Mana couldn't have imagined just how long she'd spent away from home. The very thought of returning home sounded completely crazy. Her own home and her own parents somehow began seeming like distant people to her. Father and mother…

Mana didn't tell them a word about this whole debacle. Sure, they were quite likely to be informed of things after news of Kiyomi's wedding finally reached the village but they still must've been excruciated by all the waiting and having no knowledge of Mana's well-being. After all, the magician was not on a mission, she just left to meet an old friend and then got involved into this whole crazy story. This whole time she completely forgot that she had a family that was worried about her.

Just another pair of people Mana had failed… Right after she was about to sink into a depressing mess of thoughts the magician smiled unexpectedly. This was supposed to be a good outcome on any other account: her friend was alive and well, unmarried to an ambitious sociopath and also the entire world's political balance was secured. Yet she felt so bitter about this victory. Granted, the political balance would've been secured either way, with Mana's involvement however it was secured without shedding nearly as much blood… Despite a bloody battlefield whirling wild for half a day, it was still the less bloody outcome compared to total annihilation of the Kirigakure party…

Slowly Mana took her baby steps into the village. Looking around and wandering if she'd be stopped, arrested or encouraged to report to the Hokage immediately but nothing of the sort happened. She just waltzed back into her home village without fanfare or outrage. The guards did give her a couple of curious looks but remained seated, whispering something to each other's ears. Having in mind that Mana still wore half of her bandages and the right side of her face was still bandaged, they were justified to suspect something shady or to discuss her state.

Apparently the magician was so tired and worn out by the five day trip home that she remained unrecognized by the public. Usually she was famous enough in the village to warrant a two or three times longer trip home with everyone wishing to ask her questions about the next show or just say hello to her. This time she was either not recognized with her right side of the face being bandaged and the left one being still a bit swollen up, yet remarkably less so compared to before, or the people simply didn't want to have any of Mana's current day rubbing off on their own lives. They were simply kind enough to let her be in this state and recover.

After the magician reached her home she pressed her forehead against the door and breathed in and out erratically. Her hand stayed on the handle but she couldn't will herself to open the door. For a moment her will lingered, she pressed the handle but not to the end, letting it go gently as to not to alert anyone inside. Her head then turned to what laid behind her – all the shining and tidy alleyways and streets of Konoha back there. Maybe it was better off for her to never show her face back home? Does she still have a place back there after just disappearing on a whim like those two most precious people, her literal family had not given her birth?

Mana sat down on the porch pressing her back against the wall and sighing. She could probably make a pretty decent living by herself. Performing on the streets for a while for the elementary living, performing on the stage and saving up enough to get a place to call her own. It was a despicable feeling – knowing how much you failed everyone in your life and yet not feeling regretful about the specific thing you've pulled. The girl felt firmly – she'd do the same thing hundreds of times over, maybe she'd do one thing or the other differently but… Despite the massive letdowns all around she did what she had to…

The magician stood up and walked away from her home door. Tears began gathering in her eyes the further away she walked but she figured that before she decided what sort of page this new page of her life would be – it'd be fitting enough to close down the old one. Mana couldn't really remember making the entirety of her way to the cemetery just outside the training grounds, must've been the fever acting up again. There were a few people there kneeling by the graves of people they knew with flowers. The magician took a while to find her friend's grave, still, a familiar face standing by it made her instantly locate it…

Shimo's mother was calmly sitting by his grave and just blankly staring at the gravestone. Mana's hand pressed against her own chest as if stopping her halfway, her other hand pressed against the sheathed Audra sword she swore herself to return. The magician grinded her teeth in pain as tears soaked her bandages. Everywhere she went was full of people she was embarrassed to show herself to. People she felt like she failed in one way or the other even if the feeling wasn't mutual.

The girl turned around before tearing the bandage off her right side. As sunlight pierced through her closed and still hurting eye the tearing got out of control but Mana didn't care, she calmly brushed her hair to cover up the right side of her face and hide her eye from the direct sunlight. Hide one half of her tears…

"Mana?" Shimo's mother's voice reached the magician, the girl began slowly walking away before trying to pick up her step but then with half of her face being covered up in hair she didn't notice a young man she bumped into. The youth apologized himself and helped the magician to get up, his left eye was covered up with an eyepatch and both of his hands were hidden inside his kimono with the one hand he helped Mana with slipping out. The dark shade of his hair looked familiar to the magician.

"You came here to see him? You don't need to run…" Shimo's mother pleaded the magician from behind.

"You were a friend of my brother's, weren't you? You've got a right to see him…" the young man who helped Mana up said. His voice was pretty low pitched and strong but from its husky nature the magician could tell he wasn't a talker.

"My husband told me that you are still blaming yourself…" Shimo's mother uttered before stopping her thoughts. Mana knew what she was about to say and why she stopped. The woman tried to claim that there was no blame of Mana's and no hard feelings but the magician believed that the woman didn't want to lie. She may not have wanted it but the mother still felt uneasy. Mother's feelings were also rarely rationally explained. To her Mana will always be the face of her son's death even if there was no direct correlation.

"I just wanted to place this by his grave… It was his…" Mana said giving the sword to the mother of her friend. The woman shook her head erratically with her face sinking in tears.

"This isn't what represents him. This isn't what people will remember about him, there's no place for this blade by his grave…" the woman uttered in tears.

Once again Shimo's brother's arm extended from under his kimono and touched Mana's shoulder.

"I am aware that there must've been some trouble obtaining this. Still, this sword represents the confusion of who my brother was, not his final moments of clarity. A sword is a tool of a wandering warrior looking for a purpose. No one who knows who they are allows them to be represented by a sword they used to carve their identity. It is a part of that journey, part of what needs to be discarded along with the past…" the young adult calmly explained being much more skilled at portraying that there were no hard feelings between the girl and the family of her deceased friend.

"Then can you at least keep it? It did belong to your brother, didn't it?" Mana pleaded.

The young man laughed softly before pulling out a stump on his other arm and placing it to his eyepatch, softly touching the cloth.

"I'm afraid I'd do the sword injustice. My father is more of a man of a pen than a sword as well. Despite of how it looks, despite of what you are telling yourself, this sword is no longer that of Shimo, he left it behind…" he explained.

Mana's head sunk down and her hands began to tremble. "I need to… I need something to…" she smacked her trembling free hand to the left side of her face before she broke into tears. "I need to make it right… Somehow…" she cried out.

Shimo's brother calmly touched her shoulder before wrapping his one arm around his weeping mother and turning away.

"Then fight with it. Fight with it for what my brother stood for. If you won't let yourself move past his death, don't let the world do it either. I'm quite sure my brother would've loved to help you make the world you dreamed of, he spoke about it some way back. Shape this new world of yours using his sword, how long do you think an Audra sword would remain intact stabbed into the dirt of a grave before some lowlife uses it to tarnish the memory of its wielder?"

Mana froze in place still trembling with the sword in her hand. Shimo's mother walked out from her son's embrace and walked up to the girl calmly pressing the magician's grip around the sheath and then softly pressing the hand holding the sword to the girl's chest. It was the woman's way of entrusting this part of her son's memory and passing the sword along.

As the family of her passed away friend walked away Mana collapsed on a bench nearby looking at the sheathed sword in her hand with tear soaked eyes.


	260. Tarry a While, You are So Fair!

The door to Mana's home opened crispy clean, no squeaking or hitches. Silent like the year's longest night. So disturbingly without a sound that the magician closed it a bit rough just to alert her family that she was back. This was odd – father's hands were far too damaged for precision work like maintaining the door, mother had too old fashioned of a mindset to do maintenance – man's work. Rubbish. Silly thoughts to distract her from the confrontation to come, yet another pair of beloved people she let down.

"Oh, God…" mother gently exclaimed before running up and hugging Mana firmly.

The girl squirmed and moaned uneasily as her aching sides flared up devouring her entire emotional specter, demanding the entirety of the magician's attention.

"I'm sure this begging for her life is expression of love and how much she missed us, not how much this hurts…" father sarcastically remarked before softly pulling mother away.

Mana stood there with her head lowered and submissively turned away, waiting for their choice of words to yell at her. Knowing what came next after the primary expression of love and happiness that she was relatively more alright than one would've normally been after what the girl has been through.

She just stood there waiting only for absolutely nothing to follow. Mother returned to the kitchen and father sat down by some unseen device that was settled down inside an oaken cupboard. The device father was fixed on appeared to show moving images, just like all the screens on the buildings in the different universe the magician had visited. It was like her household, which meant any normal household, had access to a miniature cinema screen. This wouldn't make old man Hiro happy at the slightest.

"Will you be having pancakes, dear?" mother's raised voice came from the kitchen. She still wore a bit too fancy and formal of attires meaning she must've only recently returned from work and still had no time to change and settle down.

"Pancakes for din… I mean… Wait, I just disappeared without a single word from me. I know I let you guys down, okay? I'm sorry…" Mana got distracted by mother's question seeing how she completely ignored the issue at hand.

"Yeah… Okay. I know, no one eats pancakes for dinner but the thing is that one morning I was too busy to finish making them so we had them for dinner and it sort of stuck. We now have pancakes for dinner once in a while…" mother smiled at Mana once again brushing the girl's issues again. "Those bruises on your face don't look too good, you may want to have those scars removed in the hospital tomorrow…" the woman smiled before returning to her kitchen work.

"Aren't you going to punish me? Yell at me or tell me how worried you were!?" Mana felt her tone rising to uncomfortable heights straining her tired vocal cords.

"Well, it's made quite clear you already know that…" father's voice came from the guestroom.

"Plus, we can't really ground you or anything – you have training and missions and the village is really missing those few skipped magic shows…" mother forked a cake from the pan and slammed it into a plate piled with them.

"That's… What I was supposed to say…" Mana mumbled to herself seeing how she seemed to recall a similar conversation happening at some point before. At this point the magician was well beyond tearing up even though the world she was supposed to know the best – one of her own home defied any conventional laws of logic and understanding. Why weren't her parents mad at her? Why didn't they try to tear their hair out in anger trying to punish her?

"We're just happy you're okay and that you're back. What's that you have?" mother wondered pointing her chin at the sword packed and sticking outside Mana's backpack.

The magician's fingers wrapped around her head. She could feel her trembling hands press too hard against her skin leaving small annoying scratches. Nothing made sense anymore, the sword she worked so hard to return by her friend's grave was rejected leaving Mana's grief just hanging in the air, now her parents refused to punish her leaving her craving for punishment for something that Mana barely even regretted hanging as well. All of those feelings, everything was bottling inside of her.

"You okay, dear?" mother hugged Mana again pressing the girl tightly while still dividing her attention by half to mind the pan.

"Shimo's mother rejected the sword. This was my anchor… This one thing I could've done to make it all feel better, the grief… You didn't yell at me or punish me for failing you either… Now nothing feels easier, everything hurts so bad." Mana quietly murmured under her own nose just faintly audibly to mother.

The woman let go of Mana and returned to the pan gesturing for the magician to sit down.

"Grief isn't supposed to work like that. You don't just do something and make it feel better. Accepting death and how it works is part of growing up, that inevitable realization that people who were always around you, part of your world just won't be anymore. It's scary, it hurts but it's how it is. Even if that boy's parents accepted the sword it wouldn't have magically made it all better, nothing ever will…" the woman explained after, much to her relief, she found out that she was done with the pancakes seeing how not a single spoonful of mix could've been scraped out from a large bowl on the side.

Mana just sat there quietly, she was too tired to try and object anything her mother did or say. Not that she had anything to object, the woman had lost her entire clan of wandering ninja before. Even more, all of them were wiped out in her youth, arguably the most vulnerable age…. She had to adapt to a whole new society, whole new set of rules but instead of breaking in to the pressure she opened up her own café and did the shit out of her job… Honestly, her mother was a hero to Mana in a lot of ways, an inspiration.

"As for your punishment…" father joined in on the conversation after switching off the television set and sitting by the kitchen table. "We figured that you'd have told yourself plenty. We know you, Mana, we know that you sometimes want punishment for things you do that aren't necessarily bad or deserving punishment. Not honoring that self-destructive impulse is the best punishment, but also the best decision a parent can make."

"But I just left you guys in the dark, ran off to fight a bunch of bounty hunters and killers…" Mana's tired tongue jumbled out.

"Yeah, that wasn't handled completely right, but you're still a child. You had to handle the knowledge that your friend's life was in danger and all those other responsibilities you put on yourself while still grieving. Punishment is no longer productive, dear, you're growing up, learning to accept mortality as an inevitable part of life and juggling responsibilities. Adults don't get condescending talks from their parents, you're not quite there but for the longest time you had to struggle with all the worst of the adult world with none of its perks. It's about time you've experienced having to own up to your own worst punishment, facing your own responsibilities without someone explaining what you did wrong." Mother sighed after the talk.

Without saying a word Mana just reached out with a fork and began stuffing her face remembering how hungry and tired she was.

"Also, please take a shower before you go to bed…" father smiled trying to lighten up the mood as he pressed his nose.

After the mandatory evening rituals of dinner, unpacking and settling down in her room and shower something unusual caught Mana's eye. Something she had not noticed when she was unpacking, likely due to how unused to seeing her own room again she was. The magician opened up a small letter that was unopened and placed just by her bed.

The magician's eyes quickly scanned through it and then she just weightlessly slammed down on her bed consumed by sadness. It was a letter from Hanasaku, one undoubtedly sent to the rest of the team in its entirety, completely the same. Had the woman written to Mana personally she'd have used a whole other set of words entirely. This one was warm and asking for a training meeting a couple of days later. The meeting was rushed because apparently the woman looked forward to "working with the three of them in the future", granted recalling the words the Fifth had for Mana before such was doubtfully the case. It was quite clear that Mana was only to be present there because the team needed three members capable of working together to pass the Chuunin Exams.

Thinking about mother's words from earlier the magician sighed. Her muscles and her entire body eased up, the pain from all around felt like getting skewered by the calming needles of resting in a familiar room where everything felt so old and nostalgic. The feeling of the soft and warm bed made the muscle pains not only weaker but also overwhelmed by all the warm feelings of nostalgia. Mana was finally home again!

The very next day Mana headed to the hospital to have her body looked at. She didn't really want to heal her injuries but she'd need to be at her hundred percent during the team meeting. Even if she wasn't a part of the team completely, in the eyes of the team's leader, Mana still needed to be at her best possible shape to fulfill the purpose assigned to her. All that Hanasaku cared about was getting Kiyomi through the Chuunin Exams and Mana was the woman's tool, a necessary yet disliked mean of achieving that goal. Even if Mana disliked that status quo she needed to obey it and fulfil that purpose if she was to not fail one of her authority figures again.

Oddly enough the magician didn't meet Eiju in the hospital. Maybe she'd have liked to, seeing the young man's reaction to the fact that Kiyomi just by the skin of her teeth didn't get forcefully married and she was fine with that fact would've been priceless. After the magician had her body looked at, some of the persisting wounds and pains looked at and quickly removed by a more skilled medical ninja and some of her troubling scars removed she settled down on a bench outside the hospital. There were just too many things she still needed to do. Mother was right, adults had it really bad, the juggling responsibilities part was especially difficult.

Only then did the magician remember that she also was completely dismissing her responsibility as a girlfriend. Before she left her and Kouta had a couple of awkward dates that didn't really work out and the boy may have taken Mana's disappearance from his life the wrong way. It was hardly her fault but becoming an adult meant taking up responsibility for things that may not have been one's own fault. Right when her next course was set for the girl, she realized that she wasn't really sure as to where Kouta lived. She had only met the boy before in pre-determined locations. This only served as a testament of how awkwardly bad their dates were – they didn't know essential details about each other.

Still, it made things a lot easier. If Mana was to meet her boyfriend she just needed to lure him out, much like she would a criminal she was hunting. It just so happened that doing another magic show was within her agenda, that way she could've made her return public, also she'd give Kouta a chance to see her again. She was well known enough around the village at this point for her return to be quite important news. With a little luck the young medical ninja would still be working for Hiro's medical crew…

With more purpose than before Mana quickly headed in the direction of Hiro's hall.

After the show the next day, the stage magician rushed off to the medical crew. After the initial looking around she noticed that Kouta was not there.

"Sorceress! A magnificent show today, having in mind how little preparation you had it was truly splendid!" one of the medical crew commended Mana. With a little embarrassment to being commended after such a long history of being grinded to dirt by people important to her Mana felt a bit uneasy being praised…

"Thank you, I had some reserve tricks from the past so it wasn't that difficult, is Kouta here? There was this young kid interning here, short, just a bit taller than me, dark and messy hair, really athletic build…" the magician inquired but the medical crew only curiously looked at each other before one of them appeared to remember something.

"Oh, yeah, I remember Kouta… No, he's done with his internship here. I think he got what he needed here and was accepted in Konoha's Hospital as an intern. Still has some time of internship left to do before being accepted as a medical ninja but that mission he had abroad really impressed the folks in the hospital." One of the crew informed the magician. Thanking the crew with a friendly bow Mana rushed off.

Knowing that she couldn't meet Kouta in the hall sort of irked the magician a bit. Still, at least now she knew where he continued his internship which made it possible to find him.

"M-Mana…" Kouta's voice dropkicked Mana out of her chain of thoughts. The magician turned around realizing that her boyfriend was waiting for her after the show right there in the hall. With a warm and happy embrace the two greeted each other.

"I was almost certain you didn't want to see me." The medical ninja awkwardly rubbed the tip of his toes at the floor. "Can't say I blame you, I was sort of a loser in our dates…"

"That's a bit harsh. It was both of our fault, I also acted a bit odd. It's just really tough to… Know what you have to do in those date… Things. I couldn't see you in the audience today, I used to be able to recognize faces but now there's just too many people coming. Sometimes they slip by me…" Mana awkwardly admitted feeling just as guilty for her lack of common dating success.

"I heard you were involved in something, something with the Yamanaka clan? I'm just glad you're okay, when I heard you were injured I wanted to be there with you…" Kouta admitted shyly taking Mana's hand and leading her outside. The magician hid her blushed cheeks under her coat collar, she was surprised by how different the boy acted. Before during their meetings he was really afraid to show his feelings, it almost looked like he was cold towards her but such wouldn't have made sense so the magician didn't buy those impressions.

"Yeah it was… Complicated. I am grateful you taught me how to fight though, wouldn't have lived through that if you didn't." Mana smiled finally feeling comfortable enough to pull her shy head out from under her collar.

"Well, can't take all the credit, Meiko and those fighters in the arena did plenty as well. Were you in the hospital today? Had those wounds looked at?" he asked.

"Yeah, it's in the past. I didn't want them removed but I needed them gone. I have a team meeting tomorrow noon." Mana shrugged.

"Oh, you're placed in a team? So you'll be in the Chuunin Exams?" Kouta's eyebrow raised suspiciously.

"Yeah, that's the only reason I'm in the team…" Mana uncomfortably admitted as the subject of her making her second out of two mentors mad was a rather painful subject.

"Hey, come on! You're smart and crafty and slippery like a little… Pink Dolphin…" Kouta pressed his forehead against Mana's.

"Little pink dolphin?" the magician couldn't help but cringe a little, "You're the worst at affectionate words. How am I even remotely like a little pink dolphin?"

"Well you're short and cute, that makes you little and pink because, apparently, pink is the official color of cuteness. That's what the bubble gum commercials say in the TV. Dolphins are slippery, they're sea creatures that swim fast – natural slippery-ness confirmed!" Kouta explained, the magician couldn't pull her eyes off of him. She saw that he knew how goofy and nonsensical he looked but he just didn't care. It was almost like he sensed that these past couple of days were really the worst to Mana and he wanted to make her feel better even if it was at his own expense.

"Oh, man, I really wish I had one of those… Recording boxes… I'd really love to show you explaining yourself to your father…" Mana chuckled like a little girl. She wasn't even sure which direction they were heading anymore, it didn't matter. As long as this evening lasted longer, if only it could've lasted forever.

"They're called "cameras", hipster-Mana…" Kouta laughed out loud himself, "Weren't you the one who brought back those samples of technology from wherever you were gone to?"

"Hipster-Mana?" the magician squinted.

"To be honest, I'm not really sure what that word means myself, it was in that one sample of what movies are that you've brought back." Kouta shrugged, "I think I used it in a similar context so cut me some slack for not knowing what your fancy future words mean…"

Mana stopped and turned at the young medical ninja, pressing her forehead gently under his chin. She just didn't want to go anywhere anymore, all she wanted was to stay there and just… Talk. Just let this charming moment extend into infinity. If there was just only thing she could have asked for, that'd have been it.

"Didn't we have movies before I brought one back?" Mana wondered.

"I think we did, but we called ours something weird. Can't blame us, didn't know what movies were all the way back in… A couple of months ago…" the medical ninja pressed Mana's head against himself gently before the two sat down on a cold yet luckily dry bench nearby.

"Another universe…" Mana mumbled with her eyes closed. Smiling wide like a happy macaque.

"Wha…?" Kouta wondered.

"It's not the future I was in, it was another universe. I'm pretty sure it's the same time, it's just that they had a hero there who had ended all wars… Technology there advanced because people worked together instead of trying to kill each other." Mana recalled that curious trip.

"Sounds like the world you want to create…" Kouta smiled looking up into the clear sky. "Why did you come back?" he wondered.

"I…" Mana suddenly stopped talking. She never really asked herself that question. Still, during her entire stay there she never thought about anything else but returning home. "It wasn't my place. Those people won peace with their own hands. I think they had people living on the Moon there…" Mana laughed out.

"Do you think someone lives on the Moon here?" Kouta wondered, Mana tried to meet his gaze by sitting up straight but she noticed that her boyfriend was looking up in the Moon.

"I hope so…" the magician smiled looking up into the reflective white disc of moon dust stuck in the sky.

"Man, I wonder if there're aliens…" Kouta's eyes began wondering across the sky wildly. The confirmation that somewhere at some point people lived in the Moon seemed to make his imagination run wild.

"No. Aliens feel hokey and spooky…" Mana's mood soured somewhat, for whatever reason she wanted to one day meet people from the Moon but the thought of aliens creeped her out. The thought of there being other worlds with people as scared and lost as Mana was when she herself was an alien in Naruto's universe was intimidating. Maybe it was just that the only aliens she had met were omnipotent godlike beings that tried to destroy Naruto's universe?

"Okay, jeez, little Ms. Diva, no aliens allowed in your world…" Kouta laughed out wrapping his hand against Mana and pressing her in closer while the two continued to just look at the sky.

If only they could've sat like that and looked at the sky forever…


	261. Hands Better Than Mine

Mana annoyingly rubbed her temples to attempt and alleviate her massive headache. This was possibly the absolute worst day to have a headache on. When it hit her it appeared like a bear trap had shut closed on her upper skull driving sharp spikes that bashed through the bone and dug into the very core of her brain, from there it transformed into a more worm-like shape as it burrowed around like a malicious pest with an outright evil intent to cause the carrier more pain and suffering.

"Something's wrong?" Kiyomi curiously inquired. The two girls have been waiting in the Training Grounds No 32. A very peculiar place that appeared like a typical decorative oriental garden and was artificially kept in a constant season of autumn by the Senju clan members working in the maintenance. While the Senju clan was a highly spoken of and rather elite club of amazingly vital and just as strong physically ninja with the added ability to manipulate trees on top of that, not all members were as elite and exceptional as the mostly spoken of golden apples.

"It's nothing, to be expected, honestly…" Mana forced herself to smile for her friend as she looked through the thick cover of falling leaves right into the noon sky. While waiting around for her sensei on the first day of training was not encouraging at the slightest, Mana still preferred it to the awkwardness of standing in front of Hanasaku herself this whole time. The woman had acquired a dislike for Mana whereas before she carried great expectations and a playful curiosity of just how far the magician would go. Standing in front of such a person for hours couldn't have been pleasant…

"To be expected? If you have migraine, that's a serious ailment. They don't authorize migraine patients for the field, it disrupts the chakra molding process, you know… You can't augment your abilities with migraine which will get you killed!" Kiyomi expressed her concerns in a motherly fashion.

"It's nothing like that, I do not have migraine. It's just that I've been practicing my illusions whole night yesterday, ever since I came back home. It's part sleepless night, part exhausted from being pinched and targeted brain centers acting up…" Mana explained as she rubbed her forehead once again in a desperate wish to ease up the acting up pain that just came and gone acting as it pleased.

"I see…" Kiyomi finally looked like she accept Mana's explanation, granted, the magician had no idea as to why she even had to explain herself or why her teammate didn't just accept the first version of explanation insisting on having the magician elaborate on what she's been doing last night. "You've been practicing your illusions on yourself? Hitting your own brain? That's dangerous…" she concluded. Her tone was odd. It was like she wanted to express concern but was worried to sound overly protective making her sound rather insecure.

"Have you been seeing Eiju again? You focus way too much in the medical aspect of things…" Mana sighed as the pain in her very brain finally eased up, it felt almost pleasant in a way, like a longtime cramp finally letting go and the body regaining a full use of an integral body part and flooding the system with happiness hormones in the process.

"If I was I'd never talk about the medical aspect of things. He's too careless in his job to warrant it being an actual topic he speaks about…" Kiyomi smiled. Her lack of a defensive reaction actually told Mana more than her actual reply. If Mana was asked the same question she'd have likely have gotten overly defensive, even aggressively so, even if she consciously tried not to do it. Comfort in such a question implied that there was no way back for the two of them at this point.

The orange, yellow and red leaves began wildly rotating in a circular pattern in a highly orderly manner as their team leader – the Konoha Sannin known as Chestnut Hanasaku landed on a small decorative bridge arcing over a little creek. The woman's landing was so swift yet so delicate that she raised not a single one of the layers on top of layers of leaves beneath her feet. Hanasaku wore a light and short flowery dress with the typical of higher ranking ninja protective vest on top of it. Her hair was actually tidy, verily unlike her usual self. The time spent as the Fifth must've made the woman more serious towards her view of the world.

"Sensei!" Mana bowed her head and her upper body respectfully suggesting respect and some degree of subordination. Kiyomi just continued to gawk at the woman's tidier look, her long spanning personal history with Hanasaku did not allow her to bow even a little. There was too many silly stories of the woman's incompetence in the Yamanaka's memory to force herself the basic courtesy of a respectful bow.

"Only the two of you?" Hanasaku wondered after winking at Kiyomi and completely ignoring Mana. "I was fairly certain that I let the third one know of my intention to accept her on the team…" the brown haired woman scratched the top of her head trying to recall any strange statements she could've made at Meiko's expense that could've scared the young lady off of training with the Team Hokage.

"Can't say I blame the third one, it's the first time you come in time to anywhere. Have you finally learned how to read the clock, sensei?" Kiyomi playfully bit at the mentor's expense, something that did appear slightly out of ordinary for Mana but having in mind the lengthy personal history and reliance on each other's best efforts to survive not at all surprising. The two have worked with each other, attended events together, saw members of their team come and go… Experiences like that make people forget courtesies and formalities.

"Sorry!" a loud shout alerted the team to an approaching bulldozer breaking tree branches and outright breaking some of them and tossing them over, breaking them in half in the process. Meiko with a greasy toast still in her mouth and most of her armor still embraced under her armpits charged at the battlefield with all of her attempts to not be any more late than she already was.

"Heh, she's kinda cute…" Kiyomi grinned in a very simian-like manner making Mana raise an eyebrow. While not quite masculine, the blacksmith had a certain build and overly heavy manner of dressing that would've separated her from how most kunoichi looked and dressed themselves. Mastery of chakra demanded perfect control of one's body, fine ability to manipulate and control the chakra network allowed the ninja to possess a fit if not a little slim build for most fine controllers of the both bodily and spiritual aspects of chakra. Maybe that was why Meiko looked a bit more bulky than your usual kunoichi, even one focusing on physical strength – her control was lacking, if anything. Either way, it was a very odd comment of her friend to make.

"Hope I'm not too late! Been a bit busy reconstructing the armor of Jiom Taeyang from the Black Sun Reckoning…" Meiko laughed out rubbing the back of her head in an apologetic manner with a little blush in her cheeks.

Kiyomi looked at Mana questioningly to which the magician could only shrug with a smile, "She's a geek about armors and weapons. Makes sense she'd spend whole night making an armor of a movie character…" the kunoichi replied to the unvoiced question which was apparent on Kiyomi's face.

"Well… If it's fine with you three we can start then?" Hanasaku inquired to which Mana uncomfortably interrupted. She didn't burn with desire to stand out in the eyes of the mentor who already sort of didn't feel too hot about her but there was one matter she still had to solve. The magician took off her hat and quickly weaved a hand seal opening up a seal inside her hat, pushing her arm deep into it until it was a good halfway there. As the arm backed out from the storage seal inside her hat the Audra blade sheathe was in her hand.

Meiko shrieked in joy, clapping like a little child. An expression of childish glee that Kiyomi found quite interesting and even hilarious. One couldn't have been sure what exactly entertained the armored kunoichi: the casual magic trick or the very rare and expensive sword in the magician's hand. It was more than likely it was the total package of the two…

"I recovered Shimo's sword recently, I went through a lot to get it but then as I stood in front of Shimo's grave I realized that just bringing it back won't do any good. Seeing how the blade was no longer owed to the man Shimo stole it from, I figured I'd give it to someone who knew how to use it and had a fancy for swords… Would you please take it?" Mana presented the sword bowing her head in an almost pleading request that her friend took it.

Meiko kept on standing there with giant stars burning out in her eyes. The blacksmith's mouth was so gapped and she looked so dumbstruck that anyone watching her would've erupted into a fit of laughter had the scene transpiring not been so touching. After the genuine admiration of the craftsmanship and value of the rare artifact in Mana's hands the blacksmith realized just what the magician was asking her to do.

"Mana… I…" Meiko uttered a couple of words in a total loss of air as the absolute awe of the amazing sword in front of her being given to her was just too demanding of it. "It's… So beautiful, absolutely unlike anything else!" the blacksmith began dancing around the magician's arms checking the sword out from every angle but wary of touching it as if it wasn't just offered to her and was just an exhibit in a museum. "But I… I just can't…" Meiko almost cried those words out. It looked like Mana's request made the big girl really squeamish and she was about to explode in a fit of tears and cries.

"I can't use it, my swordsmanship would kill any man or woman it faces but only out of laughter. Shimo's death still hangs over my head and I just couldn't use it and a sword such as this must absolutely be used…" Mana pleaded even more as she got on her knees. "Please take it!" she insisted.

Suddenly the ground beneath her feet disappeared, shocked by the development the magician screamed out in fear but then she realized that she was just being lifted up and smothered by her friend.

"This is single handedly the most amazing thing anyone's ever done for me! Still, I can't do what you ask of me, let's just say you lent the sword to me. I promise to give it back to you once your hands are more fitting for it than mine!" Meiko cried out completely taken aback by Mana's plead and what exactly was asked of her.

Realizing that such a day would never come as Meiko had years of swordsmanship experience on Mana and also trained exceptionally into use of weaponry the magician nodded in agreement. This was no consensus, this was Meiko giving in to Mana's conditions without realizing how little of their meaning she's changed by this common agreement of hers…

"Well then, are we done with this?" Hanasaku couldn't help but look touched by Mana's notion as even she raised the front of her eyebrows while lowering the ends and smiling softly looking at Meiko freaking out over the newest addition to her arsenal. "I would really like to start our first training session because I don't think you'll be done by evening…" the woman mysteriously grinned.

"Nah… Its fine, lady… I'm fine…" Meiko whined out while still rubbing her giant teardrops at her sleeve and blowing out her nose into the bandage from her ninja pouch. The Audra sword in her grasp looked tightly held, so tightly in fact that not even the devil itself could've pulled it out from there…

"So if I want you to smother me, purely theoretically… All I need to do is give you a present? Good to know…" Kiyomi joked with a devilish look on her face, the strange behavior of her friend didn't quite click with Mana. Maybe it was just the Yamanaka's way of making new friends, then again, the magician couldn't remember such behavior from the blonde when the two of them first met.

"Alright! So the Chuunin Exams are literally a couple of weeks away! We have no time to mess around, whatever training we need to do we need to be done quickly and efficiently. That is why I acquired a permission from the Hokage to take you guys on a little trip where I'll get to test all of your abilities and we can focus on training together." The woman explained with fiery enthusiasm behind her voice. Kiyomi and Meiko looked excited but Mana felt a bit uneasy having in mind what the Sannin had told her in the hospital. She had a feeling that she knew where the speech would turn next.

"However I don't feel like I can teach Mana anything. Her skillset is entirely a mystery to me. I don't understand genjutsu and as far as I know she refuses to learn any techniques that haven't been invented by her, for that reason I'm afraid I'll have to leave you behind." Hanasaku cut into the friendly cheers and expressions of joy of her team. With a long face Mana just uncomfortably looked away and rubbed her feet at the rustling layers of autumnal leaves.

"That's so much bullshit!" Kiyomi shouted out, "My skillset is also genjutsu as well as ninjutsu and yet you still trained me! Mana is a part of our team, how can she miss out on a whole training trip!? Do you want us to stay a genin forever?"

Hanasaku sighed, she must've anticipated such a heated response. "True, your skillset in theory does match that of Mana's, however you use genjutsu as a supplementary skill. Your main focus is your ninjutsu. For Mana that is the other way around. There is nothing I can teach her in genjutsu, she could teach me a thing or twenty, to be entirely honest. She did completely school me in our first training session."

Meiko sighed before interrupting, it was clear that if it was anyone else the speech was rotating around she'd have stayed quiet but her own friendly feelings towards the magician made her speak up. "As someone who has trained Mana, I must say that even if you train her in a subject she doesn't grasp of specialize in – it's very useful to her. When I taught her taijutsu during our time working together she implemented that as a part of her core skills seamlessly…"

"I don't believe that would be of much use…" Hanasaku shut the blacksmith down. "She'd just divide the time I can give you two – someone I can actually train. Look, you guys, I'm not leaving Mana behind completely. I just have other plans for her! I've already arranged a more suitable mentor to take her with him on a similar trip. She'll be even training in the Forest of Death and not Land of Lightning like us – arguably she'll be toughening up more than we will!"

Mana bit the inside of her cheek in sadness, Kiyomi pinched her shoulder to try and speak her mind but the magician just looked away.

"I'm really fine… Even if there's no one to train me, I can train myself just fine." Mana realized how much pain her tone expressed. The last thing she wanted Hanasaku to know right now was how uncomfortable Maan felt about her decision which, honestly, she should've seen coming.

In a way the magician understood the Fifth. After all, with just a couple of weeks left until the Chuunin Exams there was no time to treat any life threatening injuries. Any baggage of such an injury Mana would've carried into the exams and with Hanasaku's pent up anger towards the magician and how she treated the whole Kiyomi kidnapping situation it was impossible for someone as thick skulled and clear minded as Hanasaku to be impartial and properly train Mana without exerting too much strength on her and completely crippling the magician in the process. It was clear that Hanasaku didn't want to be in the same room as Mana and she'd have felt that way every time she threw a punch. That was not a safe environment to train in and it was in Hanasaku's interests that Mana helped Team Hokage to go the distance.

"Please don't feel like I'm benching you. I asked none other than Zairyo Jitensha – a fellow Sannin to train you. He is himself a genjutsu user, I feel like there's much he can teach you and he did express interest in that brain targeting style of illusions you use as well. It's going to be a very beneficial experience for the two of you, that man wouldn't have it any other way, honestly…" Hanasaku explained.

Both Meiko and Kiyomi just kept standing still and quiet looking scorned yet knowing no ways of properly responding to their mentor's arguments. They knew that deep inside it kind of made sense but Kiyomi could see that there were some bad feelings in their mentor's heart for Mana and she couldn't help but suspect where it came from. As for Meiko, it was never really clear what she thought, still, she must've saw through it all as well, she just didn't share the experiences that Mana and Kiyomi had just before this training session so she was mostly still in the dark as to where this shade on their team came from.

"As for today's training…" Hanasaku smiled before slapping her hands together and focusing her chakra so intensely that it burst out from her pores and exploded like an aura of silver colored violence that even Mana could see. That meant that it was fully visible to non-sensors which was alarming. Suddenly the woman's fangs began to grow in size and sharpen, her snout extended forward and arms covered in fur as well as her hair began slowly enveloping her face and wildly falling behind her back. A playful wagging tail pushed away the woman's dress. Chestnut Hanasaku began looking like a hybrid of a man and a canine as even her eyes changed into sad puppy eyes that despite it not being the woman's intention just couldn't stop looking like their owner was begging for food.

"You'll have to catch me…" she growled through her sharper and extended teeth.


	262. Sensei of the Quantum Variety

Hanasaku's strange transformation surprised all three of the students. It was unlike anything they've seen before. It didn't look like an illusion, granted, they'd not have known that until they've tried dispelling it. It didn't really abide any laws of what ninjutsu usually was capable of. It could've just been a fancy Transformation Jutsu but there would've been no point for that, it wouldn't have enhanced the Sannin's abilities if it was as simple as that. The closest explanation at least somewhat touching the grounds of reality seemed that this was an odd variant of the Transformation Jutsu, one on a much more advanced scale.

"Catch you?" Kiyomi wondered.

"That's right…" Hanasaku growled out through her teeth. Her voice became more wild and howling. It was like her entire essence had completely transformed. "Lay your hand on me and touch me, that's all it takes for you to pass this test."

Meiko gave the two girls an affirming stare before she darted off. Halfway through her charge the blacksmith touched her armored boots only to set off the sealing glyphs on them. In a powerful burst of chakra the girl was propelled forward. Mana had to hand it to her friend – she was fast. While the magician could still see the blacksmith move, while she may have had what it takes to survive and avoid any attacks delivered at that speed in a race Meiko would've blown Mana and Kiyomi away.

"Blockbuster!" Meiko yelled out as she pointed her shoulder and tensed her upper body for impact. It must've been a newer taijutsu technique as the magician couldn't recall seeing it before neither in the mission she had with Meiko nor during one of her several training sessions with Meiko afterwards. A painful pinch woke Mana up from admiration of her friend's impressive ram, she didn't need to hurt Hanasaku with that, just have it blocked or at least connect…

"I think she is acting as a distraction, she trusted us to come up with a plan of attack." Kiyomi murmured out trying not to draw attention from Hanasaku.

Meiko's shoulder charge completely phased through Hanasaku, like the woman wasn't even there to begin with and yet her image didn't blur as it used to do if a ninja was so fast that they left afterimages. It was like Meiko should've hit but then just phased through the woman completely.

"You can't do that! Human beings can't phase through objects coming at them!" Meiko shouted out before delivering another punch. Strangely enough the woman didn't just allow it phase through her. This time Hanasaku just vanished into thin air, moving so fast that neither of the students could follow her movements until the leaves rustled by her sudden dash gently twirled and settled down on the layer of their peers. "Damn it! I thought I had her…" the blacksmith cursed with a playful snap of her fingers.

"It's not about you, she's teaching us teamwork. It's a common exercise, we need to work together!" Kiyomi suggested.

"I don't think that even working together we can catch her, or even tag her to begin with… What even was that ability? I thought Meiko's punch connected and I didn't see Hokage-sensei move a bit… To top it off – that transformation…" Mana scratched her chin before her headache acted up. That skull crushing pain that interrupted her chain of thought and got in the way of relating all those new and unseen things.

Meiko's hand tapped Mana's shoulder with all the subtlety and restraint of a country sized asteroid.

"Don't twist your head. I figured her out during our first meeting – sensei's skills defy human logic. Her mind is so out of sync with reality that she just does whatever she thinks she can do, when you point out to her that humans don't function like that, when you tell her the limits she can't do that anymore. That's why I thought I had her after the first failure…" Meiko pouted.

"Huh? We worked with Hanasaku for years and we've never found that out… We just thought she was so strong and fast and durable that she did whatever she wanted… I never thought there was a sense to that madness, well, as much sense as Chestnut Hanasaku can make…" Kiyomi looked surprised. "Nice job! Way to contribute to the team!" she smiled at the blacksmith before playfully punching Meiko's chest plate.

"Still, we lost her, now we'll need to find her to begin with, even if we do find her – how do we hold her still long enough to tag her?" Mana complained still rubbing her aching temples in annoyance.

"True, it'd be really awesome to have a sensor on our team…" Kiyomi dreamily looked at the sky.

"Aren't you one? I thought Yamanaka had by far the highest percentage of born sensors out of all other clans?" Meiko curiously looked at Kiyomi, it was odd thinking that the blacksmith thought that Kiyomi was a sensor this whole time.

"Sadly…" Kiyomi shrugged, "I either don't have it or I still haven't awakened it…"

"Still… We have an advantage here." Mana suddenly realized once her headache cleared out and only left an aftertaste of burning synapses in her brain. "This training ground isn't that huge, that limits Hokage-sensei's territory, she can't move too fast or use her speed for an extensive period of time and still fit into the training grounds. Also, it narrows down the area we need to search, I think finding her won't be a problem…"

"Yeah… How about we just track the trail?" Kiyomi smiled pointing at several broken tree branches and a narrow tunnel of torn off leaves.

"Yes! If we analyze the altitude where the leaves are torn off, we will know what altitude she moved in, then we can follow that same level of height to where her trail disappears and draw her out. This training grounds is maintained in a constant season of late autumn. That means the leaves on the trees are exceptionally fragile, she won't be able to use the trees to hide or move away limiting her to the ground level!" Mana yelled out, excited by Kiyomi's discovery of a beginning of a trail.

"You know, I kinda hoped you two would think this thing through while I distracted sensei… That's why I charged at her head-on, you know!" Meiko pouted.

The three kunoichi began slowly tracing Hanasaku's trail, treading carefully and as silently as they could. Kiyomi had no problem sticking to the ground, barely making a sound as she walked even in a tight forest with endless layers of fallen trashy leaves beneath her feet. Mana was not the greatest in the art of stealth, her talents were at distraction, battlefield entertainment and enemy displacement. That was why she made an occasional trip, from time to time leaves rustled as they got picked up and rustled in an endless chain of autumnal murmuring. Meiko, on the same note, was a walking bulldozer, trampling and breaking any branches she passed by, crushing any twigs and actually damaging tree bark she banged against. Even when she stepped into small webs of little creeks it didn't appear to disturb or annoy the blacksmith at all. Not to mention the revealing sounds her armor constantly made by squeaking and clanging.

"Just a thought, maybe it'd be for the best that we figure something out. You know… What we do once we do find sensei?" Meiko wondered poking her cheek with her finger, continuously making her shoulder plates clang and jingle as steel plates clashed with each other.

"It may be a good idea to use your sword." Mana suggested, "If that phasing ability has anything to do with that transformation and isn't just an element of her astonishing speed, an Audra blade should cut through that or at least fare better against it than your bare hand…"

"I still don't get it, what's so special about that sword?" Kiyomi shrugged, questioningly looking back at her two teammates.

"An Audra sword doesn't break as easily against chakra, it partially resists the chakra over matter principle." Meiko explained.

"Wow, I was hoping Mana would explain this to me, no offense, but I didn't take you for a brainiac…" Kiyomi smiled affectionately at Meiko.

"Meiko is really smart about mechanics and sealing techniques and weaponry." Mana explained. "She has a very specific circle of interests she is very passionate about."

"Also music!" Meiko pointed out.

"Also music…" Mana nodded with a smile.

"It's a hobby…" the blacksmith shrugged, "Blacksmithing is my life!"

"You got place for a boyfriend in that life?" Kiyomi wondered.

"Ummm… I don't think her dating situation will help us catch Hanasaku…" Mana quickly steered the subject. While it made sense for her Yamanaka friend to scope out Meiko's interests and abilities, as well as the full extent of her fields of knowledge and degrees to which she was educated in them, the depths of the blonde's interests were a bit baffling for the magician.

"What's there to catch? You two just hit her, displace her, do what you do best. Meiko - smash things, Mana - blast them! I'll hit Hanasaku with a Yamanaka clan technique and we're done!" Kiyomi grinned with alarming confidence in her abilities.

"Aren't your techniques as fast as a thought? Slowing Hokage-sensei down to such an extent will not be easy, you should use your hair trick first…" Mana suggested as the three kept on following the trail that their sensei left carelessly traversing the trees at immense speeds without caring to think a moment about the state of its leaves. Be as gentle and silent as she may have been, with how weak the season made those leaves they've have all fallen from a lightest breeze.

"A new rule…" Hanasaku's voice made Mana jump up in fear as she simply didn't expect their sensei to find them instead of other way around. "A ring-out clause, if at any point anyone leaves the training grounds – they're out. If I as much as step out – you win…" the woman explained in her growling voice, with her transformation still intact.

"No way!" Kiyomi was still shaking, she didn't expect the woman to sneak up on them from the exact opposite side they were tracking her to.

Meiko only whistled in shock before laughing out. Somehow the blacksmith still found the test highly entertaining.

"This… It changes everything…" Mana uttered. "There was no way for her to sneak up on us from behind if she was the one who caused those holes in the leaves up there… That means that somehow she doesn't touch them or even travel at that level."

Meiko leaned down and carefully and overly dramatically examined the leaves on the ground and burrowed a bit deeper to the dirt under them, right below the tree where their sensei snuck up on them.

"Hmmm… I don't think she travelled on the ground level either…" the blacksmith whined out.

"Then how!?" Kiyomi shouted out beginning to get frustrated from how little of grasp they had on the situation. It seemed that this transformation had unlocked a side of her mentor that made her defy the laws of logic and reality even more than she usually did.

"She's still phasing…" Mana concluded.

"That's impossible, I told her the limit on that ability, she can't do that anymore because it's illogical!" Meiko reminded the magician before settling down and resting by the tree.

"We need to stay aware at all times. Do you know why she declared that extra cause? It's because Hanasaku is impatient. She'd never allow us to lose by waiting whole day – she needs an escape clause if she grows impatient. If that happens, if she reaches her wits end – she'll just ring all three of us out."

"But… Wouldn't we win if she carries us out?" Meiko wondered.

"Not necessarily, not if she does it so fast that we aren't fast enough to perceive her action and tag her while she carries us. Having who we're dealing in mind, do you really want to bet on yourself?" the Yamanaka explained with a somewhat apocalyptic tone, as if everything was as good as over already.

Mana looked around, all of a sudden her friends were nowhere to be seen, nothing around her but an unclear distance of forests and trees. The magician couldn't understand where her friends may have gone, the area she was in currently was completely different from the one where she was before. The girl looked up to notice the human-wolf hybrid shape of Hanasaku sniffing the air and licking her snout up right above.

"Did I lose, did you carry me out of the bounds?" the magician wonder.

"No. I didn't want to risk that much, your perception is the fastest out of the three. I had the mission report from the Box mission skimmed through to me. You've been trained by Wakizashi Meiko, Kouta Juugo and the Sun Disc martial artists to perceive hits and deflect them or avoid them even as a normal human. I have no idea how amazing your perception is currently but knowing you kept up with an underground Black Ops unit operative recently I didn't want to risk losing the test – not to you." Hanasaku howled out before playfully snapping her teeth at a fly buzzing around her nose.

"So did you eliminate the others already?" Mana put her hand into her ninja pouch, her eyes kept constant contact with her sensei's eyes trying desperately to make her focus on the magician's alluring emerald orbs and not where her hand travelled.

"Heh, no. If I just wanted to win I'd have established the rule and eliminated all three of you to begin with. I want to teach you guys something, see how you function both as a team and separately. They're all on different corners of the training grounds…" the woman replied with a more primal, rougher voice than she spoke with normally.

"Sweet Lullaby!" Mana chanted after her one hand, hidden in the empty ninja pouch on her thigh, made the one handed hand seals. A gentle melody filled the air, a testament of brain targeting illusion that overwhelmed one's body with pleasure. Something like that would've completely crippled the woman and made her tumble from the tree branch, if only the melody reached her ears… If only…

Hanasaku was gone. She ran away faster than the sound waves that carried Mana's illusion. Not only that, the woman recognized that the magician was using an illusion and then she still managed to avoid even a single sound wave reaching her. Speed like that was insane! There was only one ninja firmly rumored to be faster than sound itself, capable of pulling off such a feat of speed, that was the current Raikage but Mana just assumed that was Kumogakure propaganda meant to scare other villages from conflicting or going to war with Kumo. Seeing her own sensei pull something insane like this off was… Equal part scary as it was inspiring.

At the very same moment, on the completely opposite sides of the training ground Meiko and Kiyomi were waking up. Each of them met with same looking transformed version of their sensei lurking in the trees, receiving the same explanation of what happened that Mana got. So far neither of the kunoichi knew the extent of how badly they were being played. None of them knew that their sensei existed in multiple places simultaneously without the aid of clone techniques or anything that would've split the limited supply of Sage Chakra she had in her system. The woman simply existed in front of all three girls and spoke to them simultaneously at the same time.

"You can't run faster than sound!" Kiyomi's raised voice filled the air, a plead desperate to reach the woman and inform her that she couldn't move at the speed that she moved in. The Yamanaka merely supported Meiko's hypothesis of a weakness the blacksmith may have discovered during their training session and limiting Hanasaku's speed would've greatly assisted the three young kunoichi.

Mana kept on walking forwards, she pulled out a card with apple motifs and red colors on the other side, covered with sealing glyphs and looked at it. She could've used it, thrown it up in the air and alerted her allies to her location with its colorful red explosion. Then something her sensei had said occurred to the magician – they were being observed and they weren't being tested randomly in this test. Hanasaku implied that she wanted to test their skills operating together as well as separately. That meant that there were whole different standards to how Mana needed to behave.

The girl didn't want to fail her authority figures anymore. No more failing Hanasaku as she had failed the woman before, no more failing her like Mana had failed Tanshu-sensei long time ago. Mana stared at the card before putting it back into a compartment in her sleeves. Using the explosive seal card would've alerted Meiko and Kiyomi to Mana's location but it would be a bad move when working under these conditions in the field – it'd just as equally betrayed Mana's position to the enemy.

The magician had a feeling that once she'd have used the card Hanasaku would've moved Mana outside the training grounds and declared she had actually failed the test. The girl sighed and looked around, she still needed to alert her friends of her position somehow. She had no idea where they've been taken. It probably wouldn't have made much sense just leaving markings on the trees, Hanasaku mentioned something about taking the other girls to different parts of the field. Mana wondered if that may have meant different corners or different edges. That meant that as long as the magician progressed towards the center of the training grounds, she'd find her friends. Obviously if they came up to the same conclusions…

"Training grounds No. 32 is in the northern exit from the village… That means it's located north to the village. There is a large pond in the most southern point where the entrance was, if I listen in…" Mana closed her eyes hoping to hear a gentle rippling of a little creek, there were many webs of creeks around that lead into the bigger pond down in southern part of the Training Grounds. Mana had no idea in which point exactly she was so locating that landmark would've helped her understand better where she was taken.

Nothing.

Not a single rippling sound which was alarming, she must've been right at the edge of one of the sides of the Training Grounds. Mana had to choose a direction to travel in very carefully. If she walked up to the fence signaling the edge of the training grounds she'd have wasted plenty of time walking the wrong direction.

Suddenly Mana's eyes shot wide open as she grabbed a nearby stick and began digging through the leaves and then the sludgy mud layers below them. An underground splash of water drowned the magician's dirty hands as it began bursting through the cover of mud and leaves. The magician then ran up to one of the trees and observed the direction where the vegetation grew at. That was it – the underground springs were all going the side opposite from north – where the vegetation was.

"That means I am at the lowest point below sea level, that's why the springs are so weak and why they're running opposite direction to where the pond is – most southern point of the training grounds. If I am at the most northern point, farthest from the hills and artificial foundations of all those buildings down south – where we entered, as long as I head south I'll reach the center. Right… Opposite to the vegetation on the trees…" Mana thought to herself almost like she was her own partner to communicate with.

At least now she had a direction. Direction was all she could've asked for!


	263. Transistor Mechanics

Kiyomi tumbled through the messy autumn forest area of the training grounds. She wasn't rushing, using her immense ninja speed to cover larger distance faster – she wanted to remain vigilant. Nothing could've surprised her now or else she risked failure. Still, how on Earth were they to succeed now? Was the whole team not scattered across the entire battlefield faster than the nerve signals reached their brains, so fast that even their superhuman perceptions could not pick it up?

Then there was that talk that Hanasaku gave her. It was something that Meiko and Mana probably needed to hear, what if they did hear it? What if that insane woman was just instantaneously moving from one side of the battlefield to another without cracking sweat or leaving a single trace of her movement!? What if she's tracking the future Yamanaka heiress right now without Kiyomi knowing it? The blonde grinded her teeth together in frustration, her anger was beginning to break out.

A hawk scream awakened Kiyomi from her pent up frustration and inability to achieve anything tangible in this hellish test. Still, it was nothing compared to the utter tragedy of the first test her team went through when they first met with Hanasaku but back then they were still genin. While they shouldn't have been dropped from half the heights one of her teammate plummeted from and arms were not supposed to bend the way that Kiyomi's did, they had little to no expectations on them as just out of Academy brats. By the time genin become skilled enough to take the Chuunin Exams they usually can pass elementary mentor tests and survival drills…

"Hawk…" the young lady uttered to herself before raising her hands up and trying to aim her technique perfectly. So far she's been wandering around, trying to be careful as to not hit a metal fence signaling the end of the training ground or any ground hazard. This was her way out. If Mana and Meiko really did get the message they would've went towards the center of the training grounds. That's simply the most logical place to meet, close to where they were when they were scattered, also there are some small resting structures meant to kick back and relax. It was a landmark of sorts…

"Mind Body Switch Jutsu!" Kiyomi chanted as her mind left her own body firing off and heading straight at the hawk at the speed of thought. If she missed it would be no big deal, a minor waste of chakra as well as moments when her body would be exposed to attacks while her mind wandered back into her body. Either way – if Hanasaku wanted to eliminate her she'd have done it long ago. The mad woman wanted something out of the three. That was why they weren't immediately eliminated!

Mana peeked from over a bush and observed an old and overgrown with vegetation arbor. No one was there out in the open. Maybe the others have already reached this point and were waiting in hiding, afraid to come out? They had a time limit to this test. They had no time to waste on this. The magician quickly weaved a couple of hand seals and ran out into the open.

"You fail!" Hanasaku's growl came from behind Mana and the magician felt overwhelmed by numerous copies of the woman attacking with all of her unbelievable speed from various angles from all around. Oddly enough it was like those copies just moved instantaneously, like time stopped around them and watching from aside all of them looked like they had incalculable number of arms for their punches were that fast. Still, Hanasaku pulled her punches, clearly, still, she didn't go for elimination - she wanted to hurt Mana…

The magician's shape burst into rose petals and scattered across the autumnal ground, the illusionary copy exploded from pressure of a dozen Hanasakus striking her an inconceivable number of times with her contained strength. Frantically the woman looked around seeking to locate the real Mana, realizing she's been put into an illusion. As the real shape did not reveal itself the woman placed her hands together and concentrated, overflowing her body with chakra and placing her hands in a hand seal position.

"Dispel!" she chanted trying to dispel the illusion but nothing happened. The real Mana did not appear. Either those shapes were not illusionary replacements, with the real user who went completely invisible while the illusion is in use, untraceable by even her enhanced smell and hearing of Sage Mode, or the illusion was not yet dispelled. Must've been one of those brain center targeting illusions.

Hanasaku pulled out a kunai from her pouch and cut herself in the wrist shallowly. The pain needed to be burning enough to break the illusion but not enough to seriously injure her. Right after the initial fiery sensation of being cut ended Hanasaku smelled something, behind her!

Multiple copies of Kiyomi were all halfway in the air, winding up their punches and kicks and ready to beat the shit out of their sensei. Hanasaku did not move an inch, it was not yet too late for her to move, her student was fast but only for her own rank. To the Sannin she moved at a snail's pace, she had to restrain her own perception in order to not get bored by the Yamanaka's movement. The attacks completely phased through the Sannin. Just as Mana suspected the woman was still phasing, either that or the Yamanaka's illusion did not produce tangible means of attacking the Fifth.

"Hmph… Not bad!" Hanasaku yelled out before she once again placed her hands together and cast a simple genjutsu dispelling technique that ended Kiyomi's own illusion. It was a much fancier Clone Jutsu, creating a handful of false images of attacking Kiyomi while the real user slipped away. "But please do remember you're the ones who are supposed to catch me, not the other way around!" the woman yelled out to taunt her students who still haven't even come close to catching her.

Mana, Meiko and Kiyomi were taking some quick but stealthy moves away from the central area where they so chaotically met up. Mana smiled at her friends, feeling proud and happy that they made it.

"I wondered if you guys would find your way here… How did you do it?" she asked trying to dumb her volume down a bit so that their attempts at a stealthy retreat would still be respectable.

"I surveyed the area by placing my mind into a hawk, traced my own location and then figured where I need to go from there to reach the center. Obviously the central area was the key landmark we all knew, the southern entrance was close but it made sense that one of us was placed at the farthest possible point from it – the northern edge so it'd have been not too productive for one of us to get there. The central landmark made more sense…" Kiyomi explained her own thoughts.

"I found a creek and followed it to the southern point, then when I didn't find anyone there I just headed from there to the center, after finding that point I knew where I was exactly so finding the center was no issue at all…" Meiko explained hers.

While Meiko blundered the most out of the three, wandering around to the southern point before scurrying for the central landmark, the fact that she managed to not get eliminated or get lost was impressive. The blacksmith was obviously the person Mana was the most worried about.

"I have to say, Meiko… I, for a moment, doubted you could follow our emergency scenario, having in mind we haven't decided on it before we got scattered and pieced it together just from trying to figure out how each one of us thought." Mana voiced her doubts, it was obviously meant as a compliment that the blacksmith scattered the magician's ill thoughts of her intelligence somewhat. While Meiko was not the sharpest thinker, she was just resourceful enough where it counted.

"Yeah… My first instinct was just to wander around and hope to bump into someone. But then… I thought about getting on this team and how much it meant for me. Kiyomi was always a part of this team and Mana earned her place with that mission and the Fifth's test following it. I was recommended by Mana, I was the odd one out… I just can't let myself fail, I want to prove that I'm worth being here!" Meiko firmly declared with fiery determination in her eyes and seriousness that the blacksmith's voice rarely had.

The other two couldn't help but smile hopefully.

"So now that we know that sensei is still phasing… What will we do?" Meiko changed the subject as the three settled down in an unusually large pile of leaves where they hid in. It was pretty wet and smelled of dirt and rotting trashy leaves everywhere but it had to be persevered.

"Do we? Sensei knows my Mist Servant Jutsu quite well, she is likely to know that my illusionary attacks are just that – illusionary. Have we really seen her phase?" Kiyomi scratched the top of her head still reluctant to admit of what she was facing.

"Either way, phasing or not, there was something unusual about her – I assume all of you got her message, right after we were scattered?" Mana asked just for clarification.

"Yeah… You mean she told you that same thing at the same time?!" Meiko shouted out loud forcing Kiyomi to press her palm up to the blacksmith's mouth and shut the overly expressive teammate up.

"That means she was in multiple places in one time. That was after she heard Meiko yell at her about her limits. She must've known that she was unable to move that fast." Mana concluded with a firm whisper.

"You mean it's that transformation that grants her that ability?" Kiyomi wondered.

"Truth be told? I don't know…" Mana pushed a bunch of leaves out of her face before dashing out of the hiding spot and taking a different spot of concealment behind a very thick tree, choosing to relocate before dashing up that tree and hiding inside the frail yet still thick cover of leaves on the tree's upper level.

"I do have an idea though… Meiko's speech is delivered through sound waves, just like everyone else's. That means that Hokage-sensei would've been just as able to outrace those sound waves or allow her body to phase through them. She may not have heard those words. Back when I met her in the forest I tried hitting her with a sound channeled illusion and she simply retreated faster than sound before my illusion reached her…" Mana explained still looking back and worrying that sensei's interference could've broken all of them off once again.

"It makes sense. Meiko can't be the only person to ever stumble onto Hanasaku's gimmick. It's too simple a weakness to have no countermeasures against. While in her Super-Dog-Mode she has to phase through sound waves informing her of her weaknesses and limits…" Kiyomi nodded. She looked a little bit more relieved at the very least to have figured out the point of that transformation.

"Phasing, huh? So she can filter what reaches her and what doesn't, kinda like a fancy human-transistor." Meiko smiled before she head off to another hiding spot. Mana and Meiko soon followed.

"Transistor?" Mana asked for a clarification, she felt embarrassed that in this case Meiko was visibly smarter and more in control intellectually. Usually the opposite was the case, her intelligence and perception allowed Mana to feel worthy of being in a team that surpassed her physically so much.

"Wait, you don't know what a transistor is?" Kiyomi cringed before breaking out in laughter.

"Shut up!" Mana whispered out embarrassed, struggling with herself to keep her whisper from breaking into a shout. Meiko joined in on the laughing tirade.

"Wind Style Collaboration: Rain Song!" two synced up voices sounding just like Hanasaku sung out as one as they blurred through hand seals. One of them blew out a powerful wind current that blasted all of the girls back, Mana and Meiko slammed against a tree before being violently thrown down and buried in the mud and fallen leaves. It was immensely wide and strong, like an actual storm current strong enough to send people flying. The other one spat out a built up mass of water from her lungs right into the storm gust which made a rain-like pelting water affect.

Mana grunted as she picked herself off the ground, she saw Kiyomi and Meiko already up on theirs and ready to answer. The two Hanasaku copies soon became four, then eight and twelve. They were no clones, they couldn't have been. There was actual sound from where their feet touched with wood and they weren't just Shadow Clones as there was no actual jutsu being performed. The clones just appeared out of thin air.

"That's right… It just doesn't make sense. So much that it actually does…" Mana looked at her bruised knees and torn up clothes when she realized something. The magician weaved a pair of hand seals. Then her body just froze, her eyes rapidly raced around but nowhere near as quick as her mind tried to sum up what she had just realized.

"Retreat!" she issued out an order for her team. Her hands went through a pair of hand seals again.

"Enough! This test is over!" Hanasaku barked out before her canine shape changed into a more human shape yet her numbers still remained the same.

"Huh?" Meiko scratched her head confused, looking at Mana and then back at their mentor. "Did we win?" she ask.

"No, you failed… Because of Mana." Hanasaku pointed at the magician.

"Oh, come on! Enough of this subjective bullshit!" Kiyomi growled out seemingly believing that her mentor's decision was because of how she disliked Mana's behavior during the whole Yamanaka wedding plot.

"Would you just let me explain?" Hanasaku asked her student for a chance. Kiyomi pouted and looked away just in case her angry stares could kill Hanasaku, the girl's arms firmly locked on her chest betrayed how angry the Yamanaka was.

"You see, Mana found me out, just now. Those hand seals she made were Transformation Jutsu, the basic Academy Technique. My enhanced dog-like ears allowed me to hear what she said to herself just now too allowing me to put it all together." Hanasaku pointed at Mana who just nodded. "Go on, tell your friends everything, if you won't, I will and I won't be subtle about it." The woman demanded.

"I read this thing… In a history book once, this theory from a scientist in Iwagakure who discovered a way to mine especially tough minerals. He discovered this theory in physics where nothing particles do at a certain level makes sense – things can be in multiple places at once, things can phase through electric waves and other particles. This thing Hokage-sensei did, these techniques made no sense, they couldn't have been explained by any logic so I figured it was that. My plan was to transform into a small object and catch her unprepared, maybe transform into an animal or a plant. I figured that the animal would have the message transcribed on its back…" Mana began explaining, she was beginning to finally understand where she had failed. Her body just froze during those moments right before the transformation and she made the wrong call, she knew where and she knew what it would've cost.

"And it would've worked. I couldn't have avoided something I see in front of me, something I subconsciously read instead of a spoken sentence." Hanasaku nodded seriously, then her eyes flared back up and looked at Mana like trying to transfer that flame at her, incinerate the girl with a glare. "Keep going. Tell your team what you did."

"I froze…" Mana cried out, she was becoming embarrassed. "I… I don't want to use techniques that I didn't invent myself, I don't like it. I wondered if I should use Transformation Jutsu at all – it's a basic Academy technique. I've used unoriginal jutsu before but those were moments of life and death, this was a survival drill, a game…" Mana stopped talking, she realized that she was just making excuses at this point so she just sat down on a rock nearby and stopped talking.

Hanasaku sighed. "You see, Mana had the option of transforming and stepping over herself, removing my new techniques from me, my limitless potential to function like those laws of physics that don't make sense. She didn't, instead she cried out to retreat, without a doubt, intending to explain herself to you and asking that someone else transformed in her place."

"So?" Kiyomi glared at Hanasaku.

"So… If I was fighting with the intent to kill you – I'd have killed you then and there. Mana faltered, I would've simply attacked you two because I knew that she'd have used some tricky illusion to slip away like she did before. You two were wide open, caught in surprise. I would've moved you outside the training grounds, or killed you in real life, and you wouldn't have possibly seen it coming. You'd all be dead because Mana decided to back out instead of stepping over her stupid principles." The Fifth finally explained why she flunked the team.

Without uttering a word Mana stood up and began walking off. Her head hurt again, her chest hurt from the pressure of just having flunked her team. Hanasaku was right, had she defied her own principles and stepped over her principles for this stupid survival drill she could've helped her team pass. Her decision to back out without thinking it all through was selfish. It was stupid and it was undoubtedly wrong. Mana's hand grabbed her collar and gripped it as hard as she could while her body tensed up from the stress and uncontrollable weeping. She couldn't hold it inside her anymore. She failed everyone again. Even more, it was exactly mirroring the last training with Shimo and Sugemi – she dragged her team down, her principles did.

Just like the last time her mentor belittled her for her principles, obviously this time it wasn't her refusal to kill, it was her entertainer originality principle. One that she sometimes ignored if lives were at stake or she deemed it important but the very fact that she stopped to consider that principle at all cost them this test. Even if Mana did transform, even if she did step over herself… She'd have faltered fighting an opponent who was fast enough to kill her team. Because of her faltering she'd have seen Meiko and Kiyomi die before transforming…

Kiyomi and Meiko caught up to Mana. The magician couldn't look at them at that moment. Meiko softly wrapped her hand around the magician's neck and friendlily teased her. "So you know about some stupid impossible theoretical laws of physics but you've no idea what a transistor is?!" the blacksmith laughed out.

Kiyomi's eyes were strange, she didn't look angry, she didn't look like she'd detested the magician or what Mana did but it was impossible to tell what she really thought. She certainly didn't look happy.

"Hey, don't feel bad, if I figured it out and tried transforming I'd have failed too – remember how bad I am at ninjutsu!?" Meiko tried lightening the mood and then comically acted out a malformed animal she'd have likely transformed into making Kiyomi crack a grin from how ridiculous the blacksmith looked.

Mana dashed ahead, augmenting her abilities to try and get away from her team. She didn't say a word or react in any way. Deep inside she knew that both Meiko and Kiyomi could've caught her if they went after her, they were both faster than she was. Neither of them did. Meiko just stood around looking at the hand that Mana rudely escaped from under before looking in the distance where the magician went off to.

"Wanna go get something to eat?" Kiyomi coldly suggested.

"In the name of blazing caramel hellfire, YES!" Meiko shouted out jumping up with her fist in the air like she'd have just passed the Chuunin Exams already. While the blacksmith still felt bad for her friend, she was quite easily distracted…


	264. Insomnia

The moon that night was humongous, its illumination put all those neon lights on restaurants, small shops and gambling houses to shame. Not for the lack of trying, however. One particular establishment – the Minakuji Casino was especially bright, shining brightly with its golden shades together with skylights of various eye scratching colors. Without those lightshows Konoha may have seemed like a depressing place, young people dying left and right, people ambitious enough to leave the protection of the village disappearing and being sacrificed for the natural darkness in wild ones' hearts…

The lights and bright colors helped shake off that impression. It did for Mana all the time… Even if Minakuji, when approached closer, smelled of vomiting alcoholics thrown out so that they didn't disturb the other clients' illusions of luxury and cheer. Even if brawls were more than common with the only concern of the staff there being that they happened off the social screen, out of sight meant as good as averted, the casino's bright colors still had that cheering effect for whatever reason. Even if people unable to express their violence yet drunk of their feet commonly harassed the small-folk. Mana could recall hearing Hisako tell her a story about that place once, how she had a mission to scatter one such group of drunkards…

Or maybe it was no mission? Maybe she said she was just beating on a bunch of lowlifes? No. The violence had a goal, Hisako needed intel from them because she was chasing some maniac. Either way, knowing Hisako there was plenty of murder and "justified" bloodshed because the blood being shed was that of filthy and drunk as a slipper scum. The less details of that story Mana remembered the better…

The door to Mana's room nudged slightly and mother's curious eyes slipped in.

"You're not asleep yet?" she whispered.

"I'm just watching the lights, I need to cheer up a little, it'll be tough acting all enthusiastic and entertaining people in tomorrow's show if I'm…" Mana didn't want to say "sad". For whatever reason whenever someone uttered that word she actually began weeping when she actually was down. Even if she wasn't down, that word being thrown around made her mood somewhat bummy.

"Oh? Need a kiss to help?" mother suggested emanating that same cheerfulness Mana was looking for.

"No." the teen cut down firmly. Somehow she'd have felt embarrassed if mother pecked her on the head, almost like that moment would've been instantly transmitted to all of her friends even if no one would've known. Mana would've known and that would've been enough.

"Suit yourself, don't stay up too long now." mother suggested and quietly closed the door.

Mana's cheek bumped against her bent knees and she burrowed in her bed cover. She wanted someone there, someone who would've understood her, someone who shared her views or at least made a genuine attempt at getting them. It seemed like with each passing day people like that were disappearing from her life. Everyone who marveled her love for all life were weighed over to the other side, changed or even died. She was becoming more and more alone every passing day.

"No, I said…" Mana whispered to herself, "What an idiot…"

The magician was jumping over the tree branches, carefully positioning her leaps, moving as fast as she could. She braced for impact with the leaves that burst and scattered upon her crashing through them like a juggernaut. The girl's thighs were burning up, her dashes were becoming slower, she covered less and less distance with her leaps and her pace was becoming slower and slower until she moved at a turtle's pace. Her leaps were focusing on height instead of distance, lying that she was moving at the same pace.

Finally Mana stopped, slipped over one of the branches and slammed her body into another. Gripping it so hard that it almost exploded from pressure and her own fingernails drove into the tree and her own flesh at the same time. Shouting in pain Mana pulled herself onto the branch and surveyed the grasslands that laid ahead, where the forest ended.

There they were: Hanasaku, Kiyomi and Meiko, all lined up and facing off against the enemy. Mana couldn't see the enemy's face, it was black and blurry. They had glowing red eyes and wore a twisted smile, curled upwards like a crescent moon and shining pearl white with sharp teeth. The magician focused all of her strength and leaped off of the branch, landing to her team, covering what was left in distance by stumbling forward.

The dark shadowy figure lifted its hand, Mana knew that motion, she had seen it before. Meiko, Kiyomi and Hanasaku were banged up, they looked like they were on their last feet, bleeding and torn up. They must've been through one hell of a battle, why wasn't Mana there? Why was she lagging behind so much?

No. She won't lose another friend to that mass altering technique, she's seen it before, analyzed it, every aspect of it, thinking through what could've been done differently. Mana's hands went through the hand seals. Don't be late, just don't be late!

The shadowy man screamed out, he was reacting far too violently for what was supposed to be just a simple illusion but people reacted to pleasure in different ways. Perhaps what his brain perceived as pleasure was locked away from him for so long that the resurface of those feelings pained him? The man shook and fell on his knees, banging his head against the dirt, peeling his skin away with his nails as he scratched his skin.

Mana looked down only to see a burst of blood explode through her chest. Someone's fist was staring out through it as she was hit from behind. There was no pain, the magician just saw red, blood everywhere as she fell on her knees and Hanasaku quickly dispatched of Kiyomi and Meiko and ran to the shadowy man's aid.

"They were anchors. The village said to make it look like a mission gone wrong…" the woman explained to the man before delivering a flurry of ground shaking blows and completely decimating and leaving him only as a bloody puddle in a fraction of a moment. Sour for the woman's betrayal and seeing her friends' lying beside her Mana breathed out her final breath…

The magician's eyes opened up. It was just a nasty dream. Mana may have felt alienated from her team and her mentor but Hanasaku was no traitor. The whole thing felt suspicious from the start. It was just a dream… The magician burrowed under her cover before she began running out of air and had to "resurface". Her mouth felt dry. Should she go down and get some water or some juice? Trying to contain her anxiety Mana just switched the sides and closed her eyes. Maybe in time the memories of that dream would go away?

A loud screech, likely that of a bat made Mana cower and cover her head. Something really hairy and big past above her but the magician felt compelled to keep on moving forward. Her objective laid onwards and she couldn't have stopped and looked around. A small orb of light floated in front of Mana, slowly floating forward and with it carrying the only light source. Without it the magician would be left in total darkness in some weird rocky and smelly cave.

After a good while the sphere stopped. A quick inspection following the feint light track allowed Mana to determine that this was a large central ground where various narrow cave paths met. Out of nowhere the sphere just rocketed upwards before completely getting swallowed up by the darkness. Suddenly Mana was all alone again, in total darkness. Her objective laid outside this cave. The magician slipped her bag off and removed a lightstick, cracking it and returning to the dwarfed world of green feint light.

Ahead of her laid at least thirty two different pathways. The entire cave was filled with holes that lead to different pathways to the point where there could've been at least a good sixteen hundred floors up each riddled with entrances or exits, a matter of perspective really, up to where light didn't even reach Mana filled with countless pathways and little roads, each of which lead her to a different end. Some of them had to be dead ends.

There was no time to waver. Illuminating her way forward with the barely decent light source in her hand Mana kept on walking forward. Inside the first cave she instinctually picked. Her sandals clacked against the rough rocks and minerals beneath her feet for quite some time before they began slurping, the ground must've been becoming wet. With a single daring step the magician completely submerged underwater.

Panic took Mana over, she scratched and clawed, desperately trying to surface but her light stick was nowhere to be found and she was underwater and in total darkness. Again and again the magician pushed herself through the water, trying to find and out. Twenty minutes passed, maybe an hour. Even with all of her augmentations her lungs were burning up and begging for air, even if her augmentations allowed her to cheat the instincts to breathe it didn't help the pain of not breathing for what seemed like an eternity.

A blasting force of water threw Mana out, like a gag reflex of the cave slamming her into the rocky ceiling and then tossing her on a solid and slippery rocks below. The magician stood back up feeling bruises and bleeding cuts at the wet and slimy rocks she just cut on. There were sharp. Just taking a step carelessly could've resulted in the rocky surface cutting right through her sandals and into her feet. Mana continued to walk forward. Onwards and onwards through the dark cave until she ended in another crossway, just as tall and impossible to navigate through as the last one. Or maybe they were the same one?! Mana couldn't tell…

The magician's knees gave in, she fell painfully on her bottom and curled into a ball.

"Where to now?" she whimpered before screaming loudly into the endless void of the cave that without a doubt only lead into more endless crossways. Crawling on the painfully sharp ground before her hands finally managed to get a grip on this whole balance thing and get the girl back on her feet Mana wandered into another completely dark pathway. Wandering in complete darkness again…

Mana's eyes burst wide open and she lifted her head just to see if she was okay now. She was in no cave. She was back home, trying to get some sleep before a show next evening. Ahead was a day of pretty tough rehearsals and preparations and she'd still end up improvising on quite a lot of tricks she'd be demonstrating that evening. Maybe that whole show was a bad idea?

The magician once again switched on her other side and looked at the turned chair that obstructed the view of whomever may have been sitting in it. If there was a judgmental mentor figure or a shadowy man willing to hide Mana in a dark cave sitting in it, they would've fit in perfectly and still remain hidden. Smiling as their victim laid anxious and confused, too scared and spilled with cold sweat to check if the chair was empty.

Angry Mana burrowed her head under the sheets again. She was such a stupid brat… God she was thirsty, her mouth was dry as a desert!

Konoha was beautiful at night. All those lights, all those different people just walking around admiring the place. Children running around, fighting each other with sticks and throwing smaller wooden leftovers from the ground at each other like shinobi running from an ambush just having found the clutch kunai in their pocket and using it to escape with their life. For a dream so easily about to become reality they tried very hard to live it…

So many people to meet. Mana often forgot how known she was around the village for her magic shows. Very few to none knew her as a ninja, mostly those who have had Mana or some roster of her team work for them as her clients. Sometimes people who heard about it through hearsay and refused to believe it at first… Either way, Mana had done very few notable things as a ninja. Even the whole technology from a different universe was often either forgotten or dismissed to another, more famous ninja.

Contrarily, numerous ninja knew Mana's status and deeds. Fellow shinobi and kunoichi were rather good at identifying different missions and attributing them to fellow ninja. Had anyone asked a random vest wearing ninja of higher rank what some random chump with a headband had done they'd be able to recall one or two objective fulfilled by the person with remarkable accuracy.

"Mana, you bitch!" Kiyomi's voice made the magician's heart freeze as she slowly turned to face her friend.

Surprisingly enough the girl was dressed in a white wedding gown. The last survivor of the wandering ninja could only scratch her temple in confusion of how weird the sight looked and how normal it seemed to passers-by around them. The magician couldn't muster up a word, she was completely oblivious to what she was even being blamed for.

"Don't you just stay silent with me! Come on, tell me, why did you miss my wedding!? It was the most important day of my life!" the blonde outright screamed at Mana flailing her arms around frantically and forcing the magician to lean and dodge those gloved hammers of wedding doom in fear.

"Uhm… You're getting married?" Mana said the first thing in her mind only to be punched in the face. For a lady in a wedding dress Kiyomi punched lightning fast and as strong and subtle as a rampaging dinosaur.

"Do you have any idea how Meiko feels!? You were our best friend! You missed the most important day of our lives! We're through! You hear me? Through!" Kiyomi leaned up to Mana's face yelling so loudly and articulating so clearly that there could've been no rumors about this. Just about every word was cold factual proof all by itself to just about anyone around the world.

Somehow Mana picked herself off the ground. She was surprised that no teeth scattered or her jaw didn't get completely blown off. Her augmentations worked on point and on time but maybe it would've been better if they didn't. How could she have missed Kiyomi's wedding? Clearly it meant a great deal to her friend…

"Wait, Meiko? I thought if you were to get married you'd go for Eiju and not for some more years in the future?" Mana still caressed the part of the jaw she was socked in.

"Eiju!?" Kiyomi turned around and ran up to Mana again picking the girl up by her collar like she was a ragdoll before winding up another punch. "How fucking dare you!? After you completely missed his funeral!? After you were on a mission while he wondered where you were in his deathbed! How fucking dare you!" she screamed before dropping Mana and just storming off.

Mana remained speechless. Her legs just didn't move. She didn't know how to react to all those things. Wait… They couldn't have actually happened…

Slight peeks of Sun began showing far away into the horizon. There may have been a good couple of hours left till morning. The magician finally gathered the courage to stand up and walk past the mysterious cushioned chair and leave her room. Slowly descend down the stairs and head to the kitchen. Even her mother wasn't up yet, it must've been really early but the magician didn't check the clock in either her own room nor the living room, or the kitchen for that matter.

A large purple jug sat on top of the table. Mana peeked over the edge of the doorway leading into the kitchen. As a little kid she always dreaded walking into the kitchen in the evenings or the nights, even passing it by. That damned purple jug always looked to her like a little demonic imp sitting on the table and smiling at her. Granted little Mana couldn't see any eyes or teeth but they were there in her imagination.

With a relieved grin the magician walked into the kitchen and picked up a glass, trying to be quiet so that she didn't interrupt the couple of hours of sleep her mother still had before getting up and leaving to work. With blank eyes showing a spaced out expression the magician walked up to the jug and spilled in some carrot juice from it. It was so silly that her mother stored Mana's favorite drink in her most dreaded object. Or maybe it was just right, that way as a little brat she wouldn't get plumped on carrot juice and explode.

Mana giggled while looking at the purple jug and easily twisting it around a bit before she finished her juice. It was no imp, just like there was no one sitting in her chair. Subconsciously the magician may have known that, she was no little child anymore. Still, even if people she was thinking about so often or dreading weren't even close to sitting in her chair and watching her sleep, they were far too indifferent about one silly magician girl from Konoha, they still existed.

In more ways than one, they were much closer to Mana than sitting in her room's chair watching her sleep. They were inside her the whole time. In her mind, in her heart. They weren't just watching her sleep, they were with her this whole time. Chestnut Hanasaku would never betray her team and leave them for dead. She probably won't get lost in some cave or miss Kiyomi's wedding, whomever the Yamanaka decides to marry. Those were just some silly dreams… They didn't mean anything in the end. Just like this jug was no demonic imp sent to claw Mana's eyes out for wandering around the house at night…

Mana kept telling herself that before returning to bed and burrowing herself under her warm sheets and settling into her round and warm pillow. Hope to still catch some sleep was still alive. Hope always died last.


	265. Stars that Come Down

A crimson curtain closed to a storm of applause and flowers. Mana sighed and still struggled to calm her racing heart. It's been a while since she was so ill prepared for a show and had to improvise so much. She may even have slipped in tricks she had used before, something that she wasn't entirely proud of but in that moment there was simply no other choice. Plus while all sort of ideas twirled through her mind there may not have simply been the props on the ready needed to act on those ideas. All things considered it was a good show…

"Never seen so many people entertained by simple ninjutsu…" Hiro scratched his greyed out and oversized for his build head as if the weight of the thing dragged his body to the ground like the overpowering force of gravity.

"It's not always what you show, context and presentation is equally important." Mana smiled. It was not unusual for the manager of the hall to come and congratulate the performer after the show but the man tended to avoid visiting Mana in her little smelly and soaked in darkness and tangled spider silk room. The man used to wonder if Mana would ever choose to take any of the larger and fancier, scarlet suede covered wall rooms he had offered her. By now he must've gotten the clue.

"Well… You're all about presentation, kid. Everyone's missed you…" Hiro nodded before opening the trashed and holey wooden door to leave Mana and letting her finish her after show preparations and head her own ways. "Did you see the Sixth sitting in the middle row? Stinking hell!" the man laughed out before waggling his short stature.

After a quick and frankly a bit lazy job packing her things Mana rushed off. She decided to change out of her uniform home. For some reason she just wanted to get home as fast as possible, while today was pretty rough, mainly because of this show, the next morning she'd have to leave for the training trip with one of Konoha's Sannin.

"Hey, Mana!" Kouta's voice reached the magician as she was quickly making her way through the endless hallways, already hearing the loud noises of the actor troupe preparing for their upcoming play. After that the entire hall was to be quickly adjusted, the lighting tools removed, the stage reworked into a cinema screen and a movie must've been airing. Mana would've always thought that if the Sixth ever attended a show, that he'd be more of a movie kind of man.

"Hey… Didn't know you'd be here today." The magician blushed a little, she'd have done a bit more careful job in the dressing room if she had known that her boyfriend thought of coming and finding her after the show.

Kouta embraced the magician and pressed her tightly. His control was impeccable, for a young man who could've crushed boulders of densest minerals with his hugs he was surprisingly gentle.

"So are we doing something after this?" Mana dreamily wondered. That night with the young Juugo before the survival drill really helped her getting her mind in order and appreciating what she had back in Konoha.

"I just figured I'd give you a walk home, see where we'd go from there." Kouta grinned before rubbing his nose, he tended to do that when he got shy or withheld something.

"Well, seeing how last time we did that we went to the stars, you've got a pretty tall bar to leap over." Mana teased the medical ninja as the two quietly walked out through the side of the stage, catching a couple of glimpses of the magnificent play being performed onstage.

The weather outside was much chiller than the last time they did this. As the cold streams of air ran down one's lungs it couldn't help it but pinch the entire way down. Once the air was warmed up and exhaled it was so warm that it felt like burning the chest all the way up to the nostrils. Mana quickly burrowed herself into her coat. Even if the air was a bit chillier than usual a surprising dance of evening snowflakes joined into the fray laying the autumnal Konoha streets and gardens with their own first yearly layer of snow.

"It seems this time the stars have come down to us…" Kouta smiled admiring the view as in the evening lights contrasting the clear night's sky the slowly descending snowflakes indeed resembled the white orbs of light in the sky.

Despite the chilly and burning at the same time sensation Mana couldn't help it but breathe in the air around her, gasp and embrace it with all of her chest's capacity until it physically hurt to breathe in any more. Similarly her mind tried saving the moment, in her life these didn't come often yet they reminded her what a gift life truly was and why she fought for it with such ferocity.

Mana and Kouta were not the only people out admiring the snow. Shop keepers were just as awe stricken, obviously, also a bit peeved for they had to pull off their brooms and wipe the terraces where their clients sat down for chats or a not that common outside dinner. Children began hurling snowballs scraping the first snow as it touched the ground, contrasting it with fireballs that ninja often spat at their enemies in one of the most common games they played.

Finally in the distance laid Mana's home. The lights were on, yet dimmed. Obviously it was in the evening minimal lighting mode so her family must've been enjoying the magical evening in their own way.

"What's wrong?" Mana asked finally noticing that Kouta's expression changed after he saw the magician's home.

"It's just… I guess that's it." he pouted with an indifferent shrug. Almost like he was angry about it even if he was the sole judge of that.

"That's it? You're heading home?" Mana asked a bit confused, she thought that Kouta would've liked enjoying the village experiencing the first late autumnal snow a bit more. "Was it something I said or did?" the girl wondered even if in her mind it made little sense as she had done and said very little, allowing the magic of the moment to take it over.

"No! It's just… I want to do some training today and father promised to help me prepare. I think it's best if we don't let this thing of ours get in the way of our training. I mean the Chuunin Exams are pretty important…" the young man shrugged looking at the direction of his home as if it was just right there within his reach, imagining the family and the training waiting back home.

"Oh… Yeah, training is pretty important, I guess…" Mana shrugged trying to hide her disappointment. The worst part was that she kind of understood it, Juugo were brawlers who lived for the thrill of a good fight. They were a unique kind of ninja that contrary to the ninja teachings thrived in fighting and destruction they themselves caused. She should've seen something like this happening at some point.

"We can resume where we're leaving off when I get back, right?" she then wondered.

"Well… We're gonna be competing in the Chuunin Exams in separate teams. We may end up fighting each other at some point. I think it's best we leave this alone until the exams are done with and there's nothing distracting us." Kouta uneasily concluded. "To be honest, I kinda thought you'd be telling me that, your will to keep training past the edge where it makes sense to do so is what charms me about you."

Mana squinted at him just barely containing an urge to spout out something angry. At that point of boiling anger it was almost a temptation really.

"Oh, so that's what you like about me… Fine. Until the exams are done so are we." she sighed in anger. It was an emotion she rarely engaged in, this time the magician barely fought it off, she just let the boiling point keep rising up until it kicked every other neighbor off the boat.

"That's… A bit of a strict way of putting it…" Kouta laughed in a very clearly faked manner. At this point he must've realized that he's said something wrong but he either didn't know or didn't care enough to try and mend it.

"It's how it is, isn't it? Good luck with your training." Mana a bit more angrily cut the young man off before barely containing another temptation inside her. This time it was an urge to storm home in an overly demonstrative manner, a way to show him that she's actually pissed about the way he played this.

"Thanks!" Kouta exclaimed in a surprisingly rather ridiculously cheerful manner as if he was completely oblivious to how angry Mana was. His naïve nature must've forced him to take the good luck wish a bit more directly and seriously than it was meant to be taken.

The young kunoichi shoved the door open so loudly that she actually felt bad about it and closed it overly carefully, so peacefully and slowly that she actually failed to completely close it a couple of times before getting angry again and slamming it shut harder.

"Wow, was the show that bad?" father's voice came from the living room. "Knowing how your mother is when things get out of hand, I'm glad you don't have a knife in your hand now…" the man tried to lighten the situation up. The magician decided to better ignore her father's attempts at to brighten the mood and just angrily squinted at him as she stormed to her room with a glance that had the incinerating properties of hellfire itself. Something she'd probably later regret doing, not that the magician cared at that moment.

She didn't even understand why she got so angry about it. It wasn't that big of a deal actually, Kouta decided to devote more time to training with his father than hanging around with her. It was really understandable, all things considered. She herself planned to leave on a, possibly, couple of days taking trip tomorrow. Without even bothering to change out of her uniform the magician just dropped lifeless on her bed and pressed against the area under her chest as if trying to ease an imaginary pain that simply was not there.

Her anger just didn't make sense, and here she thought she was done with the whole puberty thing. Why did it hurt so much? Why was she acting that way? Most of all, why did fate always tempt her with friendship and love, everything she wanted most out of her life before yanking it from under her and making her more alone than she ever was. With each passing day more and more was pulled out from under her and she felt lonelier and lonelier. First it was her mentor whom she admired, then her team was being played against her and now even Kouta…

"There's some barbecue on the kitchen table if you feel hungry…" mother's soft voice came in as the woman spoke without checking in. She must've known how Mana felt, of all people, mother was someone who must've felt the most alone at one time. After all her entire clan, her family, everyone she ever befriended got killed for almost no reason at all. Even realizing how selfish her anger was, how miniscule her problems were in the grand scale… It didn't help squat. If anything it only made Mana feel more pathetic that she let her childish anger burrow so deep to her heart.

She wouldn't go down to eat, she wouldn't eat anything ever again! Just lay down in her bed and die forgotten by everyone and alone. That was apparently the fate's plan for her. Sometimes Mana felt like one of those badly booked fighters from those lame television programs father liked, her manager seemingly had no idea what to do with her…

Mana's stomach growled so loud that she jumped up. Quickly the magician changed out of her uniform into more casual and comfortable clothes and slowly made her shameful walk downstairs for some barbecue…

"Hey, glad you came!" Zairyo smiled after seeing Mana hastily making her way down the village street. "I figured that you'd be late or not show up at all, Sixth said you left the hall with some fellow your age yesterday after the magic show and…"

"It's nothing…" Mana blushed puffing her cheeks. "I would never miss it and keep my team down. I promise to take this training seriously!" she firmly declared and bowed in front of the Sannin.

Zairyo was a really tall and broad shouldered guy, wearing a fancy white silken kimono with red embroidered edges and a green long flapping cape attached to his shoulders by fancy looking metallic brooches. Still, even if he had a physical build and look of a hero, his gestures and mannerisms reminded Mana more of an opportunistic weasel.

"Training… Right…" the man played with his purplish ponytail of his slightly longer grown since last time the girl had seen him hair uneasily, his eyes shifted from wandering around and rolling in circles to uncomfortably meeting Mana's gaze. This man may have been a worse liar than Mana, something the magician thought hardly possible, also quite a hindrance for someone like the impression of what kind of a man Sannin Zairyo was the magician was getting.

Mana's left eyebrow shifted up a little bit, something easily missed having in mind of the girl's darker complexion and how thin her eyebrows were but it was obvious that Zairyo noticed the girl's suspicion.

"It's… Training, in a… Manner of speech… I promise…" he made up something that sounded just like a made-up excuse from his poor lying tone. After the magician caught up to the man he turned around and started to slowly walk outside the northern village gate and towards the training grounds. At least he was still supposedly heading to where Hanasaku said Mana and Zairyo would be training in – the Forest of Death, that is, if he doesn't make any adjustments to the course later on.

"You're going to use me for something…" Mana realized before sighing and saddening up her determined and ready expression.

"Look on the bright side!" Zairyo tried cheering her up, "If someone your age is useful for a Konoha Sannin – isn't that amazing!?"

Mana did not honor that with a response, all of the respect and formality that her speech had when addressing the man suddenly poofed like smoke. Now he was just an adult gent whom the magician was just barely an acquaintance with.

"By the way, I see you don't have your sword with you, what happened to it? I hope you didn't lose it, for something of that value it'd be a terrible waste!" the Sannin wondered showing genuine worry for the sword's well-being. Surely more than he'd likely show for Mana's if this charade of his would ever turn bad. Mana was not worth a lot of money or was of little collector's value after all… Now all those fancy sword by the man's side in expensive looking sheathes began to make sense. He was a collector, an ambitious scavenger who tried getting his hands on everything valuable but never risked his life or tried too hard. Just like he didn't try too hard with Shimo's Audra blade.

"I gave it away for someone who was supposed to have it after the sword's owner passed away." Mana explained as vaguely as she deemed needed. This man was owed no details or else he'll drag Meiko out on just such a quest as well just for a chance to get her sword from her, by trickery or bargaining or a little bit of both.

"Well… Can't say I'm not a little bit disappointed, I mean I took you with me on this adventurous trip. I wouldn't have resisted too hard if you decided to reward me with that fine Audra blade for my trouble…" the man dreamily laughed out looking at the sky as he spoke like he could see the sword but it was just outside the reach of his grasp but not outside of his dreams.

"You need me…" Mana looked ahead with an ashamed pout that already felt bad about her being dragged out on this trip. Here she thought that Hokage sensei may have let her out on an actually beneficial trip where she would learn from an actual professional just like Meiko and Kiyomi currently were learning from one.

"Ah, true… I suppose I should be rewarding you… So, what do you want? I've got some gems, rubies, emeralds, diamonds… You look like a sapphire kinda gal to me…" the man began burrowing into a large satchel by his side.

"Holy… Are those actual gems?" the magician looked as her shame and disappointment faded instantly.

"Yep, when you're walking around shady places and bartering with black market dealers they may feel awry about village issued funds that still smell of banker's soap and printing machine. Gems are a universal language that every rascal speaks, gold is similar but people can use gems for actual things whereas gold is just chewy and soft… I tend to bury boxes with nuggets whenever they start to accumulate." The man laughed out.

"And you're a ninja?" Mana's eyebrow ended up raised in disbelief. "A Sannin, no less…"

"Yep, got appointed right after the spot freed up. They call me Zairyo Jitensha or Zairyo of the Wavering Grass, get it, because I travel and wander a lot and grass bends a lot and rustles as I walk around but "Wavering grass" just looks better on paper." the man grinned.

"But you never look at nicknames on paper, you say them out loud, they don't even add nicknames on your ID." Mana pointed out surprised that the man would've been as silly as failing to see something like that.

"That is quite true, that's a low-blow…" Zairyo admitted almost like he got offended that the magician pointed it out, it was evident that the man knew that and possibly even had it pointed out to him many times before.

"It's… It's no big deal, it's your nickname, you can change it, just tell people to stop referring to you that way, truth be told, I've never heard anyone refer to you that way so it won't be that tough." Mana tried softening her voice, if she'd spend time helping this man out and training with him maybe it would've been better off not to make him hate her guts too. At least not for something as stupid as the man's silly reasoning for his nickname.

"It's whatever… Forget it. They don't even consider me a real Sannin, it's because I'm always gone somewhere, chasing something to collect." The man began sulking while his feet barely dragged his body on, at that pace it would've taken weeks to get to the Forest of Death.

"No, that's great, it makes a lot of sense now. I haven't heard about you but now I'll know it's because you're never back in the village, that's fine. I guess grass kind of wavers when you pass it by, that's fine. Don't lose your mojo over it." Mana began almost feeling bad for how badly the man took it.

"Thanks, nice to see you being so cool about it, Chestnut's so mean to me about it, always making fun of me or poking fun of the nickname. I keep telling her to just imagine posters behind me with my nickname written on them and confetti in the background when I introduce myself but she keeps laughing it off." Zairyo cheered up a bit.

Mana stopped to look back at the slowly fading in the horizon Konohagakure, her eyes then returned to her temporary mentor whom she was supposed to be useful for. That must've been all the man looked for in people – how useful they were as it was the only reason he had chosen her. Still, someone who saw her as useful was better than no one at all. The magician dreaded the idea of poking her own brain with illusions again and the headaches it'd cause. With a hopeful smile she looked back at Zairyo and picked up her pace to catch up to the man.

"So why am I so useful to you? Hokage-sensei mentioned it's the special kind of genjutsu I use, would you like me to teach you that?" the magician wondered

"Oh? No, I made that up. I need you because of a mission you once did with Uzumaki Tanshu, you've been in the hidden archive once, you know where it is, right?" the man looked at Mana hopefully.

The magician just nodded, a bit surprised that the man would care about an old low-ranking mission like that.

"Wonderful, I need to pick something up from that archive! Something you guys left behind." the man grinned with little golden stars lighting up in his greedy eyes.


	266. Slither In

Mana had forgotten that trek to the Forest of Death before. Back when she first made her way there with Team Oak she saw it as a lengthy and exhausting trip all in of itself. Since then she had travelled much further and wider and after expanding her scope what was supposed to take a couple of hours of casual strolling now seemed like just a blink of an eye away.

Finally the two had reached the place and the familiar fences covering up a gigantic forest that was dark on the inside due to the incredible competition between its towering trees for sunlight. A couple of hooded ninja stopped the two ninja but and requested to see their documents. It greatly surprised Mana, how could have two at least Chuunin level ninja have not recognized a Konohagakure Sannin? Zairyo must've been away quite often and for lengthy periods of time.

Once the hooded ninja saw the man's documents they began bowing and apologizing erratically which was quickly dismissed by Zairyo who just rubbed the back of his head and sighed as if all of this was just a big pester. The magician felt a bit bad for those two, Konoha ninja had a feeling of comradery and honor between each other. Everyone was ready to lay their heads for their comrades just to bring honor to their families and their service. Something like that must've stayed in those poor guards' hearts and pressed against their chests for some time to come. Embarrassment was not a pleasant companion.

After being let inside the fenced off area through a large wooden gate Mana looked around and made sure to breathe in as much of the outside weather as possible before the massiveness of the forest overwhelmed her. Almost instantly the magician felt the painful sensations of insects trying and suck her dry, something that shocked the girl a bit as she had never went through a similar experience with an accompanying Sannin before. Then it hit Mana, something she didn't notice feeling, or rather not feeling before.

"You don't have Killing Intent, do you?" the magician realized. Then again, she never checked if Chestnut Hanasaku had one either, the girl was just so used to Tanshu's absolutely crushing Intent that one had to combat every moment of being nearby that man that she just assumed Hanasaku had one. The warm and epic sensations in her skin when facing that woman could've been just her status reflecting on Mana and not her Intent.

"Oh no! I'm a pretty swell guy, when you're as chill as me it's literally impossible to get that…" Zairyo laughed out with a bit of embarrassment. "I recall the last time you've been here with Tanshu, right? That must've saved you a lot of trouble…"

"Yeah… It wasn't as trouble-free as you might imagine, he left us alone to fight for our lives." Mana recalled still struggling to decide which trip was worse, the last one where locating the archive was comfortable and safe but she was left to die facing off those gigantic centipedes or this one.

"Heh… I'm sure that's not how he meant it to be seen. Still, didn't you run into the inhabitants? For a kid that young fighting off even the insects that live here must've been a hassle!" Zairyo whistled with surprise.

"It doesn't matter…" Mana puffed up her cheeks in embarrassment remembering the dip into centipede goo that she had to go through last time. "Anyways, I find it really hard to believe that I could've missed an important scroll. I know a lot of common dialects of historic periods: Uluru, Anansi, Anchel and several more… What could've been stored there that was so important?" the magician lifted her eyebrow with some bitter memories flooding through.

"Oh? Can you just read normally though? It's supposed to be written on the scroll "Bailong – the White Dragons"." Zairyo explained with a bit of hesitance before revealing the object he was seeking.

"Is it a history scroll? Bailong are legendary animals, you can read plenty about them in the legend and tale scrolls I've brought back and countless others…" Mana still couldn't wrap her head around what exactly the man was after. She took it a little bit personally when the man implied she could've missed an important scroll after she took so much care in selecting the ones to salvage.

"No…" Zairyo planted his palm onto his own face before dragging it down slowly, "It's a Summoning Contract scroll."

Mana restrained her first instinct which was to erupt into laughter. Still, not too long ago she left on a trip equally as crazy with some of her best friends, the odds of Box of Ultimate Bliss existing were just as small as those of the Bailong contract scroll.

"The Bailong are supposed to be large creatures, the largest of them – Longshirisu covered up the entire sky. Even if their contract scroll does exist, where do you believe their sacred region is? Where would the entire species of gigantic dragons that can wrap around the planet hide?" the magician inquired, her tone was not dismissive or trying to poke fun of the man's desired treasure, she just wanted to hear what his theory on the species illusiveness was.

"Look, kid, I've lived my entire life wandering from one place hiding one legendary treasure to another on nothing else but rumors and hunches. I've been disappointed and proven wrong more times than I can count, I've also found more of them than anyone would believe – it's how I got to where I am today. I don't care about where the Bailong are, how they can remain hidden or anything like that – I just want to see if the scroll is there or not." Zairyo replied with bitterness in his voice.

"Hmmm…" Mana rubbed her temples as the man's disappointing reply made her feel like her brain was actually attacked, "What kind of a collector are you? Treasure is something you seek, something you imagine and see in front of you and strive to reach! Treasure is what drives you forward, it's what makes you fight people you'd never cross otherwise because your dream burns that brightly. Why are you so dry when faced with a possibility of such a discovery?" she almost yelled out.

"I've found nothing but more clues or an empty vault dozen times too many after spending decades too much time looking for them…" Zairyo shrugged with indifference.

"Oh, come on! Something like that would be such an amazing historic discovery! Have some enthusiasm behind your steps, own every single one of them!" Mana yelled out vibrantly before taking a happy leap and bumping straight into the face of a giant brown head, at least four times her size and very lacking in its attempt to be concealed behind a bush yet darkness and the extending tree branches helped it compensate what the reptile lacked.

Slimy and wet layers of skin-like substance unwrapped revealing giant yellow eyes as the small and sensitive nose which Mana bumped into lifted up revealing a large brown snake covered in black stripes. In its entirety the thing could've been well over eight meters in radius yet it slithered so flawlessly in between the slim forest spaces utilizing it so perfectly and leaving large cave-like gaps that Mana couldn't help but be impressed on top of her shock which soon turned to fear for her life.

The creature lifted its head wrapping around trees and extending a good thirty meters above the girl, running in just short from reaching the top layer and seeing the sunlight yet if it wanted to it'd easily be capable of such. The entire length of the thing was impossible to tell as it barely only lifted its head to slither a bit higher and position itself for a better strike at its potential snack. Frankly the energy wasted of impaling this little speck of human flesh on its oak-sized fangs would not even be compensated by eating both of the little humans that bumped into the snake.

Mana stood perfectly still listening for the leaves or a faintest clue of where the snake's head was. Zairyo just carelessly picked his nose and lamented the fact that their way was blocked by the parts of the snake's slithering body. A deafening sound of the snake's body slamming against the trees and its tail being slapped against the ground forced Mana to cover her ears – now her only reliable sense was disabled. The snake was really smart, using its massive body to hide the sound of when it'd decide to strike.

Then all of a sudden the sound stopped, Mana looked up only to see the snake's mouth shut closed and its head awkwardly bent backwards, without a doubt, after trying to bite at Mana and kill it with one swoop. The handle of Zairyo's sword was imbedded in the snake's nose, the man completely nullified the force of its rush stopping both of them in a flight of weightlessness before the Sannin just kicked the massive snake's head aside allowing it to tumble over the trees and actually letting in some sunlight.

"Sorry, I kinda need the kid to show me the way…" Zairyo mumbled before beginning to check his belt and the multitude of swords in sheathes, each fancier than the last, to see which one of his swords should he use to dispatch of the beast quickly.

"This snake isn't local to these parts…" Mana mumbled out in complete shock of the Sannin's level of strength and how lightly he was taking the situation.

"No. It's too large… Either it was summoned by a Snake Contract user or it followed a prey here, either way, it's quite impressive." Zairyo nodded before finally settling on a sword he'd use.

"It's an underground snake, it burrows underground, that's how it got here, that's the only way it could have bypassed all the barriers and security." Mana suggested before the Sannin grabbed her and leaped away from the colossal snake's charge from underground. The majestic reptile tried to tackle the two with enough force to send them tumbling through trees, possibly breaking some bones and softening them up for a quick kill.

"Good call… It could've still been summoned here." The man suggested another theory.

"No, a giant snake like this getting summoned would've stressed it, it would've caused too much ruckus and would've exposed the summoner to the security. I believe your theory about it following a prey here, something smaller…" Mana replied before the Sannin pulled out another blade which was similar to an extended whip and tied around one of the standing trees, with a yank the man pulled himself and the magician to it and placed her down.

"This thing's above your paygrade, stay here…" Zairyo warned Mana with a surprising amount of indifference to his voice for a man warning someone he needed for this quest.

"Could you maybe, please, not kill it?" the magician wondered.

Zairyo opened his mouth to argue, he had good reason to as the reptile was from faraway lands and so long way from home that it'd be impossible to move it without unnecessary hassle for a giant snake. Then, for whatever reason she just closed his eyes and relented, realizing that he didn't really care if the snake lived or died as long as it was out of his way. The man's body disappeared from the branch he was standing on so fast and without a single trace that it would've been impossible to tell that he ever even was there.

Mana turned at the snake and tried to follow the man's movements, clearly he was a bit too far away and moved too fast, even in complete indifference to the battle at hand, still, she could make out at least some details from the way the snake reacted to the completely invisible to it movements of the man.

The reptile appeared to be using its tongue quite often, maybe it was using it to hunt a very specific prey as using it to just take in air particles like most snakes did would've been useless for its size. Having the size of its tongue in mind it would've taken in far too many different scents and ultimately it would've just confused the creature and made it use too much of its brain just to discern and interpret the various smells. It must've used it to sense some sort of residual chakra that a creature used when fighting or using it. That would've limited the prey it hunted but it would've been a lethal hunting mechanism, it also would've explained how the creature managed to avoid being cut to pieces for so long against a Konoha Sannin.

"The tongue!" Mana shouted out, "Cut it off!"

Even before her yells were finished being formed the reptile's tongue exploded in blood and spiraled from its mouth crashing at another part of the forest in a crimson flash that created a powerful scarlet spark so intense that the girl had to turn away for a moment. The man must've been using one of his collected weapons for that.

"Don't tell me what to do!" the Sannin's voice reached back shortly after the man grabbed Mana again and relocated her as the snake's tail attempted to crush the tree she was standing on. In a flash the girl was relocated on another spot.

Now that the snake could no longer sense the Sannin with its strange tracking ability, validating Mana's theory, the man quickly dispatched of it. To the magician it all looked really vague, first a feint yellow flash of light below made bright yellow lightning-like bolt pierce the clear late autumn sky and smash into the snake's head quickly making it fall to the ground before the Sannin, rotating vertically cut at its upper head again summoning another lightning bolt to pierce the sky and smash against the creature's head. The man then pulled out a long katana with a light purple tinted steel and cut the snake's skin.

The air around the predator began to whirl and bend as it appeared like the wound ate the entire snake up by having it swallow itself with the speed a ramen addict eats a mouthful of noodles in. Just like that the reptile was gone. Mana didn't even notice when the Sannin dashed to her and brought her down and further away from the messy part of the forest that'd need to be repaired by the people maintaining order in the place soon.

"Don't worry, I stored the snake in a pocket dimension. Didn't kill it. I'll release it somewhere where I'll think it could make a living in once this is done." the collector shrugged before sheathing the blade he used to store the snake away.

"Without its tongue it'll have a tough time catching prey…" Mana longingly looked at the sky a bit worried for the reptile's future.

"Pfft… It's a sneaky devil, I had to sweat it to dent its scales. I've seen those same concentrated chakra bolts completely swallow up and reduce a trained ninja to ashes. It definitely was someone's pet… Even if it got here accidentally." The man scratched the back of his head before beginning to slowly walk ahead. Noticing that Mana didn't keep moving he turned back.

"What's wrong? Going the wrong way?" he wondered.

"No. It didn't get here by accident. It followed something… Something that's its usual prey but uses chakra, probably another ninja animal or a ninja that's native to the snake's habitat." Mana looked back at the hole in the forest roof left by the snake wondering just what could've drawn it here.

"You just let me worry about whatever that thing is." Zairyo urged her to keep walking with a chin gesture pointing onwards. After a couple of moments Mana calmed down and continued to show the man the path to the archive, at least as much as she remembered it as there was plenty of running for her life involved the last time she found it.

"Still, what an absolutely bad timing, just when I decide to look for something, someone decides to look for the same thing… I mean there's nothing else of use in this dump. We strand kids here for fun as a rite of passage…" Zairyo sighed looking a bit down on his luck.

He had some moderate point, for a ninja to come here and invade Land of Fire's territory seeking for something it must've been pretty important. There was nothing of importance in this place except a large region of forest, giant animals and an entire ecosystem of cruelty and life economics. Everyone weighing life on the scale if more energy would be gained than it would take to end it. Everything Mana hated about the world she lived in wrapped with a fence and closed off like some sick experiment.

The magician began to chuckle a little before breaking out in a fit of laughter. Zairyo looked at her funny before wandering what that was about. As Mana kept on laughing the man became visibly more annoyed and desperate to laugh as hard as she was. That mystery of her cheer held a certain power over him, compelled him to reach out to it wider and wider.

"Look on the bright side, if someone bothered to come all the way down here to look for it as well – it means that there's a solid chance of it really being here…" Mana finally settled her emotions down to explain what made her smile this much.

The man's eyes wandered up as he thought for a brief moment before his lips also tipped up in a smile. Then his cheekbones curved his face in a weird manner before he could restrain his laughter no more. Mana was glad to see the man a bit more energetic and happy about this quest, everyone looking for a grand discovery needed to live for that discovery, burn with that fire of curiosity and craving for that moment of finding what they seeked. If Mana was that indifferent to the result when she looked for the Box of Ultimate Bliss she'd have given up all the way back in the Land of Wind's desert ruins. She'd still be unable to control chakra, most likely…

Then again, Shimo would most likely still be alive. Mana had not yet discovered this point, by giving up on this one quest when it seemed too much of a bother the Sannin saved himself more disappointment and loss. He focused only on the artifacts he could actually obtain instead of obsessing over his failure locating this single one he just couldn't find. Still, discovery needed to be obsessed over, it needed fire, enthusiasm. Mana truly believed that, she had to.


	267. Into the Rabbit Hole

There was certain rhythmic monotony to the duo's trip. Mana's pace had slowed down significantly, she was trying to be more careful and mindful of her surroundings. Last time she left the archive it was completely totaled. It was very likely that there'd not be a breath of air between the massive stone pieces that filled the underground facility. If an object as ancient as the Summoning Contract of the Bailong was even in the archive to begin with, it'd be either completely turned to dust or greatly damaged at this point.

With Mana being used to the monotony of her steps clacking in tandem with the thuds of her companion she was instantly made aware of the fact that Zairyo had stopped moving and began looking up. The magician's own gaze followed only to greet a swift blur of brown feathers that latched onto the swordsman's arm and hesitantly began clawing at it, causing irritation but still not breaking the skin, rushing the wielder to take away the contents that the hawk had carried.

"What is this?" Mana wondered out loud.

"My orders. My servitude for my village is what separates a man who is constantly journeying and is simply absent from the village affairs from a rogue ninja who is having people sent to take care of him. I am still a subordinate of my village, most of the times…" the man replied indifferently as his eyes struggled to read the letter's contents due to the rather difficult to work with lighting. The Sannin pocketed the letter and gently flicked the hawk on the top of his head, it must've been a way to commend the animal for breaking through the difficult upper layers of the forest as the hawk let its voice be known and expressed in joyful pride.

Soon the bird departed.

"I thought the Sannin are as good as retired, do you still take orders from the village?" Mana stopped walking as the Sannin's explanation confused her.

"Technically Sannin are considered ninja of great value that have paid their dues. They take up the missions they themselves want to be part of, in a way, they do not get orders. They get suggestions of open jobs that may require their expertise. That being said, I was not a Sannin my whole life. I've been receiving orders from the village through messenger hawks for many years, all the way until I've become Sannin." Zairyo sighed, the magician's curiosity must've really begun to get to the man.

After a brief pause the kunoichi turned around and kept on walking, carefully looking around to identify clues around her that may have helped the magician identify the archive or at least that she was getting close.

"So you've been making the grass waver for pretty long, huh?" Mana asked, still keeping her eyes occupied.

"Ever since my team spirit died out. I was a bit older than you when I left, at first ninja were sent after me but after several encounters and proof that I haven't deserted, given the circumstances of my background, I was allowed to work while constantly on the move. I'd like to think I have made myself useful…" Zairyo closed his eyes beginning to recall the memorable moments of his past deep in his mind. Even with his eyes closed and his mind fleeting the man managed not to bump against a single tree in a forest infamous for its thickness and cruel conditions.

The magician's emerald gaze met the man's eyes once they opened but then wandered off and began surveying the environment again. The Sannin sighed, he knew quite well what exactly the girl wished to ask but didn't.

"My team betrayed me and tried to kill me. After the Second Great Ninja War ended, the mood with the young brats was not too pro-ninja village and pro-war. Young kids right out of Academy died out by thousands, entire classrooms sent to war and eliminated in their entirety. The desertion rate was so off the roof that they began skewing the statistics. I refused to desert with my team so I was betrayed, taken out and left to die. My teammates may have been deserters but they were also wimps who couldn't finish me off. I think that the Third Hokage may have gotten a bit squeamish of forcing me work, he just let me work it out the best way I saw how. If he had pressed me with orders and reminders of the "ninja way", I'd have snapped too, I think…" Zairyo recalled.

Judging from the man's voice it didn't look like he had that much hidden negative feelings or pent up suffering towards the events he described. He was talking of his team like they were already dead, granted, it could've been because they were, but his lack of grief or regret for his past was so evident that it rudely clawed at the listeners ears.

"I'm sorry. I didn't want to dig around painful memories." Mana uttered more like out of habit, sad but knowing full well that her words would likely fall on deaf ears.

"Everyone's got a dark past, everyone's got painful memories. The people who do despicable things for that reason I really cannot stand… I think those two statements are in direct relation to each other." Zairyo looked on before reaching out to Mana's shoulder and stopping her in the girl's tracks before pointing forward. "You've gotten distracted." He stated more as a general statement than a scolding.

Ahead, past a vast layer of bushes and low hanging trees laid the tough wrangled chitin shell of a gigantic centipede. A very common yet lethal predator of these grounds. Mana leaned down hoping to avoid getting noticed by the insect but Zairyo did no such thing.

"Where there's one there may be more. It wouldn't be wise causing a big ruckus so close to the archive. I still hope there are some stones left unturned there." Mana suggested that the man took a more cautious approach but Zairyo just glared at Mana before returning his strict eyes back at the centipede. The magician peeked through the leaves and kept on staring at the static centipede that just stood there completely straightened out before seeing what Zairyo saw and what she should've seen sooner.

The centipede was a scarecrow. The chitin shell was completely scratched out and rid from its fleshy contents, the goo was evidently rid somewhere else as it would've emitted too bad of a stench not to notice immediately. For now the magician couldn't tell what the armored shells were filled with but it certainly was no living being. Someone killed a centipede and left this as a tool to scare off smaller animals and inferior predators from pestering the killer as they did something else.

"This is bad." Mana whispered. "If that person can take out a centipede and chose to do this, likely to avoid conflict, that means they also wish to save themselves from trouble. What other reason would someone capable of killing a larger predator have for doing this if not wishing to preserve what's underground and very sensitive?"

Zairyo smiled. He must've been pretty impressed by the magician's perception. "We've no time to waste then, let's move and try to pick up our pace." The man nodded before disappearing in the upper layer of trees. Mana sighed, the last thing she needed was a struggle to keep up with the man, she was nowhere near as fast or as strong as even genin that were her peers. She always came out on top due to sharpness of her thought or knowledge where to strike rather than how strong. And yet the girl followed, to the best of her ability.

A calm breeze managed to make its way past the thick layer of leaves and down to the stuffy stench of the ground level of Forest of Death. A rare gust of fresh air managed to do the same. With a quick appearance of two figures all the smaller rodents that thrived because of how small and inconsequential they were, nearly impossible to catch and keep hold of by the colossal predators that lived here, scattered in fear.

"What's wrong?" Zairyo asked as Mana kept on wandering the area looking at every corner of every tree. "You stopped, I had to blitz a good twenty kilos back for you…" he asked for a clarification.

"This is it. This is the place." The girl explained as she kept on searching for the faintest clue as to where and what could've remained of the hidden archive she once visited.

As the Sannin's eyes wandered around he noticed countless more centipedes cut down and into smaller pieces by the shells of their hardened armor. Like a field of chopped up predators that alerted anyone that whoever did this was not going to play around. These were also still gooey and dripping with the smelly innards of the creature they were peeled off of and filled with… Something else.

"That's not the smell of centipede goo…" Mana realized as she turned her attention from the total lack of any remains of the archive to the field of insectoid remains stuck up on sticks and left hanging. Each one of them was as large as a human being so it did have a certain degree of creepiness and fear factor to it.

"Don't get distracted!" Zairyo shouted, "Is the archive here, or not?"

"It… It has to be…" Mana returned to the beautiful and pristine smooth grassy plains that laid where there was once ruins of an archive that had its own building as well as an underground facility. "It was here, this makes no sense, there was supposed to be at least some stony remains of the building. The way it looks now… Unless I was wrong, unless I got lost…" the magician looked away beginning to feel bad about wasting the Sannin's time. Once again she found a way to screw up.

"Are you okay?" Zairyo asked, his voice lacked empathy but it was curious and did have some feeling to it, Mana just wasn't sure what exactly it could've been.

"Not even remotely…" the magician admitted. "My friend paid the price for my gift, my sensei hates me and I am beginning to think that I've wasted your time…"

"What are you talking about? You got me right where you said you would get me." Zairyo smiled with a half-assed grin. Almost like he mocked the magician.

"No!" Mana shouted out. "No, this can't be it!" she walked past the stage of self-pity and began getting angry. "There has to be more to this place."

"There isn't. The Bailong scroll is just a big dud, my sources lied, let's go home." Zairyo sighed and began trekking back with his hands in his pockets and his multiple swords, tied around his belt, dangling.

"B-But that person, the one who killed those centipedes and that snake…" Mana wrapped her hands around her face, closed her eyes, even while her visual orbs were closed they were running around as she rapidly ran through multiple scenarios and theories in her mind, none of them making even a remote nick of sense.

"It's not here. It's gone. I can't see anything here but pristine well maintained grass and pear trees." Zairyo coughed, he had stopped in his tracks and angrily looked back at Mana, "Now let's go back. You're wasting your own time you could spend trying to catch up with your teammates who are now being trained quite extensively."

"Wait… Pear trees?" Mana looked up noticing the sudden change of the flora in the trees that the surrounding area contained. The girl placed her hands together in a hand seal position, "Dispel" she whispered as the smells of citrus and fresh air, also freshly cut grass as well as the sights of a well maintained forest ground decorated with pear trees faded like smoke.

"It was an illusion, not even a very good one. I'd have expected a genjutsu user identify one faster. Your mind really wasn't in the game." Zairyo once again just stated the fact coldly without any judgment behind his rather judgmental words. "Team problems and being the odd one in your pack is nothing special, you're the one who gives it too much meaning. Trust me, Hanasaku doesn't really hate you deep inside, neither do your friends. Maybe they think you're awkward or weird, Chestnut may not even like you but they don't care enough about you to hate you. No one truly hates people that don't mess with them with malice. I don't hate my own team that betrayed me because they didn't betray me because they hated me, they betrayed me because they wanted a way out."

Mana looked down feeling a bit ashamed but then she just smiled to herself before her face changed back to bitterness.

"That still doesn't qualify as "training"." She bitterly noted. "As far as I'm concerned you still ripped me off…"

"Was worth a shot…" Zairyo shrugged. "Still, I may want to pay you back, you may be useful in the future and useful people need to be kept happy so that they keep helping you in the future."

"And that's just… Mean and… Objectifying to people in general." Mana noted once again with disdain in her voice, not malicious one but more of the playful variety.

Without playing along Zairyo walked up to the demolished and caved in stony building of which only caved in floor remained. "What are the odds of the scroll making it?" he wondered.

"Not great…" Mana replied while sadly shaking her head.

"Earth Style: Mole Cricket!" the man chanted out weaving a pair of hand seals with his single hand while firmly holding the other on the endless layers of stone. The demolished stone pieces all shrieked in pent up pressure built up inside them before exploding in violent shrapnel that all got reduced to mere dust before it could hit anything. As the stone dust collapsed only a wide hole leading to total darkness remained.

"Stand back, arsehole, or de girlie gets it!" a loud and very distinctively south-western speaking voice alerted the Sannin who stood up from his accomplishment of opening up a hole to the archive without demolishing it any further and gazed upon the situation he ended up in.

Behind him holding Mana hostage with a long one edged blade to her neck and a knife to her lower abdomen was a good half a person sized rabbit standing on two feet. The rabbit had a darker and grittier shade of pink as its dominant fur color, a scar on one of its eyes and wore a very traditional warrior armor not seen on any ninja for hundreds of years. Its facial features looked pretty seasoned and serious despite its overall cuteness.

"It will be very difficult to "get her", having in mind she's holding you hostage…" Zairyo closed his eyes in disappointment in his enemy's skill as the person that the rabbit held as his hostage erupted in flower petals and a kunai was pressed against the rabbit's own throat from behind.

"Goddang it, damned hatchlin'!" the rabbit cursed. "I'ma kill ye when I get outta dis!" he kept on cursing which contrasted his cuteness. With a metal slick sound Mana's kunai found its way back in one of her hidden pockets while the magician grabbed the rabbit by its throat and began smothering it.

"Oy, oy, oy! I'm an esteemed warrior of de ninja-rabbits, tasked ta return da long lost Rabbit Contract scroll! You will stop treatin' me as a pet and unhand me at once, ye filthy hatchlin'!"

"Can I keep him around?" Mana asked enthusiastically giving her companion the puppy eyes.

"As long as you can keep him from killing you." Zairyo shrugged.

"Wait, what did you say your mission was?" Mana wondered after letting go of the giant two legged rabbit that angrily stared at her trying to behead the girl with sight alone. The rabbit reached for his sword but an annoyed growl by Zairyo made the ninja animal reconsider engaging the two ninja and further irritating the high ranking shinobi. Zairyo's immense hidden power and high rank was emanating so clearly that it soaked right through the rabbit's cells and was apparent even to a non-sensor.

"I am Usuzoku, the Rabbit Swordsman! I came from faraway lands 'ere ta recover a Rabbit Contract scroll stolen long ago, unless we sign da Contract with a powerful ninja, I fear we may go extinct and forgotten…" the cute rabbit rogue explained with utmost urgency in its working lagomorph cheeks.

"Wait, you mean to find it here?" Zairyo looked at the rabbit in confusion.

"Aye, de scroll is 'ere alright. The sneaky mongoose that dun stole it brought it here, where it remained hidden for centuries with the ninja rabbits unable to sign another contractor." Usuzoku nodded, despite his eyes being absolutely adorable, he was clearly believing in what he was saying and had absolutely no doubts that the scroll was here.

"Hundreds of years is a long time to not look for a stolen scroll…" Mana teased the rabbit, she just couldn't help but feel more cheerful around such a peculiar and strangely cute looking creature that felt as deadly as it was dainty.

"Ye stupid hatchling broad, we were deceived by de filthy mongooses! We had no idea it was 'ere ta begin with! Then there was also the matter of pride – after beating the mongooses we kinda felt like we didn' need no humans. We rabbits are a proud species of ninja animals! We figured that humans would line up to be our partners after beating dem pesky mongooses!" Usuzoku freaked out once again threatening Mana with his longsword before backing down himself. If rabbits could have growled, that was exactly what the pink furred rogue was trying to do at Mana.

"There was a war between ninja rabbits and ninja mongooses?" Mana asked curiously.

Usuzoku just screamed out loud with a cry of lost hope with a good mix of unhealthy pent up rage built up in her face. Then he turned away and hopped up to Zairyo who was just indifferently looking down at the ruined archive and back at the rabbit.

"So I assume it was you that lured that snake here? Killed those centipedes?" Zairyo looked around wondering.

"No, it was a filthy mongoose that dun did it! I found 'im and lopped its head off, I did! The darned bastard must've known I was sent here and came to relocate the scroll. Mongoose spies are slimy but intelligent – they are everywhere and know everything. They musta done somethin' to make humans forget about us too, no one went lookin' for us for ages!" Usuzoku growled angrily before nodding to himself.

"Who cares about any of this? I came here for the Bailong Contract scroll, not ninja rabbits…" Zairyo sighed in dissapointment.

Usuzoku pulled his ears hard, yanking them down in frustration as his jaw opened wide in shock. "Ye mean ye ain' even gonna sign our contract!?" the ninja rabbit shouted out in surprise. "Yer a damned solid ninja, we need summoners to thrive and return to our former glory!" the rabbit almost resorted to pleading but then he remembered his pride and quickly jumped back.

"I can sign it…" Mana raised a possibility.

"Screw you!" Usuzoku screamed out in frustration.

Mana looked aside disappointed that the cute rabbit refused her, "Fine, can I then maybe at least help you find the scroll? Most species hold their Contract scrolls in their respective sacred grounds and summon them when they need it."

"We did that, it was stolen by mongooses, ye filthy hatchlin' broad!" Usuzoku shouted back at Mana.

"Say, how powerful are you, rabbit?" Zairyo wondered.

Usuzoku stabbed his sword at the ground letting it get stuck in the forest soil as he leaned against it proudly. "I can split dis Oyth with dis 'ere sword as I stand!" he bragged.

"Fine. Someone like you sounds like something a fruit of "training" would be like, wouldn't you say, Mana?" Zairyo asked the girl only for the magician to nod in energetic agreement. "Therefore, if you sign this Rabbit Contract and acquire the ability to summon ninja rabbits, I will, by definition, have trained you…" Zairyo concluded his suggestion to Mana. Usuzoku visibly didn't like where this was going.

"The kid expressed genuine wish to help you finding your scroll. That's ninety nine more shits than I will ever give. Now let's go down there and look for that scroll." The Sannin annoyingly ordered the magician and the rabbit before leaping down into the hole he made earlier.

Mana smiled before looking teasingly at Usuzoku who just sheathed his sword behind his back and crossed his hands around his chest.

"Fine, I guess I'll let ye allow yerselves ta help me, just dis once 'ere time…" he concluded before following the magician behind and hopping into the hole together with Mana.


	268. It's not Like I'm A Friend or Anything!

"It's in a remarkably great condition." Mana noted while looking around. Zairyo had used a ninjutsu technique that created a small light emitting sphere in his hand and walked up front, leading the way. At this point the trio were just wandering around the archive looking for the scroll that Usuzoku needed. "The centipede that used to block the entrance also appears to be gone…" the magician recalled the obstacle that prevented her from leaving the archive all the way back.

"Aye, de centipede goo is a great delicacy for dem mongooses. I must admit its slimy qualities hold certain power over me too, however, da very fact that the mongooses find it alluring deters me." Usuzoku explained only for Mana to throw up a little bit of illusionary bile in her mouth. She had every right to despise the material, she once literally swam in it for her life and mission objective.

Zairyo was obliviously nodding, when his eyes met Mana's questioning gaze he just shrugged, "What? It's rich in protein and food is scarce when you wander…" the man waved his hands feeling a bit on the defensive side.

"So what if the scroll really is destroyed?" Mana wondered, "What happens to the ninja rabbits? Do they become just rabbits?"

"Don' be stupid, ye dirty hatchling. We'd just make a new one." Usuzoku squinted at her fighting the impulse to physically hurt the magician.

"So why didn't you make a new one when this one was stolen?" Mana scratched her head in confusion, also to remove the excessive number of cobwebs that tangled in her long dark hair.

"Gee, I dunno, maybe it's because it's our Contract Scroll!? Why don't you humans build a new Hokage mountain and just blow this one to pieces fer no reason?" Usuzoku stopped and used his large toes to lift his body up to meet Mana's eyes on her level. The two just stared each other down for a while before Zairyo sighed in boredom.

The man bit his thumb and quickly made a bunch of hand seals before driving his hand to the ground.

"Summoning Jutsu!" he shouted as a cloud of smoke erupted after a loud pop of air and a flash of light. Where the smoke soon clear stood a pair of zebra-like looking creatures except they both stood on two hind legs and had strong looking horns on their foreheads. The creatures had completely red colored eyes which made the magician take a cautionary step back after the duo revealed themselves but then their expressions pacified somewhat and they just stared blankly at their summoner.

"Help me find a Rabbit Contract Scroll. It's supposed to be here somewhere…" the man grumped it out to his ninja animals who quickly scattered through the archive that wasn't really even that large and could've been examined in a good twenty minutes of careful observation. Had the Sannin shared this part of the plan with the magician she'd have disagreed to further worsen this place's integrity.

"Wait, you have a contract with ninja zebras?" Usuzoku stared at the recently performed summoning technique with shock. Almost like his entire life choices were just put into question.

"Yeah. They're useful and quite powerful runners. This pair also possesses the horn mutation which is rare amongst the species, they are a valuable specimen." Zairyo shrugged.

"YE IDIOT!" Usuzoku yelled out, for the first time the magician saw the rabbit being angry at someone else than her, "You can't be signed ta two species at once! Why did'ya even look for de damned Bailong scroll anyways if it's useless fer ya!?"

"Huh? I once fought a guy who used both a snake and a panda summon. I thought you could sign to as many species as you can convince to sign it… I thought the one species rule is more of a recommendation to deepen the "bond" between the summoner and the animal or some bullcrap like that…" the Sannin explained his position only for Usuzoku to facepalm.

"Un-frickin'-believable." The rabbit sung out to himself, "Ye idiot, ya can sign the individual contract with any number of given individual members of da species, but the species contract only works for one species at a time. Even if ya had found the Bailong contract it'd have been useless fer ya! Some summoner ninja choose to never sign the species contract, instead opting ta go for countless different individual contracts with different species. Dat's the idiot ye fought!"

Two combined loud poofs interrupted the conversation. Both Zairyo and Usuzoku looked on ahead at the cloud of grey smoke with great shock.

"What's that?" Mana wondered after a loud sizzling sound interrupted her own desire to nag her companions for answers.

A powerful explosion lifted the floor in the particular area of Forest of Death up, opening up by making the ceiling of the ruined archive pop up like a lid of a pickle jar after the air pressure inside builds up however it was no air that caused this particular eruption of dirt and ground that rained from the sky together with a downpour of rock and paper.

An arm erupted from the hole pulling out from underground a ponytail wearing man – the owner of said arm who was quite pissed judging from the expression on his face. In a moment's notice something, like a furious rocket, blasted out from underground in a pink flurry of fur and bladework, cutting and kicking air for the rabbit's little paws could get their hold on nothing else to cut to pieces. Zairyo picked himself up and got himself together, even if he was caught in the explosion he had little to no injury to his clothes, opting instead to augment his body and simply take the explosion instead of choosing to avoid it in some more wasteful manner. A sword found its way into the man's arm, gripped firmly the blade that extended past the hilt was of solid gold color with a hieroglyph positioned at the tip of the blade meaning "giraffe".

"The scroll… It's… Gone…" Usuzoku cried out looking at the falling and still smoldering pieces of paper and leather that covered some of the scrolls' backs. "So many years of questing, so many investigations…" he still couldn't believe it as the animal tried to grab paper from paper but every single scrap burnt up just as it touched the paws of the poor crying animal.

"Forget that, where's the kid?" Zairyo asked Usuzoku who kept on weeping over the raining storm of scorched knowledge that was never to be read by anyone again.

"Heh, heh, heh, eat shit, ya stupid rabbit scum!" a sneaky laughter chuckled from behind. Usuzoku jumped up and turned around in a feat of acrobacy, foreseeing an attack from behind to come, which didn't come. Still, his aerial maneuver permitted by his immensely powerful lower body strength was remarkably impressive regardless.

"Mongoose!" he hissed out in anger. "There's always another mongoose!" the rabbit growled to himself.

"I assume you will take care of it?" Zairyo sighed before sheathing the sword. Even if the swordsman realized that the ninja animal that attacked him had greatly pissed him off, it was still a much more personal opponent for the pink rabbit rogue and the Sannin respected the rightful right of dibs for those with a personal history with an enemy.

"Aye." The rabbit nodded before he pulled out his large sword with both of his ears by allowing them to wrap around the blade whilst the rabbit's own arms pulled out two smaller daggers from his belt holsters.

The ninja mongoose that stood on an emptied centipede carcass stand brandished its claw gauntlets that had double clawed threat to them – one was the mongoose's natural claws, fully capable of decapitating a person or a large snake and fully capable of chakra imbuement due to their natural origin with them being a part of the mongoose's body. The other – steel claws were likely made from high tier chakra conductive alloy for they glowed bland blue – the color of base and lacking an elemental affinity chakra.

Usuzoku leaped at his opponent clashing with them, using his large sword to distract and occupy the animal's gauntlets, placing two quick swipes from his short daggers that danced as fast as lightning. Soon the deceitful mongoose realized that there was no following that particular pair of daggers once the skilled eviscerator – Usuzoku the ninja rabbit got his hands on them.

The mongoose quickly responded with a counterattack swiping with those clawed gauntlets of his. Usuzoku was no longer where the mongoose wished the rabbit to be, however, instead explosive tags of the rabbit himself sizzled trying to give this mongoose something of his own medicine. After the dirt and smoke picked up from the blast cleared out Usuzoku tried to survey his environment, there was nothing of the mongoose left.

"Ye stupid mongoose!" Usuzoku yelled out as his ears flung the large two handed sword into the air and his hands quickly tossed the pair of blades up only for the rabbit's long ears to lock around them while the rogue's hands made hand seals. Once the long sword landed the switch was reversed and the rabbit hopped slightly slamming the ground with great force that sent a crushing shockwave through the surrounding area, powerful enough to make the ground bend and wave like an ocean and crushing the surrounding trees from the sheer immensity of the force passing through them, surfacing their underground roots in great quantity.

"Earth Style: Exo-co-ét!" Usuzoku yelled out looking at the lifeless sack of flesh, fur and bones that got tossed out from underground. The rabbit lunged at the seemingly unconscious mongoose swinging his larger sword with the intention of cutting the ninja animal in two, just inflicting enough damage to kill it instantly and not letting it return to its native territory in case it was summoned here.

Just as the sword was about to collide with the mongoose the unconscious body poofed into smoke revealing a clone. The real mongoose dived out from underground with some tears and cuts and an awkwardly hanging broken hind leg, having chosen to remain underground and take more damage from the earthquake technique than expose himself for the finishing blow.

A red flash made Usuzoku flip over his axis and plummet down, on his chest a crimson X identified the scar he had received with the mongoose's curved blades bypassing his quick attempts at blocking as well as the primitive and limited armor that the rabbit wore. The rabbit smashed down with immense force, enough to kill any man but Zairyo did not choose to interfere knowing that such an impact would be close to nothing for someone of the rabbit's level of skill.

"Enjoy oblivion, stupid rabbit dirtbag!" the mongoose laughed out. "Now that your Contract Scroll is gone no one will ever sign to you stupid rabbits, you may have won the war, but we – ninja mongooses have won the… Bigger war, comprised of smaller… Less important wars!"

"One thing, ye filthy mongoose bastard…" Usuzoku huffed out as being tagged by his opponent's blade and the double threat manner of his strange weapon leaving a bigger wound than it reasonably should've had drawn most of his breath out. "I see ye ruined all of my centipede scarecrows, huh?" the rabbit asked while glancing around and seeing most of his centipede towers being toppled down.

"That's right, I even toppled all of your stupid towers! No mongoose will ever allow anything built or given birth by a rabbit to stand! For every plan you make, there'll be a mongoose to ruin it all!" the mongoose was really enjoying his wickedness on top of a strong lower tree branch. Then the animal hopped down and brandished his weapons again preparing to go in for the finish.

"So what yer sayin' is… Nothing's stoppin' me from doin' dis…" the rabbit leaned down, the mongoose leaped forward aiming to decapitate his opponent as Usuzoku's movements left countless of openings but the pink rabbit had concluded his movements faster, pulling on a handful of steel wire hidden underground.

"String Reeling Jutsu!" Usuzoku shouted out as the steel wire picked up on other loops of strings and more and more, triggering a chain reaction that soon locked around the mongoose's body and locked the ninja animal down to the tree. The rabbit charged up to the mongoose and lifted his ear-held blade up for the finishing strike before a loud wheezing and coughing of a young magician girl interrupted him and forced the rabbit to take a hop back and observe as Mana crawled out from underground moving like a caterpillar because the object she had her hands and legs wrapped around didn't let her use anything but her body and her head.

"Hatchling…" Usuzoku declared the obvious in surprise.

Zairyo just smiled feeling relieved that he would not have to confront Chestnut Hanasaku about one of her students dying to an explosive trap set up by a ninja mongoose.

"You have the Contract Scroll!" Usuzoku suddenly realized as his eyes fell on a brown leather covered scroll with royal pink ribbons all around it and the hieroglyph for "Rabbit" being dyed on a white circle in purple colors – some of the most expensive colored paint found in the world.

"I figured that you should've outraced that explosion, the only reason for you to have stayed was if you tried to find the scroll after the explosion triggered but before it reached us, then shielded it with your body…" Zairyo walked up to Mana and helped her get up as the magician was pretty banged up and her uniform had suffered some damage. A bunch of her cards were no longer held inside their pockets so they just scattered on the ground forcing Mana to pick them up and seal them inside her hat. Struggling to stay on her feet the magician stumbled up to Usuzoku and handed him the scroll that she had trouble holding in both of her extended hands.

With genuine shock and tears in his eyes the rabbit took the scroll from Mana's hands and placed it in his back scabbard where his two handed sword previously was held. The rabbit took the sword and slammed it right above the mongoose's head, tying up all of the steel wire strings and with a twist of the blade locking them all around the sword.

"That's odd…" Mana whimpered out with a weakened voice. "You've locked the trap up more firmly yet you also gave the mongoose a chance to escape. If he struggles long enough, in an hour or so he'll be able to escape the wire by having the sword cut through it." she explained.

"Hmmm… That doesn't fit the profile you've painted for us…" Zairyo looked at the rabbit questioningly, "Did you really cut off the head of that mongoose before or did you make all of that up?"

Had Usuzoku not had a dark pink fur with darker stripes all over it the two ninja could've seen the ninja animal blush in embarrassment.

"Shuddup, ye filthy humans! I've killed a thousand mongooses, a million billion of dem over de years! I'm Usuzoku – da great rabbit hero warrior!" he shouted out hopping on his large feet just to shout from higher up position than the two humans talking to him.

"Well, I guess that's that then. The brat fulfilled her end of the bargain, good luck with that whole rebirth of the ninja rabbits thing…" Zairyo waved as he started to slowly move back towards where the two entered the forest before.

"Wait, what about the ninja zebra you've summoned?" Mana worried, "I couldn't find them down there… The explosion must've swallowed them first."

"No. The summoned animal can return to their native territory as long as they were summoned to their location at that time. That's the sound you've heard before the explosion." Zairyo shook his head coldly, something made Mana wonder if the Sannin collector would've even cared all that much if these priceless zebra would have truly perished.

"Wait…" Usuzoku touched Mana's shoulder as the magician took her first difficult and painful steps forward. "Da summoner of de species is a very special someone. De ninja animals don' just sign contracts wit' stupid hatchlings like you! Da summoner needs ta represent da species dey sign da contract with, advocate dem and make a name fo' dem!" the rabbit explained with a strict voice. Mana just smiled back.

"Yeah, I know. Take care and best of luck finding that person…" she waved the rabbit goodbye, lifting her hand made Mana's ribs burn up but she really wanted to let the rabbit know that she had no hard feelings for the pink fellow, he was far too cute for anyone to hold anything against him.

"Shuddup, ye stupid broad!" Usuzoku shouted out making Mana turn around while halfway having caught up with her companion. "Come 'ere an sign de damn thing!" he yelled out angrily while covering up his eyes with his ears, half the reason being so he couldn't see the person he hated so much signing the contract because he'd have done something stupid to hurt Mana if he saw it, the other was because he had round crystal orbs of tears running down his cheeks.

Mana's eyes opened wide in happiness as she quickly stumbled back to the scroll and opened it. Just as the scrolls contents became visible a large brush got unsealed from inside the scroll and fell on top of it. Wielding the scroll was really difficult as it was a good deal larger than Mana herself but with moderate effort the magician scribbled her name on the empty signee spot before biting her finger and signing in the second row with blood.

"Dere! Now ye can call on all of us that are willing ta answer yer call. Don' expect to see an elite warrior like me ever! I dun work with de likes 'a hatchlings like you! Just use the Summoning Jutsu whenever ya need us, we're now contractually bound as partners – the ninja rabbits are now your partners, hatchling, don' make light deal of it!"

Mana scratched her chin before slapping her forehead.

"Sorry, Zoku-chan, this won't work…" she realized. The rabbit slammed the giant brush against Mana's face splattering paint all over and making Mana tumble back into a tree from the force of impact.

"Call me dat again, I dare ya! Why de frick won' it work? The Summoning Jutsu is simple, even a total twit can do it!" Usuzoku yelled out.

"Yeah… But I don't like using jutsu I didn't invent unless it's a life or death situation, I will most likely never use the Summoning Jutsu ever… Sorry." Mana bowed for the rabbit to the ground realizing that she had already signed the scroll and it was too late to go back.

Usuzoku hopped up to Mana's hat and peeked inside.

"It's a B-Rank storage seal, ain' it?" he wondered.

"Yes, my father made it and I can seal and unseal things from it as I please, it was modified to be useable by me even though I couldn't replicate it even if I wanted to. I use it out of respect for my father and his gift." Mana explained feeling curious as to what the rabbit had in mind.

Usuzoku put his paw inside the hat before it disappeared far past its bottom and a shine of purple right erupted from it. The rabbit rogue then took some blood off his chest wound and let some of it drip into the hat before the seal began glowing more intensely and closed down.

"If yer stupid rules allow ye to use dis thing 'ere, now ya can summon us from just using the seal by first summoning us into the storage seal's pocket space, then pulling us out. It'll cost ye some more chakra but it's not like you care, do ye, ya stupid hatchling?" Usuzoku explained before tossing the top hat back to Mana and quietly beginning his journey back to wherever ninja rabbits were naturally located.

"Mana!" Zairyo's voice broke the magician out of her daydreaming, "Come on, we've got some decent distance to cover before nighttime, you don't want to stay here past then…" he reminded the kunoichi. Mana picked herself up and quickly limped back to her companion, still feeling a bit banged up.

The total result of that day was overall much more entertaining and fruitful than the magician had initially foreseen them to be!


	269. Shadows of Greater Things

Reading on history of the Great Settlement period was always quite the fascinating subject for Mana. After all, while reading the words "Great Settlement period" made it sound so ancient and integral to the entirety of the ninja village history, truth be told it happened less than four hundred years ago. Compared to the totality of the history it was a completely meaningless step that barely even lasted enough to be seen on a total scale of the cosmic totality. A miniscule space-dust in a vast universe that to the magician glowed deceitfully brightly because it was integral for her own existence.

Even if four hundred, give or take, years didn't sound like much on the historic scale, actually it was quite something in the hectic mess of recent history. The Hokage came and gone, from Fourth to Sixth, the reign of the Fifth breezing through in a record shortage of time. Most of the early heads of villages ruled for their entire lifetimes which were quite impressive. More impressive still having in mind their hectic periods during which they lived.

"Hey…" a shy voice alerted Mana that someone had entered the archive and wanted not to consult an old book but instead to talk to her. After the magician took a glance back she decided to close the book and divert all of her attention to Meiko who was tapping her foot impatiently. Normally the blacksmith would have annoyed the folks doing their research here with the annoying and repetitive foot tapping but she was lucky that it was sort of work hours and very few people fit the criteria of both being off work and giving enough shits to read ancient scrolls in the Konoha Archive.

"Oh, you're back already?" the magician exclaimed in surprise as she pointed a seat nearby to her friend. Frankly, it should've looked a bit confusing and offensive. After all the place was damn empty so if Meiko wanted to sit she needed no pointers as to where to settle down. Sometimes Mana did some technically understandable things that, given the social context were just too embarrassing to remember for no reason at all and this may have gone under the shelf of moments not unlike those very ones.

"We were just gone for a weekend. I mean tomorrow's the sign-ups for the exams… How have things been on your side?" the redhead asked. Mana had to get used to Meiko's moves no longer causing clangs of her armor clanking against other pieces as the girl was now wearing a much more casual tracksuit and not a single steel plate in sight. Meiko even looked a bit thin, if not somewhat tomboyish, without her armor, the magician was used to seeing this firm, stiff and masculine brutish shape whenever she looked at Meiko's armored frame which now simply was not there.

"Well… The Zairyo thing was kind of a bust. Picked up one new skill in particular but… Doing my own training most of the time, you?" Mana went on to be honest without going into too much detail. Maybe she should've – after all Meiko was a teammate and would've benefited from knowledge of the magician's ability to call on ninja animals as partners. Still, knowing Meiko, she'd have simply gone off rail and overly hyped over the animals and the ninja rabbits were so cute that Mana would've simply never shook Meiko off her tail, begging to summon more and more cute bunnies until Mana would've been dry. Mana knew her friend at least that well…

"Oh… Too bad." Meiko looked away extending her lips into an artificial duck beak with her eyes jumping all around the place. She smelled of ashes, oil and coals but also something sweeter, something very honey-like or waxy. If calls were to be made Mana would've guessed from Meiko's change of attire and still blackened cheeks as well as the collection of smells on her that she was working in the father's forge.

"How was training with Hokage-sensei? I bet you guys left me in the dust…" Mana tried lightening up the mood by commending her friend on her implied growth but she was very wary about treading those grounds. Normally, Meiko would've been training so close to Chuunin Exams, if she wasn't, and instead spent her time in the forge, it meant that either the work was of profound importance or that something really bad had happened out there.

"Can't vouch for that… I messed up a Transformation Jutsu again, it was a total bust. The only good thing to come out of that was that me and Kiyomi got to kick some nukenin ass of some wandering girl with an oversized sword and her creepy friend." Meiko mooed out almost humming the words as if she regretted sharing the experience but really had to do so. Mana sighed and extended her hand over Meiko's shoulder and rubbed it gently, trying to calm her friend down a bit.

"Did you take them in?" Mana smiled, choosing instead to direct the talk all the way to the nukenin fight because that way Meiko would simply not delve deeper into the darkness of her own belittlement as she often did when things didn't work out in the chakra control department.

"Nah, they didn't seem like doing harm. They were just looking for a fight or something, I don't think the zombie kid was even wishing for a fight but that swordsman girl was a savage…" Meiko sighed.

"That sounds like… Trouble, actually…" Mana sarcastically cheeked her friend's statement that the encounter was innocent when in fact it sounded anything but.

"I dunno, it just… Felt right letting them go. The blonde had the opening to kill us multiple times but something was wrong with her, she didn't strike me in the back or attack Kiyomi when she was lying down, she waited for us to face her or stand back up. She felt like… Not right in the head or something. Turning her in felt like putting down a sick animal." Much to Mana's frustration Meiko was beginning to sound less and less cheerful, luckily after she finished focusing on the moral implications of letting two rogue ninja walk free, something that couldn't have went very well with Kiyomi, implying she had little say in the matter, and focused on the fighting experience she was beginning to brighten up a bit.

"Oh, I can't believe I forgot…" Meiko then turned around and looked into her backpack, oddly she faked her hesitance to confront the magician with whatever lead Meiko into an over glorified library, of all places, and changed it into forgetfulness. "I made this for you." She smiled innocently before presenting the magician with a tool or a very blunt looking weapon.

It was an elbow-to-wrist long wand of very soft feeling, burgundy colored steel tip which shined from its sharpness and lead all the way to a narrowing which ended with an azure Audra steel orb on the top. It had a rabbit-like face decorated from a silver layered tougher material which made Mana suspicious. After examining the weapon she realized just what it was.

"You reworked it…" was all she said. Judging from Meiko's face the redhead understood and felt rather bad about it but still wanted Mana to have it. It was the sort of useless self-loathing Mana felt with the whole Kiyomi's wedding debacle, Meiko clearly understood that remolding Shimo's very soul into a wand could've been taken the absolute worst way but she didn't regret gifting it to Mana in that manner.

"I… I told you I was borrowing it, that I'd give it back once your hands were more suitable to wield it than mine. You're a magician, magicians should be using wands, not blacksmiths. I put a cute rabbit face on there out of the blade's hilt, it uhhh… Just seemed suited for a stage magician. It's completely chakra conductive also, it can take blows from conductive weaponry better than the original ever could, it won't break that way after a couple of blocks…" Meiko sat still, thinking over something in her mind, "Still… Don't… Go out of your way looking for ways to break it… It might just break if you toss it into a… Tailed Beast's condensed chakra blast or something…"

Mana's eyes teared up, she carefully placed the wand on the table by the books and hugged Meiko in gratitude.

"My father worked on that orb on top. It's what is known as "120%" alloy, Kirikuzu molecular tinkering and all, he condensed more of the blade into that one orb. It's really intensely pulsing with chakra every time you give it some, I dunno, maybe you'll use it for jutsu or something. I recon you telling me about something to catch the victim's attention when casting an illusion, maybe it can be used that way…" Meiko shrugged. Her smile betrayed that she was really glad that Mana didn't flip out over her melting Shimo's sword and making a whole new artifact from the materials.

"Awww… You were listening, really breaking my heart here." Mana smiled before examining the wand again.

The lights died out, only the natural reflection of the moon in the dark evening sky broke through the narrow windows of the archive. It was the archive keeper's fancy way of saying that the place was closing down for visitors. Looking at the moonlight made the magician a bit uneasy.

"Ummm… What time is it?" she wondered.

"I dunno, 'round eight, I guess…" Meiko shrugged.

The magician's face paled she quickly took the wand and sealed it inside her hat before flipping the thing on and picking up all the books in a rushing erratic manner.

"What's wrong?" Meiko wondered. "The signups are tomorrow at two-thirty…"

"No! I need to be at a show right now, this wand was so amazing that I got distracted!" the magician yelled out.

"Can I come?" Meiko followed the magician as she rushed to place the books in their right stands and then rushed out through the entrance door and to the keeper.

"I'd bully you into it if you didn't…" Mana laughed out, having someone with her now that Kouta was obsessed with training and Kiyomi looked like she had a couple of problems with the magician the last time for flunking them in the survival training felt really amazing. The loneliness and dealing with rejection by people around her these past couple of days made it really difficult to feel hopeful about the future and when the future inspired no hope there was a big problem which demanded quick changes.

Mana dreaded the next day to come, not because of what was supposed to happen during the day itself but for what it meant. The sign-ups for the Chuunin Exams was a rather formal procedure, their team was already signed up by the team's leader and approved by the village administration. Either way, even if the sign-ups were just a highly formal procedure it still meant that nothing would be the same anymore.

It wasn't that the Team Hokage wouldn't be children anymore, they were so far past that point that it was not even funny. It was that it meant that the village genin, if only for the duration of examination that could've lasted a whole month, if not longer, would be competitors. The only friends Mana would have were her team, her very own boyfriend was even her possible opponent in the exams. It was impossible to analyze and predict just what would happen during the Chuunin Exams, the tests were usually different each year with the patterns mixing or repeating every couple of years or so.

With a hesitant step, after a long and grueling morning of meditation training releasing all the pent up masses of built up chakra resources that were completely unused until a strong direct pulse released them into Mana's own chakra network, fooling her body that these were her natural chakra demands which greatly increased the produce of the resource in the future, effectively increasing her chakra level by a bit more, Mana treaded out into the village. Almost instantly the atmosphere outside was completely different.

The village streets were totally tidy, paper and neon signs were all over the place, hung up almost overnight with a good portion of them still being hung up. People unlike any Mana had ever seen before were walking around in ridiculously slow paces and pointing fingers at various structures, monuments and momentous places of the village. People of different colors, clothing, builds and facial features, people from all over the world and from far away. This felt so burning up bad inside. So many foreigners meant that this year's exam would be bigger than usual, more competition meant more chance to fail and higher up bar she needed to vault over.

Kiyomi and Meiko were sitting on a bench nearby Mana's place with ice cream in hands. Late autumn was a very curious time to eat ice-cream, Meiko usually ate anything that was in her path, no questions raised, so this had to be Kiyomi's idea.

"Mana!" Kiyomi shouted out jumping on her feet and quickly finishing up her ice cream before wiping her hands into a hanky she then tossed out. Even if the blonde had some pent up frustration over how the training with Hanasaku went, she definitely didn't show it now.

"Wow, big and varied crowd…" Mana uneasily replied after the greetings were out of the way, examining the influx of people wandering the streets.

"Yep! Have to be the biggest Chuunin Exams in fifty years! Judging from what I'm seeing even teams from Getsugakure have made it through the selection of teams!" Kiyomi shrieked out looking really pumped and excited about the event.

"Yeah, not really like you to get scared of crowds, Mana." The blacksmith curiously stated before finishing up her ice cream and then wiping the remains on her cheeks and lips into her sleeves, or with her hands to her trousers.

"No, I guess I'm a bit glad, really…" the magician shrugged. The three got together into an actual team and began their trek to the given out address of a small office building collecting the teams' own signatures. It was a very odd and highly formal procedure meant to affirm the members' own desire to participate in the Exams.

"Glad? You look like peeing your pants." Meiko pulled the magician through the cheek.

"I mean… The challenge is a bit daunting but… So many villages participating this year in Konoha's Chuunin Exams, that means that more villages than usual are considering themselves as Konoha's allies. The world is growing closer together and that's wonderful." Mana had to admit with a realization that calmed her down somewhat and made her a bit more willing to tackle the challenges ahead.

"Allies? Growing closer together?" a rude voice behind interrupted forcing the three to turn around and face the hooded figures. Their skins were of much darker shade than that of any locals, similar to that of Mana's yet nowhere near the complexion of a Kumogakure ninja. "Get real, a lot of villages simply can't put together their own Chuunin Exams and must rely on kissing Konoha's ass to rank their talents up. How much closer do you think Kirigakure is to the Great Villages, a village beaten into submission and denied this year's entry?"

The young man with a verily annoying voice which reminded the sound equivalent of a rusty sickle being rubbed against the brick wall if given voice removed his hood revealing a tattooed face with rich and thick locks of black as tar hair extending past his chest and back. His two teammates also removed their hoods, the female one with long and silky silver hair pulled her teammate back.

"Come on, Mr. Political Activist, let's not cash out checks we haven't even signed yet…" the young woman pulled the young man by his elbow further ahead.

"Doma has a point, though. All requests and applications were judged by Konoha Administration. What makes them good enough to tell the wheat from the chaff? Why did our team make the entrant cut but so many did not?" a much deeper and stronger voice of a man who still remained hooded spread across making Mana shake a little, something about the large individual just felt off.

"It's the fees, our village sent only the best teams because each additional team sent to be examined taxes the village more." The young woman started explaining it to her much more frustrated and trouble-looking friends as she quickly dragged the two far enough away for them to not pick a fight with anyone around.

"How is that okay with any…" Mana still held feint leftovers of the rebellious one's voice before they were too far for her perception to keep track off and the trio drowned in the surrounding cacophony of the crowd around them.

"Didn't see their headbands, I wonder what village these guys are from…" the magician finally shot the awkward silence its kneecaps off.

"A lot of poorer village ninja don't show off their headbands, it's not a thing to be proud of…" Kiyomi depressingly explained. "The meaning of the headband in general is as a badge of honor, they are worn and required by etiquette only during an honorable sparring match. Other times it's just a sign to identify someone by, a mean to draw labels."

The trio then resumed their trip to the sign up office. Oddly enough it was in a highly forgettable office building which was etched right in between two blocks of flats, a long queue was beginning to build up outside. Could've been more than a hundred people long and the waiting conditions inside couldn't have been overly comfy.

"Well, let's buckle up, here comes the toughest part of the exam – waiting in line." Kiyomi shrugged with a playful smile, it wasn't hard to tell that the Yamanaka felt fairly confident in her skills of passing the Exams and ranking up. Even with her immensely cautious nature Mana had to admit that Kiyomi was quite just in her expectations to rank highly amongst the examined teams. All three members of the Team Hokage had experience in spades surpassing that of most reasonable examined genin participants. They could've both held their own against Chuunin and sometimes even did. The magician only hoped that their overly confident nature, even if righteous one, did not turn out to be their downfall.

Chestnut Hanasaku had made it crystal clear that after the Exams the magician had nowhere else to go. For that reason Mana had to pass, no matter the cost. She's been through enough teams and had seen too many of them crumble, with a little luck Team Hokage could tumble the whole way through the treacherous pass before their wobbly bridge crumbles down…


	270. Just Strawberry Jelly

"I'm hungry!" Meiko yelled out in an annoying tone, the likes of which is given by nature to babies to be so annoying that they raised their very parents from dreams, sweet and horrific alike, in order to feed them.

"Yes, let us leave from this point of the line and just dump everything to stuff your cute belly up. That's why you're not the main strategist of our team…" Kiyomi cheeked at Meiko playfully poking the blacksmith's abdomen with her thumb, something the blacksmith found hilarious as she began to chuckle like a baby whose parent was blowing air in a tickling manner on their abdomen.

"Manaaaa!" Meiko mooed like a bored cow.

"I'm sorry, I have to agree with Kiyomi on this one. This is very tiresome but it's a part of the process." The magician could only innocently shrug at her friend advising her to get herself together and toughen up.

"Hey, isn't that Kouta? Could we maybe ask him to let us cut the line behind him!?" Meiko's eyes began to wonder, as did those of children when they were denied their capricious desires and were looking for satisfaction of their very down to earth fix on colors and noises elsewhere.

Mana's eyes unwillingly wandered a bit further down the line as she took a couple of steps forward since one more chain of the line had filled up the documents and left. Indeed the young man she had feelings for was standing around and chatting with two other people farther in front. One of his friends was a tall and equally fit to Kouta young man with a large sword on his back and a messy hairdo of dark purple shades that extended well past the young man's shoulders. The swordsman's affinity for denim could literally not escape the observer's eye either.

"Wow, that guy is pretty hot!" Kiyomi smiled shyly while messing up her own hair by rubbing her ponytail with her hand out of emotional and physical tension.

"His sword looks pretty amazing too, look at those curves, the craftsmanship, the rugged material of the scabbard!" little stars lit up in Meiko's eyes as her slobbering tongue very nearly escaped the confines of the blacksmith's mouth.

Despite her friends' mad obsession with the young man Kouta was talking to, whom Mana also secretly found to be quite a looker, though with more success concealing that, her own attention easily focused on the very energetic young girl with braided grey hair and flaring heavenly palm leaf colored eyes.

"That guy may be pretty hot, but I'll never betray you, Meiko!" Kiyomi jokingly slapped the blacksmith's back to which the blacksmith responded by catching the Yamanaka's arm halfway back to neutral position and bending it in a very uncomfortable hold. Ignoring the childish squabble of the two friends of hers, Mana kept her eyes on the short young soul who wore a very pocket and pouch heavy belt with a beetle-themed buckle that had fake plastic gemstones in it. Something uncomfortable was beginning to stab at Mana's lung from deep inside, ripping and tearing as it crawled all the way to her throat beginning to gnaw and attempt its escape from deep down.

"Smelly Mana, eating vermicelli, nothing but a belly full of J-E-L-L-Y… Shit, doesn't rhyme nearly as well as it did in my head…" Kiyomi smacked herself in the face after realizing she messed up the modified childish tease.

"Jelly? I'm not jealous, why would I be jealous?" Mana pouted crossing her arms on her chest, hiding the fact that she may have been immensely jealous of the attention that the young female teammate of Kouta's must've received as the three looked to be pretty close, likely from training they've been doing together.

"Mmmm… Jelly…" Meiko began daydreaming and humming a tune from some strawberry jelly commercial she once saw on the primitive boxes that passed for television in her universe. A far cry compared to the sophisticated panels of the Naruto universe Mana had visited some time ago…

"Look, it's fine, trust me, as someone who once tried romancing that scumbag Eiju, I. of all people, know jealousy." Kiyomi teased the magician, one of very few things that the Yamanaka future heiress found entertaining in this immensely slobby day which wasn't even close to being likely to get better soon.

"It's just… He pushed me away, I'm not mad at him, I don't feel anger or think badly about that teammate of his or anything it's just… It hurts… Being alone." Mana sighed sadly.

"Heh, we should go out and shop for clothes or something, that much is long overdue…" Kiyomi grinned in a suggestive tone.

"Nah, I'm fine, I have like five more T-Shirts left that aren't even torn once…" Meiko dismissed with a mouth full of a chocolate bar she remembered in her backpack. "Though my ninja kit supplies are running bit thin, refilling it often feels like a chore. Guess it'd feel better if a friend was there with me, feel more compelling, you know?"

"Done." Mana smiled pleasantly struggling to move her completely irrational feelings of hurt and dismissal deeper down. Something she knew never lead to good as that which was shoved to the bottom of the luggage always resurfaced with a boom which ended up tossing the clothes all over the room.

At least the other girls completely forgot about asking Mana to get them to skip the line. After a long and just as tedious of a wait as it sounds the three finally approached what seemed like the upper part of the line. Once Kouta and his team had finished signing up for the exams and left with a bunch of documents in their hand the two shared a bunch of uncomfortable looks. Luckily enough Kiyomi's playful "Hello" directed at the medical ninja's moody eyed yet upbeat lipped friend distracted and cheered Mana up a little.

"I could beat him in a fight, you know…" Meiko crossed her arms on her chest raising an eyebrow.

"I never doubted it for a second…" Kiyomi giggled.

"There are so many ninja here… From all over the world." The magician raised her eyebrow noticing a couple of her old classmates in the Academy – Inuzuka Kidenshi and Aburame Juhi further back in the line as well as a bunch of strange looking people wearing the Kumogakure headbands like an albino boy with a flashy training hoody and torn up halfway green hat that reminded more of a sock. Then there were some very tough looking young men and women from Iwagakure, several of them wore battle armor similar to Meiko's but with much flashier designs and tougher looking alloys as Iwagakure was the country of the most luxurious gemstones and rarest minerals as well as the most plentiful steel markets. Some headbands like the one on the head of a short young man with spiky brown hair and a very early stubble of facial hair the magician couldn't even identify. Having in mind that the symbol on it looked like a star they must've been from the Hoshigakure – the Village Hidden in the Stars but Mana only assumed that much and didn't confidently know it.

Finally the three were called up to an office in the second floor, after waiting their time and slowly ascending a spiraling staircase all the way up there. The three girls were gestured to sit down and take up the pens that were placed in front of them.

"So… You three are an all-girl team, huh? That's a bit unusual, must be a custom requested team, let's see… Oh boy, I see now, kinda feel bad, the expectations must be immense!" the office worker tried making some small talk as he struggled to input the endless tables and pictures into his computer. The digital advancements were at a very early and experimental stage… The man of course noted of the fact that the trio was gathered by the Fifth Hokage by her requesting each and every member of the team instead of them being assigned to her. Then he noticed Mana in her typical magician's uniform.

"Oh, big fan…" he smiled before giving them a bunch of papers to sign. "We actually had a test in mind for this stage, maybe a bit of good old misdirection about the office's coordinates or a riddle but given how many entrants there are into this year's exams… We'd be here all night." The man smiled before wiping his sweaty forehead with a hanky.

"Yeah, what's with that?" Kiyomi wondered after putting her signature down and gently handing the office worker the documents.

"Well, it appears that a lot of teams in other villages missed the timing of their own Chuunin Exams and opted not to wait for three whole years until the next ones. A lot of them chose to instead send Konoha their applications after finding out that we're holding one just now." The man smiled before admiring the endless piles of documents he had filled up on his desk. "Over a hundred and fifty teams this year, goddamn insane, usually we barely get one fifth of that to begin with, by the time the finals roll down there are supposed to be ten or so genin left… Will be a tough competition this year."

"What do you mean?" Meiko relaxed on the back of her chair, very nearly opting to raise her legs on the poor office man's table but then somehow finding the common sense to not do that.

"Don't you get it? The more competitors there are, the stricter the rules are, the tougher the tests must be to eliminate so many people…" Kiyomi explained with her face souring up and getting serious all of a sudden. "On one hand it hardly seems fair, the one year I finally make it in time and am ready to participate is the toughest year ever, on the other, there would've never been any competition otherwise, bring it on!" the smiled as the blonde's face shifted from seriousness to hype.

"That's not all we've heard." Mana couldn't settle down and fill her papers. "A lot of more obscure villages are also participating but only because they have no funds to host such an event themselves. What's that all about?" she remembered the unpleasant encounter outside.

"Ah, yes. You see… Every hidden village wishes to breed many high ranking ninja, it's a competitive market, a village must attract clients to come to them with their missions. If a small village doesn't have the funds to host the Chuunin Exams of their own, that may be a problem because they'll be stuck with a bunch of low ranking ninja and incapable of competing. It's a sad cursed circle that leads only to oblivion…" the office man stroke his too scarcely shaved stubble and then wiped his sweating forehead again. Even if outside was almost total winter conditions the heating inside and the tense schedule kept the poor man sweating out of his last trousers, thankfully, not literally.

Mana contemplated the sad and depressing situation before signing the papers and being given more and more files to sign.

"Alright, this looks like it's all set!" the office man checked through the signed papers and placing them amongst the pile of the completed ones. "There'll be a written test tomorrow at three PM, we thought of omitting it this year because the usual gimmicks were getting stale but… With this number of teams? No way, that shit is definitely happening…" the man rubbed his tired eyes before wishing the girls farewell.

"So I assume there'll be no more shows until the exams are over?" the office man then asked one final question before Mana was almost out the door.

"I think so, I really need to pass this one…" Mana admitted.

"Doesn't everyone? Anyways, too bad. It'd be a good chance to show your tricks off to a vastly different international crowd, a business opportunity, you know…" he smiled before returning to the papers.

"Yeah." Mana just nodded. After apologizing herself and wishing the man the best of luck she then finally left. Almost instantaneously a feeling of liberation hit her chest – the excessive wait was finally over! Then again, it was followed by a sense of looming threat not too long after. The Chuunin Exams were here at last, and as she said to the overworked gent in the office – she absolutely had to pass or else she'd get booted off the team.

That evening Mana was meditating. She hadn't done this in a long time, something was very off with her Ego stage. The meditational stage where she could almost communicate with her entire body, like she could view it all in the shapes of an infinite cosmos with stars, large flaring ones and little dwarf white ones. This wasn't how her body usually looked, how it was supposed to be. The magician tried looking around, browse the endlessly vast spaces of her own inner mind and figure out what was wrong but she couldn't influence those stars.

Usually, when she was in a state of complete calm of mind and tranquility she could not only see the flaring supernovae of the problems in her body but she could somewhat focus her own body and prioritize it into fixing them. It was a promising meditational skill which may have one day made Mana skilled enough to overcome the effects of poison or especially powerful illusion through the power of her mind and communication with her body alone. Now this was nowhere near to being the case. She was stuck just watching at the stars, large and small scattering around like she had absolutely no control over them anymore…

A large, bursting with nuclear reactions, like fiery dragon heads extending from it, star closed in to Mana. The magician tried to wrap her mind around it, to comprehend the size and the absolute might of it but she couldn't. The kunoichi was abruptly woken up from her meditation screaming. Her father was standing right in front of her with a curious set of eyes and an eyebrow or two raised, clearly wanting an explanation for Mana's distress.

"I'm working on meditating battle scenarios in my mind…" Mana lied shyly, allowing herself to be seen like that by father felt embarrassing, she just wanted to burrow herself deep underground and never come out. "Not going too well…" she then kept on talking just to distract her and her father from the game of "catch the liar".

"Hmph, sure…" father's eyebrow raise sharpened, "One "Juugo Kouta" has come to see you. I assume you know him?" he wondered.

"Now!? Here!?" Mana jumped up on her feet and ran downstairs.

Mother with the richest ironic smile was feeding the young boy some of the remaining chicken wings that the family had for dinner. The magician could only imagine how much the boy had told her mother over the moments they were left alone. Chicken wings were a powerful interrogation device. Kouta may have been mighty but to someone who loved food as much as he did the battle was hopeless.

"So you and my daughter are… A thing, huh?" the woman smiled staring at Mana while the boy was stuffing his face full, completely unaware that the magician got downstairs. "I seem to have heard something of this manner but it's strange that she never invited you over…" the woman's eyes sharpened, they were actual knives stabbing at Mana's general direction.

"Mhm…" the Juugo finally stuffed whatever was in his mouth down before noticing Mana had come. His childish glee of being treated to some tasty chicken switched to embarrassment and shyness.

"You're not too subtle about it…" Mana bitterly cut him down trying to look and act angry.

"Hmmm? Well, I tend to be a pretty simple guy, I answer what I'm asked…" Kouta innocently shrugged with a smile on a face that the magician just physically couldn't be angry at.

"That's why you were invited in and fed chicken, instead of being sent off. My husband is quite in a sour mood since his injury." The woman sighed.

"So…" Kouta let on dragging before switching into a playful whistle, "Ummm… These are good." He noted, switching the subject from what he came here for to compliments about food.

"Yeah? Mana mostly made those. God knows where she improved this much, you'd have never believed her horrendous cooking before a short while ago… Well, I'll leave you two alone for a while…" the woman shrugged before making her way out the kitchen.

Kouta stopped eating and wiped his face and his greasy fingers before an uncomfortable silence took over. Mana just couldn't realize why would he come here now of all times, right when he should've been at the peak of his training.

"Look… I told Budoki, a teammate of mine, about our last encounter… She has a habit of being interested and invested into our relationship. She sorta informed me that I'm an idiot and that I need to apologize and make it up to you." Kouta uncomfortable explained.

"You don't. My reaction was illogical and overblown. The Chuunin Exams are important for both your own career and the interests of the village." Mana shook her head sadly. Seeing her boyfriend here, for some reason, just hurt her more. Her own wrongness and immaturity being rubbed in her face, the young man feeling like he had to apologize for something the magician felt.

"That is true but… I shouldn't have let it cut into the middle of our date. Now our bad-to-good date ratio is kinda lame." Kouta uncomfortably stroke the back of his head. "Also I don't care who was right or wrong, it hurt you, I don't want you to feel hurt."

For the second time that day, the magician felt that uncomfortable entity inside her claw at her innards from in her guts, her lungs and throat. Trying to cause her so much discomfort and pain that she'd cry like a little baby. No. She wouldn't cry. Mana's hands wrapped around Kouta, she calmly whispered to his ear and backed up a bit, feeling uncomfortable about her position since father was walking past the kitchen to check if the door was locked.

"Tomorrow's the written test, you want to stay over?" Mana asked with a smile, realizing that maybe just this once she could balance the young man's training with their relationship as no one was quite sure what the written test would be about.

"Awww… I'm really not feeling confident about that. No one knows what that'll be about, father said they usually mess with one's mind in those and make up crazy tests that aren't as much quizzes as they are psychological torture." Kouta sighed looking into the dark starry night's sky and observing the dance of the late autumn snowflakes outside. His eyes actually looked pretty worried.

The boy turned his head back once a surprising sensation of warm and gentle worms wrangling around his hand alerted him. It was just Mana placing her hand on top of his and wrapping her fingers around it locking them both together. "You don't really have to shoulder that alone." she faintly whispered. Exerting a very minimal amount of force the girl slowly lead the young man upstairs to her room.

Father, following the two with his eyes briefly wrapped his still aching and wounded arm around his wife's frail figure and pressed her to him only for the woman to rest her head on his shoulder while the two kept on blindly switching the channels. The man placed the remote down settling down on a funny strawberry jelly commercial, feeling the chill of an approaching winter biting at him, the man breathed in and out living in this moment in time, letting his roots in completely.


	271. Trypanophobia

Mana gently pressed on the shoulder of her friend's body, the young medical ninja was totally passed out on the table with his head pressed at a book he was reading. This was odd as the magician couldn't remember Kouta reading anything before she finally went to sleep last night. He must've either lingered for a bit longer than she did or woke up early to study.

"What time is it?" the young ninja smacked his lips before flipping the book closed and shoving it aside. A moment later he began feeling a little bit bad about passing out right on top of Mana's book.

"Wake up 'o clock. Really shouldn't have read that, they won't test us on books we've read or math. It won't be a basic knowledge quiz." Mana sighed in playful irritation over her boyfriend's refusal to listen to what she told him yesterday.

"Can't know that…" the boy objected after finding his shirt and quickly slipping into it and carelessly stroking his hair using his hand in front of the mirror in Mana's room.

"Yes I can. The Exams are not quiz shows, they are practical procedures meant to find out not our knowledge of certain subjects but to ensure that our thought process matches that needed. It'll be a psychological or a mental test more than a usual written test." Mana argued, she had woken up earlier and left the medical ninja asleep in his unflattering position so she could have a shower and comb her hair. She didn't want to be seen in the early morning and was quite glad she wasn't.

"Well… I just wanted to know, when I look at that test today, that I've done anything and everything I can to be ready for it. Just so that I don't blame myself if I fail." Mana was always impressed by how fast the guys got ready, even right now Kouta just jumped on his feet and was completely ready to go in just a couple of moments and elementary self-checks.

"Can I use the bathroom?" he wondered.

"Sure, don't worry, mother wakes up early for work and father's gone for herbs and medical check-ups. By the time they come back we'll be out." Mana explained. It's been that way for a long time with mother and father, at least in mother's case the café she managed was becoming somewhat of a famous spot for small-time dating activities and just simple coffee breaks. As far as father was concerned there was little to no hopes for improvement of his injuries, after multiple Mystic Palm sessions his hands were looking almost like they weren't almost completely incinerated but what looked normal hid agonizing pain that nothing was able to cure, just temporarily calm it down.

"Alright, give me ten, I'll be ready to go." Kouta nodded after his face betrayed the boy's relief that he didn't have to waltz around the house in fear of the awkwardness of bumping into the magician's parents.

Obviously the relationship between the young man and Mana's parents was nowhere near as toxic and complicated as that of Mana's with Kouta's father. Come to think of it, the magician hadn't even really met her boyfriend's mother, not to her memory or knowledge. It may have been possible that she met the woman in the hospital and simply didn't know it though…

Kusagoro Jugo was a terrible man, pushing and manipulating the events around his own son to have him make all the same choices he did. He wanted Kouta to become an ANBU captain or at the very least an operative. From the way Kouta sometimes looked at Mana it was clear that the young man was conflicted about it. He wanted the training and attention of his father, obviously, the two did have some sort of a bond and even Mana could see it every time the two spoke or the magician saw them training in the training grounds. Still, whenever he accepted the man's training or allowed himself the pleasure of interacting with his father figure he knew he's accepting the deal with the devil who wanted him to be mixing the pot of sinners with his own fork one way…

Her own parents didn't look to mind Kouta, for as much pain as father was in during the late evenings, when his pain management herbs wore off, he was quite chill about the whole thing. Mother even teased Mana and fed the young man. Mana's guess was that they must've seen the darkness that the ninja life, the life of an adult, was rooting in their daughter and didn't mind some more down to earth bonds to be made. Something as simple and innocent as a young love to keep the shadows of the life of a living tool of the village from taking over. A flaming sword to fight off the inner demons.

The magician sighed and slipped into the blazer of her uniform and checked all the pockets, all the strings and devices, she then took a magnifying glass her father gave her and placed it above her hat observing the state of the seal. There was almost a whole pocket dimension inside there, a good couple of hundred square meters worth of storage and Mana didn't always remember if she refilled the hat with tools and cards that were meant to be used.

It was too bad that she herself was no sealing expert like Meiko or her father. In that case she would've had so many ideas about what could've been done with the seal. It could've been altered and connected to multitude of other seals so that the magician could've used any hidden pocket of her uniform and pulled out tools from her hat from those pockets and pouches.

In a manner of stretching out the magician quickly blurred her speedy hands through a bunch of hand seals. It was unlikely that a single jutsu would have to be used in the written test but it didn't hurt to stretch one's muscles.

Hearing the rustling from the bathroom coming from the shower the magician quickly ran in and knocked on the steamed glass.

"We've got two hours, I'll make something to eat!" she let Kouta know.

Usually, way back during the mission looking for the Box of Ultimate Bliss, she'd have received some sort of sign of frustration or disappointment from her boyfriend. After multiple nights cooking the other three of her companions never failed to come up with new ways of telling that her cooking sucked. A genuine and wide smile was on Mana's face the whole way downstairs, she was glad that she took some time to learn how to cook better with old man Aporius.

Once the gathered crowd of over a hundred and fifty teams was already well in sight Mana and Kouta wished each other good luck. They also parted ways as the team of the medical ninja was waiting for him outside whereas Kiyomi and Meiko were nowhere to be seen so Mana assumed that they were waiting inside. Politely making her way through the stuffy hallways and staircases the magician looked around for the two in multiple floors until she found them when approaching the second floor from another, more western staircase, as she had missed her friends when looking at the same floor from the eastern wing.

"Mana!" Kiyomi yelled out before greeting the magician with a friendly hug. "You better compensate for Meiko's lacking score with a killer score of your own!" she playfully taunted the blacksmith as well as tried complimenting and somewhat relaxing Mana. Judging how nervous Meiko looked it may not have been the best of ideas.

"Look, Meiko, it's going to be just fine…" Mana tried calming her friend. "They're weighing all three of us as a team, in the past there were some simple mental tricks that just tested one's drive to be a ninja or their determination. You'll be great! I know of very few people who work nearly as hard as you do." the kunoichi tried to solace her friend a bit.

"I'm gonna screw everything up…" the redhead kept on stepping around and thrashing the little air that remained, all the people overcrowding the place just added to the kunoichi's panic. "I'm so stupid, I'll never pass a written test! I was never good at those, I'll drag you two guys down!"

Kiyomi looked pretty surprised by Meiko's lack of confidence. She must've not seen the redhead frustrated and self-destructive before or when she saw it she must not have paid it too much mind. The blacksmith could've gone outright depressing when she was seriously into self-belittlement.

"Don't worry, you won't screw up. There's no use worrying before you even see the test…" Kiyomi tried to play the comforting more for laughs as she kept calmly and softly laughing the whole way through but it was clearly not the funny kind of self-hatred. The Yamanaka must've never encountered that kind of self-aimed negativity before.

Any semblance of firm ground beneath her feet disappeared as Meiko lifted Mana off the ground by the magician's collar, the redhead's eyes were beginning to water slightly and she was clearly acting in total panic. Not even when Akimichi Francho threatened to kill her after he did so to Shimo did the magician see this much pent up apprehension in her friend's eyes.

"Why did you recommend me to Hanasaku-sensei!? Why did you force me to fit all those expectations!? I'm not as good as you guys, I'm gonna mess this up, I don't deserve to be here!" she began shaking in fright.

Mana softly focused her chakra into her fingertips and smacked the blacksmith's wrists at the side forcefully relaxing the grip. She grabbed Meiko's head by the back by firmly holding a fistful of red hair and pressing the blacksmith's face to hers. For a brief moment the magician just stood there allowing her friend to just stare at Mana's serious and friendly eyes. She could almost feel her friend's breathing steady out, her panicking orbs focusing and her eyelids finally lightly blinking again.

"It's going to be fine, even if it won't, it's no big deal. I recommended you not because you're my best friend but because I have utter trust in you, because there's no one else I'd rather have watching my back. Please have faith in my trust." Mana quietly whispered to her friend. Meiko was already hers the moment the magician freed herself – the redhead was much more skilled martial artist and an incredibly faster one. Had she not wanted Mana to get her hands on her – the magician would be lying knocked out on the floor about now.

Meiko didn't say anything, she didn't really have to. Her newfound tranquillity was all of the answer that was needed. For that short magical moment even the surrounding harmony of twaddle all died out.

"Wait, you mean I'm not your best friend?" Kiyomi teased Mana making all three girls crack up a bit.

Finally a strict looking man walked up to the one of the office doors and gestured with his arm to let those scheduled to take the test there in.

"We're going in!" Kiyomi chanted out, obviously referencing some movie she had seen, her highly acted out manner of speech suggested so. Seeing how Mana was no movie buff, as her older model television set could only be watched for four hours at a time before given time to cool down and not burst into a ball of flames, the reference flew over her head. Meiko was too worried clashing her own fingers against one another in fear, the magician could only hope that the blacksmith's irrational dismay for the first stage of the exams would settle down somewhat once the test is done.

"No, only one of you comes in here, the other two choose rooms besides this one." The man who let the genin in fixed his glasses. His most effeminate looking long, brown and curly hair got in his way and partly covered up the man's strict eyes.

"Hanasaku-sensei said that we're scheduled to take the exam here!" Kiyomi objected.

"There's been a change in the examination order. Teams will take the test in separate rooms, if everyone would please cooperate and split into three rooms it'd go much smoother…" the middle aged man informed after he stretched out blocking the entry to the classroom.

For a second there Mana was worried that Meiko would flip out again as all blood stopped reaching the upper part of her body, apparently. The blacksmith paled out like she was being separated to face an executioner or something.

"Stupid, red turtleneck wearing…" Kiyomi kept on bumbling as she worked her way through the crowd holding Meiko by the hand until the blacksmith split off right up close to the room Kiyomi entered to take the test.

Mana was one of the first people to get into the classroom, choosing to sit down at the nearest front corner seat she could find. Waiting for the test was not easy. She was so busy soothing Meiko that she completely forgot how worried she was about all of this. There were more than enough reasons to be worried. If she and her team failed this test they'd be eliminated from the Chuunin Exams and would have to wait for years before the next Exams. They'd probably have to leave elsewhere to take the exams in another country like so many sitting there had.

Even if she did find another country with a closer examination date, she'd be being examined as a part of another team. Chestnut Hanasaku had made it clear that Mana was no longer a welcome sight for her eyes and that she was no longer trusted, therefore she'd be kicked out of the team as soon as the exams ended. Things would be even worse if Mana was the one to fail this test and cost Kiyomi and Meiko the elimination. That would piss off the woman who was such an authority figure for the magician even more, not to forget how more difficult things would be with Kiyomi who still couldn't have forgotten that survival training not too long ago…

Being a stage magician, Mana knew that fear was an inevitable part of any performance. When standing behind the closed curtains one imagined all sorts of various failure scenarios, each worse than the other. This fear somehow felt welcome in the girl's chest, it made her body prepare for the upcoming trials, take this exam more seriously.

"Well, I sure hope that everyone's here…" the man who unlocked the room smiled before locking the door to the office which was quite recently reworked to resemble a classroom more. A couple of genin taking the exams gulped heavier realizing that what was transpiring in front of them was very real and very serious. The red turtleneck guy then approached a large collection of papers stacked on top of one another and pulled in his kunai to cut the ribbon that tied them all before giving the whole office another pitying look.

The man then took the impressive pile and placed a single piece of paper on each office table still having a huge stack left after he finished. Mana didn't as much as glance at the paper, not feeling sure if she was allowed to as the test had not yet started. Her theory of this all being just a psychological trick of some sort was beginning to nag her more and more, what if those who stared at the test before it began would be eliminated for some sick reason? Only after she saw almost every other genin staring at the paper in confusion and analysing it thoroughly, flipping it to see the other side before looking at the examiner with confused stares did she bother to take a look.

The paper was almost completely blank. There were only some sick looking, completely identical grotesque needle devices, that instead ending with the typical sharp needle ends ended with a nasty looking crescent shaped horizontal blade, on each side of the paper printed out as they were just artistic representations of some sort of gothic syringes. Besides her, already on the table was a purple marker and each of the syringe had a blank glass-like middle area, possibly meant for colouring.

Finally the examiner finished with his laborious task and sat on the front table carelessly, almost flipping the damned thing over with his sloppiness. He then giggled into his knuckle before pointing at himself and beginning to speak in a silky smooth voice.

"Well then, now that this is out of the way we can begin…" he sung out. "My name is Akina Ishi. I will be your supervising officer today, overseeing this exam. It will only be me and no one else so feel free to attempt and pull something funny if you feel cornered and hopeless, I'm just one man and I may just miss it…" the man laughed at his own sentence with a surprising degree of creepiness to it.

"This sheet of paper you've been handed is all there is to this exam. If you finish it I will accompany you to the door and unlock it for you and you're free to have a nice day. Sadly, because there're so many of you we're forced to improvise and come up with a very difficult, in a way of looking at it, written test. Our aim is to leave at least ten to fifteen teams in the end, that's right – this is the one-in-ten success rate test!"

The office full of genin just questioningly weighed the paper in between their fingers looking at their neighbour and trying to figure out if anyone here had figured out what was the deal with this test.

"The test is simple – you've been captured by the enemy and given a box full of syringes. Two thirds of them contain poison, one sixth of them contain a truth serum chemical that forces you to reveal all the information you have after which they will undoubtedly kill you. The remaining one sixth are harmless." the man began, after this sentence was uttered a handful of genin started to raise a ruckus.

"You mean this is it? That's stupid, we had this test in the Academy! It's not an actual test. It cannot be done right!" yelled out a small brat in bone rimmed glasses.

"This has to be a joke! The Chuunin Exams reduced to a simple game of chance!?" another genin – a taller young man in a ragged and worn out sleeveless shirt and a vertically striped bandana objected.

"No. There's more to this than that. You see – the test some of you may have taken in the Academy has been modified with an additional condition. This test was usually given to Academy Students to demonstrate their thought process. The purpose of the written test of the Chuunin Exams is the same. However we've added an additional condition, your objective in this test is not only to survive but to also to pick the same syringe your teammates pick. That means that you pass this test if you fulfil both of these conditions: a) your choice ends up leaving you alive, b) it is the same choice your teammates picked. You have forty five minutes…" the man topped his briefing off with a sadistic smile.

Just as he finished speaking the magician could almost feel time beginning to tick, the cruel ticks overpowered every other noise around her sinking the surrounding office room in total silence and isolating Mana from everyone else going through the same exam she was taking.


	272. Blank Sheet

With the single one, yet remarkably complicated question in front of her Mana continued to focus on nothing but the sheet of paper in front of her. In these kinds of tests how one started often laid the foundation for the right or wrong answer. The right start was essential as if one started to pave the ground the wrong way they'll never finish building that road they needed to build.

The problems of this test were numerous, it was capitally overcomplicated and deliberately designed to eliminate most of the genin taking it. Establishing and understanding the ground rules of the test may have been beneficial, having all the answers and cards on the table flipped up may have helped Mana think more clearly. The magician took her marker in hand and quickly counted the grotesque syringe devices that looked like they made their way there from a horror novel from one of the classic periods.

In general there were thirty six syringes to pick. Judging from what was said, two thirds of them – twenty four had terrible poison and were the most obvious wrong choices. Then, one sixth of the remaining ones had an intricate truth serum in them that will make the captured ninja useless as they will relay all there is to tell, undoubtedly that was the goal of the imaginary captor and, after such a syringe is picked, the ninja will count as good as dead. That leaves six empty and right picks.

Indeed such a task, to pick not only the right one, but also the same her teammates would pick, was troublesome. That may have been the most difficult criteria to fit. Mana wasn't sure if it was entirely reasonable. Such a requirement completely eliminated the luck factor out of the equation. One matter was to accidentally guess one of the six right syringes, to guess the same one one's teammates would pick as well was outright impossible.

Mana could recall such a test being given in the Academy, back then it seemed odd to her, even in its easier and modified version. Back then it only had four syringes, one of which had poison and one of which had the truth serum. Back then it was a fifty-fifty call but back then the test didn't even have a right answer. The passing grade was determined based on how the student picked their syringe, did their reasoning make sense, could they analyze the situation correctly and other similar factors. Here an actual right answer was expected.

Finally the circulating blackout that left only Mana and the test in an isolated personal dimension of dark oblivion faded and other genin came into view. The magician allowed her glance to waver just to see how her peers would deal with the situation. Judging from what the man said, "cheating" was not forbidden so it was not cheating in the technical meaning of the word. In fact, it was encouraged, likely because it cost precious time and made one wander in the dark woods treading the completely dark path in a random direction. Cheating was a waste of time so it was permitted.

No one was trying to contact their peers, not with the limited perception of the five senses that Mana had available to her. The magician was quite surprised that Kiyomi didn't try and contact her using the mental transmission ability that the girl had. Either she was located far past the technique's range or the walls were infused with chakra barriers that would've prevented any similar abilities from being used. If this office building was an important establishment of the village administration it likely had all sorts of similar protections.

Then Mana noticed something creepy, a wave of ants was crawling right beside her in a very blurry and thinned out line only to walk through the small space under the door, likely to look for the controller's teammate and relay some sort of message. Following the path of the insects the magician tracked them all the way back to a short but broad shouldered young man with sunglasses and a rather geeky looking bowl cut of his ginger hair. Could he have figured out the solution to the problem?

Mana stopped looking for clues, she knew that the others were likely contacting their peers in other ways as well. She was the only one who had absolutely no way of contacting her team… Frustrated and stressing over potentially failing the first obstacle in the Chuunin Exams, Mana returned to the test.

"Mana…" she heard Kiyomi's voice in her mind, albeit greatly weakened and breaking up. Somehow the Yamanaka must've broken through.

"Contact Meiko, calm her down. I'll work this out in a moment…" Mana relayed a thought wondering if Kiyomi even received it as after its transmission a long silence kicked in.

"Mana… I can't… These walls… Reduce my range… Need different frequency… Just us." Kiyomi's voice continuously broke up and began splitting into different weirder tones, must've been the negative effect of the girl differing the frequency of her mental chakra signals.

The marker almost broke in two in the magician's hand when she realized that Meiko was left all alone. From the training with Kiyomi and Hokage-sensei she must've known that Kiyomi was capable of telepathically communicating within certain distance. For example the telepathy may not have worked back when they were scattered in the whole training grounds by their mentor but in a situation where the girls were just an office room away from each other there was no reason for it to not work.

Mana could only imagine how scared and alone Meiko must've felt confronted by such a daunting task and left to deal with it by herself as her friends didn't try anything to contact her. The girl tried desperately to think of a way of how she could've contacted Meiko, calmed her down, maybe told her how she'd soon work it out and how she needn't worry.

"Thirty minutes left…" Akina Ishi hummed out before sitting down in a very undignified position and raising his feet on the front desk.

The kunoichi closed her eyes in frustration and bit her lip almost hard enough to draw blood. This was all going so bad, she couldn't waste time contacting her friend - she needed to work this out. She needed to at least start working on the problem.

The magician looked outside as the weak late autumn sun was beginning to hide behind the clouds and preparing to disappear beyond the horizon. Something was wrong outside, small particles of what seemed like cotton were accumulating and riding the wind in a highly synchronized shape. It must've been a doing of someone from the other office but no one else was seeing it or even bothering to check the window. Even worse – the magician couldn't identify what the code of symbols that the cotton made before being thrown around by wind currents said.

The magician pressed her palm against her eyes and face before dragging it down and covering her ears. She needed to do something, she could've tried to come up with ways to contact Meiko, she could've written down those cotton symbols and tried figuring out what they said and hoped that the message helped her to figure out the right answer.

Mana sighed and leaned down to her test. That message outside made her realize something – how amazing that young man/woman was. All of these people sitting in that office were outright amazing, so great that the villages they came from were willing to pay the entrance fee and a whole bunch of other taxes for them. What right did Mana have to look down on her friends? How could she have been so arrogant to think that they needed her protection? Meiko and Kiyomi were strong, in many areas they blew the magician right out of the water. It was about time that she let her friends walk on their own feet and focused on getting this exam right herself so that she didn't end up dragging her friends down while worrying over them too much.

This test was too complicated to be solved. That must've been the point. After all there were almost no clues given to these syringes, their positioning or anything else to work any clues out. The genin were all completely in the dark. In tests like this the key was usually in something that the examiner said, in something that the magician overlooked. This was no algebra or geometry, there were no mathematical skills required in this, there were no given or hidden data to be worked out – everything important was said by Akina as he described the test.

"Twenty minutes left…" the examiner once again interrupted the complete silence with his lazy and bored voice.

Seeing how the criteria were all that mattered to passing the test, it may have been for the best if Mana focused on them entirely before returning to the conditions. In order to pass the magician needed to pick the right syringe. Not only that, she needed to pick the same syringe that both her teammates picked… Okay, that didn't help, Mana could've spent as long as she wanted analyzing those words, making up different linguistic interpretations of them and still not have come back with the clue.

Maybe if she interpreted the test and what it was aiming to examine correctly she could've placed herself in the right mind set, that, in terms, could've assisted her with better understanding the question and how to work with it? Given how the genin must've picked the same syringe as their teammates it obviously condoned teamwork, all three ninja were supposed to mold their minds together, especially if they were unable to contact each other like the ant-boy earlier contacted his own team with a suggestion.

"Mana, look outside… window… answer…" Kiyomi's mental signal again broke through.

"Don't close the link, I may get close to the answer soon." The magician interrupted the Yamanaka before turning her eyes at the window only to see the cotton reforming into a pair of numbers. One of them looked incredibly similar to a number "3" whereas the other one combined into making a formation similar to the number "4", they were lined out to make out the number "34". It was odd that the same signal was also visible from Kiyomi's office room, it didn't seem that large to be seen from all the way over there.

"It's a misdirection. I've noticed that person communicating with their team before, their previous messages were coded. It makes no sense for them to communicate in decoded messages now. If you could also make it out from your office, that means that the person in charge of this is making multiple copies of this signal, that means that either we are lucky to both be in the same offices that person's allies are or that they are spreading the misdirection as wide as they can to eliminate as many teams as possible, after all, less teams – less competition for them as well as simpler exams in general." Mana relayed her thoughts, she wasn't sure how much of it Kiyomi got. She could sense the link still being open, after one got used to the mental link they could sense it being open and when it was closed as well as control the thoughts that were sent and what was left within one's own mind.

"Fifteen minutes." Akina declared. The desperation around the office room was visible as well as able to be smelled from where Mana was. Her nose was never the sharpest tool in the shed and yet even she could pick up the intense perspiration of both boys and girls in the room.

The more Mana thought about the problem the less certain she was where she needed to approach the test from. Everything seemed like a clever trick meant to misdirect, everything and everywhere was a conspiracy meant to trip her and her team over. Then it occurred to Mana that "picking the right syringe" was never what Akina Ishi really said, his exact words were: "the choice ends up leaving you alive". That implied that picking a syringe was not even necessary at all, one only needed to choose to fit this criteria and choose thusly so that they survived.

That meant that Mana could pick nothing at all and just hand in the paper blank and empty. If she was captured and given a box of syringes to pick, most of which were poison and some of them were truth serum, it implied that she had something that was worthwhile to acquire. What if she was told the wrong information in general? What if all of the syringes had the truth serum? Picking a syringe when only six of them were allegedly empty was simply too risky. The whole choice of choosing anything at all was too risky.

It took Mana far too long to realize that… She simply flipped the paper face down and sighed. Closing her eyes and trying to focus onto the weak and lingering mental line with Kiyomi she tried to jump into the telepathic conversation she had put on hold before.

"It's nothing, the right answer is to choose nothing, don't color any syringe, don't write or pick or mark anything. Just write your name and the date on the corner as instructed…" the magician concentrated her thoughts waiting for quite the while of uncomfortable silence before a hesitant confirmation returned from Kiyomi. Clearly the Yamanaka thought it was a stupid answer, frankly, Mana wasn't sure this was how the test was supposed to be solved but, technically, she wouldn't die from this choice, also Kiyomi will pick it as well.

"What… Meiko?" Kiyomi's worried mental signal came back, the magician simply assumed that the blonde was worried about their blacksmith friend whom she could not contact. Mana herself was worried, that was by far the worst thing about their current situation as no one could've predicted how Meiko would act. She could've picked just a random syringe hoping she hit the right one and completely wagering it all on a game of chance, she could've thought of something she thought was the right decision as well. Lead down a confusing and lengthy path of reasoning and stumbling into an overly complicated and wrong answer.

Judging from Mana's silence the Yamanaka must've realized that the magician had no idea.

"Five minutes" the examiner sighed, being the eternal economist of his energy and breath he repurposed the influx of air into a coherent yet not lengthy sentence.

Mana began to crack a grin before a weak laughter started cracking her up. She was so stupid, this whole situation was so immensely stupid, knowing the right answer yet tripping over not being able to help and contact her friend. Her only hope now was to just hope and rely on her friend to come up with the right answer or else all three of them would be eliminated from the Chuunin Exams and miss the chance to rank up for the following three years. Everything, her entire ninja career lingered on Meiko's decision.

It was so amazing that the blacksmith did not know this, else she would've been incredibly nervous over how much depended on her call. Then again, trusting Meiko may not have been the wrong idea – if anyone could've been trusted to think outside the box, that person was Meiko.

"Alright, hand 'em in, boys and girls and… Grown-ass boys and girls…" Akina picked his lazy butt off the chair and started picking up the tests referring to a whole bunch of people taking this exam who were well into their twenties and thirties even. Mana would've felt ashamed if she was one of those people, technically there was nothing wrong with being a genin into one's adulthood. There were several known cases of people serving as genin for well over fifty years before retiring. Still, she wouldn't change the world as an elderly genin, no one would've been inspired by such a person. There were ninja who were already in the black ops and past the rank of jounin in Mana's current age… Still, Mana didn't want to be one of those ninja either, being this good at killing people and lying to them only placed responsibility to fulfil those talents to the best of one's ability…

"Well, good luck in the next Exams, for the most of you…" Akina laughed out. "Okay, wait up outside, once all the tests are checked the results will be hung all over the wall, we'll also inform your sensei in case you have to be somewhere else or are just too lazy to wait a couple of hours."

With a completely droopy and defeated face Mana walked out of the office, seeing Kiyomi exit from the neighboring room with a much more hopeful face felt almost unbelievable. Seeing Meiko walk up to them from further away felt even worse, the blacksmith was completely devastated. Her skin was pale as the embodiment of death itself must've looked like, her eyes were beginning to water but then her tears stuck somewhere halfway out due to how dysfunctional and shaking the blacksmith's whole body was.

"Guys… I'm… So sorry…" she covered her face before finally gathering the strength to cry.

"I tried contacting you…" Kiyomi embraced Meiko, taking maybe a bit too much pleasure from her friend's moment of weakness and being the shoulder she leaned on during it. "I don't know what that office room you were in used to be but it was more warded off than any other office room."

"It's okay…" Mana pressed her own forehead against the cold and rough wall, turning away from her friends just so they couldn't see her beaten and crushed. "You guys can try again in three years, maybe sooner… If some other country hosts the Exams earlier."

"I… I didn't even notice the thirty four floating outside… I'm such a stupid klutz… In the end I just… Froze up and… I'm sorry, I accidentally forgot to write anything. I just gave in to the stress and handed a blank paper… Sorry…" Meiko kept on weeping onto Kiyomi's shoulder as the two kunoichi just stood there brooding before the words sunk into their brains.

Kiyomi and Mana looked at each other completely knocked out of their boots and then Kiyomi began just shouting out loud. Mana smiled and then joined in as the two girls ran in to hug Meiko and squeeze the life out of her.

Meiko was so silly sometimes… But Mana wouldn't trade her on her team for the world's strongest genin.


	273. Oldest Rock in Wrestling Entertainment

It took some time to explain exactly what the written test was about to Meiko. Someone who just stumbled through the dark throughout most of it and then just somehow, just barely, managed to luck out and come out with the right answer, even though what she actually thought she had done was give up. After the whole point of the test was explained the blacksmith seemed to catch up quite fast.

Mana really had a great deal of respect for her friend, the feeling of being completely oblivious of everything that's going on was a genuinely scary concept. Just sitting there for almost an entire hour and observing a test one had no understanding of and people all around you work their way through it must've been absolutely terrifying. So many people would've seen such a scenario in their absolute worst nightmares and yet Meiko managed to overcome that, through sheer luck, maybe, but still she did the right thing.

Then again, the magician was a little biased in her blazing adoration for Meiko's success that's been set ablaze in her chest. She was spared entire years of being stuck at the lowest grade and getting no closer to fulfilling her dream. Mana was already feeling ready to begin working her way up to trying and living up to her nindo, she no longer felt like a child nor like a child ninja. Even if everyone around her kept amazing her and making her feel like everyone's so much superior to her in so many ways, Mana still felt obliged to charge at her dream and reach out for it. She'd seen too many people suffer and die around her while she was struggling to become a strong enough ninja to change that.

"That's kinda lame though…" Meiko pouted as the three made their way and settled down on a bench with some chili snacks in hand. "I expected a bit more… Something, that's something rather than nothing." She scratched her blazing red hair that were beginning to grow a little longer and more feminine than the manner she had them in when Mana first met the blacksmith where the hairdo looked more tomboyish and under all the armor she wore Meiko could've easily been confused for a young man.

"If it was something – we'd all have failed." Kiyomi laughed it off still breathing full lungs of joy and failing to get over how lucky they all got. Even if the answers of the test had not yet returned, for some reason, none of the girls questioned the answer Mana gave them. To the magician it felt flattering and a bit frightening, Meiko tended to have utter and complete trust in Mana's calls and Kiyomi was so obsessed with her weird shaped friendship with the blacksmith that she just went along with it just to see Meiko do things in her own way and giggle at that.

"Not Mana… She would've gotten it right." Meiko suddenly got all dreamy and serious as she relaxed on the bench and just looked at the murky noon sky.

"We'd all have failed." Mana repeated Kiyomi's words seconding the blonde. "The Chuunin Exams are all about the team. It doesn't matter how smart one is, how strong one is, what techniques they know or what bloodline they come from, as long as the team fails to keep up with them and the standard of ninja that become chuunin – they're not passing."

"Hmmm… Your dango are chili flavoured, gimmie some!" Kiyomi yelled out before munching all over Meiko's arm nearly swallowing the blacksmith's entire fist with it. An impressive feat, having the redhead's physical strength and rather buff physique in mind.

"Goddamn it!" Meiko shouted out peeved over Kiyomi's affections over the blacksmith's chili dango.

"I thought you hated spicy food…" Mana wondered as her mind slowly began to float away from the written test and prepare for whatever may have still been to come. Even if she didn't want to feel overly confident, something told her that the Team Hokage had it in the bag.

"Yeah, but Meiko's hand tastes like sweet potato so it evens it all out!" the Yamanaka cheerily explained, still struggling to speak over the amount of food she stole from the blacksmith.

"Oh yeah? Here's more of it!" the powerhouse of the team began playfully bullying the Yamanaka as Mana turned her head away in shame. She wasn't really embarrassed for her team, frankly, she was beginning to grow a bit attached to the two goofballs. Meiko was just the kind of person that lightened people up, remembering how Kiyomi was before meeting the blacksmith it was impressive seeing the blonde open up and goof around a bit. She certainly had enough of a sad past and weight on her shoulders to have every reason to brood.

"Is that how Konoha's teams behave?" a chubby and tall young lady raised her eyebrow alerting the three that she and her two companions were standing behind them.

For a miniscule wink Mana had wondered if the three were just looking for a fight. They certainly looked like they could bring some, if needed. The chubby young lady in front was even larger and bulkier than Meiko, her attire was a mixture of the traditional Akimichi clan armour combined with some of her own personal and flashier plated protection. Her two companions were more casual looking with nothing but long dark grey cloaks that topped off with hoods that were hanging around their necks.

"Because if it is, I'd like to ask your team leader for some advice!" the chubby powerhouse then erupted into a fit of laughter. "I wish my own team was so friendly with each other, I just can't get all of us on the same level of fondness for each other." She smiled.

"That's because attachments to one's team are pointless." The young man walked out from being overshadowed by his massive teammate and began walking away from her. "The genin stage of my life is just about over and after it is I won't have to stomach your stupid attempts at leadership for any longer, Choroina." The young man indifferently waved his hand like he tried to stuff all of his disdain for the strong looking teammate into a single gesture.

"Awww, come on, Gunoi! Would it hurt you to work together just once? Can we, maybe, at least grab some food together?" she ran after her teammate.

The third genin who looked like he was well into his twenties just looked onto the scene that his two teammates were making before nodding at Team Hokage and running after them.

"We'd better not take as long as you usually take, Choroina, we need to be back here in an hour for the results, I'm sick of us being late everywhere!" the third one yelled at his two quarrelling teammates before the trio ran off.

The three girls just continued to stare at the three for a brief minute longer before looking at each other, still wondering what had happened there.

"Maybe we're being a bit loud…" Kiyomi wondered.

"Yeah, let's bring it way down, it attracts all sorts of attention." Meiko nodded in agreement.

Mana had noticed the crescent moon symbols on the headbands that the three wore. The tall and bulky girl – Choroina had one right on her forehead as well as having the village symbol carved out on her shoulders. The other three were much more subtle, the second, rather rude and narcissistic seeming fellow briefly flashed it tied around his arm as he dismissed his friend. The third one had it tied around his neck, protecting a much more sensitive area. It showed his calculation over tradition approach and some innovativeness. Those symbols must've been the Getsugakure ones, the Village Hidden under the Moon.

An hour didn't take too long to pass. After a long while of seeing people from different teams mix and mingle around, most of them just indifferently talking over to their teammates, some quite frustrated over the way that the written test went, finally the firm and strong shape of Chestnut Hanasaku gently made her way through the crowded rabble of genin.

"Hey, you three!" she winked at them, "Everything's alright? I heard the test was pretty rough this year…" her voice sounded more silky and cheerful than Mana was used to whenever the magician was in the same room or even the same training ground as her mentor.

"Sure, Mana kind of pulled my butt out, kind cucumber-cheeks as she is! Meiko just stumbled blindly the right way I guess…" Kiyomi reported in the usual happy manner that was slowly beginning to define her role in the team. The Yamanaka was a channel of sorts, a channel between the other girls and the sensei. Given that one of the girls didn't really feel like she deserved her place on the team and another was actually unofficially booted out of it and still must've scorned the woman a fair bit. Also a bridge between the simply joys of life and plenty of things that could've easily soured it. Both Mana and Meiko still had those bitter spoons of tar in the honey basket whereas Kiyomi either kept hers so deep down or simply learned to deal with it that her psychological strength inspired the other two.

"Oh? You seem pretty confident you got it right…" Hanasaku tried cheeking her team but she also held a remarkably proud composure and posture signalling that she may have known more than she initially let them know. Mana couldn't help but notice a couple of uneasy yet thankful glances her way. If she was any bolder in her assessment she'd think that Hanasaku may have felt bad about the way the magician was treated for some of the past week.

"Oh, we got it alright! It does make me wonder though… How did you pass this test though? You're not the sharpest tool in the shed, you know, sensei…" Kiyomi couldn't help but wonder and imagine her long time mentor in the same role as the three girls over two decades ago.

"I had a little smart-mouthed pup hide in my bosom and whisper me answers. The instructor got a bit suspicious but when I encouraged him to check my chest he chickened out…" Hanasaku smiled with her cheeks blushing a little.

While the other girls couldn't stop their bellies from the pain of their own laughter, Mana instead felt a bit overwhelmed by realizing that her own mentor was already capable of summoning ninja animals and had enough trust with them to ask one of them to hide under her clothes. The magician couldn't really even begin to imagine asking someone like Usuzoku to hide anywhere close to her. She hadn't even tried summoning any of the ninja rabbits nor did she know anyone except the nasty-mouthed bunny she met in the Forest of Death. Mana did find Hanasaku's story quite funny, regardless of what surprised her more in the pair of the two.

"So you cheated? I don't know what I expected honestly…" Kiyomi tried teasing the sensei who quickly changed the subject.

"Anyways, judging from the early results I got, you guys passed. Two of you didn't pick a syringe and just signed on top of the paper, Meiko didn't even do that so the commission kinda wondered what to do with it. It didn't express an actual desire to choose nothing like the other two did but there was no one else who filled nothing in so I just… asked them kindly… to realize it's Meiko's test and just pass it." The woman explained.

"So what's next?" Mana wondered.

"Not really sure. From what I've heard only a bit over thirty teams passed. There will definitely be an extra elimination test but it'll be something more… Physical. So far we've been given instructions to tell you guys to prepare and meet us near the western village gate in an hour. They said to get ready just like you'd get ready for a serious mission, don't get cocky yet." The woman encouraged her team and gestured for them to leave as she went into the office to straighten something out or fill out some paperwork that still needed to be done.

"Well, I guess that's official. We passed!" Kiyomi thrust her fist up in the sky in joy of passing the written test and, judging from the looks of it, already began planning what could've laid ahead.

Meiko just breathed out uneasily, like rolling a stone off her chest before beginning to hype herself up for the upcoming part of the exams. This was shaping out to be more on her alley and she hoped to be more help to the team than she was so far. Mana certainly hoped so, after all – she didn't want to see her friend sad or belittling herself anymore.

There wasn't much that Mana wanted to do back home. She just kind of checked her gear for the nth time and did some warm up exercises before wondering just what kind of test laid ahead. If over thirty teams remained the village could've held a three on three single round elimination exhibition, the fact that they suggested that they were treating this exam as more of an entertainment spectacle than anything else troubled the young kunoichi. Not that many people chose to observe any part of the exams but the finals so the choice to treat it so much like a cruel reality show was a bit baffling to the magician.

Seeing how the magician went into the written test fully prepared for a fight, as there was a strong possibility of the second exam following immediately after the first, she had little else to do for the remaining time so she just settled down to meditate. Sadly even that didn't really work out too well – there were just too many unclear fires in the vast blackness of her mind, like heated comets and little stars sparking and exploding only to reform again all around and the magician couldn't understand them at all.

With her meditational skills out of whack, Mana felt a bit uneasy. Was she just incapable to concentrate because of the stress that the exams brought? Maybe it was something more physical, some sort of a disease that her body tried to warn her about? No. It couldn't have been, Mana was incapable of even accessing the Ego stage anymore, at this point her meditational concentration ability was worse than even that of Meiko's and Mana barely even taught the blacksmith anything during the training of the two.

Worried over whatever that strange sign could've meant Mana picked up a small backpack and headed out to the western gate. She was beginning to relate to Meiko quite a bit right now. After all – the written test was something where Meiko felt like a fish out of water and with the upcoming physical test the magician felt almost the same. She was so much behind training with her peers, Meiko and Kiyomi trained with the Konoha Sannin for entire days on end whereas Mana had wasted so much time. Granted, she was training by herself but she didn't feel like she had made tremendous leaps in growth, just keeping herself in shape. Not regressing was not the same as moving forward.

With similar troubled thoughts the magician located her team in a greatly thinned crowd – just thirty two teams out of over hundred and fifty that came to take the written test. Plenty of the influx of ninja were still walking around the busy evening Konoha streets, wandering around to pass time until the finals. If they got eliminated so early, may as well pay for the tickets and see the entertainment of the finals.

"Hey! Wait a second, I know you!" a strong grip of an old woman locked around Mana's arm, the magician was surprised how her first instinctual yank didn't free her. The woman's grip may just have been stronger than Meiko's and Kouta's combined even though she didn't apply any pressure. Had she wanted it – Mana's entire arm would've been bone dust, hell, she could've yanked the whole thing out with a little more than a mean caprice.

"You're Konoha Sorceress, aren't you!? I've seen your show once!" the old lady laughed out erratically, geeking out over Mana which, frankly, was beginning to feel a bit uncomfortable.

"Oh… I'm glad you are so enthusiastic about it…" Mana grabbed the slight sips of happiness of meeting a fan and surfaced them over her shock and fear of this encounter.

"Heck yeah! I was told by my manager to check you out, just to know what real entertainment is all about! Travelled all the way from Iwagakure two years ago to see you and I would've travelled twice that distance. You helped me elevate my own entertainment tenfold!" the woman kept on jumping around energetically before her teammates noticed. A much younger attractive young man with a guitar case on his back gently pulled the old lady off of Mana.

"Enough, Gyllfa-san, just let the waitress take your order before you ask for any more food on top of that…" he advised the old lady whom he held in high regard as he used a very respective tone and honorific after her name.

Mana's lips couldn't help but pout after she was confused for someone in the service staff.

"She's not a waitress, Trest, can't you see the Konoha headband on her waist? She's a ninja." A much more mature man with dark green hair and eyes equally as blue as those of the musician shinobi who offended Mana informed his friend butting into the conversation.

The blond musician ninja began apologizing excessively, Mana played it off for laughs. It didn't help the fact that the young man's words cut deeper than she should've let them, even if they weren't deliberate. It was just that they were sharp enough and delivered at the right enough moment to stab straight through Mana's lowered defences.

"You're an entertainer too?" Mana asked, while she did feel uneasy in this company, she did try to show her interest in the woman and the woman's hint at her secondary profession was really genuine.

"Yeah, I'm a professional wrestler back in Iwagakure. Our wrestling industry isn't anywhere near as developed and world famous as that of Kumogakure but we have one…" the woman explained before noticing Mana's lingering and saddened eyes.

"Anyways, I won't hold you here for too long, hopefully we get to chat under better circumstances soon. It's clear that this half-wit here can't see a real entertainer when he sees one, don't blame him, blame his bad musical ear." The old woman bit back at the teammate of hers. While Mana politely excused herself and rushed away from the Iwagakure team that had interrupted her regrouping with her own team she still felt something hurting and squirming deep inside. It was apparent that the damage was already done…

Right after Mana joined her team a familiar frail and glasses wearing frame stepped onto a small stage positioned right in front of the Forest of Death. It was a familiar to the magician short frame covered up by a slick silky blue dress with yellow flowery motifs and draconic symbols. She was supposedly one of the jounin that were present during Team Oak's attack on the Konoha's junkyard district, she had not really met the woman face to face back then but she had seen her face on files and had her described to her by Shimo and Sugemi whenever they recalled that night.

"Attention, all of you!" she demanded, her voice was authoritative and strict enough to warrant it when she requested attention. "We are now going to begin the secondary exam of the Chuunin Exams – the survival drill! My name is Hozuki Shibari, I am a Konoha jounin and I will oversee this part of the exams."

While the woman spoke, without a doubt, seriously the smiling and rather playful tone of her seemingly strict voice somehow made her look like even more of a peculiar personality than the previous examiner – Akina Ishi.


	274. Big Balls of Gas and Liquid

"Took you a while" Kiyomi muttered twisting her lips at Mana's direction. Maybe the blonde was worried that the trio that stopped her before had told her something disheartening or tried to play dirty, then again, she could've just been curious.

Meanwhile on the plain and wooden elevated stage Shibari turned at a large covered up spherical object and removed a dark yellow cover off of it revealing a bloated sphere of some sort of gooey and colorless liquid, on the bottom of the rather impressively sized unidentified object laid a bunch of consoles and four flat monitors.

"I was a little distracted by Gyllfa-san. She's a wrestler from Iwagakure and a fellow entertainer." Mana explained trying to reveal as much as possible without skipping too much of Shibari's show and briefing of the rules. Something told her that knowing all there is to be known about the assignment would be of great value. Still, she wanted to calm Kiyomi down in case she suspected foul play of some sort.

"Holy shit!" Kiyomi shrieked while at the same time snuffing her voice emitting a very undignified whine similar to that of an injured dog. "An actual wrestler!? I love wrestlers! I mean Kumogakure is where the real wrestling is at but still…" the Yamanaka future heiress playfully punched air as an expression of hype and happiness.

"This here is a tracking device, capable of keeping track of chakra signatures in a large area. Most of the time – an entire battlefield during times of battle." Shibari explained pointing at the watery sphere. The two teammates directed their attention at the briefing almost the same instant that the woman started talking again.

"Normally tracking you in the Forest of Death, where the survival drill will be taking place, would be difficult. There'd be too many large chakra signatures of giant sized predators that lurk inside, identifying the exact signature would also be a problem. That's where these come in…" the woman walked up to a large cardboard box and removed the top of it revealing a bunch of ordinary looking kunai with odd tags attached to them.

"These are designed by our sealing expert ninja to slowly drain you of your chakra, in rates so small and insignificant that it'd take entire days to even notice anything. They however emit a very barely felt signal with the signature traits of each individual user's chakra which will keep track of specific ninja inside." Shibari revealed pointing at the watery sphere that lit up with a crimson spark at its eastern side, as a demonstration, no doubt, the symbols above the red signal read "Like this".

"I wish those kunai kinda looked cooler… They're pretty bland." Meiko pouted rather indifferently before snickering about how silly her remark was.

A much more angry reaction came from the blacksmith's backside. A whole bunch of angry murmurs that were slowly evolving into a ruckus of raised voices. Lightly tantalized by the uneasiness of the genin, Shibari raised her hand and gestured for the loud side that they were allowed to speak.

"What does that mean? How would you tell whose chakra signature it is just by taking in a small amount of it? Does Konoha have our chakra signature samples? Isn't that a bit much? What if you decide to use that information for military purposes?" a familiar face from before yelled out, slipping out from under his hood. It was the same young man who previously scolded Mana for assuming that the vast number of participants had anything to do with long periods of peace or the allied nature of the countries involved.

This time the young man wore a symbol on his cloak, the forehead protector carrying the village insignia was not attached to a piece of cloth but instead sewn directly onto his hood, just like it was for his immensely sized one and frail and feminine figured looking teammates. Now that the young man had attracted attention to himself and his team, Mana had noticed how his shorter female teammate had her hands tied around one another and her fingers tensely pressed at her elbows and the young lady was quivering as if she was cold.

It made little sense for her overly sensitive reaction to be so clear. While the air certainly was cold, Mana didn't feel too uncomfortable under a simple autumnal coat whereas she wore a full body covering hood and had it cover her head and her face. It made little sense for her to be cold. The magician remembered her previous nasty feeling about the tall man of that same team and realized that maybe creepiness was a more common trait as the young lady seemed to be the reasonable one before.

Shibari stroke her tired eyes after lifting her glasses a little before explaining herself.

"Yes. Yes we do have your chakra samples, we do have the chakra samples of anyone taking the exams. You cannot be guaranteed we won't use them for military purposes as we cannot be guaranteed you won't kill someone inside of there or purposefully sabotage the exams. It's a common feeling of tension we'll have to live with, unless you want to turn back and head home to Getsugakure, Nacasa Doma, of Team Phobos?" Shibari inquired.

"We do not!" a firm and masculine voice from under the hood of the larger team member rudely cut down. Still visibly peeved over this whole situation the shorter male of the Getsugakure team kept on growling to himself and grinding his teeth.

"You know, it's kind of weird how you're a ninja and a magician and then there's that old lady and she turns out to also be a superstar wrestler too…" Meiko almost hummed out through a tune she was whistling just to entertain herself throughout the briefing.

"Quiet down." Kiyomi slammed her palm at the top of Meiko's head rudely shoving it downwards to shut the blacksmith down. The redhead just yelled out in pain louder as a result. Luckily enough everyone was still busy discussing the current revelations and verbal exchanges between themselves to be overly offended by Team Hokage's overly expressive nature.

"I thought I was the only one trying to be a ninja as well as an entertainer behind the scenes…" Mana admitted. "I guess the idea of hiding one's identity in plain sight is a bit older than me." She whispered much quieter than Meiko before her.

"Anyways, before this whole thing needed to be cleared out, I was about to explain the rules better. This here's a hunting/survival test. Before entering through that door you'll have to pick a file from the pile right on that table. Inside that file you'll find one name – the name of the person you need to eliminate. The file is an excerpt from that ninja's own ninja record file, obviously, sensitive information is sealed with utmost care to ensure protection of their country's secrets. It was also made during that person's graduation from the Academy day meaning that you'll only get the info on their skillset not too long after they graduated – predicting their current abilities is a part of the test. That person is your ticket to the semi-finals, eliminate them and move to the northern gate of the Forest of Death." Shibari explained before staring awkwardly at the bunch of genin staring back at her in a level of awkwardness not quite unlike that of her own.

"Questions?" she wondered as the woman had expected the crew to be a bit more proactive in their hunting/survival drill.

An athletically built young man with golden dyed hair and red facial tattoos marking their eyes and lines that went over his cheeks and down to his chin as well as the typical Kaguya clan facial tattoo on his forehead lifted his hand revealing an Iwagakure headband tied around his strong arm.

"Jekleifer Kaguya, Team Corundum from Iwagakure. So it's every person for themselves? I fail to see the teamwork aspect here. What if we see the name of our teammate in that file? Could you, please, clarify the team matters regarding this test?" the young man requested with a very polite tone and equally as restrained and well taught mannerisms. His skin and arms were too well defined, too clean and smooth to be a worker of the Iwagakure mines, they were very clearly artificially buffed up from scratch instead of being a result of hard work.

An energetic young lady wearing a maroon colored jacket smacked her teammate in the back with a smile similar in its intensity and goofiness to the monkey-like smiles which Meiko liked to adorn, the edged up strings of her short darker shade of teal colored hair fell on her face making her comically struggle to move all of her hair out of her face. She must've commended her teammate on a good question in that way.

Shibari sighed before scratching the side of her very tensely stretched back into a hair bun hairdo, she did so in such speed and carelessness that a string of her hair let loose and began maliciously ruining her rather firmly established first impression of a cold, strong and strict woman.

"Well… We haven't really considered the part where you may find your teammate's name in the file. Truth be told, there're thirty two teams here so the odds of it happening aren't that great. Anyways, the whole team is only eliminated if at least two of its members are eliminated and surrender their ticket to the semi-finals to other ninja. That means that one person in your team can, in theory, be eliminated and you'll be just fine. The only thing you may not do is trade or try and switch out your own files so you'll have to confirm your candidate in secrecy with a staff member before entering." Shibari concluded.

"So at least two people in a team will be required for the semi-finals' exam…" Mana uttered to herself already beginning to count the chickens before they hatched. She realized that to trouble her head about the semi-finals was not overly wise however she was concerned with the entirety of the exams and not just a single round.

"If we find one of our names in the files we'll strike a deal of some sort, right?" Kiyomi suggested. "Let's not just go on backstabbing people, right?"

An uneasy sensation began burrowing in Mana's gut. She just felt like she was going to get Meiko's or Kiyomi's name and that this whole thing will blow out of proportions. It was just her natural luck… She couldn't fail, she couldn't allow herself to be eliminated for the sake of the team because in that case she'd fly right out of the team after being eliminated. Kiyomi and Meiko probably didn't know that and they wanted and deserved a shot at the semi-finals and finals just as much as anyone else did.

With certain anxiety Mana approached the pile of files spread in front of her and with a lightly shaking hand she reached out and pulled one out. It was like her heart had gone cold, she had the name in her hands, just inside the file but she didn't want to peek in. She didn't want that confirmation that she'd need to backstab her own friend in order to pass. Luckily enough Kiyomi and Meiko didn't pester Mana to show the name written inside the file, no one checked the files out in the open where someone could've taken a peek from behind. The names inside those files were astoundingly sensitive information.

The teams were then lined up by the entry and let inside, one by one. Mana stood behind a rather unimpressive looking young man with flappy and frail looking arms, stature even shorter than Mana's and very underdressed for the season, choosing to wear just a light blue sleeveless shirt. The young man proudly tied his headband protector right on top of his forehead like it was meant to be worn. Mana could recall seeing this boy in the Konoha Ninja Academy but he was younger than her, in the later generation that graduated one year after Mana did.

Right before the magician stepped in between the area outside the forest and the quiet darkness of absolute death that laid inside the forest she closed her eyes. Sounds of rustling leaves with no end to the height of where the rustling came from or how far away it came from in each direction. The darkness swallowed her whole and just as the magician opened her eyes on the other side did she witness a swarm of giant centipedes engaging the kids right there and up close to the southern entrance to the forest.

Meiko shrieked in joy, the prospect of battle must've excited her as she rushed at the gigantic thing with unheard of glee but Kiyomi's firm hand grabbed Meiko by her collar as well as Mana by hers and with great force dragged the two away.

"Don't waste your energy. Let's see if we can sit this out…" Kiyomi whispered before hearing ear deafening buzzing and looking up only to see a swarm of wasps at least three times her size diving in down to join into the feast of the young flesh let in to feed the forest.

"Storage Seal Rank-C: Unseal!" Meiko yelled out opening a large scroll and unleashing a flock of burning shuriken at the diving in swarm. It slowed the offensive on that front down somewhat but the swarm redirected their efforts elsewhere. The blacksmith merely tossed the scroll up in the air before touching a sticking out piece of her chest plate, unsealing a short one handed sword and jumping at the giant insect swarm, leaping from one wasp to another, slashing at them blindly like a madman and covering herself in sizzling white goo that shot out from the wounds. The poison that the wasps had within their system must've also been corrosive, as well as served the delivery function that blood served in most other species of animals.

"That idiot! She's wasting chakra augmenting her body to protect against that acidic goo. She's wasting stamina by fighting those things too! We need to get out of here fast!" Kiyomi grunted out seriously raging at Meiko and showing obscene gestures the likes of which should never be elaborated on.

"Aim at the lower part of the wings!" Mana screamed out from the depths of her lungs, she figured that Meiko wanted to fight it through the unexpected offense of the insectoid assailants so at the very least she should do so meaningfully.

Right as instructed the blacksmith began lobbing off the wasp wings one by one, disabling the insects completely by making them smash down raising storm of wood chips and bark flying all over the place as they smashed and busted down trees in their trajectory of freefall. Covered in sizzling acidic substance inside of the wasp's bodies and past their highly armored shells the blacksmith leaped off with a confident grin. The places where the acid stuck on her were lightly swollen but the blacksmith's system managed to fend off more gruesome effects of corrosion than just a light swelling.

Kiyomi angrily grabbed Meiko by the ear as the three began fleeing the total madness of the area right by the entry point. More and more genin entered the fray beginning to fight the insects off. The girls tried to focus on simply evading the battle to the best of their abilities so they could find a pocket of empty space to dash at high speeds through, the primary objective was to get away and find a safe spot. Then read out the names inside the files and come up with a strategy of some sort.

An even larger dark red colored centipede blocked off the girls' path, a loud popping sound alerted them to a ninja tool blowing up nearby. The trio tried to evade the explosive force but there was none to evade – only purple gas came out, poisonous gas which obviously the insect was immune to. Most of the more advanced poisons targeted very specific and complicated areas of the human body, areas and organs which insects such as those in the Forest of Death may not have had. Only the most primitive poisons could've worked on these beings.

A swooping sound of a blade cutting through air and sizzling sound of an explosive tag blowing the entire area up followed by a powerful explosion which knocked Mana off her feet and nearly deafened her completely.

"The gas bombs were flammable too…" she realized. That was one sneaky long range genin taking on that centipede, or maybe he was already rushing at her? Could he have identified one of the girls as his target? If the files really did have the Academy information on Mana it would've been easy to identify the young woman she'd grown up to be from the chubby cheeked brat in the picture. A steel string with a powerful scythe attached to it lobbed the centipede's head off before spinning in an erratic and impressively fast manner shredding the armored tissue and the goo inside to mush alike.

"Let's go!" Kiyomi shouted out pulling Mana by her elbow away from the madness.

Further away a large snake was assaulting a bunch of kids. Mana pointed at the trio and looked at Meiko with shock.

"Look there, it's Menna, Tala and Tiwul, Izem-san's team from Sunagakure!" she shouted out, her surprise was interrupted by Tala's sand bullets tearing holes through the snake's flesh and leaving it holey as a chunk of fermented cheese. Tiwul used her weapon puppetry to control a massive hammer in a manner that smashed the incapacitated snake dead.

"Can we just can it with the friend reunion and get out of here!?" Kiyomi angrily yelled out, all the yelling and ordering around was beginning to make her lose her voice a bit.

"You're just jealous you don't know Menna, Tala and Tiwul from Sunagakure…" Meiko grinned with that signature monkey-like dumb smile before Kiyomi remembered that the redhead had a yet untouched ear that she had to be pulled for great and highly painful effect.

And thus began the second part of the Chuunin Exams!


	275. The Brutal Ramen Destroyer Gwido!

As the Team Hokage graciously danced around the various centipedes, humongous wolves and snakes and other manners of beasts of excessive sizes Mana offered a glance at Kouta's team which was engaging a humongous flock of predators that were focusing down on an unintentional grouping of genin. These beasts were smart. They weren't the species that commonly cooperated however now they engaged their prey in a manner that drove large groups of genin together. That meant that each genin got into another's way whenever they overextended themselves. That also made them a larger serving for a predator that would eventually succeed.

"Come on, Mana!" Kiyomi hurried the magician along as she was beginning to slow down. The magician's figure began falling down to the edges of speed that was intelligible to the various creatures hunting for an influx of genin, none of whom possessed an Intent ability that was needed to keep them at bay like the older and more experienced ninja could.

Seeing how Kouta stopped the charge of an underground viper with his bare handed slap, absorbing and deflecting the entirety of the forty plus ton weighing snake. How his angered and desperate yet controlled chakra cannon blasts blew off the upper half of the snake's body and how it broke right through the hardened shell of the giant centipedes that immediately rushed into the fray, how his immense honed speed and agility allowed him to evade the scythe-like cuts from the giant praying mantises that stalked the genin by the entrance gave her confidence in her boyfriend's abilities to handle it. Even if his team's choice was to fight through the hordes of predators that engaged the entering genin right out of the bat.

While Mana's affirmed confidence allowed her to boost her speed and once again become nearly untraceable to the many predators that flocked in great quantities by the southern entrance, Kiyomi however did begin to lag behind, becoming lightly entranced by Kouta's cute looking teammate and how effortlessly his two handed sword split the attacking predators of the Forest of Death to pieces. Having finally understood and agreed to the retreat plan, Meiko just grabbed the blonde's ear and began dragging the Yamanaka away by force, in a manner similar to that which was required to drag the blacksmith away from the battlefield before.

Finally the girls found a solid straight line to speed up in, without needing to circle around smaller scale battlefields they could finally just leap with a single powerful dash and distance themselves properly from the southern entrance battlefield. With the final sight of Mana's brief glance back at it being a giant centipede stepping into a wire trap set up by Kouta's female teammate - Budoki before being cut to pieces by his male teammate the girls dashed away from the utter madness that greet them.

Everything around them blurred. Green and black environment that surrounded them began brightening and mashing together into a sick milkshake-like esthetic and any sounds of yells, grunts or reptile hisses became dulled out and monotonic shrieks in Mana's ears. Almost instantly she felt her chakra burn up inside her system, it was like someone had set up a combined system of needles that pierced her body in multiple select vital points and drained blood itself out of them leaving small painful fires where blood once was that slowly simmered and discomforted the young kunoichi.

"That was one mean dash…" Kiyomi panted before patting her messy and dirty grey dress and fixing her black vest from completely slipping off her body. Their dashes weren't perfect – all three of the girls had small bruises from where they failed to completely move out of the way of all the smallest branches and thick and sharp edges of cutting leaves and grass below. Focusing so much on speed augmentations and integrity of one's own body in such intense speeds left one's overall endurance augmentations a bit shoddy.

"Yeah, if we get attacked soon we won't be our full selves…" Meiko nodded before beginning to whine over her scratched armor paintjob. It was no branch that left those marks, these were tooth and claw marks as well as acid melting large chunks of it. Most ninja had the ability to extend their chakra augmentations a bit past the point of their own bodies and cover their entire clothes, Meiko's augmentation abilities may have still been a bit raw, her control was quite shabby and her armor pieces intricate and extensive which didn't let her offer her armor the same degree of protection she could afford to grant herself.

"Let's slow down the pace and keep moving, it's a good one and a half day of casual trekking before we reach the northern exit…" Mana suggested before putting her hand on the file that was hidden in an inner pocket of her jacket and pressing the file's corner hard in fear of what may have laid within it.

"We still need to take on three teams to hunt down our targets. Ideally some of our names will be in the same teams, that way we'd only need to fight two or less teams before we reach the exit." Kiyomi sighed pulling out her own file from under her vest and lightening the belt on her abdomen that she had tightened before to secure the file to her body.

Meiko removed a partly molten file from her pocket, the yellow cover of the file was halfway corroded from all the acidic goo dipping the blacksmith had done earlier in her quest to slay as many gigantic wasp creatures as she could, the file inside of the cover was just barely visible and barely even "confidential" anymore by the strict meaning of the word.

The trio slowed down before looking at each other and peeking at their respective files. Meiko clacked with her tongue before slipping the messed up file out from the burnt cover as most of it was exposed anyways. The blacksmith then looked with genuine reservations and some respectable composure, for her at least, before showing the file to her team. The lighting in the area was limited but some details could've been made out with effort, once the day got darker they'd likely need some illumination for pretty much anything. The picture had a young boy of more western darker complexion and a somewhat devious looking smile and shades.

"Qarsufly from Team Maruf, Sunagakure…" Meiko grinned as if that revelation really meant anything else but a person she was supposed to defeat or take out with deceit. "I think I accidentally melted off the second name of the poor guy…" the girl innocently rubbed the back of her head making a mess out of her blazing red colored hairdo.

"No, people from Sunagakure usually only have one name unless they hail from a clan. You've salvaged a surprising amount of information." Mana comforted her friend even though judging from the genuine composed and contained hype of the blacksmith she needed none of it.

"Oh yeah… Tala, Tiwul and the others had none…" Meiko scratched her chin while her eyebrows were continuously emulating impressions of smart people when they thought really hard.

"Alright, let's see what I got!" Kiyomi smiled demonstrating more of Meiko's hyped out nature in that one expression than the blacksmith did during the revelation of her target. The girl opened up the file and as carefully as it was possible while leaping around a gigantic dark forest, at least they were located in the upper layers of the trees where limited sunlight still broke through. After reading through her file the Yamanaka showed it to Mana and Meiko.

"No fricking way! It's Othello G from CWF – Cloud Wrestling Federation! Apparently he's in Team Cumulus from Kumogakure. I guess names like that are normal in Kumogakure too, Ms. Historian?" Kiyomi cheeked at Mana after the team got a better look at the dark skinned young man with feint clues of a facial hair and a silly looking green woolen hat.

"No, it's not his real name. Kumogakure doesn't prohibit uses of nicknames and stage names in personal documents. It must be his wrestling stage name, you're the authority in that…" Mana smiled, she was glad that at least two of her teammates didn't receive any names she wouldn't have liked to see in there. Not only that, Kiyomi found a name in her target file that was a known to her wrestler which meant she'd be vaguely familiar with his abilities.

"Come on, Mana! Show us yours!" Meiko hurried Mana, a sentiment of pure hype which Kiyomi soon joined in on.

The magician held her file ahead of herself, hesitant to take a look. Even while the passing trees and branches passed by at great speeds and the trio of genin kunoichi evaded them while focusing entirely on the files in their hands, the magician's utmost attention was fixed on the yellow neatly packed file. Slowly she removed the rubber band off of it and clicked a metal pin to open up the file, not because of any desire to know what's inside but purely because of need to do so.

"Junipu-R. Team Cirrus, Kumogakure." Mana finally sighed in relief as the worst case scenario of finding Kiyomi's or Meiko's name, or even that of Kouta or any of his teammates was just that – her silly worrying over too many things, anxiety for anxiety's own sake.

"Huh… I guess we really will have to take on three teams in total. Too bad…" Meiko wondered before realizing that the prospect kind of excited her. "At least we'll get to see a whole bunch of different genin from different countries and see how they fight and operate!" the blacksmith then rubbed her itchy nose.

"G and R… What kind of last names are that?" Kiyomi expressed her annoyance over foreign customs. Likely they were made up parts of the nicknames that the young Kumogakure ninja adopted as their own. Historically no Kumogakure ninja had similar names, even if the legislation regarding nicknames in documents was ancient, so it had to be a newer fad. Some old Kumogakure ninja supposedly used to shorten their credentials to avoid the humanity of having an actual name – that was the whole purpose of the previously mentioned law. The current generation must've used those laws for the sole purpose of giving themselves stage names that sounded weird and loud…

"Don't make fun of foreign customs. The only reason why allied countries even take Chuunin Exams together is to promote cooperation and friendship between different countries." Mana pouted giving Kiyomi an uncomfortable glare one gave their older and quite fascist relative who held the century old opinion that all ninja countries needed to wall themselves off from the surrounding world.

"I just wanted to come to the conclusion that we need to find them and ask them directly, mom." Kiyomi shrugged without skipping the opportunity to cheek Mana.

"Could you guys stop talking already?! I want to fight." a loud grunt right behind them alerted the three girls and made them freeze in place, or at least feel like all time had frozen whereas their bodies moved forward out of sheer instinct. Kiyomi didn't waste any time to bend her body backwards and throw an elbow strike that hit someone right in the nose, Meiko followed by dragging her arm down her armor and unsealing a short fingertip to elbow length one handed sword which she swung backwards and having it collide with a flock of sparks with another sword.

A strong shockwave nearly threw Mana off the frail branch she was on at that moment. Whoever the woman who taunted the trio of Team Hokage was – she was equally as physically mighty as Meiko which was terrifying in of itself, her blade was also made from quite valuable and expensive materials as it could clash with Meiko's own well-made blade and not break.

Meiko and the mysterious sword wielding kunoichi assailant disappeared from sight. Dozens ranging into hundreds of small clashes with sparks and shockwaves downing trees and blowing them into storms of chips firing off like shrapnel followed before light taps made Mana's ears twitch and realize that the duo had landed firmly on the ground level below. The only person still up there and curiously glaring at Mana and Kiyomi was a young and very short brat grasping at his nose which got pounded by the Yamanaka heiress' elbow strike.

It was such a curious looking fellow – clearly ready for a harsh winter as he wore a pompous looking, fancy, dark blue detective hat with furry ears buttoned to the sides with golden colored embroidery and a uniform-like looking attire that was purposed for colder weathers. The little thing was almost as large as the duffel bag that he wore by his side and was quite similar to a little male snow fairy as the boy's white as snow hair directly contrasted the bleeding nose that was spouting blood excessively all over his knitted woolen gloves with beautiful golden colored stars that were now tainted with his own blood.

"You guys again!?" Kiyomi's jaw dropped to the ground as she appeared to identify the individual. Having in mind that once the little boy lifted his face and Mana saw him wearing a fake black as tar moustache and even faker glasses that lacked any glass inside their rims at all the fact really interested her. "I thought we kicked your asses back then enough… You were lucky Meiko didn't feel like bringing you guys in!"

"Shuddup, you old hag! It's not my fault that Teia wanted to fight you idiots again! She dragged me with her!" the young boy freaked out lifting off the ground almost like he could fly. After looking at the rustling moss and leaves beneath his feet the magician identified a Wind Release ninjutsu similar to that of her own but on a much more casual and weak scale – the young man was very light in weight so weak wind currents he generated casually could've levitated him easily like a plastic bag.

"Teia? You know this guy?" Mana curiously looked at her friend who just sighed and began running down the tree they were in stuck to the bark using the Art of Tree Climbing technique, an elementary exercise jutsu known to most ninja and generally used to hone their chakra control. Needless to say the magician had to follow her friend to get her answer.

"Yeah, they attacked us when Hanasaku-sensei left us two to train alone for a while during our training trip. The big blonde bitch is Yoruma Galateia and the little brat's called Aoi Yuki. They weren't really up to no good, they just wanted a fight but they're technically missing ninja, at the time they had Kumogakure headbands. The girl he referred to is actually a Yoruma clan member from Kumogakure, she's different from Hisako though, this one's much more numb-skulled but hundredfold less sadistic. She's a fighting-obsessed nutjob but she's not really up to murder or anything like that. Me and Meiko kicked their asses but the bigger conflict was when we feuded over bringing them in, I wanted to either kill them on the spot or bring them in but Meiko resisted and… Who can argue against that cute smile of hers." Kiyomi blushed before looking away with a very suspiciously angry face, angry not for any other reason but for the fact that Meiko's puppy eyes affected her own decision in any way at all.

Finally once the two girls landed down firmly on the ground near Meiko, followed shortly by the floaty little brat that the similarly fully armored to Meiko Yoruma girl was accompanied by the magician could get a better look at those two. Actually there were three people – the duo must've gotten some other guy to tag along to fool the village that they were actually taking part in the Chuunin Exams. This kind of thing was not unheard of entirely but it was really not going to reflect too great on their prison record once their fraud was exposed.

"Look, Galateia, we don't really want to do this right now. We have a whole Chuunin Exam ahead of us. We have no stamina to spend on you…" Meiko tried to reason with the opponent whom she slowly walked towards, mirroring the swordsman's own movements before the two clashed their blades again. The duo pushed their blades onwards, desperately struggling to overcome their opponent but it was a deadlock – Mana was surprised to find out that there was another person about her age that perfectly mirrored Meiko's physical strength and skill with a sword.

"Wait, didn't you imply there were two of them? So who's that guy?" Mana pointed at a western darker complexion young man in a red tracksuit and spiky dark hairdo that was staring at Mana and Kiyomi with his dark brown stare and very refined and puffy lips.

"Oh. This is just Gwido." The young white haired brat pointed at his comrade.

"Hi, I'm Gwido." Gwido introduced himself by raising his hand and yet his face showed no emotion. Gwido was brutal and cold, from where Mana was standing, he smelled of onions too.

"We needed three people to fake our entry into the exams, Gwido here was eating ramen when we found him. Galateia liked ramen so she automatically liked Gwido and a team of three was born." Aoi explained.

Mana's eyes moved away from Gwido and onto Galateia – a very bright and almost golden shade of blond haired girl that was clashing with Meiko. Her technical skill with a sword was actually a notch above Meiko's, it was just that Meiko appeared to be faster in general that she managed to respond to Galateia's highly acrobatic and swift assault. That Yoruma woman troubled Mana the most, while Aoi may have been just as powerful, he very clearly had little to no wish to even be here.

After a powerful spinning slash that was mirrored perfectly by Meiko the two young women slid away from each other and panted as the clash took more than just a couple of breaths from them. Even so, they were very clearly still warming up.

"How did you three idiots even fool the Administration? Aoi is wearing a fake moustache and he's like what… Eight? Galateia is wearing shades that have an actual honest to God plastic moustache. You'd have had better chances at hiding if you didn't try to disguise yourselves at all!" Kiyomi grunted out as she didn't appear to like Galateia and Aoi very much, her opinion of Gwido remained to be seen. Then again, anything about Gwido was still to be seen as Gwido was yet to do anything at all.

"Alright. Leave me alone to fight Meiko. You two do whatever, if those two girls interfere you can beat them up!" Galateia appeared to be immune to Kiyomi's belittlement as she just gripped her man-sized two handed sword and prepared to re-engage.

"Right. If anything happens I fight the blond Yamanaka, you, Gwido, you can take the hotel receptionist." Aoi ordered his friend. Or whatever Gwido was in this case.

"Me? I can't fight…" Gwido shook his head with an equally as cold and brutal expression as he had when he introduced himself.

"Well then… Stay here and just be Gwido. I'll take them both on…" Aoi scratched his eyes in irritation.

Mana was suddenly broken out of the most unbelievable daydream she was blasted into by these even less believable events transpiring in front of her that offered little to no chance of a breather to comprehend what was even going. The feeling that broke her out was her own a bit chilly fingers clutching into a fist and her thigh muscles tightening in anger.

"I'm a stage magician, actually…" Mana interrupted Aoi with an irritated and ready for an engagement tone. This was the second time she was treated as less than a member of the Team Hokage and things had to be proven. The magician disliked violence but in this case it needed to be quickly resolved before their team wasted too much stamina fighting these goofballs.

"I apologize, ma'am. I happened to be wrong." Aoi politely nodded his head. Something truly was off about these missing ninja, they didn't act or feel like one's usual batch of criminal rogues…

 **OOC: The character of Yuki Aoi was created by Joe Dupras and was incorporated into the story by his suggestion.**


	276. The Floating Jiangshi

Mana's eyes carefully weighed the curious case of a rogue ninja who stood and didn't move her eyes away from Meiko. In a lot of ways this young woman was very similar to the blacksmith, she was strong, her face was by default always in a curious expression, dazed and confused by a reality she couldn't comprehend before some trigger hit her senses changing the mask on her face permanently to the corresponding emotion of a fitting response for that trigger.

In many more ways she was different – overly tall and thin. Hair so long they absolutely had to get in her way unless she somehow incorporated their movement into her fighting style and so bright that they didn't really seem natural. Then again, hair colors like this were common to the Yoruma clan. Sometimes the color of one's chakra aura irradiating from them impacted the natural color of one's eyes and hair, that'd have made this girl an owner of an immensely bright colored chakra – a reflection of noble intent, sacrificial and pure hearted character which Mana doubted a nukenin to have. Even given her optimistic attitude towards people.

Similarly to Meiko the rogue was armored, however only in certain areas, choosing to wear casual light clothing where armor was not of prime necessity. All of her major arteries and sensitive areas where a skipped slash would've opened a battle or life ending wound were covered up: neck, shoulders, lower abdomen. Her stance with the sword suggested a heightened focus on protecting her chest making heavy chest plates redundant. She was already working with a lot handling that two handed longsword of hers.

Meiko playfully teased an attack, swinging a quick slash that was not as focused in its swinging force as it was focused on a quick return to position afterwards. Teia's feet danced beautifully placing her aside and avoiding a clash, in response she swung her longsword upwards aiming to chop off her opponent's hands. From a vibrant smile on the blonde's face it was easy to read that she didn't count on Meiko's hands dropping anytime soon. A brief metallic sound suggested that a very narrow part of the blade's tip did come in contact with the blacksmith's wristplates.

"Don't interfere." Meiko cautioned the two kunoichi in her team. "There's no need of wearing out our whole team. It's best we put this to rest now and play along." Her voice was unwavering and demanded to be held in some amount of authority.

"We could quickly beat that brat up and then assist Meiko in taking this plank-wench out…" Kiyomi pouted blowing out her cheeks in frustration.

"It's fine. We're not at our full power from that dash, while we observe this fight we can recover somewhat where we would exhaust ourselves even more if we involved ourselves. We'd be left mostly worn out, all three of us, against the odds of needing to fight three teams and fight off whomever comes for us." Mana grudgingly accepted Meiko's request. She didn't like this way of looking at things one bit but her own attitude had to be sacrificed.

"Good, I really don't like fighting that much. Seeing Galateia do it this often and put us in trouble makes it look like such a troublesome thing…" Aoi nodded looking a little relieved that the two kunoichi agreed to play along his friend's terms.

"Don't lower your guard. After this is done we're absolutely taking you in. Fraud of such high caliber and kidnapping of a Konoha villager, you're looking at years of punishment in Rengoku, you may even spend some months in Jigoku if the Tribunal feels particularly nasty that day." Kiyomi sneered at the little boy.

Looking at Aoi from the side it was difficult to say his age for certain. He may have been in his early teens but he looked that damn young and innocent. It didn't help that he was far too short for a teen and floated in the air using his strange weakened version of Mana's levitation technique. Honestly, he looked like a fairy or something.

"They didn't technically kidnap me, they said I could watch the earlier stages of the Chuunin exams for free by just sticking around them and acting like I'm all business." Gwido butt into the conversation. "Didn't know I'd get to see Konoha's Sorceress too… I'd have joined in immediately." The young man grimaced.

Galateia stopped swinging her sword at thin air only to switch onto dancing away from Meiko's blade. For a while the two swordswomen kept on slashing at each other without blocking, just parrying and avoiding damaging their blades as it was made quite clear that the matching craftsmanship of their swords would've made it quite impossible to quickly shatter the shoddier blade.

"Konoha's Sorceress?" Galateia suddenly broke her stance before sheathing her sword. "Are you good?" she shifted her attention completely at Mana making the magician question just how intelligent she could've been to pick a fight with Meiko and then completely drop it after a single attention trigger coming in.

"I don't want to brag…" Mana shyly shrugged.

"Are you kidding? She does some wicked fricking magic, and I've seen a shitload of magic on the streets after her shows picked up – nothing's as good as the real deal." Gwido started to sound quite obsessed with Mana's shows, frankly, the magician thought his input may have overrated her a bit, or been a little bit biased, but she was glad to hear that she was still ahead of those that may have picked up her odd and previously unseen craft in the ninja world after her.

"Magic!?" Galateia flipped the fecal contents of her innards completely before dropping on the ground and smashing her head into the dirt, like she was beginning forgiveness. "Please don't witch me, I merely wish to challenge Meiko to a fair fight so we can settle this! I have no wish to offend you, witch!"

"Does she know my magic isn't actual magic, just stage magic?" Mana wondered squinting as she leaned over to ask Kiyomi.

"It doesn't seem so. Please be advised, she's quite mentally challenged and it doesn't seem to be caused by a disease or anything – she's just of profoundly low intelligence." Kiyomi replied, she didn't appear surprised by this sort of behavior, a bit riled up, if anything.

"I don't know… I sort of need my Meiko strong and ready to fight for me, rogue ninja… I am considering severe bewitchment…" Mana played along with Galateia's silliness.

Galateia stood back up and pulled her blade out before pointing its tip at Mana's direction. Her eyes looked cold and emotionless, she didn't sound offended or anything of the sort, she just turned her attention completely at the supposed witch that threatened her goal with a barrier of bewitchment.

"Hmmm… What am I to do? Fighting a frail witch with troublesome magical powers is boring, but I do want to fight Meiko a lot…" Galateia muttered to herself as her eyes rolled around signaling a desperate shift in her thoughts. "Witch, may I strike you with a deal? My companion here is a Jiangshi, a flesh eating undead being of a boy that died a tragic death and is looking for vengeance before he can return to the spiritual plain. If you would choose to direct your righteous magical fury at him instead of my fight, we could settle our differences afterwards."

Kiyomi smacked her face. Aoi dashed up to Galateia's face and shouted out in her face, "You stupid idiot, I told you already, I'm no Jiangshi! I'm a human boy, a really short one and pale one but just because I was sickly as a child!"

The Yamanaka, still stroking her aching forehead turned at Mana, looking to question the sanity of this situation, only to find her nowhere to be found. A tip of the magician's hat was located further behind a tree. Confused the Yamanaka slowly walked up to said tree leaving Meiko and Galateia to fight their problems out. Mana was sitting and wheezing on the other side of the tree, for the most part the magician didn't even notice that she was found and jumped up in surprise and shakes when she found out she was discovered.

"You do know he's not a real ghost, right? I mean for Pete's sake, you were supposed to be the smart and reasonable one of us…" Kiyomi sighed realizing that even Mana was consumed by the madness of this conflict.

"Sorry… Couldn't help it, she just said "Jiangshi" and my legs sort of gave way. I just really don't like ghosts…" Mana whimpered out before standing back up and fixing her messy clothes and hat and returning to the battlefield with her teammate. "He does look like a Jiangshi though…" the magician leaned in to whisper at her friend's ear so that she wasn't heard by the Yuki boy and didn't offend him.

"He does…" even Kiyomi had to admit.

"Jiangshi aren't even ghosts, you know… They're flesh eating undead." Aoi sniffled in both significant melancholy and defensive anger.

"She's a sucker for ghost stories, I suppose other kind of undead too… If you asked me it's a psychological thing, she hates letting people die so I suppose it symbolizes failure to her." Kiyomi rubbed her temples in annoyance waiting for Meiko and Galateia to finish fighting it out but it seemed like neither of the two even landed a solid hit on each other as Meiko held back significantly trying not to waste too much stamina and chakra whereas Galateia didn't fight all out by default, choosing to enjoy the battle in its dragged out entirety.

"Hmmm… Teia doesn't like killing either. I really don't care, though… She thinks that a person she kills she can't fight later so it also makes sense when you look at it from their eyes. Though she had gotten a bit overexcited before, she's not the brightest judge of when one is already dead or not…" Aoi chuckled.

A bombastic barrage of shockwaves with sparks emitted from the two clashing swords devastated the surrounding. A pair of large spiders tried catching Galateia and Meiko in their web or wrap their eight legs around them and inject their poison forcefully but the two quickly sliced their respective predators to pieces with just several quick slashes of their swords. Galateia finished dealing with hers first – after all her sword was sufficiently large by itself to do the dirty deed, she didn't need the additional effort of added movement to finalize the cut.

Meiko, just having finished dealing with her spider turned back and swung her blade backwards from instinct, she met nothing but a face full of blonde almost golden colored hair, making the blacksmith waver backwards and try listening in to her moving in opponent so that she could defend in time. It was a clever manner of attack – utilizing Teia's long hair and letting Meiko's sword just cut some of it where the patches that passed through slammed right into the redhead's face dazing her momentarily.

A quick and disorienting pull completely confused Meiko before she identified her opponent's motion – she was grabbed by her own chest plate and pulled in for a stab. That wouldn't have worked. Meiko was too fresh and her augmentations were too solid – the sword wouldn't cut too deep into the skin so early on so it slightly confused the weaponry user before an eruption of pure pain hit her right in the nose making a warm blast of blood cover her face from the blacksmith's nose. It was not a stab that Galateia pulled Meiko in for – it was a headbutt.

After Meiko opened her eyes from the burst of tears coming out from inside her tear ducts a somewhat soft kick sent her flying back. Differently from the strong and focused headbutt, this attack was barely even registered and was, most likely, solely meant to send the blacksmith further away.

Meiko quickly slid her unprotected elbow through her nose where the steel wasn't covering up the green tracksuit underneath allowing her to quickly wipe off this burst of blood and buy her seconds of time before another one came. Too slow… Galateia was already behind her!

A loud clang followed by an immense shocking sensation followed as Meiko bent her back in pain, her opponent's focused strike cut right through the armor on the back, strongest exactly where the redhead's spine was located as that part was to be protected at all costs. As the blacksmith worked her way to roll and dash away from her brutal opponent as fast as possible she lamented the damage she allowed to be inflicted initially as the countless distractions from pain coming from all sides and irritation in her entire facial area prevented from her focusing and substituting properly. A focused and good at controlling themselves and their chakra ninja would've been able to…

Meiko gritted her teeth in pain as the warm feeling of blood trickling down her back and soaking her clothes didn't let her forget this moment of getting careless. Galateia had certainly gotten better in the handful of days that the two hadn't fought each other, she was leaps and bounds ahead in just that short amount of time. Still, Meiko felt like it wasn't yet something she couldn't handle.

Suddenly a whistling and crashing buzzsaw emerged from the trees, Galateia lifted her hands up with her blade and continuously flipped overhead emulating one and slicing through wood and likely steel alike. With a gentle leap Meiko avoided the strike, she dragged her hand across the wristband of hers as a sealing glyph made itself clear and a steel string with a weight on the end got unsealed which the blacksmith used to yank herself farther away from her opponent and get on the upper layer of trees.

"I was really looking forward to this fight, Meiko. Ever since we first fought! I trained really hard to not disappoint you like the last time, please let's do our best!" Galateia grinned, for someone who described a process of two people horribly murdering each other she looked awfully excited and optimistic about it. Sometimes the blacksmith felt a bit too excited about fighting too, it was that one thing she was confident about, something she could've been useful to her friends in. But never to such extent.

"You just got me with that hair attack because I didn't expect it, let's make this clear…" Meiko answered with a smile of her own.

"I see… You've sealed your sword though, do you surrender?" Galateia wondered, "Because I won't accept such an end to our battle. I'll chase you to the end of the Earth to settle this!"

"It is tempting to just let you get bored handing me my ass and then be done with this but I need to pay my dues for my team. They worked really hard to get me to this stage of the exams, I absolutely cannot let that effort go unrewarded." Meiko replied as her smile faded and was substituted by a determined expression.

Galateia didn't offer any words, she just leaped at the tree Meiko was standing on slashing at its base aiming to bring it down. Break her opponent's sense of balance and concentration before attacking her while she had no footing. It was a grand idea but Meiko had an even grander one. With a mad battlecry the blacksmith focused her chakra all in her feet, the blacksmith ventured back to all of Mana's lessons, she relied on herself not failing with this simply trick as the redhead kept stuck on the tree even as it began sliding down only to leap behind it and kick it with her feet thusly that it wound end up flying right at Galateia.

A single silver colored blur and the golden swordswoman cut the tree in two allowing the two parts of it to split off and not harm her. With a relatively cold yet also anticipating the upcoming hype of Meiko's attack stare the rogue swordswoman continued to observe Meiko's response. Without even a sword in hand the blacksmith dashed out from the nearest bush, having hid there during the distraction that the falling tree had provided her. Teia instinctively swung her blade aiming right at the blacksmith's abdomen but was suddenly caught off balance as red sticky blood burst like a balloon bomb had just exploded in her face. The golden haired swordswoman took a couple of graceful leaps back, swinging her longsword in front of her just to ward off any attempts to capitalize on Meiko's clever offense at using her own relentlessly bleeding nose.

Teia's scream colored the dark and dangerous forest as Meiko's palm strike tensed her back elbow too much for the sword to remain in her hand.

"I made a mistake before." Meiko uttered attacking Galateia's entire body, every unarmored point with her bare fists. "I fought you – a skilled swordswoman with my own sword." The blacksmith continued after she noticed Teia's feet attempting to move and simply unsealing and tossing a pair of kunai blades that grazed her shins and stuck straps of her denim trousers to the ground. Tearing those straps required additional motions, motions that weren't getting away from Meiko's relentless offensive and bought her time.

"I don't plan to make that mistake anymore!" Meiko finished after unsealing a knuckle duster and fitting her fingers inside it while it was still in mid-air after being removed from its seal inside the blacksmith's wristguard. The redhead threw a powerful cross with it throwing her opponent off her feet and downing her. Quickly, Meiko unsealed several more shuriken and launched them at her downed opponent pinning some more of her clothes to the dirt and wooden roots beneath her.

Again Meiko angrily sniffed her nose letting some more blood burst out so that her breathing was unclogged. It was difficult attacking so relentlessly with a bleeding nose and teary eyes, she'd have been able of inflicting so much more damage if it wasn't for the damage she had sustained…

"Stay down…" Meiko quietly growled before turning her back to her opponent.

"Where do you think you're going!?" Galateia's angry growl made the blacksmith turn around. The brutal nukenin swordswoman had torn her clothes up by forcing her way out of the lock of steel that she was placed in and stood back up. Apart from cracked lip and a bad situation in her mouth resulting in a mouthful of blood coming up from time to time she didn't look too badly damaged.

"You had my back exposed…" Meiko groaned in frustration. "Should've just finished it!"

"That'd have not been fair. I only attack from the back when you anticipate me to. Not when your guard is down." The blonde shook her head before picking her sword back up and resuming her fighting stance.


	277. Meiko's Approach

The soft soughing sound calmed Shibari down greatly. During moments like this when there was no action to be seen, only relaxing sounds around her, she could just sit down and float away. Just let her consciousness fade and slip into a sweet cottony dream.

"Ma'am, we've got action between Team Hokage and the Rogue Element." a strict masculine voice reported, he sat slouched over, shoulders narrowed and his neck combatted the weight of the heavy visual equipment on his head. A concoction of steel and glass, a combination of visual monitors and a combat helmet.

Clacking the heels of her sandals against the rough stony forest outskirts Shibari made her way to the sensory mechanism and observed the problem point for a brief moment. She was biting her lip subconsciously, nibbling on the inner soft skin in her mouth while the woman stared blankly at the watery orb and symbols on it.

"Shall we send someone to collect the nuke and her accomplices?" a different chuunin asked for further orders as, in case of a positive answer, starting earlier on opening the communication programs from inside his helmet was in order and would've greatly diminished the amount of work he had to do.

"If I wanted her arrested I wouldn't have let her in there in the first place. It's fun shaking the boring games up with a Rogue Element once in a while." Shibari smiled to the man, something he could not see given the excessive headgear placed on his shoulders.

"As you say, ma'am."

"What about the other teams? I assume you are ready to report grievous injuries and takedowns, Konoha High?" the woman asked with disdain and somewhat of a playful tease towards the educational institution that the chuunin came recommended from as an intern.

"Yes, ma'am! There are no relevant injuries to speak of yet. No contacts so far, the situation at the entrance is mostly resolved, the wildlife is returning to its rightful habitat."

"Nice work, Intent Ops…" Shibari sighed before walking further off and observing the entirety of the messy looking liquid orb, her lips sharpened and ducked out from her mouth in concentration.

"Ma'am!" a squad of chuunin not wearing any headgear working by a fancy looking green and rotten grey scroll let out as a collective unit affirmed their acknowledgment of her compliment.

"Let me know when the Rogue Element is taken out. I'll go in and take the trash out personally." Shibari gave a knowingly unseen glance at the sensory team positioned by specific corners of the sensory mechanism and overseeing their own attributed patches of the Forest of Death battlefield.

Galateia's blade was caught by Meiko's arms, with a cheeky smile the blonde pressed her sword's handle harder attempting to force it through. A wound like that would've certainly made the blacksmith's day worse, right on the center of her chest, from one shoulder to the pelvis.

"You seemed to have more fighting spirit during our first meeting." The rogue ninja noted.

"That was different. I was just training, eager to push myself to the limits to move past them. Here I must preserve my resources…" Meiko grunted as her opponent's physical pressure was formidable.

The redhead growled in pain and tiredness as she pushed the blade's edge to the shoulder plate – one of the more armored parts of the body of both of the kunoichi. The heat and flashing light of the sparks that fired out as Galateia's blade slipped through the plating and smashed into the ground blinded Meiko temporarily and made her flinch. It was a wonderful thing, however, as she instinctively closed her eyes and avoided them being filled with dirt and wood chips from the ground Galateia's sword busted open.

The loud clang of Meiko's armored foot stamping right in the weight center of the sword combined with the pain and tension on Galateia's wrist from her holding the blade disarmed the girl. The blacksmith tossed a good pair of punches that'd have cracked the whole world in two but it appeared this nuke's jaw was tougher than that. Each time she was hit, Galateia turned back with an almost psycho smile. She didn't enjoy the process of being hit, she didn't like pain, clearly. She enjoyed the overall process of fighting, facing an opponent who disarmed her and exploited her openings.

The redhead just cursed aside over her left shoulder and raised her arms up, her left palm reached over the wristguard just to be able to unseal one of her bucklers if she needed to.

Galateia's response was quick, after picking her weapon back up, she slid her palm over the handle of the longsword, twisting it like a spinning toy horizontally. The blasted thing rotated so fast that a howling sound smit the blacksmith's ears, just after the nukenin's vertical palm thrust at the end of the handle of her sword Meiko realized she hadn't enough air for a proper dodge. Struggling with a bleeding nose spouting blood both on the outside and inside was more troublesome than she had initially predicted it to be.

"Sunray!" Galateia shouted as she pressed her second palm against the first, despite it being quick and barely noticeable, Meiko could pick up on her focusing significant force into her feet. A great amount of force now flowed through her entire body, perfect footing and perfect channeling of the force from her feet to the palms resulted in a kenjutsu technique that utilized a longsword like a spear.

A sharp pain in the gut shocked the blacksmith, it was so similar to cutting oneself or smashing one's own finger with the hammer as it had so often happened to the blacksmith kunoichi. However it didn't feel like getting impaled all the way through, so much pain meant only that her body hadn't gone into shock and soon enough the visual aspect of things caught up to the physical pain that Galateia's attack made Meiko go through. This darned nukenin was just so damned fast!

Meiko was broken out of her thought process as her body slammed against the ground with its back heavily. It appeared like the drilling stab had merely tossed Meiko backwards after opening a nasty pelvic wound. Like a turtle struggling to stand back on her feet the blacksmith rolled on her front and pushed against the firm ground strong enough to push her body off of it. That allowed the redhead to avoid Galateia's jumping stab at the ground and the follow-up quick horizontal slash that quickly split a handful of trees in two de-foresting a decent patch of land and cutting the grass of at least five meters in radius clean.

"Pull out your sword, Meiko." Galateia ordered like she had some authority of the situation. "I took you for more than your lowly witch companion, swords are meant to allow light to dance on their surfaces, not be hidden in pocket sealing dimensions."

"You know how seals work then? That's a first… I'd have taken you for someone who'd think it's witchery." Meiko forced a smile even though her eyes were clearly relaying a message of great pain and one of her arms had to constantly be held on the abdomen wound, at least until her ninja metabolism quickly stopped the bleeding.

"The fencing master of the peculiar "rapeer" blade from Land of Snow taught me a bit about them, she suggested I carried my own blade sealed. Negotiations ended when I showed no talent for it."

"I had expected to be able to keep some of my chakra for later. My team had done so much for me in the previous exam that this one is all mine, I must pay my dues for my team. That means I cannot fail them. I'll just have to settle for being tired now and skipping one round, rather than getting shamefully beaten whole way through." Meiko growled before touching both of her shoulder armor pieces. The damaged one from the time before when the redhead sacrificed it for Galateia's blade just spouted out a handful of sparks and the glyph faded. One less seal to maintain…

"C-Rank Seal: Release!" Meiko chanted pulling out a buckler from the armor piece and slinging at like a frisbee, right after the plate of steel left the blacksmith's hand she engaged into hand seals, hoping to make it in time. That was not the only worry on the blacksmith's mind – chakra control was an equal enemy of hers to the blonde in front of her.

Meiko made more hand seals than Substitution Jutsu needed, she made more for pure concentration, get her body in the right mind set. Knowing how easily she could've messed up such simple techniques made her wish to be absolutely certain with this.

A deep lung filling whoosh of air alerted the blacksmith that it worked, she had successfully replaced her body with the tool she just threw before she touched her armored boots in mid-air, unsealing them too. The pure base chakra lacking any elemental nature burst through launching Meiko in a mad dive down, like a fish underwater she rotated her entire body to spin over the quick desperation thrust made by her opponent.

A pillar of smoke and brutal shockwaves erupting and tossing trees, dirt and rock aside fired out from the ground as Meiko slammed at her opponent's throat, aiming to crush it with her own forearm and leave the nukenin just as struggling to breathe as the blacksmith was so shortly ago. It took a while for the murmuring and rustling to settle down and for the dust and rubble to clear.

Meiko didn't think about how tired she was, how difficult it was to lift her opponent off the ground and throw her into the air before reaching for the belt pieces of her armor and the buckle protecting her lower abdomen and upper thighs. Even more chakra got sucked right out, felt like long and thick needles being driven under her skin and sucking lifeforce itself right out. This had to work!

With handful of tools Meiko unleashed a prideful barrage of shuriken and kunai, custom made thrown knives that were more aerodynamic than the kunai most ninja used, boomerangs, tomahawks, circular blades of sharpened outer edge, smaller javelins that were meant for quick throwing right after they were unsealed, darts, throwing knives with three different sharpened blades that pointed upwards and to each side respectively appearing almost fork-like in shape.

The absolutely overwhelming storm of weaponry coming at her opponent would undoubtedly missed their mark, there were simply too many of them, thrown too fast and without focus or aiming. Meiko was a skilled weapon user, as she was skilled at making them, but her marksmanship was not the greatest in the village. After Galateia's eyes finally opened in mid-air she braced for impact. Obviously she expected most of the weaponry to just whizz past her barely grazing her.

A blue sealing glyph lit up on the blonde's chest, the spot where Meiko grabbed onto to throw her into the air. The points of each of the thrown weapons directed themselves onto the sealing glyph correcting their shoddy trajectory and hitting their mark.

The sound of steel hitting steel of Galateia's armor as well as weaponry banding together into a focused stream of edges and pure death was unbearable. The noise of thousand men screaming in agony. Meiko tried to come up with a cool sounding name for this technique she came up with after returning from the quest for Box of Ultimate Bliss with Mana, something that reflected the abhorrent noise it made when all of those weapons collided with each other with force enough to focus them all into a stream of steel. Nothing really came to mind at that moment of its discovery or in this particular moment.

Names for techniques usually allowed for a ninja to focus their mind. It was like a code for their body to move a certain way, an instinctual lock that was unlocked once those usually cheesy and strange words were uttered. They allowed for chakra to be concentrated more successfully and with greater ease, they allowed the body to move faster and more fluently performing them. This particular jutsu needed a name…

Galateia's body weightlessly slammed to the ground together with the emptied weaponry reserves of Meiko. She was covered with grazes, slashes and cuts. For her thumb-skulled brain she managed to focus her remaining chakra resources into to limited patch of her body where the seal was applied flawlessly. It hardened up the muscles and the skin and anything underneath to deflect the weaponry but as it slid past or got deflected by her body they grazed and cut open any other fleshy bits they passed by.

She probably wouldn't get an option to use this jutsu again, not until her entire reserves are replenished and that'd take some time.

"What was that?" Mana's shocked voice ringed in Meiko's ears, parts of it still got lost in the ringing clangs deep in her ears that invited the unwelcome guest of motherlode of all migraines.

"Tons of awesome, that's what it was!" Kiyomi's cheers were tough not to identify. Sometimes the Yamanaka's voice was deep and sad but whenever she spoke of Meiko or her abilities her voice changed into something of a pile miserably full of hype.

"Teia!" Aoi yelled out as he floated to the criminal. Mana looked at Meiko questioningly. The magician had no idea about Meiko's stance on killing, she had never seen the blacksmith restrain herself purposefully in order to preserve the life of her opponent or knew any reasons why she'd do it.

The redhead didn't want her friend to be disappointed in her. In a way, after their initial meeting the two lived in a constant cycle of mutual approval. Each tried to make the other happy by hitting the strings that rang the most sensitively for each other. Meiko worked on Mana's custom stage magic show orders, the magician appealed to Meiko's love for crafting and legendary artifacts… Even if Meiko had no conscious desire to preserve her opponent's life, because of that she'd do it subconsciously.

This time she may just have overdone it… With great self-scolding the blacksmith just shrugged and looked onto her opponent's body that just casually extended her arms forward and leaped back on her feet like she was just simply decked in the nose.

Meiko had to hand it to the blonde, she was very persistent and incredibly vital. It was like being cut dozens of thousands of times all over her body meant nothing to her, she even had the audacity to grin foolishly as her golden hair drowned in her own blood beginning to lose their appealing and exotic color.

The curious visual orbs of the nukenin swordswoman glared in confusion at Meiko who did her best to collect as many of her thrown and undamaged tools and seal them back to their rightful places – a less dignified and spoken about process of Meiko's battles.

"What's wrong? Do you surrender?" the swordswoman uttered.

"What? Have you even seen yourself?! Get yourself treated, I don't care how. This is done, I have no need to continue this any further and end up killing you…" Meiko angrily replied.

The blacksmith gave her magician friend a glance back, Mana tried to mask it but she approved of the blacksmith's decision and was greatly pleased by it. Her wish to hide her approval of Meiko's non-lethal approach was not something that the armored kunoichi understood, not really. Didn't she wish to lead through example? Maybe she just didn't want to be too preachy? That permission of Mana's for her friends to choose their own path made her way more alluring for the blacksmith but also it made the chances of success seem even more pitiful.

The ground beneath Meiko's feet disappeared. A foul stench assaulted her nose as the sight of an underground great snake trying to dive out from underground and swallow her whole met the blacksmith's eyes. As fast as her abilities and fatigued physique allowed the redhead reached for her chest plate removing a palm sized rod that extended into a steel bo staff and drove into the snake's mouth keeping the jaws open.

With a quick yank the armored kunoichi leaped out from the predator's mouth where Mana tackled her further from the snake's mouth using her own levitation jutsu – the Mystical Wings technique.

Further away Aoi pointed his arms towards the surfaced tail of the reptile aiming to smash the criminals and Gwido to a bloody stain.

"Glaciation Jutsu!" he shouted out freezing the humidity of the air around the snake's limb as well as the liquids inside it. The blond swordsman leaped up into the air.

"Sunray Kick!" she shouted out through pain and battle fatigue as her swift kick shattered the snake's tail to pieces.

The ground beneath began to rumble and shake, tunnels of raised dirt pillars began appearing from below signaling that more of these must've been on their way. They were nowhere as large as the usual underground snakes living in the Forest of Death but the fact they were so young and relatively small made them travel and hunt in larger packs.

"Must be the runt from the litter!" Kiyomi gritted through her teeth before gesturing to get as far away from the battlefield as possible.

With Galateia's blank stare, her eyes being the one of the few white and clean bits of her blood soaked and cut up face, being the last sight Meiko saw before dashing off and away from the troublesome pack of snakes the Team Hokage bolted away. Their supernatural speed allowed them to simply disappear from any senses of these underground predators and Aoi with Galateia soon followed, heading the opposite direction. It couldn't have been too comfortable for Gwido to travel being constantly held by his back collar like some ragdoll…

And thus this brief engagement came to an interrupted and quick ending!


	278. No One Can Understand the Pain

The dash away from just another attack from the local fauna was not a lengthy one. Granted, it was not easy to tell exactly how far away the three girls had moved, it could've been solid twenty to thirty kilometers, could've been anywhere below that. Judging from how eagerly Kiyomi looked ahead, she wanted to get as far away from Galateia and other useless fights as possible.

Meiko's loud grunting and wheezing made the trio reconsider their grandiose plans for covering grand distances. After realizing that they weren't going anywhere Mana slowed her pace down to get closer to Meiko and signaled her that the three of them were going on the lower levels with her eyes. While the injured blacksmith took some sweet time to follow Mana, it was Kiyomi's annoyed grunt that truly worried the magician.

Once the three had reached the ground floor Mana and Kiyomi carefully aided Meiko to sit by the tree. It was only then that the magician saw her friend's clothes underneath the armor drenching in blood which made her ask for the blacksmith to remove them. Meiko's movements were a bit sloppy and slow, it was painfully clear that she was combatting blood loss and dizziness. A few more dashes and she'd have bumped head on right into a tree and plummeted down the fast and direct way.

"How much chakra did you use?" Mana inquired noticing some familiar symptoms in Meiko's blue lips and bloodshot eyes.

"Probably more than half…" the blacksmith shrugged.

"Doesn't look like more than half, looks more like more than half more than what you should've used in any reasonable fight." Kiyomi expressed her own less than expert medical opinion. Despite her lack of expertise she was right.

Meiko's gut wound was no longer spitting blood, almost immediately once the kunoichi stopped moving around the wound's bleeding ratio diminished almost a dozen times. While it looked like she was hit by a large scale mining drill as the magician's fingers could've fit halfway into the mess that Galateia's weaponry made of Meiko's lower abdomen, it was not something a ninja couldn't survive and recover from over time.

"Keep watch. I'll treat this." Mana sighed before taking Kiyomi's own ninja pouch and removing some bandages from it. The magician lacked medical supplies of her own, she was too busy filling her hidden pockets and hat seal with gimmick cards to have any.

"No. I'll treat Meiko, you keep watch!" Kiyomi whipped Mana back carrying a surprising spice of passion in her voice. Despite having no idea what that was all about the magician shrugged and allowed the bandages to be bullied off of her.

Scaling up a tree wasn't that difficult nor did it take too long, still, feeling uneasy about using the Art of Tree Climbing – an unoriginal technique the magician quickly used her own Mystical Wings to levitate onto the upper layers. Honestly she'd have preferred Kiyomi keeping watch, she had more ways of effectively intercepting an attack, also more experience in general.

Subconsciously Mana knew why she wanted Kiyomi's assistance in this aspect and not the other – her friend had no qualms about hurting people badly or killing them if needed. She was nothing like Mana nor, it turned out, like Meiko, who kind of felt lukewarm about Mana's non-lethal approach.

The magician just sighed, breathing was not easy at this moment – a result of two desperate abuses of speed augmentations. She couldn't even begin to wonder how Meiko must've felt now, she not only dashed around at speeds that weren't really recommended to be used by younger ninja but she also sustained a full-on fight with an almost equal opponent.

Things were about to get even more complicated, likely they'll get worse but hopefully the saying about things getting difficult and the result afterwards would carry out both parts of its bargain. Mana was afraid to think of how it ended since she didn't want to jinx it.

A trio of ninja leaped gracefully from one strong and thick branch to another. A short casually dressed young lady turned at her teammates looking at them with curiosity.

"So any of you got anyone we know?" she asked

The sword wielding and denim loving Kouta's teammate shook his head. He looked at his teammates who also shared his lack of knowledge of whom exactly they'd be fighting.

"Zahafbit, Team Pahlavi from Sunagakure." the young swordsman spoke up showing his file face up to his teammates.

"Relta Ginn, Team Scuti from Hoshigakure." The kunoichi answered in return before the sights of the two lingered on Kouta who was deep in thought. After noticing that his team was curious and beginning to get a bit worried about his pull he shyly smiled and shook his palms in a pacifying manner.

"Trest Bregger, Team Kyanite from Iwagakure. Seems we lucked out…" Kouta smiled. "No one will have to fight someone they know and don't want to fight."

"Like your girlfriend?" Budoki, Kouta's female teammate teased him. "I hope you won't dash off to check up on her…" she locked her arms around her chest while raising an eyebrow.

"No. She's kind and likes helping people but she doesn't need being guided. My father thinks that's stupid and makes her weak but I like that. She weakens herself by limiting what she can do. Always exposing her weaknesses to everyone and as a result she grows stronger than people who don't. If I checked on her or even tried to contact her she'd probably get mad at me…" Kouta laughed out uneasily.

"Plus we can't know if she or her team didn't get your name on their file. Also, obviously, this is a test of skill which means if you guided her through it you'd only lead her to an untimely death on a battlefield she wasn't ready for. Tests are there for a reason, you know, and cheating hurts the cheater more than the examiner." His male teammate nodded in agreement. "Plus, she's not the only one purposefully limiting herself with artificial challenges…" he lingered on that thought.

"I thought we were already past this, Yushijin. I won't use my Curse Seal. I'd also very gladly only serve a supporting role in this, healing you after the fighting is done. It's not like you can't take care of the opposition…" Kouta pouted. His eyes weren't eyes of an expression of playful distaste, they were dead serious.

"I thought your clan was one of warriors. All I'm saying is that you're restraining yourself needlessly, weren't you training with your father almost every time we came to visit you? You're wasting that time you've spent doing it."

"Don't assume to know anything about Juugo. Even I used to hide behind a fake name just because I didn't know my clan well enough, only what I saw in my father, for years. Restraint is our mantra, my father is the odd one out. Every single one of our living members is taught restraint and pacifistic ways from birth. My mother went out of her way to have me spend years amongst my people. Do you know what happens to the likes of my father? Young hotshots who fight needlessly and enjoy the destruction they cause? The elders execute them, that's because they cannot allow to be identified as a violent and threatening clan to Iwagakure ever again…"

The trio just kept on moving in silence. The eerie atmosphere gripped all three of them by the throat. The knowledge of what was done to the Juugo clan by Iwagakure was not common one but due to having a representative of the clan in their team both Budoki and Yushijin knew about it. A genocide unlike any other, ended because the perpetrators themselves felt sickened by their own actions and yet one that could break out at any given point all over again if one bad seed ever got out of line.

"Look…" Budoki finally broke out of the mean shade that messed up the friendly atmosphere around them. Kouta pushed her out of his way, jets spread off of his feet blasting chakra from them and raising him above his team to intercept an upcoming attack.

A colossal fireball so immensely blazing that it wasn't interrupted or detonated by any barriers in its way, it simply incinerated them by its astounding heat. Kouta thrust his arms upwards, chakra cannons split off from his arms firing beams of concentrated chakra blasts at it that barely looked like it did anything to the upcoming destruction.

Yushijin darted past the medical ninja and caught the blazing ball of flaming gas by his own hands. The chakra so intensely focused into his palms formed a barrier that stopped the gas in its path whereas normally it'd have simply swallowed Yushijin whole and incinerated him not unlike all rock and trees or wild predators that got in its way.

The blast stopped in a deadlock, slowly the genin swordsman removed one of his arms which reached for the sword on his back and quickly pulled it out cutting an opening into the flames. The young man pressed on pushing his blade onwards deeper into the blazing inferno before splitting the superheated ball of fire in half.

"This is no ordinary Fire Release technique…" Budoki gasped looking on ahead and trying to locate the assailants. Kouta and Yushijin landed beside her.

"My, my… All three of us put so much love into this technique, surely, we thought, this compacted heat mass, split amongst the three of you, would singe you guys up and take you out." a young teen with shoulder length greasy black as tar hairdo sighed as he hung on the very top and some of the weakest branches of the tree-line.

"What is this?" Kouta growled observing the fact that there were indeed four of the assailants: the greasy and untidy haired boy, a dark and gothic clothes loving young lady with an obsession with white and black make up and eye piercing hair dye and a tall and bulky young man with blonde hair worn in a ponytail and dead inside looking eyes. The fourth member of the team wore a red dress and the signature Iwagakure jonin uniform – a young woman with long black hair and the red bandanna that the Iwagakure ninja often wore.

"Is that… Their sensei, accompanying them!?" Budoki shouted out in disbelief. "We need to get out of here, no way can we take on a jounin!"

"Nor can we escape from one…" Yushijin looked down before strictly turning his attention back at the attackers. "If that woman also joined in on the Fire Release attack she'd have boosted its temperature ten times of what it had before. They'd have knocked us out instantly blowing any augmentations of ours away."

"You're saying the reason she didn't join in and beat us, like an ambushing party would ideally act, was because she couldn't?" Budoki wondered.

"Hey! What's the meaning of this? Why do you have your sensei accompanying you? Is this a trick of some sort?" Kouta shouted out at the quartet that continued to eye at them from above.

The jounin woman closed her eyes in annoyance and shook her head. "No. My signature is being followed closely at all times. I'm here to keep an eye on this young girl. She is on notice and to be very closely observed, I will not interfere into the battle unless the conditions fit the scenario where I was allowed to interfere."

"You mean there's a scenario where you're reasonably allowed to take us out by the examiner?" Yushijin raised his eyebrow. Fear was beginning to slowly stun his facial muscles.

"Oh no, you misunderstand. I will not be fighting you, I will be taking out my own team. You see, this young lady here is the rebellious kind with a very suicidal personality. Two years ago, when she crossed the planetary barrier, she purposefully didn't control her abilities which would've destroyed our very world. For that reason I am to closely watch her so that she doesn't try it again…"

The eyes of the three Konoha genin gapped open wide in shock. A lot of ninja were capable of otherworldly destruction if they didn't control their abilities properly. Chakra was a universal force that tied the entire universe together therefore control was valued more than flat out destructive potential. No one had ever heard of a ninja that purposefully didn't focus their attack exactly onto the body of their opponent and not the surrounding environment.

The loud sound of laughter made Kouta snap out and look at his swordsman teammate.

"In other words, you won't interfere with our fight." Yushijin finally restrained his laughter and got serious. "You must be after one of us, which means that by taking you guys out of this exam one of us will be guaranteed survival of this round. Our strategy actually was to wait until we are attacked until we can take out at least two of our hunters – guaranteeing our team's survival. Who would've known we'd be so lucky!" he smiled wickedly.

"We'd have been even luckier if one of them was a person of our own interest. Still, this is just fine." Budoki shrugged before relaxing her body and taking a dive backwards aiming to disappear in the vast dark green cover of the leaves, bushes and vines.

"And there she goes taking the support role…" Kouta sighed before taking an offensive fighting stance besides his teammate.

A flesh cutting sound following a wild spray of crimson bodily fluids cut into the boys own assault. Further away, the long tongued greasy haired punk got cut down by Yushijin's sword. The scared eyes of the young man that couldn't understand how the genin swordsman had moved in what seemed an instant and his twitching in shock body fell on his back and tumbled down hitting multiple thick tree branches and flipping over them only to continue its fast journey down.

Despite just seeing one of their teammates being cut down, the goth girl didn't respond at all nor did her face betray any emotions. She just raised her foot telegraphing a powerful stomp as her arms worked on hand seals. The ponytail behind Yushijin had wide and shocked eyes and a verily gapping mouth but he did not utter a word.

Sealing glyphs lit up on the ponytail shinobi's palms which unsealed two daggers sealed inside them, his grip didn't wield them as daggers were to be wielded, instead he gripped them upwards like one would hold a blade before repositioning his thumbs to wield the knives in an almost scalpel-like grip. He aimed for a precise cut at Yushijin's throat only for a steel wire to gently yank the swordsman out of the way.

Without uttering a word the scalpel wielding ponytail shinobi dived down after his opponent. The goth girl, after stopping her own technique mid-way, followed him after stabbing a wire tied kunai on the branch she was on only for the team's jounin leader to follow her closely. The woman shadowed her pupil but her stance was neutral and overly full of openings, it was clear she was merely watching over the angsty young lady and didn't intend to protect her from being defeated.

Kouta angrily growled before placing his palms onward.

"Chakra Missiles!" he yelled out firing small blasts of pure chakra at the gothic chick that followed her down.

The young lady yanked her improvised landing tool pulling herself up to avoid the location where Kouta predicted her to be but the chakra projectiles turned up at the last moment detonating on impact as the change of their trajectory was simply too quick and unexpected to avoid. A deafening scream finally made the Iwagakure kunoichi show some emotion.

Kouta's body straightened out and tensed, like a cat waiting to pounce, his excited eyes followed his opponent plummeting down before snapping out of his battle high. The youth's eyes turned away in embarrassment, he pressed his knuckles tightly by his thighs as his breathing raced. The medical ninja slowed it down trying to calm himself down. This wasn't who he was, not who he wanted to be. Not like his father… Never like his father.

A loud tree rustling sound woke him up, a large falling log smacked the greasy haired genin away by slamming at him at the side as he tried to sneak up on Kouta from behind. Must've been Budoki's doing, she liked to just disappear and set traps for people. She was good at supporting him and Yushijin from behind… Kouta had no time to mess around, he needed to get his shit together and get back into the game.

"Ma'am! Team Pyrite from Iwagakure just engaged Team Fir. Zircon Trot, a genin from Team Pyrite is trying to take out his target – Juugo Kouta!" one of the heavy headgear wearing sensory display tracking ninja reported.

"Everyone's really passive about this… Maybe we should've given them a time limit?" Shibari bit her lip.

"Team Pyrite suffered minor injuries, their chakra levels dipped significantly."

"How's the… That girl, Jord Kvasir. The one that didn't channel her chakra right on purpose." Shibari inquired.

"Seems to be behaving."

"Well, I suppose if Iwagakure believed her to be a threat they would've never allowed her to take the Exams… And how's Yoruma Galateia?"

"Her chakra level is reaching critical but she appears to be moving, albeit slowly. Will you be intercepting, ma'am?"

Shibari checked her ninja pouch before walking up to the entrance, a young chuunin rushed up to open the gate for her. The woman didn't even wait for the gate to open completely, just as the gap between the two steel chunks was large enough she just disappeared into the darkness of the forest. Another chuunin took of the headgear and was substituted by the door opening chuunin and assumed command in Shibari's absence.

"Report!" he barked out an order.

"Shibari-san is moving in really fast… The chakra signature of Galateia Yoruma has faded, that of her accomplice however just flared up. His distress gave him a small boost…"

"This is Hozuki Shibari we are talking about, a Konohagakure Jounin. Yoruma Galateia is just a footnote in the Bingo Book, barely even worth her own entry, her accomplice doesn't even have his own bounty, just a boost to Galateia's." the substitute commanding officer remarked.

"Report! Both Galateia Yoruma and her accomplice have been taken out, both of them are moving in to the gate, Shibari-san is so fast!"

"Oh well… I suppose I better get ready to strain my neck with that giant thing again." The commanding officer massaged his aching neck muscles before switching with the young chuunin who just rushed in to open the gate.

From the open gate, completely unscathed stepped out Hozuki Shibari with the unconscious bodies of Aoi and Galateia floating in a large water bubble. Most of Gwido's body was submerged in it as well, just his silly looking head was sticking out.

"Contact the Administration, request a pickup." Shibari stretched her body out like after a good warm up.

"Ma'am!" the entirety of the sensory signal tracking corps replied in unison.


	279. Problems Abrewin'

A loud sound of cracking wood reached Kouta's ears as he continued his freefall below. After fixing his position in the air to one more suitable to protecting himself the young man noticed a humongous chunk of wood flying at his face. Nothing a quick but focused strike at the centre couldn't fix.

Right as the boy's fist connected to the large wood structure he felt an intense shock from the other side – the goth must've snuck up stuck to it. A more inventive use of Art of Tree Climbing technique. Kouta's arm had only fractions of a second before the immense earthquake causing pressure would've completely obliterated his arm into bloody mush of flesh and bone.

"Chakra Shotgun!" he shouted out as cannons split from his forearm unleashed a quick close range burst of chakra that both tossed him backwards and not only compensated for the force of Earth Release earthquake technique that the goth girl tried hitting him with but also blasted her back.

Down below and a bit to the south Yushijin continued striking at the greasy haired young man. He wielded kunai blades, curved and modified for nasty stabs and bypassing blocks and shields. Luckily, Yushijin still had a confident range advantage, still, the grease was surprisingly quick.

"Genjutsu: Last Resort!" Yushijin chanted out.

Blood burst from the side of the blood of his opponent as the entire right part of his body nearly split off. Just a little bit more strength in Yushijin's cut and it would've been lethal, splitting the young Iwagakure gent in two like nothing. Such was the strategy of the swordsman. He didn't mean to kill his opponent in this friendly competition, just injure him so much that he had to be removed from further competition.

"Genjutsu, huh?" the dark haired Iwagakure genin laughed out as his cut down body burnt up in flames and disappeared without sparking even the slightest fire on any of the leaves, moss or grass beside him.

"A subject I see you also are familiar with…" Yushijin grunted feeling a bit annoyed by his opponent's survival. The first slash he landed up there was limited in potency, his body was hardened in its entirety allowing only the tip of the sword to pierce the flesh. This time he protected with genjutsu.

"I assume that's the secret behind your incredible speed, no?" the sly Iwagakure fox smiled with all the subtlety of a viper crossed with a weasel. "No genin can be moving that fast, you're using genjutsu to affect my comprehension of time, that's my educated guess as a genjutsu user. You make anyone affected perceive your movements as instantaneous, time perception is difficult to mess around with, I must commend you!"

"You're here to talk or are you here to fight?" Yushijin grunted before playfully swinging his large sword around just so his muscles stayed in their peak preparedness.

"Ah, before I defeat you, I, Zircon Trot of Iwagakure must commend a skilled colleague… That and the fact that I must stall you before I reach my true target. Girls always had the softest backs to stab!" Trot smiled with his wicked smile once more.

Finally understanding that he was being played Yushijin weaved the genjutsu dispelling hand seal. Just like the corpse before, this Zircon Trot standing in front of his immolated in seconds. Without wasting any time the swordsman charged for Budoki, the girl was a more hands-off combatant, combat heat was something that may have greatly troubled her.

Meanwhile Budoki herself was being a bit occupied by taking on the silent giant wearing a ponytail – Horein Ptet from Iwagakure.

The brutish man pounced in gigantic leaps, swiping left and right at Budoki who just gracefully flipped back and sideways, cutting and pulling strings that triggered more and more of her traps. One kunai dispenser firing upon a wire trigger was pulled on launched a stream of kunai that riddled Ptet's right side, one even etched into the poor brute's ear.

The man stumbled and bashed into a tree as his sense of balance began to fade. The brutish mute pulled out the blades from his side and his ear and quickly began patching them up. Even when he used medical ninjutsu he did not speak. Using ninjutsu without speaking the name of the technique required much greater unity of mind and body, both spiritual aspects and physicals. Not to mention amazing concentration.

Budoki couldn't let her opponent recover. With a bountiful leap she reached for a tree branch above and tossed an explosive kunai. This time Ptet was a bit more careful and stepped to the side and right into a trap she had prepared for him – a falling pit. Using her free from hanging on the branch arm, young Budoki used a wire string loop to catch her opponent by his foot and keep him hanging in the air. She didn't have enough time for anything but a little trap hole so just having him fall down would've meant jack squat.

"Boy you're making me use a lot of resources!" she playfully teased her mute opponent before demonstratively triggering a wire trap she had placed and connected to a previously set up trap when the mute giant was still brawling it out with Kouta above.

A pair of giant tree logs were released from their hold and fell like chopping blocks right on top of the medical ninja throwing him into the hole and smashing into him as well as covering the hole up with debris.

"Hmph… It's eerily quiet, this can't be it…" she wondered out loud while scratching her soft chin and looking around. The forest around her, despite supposedly being a battlefield of genin fighting it out all around, was silent as a nightly graveyard.

"Wonder if that jounin lady is anywhere nearby, I'd ask her for directions, she looks like she's more on our side…" the young lady joked to herself before swinging her trident kunai hook on steel wire and pulling herself onto a tree farther back to get a better look.

Kouta, meanwhile, was still quite busy with the goth genin kunoichi. Despite him apparently outclassing her in physical department and mastery of martial arts, she continuously kept charging in close distance and trying to use her slow earthquake ninjutsu on him. Granted, they were powerful, a single one would've shocked the medical ninja's lower body and broken bones as well as opened fissures that swallowed him up. Still, they didn't matter as long as a quick jab or a cross to her abdomen broke her concentration.

"I wonder if Mana would be this easy to fight, she relies on hand seals as well…" the boy wondered before evading another pair of displacement kicks and using his knee to lift the girl's leg in an uncomfortable position where she'd lose balance. Oddly enough she mastered her balance and simply vaulted back using his own force to regain balance.

Utilizing all opportunities the young Juugo charged in with an elbow crack to her skull. After it connected the girl just staggered, flying back like a ragdoll. It was strange how badly she took hits and how recklessly she charged in close quarters, almost like she craved being beaten…

Kouta's legs burst up with chakra propelling him in the air with a kick to the gothic girl's abdomen. Once again her body got propelled upwards like a rocket, obviously she used chakra augmentations not to die, but this was nothing like a skilled close range combatant. When one hit a person skilled at augmenting their endurance the hits simply bounced off like off of a brick wall, this girl, however, just took it all and used chakra just to not die.

At this point Kouta kind of felt bad for her. Hitting her and hearing those painful and gut wrenching screams started feeling as painful as getting hit himself. After a couple of more of juggling slams the taijutsu user finally crashed the kunoichi into the ground and landed farther away. He suspected that she had wasted a significant part of her chakra but he couldn't have been certain it wasn't a substitution or a clone technique.

A bad feeling in his gut… Almost instinctively Kouta grabbed at his throat only to feel sharp pain in his arms, had he not moved as fast as he did his throat would've been cut open in a mere microsecond.

The medical ninja tried throwing elbow strikes and wide roundhouse kicks with some of his chakra jets mixed in to the combination but no one was there. This felt so weird, was this all just an illusion? The wound on his palm suggested differently. The greasy knife wielding boy – Trot from before, leaped in with kunai in both hands aiming to stab them at Kouta's eyes.

The young Juugo's arm moved much faster, he simply lifted it up and giving his assailant nothing more than a cruel and cold look blasted from his arm which malformed into a chakra cannon halfway before his assailant reached him.

"Chakra Pistol!" the young boy uttered as a fist sized sphere of pure chakra fired out and blew a hole in the kunai wielding genin's chest. How could he have taken this much damage!?

Kouta leaped in to check up on his opponent, feeling regret and inner anguish for having just possibly blown a hole where his opponent's chest was. Did he purposefully not block it? His chakra augments couldn't have been this diminished, he only had a pair of mean scratches as well as a giant slice all over his body, lengthy yet shallow, where Yushijin had cut him earlier.

A liquid tapping, almost leaking, sound alerted Kouta and woke him up from almost a dream-like state. A blade of a knife was sticking out from his chest, the handle of which was behind him, the clone of Trot he had just blasted burnt up to a crisp.

"The kind ones are always the easiest to fool…" the sly weasel's voice hissed from behind before kicking the medical genin in the back and off of his knife.

Kouta stumbled forward before hitting the ground. He reached for his heart, his natural chakra augmentations working in sync with his honest attempts to use his Mystical Palm jutsu and heal up at least part of his heart injury. Whatever didn't kill him immediately could've been survived. Now Kouta only begged that his chakra didn't plummet so low that he was treated as eliminated from the exam. He wanted to survive this, not to keep on living, not just the elementary prolongation of his existence. He wanted to keep competing, to show off his skill as a medical ninja to his own team and to Mana.

Trot just snickered into his fist. "Hey, Jord-chan, don't you feel glad about this plan to sucker this loser in? The moment I saw his affinity for medical ninjutsu, even early after the Academy, I knew this guy's gonna lose his stomach hitting a poor defenceless girl!"

Wiping the blood off of her nose Jord Kvasir, the goth genin kunoichi from Team Pyrite stood up. "Everyone's just in it to use us. You're using me for your own gain, this loser's using my pain to feel like a big kind hero!" she growled before kicking at Kouta's bleeding body angrily. She reached in and grabbed the boy's hair before pulling his pale face closer to hers and licking his lips.

"I feel so fucking jealous… I wish I was dying in your place. After all, our lives are so useless. Dying beats being used anytime…" she whispered into the young man's ear before licking it.

"Hey, Jord! Don't you go starting that shit again, sensei's believing your redemption. No ending the world! Bad Jord!" Trot teased his teammate by smacking her in the back of her head.

A flesh freezing cutting sound made the greasy knife wielding genin freeze in his stance. Agonizing pain took him over and freeze-framed his muscles in a state of shock. Again and again Yushijin's blade carved its name into the kunai user's back diminishing more and more of his chakra augmentations. The unwilling and instinctual chakra augmentations were the most costly, after a couple of good hits the entire arsenal could've been emptied.

"Genjutsu: Last Resort!" Yushijin roared out as his own body was beginning to feel taxed by the sheer number of ruthless slashes he performed from behind. The world around the two young men froze solid, Yushijin cut again and again and again and again. Even he felt the strain of his own illusion, usually fitting for a handful of moments, freezing a sweet moment in time for some willing extension. Now he just wanted more chances to punish the lying Iwagakure genin.

As the coup de grace, Yushijin delivered a jumping sideways kick right to the genin's neck sending him down. This time he wouldn't mess up, he extended the timer for his own illusion so long past the recommended limit that he was absolutely certain had the illusion been a clone, it would've already long since immolated.

"You lied to me, you bastard…" Yushijin kept on hyperventilating, using his longsword by stabbing it at the ground to keep standing after the immense stress he willingly went through to punish his opponent. "You didn't go after Budoki, you went after Kouta… At least now I know who your target is."

"So he used you too? Feels so exquisitely painful, doesn't it?" Jord moaned out madly stroking her own hair and rudely pulling them between her fingers. Some of her pink strings or the dominant tar black darkness stayed on her fingers, so deep was her sickness.

"So, you got caught off-guard again, huh? Heal yourself, Kouta. I'll take care of them for you." Yushijin closed his eyes awaiting his opponent's attack. He found that sometimes he could lure a less composed enemy into charging right at him just by closing his eyes.

Kiyomi leaped up with a pair of quick leaps and landed right beside Mana, taking a careless seat by her side and sighing.

"How is she?" Mana asked curiously.

"Better. Her nose is kinda already under control, the gut wound still troubles me. Do you maybe have some food pills?" Kiyomi wondered.

"Sorry…" Mana shook her head.

"I think you should know… That wound isn't slowing down bleeding. I think she wasted too much chakra and the ninja metabolism won't kick in until her chakra levels return to normal. I'm not a medical ninja, Mana… The fuck do I know what to do?" Kiyomi whimpered out.

The fact that Kiyomi, of all people, was breaking down scared Mana to no end. The Yamanaka was always like an older sister to her. She always could've been counted on to do something or make calls. The two didn't always see eye to eye but the Yamanaka was somewhat of an authority figure whom Mana held in high regard. Her breakdown scared the magician all by itself.

"I… I picked up a new skill. I can summon ninja rabbits."

"Sorry, Mana. I never really found the long-eared suckers be that charming to begin with. I'm not a child, a fluffy bunny won't calm me down…"

"No, you don't get it… Maybe… Maybe one of them knows a rabbit, or a rabbit that knows a rabbit…" Mana shrugged. Slowly, she was beginning to realize that her own voice was shaking. Her own older sister was slipping into despair, how could Mana not?

"It better… If not… We may need to call it quits. This exam means everything to me but… This is Meiko's life. Don't tell her I told you this, as far as she knows she has a cold. She's so goddamn gullible, like an honest to God child!" tears began running down Kiyomi's cheeks.

Mana lifted her palm trying to comfort Kiyomi before she felt a quick and strong embrace almost crush her ribcage. The Yamanaka's weeping was getting uncontrollable, she was really worried over Meiko's life and not in a way that the magician had ever seen anyone being worried.

After the hug had become too prolonged and almost awkward the magician slipped out of it and leaped down. Remembering the Summoning Jutsu from one of her elementary ninjutsu techniques textbooks she made a bunch of hand seals after biting her thumb hard enough to draw blood from it.

"Boar-Dog-Bird-Monkey-Ram… Summoning Jutsu!" the magician listed the hand seals by mumbling them to herself under her own nose before placing her hand deep into the bottom of her top hat that erupted in darker shades of indigo as intense light began emanating from it. Moments later a cute yet very deadly and verily familiar rabbit pulled his head out of Mana's hat before leaping out in his entirety.

"Well… Not 'verly pleasant trip, if ye kno' what Ah mean!" Usuzoku yelled out before looking around frantically and noticing desperate Mana standing behind him and uneasily considering how this conversation needs to go.

"Atcha! Ye stupid hatchlin', still rottin' in dis damn 'ere Forest 'a Death!? Are ye so dead in ye brainbox that ye can't find yer way out!?" the sword packing mammal shouted at her.

Pressing her hand against her chest, as a sign of honesty and a request for help, Mana finally gathered the courage and strength to speak up.

"Zoku-chan… I know you don't like me very much and promised me you'd never work with me but… My friend, my very best friend, Meiko is dying. I was wondering if you maybe knew, or maybe knew a rabbit that knew, some medical ninjutsu?" she pleaded.

"Eh!? Nah, I dunno no healin', we rabbits are really tough in de head, when we get smacked around we get back up, ye see? If you maybe showed me yer stupid hatchlin' friend, maybe I could help…" Usuzoku shrugged but judging merely from his expression he wasn't overly willing to help her.

"I… We don't want to expose her to the possibility it's anything more than a common cold."

"Cold? Is she fucking stupid?" Usuzoku scratched his back as the silliness of Meiko's usual character made him so dumbfounded he unwillingly started wanting to socialize to Mana.

"Something like that…" Mana shrugged. "Look, I'd do anything for her life. You are literally my last lifeline, the next step is ending the Chuunin Exam…"

"Chuunin Exams? You mean our own Stupid Hatchlin' is growin' and makin' us less ashamed of being affiliated with 'er?" Usuzoku teased the magician.

"Not anymore, I guess…" Mana rubbed her elbow as her own eyes began to water.

This was it. Maybe the examiner will allow them to continue without Meiko, likely not though. They are calling for outside assistance, even more, they'll be open for attack during their trip back. All that was left for her now was to depend on the mercy of Hozuki Shibari and permission to continue, or else this exam and Mana's own presence in Team Hokage was over…

"Sorry, kid, yer friend is good as dead, is what she is…" Usuzoku rubbed some more salt into the wound before taking Mana's hat and trying to stuff it onto his nose to fit himself back into the seal. Even the cuteness of the sight in question was not noticed over the distress and potential loss of a friend and an important part of each ninja's growth…


	280. Promises We'd Rather Not Keep

While Usuzoku was busy playing around with Mana's hat the magician turned around and went Kiyomi's way. Momentarily, a loud poof with a cloud of smoke signaled that the rabbit had chosen to return home the easy way. Mana's chest, crushed by the weight of her friend's injury and the risks they had to take, barely moved. The psychological pressure alone made breathing difficult.

"Zoku-chan said that he couldn't help us. I'm beginning to get an impression he doesn't like me very much…" Mana scratched the back of her head, her eyes wandered down as she felt quite guilty about not being able to help out.

"Goddamn it!" Kiyomi screamed out clutching herself into a fetal sphere of pain and rage.

"We need to move back to the southern entrance. Move Meiko there and ask them to treat her as eliminated." Mana admitted what Kiyomi must've been thinking as well.

"No! Meiko can't know. She'll fight back, she'll make her own injury worse by trying to escape. Can you contain her if she decides to flip her shit?" Kiyomi began losing it.

"Actually I can."

"Please tell me you haven't just said that!"

"You're right…"

"We can't move her there. There's a genin out there that is out to get Meiko. If she is eliminated they'll lose their chance and fail. Removing her from exam isn't fair, they'll likely consider removing our whole team from the exam." Kiyomi started thinking of the worst.

"Maybe they'll just count Meiko as eliminated and just count a win for that guy? I don't know… We won't know until we give it a shot." Mana shrugged.

"Mana… Please…" Kiyomi grabbed the magician's shoulder forcefully stopping her from relaying the news to Meiko and asking to have her moved the southern entrance.

"We won't fight. We absolutely cannot fight over this. It's a luxury we can't permit ourselves." Mana's voice cut back strictly.

Kiyomi's hand moved back, shaking. Even in her extreme duress she realized that if they raised their fists against each other everything would've ended – they'd have wasted too much resources to continue to compete.

"If Meiko is out they won't eliminate anyone. They must have a scenario where a genin is eliminated due to hunger, natural causes or sickness. The most reasonable case would be just to pass the genin whose target the eliminated person was, granted, the genin without a takedown would risk approaching the northern entrance…" Mana sighed.

"What are you guys talking about?" Meiko's weak and lingering voice surprised both of the girls.

"You should stay tuckered in!" Kiyomi jumped to the blacksmith who just rudely stepped aside from being gently pushed back, avoiding the Yamanaka's arm. The girl then staggered and fell on her butt as even such elementary evasive action was too much for her paled and weakened state.

Kiyomi felt up Meiko's forehead. "You're burning up… Go back to the campsite!" she lied.

"What were you talking about? "If Meiko is out" part, what's about that?" the blacksmith demanded to know. She began wriggling in Kiyomi's embrace and almost fighting out of it.

"Your cold is very suspicious. We are considering giving you up to have you treated. Granted that'd eliminate you from the exams." Mana admitted starting it off with a sigh that both demonstrated her hesitance to admit it but also heralded her honesty.

"No!" Meiko objected, her bandaged gut began briefly flashing red, the bleeding was very weak but it was there and its weakness was quite likely because the smith had diminishing liquids left to bleed with.

"We know you don't like it, Meiko. Still, I won't allow you to die on us. I'll disable you and drag you there by force if I have to." Mana walked up to Meiko and stepped on her toes to elevate her eyes closer to those of Meiko just to show that she was serious.

"No! You don't get it! This is my contribution to the team, this is what I'm good at, you can't take it away from me. You can't just snuff out the part where I feel useful. Promise me you won't!" the smith demanded.

Mana answered with silence. She genuinely didn't know how to respond to it. She kind of related to how Meiko felt. The redhead was strong, strong enough to fight off rogue ninja by herself. Strong enough to be the powerhouse and the wall of the team that protected those she held dear without fail. The only time Mana saw Meiko so distressed was when her death at Akimichi Francho's arms was all but inevitable. When it began to be clear that her protection of her friends was about to end and all of them will soon die right after the blacksmith.

"Meiko, you can't possibly ask that of…" Kiyomi tried softening the situation.

"Promise me! You're a shitty liar so I'll know if you don't mean it!" Meiko demanded it again. Her strong will was the only thing that even betrayed some semblance of life still beating in her chest.

"Alright. Whatever we do, we won't end this for you." Mana caved in, almost collapsing due to the weight she just placed on her shoulders.

"Now I know why Hanasaku-sensei doesn't want you on the team. Why she's such a bitch to you…" Kiyomi cried out. "Or is this related? Maybe you're just afraid to lose because you know what it means to you as the part of Team Hokage!?"

Tears began running down Mana's face, she couldn't stand where she stood any longer.

"Watch over Meiko." Her shaking voice ordered before she leaped away into the shade of the forest. Now that the sun was beginning to hide behind the horizon the darkness of the Forest of Death became just that much more apparent.

Mana grazed her uniform on a tree while leaping past it carelessly. A deck of sealed cards fell out and scattered all over the forest's mossy floor but Mana kept on leaping ahead before she reached a tall and thick branch positioned by one of the few holes in the leafage where some sunlight could still pass through. She just wanted to see the sky…

Her teary eyes made seeing the road ahead difficult. That was exactly why she so carelessly slammed into an obstruction. At least her body chose to instinctively augment itself and protect the magician from needless bruises and risks of infection. Of all things she needed that the least.

The kunoichi wasn't mad at her teammate. If anything she admired Kiyomi's friendship and affection for Meiko. At this point, seeing to what depths of irrationality both she and Kiyomi were willing to sink for their friend made Mana wonder if one of them felt more than friendship towards Meiko. Mana knew that she didn't, to her Meiko was always just her best friend. Why did she actually promise her that? Maybe Kiyomi was right?

Brooding here alone and courting ambush wasn't smart. She needed to go back. While similar thoughts of return continued to brew in Mana's head she just kept on sitting until the sky completely changed from early evening to a starry sky.

The magician sighed and picked herself up, she felt embarrassed to face her friends but she needed to swallow her own social feelings about the situation and face reality – the three needed each other, more than ever before. One skip by another, she kept on making her way back wondering if her friends had it in them to not make a fire.

After Mana finally returned she noticed Kiyomi having her hands wrapped around Meiko and pressing the sleeping girl against her body in desperation to keep her warm. Obviously whenever the two lied to Meiko about her burning up, truly they meant absolutely different – her skin was feeling chilly and looking just as snowy.

"I'm... I'm so…" Kiyomi opened her mouth to whisper but Mana just pulled out a card from her inner pocket and removed her bag.

"Let's eat." She said out loud which instantly woke Meiko up. Somehow the magician wasn't surprised that the only thing to keep the blacksmith up and conscious instead of passing out and going to sleep for good was the prospect of food.

"Is it a good idea? I mean it's her gut that was injured, the injury isn't too deep but it's fair to assume some of her innards burst and released something out there." Kiyomi sadly exclaimed.

"True. It may make her infection worse, but it'll also give her energy. It may also accelerate her natural metabolism a little bit and make her feel better short term." Mana wondered before removing a cup of instant ramen and a blue backed card which she positioned on top of a pack with silver colored powder inside. Making fire was a bit risky when most of the genin in the forest wanted them hurt or dead so chemistry needed to be used to heat the ramen…

"You have a card with just a flask of water sealed into it but you forgot to take food pills?" Kiyomi raised her eyebrow when Mana unsealed the small amount of water inside that card into the contents of the pack, the powder inside reacted to the water bloating the pack and heating it. After placing the cups of ramen onto the bloated bag of heat Mana allowed them to heat up a bit.

"I didn't forget, I chose something else over that. I took ramen with me. Makes sense I'd also take something to heat it with." The magician replied.

"I thought this exam would be easy… We were so strong, so much stronger than any normal genin. We haven't even faced off against any genin in the exam and we're already almost wiped out…" Kiyomi sighed watching the instant ramen cups slowly heat up from inside and waiting until the paper stickers on top bloated from the built up air pressure inside before bursting and signaling it was ready to eat.

After the ramen was done Meiko instantly dug in. The food and the energy it provided livened her cheeks up a bit. Her supernatural ninja metabolism found some more energy to draw strength from and attempt to quicker compensate her chakra loss so she could recover from her wounds. Meiko needed days to even begin to get better and the trio didn't have that amount of time, neither did the redhead herself. After finishing the ramen, the blacksmith fell asleep on Kiyomi's lap who continued to rub Meiko's skin to heat it up. The chemical pack used to heat the ramen was a bit too hot at the moment to be used for that purpose.

"She looks peaceful enough. Don't think she's in any danger for some time…" Kiyomi noted. "You haven't eaten anything though, we may need you still."

"I hate ramen…" Mana replied before closing her eyes for a brief nap while Kiyomi was still watching over Meiko. "It's easy to prepare, it's really easy to carry around also Meiko likes it and you don't hate it. I may despise it but it was the reasonable ration choice for a short term exam."

"Look… About what I said…" Kiyomi brought it up again.

"Forget it. You like Meiko, you're not yourself when her wellbeing is threatened. I get it…" the magician spoke while continuing to briefly twist her lips upwards. "I can't imagine how much things I'd later regret I'd do if Kouta was in danger."

Kouta's shaking and blood hand moved into his ninja pouch and pulled out a yellow food pill which he quickly cracked between his teeth, chewed up to gooey and mustard-like paste and let it slide down his throat. Within an instant he began feeling his racing and spouting blood heart calm down and his Mystical Palm technique slowly becoming more effective as both the food pill and his own ninjutsu assisted his efforts to treat his injury.

"You bastard!" Trot growled out, standing up all covered in blood stains and cuts. Several cuts appeared to have really gotten deeper into his muscle and flesh but most of them didn't hit any vitals. Granted, if Yushijin wished or tried to kill him he had plenty of time for it.

"I assume that jutsu of yours was an illusionary technique? That's how you move so fast, you trick our minds. Still, how did you do it before – the first time you cut Trot? Didn't hear you say any words or make any seals…" Jord wondered apathetically.

"Then I barely strained myself. I forced your brains to skip out on maybe a millisecond. Making you believe time has frozen for seconds is difficult and needs the package deal: hand seals and name and all that…" Yushijin replied switching his deadly cold stares between the two opponents of his.

Trot looked like he should've considering calling it quits. He was certainly past his fighting point and was now pushing at his limits to find power to keep standing. Maybe he could go for a couple of more rounds but a focused and connecting cut from Yushijin's sword would cleave him in half for certain this time.

The jounin mentor of Team Pyrite landed nearby closely observing the situation and keeping herself from speaking. Any advice she could've given could have been interpreted as cheating, after all. Her very presence by Jord's side was an exception granted for her country and her team all by itself.

Jord laughed out, finally breaking into an uncontrollable and very prevalent emotional fit. "It appears we've got even more toys to play with!" she declared pointing at a bush behind Yushijin that split open revealing her third teammate – the tall and powerful mute - Horein Ptet walking out with Budoki resting on his shoulder, seemingly unconscious.

"Hmmm, it seems it's three against one. Time to play it safe then and gamble two on one!" Trot finally mustered the strength needed to show his bloodied teeth through his smug and cut up face as he took steps back to hide behind his female teammate.

"If you wish, after this I can heal you a little so that these wounds don't leave scars!" Kouta suggested as he was standing on his feet again, granted, somewhat slouched and with a face twisted in pain but standing nonetheless which very few young men who have been stabbed from behind right through their toughest defenses could do.

"Well well…" Jord licked her lips.

Yushijin smiled, finally busting through the façade of deadly swordsman assassin he was putting up recently.

"I believe you've miscalculated…" he expressed in a happy and bashful manner before laughing more energetically.

A sizzling marble-sized orb rolled out from Budoki's unconscious body and without giving ample time to react simply exploded right by his feet. After the smoke had cleared large chunks of hay and leather started to fall from wherever the explosion had blasted them, the medical ninja who thought he had caught up to the crafty kunoichi from Kouta's team was resting on a nearby branch waving her legs like a go-lucky child. She used a dummy of leather and hay disguised as herself to appear like she's been beaten and caught.

"Gotcha, big guy…" she grinned with a full-teeth smile.

The explosion had torn skin and coaled up muscle tissue for the mute giant. It also released his tidily kept blond hair from their ponytail. The big man just followed up with a bunch of hand seals placing his palms against the most grievous wounds and sticking out bone to patch the injuries up. It wasn't even close to being the first time that this crafty and slippery young lady had inflicted such damage to him and caught him in a trap of her making.

"Well… This just got a whole lot of fun!" Jord smiled as her figure straightened out and she took a modified crane stance, ready to pound the ground with any one of her palms or one of her feet to use one of her powerful earthquake Earth Release techniques.

"You kidding? I'm on my last legs here… Let's scram!" Trot growled with his broken up voice before all three of the genin ninja erupted into flames, burning up like life-size paper cutouts of their originals.

Kouta and Budoki sighed easier. Yushijin kept on standing and waiting for a stealthy strike but as time kept on passing nothing came. The jounin lady looked at her side and immediately dashed away in speeds that appeared almost matching the Body Flicker Technique that a lot of higher ranked ninja used to amp their speed.

"I hate fighting without preparation like that… I really need time to set my stuff up, I almost got caught for real." Budoki complained before wiping her dirty cheek with her thumb and checking one of her two hair buns that was ruined and now lazily spread hair all over her face and behind.

Kouta laughed it up before his chest pain made itself clear again. Yushijin sighed before sheathing his sword and looking around the bloodied and devastated battlefield. Trees and lurking predators laid cut up from the gusts of cutting wind emanating from his previously deadly use of the sword. The young man almost felt bad about losing his composure like that.

"You know… I think I understand your clan a little better now." Yushijin caved in with a submissive bow of his head which allowed his long and messy hair flow all over his shoulders and his face.

Kouta looked around, finally getting the chance to see what losing one's composure for just one moment could've done. He had seen plenty of similar sights, one of the more gruesome ones was his father's gritty display of nearly blowing up the planet despite perfectly channeling his energy all into his opponent when fighting Akimichi Francho.

"You guys… Don't lower your guard just yet. That creepy mute is a pretty wicked medical ninja, maybe on par with Kouta. He'll have that Trout-guy patched up in no time." Budoki warned her careless teammates.

"Trot…" Kouta fixed his teammate's mistake.

"He may treat Trot's body but his chakra reserves he spent on not dying will take time to replenish. I'd say it'll be days before we hear from those guys again." Yushijin concluded.

"Ma'am! Engagements all over the map! It appears the teams have all settled in and are now gunning for their targets!" the sensory corps officer reported energetically.

"It appears the exam has finally truly begun. Prepare to report target takedowns. A chakra dip below ten percent is considered a takedown! If it falls below four percent let me know, we'll send a retrieval squad for immediate medical attention." Shibari kept on managing the corps.

"Ma'am!" all sensory units reported in unison continuing to observe the glowing liquid ball with red sparks signaling engagements all over the liquid representation of the battlefield.


	281. Desperate Times, Desperate Measures

In the morning no one felt really well. Mana and Kiyomi had slept about as peachy as someone switching in for someone to stand guard could've, despite their supernatural ninja metabolisms allowing for more leisure and skipping some nights of sleep altogether, that didn't mean they felt all that great about it.

Meiko may have been the only one of the trio feeling just fine, initially at least. Some coloring returned to her cheeks and she was looking plenty cheerful, if a little floaty. She didn't stand up or jig around or anything but she looked a lot less like a dying person compared to last night which was probably the best scenario imaginable.

This, obviously, was a very quick and short term improvement. It was very much a postponing of the worst of the troubles – her inner infection which may have only been made worse by her eating something to give her body the energy to fuel her metabolism. It was a gamble at best – if Meiko's metabolism treated her injuries by itself she'd be set for combat in a pair of days, if not and the fueled infection managed to overcome the out of combat healing factor of a functional kunoichi she's looking at significant trouble. Maybe even lethal…

"What are the odds of someone finding us here?" Kiyomi wondered as she sat around Meiko, a little melancholic since the blacksmith refused her suggestion to warm up her still a little paled skin through close skin contact.

"Fairly in our favor. We're so close to the northern exit that most teams will stay as far away from here as possible. Most of them will likely wish to take down their targets before coming here, no one in their fair mind will look for their target in that one place every team, including the teams after them, will be gathering in. Still, it'd be foolish to rule it out completely, after all – we're here, aren't we?" Mana replied bitterly.

The promise she made for Meiko pressed heavily against her fragile shoulders. The day went on with no activity, waiting this thing out until the injured got better and the active ninja beat each other up was a smart option. If anything, it was a very ninja thing to do. If Tanshu-sensei ever saw Mana in this situation he'd likely love her mindset. Then again, knowing that made the magician wonder if she was supposed to feel glad about it or not.

The further the day went on the worse Meiko got. Her gut wound was now nothing but messy soft scar tissue having completely closed up, its coloring was petrifying to observe. A man may have made a fortune if they got a ryo every time the girl's scar tissue changed color, from red to blue to greenish pale back to black and red.

What was worse was that Meiko's attitude started to change with it. She started getting sleepy, lazy and once Mana picked some mushrooms she could somewhat identify and made a stew out of them in a sealed clay jar heated underground by scorching hot stones she refused to eat it. That was a signal of the worst things yet to come. That "I don't feel very hungry" sounded like a drummer of the Apocalypse raiders kicking a very passionate solo.

Kiyomi dragged Mana away by her elbow. The aggression of the blonde visibly troubled Meiko but she was too weak to do anything about it. Unlike last evening when she argued somewhat passionately, current Meiko looked better visually but was apathetic and very sleepy.

"We have to give her up. This is getting scary…" Kiyomi whispered in a pretty aggressive tone. Almost like she knew what Mana would say and had played this argument out in her mind multiple times.

"No. I promised her I wouldn't do it." Mana refused.

"Which would you rather be, a liar or someone who let her friend die in front of her?" Kiyomi tapped her feet, her smart looking face revealed that she knew this phrase would cut deep, especially so for Mana. "Haven't both of us lost enough people already? We can give her up and still salvage our standing, move on to the other round."

"You know I'd lie a thousand times before I'd let Meiko die…" Mana cut back with a tone just as sharp, the fact that her friend would try to manipulate her by cutting at her most painful spiritual wounds hurt her all by itself.

"As long as she's not on your shoulders on the way to the southern entrance you've got nine hundred ninety nine lies left… The fact that she's not here arguing for herself shows how bad the situation is. We've no time to bicker about this – we need to hit those targets already, every moment we spend the possibility of being hit ourselves grows."

Mana turned back and stroke her sweaty and dirty face, Kiyomi's thoughts and words really were well thought out and sharpened. Not a word was used that didn't cut Mana personally, attack her own positions and stances, her own nindo itself. If the trio were attacked at any point, while Meiko was the way she was she was a possible weak link to be utilized by the enemy.

Ending the conversation by simply walking away, Mana walked out to Meiko and knelt by her side taking her hand and feeling its scorching heat. Her temperature did a full 180 turn overnight, where previously the blood loss threatened to drop it to a freezing point, now the infection was searing her up.

"How are you feeling?" Mana asked with a smile, she knew it was faked, she knew that Meiko must've seen through it and focused on the tears on her friend's face.

"I don't remember the Earth's mantle being this hot…" the blacksmith faked a smile back at Mana.

"Want to eat something? Play cards?" she wondered.

"Nah… Not feeling hungry." The blacksmith reached out for cards but once the distance between her hand and the deck of cards placed on the grass would've required her to physically move the infected area she froze. "You know what? I'd be a fool playing cards against you, a goddamn magician. Your strategy yesterday to feed me to deal with the blood loss was genius, sometimes I forget which one of you and Kouta is the medical ninja, you know?" she joked.

Mana's eyes lingered on the horror of realizing her friend couldn't even more her lower body due to the pain. The magician took her friend's hand and pressed her against her face.

"Do you want me to bring you to the entrance? They're gonna patch you up in minutes… I just can't do that from where I am now." Mana cried out trying and failing spectacularly to restrain her tears as the promise she had made was tearing her up from inside.

"Mana… You promised me… No matter what…" Meiko mumbled out, even through crippling pain which the blacksmith herself feared of, even with a sickness that made her resent food – one of her biggest passions she still held up her own about this.

Mana stood up and walked away, a quick glance back betrayed that her friend lacked even the strength to follow her with her eyes and her head just flopped down as she kept on staring at her bloodied and pus covered bandages.

Even in this situation… If Meiko maintained her inner strength, how could Mana give up?

"See? She won't last till the next morning… You're supposed to be the smart one out of the three of us! How about you use that brilliant yet thick head of yours…" Kiyomi hissed angrily. The worst part was that she was right, at any point in time, she was just right…

"Let me try one more thing. Please. Before I lose my last friend… One more thing." Mana whispered a request. An awkward pause took over as the future Yamanaka heiress considered it.

"Don't take too long. If I see her life really fading I'm using all of my chakra on one mad dash back – not only will I give her up but I'll also diminish my own chakra greatly which means more work for you to pull us through. Only because Meiko isn't the last friend you've got, not yet…" Kiyomi sighed before walking back to the blacksmith.

Mana jumped onto the tree branches and started dashing onwards. The worst part of this whole thing was that she couldn't rush. If she moved too fast she spent too much chakra, similarly like the energy expended to travel fast, chakra was to match those resources being used. There was a certain threshold beyond which the cost of each additional ounce of speed cost an almost Faustian bargain. The magician was wise and self-controlled to travel just on the edge of that line.

Yet her friendship towards Meiko and respect of Kiyomi's love for her wanted her to just ignore it and move past all lines, beyond all the limits and spit in the face of the future, struggles yet to come.

Kouta. He was Mana's plan. One shot in a billion, she knew, he was not the only medical ninja in this place but he was certainly the only one who would actually consider helping Meiko. The magician was aware of the odds of finding him in this vast nothingness. Given her speed of travelling it'd still take forever to scout the entire forest and track him down…

Before she gave up on her promise, before she earned Meiko's eternal scorn, she figured that she should at least waste all opportunities, try every shot and every stupid idea in her mind and she had plenty yet in mind. At least now her eyes had few tears left to shed, swollen and twisted in sadness as they were, at least they were functioning.

The magician scoured through every corner she could find, she homed in on every wildest sound trying to find anything at all. Even if she found an opposing team of other competitors, as long as she didn't engage them it'd be fine. Just like the predators of this forest, everyone here must've followed the very same rules of economy. The energy needed to take out a random kunoichi passing through was simply too much unless the magician was their intended target, in which case the odds of meeting that person were just about as slim as bumping into Kouta.

An explosion echoed from a faraway area, a burst of light and shockwave emanating from the area made the magician cover up and just barely not get blasted aside with the debris. It wasn't that uncommon to find a field of active combat in this case. A significant amount of time had passed since the exam started and plenty teams may have already concluded their first engagements. Many have already been baptized in blood and steel.

Even if she greatly doubted her odds, Mana followed the trail of destruction. Whatever clues she got about a possible location of any ninja she had to check. One of these fields of active combat could've been that of Kouta's team. The odds weren't great but as puny as they were – they were Mana's last chance at doing something before betraying her friend's trust.

The magician was never the stealthiest out there or even amongst the best dozen of such individuals, she only exceeded in stealth when her opponent's own reason combatted against them. Under normal circumstances she was about as quiet and sneaky as any normal genin that graduated the Ninja Academy. That was why faking death was such a common strategy for her – she needed her opponent convinced she died and ignoring any signs of her existence she gave out.

Still, given that the two teams were engaged in active combat – they had plenty more to worry about instead of troubling their heads over Mana. The magician was standing in a smoky and decimated battlefield with a crater at least thirty meters in radius and at least five meters deep of nothing but dirt and coal. Something very hot clearly caused the destruction she felt before.

Inside the crater knelt a tall and strong looking genin wearing a blond ponytail. Nearby him fought his teammates: a gothic attire wearing and very edgy looking your lady and a greasy dark hair possessing young man wielding two kunai knives. They were facing off against a trio the magician knew about quite well – that mysterious trio that scolded her before signing up for the exams, together with that hulking giant that gave the magician a bad feeling about him.

If she focused really well, Mana could just about see what they were doing, even see the hand seals they were making as none of their speed matched that of her own. She could also hear and focus on every word, as long as something much louder did not demand her undivided attention…

The magician wondered if she should just move on. Just like her thought before indicated – the battlefield of two teams was nothing special at all and given how Kouta or his team took no part in this scuffle it just didn't really make any amount of sense for her to do anything about this but flee.

An angry tsk of tongue alerted the magician as a woman in a red dress and an Iwagakure jounin uniform leaped down from just below where Mana was situated. Who was that woman? Why a jounin of Iwagakure was present in the second stage of the Chuunin Exams!? Curiosity took the better of Mana, she continued to sit atop of the branch she was on, where the previously unnoticed lady was also situated as it was a comfortable spot for observation and continued to observe the battle between the teams.

"Damn you three! If I wasn't so injured in my previous fight… And lacking of any chakra to spare…" the greasy haired weasel-boy yelled out, it didn't take an unnaturally gifted ninja to hear his words as he made sure to make just about everyone in the nearest vicinity heard them with his tone.

"Wanna try cutting me again?" the silver haired female who appeared to be somewhat reasonable and restraining her teammates of much more conflicting nature before suggested. It didn't look like she wanted any of this battle, if her own tone was to be judged separately, she couldn't have been hunting her target here…

"Fuck you, bitch! Just one cut, one cut will be enough!" the greasy haired knife fighter cursed at her before rushing at her shorter and much more volatile and annoyingly voiced teammate. He oddly enough extended his arms and accepted the slashes that came his way, with a throat spraying blood as well as an open chest the young man staggered back yet didn't fall. With an off handedly raised hand he and a sadistic smile he weaved a hand seal.

The body of the greasy haired fellow flew back as the cheeks of heavy make-up wearing teammate of his dyed crimson red from the bleeding teammate of hers. She just offered her downed friend an off-handed look.

"You mean if you didn't use Ptet like you use me until he was of no help in this battle?" she taunted the young man despite the appearance that he couldn't really care any less of these taunts and was quite knocked out and bleeding out as well as drowning in the pool of his own blood.

Those sharp crescent cutting wind projectiles that the shorter weirdo launched before didn't evade Mana's eye. However they were blindingly fast, if they were used against her Mana would have some trouble evading them, maybe if she didn't invest too much into her attack that was countered like the greasy haired young man did.

The man who was just called "Ptet" by the young eccentric kunoichi collapsed on the floor after a period of heavy panting and kneeling by his attackers. If her words were to be believed he was completely dry of usable chakra reserves, a fate not unlike that which once befell Mana hit him right in the face making him pass out from the exhaustion.

And yet… Energetically as ever the young lady shrieked in the air like a wild fury willing to murder the living hell out of her enemies before charging at her opponent while weaving hand seals. The silver haired female stepped up in front of her teammate who was the target of the gothic chick's furious wrath. A deafening shockwave relentlessly sieged Mana's ear drums and blew her off her feet and back into the trees which were somehow not assaulted heavily enough to be completely downed by the powerful earthquake causing punch of the young kunoichi.

Just as swiftly as she was knocked back, doing the best she could to keep up on her stealth, Mana scaled onto a pile of trees before hiding between the still intact leafage of some of them. Using them as improvised bushes she kept on observing the battle. It may not have been overly safe to move past now as she no longer had the cover of rich tree-line to protect her.

The first clear sight that the magician got was the silver haired member of, if Mana's memory served, Team Phobos from Getsugakure placing two of her fingers by the gothic kunoichi's chest area and the poor young woman just gasping for air with the most terrified expression. Her eyes were rolled back, the decorative pink strips of hair were torn up and scattered all over revealing a much more natural blackness of hair. A small stream of blood ran down from the girl's nose before she collapsed on the ground, dead or knocked out, it was tough to say…

"They were not that strong…" the female member of Team Phobos concluded before she flipped her hood back up and allowed her palm to slip deep into her dark sleeve until it was of use again.

"Only because they were already worn out. I believe they'd have been more competent if they were fresh… Maybe even troublesome." the larger member of the team from Getsugakure remarked, just looking at him made Mana's heart pound uneasily. At this point just sheer curiosity made her wish to witness his actual combat prowess.

"Yeah… I think one of them let it slip that they retreated from a previous fight against their target, let's see…" Doma from Team Phobos, previously named by Shibari during his expression of hatred for Konoha's way of handling the Exams, checked the file that laid right beside the knocked out knife fighter of the three. The file was soaked in blood alerting Mana that the young man was in desperate need of medical attention.

"One… Kouta Hirano." Doma read out loud.

"Kouta Hirano? That's Kouta's fake name he went with until recently…" Mana's eyes shot wide open as she was happy to find out that the odds of Kouta's team being somewhere nearby were halfway decent. "Judging from his chakra control grade, I'd say he's more than likely a medical ninja, we may pay him a visit if we get injured…"

The injuries that Doma had sustained from the greasy haired knife fighter's attacks were completely gone now, almost like he had regenerated them away however Mana saw no ninjutsu in effect which made her just blink in confusion about the young man's abilities.

"So… How about we kill those three pricks? They're nothing but trash that flee from their objective, run away from their target. Hypocritical ninja like that just make my blood boil!" Doma shouted out before a kunai slipped out from his sleeve and he trust it at the unconscious goth girl's chest while kneeling on one knee.

His hand was caught halfway by the Iwagakure jounin lady.

"While killing is not explicitly forbidden in the Chuunin Exams, I cannot allow you to kill these three. Sorry. I will admit that they've lost and take them to the entrance, whichever of the three is your target – you've now eliminated all three of them as I don't feel safe leaving them unconscious here with you three…" the woman coldly explained before letting go of Doma's arm rather rudely. Liquid masses of greyish blue and metallic in texture looking mass surrounded the three and raised them up in the air like floating vertical donuts. After the woman turned around and left carrying her team behind her the steel donuts followed her.

"Hmph…" Doma angrily growled, a bit unhappy by the fact that he didn't have a chance to kill ninja that spit in the face of his own understanding of what ninja should be like.

"I guess that's it. Your target is down, Gasco…" the female member of Team Phobos smiled before reaching out to tap as close to the shoulder of the giant scary fellow of the team as possible.

"No… This isn't it. I sense a sneaky little owl eyeing us. Her chakra signature is very distinct, impossible to miss. It's the little missy from before, before the sign-ups…" the voice of the large young man thundered loud and wide. Mana's heart froze up. That man was a sensor!? Those were quite rare and few in between as sensory was a genetic trait and not a talent one could just train…

"Oh? Konoha's cheerleader? Let's go and play with her a little bit…" Doma smiled before looking at his hulking teammate who pointed at Mana's exact location relatively to them.


	282. Between a Rack and a Chokehold

A cold shiver heralding great fear tore its way out of Mana's heart after she saw the tall cloaked Getsugakure genin point at her. She was completely ill prepared for such a battle, not to mention she still needed to find a medical ninja capable and willing to help Meiko to not get eliminated.

"You barely got to do anything, Stea. Want to kill that Konoha cheerleader?" the Getsugakure genin who was referred to as Doma previously smiled.

It didn't appear like the Getsugakure team was overly rushing to engage Mana. The magician stayed glued to her spot since she wasn't sure how exact the Getsugakure giant's sensory was. If she moved or turned her attention off of her opponents they may have utilized that time, her best bet for now was to sit tight and obtain as much information about them as possible while looking for a good spot to slip away from their sensory range.

"She's not my trouble. I couldn't care less, knowing why she's here alone would be interesting to know though…" Stea, the silver haired kunoichi of Team Phobos, shrugged.

Doma, the raven dark haired and tanned skinned young man of his team just squinted angrily at his teammate before his cape floated open and his arm extended to the side. As Mana's senses sharpened she saw shiny tips of at least a good dozen blades coming at her general direction. This was as good of a time as any to slip away, if anything, just for the sole purpose of avoiding being made a pin-cushion, and so she did move away.

The magician's senses sharpened and she dashed sideways allowing the blades to skewer her hiding spot and etch into branches and wood behind her where she no longer was. Mana felt her chakra surging at an accelerated pace within her body, making her stronger, faster and more durable. She would've been outright impossible to perceive to any normal man and just a black blur to a simple genin.

A thick tree sized arm blocking her path stopped the magician in her tracks. The large and creepy feeling emanating member of Team Phobos stood right up front to the tree where Mana was leaping through and simply placed his hand as a barrier preventing the magician's passage. He was no ordinary genin. Faster, visibly stronger and seemingly with superior perception being able to not only see Mana's movements but read them and intercept them. He alone would've troubled the magician, together with his team fighting them would've been suicidal.

Mana stopped and gifted the large man a desperate and angry glare, her eyes flared up as she felt cornered and placed her hands in her fighting stance, ready to blast off with her untraceably swift hand seals. To be able to weave them fast enough to confuse her opponents was something Mana felt fairly confident in.

With a graceful leap backwards Mana landed on the lower ground level of the forest, soon she was surrounded by Team Phobos as the tall and broad shouldered genin removed his hood revealing a middle aged man with a face tattooed similarly to the face of Doma's. The magician's eye could spy on a bunch of golden flares as the dark brown eyes of the large and creepy man couldn't distract her from his excessive flare for wearing golden accessories all over himself: earrings, necklaces and chains all over. The man even had a golden chain etched onto his forehead and extending past his bald head, disappearing like a braid somewhere into the back of his skull.

"She's all alone here?" Doma wondered turning at the bulky teammate of his who just calmly nodded, delving deep into his chakra sensory ability, no doubt.

"Why?" Stea asked Mana, her eyes were strangely kind and the silver haired kunoichi didn't really look at the magician as an enemy or even as an opposing competitor.

Mana smiled with the tips of her lips and lowered her hands, she had managed to weave a pair of hand seals seemingly without her opponents noticing in mid jump. It was a moment when they were likely not to be too invested into perception of what Mana was doing. Realizing she was prepared for an unexpected attack, the magician lowered her fists and clenched them. Being just one step ahead wasn't really enough, she needed a greater edge.

Doma's hand flashed in a metallic blur, he slashed at Mana as his coat allowed him to slip out one of the many kunai knives he had under it seemingly unexpectedly. The magician's figure simply burst into flower petals and scattered in the wind. The real Mana kept on dashing away from there, doing her best to heighten the distance between her and the enemy before a kick in the chest drove all the oxygen out from her body and sent her flying back. It didn't look like it meant much for her opponent to dash right in front of her and punish this attempt to escape. Doma flashed through a bunch of hand seals, the magician could see that much but her eyes were more occupied looking out for his teammates.

"Earth Style: Bridge Rack!" he yelled out.

Pulsing pain made Mana's consciousness black out for just a fraction of a moment as she let out a combination of a scream and a gasp for air she so desperately missed. She hit something rock hard and emanating with chakra, must've been the ninjutsu her opponent used. She had to move, moving was her chance of staying alive but by the time her mind got back into the game it was too late – rocky arcs smashed into her wrists crushing them by the rocky torture rack made by the Getsugakure genin.

She should've repeated her genjutsu again but it'd have cost chakra, a lot of it and also increased the cost for any successive uses for the rest of the day. She wagered on keeping it for the future but the way it was going there may not have been any future.

Warm streams of blood ran down Mana's wrists to her body, another stream of red just dyed the stone rack she was locked onto. Another set of rocky arcs locked tightly onto her feet. It was a torture ninjutsu, not really something to take out one's opponent, more like something to make them talk.

The creepy bald sensor of the team walked up to Mana and grabbed her by the hair before placing a kunai by her throat.

"Why are you here all alone? Did you three split? What are the names of your teammates?" he tried interrogating Mana without noticing her escape.

Mana was a stage magician, escaping binds was something she did for a living and she was beginning to slip out before her legs were even getting tightened. It hurt to weave hand seals with bruised and bleeding wrists, still, her ability to weave them using one hand proved very useful to Mana. She used an experimental concept for a new ninjutsu, bare and not quite ready, she began perfecting it and shaping it into an actual technique after returning from her trip to the Forest of Death before the exams.

It wasn't something anyone couldn't do, anyone with the ability to use Lightning Release elemental ninjutsu, that is. Simply separate a stream of chakra from the rest of the network and transform it into lightning chakra, no shape manipulation needed. It was an as of yet nameless technique, more of a concept but it functioned as a taser of sorts.

With a forceful shove of her leg Mana broke the rocky restraint and drove her kick to the back of her attacker's head while her freed arm pushed the elbow of the kunai wielding arm away from her throat. Saving her neck right before pulling her entire body away from the torturous rack and allowing it to crumble to a pile of lifeless rocks.

"What the…" Doma whistled before exclaiming in surprise.

"Lightning Release is known for its neutralizing advantage over Earth Release…" the creepy bald sensor of Team Phobos smiled before nodding, it was like Mana hadn't even put a scratch on him with her kick at all.

The technique Mana wanted to perfect using this taser-like concept was a taijutsu countering ninjutsu technique. A quick surge of lightning chakra over her body while simultaneously augmenting her own endurance to not take damage from her own ninjutsu, it would've shocked anyone coming within close distance to Mana. It appeared like it could've been used the way it was used in the current predicament as well…

"That wasn't an ideal use of the technique, you could've used it when Gasco was holding your hair, instead of right after you were locked up – you'd have shocked him as well…" Stea remarked landing nearby her teammates.

"I don't want to fight you three. None of you are my targets, none of you identified me as your target either…" Mana grunted before feeling her aching and still slowly bleeding wrists.

"It's true that you're not our target, still, we don't really know who your teammates are and they may just be our targets." Gasco cracked his knuckles before flexing his neck around, completely shaking off one of Mana's stronger kicks.

The magician took a fearful step back. The dark feeling coming from the man called Gasco of Team Phobos combined with her inability to decide if it was better to tell them the names of her team or to keep trying to escape without it made her tremble in fear against these three.

If she did tell these three the names of Kiyomi and Meiko nothing would've stopped them from coming after them. They would've fought Mana until the magician couldn't resist anymore and tortured her until she either passed out, told them where her team was or died. Something told her that these three didn't particularly care about which outcome it came down to. Then again, if the gamble went her way and neither of the three was a target there was a possibility of these three just moving on and leaving her to searching for Kouta.

"You've seen my teammates before, if you'd have seen their faces in the files, I'm sure you'd recognize them. Those pictures weren't taken that long ago…" Mana tried talking her way out of gambling with her team's lives. Then again, it wasn't wise to gamble with her own life either – at this moment Meiko's ability to compete directly depended on Mana's ability to find a medical ninja that could heal her.

"She's right, weren't both of her teammates female? All of our targets are male." Stea nodded calmly.

"Still… To wander off alone without a team, I bet those three losers were looking to beat their targets alone. Such arrogance, not unlike Konoha… Thinking you're so big and so strong! Arrogance like that must be punished!" Doma broke out into a fit of rage rushing at Mana, his speed completely caught the magician unprepared.

The kunoichi leaned aside trying to avoid getting stabbed right in the center of her chest, a painful shock made her stumble back as a gash bloodied up her uniform where she was about to be stabbed. Mana took a leap back, she couldn't pin down just how she was injured – her opponent missed, it was like the air around his thrust was just as sharp as the actual attack.

Mana's scream made a bunch of curious birds scatter away and look for worms and smaller insects elsewhere. Doma had moved in behind the magician's back and tackled her with his shoulder sending her bashing into a tree ahead before he kneed the magician down below like a ragdoll, smashing her and grinding the kunoichi to the ground. Luckily enough, Mana managed to roll aside right as soon as she recovered and avoid three more knives coming from under Doma's cloak trying to skewer her while she was down.

The thrust that she was meant to be stabbed by only grazed her chest, still, it was a painful reminder that her opponent possessed strange and as of yet misunderstood ability. Dodging was dangerous around him. It was like his entire skillset was centered on torture: dodging only slowly scratched and cut away at one's will and body until nothing but a tortured broken victim remained. His entire ninjutsu arsenal appeared to be focused on capturing and dealing a great amount of pain to his opponent.

Mana needed the young man to speak. Speaking was almost like a dance of swords all by itself, it revealed things about one's opponent, things that made them easier to read. If she knew her opponent was psychotic she could better predict their actions, if she knew them to be tranquil she'd know they'd aim for finishing the fight quick or not fighting at all. She needed Doma to speak…

An iron grip locked around the magician's neck catching her by surprise. She should've sensed the impending doom from the large Getsugakure sensor ninja but she was too occupied observing Doma. These three were just too much to take all by herself… No air… The bulky giant was firmly crushing her throat with his lock from behind, vision was getting blurry, Mana gasped for air but as her mouth opened Gasco only found an opportunity to crush her throat further. Mana tried kicking around, augmentation took some time to work right, she was too weak at that point. Brain was getting lazy and slow. All sorts of stupid thoughts clogged it when she needed clarity and firm decisions.

"I'm waiting for you to stop me…" Gasco's voice still found its way to the magician's fading senses. Vision was growing dim, sounds were dulling and starting to slip past her registry. It would've taken at least twenty minutes to kill a ninja out of air deprivation, why was she fading so fast?

"Stop you? Why would I care about that? Just snap her neck and be done with it. Arrogant fools that think they can take on other teams all by themselves are a weak link for their villages, a pointless existence…" the short shinobi of Team Phobos sat down on a nearby rock before turning away from Mana struggling for her life.

Whenever she wasted chakra to kick or strike Gasco with her elbows the man's own chakra augmentation countered it by toughening his body. Her strikes were completely useless against a much stronger physically opponent. Only once Mana realized how fruitless her struggle was, how this feeling of creeping certain death which she would experience for almost half an upcoming hour would be prolonged to eternity by that freaky dark feeling which Gasco carried around him her brain started working separately from her own body.

"I… Need… Help…" the magician begged her own mind to cooperate, sometimes talking to her own body in her mind helped. She'd have never given her opponent the satisfaction to beg them, judging from Doma's words he hated ninja that were incompetent in his eyes and such begging would've only made him angrier and made Mana seem more incompetent. Meiko and Kiyomi needed her help… If only she could've found Kouta… Kouta… Where was he?! Mana's eyes closed focusing on her slowly fading mind instead.

An influx of oxygen sieged the magician's chest. Like a thirsty person being thrown under a crushing tide of water all at once she began coughing and shaking, the space under Mana's eyes began pulsing madly as her blurry and dark vision started to slowly return.

"Hey, what gives? Now you'll have to choke her all over again…" Doma complained at his teammate.

"We can't kill her." Gasco shook his head, the magician heard his loud and wide footsteps thudding away from her. This man was done with her.

"What? Why not!?" Doma shouted out before jumping off of the rock he was on and running after his teammate.

"Maybe because it's just good sportsmanship not to kill people just because you aren't forbidden to?" Stea sarcastically cheeked her teammate's obsession over killing people he saw as useless ninja.

"No. That's because she's a rare breed, she'll be a very useful kunoichi to her village in the future." Gasco's voice still reached Mana, the surprise that his words invited made her struggle back on the magician's feet and stumbling after the trio just to hear what was it that Gasco felt.

"What do you mean?" Doma wondered, all malevolence in his voice disappeared in an instant. He stopped and looked back at Mana with a whole different set of eyes, less bloodthirsty and enraged and more curious.

"She's a sensor. That's why her signature felt so weird and was so recognizable to me, tell me, girl, I feel different than other people, don't I?" Gasco's low pitched and rumbling voice thundered out as he also turned at Mana.

The magician nodded after a short confused delay.

"Sensors are able to tell if the chakra signature belongs to a sensor, it feels like that person is eating up the chakra that one's body emanates and spits it back out. Her abilities are still undiscovered and latent that's why I wasn't able to feel them initially. Then she turned them on subconsciously and I felt it clear as day, she must've sought someone using her entire essence, cleared her mind in her desperate plea for her life. Remember what you did, learn that ability. It's what very few ninja have…" Gasco explained before putting his hood back on and concealing his creepy bald head.

After a surprised but somewhat vibrant shrug Doma also concealed his tattooed face under the hood, Stea also followed hiding her silver locks. The trio dashed away, they had no further use for Mana at this point.

The magician crawled on all fours to the nearest tree, her body collapsed right after the dark and scary feeling from Gasco disappeared completely and nothing but whistling forest winds and rustling leaves were left as her only company. Mana closed her eyes and lifted her chin up, truthfully that revelation sort of did make sense. Didn't her meditation work very weird recently, displaying some strange images of stars and space-like imagery. It must've been some sort of symbolism, the spacial imagery must've been some strange way for her body to use the sensory ability that was beginning to bud inside her.

She only saw those strange moving stars whenever she moved past her entry-level meditational stages. Mana closed her eyes and focused onto her own body before calling out to the surrounding environment, calling out to Kiyomi, Meiko or Kouta like she did when she felt like her life was slowly being choked away. In a loud blazing roar a bunch of stars materialized in front of her in the total blackness of space. These must've represented chakra signatures, the size of these stars must've symbolized the size of the chakra signature.

"I can see three of them one by the other…" Mana spoke to herself inside her own mind. She saw the stars at least lightyears away from her, that must've symbolized her sensory range, at this point she had no idea about the proportion of her mental imagery and actual distance she sensed the signatures in. At least it was a clear indicator of where she could've found ninja. The signatures were south-west from her whereas Stea, Doma and Gasco moved north-east, they belonged to someone other than Team Phobos.

Pain brought the magician back to the world around her. Once again her sensory abilities disappeared and she was left with the five senses available to her from birth. Even with all the hard work and training she did in preparation for the Exams or before trying to become strong enough: strong enough to catch up to her peers and the world around her, strong enough to change the world and make it better than she found it after being born, even with all that, she still needed training. Training to sharpen and blossom her chakra sensory abilities, training to perfect all of her concepts for new techniques.

It felt like being smacked in the face by a dirty wet blanket… But still, she was alive, she had a sense of purpose and the next clue.

"Wait, Meiko… Please. just wait a little bit longer." Mana mumbled under her own nose while pushing herself back on her feet. Her head still felt dizzy but it didn't look like her wrists were bleeding or the scratch on her chest was something serious.

Slowly, one step after another, Mana headed south-west where the next chakra signature clue tipped her off to go.


	283. Heroes Don't Use Cheat Codes

It was dark around, granted, it was tough to say exactly just what time it could've been outside the thickness of Forest of Death due to the dense cover of trees above. Insects of every sort, flying and crawling have started their nocturnal procession to fuel their further existence. That suggested a later part of the day, maybe past even the climax of the night. Time was running out.

A couple of times Mana dashed to the location where the straws of her sensory picked up ninja to be. The previous tip turned out empty as the ninja had moved on past their stop. A handful of more wild goose chases like that followed. As wet and frail spray of rainwater began weighing down the leafage that shielded the grounds below from it, Mana had begun to wonder if her quest was entirely pointless.

The cold didn't matter, even if the rain soaked her entirely. At least it helped to numb the pain in her chest, her wrists and just above her feet. It didn't do jack squat about the inner pain though, the desperation to do whatever it took to save her friend's health and fulfil the stupid promise she never should have made in the first place.

The next tip of Mana's sensory picked up on two signatures moving her direction from the southern entrance to the Forest of Death. While it would've been unfortunate and very unlikely that Kouta's team would be reduced to just two members so soon, missing checking it was still a luxury the magician couldn't afford. For that reason she moved their general direction to meet them sooner than they ran into her.

Her sensory was beginning to define itself as a new feeling, to sharpen somewhat. Each time she closed her eyes and tried to broaden the scope of her mind's eye it came off easier and easier. The ability must've been unlocked for the longest time, every time Mana remembered being exposed to these spacial views of giant stars whizzing past her floating body must've been it. What she took as a failure of meditation – something she usually excelled at, was truly just misinterpreted awakened ability to sense chakra.

It was a very raw and unsharpened sense. The magician needed training to make it available without meditation, just as a default feeling of hers, as usual as seeing with her eyes. Feeling up those large glowing stars of chakra, seeing their vibrant blazing colors and their immense or smaller sizes was not unlike seeing new faces. If this ability was ever trained and defined it would have been immensely valuable as Mana would've been able to remember and tell apart entirely different people by their chakra signatures alone.

Saving Meiko this way wouldn't have been a mistake. As much as Mana wanted to hate on the promise she had made to her best friend – subconsciously she knew it was the right thing to do. Meiko was someone with damaged self-worth, she lived a cheerful and goofy life but when she was reminded of the disappointment and sadness from the times she failed, such as she'd be reminded of if she was eliminated like this, she just shut down and gave up. Never seeing her friend crushed like that, crushed as she looked all those times she failed a simple ninjutsu technique or failed to concentrate on Mana's training, was worth all this. It had to be…

Hearing rustling beneath her Mana stopped and looked down. She had purposefully moved on the upper levels of the branches to be able to move quietly and survey the owners of the signatures if she ever ran into them as she predicted to be able to. A familiar young lady slowly walked down on the mossy floor of the forest raising Mana's suspicion.

A feeling of cold sharp steel pressed by her cheek from behind alerted her that she was caught.

"What are you doing here? I thought the two of you could restrain yourselves from all of this during the Exams…" a firm masculine voice spoke up.

A clang and black blur surprised Kouta's teammate as in a flash Mana had pushed the blade's edge aside from her face, stood up and pressed a steel tipped card by the young man's throat.

"That was an impressive illusion, time perception manipulation is truly something even I cannot fully master. That being said, your control is sloppy, whenever you use it you freeze the perception of not only your movements but the environment in general. Natural shifts in temperature, rustling and falling leaves and small animals all freeze making you predictable and your illusion very clear. Don't lower your guard even while your opponent is under it…"

Kouta's friend's face shifted from a serious and somewhat cold expression to amusement and even gentle laughter as he sheathed his sword, something Mana quickly followed allowing her steel tipped card to slip under her sleeve and disappear.

"We should train with each other sometime, you'd teach me control and better mastery of what I have, I'd help you with time perception manipulation… I'm Yushijin, in case you didn't know. That girl down there luring your attention is Budoki."

Mana sighed before looking around frantically, her heart was beginning to pound uneasily inside her chest and her breathing ran out of control as sometimes she struggled to draw breath and sometimes she drew too much in, so much that she began choking on it.

"Where's Kouta?" she asked worryingly.

"We've been… Tricked. We fought this team from Iwagakure and Kouta got injured. We thought it was nothing too serious, he healed himself and used up some of our food pill supply. Then he… The symptoms started."

Shaking her head uneasily Mana jumped down, from one branch to another before she landed right up to Budoki who just greeted her with an uneasy raise of her palm. The girl's eyes were sad as if she actually felt ashamed about something, as if she had wronged Mana in some way and the way this entire situation was breaking down just… Didn't rub the magician the right way.

"That poison was so smartly designed. The symptoms weren't serious but they were just annoying enough: blurry vision, popping in his ears, pain in his bones and joints. One by one he tried every antidote and every time it looked like it worked only for the symptoms to return soon enough. We went through our all medical supplies in just half of one night…" Yushijin explained rubbing the back of his head uneasily.

"We've… We've turned him in, we couldn't see him suffer anymore. He made the call – he needed too many supplies to function and not drag us down." Budoki looked at Mana with sad puppy eyes. "I'm… So sorry."

While Budoki really seemed to make a big deal out of this elimination, likely attributing Mana's mental breakdown to the closeness that the two felt for each other as a pair, Yushijin looked a bit confused about Mana's presence and her sad reaction to the news.

"Why did you come here? Why did you come alone? Is any of us your target?" he suspiciously wondered.

"No, it's just… He was my last hope…" Mana shouted out before falling on her butt and crawling to sit back to a wet and crooked tree. She could no longer control her tears and the scorching fiery tornadoes of fear for the future burning up inside her chest.

"Ummm… Maybe you should explain to us what's going on, we don't quite get it…" Budoki slowly approached Mana before sitting beside her.

"There's no time…" Mana shrugged it off and jumped up onto a taller reaching branch while gracefully avoiding the other surrounding branches by flipping over them or swinging off of them up higher.

"Hmph… So that's Kouta's girlfriend?" Budoki crossed her arms around her chest.

"Yeah, should've known better than trying to catch the Konoha's Sorceress in my illusion…" Yushijin smiled.

"She's really weird…" Budoki bitterly declared.

Seeing where she was going was getting awfully difficult. Tears were running down everywhere and that, as always, made everything more problematic. So many people used to tell her to just stop crying, they tried finding out what exactly made her cry and then after they couldn't understand it they were so fast to fire off labels. As if pain was as simple as submissive to just being willed away, being stabbed or burnt could always have been healed. No medical ninja alive managed to treat inner pain, not yet.

Knowing that Kouta was out of the picture just made Mana that much more nervous about her promise. Not only was she left all alone to deal with the ramifications of her promise but now her entire quest was rendered pointless. She was just dashing and leaping around for no reason, following no particular purpose or goal. All she was doing at this point was postponing having to face Meiko and Kiyomi after she returned.

Mana tumbled over a branch that was larger than she had predicted it to be with her eyes completely sunk in tears. She covered her face instinctively despite knowing that the fall would only shave off some chakra off of her reserves to make her survive the fall with nothing but insignificant bruises. Her newly reopened chest wound started hurting again in a very peculiar burning pain – likely an early sign of a possible infection to come. It needed to be washed…

The magician sat down and closed her eyes, she didn't even need to delve deeper into her mind to see the clusters of stars representing chakra signatures rise up in front of her. She saw several more signatures than usual, she must've been getting closer to the central parts of the forest by now, hence the more intense and larger quantities of signatures. She had used the ability many enough times to finally gain easier access to it. Still, a far cry from where she wanted it to be though… That would take time, more of it than one hectic night.

How was she supposed to save Meiko now? How was Mana now to remain both Meiko's friend and keep her promise as well as help the blacksmith to get over her wound. She did everything she thought was right – she gave the blacksmith more energy to deal with it by feeding her food which was supposed to help the superhuman ninja metabolism start dealing with the wound. She helped Meiko however she could, tried being a good friend and a good teammate at the same time…

Maybe that was impossible? Maybe being a good friend and being a good teammate were two different things and Mana had to give up on one to be the other? Even Kiyomi, someone with clearly different and much more intense feelings towards the redhead was ready to be hated, to be yelled at for the sake of doing what was right. She was willing to compromise, why wasn't Mana? It would've been the easy way out to just sit down there, just let her mind slip away into hazy deep sleep and let Kiyomi carry Meiko and give her up.

No. There was one more thing Mana had to give up, one more redefined compromise. A Faustian bargain under her own rules, it sounded empowering but truly it disgusted the magician, every time she tried to consider what she was about to do made her sick and throw up a little inside. It needed to be calculated, considered and weighed though, the inner turmoil was unavoidable…

A trio of young genin was camping peacefully around a feint and ghastly chakra lantern construct that was fueled by an unknown elemental but provided a powerful but unseen from afar, similarly to how a fire would be seen, glow. Mana observed the trio from afar, a young girl with the hair of brown and an instrument case on her back was keeping watch with her teammates sitting peacefully with their eyes closed by the lantern.

When the magician closed her eyes she could feel an extension of sorts from the dark skinned young man's chakra signature to the lantern suggesting it was a construct of his making. Judging by how the lantern stayed constantly and separately without sucking out any chakra from its owner, allowing them to even fall asleep while maintaining the jutsu, it must've been a sealing technique of sorts which didn't appear like a bunch of sealing glyphs or hieroglyphs but instead as a chakra construct.

The magician leaped down and began slowly approaching the trio, her hand was already halfway into her pocket and pulling out a bunch of cards to be thrown at her opponents before the young lady with the instrument up her back noticed it and jumped in to block Mana's attack. The magician's cards dug in deep into the instrumental case, ignoring the damage to the case the girl simply unzipped it with one fluid motion and retrieved a beautiful spruce and maple violin. The kunoichi transited between watch-mode and fighting stance flawlessly, she was undoubtedly skilled.

Taking mere moments, gentle tunes filled the air. The magician stopped in her place, jerking her body and twitching in her attempts to move that just stopped. Hearing the melody based genjutsu being set into play the teammates of the young kunoichi woke up and leaped to her aid. The lighter skinned and slightly chubby young man extended his hands as a cloud of strange dust emerged from under his sleeves surrounding Mana. The magician did her best not to breathe but the dust made its way right into her lungs and her airway.

"Well this is weird…" the third teammate of the violinist and the chubby Kumogakure paleskin yawned before extending his hands at Mana. "You couldn't have come here alone, where's your team, what are they plotting, which one of us is your target?" he kept on questioning Mana.

As the magician continued to sit silent longer and longer, almost defiantly to his request the dark skinned and dreadlock wearing sealing jutsu user turned at his chubby teammate.

"Yo, paleskin, I thought your stupid spores should've affected her will and forced her to talk?"

"They should've…" the chubby shrugged.

"This is remarkable…" the young violinist stopped playing and placed her violin back into the case.

"You say remarkable, I say dangerous!" the seal user pointed his finger at Mana making his hand shaped like a handheld kunai dispenser before he "pressed the trigger of it" materializing a flat and round sealing glyph around the tip of his extended finger that then blasted a lightning fast beam of pure chakra out and through Mana's chest blasting her down on the ground.

"Hmph… I think she actually attacked us alone." The sealing jutsu user looked around after realizing no one came to the deceased magician's aid after he blasted a hole through her chest. "Shit, I didn't really want to kill her, I thought this was a clone or… I dunno…" the young man shrugged.

"Wait, where's your ninja pouch?" the chubby pointed at his teammate's leg where a pouch containing all of his ninja tools and his supplies, medical supplies included laid. After a brief moment of confusion the young violinist noticed that the cards stuck in her case have also all disappeared as well as the corpse of the young magician that seemingly was never even there to begin with.

The violinist kunoichi started laughing uncontrollably before the team realized that they've just been bamboozled by someone who didn't even need to take them out as their targets. Upon that realization and the upcoming pondering about the unsure future without medical supplies or some of the weapons the laughter and cheer sort of died out into a more melancholic silence.

"You're just in time. A good ten or fifteen minutes and I would've taken Meiko up on my shoulders and carried her right to the southern entrance." Kiyomi faintly smiled upon seeing the magician returning with a pouch of medical supplies.

Without replying a single thing and still pale and confused about what she had just done Mana simply kneeled by Meiko's side and removed one green pill, placing it right into the blacksmith's mouth and asking her to chew.

"Where did you get those supplies? Did Kouta give you those? I figured you'd go ask him for something like this…" Kiyomi wiped her sweat in relief after seeing Meiko's physical condition improve right before her eyes. The blacksmith's cheeks and her entire skin regained its human blooming color. Her eyes opened up and started clapping together like a baby who was just really happy to be awake.

Mana didn't reply a thing. After Meiko opened her eyes the magician just fell on her side and curled into a fetal position right down there on the grass. Initially Kiyomi thought Mana was injured and even forced one red food pill down her throat to help with the wrist and chest wounds.

"Holy shit, there are two more yellow pills and two more red food pills. No way Kouta gave you this, if he had you'd be contractually obligated to marry him on the spot!" Kiyomi whistled looking into the pouch that Mana brought back after tricking the trio of sleepy genin using one of her oldest genjutsu techniques she often used on stage. A technique that created a visual double of Mana and had her die on stage and even temporarily duplicated a lifeless corpse for a good minute or two – Fancy Trick Jutsu.

It appeared that after seeing the knives and shuriken that also came in the package of the pouch the blonde realized what may have actually been done to get Meiko these food pills. Her face didn't look horrified or judgmental over what Mana may have done, in fact, it completely got absorbed into making food and taking care of Mana's and Meiko's injuries.

The magician wrapped her head around with her arms and covered her crying face up. She stole someone else's medical and weaponry supplies. It wasn't against the rules, it wasn't in any way considered wrong in the ninja world, in fact, Kiyomi was one step away from commending Mana for tricking someone else successfully for her own gain but she may have had the common decency and insight to realize how the magician must've felt after something like this.

At the very least, now there may have been four teams that wanted Team Hokage out of the competition…


	284. Honor Among Ninja?

Next morning Meiko was cheerful and running about like nobody's business. It was like any injury or infection had never happened with the food pills healing all the damage completely. Granted, the green or black ones were quite capable of preventing even more lethal injuries from claiming a life so the potent effect of the pills was not at all surprising.

"So what are we waiting for?" the blacksmith flexed her muscles after treating herself to some powdered soup that revealed its true taste and colour in heated water. "We've not taken down a single target yet…" she pouted.

"It's like she doesn't even remember what caused us this setback in the first place…" Kiyomi sighed after whispering it to Mana's ear.

The magician just sat there with her head down and her hands wrapped around her bent bruised knees. More and more often she snapped out of the chain of deep thought only to discover she's been staring at a blank point and creeping her teammates out but she didn't feel like lightening the mood up at all.

"I feel really great, I call dibs on being the first to get to hunt down her target!" Meiko yelled out energetically, quickly pushing away temporary wondering about why Mana was so down.

"Slow down there, how do you even plan on taking your target out in the first place?" Kiyomi squinted in suspiciously motherly eyes as Meiko was acting overly childish not to deserve a scolding of a more paternal nature.

"We'll just jump at them and kick all their asses, three on three!" the blacksmith grinned with her signature ape-like smile.

"You know it'd be much smarter to somehow separate your target away from their team and take them down that way, that'd save us trouble, chakra and time treating injuries…" Kiyomi once again kept on fighting Meiko's instinctive impulses. Was the blacksmith really to be blamed, she just woke up feeling chipper after a quite scary injury followed by even more terrifying infection taking its place.

Kiyomi's warm hands dragged Mana back to the world at hand instead of the mental one she was exploring. The blonde examined Mana's bruises on her wrists and then without bothering too much about common decency checked the wound on Mana's chest.

"It's still pretty red in there but having in mind the state it was in…" she noted. "We have a whole bunch of normal medical supplies, bandages and ointments, they may ease up the irritation and pain, if you want. Clearly they're no million ryo costing food pills but…"

"I'm fine." Mana turned away.

"Really?" Meiko smacked her forehead against Mana's to check for fever. "You don't really look fine. I mean you look fine but you're not acting fine…"

Even in her grinded to the dirt mood the magician couldn't help but crack a small smile seeing Meiko's rude and careless manner of checking her teammate's temperature. She must've thought that the only suitable way to check someone's temperature was to check with the same place of one's body which was why she almost cracked the magician's skull with that headbutt that was supposed to be a kind and playful gesture.

"Don't dig too deep. While I watched you yesterday Mana ran off and stole some medical food pills from some team, must not be quite up to her almighty moral code or something." Kiyomi shrugged while digging into the instantly prepared food cup she was yet to eat. It was simply too hot right after preparing and the Yamanaka was one of the people who let her instant soup or stew chill the longest, at least she didn't gobble it all down like Meiko and then complain of a scolded mouth…

"Really? Good job!" Meiko commended Mana by smacking her back.

That was the way it always went. Praises for things that should never receive praise, Mana bet if she started killing people she'd be commended for that as well. It was always the best killers, the best thieves that rose above the rest. Those that not only stole the most but also got caught the least. Somehow it wasn't the act of stealing that was a moral stigma but instead the misfortune of being caught. Instead of hurting other people and taking away what was theirs, what they needed and they've earned, what was a crime instead was lacking the skill needed to get away with it.

"You're really overplaying it, you know. There's no need to lose sleep over it, this is a competition where people are allowed to be hurt or even killed. It's not like you took a candy from a baby or anything…" the blonde shrugged with a mouthful of noodles and chicken.

"Come on… Let's go do what we need to do already!" Meiko began smacking about like a baby before deciding to better devote her limitless stamina to working out.

"I agree with Meiko." Mana unexpectedly decided to join into the conversation. "Other teams have already been through one or even two conflicts with the others. The more time passes the higher the chance that someone will have three or two targets by their belt – they'll come here for the northern exit to finish the test. Soon enough this place won't be safe anymore."

"I'm fine with kicking some ass, all I'm saying is that we may not be able to carry out a full out brawl. We'll get injured, it'll need nursing back which'll cost us time. It may be better to find our targets and separate them from their teams before quickly taking them out." The Yamanaka once again suggested.

"We're probably stronger than most people here. We're not ordinary genin, you know!" Meiko roughed out through her painful looking and gravity defying push ups.

"I wouldn't rely on that. While it is true that our overall strength and skill dwarfs that of ordinary genin, we're not dealing with ordinary genin. While I was looking for the medication I saw genin capable of playing with one's perception of time using genjutsu, I saw sensors and people capable of firing blasts of concentrated chakra like they were a Juugo clan member…" Mana lowered her head.

"Yeah… It may just be that we're unfortunate enough to take the Exams the same year the rest of prodigies and people that skipped too many Exams ended up doing it. I still feel confident in my ability to beat anyone in this Forest but that doesn't mean it won't be tough." Kiyomi looked at the dark void of the Forest of Death behind her with worry in her eyes.

"Wow, look at that! I told you hiding near the northern exit was a good idea! Maybe if we did that Aya-K wouldn't have gotten eliminated!" a voice of a young man scared the three kunoichi who were in the middle of planning out their further actions.

They were so troubled about Meiko's sickness and how much it disturbed their overall game plan that they somehow completely forgot about setting traps or some other alert mechanism. Then again, when there were thousands if not millions of different altitudes and angles they could've been attacked from, such a task would've been difficult without Meiko's sealing jutsu knowledge.

"Shut up, we got our targets, didn't we?" another young man replied. His tone was clearly on the defensive and conflicting, neither of the two was playing a leading role and they were clearly butting heads. Maybe that much could've been exploited…

There Mana went again. After she realized that the first thing she thought about when meeting her peers was thinking about how to take them out more efficiently the magician got even more sorrowful. What if she was starting to lose her own humanity? What if she was losing that sense of naivete which she wanted to guide her through her lifelong desire to change the violent world around her? What would be guiding her instead in that case?

The two young men leaped down from their higher up positions and slowly walked up closer to the girls' camp without coming too close and beginning to feel imposing. They did mention something about having already taken care of all of their targets which was surprising to hear and a little alerting, then again, they clearly only had two members left which meant that they only needed two targets to pass.

The duo was clearly from Kumogakure or even more to the north. Their skin was plenty of shades darker than Mana's and their hair was just as wild as that of Kumogakure ninja. The first impressions after hearing those horrendous nicknames that the young generation made up for themselves in that place couldn't have been strengthened any more after seeing the punky hairstyles and wild exotic colours they donned. The second, larger one was completely bald which also didn't help his case as very few young men his age made that life choice.

"You've already taken out your targets?" Kiyomi wondered in awe. Her voice was a little thorny, Mana started feeling a bit worried about the blonde being a bit too hostile and leading this right into an unnecessary conflict.

The first one, a short but vibrant young man who dressed in a long red and almost feminine looking coat and a modified black coloured forehead protector stepped up closer. Mana noticed that the other, bald fellow also subconsciously took a couple of steps forward, her best guess was that he couldn't stomach the thought of his teammate talking for him or standing ahead of him.

"Yeah. Sadly we lost one of our own too. Got attacked in the middle of the night, she got focused on since she was keeping guard at night and taken out. I'm Kei-J, Team Stratus, Kumogakure, this is Roh-D." he explained before introducing himself.

"Hey, you don't need go around yelling our names out like that!" Roh-D objected, "What if they're gunning for us!? No one yet tried to take me out, my hunter is still in the dark. It could be any one of them!"

"If you were our targets we'd know your name and how you look like anyways, we do have these… Also sorry for your loss." Kiyomi lifted her file up in the air showing it off before hiding it again.

"It's not like she died or anything. She just got injured too bad to continue, that's all. Well, if you ladies have no objections, we'll be passing by and getting the hell out of this Forest." Kei-J smiled. His eyes were still careful and very clearly observing the girls and looking out for any danger from their side.

"Wait a second. How did you find your target? This is awfully fast for locating two right teams out of thirty two in this massive Forest…" Mana raised some thoughts into the clear. If these two were not a threat and they were already lowering their guard and preparing to quit the Forest, they may as well have shared some information. Namely something that'd quite likely raise a lot of trouble.

"Oh, that's quite simple, we traded information. A lot of teams did and still are. When two teams meet up, if they trust each other, often they'll trade the sightings of one team or another for some information." Roh-D shared this insight, it was surprising how he warmed up to the girls just after realizing they had no interest in fighting him.

"You're from Kumogakure. It's more than likely you know the location of Team Cirrus, also from Kumogakure. We've no information to give you in return but you don't need any, seeing how you're already done with it." Kiyomi asked.

Kiyomi's bargaining strategy was remarkably odd. The blonde just said out loud what she needed assuming that it could be provided for her without anything in return. Usually the common bargaining strategy was quite opposite – name a starting suggestion for a fair trade just to establish that trading options are on the table. Mana would've tried offering some supplies in return, Team Hokage had plenty of bandages and simpler medical supplies, also enough food and drinks to last a week even if they all ate like normal civilians and never skipped a meal.

"Sorry, Team Cirrus are our friends, we go back all the way to the Ninja Academy days. We wouldn't sell those guys out…" Kei-J politely shook his head in refusal.

"That being said, there are teams we may want to screw, teams that screwed us over that are too risky to go for at the moment. We'd appreciate if someone would screw them in return, namely: Team Zumurrud, Team Hickory, Team Dunyazad" Roh-D suggested. Judging from his tone he really wanted to screw those teams over and that suggestion was most likely trustworthy. The genuine need to screw someone over was always something to bet on and not question.

If only Mana had uncovered her sensory ability much earlier, if only she had trained it enough to where she didn't need to focus on it so extensively for it to work. Now it worked just questionably enough to not even tip her off when she was being approached, granted, she was deep into self-destructive thought processes so noticing the duo would've been difficult. If only she had awakened those abilities earlier and developed them, maybe then she'd not need the help and information from these two. Maybe then she'd have memorized the signatures of everyone as they were gathered by the entrance and found them all when needed…

"Team Hickory? That's Konoha's team…" Kiyomi scratched her chin.

"I bet it's Pagu that screwed you guys over, he's kind of an asshat…" Meiko leaned back before snickering and rubbing her itchy nose.

"A member of Team Hickory tried to feed our sick friend actual supercharged acid just to test how it works. Had we not noticed a fly getting dissolved in it right before our very eyes, Aya-K would be dead or alive with very disintegrated innards right now. Tough to say which fate is worse…" Kei-J looked to the side, his eyes actually squinted in anger and his entire body was shaking. He really looked like regretting not being able to kick this Pagu's ass himself.

"Yeah, typical Pagu…" Meiko shrugged, "We graduated the same year. He was pretty bright but never too shy to let you know he knew it. I'm down with kicking his butt just for fun. He once injected bile of vanillitus cells in my tea."

"I thought vanillitus wasn't contagious…" Mana looked at her friend with a questioning glare. It was certainly a scary disease to develop but it not only never developed in ninja or people capable of controlling chakra, it wasn't contagious at the slightest.

"It isn't, he was like six back then. Smart enough to cut a cat open and into its tumor and extracting it but not to fully understand what he's doing. Doesn't make him less of an asshole." Meiko shrugged.

"No. We don't have the time to waste. None of these teams are teams we are looking for, sorry." Kiyomi cut the conversation short.

Kei-J bowed his head slightly in respect. "I see, I'm sorry we couldn't be of more help. With your permission we'll be on our way."

"Actually… You may just help us out tremendously. Wasn't Team Dunyazad the name of Menna, Tiwul and Tala's team? We may ask them around, offer some supplies, info or food in return." Mana suggested.

Kei-J and Roh-D turned around and looked at each other. "Fine… Just take care around this Tala guy. Him and his team beat us three when Aya-K was still with us, we had to flee but he was Aya-K's target. Once she was eliminated we no longer needed to fight him. The last time we saw them they were in the south-western quadrant of the forest, I'll write down the coordinates for you…" Kei-J removed his backpack and scribbled something on a paper where a rough map of the forest was previously drawn.

"That's a pretty good map…" Kiyomi observed as she twisted and flipped the paper around marvelling at the masterful job done with it.

"Roh-D is quite exceptional with maps and blueprints. Must be his Kirikuzu blood…" Kei-J nodded with a smile. Mana noticed Meiko's fists clench and her teeth firmly shut inside her mouth. The redhead's face shifted to a more firm and serious expression, she mustn't have really fancied seeing a member of the Kirikuzu clan.

For a moment there the magician thought that the blacksmith would just leap at the tall bald member of the Kirikuzu clan but after a gentle tap on her shoulder and redirecting of her attention the blacksmith managed to somehow eschew from lashing out.

Not too long later the duo from Kumogakure had left and Team Hokage was left just with a map with where the clash with a team familiar to them previously took place. It wasn't much, just a tip to where they could find friends that may have had information. Mana had met the team she stole from before, she also encountered that creepy team from Getsugakure again. Neither of the two fancied as information she'd like to disclose, even to friends. Even in return to useful info.

Team Phobos from Getsugakure was dangerous and ridiculously strong. Their abilities were so odd and deadly that even now Mana couldn't entirely comprehend the short battle she had seen between the poor trio taken out by Team Phobos and the Getsugakure competitors. The team from which Mana stole the food pills, on the other hand, was not a team she wanted to expose to danger. The problem with that team was more of the inner variety. It was almost like the magician owed them something, like she had to look out for them just because she left them without their food pills for the duration of this exam.

"Alright. I guess this Team Dunyazad is the best chance at information we've got. If that doesn't work we may as well just blindly wander around and look for teams that are either our targets or have intel on our targets. We've wasted enough time, let's go!" Kiyomi leaped up into the swallowing oblivion of the forest's natural darkness first, Mana and Meiko followed the Yamanaka shortly.

"Can you really give this Team Dunyazad anything they want? Like information on teams? Can we trust this Tala guy to not be a dick?" Kiyomi turned her head at Mana after slowing down a little bit.

The magician wrapped her arms around herself and shrugged uneasily. She felt uncomfortable about disclosing anything about her experience running frantically and looking for the faintest glimmer of hope that her best friend could survive. It was not an overly pleasant experience to look back on.

"I see…" the blonde sighed, "Then let's just hope they either really like you guys or that they really need the supplies we have."


	285. Do Squirrels Dream of Golden Showers?

Just closing her eyes while continuously moving at high speeds didn't work that well with Mana's latent and untrained chakra sensory abilities. She needed to stop, close her eyes and concentrate for that and even then she was looking at the ability to sense something up to a kilometer away. A distance completely irrelevant in the grand scheme of the massive vegetation which was the Forest of Death.

"You were away the whole night, I'd have thought you'd be covered with massive mosquito bites like Kiyomi." Meiko grinned after looking back at Mana, breaking the magician's concentration. Not that it mattered anyways since it clearly wasn't going anywhere.

"Yeah, they were annoying but I guess the food pill treated that." Mana shrugged while taking a moment to look onwards to Kiyomi. Her arms were covered with large and quite wide for a mosquito bite spots of red. Even her face, which clearly was an area of prioritized protection had a couple of spots on it.

After hearing the silence that took over the conversation Kiyomi looked back with wonder before squinting at Meiko, "I'm not taking a medical food pill just to treat a bunch of itchy bites…" she hissed out. "Don't you know how expensive those things are?"

"Kouta seemed to have them on him in great quantities…" Meiko shrugged.

"That's because he's a medical ninja, he can probably make his own himself from herbs and common spices. The medical food pills are actually pretty expensive and rare for non-medical ninja. The black ones are particularly difficult to obtain, I had to save up dozens of tool refill funds before I could get my hand on them and it still took a whole two and a half years to make enough money for just two of them." Mana explained.

"That doesn't seem right, food pills can heal people just like medical ninja, right? Wouldn't that make them a replacement for medical ninja, in a way?" Meiko bellowed in confusion.

"Food pills don't "heal" people. They accelerate and boost the ninja's own metabolism which is already far surpassing that of non-chakra manipulators. They have very specific limitations and shouldn't be taken in larger quantities or too often. It'd be better if me and Meiko refrained from taking them for a day or two. It's because of these limitations that they are so expensive, the Administration doesn't want non-medical ninja, who don't know all the factors involved, dealing with them."

"You'd probably be alright, you took the red one, right?" Kiyomi looked back. "Those are child's play. You could probably get away taking a couple of those at a time… My brother used to tell me about taking several of reds to emulate one yellow pill, I can remember at least several stories about his missions where he did that."

"Maybe, our best course of action is still to avoid picking fights…" Mana noted while she jumped up higher as she noticed a pair of giant centipedes crawling and wrangling up a tree. As their armored shell rubbed against the bark it greatly damaged the plant and if the insect really wanted to it could snap even the toughest trees in half by just pressing it harder.

"Someone's following us…" Mana whimpered out as she sat above on a large tree branch. Kiyomi looked up at the magician in surprise. Meiko quickly zipped her pants back up and hustled and rolled out from the bush she was peeing in like a scared chubby penguin before fixing her clothes and fastening all the belts and harnesses of her armor.

"How do you know that?" Kiyomi wondered.

"Mind link." Mana whispered, she remembered how well she could hear a conversation when she tracked Team Phobos. If she revealed she was a latent untrained sensor she might trigger the people following them to attack. Kiyomi closed her eyes and weaved a hand seal before opening them and looking at Mana, momentarily the blonde's voice as well that of Meiko were linked together with the magician's mind.

"I'm a sensor. My abilities are a bit raw and I've only found out yesterday night. One of the ninja I was following was a sensor and sensors can tell other sensors, so he told me." Mana focused on her thoughts, putting them into a mental message.

"I wonder if squirrels pee while they're stuck on a tree or if they hide in bushes or something…" Meiko's thoughts echoed out loud, almost like the blacksmith was yelling them out loud.

"What? Wait… Also, Meiko, we heard that. Don't focus on thoughts you don't want us to hear. Imagine speaking in your mind, keep your needless thoughts at a less material level, just let them float freely while you focus on things you need to transmit." Kiyomi explained. "I thought we've done this already a couple of times?"

"Sorry… I'm not too good with control…" Meiko actually blushed in the material plain while only her thoughts could've been heard. "Plus, I don't remember that being established, I must've just not thought about anything else back then…"

"So what's our plan?" Mana tried returning the team back to reality of being followed by a team of unclear power and intentions.

"How unrefined is your ability? Can you tell how far away they are? How strong they are?" Kiyomi wondered.

"Not exactly. I can estimate with something better than an educated guess, they should be about five hundred meters away. I can only tell their strengths apart from each other if it differs greatly, for example I would absolutely tell a difference between a chuunin and a genin but I'm not yet good enough to tell how strong they are precisely. Also… I'm pretty sure there're four signatures." Mana kept feeling out and exploring the four large stars in the mental meditative imagery she was perceiving.

"Four? Could it be an alliance between teams? If neither of the teams are going after each other, it's possible." Kiyomi theorized.

"True. But they're following us too persistently, that smells to me like one of us is their target. They wouldn't have bothered otherwise…" Mana suggested.

"Seems a little bit lucky to just bump into your target, doesn't it?" Kiyomi wondered.

"Exactly, that means they are capable of some sort of enhanced tracking abilities." Mana deduced.

"Inuzuka…"

"Most likely…"

"Awww. I don't like beating dogs…" Meiko grunted.

"So what do we do?" Kiyomi wondered.

"Right now they have a drop on us, they're the hunter and we're the prey but we know they're there. We need to flip the table on that. They've also got an advantage – we're useful to them whereas they aren't to us. I don't like the idea of fighting them but they've got an Inuzuka, we'd never escape them for long." Mana kept thinking while keeping the entire thought process revealed to the team on the link.

"So, what you're saying is – we need to break that damned dog's nose?" Kiyomi grunted as the thought of a needless conflict was just as irritating to her as it was to Mana.

"That's not enough." Meiko butt in. "Even if we do injure the sniffer, they can still recover just like I've done, plus an Inuzuka is part the sniffer their dog is. Safe bet is taking them out completely, I'd also say – let's find out which one of them needs which one of us and take them out as well. That'll reduce the width of the degree at which we need to watch our backs."

"Seconded. Full-out brawl it is." Kiyomi let the team know of her agreement.

Mana could just sigh. Still, she began transmitting her suggestion of the plan on how to flip the stipulation of the battle over. She didn't like the idea of screwing someone else over, eliminating someone else from the exam and therefore from the opportunity of becoming chuunin this year. She needed an inner reminder of what was at stake for her to get more of her heart into the game.

"Alright, punks! We know you're out there!" Mana yelled out with her voice echoing into the dark void lacking happiness and sunlight beyond in all sides.

A rumbling roar emanated from beyond the void and shortly after the dark of the forest began to slowly light up. Tree rustled, crackled and fell down as a sharp ellipse of searing blaze tore its way past them. Surprisingly enough the heat was contained and didn't even set the trees it downed ablaze. All jammed and packed into this tablet of destruction, almost like a rocket of scorching red blaze. A long and spraying watery tail fired off from the end of the projectile only strengthening this impression.

Mana and the rest of the team scattered away from the projectile as it slammed into the ground before erupting into a pillar of absolute destruction. Twenty million degrees and hundred megatons of explosive power compressed into a singular fifty meters radius pillar that extended beyond Mana's field of vision up in the sky. A technique like that would've taken all three of the girls out and left them incapacitated or on the edge of dying. Even dodging it by half its radius felt like hell itself and the pulsing chakra shockwave nearly blew Mana away like a Wind Release technique of its own.

A jet of Caribbean blue darted off of the pillar of flames and darted off right at Mana. The watery tail of the Fire Release technique was no tail of a rocket – it was an actual person rotating nearby the technique. It was a smart strategy, a skilled Water Release user could've manipulated the temperature of the water around them and kept themselves from getting boiled or incinerated by the technique while they also followed their opponents after they've avoided the clunky devastative distraction of the technique that came earlier.

"Kraken Fang!" an enraged roar surpassing the lingering roars of the destruction that it shortly followed darted off of the watery rotating drill – a version of the Inuzuka signature rotating technique except with Water Release properties giving it greater shredding drill-like properties.

The rotating Inuzuka tore through Mana's flesh and through her chest clean leaving a gapping hole where it drilled through. The ease at which the young genin dispatched of his target surprised the Inuzuka greatly as after piercing Mana's body the young man turned around immediately and ended the technique, focusing on regaining his composure and defending against the enemy's counterattack. After weaving a hand seal the young individual whispered "Dispel".

Mana's corpse faded away like a mirage and so did the dashing away figures of her teammates. Now the hunter has become the exposed prey with the magician and her team remaining hidden and having clear vision over the Inuzuka and his Fire Release using teammate nearby.

"That was impressive…" Kiyomi smiled.

"Yeah! Did you see that explosion!? It'd have really hurt! I think I'd have barely survived that! I'd have been a steak after it… Wonder if I'm tasty…" Meiko kept on freaking out overloading the mental link with loud and headache inducing pulses of mental energy before biting her own arm softly and nibbling on it for a while.

"No, I meant Mana's illusion. Leave it to Konoha's Sorceress to expand the illusion to affect all of us…" Kiyomi commended Mana's trick.

"Fancy Trick Jutsu is an old illusion I've mastered as a child. I wasn't completely sure if expanding its effect would work but it was likely. Now all three of us are concealed. Truthfully, the corpse should've been emulated for far longer. The technique usually ends when I begin using chakra for my own counterattack or disrupt my mental state with a physical attack."

"He must've dispelled it, fairly easily too. He knows of your genjutsu prowess, must've seen your file. You've been skilled at genjutsu ever since the Academy, your skillset hasn't varied too much after then, that's not good." Kiyomi looked on at the Inuzuka who remained in his current position and on the defensive, choosing to stand still and be able to perceive his own environment instead of moving and exposing blind spots. A furry grey and black husky growled by his side with fangs as long as a senbon needle and as wide as a banana.

"I thought Mana's illusions weren't this easy to dispel…" Meiko curiously cocked her head to the side.

"If they are perfected, used against an opponent of lesser, equal or only slightly higher skill, they aren't. This Fancy Trick Jutsu was out of balance, using conceptual expanded effect and range as well as being unstable. A simple push would've toppled it down…" Mana explained.

"There they are…" Meiko pointed surprised at the two figures faintly sticking out of their environment, only because they looked so extravagant that concealing their presence would've been nearly impossible.

Just like the Inuzuka genin from before, judging from the side which they were seen from, both teammates wore Hoshigakure protectors. As evidenced by the clear star symbol on their forehead protectors. One of the duo, likely the one who launched the Fire Release technique before, was dressed in bulky and almost stone-like in texture metallic armor with loads of small constructs that looked almost like exhaust pipes. He wore a dark bandanna so it was tough to tell much about the genin's hair but several longer strands stuck out from under it.

"Nice eye, Meiko…" Mana praised her teammate as she liked the fact that she didn't need to focus on sensory and expose herself more than she needed to in order to locate the other two competitors.

"I'd notice sweet armor like that anywhere! Maybe we can strip him of it?" the blacksmith wondered.

"Cheeky… Anyways, what's that other one?" Kiyomi noted asking for the attention to be directed at the third teammate of the Inuzuka standing right by the side of the heavily armored ninjutsu user.

A long and flowing cape-like purple dress covered the entire feminine shape of the kunoichi. Her lips were so eye-scratching in how gleamingly they were covered with lipstick that she certainly stuck out in the dark and gloomy green of the surrounding forest even without much enhanced perception needed. She wore the strangest headdress of a large metallic axe-like shape that covered her head from the nose up. The young lady looked demonic, almost like a monster from some sort of a horror movie.

With a gentle twitch of his eye, the Inuzuka youth betrayed his movement. His ninja hound fellow leaped beside him, ready to protect his master in mid movement. Mana realized that their position must've been already been known by the ninja dog and its Inuzuka owner. Those guys possessed an intense sense of smell which the magician had a chance of finding out back when she fought Inuzuka Noji and his partner Sunomaru during the mission she first met Kiyomi on.

Intercepting that leap to safety would've been a mistake. The young man wouldn't have moved if he wasn't sure his team or his canine friend was ready to cover him. They likely had some sort of ace up their sleeve or the young man would've merely substituted with something which would've in terms left the attacker in a very exposed position.

The axe-head young lady suddenly turned her head right at Team Hokage's location, followed by the heavy armored genin that leaped on another branch and turned their general direction as well. At that moment both teams knew of the location of the other but neither one of them was exposed needlessly. At least Team Hokage could make the best out of the bad situation and move into a less exposed location as well as scout out their opponents.

"So. Your target is Mana?" Kiyomi asked out loud. She must've put it together from how the Inuzuka prioritized the magician after the blast even if the other girls were clearly just as exposed, even if they knew from her file how Mana was a genjutsu user and very likely prepared for a simple physical assault – the most cliché way of coming after an illusion user.

"Yeah…" the Inuzuka grinned confidently before pointing at himself with his thumb. "Name's Clarmac Inuzuka, this lovely fur-ball is Basto. The waitress girl is kinda my target, sorry…"

"I'm a stage magician!" Mana yelled out embarrassed to be confused to a servicing worker yet again. "I do magic tricks on stage, this is my uniform!"

"It looks cringy…" Clarmac's female teammate noted. Her teeth were as white as her pale skin, clearly contrasting her blood red lips and dark purple dress as well as her metallic headdress.

"You're the one to talk! You're wearing someone's axe handle on your head!" Kiyomi yelled out. "I'm taking this metal-head down, I hate edgy bitches!" she relayed on the mental link.

"Anyways, my lady friend is Ieiria Deargli. The guy you've already met before by him nuking you is Teclaim Laoch. We're Team Sagitarii from Hoshigakure. I suppose since we've already located each other and established our need to fight this out, may as well do it honorably." Clarmac grinned arrogantly.

"Okay, I'm Wakizashi Meiko, this is Yamanaka Kiyomi. We're Team Hokage from Konoha. I suppose we'll be fighting 'till one of the sides refuses or physically can't go on, we've no interest in killing anyone today." Meiko replied before unsealing a buckler shield and a one handed, two edged and firm gripped, one arm long sword.

"Neither have we. Killing in an examination like this is distasteful and lacking any sportsmanship. I'm glad we can agree on that much…" Laoch nodded with a firm approval. His eyes were firmly stuck on Meiko, he must've established her as the main physical threat of Team Hokage.

"This fight isn't gonna be pretty, it won't be to our favor either. Look out, Mana. They'll be looking to finish this quick." Kiyomi warned the magician mentally.

"Yeah, I'm Clarmac's target, neither of them is ours. They don't want to be injured so they'll be out for my blood… I'd rather not use Flower Petal Sanctuary Jutsu again and keep increasing the chakra cost creep again." the magician agreed.

"Don't worry, you won't have to! After being side-lined for so long. After having my life and participation in this exam saved by you so many times… They can sling a galaxy at Mana and I'll just kick it aside like a ragball!" Meiko grinned, her thick and muscular thighs were shaking in excitement for finally being able to repay the debt to her team in a meaningful way. She's been sidelined and out of her comfort zone for so long, having to rely on Mana's intelligence or Kiyomi's experience and skill for so long. Now was an opportunity for the blacksmith to cut loose. Protect her friends and bash some heads in.

There was absolutely no way that the blacksmith would fail her team now. These three wanted the blood of her friend, they'd have to take it from over Meiko's dead body.


	286. Duffel Bag of Magic

A quick metallic clang signalled the beginning of the clash between two teams from two different villages. The exhaust pipe-like extensions of Laoch's armor hardened and extended outright before bending in half at Team Hokage's direction. It was a rather slow manner of attack suggesting it being some sort of a setup or a distraction of a more complicated combination.

Light emanated from the deeper end of the cannon-like armaments as a beam of superheated Fire Release flames spewed out at the general area of the Team Hokage. Instinctively expecting to be targeted Mana leaped aside, feeling the heat from the blast as it extended and erupted into a dome shaped explosion with intensity and heat matching that of the genin's previous attack. The immeasurable heatwave from before was no outlier, it was a hellish reality of what had to be overcome.

Mana saw Kiyomi gracefully bouncing from one branch to another away from the multiple dome shaped and still expanding explosions. Mana stopped not wanting to retreat too far. As the domes of fire and smoke disappeared Meiko stood right in the center with her shield placed with in front of her. She appeared to choose to block the beam's intensity by only taking the damage from the explosion, choosing not to open herself up by moving away and dodging the blast. Her slightly scorched clothes and singed skin suggested at least some damage being taken from the explosion that surrounded the shielded kunoichi.

Hearing the noise of rustling waters behind her the magician leaped up without looking behind. It was a risky strategy but it allowed her to avoid taking some damage from Clarmac's repeated Kraken Fang. They used the same strategy as before – allow Laoch's overwhelming blasts to distract their enemy and make them scatter before Clarmac picked them off one by one. Deargli's role in this was still unclear as the young woman remained still and standing in her place with an apathetic expression and a completely open to attacks stance.

Kiyomi appeared to have noticed it as well as she threw a pair of kunai at the kunoichi to move her, just to scope out how she'd deal with a little heat from a simplistic attack. Without a doubt the Yamanaka had hoped that Deargli would reveal her abilities to some extent, clearly not having expected to be targeted for an attack when her teammates represented the clear present danger to the enemy team.

Laoch moved in with his wide armoured hands placed together in a primitive blocking stance allowing the steel knives to just bounce off of his greaves. A barely audible clicking sound alerted Kiyomi of danger. She instinctively tried to move away allowing her adrenaline to command her body to some extent. Sharp pain in her arms and legs alerted her that she's been tagged. A visual observation of the pain cause allowed her identify the problem – a handful of senbon launched from Laoch's armour during his block had successfully hit her.

Senbon were very peculiar tools. They were tough to see in high speeds, large for a needle but very thin for a projectile. They didn't do much lasting damage unless they hit a very precise vital point of one's body. It took a very knowledgeable of the human anatomy ninja to successfully utilize senbon, Laoch didn't remind Kiyomi of one and seeing how she felt no ill effects that usually followed a successful use of senbon showers she must've been right with her presumptions. It was merely a tool to cause her pain and make her think twice before repeating similar attacks in the future. With a rude pull Kiyomi yanked the needles out, grunting in pain as a pair lodged deep enough to hit some bones which was never a pleasant feeling, a small stream of blood trickled down the affected areas.

Laoch was overly proud of his successful protective action to notice the fact that Meiko's buckler dug right into his cheek throwing his entire body in a stumbling spin around his axis. The blacksmith's hand went through some hand seals, remarkably fast, one may have added. It appeared that the redhead had taken some lessons of Mana's in hand seal speed in mind. Triggered by Meiko's sealing technique the sealing glyph on the buckler lit up triggering a fairly weak explosive blast that further threw Laoch off his feet and tumbling down below.

Meiko was relatively skilled with sealing techniques but her low ranking seals couldn't have contained too much chakra in them. That was too bad since her move may have actually caused some damage to both opponents had she sealed more chakra into the seal placed on the buckler.

"Don't rush after him!" Kiyomi's voice ringed in Mana's mind.

"I know. I'm not moving one inch…" Meiko's calm mental response followed.

"It didn't look like he took too much damage from that. May need to hit him harder than that." Mana let her own observations be known.

"Above you!" Kiyomi's alert reached Mana in time, a tiny bit earlier than the magician would've naturally heard her friend's response usually and went through the hand seals. The magician hopped back avoiding the crashing Kraken Fang from above that tore the tree she was on like a rolled newspaper in a shredder sending small wooden chips at every direction and forcing the magician to hide behind another tree.

Mana reached into the hat while holding it with her teeth and weaving a hand seal with the other hand. Her hat lit up with dark blue hues as the seal inside it opened up and the magician pulled out the wand that was made by Meiko before. She hadn't had much time to practice with that thing yet but she'd need it. A particular set of techniques came in mind as very useful to the magician but she remembered that it required a chakra channelling tool. Normally a simple kunai would've sufficed, but Mana wanted to try something stronger, more efficient and conducting to chakra moving through it.

"She pulled it out! My wand!" Meiko's shrieking wand almost made the magician grasp at her temples as it caused moderate headache but she couldn't help but crack a grin at her friend's excitement.

The magician noticed Clarmac resuming his technique, she once again leaped off from her branch onto another continuing to move further away from the relentless barrage of Kraken Fang assaults as he continued to aim to beat the magician down with it. Her free of holding the wand hand weaved a pair of one handed versions of the normal hand seals used by ninja as she swung her wand around, feeling the surge of lightning chakra moving through her body and through the wand, wasting not a single ounce of it… Audra steel was amazing.

"Magical Shock Jutsu!" Mana yelled out pointing the lit up wand at her opponent and firing off a beam of Lightning Release chakra at her opponent. It was a fairly simple and not overly powerful technique with relatively short range of around nine meters, and yet, range was of no matter here, when her opponent was closing in on her and trying to chase her down.

Once the beam hit the tunnelling water stream with Clarmac rotating inside it, the whole damned thing lit up with lightning bolts firing aside. Oftentimes with concentration good enough a Water Release user may have overcome the natural weaknesses of water like naturally produced electricity or intense heat that'd have evaporated it all in a second but this was no natural weakness – it was all ninja magic.

Not too long after the Kraken Fang was hit by Mana's response, the formation of water simply exploded like an explosive kunai was detonated from inside. The Inuzuka inside of it plummeted down clearly having taken some damage but Mana knew it wasn't nearly enough to keep someone like him down. A lot of her arsenal was fairly outdated, techniques created by Mana when she was just a child with high naïve hopes of pacifying her enemy with weak lightning bolts. It may have hit a sweet watery spot and multiplied the effect greatly but it was still not enough to keep a decent ninja down.

"Don't get too excited, Suppressing Fire Barrage!" Laoch's voice broke Mana out from her little moment of joy as the armoured genin managed to sneakily get on a branch below and unleashed fire of kunai at the magician from his gauntlet devices that appeared to function like multiple automatic kunai dispensers attached to his boulder width arms.

Step by graceful step Mana leaped away and hid behind trees trying to evade the suppressing stream of bladed hell unleashed on her. A painful scratch to her back suggested that the blades were launched fast enough to pierce right through even the thickest and toughest of trees that grew in the Forest of Death. To make matters worse, loud sounds of steel rubbing against itself alerted the magician of worse problems to come as Laoch's shoulder cannons once again aimed at her and fired off fiery jets at her as well.

The magician's hands went through a bunch of hand seals and she breathed in deep. Had the fiery blasts simply been fiery projectiles they'd have been easier to dodge but they weren't, they flew up into the air before reaching max altitude and plummeting down. That made Laoch's assault especially dangerous because it required to focus one's attention at the bombardment from above while the endless sharp hell of kunai storms continued to be fired from other directions.

"Rebellious Twist Jutsu!" Mana yelled out while blowing out all of her air inside her lungs and starting to spin against the direction she was blowing it out at. A weak vortex of wind chakra formed around her, just strong enough to deflect even the most intense ninja tools launched at her at the highest speeds. That still left the downfall of fiery doom to deal with. A loud blast above following a great fiery light emanating downwards suggested that it was no longer Mana's problem as Meiko, having once again regained her buckler, jumped up and blocked the fiery projectiles.

The force of the blast still flung Meiko down at great speed but the blacksmith stopped herself by digging her buckler into the tree besides her and breaking her fall, or at least minimizing the damage and speed of it since she still ended up hitting the ground below somewhat. The shield's attempt to break the fall had only cut the tree open deep enough for it to collapse down and cover up the devastated area from Laoch's initial explosive pillar of fire.

"I've got your back…" Meiko grinned with a dirty face and slightly singed hair. Her shield appeared to have taken some punishment as it had turned black as coal in its center expanding like a star of total darkness to its edges and darkening its initial emerald color.

Mana nodded in gratitude before sensing impending danger and turning behind. The danger always came from behind as being caught off guard was the easiest way to deplete the ninja's chakra reserves, augmentation without control and fuelled by surprise was always the most wasteful. It was the difference between carefully picking the pennies from your wallet to pay the exact price and randomly grabbing a bunch of bills and tossing them at the clerk.

Luckily enough Mana found just enough time to shove her wand down the throat of Clarmac's kind of cute yet scarily adult dog – Basto. The dog whined in shock of having a hard metallic tool shoved down its throat and kicked off of Mana before pouncing away into darkness again. A loud explosion from where the fight initially started made Mana and Meiko turn their glances at it, flipping back a couple of dozens of times, Kiyomi appeared from the cloud of smoke before grabbing a weaker branch to break her mad acrobatic swing and landing not too far from Mana.

"Didn't you say you could summon ninja rabbits? How about evening the odds a little bit?" Kiyomi suggested while panting a little as the show of acrobatics before clearly cost her some air in her chest.

"Not worth it…" Mana linked her thoughts. "The only rabbit that shows up is Zoku-chan and he hates me. If I call him every time emergency strikes I will never earn his respect, plus if I summon him and he refuses to help I'll have wasted a whole bunch of chakra on a B-Rank ninja animal that just kinda sits around and looks cute."

"Ninja animals, am I right?" Kiyomi cheeked it.

"Wait, you can summon bunnies!? I wanna see!" Meiko's cheerful voice once again summoned headaches for everyone listening in on the mental link of the three.

After looking around and realizing that she won't be this lucky to respond to Basto's attacks from behind consistently enough, and if she doesn't – she'll likely have her throat in between its jaws, Mana had to reconsider. She playfully flung her wand in the air before biting her thumb and placing her hand inside the hat after flashing through a whole bunch of one handed seals and lighting it up once more.

Soon enough the magician had to quickly move her hand out as Usuzoku simply dove out from the hat and landed on a branch beneath Mana's.

"Are you serious!?" his angry voice rumbled out. "I was in the middle 'o my trainin'!"

"Sorry, Zoku-chan…" Mana blushed before rubbing her messy hair. "I thought you guys choose who comes out of the hat…"

Usuzoku, completely ignoring Mana's wonders, sniffed the air with his cute nose. "Izzat a filthy mut!? Izzat a mut I smell!?" he shouted out before grabbing the handle of his blade that hung on his back.

"Eh… It's cute, I guess… Not my kinda cute though. Not sure what I was expecting, really. Don't like pink fluffy things too much." Meiko shrugged.

The enemy team just stared in shock at the actual rabbit that was pulled out from the hat. Neither one of the ninja present there was actually categorized as a B-Rank threat. As such, Usuzoku clearly demanded the enemy's full attention.

"Actually I believe Basto is quite well smelling for a dog…" Clarmac raised his voice at Usuzoku. "Plus, don't you dare play the big badass here, dogs hunt rabbits, that's common knowledge…"

"Tsk…" Usuzoku played with his tongue inside his mouth, he was clearly pissed beyond belief that he was summoned again but the desire to kick a dog in the teeth was too alluring. "I'll have ye hatchlin's know I hate filthy mutts… I'ma kick 'em in de teeth and den be on mah way!"

"I am grateful, Zoku-chan… Although… I thought you hated centipedes and mongooses." Mana scratched her chin trying to clearly draw the circle of the species Usuzoku hated. If he cleared that out for once, maybe she'd know exact opportunities to summon him on.

"Don' even get me started on 'em mongooses!" Usuzoku growled through his front two chompers before pulling his sword and taking an offensive stance.

Kiyomi giggled right beside Mana, "Yeah, this guy's weird enough to be your summon…" she let it out on the mental link.

"Alright, ye bastard, ye son of a lots-a-fleas! Come at me!" Usuzoku yelled out as he leaped behind Mana and straight into the darkness of the forest. Clarmac only gulped in worry of what difficult fight awaited his canine friend.

Leaves right below Clarmac rustled intensely before Deargli landed right beside him and extended her hands over the burnt areas and injuries that the Inuzuka had sustained.

"Mystical Sealing Variant Palm!" she uttered as her hands lit up with black and red light instead of the usual greenish emerald hue of most medical techniques.

Trying to interrupt the healing Meiko tried to leap at the duo but fiery beams from Laoch's cannons stopped the blacksmith by firing right where she would've been had she carelessly jumped at them. Kiyomi pointed both her arms at Clarmac who was being healed.

"Mind Body Disturbance Jutsu" she shouted out aiming her technique carefully. A miss would've left her exposed for easy counterattack for far too long for comfort. Using blue flame jets in his boots Laoch once again dove in to block the technique with his own body. A loud howling sound echoed through the forest area before the strongman turned with a backhand smack at his teammates knocking both of them aside.

Still holding her hands at the extended hand seal position and struggling to keep control of the brutish genin Kiyomi grinned. The healing session was interrupted successfully and now she had a puppet under her command for a brief while.

"I'd appreciate some protection for a while." Kiyomi uttered out loud as she probably couldn't keep her mental link running as efficiently as before while struggling with this B-Rank technique. Just the fact she could use it at all was fairly impressive for her rank, then again, having her higher than usual genin experience and skill in mind it was of no surprise at all.

"Alright…" Mana nodded stepping up front and allowing her wand to light up lightning release chakra and beginning to emanate the Audra's signature coloured glow. Similarly Meiko hopped up a couple of branches to get to a better position to intercept any unexpected attacks coming at her teammate.

"As long as I can keep this hand seal going, he's my puppet. He's resisting so if my concentration wavers, like if I get hit or something… He'll break it himself. He's pretty strong and I'm not too good with this jutsu yet, just holding him like this is pretty rough…" the blonde smiled feeling proud that she gave her opponents no other choice but to protect their teammates by shielding them with their own bodies.

"They won't be holding back anymore, they need Laoch, Deargli is a supporting ninja so they'll lack offensive without him. They'll pull out all the hidden techniques now to get him back. Get ready." Mana tried mentally getting herself there as well.

"Yeah, but now their focus should be split, they won't be one-tracked on taking you out, Mana. This is a good thing, as long as it lasts…" Meiko grinned.


	287. All Stops Pulled

With a loud roar signaling not only his enraged lunge at his friends but also his inner struggle to gain back the control of his mind Laoch leaped down at his two confused teammates. The armored genin was quite fast but Mana noticed that the blue flares on his boots similar to Meiko's own sealing technique that made her boots into jet-boots was missing.

"You can't make him use his techniques, can you?" Mana questioningly glared at the Yamanaka.

Kiyomi was visibly struggling keeping complete control of her opponent but she still managed to shake her head erratically, shaking off some sweat off of her tired and twisted face.

"I don't really understand his armor, a lot of his techniques appear to be based on his armor and switches inside it, setting off sealing glyphs placed inside and such… I think we're stuck with only his physical prowess." Kiyomi concluded.

Laoch's assault was still completely successful as his massive armored arm dug deep into the team's medic gut lifting her off the ground and sending her back through a bunch of trees. While the woman clearly took damage, it wouldn't have been wise to bet that she hadn't augmented her endurance to survive such a crash.

"What the hell, you asshole!?" Clarmac yelled out as he continued to dodge Laoch's offensive taijutsu pressure. Mana possessed more intimate knowledge of evasive prowess and to her it became clear that landing a blow on someone like Clarmac would've been immensely tough for a highly physical combatant such as Laoch.

After one of such dodged blows, where the nimble Inuzuka leaped over his friend's strike that attempted to crush him into the dirt Clarmac tied his legs around his friend's arm and applied pressure on the back of his elbow that had a separate steel piece on it. Laoch yelled out in pain as a snapping sound could be heard in his arm, Mana noticed Kiyomi starting to breathe a little easier for a while.

"Aren't you in pain?" the magician wondered remembering her previously witnessed Mind Body Switch jutsu which completely transferred Kiyomi consciousness.

"No. My mind is in my body here. In fact, pain helps me because it focuses his mind on other things instead of having him fight my influence." The Yamanaka smiled.

With nimble jumps and kicks, vaults and flips Clarmac continued to completely blitz and dominate his friend. Vaulting and avoiding any attempts to grab hold of him or to pin him down with power blows while landing a kick or a quick jab when his feet got back firmly down. While his counterattacks were impressive and matching the abilities of Mana's, if not surpassing them, in that department, he still left little lasting damage on his taller and better geared friend.

"Kraken Fang!" Clarmac yelled out quickly jumping in the air and positioning himself right vertically above his teammate before beginning to spin and coating his tunneling vortex of claws and fists with water.

A dark mass crackling with red lightning blasted Clarmac away with great force, enough to disturb and interrupt his finishing attack but not quite enough to leave too much damage on him. His medical ninja teammate appeared from the rubble of trees and wiped blood off of her face. The streak of bloody crimson matched the shade of her lips and greatly contrasted the white of her pearl teeth and her pale cheeks.

"Don't fight him, Clarmac." she grunted before pointing at Kiyomi with her dyed red fingernails that looked long and sharp enough to scoop out an entire eye.

"She's got control over him. The fact that Mana's team didn't follow Laoch's offensive suggest they wish to protect their teammate – hit her to free Laoch." the kunoichi explained.

Clarmac smiled confidently before turning his glance at the trio of Team Hokage. Mana and Meiko braced for an upcoming attack. Kiyomi breathed out in pain as Laoch's mental defenses quickly returned to lay siege on her own mental foundations. Her body tensed up as her muscles began twitching erratically.

"Alright, let's pull all stops, let's not hold back. Screw the other fights, let's just win this one!" Clarmac roared out at Deargli who continued to leap away and avoid Laoch's simple power swings at her by simply increasing the distance between her and her teammate.

A loud whistle emanated from Clarmac's direction, followed by a barrage of a loud energetic barks and a whine. Basto leaped out of the shade and right to his lifelong partner's aid. Usuzoku landed nearby Mana placing his blade defensively as a barrier in front of her.

"Dat arsehole is a slippery mutt…" he growled angrily.

Even if Usuzoku hadn't managed to take Basto out in the few moments he was given, the white and grey wolf-like canine still had streaks of red covering his body and running down his majestic fur in places where the rabbit's huge sword actually found its marks.

"You've done great, Usuzoku… We couldn't have lead this fight this favorably to us so far without you." Mana whispered to him, her voice was weak in volume but judging by the rabbit's affirming glance back and the way his massive ears twitched – he heard what he wanted to.

"You misunderstand me, Hatchlin', I ain't done carvin' 'em yet. I'll make a filet of that dog still…" Usuzoku threw back at her.

Clarmac clapped his hands together and began yelling loudly, the strain and effort he had to put to manipulate and accelerate his natural chakra flow must've pained him physically as much as the growing influx of power made him confident and proud to yell this battlecry of his. Mana turned back at her team.

"Watch out, I've seen this technique before, his speed will increase many times over and his strength will become animalistic. Sharpen your senses to the limit and hope to survive, plan out ahead a clutch survival jutsu or two, just in case…" she warned her team remembering a similar chakra flow manipulation from her fight with Noji way back.

"Four Legs Technique!" Clarmac roared out as flavorless bland blue chakra burst from all his pores so intensely that Mana could actually see it. Something like that was remarkable. It couldn't have meant anything good…

"Let's partner up, Basto!" the Inuzuka barked out as the overgrowth of fangs in his mouth and sharpening of the more animalistic features of his body made it difficult for him to speak clearly. The great white canine leaped on top of Clarmac's back and showed the Team Hokage three its massive fangs.

The jutsu had a very clear flaw – a massive start up period of chakra channeling, sadly neither Mana nor Meiko wanted to leave Kiyomi's side to interrupt it and it wasn't likely something like a kunai would've helped that much with the degree and amount of chakra channeling in question. One look at Laoch revealed why Kiyomi couldn't tell him to intercept – the armored genin struggling and waled around in the air like a beetle on its back as black with red crackling lightning mass of chakra had tied all around his body and held him in place. That was Deargli's doing, hers and some unknown technique she used.

"Secret Art: Kraken Fang over Fang!" Clarmac shouted out as both him and Basto leaped in the air and began spinning separately. It was a similar combination technique to the one most Inuzuka used and not that much different to Noji's technique, except Clarmac coated his version in water which made it more penetrating and powerful.

Mana and Meiko leaped in to protect Kiyomi as she was clearly the main target of the technique. The blacksmith placed her buckler in front of her whereas Mana lacked any similar tools so she chose to weave a pair of hand seals and breathe out a powerful gust of wind to weaken and slow the opponent's technique down.

"Friendly Gust Jutsu!" she chanted out before the blast of wind flew Clarmac's direction.

Where the two tunneling vortexes of water were slow to start up, choosing to wind back and make half of a circle back before lunging at the three, once they decided to come at their intended target the duo dashed in a blue flash that made anything else difficult to perceive. They blitzed and whizzed past by completely evading Mana's sights and breaking through her measly low ranking jutsu defenses.

A powerful force flew right past Mana, cutting and shredding through what little it managed to graze and sending the magician plummeting down from the immense force of air pressure emanating from the watery drilling technique. There were so many sensations all around her: the feeling of pain in her chest where she was grazed by the passing by taijutsu and ninjutsu combination, the taste of her own blood, the screeching sounds of Meiko's shield shattering and Kiyomi's screams.

Darkness faded slowly. Right after Mana realized that she was alive and needed to get up her eyelids flapped together faster before opening wide and before the girl rolled back on her feet holding a hand full of cards from inside her sleeve and ready to use them against anyone brave enough to come to finish her off. There was no one. Mana looked up and allowed her blurry vision to sharpen, Deargli and Laoch were standing up above on a pair of mid-level stronger branches.

Meiko was nowhere to be seen but Kiyomi was resting on Usuzoku's back up where Mana was tossed away from. The magician leaped up and reached out for a branch to help her quickly flip and cover the distance to where she fell from. Before she could sharp pain on her chest made Mana trip and fall back down. She looked at the nasty graze full of dirt and still spitting out blood. It didn't look good but it was still just a bit more than skin deep of a cut. She was lucky to only have the amazing nintaijutsu miss her and pass her by.

Now fully aware and no longer surprised by the pain that came from her chest wound Mana made her way back up. She wasn't interrupted, Basto and Clarmac were resting back on the higher levels of branches up above. Mana glanced at Usuzoku's body and his dirtied up and blood covered fur. He looked like he took some decent battle damage from that attack which frankly scared the magician a little bit. No normal genin could've whipped up a technique powerful enough to damage a B-Rank ninja animal this much.

"You interfered…" Mana mumbled out in gratitude seeing Kiyomi in Usuzoku's arms, the rabbit placed her down once the shock of pain passed and the blonde started getting back to her rightful mind.

"She'd 'a taken too much damage if I haven't…" the rabbit grunted. "I don' like to help ya out but… That dog is still mine." He declared before ruthlessly dashing straight at Basto.

It was a foolishly bold move – Laoch and Deargli were ready to step in and protect their teammate, Clarmac would've likely offered his life before allowing his ninja dog to die or get badly injured. It didn't look like either of those prospects mattered to the rabbit swordsman as he rushed at his opponent. Laoch pointed his arm forward activating an explosive blast inside his gauntlet which launched out a strong weight attached to a chain which Usuzoku simply rotated around in mid-air making it miss him by a rabbit's hair.

All that Mana heard after that was a loud whine of an injured dog as Usuzoku's powerful foot decked it right in the nose sending it back and crashing through and into trees, sometimes bouncing off of them like a lifeless sack of vegetables. With a rough grunt Usuzoku leaped right after his target pressing his blade tightly by his side. Now that he knew the signal which Clarmac used for calling up his dog partner and the fact that once his master calls for him the dog loses concentration and rushes to him, Usuzoku must've been just waiting for that moment of an opening…

"Where's Meiko…" Kiyomi grunted wiping blood off of her nose and lamenting over her torn, dirtied and bloodied clothes. Of the three genin she took the most damage since she was the initial target.

"Here I am!" the blacksmith laughed out with a mouth missing a certain something and bleeding where that something should've been. "Missing a tooth too, here, look!" the redhead stepped up and opened her mouth to show off her trophy of battle damage she had taken.

"Just give me a couple of seconds guys…" Clarmac breathed out and stood back on his feet again, "Then I'll call Basto up again and we'll finish this!" he firmly stated.

"You think so?" Mana asked him with a soft look at his eyes.

"What, you think you're tough because you survived this? I'll have you know that you two meddled into my attack splitting my force and attention, I only hit your friend with maybe one third of the intended force, the rest was split amongst you two and the rabbit." Clarmac confidently explained before locking his arms on his chest. He had expected this revelation to come as some sort of a shock to the girls but he was the one shocked when neither one of them were that surprised.

"Then go on ahead, call him." Mana called Clarmac's bluff. "Even if you have the chakra left needed to pull this jutsu off again, Zoku-chan is just waiting for an opening to behead your dog."

"Y-You wouldn't!" the Inuzuka jumped up in anger.

"I wouldn't. Did it look like I have much control over him though?" about at that moment Mana felt Kiyomi's mental link return from being briefly muted. That was a sip of good news when they were useful.

"Don't worry, we're still here and now we can continue this as intended!" Laoch grinded his metallic gauntlets against each other before taking an offensive stance, his injured arm moved a bit slower and looked pretty numbed up but mostly functional which was unfortunate. Close to him Deargli extended her arms forward and also prepared for a battle.

Gripping the wand in her arm more tightly Mana hardened her own focus and took an offensive stance. In before any of the girls could figure out a further course of action Deargli's hands went off into a collection of hand seals.

"Tainted Sealing Method: Release!" Deargli yelled out as a red sealing glyph appeared just past her extended palm unleashing the previously seen mass of dark chakra with reddish crackling lightning around it.

Meiko's reflexes were fast, the blacksmith reached behind her all the way to the back plates of her armor unsealing something of her own – a gigantic shuriken that appeared to have been made out of four longswords put together into a cross-like shape and stuck together by a sharpened metallic ring that would've lopped a head off of an actual dragon if such creatures were not a being of mythology and imagination.

The shuriken pierced right through the black mass of chakra that simply molded around it and continued to rush at the trio of ninja. Mana didn't anticipate such reaction as most destructive techniques were highly volatile to any damage, no destructive technique she had seen could've withstood being cut in two and just effortlessly keep moving forward after reshaping. At the least the technique should've been detonated if not completely dissolved.

The two separate string of chakra began rotating around one another like a braid before it reached the three girls in close proximity. Meiko was too invested into the powerful toss of her ninja tool to be ready to dodge, Kiyomi was quite injured so one shouldn't have overestimated her own agility either. The technique didn't injure them at all, however. Instead of hitting them with anything it just dissolved right nearby the girls' faces.

After the immediate danger to their health and lives was over, Meiko looked on ahead to her own shuriken only for her mouth to open in a wide gap – her shuriken had successfully hit its mark and penetrated Deargli through the area from her lower chest all the way to her upper gut. The injured kunoichi just wheezed in pain before blood violently broke out her mouth. Her stance bent into one crooked in agony.

"I-I didn't think…" Meiko whimpered out. Usually murder wouldn't have mattered too much to the blacksmith but she had showed her best friend so recently that she was ready to support her views and her nindo… Meiko didn't want to kill, not like this where it wasn't necessary.

"You… Could've cut me in two if you tossed it harder…" Deargli's ghastly voice emanated through the entire battlefield.

Mana's eyes squinted in suspicion as they turned at Deargli's teammates who didn't appear to be worried the slightest.

"Watch out, it's a trap!" she declared on the recently re-established Kiyomi's mental link. "She can't be lethally injured, her friends don't appear to be worried over her health at all – it must be her ability."

The shaking bloody fingers of the pale axe-blade wearing woman reached for the massive shuriken and pulled it out violently gushing out some more blood before tossing it aside and allowing it to plummet down and get lost in the void of darkness of the Forest of Death. The young woman spat out a mouthful of blood aside before feeling up her wound with her fingers allowing her pale skin to go fingers deep into the redness of her own flesh.

"Hmph… Not enough." She uttered. Her voice was weakening, shaking in pain and she was clearly injured but for some reason it was almost like she wanted to be injured.

A loud clang made Mana's confused face to turn back at Meiko, the blacksmith had fallen on her knees and started shaking. The magician reached out for her friend but then she realized that… She just didn't care. She didn't care if Meiko lived or died, she didn't care that much if Kiyomi lived or died. She didn't care about her own life either. The limitless depths of apathy beneath her feet in which Mana was sinking was scaring her to no end, the magician's shaking hands weaved a hand seal.

"Dispel" she yelled out focusing her chakra and sending a flux of it forward as intended to break genjutsu, she expected to meet a wall of chakra that allowed her to know how much more chakra she needed to send to break it but… Nothing happened.

"Awww… Meiko is afraid. That's so bad." Kiyomi started weeping before ramming her back rudely at the tree she was standing on and slipping down on her bottom. "Mana is so quiet… That's so sad. I like it when she talks, I like when Meiko is brave!" the Yamanaka cried out as tears began running down her eyes so erratically they mixed in with the blonde's own blood.

"Illusion? You think this is a cheap illusion like your knockoff tricks, stage magician?" Deargli smiled through her rapidly paling lips. "I've no idea what emotion you're feeling right now, but I assure you, it's no illusion – it's your downfall."

Following their teammates words Clarmac stood on all fours and concentrated his chakra into his "Four Legs Technique" and Laoch aimed his cannons at the three girls crippled by some odd technique of Deargli's. Just like that with a flick of a wrist Team Hokage was moments away from being eliminated entirely.


	288. Life Is But Failed Dice Rolls

With a triumphant look Clarmac leaned in for a crushing move. Laoch aimed his heavy cannon hands at Mana as well. It only made sense that he'd target her, after all – she was the target of Clarmac's to begin with. Mana tried to force herself to move, she could. The magician stood back up on her feet and prepared to defend herself but her movements were so clumsy and slow. Her body didn't respond to impulses to augment herself willingly, still, it'd likely have augmented her unwillingly with a much higher chakra cost.

"It's too bad that no surrender rule was established. It'd have spared you of this…" Deargli lamented before Clarmac's feet kicked off of the ground and he began rotating.

"Kraken Fang!" he yelled out enthusiastically, feeling almost sure about his victory. A strong elbow strike to his cheek cancelled out the rotating watery drill technique sending the Inuzuka crashing through the trees aside and leaving a large track of devastation behind him.

"He… Is he OK!?" Kiyomi wept out loud without even bothering to contain her cries of sadness. At this point everything saddened her. Mana couldn't understand just what on Earth could the deal behind her own apathy, Meiko's fear and Kiyomi's sadness have been.

With a bloody forehead mixed into her messy front hair that fell all over her beaten and crimson face Meiko stood in front of Mana with her elbow raised and staring angrily at Deargli and Laoch who just stared at the blacksmith completely shocked. Deargli was particularly having trouble dealing with the fact that the blacksmith managed to intervene.

Just about then Mana realized that it was Deargli's technique before. The one that just dissolved right in front of their faces without inflicting damage. Somehow that ninjutsu must've affected their emotions, it wouldn't be an impossible concept for a ninjutsu technique – smells, pinches at certain brain centers as well as tastes could've achieved subtle mood manipulation. Who knew if given enough chakra same couldn't have been amplified a dozen times over. Granted, such effects would've rather be left for a genjutsu technique as it had more diverse points of entry into the opponent's chakra system for a more guaranteed effect but, if Deargli lacked the skill for it, ninjutsu would've been a fine substitute.

"Impossible… The chakra I seal is filled to the brim with my darkest feelings and emotions. It is built to instill matching dark emotions into my opponent! Pain matching my own, no one can overcome those emotions!" Deargli angrily yelled out punching air at her right side.

"I am afraid…" Meiko grumbled, "Afraid to disappoint my team, afraid that after everything they did for me I won't be able to pay them back. Afraid that Mana recommended me for no reason and that I'm unable to match her expectations. That very fear makes me fight to my limits and beyond!" a declaration cleared the air and killed all other sounds in the area.

"I see…" Deargli giggled, soon her lovely restrained chuckle exploded into a confident and somewhat alluring laughter. "So my jutsu worked, it's just that the emotions that the presence of my dark chakra in your system invited plays into the action of fighting back."

"What does that mean? Did she overcome your abilities?" Laoch wondered.

"By no means. I was scared for a moment but it appears I've only lost the dice roll." The strange headdress wearing medical kunoichi explained.

"I see…" Laoch grinned before firing his cannons without any signal or telegraphed motion to read his attack.

As the smoke cleared it appeared like the tree that the Team Hokage were positioned on had been trashed and completely incinerated all the way to the smallest dust. In its place, however, stood another pillar, one of very impressively stacked rocks. The rocky pillar looked like it was built in a rising circular pattern. After its purpose was served the first couple of stones began falling from the top and crumbling on the ground.

With a loud and maddening battle cry Meiko burst from the rocky wall, her boots flaring with blueish chakra flame as she burst towards her opponent giving him a strong cross from the weaker numbed arm side of Laoch. The armored genin flipped gracelessly in his journey wherever the force of the impact carried him off to.

"B-But how!?" Deargli lost her composure after seeing the rocky pillar beginning to collapse again.

"Seeing Meiko hurt would make me even sadder…" Kiyomi cried out pathetically, she had managed to pull off an Earth Release ninjutsu that raised chunks of dirt and smaller rocks into the air with a burst of explosive force below it, transferring her chakra through the tree she was on and through its age old roots and into the minerals, such was Mana's guess, at least.

"I don't care about anything anymore… May as well fight to the end." Mana sighed indifferently as her own Rebellious Twist Jutsu created a gust of Wind Release chakra that rotated just strong enough to focus Kiyomi's dirt and rocks into a rising pillar pattern that matched the vortex of wind that she had created.

None of this would've been enough without Meiko's input as well, it was just a stacked pile of rocks the way it was after Mana and Meiko matched their techniques together but it was Meiko who sealed chakra from inside the wall to transform the messy and shaky pillar of dirt and rocks into an actual barrier technique that held together using her sealing jutsu prowess. It was an actual three-way combination technique, each girl useful in her own special way and it all adding up to a defensive sarcophagus strong enough to withstand even Laoch's powerful cannon blasts.

Deargli's infuriated facial expression betrayed that the kunoichi actually understood how the trio had overcome their emotional distress. They had given purpose for the desired actions given the context of their disarrayed emotional state, assigning a justification for each action from the point of view of a person feeling that particular emotion. It required maturity and understanding of one's own personality and feelings in order to pull something like this off.

"I don't care what you feel like…" Mana mumbled out to herself as her hands flashed through a combination of hand seals. The magician's eyes flashed with a blinding yet momentary burst of light, a result of great amount of chakra focused straight into her eyes.

Usually genjutsu techniques required some sort of a very loosely defined condition to be fulfilled. It was a method of placing one's chakra into their opponent's body, one of the methods was the opponent looking into one's eyes or a specific object the user had, them hearing a sound that the user makes was another. It was a slightly higher level of a genjutsu user to specifically allure one's opponent into fulfilling that condition with another visual or auditory tick.

"Polymorphy Jutsu!" Mana shouted out the name of an old favorite of hers which she hadn't used for a long time. It was a bit too goofy and random to be chosen as a technique of choice but given her current state of overflowing apathy there were no more shame or limiters to hear out.

Deargli straightened out her spine and bent her arms over, her eyes squinted for a moment before starting to racing across, turning and bending. The kunoichi bent her knees and stood in a firm standing position before beginning to lightly hop on her feet while holding her arms bent over as if they were completely busted or too weak to use.

"Huh?" Meiko wondered curiously over the strange behavior of her opponent. It was a very bad choice of actions as the blacksmith quickly got socked in the teeth, albeit not too strong, by the "polymorphed" opponent.

"It's my illusion… She believes she's an animal of some sort, it's a random choice of something she had witnessed in her life." Mana explained.

"That's a weird illusion. Granted, that doesn't look like any animal I've seen, I've seen so few animals, it's so sad!" Kiyomi once again burst into tears.

"I really don't care what animal this is." Mana shrugged before allowing her eyes to wander off.

Deargli began hopping around like a kangaroo before tripping and beginning to fall all the way down. Meiko quickly followed her falling opponent to give her a few good hits. One couldn't be sure if the medical ninja could augment herself properly in her confused animal state, it didn't last too long anyways as eventually anyone would get a little used to the different point of view and soon awoken from the feeling of dreamy confusion before remembering that they were human and the illusion ending. One of few of Mana's genjutsu that ended naturally after a minute or several, depending on the opponent's mastery over their own will and the ability to remain lucid in the dreamy state.

Mana and Kiyomi followed Meiko and the falling Deargli into the crater caused by the initial Laoch's explosive pillar blast. Meiko wiped blood off her lip.

"Goddamn it, I think she boxes better in this state than she did normally…" the blacksmith noted.

"Well… Sometimes behaving like an animal changes one's behavior, their strengths and weaknesses. Like I care…" Mana sighed with a shrug.

"She's wasting chakra augmenting her punches and push kicks… So sad!" Kiyomi whined out.

"Hey, it's an illusion I came up with together with a textbook as a child. Not that it matters…" Mana replied. She was beginning to feel the bitter apathy in her chest slowly letting go. Whatever intense sensations Deargli's dark chakra nature made her go through were beginning to fade. Her thoughts were becoming clearer and clearer.

One's chakra was essentially everything the person themselves were. If that person's specific trait perfectly defined them – even one's chakra color signature could've changed completely. A bright and cheerful person would've had a bright and yellow chakra signature. A gloomy sadist would've had a dark chakra signature of murky or black colors. Since chakra was pretty much the essence of everything around, having to deal with different feeling chakra affected one's mood. Consciously or subconsciously and the sensors had it the worst of all. Just for now Mana had to feel thankful that her sensory abilities hadn't fully developed or else she'd have been completely broken by Deargli's tainted chakra containing all of her darkest thoughts and experiences.

"Want to see a magic trick?" Mana playfully asked her opponent, it may not have been a good strategy to reveal the fact she was overcoming her emotional duress but it appeared to work for Meiko. After all, this revelation appeared to have some sort of shock value for Deargli before. The magician flicked the cufflinks sideways before pressing on them slipping out a deck of cards that she shuffled and played with so fast that it was nothing else but colored blurs mixed in with Mana's stained and dirtied white gloves. The magician pressed on her shuffled deck harder shooting off a mess of cards at Deargli, as those cards floated in mid-air she made more hand seals.

"Friendly Gust Jutsu!" Mana chanted as the blasting gust of wind thrust the cards expulsed from her deck right at her opponent at high speed. Deargli raised her arms up, crooked and strangely contorted as they were to cover up her face. She emitted a strange murmur as the steel tipped orange and red cards whizzed past her leaving cuts all over before landing right behind her. Momentarily the cards exploded with the shockwave tossing Deargli forward, right into Meiko's combination of blows and the blacksmith was rushing in, almost like she was waiting for Mana's part of the combination to play out.

Sadly the teamwork of the three was nowhere near perfect, Meiko hesitated maybe for an insignificant part of the second before realizing it was her turn to rush in and that Mana's "magic trick" was just a mean to blast her opponent into the air and right at Meiko, disabling any chance for the medical ninja to defend herself or dodge the redhead's strikes. That microsecond of hesitation made a powerful blast of chakra overwhelm Meiko before she could conclude the Mana-Meiko combination and toss her away like a lifeless sack. All the way to the other side of the crater.

Laoch burst into the air, his shoulder cannon reshaped again, instead moving behind him and the chakra blasts served instead as a jet blast throwing him upwards in much greater speeds than he could muster up before. The genin weaved a pair of hand seals relatively quickly before placing his palm onto his chest revealing a lighting up sealing glyph on his armor which the armored genin turned clockwise. After a loud poof a flock of rotund falling devices separated from the young man's armor in great quantities yet speed so lacking that it became instantly clear they weren't meant to be projectiles.

"Sealing Technique: Field of Ragnarok" Laoch grumbled to himself as he carefully landed below.

Upon the technique concluding the fallen rotund devices lit up with bright yellow light and began blinking on and off.

"It's clearly a minefield technique. Be careful." Mana warned her friends.

Deargli's crimson lips twisted and turned into a shape of a sick smile before her own hands began weaving seals. Mana realized how bad this situation was – the three were stuck completely paralyzed from movement in a battlefield full of mines, which left them totally open for another emotional distress ninjutsu from Deargli's arsenal. So much displacement and stunning in the strategies of Team Sagitarii.

"Tainted Sealing Method: Great Sphere Release!" Deargli declared a different variant of her technique, instead of just releasing a shapeless mass of her tainted chakra she compressed it all into a watermelon sized sphere. The sphere was crackling with red lightning much more intensely than the other variants did before.

The blast was completely physical and very real this time. Even Mana's illusionary clone was completely overwhelmed and dissolved into flower petals, there was no such completely overwhelming effect of physical damage before. Kiyomi and Meiko got blasted aside from the shockwave as well. Upon the quite undignified landings of the two kunoichi the field mines detonated. They were not overly powerful explosions but Mana realized that it would've chipped quite properly at her teammates' augmentations. Kiyomi was not getting up, while still unseen by her opponent who only saw an illusionary clone from Mana's Flower Petal Sanctuary genjutsu, the magician felt up her friend's chakra.

She completely lacked skill in this sensory thing. Despite a certainly grisly appearance of her friend having taken damage: bloodied and torn clothes, bruised and bashed about face and exposed skin and messy hair, Kiyomi's chakra signature appeared to be burning like a faintly dimmed star still. The Yamanaka's fortitude didn't surprise Mana at all, the blonde was long since on the chuunin level experience wise and trained for several years longer than Mana or any other genin in the Exams likely has.

Much to Mana's surprise, once the magician returned to her more physical senses instead of focusing on the chakra sensory, Kiyomi began trembling before picking herself off the ground. A small puddle of blood remained where Kiyomi picked herself up and wiped her face. By that point it was a given that Team Hokage would spend those medical food pills to survive this exam, much to Mana's disappointment as on some degree she had hoped that they'd succeed at somehow paying the team she stole those from back for the longest time.

"I'll kill you! All of you!" the Yamanaka laughed out maniacally. Once again Deargli's emotional dice roll proved to be somewhat unlucky for her as Kiyomi's psychotic edginess would prove a very useful distraction for Mana. It'd also give Team Sagitarii plenty to have their hands full of. It was just unfortunate that Mana had to use Flower Petal Sanctuary again and reset the timer on the cost increase again. The cost kept on growing and growing every time the jutsu was used and it only reset after at least a good couple of days.

"You guys… You're here but are you really there for me? I just feel… So lonely…" Meiko wrapped her arms around herself as she sulked aside from Kiyomi. With a loud and frankly quite bold roar the blonde rushed at her opponents head-on. Her strangely dark emotion of cruelty must've impacted her decision making as well. Just as Kiyomi was about to deck Deargli, Clarmac dashed up from behind, having recovered from a very powerful and direct hit and ready to get back into the fight.

The Inuzuka kicked Kiyomi at the back of her knees sending her kneeling down. The future Yamanaka heiress yelled out like a rabid dog and continued to swing around madly before the combined might of the three opponents overwhelmed her with taijutsu combinations and blows. Even if the chaotic cruelty felt by the Yamanaka granted her the vitality and sheer bloodlust to try and block most of the strikes, even the blocked ones looked like they hurt. Mana wanted to scope the situation out, find a better chance to strike once Clarmac's defenses were down but…

Kiyomi was in trouble and Meiko was overcome by her own imposed loneliness which, ironically enough, prevented her from helping out a friend right in front of her. Laoch growled to warn his friends of Mana who was rushing in and weaving hand seals, the moment that her mind began concentrating on another chakra utilizing technique her illusionary invisibility ended and Mana just faded into the full view.

"Hell Skewer Jutsu!" Mana shouted out as Clarmac's body bent over strangely and crooked over. The sight and feeling of him getting skewered by dozens of swords that just materialized above his head and rained stabbing at the dirt was too much to take. The magician bought herself a distraction and some time, this had to work, or else the situation would've been too desperate – just her against a team that wanted her out cold.

"Spear Kick!" Mana shouted out as she leaped in the air and pushed her foot against Clarmac's gut before stomping him into the ground. Something soft and gurgling shifted in the young man's stomach, he had taken so much damage from Meiko's previous attack. Mana was right to target him – all the damage he had sustained and chakra he had wasted on all the failed Kraken Fangs instead of protecting himself had finally begun to really mess things up for the young Inuzuka. He couldn't have been more than a couple of good strikes away from passing out.

Pain. Bright lights began flashing all around as Mana realized she was knocked down, it was difficult to see exactly what did so. If she had to guess, Laoch's shoulder charge betrayed by his kneeling current stance must've had something to do with it. Damn it. She was so close… And still, she couldn't take on the entire Team Sagitarii all by herself.

She needed to persevere until Kiyomi and Meiko's emotional disarray ended.

Just survive… Somehow!


	289. Rabbits Don't Have Middle Fingers

The heavy tolls of Mana's respiration silenced all the other measly sounds on the battlefield around her. Her heavy breaths came like bells and her chest was a very energetic ringer. She was decently battle worn, sustained notable damage in this scuffle and was surrounded by enemies whereas her allies were still recovering. Things could've been better than they were at that moment.

That being said, they could've also been worse. Mana had the intelligence on her enemies, she noticed a couple of weaknesses in them. Some of them were sustained and originated from this battle and some of them were innate and born from the nature of their abilities.

Deargli was very similar to Mana in some cases: she used ninjutsu and supportive healing techniques. That made her overly reliant on hand seals and the protection of her teammates at close range. Mana knew her own hand seal speed completely left Deargli's in the dust, with moderate chakra enhancements her kicking speed would knock the medical kunoichi down before she concluded her dangerous techniques.

Laoch was dangerous, beyond just dangerous. His armor was thick enough to brush off Mana's strikes. She knew a bit more than a handful of ninjutsu techniques, most of them created by Mana long ago when she was still studying ninjutsu and chakra control from textbooks. They were all just inconveniences, smoke and mirror, all look and no punch. None of them would leave a dent on him at all. That being said, his numbed arm was certainly something to exploit with high chance of success.

Clarmac was a match for Mana. If both of them were at their full potential with their bodies and minds completely rejuvenated they'd put up a good fight. That being said, his Inuzuka nin-taijutsu relied on his team's distrations to hit his opponent. If Mana managed to beat Noji way back when she was still not enhanced by the tremendous boost of chakra and skill during the quest for the Box of Ultimate Bliss, she'd take Clarmac as well. Even more, currently Clarmac was beaten and bruised to a very alluring degree and if fight broke out he'd likely be Mana's prime target.

Laoch charged again. He aimed to just bash and throw Mana around until she either passed out or gave up. Given the short time to get her mind together, provided to her during the time Team Sagitarii ganged up and regrouped, the magician was ready for him. She leaped up placing her feet firmly against the armored genin's broad shoulders before relaxing and plunging down while grabbing his weakened arm by its upper armor piece and pulling it.

Yelling in pain the armored genin shook it rapidly but Mana wrapped her legs around it and kept on yanking it and pulling it off its socket. Very uncomfortable sounds kept coming from inside, like the tender meat of a turtle being grinded inside its still intact and very thick shell.

A fresh breeze went past Mana's ears fondling her hair as a feeling of weightlessness instilled fear in her heart. Laoch lifted her body up for an attack by one of his teammates. That was her signal to get off. Using the large genin's weakened and numb arm as a very flimsy pole the magician extended her feet and kicked at the back side of Clarmac's head as he attempted to leap in and strike her down and off of his teammate's arm.

The Inuzuka boy's jacket and shirt torn off as his body hit the ground. Normally one's body would've augmented itself and withstood such damage. This slip that left a bloody puddle on the dirt informed the magician that her hunter had taken significant damage, so much so that his augmentations weren't completely reliable and were beginning to slip and skip some blows.

Deargli didn't attack, just as it could've been predicted. She instead dashed wildly to Clarmac's side. Medical ninja always looked for opportunities to do what medical ninja did best. Gathering the final ounces of breath in her lungs before she'd need a breather Mana kicked off the ground shortly after landing aiming to plant her foot into that grotesque headdress of the Team Sagitarii kunoichi.

No firm shock to her joints. Mana's kick missed its mark as the evasive medical ninja ducked at the last moment avoiding getting kicked right in the sweetest part of her cheek. It was nothing to be surprised at – medical ninja were possibly the most evasion focused field of ninja art mastery, Mana herself studied evasion from Kouta, a fairly decent medical ninja on his own feet.

The magician tossed a pair of cards at her target trying to prevent her from reaching out and healing Clarmac. The damage that the Inuzuka had sustained so far was her only shining star of hope, if he was somehow treated to any extent and the finishing line raced on ahead Mana's hopes and dreams would sink under all the way to the bottom.

Deargli simply flipped over the projectiles. Her limbs stuck to her body and under the cloak she really did look like a grisly and slimy spirit of some kind, without a doubt a distracting tactic of intimidation was a part of her attire. Mana's own dressing code would've been deemed weird even by somehow as eccentric as Deargli but even it had its own functions.

As the medical ninja's arms extended over her friend Mana hopped in right at her. Deargli may have been evasive but she needed to stay in place to heal the Inuzuka and knowing where she'd need to stay gave the magician an advantage. It would've been more efficient and much smarter to use illusions or ninjutsu but Mana didn't want to use that much chakra. She'd need every ounce she has if she got hit again or needed a clutch Flower Petal Sanctuary escape.

Right in the middle of her graceful leap the magician shoved her feet down, the noise of steel clanging against itself and those disgusting metallic screeches made her identify a nearby threat and stop herself from getting clotheslined by Laoch. The giant genin held his weaker arm bent and pressed against himself while he threw strong punches and kicks at the magician trying to keep her away from his teammates.

It would've been so easy to just bypass him, leap away and gain some distance on him… That would've been foolish however. She was lucky that Laoch decided to involve himself personally and physically and not just blast Mana away. He must've been preserving chakra as well, or maybe possibly he was running out of chakra he had sealed away. For someone reliant on sealed chakra resources to run out of it in the first fight for the target would've been catastrophic. It would've taken days to regain one's natural resources and then weeks if not months to resupply those seals.

And so Mana was stuck in a loop of dodging and redirecting while still trying to stay closer to her enemy, just close enough for him not to consider using his more destructive blasts. It kept her away from the enemy, however. The nagging feeling of her consciousness eating at her for not managing to keep Deargli away from Clarmac annoyed the magician to no end. Even if she couldn't feel Clarmac's body being healed or his chakra being somehow restored or boosted, the phantom feeling of her opponent growing stronger every passing moment persisted.

"Mystical Sealing Variant Palm" Deargli's voice echoed around the fairly wide crater that Laoch's initial offensive had created.

Enraged Mana leaped in the air and kicked with surprising devotion to her move aiming right at Laoch's elbow. She herself felt a little relieved that her opponent weaved back and retreated as the kick could've severed a broken arm all by itself. At a certain degree of damage to a broken limb it would've been impossible to augment it anymore and at that point even the measliest of kicks and punches would've severed those limbs completely. Mana would've hated ruining her opponent's life like that…

Clarmac stood back on his feet and cracked his knuckles, working out his neck and his numb limbs at the same time and warming up. Mana's eyes widened in shock, Clarmac's body looked almost halfway back to its full health. While medical ninja of higher rank were quite capable of high caliber healing techniques that'd have quickly placed an incapacitated ninja back on their feet, genin should've taken half an hour to a whole hour to heal someone completely. The entire exchange between her and Laoch couldn't have taken more than a second or so…

"What is this?" she grumbled in disbelief. Bitterness was beginning to take over her voice. At this point her hopes of solitary victory were beginning to get choked out, by now, if they were a choking victim they'd have let go and went to peaceful eternal slumber. Mana felt her hands shaking having realized that half of the entire damage sustained by her opponent was just magically shaken away like it had never happened. Quietly the girl moved them into her pockets, acting like she was preparing for an attack whereas she just didn't want to tell her opponents she was scared.

The weak tapping noises of Deargli's bleeding gut wound focused the magician's attention. It was the one element of the entire battle that made no sense – the young lady seemed fairly excited to get hurt, she didn't move away from that attack of Meiko's and took a whole giant shuriken to the gut. She didn't even spend time healing that damage at all, her bleeding was being controlled through chakra sustenance payment alone. She devoted a small burst of chakra to that area with each heartbeat to keep herself from bleeding out – she wanted that injury there. She was willing to struggle with the pain of such an injury, tolerating it while in the middle of a battle.

"I see…" Mana closed her eyes and lowered her head finally having realized something about Deargli's medical abilities. Something she had already seen in Team Phobos of Getsugakure. Deargli stored the pain and negative emotions converted into a unique mixture of bodily and spiritual chakra and the remnants of chakra used to injure her away into damage seals, similarly to how Team Phobos utilized damage seals in their fight before. Once those seals were filled they appeared to augment Deargli's medical abilities which meant that she healed more potently the more injury she herself sustained in battle.

It was a very lethal ability for a supportive ninja, medical ninja and support role ninja were the main targets in a fight. Even their own first instinct was to target Deargli because she was so hesitant to fight that her hesitance was mistaken for weakness or lack in useful techniques. This was hopeless. Damage seals were at least a B-Rank concept, genin usually couldn't use such difficult sealing techniques because sustaining injuries disturbed one's concentration all by itself. It was immensely complex to maintain full control of one's chakra in pain.

Clarmac leaned to his all fours as chakra began leaking out from his body, his facial features became more defined and primal, his fangs sharpened and elongated and his hair began growing a couple of inches on sight. His eyes widened and his irises began thinning down to a rather savage look.

"Four Legs Jutsu" he roared out before launching himself at Mana. A loud crack in her mind almost made the magician turn off. It was like a firecracker had been blown up right by her ear when in fact it was just the sound of world cracking blows planting themselves in her jaw at barely even traceable to her speed.

A powerful shock to Mana's side pushed her away, the magician's mind was beginning to fade in and out as she rolled aside like a lifeless sack before finally gathering the strength to lift her bloody face and push aside her sticky hair to see.

Roaring like a madman in her sadistic cruelty, still affected by Deargli's emotional distress ability, Kiyomi matched Clarmac claw to a kunai knife. Kiyomi always was a better hand to hand or knife to knife combatant than Mana and even if the blonde had much more severe injuries than Mana, even now, her complete berserk rage made her push past the pain and try to stab the Inuzuka's eyes out with her knife.

This was stupid. Clarmac was a mixed taijutsu - ninjutsu user, he'd have eventually gained an upper hand even on bloodthirsty Kiyomi and slashed her down. The Yamanaka would've been better off using her clan techniques but her cruel mind didn't want anything to do with tactical thinking – she was all rage and madness. That needed to end. Looking at Meiko, the girl was still wrapped with her own arms and cowering in her crippling loneliness as well.

Shouting loudly to brave herself up Mana leaped in between Clarmac's claws and Kiyomi's knife. In total shock both of the two stopped their attacks, Mana could feel the sharpness of the Inuzuka's paws scratching against her bruised and beaten body in the back and the coldness of Kiyomi's kunai by her throat.

"Move aside!" Kiyomi roared like a wild animal. "I need to kill them all!"

"Not before you kill me. I'm a criminal, remember? I stole those pills from some those genin before. What about your hatred for criminals? Your Aku-Soku-Zan?" Mana played with fire there. So much so that Clarmac backed up grasping at a pair of fresh scratches at his side where Kiyomi successfully grazed him. He had decided to use this moment to have Deargli heal him some more. That was just too troublesome of a turn to permit but Kiyomi and Meiko's minds came first.

Shaking in her hand the kunai broke as the girl's pressure to the handle was too great. The blonde collapsed on her knees before picking herself up again. There Mana heard that familiar respiration in Kiyomi's own lungs, the two stood by each other's side and now the blonde no longer looked around frantically with racing bloodshot eyes looking for a victim to kill.

"She used the instilled emotion to force her friend into an illogical action she stands against with all her essence. Essentially she shut her friend's mind down out of internal conflict between the instilled emotion and her own will before it rebooted itself. I've never seen such a weakness of my techniques before." Deargli peacefully commented while continuing to heal Clarmac's injuries even more.

"And yet this is the second gap in your jutsu that these three found. Don't use it again, soon it'll be completely ineffective against these girls and it wastes chakra you could use on healing us. Once this fight ends it'll be a much more integral ability." Laoch grunted angrily while carefully warming up his numbed and busted arm but failing to do any difficult and precise motions with it.

"I've gotta say, for a moment there I believed you'd cut my throat open…" Mana sighed with a smile.

"No… You're like my little sister, remember, I've lost a sibling already, I will not lose another." Kiyomi shook her head, still breathing heavily and her voice a bit tired over all the shouting and all the crazy obscenities she yelled out so recently. "Have any idea how to snap Meiko out?"

"Sorry…"

"Well, I wish I could tell you to sit back and let me take this over for a while but… I'll need you in this." Kiyomi looked on ahead, Deargli quickly moved away from Clarmac to free up his space for movement if he was targeted.

"Twin Rabbit Blitz!"

A silver and pink blur flashed right past Mana's eyes before a spray of crimson red flew in the air, like petals of roses scattered in the wind. Laoch stumbled forward before he realized that his impressive armor was cut into four big chunks that one by one fell off his body as a large rabbit landed in front of the three genin holding his sword by his shoulder as it was too large to hold anyhow else.

"Missed me, ye losers?" Usuzoku angrily exclaimed before turning his eyes fiery with rage at the Inuzuka. "Go pick up yer filthy mutt, ye asshole. Teach 'em somethin' else dan just runnin' away, I had ta take a breather chasin' after 'em"

"Zoku-chan…" Mana's pale lips turned into a smile before the tip of the rabbit's long sword pointed at her face, just a thumb's length away from digging into the girl's eye.

"Call me that again, ye filthy hatchlin', I dare ye!" he yelled out. Laoch grunted out loud charging after Usuzoku but with a careless swing of the blunt side of his blade the rabbit knocked the now unarmored genin away and down to the dirt. The large young man spat out a fair amount of blood and teeth as a bonus of the fall, his own chakra augmentations were beginning to skip some beats as well.

Showing the two middle fingers on each of his paw to everyone around him Usuzoku poofed into a cloud of smoke, now having fulfilled his goal of kicking an Inuzuka's ninja hound's teeth in and feeling content with the battle, or rather the chase he went through.

"This is weird. He doesn't have thumbs so the whole concept of flipping someone off doesn't really work on him. I get it when he wields his sword with his ears sometimes, that's bypassing natural thumblessness like a boss, but flipping the bird just looks hokey on him…" Meiko's lazy voice made Mana and Kiyomi rapidly turn around and hug their friend who appeared to have overcome her crisis of loneliness in the middle of a busy battlefield.

"Both of our sides are injured. We'll both need to hide and lick our wounds after this, avoid battle for a long time… We aren't even your targets. Just give Mana up, you're wounded much worse than us and one good hit would keep any of your three down for the count." Clarmac growled out.

"I can attest to that…" Deargli lifted her palm up.

"There's no need to keep this up and risk more grievous injury or even death. Mana, be reasonable and give yourself up for your team." Clarmac looked the magician right in the eyes. "All three of them are going through injury that'll minimize their chances once they'll need to fight for their targets, you're being selfish clinging to survival this hard. If you just walked out the front gate now and gave up, your friends would only need to fight two times instead of three – you'll redeem the pain you put them through right now for your own survival."

Mana lowered her head, her black sticky from the blood hair slipped all over her face and down her shoulders. She looked like a creepy vengeful spirit of some sort as her head slowly and gently moved to the left and to the right in denial.

"I'm sorry. I have a nindo to live up to and I've no safety net to back down on. I have no more team if I fail and it'll take too many years to try this again if I fail. People who take this long to rank up to chuunin aren't the ones that change the world, they aren't the heroic examples that people would follow. I'm sorry, Kiyomi, Meiko, please allow me to be selfish just this once…" the magician smiled as she lifted her head and looked at her teammates.

Vertigo took Mana's perception over, all ground began shifting from under feet and Meiko grabbed Mana's head into a headlock and began painfully rubbing the top of her head and pulling on her hair like a violent older sister.

"She grew up so fast…" Kiyomi grinned. "It seems our common sense is rubbing off on the stupid little Mana who would've ran off alone to fight a chuunin all by herself or taken on a member of the Imarizu one on one." The Yamanaka laughed it off.


	290. Royal Flush

A sense of broadening, as if her mind had exited the confines of her own head into a much wider harmony, tingled in Mana's temples. Kiyomi had reestablished the mental link she had previously opened up. There were small and barely comprehensible hissing and almost static fizzling in the mind signals. An impression hit Mana that Kiyomi must've struggled with the remaining chakra resources which caused this secondary effect.

After activating his All Fours Jutsu Clarmac rushed onwards. He was likely the only member of Team Sagitarii with considerable threat left to him: he was more than halfway healed up by Deargli's innovative mixture of healing and sealing jutsu, he appeared to still have chakra ready to be utilized in his system. Also his main weapon was not cut into pieces as it was with Laoch.

Clarmac swiped his arms in a flashy blur, he was so immensely fast combined with the fact that Mana was beginning to feel so fatigued that even after ordering her body to move aside from his attack it didn't budge. A stream of red squirted out in the air but it wasn't Mana's, the magician felt no pain as Meiko stepped right in front of her and took the mauling slashes of the Inuzuka's elongated claws and teeth.

And the canine ninja kept on mauling, swiping and slashing with his claws, spinning to cover wider and wider area, hoping that one of those swipes caught Mana or Kiyomi as well. Meiko's body was evidently undergoing some serious augmentations to survive this ruthless and primal offensive, the claws pierced her skin and began budging into her flesh but made little relevant progress. Then with a more focused and powerful slash Clarmac sent Meiko sliding back and gripping the dirt beneath her feet to stop herself from sliding too far away.

The Yamanaka and Mana stepped aside from Meiko's path, just getting hit by the blacksmith's inertia fueled slide back would've sent one flying back further than getting hit by a speeding train. Clarmac lunged at Mana, now that Meiko had moved out of his way, but now that she was given enough time to prepare, and that Clarmac was himself slightly worn by his brief mauling of Meiko, the magician managed to move aside with just a pair of shallow scratches on her cheeks and her shoulders. The young man was like an enraged typhoon of claws, teeth and pain.

Laoch charged in from behind, Mana could hear his furious roar. Even without his armor the young man was a considerable physical force and a true brute on the field, granted, a more vulnerable one.

"String Reeling Technique!" Meiko grunted as she pulled on a strand of steel wire with her teeth and her arms manipulating a complicated combination of loops of wire to pull Mana aside. The magician felt the steel wire cutting into her skin and leaving uncomfortable pressure marks as well as multiple scrapes but it was better than having most of her skeleton pressed on by whatever equivalent of force her opponent was coming at her with.

"They're focusing on Mana again, punish them for each failed attack!" Meiko almost yelled out into the mental link.

With a kunai in hand Kiyomi charged at Laoch, together with Meiko. As expected the weaponry user had little experience fighting in a way that didn't result in him getting hurt. The blonde and the blacksmith danced a graceless and brutal also a highly coordinated dance of blades, whizzing and dancing around the large youngster, cutting into his blindspots and switching positions. Moving so fast that even his enhanced perception failed to keep up, let alone his tired and injured body. They were like botflies circling a worn bull. One feasted on blood while the other pestered the poor animal with its relentless buzzing and itchy landings.

"Guppy Fang!" a shout came out of nowhere as Clarmac's sea blue nintaijutsu whizzed right past Meiko's face and dug deep into Kiyomi's lower body sending her crashing backwards in a furrow as wide as it was deep through the dirt.

"Guys… Give me a sec… Then, Meiko, the Triple Pin-Cushion Formation, like we practiced." Kiyomi's pain ridden thoughts broke through the static of the mental link.

Seeing Clarmac in a sensitive position of recovery after the focused movement of his weaker yet faster version of the Water Release infused Inuzuka technique, Mana decided to exploit the occasion. With a quick dash, the magician retrieved the hat that still laid on the floor, making her way out of Meiko's steel wires that have long since loosened after they were first used. The kunoichi's remaining free hand scurried through the hand seals before digging deep into the indigo colored glow inside Mana's hat.

She pulled one boxed deck of cards, then another, third one and then a pair more. Throwing all of them as projectiles. Clarmac leaned aside from the first two before realizing that the decks were neither dangerous nor that carefully aimed. They were also thrown far too strong as they flew a fair distance past his location. His erratic and scared reaction, using complicated aerial and acrobatic maneuvers to avoid Mana's improvised offensive, only played into her trick.

Mana's second arm flipped the hat back into the air and as it lingered, flipping and spinning around before landing right on her head, her arms worked with hand seals. The final item she pulled that fell out right before the hat landed was her wand. Mana pointed it at Clarmac who at this point was still on his right arm and upright – an uncomfortable position to continue dodging in, given also that he spent so much air and effort into dodging harmless boxed decks of cards.

"Magic Spark Jutsu!" Mana shouted out unleashing a wild flock of sparks at her opponent. The poor Inuzuka had nothing else to do but land on his feet and cover his face. He had prepared himself for a powerful attack – seeing this technique as Mana's real play, which it sadly wasn't. Just another fake-out before the real show-stopper.

Mana was a very different genin, she spent so much time as a child studying textbooks and reading into different concepts of genjutsu and ninjutsu, inventing weak and relatively harmless techniques that looked rather impressive but ultimately were just smoke and mirrors. Magic Spark Jutsu was one of the dirty dozen – it looked flashy and cool but, unless somehow improved, it was relatively harmless to a worthy opponent. That being said, its flashiness and the uncomfortable sensation of these illuminating sparks exploding right in one's face forced Clarmac to back up a bit to where these sparks lost their flashy flare.

By the time that the Inuzuka realized that he was right in front of all the cards that were flung his way, flung too strongly to be aimed at him, but just strongly enough to cover some ground he'd be stumbling back as flashy sparks exploded in his face, it was verily too late. With a one handed hand seal in one hand and the Audra wand in another, Mana pointed at the various cards located in those boxes before setting them off.

All sorts of hell ran havoc. Small amounts of water erupted from ones, weak lightning jolts from the others, sparks of flames and just old fashioned explosive tags. It was the world's most beautiful artistic cacophony and Clarmac was up with his face in it. The magician could hear no sounds, the noisiness of the mess she had created by emptying her supply of cards sealed in her hat was enough all by itself. Shrapnel of steel tipped cards began flying outside from the absolute colorful chaos that transpired.

Once the smoke cleared Clarmac laid positively downed. So much so, in fact, that Mana got scared for a moment that she'd killed him as his eyes were closed and his fangs had well retracted from his All Fours Jutsu state and back into the usual slightly elongated state of a normal Inuzuka clan member. Surprisingly enough, Clarmac Inuzuka was knocked out.

"Hey, Clarmac!" Laoch yelled out as he had tried to rush to his friend's aid a couple of times before being cornered by Meiko and her fisticuffs pummeling his face to keep him in his place. This time the blacksmith moved aside and allowed the tall genin to pass, moving in closer to Kiyomi. Proceeding to activate a seal to proceed with Kiyomi's previously suggested combination.

"Move aside, Laoch! I'll heal him!" Deargli declared. Her mouth opened again but before it could an arrow pierced her knee, then another below the biceps and another through the palm of her hand.

"Mind Body Disturbance!" Kiyomi yelled out triumphantly as after Meiko's quick release of the sealed bow and a handful of arrows her opponent was pinned.

Laoch rushed at Kiyomi madly. Meiko previously wanted to seal her bow and quiver back into whatever pocket dimension they came from but she had to drop it and run at her enemy to intercept his attempt at harming Kiyomi. The blonde's grasp of the medical ninja of the enemy team was simply too precious to waste.

A powerful jumping punch from Meiko stopped Laoch in his tracks, the two began trading brutal punches before Laoch's knee in the redhead's chest pushed her back. The now unarmored genin had a more powerful body build, he had more chakra and much less injuries compiled and even with one fully functional arm he managed to successfully bombard Meiko with elbow strikes, hooks and powerful kicks before elbowing her at the top of the redhead's head and crashing her down into the dirt so strong that the shaking ground threw both Mana and Kiyomi off their feet.

Meiko drastically pulled her aching and burning body off the dirt. Blood dripped and pooled beneath her in alarming quantities as her remaining chakra must not have been enough to contain her bleeding anymore. Kiyomi, missing her consciousness, was still laying lifeless in the dirt. Mana had started to rush in to Kiyomi's aid even before Meiko and Laoch clashed in their exchange of blows so she managed to make it first to the blonde and stood in protection of her friend.

Slowly the hulking genin cracked his knuckles. "Step aside" he ordered. "I'm larger than you and a better physical combatant."

"Our chakra resources must be around the same at this point – you've spent a fair deal of it in those concentrated blasts from your cannons. I was trained to fight better people than me. You have a fair reason to trust me when I tell you – you won't pass." Mana declared angrily stepping in and on her toes to stare at her much taller and bulkier opponent.

And so Laoch threw the first focused punch. He was fast for his size but he was tired. He also had just one functional arm for Mana to read where the other one was completely numb and just hanging by his side like a flimsy vine. The magician avoided the blow, ducked under the back elbow strike that she simply read beforehand before striking Laoch's elbow from behind, the one of his numbed and injured arm. The brute stumbled back screaming in pain, clawing at his eyebrows and temples from how much pain her carefully placed strike caused.

"It's true that in a physical fight, if I was to fight honorably - fist to fist, you'd crush me completely." Mana allowed herself the luxury to taunt her opponent before she dodged a jumping knee from him by rotating around her tensed up foot like a dancer. The style of a Water Country taijutsu as taught to her by the old man from the Sun Disc arena. A martial art focused on dodging and redirection with the following up sharp counterattacks – that of her own.

"That being said, I don't fight honorably." Mana let her opponent know as she leaned aside, seeing at least sixteen angles to counterattack like she was taught but waiting patiently. The more attacks her opponent whiffed, the better her chances to cripple him with just one good counter. The more breath runs out of his lungs. The more time Meiko gets to pick herself up and finish Deargli, who now just stumbled around with Kiyomi's consciousness inside of her.

Laoch swung his fists in a wide arc, trying to catch Mana but she simply ducked under and then moved in behind him from the side of the push kick he tried to lure her into. The weightless numb arm just flapped around strangely as it was attempted to be used for attacks.

"Fight me!" Laoch yelled out so intensely that he could barely breathe afterwards.

"I don't want to. Incapacitating Clarmac was my main goal, knocking Deargli out is another one – so she can't heal him. I don't wish to fight or hurt you but I am skilled enough to prevent you from landing a hit on me as well." Mana smiled gently as instead of striking the man's spine with her palm causing him immense nerve pain she just casually leaped back before kneeling and taking a breather of her own.

Deargli leaped up high in the air. The magician followed her with a glance before observing Kiyomi who just laid lifeless. The blonde must've been fairly injured but she wasn't that injured – this course of action was undoubtedly Kiyomi working her magic inside Deargli's mind and body. The medical ninja flipped upside so that her head stuck down and she'd have fallen from high up straight onto her head. It would've been neck-breaking for a normal human but just overwhelmingly painful and dangerous to a ninja, even one without control over one's chakra circulation and body.

"Mind Switch: Harakiri!" Kiyomi chanted in Deargli's voice from the young woman's body.

Laoch dashed in, Mana jumped on her feet preparing to protect Kiyomi again but the tall genin didn't rush to hurt the Yamanaka – he ran to catch his friend safely. He did that successfully, saving Deargli from a great deal of pain.

Finally Meiko picked herself up and bolted at Laoch, with Deargli still in his hands. The blacksmith jumped in the air and flipped over herself to deliver a diving punch which the brute dodged by stepping aside. Due to the complicated and skilled manner of the redhead's punch she concluded it in a roll, however before her roll was executed Laoch picked her up and slammed her to both of his sides before trying to finish her off with a strong push kick which was blocked by Meiko's knee.

"Meiko, back up, you're injured, this is getting dangerous. We don't know how much chakra Kiyomi has left…" Mana encouraged her friend while her attention got directed at the lifeless body of Deargli's hitting the dirt behind Laoch after being rudely tossed aside after he prevented her suicidal dive. The fact that Deargli was not on her feet and fighting with Kiyomi on the wheel suggested that her friend was seriously injured, even while controlling another body, the mind of the Yamanaka couldn't stand up.

A strong punch sent a brutal shake of teeth and blood flying from Meiko's mouth as she turned a full 360 around, focusing the force in her turn into a strong kick to Laoch's weak arm. The unarmored giant roared in pain before falling to his knees, right at the same time Meiko did in front of him but the two didn't want to end their clash. Angrily the two bashed their foreheads against each other as the thought of a powerful headbutt hit them both at the same time but their equal strength cancelled each other's attempts out.

The two kept grinning at each other with bloody mouths as they kept trying to push the other's forehead away. It was a deadlock that could've lasted forever. Mana didn't want to attack Laoch now, Meiko had that look in her eyes where it was evident she had things to prove to herself. Whenever Mana tried to take a pair of steps forward the redhead just glanced at her with that judgmental look. Meiko wanted to prove herself worthy to fight on this team, to fight on this level. So far Mana and Kiyomi have been pulling her weight which was too painful for the blacksmith to bare.

The magician stopped to consider some things before turning away. She would allow Meiko to finish this herself. She was in no mood of fighting Laoch anyways, Deargli was the one she wanted to knock out. That, however, was complicated – Kiyomi was still inside the medical ninja's mind and the poor sack of bones and flesh was just writhing on the ground helplessly.

"Leave this mind and rest." Mana spoke after approaching the helpless Deargli. With every passing moment Kiyomi was losing chakra that she could've used on staying conscious with her overwhelming injuries. The magician weaver her own pair of hand seals before the familiar howling sound alerted her that Kiyomi had returned to her body.

"Scary Trick Jutsu!" Mana chanted out a name for her genjutsu technique as even after Deargli's will to fight on returned and she tried to stand up, the poor girl just froze.

In her eyes she saw herself covered with snakes, insects, and other parasites, drowning in their endless swarms as if the entire ground was covered in them. A loud and piercing laughter distracted Mana.

"I am someone who seals the pain of her past, the loneliness of an orphan, the disdain of one's own true family, the disappointment of life lived with a skin condition, the apathy towards my own life instilled by cruel people around me, the sadness of everything that I'd ever known being either a lie or sand that shifted through my fingers into techniques other people get crippled by just getting a taste of. Do you truly think I'll be scared by crawlers!?" Deargli yelled out before hooking Mana right in the jaw and knocking the magician down.

The sheer unexpectedness of her illusion being completely inefficient like that made her completely oblivious to the incoming strike, one she'd have normally dodged a multiple different ways all at once. One she'd have normally danced around flawlessly.

"The more injured I am, the more potent my healing techniques are. Clarmac and Laoch will soon crush you three with all of their returned might!" Deargli yelled out as she towered above of Mana's downed body intimidatingly. Her voice sounded pathetic, a cruel mixture of a young lady who feared and hated pain but needed it to heal the people she genuinely loved and treasured, people that replaced all that darkness she spoke about previously.

Deargli's arms lit up with chakra of her unique medical techniques just for a brief fraction of a moment before two firm hands locked around her peculiar headdress before slamming the girl's face into the dirt by using her entire body weight and the remainder of her physical force.

"Welcome to the toothless club…" Meiko slurred out as she could very hardly stand on her two feet. Beside her feet laid Laoch, he still had some fight left in him but at this point he must've seen how pointless it was.

The fight was over. All that was left was to scoop up the ashes…


	291. Don't Ask How Sterile the Balloon Is

Surveying the battlefield was a bitter pill to swallow. The giant round crater jawed where Laoch blasted at Team Hokage in the beginning with trees continuously falling and sliding down as the inverted orb continued to sink further. Blood, rags and small fires didn't paint a better picture either. Mana just sighed before turning at Meiko.

The redhead just sat in dizziness spitting blood aside and doing some elementary battlefield patching up. She didn't look great but she was in no danger of dying like before. Kiyomi, on the other hand, switched between passing out and just laying sprawled in the dirt with each passing moment.

"Everyone's out cold, we did what we wanted to do…" Meiko smiled at Mana with a half toothed smile. The blacksmith was going to have quite a night at some point in her nearest future, teeth were painful to grow back – Mana had first-hand experience with that.

"No. We were stupid." Mana realized looking back at Kiyomi and then back at Meiko before examining her own injuries. Feeling up her own stamina and roughly how much chakra she could still spend informed the magician that she escaped this fight pretty cheaply. Most of the highly devastative moves just blasted her aside or barely grazed her and Meiko consistently protected Mana whenever that wouldn't have been the case.

"Why?" the blacksmith curiously looked at the magician, her eyes were almost childish. She really had no idea what Mana meant but she didn't object the magician but instead wanted to understand her position and maybe learn something. It was an admirable trait in a person.

"We kept on fighting well past the reasonable limit. This wasn't a life or death fight, we should've just retreated at any point, they should've also. This test is tricky – it punishes over-extending oneself. The clever strategy would've been for them to escape, heal themselves, while keeping our tracks in mind, before attacking us again. We have no medical ninja – we were at a disadvantage." Mana sat down as her own thighs were beginning to burn up with fatigue.

"That's their mistake…" Meiko shrugged before falling on her back and extending her arms, letting them sink into the softened and grinded dirt and ashes, picking it up and letting the mix sip through her fingers.

"No. It's ours as well. We were fooled by their relentlessness. At some point we lost the track of what's at stake. We won, but what did we win exactly? All we did was remove a person who may have attacked us to take me out but we didn't advance in the test at all. This isn't the winning strategy of this exam…" Mana complained before reaching to her pouch and removing a handful of medical food pills she stole from a team of genin previously.

"And you know what is?" Meiko wondered lifting her head off the dirt, her hair was messy and sticky as the ash and grinded sand mixed with the blood which her hair was soaked with.

"I am beginning to get a feeling… It's blitzing this exam – just like those two guys we met by the northern exit did. A team that wishes to pass shouldn't engage their hunters, they should evade being found while simultaneously diverting their efforts and resources into what's absolutely necessary – the targets. It's an exam of all that is essential to a ninja – the ability to evade enemies while completing an objective."

Mana continued to stare at the pills in her hand, rolling them around and playing with them like she played with marbles as a girl. She wasn't the most popular kid, she had few friends so she mostly played marbles with herself at home. The small group of friends she did have liked playing ninja anyways…

"Hmm? Anything wrong?" Meiko curiously hummed after stumbling back on her bottom and curiously staring at Mana's distress over the food pills she clenched in her hand.

"Yeah…" the magician smiled. "I felt so bad about stealing them. I hated myself for what I had to do. I hate myself for having had that thought or having honored it, having gone through with it makes my stomach churn…"

"It saved my life, probably…"

"It did…" Mana clenched the pills in her hands, her face turned away from the tightly pressed fist before her lower lip began to quiver, when her eyes finally opened they were wet and leaking salty tears that soon mixed with her blood into a dirty red cocktail that was both sweet, bitter and sour at the same time. "I wanted to return these, wanted it so much, thought maybe it'd somehow make what I did better…"

Meiko uneasily scratched the back of her hair making the sticky clogs of ash and sand crumble off of her hair like a blizzard of dandruff, except a bit less revolting, for whatever reason.

Mana picked herself off the ground before slowly but firmly walking up to Meiko and extending her hand with an open fist, the medical food pills gently rolled in the magician's hand.

"Mana…" Meiko uttered.

"I can't… You two need them, it wouldn't have made what I did any better anyways. The deed is done, you can't just return part of what you stole and change it. That's not how it works. What you do lives with you, the people involved may forgive you, you yourself may forgive yourself but… It never goes away."

The blacksmith reached out to pick up a green food pill but then Mana coughed before faintly rolling her hand to make a yellow pill, one of a pair, to roll outside the bunch. Slowly and with a hesitant hand the redhead took it and placed it into her mouth, looking sadly at Mana with each passing moment. With a painful cough she spat the pill back out covered with blood.

"I can't. The few teeth I have can't crack it… They hurt and start bleeding immediately." the kunoichi childishly complained before blushing. Mana could barely tell that fact seeing how dirty and bloodied her friend's face was.

Mana took the pill from her friends' hand and smashed it in her hand before gently dropping the gooey mass into her friend's open mouth.

"You need to treat her." Meiko looked at Kiyomi worryingly.

"Probably should've treated her first, she took the worst beating." Mana nodded in agreement.

Slowly the magician walked up to Kiyomi and smashed the last yellow food pills before opening her friend's almost lifeless mouth and dropping the gooey mixture of herbs, chemicals and actual food into her mouth. The blonde just uneasily rolled around in the settled cloud of ashes and sand. Medical food pills were no miracle medicine but they were a guarantee for a quicker and more successful treatment in the nearest future.

"As you were!" a firm masculine voice made Mana get kicked out the window of her own thoughts and plummet back down onto the reality around her. A tall and seemingly mature ninja in a colored bird mask and a black, long, leather coat stood in the middle of the battlefield. He wore Konoha's headband tied around his arm. "I'm here to pick these three up…" he added before pointing at the knocked out Team Sagitarii.

Mana's eyes sharpened and squinted suspiciously, in a lightning fast moment they turned soft and kind before she turned to Meiko and Kiyomi examining their quick recovery. She encouraged them to leave.

"Some battle you had here. All those dead centipedes, wolves, foxes and bears around you are all your doing too? Impressive for genin, must be at least thirty dead animals all around this place…" the masked ninja remarked before picking Laoch, Deargli and Clarmac up onto his shoulder.

"No. Must be my summon's doing, he's a B-Rank…" Mana confidently stated before turning to leave, only for her team to follow.

The medical pills didn't just magically regenerate her friends. Kiyomi was still clenching at her wounds, they no longer bled externally but they were still quite aching and would be for a little while more. The pill merely boosted her chakra regeneration and metabolism which would've accelerated the rate that her body recovered naturally, which was already superhuman to begin with.

"How long was I out? I can remember bits and pieces…" Kiyomi grumbled out before stroking her neck carefully so that she didn't invite any pain.

"A minute, perhaps a bit more." Meiko replied before stroking her own fair share of wounds and removing a piece of armor that was cracked inwards and was poking right into a flesh wound that the blacksmith had sustained. Now that not the entirety of her body was flaring up with unbearable pain the blacksmith could tell such pain sources from numbed spots.

"Damn, that ninja sure didn't waste any time. If he even was a Konoha staff ninja…" the Yamanaka remarked.

"I don't think he's staff either. I mean, for God's sake, he didn't even take the dog with him, doubt he even knew there was a dog. Must've been a transformed genin from one of the teams… Real staff members would've waited until we left to do their job so that they didn't disturb the natural progression of the exams. Think about it, have you seen any staffers so far? They were the ones who removed all the eliminated ninja, they also are to maintain order and observe the rules, few as there are… Staffers don't get seen, they're the real ninja here." Mana nodded as such was her impression as well.

"Hmm? Leaving the beaten and unconscious to a disguised ninja? That's ruthless, Mana!" Kiyomi sarcastically cheeked the magician.

"It was the best choice. There's no use for a team of ninja to just kill unconscious people off, it wastes time and effort. Plus our battle was loud enough to attract every team in this damned forest, we're wise to get out of there as soon as possible. I'm sure our battle was being observed by at least several teams from the halfway point."

"Hmm? Why didn't they attack us?" Meiko wondered, slowly she was beginning feeling pretty comfortable about the speed that the Team Hokage were travelling in.

"Because fighting us is not in their interests. We lucked out that neither of the teams to make their way there was anyone who is targeting us. Even if they were to target us – they must've known that this spot was pretty loud and by exposing themselves they risked attracting the fish after them as well. In that case it'd be six on three against the hunters…" Mana scratched her chin.

"Maybe they're tracking us right now?" Kiyomi glanced back. In agreement to her fears Mana stopped and began meditating. It took quite a while before she managed to reach out to her gift of sensory, halfway through the process of delving into her mind the magician wondered if maybe she couldn't just do it on will and every time before she did do it she was just lucky.

"No. No one's in the vicinity." Mana concluded after standing up and stroking her numbed and tired legs as sitting in a meditative position really began taking its toll.

"Wow… You really need to learn to pick up the pace of that!" Meiko whistled into the air as she carelessly laid sprawled out by a tree before getting up and yawning.

"Excuse me if my ability to tell someone's presence just from their unique signature and mark they leave in the force that holds the universe together isn't to your utmost comfort…" Mana raised an eyebrow.

"So then most of the people there were only there to obtain information…" Kiyomi suggested a theory.

"Possible, information is the currency of this exam. As long as they felt safe and confident they wouldn't be seen or taken out they would've had no reason not to check out that scorching pillar of sky piercing super-flames and all the sounds of earth-cracking explosions." Mana shrugged.

"But it'd have been the strongest teams, in an environment like that the ones that move the most freely and take chances like this are the strong. Weaker teams that struggle for their survival and are hiding wouldn't have taken the chance…" Meiko wondered.

"Yeah. And this information would only have deepened that gap as the strong and the bold hunters obtained another bargaining chip whereas the weak ones just enjoyed not being in the heat for a moment longer…" Mana acknowledged the irony.

"Still, I don't believe that Team Sagitarii are in danger of being murdered. Enough time has passed for the real staffers to reach that place by now. I don't know just what the goal of that transformed genin was, maybe he wanted to loot the unconscious, maybe he was looking for bloodlines to salvage for his village, couldn't tell for certain. Either way, the staffers would soon have arrived and taken the three completely unseen." The magician added

"Still… What if that guy was targeting to take one of us out up close? Maybe we should've kicked his ass? I mean transformed ninja can't fight seriously and keep up their disguise at the same time." Meiko voiced her opinion.

"True, that'd require too great of chakra control and precision the use of the Transformation Jutsu. Not something most genin could pull off, then again, I've seen at least two people pull of a damage sealing jutsu this week. An exceptionally skilled face-swapper wouldn't surprise me one bit…" Mana shrugged. "Trust me, if I thought for a moment that Team Sagitarii was in any danger at all, any more than that which we put them in, I'd not have moved one inch…"

"Yeah, I've known Mana long enough to vouch for that… Still, even if we did engage that guy – his team couldn't have been too far away and we'd have soon been overwhelmed in the chaos of everyone aiming to take everyone else out. We've already had too much ass kicking hitting us to survive anything remotely close." Kiyomi firmly put an end to that discussion.

"So we're still moving the same direction?" Meiko wondered, "Still looking for Menna, Tiwul and Tala?"

"Yeah." Mana nodded firmly before allowing her eyes to shift from firm determination to lingering worry, "Except now we have even less resources to offer them – I spent almost all of my sealed card decks on that chaotic ninjutsu combination…"

A heartfelt sigh came from Kiyomi's side. A soft touch on her shoulder made Mana look back at her friend's apologetic face.

"I know how bad you felt about those pills, I know you wanted to return them after this. I'm sorry you had to spend more of them…" the blonde whimpered out.

Mana's pale face smiled faintly, the tips of her lips twisted up but the sadness that ate at her from inside made it a difficult campaign to wage war for every smallest inch of that smile. Kiyomi's eyes wandered lower onto Mana's chest where a red spot continuously widened on an already torn and exposed part of Mana's uniform making the magician's remaining rags look even more pitiful and blood soaked.

"You need to treat that, a single green pill would…" she began.

"No. I'll see what I can do about it once we stop for a break." Mana cut the topic short before trying to accelerate but the dizziness from the moderate blood loss made the magician stop daydreaming about being cool and leading her team ahead and slow down a bit.

Kiyomi wanted to speak up again but Meiko shook her head. "Just let her work this out by herself. She always had plenty of needless things to worry about but she always works them out." The blacksmith whispered close to Kiyomi.

"That's not really how being a friend works." Kiyomi crossed her hands for a brief moment. The thought wasn't told but instead transmitted through the mental link from which Mana was excluded. A link of just two people so close to each other came to Kiyomi almost naturally, without much effort or hand seals.

"It is with her…" Meiko smiled.

A good half an hour later the girls stopped for a break. Their departure was so erratic and sudden that they needed something to slow down their pace. Kiyomi and Meiko hadn't recovered even remotely fully yet and Mana still needed to tend to her moderate yet not overly important injuries. Plus it was starting to get dark.

With a slow and soft motion, yet not nearly so as Mana would've wanted it to be, the magician peeled off the improvised cover of her wound. Quite thick expulsion of blood came out after the pressure was removed and the magician instantly felt dizzy, she was lucky to be sitting down. Strangely it didn't really hurt… Or maybe it did but Mana was so used to pain that a pain of this magnitude felt as numb as no pain at all… The chaotic and heart-chilling screams of Laoch echoed in Mana's ears from after she punched him in the busted arm. The magician closed her eyes and delved into her erratic and scary memories that came flooding before remembering that she was patching herself up.

"I haven't got too many medical supplies, bandages and such…" Mana admitted after returning. "If I tear one more string of my own shirt for a cover of a wound it'll be getting really cold at night…"

"And more skin for those buggers to suck into…" Meiko noted as she was catching bloodsuckers from the air at an inhuman speed. Entire flocks of them, young and matured sensed a night incoming and felt obliged to ruin the day of anyone foolish enough not to be hidden.

"Those pests aren't even remotely the worst part of it compared to the kinds of things I had to kill to keep watch of you while you were out, Meiko." Kiyomi smiled as she had a bunch of stuff just piled up and waiting for Mana.

The items were very odd looking long balloons that were pulsing full of water, a bunch of herbs and mushrooms and several slipper sized insects murdered by stab through the head shell. Kiyomi's stabbing power must've been either astoundingly precise to bypass the armored shell or amazingly strong to pierce it. Just a bit over a year ago Mana struggled piercing the shell of a single crustacean herself.

"What is this?" the magician yawned.

"I collected some water from a river nearby in these… Balloons… We can make a stew from them, Meiko was scared speechless of your cooking but, while we were waiting for you outside the Forest of Death before the exam, Kouta told me that it's something to try sooo…" Kiyomi bellowed suggestively.

"Okay. I'll do what I can with these." Mana nodded. She unsealed one more chemical heating bag from inside her hat to help heat the water. It'll be difficult to make anything tasty without proper heating of a fire but it wasn't impossible…

"Wait, don't animals usually poop into the water?" Meiko wondered out loud something she should've just kept inside.

"Usually a water source containing leeches and slugs is extremely contaminated, if that's what you meant. That's why I picked it up with my own sock to filter out the mud, and I contained it in these… Sterile balloons… And we'll be boiling the water as well. A ninja's metabolism is already extremely resistant to natural contaminants so whatever remains won't worry us." Kiyomi explained.

"Fine, I'll drink the water from your condoms as long as it doesn't give me explosive diarrhea in the morning…" Meiko suspiciously locked her arms around her chest.

Kiyomi bashed the redhead's head before the two started wrestling. "I told you those aren't condoms, they're… Sterile balloons!" the Yamanaka kept on yelling. Had the two been even remotely serious it wouldn't be much of a match but Meiko was somewhat hesitant to hurt her friend who was both physically weaker than her and also got the worst beating out of the three during the last fight.

"Whatever, why would you even bring condoms to the exam, you creeper!" Meiko tossed Kiyomi aside before the blonde leaped back into the fray of playful wrestling.

"Sterile balloons!" she screamed out loud.

"Calm down a bit, you guys." Mana warned them before not being able to help herself and breaking into a bit of composed laugh. She had plenty on her mind but watching those two bicker around about meaningless things made her think less about what really hurt to think about.


	292. A Helping Hand

Leap by leap, Team Hokage was traversing through the Forest of Death towards the region where Team Dunyazad was last seen in. It would've only taken about half an hour to cover the entire distance, the trio didn't want to spend chakra on going any faster. Maybe if they focused hard and decided on wearing themselves out they could've covered the distance of over hundred kilometers momentarily, still, given their situation it would've been less than reasonable.

"I still think we should've fought that bear…" Meiko pouted, killing the silence that had reigned for most of the early morning.

"It had an arm taller than an oak and many times thicker. Its claws were twice the length of a banana. It'd have taken too much effort." Mana firmly shut her down.

"Yeah, but we left so fast that I left my bag behind…" Meiko whined.

"Your bag!?" Kiyomi flipped out, "You mean the one with the map and your spare ninja tools and supplies?"

"No. That's my main bag, I'm talking about my beef bag." Meiko smiled.

"Mana was preparing for you out of her own supplies for two nights already, I've stored water for you in condoms! You didn't tell us you had a bag full of beef." Kiyomi launched herself at a diagonal angle to slam her shoulder at Meiko and throw her off balance, the blacksmith just kicked off of a nearby tree and launched herself back at her rushing teammates rejoining the formation.

"Now that I think of it, it sounds like something Meiko would do. We should've seen it coming." Mana smiled. It may have been the short moments of bliss watching her friends behave like people that knew no sorrow and fooling around with each other that made her this ignorant to the troubles she went through to satisfy Meiko's hunger but something left just that kind of an effect.

"So you admit it then!" Meiko yelled out, "It was condoms!"

Mana was surprised that she was able to hear the sound of Kiyomi's teeth being grinded. While the blonde blushed and really didn't look like she took the right things from all of this situation, allowing herself to be dragged down into an immature game Meiko played to make everyone forget her own offense of hiding food, the magician found it as just kind of hilarious.

"Although, I have to admit – Mana's cooking kind of got awesome all of a sudden!" Meiko vibrantly cheered for her teammate.

"It was one of the several things I've trained during the whole Yamanaka clan affair." Mana shrugged.

"How much further ahead?" Kiyomi looked around before Mana stopped, only for the rest to follow.

"Not sure… It'd be naïve to expect to find Tala, Menna and Tiwul in the same spot they were last seen in. That being said, I believe that they may not have changed their quadrant. Moving around so drastically is just looking for trouble, as we've found out…" the magician scratched the back of her head before settling down and preparing to meditate.

"Is this gonna work? Will you be able to recognize their chakra signatures?" her armored friend raised an interesting conundrum.

"Obviously not, still, we'll head towards the nearest signature I can find." Mana shrugged.

Once again it took her a good while to calm herself and reach the right degree of concentration. It took longer still to reach out with her entire consciousness to the environment around her and until all of the chakra stars flared up in her imaginary visualization of the chakra sensory ability. It was such a flawed and early stage of the ability, Mana would've liked to devote so much more time into this genetic trait, at least as much as it'd take for her to sniff chakra signatures out as easily as she could tell smells.

"There are six signatures that way, they're really close to where we were told Team Dunyazad last was. It must be them…" Mana jumped back on her feet before beginning to move that direction.

"Oh… We lucked out, maybe if we help them with their fight, they'll help us with the information trade?" Kiyomi shrugged, the two teammates quickly joined Mana moving to a location nearby.

Tiwul's long and round bottom bashed into the face of a handsome tanned blond male who appeared to have been caught unprepared by the highly unnatural manner of attack. The chubby young lady lifted her arm up and, like clockwork, a handle of a weapon poked out from her large metallic backpack which she pulled out and revealed to be a scythe.

"Ninja Style: Tool Expansion Jutsu!" she yelled out in a tired and resentful tone that so immensely contrasted her usual cheerful tone. The scythe expanded to tremendous size dwarfing its primary shape at least several dozens of times and extending in its massiveness way past the proportions defined as "necessary". With a graceful guiding of its path to absolute destruction, the massive tool slammed into the ground where the shaken handsome shinobi previously was.

After the ginormous cloud of dust, wood chips and torn leaves settled and the gigantic ninja tool returned to the size of an ordinary scythe and got placed back into the bag, after being minimized to the size of a toy a little doll would wield, the tanned blond opponent of Team Dunyazad was revealed to be completely out. His forehead was cracked and the poor young man was bleeding profusely from his busted forehead.

"That's what you get for hurting Menna, you mean bastard!" the chubby young lady panted. She herself was not holding on her most gracious and strongest legs. Her usual lovely bandana was missing as it was recently completely incinerated, the young lady was beaten around and bruised up, her tomboyish futon t-shirt was torn up together with her strapped jeans.

Tala slid back beside her, having been tossed backwards by some considerable impact force but somehow managing to maintain his upwards stance and remain on his own two feet. He angrily glared at his teammate.

"Don't stop moving! Do you want to get taken out like Menna!?" he shouted out ferociously as if he was scolding a person he actually hated the guts of.

Tiwul's eyes wandered briefly at her knocked out friend by her side, seeing his whited out eyes and grit together in a painful expression teeth made her chest burn up with anger and fear for her own well-being, but also rage and desire to pay back the pain caused to her friend.

A strong impact at her chest sent Tiwul tumbling back, had the hit not been tremendously soft and coming from a cotton ball she'd have tumbled over and flew crashing through multiple trees way back.

"Don't move your eyes away, Tiwul…" a blonde, glasses wearing kunoichi with a white coat covering her shoulders uttered in a mocking tone.

"You do realize you've just hit me with a cotton ball, right?" Tiwul snapped back at her opponent before charging at her with a jumping kick. The powerful and highly unpredictably manner upper thigh kick caught the opponent medical ninja by surprise knocking her aside and giving her a nasty nosebleed. Just barely did the young lady manage to regain her consciousness and balance and recover with a backflip.

"I think I'll be just fine…" the chubby Sunagakure kunoichi grinned at her opponent with an equally cheeky manner, even going out of her way to make an offensive facial gesture her way.

Without uttering a word, the enemy medical ninja smacked her hands together in a hand seal making the cotton ball explode into smaller cotton balls that continuously flew around and bashed at various openings they could find in Tiwul's larger than average frame which struggled to keep up with the intensity and number of the attacks.

"This… Doesn't hurt… Dammit!" Tiwul kept on shrugging the balls off before she realized that the balls were too painless to be the young kunoichi's main mean of attack. The more the Sunagakure weapon puppeteer tried to remove those cotton balls off of her body the quicker they rolled aside and less success she had at pulling them off their skin as they got stuck to it like leeches.

"Hmph… I figured a larger person like you would require higher number of attacks as compared to singular more powerful attack." The opponent mocked Tiwul who lazily ran at her with a running strike. The cotton balls stuck to Tiwul's body rolled onto her eyes making her miss the enemy's counter attack of lazy pair of slaps at her sides. They were incredibly weak but soon the Sunagakure kunoichi realized that she had several more cotton balls stuck to her body.

"What kind of retarded-ass strategy is this? What happened to you, Dubia, you graduated the Academy with amazing grades!" Tiwul tried attack her enemy with words. She needed to catch some of her lost breath back and think of a way of getting these off of her skin as they were moving nowhere peacefully. They also quickly relocated onto her other body parts. As the weaponry user of Sunagakure opened her mouth, one even tried to even roll into her mouth and try suffocating her from inside her throat.

"What's wrong? Feeling tired yet?" the blonde who was revealed to be a fellow Sunagakure kunoichi fixed her glasses while she triumphantly stared at her worn out opponent who was getting more and more pulled to the ground. "These cotton spheres are a newer jutsu of mine. They are a ninja tool used by medical ninja to drain blood off of a wound quickly, they use the residual chakra inside the blood traces to fuel their usage."

"But… I'm… Not… Bleeding…" Tiwul panted as she fell to her knees.

"No, but you're sweating. Profusely. This effect is magnified on someone of a more muscular or chubbier body build. Your build is great for manipulating greater weights but it doesn't conserve energy too well, now does it?" the opponent taunted Tiwul. "Soon enough you'll fall ill to extreme dehydration of the body, not to mention tremendous chakra loss of your ninja metabolism trying to compensate the incredible strain your body is going through."

Farther away Tala kept on firing bullet sized capsules of Wind Release chakra at his opponent. The young man that the red headed conservative Sunagakure ninja was fighting was an odd looking one, wearing vibrant colors and a humongous ribbon on his neck. He also appeared to use an electronic keyboard instead of a sword or a similar tool suited for battle.

The musician moved quite skillfully and his evasion skills were certainly not lacking. However Tala's skill in cornering his opponent soon forced the young man to drag his arm through his electronic keyboard playing a bunch of its black and white, well maintained keys and spreading a melody of deplorable quality. Each of the keys had a yellow colored hieroglyph on them which served as a visual aid for the boy himself for the correct use of his ability.

"Genjutsu: Bandit Jig!" the enigmatic young gent sung out.

Tala's hands shaped into a pistol hand sign and firing off a stream of wind bullets at his opponent froze before beginning to shake. The red haired shinobi soon found his feet shaking similarly as well. Against his will his right leg began to tap the ground, soon the left leg joined in. It was just a diversion for the dark haired musician to pull off his ace ninjutsu. As Tala was immersed into the illusion of being placed in front of a live audience in a theatre far far away and feeling obliged to dance, the musician bit his thumb and flashed through a handful of hand seals.

"Summoning Jutsu!" he chanted after slamming his hand to the ground.

As Tala's iron will finally understood the absurdity of dancing in front of a live audience and how against his character it was and forced his hands to make a hand seal required to dispel illusions, the very ground beneath his feet began to shake as from the massive cloud of smoke a bunch of green, human sized ogres started charging at the Sunagakure ninja, armed with scimitars, clubs and even large boulders tied around their arms – hand to elbow.

The forty summoned ogre soldiers began charging at Tala who had no time to prepare sufficiently for their cruel horde rush. Surprisingly enough, they didn't attack him, instead they started scattering wildly, so close to the young man's face that he could feel their foul stench as they ran across or aside him, all over the battlefield and slashing at bushes, trees and anything but something living. The red haired Sunagakure ninja just observed the mindless rampage of the ogres in confusion, was it within his character to giggle, the sight of an ogre smashing a little daisy with a giant rock tied around his arms over and over again would've certainly invited such a reaction.

"I apologize for the stupendous idiocy of my summons…" the musician shrugged. "For a more lethal jig, a more hands-on approach is needed…" he smiled before pulling his hand out of the pockets of his cartoonishly oversized purple tuxedo and beginning to play his electronic keyboard, this time with sufficiently more skill.

"Demonic Keyboard: Illusionary Bandit Manipulating Melody!" he sung out as the forty well, as well as significantly less well, armed ogres started rushing at Tala with a ferocious frenzy and thirst for blood matching their past desire of destroying pretty flowers and bushes.

"Wind Style: Jet Surfing!" Tala chanted out managing to push in a pair of hand seals in between his mad evasive maneuvers as he avoided getting completely surrounded and overwhelmed just by the skin of his teeth. A strong gust of wind picked the young man up and blew him to a more remote and farther place where all forty of his assailants had to chase after him.

"Wind Style: Automaton!" Tala shouted out as the relentless barrage of cutting wind bullets started firing upon the ogres. The beasts just covered themselves up with their weapons. The rocks easily got penetrated, the swords got shattered and several ogres got immediately taken down. Had they been their usual stupid selves, they'd have continued to try and find cover, block or otherwise defend against Tala's offensive. However with a cruel stroke of some more electric keyboard keys the entire horde was sent in a suicidal rush that'd have destroyed more ogres but also allowed them to reach Tala.

A loud howling sound made the Sunagakure's redhead shinobi look at his right, then to the left frantically as the battlefield around him appeared to have frozen. After looking behind him Tala noticed that the cotton balls had fallen off of Tiwul's body and laid peacefully by her side, twitching but not moving any bit more. After turning at his electric keyboard using enemy the young ninja, much to his surprise, saw his opponent grinning with astounding idiocy and hopping around on all fours, scratching the divide of his behind frantically before smelling his finger and making odd sounds of an exotic ape.

"Double takedown!" Meiko cheerfully chanted from high above as Mana and Kiyomi landed down and revealed themselves. Kiyomi still held her arms up in the hand seal she used to cast the Yamanaka clan technique to take over the medical kunoichi's mind, similarly, Mana also held her right hand up in a modified, one handed, hand seal position, having just successfully cast her illusion on the electric keyboard player.

"We probably shouldn't have waited this long…" Kiyomi smiled with the edge of her lips.

"We had to find a perfect opportunity." Mana shrugged.

"So, what now, kill them?" Meiko wondered.

"You can't!" Tala energetically opposed to the idea, rushing up to the armored genin and grabbing her by the shoulders.

"Don't worry, I was just fooling around…" Meiko apologized before getting out of the weak hold of her opponent by herself.

"They may be scum but they are still Sunagakure ninja… I won't advocate the spilling of another comrade's blood." Tala growled out as a warning.

Mana lowered her hand seal before gesturing with her chin for Kiyomi to do the same. The blonde questioned Mana's decision and quite clearly opposed it for a brief while but then, with a disappointing sigh, let down her hands letting the medical ninja slip out from her control and the temporary paralysis she placed the medical ninja in.

"Scram!" Tala angrily warned the enemy team who appeared to have weighed the pros and cons of fighting five enemy ninja at once before picking up their unconscious pretty boy of a teammate and fleeing.

"Wow… Thanks!" Tiwul smiled, still too tired to stand back up on her feet.

"Hmph… We could've handled it by ourselves. Matters of Sunagakure do not concern you three." Tala objected softly, knowing him, Mana took it as a sign of gratitude.

"This goes beyond matters of any single village. This is the Chuunin Exams, I don't think you've noticed it yet…" Kiyomi objected.

"Don't listen to that pouty-face. We're grateful you pulled us out, wait… Where's Kouta and Shimo!? Is this your actual team?" Tiwul wondered.

Shimo… Mana turned away after a mere mention of him. She could stomach the topic being brought up, she cried too many tears over her friend to break down every time people spoke of him but it never got any easier…

"He umm…" Meiko looked at Mana uneasily, it was easy to tell that she wasn't sure if she should even say it out loud.

"Got eliminated already, huh? What about Kouta?"

"Actually… Shimo died. At the very end, just when we found what we've been looking for. Kouta's been eliminated already, he's on another team." Mana somehow toughed it out to utter those words.

"He was… A good friend. He appeared to be lost in many ways when we met but… I just hope he could find who he was before it happened." Tala sat down, his face softened up somewhat. Whenever a sip of sadness entered a face of absolute anger and strictness, it couldn't be helped but change a little bit. "This damned exam… Comrades turned against each other. Pisses me off." He changed the subject. He probably wanted to do something good with that.

Mana kneeled by Menna and checked out his injuries. Even she could tell that these burns and deep marks on his body weren't going to end up bringing anything good. Her arm lingered on the bag of medical food pills by her side. With the inevitable regret of her own actions, not due to the fact that she was treating someone, the fact that she was doing it with stolen supplies, the magician pulled out a pair of red food pills and placed them by Menna's mouth. Opening it through his intensely grinded teeth was troublesome.

"Don't bother." Tala angrily cut her down. "He's injured well past what a single red pill can solve. Even if you gave him two – he'd only recover enough to drag us down and suffer more."

After a sigh Mana placed one red food pill back into the bag and pressed Menna's nose forcing the knocked out shinobi to shortly loosen the lock of his teeth just enough to push a mashed pill down into his mouth.

"It'll ease his pain, at least…" Mana observed after looking at the burns and dark grievous injuries all over his chest. His entire top was signed and blown off, must've been quite the powerful blast he got caught in.

"Tsk. Sentimental as always…" Tala sighed in annoyance.

"What's wrong with you!? She's trying to help!" Tiwul yelled at her teammate.

"She's being pretentious, acting like the boundaries of villages don't matter. One day she'll die just like the rest of us and her ideals will die with her. It's easier to just hate the others. People will be at each other's throats just because the other was born in another village. People will sack entire villages just because they're defenseless. Her pretentiousness won't change a thing." the Sunagakure shinobi pushed his friend aside rudely before jumping up and sticking to the side of a tree before dashing up to the top.

"What's that guy's problem?" Kiyomi whispered into Mana's ear.

The magician just sighed. She knew that it was because of young Tala hearing about the recent history of his village in the Sunagakure Academy and feeling appalled by the behavior of "civilized" ninja villages jumping at Sunagakure's throat just because the war weakened it sufficiently enough for a finishing blow. Frankly, she understood the young man's character and anger perfectly, even if she couldn't really relate to such nationalist feelings.


	293. Walls of Glass

Tiwul lingered uncomfortably, tapping her feet nervously. Mana's eyes barely picked it up while switching between the unconscious Menna and back to the Sunagakure kunoichi. The magician turned at her foreign friend and raised her eyebrows faintly to gesture that the girl's need to ask something was acknowledged and that she was encouraged to go ahead.

"Ummm… Look, we appreciate the help, me and Tala, even if that dick has a mean way of showing it. That being said…" she lingered still.

"You want to know why we came here?" Mana sighed.

"Yeah, I mean it'd be naïve to think that you just wandered into us, I mean us… Of all people." The girl shrugged before wiping her sweaty forehead with the torn rags of her purple t-shirt with a futon symbol on the chest.

"Yeah we… Were kind of hoping you guys would be willing to trade information. We know a bit of something about several teams, we need intel on certain others." Meiko butt into the conversation making matters short and clear.

"Frankly, given your situation, we wouldn't rule out an opportunity of an alliance as well…" Kiyomi looked at Tiwul with hopeful eyes. "We've got information on a lot of teams but we haven't picked off a single target yet. We saved your butts here that has to count for something."

"Very well!" Tala's firm voice cut Kiyomi's lingering suggestions down. "We agree to an alliance, to share information. Anything you want." The young man leaped down from quite a high distance up, the landing only deepened the few holes he already had on the knees and elbows of his black, white and orange jumpsuit.

Mana looked shocked at the Sungakure ninja for a brief moment before looking at Menna again. The boy's eyes were closed calmly, his teeth were no longer grinding together so hard that they cracked or broke off and he didn't look like bleeding that much. His chest lifted up and down peacefully as if he was sleeping. That deceitful tranquility… He wouldn't recover and Tala knew it.

"No." Mana shut the Sunagakure redhead down. "You're just trying to justify your own stereotypes here. You're trying to make it like we're just here because we need you for something. By agreeing to our terms you make Konoha ninja look as sick and twisted as they are in your mind. We will not bargain under those terms."

"You are here, are you not? Clearly you wanted something out of us… You can't back out from where you are to your usual moral high ground!" Tala snapped back at her with a cold stare. "We know plenty of information on Konoha's Team Walnut, Kumo's teams Cirrus and Stormcloud, Getsugakure's Team Iocaste."

Mana's heart jumped a few beats after hearing that Tala's team knew about Team Cirrus. The team of her target - a young kunoichi named Junipu-R.

"We didn't came here to use you, we came here for a trade." Mana realized that her shock after hearing a familiar name was evident to Tala who was already making a smug expression as he realized he was in full control. He had a chance to expose Mana as someone only he wanted to make her out to be. She was one of few people who, so far, didn't bend to his sick vision of foreigners and he'd never bend without playing the cards in his hands the best he could.

"And trade is something different?" Tala squinted at her almost mockingly.

"It is. Using you would be asking for something only because of something sentimental – using our past history and friendly feelings. Pressuring you to help us as we've just helped you. We want none of those things, we only want an honorable trade." Mana rubbed her elbow, she didn't like the manner in which her body language folded under pressure but she simply couldn't help it. Tala knew something that she had to have, if she didn't – it'd all be over for her, her time with Team Hokage, her chances at becoming chuunin and even her lifelong dream. She had no room to compromise her and she couldn't stop biting her lip because of it.

"You need information about who? Team Cirrus, based on your surprise of hearing that name? Fine, tell us what teams you have information about, we'll see what we can work out…" Tiwul took a step forward, she must've seen how uncomfortable this conversation was making Mana feel and so she decided to take some initiative.

"We know of Team Fir – Kouta's team, we know that Team Stratus has already completed the exam, we know the last location and the abilities of Team Phobos of Getsugakure, we know Team Pyrite has been eliminated and we've eliminated Team Sagitarii ourselves." Mana carefully listed the bits of intel known to them, carefully observing Tiwul's and Tala's reactions. They may have spoken one thing after she was done listing, their faces may have said another.

"Team Fir! We need that one!" Tiwul just yelled out right after Mana was done, "We can trade what we know about those two teams!" she turned at Tala for his hesitant approval. "Team Hickory is also from Konoha, maybe you know something about them too?" the energetic Sunagakure kunoichi leapt on her feet vibrantly.

"Wow, Pagu made a big mess of himself, quite a popular guy. Everyone wants a piece of him!" Meiko whistled.

"We don't…" Mana shook her head before realizing the deal made. She had to give up information about Kouta's team in order to get to her own target. Sure, Kouta was already eliminated, that being said, how would he feel knowing that Mana told these guys all about the last location of his team and lead Team Dunyazad right into the right tracks to catching up to his team? He'd probably be mad at her.

"Can we… Trade information after we bring Menna to the southern exit? He clearly won't recover without help of a medical ninja, unless you know one willing to cooperate?" Mana tried buying some time.

"I thought we did… But Team Haddar went after us so I doubt Dubia will still help us, she'll probably just drain the rest of my fluids out with those creepy cotton balls of hers for what we did to each other's teammates." Tiwul shrugged sadly. "There's no need of bringing Menna anywhere, one of the things we've found out was that if you leave your teammate behind, after a while, the staffers will pick them up. You can have that bit of information for free."

Meiko unzipped her tracksuit's collar to let some air in after realizing that if Kiyomi left her alone when she was injured, the blacksmith would've been picked up and eliminated from the exam. That thought looked like it scared the redhead a great deal.

"No way! We're going to carry Menna to the exit, it's the equivalent of burying your comrade yourself in this battlefield simulation. No Sunagakure ninja will be left behind!" Tala growled as he rushed up to Menna and flipped him over his shoulders before giving the rest of the girls a mean stare, "Let's go now. We've no time to waste."

The quintet of ninja took off, moving towards the southern exit. Tala wasn't rushing too fast, as expected, he was using just the right amount of speed to maximize a weak chakra output and achieve optimal speed for minimal costs. He was a skilled and wise ninja, not only sufficiently strong in combat but also a great micromanager outside of it.

Not too long after the five took off to surrender Menna to the Konohagakure staff, the magician picked her pace up to catch up to Tala.

"Are you ready to hear our information now? I will give you no trade. You know my conditions – I tell you about Team Cirrus and you leave." Tala spoke firmly but quietly, almost in a grumbly whisper.

"I… It's not about that. Why is it so important for you to prove that everyone from the other villages is some sick monster looking to use you or screw you over?" Mana asked him honestly.

"Tsk. Because I know they are. You keep fooling yourself and everyone around you and that confuses me. Not on a conscious level, on a subconscious one. I can feel like every time I am reminded of your lies to yourself and the world around you that I don't fight as efficiently as I could be. Information about Team Fir is pointless until you admit that you're no different from the others – even if I fight them now, I will not be strong enough, ruthless enough to do what needs to be done." He replied.

"You're already weaker than you used to be – last time we met you told us you used Wind Release ninjutsu to close sand into bullet-like projectiles. There's no sand in this forest's soil – your jutsu here is much weaker." Mana brought up.

"True. All the more reason to at least get my mind together."

"I see…" Mana slowed down to lag behind the quintet. She looked down at the green and black blurs beneath the level that the ninja were dashing at. Once in a while she raised her head up to check on the path they were moving in but it was more and more difficult to do so every time she did so.

"What's wrong? Why didn't you just trade them the information?" Meiko slowed down to talk to Mana while the quintet moved towards the southern entrance.

"I… He offered to give us the information for free. All Tala wants is for me to ask it of him." The magician mumbled.

"Even more reasons to do it. I mean… I guess if you give up Kouta's team – he'll be mad at you, he looked quite friendly with those guys. Tala offered you a way out." Meiko's voice softened. She must've really wanted for Mana to take the easier path, no, it was something else – she and Kiyomi must've already spoken about this and they wanted some kind of a deal to come out of this. They've come too far and spent too much effort for it all to be pointless.

"A way out that will dishonor my entire village, that'll expose us as something we're not. A way out that'll make Tala's sick and twisted vision of the world a reality for him. He'll be sad and hopeless, drowning in his own apathy and we'll just fuel the fire of his hate. My ninja way is to unite everyone, make all life mean something, not just escalate building walls around the villages and hate for each other." Mana felt her voice slightly picking up, maybe even a bit more loudly than she wanted it to be heard. It couldn't be helped anyways…

"I see… So if you take Tala's offer – you'll object your ninja way and if you take Tiwul's you'll make Kouta feel betrayed." Meiko snickered. "Just like the paper test, isn't it? No right answer…"

"No, it's like Tala said. This is a simulation of actual mission conditions: a clearly set objective, people hunting after you and people with unclear motivations and information you need. It's all in how sly you are, the deals and compromises you make and what you're willing to offer for the mission objective… It's just like the life we'll be living as chuunin. What's weighing heavily on me is that I don't have the answers to this life's questions. What if I'm truly not ready yet to enter that stage?" Mana's voice was beginning to tremble, internally she hated that, tried to restrain herself as much as possible from breaking down but the more she tried to fight the more evident her emotional distress became.

"So screw it… Don't make any deals. Sure, Kiyomi will be mad but I think she kinda likes me so I'll smile really nicely and rub my head against her side and she'll break, eventually. A pointless outcome is better than one which breaks us apart from inside." Meiko shrugged before trying her best to make her best little kitten impression as she illustrated the ways in which she'll be trying to calm Kiyomi down. Even with all the despair in her chest, expanding and clawing at her lungs, trying to burst out with the last of its efforts, Meiko's faces and the noises she made cheered Mana up a bit.

"I can't. That's the worst part, maybe I am selfish, maybe… Maybe Tala is right?" Mana's slightly fixed mood went to the crapper again. "I can't be eliminated. That'll be the end of it all. After the Chuunin Exams are over, as Hokage-sensei made it clear, I'm out of Team Hokage. I'll be waiting for years to be assigned to a team, then even more years until the other Chuunin Exams will take place. I'll be an adult genin, you know how it's like to be one…"

"Yeah… Those guys don't have it easy…" Meiko looked up as she scratched her head heartily. "They're kind of the laughing stock of the bunch."

"Exactly, I'd have no problem with being looked down on and laughed at, in a way, I've been like that my whole life. The problem is that my nindo compels me to be someone people look up to, someone who makes people appreciate life through example. If I fail here… It's all over, I'll never build myself up to someone people will follow." Mana covered her face up with one hand while still keeping a half sunken eye open to keep watch of the way in front.

"I… I don't know how to help you…" Meiko murmured. She looked away herself, it was evident that the blacksmith was beginning to feel bad about not being able to be a good friend in the way that counted.

Finally the quintet reached the southern exit, Tala walked up to the massive gate and softly placed his foot at it. A strong rumbling wave of force rippled all the way to the edges of the gate making it slowly open up. A pair of ninja rushed in to the five ninja. Judging from the sight of it – chuunin. They wore a simple chuunin uniform with complicated headgear that looked like hi-tech visors of some sort.

"Do you quit? All five of you?" the ninja asked in a highly robotic voice, the fruit of a cybernetic voicebox he used.

"No, we just brought our teammate here to give him up. He's had enough and we want him treated. We're going back in." Tala softly spoke as he surrendered Menna to the chuunin's hands. The ninja nodded and watched the quintet leave back.

"You know, you don't have to do this. I shouldn't be telling you this but you can leave your teammates behind, they'll be watched after…" the ninja spoke up.

"Yes, I do have to do this. No Sunagakure ninja gets left behind." Tala firmly cut the man down with a cold stare. Before the man's reply or thoughts on the matter could be heard the iron gate closed up and total darkness enveloped the squad.

"So… How will this thing of ours work out?" Tala looked at Mana curiously. Right as his face finished its turn at the angle he imagined being able to look the magician in the eyes, just an extended fist placed right by his face laid. After the young man turned his head a bit to the right Meiko furious face stared right back at him.

"However this will turn out, I'm gonna kick your ass for hurting Mana later." She pretty much promised the Sunagakure genin. Tiwul chuckled a bit seeing how similar Meiko was to Tala in a lot of ways, her face turned bitter after she looked back at her teammate who clearly couldn't see the irony staring right in front of him. It was tough to say just what may have went through his head.

"I… I want to trade." Mana submissively lowered her head. She almost dragged her feet to Meiko's bag, removing the rough draft of a map that the others scribbled for her before taking out a pencil and circling up a zone where she encountered Team Fir before. Obviously Kouta's team was no longer there but they left tracks. Any ninja worth their mettle would've picked up enough tracks to track down the team that stayed there: footsteps, marks on trees, remains of food, other similar things.

"Mana…" Meiko uttered looking at her friend's crushed expression.

"They were here when I last saw them, it's tough to tell time here but it was a couple of days ago. They fought not too far from there so you'll find examples of their combat tracks there. Eventually you'll bump into them. There are two of them: Aozora Yushijin and Erumo Budoki. From what I remember about them from the Academy days, Yushijin is a genjutsu user and a swordsman, Budoki never had specific skills, tough to say what her skillset is exactly."

A long drawn out silence followed Mana's words. Tala looked to be going through a combination of frustration and shock, he didn't really expected Mana to choose to give information on her own village to foreigners instead of using the Sunagakure ninja to get intelligence from them for free. No reasonable ninja behaved this way, loyalism to one's own village was instilled to children since childhood, before even the Ninja Academy.

Seeing how Tala was tapping his feet, stepping around impatiently and angrily grunting, Tiwul stepped up and took the pencil over from Mana's hands. She looked carefully at the map, without a doubt, examining the thing as she hadn't seen this version of it before. Then she scribbled some things around on the map as well before marking the circle amongst other circles with a Kumogakure insignia.

"You'll find Team Cirrus here, when we encountered them there were three of them: this weird beanie wearing guy named Inaba, a short stature and even shorter tempered guy named Quill-B and a girl named Junipu-R. We've bargained with them only so we've never seen them in combat. I wish we could give you something more but we don't have much. This Quill-B guy wears two swords so he may be a swordsman, the rest of them look pretty puny so they may be specialist ninja of some sort – maybe ninjutsu, genjutsu or sealing techniques." Tiwul carefully explained.

Another overdrawn pause killed it once the chubby young lady was done talking and the trade finally transpired.

After the duo of the Sand Village took off, rushing to start following the tracks of Team Fir of Konohagakure Kiyomi stared at Mana in disbelief.

"You just gave up a team from your own village…" she uttered in a clearly objecting tone.

"I gave up the team of my own boyfriend. Things like villages I couldn't care less about…" Mana rudely snapped back at her friend before rushing off ahead.

"Can you believe it!? She had the option to just get the information, they would've just given it to us!" Kiyomi freaked out just as Meiko had predicted. Mana couldn't hear what the two were talking about, she didn't know if Meiko's planned soft cuddles strategy helped please her friend and calm her down.

If the staffers were following the progression of the exam and if they heard of this – Mana's participation in this exam was as good as done. The final exam of the Chuunin Exams was always this massive fighting extravaganza under a clear sky with officials from all the villages involved participating and admiring the next generation. The promises of what's to be. Winning that event didn't make one chuunin, a committee of anonymous ninja still decided if the ninja demonstrated the skills needed for a chuunin to have and if they were ready to join the circle of the higher ranked ninja.

Needless to say, people who gave up teams of their own villages would've never passed. Not because it's against the rules, it wasn't. Not because it's illegal in some way, it wasn't. Because of the social stigma betraying one's own comrades brought up, the unwritten social mark of loyalty one must have upheld. Obviously there'd be no such stigma eliminating a team of one's own village if they were one's targets, that's just following the rules. What Mana did just now was unforgivable in the eyes of plenty of the more conservative villagers.

What she did was unforgivable in her own eyes. Meiko finally caught up to Mana.

"I… I think Kiyomi will be fine. She's only half a national loyalist herself, nowhere near as conservative as Tala so… You should be fine… Eventually." The blacksmith tried calming Mana down as the magician just silently kept moving ahead with her head sunken down, tears running down her cold and lifeless face.

"If I'm ever injured to where I weigh you down... Promise me." Mana uttered quietly.

"Yeah, just like you, I won't give up…" Meiko cheerfully barked out lifting her fist up for a fist bump.

"Give me up immediately." Mana shook her head angrily before stalling back to allow angry and betrayed looking Kiyomi to take her over. The blonde didn't even look Mana's way. Obviously she was angry, even more obviously their friendship lasted too long and they did too much for each other for it to end like this. But just for this moment in time, neither one of the two wanted to even look at each other.

The irony still was that Mana hated herself much more than Kiyomi must've done on an irrational and highly emotional level.


	294. Chasing the White Rabbit

With decent pacing it didn't take Team Hokage that much time to reach the marked location where Mana's target was last seen by Team Dunyazad. While initially there was little holding back the trio's speed of movement, after they got a bit closer to the location the speed had to be diminished. One couldn't track their opponent moving at a breakneck place and thrashing the forest around them as they moved. Ninja could move at unbelievable speeds in combat but moving at anywhere near those speeds while travelling or tracking raised too many problems.

"We should've asked Tiwul when exactly they've spoken to Team Cirrus. Measuring time is important when tracking…" Mana mumbled out while observing the environment around her for clues.

"There are sensors in our clan. They're able to track people by the residual chakra signature leading them to the actual chakra signature far outside their range. Maybe you should try it?" Kiyomi shrugged. Her tone was strict yet not as strict as her eyes when she looked at Mana. Then again, the magician knew where she was going into when making the decision she made.

After a brief pause of hesitation the girl knelt down and closed her eyes. She placed her hands calmly on her thighs so that neither her feet nor her arms went numb in the lengthy process of calling for her sensory to surface. Sometimes accessing her natural gift came easier, sometimes it was incredibly difficult.

A good twenty minutes later the magician opened her eyes and stood back up, rubbing her tense shoulders and ankles she shook her head with sadness and disappointment.

"There aren't even actual chakra signatures within my range." She uttered.

"Oh well, you tried…" Meiko shrugged.

"Well…" upon Kiyomi's mouth opening Mana expected something offensive or edgy thrown her direction as there was no way that something as controversial as relaying intelligence on a Konohagakure's team would've been let go soon. "It's way too tough to tell time in here anyways. Even if we did ask Team Dunyazad about it we'd have received nothing exact. Then we'd only have that approximate to compare to our own approximate measurements. We'll need to fly a little blind with this tracking quest of ours." the blonde surprised Mana with her composure from being overly confrontational about how the information came into their hands to begin with.

Kiyomi had plenty of reasons to despise Mana's decision. Her own brother, the only person to look at her like something more than a delicate Yamanaka heiress, a soft and tender crimson rose surrounded by walls of thorns of much more poisonous and defensive plants, was killed by bandits. Those very same rogues had to obtain information about her brother, it was more than likely that Mana's sellout of Kouta's team ringed too close to whoever sold out her brother.

"Well… Let's go in a straight line, filter the surroundings, observe several branch layers. Watch for traces on the moss, as subtly and quietly as they went, we should pick up some tracks if they got too tempted to dash around at breakneck speeds at any point." Meiko suggested. Mana nodded in agreement submissively.

"I'll watch the upper layers, Meiko can watch the middle layers, Mana watch the bottom layer." Kiyomi shrugged before disappearing in a single leap up. There was an area of around five kilometers to observe for the smallest traces or damage on the tree bark or the moss that vegetated on the old as the Leaf Village itself branches of the Forest of Death.

Meiko and Mana scattered as well. The magician allowed herself to immerse in the plunging down, she knew that with proper balance she could've stopped herself by vaulting off one of the thicker lower branches anyways. The air whizzing by refreshingly by her cheeks and fondling her hair just felt too tempting in her greatly stressed state. A feat such as stopping herself close to the ground, as inhuman as it sounded, would've required no chakra augmentation from her part at all.

The Forest of Death was utterly magnificent. Deadly, primal yet magnificent. It was especially beautiful and beloved to those who were looking to track someone located inside it. All around the year the conditions barely changed, no rain, no snowfall or other kinds of unnatural weather conditions to disturb the natural traces. Someone from the mountainous regions like the Kumogakure wouldn't know how to move on such a delicate mossy environment. Maybe Team Cirrus could hop around fast and free on the rocky surface of the Land of Lightning's rocky wastelands and deserts but they'd leave plenty of marks on the local moss or damp forest soil.

Whatever rainfall that fell over the Konohagakure got absorbed through the leaves of the tall and widespread plants. Then all that humidity got filtered and transferred straight to the soil through the plant itself and through its roots watering the soil and benefiting every smaller plant that was less lucky to break through. The vines that wrapped around the tall and thick trees sapped that water straight from the barks of the trees without bothering to wait for their share below. They were the corner cutters of the forest.

Carefully so that she didn't leave too many traces of her own, those that could then be confused with traces of Team Cirrus, Mana leaped from one lower part of a tree to another, scanning the soil and lower branches like an owl. More so – her vision as a capable young ninja was thousandfold that of the hunter bird. A single scratch on the overgrown with moss bark would've never slipped past her quick and accurate sight.

"Nothing…" Mana sadly sighed before quickly making her way back to where the search started and scaling her way back to where Team Hokage split from.

"I've got tracks – those are man's tracks, the guy walks like an elephant and the space between the several tracks I've found is too wide for it to be female's tracks." Meiko grinned with a thumb up.

"Yeah, I've got several too. One man, one female. Judging by the spaces between the separate same person's tracks one is of average height where the female is much shorter. They were moving to the north-west from here." Kiyomi nodded before looking at the direction she predicted the team to have gone.

"I found no footprints…" Mana looked away.

"No surprise, they'd not have moved on the ground level…" the Yamanaka shrugged.

"I found a bunch of these though…" Mana showed the team a plastic bag of instant noodle packs and cups left behind.

"Okay, so we got something… Still, can't say for sure if those tracks are Team Cirrus' without templates to compare them with." Meiko shrugged.

"We may." Mana interrupted. "All of those cups are single brand. That means that whoever took them with them either bought them in bulk or they prefer this brand. As someone who recently purchased a bulk of instant ramen, such as those Meiko devoured while recovering from her injury, I've never seen this brand of noodles in the local stores."

"Okay, so we have a reason to suspect that whoever left the trash behind liked instant noodles and was a foreigner." Kiyomi closed her eyes deeply in thought.

"It was a single person that left the noodles behind. There were multiple packs scattered in highly consistent distances and matching numbers, just about enough in quantity to feed a single person with a relatively small appetite." Mana added.

"Are you saying that these were found in multiple locations and were eaten over separate occasions? Then yeah… I suppose Mana has a point, I'd have eaten that much as an appetizer all at once!" Meiko smiled before shyly rubbing her nose.

"Except these aren't ramen cups, they're instant noodles of spaghetti." Kiyomi noted after examining one cup and one pack separately, noticing that both of them matched in their content and even taste. "Marinated tomato flavor too… Ewww."

"Instant spaghetti are most popular in Kumogakure. Instant ramen is more common in Land of Fire, fish burgers are more common in Kumogakure and the Archipelago whereas Land of Snow is proud of their tomato and chili soups, Land of Wind with their desserts and sweets and Land of Earth with their baked goods. Any cheese, non-ramen noodle or non-soup tomato or chili snacks would be most likely bought by a Kumogakure villager." Mana recounted her short acquaintance with various cuisines back in old man Aporius' library.

"Still, we can't be sure it's not someone with specific taste in Kumogakure cuisine or someone wanting to confuse everyone by making themselves seem like a Kumo ninja, for whatever reason." Meiko bellowed while scratching her chin. "Plus no one's that much of an idiot to just dump their food in the open like that, that's how you get attacked by giant bears."

"We got attacked by giant bears…" Kiyomi looked at Meiko ironically.

"That's how we found out how you get attacked by giant bears." Meiko shrugged.

"Either way, we don't need to sit here and try to find out for sure – all we need is a reason to believe that the tracks belong to Team Cirrus which, I'd say, we've got. Let's move after those tracks north-west, slow and steady." Kiyomi ordered before leaping off and disappearing in the vast dark green of the forest.

"Well, she didn't wait long before appointing herself as leader…" Meiko grinned before dashing off to follow the blonde.

Mana looked back and rubbed her elbow uncomfortably before following her teammates. Maybe it was for the best that Kiyomi started calling the shots. Mana has been the de facto leader of the squad that went off after the Box of Ultimate Bliss and because of that experience Meiko fully trusted the magician's calls. That sort of made her leadership on the battlefield more efficient even though the matter was never fully discussed between the girls. Given the recent events, Mana had no problem with relinquishing any chances of ever calling the shots in the team. Team Hokage needed someone more reliable and more experienced anyways.

The trio moved slowly and with their eyes and ears open, Mana tried reaching out for any chakra signatures whenever they took short breaks or whenever Kiyomi felt like the great forest beyond needed a little scoping out. It didn't take more than thirty five kilometers to run into seven chakra signatures a full hundred meters ahead.

Carefully so that they weren't found the girls positioned themselves on top of the trees to observe the thick and messy bush field below. It was a less than ideal fighting plane, usually one would've preferred finding a small grassland opening or a larger crater where there was hope of seeing the Sun break through the thick layers of the leafage of the colossal tree structures laying one over the other, competing for light and rainwater.

The hectic field of battle below had various different combatants. Mana's eye excitedly caught a glimpse of her target, the girl she almost instantly recognized from the file but there were simply too many other factors involved. The fight appeared to be four on three, stacked against Team Cirrus' favor.

"Do we watch or do we get involved?" Meiko looked at Mana before receiving her answer from the other side making her turn fast and feeling like she just got scolding boiled water thrown on her from Kiyomi's side.

"We watch, the four of the enemy of our enemy may reveal their abilities to us which will be useful in the future. Not all teams in here are our friends and Mana only has one boyfriend she can sell out – we need information like this for potential bargaining in the future." Kiyomi whispered quietly.

Her friend's words really did sting deep, not because Mana was misunderstood or because Kiyomi was somehow wrong with her statements. The magician did sell out her boyfriend's team because when the choice of giving up on her ideals or her love came to be she made a choice. Even now she still thought it was the right choice, granted, she still hadn't seen all of the fallout to come from this decision.

The trio of Team Cirrus were just like Tiwul described them: one blond haired beanie wearing young man, one swordsman with typical Kumogakure uniform and a casually dressed young lady – Mana's target. The pale skinned beanie wearing young man stuck out from the bunch almost the same as Mana did among Konoha peers. Just like Mana looked to be of more far off northern Kumogakure descent of darker skinned people, this youngster looked pale enough to be more of the cloudy and murky Kirigakure, instead of scorching hot Kumogakure.

Junipu-R, Mana's target girl, looked almost like a civilian. She wore casual clothing that'd have completely blended her in somewhere in her native country where her skin color didn't stick her out like a sore thumb. As someone several shades darker than most people around her, Mana could relate to sticking out in that way. Being called adjectives like "rare" and "exotic" by people who wanted to note her difference without offending her.

The swordsman to whom Tiwul referred to as Quill-B previously was a more typical looking Kumogakure shinobi. Dark skin, typical Kumogakure native features. Strict looking face and orange hair that really scratched at the beholder's eye. Tiwul's intel was wrong, however, the young man didn't just wear two swords – he wore four shorter ones. It was a simple mistake to make if she didn't observe the man's back carefully. He only had two long cross shaped sheathes but short swords were located diagonally on both his upper and lower back. Judging from how he handled himself, he wielded them with great skill as well, switching in between them on the fly effortlessly. Flowing like a river and striking precisely and lethally like a viper.

Finally what appeared to be a hectic clash of swords, fists and feet, was slightly brightened up by a show off of one of the enemy kunoichi abilities. A tall and bulky built young lady from the team of four confronting Team Cirrus bit her thumb as she was blown back by beanie wearing Inaba's overhead kick which missed her head but landed on her shoulder and chest. The enemy kunoichi wore round plates on her chest and around her shoulders and wore her long blond hair in a slithering braid that had a sharp steel weight attached to it, likely to turn something most long haired girls considered a nuisance into a controlled battlefield tool.

After the braided kunoichi completed her set of hand seals a strange looking blue skinned equestrian being charged from the cloud of smoke. It looked like a combination of a nasty amphibian and a horse as it had fin-like features around where horse's ears would've been. The rampaging amphibian equestrian continued to tackle, kick and bite at Inaba throwing him around like a ragdoll. That was when another one of the enemy ninja appeared behind the beanie boy and tried cutting him down. The teammate of the braided kunoichi was a strong looking brawler of blond hair and verily similar features when compared to his teammate. Yet he wielded a signature weapon of sorts – a blade of black obsidian-like alloy, when it set ablaze shortly before it'd have cut poor Inaba open Meiko almost screeched in joy, only due to Mana and Kiyomi's quick thinking they managed to keep themselves concealed and cover up the redhead's ecstasy.

Luckily for the short beanie boy, his injury was prevented when the four blades wielding swordsman he had for a teammate blocked the blazing sword with a cross shaped block of two of his own blades. It looked like the blaze that came off of the enemy swordsman's blade was an intense fire blast that radiated with considerable force of its own as the young Kumogakure swordsman struggled to maintain his perfectly timed block in place against the immense force of the opponent's blade. Luckily enough, before the beam of blasting flames engulfed and incinerated him the blade's fire went out and the two swordsmen pushed each other away.

Quill-B only slid back right into the relentless physical offensive of the other two ninja. A tall and bulky brown haired and long faced stud that continued to strike at the overwhelmed swordsman with elbow jabs and knee strikes relentlessly and a much smaller and more frail looking young man with bland grey colored hair and poor rags for an attire. Mana noticed how the second frailer young man held his hands, she could tell that while the frail shinobi could fight hand to hand he kept his hands in the ready for impromptu hand seals and any quick ninjutsu combinations he could perform.

"Is this enough observation?" Mana asked.

"Not really, we still only know the abilities of two of the enemy combatants. Plus, what do you care if Junipu-R's team is taken out? She's your target, the enemy is doing your job for you." Kiyomi looked strictly back at Mana.

"Those four are clearly an alliance of teams, likely they both lost one member and decided to pool their efforts together. Such alliances are too dangerous for us and we'd be wise to work with other teams to break them before they grow and come after us." Mana noted.

Kiyomi opened her mouth to speak but she noticed that Meiko was already out of hiding and leaping down with her kunai in hand shrieking in joy.

"Yahoo! We're fighting an enemy alliance!" she cheered like a little brat.

"OK, what the actual shit? We need a tipping factor but this ain't exactly it…" Inaba the beanie guy remarked watching Meiko land less than graciously and dash to his aid.

"Well, Steinck, it seems you may need to use your ability after all!" the frail enemy ninja of the alliance grinned after the relentlessly striking teammate of his got pushed back by Junipu-R's lightning bolt ninjutsu technique and hit a tree. Junipu's technique didn't appear to be strong enough to have left any lasting damage however.

After the tall enemy alliance striker, to whom his ally referred to as Steinck, observed Mana and Kiyomi quickly leaping out from hiding to join Team Cirrus in their defense he indifferently glanced back at the amphibian horse summoner and her burning sword wielding ally.

"Corot, Hafred. Don't bail on our alliance now. We see this to the end! I won't tolerate you two bailing when we've found my target!" he angrily warned his own alliance.

"Don't worry, for the medical help your friend gave our friend Vespiga, this alliance won't shake even when the odds are against us!" the summoner Corot replied confidently.

"If it weren't for your medical ninja friend, we'd have died. What's elimination compared to that? Our alliance stands!" her teammate Hafred affirmed.

Something about the fact that the alliance of four wasn't scared off by Team Hokage leaping in to the Team Cirrus' aid felt off to Mana. Either way, an alliance of genin sounded dangerous and needed to be stopped, if that meant teaming up with her target's team temporarily – so be it.


	295. Fickle Alliances

It was six on four in this situation and yet the enemy refused to back down. That meant that either this was an all or nothing effort for the alliance or it was the final target before the entire alliance passed this exam. In the first case Mana would've wanted to know what exactly caused such a desperate approach to hunting for targets, in the second – she could've split the alliance in half by determining which team already had all the targets and which was one short.

The enemy didn't let Mana think, try and pick up the required clues to piece it all together and make something of it all. The towering genin with the Iwagakure headband called Steinck rushed forward, separately from the rest of his alliance and it didn't seem like any of the four hurried after him to support the brawler. Now that Mana looked at him from the ground up, she realized how absolutely terrifying the Iwagakure genin was. He was not simply tall, he was more than twice Mana's size and almost half of his frame taller than any normal ninja his age.

Steinck ran in a mad dash after Kiyomi, it was a smart strategy – she was a Yamanaka who was capable of massive battlefield disruption with her hidden clan techniques. The fact that the Iwagakure ninja could even identify a Yamanaka to prioritize her in the first place was impressive, Yamanaka weren't too common, if at all prominent in Iwagakure. It was something one would've read about or heard from hearsay.

The worst part was that Steinck was deceitfully agile. His muscles moved in all the right ways, his limbs looked elastic and fit as those of a ninja in their physical prime. Had Kiyomi not been above most genin in skill, even if her skillset wasn't quite focused on martial arts, she'd have been absolutely devastated. Luckily enough she managed to lean and vault aside from the standing push kick into a diagonal stomp and knee strike combination. After Steinck began cornering the blonde with his ceaseless taijutsu combinations Quill-B, one of Junipu-R's teammates came in to back Kiyomi up.

Quill-B came in to block Steinck's combinations with his blades that were positioned at the backs of his arms up to the elbows, similarly to how Hisako used to wield them and strike with those blades using elbow strike motions. Something odd happened, Steinck jumped up caught in an unexpected sensation and dashed back as the alliance prepared to back him up. Quill charged in regardless. Kiyomi stood there and observed the Kumogakure's swordsman's motions, she wasn't familiar with his fighting style, she couldn't fight together with him, just watch him and wait for familiar strings she could join in on.

Quill-B's blades stroke and slashed wildly, the young man spun like a spinning toy on his feet, his knees and his arms. There were buzzing blades everywhere. Mana was barely able to even see anything more clearly than just a silver whizzing flashes and blurs. Just what on Earth was this fighting style? Had Kiyomi tried joining in on Quill-B's attack in attempt to prevent Steinck regrouping she'd have been torn to shreds herself. Glowing in crimson streaks Steinck backed up. The bright red goop dripped from his wounds reminding how real and intense those attacks were.

"Those blades are high quality. So much chakra weaved into the alloy, not much imbuement or augmentation is needed…" Meiko noted. "I don't know how to complement his style…" she uttered looking at Mana questioningly.

The equestrian amphibian charged at Quill-B with a wild stomping barrage raising dirt and dust off the ground. Wherever the amphibian stamped the ground holes and devastation followed, the ground shook in the wake of its rampage. The other swordsman named Hafred charged in with his pitch black obsidian blade slashing at Quill-B, who was on the defensive now.

"Lightning Style: Thunder Wonder!" Inaba yelled out as a lightning bolt fired off from his hands bashed right into Hafred's right jaw sending him rolling aside. The lightning chakra enveloped the swordsman's entire body and continued to send shocks. Judging from the intensity of the ninjutsu and the sound it raised it didn't look like it dealt that much damage, regardless, Hafted remained down on the ground.

"Transportation Seal!" Junipu-R chanted as Inaba's response to enemy alliance's pressure allowed her to weave a technique of her own. Mana was so invested into observing the battlefield and its conditions and making mental observations about the things she had noticed that she completely forgot to analyze her potential opponent's strengths and weaknesses. She didn't see how many hand seals Junipu used in her sealing technique and how proficient she was at weaving them.

Large and intensely bright circular sealing glyph discuses made of solid chakra constructs materialized around Junipu-R's hands. The girl slung one of those discs onward meanwhile she gently laid down on her knee and placed the other one on the ground, as it was placed the sealing glyph stayed on the ground whereas the other one stopped at less than eight meters from where it was launched from.

"Multi-Kunai Jutsu!" Quill-B shouted out as he threw a handful of knives at the first transportation seal on the ground. In mid-air those kunai poofed in a cloud of smoke and multiplied several times over before getting absorbed and disappearing into the first seal and exiting from the other one in the air. The summoner Corot braced herself as the rain of knives enveloped her. After the initial shock of several knives grazing her, the aquatic equestrian shielded her with its large body taking all of the damage for itself and disappearing.

Meiko launched herself at the opened up and vulnerable body of Corot, the burning sword wielder Hafred interrupted her madly fast swipes that'd have quickly opened the girl's throat and gut in mid-swing. The previously stunned swordsman had managed to pick himself up, even if weak crackles of lightning still lit up and stunned him painfully, slowing him down for a brief moment or two. For a moment Meiko carefully backed up from the much longer reaching weapon, carefully using her inferior and shorter ninja tools to deflect dangerous swings and lean to safety. The two danced a very intimate dance of blades as Meiko took the role of a wary mountain cat. Attacking with relentless and lightning fast swipes of her short kunai blades before backing up as the larger and longer reaching dancer responded.

A streak of flames separated from Hafred's sword decimating Meiko's kunai blades completely. The steel just crumbled into dust right in the blacksmith's hands like the heat and concentration of the sword's flames was so intense that the massively inferior tools skipped the heating and melting stages entirely and just went straight on to being reduced to dust completely. Meiko's banged up chest plate fell apart finally folding under the immense heat and pushing force of the scorching blast of fire coming out of Hafred's blade and the red streak on the redhead's chest was hit with so much blaze that it got cauterized immediately. Meiko just coughed up in pain and shock of how powerful the swing and its aftereffects were.

Then in an instant the blacksmith dashed in with a crushing dropkick out of completely nowhere right at Hafred's own sword that bounced back from the crushing force and slammed into the young man's armor. It didn't look like she had successfully forced the obsidian sword to pierce Hafred's vital or important blood vessels in his shoulder area as the cut into his primitive armor was too shallow. Regardless of that – a branching streak of red shattered off like cracks of broken glass down the young man's shoulder.

"What an impressive comeback…" Quill-B noted in surprise. "I didn't expect her to snap back like that, evidently, neither did the opponent. Even if she wields no weapon, she used the opponent's own sword and his lowered guard!"

"We're both marked now…" Meiko grinned as if her own chest injury didn't bother her at all. It appeared that within fraction of a millisecond that it took for her to switch between injured and dazed off Meiko into murderous warrior Meiko she completely forgot about the hellish pain of the wound on her chest.

The Iwagakure youth who had stayed behind the alliance's fight weaved a pair of hand seals. The boy breathed in deeply. Mana's eyes caught his attack immediately, such a foolish manner of attack. Everyone was on their guard and ready to avoid it. Was this boy, this foolish or was this just a first string in a longer and more lethal combination?

"Water Style: Water Assault!" the young man gurgled out before spouting a large mass of water from his mouth rushing at Mana who had remained stationary for so long. He must've thought her to be a medical ninja who would only involve herself once her teammates got hurt. With a graceful and calculated back step Mana leaped back and behind a smaller tree – a sufficient enough barrier to stop any damage that such a low ranking ninjutsu technique would've caused.

"You're being reckless with your techniques, Erblau!" Hafred angrily grunted at his alliance mate who didn't appear to listen to him, just continue to weave further hand seals.

"Mystical Palm: Vapor Variant!" the Iwagakure genin, previously referred to as Erblau, continued to chant out as the small puddle of water created by his low ranking lackluster jutsu evaporated in thin air, indigo colored vapor circulated around Hafred's armor before disappearing in the crack of his armor completely as the blood stopped leaking from inside the cracked plate.

"A medical ninja…" Mana realized to her frustration. Someone of the boy's low ranking couldn't have been too efficient with healing ninjutsu but either way, it'd make her quest of defeating and splitting this alliance more difficult.

"For someone invested into scattering this alliance you're not very active, waitress-girl." Junipu-R noted curiously looking back at Mana.

"They actually stand a chance of winning this…" Mana uttered it to herself before angrily correcting the ebony Kumogakure girl on her exact profession and the nature of her odd attire.

"So you've noticed too?" Quill-B smiled. "Konoha ninja are quite impressive, I'd expect nothing less from a half-tan."

"Again with the skin thing, Quill?" Inaba the beanie guy angrily objected, he had a reason to be offended by the whole "paleskin" cloud hanging over him as he looked about as tan as someone who spent a lifetime living underground.

"You've earned my respect over time, Inaba, paleskins are simply less intelligent and that's a scientific fact proven by actual scientists! Proven again now by this waitress-girl's remarkable show of perception and strategic thinking." Quill-B explained slowly.

"What do you mean, Mana?" Kiyomi asked slightly irked to be reminded of the casual racism she herself endured in the hands of the Imarizu who had kidnapped her some time earlier.

"We may have the numbers but… The numbers are working against us. Everything in here is working against us – we don't know our allies' abilities, their fighting styles, strings and moves. We know nothing of how to strengthen their styles and back them up. If we'd try to we'd simply get in their way or get injured ourselves. In addition the battlefield is too tight and thick to allow us these mistakes. In order to fight together we need to pretty much rub our shoulders…" Mana explained. Much to her surprise the enemy didn't appear to object or try to intercept her explanation, it was an odd thing to notice all by itself.

"What are you waiting for, Hafred?" Corot noted that as well.

With a confident smile Hafred lifted his black sword and pointed it at Meiko, "Any time now, young lady…" he taunted her before relaxing and taking a more open stance.

"Guys, no need to worry over me, just go at them, really, I'm fine!" the medical ninja of the enemy alliance blushed as he began rubbing his cheeks awkwardly.

"It appears the enemy is having second thoughts. If the waitress-girl and her team decides to retreat it'll be better off for us, let her talk…" the giant named Steinck thundered out looking at Corot and completely ignoring his medical ninja of an ally acting out.

"So you're done helping us? You haven't really done anything yet…" Junipu-R squinted angrily at Mana. Her strangely confrontational personality didn't completely evade the magician's analysis and mental safekeeping.

"That's not what I said. I'd also appreciate if you stopped calling me…"

"To the point, Mana!" Kiyomi butt in.

"Fine. We just need to change our style. I won't blab about my suggestion like this with our enemy standing nearby though…" Mana looked back at Kiyomi suggestively. Within moments the mental link was established and the enemy team realized that Team Hokage wasn't about to back out.

"Don't freak out, guys, this is Kiyomi's mental link hijutsu. It's a hidden technique of her clan's…" Mana let out a mental signal.

"Wow… That's… A lot of people…" Kiyomi grunted in pain, it was likely she wouldn't be able to keep all six on the link while engaged in active combat.

Mana's attempts of explaining her suggestion got put on halt. The colossal genin Steinck quickly went through a handful of hand seals before smacking his arms together. His giant thigh and foot got rotated around and flexed out like that of a sumo wrestler before being smacked into the ground.

"Lava Style: Wet Floor!" the giant thundered out as the cracked dirt began to glow red. The force of the rising magma wasn't too great but it was remarkable regardless, enough to heat the dirt and turn it into a finger thick layer of searing molten rock. The magma slowly enveloped the lower areas of the trees in flames beginning to incinerate them and swallow them up at a turtle's pace while the smaller bushes got completely scorched up almost instantly by just being near the glowing red liquid.

The combined forces of Team Cirrus and Team Hokage scattered to the tree line.

"Was that actual lava?!" Meiko yelled out making all the ninja inside the mental link cover up their aching temples as the intensity of the girl's thoughts gave them all a small headache. The link even began breaking up and breaking into static as the effect was multiplied even worse for Kiyomi.

"That's the nature of all elemental ninjutsu – manipulation of the elemental forces. We've seen his friend evaporate water before, it's likely that Steinck simply used his chakra to elevate the temperature and melt small amounts of rock and minerals and raise the mixture up." Kiyomi replied.

"They all work together so well… And appear to get along with each other too." Mana noted.

"It's too troublesome to keep them all online, I'm just keeping the beanie guy on because he's the closest." Kiyomi explained. "You'll relay whatever Mana suggests to the others."

"We need to fight them differently. Not to try to take them all at once while attacking all together. Instead we need to fight one at a time, quickly switching in and out, wearing one select member of their alliance down one by one." Mana quickly got to the point.

"What Quill-B said previously was true, with all our minds together we'll kiss them adieu!" Inaba chanted energetically before his own signature faded away.

"I could really do it without all of his rhyming." Kiyomi admitted.

"I don't remember your technique having a quantity limit. From what I remember it is mostly limited by its range…" Mana relayed through the link before noticing that the summoner girl Corot was following her and hearing some more movement not too far away from her. Seeing how her involvement so far was so lackluster she was likely targeted as the weakest link of the two teams.

"Of course I could've kept all of them online, I just needed to make an excuse to drop them eventually so that someone really silly doesn't accidentally slip the fact that Junipu-R is Mana's target on the link…" Kiyomi relayed back.

Mana leaped and swung around the branches using the tree for cover as a barrage of kunai and shuriken flew her way, piercing through the tree easily but the fact that she hid behind it at least partially covered her up as a clear target.

"Nice thinking…" Mana commended her friend.

"It's true, it does sound like something I'd do!" Meiko giggled out. A loud cracking noise followed her speedy shoulder tackle at the enemy alliance that was evaded leading to Meiko crashing through a pair of trees. Corot flipped gracefully in mid-air before kicking the blacksmith down. It didn't look like the impact carried that much force, likely Corot wasn't a physical combatant and just used this as a free hit exploiting an opening provided for her.

Mana's own hands blurred through the hand seals before she pointed her hands at the enemy and leaped out of the cover.

"Hell Skewer Jutsu!" she chanted quietly as Corot began frantically shaking and trying to block invisible attacks in mid-air. It was a simple scare tactic technique that made the enemy believe that swords were materializing from thin air and aiming to skewer them to the ground. It had absolutely no effect other than visual distraction but Mana wondered if she had allies hidden that could've exploited this opportunity.

The magician screamed out in pain as a sword pierced her own thigh and pinned it to the tree. Mana looked at the wound with teary eyes realizing how miniscule her chances were to fight her target now that her own bone was sticking out from her leg and blood was squirting from the wound where a sword was gapping from. A shocking painful sensation made her shaking frantically body freeze in a creeping up feeling of panic fear – her hand was also pinned up to the tree by another identical looking sword.

"Wait a second…" Mana realized that this technique matched none of the profiles of her previously observed enemies and it suspiciously matched her own genjutsu she just used. Now that her own mind realized the trick she just somehow cast on herself her hand weaved the needed hand seal with little to no trouble.

"Dispel!" she firmly shouted out as the swords slowly faded like a mirage together with her wounds.

How on earth did she get hit by her own illusion just now?


	296. Goats on a Bridge

"We're closing in on the summoner." Kiyomi's thoughts echoed in Mana's mind through the link. "I think Team Cirrus are working on the flaming sword guy."

"Wait." Mana quickly interrupted her friend. "She's got something. Some unknown ability, don't fire anything at her just yet. Try picking off the medical ninja first. I'll hold Corot here for a while."

"The numbers are on our side. If she summons something else we'll lose that advantage." Kiyomi tried to object.

"She reflected my genjutsu back at me somehow. Just think of what if that's an ability she can use to reverse your clan hijutsu. It will definitely make everything worse unless we learn what exactly happened there." Mana angrily snapped back at her friend.

An uncomfortable pause took over the link. For a moment there it was difficult to tell if the link was active at all. A short "I'll leave you to it then", issued by Kiyomi, ended the pause after the Yamanaka finally understood how much worse the situation could've gotten if Corot's abilities weren't properly analyzed.

"If that's true… You won't be able to use ninjutsu or genjutsu against her, can you do it?" Meiko wondered with a seed of worry in her thoughts. The signal was getting weaker as the two retreated slightly to assist Team Cirrus in picking off the splintered ninja of the Iwagakure alliance.

"It has to be me. I need to understand how her ability works." Mana firmly replied. Truth be told, the realization of the fact that she was left with nothing but her almost emptied card supply and entirely defensive and reactive martial arts style made Mana's heart skip a beat whenever she thought about it. When she put this plan together she really didn't realize what she was signing up for, it was ironic that the least analytical member of the Team Hokage brought this down to ground level.

A thud made Mana's eyes snap back open. She leaped off of the cover of the tree she was hiding behind. A kunai could've been tossed fast and hard enough, provided it was made as a custom order from tougher stuff than the bulky commons, to pierce right through even the toughest of wooden materials. If this specific kunai got stuck it could've meant only one thing – such was its purpose and the only kunai whose purpose was to be stuck to a barrier in the way was an explosive one.

A powerful blast scattered larger chunks of wood, several got stuck in Mana's flesh or scratched her shallowly by grazing by. The girl insisted and suppressed her chakra augmentations on purpose to save up some chakra and not to further kick her network out of balance. She knew that it'd hurt but she was in the safe zone, technically, her limbs wouldn't have been pulled apart at that distance, having reacted so early.

The magician extended her arm to stop her fall and swing off onto another branch a bit higher up. This time certain miniscule augmentations needed to be used, else her shoulder would've popped out. Sure, a more physically intimidating ninja may have pulled something like this off with just their physical training and impressive agility and strength but Mana was a different kind of ninja.

"I need to see Corot, get to see her up close. I need to see her deflect my jutsu, see if it's a weapon, a seal or a jutsu of her own." The kunoichi thought for herself. Her hands flashed through more hand seals. Her palm lit up with bright glow of concentrated chakra. By itself it was absolutely harmless, even if Mana punched someone with this glowing hand it'd have done no additional damage than just punching them normally. This was the one of the first illusions she made up but she rarely, if ever found a use for it. She never needed to be crappy on purpose…

There was a first time for everything. Mana dove down, using her unenhanced palm and her legs to swing from lower branches or to slow down her leap. She could pick up feint sounds of footsteps after her. There were certainly people used to a more mountainous environment, they walked like heavy machinery. They wouldn't have bothered of leaving traces behind, somewhere deep in their minds they were still walking not over the mossy brittle wood but on mountain rocks and minerals. It was something instilled, something learned and kept deep in one's subconscious. It needed to be eliminated and done so over time.

They weren't loud, the toughness of the ground their feet treaded usually warranted one learning to step silently. That being said, complete disappearance to a ninja's ears and eyes was something very few ninja could do. Most just accepted the common Academy training in stealth and variated very narrowly off of it.

Right after Mana's feet planted firmly on the mossy and wet forest dirt she quickly looked up. She couldn't see anything. They were fighting like ninja were supposed to, they'll try to pick her off. Yes, they. The footsteps Mana heard before, the rustling of leaves was too widespread, too rapid. There had to be multiple ninja involved in this.

However Mana wasn't planning on getting taken out by textbook techniques. She placed her glowing hand onto the ground and after her palm was lifted the glow stayed and flared momentarily. It was too weak a glow to signal someone but it was certainly direct enough to attract attention – genjutsu needed a medium to be transmitted. Sometimes the user needed to attract one's attention with an unusual object, a sound, often enough a glow sufficed. It was very useful for illusion using ninja to utilize such unusual environmental details – most ninja had remarkable perception and details rarely evaded their senses. That could've been used.

The glow on the ground faded completely. Feeling shock that her illusion didn't work Mana looked down. It wasn't reflected back at her like before. The illusion just ended. Mana could even feel it in her network – the illusion no longer demanded further chakra input of her. It was over.

A sword pierced Mana from behind, all the way through the chest. The magician's eyes widened in pain, tears ran down her cheeks before the entire frame shook like a bag of skin filled with fireflies trying their best to let loose before her body dissolved into flowery petals.

Mana couldn't let this opening go unpunished. Her mind raced trying to remember which of her pockets still had cards she hadn't used before. Just to give her more time to think she threw a pair of hook kicks, striking at her taller opponent using her upper leg before wrapping her leg around his neck and leaping over him. She landed a pair of palm strikes, targeting Hafred's nose. Anything to make his eyes tear up and mess up his precision with that sword.

The swordsman swung his blade around but he was just a cornered and desperate opponent. Mana could have probably dodged such desperate swipes even as she was still a depowered civilian. She had hoped that her greater than usual experience in the field before taking this exam would've helped out before this all started. This was one of those few moments where she felt a bit more skilled and experienced than her opponent. His nose was burning from being slammed and cracked, his eyes were teary. Not ideal conditions for prime swordsmanship.

Four small equestrians rammed straight into Mana's side. They were so fast, so silent. So that's why Corot wasn't here to back her friend up – she was still hidden, trying to conceal her uses of Summoning Jutsu and whatever skill allowed her to cancel or deflect back opponent's jutsu.

Mana gripped her sides as a taste of blood made itself present in her mouth. That must've been a pretty nasty impact, she wasn't expecting it. Even with elementary augmentations she only managed not to immediately get splattered and still took some damage inside. That blowback force from the iron skulls of those blasted ponies sent Mana sliding back and rolling all over the dirt, she had to augment her body in several places to avoid breaking bones needlessly in that powerful blowback.

Still, for someone granted an almost free hit on an unsuspecting opponent engaging in combat with another ninja so that said ninja didn't recover and attack more efficiently, those little ponies carried little kick to them. A higher rank summon would've easily knocked Mana out with such a successful hit.

This was good… Those two were so thrilled by hunting down Mana that they forgot that two of their alliance mates were now taking on five other genin.

"Is that all you've got?" Mana asked taunting her opponents. She needed them on edge, even if together they could've easily injured her or sidelined her.

"Corot, I'm going back to supporting the others. Your Folkrumnir counters her abilities the best, keep her away!" Hafred yelled out finally having come to the same realization Mana had come to. As the swordsman rushed up and away at immense speed, his Iwagakure teammate took his place. Now that she showed herself Mana realized what changed in the formula – she held a round, green and brown buckler in her arms with variously colored diamond and flower shaped enhancements.

This weapon must've been the means of deflecting and absorbing Mana's jutsu. While the magician was overall quite satisfied with her level of experience and skill in this exam, this encounter reminded her that she could've used having a technique to destroy such weaponry. Surely nothing of the sort could've been used in exactly identical situations, seeing how any technique would either get absorbed or deflected back at Mana, in general, an ability to destroy weaponry would benefit her greatly.

"A lightning bolt could do… But it'd have to be intense enough to be qualified as a B-Rank ninjutsu and I don't know if something like this could be learned easily." Mana thought to herself as Corot remained stationary and watching Mana. The kunoichi knew exactly why this was so, while Mana previously avoided showing off her abilities, what little she had shown and had deflected must've already made it clear for the summoner that she'd be unable to beat the magician. Her goal was to stand there and keep Mana from aiding her team.

After a brief stare-down of the two girls, Mana just fell on her butt and relaxed her back. Corot turned her head in confusion before lifting her shield up and holding it tighter to her body, the ponies also surrounded her in a closer circle, wary of somehow being tricked.

"What're you doing?" Corot asked, judging from her voice she was almost afraid to ask it, almost like the magician's revelation as to what exactly made her so relaxed and confident would reveal something terrible, something that'd just make it all hopeless for the Iwagakure girl.

"Backing down so both goats can pass. The difference is that while I'm going to pass second, I'll be passing to facing more stubborn goats whereas you'll be headed to a freedom. Although given how our society works – I'm supposed to feel like a big winner here!" Mana sighed.

"What do you mean? Explain!" Corot demanded as her ponies lowered their heads and prepared to charge for another painful tackle.

"Your goal is to keep me here – that's fine by me. Your shield blocks any low ranking techniques I can throw your way, you've efficiently restricted most of my options here. Fighting you hand to hand would make me spend too much effort, I don't know if you've noticed this but this forest is all about the economy of effort." Mana explained.

"So, if you submit, nothing stops me from beating you!" Corot took an aggressive step forward, "I could join my team and help them, they need all the numbers they can get!" she slowly reduced the space between herself and Mana.

"True. But we both know you can't beat me. Your ponies are a low ranked summon, I have experience with summons and higher ranked summons cost a load of chakra and aren't too cooperative with genin summoners. These guys would never touch me and you know it. You could summon some aid but I wonder how much chakra you've got left after summoning that B-Rank amphibian horse and these D-Ranks, plus unsealing your shield. The shield also takes its own chakra cost to use, doesn't it?"

"Don't assume to know anything about my Folkrumnir!" Corot warned Mana, she stopped moving in and her eyes appeared to be getting rid of their aggression as well.

"I know enough. It has two special abilities, both of them cost chakra to use, like a technique of their own. That's how weapon abilities work, right? It can either absorb and nullify or deflect back a ninjutsu or genjutsu technique, right? But not only it is limited by rank, you also can't choose which of the two the shield chooses." Mana smiled trying to befriend the Iwagakure kunoichi.

"And how do you know that?" Corot sat down as the ponies around her poofed away, returning to where they were summoned from.

"Well, the first genjutsu I've used was Hell Skewer Jutsu – a very specific imagery based low ranking technique. If reflected I'd have easily identified my own technique which I did and dispelled it. A smart kunoichi would've instead chosen to absorb it and make me think you're incapacitated, luring me in for a surprising counterattack. The second one was Many Faced Jutsu – a technique that creates mirage-like genjutsu copies of me that appear from the light on the ground, your shield absorbed it instead of confusing me with copies of you appearing. Something like that would've simply baffled me and given more chance for your comrade of catching me by surprise. The odd choices gave your shield away." Mana slowly and in detail explained it to the Iwagakure girl who just calmly listened, with her shield still raised up and placed in between Mana and Corot.

"What about the rank of the jutsu it affects? You've only used low ranking illusions, how would you know how it affects a higher ranked technique?" Corot wondered. By now she realized that Mana had a bit more experience than her and was more curious than wishing to escalate a fight between them, especially given that the magician submitted so easily to just sitting this one out.

"A shield that affects all ranks of any abilities would simply be too powerful for a genin to wield. A village would not entrust a tool so priceless to a genin who is as likely to die in battle against a more powerful enemy as they are to accidentally lose it. Then there's the unwritten rule of chakra usage – commensurability. Usually to dispel or break a technique a chakra input matching it or greater needs to be applied. You'd simply not possess the chakra to wield a tool capable of such a wide reaching ability. I was completely assured of it when your shield failed to affect my Flower Petal Sanctuary Jutsu which is a B-Rank genjutsu technique, it also didn't affect Kiyomi's mental link technique, my guess is because it was used before the shield was unsealed." Mana shrugged.

"You're right. About almost everything… Folkrumnir is a shield entrusted to me by my grandfather and you've pretty much pinned down what it does. However the cost of chakra to use it doesn't come from me, the shield feeds itself from the jutsu it absorbs." Corot admitted.

"That's a pretty strong ability. Let's keep it a secret from Meiko – the armored teammate of mine. She'll be all over your shield if she finds out and will probably try to challenge you for it." Mana laughed out.

For a brief minute Corot shared that laugh before getting serious. "Why didn't you keep fighting? Don't you wish to support your own alliance? With your experience I'm sure you'd have beaten me eventually."

"I already told you – it'd have been pointless. I'd have wasted chakra, I'd have gotten injured and injured you. Before I used to not like fighting in general, now I really despise pointless fights. Plus, my team isn't used to fighting alongside Team Cirrus, I'd probably just have gotten in their way." Mana replied, slipping back in her memories to how she was before meeting Guru Ayushi and Hanasaku-sensei. Where Tanshu wanted to make a killer out of her, without compromises, Hanasaku and Ayushi tried to just shift her ideals into a more favorable direction creating the Mana that she was right now.

"So then there's a point in stopping us from beating Team Cirrus?" Corot pondered.

"Several." Mana nodded.

A party of ninja approached Mana and Corot, the six were surprised to see Mana and Corot just peacefully talking over things. Inaba, Quill-B and Junipu-R appeared to be mostly alright, so were Meiko and Kiyomi. They had several small scratches and bruises but nothing major that a little rest couldn't fix. Surprisingly enough Steinck also followed the temporary alliance of Team Cirrus and Team Hokage. He held on his shoulders the knocked out bodies of the other alliance mates of his.

"I'm sorry, Steinck. If I'd have come to rejoin you – she'd have followed and rejoined the enemy." Corot apologized her alliance comrade.

"It's fine. She must've realized that there was no need for her to be there. Somehow those five knew to focus specific targets. They just sat on our asses until they landed the successful hit." Steinck grunted angrily while looking away, clearly ashamed by his loss.

"Mana told us how to fight, the Team Cirrus guys knew which people were whose actual teammates." Kiyomi triumphantly smiled. She looked at Mana and nodded, her eyes were much softer than before and it looked like while the deep insult of the magician choosing to betray her own comrades rather than her ideals still hurt, Kiyomi was willing to look past it.

"I see. So you've eliminated the two members that were both members of separate teams, seeing how the alliance was made between two teams with one eliminated member in each – further fighting is now pointless. Corot and Steinck are from separate teams. I was too busy analyzing their abilities to think of such a simple solution." Mana admitted with a smile.

"Me and Erblau were members of Team Monazite. Seeing how Corot's Team Rutile is also from Iwagakure we kind of knew each other. We've both lost our teammates early on so we could've used each other's help… We lost our genjutsu user – Kepdur, Team Rutile lost their ninjutsu powerhouse – Vespiga. I guess alliance was ultimately just a temporary solution that prolonged the inevitable." The towering genin angrily admitted to himself as he was clearly frustrated over getting eliminated from the exam.

"Well then, now that we've helped you survive the attack of Iwagakure's alliance unscathed, I want to challenge Junipu-R to a one-on-one fight." Mana nonchalantly declared. "Junipu-R is my target."


	297. Wild Dances

„You damn, dirty snake, I'ma make your slimy fangs ache!" Inaba angrily grunted holding his fist up and tensing himself up. The only reason why he didn't lash out and strike at Mana was because her teammates were close enough and Meiko has proven herself to be fast enough to intercept him midway.

"So that's your plan…" Kiyomi thought out loud before shrugging her shoulders lazily and looking around at the wildly unstable Kumogakure shortie and his darker tanned teammate who just calmly observed Mana's further actions.

"If you want me, you should've let them beat us up. Just watch us lose to them. What gives?" Junipu-R squinted angrily at Mana, stabbing with her eyes like they possessed the ability to poison somebody.

"It's pretty simple, really. I want to change the world, make it value life as something magical, just like I do. I hate causing people pain, I hate fighting meaningless battles…" Mana began explaining.

"So you're guilt tripping Junipu-R into fighting you alone. Just because you helped her and because accepting this deal can spare our participation in the exams further…" Quill-B grinded through his teeth. It was clear as day that his opinion of Mana changed from when he first saw her.

"I'm not manipulating anything. I just wanted to give Junipu-R an option to settle this by ourselves and spare our teammates the trouble. The participation of the Iwagakure alliance would've ruined that idea. By now you guys must know that three on three battles are terribly wasteful." Mana shook her head beginning to plead Junipu, her tone softened to match her lowered position somewhat.

"I don't think you know how this ninja thing works, you need to take your X out, no fireworks!" Inaba grinded his teeth again, like a dog ready to pounce but still restrained by the leader of his pack. Judging from the eyes of Team Cirrus, as Mana observed them, that was Quill-B.

"Jeez… She once stole a bag of food pills and she still won't let that go, if she stabbed someone in the back while they're peeing, or something, we'd never hear the end of it!" Kiyomi groaned.

Both Inaba and Junipu were switching their sights from Mana to Quill-B, watching both. One deserved a portion of their attention just to have her actions surveyed, the other, meanwhile, called most of the shots in Team Cirrus. Quill instead chose to look calmly at Junipu-R and ask a simple question.

"Do you think you can do it?"

Junipu lowered her head submissively before her eyes wandered off aside. She was clearly unsure, Mana didn't show her abilities off too much so it was tough for a non-sensor kunoichi to just go on a hunch. Mana, on the other hand, saw a general skeleton of R's abilities. She could begin formulating a plan, figuring out ways of how to overcome the Kumogakure kunoichi.

"It doesn't matter if I can or cannot do it. I need to." Junipu-R firmly declared by nodding her head.

"But you provide our team support, fighting head-on isn't your forte!" Inaba looked hopelessly at his teammate.

Just looking at all the emotions in the eyes of the Kumogakure ninja made Mana feel like scum. And yet it couldn't have been helped – she needed to fight, she needed to win. It wasn't a fight she was used to, not like the others. Mana wasn't fighting for someone's life or a chance to save it, she was protecting absolutely no one. This fight was bloody and dirty and completely selfish – just a primitive need to further herself in the competition and advance to a higher rank. It made the magician feel dirty and made her want to clean herself for hours after this, not even for the reasons of personal hygiene after being stuck in the Forest of Death for so long.

Honestly, it shouldn't have felt this bad. Mana didn't like that feeling of guilt crawling up from inside her lungs and all the way up to her throat before locking it with a cold and strangling grip. She went out of her way to give R an option to leave her teammates out of this, to have her team still survive in the exams even she lost, have them remain completely unharmed in this battle.

Steinck carefully placed his unconscious friends nearby and settled down. "We've raised some noise to these parts, if an enemy comes looking we'll help keep this matter between the two of them." The giant declared after looking at Corot who also nodded in agreement.

"Fine. We'll make it a sparring match." Junipu-R nodded. "A one on one fight until one of us is knocked out and unable to battle. I don't think either of us would trust each other with a surrender clause?"

"I would've…" Mana shyly admitted before rubbing her itchy nose, allowing her dark hair to cover her blushed face.

"Wanna call the countdown, Inaba?" Junipu-R looked at her teammate curiously.

"Are you speaking seriously? Asking a rapper to count down is total idiocy" Inaba crossed his arms around his chest.

"You're not a real rapper, Inaba, no one trusts you with a microphone back home." Quill-B rubbed his temples before calmly walking a few steps back and settling down on a larger stone. An old and mossy testament of an old structure that got totaled around these parts with a part of it landing all the way there.

"I'll do it!" Meiko ecstatically jumped up, "Finally taking on one of our targets is a refreshing change of pace for us!" she chuckled before extending her hand forward.

After the redhead finished counting down from three to one and swiped her hand signaling the beginning of the sparring fight Junipu took a wild dive sideways, shooting her arm out to calm her momentum down and steady her aim. Mana hadn't yet seen this movements and aiming this unorthodox, instinctively she reached for her cufflink trying to pull out a pair of clutch bladed cards to deflect any ninja tools being thrown her way.

Nothing slipped out.

With there being no time or proper balancing to her body, Mana covered up her face with her arm feeling sharp pain in her mid and lower arm. It was just senbon… While needles this long and this sharp penetrating her flesh and hitting the bone with their tips, damaging them ever so slightly, hurt immensely, Mana wondered why would Junipu-R use such a weak manner of attack for what basically ended up a free hit. She hadn't anticipated her card reserves having run down so drastically after taking down Clarmac with her newly improvised move.

A painful blast of force sent the magician rolling forward on the ground and struggle to pick herself up. The Kumogakure kunoichi had used the opening to move behind Mana with what she thought as a strong knockout kick to the back of her head. Sadly, Junipu's taijutsu skill, precision and chakra level was nowhere near the level needed to knock someone as experienced and skilled as Mana out immediately. Not that the magician didn't momentarily regret not having been knocked out as her busted and bleeding head let droplets of blood run down her sticky dark hair.

"You're lucky not to have blocked that kick…" Junipu smiled. It was a confident smile of a girl who thought she had the control of the battle, then again, while Mana felt like this display of force and exploit of an opening gave her confidence in the fact that she could eventually take Junipu-R down, R very much was in control so far.

Mana's eyes lingered down on the bunch of senbon still sticking deep in her arm. The girl's eyes widened for a moment before she pulled them out in a hurry, Junipu-R probably meant to drive them in and through the magician's bone by having Mana block her slow and relatively well telegraphed kick with the same arm. That'd have likely disabled her arm completely for the duration of the exam. As the bloody senbon hit the wet grass, clinging against each other in a high pitch, Kiyomi's pleading voice reached Mana.

"Get yourself together! What was that?"

She must've been confused, rightly so. Mana she knew was faster, smarter, stronger, more elusive. That one hitch with the missing cards threw the magician's entire fight out of its rhythm. It couldn't have happened again, it won't.

The girl's hand dragged through the bloody and wet grass picking up her fallen hat. Junipu once again tried to intercept the magician's actions with a well-placed barrage of shuriken. After the ninja tools left the kunoichi's hands they instantly raced to weave a bunch of hand seals.

"Multi-Shuriken Jutsu!" she chanted out as the shuriken multiplied four times over and expanded into a cloud of steel which all of itself was a pretty serious threat to Mana's health and, quite possibly, her life.

A metallic sounding chain of clangs symbolled the fact that the shuriken incoming at the magician got completely deflected by Meiko's masterfully crafted wand of Audra steel which was gifted to Mana and came out from the seal in the magician's hat. The girl's heart skipped a couple of beats, she had never before deflected this many tools with this much success. Only when she realized that it wasn't too much different from redirecting strikes and counter attacking, treating the wand as an extension of her own body, that Mana realized she could do it.

Without wasting any time, Mana extended the wand while weaving hand seals with her free hand.

"Magical Shock Jutsu!" she chanted out as a beam of lightning chakra channeled through the chakra conductive Audra wand fired off at Junipu-R's general direction. Had it connected it'd have meant a painful shock for her opponent, also a temporary opening for Mana's more powerful attacks to come. After all, while she did successfully invent about a dozen techniques as a child, with this one being one of them, neither of them was of much actual use besides being flashy distractions.

The poor Kumogakure girl extended her arm forward, like a primitive self-defense instinct as the beam passed through and into her body. It was not a piercing lightning chakra projectile, merely a jolt of electricity capable only of painfully shocking the enemy. Still… When the other part of the beam exited through Junipu's other hand and blasted into the air before dissolving a pair of meters higher Mana's jaw opened up. That was no primitive covering oneself up, it was a controlled sealing technique transferring the jutsu upwards.

"It's that transportation seal she used before…" the magician realized before finally observing the small glyphs on Junipu's hands. "It was performed imperfectly though, she probably strained her chakra network with that. There were no hand seals, no name for the jutsu to help her body cope with the strain."

"Don't do that again!" Mana angrily scolded her opponent.

Junipu curiously raised her eyebrow.

"Don't treat your body like a rag like that! Don't abuse your network and spit at all rules of control. You can tear your entire network apart and it might ruin your life!" Mana pleaded with her opponent. Granted, she did so out of her own personal experience. It was she herself, after all, who abused chakra augmentation, something most genin should've had nothing to do with, to the point where it tore her system apart once.

Junipu's face changed into a warmer smile. "You're not a bad person, I can tell. You really were concerned about my team before, weren't you?"

"I'm not just picking on you. Obviously, I don't want both of us to fight needlessly beyond the point of reason. We've already been through a fight like that…"

The Kumogakure kunoichi then swiftly moved her hands into a hand seal position. Mana just prepared herself for an upcoming attack, having realized that she had little to no ninja tools to waste on simple distractions. The magician decided to instead rely on her evasive skills rather than get lured into an overly aggressive attack while trying to interrupt her opponent's hand seals.

"Transportation Seal!" Junipu-R yelled out as bright circular glyphs of much larger size and intensity extended around her hands as discs. Junipu placed one of them on the ground while throwing the other one Mana's general direction. The magician just smiled faintly.

"Magical Sparks Jutsu!" she chanted out firing a flock of her own Lightning Release chakra sparks through the secondary seal which closed down after absorbing most of them with the sparks blasting out from the one below Junipu-R. While Mana's technique wasn't overly damaging it still knocked the girl off her feet forcing her to roll backwards and prepare a kunai knife in her hand and get ready to defend from follow-up attacks which didn't come.

"The weakness of your technique is that your opponent can use it, if they know how it works…" Mana calmly stated while standing still.

"You didn't attack me just now, then you also failed to block that attack before…" Junipu-R mumbled to herself but Mana's superhuman ninja perception allowed her to pick up on bits and pieces of it. The Kumogakure kunoichi jumped at Mana with the kunai in her hand having come to the conclusion that Mana's poor hand to hand showings and reluctance to engage in close distance combat must've meant her lack of skill in it.

The magician leaned aside avoiding a simple strike and gently redirected Junipu's kick to where it threw the girl off of her balance and she stumbled. When Mana leaped in to exploit this opening by cracking at Junipu's knees from the side, effectively crippling the opponent temporarily, the Kumogakure kunoichi pushed off her body with her arms kicking at Mana's barely timed block.

Mana jumped back, she wasn't used to blocking. Blocking just a single strike by even a less physical opponent made her forearms twitch with pain before going numb. Exploiting this brief moment of numbness Junipu leaped in with swift jump kicks and palm strikes. Interestingly enough, this Kumogakure youngster had a very similar fighting style to what Mana used to use before learning her improvised newer one. One key difference was her unorthodox movements on the ground, using her arms and legs to spin around, almost like an entire dance on the floor turned to a fighting style.

Mana couldn't compete with those fast strikes, spin sweeps and rising palm strikes. Not with her numbed arms so she tried weaving away but for each one of her movements was a well-timed rolling kick or a strange headspin kick. It reminded the magician of Quill-B's style of swordsmanship. This must've been native to the region, this curious case of floor dancing.

"Mana is getting tagged, that's pretty impressive…" Meiko smiled after relaxing her aching neck and stretching out.

"Yet you seem awfully confident and relaxed, pale-skin" Quill-B noticed coldly.

"Sure, Junipu-R is clearly an unskilled and untrained taijutsu combatant. Mana hasn't really fought someone like that, she hasn't seen these wild strings and random strikes so her defensive style sort of falls short. Once Mana will see all of Junipu's moves she'll map them out and beat her easily. Anyways, which one of you likes instant spaghetti?" the redhead carelessly waved her arm.

Inaba raised his hand.

"Wanna share some, beanie guy?" Meiko winked his way.

"Are you crazy or do you just not care? Instant food is useless without boiling water. That's how it's best to be prepared, instant spaghetti ain't no simple matter." Inaba cheeked at the girl who just waved her hand.

"Just throw me a pack, scrub." She bellowed.

Mana fell on her back again and only avoided getting painfully grinded to the dirt because her opponent who couldn't even breathe properly when throwing strikes ran out of breath. The magician rolled back clutching at her aching ribs, cracked teeth and bleeding nose. Her right eye felt like just about swelling up. She couldn't believe that she still couldn't properly weigh and map out Junipu's style. She skipped so many blows and her moves were almost impossible to read. She could've sworn she faced some Kumogakure martial artists in the Sun Disc arena and none of them fought this way. It must've been a signature style of the newer generation, half dance, half fighting style.

"At this rate I may need to spit at my own advice and start augmenting myself more intensely instead of relying on my natural strength." Mana realized as the natural fear of losing her chakra control sparked in her chest again. She would've rather died than felt so powerless again, so crippled and unable to live up to her dream.

Mana's hands weaved a single hand seal as she tried catching her opponent's gaze with the tip of her wand. When Junipu's head began turning left and right in panic and she desperately tried to avoid thin air Mana knew that her illusion connected.

"Hell Skewer Jutsu!" she mumbled out to herself. It was such a simple illusion – appearance of decorative swords, similar to ones Mana used as stage props during her magic shows. She had seen that image so often, hundreds if not thousands of times that she's been able to recreate it with extra accuracy and lifelike qualities. She's been accidentally cut so many times by failing to do a trick just right, making the audience member's heart skip wondering if they've finally witnessed a trick going wrong, that she's been able to perfectly recreate the pain of those swords grazing her. Such a simple illusion was difficult to tell from reality.

Mana's hands raced through more hand seals. The swords that grazed and penetrated her opponent forcing wild screams of pain to come from her chest evaporated in thin air as the magician chose to dispel the illusion herself. She extended her wand forward again.

"Finger of Fate Jutsu!" the magician chanted out as she pointed her wand forward and a gust of wind extended onwards from the tip, aimed right at the center of Junipu's thigh. Thinking it was another illusion and not wanting to be caught in a chain of genjutsu that'd have worn her down to no end the Kumogakure ninja instinctively weaved the dispelling hand seal and tried dispelling it.

As the weak cutting blast of wind chakra pierced Junipu's thigh about as strongly and deeply as a kunai knife would've the young kunoichi must've realized that this technique was no illusion. Clutching her bleeding thigh the girl collapsed on her knee realizing that her odd taijutsu style may be immensely more difficult to rely on with this injury.


	298. The Empirical Clause

Kiyomi's tapped her foot uneasily as if a terrifying theme of a tense thriller was running. She wasn't sure why but she was worried about Mana more than she'd have liked the people around her to see. She put up a tough façade but every time Junipu-R's peculiar attacks landed on the magician opening up a new bruise the blonde noisily objected.

"She shouldn't be taking this much damage…" the Yamanaka expressed her worries. "She's better than this, she should be able to dodge those attacks!"

"Not really. I'd have trouble dodging them too. Mana hadn't yet fought an opponent who has little to no experience and training fighting hand to hand. She honed her skills in a martial arts grinding house arena seeing and being trained by the best of the best. She probably can't understand it herself but that lack of experience facing someone as bad as she used to be is hindering her…" Meiko shrugged after sinking her teeth into the dried up pack of noodles that were so dry that they cracked and crumbled like biscuits.

"Tsk… This makes no sense!" the blonde objected, truthfully she just refused to believe that the magician had taken much more hits than it was healthy for any combatant to take willingly before changing their strategy.

"Usually when a skilled ninja faces this problem they augment their body to withstand the skipped strikes until those lacking strikes are all mapped out. Mana must be saving her chakra for something else, she probably doesn't see the threat in those strikes." Meiko began analyzing the exchange of fists and feet more carefully.

"You're the best close range combatant out of us three. Is there any hope for Mana to win?" Kiyomi asked with a worried expression.

"If you asked me – she's already won. Junipu-R tossed everything she had – every odd looking combination and Mana's already beginning to see through them. Just look at it carefully. Unless her opponent launches something huge soon, something to knock Mana out with a single hit – R will lose." Meiko smiled confidently before asking Inaba to give her another pack of spices to enhance the taste of her bland unprepared snack.

"Please don't call Junipu just R, nicks are solely for friends to refer." Inaba calmly noted.

There was some truth to Meiko's words. Mana was beginning to see pathways around Junipu-R's odd dancing fighting style. She saw dozens of openings for swift counterattacks and yet she restrained herself from exploiting them – that's exactly what lead her to getting hit the last handful of times. Now Mana was just using the space advantage she was creating to see all the strings and wait until Junipu will begin repeating them. Bit by bit, Mana was seeing where the dancers' legs could stretch, how far her reach was and how much she favored each limb. Small details like that were beginning to draw a profile and soon, the magician felt, her opponent would no longer be able to as much as touch her.

"One thing that's bothering me though…" Meiko scratched her head. "Why doesn't Mana use her odd flower petal illusion thing? She could've avoided getting hit each and every time…"

"From what she told me before, I gather that that the strain of that technique increases drastically every time it is used. It then takes days of time for the cost to reset again." Kiyomi replied calmer, now having seen the bigger picture of what seemed like a losing battle before.

Junipu's long spinning overhead kick got blocked by Mana's daring dive in. Just as the second leg of the Kumogakure kunoichi snapped back hooking on the magician's neck and locking around it in a crushing stranglehold Mana's own push kick blasted off into the girl's chest throwing her like a ragdoll flying away and smashing into nearby trees.

Mana wiped the traces of blood on her mouth crawling out from a cracked lip and wondered deep inside if she could even outlast her opponent like previously expected. Slowly she was beginning to gain the advantage on close distance encounters and she had already revealed to her enemy that their ace technique was useless against Mana. Normally she'd have had this fight in the bag, that being said, as the magician's vision blurred and her right eye began to swell up she wondered if she could even outlast her opponent to that point of certain victory.

The opponent's king piece was already within sight. Her own pieces were about to launch an imminent and crushing siege on it in just four turns, still, the Konohagakure kunoichi wondered if she was to have any pieces left to enact that finishing maneuver in four turns.

Junipu must've been thinking the same thing. Her thigh was bleeding quite relentlessly and it was no small deal. Mana's combination of illusionary and ninjutsu attacks tricked her into skipping a real deal right through her leg which slowed her down greatly. It skipped Mana's victorious climb to success a couple of turns but it may not have been enough. All the little pawns she lost and sacrificed in the beginning of the game were beginning to really leave the feeling of choking on options.

The magician's hands raced through hand seals, the opponent tried to interrupt her but somewhere halfway through her mad dash to kick Mana in the face, struggling through the pain of a stabbed through and bleeding thigh, Junipu-R realized that Mana's hand seal speed was hopeless to match or interrupt. Not by anyone on the genin level. That area of expertise required the equivalent of space travel of hand seals to match.

There it was – Junipu-R got lazy and desperate. She had devoted so much effort and speed into this dash to interrupt Mana that she decided to finish it. The girl leaned forward thrusting her hands to the ground while her back leg bent over her back and her head in an odd looking upside kick aimed at Mana's face. The magician caught her opponent's hand with her glowing hand while she placed her other hand right up to Junipu-R's face.

"Many-Faced Jutsu!" Mana chanted with a smile, knowing that there was no way for her opponent to avoid the stimuli of bright light emanating from her hands at that distance. The illusion got initiated.

As countless copies of Mana appeared from a glowing hole in the ground the Kumogakure kunoichi did her best to deliver a head spin kick, a back handed elbow strike or any other improvised manner of strike to the illusionary clones that appeared. All of them dissolved right after being hit like mirages of bright flashing light. Having successfully faded from her opponent's view Mana prepared for her finishing attack.

Junipu-R used out so much chakra for augmenting her abilities before, for breaking her own physical and mental limits. Mana knew that with a pair of precise strikes in places where the girl didn't expect them with her guard all lowered she'd go to sleep. Carefully walking up from behind her opponent Mana opened up her fist to a palm and prepared for the strike at the side of Junipu's other leg. A pop to the backside of her knee will cripple her, then a quick strong spear kick to the back of her head will knock her out…

"What are you doing punching air? She's behind you so better beware!" Inaba yelled out shocking Mana that he'd interfere like that.

Something changed, Junipu's body lit up with flames, as the magician's eyes looked back at her opponent she noticed that R placed her hands in the Tiger hand seal position and her entire body felt like it was pulsing with immense chakra pressure. From this up close – there was no need of sensory to know what's coming up.

Using all of her ingenuity, all of her agility and all over her gathered information on Junipu's movements Mana carefully navigated around the girl's blazing foot as wherever the breakdancing ninja tossed her kicks a blazing projectile of Fire Release chakra scorched through.

"Crap!" Mana screamed out as her aching back made her botch a proper lean backwards and a blazing fireball grazed her chest slightly tearing off the bandages and singing them off – exposing the past wounds. The girl fell to the ground clutching at the wound, the heat wasn't intense enough to knock her out even after direct contact but it still was enough to cauterize the reopened wound almost instantly. The painful pulsing sensation in her body made it impossible to stand back up, like miniature hot glass pieces being driven all through her body.

"You inbred son of a special person!" Quill-B shouted smacking Inaba in the back of the head. "You interrupted in the fight!"

Only then did Junipu realize what happened, her face changed into shock as she ran up to Mana observing her wounds.

"I'm sorry. I… My body acted all by itself! I didn't realize what happened – right after hearing that information I just…" she began crying out excuses. The fact that she exploited her teammate's interruption must've greatly troubled her.

With a painful grunt Mana rolled back on her knees and stood back up, tying the remaining rags of her clothes together into something resembling a protection against colder breezes and parasitic insects.

"It's fine, let's continue this…" the magician coughed out as her chest still felt the crushing pressure against it and it felt like all the air in her lungs had been burnt out by the fireball that just narrowly missed her body.

"Hey! What kind of childish nonsense is this? Let Mana take a minute to rest or let her take a food pill. This hit was dirty." Kiyomi yelled out energetically, growling like a caged animal that wanted to let her fangs and claws out on the people attacking her pack.

Hearing such intense defense from a friend whom Mana thought she may have surely lost gave the magician some new life and confidence. A smile covered the beaten magician's face and somehow at that point she realized – it's all going to be alright. Kiyomi is still her older sister. No matter what Hokage-sensei said, no matter what quarrels made their friendship bitter, they're too close at this point for it all to end like that.

"I don't need rest. If we take a break Junipu-R will get some rest as well so it's not an equalizer. Let's just finish this now." Mana happily replied looking at Kiyomi with friendly and inspiringly warm eyes.

Kiyomi's own bright blue visual orbs lit up with trust for her friend's judgment before a firm nod.

Little by little the magician sent orders for her body to move her limbs one by one. She wanted to see just how potent and quick was response. As expected she was just too injured and thrown off balance by that last attack. While Mana's perception remained just as sharp, her body was far past its prime condition and to the enhanced ninja perception of time it looked like an entire eternity before her limbs responded. She could probably still weave hand seals, if only she prepared and raised her hands up first.

Mana wondered if she could properly avoid her opponent's attacks now. She had Junipu's style all mapped out and she could've easily just walked past her assault unharmed and counterattack harmlessly at some point. That being said, her mind and her body no longer worked in sync anymore. There was significant lag between what Mana thought to do and when she performed the action. Just as her plan went, Mana raised her hands up. Hand seals was the only thing that she could do better than her opponent at that moment.

"What's wrong? I told you to continue…" Mana taunted her opponent.

"That's right but… You kind of have me at an impasse." Junipu admitted with laughter.

"Oh? So that's it for your abilities then? No more hidden aces?" Mana then realized what her opponent meant.

"Right. If I perform my Transportation Seal you'll simply use your own jutsu as a counter and use it against me. If I attack you physically you'll once again interrupt my attack with an illusion which I'll be rushing head-on into. I'm sort of out of options." The Kumogakure genin admitted.

"Then surrender. I'll trust your word that you'll quit the exam." Mana replied.

"No. Not yet… That isn't how this exam is supposed to go. You must knock out your target and you can't really do that in your tired and bruised condition either, can you? You yourself are afraid to attack me too. Else you'd have long since pressed an offensive on me."

"No. My fighting style is completely defensive. Every technique, every move in my arsenal serves as a defensive measure. I'm waiting for your move." Mana shut down her opponent's theory. "I can assure you that I have profiled and understood your unique fighting style and am able to crush it."

"You're bluffing!" Junipu-R confidently declared before launching her body at Mana. Her knees shot forward and her entire body bent backwards at her lower back, throwing herself forward like being shot from a catapult at an impressive speed. While this was a new move, previously unseen in Junipu's arsenal, at this point the magician knew which strings it was supposed to lead into. She could predict what strikes and combinations would follow.

"She'll be rolling first. She prefers overhead ground attacks…" Mana thought to herself as she thrust her left leg to the side blocking her opponent's roll and with a hard push shoving her opponent back on her feet – back where she was out of her comfort zone. With a single movement Mana threw the entire dancing routine out of balance. Junipu-R threw a sloppy palm strike but the magician ordered the precise movements to counter it before even the rolling attempt to stick to the floor.

Mana's wrist grabbed Junipu's wrist firmly as her other hand slammed the palm right into the girl's nose, letting go of the wrist entrapment just temporarily to throw her off balance before reapplying the same entrapment and driving the same palm at the elbow snapping it upsides and throwing a palm hook upwards to knock the Kumogakure kunoichi on the floor. This time she was too dazed to perform her dance. It required sensitive balance and timing to perform all the flips, jumps, head spins and overhead attacks.

After Junipu's guard returned back to its place the panicking opponent jumped and vaulted back a couple of times to put distance between Mana and herself. The girl was shaking, stumbling and bleeding from her nose as well as clutching her backwards sticking arm.

"I told you, I'm ready to accept and trust your surrender. You yourself said there's nothing else you can do here. It's over." Mana pleaded, still standing still, wary of taking a simple step forward so that her opponent doesn't assume she's trying to take control and assume dominance of some kind. If Junipu-R was to do the reasonable thing she shouldn't have felt cornered.

"There's something I can do!" Junipu-R firmly declared after grabbing her busted arm with her healthy one and pulling intensely while an immense air pressure fired off from it. Mana had seen this and done so several times before herself not to recognize Junipu's last resort. She was using chakra augmentation as a mean for her busted arm to work.

"Don't do this." Mana calmly advised her opponent by raising her palm up and taking a calm step backwards. "I have fallen for this temptation before – thinking it's OK to do this just once. Prolong my life just by little bit to keep on fighting using chakra augmentation. It cost me everything I held dear, it cost me my own identity. It's not something genin should do at all. Please…"

Junipu's hands bent over and took a hand seal position. Knowing that she could weave a hand seal with her single extended hand Mana didn't antagonize her opponent by preparing to defend herself.

"You don't understand!" Junipu cried out. Her voice began to shake as her hands raced through hand seals. One after the other, one after the other in a combination that extended into the hundreds. Had an ordinary civilian watched this battle he'd have actually been able to perceive Junipu's movements as a blur which served as a testament of how many hand seals she placed in this last resort of hers. "I have my target." That single explanation was all she offered to help Mana understand.

So that was it. Junipu-R had already taken down her target which meant that if given the mercy of walking to the gate and surrendering she'd have tremendous difficulty and regret doing it. It was a very artificially planted reason, a foolish one to spit at one's own vitality and chakra network but she was young, about as old as Mana but evidently not as experienced. It must've been her first time fighting against such odds, being driven so far whereas to Mana it was an almost every other day occurrence.

"I trust you to be strong. To make the right choice. I trust you to be able to do it, to walk away from this all and return stronger." Mana shouted out like a mother scolding a child, except this time the child was about her age.

"She won't do it!" Quill-B interfered by raising his voice. "To a Kumogakure ninja, a kunoichi from a country so closely and deeply intertwined with the Iron Country samurai and the bushido code to walk away with their objective already completed would be unthinkable. If she is behaving as foolishly as you claim she is – finish her off before she crosses the line."

Tears ran down Junipu-R's face. "Don't make me do it. Don't make me choose between surrender and deceit."

Mana understood her opponent's dilemma. She was basically forced to either surrender and quit while she has already fulfilled her objective to hunt down her target or to lie to Mana's face. Usually to a ninja it'd be absolutely no problem to lie to someone's face but it visibly plagued Junipu to do so. Mana's trusting and warm attitude towards her made it more difficult to betray the magician's trust, in a way, the Kumogakure girl was already broken which made her desperate. Desperation made her dangerous.

"I could show her the Flower Petal Sanctuary, show her that I'm able to dodge anything she throws at me and that she'll be damaging her network for no reason… But if I do, I may not have enough chakra to pay the enlarged cost again – if I show it off and she decides to attack me anyways, I'll get taken out." Mana grit her teeth beginning to grind them angrily as she struggled to find the right words or options and judging from the expanding air pressure her opponent was done.

"Mass Transportation Seal Jutsu!" Junipu-R shouted out as she began throwing glyph after glyph Mana's way, creating a massive system of small transportation seal discs around the magician, this time she placed no seal right beside herself to avoid being countered. That meant she needed a precise hit on the right seal close to Mana.

"Stop!" Mana screamed out. "My nindo… The thing I tried to accomplish my entire life had to tackle the fact that people aren't tools. That they can't be useful or useless. That life by itself is valuable. For once just swallow your damned pride, your stupid code and stop crippling yourself!"

"Could you?" Junipu-R whimpered to herself as her body lit up with Fire Release chakra and she began dancing again, firing off dozens of fireballs Mana's way that upon missing got absorbed by the complicated transportation seal system and transferred right back at the magician from another angle. It was the absolute excess of all of Junipu's abilities. While Mana would've gotten absolutely incinerated and greatly injured had she remained standing, unable to avoid all of attacks from all the angles, this time the cleverly kept in her pocket Flower Petal Sanctuary pulled her out as her shape dissolved into flower petals and her real body disappeared from the view of anyone within the area of the genjutsu effect.

"She's right…" Mana cried out in her own thoughts. "I couldn't step over my own principles, my own nindo to protect my life. How am I supposed to save her if I myself am such a hypocrite? No words will make her stand down… No words would make me stand down and swallow my own nindo." She pondered as the magician calmly walked up to the exhausted girl in front of her.

The moment she'd tense up her muscles and chakra flow intensified for an attack she'd become visible again. Even so, if she could quickly take her opponent out before she could pull that crazy trick once again, this time tearing her body apart for sure… No. Violence won't be Mana's answer. It has been for far too long. The magician threw her first forward stopping it right by Junipu's face right before she became traceable by the others' perception again and the magician's illusion of flower petals faded.

"What are you doing!? I'll kill you from this close, I'll do it, I'll attack you again!" Junipu cried out.

"Go ahead, I'll just dissolve again revealing that this is all just another illusion and afterwards your network will surely be torn and your body broken and unable to manipulate chakra ever again." Mana falsely encouraged her opponent, acting like she could perform another use of her illusionary technique when in fact it'd surely push her to the point of exhaustion where she'd pass out for certain.

"My team needs me…" Junipu cried out. "My friends… My village."

"You'll be hurting all of them if you do this. They'll all be disappointed if you break your body apart, they're your friends after all. Being reckless and dying or crippling yourself is the easy part, facing your loved ones afterwards is what hurts the most. Trust me, I've been in your shoes before." Mana came up closer while lowering her hand. At this distance Junipu could've probably attacked the magician a different way but something told Mana she wouldn't.

"How did… How did you deal with it?" the Kumogakure kunoichi wondered.

"I've lost people. People I loved." Mana admitted while looking away. "I gave up my chakra control to save a life of a criminal and my lifelong friend died in my quest to restore it. I live in grief and debt everyday but what hurts the most is the feeling of inevitability, knowing that if given the chance to change something I'd likely do it all over again the same way. There's none of that in your case, you can still do the right thing."

Junipu raised her hand to remove the headband tied to her arm and let it gently slip through her fingers down by Mana's feet. After it fell the girl leaned over to pick it up and tie it back where it was.

And just like that R invoked the surrender clause.


	299. Bigger World Ahead

Mana smiled at her target. For once her attempt to shake the foundations beneath the set in stone ninja system and the truths ingrained within the minds of everyone living in it brought some fruit. For once she didn't feel guilty about the way she won in. As she had come to learn previously from many dear people and experiences – fighting in this world was inevitable but, for the first time, Mana felt in control and knew the perfect balance of fighting and peaceful resolution.

"You are a great ninja, Mana…" Junipu-R complimented the magician after she settled down on a larger stone to rest. Inaba shyly walked up to her and handed her the medical supplies. Mana herself probably needed even more treatment of her own injuries. Still a bit dizzy she sat down on the dirt, Kiyomi and Meiko rushed up to her aid.

"I'd like to think I'm not…" the magician mumbled as if only meant for herself to hear. She didn't want to just be "a great ninja" because what most people treated as being a great ninja Mana despised in its entirety. She didn't want to be a sneaky deceitful tool that carried out assignments without a hitch, one who killed and stole just because such was their mission.

Regardless of that – she had her own unique understanding of who ninja were and she wanted to live up to that idea. It may have been childish, it may have been misguided but it was Mana's ninja way. To her ninja were people with responsibility, people entrusted by nature with the power to manipulate its laws and therefore had the weight on their shoulders to protect and live up to their own ninja way.

"We don't have much supplies left. You may need to take the food pill…" Kiyomi groaned after realizing that all the bottoms-up fighting they've been doing had exhausted their supplies almost completely.

"I'll be fine, let's just find a water source and purify some water. I'll wash my wounds and they'll be just fine. I've eliminated my target already, hopefully we'll find ways of eliminating yours without extensive three on three fighting…" the magician gently refused.

Steinck stood up and picked up all of his knocked out teammates. He gave Junipu-R a strict stare. Before he could speak up Meiko's surprised yell interrupted him.

"I completely forgot you guys were here!" she exclaimed before realizing that she actually found it extremely hilarious and laughing it all off.

Steinck cleared his throat before addressing Team Cirrus. "Me and Corot are heading towards the southern exit. We'll take Junipu-R there and protect her. Being honest with the Konoha ninja will be hard knowing that you've already eliminated your target and can just complete the exam by leaving through the door. We'll help you uphold your part of the bargain." The giant suggested.

Having patched up her busted arm and several less grievous injuries Junipu nodded in agreement.

"Wait a second, before we part our ways, can we maybe trade information? It'll be troublesome to go through the whole ordeal for us again just to find our targets and surely you guys may benefit from our end of the bargain as well." Kiyomi suggested. "We have intelligence on Team Stratus, Team Phobos, Team Pyrite, Team Sagitarii. We'd appreciate some intel on Team Maruf and Team Cumulus"

Steinck stopped as he was already lingering on just leaving the battlefield. After hearing out Kiyomi's offer he sighed, thinking it through carefully.

"Well… Our alliance has been eliminated, we've got no use for our gathered information so may as well… We have intel on Team Maruf, also teams: Alto from Kumogakure, Quartz of Iwagakure, Iocaste of Getsugakure, Zumurrud of Sunagakure and Cephei of Hoshigakure." Steinck listed.

"Wow, that's so much information!" Meiko whistled before shouting out in surprise.

"We've pooled our intelligence when we entered the alliance, also we've made it an important goal to gather as much info as we could now. After all, other teams may need information considered worthless to us and, if we passed onto the next exam, we'd have used it during other rounds of the Exams." Corot smiled, realizing now that all of their efforts and strategies were running down the drain, unless they entrust all the knowledge to the others.

"We have intelligence on Team Dunyazad of Sunagakure, Team Iocaste of Getsugakure and we knew about Corot's Team Rutile before you guys attacked us. Our strategy was to gather intel on teams we either needed or teams someone with intelligence on teams with our targets needed." Quill-B shrugged having decided that staying for a while and hearing about the exchange of intelligence may be beneficial to all teams involved.

"Please, Mana. Have some of my bandages. I served a more supportive role in my team and was determined to patch the guys up after fighting, Inaba is quite a troublemaker and often gets beat up…" Junipu kindly bowed before handing a Mana some medical supplies for her injuries. With a bow in return Mana took some bandages that were offered to her and one jar of ointment for her wounds. The rest were then given back to Quill and Inaba.

"I don't know what makes you exaggerate, I'd say my abilities are pretty adequate!" Inaba shyly waved his fist as his blushed cheeks prevented him from looking and acting too angry and annoyed.

"Well… Since Team Cirrus has intel on people we either know of, or of whom the Iwagakure alliance also knows, it'd be least wasteful to know of what Iwa alliance knows." Kiyomi suggested.

"What about you? You've got intel on some fairly unheard of teams. Willing to share?" Quill-B squinted suspiciously at Kiyomi.

"I thought you guys didn't need intel on teams you're not gunning after…" the blonde teased the Kumogakure swordsman. "But fine, if you decided to change your attitude – we are willing to share."

The Yamanaka then took some time relaying what she knew about the teams she previously mentioned. When the speech turned to Team Phobos Mana had to elaborate on quite numerous occasions as Kiyomi only knew of those guys from what Mana told her about and the magician's first hand word was more exact and trustworthy. Also, something Mana greatly appreciated, was that somehow Kiyomi managed to hide the fact she knew plenty about Kouta's team – Team Fir. While the Iwagakure alliance had no reason to withhold information, it was highly likely that both sides withheld some information about known comrades or teams with exceptional bonds of friendship involved.

"I see… Those Team Phobos guys seem pretty capable. We'd be wise to stay clear of them." Quill-B noted after Team Hokage finished sharing information.

"It's not that simple – if you can see them or know of their presence, they've likely known of yours for a long time. One of their members is an amazing sensor." Mana nodded feeling a bit petrified herself when remembering those fearsome three. "They also take people down without actual need. They hurt and are willing to kill ninja they simply don't like or consider useless to their respective villages."

"Hmmm… Hearing about all those ninja, it only makes me wonder that we may have rushed with this Chuunin Exams thing." Junipu-R joined the conversation while longingly looking far off into the thick dark layers of leafage above her head.

"Yeah… We also thought we had this thing almost in the bag, after all, me and Mana had faced chuunin level opponents under several occasions and we've got several times more experience than it is required for the Exams." Kiyomi grinned in overwhelming sense of dread.

"True, it took us long time to learn that in this world it's not the one with the most power, speed or the most amazing jutsu that wins. It's the ones that manage to control themselves, pace themselves right and plan ahead. Had we joined last exam we'd have undoubtedly been eliminated halfway…" Mana nodded.

"Anyways, if you guys are done, you may want to hear about what we know." Steinck interrupted the current topic after clearing his throat. "Team Maruf is positioned in a structure they've built of dead local animals' carcasses: centipedes, their bodily secretions, snake skin and giant bear pelts. One thing is for sure – they're not hiding." Steinck took the map that Kiyomi held loosely in her hands and marked the spot where they've last seen the Team Maruf camp as well as the last known locations all the other teams they had intelligence on.

"Team Maruf is composed of a girl named Squlra, she wields exotic round blades, native to Sunagakure. Her entire body is covered with belts of those things. She's also rather composed and protective of her friends but ruthless against anyone else. She nearly beheaded Corot the first time our teams came in contact. The second member is named Faqsadid – you won't miss him. He's the enormous fatso with zits and ulcers covering most of his body. We've never seen him fight. He, or what's wrong with him, is a total mystery to us. The third member, likely the leader of their team, is named Qarsufly. He doesn't strike as an overly wise leadership figure as he's aggressive, picks fights easily and the only thing holding him back is the objective. He was the one to restrain Squlra from beheading Corot because he wanted intelligence from us and only because of that reason alone."

"Sounds like a handful…" Kiyomi sighed, "We'd most likely be stronger than them three on three, normally, but… Right now, with Mana worn out and all that… I wonder about that."

"They're holed up in a structure. That gives us a unique opportunity to take Qarsufly out silently." Mana coldly suggested.

"But I wanted to punch them in the face for being mean to Corot…" Meiko groaned.

"Awww… Isn't she cute when she's acting like a little justicar?" Kiyomi teased her friend. "I must agree with Mana on this, stealth would be our way to go."

Steinck coughed angrily in order to make his case that he was ready to speak and didn't want to be interrupted again.

"We haven't met Team Iocaste in battle. We only know their names and appearance: Calliastro, a blond guy who dresses like a waiter, not too differently from Mana, a really messed up girl named Vinda and a meathead-like looking Armasar." Steinck began relaying intelligence on other teams, while Meiko looked jumpy and eager to leave, Mana and Kiyomi sat still and listened carefully. The information may have ended up being useful at some point later. They were basically being handed free bargaining tools on a platter here.

"We've fought Team Iocaste – Calliastro was R's target." Quill-B grumbled. "We attacked and knocked him out quietly, he put up little resistance but from what we've seen he was an able taijutsu user and had several Fire Release techniques in his arsenal. Also, while we were making our getaway, the Vinda girl launched a peculiar corrosive Water Style jutsu at us. It looked powerful so it may be wise to be careful with her. Half of her face is masked so that may be a mean of identifying them." The swordsman added some details on the team.

"Is it OK if we share intelligence on Team Alto – they're from your village." Steinck wondered to which Quill-B just indifferently shrugged. After an awkward pause the giant opened his mouth again to speak.

"Team Alto is composed of Neph-T, a young lady with two one handed swords by her side."

"I've sparred with her once, she is capable of covering her body in a rubbery substance, like an Advanced Bloodline of sorts. Swords cannot cut it so, at the moment, to me, it seemed like a useful sparring ability." Quill-B added some information on top.

Initially feeling a bit annoyed that he was interrupted, now, Steinck felt glad that Quill-B decided to add some intelligence on top of it, where he seemed it fit. While giving information on a team from one's own village was touchy subject for most ninja, having much to do with the matters of patriotism, it didn't appear to bother Quill-B too much.

"The second member is Oto-B, we've not seen his ability but he didn't look too fit and able to fight, he's overweight and wears glasses. Most of the time he was just barking out orders and concerning himself with the battlefield decisions and strategy, a lot like Mana was during our fight." Steinck added before turning at Quill-B and wondering if he had something to add.

"I've never seen him fight either. That being said, I've no problem with you guys taking Team Alto out. I've got issues with their third member – Kres-T" Quill-B revealed. "He's killed people, people I loved and held dear to me. One of my friends had decided to abandon the village while in the middle of a mission and Kres-T volunteered to help the authorities eliminate them as well as supplied them with all the information needed to do so. Legally I can't screw him over for such a reason, but if someone kicked his face in in a competition like this – I wouldn't mind. He's mainly a weaponry user focusing on custom made smoke bombs with special toxins and gases. They're all his own concoctions and while a genin couldn't devise anything too scary or too lethal, he's still dangerous. Overall, I'd recommend avoiding Team Alto just like you'd avoid Team Phobos."

"Well, good thing we've got no trouble with any of them…" Meiko grinned.

"Heh, actually, one of our fellow Kumo teams has been asking around about you teens. We've not told them anything prime, mostly because we had nothing to fling at the time." Inaba recalled. Quill's angry stare made him shrug and quiet down.

"I'm guessing info on those guys after us is out of the question?" Kiyomi curiously wondered with an "I had to try" face.

"Sorry…" Quill-B looked down and away.

"We'd rather not go into too much detail on Team Quartz either. We aren't too warm with them nor do we have any grievances. You'll see that they're ones I haven't marked on the map, after all – you're leaving out something as well." Steinck pointed out. After Kiyomi checked the map she noticed that Team Quartz wasn't amongst the teams marked on it.

"Wow! How did you know!?" Meiko shrieked out in excitement. Her reaction sounded awfully similar to all the children Mana entertained with her magic tricks.

"No team ever doesn't have some knowledge about another team from their own village. There's too many possible bonds for them all to be ignored: some of them may be one's siblings, friends or sworn enemies. Never one team or another means nothing at all. You've given us nothing on any Konoha teams but we've pretty much taken it as obvious sign of loyalty and no offenses were taken." Quill-B smiled confidently, glad that his past opponent also saw through Team Hokage's play.

"Actually Mana has no problem giving intelligence on Konoha teams…" Kiyomi found a place to bite the magician again where it kind of hurt.

"Yeah, she's straight out stabbed her own boyfriend in the back! Don't worry though, he's nice so he'll forgive Mana…" Meiko laughed out.

"Really?" Quill-B raised an eyebrow, while initially his face looked a bit surprised and disgusted, eventually it shifted to a bit more curious and involved expression. "I'm a bit surprised and… Interested. Good for you to be able to twist the knife!" the Kumogakure genin teased Mana as well.

"Another team we've ended up feuding with right from the get-go was Team Zumurrud of Sunagakure." Steinck mentioned.

"One of their members – Salnisa injured out teammate, Vespiga. She's a bladed fan user, her fans are able to not only enhance her Wind Release techniques but they also are used for bladed projectiles to be used in a combination. Vespiga never recovered to full hundred after that…" Corot longingly mentioned. Seeing how Steinck stopped talking to let Corot finish her recalling of the experience of facing the team she continued.

"The other members are Dhaogu, a peculiar looking young man with dark purple hair who appeared to wield liquid gold of some sort. It could've been hardened and liquefied again with almost no delay, we couldn't really pin down his ability."

"Maybe it's a Hozuki clansman? A lot of skilled clansmen put a spin on clan abilities, manipulating and inventing new variations even. Hozuki can control liquid water, most can easily harden or evaporate it with a little of focus into their clan techniques, maybe one figured out how to use the same principles on liquid gold?" Mana wondered.

"No. It's a completely different principle. Hozuki are tied to watery liquids. I could see a very skilled Hozuki manipulating blood or some chemical made mostly out of water but not a completely different substance like a liquid metal. Gold and water are too different, it has to be something else…" Kiyomi shut down Mana's theory. She had more credibility as an important clan figure of Konohagakure, she's been interacting with plenty of important clan figures and children of other clans since her youth. She must've knew more about the general principles of how clan specific techniques worked than Mana.

"Anyways, it's hard to say what the third one's ability is either. The third one named Lazimo refused to fight seriously." Corot ended her recollection.

"You've been beaten by just two people? That's intense!" Meiko asked brimming with excitement.

"No, you misunderstand, Lazimo did fight but he didn't use any of his abilities. He also retreated and let his teammates do heavy lifting whenever opportunity came. It's likely his abilities are quite chakra consuming since he refused to use them so early on." Corot concluded.

"Either that or they're too destructive or too precious for his village to be revealed." Mana added, truly there were too many possible reasons for a ninja to hold back to such an extent so early on in the exam.

"You mentioned another team – Team Cephei." Kiyomi raised the issue. "We've discovered so much, may as well hear out anything useful about those guys too. They're from Hoshigakure, right? Not the crowd favorites to do well in this exam but…"

"We've seen them take down another team: a team of a violinist genjutsu user, an odd sealing technique that fires chakra stored inside them user and a fellow using what appeared to be spore based techniques." Steinck recalled before delving deeper in his memories to bring back any specifics. "Team Cephei consisted of a brown haired girl using vines and flower petal based ninjutsu named Rosanna, a summoner boy named Bennow using ninja crow summons and Faeras – he just screamed a lot and had a huge saw-like sword with dented teeth attached to a chain rotating around it."

"Awesome!" Meiko shrieked out like a fangirl hearing about her favorite band. "Can we go see him? I wanna see the design of that chain-sword so I can make one for myself!" she began nagging Mana who unexpectedly stood up, sulking while looking down, and started walking off. Seeing how Mana was having none of it, the redhead started nagging Kiyomi instead.

"What's wrong with her?" Steinck wondered seeing Mana off with his eyes as she walked off further away and just started looking up into the endless covers of leaves and wood above of her.

"I may have a feeling but… Anyways, it seemed like you traded information with them?" Kiyomi wondered.

"Yeah. They didn't have much to offer at the time, that Faeras didn't look to stable, if you catch my cold, and so we never considered contacting them again." The Iwagakure genin nodded.

After seeing Mana beginning to break down, Kiyomi stood up and thanked for the successful exchange of intelligence. The two girls politely said their farewells before the remaining Team Cirrus duo disappeared in a flashy blur and Steinck took his unconscious allies back on his shoulders before beginning to head towards the southern gate. After Corot and Junipu yelled out their farewells to Mana the magician just faintly waved back but it was clear that something was wrong.

"Anything you want to share?" Kiyomi carefully treaded around Mana's mental state while the trio travelled through the tree-line despite having no particular set destination in mind. The magician's mood had obviously seen better days. Her eyes kept wandering away from the road ahead, she didn't involve herself into the conversation of where to head next and her lower lip kept twitching like she was about to break down into tears.

"The team of a violinist, spore user and that sealing guy… It's the team I stole the food pills from." She grumbled out after a long pause. Kiyomi's eyes widened in a sense of clarity before squinting in sadness and the realization why the magician felt so plagued about it.

"We'll talk about that later. Also, you seriously need to wash all that blood off your face. For now let's just look ahead and not cry too hard because you'll bump into a tree." The blonde smiled before observing Mana's ragged clothes situation and pulling out a t-shirt from Meiko's backpack to which, initially, the blacksmith took great offense but after she saw it was for the replacement of Mana's destroyed uniform she stopped arguing.

"You took clothes with you?" Mana asked the blacksmith curiously.

"Sure." She nodded happily.

"Didn't take food pills or medical supplies or… More food?" the magician wondered.

"There'd have been no place for the clothes, for the t-shirt you're wearing right now." Meiko noted before curiously pointing at the magician's attire.

Mana just stared at the blacksmith's face that looked so innocent and confused as to why to her friend it seemed so odd that she'd stuff a bunch of clothes into her backpack. At that moment Mana wondered if she was just approaching insanity by thinking it was odd or if it was just another weird thing about Meiko. After a drawn out pause of the two just staring at each other Mana couldn't control a smile that shimmered through the cloudy gloom in her mind.

"I've got nothing…" she uttered. While Meiko's choice to fill her bag almost up to half with snacks and spare t-shirts looked absolutely bonkers, Mana did just need a clothes replacement so it ultimately proved somewhat useful.

"Exactly. I'm always one step ahead…" Meiko tapped her temple with her index finger before making a face she considered being emotionless and badass and just taking off ahead of the trio.

At this point, Mana wondered how gloomy her life would be without her friends…


	300. Of Spiders and Flies

Team Hokage settled down to rest and prepare for the upcoming stealth quest. Usually times like this could've been spent for training, particularly - Mana training Meiko in the art of chakra control and combatting illusions. While Meiko was no slouch in that department, Mana, and therefore any more skilled users of the illusionary art, could've easily sent a more complex illusion Meiko's way. The blacksmith was too distracted most of the times to pick up on more subtle temperature changes, absence of weather factors such as humidity and chills, etc.

It was tough to tell night from day when being surrounded by dark murky gloom all the time. The team rested when they felt tired, mostly coordinating their resting sessions through communication. Usually ninja wouldn't have needed resting sessions, eating, sleeping and other similar activities due to their enhanced metabolisms allowing them to bypass such natural limitations. Now, after so many battles and emergencies straining the girls' chakra network they could no longer ignore it. It was an endurance game as much as it was one of mind or body.

This time Mana wasn't training Meiko. The magician was washing her face and her older injuries. While a lot of her wounds and bruises were patched up haphazardly, they still needed to be observed. Some of the oldest injuries were already completely healed, some of them had old bandages singed, torn up or grinded into this strange gooey white mush that only made the injuries they covered more painful. The magician wondered if now with her chakra level taking a larger dip than usual she had to worry about infection. She didn't like being so weakened but it was worth it…

"Hey." Kiyomi's voice quietly alerted the magician of her friend's presence. The blonde had to be sitting on the watch. Being attacked now was a bigger danger than ever: they left the unusual safe-haven of the northern parts and the teams still remaining in the competition must've been more daring and desperate.

"I left Meiko on the watch. We have at least five minutes until she falls asleep or gets distracted and chases off a wild animal…" Kiyomi smiled as if knowing Mana's exact thoughts at the moment. She had all the reason to know them, even without her clan abilities she was a skilled and experienced ninja and therefore she'd have known what another experienced genin would've been thinking. Especially one she'd spend so much time with.

"Does this look familiar to you?" Mana blandly asked before lifting her fingers with the grinded white goo of the bandages on her wounds. Kiyomi just shriveled in disgust before observing where they came from.

"That thing spent a lot more time on you than it should've. You're patching same areas of the body over and over again, then the bandages get torn, burnt or cut off. You get pummeled with the amounts of force I dread even to think of… Frankly, this is kind of new to me as well. If you feel something… Troublesome, keep me updated." Kiyomi replied before helping the magician change the bandages spanning from her left shoulder to her pelvis and applying some ointment on her back.

"It was nice of Junipu-R to pass on to you part of her supplies." Kiyomi noted shortly before the magician finished washing the blood off her body and tending after her wounds. "Most ninja would've just fought her to the end and wouldn't have obtained those supplies. I think a lot of people are quick to criticize your way of doing things while they ignore the good that your way brings."

"Yes, R means a lot to me. She's the first person in a while I managed to defeat my way, without hurting her or ruining her life trying to help her…" Mana looked away before settling her sights on a large fish deep underwater, visible only when its gigantic head came thumb's length from the surface to swallow up tons of leeches out of the small lake and then dive back into the depths.

"You're still sad about what happened to the team you stole pills from." Kiyomi didn't ask that. She deduced it with a firm statement.

"How can I not be? If I've not taken those pills from them they've remained in the exam. Even more, I stole those supplies from them…" the magician sighed. "For someone who hates all criminals I'd have thought you'd be a lot less fine with this than you are."

"It's not a crime unless you break the law." Kiyomi cut down firmly. "You were engaging an enemy team, alone against three opponents. You were doing it in a competitive examination environment, in those conditions it'd have been fine to beat them, cripple them, even kill them, if you're a poor competitor. Stealing tools and weapons from them isn't something that should weigh down your conscience. Even when you gave up Team Fir, while it was a dirty and needless move, you broke no actual laws. No matter what happens, you'll always be my little sister, Mana. Maybe not by blood but definitely by heart."

Mana remained silent, looking onwards to the other side of the lake as if there was something to see there.

"This reminds me of a story." Kiyomi smiled after settling down closer to her friend and wrapping her hands around her knees while looking onwards to the other side just like Mana was. "From my childhood. Back when I was still forbidden to do anything but be a little princess, banned even from running around so that I don't bust my elite knee, I often joined my mother in the garden. It was the closest thing to dirt I could get without making everyone mad."

Mana smiled subtly. She had never experienced similar prohibitions but with Kiyomi putting them this way she was somewhat glad that she didn't. Her parents just observed everything Mana did and supported her from behind. When Mana wanted to play with other children they didn't hold her back, when the other children made fun of her for being "special", back when she still had her mental disorder to hold her back, they told her that friends like that weren't real friends anyways. When she decided to join the Ninja Academy they supported her even if they thought she'd certainly fail with her ideals in mind. Overprotectiveness has never been a scorn in the magician's side.

"Once, when I was helping mother with weeds by the shed I saw the hugest web being spun all over a tall patch of ragwort and a fly caught in it. The thing was struggling with all of its survivor's heart and just getting in trouble more and more."

"That's how webs work…" Mana closed her eyes.

"For a moment I just sat there on my butt, dirtying my white dress, and watching nature do its thing right in front of me. Then I saw the spider resting on the top of a pair of taller ragworts, just watching and waiting until the little thing ran out of breath. It was a pretty large bugger, could've been a joro spider or some other kind, memory is a bit murky. Anyways, obviously I pulled the fly out and tore the webs up. After a while of awkward rolling around the prey just flew away so I ran to brag to mother."

"Looking for approval." Mana nodded.

"Right. But mother kind of looked horrified. I thought that here, after being continuously told what I could and couldn't do, I've done something good all by myself, something deserving praise and something I came up with all by myself. I guess my mom was a big fan of spiders and she told me I ruined the spider's work of art it took hours for them to build and I let its food get away which it waited for hours to catch." Kiyomi laughed out in a way that people laugh bitterly when remembering a sadder memory that currently seems kind of funny with how troubling it seemed at the time.

"Joro spiders probably eat small birds and snakes anyways, how much satisfaction could it have gotten from a fly?" Mana shrugged.

"Right? And here comes little ass-hat Kiyomi Jr. and rips its web apart over a measly fly. Now that I think about it seems like a ripoff for the spider…" the blonde smiled. "So the point is that by saving the fly I probably killed or caused that spider loads of trouble. Maybe it starved, maybe it went to hunt elsewhere and got smashed by my brother – he may have been able to breathe fireballs from his mouth but he feared spiders and wasps and all sorts of insects."

"So by saving the fly you doomed the spider but by leaving the fly alone you'd have let it die." Mana summed it up bluntly.

"Right, so the thing is – you did what you had to. You saved Meiko but took something away from someone else. You didn't even kill anything. If you didn't take those pills that team would've most likely won and eliminated their opponents but also Meiko would've definitely had been eliminated. You can't really stop everyone from dying, sometimes we can only barely control who gets the sharp end of the stick but nature and what happens isn't always up to us. The important thing is that you did what you thought was right, you didn't lose your way, you've got nothing to sulk and brood about. I used to have this Uchiha teammate guy, he was an asshole – always brooding for no reason. Don't be like the goddamn Uchiha, no matter what happens, do what an Uchiha wouldn't do."

"I've never met one. I'd not know what an Uchiha would or would not do but… I'll have it mind." Mana nodded somewhat cheered up.

"Well, now that this is done, I better check up on Meiko…" Kiyomi lazily picked herself up and began walking off. "When you're done here join us for the whole planning out our assault thing. We could use your bright head out there."

"Kiyomi…"

"Yeah?"

"Thanks."

When Mana looked back at the point of darkness at the other side of the lake she realized that it was scary how much better Kiyomi was of a leader than she herself could've ever been. First of all – her friend took the role formally, she may not have declared it just like Mana never has but she took it and wore it proudly. Secondly, she took it onto herself to watch over her team, whenever someone had problems the blonde may not have even understood or agreed with, the responsibility pressured her into putting her teammates back together and helping them get back into the action.

Back when they first met, to Mana, Kiyomi was this more experienced and older admirable kunoichi. Almost an entire year may have passed since that day but nothing truly changed in that regard. The magician may have walked a mile forward but so did the Yamanaka heiress. For every firm step Mana took, Kiyomi took one even bolder and while both advanced forward it just felt like the overall distance remained somewhat the same.

She was just so cool.

* * *

Just about when Mana felt confident she could join in with her team with the planning Kiyomi's grunts reached the magician's ears and before she could turn around and get back on her feet the girl's head peeked out from the bushes followed by her entire body.

"Meiko's missing. I've no idea what the hell happened. What if she got taken out!?" the blonde lost her cool. Maybe Kiyomi was the most solid choice for a leader of the team but, for some reason, whenever judgment of Meiko matters was concerned she always lost her composure and began panicking.

"No, it wouldn't make sense. We were close enough to hear an engagement and even if they were this silent – they'd have just knocked her out and left her behind." Mana began stroking her chin before an idea struck her and Kiyomi momentarily later, almost at the same time.

"The chainsaw-sword guy!" they both proclaimed together before picking up their things and rushing off.

"At least she had the common decency to leave the map behind before running off to fight some crazed lunatic with an overrated sword!" the blonde grumbled out looking where Team Cephei was supposed to last have been seen. With any luck they'd have moved along and Meiko wouldn't have enough moxie to track them all the way to where they were. When it came to matters of brawling and weaponry Meiko was pretty sharp but that was pretty much it, it was doubtful that she'd be able to track a team all by herself.

"Do we rush?" Mana questioningly looked at Kiyomi. It was an important call – if they wasted chakra just to move incredibly fast they'd have gotten to the location almost in an instant but they'd have definitely raised noise, also they'd have most certainly worn themselves out which would've left them weakened before a possible combat encounter.

"No." the blonde made a call. "We proceed at our top physical speed but don't use augmentation."

An immediate, excruciatingly painful flash blinded Mana forcing her to cover up her eyes. The flash was so immensely overflowing with chakra that even if she tried to somehow attempt to augment the endurance of her eyes and build resistance for similar techniques she'd have never succeeded to do so. It was like the flash completely bypassed any natural or artificial resistances and just stabbed daggers made of solid light right at every sensitive part of one's eye.

"Shadow Possession Jutsu!" a bellowing and somewhat smug voice interrupted the monotony of Mana and Kiyomi painfully moaning over the loss of vision and the completely overtaking all bodily functions pain in their eyes.

"Mana! I can't move!" Kiyomi yelled out somehow managing to speak intelligibly through the pain.

Almost instinctively the magician dived backwards, she knew that if she was still unaffected by any technique she'd be the next target for the enemy attack and based on the loud popping sound of muffled thunder she was right. As her body was pulsing with adrenaline the magician felt wood chips and branches just bounce off her skin – her petrified and panicking body was augmenting her all by itself. She bypassed the level of subconscious fear over losing chakra again and entered the level of panicking where her body augmented itself to protect her from even the most insignificant amounts of damage.

"Damn, I missed!" a female sounding voice declared something Mana noticed. With her hands shooting out and feeling anything she could catch or cling onto the magician finally found a tree she could cling to with her feet and stick onto.

"Do I go?" a lazy sounding voice asked. It sounded strong and coming from deep in someone's lungs, it must've been a fairly large and bulky opponent.

"No, definitely not!" the Nara replied his teammate.

Mana tried to climb down and hide behind the tree she was stuck on. Not only she was completely blind but also the immense physical pain in her eyes made it impossible to concentrate on other senses. It was a lot like that time in the Wind Country after the Shaphac detonated that huge explosion and took all of her senses away. This time Mana had her ears to rely on but the pain made it difficult to listen and process what she experienced.

"Tsk… I don't have all day here…" that same voice that previously used the Nara clan technique declared.

"This isn't right, there's only two of them. I thought there's supposed to be three…" the female voice that targeted Mana before complained. Kiyomi's scream echoed – she must've been attacked. The magician's heart pounded in her chest, this was bad, not only could the magician not see or hear right but if Kiyomi passed out it'd probably be treated as elimination.

Mana groaned as she relaxed and fell forward. By that time she had a good feel of everything around her and was beginning to recover from the initial shock and blindness but she needed to draw the enemy way. As her body slammed against the puffy moss and grumbled painfully as her gut hit a rough edged rock the magician screamed out, her pain at that moment was very real. Deciding to keep up the act Mana crawled away, she was almost tempted to yell something suggestive at her opponents, draw their attention from her paralyzed teammate.

"That other one is down." The Nara voice declared.

"Gee, you think? I'm going after her!" the female voice angrily snapped back at him.

"I'm coming with you, Faeino, we were told that the weakest smarty-pants girl was the most dangerous. My bet is that she's luring you in!" the strong sounding male voice seconded.

"Hold her here!" the female voice instructed the Nara. "I'm not getting eliminated by a fucking killdeer act, I'm taking Saol for backup."

"Fine, she's not going anywhere while I'm here…" the Nara lazily bellowed.

Mana crawled and rolled onwards, she could feel burning pain in her gut and something inside her made her feel thankful that her eyes were still in relative dark, albeit a blurry and brightening one, unable to see just how bad her gut wound looked. Fighting back or even defending herself was out of the question now. Not so soon after the big fight with Junipu, not with all of her injuries so fresh and still very much healing.

The magician heard foot taps further ahead. Her hands instinctively weaved a hand seal. A thunderous blast pierced the magician's body that erupted into a storm of petals that scattered into the wind. Normally ninja would've never allowed their footsteps to be heard like that unless they were certain they were going to finish their opponent off, unless they wanted to make it big and flashy. Unless they wanted her enemy to bleed and feel at awe at the opponent's finishing blow.

This was wrong. Those people after them were not behaving like normal competitors. So far they haven't expressed interest in them as a team, they haven't shown much care in any of the girls as their target. Mana couldn't have been their target since she'd eliminated her target already, had Kiyomi been their target they'd simply have taken her out already but they followed Mana to finish her off. This was personal.

"This is personal…" the magician whispered to herself as she rolled aside and breathed heavily just laying on a pile of organic trash, roots and moss as her opponents walked past her and looked ahead. By the time that the illusion wore off and they'd be able to see Mana she'd have been in plain sight but they kept on walking ahead slowly. Looking around and wandering where their injured prey had gone off to.

"She aimed for my chest, several times now – she tried to kill me…" the magician's mind kept on racing as she laid completely exhausted and sprawled out, yet momentarily still invisible to her enemy. Her chakra was very barely beginning to return to her, she may have still had enough to pay the enlarged cost of her illusion and not pass out but she was completely powerless to as much as even move.

This could've been it. Not only for their participation in the exam but their very lives…


	301. Ino-Shika-Cho-Ino

Mana's breathing continuously slowed down to a crawl before stopping completely. After her vision began returning from the complete eye-scratching dark red agony into bright blurs she saw that the two ninja that were looking to hunt her down had passed her current position and were now walking further, filtering through their surroundings step by step.

If only Mana could fight back, resist in any way. At this point her ninja tool supply was nearly emptied, her chakra resources strained to such an extent that she lucked out to not pass out after saving her own life. That last saving grace left the magician in a state of exhaustion that left her completely incapable of moving a muscle. Just the little involuntary twitches of her aching muscles or her bleeding abdomen or her chest when it began frantically lifting up and sucking in air.

There was this strange reaction to exhaustion when one's chakra was approaching the edge of complete depletion that one's lungs began working overtime. The body began taking in air as if breathing in so much air that it bloated out one's chest would somehow help replenish one's chakra reserves. Mana tried moving her head in a way that'd have allowed her to see Kiyomi but she couldn't. Her neck simply wouldn't bend backwards that much.

* * *

Meanwhile, the blonde's vision was similarly beginning to return. That being said, with her body being paralyzed and unable to protect or rub her eyes from the immense pain that the flash of light ninjutsu technique before caused made the girl's eyes teary and slightly swollen. It looked like she had been crying for hours on end. As the vision finally returned, in limited blurry shapes and forms, Kiyomi finally saw the mysterious assailant that attacked her and Mana for seemingly no reason at all.

It was a young Nara clan member of average height and frail build. That much was evident from his dark hair tied into the spiky ponytail mostly seen on Nara clan members. He also wore silver earrings with the kanji symbol for "deer" on it, something that, as a Yamanaka, Kiyomi also had a general read about. He worked with the members of Akimichi and Yamanaka clans, these three clans had a very close relationship and whenever the members of their clans were placed in a single team they always symbolled that momentous bond spanning generations with the silver earrings with kanji symbols of "boar" for the Yamanaka member, "deer" for the Nara member and "butterfly" for the Akimichi member.

"That's rich, you bastard!" Kiyomi growled angrily showing off her teeth like a wild animal. At that moment she was truly ready to claw the frail Nara's eyes out with her bare hands. "Attacking a Yamanaka member with the fucking Ino-Shika-Cho earrings, that takes fucking nerve!"

The Nara didn't reply but from what little Kiyomi could tell, with her still barely functioning eyesight, his face did undergo a painful and worried reaction – the clan traditions still meant something to him, evidently. As seconds passed, the Nara refused to honor Kiyomi with a reply or even a version of a pathetic excuse as to why he attacked a Yamanaka member. As more and more of Kiyomi's vision started to return, the return being accelerated by Kiyomi's mostly completely peaked chakra resources, she could identify more and more details about the bright blue jumpsuit wearing oddball of the Nara clan.

One of the more important details of the Nara's attire was the Hoshigakure headband tied directly onto his forehead, like most ninja on the field usually wore them. This traditional approach to the ninja attire pissed Kiyomi off even more. This guy looked like a pretty mindful and submissive to the clan rules individual and yet this collection of details on him when paired with his behavior kept on rubbing off on Kiyomi in all the wrong ways.

"Hoshigakure?" Kiyomi grunted out, "I wasn't even aware Nara had members in that village. You sure as hell won't anymore after this shit. I'm Yamanaka Kiyomi – member of the Konoha's elite Yamanaka branch, future heiress of the Yamanaka clan. I don't care what pity grievances you have with my team, they end here and now, let us go!" she commanded the Nara who appeared to be somewhat troubled by the revelation.

"Faeino, we've got a big problem!" he yelled out looking over Kiyomi's shoulder as if trying to pick up sight of his teammates. Then his eyes widened even more and his entire body froze. Kiyomi could tell that the boy saw something really interesting as her own body mirrored his actions perfectly while she was bound by the Shadow Possession Jutsu.

"Mana…" she realized what the Nara must've seen.

"Look, I don't care what your stupid names are, your entire village's Nara population will be murdered if something happens to me here. The Nara, the Akimichi, the Yamanaka will all rather choose to cut off their black sheep branches in their entirety than risk their long lasting tradition of cooperation. Hoshigakure will never see a member of those clans working for them ever again." Kiyomi spilled words out in a hurry, trying to overload the mind of the worried Nara with words so that he couldn't alert his teammates to the exact location of Mana. By now the Yamanaka believed her friend was in plain sight, Kiyomi's worried heart just worried that her friend wouldn't be knocked out.

"Faeino, Saol, BIG problem!" the Nara shouted out grabbing his hair with his hands before pulling on them so hard that he actually let his shoulder long dark hair loose, tearing a fair chunk of hair out in the process. Kiyomi's body mirrored those motions perfectly, grabbing her own hair and sifting through them with her fingers.

He must not have known that Kiyomi was a part of Team Hokage when he took up whatever this was. Kiyomi's mind raced trying to put together what exactly could've been their problem with Team Hokage. Technically Mana helped out Team Cephei of Hoshigakure by weakening the team she stole pills from, allowing them to get eliminated. Then again, the three of the Team Hokage did eliminate Team Sagitarii – the team of Clarmac Inuzuka who targeted Mana, could this have been about that?

"Shit… Sorry, I'll need to take you out and hide your body. I won't kill you, just eliminate you so that the staff can remove you from the exam." The worried Nara explained with his voice slowly heightening in pitch and his forehead beginning to sweat more and more. "Shadow-Neck Binding Jutsu!" he shouted out weaving his hand seals to command the shadow that binds Kiyomi to reach out and suffocate her until she passed out.

For a moment the two ninja stood in place and stared at each other, then Kiyomi's eyes began to gleefully glow to match her triumphant smile as the Nara realized that his body was completely paralyzed and unable to move whereas the Yamanaka was completely free of his restraints. Even his Shadow-Neck Binding technique was interrupted before the second hand seal could have been formed.

"Chakra Hair Trap Jutsu!" Kiyomi declared as the hair traces on the ground lit up with strands of blue glowing base chakra color reaching out into a long channel from Kiyomi all the way to the paralyzed Nara.

"W-When?" the frail youth exclaimed. "When did you tore strands of your hair out?"

"Back when you did. My actions mirror yours, remember?" Kiyomi smiled. "That's why the Konoha branch of Ino-Shika-Cho is the elite one and the Hoshigakure one is just a bunch of exiles and runaways. Mind Body Switch!" she chanted as her mind exited her own body with a loud howl and entered that of the Nara, completely taking it over. Almost immediately Kiyomi, in the Nara's body, rushed in to grab her own limp body and place it in a safer angle and position, preventing it from tumbling down.

* * *

"There's nothing here, not even any blood!" the Akimichi complained as at that point the two felt like they've wandered off too far for further search to make sense.

"Shit!" the girl who was referred to as Faeino cursed, "Could you shut your stupid mouth for one moment! I thought I hated you when you're stuffing your stupid face but it's worse when you talk!" she waved her hands frantically jumping right at his face.

"I'm not wrong though…" he let that last noise drag on for a while.

"No… You're right…" Faeino slapped her forehead. "I can't believe a blind, wounded and tired girl escaped us." She began furiously rubbing her face in annoyance.

"Yeah, but if we eliminate both of her teammates – that's still fine. We'll still get the bounty…" the Akimichi tried to calm his teammate down by softly tapping her back.

"No, Saol, no we won't, because how will we do that when there's only two of them here, Saol?! How will we do that, Saol!? When there's only two of them here, Saol!?" the girl began losing it and pulling the skin and muscle, pinching and scratching her teammate all over his body to which he appeared to be almost indifferent due to his large and strong build, he just slowly contemplated what was said as it appeared the young Akimichi was slightly slow to understand things.

Just when it appeared that the Akimichi was ready to speak he began consulting his hands in the complicated calculation of how many Team Hokage members he had just attacked.

"I can't believe how stupid you are, Saol! Can't believe it, how stupid you actually are, that's what I can't believe, Saol! If there's only one thing I can't believe, it'd be how stupid you are, Saol!" Faeino yelled out as she smacked her foot right into the left temple of her teammate. The tall and gentle fatso just kept on counting things with his hands continuously bending and straightening out fingers.

"You're doing it all wrong. This is how it's done!" an angered voice came from the side before a sound of a chakra flare emanating from the blacksmith's boots, followed Meiko's foot digging deep into Saol's cheek followed. The redhead's foot disappeared almost halfway into her opponent's cheek before the laws of physics demanded to be listened to and the Akimichi's body got sent crashing, rolling and tumbling to the other side of the woods.

Meiko had arrived to the battlefield to rejoin the Team Hokage!

* * *

With a pair of strong leaps Kiyomi closed the distance between Mana's lifeless looking body and where she took over the Nara's body. It seemed odd to the Yamanaka that the two enemies missed the magician just laying out in the open like that and barely even moving, it appeared that she was completely drained of chakra and wouldn't have been able to protect herself from pretty much any kind of assault.

Mana's eyes widened as she saw the enemy land close to her. Her mind raced through a whole bunch of possible scenarios as to what could've happened to Kiyomi. Her only exposure to the Nara tactics was her own past teammate – Sugemi. The one member who went out of his way to spit in the face to the usual way that the Nara fought and devolved most of his battles into fistfights so she had few things to work with trying to understand this guy's abilities.

"Relax, it's me." The Nara said as he kneeled down to Mana and picked her up. The young man appeared to be troubled while doing it, the body she changed into must've been less than physically fit.

"What's the plan?" Mana asked, for the first time in a while she had no ideas of her own and felt completely powerless. She could barely even move at that point.

"I can't let him go and return to my body, if I do he'll come after us. I could try to move this body as far away as I can but if I try to the others might come back here and finish you off as well as my powerless real body." Kiyomi began thinking out loud as she moved Mana's immobile body into a more hidden and safer location. "It's good that I know of the Nara techniques and how they're performed. I may use the element of confusion and surprise to catch those two losers un…"

A loud rumbling noise followed by the thundering sound of trees falling and clouds of dust and tree chips whizzing by interrupted the blonde's train of thought.

"I think someone's fighting them." Mana wheezed out through pain.

"Shit. I need to see what's going on there." Kiyomi cursed before running off.

* * *

Meiko's quick combination of strikes overwhelmed the Yamanaka's defenses. All semblances of oxygen instantly left the girl's body after being hit as well as greatly shaking up her chakra network as it struggled to keep her body intact. The blonde didn't look like someone keeping up with her physical training or placing great importance on her endurance training which forced her to use the risky tactic of chakra augmentation to withstand Meiko's ground shaking blows. Seeing the advantage she had on her hands and a successful offensive pressure at play, Meiko pressed on harder, finishing her lightning quick combination with a spinning back elbow strike that even while blocked sent the opponent flying back.

The flares on Meiko's boots lit up with chakra flares as the blacksmith launched herself in a mad chasing dash after her airborne opponent. The blacksmith knew that in a battle against an opponent like this, someone frail, someone likely to possess weird abilities, similar to the kind Mana and Kiyomi had in their arsenal, she needed to not hold back. Press on, keep punching, just keep punching. A single breath caught, a single moment of hesitation or a microsecond for her opponent to recover and the redhead could've found herself caught in a fearsome ninjutsu technique she had no capability of escaping from.

Meiko's rampaging fists tried their best to tear through the Yamanaka's abdomen and punch a hole in her opponent. Try as hard as the blacksmith did, the blonde's augmentations proved mighty and she just got flung higher and higher up forcing the blacksmith to try and smash her back down before reaching the highest levels of the Forest of Death, even though the possibility to try and amp her fists up to the limit and punching her opponent into the atmosphere did tempt the redhead.

Faeino covered up the top of her head to avoid having her skull smashed by Meiko's ruthless finishing blow. Something of that intensity and limitless physical might would've undoubtedly cracked the whole round earthly orb into pieces and the Yamanaka didn't believe her head to be able to withstand something of that might in a healthy state. Like a piercing arrow from the heavens the Yamanaka plummeted down, Meiko pointed her feet upwards before firing off another pulse of chakra from the seals placed on her boots to jet after her plummeting opponent for another finisher.

Just as the Yamanaka's body appeared to be in sight, just as Meiko's eyes locked onto the injured and defenseless target and just as her strongest punch was ready to knock the enemy out her punch met something soft and something large. As Meiko's own perception caught up to the present she found her fist being caught and stopped in place by the Akimichi who had recovered and rejoined the battle.

With a busted up head and lower lip, missing a few teeth, battered and bruised the Yamanaka girl of Hoshigakure picked herself up and began yelling at her teammate.

"You idiot! Could you not have joined in faster? She's been beating on me for a damned while, you idiot, how about joining in on it faster? To maybe stop having her kick me around like a ragdoll, do you know for how long she's been kicking me around? Pretty damned long. It'd have been a lot less long if you joined in sooner…" Faeino kept on shouting at her large teammate who tried smashing Meiko to the ground after swinging her around by her entrapped fist, only for the blacksmith's hand to stop her fall and her two feet push her opponent further away and free her tightly squeezed in her opponent's enlarged hand fist.

"You're an Akimichi? I've seen a guy like you before…" Meiko noted before looking at the Yamanaka girl, "Your teammate talks weird and repeats things a lot."

"Faeino speaks that way when she's really angry." The Akimichi smiled before his hand returned to normal size, normal relatively to his clan.

"Shadow Possession Jutsu!" a loud yell alerted the entire battlefield. Seeing how it was familiar voice coming from a friendly face the enemy team didn't bother to avoid the technique that followed. Meiko, on the other hand, was too surprised and confused by the appearance of another opponent to properly avoid the technique. Luckily for her the shadows didn't tie her down but instead her opponents – both of the Nara's own teammates.

"What the hell, Rarifa! You stupid asshole, you're supposed to restrain her, not us, that's how your technique works – it paralyzes the enemy, it's not a support technique, you idiot! You're supposed to target the enemy and then the shadow ties them down by connecting to their shadow! Does all this dark gloom mess up your shadows' aim that much? That's not how your technique works, Rarifa!" Faeino kept on freaking out.

"What are you doing, you cuddly goof!" the Nara scolded Meiko who looked completely oblivious to anything that's happening. "Stop fighting those guys, we don't need them, just run!"

"Wait… Why are you giving me orders?" Meiko scratched her blushed cheek as something inside compelled her to obey but her rational mind was still completely confused.

"Oh… I get it! So the Yamanaka-like looking girl in their team is actually a Yamanaka and is now Rarifa and her real body is unconscious somewhere because her mind is in Rarifa's body!" the Akimichi vibrantly declared before giggling goofily.

"Oh, wow, really? You caught on? How cute… You're so damn smart…" Faeino squinted her eyes in annoyance as if her sarcasm actually physically hurt her. Her facial muscles were the only part of her body that could move properly.

"Look, just head the direction I just came from, grab my body as well as that of Mana's, she's hidden in a bush near a pool of blood, right below my own body. Then head as far away as possible. I'll leave this mind when it becomes too difficult to hold them here and fight off the Nara trying to regain control of his own mind." Kiyomi, in Rarifa's body, explained to Meiko who just nodded and dashed off as fast as she could to pick up the bodies of her teammates.


	302. Class Meeting

Meiko was quickly moving through the upper levels of the Forest of Death, even while she held Mana carefully on her back the blacksmith moved incredibly fast even without the aid of chakra augmentations as her physical shape was by far the greatest of the three in her team. For a while the girls dashed around in silence.

"You know, you really took your time with returning to your body. If I didn't know any better I'd have thought you just wanted to be a freeloader and enjoyed the free piggyback…" grumpy Meiko complained.

"Me? What? No!" Kiyomi blushed momentarily before switching the topic, a simple verbal riposte that always worked to disarm her simpleton friend, "You of all people should be more ashamed than you are!"

"Yeah, Meiko, we were worried…" Mana gently joined to Kiyomi's side of the argument.

Meiko laughed out loud from the bottom of her heart and only shook her hands defensively once the curious and judgmental stares of her friends turned her way.

"You guys suck at these pep talk things. Mana's too soft in general and Kiyomi isn't too good on letting me have it…" the redhead noted.

"I'm… Fairly decent at… Letting you have it." Kiyomi shrugged before looking away in shame.

"No, in all seriousness, I know that what I did was wrong. I left during my shift keeping guard and I made you guys chase after me like an idiot. I'm sorry, when we were told there's a guy here with a chainsaw sword I just wanted to see it really badly." Meiko looked down clearly showing shame and regret in what she did. It was good that she did realize what she did was wrong because Mana started to suspect that Meiko's remark before about the two being soft on her was sort of right.

"What's important is that you're back…" Mana smiled as she could do little else in her powerless state. She did feel a little dizzy after losing a bit more of blood before, luckily enough Meiko stopped temporarily to apply ointment and some of their remaining medical supplies before continuing their trip. "It kind of makes me wonder why you returned in the first place. Did you even get to see the guy's chainsaw sword?" she wondered.

Meiko nodded. "I did, though when I heard those three discussing coming after us I realized that you guys may have been in trouble. Instead of snagging that sword to check it from the inside and how it's made I'm stuck with just the outer visuals. I'm pretty sure I could replicate it somewhat but it wouldn't be an exact replica until I make it show me some skin inside of it. I'm just good like that…"

"What did you mean by them talking about coming after us?" Kiyomi wondered.

"Well, initially my idea was to steal Faeras' chainsaw sword and see it from the inside, make some blueprints before giving it back to him. Then as I kept watch on them, looking for my chance, I overheard them considering joining in on a hunt for our team. Apparently, a whole bunch of teams don't really like us for a whole bunch of reasons and want us gone, they're even all pooling some resources together to make a "bounty-pool" of sorts to whoever eliminates us." Meiko explained.

"What other teams have you heard about? Surely they should've mentioned some other names for us to look out for…" Kiyomi looked fairly troubled by this revelation.

"Well, Tala and Tiwul got eliminated by Team Fir. Team Fir apparently did express dislike of our team but they didn't join into the pool. That much those three discussed. Then there was a whole bunch of Hoshigakure teams who were friendly to Clarmac's team we've eliminated. They didn't mention any more names." Meiko shrugged.

"That means Yushijin and Budoki know about my betrayal. Tala probably spilled it out after being beaten just to spite me…" Mana bit her lip in anxiety.

Kiyomi just sadly looked at Mana trying to find something to say to comfort her friend but she couldn't really find anything. It was probably tough to comfort someone with actions they did of which the comforter disapproved themselves.

"It wasn't a betrayal. People exchange information in here, remember how Quill-B just out and spilled the beans on his comrades too?" Meiko took initiative in consoling Mana.

"Yeah… On people who went out of their way to hunt down and murder his friend." Mana replied bitterly.

"I, for one, am really glad you returned when you did." Kiyomi smiled. "I was really beginning to sweat about how to pull me and Mana out. She was just sprawled out and completely helpless and I was not strong enough to fight everyone myself. Your help really put the plan together." The Yamanaka changed the subject again with a happy yet deceitful smile that hid the intent of changing the subject for the sole purpose of making Mana forget about what she indirectly stirred.

"Yeah, well… I saw the chainsaw blade, it was pretty cool, I loved it. Not even remotely as much as I love you guys, though!" Meiko grinned with a bright smile. Mana looked up into her friend's bright and goofy grin and, much to her surprise, realized that there was absolutely no regret of her choice. "I was pretty lucky to just stumble into you guys. I just went back all the way I came figuring it'd be the fastest way back…" the redhead shrugged.

* * *

A murder of crows, the size of a large mammal, lifted off the trees rushing through and outside the upper thick layer of leafage and into the bright sky as the ground wildly shook in a tremendous quake that sent ripples of its awesome might to at least fifty kilometers in each direction. Meiko just stopped in her tracks and grabbed firmly to Mana's thighs so that her friend didn't fall off her back. Mana yelled out in pain as in her weakened state her friend's grasp seemed almost like two mountains crushing her leg in between and after her expression of pain the redhead loosened her grip quite extensively in her apology.

"I vote we check it out." Meiko grinned after looking at Kiyomi.

"Oh, yeah, our sabotage, distraction and escape expert is weakened and almost completely paralyzed on your back, who knows how many teams are after our necks… What's the worst that could happen?" Kiyomi shrugged.

"It's fine. Stay quiet and stay down. Whatever's causing it is probably making a lot of noise which will make detecting us almost impossible." Mana softly tapped Meiko's shoulder.

The magician thought to herself what caused her encouragement. It was so many things that ran through her head that making out a singular, most important reason was quite impossible. On one hand, Meiko was quite likely to slip away and still look for whatever caused that shock, regardless of what the popular decision was. Maybe the recent events shook the blacksmith off this independency, maybe not. On another – it could've been genuinely useful seeing what they could find. Maybe it was another team, more intelligence to add into their quite rich package of information?

Meiko and Kiyomi carefully leaped down a pair of jumps, descending a good twenty meters lower before hiding in the thick branches that hid them from a large and more open field with a large swampy pond lurking further away. Only after they've safely positioned themselves to observe the ground shaking events did the trio dare to peek and analyze the transpiring situation below.

"Whoa! It's Pagu the Asshole!" Meiko shouted out quite loudly, yet her yells were very effectively drowned out by the noise that the situation below made. Situation being the colossal centipede at least a good six times larger than any that Mana had ever seen in this area, almost matching in size that enormous snake that she saw in this forest previously when the Rabbit Contract was rescued.

"I vaguely remember that guy…" Kiyomi shrugged her shoulders. "That is a Konohagakure team below us then? Friendlies?" she curiously inquired.

"He was in a class one year below me in the Academy. His reputation as a troublemaker was well known to me though… Even if he was younger than me I still was a bit wary of him and tried avoiding him for a long time. Not because he was aggressive or a bully, because he was just outright disgusting with the stunts he pulled." Mana recalled her experiences with the young short boy of dark chestnut colored hair and flashy azure eyes, murky green jumpsuit and silver rimmed glasses.

"When I failed the graduation exam once, I was transferred to his class. I can assure you that he is a complete ass-hat. He rarely ever won a fight he picked but he always scared everyone decent away and pulled anyone remotely as messed up as him closer." Meiko nodded looking at the team fighting below with genuine discontent that Mana had rarely seen in her friend. Then again, having in mind how much anxiety and stress the stories of the boy's behavior drove into Mana's own young mind, it was not overly surprising to see such vibrant reaction from someone in the same class as him.

"Is it true that Pagu Aphonei once peed all over the swings in the Academy yard in public view?" Kiyomi wondered in disgust.

"Is it true that he salvaged all of his ninja tools from a disposables container and then actually missed his targets on purpose, trying to infect his friends during target practice?" Mana's face shriveled in discontent.

"You don't even know the half of it… Like that time he rubbed himself in feces during sparring training so that his opponent freaked out and couldn't hit him." Meiko nodded.

"Please stop…" Kiyomi grimaced with her tongue in disgust.

"His poor team…" Mana shook her head.

Meanwhile the battle below raged on. The massive centipede let out some strange crackling sounds as his mandibles cracked together in hunger and anticipation of cracking some bones, letting out small spits of acidic goo that weren't intended to hit his prey of three but instead just trickling down his titan-hard shell without leaving as much as a scratch on its surface. The massive insectoid smashed two of its seemingly endless limbs somewhere in the general direction of the three ninja but all three of them jumped aside in an instant. They moved quite fast for ninja of their experience and rank. Even in her weakened state, Mana could tell that if she ever had to fight these three she'd be dodging their blows through reads and prediction as she'd have little chance of seeing them actually move.

Pagu had grown a nice fistful of hair since Mana last saw him. They ran carelessly all over his face which must've further inhibited his limited vision which required the silver rimmed glasses he wore. The young freak smiled sadistically as he swiped his hand tossing a bunch of empty syringes at the centipede's softer mouth parts before lunging in to its shell, using two others to take in some of the massive insectoid's secretion.

"It's a Hundred Kilometer Centipede…" Mana identified the massive creature sticking out of the ground. The astonishing earthquake before must've been caused by its surface from underground where it must've usually resided. Appearing from larger caves and crevices or just bashing through the ground and rock with its immense head to poison and dissolve its prey into mush.

"What!? A whole hundred!?" Meiko yelled out in excitement. "That's like… Whole Forest of Death in length!" she pondered long before the answer to a question she herself raised.

"Less than half of it, actually…" Kiyomi squinted at her silly friend before expressing her own doubts, "I don't think it's that large, really. Looks more like ten, if not less… Judging by the head part."

"It's not really hundred kilometers long, it's just a name. It refers to the insect's limitless potential to grow larger as it doesn't usually die of natural causes and lives underground after it matures. Usual specimen found range from five to ten kilometers in length but they can potentially grow to a full hundred and even more. They don't usually live too long and are commonly found in pieces. Full remains are quite rare." Mana explained. "Unlike another ground-shaking giant I've met around these parts, this one's actually native to the Forest of Death."

"Byakugan!" a loud yell from below forced the magician to stop discussing the native species and focus back on the three genin fighting for their lives below. A young lady with raven dark long hair had just activated her clan's signature ability, the Byakugan which the Hyuuga clan used to observe chakra nodes and intelligence gathering for generations. It was an old, elite and respected clan in the village with the smaller branches in other villages being treated almost as rogue second-rate ninja by the clan members themselves.

"It's Kuren…" Mana identified her past classmate.

"Is she as messed up as Pagu?" Meiko wondered as Kuren proceeded to run around and scale the insectoid's massive body looking for weak spots in its intensely hard shell and the softer flesh inside. Despite Kuren's most genuine attempts to strike at the weaker parts of the insect it appeared to be completely unfazed and what little chakra she inserted into the strikes didn't transfer past the powerful armor of her enemy.

"No, although it's tough to say. She didn't talk to me or play with me when we were kids. She had her own circle of friends she considered equally important as her. She once broke the hand of Chominu – another classmate of mine for touching her sandwich with a single tap of her fingers." Mana shook her head.

"Sounds like she was mean in her own way…" Kiyomi look at Mana with sad eyes, this was possible one of those few moments when the Yamanaka wondered what it was like not to come from any respected ninja clan. While most of the times it didn't make much difference in the social interactions, the more conservative people probably made a big deal out of it. It caused experiences Kiyomi, as a future heiress of the Yamanaka clan, couldn't really relate to but she was quite curious about them. In a way, she even wanted to experience them.

Another young lady with bright violet hair began dancing gracefully holding two sticks in her hands with long strands of silk tied to them. It was a curiously attractive sight to lay one's eyes on but not overly effective fighting technique, or so it seemed looking at it with a naked eye.

"Wind Style: Fifty-Knot Crescent!" the girl chanted out as a powerful shockwave emanated from the silk cloth of her peculiar weaponry hit the insect whose body leaned backwards as if blasted away by a powerful force.

Pagu landed off of the staggering insect down on the ground beside his two kunoichi teammates before teasing Kuren. The young man spat onto his palm before attempting to tap her shoulder in consolation that her attack brought no fruitful results. The freak's attempt was met only by a light lean backwards by Kuren, avoiding Pagu's gross move, and a knee to his gut that made the young man lean down and wheeze out air he had lost.

The monstrous centipede returned to its upwards positioned, straightening out the part of its body that was aboveground before spouting out a whole wave of acidic goo from its mouth that was likely the poison it used to degrade the still living prey to something it could consume.

"Eight Trigram Palms: Revolving Heaven!" Kuren yelled out loud as she released large amounts of chakra from all of her chakra nodes all at once before beginning to spin rapidly to form a rotating sphere of shielding chakra. The technique only covered up the kunoichi herself and didn't bother to encompass her allies. However the powerful force of the rotating shield blasted Pagu away from any harm in a rude and painful yet saving manner.

"Wind Style: Fifty-Knot Full Moon!" Kuren's ally yelled out as she continued her graceful and acrobatic dance with her silk and wood sticks creating a strong defensive pillow of storming winds that blasted a significant portion of acid back onto the centipede's own shell making it wrangle uncomfortably even if its shell didn't appear to be affected in a meaningful way.

"That was rude, Kuren-chan!" Pagu teased his teammate as he crawled back to the battlefield on all fours, clearly injured from being tossed around.

"Shut up or I'll break your spine, lowly trash." Kuren gave his teammate a cold stare. "I apologize I did not protect you, Zephra, I believe you to be able to protect yourself sufficiently."

Kuren's other female teammate just blinked a couple of times in confirmation before resetting the patterns of her dance. This was good. A clear chance of seeing these three in action, surveying their abilities as well as seeing and mapping out their movements for further use. Just seeing her reset her dance made Mana a quite hopeful that she'd be able to read this Zephra girl with more success in the future.

"This Zephra, I think she was one year older in a different class." Mana tried to remember but could only remember vague recollections. Zephra was not really the kind of student to stand out too much, she was more of a textbook grey filler of the classroom. As an older student she was equally admired by everyone in Mana's class but she was certainly no celebrity in the school for her behavior, good and bad things included.

Pagu scratched his messy and greasy hair before pulling out two handfuls of syringes, holding them in a textbook kunai and shuriken throwing position. He must've used syringes instead of normal ninja tools meaning he bothered to modify his arsenal with custom orders, similarly to Mana and her different decks of sealed cards, but also that he was skilled enough to concoct different chemicals to place inside of those syringes. With a jumping and spinning toss, maximizing the momentum and force, Pagu lobbed his syringes to the upper parts of the aboveground centipede's head.

The insect merely shook before placing the top of his head in front of the three and allowing the syringes to bounce off of the forehead toughened section of his shell.

"Oh no…" Pagu lamented in an overly dramatic manner, as if he was just fooling around. "It appears my attacks are completely ineffective against this monster! Maybe I should've acquired greater weaponry than just measly syringes!?" he gripped at his lower jaw as if he was going through a life crisis.

"Stop making excuses for being useless!" Kuren scolded her teammate before turning to Zephra. "It looks sort of pointless but he's definitely taking damage. If we were to kill this thing it'd take more effort than we should spend on it. I advise retreat."

"True. I'm sure if I amped up my ninjutsu I could cut it to pieces but it'd be a hassle. We need to save some chakra for the real enemy." The dancer girl nodded.

The ground beneath began to rumble and shake again. Team Hokage curiously looked down before realizing that a swarm of building sized ants was bursting from a large pile of dirt that was beginning to build up from right below in such quantities that it displaced and threatened to completely topple the tree they were on. Kiyomi and Meiko quickly leaped onto another tree before observing what transpired further. They observed in horror as the swarm rushed right past the three genin and began snapping the centipede's shell open with the gigantic mandibles on their heads shaped, as it appeared, exactly for this function.

Squirting acid and whatever else involuntarily was released from its soft innards the centipede cracked its head part off and twisted into a rolling ball of solid armored shell before rolling away, looking for a quieter spot or a cave that could've lead to its favored hiding spot where it could've restarted its journey of growth to become a ten kilometer centipede once more. Soon the giant ants began burrowing into the ground in search of the massive body that its fleeing prey left behind as its escaping speed was a bit too troubling to pursue.

"Hmmm… I wonder where these Snapper Ants came from!?" Pagu shouted out in surprise in an overly dramatic manner once more as if all of this was just a game. While his kunoichi teammates looked troubled by the swarm's appearance initially, they now observed as the blind in their savagery insects disappeared once more into the same hole from which their previous opponent had surfaced.

"Snapper Ants?" Mana wondered out loud. "It's one of the natural predators of the Hundred Kilometer Centipede."

"I know they're from around these parts but… Wasn't that quite lucky that they surfaced right now and completely ignored the three people right in front of them?" Kiyomi inquired. Something seemed suspicious to her.

"Of course it was the Snapper Ants. A certain cast of females die right after giving birth and decompose especially quickly, their pheromones are incredibly easy to harvest or emulate using the Awashan mushroom." Mana began wrapping her mind around what Pagu's move was exactly.

"He must've known that his syringes would get busted but that's what Pagu wanted. He wanted to spread the food trail pheromone all over the centipede…" Kiyomi followed the trail.

The three girls observed for a while more, even after Pagu's Team Hickory had left in a blurry flash, as the crazed Snapper Ants surfaced only to disappear in the hole where the rest of the centipede's body laid, abandoned by its head part to make a successful escape.

In his teen years, Pagu Aphonei was just as scary as he was during his kid years. Just in whole different ways…


	303. The Splintered Cell

Kiyomi rolled the two remaining food pills in her hands. So far, Mana has been the only member of the team not to use the pills she had stolen from one of the teams. Maybe it was her own guilt tripping her over, maybe the magician genuinely thought it'd be more reasonable to save them for later. Either way, for the Yamanaka it seemed a foolish oversight which couldn't have been allowed to continue.

Meiko was gulping down water sounding more like a thirsty horse than a decent and composed human girl. Water was not something that was completely unavailable as various lakes and ponds and smaller water sources were all over the place. Obviously, the water needed to be boiled and purified for ideal drinking experience but it rarely was a problem. The redhead could've gobbled down all of the water the trio had and it could've been replaced. After the initial glances at her thirsty friend Kiyomi started to completely ignore her expression of thirst after remembering all those things.

"Mana, you need to take these", the blonde raised the problem out loud. The magician was positioned by the tree and sat up on the branch the trio was resting on. The trio weren't too far away from the marked Team Maruf hideout so strategies needed to be drawn and preparations needed to be made.

The magician pondered on something, trying to come up with an excuse not to take the pills but she couldn't really figure anything out. The usual accelerated ninja metabolism began recovering chakra resources pretty soon after leaving a field of active battle and consuming one's stamina. Her chakra was already regenerating to some extent, similarly to how normal resting worked. That being said, it almost always took a day or two to fully recover chakra resources for a ninja. Even their bodily injuries ached and troubled their body less in two or three days even if they took longer to fully heal.

"I know what you're thinking – we don't have the time. We've wasted enough of it as it is. We don't have two or three or five days, however long it'll take. These pills can return you to half your peak in couple of hours. Even your wounds will stop stagnating and bleeding and will start to slowly heal. We need you". Kiyomi pressed on harder.

"Well, we may need you less in this mission, it'll all be stealth and sneaking around but… You are an important part of the team", Meiko nodded energetically, Kiyomi realized after looking right into the redhead's happy eyes that the blacksmith missed the point of this conversation completely. Meiko thought this was about Mana's self-confidence so she felt obliged to compliment the magician's importance but it was more than that. It was about proper teamwork and getting back into track after spending so much time fighting snuck in rogue ninja and their own hunters in battles that took too much time and too much effort to fight.

Mana closed her eyes and looked down, she looked kind of defeated and submissive but it may have been the general look of her – she was pretty banged up from all she had to go through recently. Kiyomi's pouting frown turned upside-down as she witnessed the magician fondling the food pills for a moment before placing them in her mouth.

"These are red pills after all – they're by far the least stressful to your body so you'll be able to take two of them no problem"! the blonde energetically cheered on her friend.

There were better tasting things than the red food pills that Mana chewed up for a while and swallowed. It sort of tasted like dragée made of old mashed tomatoes, paprika and chili peppers. It was bitter, sour and sweet, hot and acidic all at the same time but it was a little less chewy and seaweed-like than the green pills. Almost instantly the magician felt an influx of energy that was quick to burn up but it felt like her entire body hit the reset button and was quickly beginning to fire up again with newfound strength and stamina.

"My chest itches a bit", Mana noted after scratching it softly to alleviate the uneasy feeling.

"Yeah, well… Those are medical food pills after all – they do stress your body even if those are the least stressful to take. You should be clear of heart attacks just yet", Kiyomi shrugged before lightly tapping on Mana's shoulder and looking on ahead to the empty space of the forest where Team Maruf hideout was supposed to be.

* * *

It was truly an impressive camp that Team Maruf of Sunagakure put together. It was a complicated construction of peeled off shells of centipedes and snake skin, it was all held together with mandibles of insects that appeared to pierce everything like laundry pins and act almost like nature's nails and stitches. The camp would've been completely immune to an attack from basic ninja tools or weak ninjutsu attacks or physical blows.

"I could tear it down", Meiko bragged as if she knew exactly what everyone was thinking. "I'm almost regretting sneaking around, it'd look really cool to see this thing fall down".

"Jeez, Meiko"! Mana expressed horror at her direction. "Didn't know you were such a demolitions enthusiast".

"Hey, it's a thing, and as long as it fits that condition I like taking it apart and putting it back together equally"! the blacksmith grinned while rubbing her nose.

Mana didn't really feel easy about this whole thing. On one hand taking the target down silently would've been the quickest and least painful for everybody method. On the other hand – stealth was probably the one aspect of her arsenal she was the least confident in. Her stealth grades in the Academy were just barely passable and as an entertainer she actually liked being showy and very in your face so she wondered if she could even assist her team on this as she was expected to.

At least the medical food pills were working as they should've been. Feeling one's chakra network and metabolism working in an overdrive felt odd. That inner sensation of spiritual and physical energies growing back to their peak with each passing second felt strangely… Tickling and warm. Even her mind was slowly sharpening and she began perceiving things and thinking much faster than she was with a reduced chakra reserve. It was nowhere close to full recovery, Kiyomi's estimations were just about right though. Mana could feel her wounds hurting less and less every minute and her chakra was approaching half of its total capacity.

With Kiyomi giving the signal the entire team took off. It felt really refreshing moving so fast. It felt almost like moving instantly. With a couple of leaps the girls made an entire circle around the camp and observed it from various corners. Surveying multiple possible entries.

"The head piece is made of giant centipede's head shell. It has four holes where the insect's eyes would've been stuck up with bee wax. We can melt that with a weak flame or cut through it. Melting it would be the least noisy but it'd take longer and none of us, to my knowledge can use D-Rank Fire Release jutsu". Kiyomi whispered.

"Cutting it is", Mana nodded. Meiko also gestured her approval of the idea.

"Mana, I'd appreciate a quick sense of the place, try to figure out if they're inside at the very least. I know your ability isn't too precise but if there're any signatures nearby we'll take it as a positive". The Yamanaka then ordered.

Mana closed her eyes and tried to sit comfortably in a meditative position as she extended her consciousness beyond her own mind, trying to feel the outside world as if it was something she could just reach out and touch. It took a good ten to fifteen minutes before the magician managed to slip into the proper meditation mode that fit the description of what chakra sensory usually looked like but it worked – three moderate sized stars floated in a cluster orbiting around each other nearby enough to be the real thing.

The team blitzed away and in a single superfast leap turned up right on the piece of the upper floor made of the giant centipede's head. Meiko pulled out a knife and thrust it at the waxy parts but the kunai blunted out in her hand from a single thrust. Kiyomi closed her eyes and gritted her teeth together as a louder than she had desired clang combined with a fleshy wax damage sound emanated through the entire construction. The team lingered for a moment waiting to find out if they've been discovered but they appeared to have been lucky.

No one heard their moves just yet. Kiyomi sighed with relief as she gave another kunai to Mana. The magician nodded, she realized the problem as well – the kunai needed to be heated. It didn't appear that the wax of the local giant bees could be damaged with blunt or cutting force and required heat to be passed through. The magician gripped the knife tighter in her hand before weaving a pair of hand seals and pointing it into the sky. She needed to half-ass the ninjutsu, just enough to heat the blade but not enough to make a flashy effect that'd attract attention…

"Magic Skewer Jutsu" she whispered to aid her focus as the usual rod shapes of lightning chakra formed around her, this time just barely matching the size of the kunai and drove into the wax together heating it up to the shape of a gooey white substance. The magician drove the kunai in firmly and dragged it across the hole of where once an insect's eye was letting some of the wax drip on the inside despite her genuine efforts to drive it on the outside.

"Nice. We're in", Kiyomi nodded while shaping her lips to form words yet uttering no sounds. Luckily enough Mana and Meiko could read her lips just fine enough.

Right before the team settled on entering the structure Kiyomi weaved a hand seal and initiated the mental link. It was entirely possible for her and Mana to communicate using sign language taught in the Ninja Academy however Kiyomi knew better than to rely on Meiko's knowledge of any languages other than her first one. Something about memorizing hundreds of different signs and all the ways they interact together just didn't seem like anything Meiko would pull off, having her skillsets in mind.

"When we're in stick to the walls." Kiyomi let out an authoritative mental signal. "Meiko, I trust you still have your T-shirts with you?"

"See? I told you two stuffing half of my bag with clothes will come in handy!" Meiko emitted a powerful joyful thought.

Mana bit her cheek on the inside. She knew what Kiyomi's idea was and, frankly, it was quite genius. The Yamanaka wanted the team to use the Cloak of Invisibility jutsu which was one of several E-Rank ninjutsu techniques taught in the Ninja Academy. It'd have allowed the team to stick to the walls while using Meiko's pieces of cloth to disguise themselves perfectly while they moved throughout the area unseen.

"Mana"? Kiyomi signalled for her to follow but the magician lingered. She just tried figuring out a way for her to avoid using a generic technique which she herself didn't invent. She had used generic techniques before but only as a mean to save someone's life. Now she tried to run through all of her options before crossing her principles.

"She doesn't want to use a technique she didn't invent", Meiko reminded Kiyomi casually.

"Oh for… Do you have a ninjutsu or an illusion to replace this one"? Kiyomi wondered mentally.

"Not anything I can think of", Mana shook her head feeling ashamed and disappointed in herself.

"Goddamn kindergarten is what this is… Fine, let's go, Meiko. We don't need all three of us and it might actually be better to use less space while sneaking", Kiyomi cursed before the following thought occurred to her. The less people will be sneaking around inside, the less the probability of them failing or bumping into someone or messing up their technique.

Both girls activated the Cloak of Invisibility technique which weaved chakra into the cloth used for the ninjutsu and made it large enough to cover both of the users individually and morphed their shape and color into being perfectly fit for a disguise when sticking close to a wall. Usually when performed by a low ranking ninja the technique didn't adapt to movement but with additional chakra input it could've been done by a more skilled ninja. The only things the two girls had to worry about now was spreading betraying noises, smells or someone bumping into them accidentally.

"Wow, it actually worked"! Meiko emitted a happy thought onto the link.

"Of course it worked, it's a generic Academy ninjutsu. It's like jumping in joy after pulling off a Transformation Jutsu, you're in the goddamn Chuunin Exams, Meiko", Kiyomi cheeked at her friend's direction, Mana wondered if the blonde had ever seen Meiko fail basic ninjutsu techniques and mess up proper chakra control quite as many times and on such basic things as the she had seen during the search for the Box of Ultimate Bliss. Even while this Meiko here was much different from the girl that left with Mana to look for the Box, she had plenty to cheer on about with pulling this jutsu off.

"This may turn out for the better yet, sit tight and observe the area, Mana", Kiyomi sent a signalling thought Mana's way.

Even knowing that Kiyomi couldn't physically see her, Mana nodded and dashed off to the sanctuary of the woods, careful as to not to trip over or make too much noise with her movements. She probably did make some troubling noises which a careful ninja would definitely pick up but no reasonable ninja would ever react to every noise they hear in the Forest of Death. This place was full of creatures crawling and buzzing with all the subtlety of a Tailed Beast.

"Alright, let's look for this Qarsufly fellow now. I trust you know how he looks like"? Kiyomi began guiding the sneaking process as the two girls carefully sneaked outside the little attic-like room where the insect's eye socket would've been and into a larger skull area lit by small torches and full of different rooms where the other eyes were as well into the rooms left by spaces where the massive mandibles and antenna of the creature were.

"Definitely"! Meiko nodded firmly. That was one person whose face she allowed to sink deep into her mind. In a massive forest filled with thirty two different teams and almost a hundred different genin she most certainly made an effort to memorize the person she was after.

"Good, now let's carefully look for him, slow and steady, then take him out quick and get the hell out of here. After he's down we can ditch the subtlety if we're found out, I'm confident we can outrun most people in this forest", Kiyomi breathed in and out deep before shutting her breathing down completely. A ninja could've held their breath down for twenty minutes at average, longer if they spent chakra to sustain their bodies but after fifteen minutes or so the body began to react – heart rate accelerated, sweating intensified and hiding would become difficult.

"Now that I think about it, how do we plan to take him out? Won't his body instinctively augment itself when we hit him, even if we do it from behind"? Meiko wondered.

"Don't worry, Hanasaku-sensei taught me a trick to bypass that sort of thing when his back is open", Kiyomi sent a calming and happy thought back on the link.

Team Hokage carefully snuck about the place, they've seen a person of slim feminine dressed in all black and wearing a peculiar headdress that made her face completely covered up and a belt full of circular in shape blades with sharpened outer edges and with varied sizes as well. The smaller ones on her waist were of around fifteen centimeters in size but she wore many larger ones as accessories holding her complex and verily concealing attire together. The young lady was meditating in one of the side jaw rooms so the two kunoichi sneaked past her.

"This must be Squlra, of whom we were told about, the one with a nasty attitude. Wouldn't have taken her for the meditating type", Kiyomi noted.

"Faqsamalopolis is probably in the kitchen, stuffing his place. I wish I could help him with that noble goal", Meiko emitted a longing thought back on the link.

"His name is Faqsadid, although, yes, I agree with that assessment. Still, we've no idea which room they've chosen for the kitchen. We've no time to properly map this place out, let's just find Qarsufly and hit him fast and rough", Kiyomi corrected her teammate before moving onwards and past Squlra's room.

Right as her step would've touched the middle step of a long and round staircase which channelled two different levels of the structure Kiyomi's foot froze. Meiko felt the mental link growing cold and an uncontrollable feeling of dread that began to chill the overall mental image.

"What's wrong"? the blacksmith wondered before quaking in her boots in anticipation as Kiyomi was in front of her and was halting the duo's progress.

"Mana just went off the link for no reason", the Yamanaka whispered vocally, almost like the whisper was meant only for herself.

The feeling of firm ground beneath their feet shifted as Kiyomi and Meiko got tossed backwards and slammed into the armored shell wall as a powerful ram built of purple crystal penetrated the structure from multiple sides skewering and crushing it almost completely.

"What the hell"? Kiyomi yelled out mentally before grabbing the t-shirt and shooting up the stairs and into the first little room she saw, only for Meiko to follow.

"That was no one we know about", the redhead stated the obvious.

"Yeah, Faqsadid is an ugly fatso, Squlra is a circular blade using weaponry user. Maybe it's Qarsufly? We haven't heard about his ability yet", Kiyomi tried piecing it all together but the more she thought about it the less sense this all made. Whatever ability Qarsufly had he'd have not sensed and taken out Mana first, whatever threat this was – it came from the outside.

"Faqsadid, we are Team Corundum of Iwagakure, we've come for you", a firm voice of an athletically built young man with golden dyed hair declared. His face was completely covered in red markings and tattoos attributed usually to the Kaguya clan and he pointed his hand upwards holding an elbow-to-hand long blade that appeared to be made completely of bone. That much the two Konoha girls could see through a small crack, likely left over from when the creature was killed for its shell and parts to be used in this structure's construction.

This got out of hand pretty fast…


	304. Gifts and Curses

Kiyomi and Meiko continued to observe the fight that was about to erupt between the invading chaotic factor and their own target team. They did not sit easy as the duo were constantly doubting every little move they made, even their current position of sitting quietly and observing the battlefield.

"If Mana's out, does that means she's eliminated"? Meiko asked mentally, somewhat vaguely.

"I… I don't know… I don't want to jinx it but… It's more than likely". Kiyomi gritted her teeth as a brief ray of light illuminated the mostly dim little spherical shaped room that the two observed the scene below from.

Kiyomi turned at her friend and teammate just to observe what reactions were running down her face. Meiko was quite unpredictable in her usual state and right now Kiyomi, as Team Hokage leader needed unpredictability the least in her life. The blonde herself wanted to just run out and start taking over minds and kick asses but her more rational part demanded to think her plan through.

"We need to get out there, we need to fight"! Meiko demanded as her mind became murkier, her thoughts raced through and burnt out before they could be clearly read by Kiyomi who was beginning to worry more about her teammate than the odds of them taking out their target.

"No! Sit tight! For now at least… There're too many factors we still don't know about all of this". Kiyomi silenced the blacksmith as the two continued to observe the situation below.

A circular blade of Squlra's shot out from out of nowhere aiming right at the golden haired Kaguya's neck. It whizzed so fast that Kiyomi found tracking the blade quite difficult as to her it moved in a faintly visible silver blur. If seeing this thing was so troublesome, the blonde couldn't even begin to imagine the trouble it'd be to actually avoid it.

The Kaguya youth of the invading team leaned aside allowing the blade to whizz right by the skin of his neck. It seemed a very arrogant and berating way of dodging. If the opponent had any afterthought of this attack, such a careless dodge would've left countless openings to exploit.

Such was actually the case as another blade flew at the Kaguya from the side. Squlra herself dived out from one of the upper floor hallways and stuck to a wall as she launched her rotund blades at the enemy. The golden haired young man lifted up his hand and trapped the spinning circular blade in his bone weapon like a horse-shoe on a pin. The bone began to spark violently as the blade must've been of higher quality materials and craftsmanship but the bone didn't even come close to relenting.

In a final motion the girl pulled on a string attached to the second blade which only became evident once she wished it to be revealing that it was tied on another piece of string tied to the first blade she tossed.

"String Reeling Jutsu"! The young lady yelled out in an energetic and relatively low pitched voice for a girl, her somewhat masculine voice was further muffled by the headdress she wore that covered almost the entirety of her face except for her dark brown eyes.

As Squlra pulled the second string it pulled on the first one making the spinning first blade whizz right back in a circular motion and saw a wide arc in the walls of the structure before re-entering the manmade building and whizzing in straight at the Kaguya's neck for decapitation.

Without caring too much about the incoming decapitation Jekleifer Kaguya grabbed on the steel wire on the second blade and pulled on it firmly, pulling his opponent in for a close distance battle. A flesh slicing buzzing sound followed by a metallic clang heralded the contact between the buzzing circular blade coming in contact with the Kaguya's neck as he pulled his enemy in. A small amount of blood squirted out from the damaged flesh but it appeared as if the circular blade had lodged into the young man's neck very shallowly.

As the body of the young lady clad in black whizzed by in a whirling vortex of dark cloth and Kaguya slammed his opponent's body to the ground leaving a bone in the center of her chest where he had punched her. As Kiyomi and Meiko observed the exchanges of murderous strikes and were just about to bury both of the opponents Squlra's body disappeared in a cloud of smoke leaving just a log with several circular blades lodged in it, joined by Jekleifer's hard as steel bone blade.

An athletic young man with shoulder long dark hair looked at his teammate with a mocking glare.

"Got tricked by a Substitution Jutsu", he stated the obvious.

"I expected some manner of a trick. Substitution, clones, something. That's why I chose to approach this lethally, I knew she'd wriggle out of it somehow", Jekleifer closed his eyes as he removed the circular blade that had left a small flesh wound on his neck, just past the skin and several bits into the flesh. "You may have known that I'd place a bone plate under my skin but you could've helped me out with that".

"I would've… I just didn't care enough to", the Kaguya's comrade shrugged with a seemingly innocent grin.

"I would prefer if we took this outside", the female teammate of the golden haired Kaguya mumbled quietly making it difficult to distinguish what she said with hearing alone. She looked relatively odd compared to her teammates – she wore a thick leather jacket covered with fur and dark sunglasses that looked more like swimming goggles.

"I intend to, don't worry, Maurlon", the Kaguya nodded affirmatively. The firm and calm look on the young man's face heavily implied that he understood why his teammate asked of it and had it in mind before attacking the place to begin with.

"They want to take down Team Maruf just like us. They're pretty capable too", Kiyomi mumbled to herself.

"Maybe we should show ourselves and help them fight? Six on three we are sure to win", Meiko suggested.

"No way. We don't know what their intentions are towards us. Also, if we show ourselves too early we can scare Team Maruf away into fleeing. We need them to think that they are in control. Besides, how willing would you be to cooperate with the folks that took Mana out"? Kiyomi shook her head listing multiple reasons from the top of her head she had for remaining hidden and tracking the battle. Even though she appeared firm on this question, the possibility of revealing themselves has crossed Kiyomi's mind early on as well.

The eyes of the attacking team turned at somewhere right above Team Hokage's hiding spot, as well as on both sides of the staircases around them. Judging from that, Kiyomi assumed that the enemy team had revealed themselves. So Team Maruf decided to take on their enemies in a full out three on three brawl…

"Stay down and wait for me to move in. We need to wait for a good moment to strike, when we find an ideal opening we take out Qarsufly and we run. Hopefully those Iwagakure guys won't care enough to pursue us and Team Maruf will be pinned down by them and won't follow us either". Kiyomi ordered.

"What about Mana"? Meiko looked worryingly.

"The only ways she could've just disappeared from the link like this would've been if she's out, dead or she left by her own choice. There's nothing we can do but leave her for the staff to take care of", Kiyomi looked away from the brewing brawl below and turned her eyes at a blank point in the dim room the two were hiding in. At that moment she felt the weight of a leader, the pain of wrestling with one's own self and making a tough call. It wasn't a life or death call, not a real one anyways. Either way, it was a simulation of what a real higher ranked mission was like.

"But… Maybe she blanked out to warn us"? Meiko still tried to fight that decision. It made sense, Mana and the redhead had a pretty close background and they've bonded quite extensively over that trip the two kept mentioning briefly.

"It doesn't make sense that she would. She would've just let us know about the approaching enemy mentally instead of leaving the link and leaving us to wonder. We could've communicated more efficiently like that, Mana's smarter than that. If she left – she's out cold", Kiyomi stood by her decision firmly, she had to admit, her own minds fluctuated and wavered similarly to how Meiko's did when she first realized what Mana's unconsciousness meant.

The entire structure rumbled forcing Kiyomi to direct her attention at Team Maruf that had gathered in the circular hall surrounded by staircases that lead into the "brainbox" of the second floor. The ground floor likely was the insect's mouth before it was reworked to look more like a hall.

Team Maruf were just like they were described: Squlra, whom Team Hokage and the invading team wearing Iwagakure's forehead protectors had already met, a tall and fat, seemingly genderless and featureless, thing covered with green bubble-like features that were described by Steinck as "ulcers". The team leader was Qarsufly, a youth with shoulder long dark hair with two longer strands extending past his back and quite formally dressed, wearing a long and dark jacket over a simple white shirt.

"So you've shown yourselves? That's good", Jekleifer calmly closed his eyes in approval. He appeared completely confident in the total victory of his team if he allowed himself the mocking luxury of closing off his eyes right before battle.

"Make no mistake, the fact that we're standing in front of you means that Squlra sized you up and decided that we can beat you", Qarsufly raised his fist up angrily, it appeared that the utmost confidence of his enemy annoyed him.

"So that's what it was"? Jekleifer noted calmly before taking a fighting stance.

The fat and mushy member of Team Maruf, Faqsadid, leaped straight from his staircase post aiming to crush his enemies using his own weight. Only once the large and rotund genin extended his arms and legs and stretched out in the air that the trio of the attacking team realized that their opponent was large enough to do it. Right as the slow downfall of the massive genin concluded the invading team had dispersed in a quick blur of movements.

Like a swarm of highly coordinated insects the Iwagakure trio decided to focus on their belly flopped opponent who was currently writhing on the ground doing his best to get back on his short but bulky feet. Jekleifer threw a combination of quick punches testing out the bulk and toughness of his opponent, knowing the precise limit of one's opponent's endurance allowed one to precisely calculate the amount of force needed to overcome them instead of killing them. Despite emitting powerful shockwaves and threatening thundering thuds upon impact, Jekleifer's powerful blows bounced off the large body of the Sunagakure giant.

"Crystal Style: Diamond Ridge"! Jekleifer's comrade yelled out as he quickly weaved a pair of hand seals and slammed his hand to the ground. Tall crystalline pillars with sharpened edges shot out in a straight line completely tearing to shreds any structural obstacles on its way to the giant genin. The crystal appeared to be powerful and sharp enough to toss the massive genin into the air and make him grunt in pain, it even left gruesome looking shredding wounds on the exposed body of the heavyweight.

Attempting to aid her comrade Squlra sent a whizzing barrage of her circular blades her opponent's way. Had they connected it'd have been entirely possible that the buzzing barrage of blades would've left the crystal ninjutsu user in pieces but at the very last moment a swarm of insects surrounded him in a sphere protecting him from harm. Judging by the extended arms of the female teammate of the Iwagakure team it was the female Aburame's doing.

"And who's protecting you?" Qarsufly yelled out as he attempted to kick the female member of Team Corundum with a deceitfully fast divekick.

A gut-wrenching sound of tearing flesh and blood splattering on the ground followed as Qarsufly's kick did not connect to the chest or head of the female Aburame but instead to her Kaguya clan teammate's exposed back which had bones protruding from all over his body as he stood in a hunched over position so that the protruding bones could do as much damage to the enemy as possible.

Jekleifer's female teammate followed up her comrade's caring guard with a quick kick that sent the bruised and injured Qarsufly sliding back to his initial position. While the Sunagakure genin managed to perform basic course protection in mid-air, thanks to his up to par superhuman perception being able to follow his opponent's movements, he still didn't avoid grievous cuts and lacerations. Attacking the Kaguya clan physically was the equivalent of headbutting a defensive echidna.

With pain caused grunts the Kaguya straightened himself out, allowing his bones to painfully return to their places from where they pierced his own body. Shortly after the bones disappeared a white cartilage tissue covered up the wounds where Jekleifer's own generated bones pierced through his body. It was a highly efficient combination of offensive and defensive techniques however it didn't come pain free.

"Hmph… A Kaguya member with the Shikotsumyaku ability", Qarsufly uttered in relative surprise. "You'll have to forgive my oversight, it is not something that one sees every day…"

"You know about the Kaguya clan"? Jekleifer grunted as he still felt the resonating pain inside his own body from creating new bones on the fly and making himself a human hedgehog in a fraction of a second.

"This and that. I've heard about the ability to control one's bones, mostly as an example of a rare ability that only a few members of a clan inherit", Qarsufly smiled as he observed the bleeding cuts on his lower arm, biceps and his thighs as well as one on his abdomen. He was lucky to avoid more serious wounds as at that moment his body was focused entirely on delivering as powerful of a kick as possible and not bothering with defensive measures.

"It's not like you aren't a bunch of freaks either", Jekleifer's crystal ninjutsu using teammate grinned after seeing his crystal pillar collapse into chips and dust and seeing some bright red liquid goop out from the wounds of the massive genin he had injured. In his life Tolkre Guren has seen blood but this thing leaking out from the giant was not it.

Qarsufly's hands moved first, the Sunagakure genin quickly bit his thumb before running through a bunch of hand seals and driving his extended palm to the ground. In a large cloud of smoke a quartet of bulldog sized beetles emerged aiming their horns at the enemy.

"Summoning Jutsu", the young man chanted out as the four beetles rushed at the Kaguya.

"Dance of the Tulip", Jekleifer shouted out as bones once again protruded from his upper arm and under his biceps from where the blades were pulled out with the Kaguya's own arms and wielded as blades in a relentless barrage of lightning fast thrusts that created this ruthless rushing offensive combination.

One of the beetles got skewered by the bone blade thrusts, that were completely invisible when used with these coordinated thrusting movements of the dance, almost immediately. The others persevered the multiple stabbing wounds and rushed on, grazing and bruising the Kaguya using their horns and tossing him over their large bodies like a ragdoll. Adapting to being tossed around Jekleifer fixed his mid-air position and began relentlessly thrusting his blades with the same dancing combination of thrusts vertically downwards skewering and heavily injuring the insects even more.

Slightly to the right the massive Sunagakure genin slammed his own belly as if he tried to beat his own guts out forcing a handful of the dark green ulcer-like orbs all over his body to pop. However instead of blood or some pus a bunch of small and creepy doll-like humanoid figures, with knives at the end of each limb, emerged rushing straight at the crystal ninjutsu user. The young man was completely surprised by the highly unorthodox manner of attack, by the time he tried weaving the hand seals to protect himself it was too late.

The toy-sized puppets began whizzing by and around the Guren clansman slashing and cutting him with small blades on their hands and feet without giving him space and time to counter properly. Before too long the young Iwagakure genin was covered in crimson stripes and bruises but the ruthless hands-off offensive of the massive Sunagakure genin continued. The puppets began attacking with purpose, buzzing around in loops that tried to tie Faqsadid's opponent down and leave him powerless. Luckily enough he managed to weave a pair of hand seals, struggling through the pain, right before the loops tied around his hands.

"Crystal Style: Crystal Needles", he yelled out sending a storm of crystal shards his opponent's way, the wide reach of the technique allowed to damage Faqsadid's puppetry strings, pin down some of the annoying little dolls he used as well as damage the giant again leaving more leaking cuts on his massive frame.

"A little help next time, maybe"? Tolkre the crystal ninjutsu user complained at his teammate noticing too late that she herself was slightly occupied avoiding Squlra's ceaseless offensive.

However Faqsadid's own attacks have not yet ceased, right as Tolkre turned around to face his opponent he noticed that some of the damage he inflicted popped more of his green pulsing ulcers releasing another group of toys that intended to pester and cut him up to a more lethal extent. This time, however, the genin was ready. He rolled forwards weaving a pair of hand seals while he avoided the initial swipe of blade strikes and grabbed the puppetry strings of the massive Sunagakure genin.

"Crystal Style: Crimson Fruit"! Tolkre chanted as a large dome enclosed around the toy puppets shutting them off from their puppet master's control and leaving them completely powerless and useless.

While the crystal ninjutsu user was busy dealing with the weird puppetry attacks of his massive opponent and Jekleifer was matching strength and speed with Qarsufly's beetles, Squlra was attempting to cut down the female Aburame member to pieces with her deceitful and quick bladework. However every time that she managed to trap her opponent with strings before pulling and shredding her to pieces or successfully beheading the girl it turned out to be just another insect clone that collapsed into a lifeless swarm of insects upon being stricken down. Both young women realized that the Aburame was just wasting chakra fighting defensively like that but for some reason the Iwagakure girl just continued to attempt to evade the sadistic kunoichi's attacks, waiting for something resembling a chance to strike.

As the bloody scuffle between Team Maruf and Team Corundum was heating up, Kiyomi and Meiko waited patiently for their chance to incapacitate Qarsufly. So far, while the young man was occupied with Jekleifer, he sent his summoned ninja animals after him leaving himself quite ready to intercept any upcoming attacks. While his back was turned and his attention focused on his brawl with the Iwagakure ninja Kiyomi still waited for a better chance since Team Hokage only had one shot before exposing themselves.


	305. Kiyomi's Secret Ultimate Technique

After the swift Dance of the Tulip tore through Qarsufly's four beetles forcing them to flee the Sunagakure summoner took a wary step back. It was just a momentary tremble of confidence but it was not missed even by the two kunoichi observing the battle from above the hall where the battle took place.

"Those bone moves are amazing"! Meiko cheered out in excitement overloading Kiyomi's mind with loud shrieks of joy, "They're so fast and powerful, they'd tear any shield I have like wet paper"!

"Hey! Just whose side are you on? You may just end up fighting guys like this in the next rounds", Kiyomi complained so that her friend lightened up her overwhelming excitement. "Better start looking for weaknesses while you have a chance" the Yamanaka tried to direct her teammate's energy to something more productive than vain obsession.

"You're just jealous he's cooler than you!" Meiko joked, her thoughts were more collected this time but somehow they managed to sound even more insufferable. In a way, Kiyomi didn't really feel too fond about Jekleifer, maybe it was just his clan in general. Maybe there was a hint of jealousy in that hatred, similar to how Kiyomi hated Uchiha.

That being said, the jealousy and hatred for Uchiha felt more warranted somehow. Those were people praised for being the total ninja elite, the highest and the most amazing bloodline one could've been born into. Uchiha were destined for greatness, they had every tool handed down to them to be Hokage, to be the most powerful and amazing ninja. To be strong, smart and handsome. Whenever Kiyomi felt proud to be Yamanaka somehow Uchiha always were brought up as if somehow Kiyomi's own blood was less worth than that of theirs.

It wouldn't have been that bad if those guys used their blood right. Rose above the occasion, lived up to their potential and sacrificed their lives working for their village and doing their best. Instead they lived their lives in vanity and arrogance, thinking that their natural prowess and talent was all they needed. That was how most of them died off or got retired early – they got careless and cocky. That was likely the bottom of Kiyomi's beef with those people. The fact that they were naturally superior to everyone else, constantly shoved in her face about how that was the truth, and yet they wasted everyone's time with all that potential.

Then what was the problem with this guy? He clearly was fit and well trained, he used his abilities properly and even innovated on them. He was cocky but he could back up every word of it. He wasn't like the Uchiha Kiyomi knew or heard of at all.

Qarsufly's hands danced gracefully in a combination of hand seals after his teeth drew more blood from his thumb and he summoned another beetle. This one however was the size of a rhinoceros. Its side horns extended halfway throughout the entire hall and the central nose horn was as tall as the entire floor and looked like it could've crushed every bone in someone's body with a single ram.

With a whooshing sound the side horns snapped shut, trying to cut through Jekleifer like scissors. The golden haired Kaguya spread his hands to the sides catching the horns right before they pierced him. Blood squirt from his hands as he struggled to keep the horns away from impaling him. As the beetle intensified its pressure Jekleifer's hands should've caved in from the ceaseless intense pain but the young man held the horns firmly. Instead of squirting blood only a bone cracking and grinding sounds followed every attempt to press the horns together and impale the Iwagakure youth. Jekleifer managed to form cartilage tissue on top of his hand injury which provided him with enough protection and toughness to his grip to hold the horns away.

With a mad dash forward the beetle tried to force Jekleifer back and crush him against the armored centipede shell wall to loosen his grip and crush him with the large central horn. Another barrage of crystal pillars tried to derail the beetle's forceful advances but they were toppled halfway by Faqsadid's shoulder ram. Upon hitting the crystal the pillars shattered into smallest pieces together with Faqsadid's shoulder. Despite that the strange inhuman giant kept on standing with the same look on his face, that dumb smile.

"I'm your opponent", a cybernetic sounding voice came from somewhere deep in Faqsadid's chest.

Shortly Jekleifer's body gave in to the pressure, his feet lifted off the ground and his body got slammed against the wall with the oversized horn of the beetle crushing the young man between the armored centipede shell and its horn. The wall that Jekleifer got smashed into collapsed outwards but the Kaguya youth managed to avoid being flung outside.

Jekleifer's female teammate attempted to move him further away from the cornered position he was in but a speedy whizzing circular blade buzzed right past her face stopping her. By leaning left and right the young Aburame avoided multiple more attacks from the circular blades before leaping up and sticking to the ceiling of the floor.

"Outside"! She yelled out turning at the messy and dusty corner that her team leader was cornered into.

Much to Qarsufly's surprise, Jekleifer stood back on his feet. The flesh on his chest appeared to be completely stripped off and only a hardened bone tissue that was generated on his actual skeleton protected that part of his body before it changed into a softer but more flexible cartilage tissue.

"That should've grinded your bones to dust"! Qarsufly's mouth opened up in disbelief from what he had seen his enemy survive. The beetle he was standing on and whom he was controlling was the most powerful member of the ninja beetles he could use in combat. The combination attack that the Sunagakure genin had used must've been his most powerful hit and yet it didn't appear that it fazed his enemy at all, except numerous flesh wounds.

"That guy can take a punch too!" Meiko once again emanated overloaded with excitement thoughts onto the link.

"Yeah. But by now you should've noticed it. His weakness", Kiyomi smiled. Somehow it gave her joy now that she saw a way to defeat this genin if she ever had to fight him head-on.

"Weakness? Nothing he's hit by hurts him too much, what are you talking about? He's next to invulnerable. That white stuff completely covers up all the fleshy wounds and his bones are harder than anything in my arsenal", the blacksmith continued to remain in total awe at the Iwagakure genin's strength and endurance.

"That's right, physically he's next to invulnerable but not mentally. Every time he uses his ability he creates new bones under his flesh as well as stabs himself from inside to create weapons and counterattack it hurts him. That sort of agonizing pain wears on you and eventually the fatigue will just keep you down even if your body is still alright. Technically speaking, he damages his own body every time he both attacks and defends, his ability is a curse as much as it is a gift", the Yamanaka explained.

Without even weaving any hand seals Jekleifer placed his hands onto the ground. The skin on his flesh started twitching and shifting like large objects were moving through his flesh and his teeth grinded in pain.

"Dance of the Seedling Fern"! Jekleifer almost screamed out in crippling pain. It was clear that momentarily his enemy wondered if he should've tried and attacked the youth again as the start-up for his jutsu was incredibly sluggish and he took several seconds just standing there and letting his body shift and twitch before the technique initiated. That being said, once it did – it transpired instantaneously.

The entire structure built by Team Maruf was completely annihilated and blown away by a rising forest of colossal bones totally tearing anything in its way to shreds. Kiyomi couldn't even fathom what had happened for entire seconds after the tremendous forest of bones erected and completely ravaged the landscape for a good fifty meters in radius. She even wondered if she was still alive before realizing that she was mostly unhurt and in Meiko's hands.

"Thanks", the blonde expressed her gratitude to the quick thinking of her teammate. Meiko just nodded before sighing more easily. They were sitting on top of a strong branch inside the forest and not holed up in some room in a tight and armored structure. This was a much more comfortable location to launch the intended stealth attack from.

From a single look at Qarsufly's eyes it became clear that the genin didn't expect the manner of widespread and total destruction of the building he helped Faqsadid build. Had his beetle not taken off and avoided every bone spike protruding from the ground in its mad flight to the air he'd have been completely overwhelmed and impaled, without a doubt.

His team however were not as fortunate. Faqsadid laid on the ground with his strange body completely torn and lacerated. He looked like he got gutted by a rampaging boar as he laid outside the forest's range, without a doubt being tossed there after the spikes erected shooting out from the ground so suddenly. Squlra also carried massive battle damage from the suddenly emerged forest as her highly concealing outfit got almost completely torn apart to shreds and her exposed skin revealed endless streaks of cuts and shallow stabbing wounds she received. The young woman was hanging on a circular blade attached to a steel wire that she lodged onto a tree branch, using it to pull herself away after taking massive damage to both her body and her chakra reserves.

"Still want to try your luck against that Kaguya guy"? Meiko mumbled with a cheerful smile as the overwhelming attack against the entire battlefield caused Kiyomi to break the mental link.

Without answering anything Kiyomi just pointed her finger at the Kaguya who stood in right outside of the forest of bones surrounded by his teammates. Jekleifer was breathing heavily and sweating profusely, trickling drops of blood forced their way through the cartilage tissue and somehow found its way outside his body. It was evident that the Team Corundum leader took a great toll using this technique.

"Whaaa!", the blacksmith shouted out loud enough for Kiyomi to temporarily feel worried that they may have given their position out.

"I mean… Yeah, I know I was right but I didn't expect you to be that excited. Jutsu like that have their cost, you know", Kiyomi shrugged as she started getting drawn into her own lecture before Meiko grabbed the Yamanaka's soft and squishy cheeks and turned her head against a pink pillar of crystal laying on the ground a good twenty meters behind Team Corundum.

"Mana", Kiyomi uttered finally realizing what caught her friend's attention before. While finding her friend did feel a little clarifying, at the same time it sort of kicked Kiyomi straight in the groin. As if her face was dragged in the dirt of her failure. Her own immobilized teammate frozen in a chunk of crystal just laid out besides an active battlefield.

Before the blonde could figure out if she wanted to risk being seen while moving the magician's crystalline prison away from the battlefield, the squabble was resumed.

"Ninja Style: Chakram Whirligig"! Squlra yelled out taken over by rage of being cut up and damaged. She saw the weakened state of the Kaguya and went for it. Ten chakram blades flew right at the worn out and self-injured Kaguya who clenched at his own wounds. Right as the blades would've hit her teammate, Aburame Maurlon placed her hand against the ground. Powerful jaws emerged from underground deflecting the blades aside before submerging again.

Angered by the lack of success in injuring her opponent Squlra grit her teeth before pulling on all the strings attached to all of the chakram and driving all of them to their intended location. Despite her repeated attempt to hit the enemy the entire team was protected by a crystalline dome surrounding them.

"You actually helped this time", Maurlon noted in genuine surprise of the very uncharacteristic behavior for her Guren clansman teammate.

"Tsk, don't get any wrong ideas, if those blades actually hit Jekleifer I'd have gotten dirt and blood into my eyes, that's too annoying to allow to happen", Tolkre replied sarcastically.

"Go. I'll watch both your backs"! Maurlon asked for her teammate who just nodded and weaved a pair of hand seals before charging alone at his enemy.

"Crystal Style: Crystal Lance!" Tolkre yelled out as his hand hardened with an outer layer of crystal which kept growing thicker and longer until it began resembling a large lance made entirely of pink crystal material sharper and harder than titanium.

Momentarily Tolkre's eyes wavered as he saw little to no support from the Aburame coming but soon his feeling of ground beneath his feet wavered. The Guren clansman realized that he was mounting an immensely sized insect causing movements underground that forced the ground beneath his feet to shift, moving him at his opponent's direction like a surfboard.

"The beetle, Tolkre"! Maurlon commanded to prioritize the insectoid partner of Qarsufly.

"Forget it, let's just get Jekleifer his stupid target and be done with it!" Tolkre smiled as he thrust his spear at the laying giant.

Before the crystalline spear could pierce Faqsadid, however, Qarsufly's beetle swooped down and rammed Tolkre from the side tossing him aside and off of his surfboard of shifting dirt. It appeared that the impact shook the young man up and injured him pretty badly as he didn't move or attempt to get up after being tossed aside.

"Fine, I'll finish him off myself", Maurlon grunted as she slammed her hands against the ground setting off her ace technique which she was waiting to use this whole time.

The dirt beneath Faqsadid's massive frame exploded like a gazer of stone and soil before beginning to sink down. The sinkhole grew in size and depth with an alarming rate.

"Lightning Style: Lightning Teetotum!" Squlra yelled out sending a bunch of chakram blades attached to steel wire through which she channeled Lightning Release chakra to grant her blades more cutting power and completely imbue them with chakra. With cutting power like that the young Sunagakure kunoichi could've cut through most of any weapons found in genin's arsenal and even through elementary chakra augmentation using genin like nothing. As the blades got swallowed up by the rotating and shifting blackness of the sinkhole in which Faqsadid was getting absorbed in a strong lightning pulse came out from Squlra's chakram before the tools got completely swallowed up.

"What!?" The injured Sunagakure kunoichi yelled out in surprise, "My Lightning Release chakra should've broken your Earth Release ninjutsu apart"

"Earth Release ninjutsu?" Maurlon smiled confidently as she confidently straightened out her back and rubbed her nose triumphantly, "Who told I was using something like that?"

"But", Squlra hesitated before observing the shifting dirt inside the ever deepening and widening sinkhole more clearly. It looked like every smallest grain of the soil was a living, moving and squirming organism struggling for its life which caused the sinkhole effect.

"That's right. Those are all insects, burrowing through the ground, desperately fleeing from something larger that lurks in the center of my technique", Maurlon grinned before Faqsadid's massive frame got grabbed by two pincer-like gigantic jaws and dragged completely underground before the insects all settled down and burrowed underground. After one more violent quake of the earth the sinkhole got completely covered up and collapsed in on itself, the doing of all the miniscule insects who didn't sink below to the absolute giant lurking below.

"Don't worry, we'll give your teammate up to the staff. We'll claim him as our target, of course", Maurlon laughed out in triumph. Her technique utilizing two entirely new species of the Aburame chakra devouring insects required open space or a more suitable floor than the armored shell of a giant Forest of Death centipede which covered Team Maruf's camp before. All the burrowing little insects attacked the enemy eating away at their chakra resources and making it difficult to escape the sinkhole while the large predator awaited in the deep center of the sinkhole waiting to lock its tight jaws around the sinking and weakened prey and either hold them captive or just crush them in its grip.

Squlra's cocky feminine laugh pierced the silence. Not too long later Qarsufly's laughter followed.

"Our teammate? We tried to save his puppet, not his body. Replacing the big one will be a big pain in his ass, that's all", Squlra mocked the Aburame who lingered for a moment before a light tremble gave away her suddenly rising fear.

Dirty little hands burst from underground grabbing firmly on the Aburame's heels and holding her in place.

"I… I can't contact Arijikochu. What have you done to her"!? Maurlon tried to still maintain an image of being threatening despite being firmly restrained and all of her attempts to call for her underground swarms ending up in vain.

As Qarsufly's buzzing beetle prepared to ram the enemy of its summoner and break her body Squlra could've help herself from bragging.

"It's Faqsadid's giant puppet, the gooey red secretion that spreads from its wounds is poisonous" she giggled, "If I had to guess, your buggers are all probably all knocked out or dead for trying to eat his chakra up from up close".

After lowering its massive ramming horn the beetle swooped down. Maurlon closed her eyes, she could probably have used some more of her chakra to form an insect clone using the parasitic insects already inside her body but it wouldn't have stopped the incoming horn, nor would it have allowed her to somehow get loose from the real Faqsadid holding her from underground.

"Konoha Secret Taijutsu: One Thousand Years of Death!" Kiyomi's voice echoed out of the blue as she and Meiko blitzed behind Qarsufly in his moment of lowered guard. The Yamanaka pressed her hands together inserting her index and middle fingers into Qarsufly's rear end forcefully. Meiko had definitely not expected Kiyomi's secret anti-augmentation method to be this embarrassing but she appeared to follow up her attack flawlessly, if cringing ever so slightly.

The blacksmith's hand chopped Qarsufly in the back of his neck subtly, knowing that Kiyomi's technique neutralized her opponent's ability to augment his body using chakra. In his moment of constipating embarrassing agony the chop hit Qarsufly where it was sent knocking him out instantly and slamming him against his summoned beetle so strongly that it derailed the insect and slammed it to the ground shaking it up greatly. After the beetle dispelled with a loud poof followed by a cloud of smoke in its location being left behind Qarsufly's unconscious body rolled out from the smoke cloud.

Initially the two girls intended to hit and run but now the two just stared both weakened and feuding teams down angrily. Kiyomi had previously thought that the magician was knocked out from behind or cut down. Seeing her covered up in crystal and locked inside that crystal pillar it inspired hope that maybe there was still hope to rescue her and have her maintain consciousness.

They'd convince Team Corundum let Mana go and bring her back even if it took giving Tolkre a thousand kancho pokes to do it.


	306. Someone that I Used to Know

"Who are you"? Maurlon's worried voice broke through the suddenly dominant silence that took over not too long after Meiko and Kiyomi revealed themselves and knocked out Meiko's target. The blacksmith straightened her body out and began walking onwards approaching Maurlon.

The Aburame raised her hands up defensively but her unique breed of parasitic insects was rendered virtually useless by the poison of Faqsadid's puppet and she was effectively left defenseless. Several meters aside Tolkre Guren – Maurlon's teammate was picking himself back up and getting on his feet, just trying to acquaintance himself with the situation transpiring around him.

After Meiko got dangerously close to Maurlon the Aburame just stared at the Konoha kunoichi angrily as if trying to stare her down into submission. Meiko's arms shot downwards faster than the Aburame could've responded to, aiming to grip firmly onto the wrists that held the Aburame from underground and pull onto them firmly and pull out the little puppet user from his underground hiding place. A buzzing sound alerted Meiko from behind.

As Squlra attempted to prevent Meiko from removing her teammate from underground the girl got covered in a crystal pillar similar in size and density to that which enveloped Mana. Jekleifer also leapt into action, finally recovered and somewhat capable of attacking, as bone tissue wrapped around his fist creating a makeshift spear-like shape, which Jekleifer thrust at the crystal pillar crushing it into little bits and knocking the female blade-wielder out in the process. After Squlra got knocked down and out of the crystal prison Jekleifer just nodded at his crystal ninjutsu using teammate as a sign of successful cooperation.

Meanwhile, while the attempt to attack her distracted Meiko, she noticed that the small wrists that restrained Maurlon's feet from underground had disappeared once she turned back. Only at that moment did Maurlon realize that the redhead was trying to free her and pull Faqsadid out.

Kiyomi looked at the unconscious Squlra before nodding at her with her chin and turning at Jekleifer.

"Is she out"? The Yamanaka asked it straight and strict.

"Her augmentations prevented her from getting impaled, that being said, she is out of the competition", Jekleifer confirmed with a grumpy and tired tone, the pain and weariness he had experienced in this battle were all reflected in the way he replied to Kiyomi's question.

"Well, I assume that beetle guy was your target, thank you guys for an assisting hand, we'll be going on ahead then"! Tolkre cheerfully attempted to slip away from confronting Team Hokage and answering all of their questions. Oddly enough it wasn't just Kiyomi's voice that stopped the Guren clansman from leaving the battlefield, it was that of Jekleifer as well.

"You incased our friend in crystal. Free her"! Kiyomi demanded first, before the Kaguya could reiterate what it was exactly that he said. It was a social play, a display that she considered what she had to say as being more important than whatever it was the Kaguya wanted to say.

Jekleifer looked back at Mana who stood incapacitated and completely incased in crystal, almost like she was frozen in time at the exact moment she figured out that the Iwagakure trio had snuck up on her. Distress and anger went through Jekleifer's face once he realized the relation between Mana and the team that just revealed themselves. It was likely that he expected a problem during the time when he could've used some time to rest and recover from the pain and fatigue he had caused himself.

"Look", he tried to reason with Team Hokage before, much to his shock, Tolkre leaped up to the pillar and punched it with great force shattering the crystal to pieces. Fortunately enough, Mana's unconscious frame fell down freed from the prison instead of being shattered together with it.

"You dick!" Meiko charged at Tolkre blasting out flares from her boots and looking to absolutely wreck his entire face. Her fist only stopped a hair away from Maurlon's face when she jumped in to shield her teammate. It was only because Meiko had observed the battle and knew that the Aburame girl was completely defenseless that she stopped her fist in motion. The self-sacrificial drive to protect her team while being completely powerless oneself was something that Meiko couldn't help but respect.

"What are you so fussy about? That's the only way to free her from the restraints", Tolkre teased the blacksmith who only growled through her teeth at the smug Guren clansman. "You should feel lucky my crystal hasn't come in contact with Earth Release and turned into Emerald Release – then it'd have been really tough getting your friend out".

"Enough. There's been a misunderstanding between us. We didn't count on someone standing in our way and we weren't sure about your friend's motivations or abilities. We succeeded on sneaking up to her, she looked like she was occupied somehow with something else so we used the opportunity to imprison her. Tolkre's crystal covers up the entire body, even the inside spaces, like all the way inside her lungs, she is most definitely passed out right now. We're sorry about that" Jekleifer apologized trying to still stitch some semblance of social peace together.

Meiko and Kiyomi went up to Mana checking her condition, judging from their faces they weren't happy. That troubled Jekleifer but his thoughts were more focused on something else entirely.

"As I've said, we apologize for what happened. That being said, this is a competition. Eliminations happen. Our goal now is Faqsadid. His team may be out but he is still my target" Jekleifer spoke up firmly as he was looking on ahead and at the ground beneath his feet.

"Are you kidding me? His team is eliminated, he bit his tail and ran away! He's none of our business now"! Tolkre complained out loud.

"That's right. That being said, we aren't sure that's how the rules work. Technically Faqsadid is still not eliminated, even if his team is out of the exams. Even if he was counted as eliminated, I want to know that I can fulfil my assignment, it's a matter of honor", the Kaguya grumbled out through his injuries.

"She was busy communicating with us on the mental link to watch out behind her", Kiyomi grunted out while gripping her fists together so hard they were shaking. The blonde felt that the Kaguya was right, this was a competition and eliminations like this happened from time to time but this just wasn't fair. As a leader none of these excuses helped the guilt she felt. Her rational mind managed to calm itself but on the inside the Yamanaka was shaken.

Maurlon looked at the distressed Team Hokage. It was tough to say what her exact thoughts were or what her feelings were as her dark shades covered up the girl's eyes but a feeling told that she was actually regretful towards the way things worked out. About how her team ended up eliminating a genin they had no reason to eliminate.

After a brief moment of just looking from aside Maurlon walked up to the two and bowed respectfully before offering some medical supplies.

"It's fine, your leader will need those more." Kiyomi angrily shut the Aburame down.

"What are you doing, Maurlon"? Jekleifer turned back at his teammate enraged and desperate to pursue his target. "We need to move"!

"You're tired and injured. You can't just throw your techniques haphazardly like you did before. You sit down and treat your wounds, then we'll move to look for that guy before we head to the northern gate", Maurlon refused to follow calmly, choosing instead to reason with her team leader, almost pleading him.

"Heh heh, yeah, loser, sit down and rest or else you'll run out of breath and faint like that time during survival drill", Tolkre teased his teammate, after being given a heart-freezing stare the Guren clansman just shrugged. "I mean, chasing after that puppet user now is a waste of time anyways. I'm all with Maurlon here" he made his true position more clear.

"While we sit around here Faqsadid will get eliminated by the staff and removed from the Forest of Death premises, I'll lose my chance to fulfil my assignment", Jekleifer complained before sitting down on a nearby rock. His usually more tidy and restrained golden hair broke out from all restraints and fell chaotically all over his face and exposed naked upper body, covering up his grievous looking flesh wounds and grazes and exposed bone tissue and cartilage patches.

"Mana was a lot like that too. She talked a lot about how little this warrior code meant to her, how she was willing to cut any corners but the idea of being tested and being actually ready, honoring the conditions of the test meant a lot to her. More than she was willing to admit", Meiko smiled looking at the grumpy Kaguya who looked like he was actually forcing himself to sit still and treat his wounds. "She also acted like she could take much more than she was actually able to"

"You've no idea", Kiyomi smiled kindly looking at Mana's peaceful expression. "Don't talk about her as if she was dead though. That shit is creepy"

"That is annoying, isn't it? Especially when you care about your friends. That total persistence that they are alone despite your utmost effort to be by their side and that their problems are theirs alone", Maurlon laughed out before looking at Jekleifer who just glared back at her angrily before once again resuming applying bandages and ointment to his grazed chest, shoulders and arms. Tolkre just settled down further from both of his teammates and pulled out something packed up to eat during the break.

"Say, now that Qarsufly is dealt with, you wouldn't be willing to trade information, would you"? Kiyomi inquired as she still had a target to locate and defeat.

"Well, this fight is actually our final one. We're pretty much ready to move on now, I'm surprised you guys are still missing a target. They may have already finished the exam as well at this point", Maurlon shook her head uneasily gesturing that her team had no need for information.

"That's not true, we do need information. We'd be willing to trade whatever we have. After all, the exam is still not over. We'll tell you all about whomever we know in exchange about the abilities of people you know about", Jekleifer suggested as he joined into the conversation shortly after finishing watching over his injuries.

While it was much more difficult to pull off without Mana's aid, Kiyomi and Meiko told Team Corundum everything they knew about the teams they've met along the way and the abilities they possessed. The intelligence trade extended so far ahead that at some point Tolkre got interested and joined in on the whole exchange.

"I see", Jekleifer exclaimed after the briefing was finished. "We have information about Team Kyanite of Iwagakure, Team Hickory of Konoha, Team Pine of Konoha and Team Zumurrud of Sunagakure".

"You've met Team Zumurrud? Do you maybe know of the abilities of their third member? We've obtained intelligence about them from another team but the third one remains a mystery", Kiyomi recalled the long information trade with the alliance of teams they've met earlier.

"I'm sorry, we do not. Despite our utmost push to reveal his abilities, Lazimo didn't use them", Maurlon shook her head.

"Yeah, we would've had them on the ropes but they gave us the slip", Tolkre grinned confidently recalling Team Corundum's experience with the discussed team.

"Did you eliminate any of their members"? Kiyomi raised an eyebrow.

"We did not, as I've said, abilities were as valuable to us as the information of the team's location. Sometimes we pressed on teams with unknown to us abilities to reveal them even if they weren't our targets", Jekleifer elaborated.

"In any case, for reasons we're sure you'll understand we won't reveal about Team Kyanite's abilities. You didn't appear to let out that they are your targets so snitching on people from our own village would be wasteful in such a case" Tolkre teased the Konohagakure duo.

"Fair enough", Kiyomi nodded. "They aren't my target, none of your listed teams are so feel free to give as much info as you feel like sharing".

"You've shared plenty with us, it'd only be fair if I told you everything else we know", Jekleifer sighed, "Team Hickory is comprised of…"

"We've met them recently, you can skip them", Meiko interrupted.

"Very well, I just felt like that would've been useful information. We've found that plenty of teams are seeking Team Hickory for some reason. I must say, Team Hokage also doesn't have the best of reputations, I'd watch out if I was you", the Kaguya noted before resuming his part of the sharing process.

"At this point the warning is way overdue", Kiyomi sighed remembering about the bounty she recently found out about and the team that attacked her and Mana.

"Team Pine is comprised of Aburame Juhi, a girl with a very refined version of the Parasitic Insects Jutsu. She can shape her kikaichu species parasitic insects with much better precision than most Aburame", Jekleifer began briefing the two kunoichi about the ninja he found out about.

"I can attest to that, many Aburame choose to seek for different species than the bland basic kikaichu. But Juhi chose to polish the controlling technique instead", Maurlon added.

"We've eliminated a second member of their team – Tohi Jomya, he was a very unimpressive ninja lacking the ability of chakra control. From what we could gather it was due to abused chakra augmentation early during their career, a rookie mistake. He tried building various gadgets and traps and using weaponry to compensate but without chakra control he wasn't too difficult to take out", Tolkre added the part of the encounter with Team Pine he cared about the most.

"The third member was an odd one. His name was Tanko Shigin. He was able to extend his body and withstand physical blows as if he had no bones or sensitive organs inside his body at all", Jekleifer recalled, "I'd say of the three he is the most dangerous, so far we have not come up with any way to injure him or take him out".

"No bones at all, huh? I don't really even remember Tanko from the Ninja Academy, do you, Meiko?" Kiyomi pondered.

"Nah, doesn't sound like anyone from my class or anyone I've met or heard about. But now that you bring it up, I'd really like to see Jekleifer fight that guy – a guy with an excess of bones against a guy with no bones or organs at all. It just sounds pretty hilarious"! Meiko grinned before breaking out into laughter.

Shortly after exchanging information Team Corundum left towards the northern gate, still arguing about possibly trying to locate and eliminate Faqsadid themselves once more. Their departure left Kiyomi and Meiko to their own. While that concluded a part of their exam trials, it also opened up a new question – what to do with the unconscious body of their friend.

"We should probably bring her to the southern gate. She's offered so much for us, it'd only be fair that we go out of our way to safely bring her there ourselves, just feels more honorable that way", Meiko angrily grunted, it was clear that she didn't take it too well that Mana needed to be eliminated at all. The feeling was, very obviously, shared by Kiyomi as well.

"Hmmm. While I do agree but… We're running out of time. We need to find information about my target, find them and take them out", the blonde complained trying to come up with a solution. She did want to properly honor her friend's performance and with this whole Forest of Death stage of the Exams being a simulation of a real-life mission situation it was the equivalent of burying one's friend.

"Yeah but… It's Mana. She really worked hard and…", words simply stuck in Meiko's mouth.

"I hear you, that Tala dickbag surrendered his teammate himself. No way we're being bigger dicks than him", Kiyomi shrugged empathizing with her teammate's state of mind. Even she had to agree that where usually Mana never was on the same page with her team, always looking out for her own ideals and inner feelings over the mission objective, this time was different. There was this feeling like she took these Exams seriously, like to her it was an all or nothing affair which only made this failed effort more painful for all of them.

"Earth Release: Practice Brick Jutsu!", a loud chant alerted Kiyomi and Meiko forcing them to look up and into the trees for their assailant as four tall walls of solid, rough ground rose in the air cornering them and shutting them inside the ground walls.

"Break this wall, now!" Kiyomi yelled out an order as Meiko angrily tackled one of the walls with her shoulder and grabbed Kiyomi by her shoulder and tried dragging her away from the cornered quarter. A black blur and a little twin red flash inspired great fear as well as great rage in Kiyomi's heart, the blonde would've told those red orbs from any other eyes in existence. Seeing how one of Meiko's hands was occupied with dragging Kiyomi further away from the battlefield she got overwhelmed by a flurry of punches and kicks and sent crashing back into the cornered area.

"Human Bullet Tank"! a loud cheerful voice made Meiko look up and realize she'd just be too late to dodge a slamming giant taijutsu attack that converted the user's own body into a massive human sized ball that body slammed right into the area surrounded by walls of dirt that were raised before.

Knowing that dodging in time was out of the question Meiko rolled on top of Kiyomi and braced herself to take most of the impact. As the rolling human boulder slammed on top of the two kunoichi it broke through the weak and filtered ground itself sending Meiko and Kiyomi tumbling down into a deep dark hole underground. The cave system of the Forest of Death full of supermassive insects and other creatures that couldn't fit to survive on the surface or needed a different stage of competition to better thrive.

It seemed like Meiko and Kiyomi were falling for a whole eternity, nothing but total darkness with brief rays of light overhead that now seemed like solar objects compared to all-encompassing darkness that surrounded the two girls. Meiko could her a string reeling sound followed by a loud clang of steel cutting into rock, someone grabbed her collar firmly and stopped her fall before the girl slammed into the rocky wall but it was nothing compared to falling all the way down and smashing into the bottom of wherever this plummet went.

"Still alive, Kiyomi-chan?" a loud yell came from way up, Kiyomi's eyes filled with hatred and burning rage could tell those infernal red eyes staring down the hole straight at her.

"Fucking Lithia, I'll murder her stupid face…" the Yamanaka just kept on repeating to herself. A tearing sound signaled that the Uchiha girl from above managed to sever Kiyomi's last string that held her clinging to the wall by her side and sent her plummeting all the way down instead. As the blonde kept on diving further and further down all she could hear was the cocky laughter of the arrogant classmate she once knew in the Academy – Lithia Uchiha. The source of all of her hatred for that cocky overrated clan. The sole reason why the Yamanaka will recover, climb her way out of this stupid hole and kick her shit all the way up until it is thrown up from her arrogant elitist mouth.


	307. Keep Rolling, Rolling, Rolling, Rolling

A thundering thud broke Kiyomi from a tiresome tirade of dizziness. Meiko's quick reaction and tough body allowed her to recover in time and pull Kiyomi out of the harm's way. The powerful punch that was aimed right at Kiyomi's face went straight through and into the iron hard layers of rock located below in whatever cave system the two tumbled down into.

"It was an impressive trap, Kiyomi. You were always pretty smart, should've talked Lithia out of underestimating you", a low-pitched and slightly slurry voice echoed through the darkness of the underground ravine where the trio ended up in.

"That's right, Chominu. But that always was her problem, no one ever is worth a second thought unless they come in dark hair and an emo package", Kiyomi cheerfully raised her fist up trying to act like tumbling down into the ravine and separating the chubby teammate from his team was the idea the whole time.

"But you haven't done anything, it was the bug girl that softened the soil and messed up the dirt with her bugs", Meiko pointed out making what she thought smart faces looked like.

"Shut up, Meiko! You're not helping this at all, Meiko!" Kiyomi hissed turning back at her teammate. If Lithia ever came to hear about this streak of good luck, she'd never let Kiyomi get over it which would only piss the Yamanaka off more in the long term.

"Now you sound like that other Yamanaka girl, repeating things when you're angry"! Meiko cracked up laughing pointing her finger at Kiyomi mockingly, which only infuriated the Yamanaka heiress even more.

"So, I'm Lithia's target then? Fate's a cruel bitch, isn't it?" Kiyomi quickly changed her expression into a façade of a cool and composed face.

"Not really, Lithia doesn't really care about you. In fact, when I brought up Team Hokage to begin with, we had to remind her that you were in it and that the two of you shared history in the same class. Your teammate here is actually my target", the chubby Akimichi from a different class in Kiyomi's year pointed at Meiko who just pointed at her own inflated and swollen from laughter cheeks in confusion. A moment after the whole matter sunk in Meiko erupted into a more chaotic fit of laughter.

"Your… Academy rival… Doesn't even remember you, she doesn't even care about you and they're actually here… After me"! The redhead kept on breaking up and bending over in pain that the intense laughing caused to her abdomen. The blacksmith was one stage of laugh away from writhing on the ground.

"Shut up, Meiko…" Kiyomi closed her eyes and rubbed her temples furiously. "Fine, I take it that Lithia is coming down here eventually as well. It'll be a chance for me to remind her just who was actually the talented one in the Academy. As for now, these are very poor odds for you, Chominu".

"Lithia won't be coming down here. The climb is too much trouble for her, Kidenshi may come down here to even the odds, though", the Akimichi shook his head carelessly. It didn't appear to trouble him that he'd effectively be facing off against two people all by himself for a short while. "Knowing Kidenshi, however, he'll be arguing his pants off trying to convince Lithia to come down here as well. Those two tend to argue a lot, so if it's not too much trouble, I'd not mind waiting for them to come down here and finish you two off".

"Okay", Meiko nodded and dropped her large behind on a rough looking oval stone formation on the ground.

"Okay"? Kiyomi squinted in fury at her teammate. "They want to eliminate us from the competition, you're their goddamn target"!

"Not really, we only care about Meiko. If you wouldn't involve yourself at all, Kiyomi, that'd be just ideal", Chominu nodded his head with a cheerful grin, happy that Meiko had decided to sit and wait for Chominu's reinforcements, Team Walnut, to descend and eliminate her.

All of a sudden, Meiko jumped up and clapped her hands together, like she had just forgotten something. Curiously, Chominu looked the blacksmith down, wondering what it was exactly that changed the redhead's opinion.

"Wait, Mana is still up there with them. Unless we get up there we can't pick her up and bring her to the southern gate"! Meiko recalled.

"Exactly, that's why we need to kick this guy's ass, eliminate your hunter and then bring Mana to the gate", Kiyomi cheered on Meiko's decision for the sole purpose of wanting to return to the surface just so she could shove it down Lithia's face.

"That's right! That's what we're gonna do, sorry, Chominu", Meiko smacked her fist against her palm before taking a fighting stance, a decision which Kiyomi soon joined in on.

"I see, that's too bad", Chominu nodded to himself before launching his tall and round frame off the ground in a mad shoulder tackle charge aimed at both girls. It was quite brave to take both of them on alone.

Kiyomi graciously leapt aside from the tall-and-chubby's charge, Meiko, on the other hand, chose to intercept it and take the young man head-on. Right as the blacksmith's palms interrupted the powerful rush, Meiko quickly responded with a strong and precise right cross straight at the Akimichi's jaw which was left completely open. Despite a powerful shockwave rumbling the underground ravine and disturbing the quiet creeks and water sources it didn't look like it'd keep the Akimichi down for long as he jumped up with an uppercut of his own.

As Meiko's body lifted off the ground, Chominu's large hand tied around the girl's ankles and pulled her down and over his shoulder and slammed her weightless frame into the dirt shaking the ravine up once more. A wave of freezing water covered Kiyomi from behind, a testament of the great damage and disturbance that the fighting between the two was causing. Kiyomi looked up with a clever squint.

"Meiko, keep the fisticuffs up, the more we shake this place up, the tougher it'll be for little Ms. Cocky-pants to get down here with her fancy boots and her sensitive fingernails", the blonde alerted her teammate.

"Ms. Cocky-pants in this case being"? Meiko wondered as she picked herself off the ground and leaped aside from a powerful earth-shaking stomp coming from her opponent and wiped blood off of her cracked lip, "I'm sorry, it's just that this resurfaced Academy life of yours is a little confusing", she grumbled.

"Lithia"! Kiyomi yelled out as she leaped into the fray to join in and aid her teammate.

A wild swipe of Kiyomi's kunai went completely unseen in the darkness of the underground ravine, with a little of wet slippery rocks being mixed into the equation the swipe sent Chominu stumbling back and falling into a underground pond of freezing crystal clear water.

"Nice work"! Meiko commended Kiyomi for utilizing the battlefield just right. Despite the attack being a simple kunai swipe it was perfectly timed and placed, utilizing the natural darkness of the battlefield as well as the other natural conditions. It was also just quick enough to open a small and barely significant scratch, but also just strong enough for the painful shock of the cut sending Chominu tumbling over.

As the standing pool of water erupted in a mad blasting gazer, Chominu's massive frame, expanded by the signature Akimichi clan's Multi-Size Jutsu, leaped up into the air. The genin's arms and legs disappeared in the bodysuit of the young man forming a ball of human meat that got propelled by the chakra used to drive it forward and control it, applied by the user.

"Human Bullet Tank"! The Akimichi clansman yelled out sending himself down into the two girls in a mad rolling frenzy.

The gigantic human boulder slammed against the elevated rocky grounds where both girls originally stood crushing the entire structure and sending it underwater. Chominu may have only understood too late that he was only crushing small, dislocated stalactites placed in harm's way by both girls using the Substitution Jutsu simultaneously in great sync.

Kiyomi and Meiko stuck upside down to the wall where the stalactites they used to replace themselves originally were. Both of the girls were struggling to breathe properly so they had to take a breather before being able to talk right.

"That technique is pretty annoying", Meiko acknowledged.

"Yeah, but there are plenty of weaknesses to it", Kiyomi smiled as she couldn't help but feel inspired by how well they've executed the synchronized Substitution, as any team leader should.

"Really? Go ahead and exploit them in that case", Meiko cheerfully nodded before pointing her blunt and rotund chin at the rolling enemy human boulder that dived once more out of the water and used the walls and ceiling of the ravine now like some mad bowling ball in a rush to topple all the annoying pins, no matter where they were stuck.

"It's gaining acceleration with each passing second, soon we won't be able to stop it. Attack it, he won't be able to properly defend himself while rolling"! Kiyomi commanded as she placed her hands forward in the signature position for most Yamanaka hidden techniques, ready for Meiko to lure her enemy into an exposed position where she could've hit it with one.

"No problem"! Meiko grinned with a monkey-like full-toothed grin and placed her hands by her lower sides. Sealing glyphs lit up in bright red light before two curved blades got unsealed from Meiko's sides and the blacksmith leaped to work. It was a very sensitive moment, a clash between two techniques, especially ones based on physical prowess.

As Meiko's body dashed onwards, both blades in hand, Kiyomi began seeing the attack almost like it transpired in slow motion, despite any stage of the exchange being completely invisible to an untrained eye. Meiko must've aimed to slash with a wide X position slash, straight at the exposed and defenseless boulder. It was a bold move that could've resulted in an injured opponent and interrupted technique but she needed to play all the cards right. Chominu's speed and force of impact would be immense. That meant that Meiko needed to activate her chakra input for the dashing slash at the exactly right moment where it'd overpower her opponent's chakra input and broke his jutsu. Not to mention compensate for the growing acceleration and therefore force…

A powerful rumbling shockwave following a loud thundering crack shook Kiyomi wildly, almost strong enough to dislodge her off the ceiling and send tumbling down to the roaring and whirling, foamy waters below. Meiko messed up, she decided to clash with the opponent with brute force instead of a subtle and quick slice. She just rammed her blades bluntly right into the rolling boulder, slowing it down greatly as the boulder attempted to push Meiko away and knock her off her feet. Blinding, lightning bright sparks emanated from Meiko's blades.

For a moment Kiyomi wanted to interrupt her own carefully positioned into hand seal positions hands to assist Meiko but… Her trust in her friend paid off. With an inhuman, almost bestial roar Meiko overpowered her opponent sending him flying back and smashing through stalactites way back. With lightning fast backflips, still horizontally and upside to the ravine floor, Meiko backed up some before pushing at the tips of the blades she just used with her thumbs.

With a loud steel clanging sound the twin blades revealed themselves to be giant windmill shuriken as they transformed into shape. "Not done with you just yet"! Meiko yelled out as she launched both of the windmill shuriken at her opponent in an odd crisscrossing trajectory the specifics of which were relatively difficult to read. Chominu quickly braced for impact locking his hands around his knees into the shape of a human boulder before beginning to spin in place.

It appeared that Chominu's unorthodox defense had worked out somewhat, where normally the shuriken would've went right through the young man or cut him in two completely, the added chakra input and swift rotation caused the blades of the shuriken to just graze at the Akimichi's back opening up an X shaped crimson wound.

"How's that"? Meiko arrogantly laughed out after glancing back at Kiyomi.

"You threw him out of the range of my jutsu, you absolute monster", Kiyomi commended her teammate. While she was troubled by Meiko's excessive show of physical force and complete balls it took to engage the enemy that way, commending the redhead went a longer way, ultimately, than trying to tell her why she should've been more subtle with her approach.

Emerging from the clear freezing water Chominu stumbled onto the first rocky floor platform he could find before sitting up on his butt and feeling up his cut up back. The young man didn't like to admit being pushed put even he could see that taking on both of the fellow Konoha genin this way may have been a rushed and foolish decision.

"Our friend is lying unconscious up above", Meiko began explaining after her face turned serious for a moment, as matters often did with the blacksmith when the well-being of her friends was concerned. "You cannot win here taking us both all by yourself, all we want is to pick up her body and bring her to the gate."

"It's too late for that, I am not looking for victory, I am merely trying to buy time for Kidenshi to finish his silly argument and make Lithia follow him down here. Frankly, I'm sure by now they're at least done fighting and have left your friend by herself. Don't worry, the staff will take care of her for you." Chominu explained before pulling out a sweet smelling flask, flipping it over, and wiping a bunch of juice he let spray down his face in his voracity off.

"You bastard, I said let us pass"! Meiko grunted before launching herself off the stalactite-filled floor straight at the enemy.

"No! Meiko, don't rush"! Kiyomi pleaded aloud before biting her lip in the painful realization that her opponent was still too far for her to use any of her clan techniques optimally. In that range they would've certainly missed their mark and it didn't look like the enemy intended to move in any closer. For all the dissing that Chominu did – he was wary of Kiyomi and incorporated a careful range from her into his strategy.

The Akimichi clansman smacked his hands together before extending those outwards at Meiko and slamming his wide and long foot down.

"Earth Style: Stalactite Rain"! Chominu yelled out as all the rocky and sharp stalactites on the ravine ceiling rumbled and cracked off in a wild rain, aiming to derail and down Meiko. The blacksmith shifted her body's direction upwards to attempt and protect from the stalactites but it barely helped as the raining rocks overwhelmed and downed her nearby Chominu's position. The Akimichi rushed to weave more hand seals but Kiyomi's quick counter of shuriken and kunai forced him to leap back and stick onto a back wall avoiding Kiyomi's own barrage of ninja tools that interrupted his hand seals.

Gripping onto a string of steel wire she had attached onto one stray kunai that the blonde launched at the ceiling of the ravine, Kiyomi pulled on it with all of her strength zipping with a flying kick aimed right at her opponent. She needed to buy Meiko some time to recover. Luckily enough Kiyomi's kick hit Chominu straight in the side leaving a strong and wide dent in the rocky wall and sending the chubby tumbling and rolling aside. The Yamanaka didn't relent, however, she pressed her offensive on.

The Akimichi appeared to be a very solid hand-to-hand combatant, the chubby weaved to the side avoiding Kiyomi's push kick. Her multiple palm strikes were also gently redirected and even when she leaned forward to shift her weight into a roll, deceitfully pulling off a smack at the side of her opponent heel to twist his foot the opponent managed to avoid it. Kiyomi tried several more stomping kicks at the heavyweight's knees – what she took for his weak-spot but the leg-work of her opponent was on point. As Chominu collapsed on his bottom and began spinning, using his extended sideways legs for sweeping kicks, Kiyomi found herself in need of evasion and quickly retreated from the close range clash.

Without wait or warning Chominu turned at Meiko and began weaving hand seals. At that point Kiyomi wondered if her assault had made her opponent cocky as she, together with Meiko who was still a bit further below launched a combined storm of kunai and shuriken at the enemy to interrupt the hand seals. Surprisingly enough with a loud clang all of their ninja tools got deflected in mid-air and the hand seal string got completed. Chominu smacked his extended palms together and stomped his feet firmly onto the wall he stood on.

"Earth Style: Practice Brick Jutsu"! He yelled out raising a bunch of flimsy dirt walls all around Meiko.

Kiyomi rushed at the Akimichi, desperate to stop his attack, she was really reckless and failed to notice an opponent from above, or her right, respectively. A powerful right cross from her side sent the blonde crashing down into the freezing waters below. A fluffy ball of fur and teeth and cute doggy eyes stopped whizzing around the attacker's arm and settled down inside the boy's that attacked Kiyomi jacket as he confidently felt up his own bicep as a gesture of strength.

"Multi-Size Jutsu"! Chominu yelled out as calories in his body got converted into chakra at intense rates massively expanding his size into a round, boulder-like shape.

"Human-Pinball"! The Akimichi yelled out as his round boulder-like frame fired off the wall he stood on and flew straight at Meiko. The blacksmith covered her body up with a block as the massive body slam sent her flying back together with the human boulder technique and through several of the erected dirt walls. By the time that Meiko realized what Chominu had raised those walls previously for it may have been already too late as the human rolling boulder bounced off the dirt walls and rushed at Meiko repeatedly in rapid ceaseless succession.

At some point Meiko guard lowered down and she stopped blocking or trying to brace her body, trying to predict where the hits would come from. Finally, the expanded human boulder slammed her to the rocky platform busting it to pieces and toppling all of the dirt walls through the devastating impact shockwave it let out. For a moment the foamy crimson waters kept on whirling and waving, the glowing red eyes of a girl stuck to the ceiling wall continued to observe the water.

A good minute later Chominu surfaced, gasping for air erratically. "Took you guys a good while to get here"! The Akimichi complained out loud.

"Blame Ms. Stick-Up-Her-Ass, she couldn't even be bothered to come down here and help you", Inuzuka Kidenshi pointed his finger at his Lolita-style favoring, crimson-eyed teammate.

"Oh… I figured you two would be fighting over it", Chominu sighed before swimming up to the wall and finally crawling up it to catch a breath. "Oh well, at least I knocked Wakizashi Meiko out", he sighed easier.

"Actually, they both escaped", Lithia giggled mockingly at her own hand. "Kiyomi-chan salvaged her dizzy teammate and swam to the lower levels, catching a stream that carried them away, you were still floating about when it happened too", the pompous girl yawned into her hand. After her eyes closed for the yawn and opened again they no longer glowed red, having changed into a pitch dark shade of black.

"And you only tell us now?" Kidenshi got outraged, "Should've dived after them instead of standing around there!"

"And get wet? Are you mad?" Lithia crossed her hands onto her chest angrily squinting at her teammate with frustration, "It's not my fault they escaped in the first place".

"If you knew they were escaping, I'm pretty sure it was, you dumb bimbo"! Kidenshi growled at his teammate showing off his sharp fangs.

* * *

While the team of Meiko's hunters bickered, Kiyomi grasped firmly at the struggling and beaten up body of her teammate as the underground stream carried them to a falling stream that threw them even deeper underground.


	308. Gear-Man Sentai Tokusatsu

A bitter mouthful of water got tossed out violently from Meiko's lungs after an erratic series of coughing. Had Kiyomi looked back she'd have noticed that a considerable amount of blood was present in the water running down Meiko's body, clothes and out from inside her body. It was tough to see exactly how much blood was present for Meiko as well seeing how the beating she took made her right eye well swollen up and her entire face was busted in several places, her messed up ribs made breathing hurt.

"Thanks…" Meiko gathered enough air in her lungs at last to let out an expression of gratitude. After all, Team Walnut was after her all along. "Pulled my butt out of the fire", she admitted.

"You probably could've taken Chominu, when the others interfered it just got too hot for that", Kiyomi angrily dismissed her teammate's sensitive moment.

Meiko looked up sadly at her friend who was just looking away at a random point in the moist cave system, occasionally the blonde reached her hand up to wipe her nose or to get her wet loose hair out of her face. The blacksmith stood back up, staggering considerably as she did so before reaching out and touching Kiyomi's damp cold shoulder.

"I know what this meant for you. You really wanted to show up that Lithia girl but you chose to run away to save me. Thanks for that", Meiko quietly muttered before scratching the itchy cold swelling on her eye.

"Whatever, I'd be a lousy leader if I couldn't step over petty nonsense for my own team", the Yamanaka dismissed the notion on the outside, even if she clearly still hated herself internally.

Little by little, Kiyomi was beginning to understand what being a leader was all about. Often in her past she had to step up to do the right thing properly when her own sensei messed up or simply didn't know how to do the right thing, still, this exam and her stepping up during it gave the girl perspective. Another point of view about how difficult things would be from here on out, after she became a chuunin.

"So… What now? They may come after us", Meiko wondered before looking around. The cave system they'd ended up in looked pretty narrow and straightforward. The ravine's lake of water appeared to have a channel that lead into a long submerged tunnel, which dropped water on the lower level of the underground caves. The room where the girls were in was a round cave with only two ways out - to swim and scale up to the fall the stream tossed them out from, swim upstream through the tunnel or head onwards through the caves.

Looking ahead through the darkness ahead Meiko blinked a couple of times rapidly before looking up. The redhead then looked down at her clenched fist.

"You know, I could probably bust us out. Probably wouldn't even need augmentation, my natural strength should easily bust through a good kilometer of rock", the blacksmith suggested.

"No. We'd cause a downfall of the whole thing. Maurlon's bugs have already weakened the soil as it is. You'd cause a ruckus that'd attract attention and we'd risk getting buried under the rubble. Having in mind that a large amount of teams wants us dead… Well, you know…", Kiyomi shook her head before looking on ahead to properly weigh all of the options.

"Yeah, I guess my idea sucked", Meiko bit her lip.

"It was a good idea just… Don't rush this, you've taken a beating, focus on getting through this and resting up", Kiyomi sighed after seeing Meiko frown a bit too much for her liking. The redhead was by far at her strongest and most beastly when she was enthusiastic and not looking down on herself, that was the version of Meiko that Kiyomi wanted to have around about now.

"Alright, let's go on ahead then, we don't want to sit around here and get followed", Meiko sighed before slowly walking up ahead and into the tunnel, walking far enough for the complete darkness of the cave to envelop her and too far on ahead for Kiyomi's enhanced ninja vision to be able to track her sufficiently.

Before rushing on ahead after her teammate the blonde frowned and looked up and to her back. Where she had imagined Mana to lay out cold. Having been left all alone and by herself she was probably already taken in by the Konohagakure staff. These were the odds, as a leader she knew them. That was the reality on the battlefield as well - sometimes not everyone made it. In the real world her comrades won't just get eliminated, they'll get taken out permanently. This was the part of ninja life she had to accept, something she had to own up to as a soon-to-be squad leader.

* * *

"Keep your ears stretched out and your eyes open", Kiyomi warned her teammate as the two carefully treaded ahead through the long and narrow cave corridor. It looked a bit too small to be made for all the massive underground denizens of the Forest of Death. Something about it really smelled suspicious, it looked just too fitting for human shapes to tread through.

"Ironically enough, you're crowding my ears with your mommying", Meiko pouted giving her teammate an angry stare back.

"Mommying isn't a real word, even if it was, I'm not mommying"

"It is totally a word and you totally are"!

A loud wooden popping sound interrupted the quarrel of the two girls. From underground a bunch of rods with kunai blades attached to the tips shot out. Just due to their superhuman reaction time and vision did the two girls manage to bend and twist their bodies in ways that allowed them to avoid getting skewered and impaled on them, twisting and turning their bodies to only receive minor scratches where they were unavoidable and avoiding a single makeshift spear from impaling them. This was no trap for a ninja, this was either a warning sign of something meant to hunt down animals and this corridor didn't look like it could fit any animals that lived down here.

"You know I saw this horror movie once, this brings up memories of it", Meiko's grumpy voice informed her teammate before both girls tensed up their muscles and broke the spears around them giving them some freedom.

"I find myself too hard to scare watching those, I mean they really lost their effect about by the time I learned to control other people's bodies remotely", Kiyomi smiled as the two walked onwards.

"Shit"! Meiko yelled out as she tripped over something and fell down. Having in mind that they were just narrowly almost skewered by a death trap, Kiyomi's mind worked lightning fast. Her arms worked through myriad of hand seals and she slammed her hand to the ground.

"Earth Style: Rock Shelter"! Kiyomi grunted out fast enough to create a formation of rocks and dirt from around her, forming a dome around her and Meiko that deflected the seemingly ceaseless barrage of kunai that got launched from the second deathtrap triggered by the steel wire that Meiko tripped over.

"I didn't know you could use Earth Release too"! Meiko shouted out in surprise.

"I'm pretty sure I told you when we were training together, it's my secondary elemental affinity. I don't know too many jutsu though. Normally you'd have been fast enough to catch one of the kunai and deflect the others even in total darkness but since you so hilariously ate shit on the floor I had to step up", Kiyomi teased her friend before letting the dome collapse into a lifeless pile of rock and dirt.

"I dunno, my eye's really messed up so I may have missed some", Meiko shrugged, "It's good enough that you decided to pull this out of nowhere…"

"I told you already, I didn't hide it from you or Mana"! Kiyomi complained out loud waving her hands in the air frantically as the two girls made their way out of the narrow cave corridor.

* * *

Right as the corridor was about to widen up and the cave to which the long and narrow tunnel lead to expanded into a massive structure full of Snapper Ant eggs that glowed in the dark with an almost phosphoric blue hue Meiko noticed someone, or rather something that looked out of order.

"Those Snapper Ants, they're all knocked out", Meiko pointed at a bunch of massively sized insects stuck to the walls by some white cotton-like substance.

"I knew we were walking into a fight", Kiyomi grunted before looking around, trying to locate anyone or anything out of ordinary.

"Hey, look over there, it's someone's puppet armor completely not making any effort to hide and completely in plain view"! Meiko shouted out with excitement as she rushed on ahead. The gear-headed heart of the blacksmith demanded that she conducted a thorough and long investigation of the two times larger green metallic and mechanical structure.

Right before the redhead closed in on the puppet armor, the blue glowing orb on the center of its head part lit up and the thing extended its arm firing off a large rocket propelled fist attached to a long metallic wires strung together and wrapped around each other for density and greater thickness. The blacksmith braced herself and blocked the hit, the force of impact sent her sliding back and staggering at the end of the slide as her shaken brain struggled to keep her body upright and balanced.

"For your information, fair maden, I was blending into the environment!" a completely human voice, unaltered by a cybernetic voicebox which sort of was expected from someone hiding inside a puppet armor, thundered out. "You see, it is completely normal for ninja to look for what is hidden underneath, so normal that it is not unusual for them to miss something in plain view"!

"Yeah, that's stupid, I mean maybe if you were a cloaked man standing by the rocky wall in the darkness, I guess… But you're a large green robotic puppet with armor, it sort of stands out", Kiyomi scratched the back of her head feeling a bit mixed feelings about this odd man in the armor. There were too many questions to simply attack him outright.

"Yeah, but I had to point at him before you noticed", Meiko grinned teasing Kiyomi.

"I was getting to him, also, shut up", the blonde grumpily snapped back at her friend.

The cracked and bruised steel all over the robotic body of the gear puppet lit up in the cracks and spaces between the steel plates and gears. That must've been the sign of the puppet being activated and prepared for combat use. The more focused and intense lighting also allowed Kiyomi and Meiko to observe the oddity in its full appearance. It was a peculiar construction of thick and large, even sluggishly looking steel plates on its feet, groin, body and chest as well as head and its lower arms. There were bent arm sized gears sticking out of the armor in the places where joints were supposed to be.

"This isn't very functional, you know", Meiko pointed out addressing the puppet-master inside the armor. "Those gears are too sluggish for quick and precise movements, they're also all exposed making them one foreign object away from clogging and getting stuck. Those tied wires around your arms, neck and legs also don't look comfortable, in battle they'd rub against your clothes and skin and irritate them."

"Look… This isn't the point", Kiyomi grinned after hearing Meiko disassemble the strange robotic armor standing in front of them. "We're not here looking for a fight, in fact, we're running away from one. All we need is to find a way to the surface. If possible, we could also trade information".

"I am well aware of the problems with the armor. I am the one wearing it, after all. The functionality and efficiency of the armor doesn't bother me. It has a more personal value to me" the puppet-master spoke.

"You mean how it's a complete rip-off of Gear-Man from Gear-Man Z manga"? Meiko squinted suspiciously at her new acquaintance.

"It's like none of them are even listening to me at this point", Kiyomi smacked her face in frustration.

"That's right, it is indeed heavily based on Gear-Man from Gear-Man Z", the puppet-master admitted after a heavy sigh.

"A complete rip-off", Meiko didn't relent. "It's like I'm looking at the full-page panel or a cover art right now".

"Look, it's not about what it is, it's about what the armor means to me."

"Not to mention how it defies the very function of puppet armors, those are usually used to trick the opponent and provide protection for the sensitive and frail puppet-user. Looking at Gear-Man here, one would instantly figure you out as a puppet-armor", Meiko shrugged continuing to argue with the man inside the shell of gears and steel.

"Gear-Man is not just a puppet"! the puppet-master exclaimed. "It is a personal hero of mine. The symbol of my outer layer of physical strength with my own sensitive inner core resting inside. I do not care if it is useful or not, I do not care if it is functional or not. For what Gear-Man means to me, I simply cannot choose another way to fight"!

"So you admit it then", Meiko cheeked the large gear-bot.

"Yes. It does take the shape of Gear-Man, with all of his abilities and gadgets recreated as accurately as I could pull it off. Obviously, the Gearbeam couldn't have been actually shaped like a gear, I do not possess the needed chakra shape transformation skills yet. That being said, my Z-rangs are a superior copy even to those used in that terrible Gear-Man movie"! The young man explained before reaching for a section of the armor protecting his thigh, which opened up and allowed him to remove golden colored Z-shaped boomerangs.

"I mean… I do myself often rebuild weapons and tools from stories and manga and I love cosplaying within the confines of my own room, so… I guess you're alright, Gear-Man", Meiko smiled kindly.

"And now she's befriended Gear-Man", Kiyomi rubbed her forehead in irritation.

"Make no mistake, I do not call myself Gear-Man, my name is Masen-Z from Team Cumulus, Kumogakure. My team is now resting in a cave nearby here and I am tasked with protecting them and standing guard. That is my job in the team, as a true Mechanical Hero of Maximum Justice"! Masen stroke a heroic pose standing up straight and placing his hands by his sides.

"Dude, I think your team is just abusing you so that you could stay on duty all the time", Meiko approached the robotic armor and jumped up so she could pet its shoulder softly.

"Wait, Team Cumulus!?" Kiyomi shrieked out.

"That is correct, what is the source of your surprise, maiden?" Masen inquired, clearly taken aback by Kiyomi's surprise of just stumbling into the team member of her target by accident.

"Well, never-mind…" the gear giant dismissed the notion as quickly as he brought it up before turning back at Meiko, who looked forgetful enough to have forgotten that Team Cumulus was the team Kiyomi needed to locate. Had she known or remembered halfway, she'd have undoubtedly let it slip out in one context or another, so maybe it was for the better that she was forgetful.

"Indeed my comrades are using me for all sorts of things. Othello G is constantly trying to wrestle my armor while I am outside it, using it as a dummy and constantly performing only his sickest suplexes and leg drops on it, Sunny-Lee keeps trying to power my armor using her cotton discharges when it's not even electricity based". Masen sat down on a nearby rock only for Meiko to follow him and settle down nearby while Kiyomi was left to try and come up with something resembling a plan.

How was she supposed to think when everything was constantly hitting her with all of its worst right in her face like this? Mana got knocked out after a combination of misfortunes and misunderstandings, bad calls from all teams involved. Lithia and her team were possibly chasing after Kiyomi and Meiko, seeing how Meiko was Chominu's target. Meanwhile, while on the run they run into the team which Kiyomi needed most of all, yet found in the worst of times.

Should she engage Masen right now? No, that would take too much time, fighting anyone here and now will cause Lithia's Team Walnut to catch up to her in the most inconvenient moments, as usual. Not to mention the remaining members of Team Cumulus which were resting somewhere nearby… This Masen person looked like a loser who cares more about being faithful to his stupid manga hero than making a functional armor but the rest of Team Cumulus may have been too strong for tired and busted up Meiko and Kiyomi to handle by themselves. Being a leader and calling the shots sucked! No wonder it tore Mana to pieces internally…

"But then again, such is the nature of man. Being but a machine, a robot of clockwork and gears, grinding without emotion to the outside world of other gear-men and robots. We are all just steel masks of functionality, hiding our true souls inside but we are too afraid to reveal them or we simply don't know how. That, in my mind, what Gear-Man Z is actually all about and that's what I represent as the real life Gear-Man! That's why I chose "Z" as my nickname as well, wearing it beside my first name proudly!" Masen declared as he once again stroke a heroic pose much to Meiko's clapping amusement.

"Earth Style: Rock Avalanche"! the familiar slurry voice of Lithia's overweight teammate finally made Kiyomi realize her time for decisions had officially ran out and the decision was about to be made for her.

The Yamanaka turned in desperation at her blacksmith friend standing beside Masen-Z. The desperation came from the realization that Meiko was bit too far from Kiyomi's protective Earth Release techniques to reach. Once the smoke and rubble cleared the powerful Gear-Man armor pushed the stones that he had protected Meiko from off of his raised chakra barrier.

"Blue-Gear Formation: Protective Hero's Barrier of Maximum Justice"! Masen-Z chanted out the name of his technique before turning to Meiko. "I have to say the name of the technique after I perform it, because it's too long and if I try to say it while I'm doing it, I'm a bit too slow and if I try to speak as fast as ninja do during battle my tongue gets twisted".

"It's fine, you just need practice, Gear-Man"! Meiko cheered on the brave young man who loved a hero from the comic books he was passionate about and recreated it in real life.

"Foul villains, you have attacked my recently met friend, Meiko. If you target Meiko, you pick fight with Gear-Man"! Masen boldly declared shaking fears into… Someone's heart, somewhere.

"Yeah… Maybe don't go around yelling Gear-Man's name out loud… That's kind of a lawsuit waiting to happen. I heard those became pretty common after the movie industry bloomed." Meiko warned her new friend.

Kiyomi laughed out, realizing that this weirdo may have been an ace up their sleeve after all. She quickly dashed up to the crafty duo of Meiko and Masen before turning at the Kumogakure craftsman with a cheerful grin.

"You're pretty alright, Gear-Man, you're pretty alright!" she over-joyingly declared both to herself and to her newly met friend.


	309. The Explosive Squabble

"They'll be targeting Meiko, she's the chubby one's target", Kiyomi muttered. She felt confident that her teammates could've been spoken too in a more quiet tone, avoiding the revelation of her mental communication ability to the possible future enemy. While the Yamanaka was gleeful to team up with this Gear-Man fanatic now, she kept it well in mind that he may become an enemy soon enough.

"They will have to go through me first"! Masen-Z energetically declared as all the possible lighting under the heavy armored shell lit up building up an image of a powerful and fired up gadget-using ally.

"So do we run at them"? Meiko grinned excitedly, somewhere under her bruised and busted face there was that very same vibrant redhead. Kiyomi was glad to see her ally mostly ready for combat after a brief period of tranquility.

"No. We scope out their abilities, we see what Masen-Z can do and put a proper strategy together", Kiyomi denied her ally's enthusiasm for attacking the enemy.

Chominu's hands flashed through a collection of hand seals, Kiyomi could identify that specific set even if she could just see them briefly with the entire package of poor lighting and blurry speed being in play. The chubby was preparing for his signature combination of techniques but her gut told the blonde that there was something different, something more she didn't incorporate.

"Earth Style: Practice Brick Jutsu"! Chominu slurred out slamming his palms at the ground while bending and widening his feet and taking a more headstrong fighting stance.

As the ground beneath their feet rumbled Kiyomi noticed the shoddy dirt and rock walls rising significantly farther behind them. Was it an attempt to trap them off from the remaining members of Team Cumulus? Did Team Walnut take Team Cumulus as Team Hokage's allies after seeing Gear-Man aiding them out? No, there was something different in play.

"Let's go, Pomumaru"! Kidenshi, the third member of Team Walnut encouraged his little pom-pom like looking canine fellow. Almost immediately, the little ball of fur dove out from its safe hiding spot inside his partner's jacket and began running erratically in circles all around his master's body.

"Intercept that attack"! Kiyomi ordered after remembering the damage that this particular combination of ninjutsu dealt before and just the amount of force that this combination carried. The blunt force from the impact she could vaguely recall was nothing short from astounding, it was like the little critter built up force and momentum while running in circles around his partner before joining into his punches, kicks or tackles.

"Too late, Pom-Fang"! Kidenshi shouted out as he planted his fist firmly into Meiko's chest making the redhead blank out for a moment and throwing her body rolling backwards like a ragdoll. Just as Kiyomi theorized, the little critter he took for a dog ran around his master frantically, building up momentum and further boosting the increase in force using chakra in a combination of ninjutsu and taijutsu. The two worked in a perfect close range synchrony.

Luckily enough, Meiko had ample time to prepare a response for the attack. Shortly after it appeared that her body would've gotten flung backwards and into the surrounding of the dirt wall structure her injured body poofed away in a cloud of smoke. What remained in its place was a ball of cotton that held all those incapacitated Snapper-Ants that made their nest here before Team Cumulus found this hideout.

"Substitution Jutsu? Such crude and basic techniques", Lithia Uchiha taunted Kiyomi and Meiko standing behind both of her male teammates and playing with her knee long black flowing locks. It was odd for the Uchiha to wish to see more complex and powerful techniques but perhaps that was just her arrogant personality speaking over the girl's reason.

"Wow, heard that, Kiyomi? An Uchiha clansperson thought my jutsu were basic and crude! You're so cool, Lithia"! Meiko got a serious case of starry eyes over the famed young lady of the Konoha Ninja Academy. The blacksmith never had the opportunity to see Lithia Uchiha in action but there was a certain flare of idolizing of most older students, being a member of the elite Uchiha clan, Lithia naturally hogged all of the starry eyes meant for her entire class.

"Seriously, Meiko! I'm gonna punch you right now"! Kiyomi grunted in anger.

"Calm yourself, fair maiden, please, remember the true enemy. If you eliminate the one of great thick belly they will lose interest in your team"! Gear-Man reminded Kiyomi as an attempt to get her head fully in the game. The blonde grabbed her head with both hands and growled like a wild dog.

This was just so unfair. The one chance when Kiyomi finally got a chance to show up Lithia Uchiha, the one girl who tormented her all Ninja Academy years by getting all the praise and all the worship and all the popularity despite doing literally nothing but being a snobby ass-hat, she had to focus on someone else entirely.

"What's wrong, Kiyomi-chan? Finally realized that you just can't cut it to fight on the chuunin level? Oh, wait, why am I even trying to comprehend your problems, they're so beneath me anyways", Lithia smiled confidently before lazily erupting into a controlled and very composed laugh that lingered on the edge of appearing faked.

That remark made something snap inside the Yamanaka's mind. Her hand fired up and darted off from tearing into her rich blond hair and into her tool pouch grabbing a large handful of explosive tags before launching all of them into the air wildly as she emitted her strongest and deepest battle cry to vent out her rage and frustration.

"Are you insane, fair maiden, you'll blow all of us up! You're supposed to use those tags on the enemy"! Gear-Man tried to calm Kiyomi down before seeing her hands work a bunch of hand seals.

"Earth Style: Traveling Rock Pillar"! Kiyomi muttered out as all of the air in her chest had long been drawn out by her battle cry and the burning anger for the smug Uchiha that she always failed to expose for who she truly was. A great formation of rock burst out from underground grabbing the floating explosive tags and allowing all of them to stick onto them before beginning to move towards from underground, appearing like a fin of a rocky shark, right at Team Walnut.

"No, Kiyomi, you're wasting your time, Lithia will just see through your attack and dodge it, you can't up-show the Sharingan"! Meiko scolded her team leader before looking at the trajectory of Kiyomi's technique and how it drastically bended at the last second to reach Chominu instead of Lithia.

The chubby yelled something unintelligible out while the rest of his team dashed away at incredible speed, managing to outrun the explosion after it was set off but before it reached them in just a narrow speck of time. Kiyomi looked content with her fake-out. Yeah, she wanted to hand Lithia her ass more than anyone else in the village, still, sabotaging this fight and risking her friend's well-being was the wrong way to do it. A much superior way was eliminating that self-righteous snob from the competition.

"Kiyomi…" Meiko uttered in amazement at how good at acting and faking out Kiyomi was.

"We're going to eliminate two members, Meiko, you hear me? Two members. It doesn't matter who they are", Kiyomi breathed out heavily as she may have spent a bit too much stamina and breath with her acting effort.

"Ouch"! Chominu's slurry voice interrupted the conversation as the cloud of smoke parted and cleared enough to reveal the young ninja having used the Multi-Size Jutsu right before Kiyomi's attack hit him. He may have realized that he would've failed to escape the explosion when it was going off right at his face, luckily he didn't need that much movement and effort to set off a simple signature jutsu of his clan.

"That doesn't make any sense", Meiko grumped out, annoyed that her hunter wasn't eliminated which would've normally been a strong possibility. "He used the expansion technique, how did it help him, exactly?"

"He expanded his body size, increasing the area of effect to which the force of the explosion was applied to which reduced the overall force his body was hit by", Kiyomi sighed in disappointment that her fake-out trick failed.

"Now is our chance to strike, however"! Gear-Man realized before reaching to the compartments by his thighs and pulling out a pair of Z-shaped boomerangs before striking a heroic pose and launching them at the expanded yet slightly injured opponent.

"Z-Rangs of Complete Justice's Optimal Bringing"! Masen-Z chanted out as the elaborately named technique, which consisted of two simple actions, him removing his boomerangs from the compartments and him tossing them at the opponent was set off successfully.

"Pom-Tunneling Fang"! Kidenshi yelled out as he kicked off of the ground and positioned himself above the two boomerangs as they flew in the air before striking twice while his little Pomeranian companion built up momentum and force almost instantly, sending all of it out in a mighty wave of air pressure that deflected Gear-Man's Z-rangs.

"Thank you", Chominu thanked his Inuzuka clansman ally before his body returned to normal size and he collapsed on his knees clutching to his aching body. "That being said, the feeling that you did not have to do it just can't completely fade from the mind. I mean those boomerangs were shaped like the letter "Z", that can't be a very practical shape for a projectile weapon…"

Kiyomi had settled a while ago on the idea that she'd need to resort to her clan techniques in this battle. That being said, she still had to single out an optimal target for her disruption tactics. She saw Chominu clashing fists and limbs with seemingly considerable powerhouses like Meiko and Masen-Z, on the other hand, Kidenshi was a quick and strong disruption factor himself. Still, if Kiyomi switched into his body she'd be unlikely to properly setoff any of his hidden techniques as it involved cooperating with his little critter.

Before Kiyomi could single out a target for her mind displacement techniques, Meiko took initiative in attacking the opponent. She reached in to her lower left waist area where a sealing glyph symbol lit up allowing the blacksmith to unseal another one of her hidden weapons. The drawn tool was a large round bamboo ball with bark strips wrapped around it. One of the most stand-out features of the weapon was the large number of kunai blades sticking out from it and the crystal clear seen explosive note stuck on its left and right central areas.

Grabbing the spiky explosive sphere by one of its dulled blades, Meiko winded up. The redhead used her entire body, making it work together in order to be accurate and powerful at the same time. She was like a baseball player preparing to make some mad plays. She needed to pitch the sphere strong enough for it to gain too much speed for it to be intercepted, yet she had to reserve enough strength not to damage it or mess up her aim mid-way.

The sphere disappeared from clear sight the millisecond it left contact with Meiko's hand. It flew seemingly instantly to its location being aimed right at the chubby hunter of hers. Before Masen-Z, Meiko or Kiyomi could celebrate however an obstacle stood in their way, with her flaring red Sharingan eyes Lithia leaped in and grabbed the exact same blunted grip and lobbed the sphere up the exact same way Meiko did to the most exact twitch of her muscles.

"I didn't notice her activating the Sharingan", Kiyomi grumbled as the blast splattered a bunch of knocked out Snapper-Ants around and sent rubble of rocks and scattered kunai blades scattering all around the area.

"I wouldn't expect you would…" Lithia cockily taunted the Yamanaka with a snobbish smile, not even bothering to observe the rubble falling from above and the dislodged massive layers of rock and splattered body parts of Snapper-Ants raining down. She had successfully calculated and read the trajectory of every smallest pebble of that debris almost instantly using her Sharingan eye and already knew there was no need to trouble her elite little head about it.

Both teams covered up from the resonating blast shockwave and from the chain rumbling of the massive debris raining all across the large cave room. Lithia was the only one completely unfazed by any of the surrounding events shifting the very battlefield that the squabble for further competition in the Chuunin Exams took place.

The very moment that the final rock landed the newly improvised Kiyomi's squad scattered across, hiding behind whatever cover they could find as such a messy battlefield was more akin to the ones they were taught to fight in. Chominu and Kidenshi also dashed for the rocky or hardened chitin cover with the female Uchiha following her teammates shortly without uttering a single word.

Meiko felt Kiyomi's mind reaching out for her and she relaxed her head to allow her friend entry into her mind. It was tough to say for certain, at least until the gear giant didn't speak mentally, but Meiko was guessing that Masen-Z was excluded from the mental link.

"Did you see how many tomoe symbols Lithia had?" Kiyomi wondered.

"Does it matter"?

"I guess not, if she could copy your movements so perfectly, she could copy my own Yamanaka techniques as well"! Kiyomi raged.

"Wait! So that's why you don't like Lithia that much, because she can just copy your clan's hidden techniques by just observing them. In front of her, you're not special",

"There are plenty of reasons to dislike Lithia but… I've gone through many difficulties to learn and master everything that makes me special. Lithia, meanwhile, can just look at what I do and repeat it, all the hidden jutsu of my clan. That perfectly reflects everything that's wrong with her. She just gets everything, praise, being called "elite" and "special" for the sole reason of the clan she was born in. That's simply not fair, I've tried to prove her and another Uchiha clansman in my team that their fancy eyes don't compensate hard work but… They're too busy to listen to anyone else." Kiyomi vented out.

A strong roaring engine sound alerted the two kunoichi and made them peek from the relative safety of their covers and observe Masen-Z appear from his cover. It was probably smart for him to attack first, this makeshift cover barely did conceal him anyways and his own large size robbed him of subtle and restrained movements while in cover. Every slightest movement would have betrayed his position whether it was visually or audibly.

"Flying Strong Fist of Get-Closer Justice!" Masen-Z yelled out as his mechanical puppet armor shot its lower arm piece extending it through a long piece of wrapped together hardened strings of steel wire. Oddly enough the fist wasn't meant to demolish cover as it was shot in an odd trajectory, it flew over the cover and then bent over the top to slam into whoever was behind it. Despite Masen-Z's strongest guess he only picked up a bunch of crushed rocks in his grip when the mechanical extending fist returned.

"Multi-Size Jutsu"! Chominu yelled out after jumping in the air and over his cover, revealing his true position. Meiko and Kiyomi must've realized Lithia's clever plan all along, the Uchiha didn't just lob off Meiko's weapon to the upper ceiling of the cave for the show – she created a perfect rocky battlefield for her teammate's innovative style of Akimichi clan technique use.

"Human-Pinball"! The chubby shinobi shouted as he launched his expanded and rotund frame rolling like a human boulder at the large exposed robot.

Masen-Z's palms extended as if he was intending to stop the hurling massive human boulder with his armored hands but before he could even try such a silly thing the palms opened up firing off searing jets of flames at his opponent.

"Super Hotheaded Justice Shine of Fiery Passion V2!" Masen-Z declared the hilariously too long named technique right after the flames covered the ball of rolling human flesh.

"It won't work", Kiyomi worried, with good reason. She saw that technique hit her ally not too long ago and had seen Meiko struggle to overpower its weaker version before. A simple jet of flames may singe the Akimichi a little bit but it won't even come close to stopping the jutsu or its momentum.

"No, it's not just flames, it's a contained explosion that he lets out. Those gauntlets must have a bunch of explosive tags that all detonate at once and he merely directs the built up force and heat through the channel in his gauntlets", Meiko smiled seeing the fiery blaze blast Chominu aside completely and crash him into and through a large debris boulder that had fallen from the ceiling earlier.

At this point, Chominu's endurance had to be admired. He had taken some damage, even if it was greatly reduced, before from Kiyomi's combination of clever ninja tool use in sync with her Earth Release ninjutsu. His clothes were tattered and he had burns and bruises all over, his headpiece with the Konoha headband protector got all torn up by the blast and constantly was in the danger of falling off and getting lost somewhere. And yet the Akimichi still stood, he may have been the second most durable and gutsy Akimichi member Meiko had ever seen.

It didn't appear that the impressive technique left without taking its toll on Masen, however. The gauntlets were bent awkwardly from the inside with a large hole sticking out from the left one, as if part of the force had exploded right out from the gauntlet from the inside and it appeared like the Gear-Man was beginning to fall apart from the awesome might of his own techniques.

"I'm moving out to cover him, you with me"? Meiko wondered without waiting for Kiyomi's reply to dash out into the aid of her newly met friend. Meiko's defensive formation advances were not vain as Kidenshi had revealed himself almost at the same time to engage with the two.

"No, but it's OK, neither will Lithia reveal herself. She tries to make it seem like this is all beneath her but she's waiting for what I'm trying to avoid – she's waiting for me to show her a Yamanaka clan jutsu. We're deadlocked into standing still and waiting for the other to make a mistake", Kiyomi revealed her version of why Lithia was so inactive as well as her own reason for reserving the use of the Yamanaka hidden techniques.

"Hasn't she seen your jutsu in the Academy before"? Meiko wondered as she clashed in a taijutsu exchange with Kidenshi who was just as desperate to take the blacksmith out as he wouldn't have refused to completely trash the Gear-Man suit.

"She has, that being said, the Uchiha can only record techniques for a set period of time. I'm not sure what that period is, but it's something that my uncle taught me when I was a kid, training my ass off to kick Lithia's ass. Unless the Sharingan is at a very mature perfected stage, she can only copy bits and pieces of movements or whole techniques she's seen recently", Kiyomi replied.

"Alright, stay put and wait for Lithia to make a mistake then. I've got this handled"! Meiko yelled out as she kept on dodging and dishing out punishment of her own. The blacksmith was blocking and dodging rather successfully for the longest time whereas her fists constantly found their target. Once after she opened up a bit too much and got a bit too greedy in pummeling her opponent she got a nasty cross to her ribs to drive the air out. It was a desperation move, Kidenshi clearly wanted to retreat so Meiko decided to exploit it.

The blacksmith shot down at the same time as she was breathing in and swept at the Inuzuka's legs before dropping at his gut with an elbow drop and flipping back up before dashing to a safer distance. She could've kept on punching but the redhead decided to back up, just in case one of the other Team Walnut members decided to remove her off of their fallen member while she was too busy punching him while leaving herself completely open.


	310. Anvils and Bushy Armpits

"Thank you for the distraction, Meiko", Masen-Z huffed out before his cracked and worked up puppet armor straightened out and prepared for combat again.

"They shifted the entire battlefield to better suit Chominu's style, we'd appreciate if you helped us clear it up", Meiko relayed verbally what Kiyomi told her mentally making it look more like her own strategy. It wasn't that Meiko hadn't noticed how well this shifted battlefield played into Chominu's fighting style but she wouldn't have placed such a high priority on wiping the surface clean.

"It appears I shall have to use the Gearbeam, I will require some time to concentrate and charge it up. It uses both my own chakra stored into the puppetry wires as well as the momentum energy from the gearwork inside" Masen-Z rumbled out to which Meiko affirmatively nodded. Holding her own for a while, as long as Lithia chose to hold herself back to scope out Kiyomi's abilities, didn't sound like too much of a problem. As long as the payoff was cleaning the slate and making Kiyomi's battlefield preferences satisfied.

"I'm surprised your team hadn't involved themselves, we're making quite a ruckus here", Meiko grinned observing Kidenshi rolling aside and with difficulty getting back on his knees before spitting out a bit of blood aside and picking himself back up. Whatever damage her exchange of blows with the Inuzuka had left, it must've convinced him to throw all of his limiters out the window and go all out.

"I doubt they would, they are using the Snapper-Ants' nesting pods for resting, they possess both minimal healing properties and sound insolation. It'd take a much louder blast to make them suspicious. Also, they may be a bit mean to me but they do trust my abilities so even if they do hear something they'd just take it as me doing my job as someone standing guard", the gear giant rumbled back at the redhead.

Unexpectedly to everyone, a white flash with two crimson red trails blurring behind her like a tail of ionized gas and dust that commonly followed a comet burst out from a rocky cover. Closing the distance between where Lithia hid and Meiko's location in an alarming rate, the Lolita style favoring Uchiha attacked Meiko head-on.

The first palm strike dug in deep into Meiko's lower abdomen driving air from her body and slightly elevating her higher from the force of the strike. It was like the Uchiha girl saw events in slow-motion while she herself moved at hyper speeds even for a ninja. The Uchiha then proceeded to throw a blindingly fast chain of punches that almost disappeared from the range of vision even to the three genin ninja. Even confronted by exceptional close range threat of the Sharingan, Meiko placed a firm block that allowed her to cushion most if not all of Lithia's chain punching force.

Seemingly seamlessly Lithia transitioned her chain punches into a jumping cartwheel kick that smashed straight into the top of Meiko's head smashing her head, face first, right into the ground shaking the ground strong enough to move even the larger rubble rocks slightly.

"Mind Body Disturbance"! Kiyomi's voice echoed from somewhere aside, Meiko's head was too dizzy and spinning to identify her ally's exact direction but with Lithia's guard potentially being lowered the Yamanaka was finally free to hit her hated rival with the Yamanaka hijutsu.

Lithia casually leaned her body back before transitioning her painfully uncomfortable evasive motion into a back cartwheel and landing gracefully on her feet, almost like she was just showing off.

"You are aware that the Sharingan allows me to see chakra, right? I can visually see your mind projectile coming at me from over there and avoiding it is child's play." Lithia arrogantly laughed out into her palm, Kiyomi hid behind her cover once again. The Yamanaka was properly furious with Lithia baiting Kiyomi into showing her Yamanaka hijutsu to a hated rival.

"Partial Expansion Jutsu"! Chominu yelled out as Lithia's body twirled aside seamlessly allowing her ally's enlarged fist to pass at her side without even ruffling her skirt. The fist sent still dazed and kneeling Meiko flying back and smashing through one of the larger fallen rock structures making it completely collapse.

Bursting with tiny lightning crackles the Gear-Man armor worryingly looked back at the injured blacksmith being tossed around by the combined forces of the entire enemy team. He was busy charging up the only equalizer his team had meanwhile Kiyomi was temporarily defenseless and disorientated while her missed mental projection returned to her body. There was no one to aid the redhead fight back.

"Meiko! Stop holding back, you've not used a single ace jutsu yet, please take this seriously or you'll get hurt"! Masen-Z pleaded before realizing that the trio of his opponents have all gathered in front of him and prepared to disable his armor before proceeding to team up on Meiko.

"Sorry, Gear-Man, I can't", Meiko's pain ridden yet still cheerful voice came from the side of the rubble causing Team Walnut to redirect their attention at the standing and injured target that surprisingly enough was just as durable and wanted to win just as much as Chominu, who himself took more than his fair share of beatings.

"I beg of you, Meiko, take this seriously"! Masen-Z shouted back at her, "Use all of your ace techniques now, no use holding back for the other rounds if you won't reach them"!

"You don't get it, do you, gear-head"? Kidenshi smiled before looking back at Meiko's crooked and staggering figure walking out from the dusty rubble. His glare was not belittling or offending by any means, there was a hint of admiration and respect in his eyes. "Meiko's chakra control is lousy, she was the only genin to fail the Graduation Exam in our year. Even now she still has to fully concentrate for Academy Techniques, that is why all of her techniques focus on unsealing and using her immense arsenal or physical strength".

"Hm? You mean she can't even use one jutsu without worrying if she can pull it off correctly? That sure is lousy, what good is a ninja without jutsu"? Lithia yawned.

"She packs a good punch", Chominu commended his target before the trio of Team Walnut passed Masen-Z who was still charging up his technique and continued to walk towards Meiko, slowly preparing themselves and building up their chakra for an intense rushdown which would leave the redhead completely unable to stand.

"What good is that?" Lithia dismissed her teammate, "I can nullify her physical strength and kick her ass up close, just by being genetically superior. My Sharingan makes her sloppy movements look slow like a glacier".

An intense flare fired Meiko's body off the ground at a powerful rush forward, charging into three opponents before she was attacked and hunted down like an injured wild animal. The jet boots positioned Meiko's frame as close to the rocky floor as the girl could get without hitting it, she aimed for Chominu's shins and feet with her tackling flight.

The painful shock to her shoulders suggested she did it, she hit Chominu in the shins making him trip up and flip over, Meiko repositioned herself to grab her opponent's feet and toss him in the air. Only then did she see Kidenshi's fist and Lithia's kick coming right at her face. She had already invested too much momentum and force into her movements for her to dodge, the counters were too close to properly avoid them. All of Meiko's responses were too late, all she could've done was look at the two incoming attacks and wait for them to take her down.

Kidenshi's fist changed direction mid-way and flew straight at Lithia's face, forcing the Uchiha to change her course of action immediately in order to avoid a strong hit. The Uchiha's left hand quickly shot sideways and up to lock down on her ally's traitorous attack before twisting his arm and disabling him. Kiyomi's grunting moan betrayed her pain before Kidenshi got broken out from the blonde's Yamanaka hijutsu.

Meiko's attack got initiated successfully with a little help from her hidden ally who recovered and launched another attack just in time, this time one not aimed at Lithia and timed at a very sensitive moment. When all of Lithia's attention would be fixed elsewhere, even if the Uchiha would've been able to see Kiyomi's hijutsu coming, in that moment she'd have not been able to change anything but protect herself.

Gripping firmly at Chominu's shins and feet Meiko soared as high up as the cave height allowed before turning off her boots and allowing the natural laws of physics to do the rest of the work for her. The blacksmith flew crashing down with her hunter in her grip with a supersized piledriver slamming Chominu into the ground.

"Anvilstone"! Meiko yelled out right before the impact driving chakra in a mad rush to add extra force to the slam.

"Taijutsu techniques are jutsu too"! Masen-Z cheered on his friend excitedly as the smoke and dust cleared and both Meiko and Chominu laid sprawled out and huffing, both damaged and worn by the long lasting battle. Lithia and Kidenshi leaped farther aside to avoid the shockwave and earthquake caused by Meiko's slam.

"She's mad, she could've cracked the whole planet in half if she didn't control the augmentation right"! Kidenshi laughed out, laughing at how reckless Meiko's taijutsu technique was.

"There was no risk", Meiko boldly declared before picking herself up and stumbling a couple of times before she stood back up on her feet. "A friend of mine has been teaching me how to concentrate and control my chakra to defeat genjutsu for a long time, the general concept appears the same", she shyly rubbed her nose with a confident grin as she declared it.

Chominu grunted with a rather scary sounding cough that suggested a large amount of internal injuries being present in his body. Either way, it was impressive he could even move being slammed head first into the rough underground layers of hardened rock and minerals.

"Y-You really think some… Puny hit like that could take me out"? The Akimichi taunted Meiko before his eyes widened in a painful shock before closing and the heavyweight collapsed, falling right on his face. There could've been no confusion about it – Chominu was out. The unquestionable and crystal-clear air pressure that a ninja with an active chakra level put out was missing and the young man looked almost lifeless as he laid down on the ground.

"What? Chominu should've taken that hit, what the…", Kidenshi started losing his cool before looking at Chominu's back which was covered in kunai knives being driven in both vertically and diagonally in various angles and depths of penetration. Both Lithia and Kidenshi stood there in silence observing the environmental factor that had taken out their friend and a small puddle of blood started accumulating under the chubby's body.

"I see… It was an impressive amount of foresight", Lithia commended Meiko's attack and the complicated amount of planning needed to scatter all those kunai blades with her previously used explosive weapon only to use a high-flying slamming attack to drive all of those blades in. If the body didn't expect consciously a certain angle or manner of wounds, the chakra augmentation on that area would've been subconscious and therefore strained and multiplied exponentially, proportionally multiplying the true amount of damage dealt by the taijutsu attack as well.

"Actually, I kind of forgot those were scattered here and just sort of lucked out", Meiko smiled with a blush as she stroke her red hair energetically feeling a bit ashamed of being praised by an Uchiha who recently handed Meiko's ass to her in close range combat – an area in which the blacksmith previously thought she excelled.

"It's over, Lithia", Kiyomi jumped out of her cover and leaped on top of the large rock that used to conceal her. "With Chominu unconscious you have no more quarrel with us".

"Oh? I thought you told your friend here that you'd take down two of Team Walnut's members to eliminate us from the Exams"? Lithia turned back at Kiyomi.

"I did, back then. But something I've come to learn after taking leadership of Team Hokage is that being a leader means to rise above one's own self and one's own problems and rivalries. I can see that forcing myself, Meiko and Masen-Z to fight against you any further would mean injuries and pain that would be completely pointless and would harm my reputation as a leader. How could Meiko trust my judgment in the future if I asked her to fight meaningless battles motivated by my own lowly rivalries"? Kiyomi longingly looked at Meiko and Masen-Z who was still trembling and twitching as electricity continued to build up and crackle all over the armored puppet.

"Rivalry? What gave you the idea that you're my rival? I forgot that you existed the moment I left the Academy grounds after the graduation. You were never, nor will you ever be my rival", Lithia indifferently chuckled into her palm before playing with her hair and taking a couple of steps towards Kiyomi. "As of this whole thing… I've heard that gearhead say something very interesting. Something about the Snapper-Ant nesting pods and their healing properties. Chominu may be out cold right now but as long as he isn't eliminated, he is not out of the competition. All we need to do is to place him inside one of those pods before the staff removes him".

"Whaaaa! That's pretty clever, as expected from Lithia! Hey, Kiyomi, we should've done that with Mana"! Meiko yelled out in surprise of the Uchiha's decision to continue the battle.

"We may have, but it's too late now. She's been out of our sight for way too long, also we only figured out about those pods right now", Kiyomi replied.

"Well, if you foul villains still want to continue, have some of this – Gearbeam"! Masen-Z roared out as his armored suit began twitching and its parts began stressing and breaking apart before all of the built up electricity and chakra concentrated on the chest gear piece and the chest piece started to glow in a blinding white light.

A destructive and blindingly fast wave of compressed electrical energy and chakra fired out to the farther diagonal upper left corner of the cave as the shock and kick of the blast forced Masen-Z to get blasted back. He had to activate his jet boots to even maintain proper balance and control the beam so that it could be swiped to the right and all the battlefield obstacles could've been wiped clean. Obviously, if the jutsu ended up knocking out one or two enemies it'd have been just perfect too…

Having anticipated the blast coming sooner rather than later, Meiko leaped up in the air almost momentarily after it was activated. She could still make out the Gearbeam completely swallowing and overwhelming Kidenshi with the blinding and incredible speed of the blast and burning him up as well as violently tossing him out of the concentrated wave of chakra. Even trying to look at the blast's general direction was painful and stressed Kiyomi's eyes. All she wanted to see was the awesome speed and power of the Gearbeam tripping up Lithia and shoving all of her talk down her throat. Kiyomi just wanted to have that much…

Where it appeared that Lithia would also be overwhelmed and swallowed by the beam before being singed up and tossed aside with grievous battlefield injuries, the Uchiha appeared to manage to react just in time and arc over the beam with an acrobatic dodge. The beam only barely grazed her back tearing off a large chunk of her jacket and leaving a small burn where it grazed the Uchiha.

After the beam narrowed down to the form of a simple ray of light before completely fading, Lithia landed firmly on the ground but she didn't try to counterattack or exploit the massive opening on the Gear-Man armor which Masen-Z provided. Right after the Gearbeam concluded the armor appeared to almost completely shut down and just uselessly crook over and get weighed down by its own weight. It was a great opportunity for a powerful ninjutsu response but Lithia restrained herself and just stared at the enemy.

While initially the girl's response proved odd to Kiyomi, once the Yamanaka looked at the girl's eyes she noticed the reason – her Sharingan was missing. Instead of those fearsome red orbs with tomoe positioned symmetrically over its iris, only the void black depth was present. She must've abused and strained her Sharingan quite extensively to avoid this impressively quick and powerful blast, this was the first time Kiyomi had seen the Sharingan being shut down to give it some rest. It was a massive weakness and a possible ace under her sleeve in the future.

A loud masculine battle cry made Kiyomi change her focus from Lithia to Kidenshi who proudly stood back up on his feet and prepared a follow-up attack seeing how his teammate decided to rather remain stationary, instead of utilizing the opening she was given. It was an easy question to answer, as to why she did that. Uchiha were arrogant and the Sharingan was the reason of their arrogance, it was easy to see that without easy access to it Lithia had little faith in her abilities and chose to rather sit tight and wait for her eyes to rest a little bit.

It reminded Kiyomi of her own teammate Yamashiro so much, that young Uchiha boy also overly trusted in his Sharingan and after he had lost it in a poorly chosen battle it completely crushed his confidence to the point where the young boy chose to leave the profession behind for good and retire. Their bond with their own eyes was probably the only human trait of that forsaken clan.

"Pom-Pom Fang over Fa…" Kidenshi yelled out enraged before winding back his fist for an attack as his canine partner started building up momentum and molding chakra for something massive. This must've been his ace technique, one he was saving for the final stages of the Chuunin Exams, if hit with it head-on, without any protection, Masen-Z would've certainly been doomed.

A pink, black and red colored boa locked around Kidenshi's body, completely out of nowhere in an instant. Stretching its body from locking down his legs completely by the joints as well as around his elbow joints and even on his neck. The snake even coiled around his little cuddly critter, whereas the dog lacked severely in size, the boa only coiled around with simple loops around its waist.

"Hidden Wrestling Style Taijutsu: What-What" an energetic mumble came from the further passageway of the corridor leading further into the cave system from an extravagant and highly flamboyant older man. Upon his command the colorful boa constricted and with a bone snapping sound knocked Kidenshi out completely, allowing the boy's unconscious body to just collapse on the ground. After performing the constricting taijutsu move, the reptile then disappeared in a cloud of smoke as unexpectedly as it had appeared.

The newly emerged ninja, wearing the Kumogakure protector on the upper shin area of his wrestling boots as well as on the colorful tights on his groin, was wearing only the minimal required wrestling attire consisting of black, red and pink colored trunks and rainbow colored boots. The middle-aged man had an immensely toned and beefy body build yet it was somehow made much less impressive by the excessive body hair he was sprouting on his chest, his abdomen and armpits. That was to remain completely silent of the bushy full beard and the excessively shaved pate leaving a long bushy strand coiling around the man's head. The shaved pate was obviously to show off the "Boiga" tattoo written in blood red with yellow and black borders right on the right side of the man's forehead. All was topped off with stylish pink shades that, frankly, kind of mixed in well with the darker complexion of the flamboyant Kumogakure ninja.

"What the fuck's with all this ruckus"!? He angrily screamed out, judging from the dripping salad green goo on the wrestling gear wearing shinobi, the Gearbeam had woken up and forced out of the Snapper-Ant nesting pod where he was healing his injuries and resting.


	311. Sob Stories For Everyone!

"Othello G"! Masen-Z yelled out in great joy as his friend's well-timed appearance had saved him from taking a considerable blow, which could have, for all intents and purposes, wrecked his Gear-Man suit completely or even damaged the real soft and fleshy Masen inside of the puppet armor.

Lithia clenched her fists angrily, this was probably the first display of real human emotion that the young lady had shown over the past hour. Visibly distressed she looked down on her teammate trying to maybe see a twitch or any other sign that he wasn't completely out and yet nothing of the sort came her way – both Kidenshi Inuzuka and Chominu Akimichi have been eliminated, effectively ending Team Walnut's participation in the Chuunin Exams.

Another, much younger than the middle aged Othello G, kunoichi appeared besides him, walking out into the field of vision of everyone from behind her tall and bulky teammate. She also looked quite flamboyantly with her full-body yellow and pink tights separated with white streaks that made her suit look almost hi-tech in its motifs.

"You heard Othello, Masen. What the heck's going on here?" the young lady, previously referred to by Masen-Z as Sunny Lee, spoke up.

"I apologize, allies, it is because my new friends were attacked by these three foul competitors that I was forced to use the Gearbeam"! Masen-Z bowed his head apologetically, his attitude towards these two appeared almost submissive, as if these two held a certain degree of subordination over Masen-Z.

"Well, two of your friends are down, I suggest you scram, Uchiha. I'm in no mood for your typical gloating so if you stick around I may break your bones as well", Othello-G pointed at Lithia who just arrogantly turned her head and started moving back into the parts of the cave where she came from, leaving her teammates behind. It was then that the muscular wrestler turned his eyes down to see Kiyomi geeking out over his stature and presence, little stars in her eyes and drooling included in the total package.

"Ummm… I dunno what's your shine, but you're freaking me out", Othello G raised his pink shades revealing deep blue eyes underneath. While they looked rather unnatural given his dark complexion, it was within the range of what cosmetic medical ninjutsu could achieve in a strong ninja village such as the Kumogakure given the right amount of money.

"Othello G from CWF!" Kiyomi shrieked out.

"I think she's a fan or something", Sunny Lee turned her head sideways trying to examine the odd symptoms of the Yamanaka genin.

"Ugh, I don't really care about all that stuff, she can shove the groupie shit way up", Othello G grumbled out after his face twisted and he shoved his palm into Kiyomi's face forcing her to fall down on her butt, even as she was humbled and rejected by her beloved wrestler, the girl's geeked out expression remained the same.

"I personally think it is awesome", Masen-Z laughed out as he lifted and swung around his bulky armored arm on which Meiko hung, trying to shake her off. The girl's arms and legs wrapped around it like a those of a monkey gripping at a fruit tree. The blacksmith was overly obsessed examining the exposed and damaged suit's inner workings.

"Fans are a nuisance. One thing twenty years in the biz has taught me is that fans make no sense. They cheer and boo like sheep, collectively one after the other and their behaviors can't be predicted. Their stupid voices interrupt the art I do in the ring"! Othello G flexed his impressive muscles before turning around and walking back into the cave, which he woke up in.

"Wow, he's keeping up kayfabe even outside the ring"! Kiyomi turned at Meiko with a childishly gleeful smile.

"I think he's just an asshole in real life", Meiko scratched her head in confusion after having just jumped off of the exposed parts of Masen-Z's Gear-Man suit.

"So you know a little bit about wrestling? I'm impressed to see fans of Othello G in Konoha, what's your name"? Sunny smiled to Kiyomi before extending her hand to help the Yamanaka get up off her knees from the highly undignified position which the blonde was obsessing over her beloved wrestler in.

"Kiyomi Yamanaka, Team Hokage from Konohagakure", Kiyomi introduced herself completely throwing any hints of caution into the wind.

"Alright, come on over, we'll look at those wounds", the brown haired and expressively dark blue eyed girl smiled warmly.

* * *

Under the bioluminescent bright green light of the Snapper-Ants' nest, , and surrounded by the sound of Othello G smashing boulders ten time his size in his grasp into dust Sunny Lee was tending to Kiyomi's wounds, rubbing the glowing green goo from the nesting pods. All the living inhabitants of the cave hung all around, knocked out cold and stuck to the walls using the same cotton-like substance. Meiko, who got her body rubbed completely with the nature's ointment and waited until it helped her natural ninja metabolism deal with the entirety of the injuries she sustained was hanging out with Masen-Z, helping him fix his armor.

"You know, when Masen-Z told us about you guys beating on his armor, I kind of imagined you guys as real dicks, bullying your friend like that", Kiyomi admitted laughing out loud over her own preconceived impressions of the two other members of Team Cumulus.

"Well, Othello G really does bully Masen-Z, initially I thought similarly to you, but when he told me the reason I kind of felt like joining in", Sunny smiled while rubbing off the shiny green goo until it stopped emitting that creepy shine on Kiyomi's skin. "You see, Masen-Z isn't like Othello, he's not really a mighty powerful guy, nor is he like me – a descendant from a powerful and elite ninja clan. He's just a hard-worker with a passion for both his silly superhero stories and actual justice. Othello merely tests his passion, his suit, he keeps on wrecking Masen's armor and bullying him to make him strong, to keep him on edge and encouraging the goof to upgrade his suit every time it gets trashed".

Kiyomi looked to the side, she smiled seeing both the puny and short, ebony skinned and bright cream blue afro wearing gearhead running around with Meiko, screwing in nuts and bolts, rebuilding and improving on the suit where it didn't desecrate the original "source material" and didn't look too far off of the Gear-Man Z manga book. Seeing those two goofing around and just messing with the armor made Kiyomi realize that she hadn't seen such a peaceful moment in a while.

"Actually… I keep wrecking Masen's armor for another reason entirely", Sunny blushed admitting it to Kiyomi.

"Oh?"

"Yeah, has he told you what the armor means to him? Not just the whole "I love Gear-Man Z" story, the deeper meaning"? Sunny wondered.

"Yeah, something about people all just being machines, showing off their robotic outer facades", Kiyomi shrugged making Sunny accidentally drop the rubbing cloth which made the Kumogakure genin give the Yamanaka a scolding look only to be returned an apologetic shameful smile.

"Basically… You see, Masen-Z is a very sensitive boy. People weren't really kind to him that much in his life. His parents only saw him for what he could have become, the job he could have attained given his talents. His friends… Well, he wasn't too popular as long as I remember him. Everyone just used him because he could have gotten them the best things they wanted while expecting those things from him each and every time, like it was just his function. Like he was a machine or something"

"You said you were in an elite ninja clan, what's that all about"? Kiyomi wondered.

"I'm from a branch of the Senju clan, I suppose us clan-people kinda get our own fair share of this utilitarian façade treatment, huh?" Sunny looked at Kiyomi.

The two girls shared a prolonged session of laughter, both remembering similar experiences in their life where each one was treated only for the sum of what they had in them and what they could do instead of for the people they were.

"I hate those feelings, that sentiment that makes Masen-Z hole himself into a suit of armor. To Masen it's a form of protest, a statement – "All of you show me your armor and hide your fleshy bits inside expecting me to be the same, so here it is, my armor" kind of thing", Sunny sulked giving the energetic and obsessed Masen-Z to her right a pitiful look. "To me it's his surrender, a retreat. He becomes that which people treat him as because he can no longer bare the pain".

"Which is why you keep sabotaging the armor, to keep forcing Masen to show his sensitive, fleshy body to the world around", Kiyomi smiled lyrically.

"Yeah, I guess him updating the bucket of rust once in a while is also a good motivation to kick that metal can's ass", Sunny sighed.

Shortly after Kiyomi's treatment and the brief conversation about Masen-Z's life's disappointments was finished, Othello G in his full sweaty muscular goodness walked up to wash himself and treat the little skin irritations he had acquired after a long session of grinding hardened minerals and rock against his skin and reducing boulders to dust.

"Maybe later you can sign one for me"? Kiyomi wondered after handing the bulky giant, who still favored his weird pinky shades for whatever reason, the towel with his actual name and face on it.

"I don't owe you or fuckin' anything"! Othello G rudely cut Kiyomi off before tossing the towel aside and running off to train again.

"Don't hate Othello for being like that", Sunny advised.

"Hate him? I love him, he's my favorite heel ever"! Kiyomi cheerfully smiled at the Senju girl. "Well, maybe that's Porfirio D, either way, he's one of my all-time favorites so I kind of can't help it. I mean how can I hate a guy for taking his in-ring character seriously enough to keep the kayfabe up even outside the ring"?

"It's not kayfabe", Sunny sadly shook her head before looking back at the possibly the oldest participant in the Chuunin Exams that participated in it. "He really dislikes wrestling fans in general. I think that may be why he doubled down on being a ninja instead".

"What do you mean"? Kiyomi wondered with the sad eyes of a fan who had just met their idol and found out that they may not be as perfect and innocent as they had made the man out to be.

"Well, maybe a decade ago, maybe even more, Othello G was a big time wrestling superstar. Back then he still had the Bordello Othello gimmick, it was a different time – the Angst Period where the more aggressive and ridiculously edgy the wrestlers were, the better they were received. At some point, Othello had reached his physical peak and began thinking about retirement, maybe managing some new talent, as wrestlers often did past their prime. He cut this tear-jerking promo about leaving, all the awesome memories he had as the Bordello Othello and how it was time for him to leave the yard for the new guys".

"I've never heard of that"! Kiyomi leaned back, squinting suspiciously, as if refusing to believe what she was hearing about her idol.

"That because back then wrestling could only be experienced by seeing it live or through wrestling magazines that were too busy with flashy pictures and wrestler bio pages. The actual storylines and feuds remained a closed secret to keep the business going and profiting." Sunny sighed.

"Oh, that makes sense. I've had a couple of Bordello Othello posters, have a bunch of magazines with him and even more about him after the gimmick change – that's when I really got into liking him." Kiyomi scratched her head apologetically since she had realized she was surprisingly casual with her passion for this conversation. It didn't appear, from the lack of excitement in her speech, that Sunny Lee was too much into wrestling and she still knew more about the culture than Kiyomi did – a foreign fan.

"During that retirement promo he kind of hinted that he may be starting his own thing, his own promotion. Just when taping wrestling and running it in theaters and all those big tours became a thing – he sensed a market shift and wanted to exploit it. The public really looked completely over that idea, even the management didn't mind promoting a possible competitor as long as they could do a couple of shared events and crossovers, invasion angles etc." Sunny continued to explain. "Right after he finalized his supposed retirement and started managing the big shot new company, initially the money started rolling. Then the fans just stopped getting into it completely out of the blue, they turned on Othello beginning to boo him for selling out, for being a has-been and then the worst happened – they just stopped interacting with the events at all".

"Yeah, I guess when taping and theatre scene kicked into the wrestling business there was a lot of money to be made in that. It doesn't seem that bad for fans to boo him, he was known as a heel before, he could work a heel manager character pretty well working the heat off of that fan hate. It doesn't make much sense that they'd stop supporting him altogether though", Kiyomi kept on pondering to herself about what could have been the problem. The more she thought and listened the more she realized that she knew little to nothing about the business and how it was handled. It was a scary realization but also an exciting one as it appeared that one of her past time entertaining passions had more to explore about it.

"That's 'cause fans are stupid. There's no logic to their behavior, the most random shit gets over and the coolest stuff has to be aborted because it just doesn't interest anyone. They can cheer for you one show and then boo and chant profanities during a match just because the ring apron is of a color they don't like. When they band together they're like animals", Othello G butt in having overheard the conversation during his training before picking up a red mineral-textured rock and smashing it against his head. A pudgy orb rolled out from the tough shell only to be tossed into the wrestler's mouth and munched enjoyably before being swallowed.

"It looks like that rock brings you more joy than your job", Kiyomi sadly noted only for Othello to grin.

"These are what Snapper-Ants feed their young, they smash it with their huge snappers above the nests and let the pudgy thing fall right on their stupid faces, tastes like truffles. That's the reason we're here, amongst some others, we're resupplying on food". Othello G explained.

"You know what, though? I have heard of you during the whole Bordello gimmick run, but I've mostly admired your work as Othello G, it's the gimmick I grew up with and I was always really entranced by the ruthless aggression and utter distaste for everyone's faces you brought with you into the ring", Kiyomi admitted. "Even if you don't like having to return to your old home after having retired and doing this whole new gimmick run, just know that you're really sick at it".

Othello annoyingly played with his tongue, "Did you know that those asshole suits are planning on transmitting the shows on the TV now? Like some stupid strawberry jam commercials… The high class art of wrestling completely lost all meaning, back in my days people used to dress up to watch wrestling", the grumpy middle ager complained seemingly to himself before grinning at Kiyomi.

"You're Kiyomi, from Team Hokage, huh? You're here to take one of our team down, isn't that right? I think that it was me you're after?" Othello G asked the girl completely leaving her breathless.

"Don't worry about it, there's this guy from our village, Otto-B, he's a genius of sorts, real good with the numbers, and he had made a highest probability hunter-target chart which we had a chance of looking at when we exchanged information. He managed to narrow it down with very few question marks, exchanging intel with many different teams, after a dozen of "this guy's after that guy" the rest sort of put itself together", Othello G shrugged before standing up and stretching out.

Kiyomi jumped on her feet facing the twice-larger man and staring at him face-to-face, if the Deceitful What-What Heel Othello G ever tried to pull one of his unexpected attacks on her, the Yamanaka wanted to be ready for it.

"Look, you seem like a nice kid, so if you want a go at it, I've no objections as long as we do it clean and wrestling style. If you want to go at it the shinobi way we'll have to take you on three on two", Othello cracked his knuckle emitting a strangely terrifying thunderous sound, having in mind what those fists and hands could tear asunder and crush it was of no surprise.

"Wrestling style? You'll trust me to surrender after being pinned, because I sure as hell won't trust you", Kiyomi pouted as this whole situation smelled off. Sure, Othello had no reason not to just wrestle her, after all – he was the superstar and she was just a kunoichi from Konoha. Granted, this match would have the additional chaotic chakra control element to it, which was sort of an equalizer but both options smelled equally stinky for the blonde.

"Alright, we can make it a hardcore match without pins. The only ways to win are breaking your opponent's body through submission or knocking them out", Othello shrugged his massive shoulders, Kiyomi took a pair of steps back because the bushy armpits of the wrestler very nearly were exposed to her face and she found the emitting smell atrocious.

"Cool, I guess I'll just visualize the ring", Kiyomi grinned confidently before warming up, with a disapproving sigh Sunny Lee backed off a bit to observe the match from a distance.

"No need for that, I always carry the ring with me, wherever I go"! Othello smiled before biting his thumb and swiftly working through hand seals before driving his extended palm to the ground. "Summoning Jutsu"! He chanted out.

After a loud popping sound and a tremendous cloud of smoke a long wrangling constrictor appeared behind Othello G who proceeded to run right at Kiyomi. The girl just stood there watching the man run right past her while the constrictor's tail extended to right behind her, allowing the man to bounce off of the snake's tail as he would've done off of ring ropes before returning to his primary position to where the snake's immense body once again aided him with his rope game.

"So are we gonna do this, or what"? He asked excitedly.


	312. Food for the Ninja Gods' Minds

Meiko looked back at the unexpected ruckus caused behind her. While working on Masen-Z's Gear-Man puppet, all the cheer and joy included, was relatively noisy and messy, something about those noises back there seemed more chaotic. Just as the girl turned around, she witnessed a black and white striped crimson constrictor wrapping itself around an area of eighty meters or so, creating a ring suitable for a close range brawl.

"What the… Are they going to fight"? Meiko yelled out in surprise as she jumped off of the shoulders of Gear-Man. She wanted to dash right to her friend but her gear-headed attitude forced her to turn back and admire the upgraded and rebuilt Gear-Man. It had much more bright yellow coloured plating and much more protection on what Meiko thought of were weaknesses, even if Masen-Z actively objected making the puppet too efficient, he didn't want to sacrifice its authenticity in the process. The boy cared more about it looking like he wanted it to look rather than it being optimized, just like with his entire weaponry system…

"Oh, don't worry, they'll just have a friendly wrestling match. Your friend is after Othello G, isn't she?" Masen-Z carelessly waved his hand.

"Wait, what!? She is!? What the hell is going on"!? Meiko freaked out continuing to switch onto the wrestling match about to start behind her and the Gear-Man armor.

"Yeah, we knew it all along. I was wondering why we were being so quiet about it and I was worried that Othello G or Sunny Lee may try to pull something funny while you were resting but I'm glad they decided to settle it with wrestling". Masen-Z smiled, paying little to no mind to the craziness behind him, continuing to adjust the yellow shoulder pieces of his puppet.

"B-But if Kiyomi gets beaten up…", Meiko was beginning to worry.

"Don't worry, if she gets beaten – you guys get eliminated, right? Well, that's how this thing works. You don't want to fight three on two under any other conditions, right? Now come up here and help me with this, if you do, I promise I'll show you something cool when we're done", Masen-Z smiled ecstatically pointing at a point of shoddy gear-work where the gears fired off sparks in every direction once they started working.

* * *

Kiyomi carefully moved around the constrictor's controlled ring area, she didn't try out approaching the snake too close, worrying that it may not allow her to use it as wrestlers usually used ring ropes but the snake's eyes were hypnotizing even in their calmness making the girl's heart calm down slightly, at least as far as that was concerned.

"Do not worry, Anaron is just a ring tool, he will not be attacking, you unless he's acting as the ring corner. If you want, we can edit the rules, establish an interference DQ clause", Othello G suggested as he continued dashing around the Yamanaka in blinding speed, his already incredible swiftness accelerated even more with each rebound off of the ropes.

"Sounds fair enough", Kiyomi replied, quickly turning around with a punch. She needed to slow Othello G down if she wanted to begin to hope catching him with a Yamanaka hijutsu at any point. At a soon enough point, given a few more rebounds she'd have been unable to follow her opponent's moves at all.

Othello's figure blurred, he moved so oddly and grotesquely, a bended up and mangled speed mirage made following his moves nearly impossible as the lightning swift wrestler bent over Kiyomi's punch, drifting like a lightning bolt to the other rope and shooting off of it, coming at the blonde in speeds escalated to an unforeseen degree.

The large brawler leaped in the air, flying like a bird with his arms stretched out wide. Running right at Kiyomi the wrestler decided to punish his opponent's slow movement with a forearm smash.

"Egoi Smash!" Othello shouted out, Kiyomi knew that he was aiming at the back of her neck, he was far too fast for a proper response, the best she could have done was just turning around and taking the hit with the front of her body, doing her best to raise a block. While turning around the kunoichi did her best to bend and relax her knees to not tackle her opponent's superior smashing power with her own, such a competition would've either busted her bones and completely decimated her or caused her to spend too much chakra trying to overcome the enemy's offensive.

With an awesome flying forearm smash the blonde got sent flying down but, having done all she could to minimize the impact, she could roll aside and bounce back on her feet relatively easily. When one trained under the logic defying physical monster of utter incompetence that was Chestnut Hanasaku, one learned to deal with absolutely unfathomable physical power coming right for one's head.

At least the exchange, while costing Kiyomi some painful bumps and chakra to not get her arms blown up in fleshy bits from the force of impact with the very particles that compose her body being smashed out of her, stopped the accelerating level of Othello G's threat.

"That wasn't bad", Othello G commended Kiyomi as he continued to move across the ring, little by little his circular running forced the blonde into the center of the ring.

"As good as your normal human opponents, I wonder"? Kiyomi taunted the man.

"As if you don't know that it's all scripted", Othello smiled before diving in, shoulder first, at his opponent, only for Kiyomi's side palm chop to hit the exposed part of his neck and stop the giant lump of flesh in his path. During the giant's moment of stumbling, Kiyomi kicked him at the side of the man's leg, loosening his balance and potentially damaging some of the more sensitive bones near the area of the heel. To top it all off, Kiyomi thrust her palm straight into Othello G's face sending the wrestler tumbling back and hitting his summoned snake. This time his heels got too damaged to bounce off or to regain his balance so he just slammed into the reptile.

"I do know that, it's what I like about wrestling. The soap opera aspect of it", Kiyomi grinned, "I have one friend who doesn't like violence all too much, she'd probably like scripted expression violence where no one gets hurt as well. Our free time hadn't been peaceful enough for me to introduce her to wrestling yet".

One oddity that demanded Kiyomi's attention was the behaviour of the snake Anaron. When Othello G was running around he was using the snake's body to be bounced off, sometimes the reptile even aided that goal by using its tail to repurpose the force of momentum and push his summoner. Yet now the wrestler just slammed into the animal with a rough thud. It was so odd how erratic the snake's behaviour was but it appeared that it could control the elasticity of its own body, which was likely why the wrestler used it as a portable, summonable ring.

"Mind Body Disturbance: Art of Valentine"! Kiyomi yelled out, having found a perfect moment to hit her opponent. Using Yamanaka hijutsu was risky, one of the first things she learned was to never use them just blankly as if they missed she'd be completely exposed for a brief moment. The travelling speed of her projectile may have been just slightly slower than the speed of thought but in the ninja world such speed may not have always cut it.

Othello's body rolled right under Kiyomi's Art of Valentine variant, the quick evasive roll was fast and sharpened, the man wasted not a single moment and each and every movement of his body was up to its potential. The man may have reached the very peak of human physical condition meaning that every time Kiyomi wanted to attack him physically she'd need to use chakra augmentation – the only way of surpassing the barrier of humanity.

Othello finished his roll right up at Kiyomi's face, while the girls mind raced to return to her body, having just missed her seemingly dazed opponent. As her mind did its best she couldn't help but notice her opponent's body tense up, something big was coming.

"Dahomey Eyes"! Othello G yelled out as he picked the girl's body up and tossed it in the air. Anaron the snake looked directly at Kiyomi, the petrifying reptile's gaze being the first sight that the returned mind of Yamanaka allowed the girl to perceive. As her perception sharpened, her mind scurried to find a solution from the incoming attack she realized that those scary eyes were observing her from closer and closer on – the snake was tackling her.

As a rumbling shockwave blasted out from the upper part of Kiyomi's body and her back twisted the mortifying sensation was followed up by a heart-chilling snapping of a spine sound. The gruesome illusion of Kiyomi's painful demise was cut short by the body poofing into smoke and getting replaced by a bag of the sweet truffle-like rock hard nuts, the food for the Snapper-Ants' young which Othello G enjoyed previously.

Before Othello G realized and properly processed that this was no genjutsu, but instead a Substitution Jutsu, Kiyomi's image blurred in right in front of him, stunning the fleshy giant temporarily. The Yamanaka's foot shot right behind him as her palm slammed against his face and nose and shoved Othello G down, using her augmented by chakra strength to slam him against the rocky ground before smacking his open central chest area with a powerful heart punch and retreating from counterattacks.

* * *

Meiko just could not distract herself from the rumbling and raging battle, surprisingly somehow managing to contain itself within the snake's coiled ring. More and more often the blacksmith's eyes slipped away to glance worryingly at her friend's struggle to overcome her target. Where before they could decide how they'd engage, here things were completely different – the conditions for the battle were thrown at them and they were the only straw they could grasp for.

Masen-Z sighed before leaping his own height in distance off of the puppet armor and down on the rocky ground. Following his example Meiko leaped down, her eyes still locked on the battle that transpired. She couldn't exactly make the specifics out but it seemed like an even enough fight for there to still be hope.

The young man grabbed under a plate of armor and began yanking it wildly, after a short while the annoying steel clanging noise distracted Meiko and made her return her full attention to the puppeteer.

"What are you doing"? She wondered, slightly confused as the young man proceeded to tear the armor plate off. He was lucky that the plate had to be loosened there so to contain the large two-handed sword blade and the gear mechanism used to spring it out and pull it back in. That was the only reason why such an effort brought results in the first place.

"I want to show you something. Like I promised, you're someone who was nice to me and shares my passions so it's only fair you see this and enjoy it as much as I did", Masen-Z smiled confidently before falling down from his strange tampering with the armor before picking himself up with an embarrassing blush in his face. In his hands the young man held the exposed sword taken off of the puppet. Its handle was just an uncomfortable chunk of gears and solid steel so it was less than desired battlefield weapon while unattached from its original location.

"You know, if you wanted a sword for your… Whatever this is, I could've pulled one from my seals. I'm sure I still have one or two left there somewhere", Meiko began rummaging all over her body, tapping over herself, trying to remember where exactly she had sealed what as some of the lesser used tools may have went forgotten after a long while.

"See? That's exactly the point. You were friendly to me, so I want to share a technique with you. One that I can't really pull off, hopefully you'd have more success", Masen-Z energetically jumped right up in Meiko's face, almost impaling her on the giant blade. Once again the awkward young shorty pulled the larger than his own body blade aside with a blush before focusing his chakra so intensely that his whole body tensed up and the boy had to cry out from the strain building up so much chakra caused.

Momentarily, the sword lit up in flames, a completely inflammable solid steel blade was blazing like a chunk of wood with the flame feeding off directly off of Masen's chakra pool.

"Ummm… I don't know what they teach you in Ninja Academy back in Kumogakure but… We kind of already know you can imbue your weapon with chakra. It's called "Chakra Flow" and you can channel your chakra through pretty much anything, although I'll admit it, transferring Elemental Release through it like this is impressive for a genin", Meiko shrugged looking somewhat unimpressed.

Masen-Z then put the sword down allowing the flames to extinguish as his own breath intensified and he started to huff from the exhaustion of maintaining the chakra flow for as long as he did.

"Then why don't you use it?" Masen-Z wondered, "If you know how it works, the basic principles of it, how come you barely ever channel your chakra through your weaponry? Your physical force will only take you so far, you know".

"Well… I don't know if you knew but… I'm not the best with chakra control. I thought Team Walnut have mocked me enough to give you the clue", Meiko pouted feeling ashamed of admitting her own flaws in front of Masen-Z. She turned around but, for the first time, not to watch Kiyomi's battle but to turn away from her newly made friend.

"That's not true, you're using Sealing Techniques that are quite difficult on the whole scale of things. They're above ninjutsu in complexity, lower perhaps only compared to genjutsu and medical ninjutsu. How could a failure of chakra manipulation ever pull that off with such ease and high degree of success? Just how many Sealing Techniques have you failed to do?" Masen-Z objected pressing on Meiko's shoulder which he needed to step up on his toes to even reach. It was a result of a combination of both higher than average Meiko's height and his own, much shorter than average.

"Sealing Jutsu are different, they're almost a second nature to me. I've practiced them since I was a little girl so I pretty much got the hang of them. They sort of naturally came to me. Maybe it's a counterbalance of my other failures, like a lack of use of my clan's bloodline…" Meiko pouted before walking further away and sitting down on a rock, pressing her puffy cheeks against her fingerless gloves.

"Well, you must know that while your physical strength is impressive, you won't survive for long relying just on it and weaponry. You need an expansion of your arsenal, you need to improve or else you'll get left behind. This Chuunin Exam, is there something you want to prove with it"? Masen-Z wondered.

"Yeah, it does mean a lot to me. My friend – Mana, she's helped me out so much, she lead me on an insane expedition to give me the honor to hold a legendary artefact just because I like legendary weapons and artefacts. It's because of her recommendation that I am on Team Hokage and sometimes… I can't help it but… I feel like I don't belong amongst the others", Meiko sadly turned her face away.

"Well… You may not belong for much longer", Masen-Z cut the sharp edgy truth ruthlessly, yet trying to use as soft of a tone as possible.

Angry and shocked that the Kumogakure ninja would even say that when he was the one wearing a nearly dysfunctional suit of armor with more flaws than a horror movie divinity had tentacles, opting to go for what looked cooler and what he liked more compared to functionality.

"You see, your friend here - Kiyomi, she's a Yamanaka, with time she will only grow mightier. I haven't seen much high ranked Yamanaka in Kumogakure but we've read plenty about them, so should have you. She'll be able to read minds, influence them, mentally torture her enemies and execute people with just a glance. She'll be crushing people mentally before you know it. In a world of such people, you need your own thing to compare. If you don't grow past your limits, you'll never be protecting your friends, you'll never fulfil your promises made and you'll always be protected by them. You must've seen that limit you've reached as a genin, that bar being raised today", Masen-Z sat nearby to Meiko trying to be as frank and as soft as possible. The last thing that the blacksmith needed now was a tough and condescending talk.

"Yeah, a girl everyone admired in the Academy, with a better bloodline than she probably deserves, beat me at my own game." Meiko stuck out her lips bitterly recalling when Lithia Uchiha kicked her butt up close, something that rarely happened. Almost never when faced against someone as puny as Lithia was physically. She had little to no taijutsu skill but her Sharingan was all the edge that the Lolita teen needed.

"Well, there's one thing I tried to pull off. Something I invented and have never heard of it being used elsewhere…" Masen-Z jumped up and stood in front of Meiko as he picked up a kunai out of his pocket and extended it right in front of Meiko's face so that the blacksmith's attention focused onto it.

Wind and dust picked up from the intense concentration and chakra being built up, jets of hot air circled around the shorty as the kunai once again lit up with flames, this time with much more strain and focus than it was used before.

"You know, when you channel your chakra into a less conductive weapon, or one not conducting it at all – you need to use proportionally more chakra to channel it", Meiko pointed out with a bored and saddened expression as she saw little to no point to what Masen-Z was showing her. The kunai knife he used was not a generic one sold in bulk for filling ninja tool pouches, it was a custom order but the alloy still looked shoddy and had small percentage of chakra conductivity, most likely. The boy was selling an arm and a leg to even make it heat up, at this point.

Then, with one swift energetic shout the flaming chakra got changed with base chakra lacking any elemental properties before the colorless and almost invisible channeling of chakra got turned slightly red. Masen-Z was balancing out the percentage of Fire Release chakra in his imbuement, with a lower percentage he could still make the chakra visible more easily to a naked eye while not having to strain himself so much to maintain elemental release. Masen-Z gripped the kunai as he would a reverse grip short blade before an elbow sized blade made out of nothing but transparent light red chakra extended from the kunai before fading away. Almost immediately after the young man collapsed on his knees.

"One day… I tried replicating Gear-Man's… Crimson Blade… Of Positron Maximal Ultimate Justice Bringing… Then I found this out…" Masen-Z huffed out before extending the kunai for Meiko to examine. "You don't have to use a sword to imbue a weapon with chakra. With enough intensity, control and skilled shape manipulation you can create a sword of chakra through anything. I don't think there are limits to this ability. Just imagine – a massive mountain-sized sword coming out from a kunai, or a shield large enough to protect the entire village. Imagine a suit of armor made of nothing but solid chakra channelled through some unimpressive object like a simple chest plate", Masen-Z fell on his back as his chest rapidly lifted up and down.

Meiko's hand shook holding the kunai, tears ran down her cheeks falling onto it before she placed it beside Masen-Z and clutched her fists.

"It's not something I can ever achieve. I can probably flow my chakra through weapons with enough intensive training, make it natural to me. Shape manipulation? That is well outside my world, that is a weapon of ninja in the class of Gods but… Positive Chakra Flow. That's an amazing ability"! Meiko kept on brooding before exploding in excitement with the final words. It was the most amazing thing she had ever seen, like a child being showed the most astounding and breath-taking, yet the most expensive, toy in the shop. One they could probably never ever own in their life unless a miracle happens.

"Positron Blade… Positive Chakra Flow… I like that name", Masen-Z laughed out still breathing heavily on the floor.

Seeing this ability was better than telling Meiko a secret. It was making her believe and hope in a miracle. A miracle that she could at some point control and use this Positive Chakra Flow.


	313. Of Safe Roads Not Worth Taking

"I thought your snake would not attack me", Kiyomi twisted her lips upward in a deceitful display of discontent. Truthfully, she just needed some time to relieve the strain of the Substitution Jutsu, a technique that allows a person to replace themselves with an object around them, allowing that object to take the damage even thought for a moment it'd appear that the person was damaged.

It was a commonly used and an incredibly useful technique but it was no panacea to any manner of attack. First of all, it only worked on physical or material attacks, taijutsu and ninjutsu were fair enough but illusions couldn't have been substituted out of. Secondly, it was useless against an opponent with a greatly higher amount of speed as such an enemy would've seen through it and possibly intercepted it. Third, the object needed to be focused on, similarly to how Academy instructors told students to keep their eyes on the target when they threw knives at it.

The object needed to be clearly thought of and it needed to become the sole, dominant thought to focus the entire body's effort into the technique. Then finally, after the boost of speed and replacement transpired, the user was left strained, usually it doesn't really impact other techniques like ninjutsu and the sort but it makes the body completely numbed when performing speedy or overly acrobatic techniques such as the Body Flicker Jutsu and others.

"I told you already, Anaron will attack when he acts as a part of the ring. Dahomey Eyes is a taijutsu technique that involves the ring corner, tossing the opponent into the air making them land and smash their head right in the ring corner. Anaron's tackle was fair game", Othello G stretched himself out as he continued to nimbly move around the ring, never stopping in one place and allowing Kiyomi to take target for her signature clan hijutsu.

Finally remembering that she was in the middle of a wrestling ring, Kiyomi timed her movements to perfectly mirror Othello's, moving around the ring in a perfectly opposite angle before dashing back, heading for the Anaron's extended body for a bounce off of the elastic flesh and skin of the reptile. Just as predicted, it appeared that Anaron had read Kiyomi's intentions and relaxed its body allowing the girl to bounce off of it as if its body were actual ring ropes, maybe even softer. The Yamanaka felt the surge of speed gained from the bouncing movement as she headed towards her opponent who proceeded to bounce off of the opposite side and come at her.

"Uranus Uppercut"! Othello G yelled as he threw his fist, forearm and the entire hand up to the shoulder up trying to dig it under Kiyomi's chin. However all that Othello's uppercut hit was just a surge of air as the blonde dove under him with a sliding movement before pushing her upper body off the rock with her palms shoving herself upwards while she positioned her right leg vertically upwards in a knockout sky kick aimed, similarly to her opponent, under Othello G's chin.

The resistance that Kiyomi's foot encountered after her foot slammed into the middle-aged wrestler's lower chin was intense. Almost matching that of trying to kick a small planetoid away but with a strong intensified flow of chakra in her lower area Kiyomi managed to make her force move things up a bit by tossing her opponent into the air from the force in her kick.

Focusing a strong flow of chakra into her lower legs and her thighs Kiyomi froze momentarily before freezing the intensified masses of chakra in her feet. Then, in one motion, she forced it all out of her feet, creating another miniature circle of chakra flow in her legs before her body fired off after her opponent in a pursuing dash upwards. The girl's hands firmly locked around the wrist of her airborne and still dazed opponent before flipping the man over her shoulder in a powerful throw down, however she didn't let go of the man's hand. While Kiyomi risked a possible recovery and counterattack, the young woman chose to instead of finish her over the shoulder throw right before hitting the ground so that the force behind the throw as well as behind both their falls was focused on her opponent's back.

The gamble paid off!

Othello G yelled out in pain and confusion after his body smashed into the hardened underground minerals and endless layers of rock. The sheer intensity and force of the impact made the ground where he hit the floor crack and scatter, forcing Anaron to intervene and cover up the rocks that collapsed with its body while pulling its summoner's body out and placing it back onto its own coiled back, still seemingly lifeless. The sound of bones cracking and twisting deafened by the thunderous crack that the conclusion of the throw made upon its climax.

Just as Kiyomi wondered if her opponent was out she paid for the mistake of lowering her guard. Within, seemingly, an instant a grip locked around her own wrist, lifting her hand horizontally to her side as her large opponent picked himself up and quickly pulled Kiyomi in to his own side before falling on his back. The backwards fall with Kiyomi's dominant arm locked in an iron grip made the girl's head smash into the Anaron's body, which, wonder of wonders, toughened up right before the impact.

"One-Lock Demonic Down Technique!" Othello yelled out after he bounced back on his feet and stretched his aching back and shoulders out. Kiyomi writhed on the ground for a while before she heard a loud thudding noise – a signal for her to move. Only due to a roll aside did she avoid a backdrop of her lightning fast and deadly strong opponent.

Kiyomi tasted blood in her mouth and felt the warm sensation of a small drop running down her forehead in several places. It was no simple grab and drop, chakra augmentation was involved and yet…

"You could've torn my limbs apart, you had your hands on me. With your strength this battle should've ended then and there. I can't use Substitution Jutsu for a while after using it once", Kiyomi wiped the blood off her lip and the burning spot on her forehead.

"I told you already – this is a wrestling match. I'm not gonna just tear your limbs off, I'm gonna wrestle. That's my Ninja Way, fangirl", Othello G raised his hands up as if flaunting his well-built physique and showing off his physical superiority even if he was the one who took by far more damage in that last exchange of blows.

"The audience is getting a bit bored, what do you say about kicking it up a notch"? The oversized wrestler taunted Kiyomi by flexing his biceps which almost made the girl throw up seeing the amount of bush coming out from his untrimmed ever since he was born armpits.

"Audience"? Kiyomi wondered.

Othello G's body blurred once more as the mirage of his immense movement speed made his proportions appear contorted and almost snake-like. In a dark brown blur, matching the color of the man's dark complexion, blur Othello G drove his elbow and the lower arm right into Kiyomi's chest but it was no augmented strike. Any semblance of force was sacrificed for overwhelming speed so that the push and shove effort connected.

The Yamanaka took almost no damage from that impact, yet she felt stupid having wasted some chakra investing into augmentation, expecting a more powerful hit. The blonde imagined a clothesline or a lariat with the power to split even the most colossal mountain in two and what hit her was just a strong push, essentially. As the air whizzed past her and fondled her hair, the Yamanaka wondered just what technique could this have been. Just as Anaron's tail bounced her back, as ring ropes would have if she was a normal wrestler, did she realize what was coming her way.

"Liwui Backdrop"! Othello G yelled out simultaneously as Kiyomi's racing mind identified the move in her mind. This was bad, at this point most of the setup for the technique was already done, without Substitution Jutsu there was little to nothing Kiyomi could've done!

As the blonde's body bounced off of the tail of the massive summoned snake and flew right at Othello G, the wrestler once again focused all of his physical might into another shove. This time, however, Kiyomi got tossed upwards, as high as the cave would let her however hitting the ceiling of the cave with her head was the last of the girl's concerns. It was the painful backdrop that troubled her. The entire move sequence kept replaying again and again in Kiyomi's mind, a flow of pictures in her wrestling journals with numbers by them and a painful sounding description of the move.

Othello's large frame dashed upwards, losing none of his incredible speed as he buzzed right up to airborne Kiyomi and grabbed her by the abdomen with a single hand. His wrist somehow, just barely, managed to cover the girl's entire body as the wrestler turned around his axis in the air before simply lobbing the girl from her airborne position back down into the "ring".

For a brief second there Kiyomi blacked out before hitting Anaron's body from up above. She was tremendously lucky that they were in a cave and not outdoors where only Othello's own imagination limited the height of his throw move. Due to the amazing luck of blacking out she couldn't feel her organs shifting and her bones struggling not to shatter upon the massive impact surpassing many times the force of being hit by an actual asteroid. Frankly, for a moment, seeing the rocky ground just whizz right at one's face may have reminded of such a sight…

Dizziness couldn't go away, popping in her ears didn't let her hear a single thing while the Yamanaka tried to at the very least show a single sign of being alive. She couldn't have been out, for a moment she thought she was nearing it as blacking out was only substituted by shrieking sensation of white sparks that erupted out of nowhere waking the girl up before disappearing again. Finally, Kiyomi's eyes snapped back open, only to see her opponent showing off to the non-existent audience as if he was actually in the middle of a match. She was lucky he wasn't punching her face off this very second and was wasting time on his showy gimmick.

"Move"! Kiyomi kept ordering herself mentally. Her mind kept bringing up the images of Chestnut Hanasaku and her encouraging gestures. Failing here, after all that time of being forced to skip the exam, would only kill her momentum. How would Hanasaku-sensei ever feel like Kiyomi was ready for another go if she failed now.

"Mana is already out, don't go to sleep now"! Kiyomi ordered herself again remembering everything that the girls had went through up to now. Every battle and every moment of pain and struggle they went through leading up to this peculiar wrestling match.

"You're the team leader, damn it. You wouldn't pull this shit on Meiko, you wouldn't pass out making her fail for no reason! Move, damn it"! Kiyomi kept thinking as she writhed on the ground before finally managing to peel her bleeding face off the ground and pick herself back up. She was stumbling and twitching in the bleeding and injured spots but upright which was a thousand times better than what she had before.

"You're up"? Othello wondered as he restarted his default stance of taking a wide and open position while dashing around the ring, trying to push Kiyomi into the middle of a circle so he could control the "ropes" and the outer part of the "ring".

"I could go for two or three more of these, can you"? Kiyomi taunted her opponent as she wiped the blood off her lip and her right eye. Right as the blood was wiped off her busted forehead fired off more. That was bad, it meant that Kiyomi had to keep her right eye closed due to the blood.

"Just how large is your chakra pool, you're no ordinary genin"? Othello G exclaimed in surprise. He had expected his opponent to either be out or be really softened up for his finishing move, seeing Kiyomi in semi-fighting condition greatly surprised him.

"I've skipped several Chuunin Exams already, one because me and my team were away on a mission when it happened, another one because I had no team at that moment. Me and the other two members of my team have long since surpassed any genin, we've faced plenty of hardships and streaks of bad luck in this exam and it's only due to our larger than the genin standard strength and chakra pools that we managed to get by. You're an amazing wrestler, my idol, that being said, you're my target which means I'll use all of my advantage and all of my skill and strength to beat you", Kiyomi calmly declared before charging at the physically stronger and much larger opponent which confused the man for a moment.

Othello leaned in for a move involving Kiyomi's legs, no doubt. It was an uncharacteristic behavior for him, which was why similar moves blasted Kiyomi, someone who knew well about her idol's moveset out of the water. Othello G never behaved this way against physically lesser opponents, he only went for the lower body against stronger and larger enemies. And yet Kiyomi was ready, her tremendous, for a genin, chakra network flow accelerated granting her perception and reaction time infinitely surpassing that of normal humans assisting her in her flip over her opponent's body.

The girl landed right on Anaron's body, the ropes of the ring, with a jumping turn she kicked her opponent right in the jaw the same moment he turned around to try and catch her. The impact thundered throughout the cave system, the huge lump of flesh staggered back and forwards as Kiyomi's kick hit him in the ear causing great damage to the more sensitive parts of his inner ear as well as his brain.

Kiyomi leaped off of the ropes trying to lock her legs around the opponent. Her intent was to throw her unbalanced opponent over using all of her force to bend the neck and then, once the enemy is down, beat on him until he can't move. That didn't quite work out as Othello G locked his wrists around Kiyomi's leg instantly bringing her plan to a threat of a sudden and painful close.

A quick barrage of elbow strikes to his forehead, busting his pink shades to tiny pieces and cracking Othello G's forehead open made him stagger but then Kiyomi felt a powerful thud in her back. She felt her overflowing chakra surging out, realizing that her body instinctually augmented itself to withstand a crushing blow that'd have broken all of her ribs and her back, instantly killing her. It was that blasted snake again, still, Kiyomi was at the corner of the ring which meant that Anaron could butt in as the ring corner.

An asphyxiating influx of air caressed her hair throwing them into her breathing tract through her gapping mouth as Kiyomi got dazed herself in the wild painful ride to take her opponent down. Othello G was running with Kiyomi in hand, looking to slam her in the center of the ring. He'd likely leap up high and use immense elevation again to further chip at Kiyomi's stamina and chakra pool. That was bad…

With a quick pair of jabs Kiyomi thrust a pair of fingers into her opponent's wrists that held her thighs as firmly as bridges of titanium built around them would. Hit at the pressure point the wrist weakened allowing Kiyomi to pull her thighs out and jump off of her opponent. She wasn't just planning to escape however, right as the Yamanaka's feet touched the ground, her own grip tightened around the massive numbed wrist of her opponent before Kiyomi pulled and turned it forcing her opponent to flip over and smash against the snake's body. After the throw was completed, with a sharp and swift kick to the back lower neck area Kiyomi sent her large opponent rolling aside.

Just as she had suspected, at the moment when Othello G would've hit a ring corner in an actual ring, Anaron's head smashed into the giant lump of muscle crushing him under it in between the snake's massive snout and its body. It appeared that Othello G was playing fair – he was utilizing Anaron as an actual ring, it was just that Kiyomi didn't think utilizing her environment until now for extra damage.

Just as the blonde started feeling confident about her chances and thanked for all the times she overtrained thinking these Exams would just be a breeze with enough training, Anaron's titanic head started twitching and lifting off. With massive effort Othello G forced the head off of himself and after being pushed for a sufficient amount of time the snake gave in and raised its head off of its summoner taking a position of a neutral spectator from above once more.

"Not bad… But you won't beat me like this", Othello grinned with a smile that demonstrated him missing a tooth, a thin red streak of blood burst from the giant's mouth the moment the toothless smile was revealed from the damaged gum.

Kiyomi had in mind what her opponent was saying. Othello G's finisher move, the one no wrestler ever stood up after, one of the most protected finishers in all of CWF if not the entire industry was the "What-What" move. A seemingly out of nowhere counter that had a summoned snake wrap around the enemy in an instant and break most of their bones at their joints, cracks and other weakspots. Seeing how it's a counter move, timing was everything and sufficiently weakening the opponent and their bones also had to be done. Timing was what separated a one hundred percent KO move from a whiff and opponent's counter-counterattack.

While the Yamanaka wished to give her idol wrestler no openings for a "What-What", she couldn't really help it. Her physical might was insufficient to put Othello G down quickly and her Yamanaka hijutsu were either missing or inefficient.

"You're right, it seems I'd be pummeling you for days on end before you'd stay down. I may just need to take some serious risks and get really unsafe", Kiyomi sighed with some worry in her voice. She didn't like taking risks but she had neither time nor the luxury to jump around her enemy. Othello G was stronger than her physically, he was far more meaty and could take more punishment than even Meiko. Punching him down was out of the question, sadly.

Kiyomi may just need to get creative if she was to eliminate her target and keep Team Hokage in the competition.


	314. Ninjutsu VS Puroresu! Resolution!

"Come on, Kiyomi, you can do it"! Meiko cheered for the Yamanaka unexpectedly from the side. The sheer surprise of realizing that both Meiko and Masen-Z were watching made Kiyomi's mind, kind of, snap out of the trembling sensation that realizing she needed to take high risks in this battle brought.

While the blonde felt that Meiko's attempts at cheering her up were really cheesy, somehow, they worked. They worked at least at calming Kiyomi down. The pressure of knowing that losing here meant the end for her entire team stopped mattering as much, the expectations that Chestnut Hanasaku as well as her own clan and her team had for her stopped holding Kiyomi down.

One thing that was crystal-clear at this point was that Kiyomi needed to stop trying to outwrestle Othello G or even fighting using that style. When fighting fair she had little to no hope of beating the man, her punches and kicks simply bounced off of him leaving little to no damage no matter how augmented they were and she was just tiring herself out and getting herself ready for a "What-What" finisher.

Still, she had little to no options of changing her style up in this ring. Her ninjutsu affinity was for Earth Release techniques, at this moment Anaron was covering up the busted ring floor with his body, which meant that Kiyomi would be unable to use them unless the rocks somehow broke through the snake's body. That meant that the jutsu would come out later and weaker as they would struggle to bust through the snake already. She needed to think smarter, think broader and improvise.

Just as Othello's feet propelled the large wrestler forward, throwing him into an acrobatic roll forward, aimed at placing him behind Kiyomi so that he could lock her into a suplex or strike from behind, the blonde's own hands occupied themselves with hand seals. It was a lethal race as to who would get to their attack first. Luckily enough, the technique on Kiyomi's mind was simple enough and required very few hand seals.

"Wind Style: Great Breakthrough"! Kiyomi chanted as she jumped up and turned her upper body around, stretching herself to turn back so much that her sides started hurting. A little bit more and she would have most certainly flexed a muscle.

At the same time Othello placed himself behind Kiyomi as a smaller snake burst through and out of Anaron's scales. The purpose of the smaller reptile was to wrap around Kiyomi, it didn't look like the snake that performed the "What-What" but it still looked quite capable of constricting Kiyomi until she could no longer breathe or move and would end up passing out of air shortage.

Luckily enough, the Wind Release technique of Kiyomi's secondary, weaker, elemental affinity delivered a powerful pushing shock which shoved the user herself out of harm's way seeing how she was in the air and didn't use her feet for holding her balance still. Kiyomi's weightless and relaxed body was thrown backwards from the aftershock while the windblast hit Othello right in the face up close.

Shaken by the powerful wave of wind, Othello G braced himself as the smaller snake once again disappeared under Anaron's scales from where it initially appeared. The powerful wrestler soon regained his full composure, having not only withstood the tremendous toppling force of the raging windstorm containing all the power of a hypercane compressed into a single wave but also recovered from it far sooner than any ninja of his rank reasonably would. The first sight that met his eyes was Kiyomi in a jumping punch stance, her fist cocked back and winded up, ready to wreak havoc upon Othello G's face.

"Apep Suplex"! Othello G yelled out as his body moved many times faster than even the mental command for the blonde to unleash her prepared punch. The speedy powerhouse dashed right behind the airborne opponent trying to grip at her lower abdomen before dropping his body back for an immensely powerful suplex. He would have knocked Kiyomi out completely had it not been for the minor detail that his vehicle sized arms phased through the girl's body dispelling a floaty mirage.

"Clone Jutsu"? Othello G realized too late once his body was already halfway falling to the ring floor.

"Mind Switch: Art of War"! Kiyomi shouted out placing her hands forward in the hand seal position used for the Yamanaka hijutsu. The Yamanaka's mind floated out of her own body, entering that of her opponent's before dissolving in a powerful mental pulse that was able of causing an excruciating migraine and returning to its owner's body.

Oddly enough, Kiyomi could not feel her mind having affected a living being. Something about her well set-up ninjutsu finisher felt… Odd and only once the mind returned to her did she realize that she her mind was reflected back off of a sweat stained towel which Othello G substituted with at the very last moment before her mind would've entered his.

Othello was huffing outside of the ring, feeling ashamed and breathless over the dangerously close exchange that transpired just now. Kiyomi smiled bitterly from inside the ring at her target who finally stretched his tired muscles out and jumped back into Anaron's ring, over the large reptilian tail.

"That's not fair"! Meiko complained, "I thought this was a wrestling match, or something, how come the bushy baldy used that snake thing from under the large snake"?

"It's not like your teammate is fighting like a wrestler either", Sunny Lee replied, appearing slightly offended by Meiko's suggestion. "Still, it's a bit unusual to see Othello using ninjutsu as well, he must've been pushed really far".

"It's fine, Meiko. Snake submissions are how Othello G fights, it's his whole gimmick. I'd have been a fool if I didn't anticipate the smaller ones sliding out of his tights or his boots or his bushy armpits or chest at some point", Kiyomi couldn't shake off her bitter smile, "Still, I was so close…" she lamented.

"Yeah, I'm a bit ashamed to have used such a dirty method of getting away but in the end of the day, I am a heel, ain't I"? Othello G shook his head in disappointment.

This was horrible, Kiyomi's mood began to change from proud disappointment into outright respectful fear. She had almost reached the halfway of her chakra pool and using techniques like "Art of War" or "Art of Valentine" without success really choked her in that area. To think that she planned such a nice set-up only for it all to get substituted away…

"Even when I outsmart him I can't seem to pin him down, he's that flexible and agile in the ring. Somehow I feel like I'm still clashing with his strengths instead of his weaknesses, does he even have any"? Kiyomi kept on wondering in her mind.

"Kukulkan Scissors"! Othello yelled out slamming his hands together, Kiyomi's eyes widened as she knew that move and still felt like she was screwed. Even while she could not quite see the two smaller snakes appear from under Anaron's body again, she knew that they would, from both sides. The only way was forward! Kiyomi charged blindly at her opponent, desperate to avoid his clutches but the gut wrenching pressure around her abdomen locking her in place and dragging her down and back thought differently.

"Seth Choke"! The wrestler yelled out pressing his palm against Anaron's scaly body as another golden colored snake shot out from under Anaron's scales and tied around Kiyomi's throat. Kukulkan's Scissors was not a powerful move, but it was near inescapable. Kiyomi could not quite remember any wrestler being able to evade it as much as they broke out of it once it started, then again, the whole blasted thing was scripted anyways so relying on her fan's knowledge proved to be quite perilous. Those damned snakes were far faster than they were on camera, where Othello G slowed them down so they could be captured on film.

Othello G still remained on his knees, pressing his palm against Anaron's body. In real life he must have needed to maintain chakra input and constant focus to apply these holds successfully but it barely even mattered when they already gave Kiyomi too much trouble to begin with. Othello G being able to move would have been an overkill. Where the first double snake lockdown drove all oxygen out of her body, applying further pressure to the lower abdomen, the second one tied around Kiyomi's throat choking her out when she had no air reserves to begin with.

Kiyomi would have screamed out had she the ability to use her voice, not just blankly stare into the darkness above, and gasp for air. Her best attempts to break out were not even close to bringing any use and judging from the burning pain in her entire body and the grotesque sounds coming from her slowly crushed body she was getting weaker to keep resisting in the future as well.

"This is… Cruel", Meiko lamented aloud running up to the ring, as if her proximity had any supportive effect for her friend.

"Yeah, a person would pass out almost instantly under such a hold, granted, if the hold itself would be weakened so that the person wasn't crushed instantly into a puddle of blood and guts. A ninja, meanwhile, has the ability to prolong their suffering, asphyxiating a ninja may take twenty to forty minutes, I wonder if your friend can even take that much pain", Masen-Z's voice weakened as he too was disgusted by the double hold applied by his teammate.

"Stop this, Othello, she can't even surrender, this isn't a wrestling match, you need to knock her out. This is torture"! Sunny shouted out, appalled by the method of victory used by her teammate.

Kiyomi tried struggling, at that point she knew that her strength was being drained. The best chances of getting out were right in the beginning. Now with her head and few areas of her body that were not being grinded and crushed pulsing in pain and feeling like a bloating balloon it was next to impossible. Still, the Yamanaka did not want to give up. She was the leader of Team Hokage, she had no right to call it quits, give up and tell her opponent she would abandon the competition.

Heart pounded erratically, by this point a normal human would've long since passed out whereas Kiyomi was fighting to prolong her body's endurance and ability to withstand this immense pressure and shortage of air. Then, in a momentary swoop, the blonde felt the pressure loosen for just a brief bit. It was then or never, Kiyomi expelled a massive amount of chakra from her body through her pores as she accelerated the flow to maximize the amount of strength her weakened body could muster up. The snakes holding her down all popped loudly and dispelled in a cloud of smoke, choosing to escape instead of continuing the submission move before beginning to wander what it was that caused this loss in pressure power.

"What the hell are you doing"? Sunny Lee curiously wondered, as her head failed to comprehend her teammate's peculiar movement as the wrestler was running around the ring and flexing his muscles by the corners at the spaces where the audience would have been seated.

"I'm taunting and firing up the audience"! Othello G yelled out proudly.

"Huh? But we're the only audience here, there's no need for that", Sunny Lee slapped her forehead realizing that it was because of her teammates two decades lasting experience as a wrestler, taunting his opponent and firing up the audience after every move that Othello enabled his opponent to break out from his hold.

From the cloud of smoke, created by the smaller snakes escaping, a handful of shuriken flew at Othello G before a raspy feminine voice came from inside the cloud. The voice tried to utter a name of a technique but failing to do so as her damaged body and numbed arms slowed down her hand seals to a crawl and made every hand seal a painful agony. Where usually the name of a ninja technique allowed the body to jump into a mode of pre-memorized movements and made it easier to concentrate and perform the technique, without the aid of her vocals Kiyomi failed to perform the technique she wanted to do.

Othello G covered with his hands taking the handful of shuriken as he tensed up his muscles making them barely pierce his skin shallowly. With a firm and harder flexing his body expelled all of the ninja tools etched into his body. Finally, the smoke cleared and Kiyomi and Othello G clashed their eyes again.

Kiyomi grunted in pain and frustration, realizing that Othello's submission combination, as it damaged her body. With a little bit of time she may be able to muster up the strength and the ability to speak properly, maybe activate a technique or two. Now she was left with the requirement to engage Othello G in a wrestling match – just like it all started.

All was not nearly as hopeless as it initially seemed, Othello G wasted a lot of chakra on using two of Anaron's snakes at once. He clearly was concentrated on maintaining the hold of that technique meaning it required his full attention and conscious effort. Using two techniques in sync like that probably once again dipped his remaining chakra far below Kiyomi's current level. It was an equalizer of sorts.

Othello kicked his body off in a wild dash at Kiyomi's direction, there it was – weariness caused by a whole battle of augmentation and chakra usage, the decrease in speed and strength after that last scary combination. Kiyomi rolled diagonally avoiding her opponent's shoulder tackle before jumping on her feet and flipping over her shoulder with a double kick to her opponent's shoulder and lower jaw. The mass of dark flesh fell on his knees, this was an amount of damage Kiyomi could have never have hoped to inflict before – this was her moment to wail on her enemy and hope she recovered her ability to use ninjutsu and clan hijutsu in time.

Kiyomi's body rotated like a spinning toy, she threw wild kicks and elbow strikes at her dazed and weakened opponent from each and every direction using momentum to boost the power and speed of her blows. Her muscles burned in pain but she persevered through grit and determination not to let her team down. This was the amount of hidden willpower she would have never been able to access if she was not the leader of Team Hokage. Leadership appeared to bring out the best in the Yamanaka, it could not have been other way – she was the future clan heir, after all!

Pain! An unbearable shock of pain, an aftereffect of abusing her body caused the Yamanaka to trip up and fall on her own knees right before her half-finished opponent who didn't take long to recover, jumping right on his feet and grabbing Kiyomi by her abdomen before slamming her outside the ring, right over his shoulder.

"Wadjet Slam"! Othello G roared out proudly before flexing his muscles at the audience and taunting Kiyomi again.

"I've no idea why Kiyomi likes this guy, seems like he's really full of himself", Meiko pouted locking her arms around her chest.

"It's just the way wrestlers fight, they keep taunting and flexing out. Taunts convey the wrestler's character and gimmick to the audience without needing to tell them about it, you know"? Masen-Z laughed out into his fist. "It's a weakness Othello G will have to overcome in the future".

After finishing flexing out, Othello smacked his hands together before rubbing them as he stretched his upper body forward while shaking his lower body like the tail of a rattlesnake. It was an immensely cringy taunt and yet Kiyomi, as a fan of Othello G, knew far too well.

"It's the I-See-You Serpent taunt… He's informing the audience that he'll be performing the What-What, so he thinks I'm weakened enough"? Kiyomi grunted as she struggled to stand back up, getting back on her knees being the best she could muster up. "I can't give him a space for counterattacking, I need to time my moves right and keep him occupied or it's all over", the Yamanaka realized as her body finally allowed her to stand back up.

Kiyomi's voice felt raspy and her throat burned with every thought attributed to the pain in her neck. Her whole body felt tired – she had to admit, she was busted and ready for a What-What to finish the match. She was out of ideas and out of moves – what What-What needed was an opening, provided by a too slow and too reckless attack. That meant that if Kiyomi attacked physically she would be finished off with the first provided chance but she could not really attack any other way.

Only Academy techniques were so ingrained into a ninja's mind that they required no words to be uttered and the hand seals were fairly simple. Kiyomi just needed to figure out an Academy technique fitting for this moment, something to help her tough through it. Her opponent was on his last legs as well, she just needed this one final addition. Sadly, no Academy technique happened to seem helpful or the Yamanaka had already used them all and using them again came with a risk of her enemy seeing through the repeated pattern.

As Othello G charged at Kiyomi with an elbow strike, aiming to crack her jaw before sending her bouncing off the ropes and back into his grasp the girl's hand raced for her ninja tool pouch before reaching for a marble-sized, white colored bomb. Cracking the little orb in her hand the girl unleashed a powerful light burst that the nearby wrestler had no idea he needed to avoid, without his pink shades he was left just screaming in pain and tearing up from his eyes as he stumbled around the ring.

She was no wrestler. The idea that she could wrestle with her childhood idol was a naïve and a foolish one. Othello had over twenty years of experience and training, his skills, his moves were so ingrained that even now he couldn't shake off old habits that came with them. How could Kiyomi ever compete with Othello G in a ring? No, she was no wrestler. Kiyomi was a ninja and only fighting like a ninja she stood a chance to beat not only a wrestler but any kind of opponent.

Given the brief space of time to attack her blinded and tearing up opponent Kiyomi cracked a smoke bomb as well before disappearing into the cloud of smoke. Her fists, knees, kicks and kunai flashed in the dark murkiness of the smoke cloud created by her smoke bomb finding their way at the opponent's blindspots. The weak generic smoke bomb was able to leave nothing but brief shapes being perceivable in the smoke. Given the limits of the Anaron's ring, Kiyomi was able to see her opponent clearly and attack him whereas Othello G was blinded before the smoke bomb was activated and his vision was temporarily too impaired to perceive Kiyomi's rough shape in the smoke cloud.

Finally, Kiyomi felt slight alleviation in her throat, she dashed back outside the reach of her blinded, beaten and tired opponent before raising her hands up in the Yamanaka hijutsu signature hand seal position.

"Mind Switch: Harakiri"! Kiyomi yelled out from farther away as her weakened and staggering opponent froze in place before leaping up in the air and flipping over halfway so that he landed on his head. Despite the painful sounding snapping noise, the giant's chest still erratically rose and deflated signaling that he was alive, albeit out.


	315. A Special Case

The first couple of seconds after the fight ended Meiko looked around, worried that Othello's team would lash out and jump at Kiyomi. From where Meiko was standing, Othello G beat her friend up quite badly and the Yamanaka would not have been able to defend herself properly. With such an explosion of anger being completely by the rules and legal, the probability of it only increased.

After those chilling couple of seconds of silence Sunny Lee sighed disappointed by the outcome before moving back a bit and letting Meiko rush in, as Anaron dispelled himself, also to catch Kiyomi in her arms. It looked that the Yamanaka was able to stand on her own but the angle she was falling in looked pretty bad so the blacksmith's body just acted on their own.

Kiyomi rubbed her face into Meiko's left side. "Never let go, Meiko" she dreamily exclaimed before the blacksmith jumped back, accidentally letting the blonde fall on the ground. Rubbing her aching head and elbow, hurt when Meiko's instinctive jumping trigger going off caused the Yamanaka to get dropped. Kiyomi stood back up on her feet chuckling to herself.

"Come on, let's see your wounds. Sunny, you're gonna tend to Othello"? Masen-Z wondered asking his friend.

Sunny just nodded as she ran at a casual pace to her teammate before smacking her hands together.

"Wood Style: Static Cotton"! She chanted out as four buds of wood burrowed from deep underground as well as few more from up above, making short work of the incredibly tough minerals that made the walls, ceiling and floor of this Snapper-Ant cave. The trees quickly burst their buds revealing a large white cotton-like substance that then parted off of their source and floated in mid-air, emitting lightning sparks in their static state.

Carefully the cotton chunks forced themselves under Othello G and lifted him up. It was more than likely that Sunny Lee was well able to lift her teammate herself, even given his respectable weight, still, her decision to instead use the Senju bloodline ability of Wood Release revealed that she considered that technique a lighter strain on her chakra resources than trying to lift her teammate with her natural strength.

Once the static cotton wrapped around Othello G it appeared to stick to the man as if he was magnetically attracted to it. Maintaining the hands locked into the hand seal position, Sunny Lee strolled to the Snapper-Ant nesting pods with her teammate floating carefully by her side as the lightning sparks coming off of the cotton appeared to electromagnetically levitate off the ground.

"We should just go", Kiyomi suggested, even while Team Cumulus were quite polite and nice she felt like she should've stayed around as shortly as possible. Maybe it was just her own uncomfortable feeling having just butt into their day and beaten Othello G, eliminating him from competition, but she didn't like sticking around the cave for too long.

"Nonsense, in your current state you're far too slow. You'll be keeping Meiko down and you may get attacked halfway there. You're already one member short and you are injured, what are the odds of Meiko fighting off any attackers alone"? Masen-Z objected.

"He has a point, let's just stay around shortly and then we can go to the gate and finish the exam. We have nowhere to rush now, we've done it"! Meiko energetically cheered on Kiyomi after encouraging her to heal at least a little bit.

"It won't be that short of a time. Even elementary patching may require hours. These nesting pods have a very useful secretion being emitted but aside from a tremendous amount of stem cells inside of it and other useful elements for regenerating and growing new tissues it isn't a miracle cure or anything", Masen-Z brought Meiko down to reality. "Just lay down inside and relax, try to get some sleep, there are some relaxing chemicals being released inside there too so you may just get some rest done"!

As Kiyomi laid inside the horribly uncomfortable, bioluminescent, bright green pod and felt the warm and gooey substances being emitted she thought that she'd have never laid inside anything like this under any other circumstances. Now, with all of her innards, bones and joints hurting, with her voice still raspy and husky, with her muscles burning and her chakra reduced to less than third of her total pool, a little disgusting smelling and feeling goo was the least of her problems.

"Othello was really unfortunate to face your friend", Masen-Z smiled. Even while his face showed content he was clearly disappointed that his friend had lost.

"Huh? I'm pretty strong too, you know, I'd have beaten your friend too"! Meiko objected feeling a bit offended by Masen's implications.

"No, you don't understand. She knew all of Othello's moves, it was evident in the way she fought. She gave Othello no opening for a What-What at all, even when Othello tried balancing the scales by damaging her body, disabling her ninjutsu, she managed to come out on top", Masen-Z shook his head.

"This "What-What", is it really that strong of a move? I've been hit with a lot of tough moves, I'm pretty confident I could take it", Meiko pouted, still feeling a bit competitive about the implication that Othello would have beaten her.

"No one who has been hit with it has ever stood back up. It completely breaks most of the body's bones. It's a certain-win move. Still, it's no use if one can't find an opening to counter with it, like all powerful jutsu, What-What has a counterbalancing weakness. It's best used when the opponent doesn't know about your presence or is too reckless and wide open", Masen sighed.

Meiko just dreamily looked up in the trees that burrowed from up higher, close to the surface. By now, the trees had begun to rot away slowly before collapsing to dust. Seeing how chakra gave them life, without its support they could not survive being completely encompassed by rock hard minerals. Seeing those trees rot made Meiko remember the Academy, back when the kids were taught that higher rank Senju clansmen were able to create entire forests that did not rot away without chakra input at all.

"Maybe I do need an equalizer of sorts", the blacksmith pondered to herself, recalling her conversation with Masen-Z as well as the fight with Lithia's team before.

* * *

"What in the holy shit are you two losers doing"!? As pretentious as it was loud yell penetrated the peaceful moment of rest, making Meiko's sleepy eyes shoot wide-awake and have her jump on her feet and running at the source of the noise.

"Wood Style: Static Cotton"! Sunny Lee jumped in to protect her still recovering teammate with surprising ferocity. The kunoichi flashed through hand seals and unleashing a large forest of smaller in size bushes erupting from the floor and ceiling and unleashing a larger concentration of much smaller cotton chunks than before. All of the cotton projectiles rushed at the unknown trio of opponents who had entered the cave through unprotected previous cave and the corridor of disabled traps further back.

One of the trio, dressed in baggy pants and wearing odd armored boots and chest armor that extended over the ninja's upper body, wearing an iron plated mask with red eye pieces and a breathing device of sorts, extended their hands forward unleashing a powerful wave of steam that incinerated the cotton up to the smallest speck of dust just from the intensity of the heated steam alone.

Dashing from the side was Masen-Z, jumped into his newly repaired and slightly updated Gear-Man armor. A heated scorching red sword extended from his arm piece as he aimed to slash at the trio of invaders and shake them off. The invader from the right jumped in to meet his advance, right as the caped blond haired girl closed in six mechanical arms appeared from under her body-covering coat as she unleashed a steel bending flurry of blows straight to the core of the Gear-Man armor.

Grunting from the power of the blows Masen-Z skid back, thrusting his heated sword into the rocky floor to stop his throwback force before his tall robot armor got thrown into the back wall and busted up most of the nesting pods. The blond girl then graciously leaped back to her position to the right of the trio.

"Can you just stop this shit and listen"!? The invader from the center yelled out as he pointed at the Konoha headbands on the center of the well-armored genin's forehead to his left as well as one on the head of the blond haired girl with six mechanical arms added to two of her own to his right.

"Nara Sugemi"? Kiyomi's voice, now sounding slightly more feminine and healed after a good handful of hours of regeneration inside the nesting pod, yelled out in surprise as the Yamanaka crawled out of the pod. She didn't leave the pod because she felt rejuvenated but because of the sounds of fighting made by the interaction between Sugemi's team and that of Team Cumulus.

"Yeah, it's me, calm the fuck down, will ya"? The Nara scratched the back of his neck, "Jeez you guys are trigger happy", he complained afterwards.

"Well, your introduction wasn't very polite", Meiko shrugged as she looked at Sunny Lee and Masen-Z with a reaffirming glare, suggesting them to stand down.

"Hmph, maybe we better pack up and leave this place. It's becoming too publically accessible for my taste", Sunny Lee bitterly noted as she settled down on a rock and waited to hear what Sugemi and his team had to say.

"To be honest, one has to work through kilometers of dirt and rock, then, swim through a freezing lake and into an underground stream to even end up in the cave system. How was I supposed to know it'd become so crawling with people"? Masen-Z laughed out after he jumped out of Gear-Man. The boy then loudly lamented the dents in the frontal area of the armor before picking his tools and preparing to fix them. A little bit more and those punches could have drilled right through the most armored part of Gear-Man and that alarmed Masen-Z as well as informed him of the strength of that Konoha trio.

"We were looking for Team Hokage for a while, we knew from quite recent information exchanges that you two were supposed to be around here but we didn't know where exactly. Then we met Lithia Uchiha climbing out of the cave and learned a bunch of things", Sugemi shrugged.

"Like that Lithia Uchiha is a stuck up bitch", the blonde from his right remarked bitterly locking her normal, fleshy hands around her chest.

"So what do you want from us? Don't tell us that I am your target"! Kiyomi wondered out loud.

"No. I just wanted to know why you left Mana alone to be kidnapped and bargained for a shitload of supplies to other teams"? Sugemi calmly asked before a vein began popping out from his forehead suggesting a massive rage impulse raising up.

"Wait… Mana"? Meiko's jaw gapped from surprise.

"That's right, I know that in my time I wasn't the best teammate for one of my childhood friends but at least even at my worst I never forgot about her existence"! Sugemi shouted aloud as a bit of his pent up rage began spilling over the top.

"I mean… She was… Knocked out, by the way, we didn't leave her behind. We got attacked and separated and we just… Assumed she was taken away by the staff because she was out cold", Kiyomi looked down in disbelief. She just could not wrap her head around the fact that for some reason, despite being completely knocked out, Mana was still not removed from the competition, at least according to these three.

"Wait, what!? She was knocked out"!? Sugemi took a step forward at which point he was stopped by his heavily armored and covered up teammate from his left. "You guys are seriously the worst teammates, and I'm including the asshole that I was to her before in that assessment", he cursed after painfully lowering his head. It was clear that Mana and Sugemi still had issues to work out that the Nara boy was suppressing.

Snakes burst from underground, wrapping around Sugemi from out of nowhere, reaching in for a complete lockdown of the young genin's body. And yet the "What-What" could not have been completed, the reason why could've been observed once one looked down and noticed a long string of shadow extending from Sugemi and all the way to the massive lump of flesh and muscle who had emerged from his pod. Sugemi may have struggled to keep Othello G paralyzed under normal circumstances but with the wrestler's weakened state he was still fair game.

"Who the fuck are you three"!? Othello G thundered out, roaring like a proud lion and trying to toughen out through his injuries that were still evident even after some time resting.

"Ah, my name's Nara Sugemi, this armored fellow is Daidao Deiji – the Five Tails' Jinchuuriki and the other one's Nanaba Aomyaku – the Seven Tails' Jinchuuriki. We're a special team from the Eden Correctional Facility with special permission from the Sixth to participate in the Chuunin Exams - Team Hawthorn", Sugemi calmly introduced himself and his team, upon being introduced each of his teammates bowed respectfully with the Nara remaining the only one unbowed.

"Now, maybe you will consider not attacking us, please"? The girl Jinchuuriki of the Seven Tailed Beast – Nanaba bowed once again respectfully upon which request the "What-What" snakes withdrew and slithered back into the bushy cover of Othello G's chest hair as well as his boots and his trunks before disappearing there.

"Two Jinchuuriki"? Sunny Lee scratched her head looking a bit overwhelmed by the fight she very nearly picked. The casualty at which the information was relayed as well as the contents of the information surprised her equally. Usually Jinchuuriki – the people inside of whom laid sealed dormant the Tailed Beasts were a guarded secret and a treasure for each Ninja Village to have. Like a human weapon of mass destruction.

"That is correct, we may be Jinchuuriki owned by Konohagakure but we are also ninja, not just prisoners. We are usually located in Eden for our own safety, not due to criminal activity in our past. It is useful for the village to train us as well as rank us up once in a while", Daidao confirmed with his voicebox enhanced yet calm in tone voice.

"Can we just get to the matter why we came here"? Nara angrily shouted out before crossing his arms around his chest.

"Ah, yes, your Mana. Please, carry on, Sugemi", Daidao bowed.

"She's not mi… Look, whatever, the point is – you guys must've missed something because the information we got from one of the teams we spoke with was that Mana was kidnapped when you three weren't around and she's being bargained for a caravan-load of supplies", Sugemi explained. "The worst part is that the info is solid, we have no reason to not trust this team and we've confirmed it with yet another team".

"But… Why would they even care enough to kidnap Mana"? Meiko wondered, "She's just a lifeless, knocked out body".

"Because she wasn't eliminated, for whatever reason", Kiyomi realized before scratching her chin as her mind raced to develop that thought, "A passing by team finds a body, one that's been knocked out, but sleeping peacefully all by itself and yet not eliminated. That'll raise some questions – she's valuable as a possible bypass of the rules. If a medical ninja examined Mana they may determine why she wasn't removed despite being knocked out".

"Wait, examine? You mean they'll cut her open"!? Sugemi freaked out.

"That is a possibility, Team Hokage is widely hated by the other teams so subtlety is not a necessity with those teams. Wasn't there that whole huge thing about a bounty on your heads"? Sunny Lee suggested.

"That asshole Pagu will probably donate his liver just to get to cut Mana up, that stupid asshole, always taking jokes too far"! Meiko grinded her teeth.

"Wait, that's a bit of a logical leap, don't you think"? Kiyomi smiled.

"Oh yeah? Do you even know Pagu Aphonei"? Meiko freaked out before beginning to pack up all her tools and things that she had unpacked during her brief stay. She was in a rush to find the team that had kidnapped Mana and wanted to bargain her off.

"Wait, Meiko. If we go look into this – we may risk needlessly. We've beaten our targets, all we need to do is walk out the gate now. Even if we recover Mana, we can't be guaranteed she'll even be allowed to continue", the blonde tried to calm the blacksmith down.

"Excuse me!? We're talking about Mana! She crossed half the world to save you from your fucking arranged marriage"! Sugemi jumped up and started rolling back his sleeves angrily, intending to punch the Yamanaka right in the nose. His calm and calculated proceedings were stopped by his armored teammate.

"Wait, arranged marriage"? Meiko squinted at Kiyomi.

"Technically, I wasn't entirely opposed to that marriage, she went a bit rogue on that one but… Fair point", Kiyomi looked away, feeling ashamed slightly by her calculated leader's approach to the matter.

"There is logic in what Kiyomi Yamanaka says, her team has won. Anyone looking for Mana's body will likely have to fight through numerous teams and is very likely to be beaten up and eliminated. There is zero use in risking one's life for a dead-weight teammate that's already out of the exam." The mechanical ninja explained.

"Daidao-kun, please stop talking this way. This is mean for poor Mana-chan"! Nanaba shrieked out horrified by her teammate's words.

"Nanaba, I merely am stating that this Yamanaka is a capable and logical leader. We are wise to rank her possibility to rank up very highly", Daidao shrugged.

"I can't fucking believe it"! Sugemi yelled out. "Fine, you just run away, tuck your tails and go. I made Mana suffer enough way back when, with my words and my actions. I'm gonna go there and beat everyone up even if I need to fight off the summit of all of the teams present here, I'll be the kind of man manga are written about"!

"Wait… We're going too", Kiyomi sighed after picking up her things and quickly waving her farewells to Team Cumulus.

As a leader she had to weigh the pros, the cons, the advantages and disadvantages, the risks and consequences of each action her team performed. This action was profoundly stupid and yet… It felt like that was what needed to be done. Just looking at Meiko's face it made it feel like the right thing to do. Meiko promised Mana and Kiyomi that she would protect the two, she wanted to pay back the favor of getting the blacksmith through the first half of the exam and for sticking to the promise not to give Meiko up during her injury.

While no sane leader would have agreed to take up this madness of a hunt, who was Kiyomi to deprive her teammate of a promise she had made. Technically, it was justifiable even from a leadership point of view – a happy teammate was a teammate who would coordinate better in the future. While Mana's well-being meant a lot to Kiyomi, she had to delve deep into her own mind in order to make up excuses for sticking to this hunt for Mana's unconscious body mission.


	316. Need for Answers: Most Wanted

Light partially seeped into Mana's eyes inviting a familiar dreadful headache she had felt so many times before. A painful reminder that one was still alive which momentarily made one wish they weren't. The magician realized that something was wrong almost instantly, she felt tight bindings around her and an almost supernatural force holding her still, pressing against her chest and emanating from a glowing paper tag placed there. While the magician wanted to remain still and keep quiet so she could carefully survey her surroundings and evaluate her situation it didn't work out. A stinging sensation in her breathing tract made her cough erratically almost within seconds of waking up.

The magician felt the taste of blood as the rough yet small shards of crystal left her throat through her mouth, bruising and cutting at every soft fleshy wall it passed. The wounds were not troublesome or deep but Mana realized then that her total chakra pool was smaller than half her total, right when her body instinctively tried to protect itself through chakra augmentation and had to be eased through it.

"Interesting, she's awake", a crude sounding and lingering masculine voice made Mana's eyes turn to meet a young man, in his middle twenties or slightly older, whom the magician couldn't shake off the feeling she had seen somewhere already. Despite her best attempts at recalling details of this blond haired, glasses wearing young man she could not quite put her finger on it.

"Oh, great, you know, we should've just brought her to the gate, that or killed her", another young man, this on looking in his teens and with much greasier and messier dark hair running past his shoulders advised coldly.

"Aw, come on, you guys, Crus said that she was supposed to be eliminated but wasn't", a rather low pitched and strong yet strangely more feminine sounding voice made Mana flip her head back to observe the third member of the team that sat around her, having placed her on the ground after the magician woke up.

"Eliminated"? Mana muttered to herself. Her memory could vaguely recall something terrifying, something covering her up, getting all into her nose, mouth and filling her lungs and on the inside. The exact details still eluded the girl's memory but the shock and the panic fear she felt at those moments returned flawlessly.

"I stand by that, her presence is a paradox. She was, by all signs, knocked out and should've been withdrawn from the competition, her team abandoned her, after all", the bright haired young man nodded, using his palm to keep his glasses in their current positioned as he gestured with his head. His face was not quite malevolent, his eyes showed no pleasure in holding Mana against her will or intent to hurt her but he did look somewhat indifferent towards it, almost like he held himself above this.

"They did"? Mana raised an eyebrow, wondering internally. She worried about Kiyomi and Meiko as something must've happened to the two as they wouldn't have just dropped Mana and went on without her, at least the magician believed so herself.

The girl moved her hands around, tied behind her, placing them closest she could to the requirements of the Academy technique ninja used to escape bindings – the aptly named Rope Escape Jutsu. Then her hands faltered, was this really a sufficiently threatening situation to warrant her breaking her own rule about generic techniques? Slowly her hands parted away as she continued to lay low and listen.

"Hmph, still… Our time would be better spent seeking our targets, I am almost ashamed to talk in front of this girl how badly we're doing at that"! The other male teammate of the team remarked.

"Aw, come on, Gunoi, if Crus says that the girl may have stumbled into a way to cheat the system, it might be useful to find the secret out. Remember how many close calls we had recently"? The young lady once again butt in. After looking at her closely, Mana remembered bits and pieces about her from before.

"Hey, I remember you three, we met after the written exam shortly. Your name is… Choroina, I think? You expressed frustration that Gunoi wasn't following your leadership and your team didn't get along like the three of us did", Mana spoke up.

"Wait… Oh yeah, the cheerful Konoha team"! Choroina clapped her hands together, "Sorry, still can't let you go. The team we stole you from said something about your genjutsu being very dangerous".

"The team you stole me from"? Mana's eyes squinted as she realized just how much must have happened while she was out and how foolish this whole situation was to an uninitiated obeserver.

"Yeah, you're pretty much the most popular girl amongst the teams still competing – your body holds the answer why you weren't eliminated." Crus remarked.

"And don't even bother using the Rope Escape Jutsu, we've placed a chakra seal onto your bindings. You'd need at least a C-Rank technique to break it, definitely a more powerful technique than a generic Academy ninjutsu", Gunoi mockingly addressed Mana as if gloating over his superior standing.

"No problem, I've already escaped", Mana showed her hands holding the rope with a smile and before the enemy team could comprehend all the ramifications of her words those hands went through a collection of hand seals.

"Partial Expansion Jutsu"! Choroina yelled out as a giant fist slammed at Mana, large enough to break all of her bones upon impact as the giant had no problem breaking her opponent, knowing she wouldn't get eliminated anyways. Instead of a rough hit upon her opponent's body the female Akimichi with a Getsugakure headband hit only a twister of flower petals that scattered away into the wind that her own impact picked up.

"Lightning Style: Shock Wall"! Gunoi yelled out as lightning bolts lit up in a net formation around his fingers and expanded flying fifteen meters or so at the general direction of the young man's intent before dissolving. The young man repeated the technique a couple of times in several directions trying to aim with luck and intuition instead of sensory input or skill.

"There's no use trying to hit that on an opponent you cannot see, Gunoi", Crus remarked mockingly.

"How about you try to do something"!? Gunoi flipped out.

"That's because I am a medical ninja, I am useful to this team in other ways".

"You should've done like those other guys intended to and cut that bitch open then"! Gunoi cursed again, "This is why we are the underdogs in this stupid exam"!

"Whatever caused this girl to remain in the competition was not a medical problem, it was a trick of some sort. I scanned her already using the Diagnosis Jutsu, cutting her open would be redundant. You dare doubt my judgment"? Crus arrogantly stepped up into Gunoi's face as the two teammates collided with each other, firing off lightning bolts between the eyes of each other.

Mana breathed uneasily on a tall branch up above. She may have wanted to use another genjutsu to disable these three but she was working with a much smaller chakra pool already. While the first instinct she had was to run, that was not a priority. Most of all Mana wanted to know about exactly what everyone wanted to know – how she remained in the competition after having been knocked out.

While escape was very alluring, she was still dazed and much slower right now. If these three were stronger than they were predictable, that would have made them catch up to Mana if she tried to run right away. One of those stray lightning bolts may have even hit her as the ninjutsu dissolved. Even more importantly, one of the three mentioned something about Mana being hunted by every team still in the competition. That meant that eventually she would need to confront more heat than she was comfortable with. When that time came, her best option was to tell those people what they wanted to know but for that she needed to know it herself.

"Man, I guess cooperation just isn't in the cards for Team Adrastea", Choroinu sighed sadly as her two teammates bickered before smacking both of them and encouraging them to keep on searching ahead. Shortly after, Mana was left all by herself to sit and contemplate her further plan.

It was a good thing she was a stage magician who escaped bindings for a living, even without needing to use the Rope Escape Jutsu or any chakra at all. Removing a seal was as easy as removing a paper tag once her hands were freed by natural means. Working through a simple rope bind should have taken Mana far less but she was still a bit wonky and the information she overheard did interest her.

A thunderous crack interrupted Mana's train of thought as the large branch she was sitting on cracked and made the magician plummet down until she could grab onto another and try to pull up. That was before a purplish chakra sphere flew right past her head, right where Mana would've been if she would've blindly pushed herself onto the branch.

A strong looking middle-aged man leaped right onto the branch Mana was holding herself onto before trying to kick at her, luckily enough, the girl managed to read his intentions and let go before the kick was delivered. As Mana grabbed onto another branch and swung onto one right in front of it, on another tree, she saw the strongman take a nosedive down holding what looked like an elbow length two-edged short sword in his hands.

"Residual Style: Sparrow Bolts"! The female ninja of the strongman's team yelled out launching a wild barrage of purple colored flares that appeared textured almost like chakra itself. Mana reached for her own wand inside her pocket and under her shirt while her one free hand weaved hand seals.

"Lightning Style: Magic Spark Barrage"! she chanted out as a wild flock of Lightning Release spherical projectiles fired off channeled through Mana's wand to match and detonate the enemy kunoichi's odd ninjutsu technique. As it was intended, the two barrage techniques clashed mid-way, detonating one another.

A strong hit threw Mana off-balance and made her fall from her branch. It must have been the third one, it was hard to believe that anyone could've thrown a hit as fast as this one did.

"Nice teamwork, Harpalke, Iuteb, keep pressing her"! The strongman commanded as he picked his buckler up from the ground and prepared to join in on the offensive to take Mana down.

The magician closed her eyes before weaving hand seals and breaking her fall with Mystical Wings Jutsu. She lost the wand somewhere, the hit to her jaw was that strong that she completely lost concentration. A bit stronger and it could have completely knocked her out. This was dangerous, probably the most dangerous situation Mana has been in throughout this whole exam. These people may have been underdogs and Mana may have been well over-trained and over-experienced for this exam but if they ganged up all at once she stood no chance to survive against them.

The wild card of her chakra sensory kicked in. Right as her visual senses closed, Mana's sensory overwhelmed her without her will beginning to show her those blazing orbs of chakra. This caused the magician to quickly open her eyes, cancelling the sabotage of her own sensory abilities instantly. She leaped back to avoid the diving attack of Iuteb, the speedy taijutsu user who clocked her before. She delivered a kick to his exposed back right after he missed his diving punch.

"She dodged Iuteb's punch"!? The strongman, who appeared to be the de facto leader of the team remarked in great surprise.

Truthfully, it was only possible because of what Mana's sensory had showed her. The unasked for sensory sensation showed off some of the specifics behind Iuteb's taijutsu style and some signs of this Harpalke's "Residual Release". Mana placed her hands up in the hand seal position, preparing them for a genjutsu which she needed to time just right if she wanted to escape.

This Iuteb boy bent light around his body using chakra. That made his chakra signature light up with activity once he moved and it was what caused his body appear to move much faster than it actually did. Where the opponent never saw Iuteb coming, the boy was attacking normally but merely bending the light around his body to make his attack appear instantaneous. It made it appear like his body flashed in out of nowhere.

The chakra signature of this Harpalke girl appeared to stretch and thin out once it lit up with activity. Mana saw the star-like representation of her signature expand and reach out for the surroundings, she must've somehow been able to utilize the chakra from the environment around her, using her own chakra to mold it all together, not too much different from the technique Kouta's father once used, except on an immensely smaller scale.

Iuteb posed very few problems, Mana had already seen him move with intent to hit her twice. She had the approximate calculation and rhythm of his speed and he would never lay a hand on her again. Harpalke, on the other hand was more problematic. Mana's sensory appeared to work all on its own, like a capricious child. Sometimes it took half an hour to tap into it, sometimes it did not work at all and sometimes it turned on all by itself robbing Mana of another sense in its place. There was no way to know the specifics of her ability.

Mana jumped back and onto a tree, she wished to gain elevation but the leader of the team that attacked her jumped up and right in front of Mana, swiping with his blade to force the magician to stop on her tracks and jump back to avoid getting cut almost in half at her chest. Right afterwards the swordsman followed the move up with a buckler bash, following the same wave of momentum and wasting no movements. Mana grunted in pain as the buckler drove into her and sent her crashing back down.

Instead of hitting the ground, purplish flames enveloped her in a wide sphere before exploding suddenly and violently leaving the singed and injured magician to finish her fall. Hearing a rumbling of the ground beneath her Mana timed her roll aside to avoid a powerful jumping strike from Iuteb before getting back on her feet and wiping the blood off her nose because it made breathing a struggle.

The leader of the attacking team landed right in front of Mana right before his team joined in with him by his sides.

"We needn't fight, we just need your secret", the man calmly asked of Mana.

"I'd tell it if I knew it", Mana shook her head as her eyes wandered chaotically across the battlefield.

"Why don't you try to withdraw? You seem smarter than to consider taking us three on by yourself", the enemy strongman wondered before raising his buckler to his face and raising his sword wielding hand over it, preparing to stab over his shield if the magician chose to attack him head-on.

"I lost something here, my wand." Mana admitted.

"This wand is worth getting injured and hunted down for"? Harpalke yelled out in disbelief, she spoke in a strange southern dialect. Her pronunciation reminded Mana to that of Team Phobos suggesting heavily that this trio was from Getsugakure or another southern country.

"It's worth dying for", Mana replied firmly.

Harpalke was troublesome. Chakra was a fundamental force of the universe, present within each and every object in certain concentrations and quantities. Right now, without her gift of sensory cooperating, Mana could not possibly know the amounts of chakra she could concentrate from her surroundings and just how much of her own chakra went into this concentration process. Planning was useless without this information. This was pathetic, Mana needed to scoop off more chakra from her already lacking pool…

The magician's hands clutched onto an area over her ribs, Mana faked out being in pain, or at least more pain than she was really in, as her hands dove under her shirt where they could freely weave hand seals without being clearly seen.

"Sweet Lullaby Jutsu"! Mana yelled out before Iuteb's body bent the light again, trying to psych her out and believe he moved instantly when in fact he merely hid inside the pocket of light he bent. The magician's hands and her lips did not tremble as she began whistling a sweet and soft tune that quickly spread her illusion throughout.

Iuteb just unceremoniously slammed into the ground, shaking as his bodily sensors were overloaded with pleasure making it impossible to resist in the early stages of the illusion. His teammates followed but with more self-control and grace as they were not quite as engaged by trying to attack Mana.

That magician leaped up onto the nearest tree as she continued to hum and whistle the tune, staying within an audible range for her tune to be heard as her eyes raced wildly to find her wand.

A sharp pain at her shoulder made the magician scream out due to the surprise of the painful shock as she witnessed a small scalpel digging into the back of her shoulder a good couple centimeters. Had her chakra not been so stressed she may have been able to completely make it bounce off but now the girl felt her right hand go completely numb since the blade must have hit a sensitive point of her body.

"If you escape, don't just stick around and get into another fight", Crus of the trio that previously kidnapped Mana from someone who kidnapped her from her own team playfully suggested as his teammates quickly joined in.

"Partial Expansion Jutsu"! Choroina thrust her massive expanded fist straight at Mana. Crippled by the pain in her shoulder Mana tried to jump off but it would not have come in time.

"She's ours"! A loud and authoritative yell made Mana open her eyes and lower her left hand, which braced her head for impact. The blond strongman from the other Getsugakure team dashed up and blocked Choroina's attack with his buckler.

"Fuck off, Staeg, we stole her from Team Quartz of Iwagakure fair and square"! Gunoi angrily taunted his fellow Getsugakure ninja by raising his fist before placing his hands in position for hand seals.

"You disappoint me, Gunoi Azbur. As a fellow Getsugakure ninja I was ready to share the secret with you", the strongman wielding shield and sword, now known as Staeg replied as he stood right in front of Mana after the blowback threw him back at her and he managed to maintain both her and his own balance.

"I'm fine with sharing with Team Eurydome, really", Choroina apologetically bowed her head before her expanded hand returned to its normal chubby size.

"Fire Style: Burning Ash"! A voice came from out of nowhere as a wild cloud of ash covered the forest area and Mana felt Staeg grab her by the abdomen and dive down. The magician figured to resist for a moment but remembering how low her chakra pool was and how it might come in use later she didn't resist a man whose prime interest was to protect her until she could disclose her secret to him.

"Gunpowder"? Staeg muttered to himself before the black ash surrounded him and Mana and a violent explosion, caused by a small spark coming from a ninja hidden inside the trees further away detonated it.

A cocky laughter came from the western part of the forest before a loud thud silenced it.

"You're a fool, Fulgasa, what if you killed the girl"? A very frail and a rather feminine looking drab red haori wearing youth scolded his teammate as a team of five was revealed standing to the west, once the aftereffects of the gunpowder cloud explosion cleared up a little.

"Team Quartz of Iwagakure"? Choroina gasped in shock.

"That's right, we caught up to you! And this time we've brought some friends"! The energetic young man who apparently cast the ninjutsu and was referred to as Fulgasa earlier laughed out while pointing at the four ninja to his side, one of whom held an unconscious teammate tied to their back by a piece of cloth. "They really could use this girl's secret for their defeated comrade"!


	317. The Best Kind of Spirituality

As the smoke from the detonation of the gunpowder cloud cleared it became evident what became of Mana and Staeg, the leader of Team Eurydome of Getsugakure who chose to make it his personal responsibility to keep Mana and her valuable secret in his hands. An orb of purple chakra flames had enveloped the two, created by Harpalke of Residual Release style ninjutsu at the last moment, keeping the two from harm.

Looking around, Mana was surprised to see that while the flames did appear flame-like in texture and appearance, they were not quite hot when their user did not intend them to be harmful. The magician could only speculate as to why they appeared that way. It could have been because chakra was very flame-like in its purest form, it took the appearance of bland blue flames when visible and unenhanced. Or maybe it was because Harpalke's own Fire Release elemental affinity that the Residual Style appeared this way, taking some of its signs from its user.

Staeg landed on the ground before placing Mana down and looking up at the battle that erupted between the two Getsugakure teams - Team Eurydome of his own management and Team Adrastea and the attacking two teams.

Without waiting around too much, Mana dashed further away from the hectic battlefield but Staeg jumped in between her, the forest thickness, and the nearest tall tree.

"Your team is fighting right now, they could use your leadership", Mana uttered as she lowered her face making her hair slip over her eyes so her enemy couldn't read her distress and see her sweating forehead. To a ninja such details would be a clear indicator that Mana was tricking him and trying to avoid combat by all means which might have been taken for weakness.

"They are fighting Team Pahlavi of Sunagakure and Team Quartz of Iwagakure, Team Pahlavi lacks a member which makes it five on five. I'll manage watching you just fine", Staeg bravely responded raising his buckler to his strong and broad chest. Despite not being able to see the man sheathing his short sword, Mana could hear the sound of steel rubbing against the sheath – he was ready to punch her out if needed but her life needed to be preserved.

Up above a fierce battle was in its early stages. It was unusual to see teams from two different villages working together like Team Pahlavi and Team Quartz did. Needless to say, the desperation of a lost team member combined with ages of common history being abused by the larger ninja villages and ignored in the grand political scale made Iwagakure and Sunagakure grow a little bit closer than most other ninja villages would've. With those two elements combined, believing in the cooperation of the two was not that tough.

Fulgasa of Team Quartz, the young man who used the ash cloud technique earlier pulled out a strange long reaching weapon comprised of a long steel rod and a plough-like tip. Aiming to strike at the enemy team the young man charged diagonally down, aiming at the slightly worn out Harpalke who was beginning to hunch over the strain caused by her techniques. Luckily for Staeg's team Iuteb managed to clock Fulgasa straight in the nose using the same overplayed light-bending trick again.

"Partial Expansion Axe Handle"! Choroina yelled out leaping into the air with her hands raised over her head, aiming to smash her attackers into the ground. After a brief fraction of a second her hands expanded dozens of times, inflating in size and increasing in weight drastically.

As her arms drove down, however, they met a powerful resistance from the enemy as Fulgasa's female teammate with shaved sides of her thick, shoulder-long, maroon hair jumped in to assist him. In mid-leap rocks and dirt rose from the soil beneath Mana's feet and covered Fulgasa's teammate in an innovative rock, dirt and mineral armor technique allowing her to block Choroina's strike, however the immense force from the impact still cracked and shattered the Earth Release user's armor.

"Thanks for the assist, Taudall" Fulgasa grinned like an idiot, feeling sorry for being repelled and nearly taken out this easily.

Using the steel wire combination with the String Reeling Academy ninjutsu, Taudall, with Fulgasa in her strong and thick arms, zipped away from trouble with their teammate, the effeminate looking Yuki, providing some support.

"Ice Style: Diamond Mist"! The dark haired youth from Iwagakure chanted out as the air temperature around the tree where the five were situated, expanding to the tree where Taudall and Fulgasa were zipping off to chilled drastically creating a mist-like effect of dry ice and small ice chips floating weightlessly around, getting tossed around by the gusts of wind.

The golden haired, tanned young man standing calmly beside Team Quartz finally extended his arms from his praying stance to reach out to two scrolls crossed on his back, the size of which surpassed the feeble looking young man himself. The youth then quickly tossed the scrolls in the air after removing the pin that held them together and allowing them to open before he once again placed his palms together in a praying stance.

"Ninja Style: Śrāvakayāna, Pratyekabuddhayāna", the feeble youth spoke in a praying-like tone as a bunch of bits and detached parts unsealed from the scrolls.

"Whatever he's doing, don't let him"! Gunoi turned at his teammate, the medical ninja Crus who just shrugged innocently.

"What am I to do"? He replied much to his teammate's annoyance.

"Lightning Style: Shock Wall"! Gunoi quickly worked through his own hand seals, before electrifying multiple strings of steel wire and swinging them by parting his close placed palms. After the steel wire had expanded to its limits and stopped in place, the Lightning Release chakra continued to flow and move outside its initial medium.

The cloaked teammate with a purple mohawk, standing beside the feeble looking member of Team Pahlavi quickly bit his thumb and started working through his own set of hand seals, right as Gunoi moved to attack his teammate. As the strings of Lightning Release chakra expanded the tall man had already completed his Summoning Jutsu.

A violent eruption of smoke and loud popping noise followed the resolution of the Summoning Jutsu and for a moment it was unclear if Shock Wall had hit its intended target, or any target at all. After the smoke cleared however, a massive spider, standing in between two trees and right behind teams Pahlavi and Quartz was present, having created a large round web which absorbed the lightning shock and was glowing and sparkling with the intense amount of Lightning Release chakra running through it.

"Darn it", Gunoi cursed after realizing that his most powerful and advanced jutsu was so effortlessly absorbed into the web.

"Hurry up, Buhakim", the punky man encouraged his teammate who did not appear to be reacting to his ally that much nor to the massive spider behind him who continued to climb up and up until it seemingly disappeared in the upper layers of trees. "Skip the early stages and go right for Bodhisattva"

"I cannot do that, Zahafbit, you know very well that without Vehicle of Disciples and Solitary Awakening there'd be no Enlightenment. That is the path of Uber Spirituality", the frail youth explained with a soft smile. After his words ceased, the young man's fingers extended from their praying stance revealing strings of puppetry, glowing with chakra being channeled through them.

Soon the seemingly useless floating body parts began merging, forming two separate puppets. One of them reminded of a creepy fusion of bodies and body parts, with eight legs, thirteen, or so, hands and a number of limbs and heads that was too numerous to count from a quick look. It was covered with a red piece of cloth that ran down from one of its mouths and wrapped around its entire grotesque body before disappearing in another open mouth of a malformed face with four eyes yet no nose.

"Śrāvakayāna"! Young Buhakim prayed out as the puppet took shape and stretched its multiple body parts.

Then the second one fused together from a floating bunch of parts, forming a weird iteration of the dharmachakra shape, reminding of a ship's wheel, with arms for handles and an obsidian eye at the center, controlled entirely through a single puppetry string, whereas the first puppet demanded whole nine fingers to control.

"Pratyekabuddhayāna"! Young Buhakim repeated the praying ritual before the odd non-humanoid puppet activated.

* * *

"Let me leave"! Mana yelled out in a demanding tone right at Staeg who appeared completely stunned at the massive fight that was about to break out above.

"You're in no condition to make demands", the strongman took a step towards Mana, bringing the shield closer to her, as if pressing his stance towards her.

"Don't you get it? A massive fight will break out soon, it already has. Nothing good will come of it. I don't know what you wish to know so you'll all fall for nothing"! Mana tried to explain as she felt her voice breaking in desperation. "Please, there's no need for any of this"!

"You're right, there isn't, tell us what we want to know and this fight can end right now. All of us just want the secret, but they're fighting for the right to beat it out of you". Staeg lowered his shield as he saw in Mana's pleading eyes that she wasn't about to harm him. He saw the truth as the magician had settled on wasting no more chakra for fruitless attempts of escaping and trying to reason with her captors and all of her re-captors.

"Please, just let me pass and find my wand. You can all chase after me together after, I don't care. Just don't fight", Mana pleaded.

"I'm not moving one inch, if you want to save everyone from this fight, you'll have to think harder and remember what you did to bypass the rules. I have no leeway to offer you. I won't move or take bribes. If you want to pass, tell me what I want to know – those are my conditions", Staeg firmly cut the conversation down. "Or you can fight me yourself, see where that goes".

Mana bit her lip in frustration, hard enough to draw blood. She was not sure if Staeg didn't get it or if he simply was that desperate for the secret. His team was tired, sure, they were not the strongest people in this forest but he did not need it that badly. If the fight broke out it'd only end with one side or both of them utterly wiped out, that's to rely on the lucky chance that another team won't join into the brawl halfway – half of the Forest of Death wanted Mana right now.

Mana fell on her knee as a sudden feeling of dizziness began drawing her to the forest floor. The magician moaned in pain before reaching back to the source of her pain and feeling Crus' projectile scalpel that was still stuck in her back. So many things have happened, one after another, that the girl had completely forgotten to deal with that injury. It just remained there sucking chakra out from her network and draining her stamina until the pool grew too thin for it to be ignored.

"Oh, are you OK? Do you need help?" Staeg jumped up and rushed to Mana, helping her up, "I have some bandages in my pouch, sorry, no food pills or anything like that".

As the strongman helped Mana sit down on a rock and began burrowing in a pouch attached to the belt wrapped around his body, shoulder to pelvis, something popped in the magician's mind. A realization, or rather an idea, which required external simulation and a calmer situation to have a mind be properly wrapped around it.

"Food pills…" Mana lips muttered out moving seemingly all by themselves.

"Huh? No, I told you we have none. Those are too expensive for our team and they're even more difficult to get in Getsugakure than they are in Konoha", Staeg waved his hand before pulling out a bandage and examining the wound. He must've been trying to judge if the wound would be sufficiently patched up by a bandaged ninja's metabolism or if it required stitching – a rather rare occurrence in the ninja world, mostly applicable when ninja's chakra was dwindling low and had little to no hopes of recovering soon or with exceptionally deep wounds.

"No, that's the secret", Mana quietly explained with a weakened voice as her skin began paling at a crawling pace.

"That doesn't make sense, plenty of ninja consume food pills. I believe that many of them would've brought a handful here, at the very least, and yet all of them got eliminated, I'd assume", Staeg wondered before taking a couple of steps back to think before placing the bandage back in his pouch. He must've lacked trust in his own ability to treat the wound.

"Yeah but not right before an accidental knockout. Also not two in a row. Usually ninja consume them right after the battle or during its end, whereas I took them just in time for them to be at their peak effectiveness when I was taken out". Mana shook her head before realizing that it made her dizziness even worse and made a nauseous note to herself not to emote so energetically in the nearest future.

"How would medical food pills keep you from being knocked out"? The Getsugakure ninja still felt defiant and mistrustful towards Mana's explanation. He then gestured for the rest of his team up above who quickly withdrew from the heating up battle and surrounded the two ninja, shortly followed by their opponents.

"She says that medical food pills helped her prevent elimination", Staeg cut it short for the rest of the ninja gathered there.

"They wouldn't just keep me from being knocked out but they'd hide it from the staff. Think about it, how does the staff know about a ninja being knocked out"? Mana asked, trying to guide her pursuers through the thought process themselves. It was a psychological trick of sorts, if the others arrived to the same conclusion as Mana all by themselves they would be more likely to buy it.

"That huge sensory ball, right"? Gunoi confidently stated before looking at the other ninja around him, waiting for one of them to butt in and correct him but no one did. That was because he was correct.

Seeing that Mana was cooperating Crus slowly took a larger pouch off the back of his belt and started checking Mana's wound out. The attacking teams of Sunagakure and Iwagakure initially reacted jumpily but then eased up a bit after seeing him start to stitch and bandage Mana's wound, before rubbing numbing powder to kill the pain in the area and an ointment to slow the bleeding down. Crus was a really skilled medical ninja, more so than Kouta, since unlike the Juugo youth Crus knew exactly when he needed medical ninjutsu and when he could've handled the situation with medical supplies and which ones exactly. There was dedication and experience in the Getsugakure genin's moves as opposed to Kouta's usual desperation and fear for his friends' health.

"Exactly, the sensory ball. Once a ninja's chakra signature drops below a given point – the staff treats them as knocked out. They can likely tell when a ninja is knocked out and when they're just really low on chakra but it must be a tough detail to tell apart. That's how medical food pills work – they slowly, partially refill ninja's chakra pool boosting their bodily metabolism in the process. Since I was knocked out in the middle of my recovery – my body was still quickly regaining chakra which tricked the sensory ball." Mana explained her best guess at what exactly must have happened.

"I see… There is one problem, however", Zahafbit, the punky looking attacker, mumbled out before placing his hands together in a hand seal position.

"Genjutsu: Speyeder"! The ninja chanted out as a bright green light flashed from high up above. Mana could barely make out the shapes of a giant spider with a humongous eye with luminescent green iris that was spreading the blinding light before her mind blacked out for a moment. The last sight she could consciously make out was the eyes of all surrounding ninja blanking out. Everyone but Team Pahlavi appeared to have dulled out grey eyes, like hypnotized zombies almost.

* * *

Mana opened her eyes after a rude shake when her carrier failed to maintain his balance and subtlety while moving alongside the thick branches of the Forest of Death. Her head ached, she could clearly remember the last moments before she blacked out, still wondering if it was Konohagakure staff that carried her with intent of eliminating her.

"Don't worry, you're not out of the woods yet, get it, because we're in a forest"? Zahafbit turned around with a mocking smile. His teammate – Buhakim sighed in disappointment.

"Don't mind him, he doesn't get jokes", Zahafbit snickered addressing Mana who remained tied with what appeared to be spider silk on his shoulders.

"That was dirty, we could've all just parted ways with the information. There was no need to eliminate us all". Mana bitterly expressed her sadness.

"I told you – none of you were eliminated, in the beginning at least. You just can't remember the illusion that I cast on you. I did knock everyone else out after they went to sleep, though", Zahafbit coughed back at her in moderate annoyance. "Sadly, we did have to leave Alsamryf behind as well, she was knocked out before taking any pills so even with the information you have we couldn't have helped her".

"What business is it to you if I'm eliminated or not? You should've just finished me off", Mana grunted as she tried her usual rope escaping tricks, sadly, the material she was bound with was more of a sticky, glue-like bodily secretion than a rope she could work with.

"And what if I go to pee and Buhakim looks away, with one lightning fast swoop you'd be removed from our grasp. We need you for one last exchange and its safer if you're not in danger of being removed by Konoha ninja whenever we look away at the same time", Zahafbit smiled, this must've clearly been his idea as he looked too proud explaining it all to Mana.

"You see, while we are grateful for the information you've provided, we have no medical food pills or that much supplies left so it is useless to us. There is however a way to obtain those food pills and other ninja tools – the bounty on you", Buhakim explained calmly. The odd golden haired boy leaped at tremendous speed without even opening his eyes or moving his hands away from praying position.

Mana felt tired and whatever medical supplies were used on her to numb the pain in her shoulder was beginning to wear off but a genuine laugh still escaped her chest.

"Zahafbit was wrong, I may be Uber Spiritual but I do enjoy a good laugh, may you share with us what was so funny"? Buhakim wondered.

"Last time a big chunk of ninja met together in one group, one guy ended up screwing all of them over. What do you think will happen now"? Mana smiled.

"Shut up, the bounty's real. Multiple teams we've exchanged information confirmed it", Zahafbit dismissed Mana's words but his face could not quite shake off the uneasy feeling that sparked up in his chest. The man even went as far as to scratch his chest.

"Really? Who do you think still has enough ninja tools to pay a bounty? This is the very end of the road – most teams have already finished the exam. Everyone who's left now are on their last legs, their supplies emptied and they're all ready to jump at each other's throats. Everyone's worried about everything, why do you think my survival has inspired so much trouble? Everyone is looking for any smallest straw to devote all their effort to because at this point they feel like their main objective may just be pointless", Mana twisted the knife she believed she had firmly planted in Zahafbit's chest already.

"Buhakim, help me out here"! Zahafbit complained.

"There is little to say, what the girl says has some reason. Lucky for us, Uber Spirituality and reason has little to do with one another", Buhakim coldly explained as he continued to pray silently as he continued to dash ahead.

"My wand"… Mana lamented quietly in her mind, due to Team Pahlavi having moved her so far away from Shimo's sword, reworked into the wand, which was so precious to her.


	318. Message in a Beetle

Kiyomi, Meiko and Sugemi with his team were quickly making their way through the dark depths of the Forest of Death. Their speed was slightly higher than usual. It was because Daidao Deiji – the steampunk Jinchuuriki of the Five Tails had a bright green lantern by his side which illuminated much farther than the ninja's usual supernatural perception allowed them to see. This increased visibility granted the merged teams the ability to allow themselves to pick up the pace.

Finally, Sugemi's rate slowed down and the Nara landed on a thick tree, from which one could have seen a larger circular field. The trees around the field had bent to surround its upper layers with leafage, which still kept it in relative gloomy shade as every tree tried to exploit the small hill's breakout spot for extra light, covering it up in the process.

"Strange", Sugemi scratched his head as his eyes squinted while he was deep in thought.

"It appears Team Scuti is no longer here", Daidao stated the obvious.

"It was so mean of them to leave this suddenly, without letting us know of it", Nanaba pouted as she camped it up with her gestures and jumpy stance.

"They haven't left too long ago", Kiyomi looked around noticing small weight pressure signs on the grass that usually weren't present when an area was left for a longer period of time.

"Yeah… The fries are still warm", Meiko cheered with a full mouth having stuffed her mouth full of unknown gooey food.

"Really"? Kiyomi squinted teasingly, "They don't smell fresh".

"No, it's a fine observation, if a bit icky, Relta of Team Scuti would eat actual garbage for food", Sugemi shrugged after examining the camp more closely.

"So who are these guys anyways, how are they supposed to help us find Mana"? Kiyomi wondered.

Sugemi sighed. "We formed a sort of an alliance with Team Scuti. We constantly exchanged information and shared useful advice and intelligence", he explained, putting it short.

"Nana, would you please"? Sugemi wondered turning at his teammate in annoyance that the girl had not followed the social cues already. After being encouraged the young lady hopped on her feet for a moment before glaring at her thumb regretfully and biting it with some scare in her eyes. Her first nom failed to draw blood so the squeamish girl had to bite again ending up paying twice for her penny pinching.

"Summoning Jutsu"! She chanted out after weaving a bunch of hand seals and slamming her extended palm to the ground. A moderate cloud of smoke rose up revealing a small beetle with obsidian shell with golden colored edges and blood-red compound eyes on the front.

"Contact Team Scuti, please, Bushika-chan", Nanaba asked of the beetle, without answering the insect lifted off and buzzed away into the darkness of the forest.

"Summoning Jutsu"? Kiyomi wondered to herself aloud.

"Yeah, it's not a common skill among genin. Not many partners trust low ranking ninja, naturally a Jinchuuriki would be taken more seriously", Sugemi sighed before sitting down on the grass and taking a couple of breaths to calm himself. "Once I get my manga out there, I'll have all the animals begging to be my partners", he grinned.

"Your summon is much cooler than Mana's lame rabbit", Meiko grinned, still following the beetle with her eyes far away in the darkness.

"Mana's summon"? Sugemi raised an eyebrow.

"Yeah, Mana acquired a Rabbit Summoning Contract right before the Chuunin Exams", Kiyomi waved her hand, "It doesn't look like those guys trust her too much though so she has to bargain with the critter to get it to listen to her".

"Nothing's ever simple with her", Sugemi smiled before looking away again and trying to wait more patiently for Nanaba's beetle to contact Team Scuti and get their current location.

* * *

Zahafbit and Buhakim stopped all of a sudden, making Mana, who was still resting on Zahafbit's shoulder shake painfully from the sudden stop. Her attempts at freeing herself from the gooey spider silk substance was still unfruitful, had she performed a similar escapist trick on stage she would have probably used something sharp to puncture the glue-like material and weaken its overall integrity. Without a single bit of damage on the glue it was rough to work with.

"Hey, Team Nimbus, the deal on Team Hokage is still up"? Zahafbit calmly asked dropping Mana in front of the Kumogakure trio who just lazily looked her up.

Team Nimbus was an interesting trio. One of them was a massive middle-aged ninja with rock-hard physique and six arms that looked strong enough to crush boulders, one in each arm. The six-armed giant wore what appeared to be a skinned pelt from a white canine, which reminded Mana eerily of the breed of dogs that the Inuzuka clan used. The other two were a similarly built pair of two ninja, male and female, of light brown hair and matching, slick steel armor. Both of them were covering up their faces with cloth from their nose and their eyes looked so eerily similar that Mana took them for siblings almost immediately.

"Who's this again"? the six-armed giant wondered pointing a ripped off limb of a giant centipede at Mana before finishing slurping the remains of flesh and bitter protein goop inside of the shell.

"Are you serious, Spyder"? This is Nakotsumi Mana – a member of Team Hokage, the one you agreed to hunt down, amongst several other teams for the bounty pool", Zahafbit laughed out uneasily, as Mana couldn't keep her laughter inside her chest the punky shinobi just glared at her but still moved his hands off his chest and in a more ready for combat position.

"Do you have any idea how long ago that was"? The slick female member of Team Nimbus jumped up and approached Zahafbit, removing the piece of cloth from her face so she could speak more comfortably and loudly. "Most of the teams that pooled their efforts on this side-job have already finished the exam, southern gate and northern gate kind included".

"Don't be mistaken though, Team Hokage does interest us, just not this member of it. The only reason we even are after Team Hokage to begin with is our target – Yamanaka Kiyomi, not this girl", the third member of Team Nimbus spoke up as he stood and approached Mana just to watch her over. Once the man stood up, Mana noticed his long sword hanging on his back, almost as tall as the man wearing it himself. "The blonde is the only reason we've stuck around for this long, if you're looking to cash this girl in for supplies – you're out of luck".

"Not necessarily, she does still have the elimination secret, doesn't she"? The female member of Team Nimbus stepped up to the swordsman teammate of hers, completely ignoring Mana laying right next to her or Team Pahlavi. "Not that we'd need such a thing. We're far above the level of all the remaining teams".

"So are you willing to trade her for something, or not"? Zahafbit growled in annoyance.

"She might be useful to us but we have no wish to part with any of our supplies for her", Spyder laughed out as he started packing the kitchen tools chaotically scattered around the place.

"So it's a fight you're after"!? Zahafbit raised his fists up and weaved a hand seal exposing his massive spider companion from the upper layers of leafage with its lower bottom eye open and spreading its deceitfully beautiful light. Mana closed her eyes, this whole situation really felt off to her and she would rather not go to sleep when both teams were in the process of finding out they barely even needed her anymore.

"Genjutsu: Speyeder"! Zahafbit yelled out using the technique he had set up right before entering the negotiations. Mana's mocking attitude and belief that the deal would go bad was partially the cause of Team Pahlavi entering the negotiations with the giant spider already summoned and hidden in the upper layers of trees.

Oddly enough, both the two Team Nimbus armored ninja as well as the giant and intimidating Spyder followed up to the technique in a similar way. After the light, which initiated the genjutsu, stopped shining and Mana opened her eyes, she saw a peculiar sight of an attack frozen in time.

Zahafbit's fist was tightly enclosed in Spyder's grip with the pelt of an unidentified animal having covered up the giant's face to the point where the fangs of the beast laid right below the man's nose, covering up more than half of the man's massive head. The two others, meanwhile, had shifted their cloth from their neck and lower mouth up to their eyes so that the light wouldn't affect them and were now fully armed with the male armored ninja holding the handle of his massive sword, ready to unsheathe it at any moment meanwhile the female held two long knives in her hands ready to plunge at any nearby enemy. Only the uber spiritual Buhakim remained calm and steady in his praying position.

Spyder flipped the pelt of the animal on his shoulders up with a quick head banging movement letting his bloodshot eyes get exposed and meet Zahafbit's gaze.

"Did you really think we'd have deals with your team without knowing about your abilities beforehand"? the female member of Team Nimbus smiled confidently before pulling the cloth down and sheathing her knives as Zahafbit withdrew slowly, his fist slipped out of Spyder's grasp without resistance from the giant Kumogakure shinobi.

"My sister is right – we're not still lurking here because we're the underdogs. Don't put us in with the other teams. We're here because Yamanaka Kiyomi evaded our sights for too long, that is it", the male swordsman confidently stated as he moved his hand away from the hilt of his sword.

"That being said, we're not looking for pointless fights either. Normally Jean or Jon would've long since cut you down, Zahafbit, but we're well aware of just how dangerous your teammate is. He'd give us too much trouble, for what it's worth, for what this Konoha kunoichi is worth as well", Spyder cracked three of his fists in the other three palms making Mana just imagine how threatening of a close range combatant this man truly was – he stopped Zahafbit's punch which carried full knockout intent with just one of his arms.

"Wait, me"? Buhakim wondered, looking genuinely curious about why he was so revered by the enemy. "I'm just an uber spiritual ragamuffin, trying to raise my awareness and spirituality".

"Sure you are", Spyder laughed out before he flexed his muscles out and continued to pack the things.

"You're leaving"? Mana wondered as Zahafbit looked too angered and crushed at the same time to oppose or even talk to Team Nimbus.

"Oh? You guys didn't know"? Jean, the kunoichi of Team Nimbus, asked teasingly. "There aren't too many ninja left. At this point, it's a big hide-and-seek game so all the remaining ninja are pooling together in the center for one big fight. It's a last chance to find out if one's target is still present and take them out. Who knows, maybe someone there will give a shit about you, Nakotsumi Mana".

"Oh, I thought you may have found Kiyomi. I'd have bargained for getting to go with you guys", Mana looked down in disappointment.

"Oh, she'll be there. At this point most teams know about it and they'll make it their business to let every other team know of the battle as well, it's within everyone's best interests to end this already", Jean shrugged as she nonchalantly started walking away.

"It's so cruel of you to just waltz around like that", Spyder complained, his bloodthirsty mood had seemingly evaporated completely since a couple of moments ago.

"What are you talking about, Spyder-Wolf, you've got six arms, that makes you good for carrying six bags and there're only three of us. If you asked me – you got off easy", Jean teased her teammate using his full nickname, suggesting that the relationship between two was less than being soulmates.

"Hey, Nakotsumi Mana", Jon of Team Nimbus turned around and looked Mana right in the eyes, halfway to dashing after his team who had bolted away. "When you meet Yamanaka Kiyomi, please tell her that Spyder-Wolf, Jon-D and Jean-D are coming after her. She may not know of us, but I want her to break a sweat before we take her out". The enigmatic swordsman calmly and with a serious expression asked of Mana before pulling his sword and swinging it in the air.

Mana felt the glue that stuck her body together, preventing her from making even the subtlest of moves loosen somewhat. That was just the little amount of damage needed to break the sticky goo easier. The magician's hand started working on the binds almost immediately and she was surprised by how quickly she broke it completely and simply slipped out of it. It was a very quick escape considering her inability to weave hand seals and low chakra level.

"Hey, what the hell are you doing"!? Zahafbit yelled out aggravated by the fact that Mana escaped her binds as well as Jean-D's involvement in her escape.

Mana took a pair of defensive leaps back prepared to defend from her opponent with all of her clutch evasive and counterattacking skills. She suddenly remembered just how useful this kind of fighting style was as she had kind of forgotten its nature and life-saving properties after having regained her chakra manipulation. Zahafbit may have only had one notable trick and has been belittled by Team Nimbus considerably, still, even if he wasn't the strongest threat out there, he was still a considerable challenge to weakened and injured Mana.

Unexpectedly to all, except maybe Team Nimbus who just walked away from the mess they themselves had caused, Buhakim's hand softly pressed against Zahafbit's shoulder.

"Calm yourself, my non-uber-spiritual friend", Buhakim calmly asked, "Remember what our goals are and do not be wasteful with your meaningless gripes".

"Are you serious? The girl we were supposed to trade supplies for escaped"! Zahafbit pushed his friend's hand off his shoulder before turning at him. Mana wondered if she should have just taken the chance to book it but it may have been taken the wrong way. She wanted to remain as genuine as possible and she was quite interested to see just what further information she could obtain. If things got especially wrapping around her throat – she could have done something she really did not want to and further diminish her last remaining chakra for an escape measure.

"And why do we need her"? Buhakim firmly and just as calmly asked, "Did we not hear about the rest of the teams' indifference towards these lousy games? All everyone cares about now is the finish line. Do you really wish to involve yourself in this petty fight and risk advancing"?

"B-But…" Zahafbit turned back at Mana, he was clearly conflicted about just letting the girl go.

"You needed me for your injured teammate but now it's too late. You wanted to trade me for supplies but now that won't work either. I feel like I am getting a feeling of the kind of man that you are, Zahafbit", Mana spoke up greatly interesting the tall Sunagakure genin who curiously stepped up closer to Mana. He walked up so close that the old man from the Sun Disc arena would have already scolded the magician for not defending herself but she knew it was a power play. Team Nimbus demeaned the man, he was desperate to get some of his power back.

"Oh"? He wondered.

"If I reach Kiyomi and Meiko I can promise you one thing – knowing that she is hunted more intensely now, my friend will leave the Forest of Death immediately, robbing Team Nimbus of their chance to beat her and advance for one of their members. I can see you'd like that very much", Mana smiled.

"Embrace your uber spirituality, Zahafbit, think about it, we have no more targets to eliminate. All we need is leave the Forest of Death. We wanted more supplies for the next round but it won't be quite working out that way, how about you stop this senseless fight and just allow yourself to win"? Buhakim asked once more after seeing Zahafbit's lips twist to match Mana's warm smile.

"Whatever". The punky Sunagakure genin flipped his hands in the air as he turned around and walked past his teammate, gesturing for Mana to leave which she didn't have to be asked twice about. He turned suddenly to tell Mana one last thing, "We're gonna buy those supplies we are short on from the local stores after the exam, your freedom changes nothing. You better be ready for us in the next exam".

Mana nodded before both genin continued their walks. Buhakim cleared his throat after turning at Zahafbit.

"North is that way, Zahafbit", he mumbled pointing at the direction ninety degrees to the direction where Mana took off to.

* * *

Nanaba's beetle finally buzzed back, carrying a small green scroll in its limbs, pressing it against its armored chest very tightly. Right as the insect approached its master, it dropped the scroll by her feet and landed nearby, waiting for the scroll's content to be read and if its summoner wished to send a reply. The insect did not look too powerful with its natural offensive however it did appear well armored, which explained why it was used as a messenger.

"Gentib says that all the teams are gathering by the central watchtower to resolve their problems with each other. That's where we'll all know who's still in the competition and will have a chance to take down our targets." Nanaba read the contents of the scroll aloud.

"He didn't include his current location? I thought we settled that was what an empty messenger meant"? Sugemi grumbled to himself before sighing and realizing that the tip about the big meetup was significant enough. After all, it was clear that if Sugemi asked about Team Scuti's location he had no idea about the big brawl about to happen, only one who doesn't know about the big fight wouldn't have realized that current locations are rendered irrelevant in the face of this big battle.

"I suggest we move out, it will be there that we shall find your Mana, Sugemi", Daidao suggested.

Both Team Hokage and Team Hawthorn picked up all of their remaining things and set out to the central watchtower for the big fight. While it was most definitely going to be messy, the team could not have cared less about the brawl itself. All they wanted was to find out about one specific ninja that may have possible been used as bargaining chip or a valuable ace in the big fight.


	319. The Final Countdown

An underground dweller, living beneath multiple layers of the Forest of Death, unearthed itself. It was a foul looking being, eyeless, covered in hair loosely, each one as thick as a thorn on an echidna's back. Its flesh looked as relatively white and fleshy but it was just a matter of deceitful appearances as the being lived well below the rocky layers of underground making its fleshy bits as hard as diamond themselves. Its gapping mouth was covered with round rows of teeth, each fang was the size of a banana and capable of rotating a full 180 if it ever needed to grind something tough or replace a missing row of teeth.

The dweller carefully flipped its exposed upper half around, waggling like a surfaced whale but only because the soft air pressure on the surface felt odd for the eyeless abomination. It waggled for a while more, trying to understand why it wasn't grinding any rocks or encountered trouble moving forward, why it sensed no vibrations on the ground of smaller underground insects or animals as it rarely hunted surface dwellers.

"Idol: Applegate Crescent" an energetic male voice yelled out as a concentrated wave of slicing gusts bent in a crescent shape which appeared highly unnatural considering the angle of turning and an odd direction which the blast was fired from. The pressure of the windblast blew the underground dweller's upper body completely off before the cutting winds tore it to small shreds.

"That was unnecessary", a brown haired boy with blue facial markings, resembling feathers of a peacock remarked. Judging from his face it did not appear like he lamented the death of the grotesque abomination however his tone did suggest distaste for his teammate's actions.

"I think Gentib did us all a favor, I mean look at how ugly that thing is", a red-haired girl remarked pointing at the still tingling lower body that was so rock hard that the upper half being blown off forced it to forcefully expel its inner body like a tube of toothpaste.

"I mean, it could've been dangerous, it looked dangerous", the young man, previously called Gentib, shrugged before stroking his spiky brown hair making them spike up even more than they've already have been. "And it's not ugly, Relta, I'm sure to this creature's mother it was the most beautiful thing in the world. There are no useless things in this world, they all have a purpose and all are beautiful in their own way. I was merely worried it may be dangerous to us".

The third member of Team Scuti sighed as the deceased underground abomination disappeared from their vision completely and got swallowed in darkness. It was inevitable that soon some massive pincer wearing insectoid will snap the remains in half before sucking them dry, that was just how dangerous and cruel this whole forest was. The unholy economy of energy where life was worth only as much as how much energy would one have wasted in extinguishing it.

"Sometimes I am thankful that I was given the burden that I bare and not you, Gentib", the third boy with the facial markings sighed. "One positive of slowly dying with each passing second of combat is that you pick your fights very carefully and weigh every existence against that of your own".

"You know, Gorm, for a guy who is slowly being killed by his fighting style, you really picked the wrong profession", Gentib looked at his friend with some worry in his eyes.

"No one forced me to accept the Sky Gift, I had that stone put inside me because that was the only thing that made me special. I wanted to be a hero, to make my life mean something and, unlike you, I am not some sort of a talent who can master enough techniques for multiple personas or like Relta who has an abnormally large chakra level for her age. Hosting a chunk of radioactive rocks inside my body was the only way I could fight alongside the likes of you", Gorm replied with a pain ridden expression as his teammates sadly looked at each other before looking on ahead.

"Gorm… You know that these stones don't really hurt you that much until you use their chakra. You don't have to overdo it. I messaged Team Hawthorn already, they'll back us up if we need it", Relta tried softly comforting her teammate.

"I am slowly dying with each passing second. I have no time to fail a Chuunin Exam if I want those stones to mean something. You've no idea what my family had to give up so that I could even have those stones put inside me. How many straight days me and my parents had to work in the factory to earn, or rather, buy that right. Forgive me if I think that taking my time isn't really my style." Gorm replied uneasily as he looked on ahead, seeing the larger field in the open covered in fallen trees with the surrounding leafage and vines having taken the place of the fallen, draining the fallen for all there was to drain until nothing but rotten trash remained. Until even the parasitic insects and plants thought themselves above feasting on the fallen and moved on.

"I think you might want to change your clothes, we could use some of your undefeated persona's might here", Relta smiled at Gentib who nodded and separated from Team Scuti.

Relta and Gorm, meanwhile landed in the open, joining a circle of other teams that continued to stand in a circle and observe each other. It appeared that no one was yet fighting anyone, meaning either the very unlikely possibility that there were no more hunter-target combinations left in this forest or that the countdown still hasn't taken place.

"Introduce yourselves"! A darker skinned young lady with a patched up nose, vibrant azure colored short hair and leather work clothes that reminded of clothes that richer blacksmiths wore, wearing a Sungakure headband tied around her rolled up right sleeve.

"It's only good manners for people requesting introductions to do so first themselves", Gorm looked down in cold irritation. He did not feel too good about the prospect of fighting of this scale, then again, given his life choices, such attitude towards unnecessary violence was not hard to understand.

"Fair enough, my name is Bukhande, this is Alemyat and Daseaut. We are Team Shahryar from Sunagakure", the strong of body female nodded before proceeding to introduce her teammates and herself. "I assume you'd have known some of us, at least, if one of us was your target", she then smiled.

"Or he is just messing around to shake off your attention, like a true ninja would", the one teammate of Bukhande's she referred to as Daseaut noted following up on Gorm's cold and irritated attitude by locking his hands around his chest. Daseaut was a taller and slimmer kind of athletic shinobi with dark curly hair and tanned skin, wearing a standard martial artist's gi that appeared to have been made from shreds of many other different colored gi.

"Very well, my name is Relta Ginn, this is Gorm Cleiti, we're Team Scuti of Hoshigakure", Relta politely introduced her team feeling a little bit ashamed by her teammate's cold attitude towards the others. For a young man who did not like violence and only fought when absolutely necessary he didn't appear to trust or like people too much.

"What the fuck? Did you guys strangle Gentib in your sleep or something, of all you lot I'd have expected to see him eliminated the least. He still owes me a good brawl"! A longer grey haired young man in a yellow jumpsuit exclaimed waving his hands erratically in a manner not at all different from that of a crazy person, yet due to past familiarity with the genin in question Team Scuti didn't take it too seriously.

"Calm yourself, Faeras. Gentib will be here once he changes into his Tankobaji persona", Relta calmly explained, smiling confidently as she knew the effect that this revelation would cause to the entirety of Faeras' Team Cephei – a fellow Hoshigakure team and the only other Hoshigakure team to survive this long as both other teams: Team Westerlund and Team Sagitarii got eliminated already.

"Oh, it appears he's taking this very seriously. I'm very curious to know just who he is expecting to see here", a dark brown haired young lady in classical maroon colored gomaido style chest and shoulder armor smiled politely at Team Scuti, feeling a bit ashamed of her brutish teammate who just took a couple of steps back waving his palms.

"Hey, hey… Now I feel like this shit's gonna get really interesting"! Faeras wheezed out before reaching for a large weapon on his back, wrapped in cloth and silk and tied together. After the ties were unbound and the cloth and the silk slipped off most graciously, what was left exposed was a wonder of engineering – a chainsaw sword, which took a very physically powerful individual to wield properly.

"If the rest of the teams present wouldn't mind, we'd appreciate if they all introduced themselves to us as well. It'll help us pass the little bit of time it'll take for Gentib to get into his Tankobaji persona. It shouldn't be too long until we're ready, please understand", Relta bowed her head respectfully as the other teams rustled in conversation between themselves, both in calm and heated manner.

"I'd advise for it, we can start right after this, whether "Tankobaji" is here or not. It'll serve as a nice last stretch that'll allow the late teams to show up", the third member Team Cephei, a seemingly composed and modest individual, nodded in agreement before expressing his thoughts out loud. "Just to show good manners and faith, my name is Bennow Vingcro, this is my team: Rosanna Senju and Faeras Gabscrue, we are Team Cephei of Hoshigakure".

"Alright, we may as well tune in", an elegant and pompously dressed male shinobi with a handful of scrolls sewn into his exquisite purple and white jacket stepped forward. "My name is Trest Bregger, this is my team – Gurker Gliesse and Gyllfa Ellidani. We are Team Kyanite from Iwagakure"

An awkward silence dominated the field as the three teams realized that with that last introduction all the formal matters except one were out of the question – all the teams have already introduced themselves. Given how much time had passed since the meeting was supposed to take place, it was highly unlikely that anyone was still out there, and if they were – it was their bad.

A fire pillar so intense that it lit up the entire area and so searingly hot that it actually emitted a loud roaring shriek scorched the deceitful silence as the pillar of flames bent over and torching everything in its way arced right at the general location of the gathering. As the arcing searing flame smashed into the battlefield center the flames splashed off like waves of water before quickly dying out as a single completely unfazed young man kneeled demonstratively in the center of the fiery blitz.

"Tankobaji… Such a showoff, as usual", Rosanna Senju rubbed her temples with a smile identifying the different persona of the young man from her village, known as Gentib de Vitt but one adopting different persona suiting the occasion and mood of the young man as he fought.

Gentib now adored a white haori over a red kimono, hand guards and wooden sandals, as well as intricate white and red face paint and crimson red wig of lengthy and spiky hair tied in a ponytail with two long strands flowing freely over his chest. His right hand was extended forward whereas his left one held a long iron staff with clunky steel rings attached to it that clinked and tolled every time the staff was moved creating an almost demonic jingle. Tankobaji just gave Rosanna an angry glare with pouted lips and raised nose yet he offered no words. Mainly because the Tankobaji persona did not speak except for the names of his techniques to aid his concentration.

"That was very showy, thanks for that, my friend", Daseaut of Team Shahryar, Sunagakure, was first of the non-Hoshigakure teams to speak up. "That being said, the purpose of this meeting is to fight it out between the last teams left. It'd be easier if teams with targets present would identify themselves".

Tankobaji once again angrily turned his head in a degree that surely flexed and made Gentib's neck hurt, a moment later the oddly behaving persona jumped up making Tankobaji's body catch up to his angry glare and turn with his full body at Daseaut of Team Shahryar.

Without uttering so much as a word or an angry grunt, Tankobaji fired off the ground like a man launched from a cannon, blazing at Daseaut at lightning fast speeds and making the Team Shahryar genin try and take defensive measures, winding his palm backwards as if preparing it for a defensive jutsu. Before Daseaut could execute it, however, Tankobaji's clinging ring staff dug into the ground right by the foot of the Sungakure ninja before the inhuman-like Tankobaji flipped over his staff and then bounced the completely different direction – instead aiming to slam his staff right at Gurker Gliesse's of Team Kyanite head.

Gurker revealed the hand placed inside his jacket and holding a one handed seal in place as water gurgled in his lungs before shooting out in large quantities defensively.

"Water Style: Cucumber Farm"! he wheezed out after the mass of water clashed with Tankobaji's advances and sent the almost demonic acting young man flying back, only to recover in mid-air and land right on his feet before resuming his demonstrative and showy posing.

"So… Gurker is your target, weirdo", Trest, Gurker's teammate, sighed looking greatly annoyed at the unfortunate meeting.

"It just so happens that Bennow Vingcro is my target" Alemyat, a dark red haired young man of a well-trained and tanned by the Wind Country's desert body and a teammate of Daseaut and Bukhande noted, "We are willing to aid fending that fiery weirdo off if you'd be willing to give us a hand. Senju is a troublesome bloodline and his teammates will undoubtedly defend Bennow".

"Well, you're not wrong. With the two of us being the last Hoshigakure teams remaining, we'll sure as hell fight together"! Rosanna raised her fist up with a brave grin.

"I suppose it's settled then", Gurker fixed his jacket before placing his hands forward in a position prepared to weave hand seals, implying he was a ninja relying heavily on ninjutsu or genjutsu instead of a more close-range, physical approach. "I kind of liked your weird gimmick, Gentib, that being said, you made a mistake by attacking me". The young man calmly stated before his hands began firing off hand seals rapidly.

"Water Style: Cucumber Spring"! he yelled out as the remaining water still soaking Tankobaji's clothes suddenly puffed up and expanded into bubble-like spheres that hardened and became more gel-like in consistency instead of being liquid water.

Tankobaji's eyes widened out before he began stumbling forward and back. His mouth opened wide for a wild and loud roar of pain but it was so dry that it did not appear like he could even breathe. Air itself could not make it down his throat, as the humidity in the air was painful for the intensely dried out mouth and palate of the young man.

"Wood Style: Surfing Dragon Jet"! Rosanna yelled out after weaving four hand seals and jumping in the air and clapping with her sandals. A wooden rod emerged from underground catching her and quickly rushing her onwards at Gurker who kept on draining the humidity out of Tankobaji's body with his odd combination technique. Something that did not quite look lethal but was quite an inconvenience and painful enough to restrain one of the most unpredictable and most promising young ninja of Hoshigakure.

Gurker leaned aside, avoiding the wooden rod that kept on extending before rotting away almost instantly, once the Senju girl hopped off of it and threw a jumping roundhouse kick at Gurker's chest. Old and long fingers unexpectedly wrapped around Rosanna's leg before Gyllfa – Gurker's teammate and the old wrestler lady whom Mana met shortly before entering the Forest of Death caught it firmly and swung the Senju around in a spinning toss.

The old lady was surely mighty as Rosanna, underestimating the old lady's strength, flew back far away, crashing through multiple trees and creating a widespread line of destruction. It appeared that the Senju girl got temporarily removed from the battlefield just due to the length of the distance she slid through the ground after landing down and the messy aftereffects of the throw.

"Summoning Jutsu: Murder"! Bennow, Rosanna's teammate, yelled out after biting his thumb and weaving a bunch of hand seals before driving his palm into the ground, summoning a murder of crows with blood red glowing eyes and ivory bright beaks.

The wild murder of birds darted off at the old lady Gyllfa's general direction, right before the wild old crone prepared to fight the onslaught off by giving a chop and a slap for each wild bloody crow, the birds darted up high in a coordinated manner. It looked like the strain of moving so quickly and changing directions so erratically and unnaturally caused significant strain for the bodies of the crows themselves as quite a handful of feathers fell from Murder's, the murder of crows', wings and bodies in their mad ascension.

"Genjutsu: Murder"! Bennow clapped his hands wildly before repositioning them in a hand seal and setting off the genjutsu channeled through the fallen feathers of Murder.

The old lady wriggled uncomfortably as even her experienced eyes were horrified by the sight of the still falling crow feathers turning into rusty knives and piercing her skin, her body feeling numb and paralyzed and completely unable to resist. Meanwhile, the feathers that have already fallen turning into black leech-like parasites that wriggled and bit their way inside her flesh and roamed her body with grotesque looking skin bumps showing their burrowing journey off in the most terrible way possible.

Before Bennow could grin confidently, feeling glad about his successful attack, the granny poofed in a cloud of smoke leaving only a rotten piece of Rosanna Senju's wood pillar she used to move around on previously. It appeared that the old wrestler had replaced herself well before falling victim for the genjutsu, or maybe once it already affected her, either way - she used the safety of the Substitution Jutsu to dispel the genjutsu while the substituted wood provided the transformed illusion that the old woman was caught in the grotesque genjutsu.

As Bennow's crows, collectively known as Murder, the murder of crows, settled way high in the trees. The battlefield appeared to have frozen as each ninja waited for even the slightest twitch of the enemy betray their further maneuvers so that they could exploit that telegraphed attack with their own appropriate response. It appeared that round two of this wild battle would not be held up for too long…


	320. Genin Waterloo

The battle between the last remaining genin teams inside the Forest of Death raged on as each team got entangled in some sort of a bond with another participating team, making them duke it out in a large twelve people scuffle. Gentib, now in his Tankobaji persona, had a fight to pick with his target – Gurker Gliesse, meanwhile Team Shahryar wanted to beat another Hoshigakure ninja forcing them into an uneasy alliance with Gurker's team.

Seeing a chance for the offensive, Daseaut, the member of Sunagakure's Team Shahryar breathed in and out, closing his eyes to calm his body before using his technique. Just like before, when Tankobaji faked him out, the young genin winded up his extended palm as he begun molding large concentrations of chakra. Where before the surrounding ninja were completely oblivious to Daseaut's subtle chakra build-up, once the immensely powerful Wind Release technique of the genin picked up momentum and started creating powerful gusts of wind, powerful enough to blast even the battle-hardened ninja off their feet, the entire battlefield suddenly turned at the distrustful Sunagakure genin.

While the enemy alliance waited for Daseaut to reveal just what nature of jutsu this build-up of chakra was, the Sungakure genin simply gracefully focused force into his lower feet and bounced off the ground, flying head-first and winded up palm aimed at the enemy. The spiraling intense winds that very nearly pulled the surrounding ages old, birthed by powerful chakra, trees out with their entire roots began settling down in a glowing sphere in the boy's hand. The sphere's shape was uneasy, trembling and whirling, too large to suggest optimal and compact containment of the storming chakra within.

"No name"!? Relta Ginn trembled in her boots once she realized that the previously considered completely unremarkable Sunagakure genin pulled off such a technique without uttering its name – suggesting that Daseaut had made his technique so perfected and practiced inside his body and mind that it no longer needed verbal aid to prepare his body for performing the technique.

As the boy flew straight at Tankobaji, the showy and demonic persona pushed his staff against the ground at remarkable force, pushing his entire body out of the way of the rushing genin who decided to attack him with such a powerful yet straightforward technique in such a brutish way.

As Daseaut passed the location where his intended target was supposed to be, the spiraling sphere of rotating chakra faded in the boy's palm as he found himself wide open and completely without cover in the enemy lines. Tankobaji's teammate – Gorm charged at the wide-open Sunagakure genin with a rushing elbow strike. Daseaut just coughed painfully as the powerful strike dug deep in his jaw, lifting the young man's body off the ground even.

After the initial strike connected, Gorm didn't intend to stop with his offensive just there as he continued to attack the weakened young man with continuous chain strikes, with each successive strike, it appeared, the rest that followed were faster and stronger, continuing until no one could have even counted properly how much strikes had Daseaut received.

The genin's teammate, the athletic looking female blacksmith stepped forward to help her teammate before her own other teammate stopped her. After being given a death-wishing ice-cold glare, Alemyat just shook his head.

"He knew that the jutsu was incomplete and that he still needed training to use it. He placed himself in the enemy lines and if you attack like that you'll just further scatter our ranks", Alemyat explained himself.

Finally, the Wind Release ninjutsu user managed to catch one of his opponent's punches successfully. With one of his opponent's arms trapped, Daseaut stepped in to strike with his other hand and, once the other hand was shoved aside, headbutt his opponent, sending Gorm sliding back with the foreheads of both boys bleeding profusely. Granted, it was tough to say just how much of blood on Gorm's forehead was his and how much that of his properly softened up opponent.

After a brief stalemate and angry glares, with most of the genin breathing heavily and racing to regain some of their stamina and breaths, Rosanna finally rejoined the brawl, having leaped out of the trail of destruction she was sent crashing through almost unfazed, just donning some twigs in her newly messed up and flowing wildly dark brown hair.

The stint of silence was killed by Faeras' mad fit of laughter. The genin placed the turned off chainsaw sword on his shoulder as he stared down at Daseaut like the Sand Village genin was a tasty sandwich and Faeras was in danger of starving out.

"That jutsu! It was fucking amazing! My feet started shaking a little bit, show it to me again"! The chainsaw-sword wielder yelled out maniacally as he pushed the sword off his shoulder before yanking hard on a trigger that set the sword off. In a mad dash, not unlike that of Daseaut's before, the mad chainsaw genin charged at the exposed Sunagakure genin.

"Wait"! Bennow tried to stop the brutish teammate of his as he still wanted to properly analyze the opponent's technique and give Rosanna some time to regroup and stand by the line of her team. Now Faeras was just repeating the mistake of overextension, which Daseaut just paid for.

"What's the matter? I thought by now you're used to Faeras just charging out this way"? Rosanna playfully addressed her teammate with a warm glare as Faeras got blown back by Daseaut's teammate – Alemyat moving in at a very odd and seemingly impossible angle of movement, appearing to switch his position and angle mid-air. The Sunagakure genin moved as if he was using some sort of wire or rope, almost like he flowed freely around the trees and didn't lose any speed at all.

Hit by such a powerful jaw-buster, Faeras just stumbled back, swinging his massive chainsaw-sword in a wide circle but Alemyat withdrew as if he saw such an attack coming. Something that confused Bennow even more.

"That team… They're really dangerous", the more composed and calculating member of Hoshigakure's Team Cephei angrily grunted out. "Are you absolutely sure it is our business to face them right now"?

"Huh? Hell yeah! Team Scuti are our Hoshigakure allies, me and Gentib participated in the same drama clubs in the Ninja Academy"! Rosanna objected vibrantly smiling confidently at her friend and teammate.

"That Daseaut guy… The technique he used was so odd, it was powerful beyond measurement but it felt… Incomplete. Like it was used at an early stage, but why would he have used it when it was incomplete and in such a reckless way, surely he has more reliable and complete ways to fight. And then he used the jutsu without its name, how can you both be unskilled enough to use it at such an early stage and skilled enough to use it without its name"? Bennow continued to mutter to himself making Rosanna look at the deceitfully brash Sunagakure genin in completely new eyes. She was rarely the one to overthink her attacks or advances, she just tossed herself head-first at any wall, hoping the toughness of her head would break it.

"Yeah… That Alemyat guy ain't no slouch either", Faeras smiled with a maniacal giggle that sometimes really creeped Rosanna out. As the trio observed Gorm try to use some of his competent taijutsu skills against the enemy, clashing with Alemyat to almost a stalemate of blows and blocks, then Relta providing some ninja tool support, helping her teammate return back to ally lines with a barrage of shuriken for cover, they kept on discussing the oddities of Team Shahryar.

"What do you mean by that"? Rosanna wondered curiously, Faeras was quick to get fired up but this time he was almost… Aroused by the opponent's skill. That rarely happened but when it did, she saw a whole new cold side to her teammate that enjoyed fighting and carnage. The two of them were different in those exact moments of ruthless attacks – where Faeras enjoyed fighting and hurting people, Rosanna just did it because she needed to.

"Did you see that angle at which he charged at me? Almost like a puppet, don't you think"? Faeras laughed out finishing his laughter with a drawn out and immensely creepy moan. "That would mean I don't have to be a good sport, huh? That I can let loose a bit, shred and grind"!

"More so, the quickness of his retreat after the first hit. The first instinct of a successful taijutsu strike is exploiting the self-created opening with follow-up attacks, as we've seen Gorm do. Alemyat withdrew, almost like he saw through your swing, like he had an outsider's perspective from a comfortable vantage point, controlling his body with that superior information input. I second your conclusion, Alemyat is most definitely a puppet body", Bennow nodded, it was not often that he agreed so easily with his teammate which troubled the Hoshigakure strategist somewhat.

Relta's hands quickly went through a collection of hand seals once her teammate successfully withdrew from the clash with Alemyat. Even while the hand seals were still being made, large chunks of rock began rising from underground, shaking the very foundation beneath the battlefield and somewhat evening up the hill on which the teams clashed.

"Earth Style: Rising Stars" she chanted out before gracefully flailing her hands to command the rocks to move onwards, after her signal, it almost appeared like the rocks were launched from an invisible catapult, judging from the trajectory at which they were tossed at the enemy. Relta was not done, however, the girl weaved yet even more hand seals before keeping her hands in the Tiger hand seal position and breathing in deep.

"Fire Style: Star Birth"! The girl wheezed out as she breathed a jet of flames from her mouth, hot enough to set the hurling rocks on fire and scorching them so intensely that they flared up in bright white light.

The combination of the rocks rising in an powerful earthquake shock, as well as the bright light coming out from the combination technique would've provided a sufficient distraction for the enemy to be rooted in place as the falling scorching rocks devastated the battlefield in a massive explosion. Tearing the surrounding trees out and incinerating them as far as fifty meters away and bending most with a powerful shockwave as far as hundred meters away.

After the dust clouds settled down and the downfall of debris calmed up, Relta observed the remains of the enemy lines carefully, hyper-ventilating as she just pulled her most powerful combination ninjutsu out of nowhere, aiming to trick her opponents into underestimating the destructive power of her jutsu and possibly even scoring some early eliminations. Much to her shock, the enemy team continued to stand calmly and stare around. Judging from the reaction of Team Shahryar, namely the absolute loss of their shit, it must've been one of Team Kyanite who protected the six.

"It was me"! The handsome and extravagant clown-like jacket wearing blonde – Trest Bregger of Team Kyanite, Iwagakure smiled in excitement. Upon a more inspecting look the additional detail of a large yet light looking harp, worn around the body of the young man stood out.

"Judging from the awesome power of that jutsu combination, I'd assume you just threw your most powerful jutsu, right from the get-go, huh? Do you know why ninja don't do that"? Trest playfully teased the enemy alliance who just angrily stared at the young man, wondering just what the nature of his abilities was. It would have been easy to just try and attack him, shut him up, but the might of his defenses proved powerful enough to easily overcome Relta's ace jutsu combination and that was too scary of a level of skill to rush at blindly.

Relta did not honor her opponent's confident smile with an answer. The smiling blond ninja musician carelessly stroke his hand through the cords of his harp creating a mellow yet, on a barely audible side of the spectrum, screeching melody. Sharp, piercing pain took over the girl's body as she took a late step back, struggling to keep her body upright as the force of impact forced her to take a pair of steps back. Equally as gruesome as seeing her own blood splash in a wide arc on the messy grass and dirt in front of her was seeing Tankobaji grunt out as similar superhuman force tossed him aside.

A loud clang came from Bennow's side. A handful of shuriken clanged as they hit the ground, getting bounced back from an invisible force right up at the level of the eyes of the young man.

"We don't do it because during the beginning of battle our opponent is at their peak. Their body is free to use the Substitution Jutsu, it's free to use their chakra in millions of ways they have of avoiding your most powerful technique or augmenting their body to survive it – landing one's ace successfully is an art in of itself. It's as complex and beautiful as writing a verse of a song", Trest laughed out seeing the fear and confusion in the eyes of his enemy.

"Careful, his music sends air projectiles at you. Watch closely and you should be able to see them"! Bennow grunted at Relta and Tankobaji who picked themselves back up with the female member of Team Scuti clutching at the wound on her lower chest inflicted by a diagonal cut of her opponent's attack.

"Not only that, but during the beginning of the battle you are completely oblivious to your opponent's abilities. Right from the get-go is the absolute worst timing for using your ultimate jutsu, what you just did was hand me an opportunity of using mine against you". Trest played his tunes again, this time both Tankobaji and Relta managed to see bent airwaves just barely skewering the view in front of them as the airwaves sliced at them at speeds slightly lesser than the speed of sound.

"Wood Style: Birth of Trees"! Rosanna chanted out, slamming her palms together and erecting a healthy and seemingly ages old tree right in front of the injured Hoshigakure girl almost instantly. The shape and consistency was not perfect but the speed at which she needed the tree up demanded something to be sacrificed. Seeing the airwaves cutting down not the impatient and inexperienced genin, but instead a tree made of concentrated chakra with a network of chakra all of its own made Trest tsk with his tongue annoyingly.

"Watch out, you guys, those airwaves detonated those falling blazing rocks and cushioned the explosion all by themselves, didn't they? You were lucky he split the waves amongst you three before, if a concentrated set hit you – you'd really be in trouble"! Rosanna encouraged Team Scuti to be more careful.

"Don't get over-excited or careless", Alemyat spoke up after the scare of witnessing Relta's technique somewhat settled down amongst the Suna-Iwa alliance. "We're being watched".

"What"? Bukhande yelled out, breaking the illusion of composure the alliance had before the information was given.

"I'm not sure who that girl is but my puppet can see her. Her skin is darker than most locals, long raven-black hair, casual t-shirt and moderate battle damage over her body", Alemyat replied.

"Wait, his puppet"? Gurker Gliesse wondered looking at Alemyat suspiciously.

"Well… I didn't want to leak my fighting style so early but, that's right. This body is my real one, the puppet is controlling it from afar. It is conveying me a broader battlefield view, allowing me to make better decisions and see enemy attacks coming with more perspective. I won't go into details how it's done, we don't have the time", Alemyat smiled with a hint of disappointment that he had to leak out the details of the way he fought.

"It's fine, it's not like our team has no more hidden aces up their sleeves, right"? Bukhande happily comforted her teammate.

"Oh, I know her", old lady Gyllfa laughed out as she turned around and waved at the blackness of the forest. "Mana-chan! Please show yourself"!

"What's she doing"? Gorm wondered from afar, seeing his enemy turn around and wave at a random point of leafage, further away in the forest.

It appeared that Tankobaji was not about to wait for his enemy to turn back and decided to use the moment of lowered guard. The young man grunted and roared like a man possessed and gripped the ringed staff firmly in both of his hands, allowing his chakra to leak out and make the steel turn red in heat. Tankobaji placed his palm by the large ring at the top of the staff before winding it back and driving it forward again.

"Tankobaji: Asmodeus"! he roared out in a primal, animalistic voice as the Fire Release chakra stored inside the staff erupted all at one through the large ring upon being forcefully pushed out in a ring of fire that blitzed off at Gyllfa.

From the farther off corner of the forest, a bit to the west to where Gyllfa waved at Mana, a beam of almost invisible Wind Release chakra fired off. It was not a powerful technique, about as powerful as a well tossed kunai with its penetrative power however its Wind Release elemental affinity allowed it to detonate the Asmodeus jutsu halfway, before it reached the confused enemy team.

Not too long later, Mana bounced out of the cover and into the limelight. The magician was confused as to how exactly she was spotted. For her to be found out someone of these six should have been a sensor. She was sure to keep her head down and her body low and hidden. Her intentions were to wait this thing out, just sit tight until her team showed up, as it inevitably would have. After all, was Team Hokage not still short on targets? A place like this would have been a perfect place to locate any wanted people.

"Ah, the service girl? Finally changed your weird attire, I see", Trest laughed out to his palm reminding Mana that she was not too fond of that guy. Still, from her impressions of Gyllfa from meeting her before the exam, the old lady seemed like a pretty nice person.

"What's this? Your reinforcements"? Gorm grunted as Tankobaji growled like a wild animal right by his side, turning at Mana.

"I don't wish to involve myself in this, I dislike fighting, I'm just looking for my friends", Mana explained, trying to get the alliance facing off against Gyllfa's team to take their aggression down a bit.

"You're all alone? Are you sure your friends are still even here"? Bennow wondered as he found a straw to grasp for – Mana's reluctance to join into the battle on the enemy's side.

"I'm… Not", Mana looked down realizing how bad her situation was. Even if she had her target hunted down and could've just left the Forest of Death at any point, hoping that her team would eventually join her in that venture, she still wanted to regroup with her team and help them out if they needed help finishing the exam.

"You're breaking my heart, service girl, come on, help us take that creepy crow guy down and we'll help you out with finding your friends", Trest promised.

"We have reinforcements of our own coming soon, you'll regret joining their side, they're from your village too so they might know more about your team", Relta pleaded with Mana as all of the fighting temporarily stopped just to convince the chaotic factor to join their side.

Mana clenched her frail fists so hard that her hands shook from the tension. Was she truly expected to pick a side here? In a fight she didn't want to even take place in the first place? This meaningless squabble where only a set amount of people needed to take on another set of people but other people got involved needlessly just to ensure the destruction of the opposing side.

"I won't take part in your fight", Mana declared after raising her eyes back up and firmly glaring down at both sides of the conflict. "Not only that, I encourage that you settle it between the people that need to settle things according to the rules so that only the people forced to fight each other would get hurt and no one else. If you won't and will continue this stupid battle I will stop all of you".

Finally, both sides of the conflict were united in one thing – laughter as Faeras, Daseaut and Gurker all laughed their breath all out meanwhile the others either stared at Mana in disbelief or desperately tried to hide their laughter.

Only Mana's firm face testified that she was serious with her resolve to stop this fight, a moment later making those that laughed at her to join the side of people that stared at her in disbelief.

"Care to back that shit up"? Alemyat smiled

A sound of reeling string alerted Mana to an attack coming from behind, the girl dashed aside while turning to the side where she could see both the incoming attack from the back on her left and the other potential threats on the right.

A mannequin-like looking puppet smashed its hand, filled with long claws with multiple joint sections that looked sharp enough to leave deep gashes, matching those of kunai that ninja used except in greater quantities and much leaner, into the ground, missing Mana narrowly. The puppet's eyes had wide black lenses, possibly for recording, or snapping pictures, its right hand also was extended towards Alemyat. The usual glow of chakra present in puppetry strings could've been seen only with intense concentration.

It appeared that the magician now antagonized both alliances with her desire to rationalize their outburst of violence. It was just great, standing in between the unstoppable force and the immovable object was always the position Mana wanted to take in life, as long as the two were planning to destroy one another. These Chuunin Exams were a test of if a ninja was ready for their future, for the higher level and it was a fitting simulation of a life Mana wanted to lead.


	321. If You Can't Rasengan - Power Strike!

As it would not have been too tough to imagine, Mana was afraid. She was just crazy enough not to be absolutely shaking in her sandals, however, facing off against twelve ninja at once, even if it was unclear how many of them wanted to go at her, with only a lesser amount of her chakra still useable was one of the toughest challenges she had faced. In fact, the girl had considered herself so mad that she couldn't accurately tell if it was just a challenge that'd push her abilities and quick thinking to its edges, or if it was outright a suicidal plan.

"What'll be suicidal is when I'll face these odds on the field, placing myself in between actual enemy and ally teams", Mana thought to herself as her eyes carefully observed both of the frozen in place alliances. "If I cannot shoulder all of their hatred and all of their violence and stop it, there's really no use advancing to the next stage", she concluded.

Where the Hoshigakure teams appeared to be somewhat hesitant in attacking Mana, the Sunagakure team showed no such hesitation. Daseaut dragged his left foot backwards, preparing for a powerful dash, or so Mana had read from his movements from just what she had seen. The female blacksmith girl, reminding Mana painfully of Meiko, or rather, a more exotic, western version of her, pulled a scroll out of her large pocket and placed it in front of her, letting it unravel.

"Hey, they can't be serious, attacking that girl all at once"? Relta looked back at Gorm who looked back at his teammate just as confused.

Alemyat's puppet pulled out. As Mana's eyes tried to follow the dangerous bladework of the grotesque mannequin, a strong punch from an attacker from the side tossed her back and rolling off her feet and aside. Her eyes blacked out, screeching noises and child's laughter were all the things Mana heard, just blackness and bright stars popping in her eyes but the girl powered through and pushed herself up on her feet.

Puppeteers should have never been this strong! Mana did not expect a puppeteer with such focus and training in taijutsu – such speed and skill. Puppeteers were supposed to be frail and focused on precise chakra control and crafting their intricate puppets, not powerhouses in their own right. As Alemyat's punches and kicks further pummeled Mana, giving her few chances to properly evade or counter his attacks due to her impaired vision, hearing and dizziness that made it hard to stand, let alone use her acrobatics to evade much of anything her sensei's words ringed in her ears.

"In the field, when facing a puppeteer, always target the puppeteer himself. Puppeteers are usually pretty frail and powerless when hit, also you'll always disable the puppet by beating down the puppeteer and even if you get poisoned by their weapons – most of them carry antidotes on them in case they get some of their own medicine", the mid twenty year old said to a class of children. Spoken by a man who had spent no time at all in the field, a man who had read about Ninja Arts from a book and attained a degree in them by talking about them, drawing from someone else's experience. Mana was not ready…

Alemyat's puppet dashed at Mana from behind, a strong punch made Mana stagger backwards, by the time the magician's eyes fell on the puppet it may have already been too late as its sharp elongated fingers extended to pierce the girl's back. It would have been a lethal wound for a normal human but only a disabling one for a ninja. Mana had no luxury to be disabled, she had no right to cry or complain about how difficult this was – it was a life she had chosen, stand in between both sides of the conflict.

The girl's hand pressed onto the puppet's shoulder as she graciously flipped back and over it, avoiding having an entire arm pierce through her body. Mana's body staggered as even after landing firmly on her feet she struggled to stay that way. Blood trickled down from her cracked forehead onto the left eye, the right eye was beginning to swell up again. Just one attack, she withstood just one attack…

"Power Strike"! She heard a noise come from behind her, another one was coming after Mana. The magician turned back and leaned her body backwards, avoiding a body shattering headbutt coming from Daseaut generating his odd wind sphere technique in his feet and propelling his body off the ground at the enemy at a break-neck pace.

A forceful shove at the ground made Mana roll aside from her exposed laying position on the ground to avoid a large blob of oil from covering her. Bukhande – the third member of Team Shahryar to join in on trying to knock Mana out and get her out of their alliance's way had unsealed a massive tube-shaped cannon mechanism that fired liquid oil-like substance, attempting to soak Mana in it. It would have taken an utter idiot not to know what she intended to do with oil, the magician could not let her land as much as a single drop on her.

A rumbling noise made Mana groan in frustration – Faeras, one of the Hoshigakure genins leaped in to cut her into shreds with his massive chainsaw sword. At least the blasted toy Meiko wanted to gander at so much earlier made so much noise that it would have been impossible to catch the magician unprepared with it. Once Mana picked herself up on her feet, avoiding the massive and sluggish weapon was not outside even what her out of breath and weakened self could pull off.

"Faeras"! Rosanna yelled out angrily, disapproving of her teammate's ecstatic and blood thirsty manner of attack. Mana didn't bother trying to hit him back with a counter attack – she was saving up her strength for her intended ace, it was not like she could leave a dent in his fresh, chakra augmented body with her out of breath puny strikes anyways.

"Haven't you caught on to it yet, Rosanna"? Bennow grunted as he placed his hands together, ordering his summoned murder of crows, aptly named Murder, collectively, to swoop down from their resting positions up above and right at Mana. Once the crows approached close enough they all dispelled with a poof of smoke, surrounding the magician in a blinding cloud that naturally came as an aftereffect of certain jutsu, such as Summoning Jutsu, in this case, when ninja animals were summoned or un-summoned.

"She's the one, Nakotsumi Mana of Team Hokage, one of the Team Hokage which eliminated Laoch, Clarmac and Deargli", Gorm recalled suddenly as he pressed his fists tighter, for a moment purple, foul chakra rose up from inside the boy, cloaking his entire body in it while it emitted a nasty shade of salad green in glowing aura. However, the young man calmed himself, controlling his deadly to himself ability and restraining it for a better time.

"Wood Style: Double Helix"! Rosanna yelled out, smacking her hands together as two wood structures rose out from the ground inside the large cloud, created by Bennow's crows disappearing and aiming to restrain Mana as they coiled in a double helix shape.

All twelve ninja stood with an uneasy feeling and observed the cloud of smoke where their desired distraction was last seen in and where she now stood supposedly restrained. Faeras screamed out maniacally, charging into the cloud of smoke with his roaring chainsaw blade, swiping at the double helix madly.

"Faeras, don't be stupid"! Bennow raised his voice, something he rarely did but he did not want the insane Konoha girl to end up dead in this, that much warranted an unusually energetic reaction from his part. Luckily for his intentions, the chainsaw blade only cut through chakra infused wooden double helix structure and thin air, scattering the cloud of smoke and dust as well in the process.

"She's gone"! Bukhande yelled out in surprise.

"She must've retreated, why would she bring this up on herself to begin with"? Gurker Gliesse pondered as he uneasily looked around, trying to determine if Mana was insane enough to try and sneak up on one of them or if she had actually withdrawn and was reasonable.

"Genjutsu: Sweet Lullaby"! Mana's voice mellowed from an undetermined place inside the dark green of the Forest of Death. As her soft and sweet whistled tune echoed through the battlefield all of the ninja found themselves entranced by the girl's tune and completely frozen in place. Overcome by unearthly pleasure of all of their bodily pleasure centers firing off at once, they quaked and quivered, some even fell writhing on the ground.

"B…B-Rank… Genjutsu"? Bennow groaned, struggling to even breathe or speak as he writhed and clawed at his own skin, trying to cause enough pain to overcome the pleasure, pain was one of the genjutsu cancelling effects after all, as a genjutsu user the crow summoner knew it. Still, the intense pleasure served as a painkiller as well, no matter how much blood the young man drew and how deep his nails burrowed into his own skin, not an ounce of pain was significant enough to overcome the beginning stages of Mana's genjutsu.

As Mana sat tight in her position on a lower branch of one of the trees, having found a chance to slip out once she realized what Bennow was doing with the crows and used the smokescreen to her own gain to slip out, she was beginning to realize the severity of the situation. Sweet Lullaby was an immensely powerful technique – subduing as many people as many of them heard the tune she whistled, sung or hummed. However, pleasure was a curious thing. The human body got used to it very quickly, where in the beginning stages no one was able to move or do much of anything – as time passed they'd be able to weave hand seals, even dispel her illusion of beautiful sights, divine smells and majestic melodies that affected all of those under her genjutsu.

Her choices in this case were slim. She could either jump out of her cover, carefully, without using her chakra augmentations so that she did not disturb the calm and steady genjutsu lock she had everyone in, take everyone out, one by one, or she could have kept still and waited for her illusion to time out. Eventually her genjutsu would end: be it by her chakra draining too low to keep it up, her opponents getting used to its effects and finally managing to break it or a different factor entirely. Either way, the problem was time.

Mana told those teams she would take all of them out if they did not stop their irrationally massive brawl. Do so skillfully and painlessly, as it was her nindo. So far, she had managed to calm it down a bit by engaging everyone and locking them down in a time-out of sorts. If she was to try and actually beat the enemy who hesitated, underestimated and even made fun of her, she had to harm them actively, going out of her way to injure them. Mana did not want that. Therefore, she kept on sitting calmly, holding the lock in place. Despite knowing exactly how she would lock the hostile alliances down, Mana wondered if she truly thought this whole thing through.

Mana kept sitting still, she saw the affected genin easing down before their bodies regained a certain degree of mobility. A few moments later, a number of larger aquatic looking masses on Tankobaji's body imploded into gooey liquid and ran down his body. It did so like it was nothing but a puddle of water. Slowly, one by one, each member of each separate alliance was regaining an amount of their mobility and raising their shaking hand up in a hand seal position. They were preparing to dispel Mana's illusion.

"Dispel"! Bennow grunted, being the first of the entire group to overcome Mana's illusion. While he identified being under a genjutsu long ago, his body only recently regained enough freedom of movement and control to actually fight back. His prowess of illusionary techniques must have helped him out to be the first one.

Once the genin stood up, he bit his thumb and went through hand seals. Mana knew what the collection of hand seals was – it was the Summoning Jutsu. She may have engaged the escaped genin but it would have been detrimental if not foolish to do so. She was worn out by all the previous fights and struggles to escape captivity. Even once she started out back then, she had only about half of her total chakra level brought back by the pills.

"Seppuka, find her"! Bennow commanded ordering a much larger crow with an exotic black, purple and silver colored feather pattern. Whereas Murder was a collection of relatively normal looking, if a little ravenous, crows, Suicide was more akin to what a partner ninja would have summoned looked like.

"It was pretty smart of you to lock us in a genjutsu together. Overcoming a high-ranking illusion requires a high input of chakra, higher, without a doubt, than the cost you had to pay for the technique. Seeing how you want to stop us from fighting this way, I'll assume tiring us out by forcing us all to dispel your illusion is how you plan on achieving that"? Bennow confidently theorized, calmly observing Suicide swoop up in the air.

Mana wondered just how would the large bird go about finding her. After all – Mana hid pretty well. Needless to say, the bird was far too large for a head-on assault as it struggled to even maneuver around the thicker layers of upper Forest of Death trees. It was then that the large bird cawed harshly, while the sound was blood chilling, it did not disturb the concentration needed for Mana to maintain the genjutsu.

Then the oddest thing appeared to happen, it was almost like the crow's intense caw forced it to shed a couple of handfuls of feathers, sending them like sharp projectiles, piercing random angles and locations all around it like large rods falling from high up. Still, neither of them appeared to come even close to Mana, could to fire away randomly have been his plan? Why would he be so reckless with his approach?

"Genjutsu: Suicide Sphere"! Bennow chanted, slamming his palms together as he activated the illusion.

"The feathers are a medium"! Mana realized as she swiftly closed her eyes. Luckily enough, she managed to do so before the genjutsu initiated, or so it seemed at that moment. The magician decided to stay mindful of her environment in order to identify any potential changes that'd betray an illusion.

"Wood Style: Hand Tool Manipulation"! A feminine voice ringed in Mana's ears realizing that Bennow had counter on the magician identifying a genjutsu medium in time and closing her eyes – in fact he wanted that very thing to allow his teammate to attack when her guard was down.

It was too late. Sharp pain made Mana scream out in pain and lose concentration of her illusion as she plummeted down from the top of the tree she sat on. A brief glance at her shoulder allowed her to identify a wooden kunai, made entirely of Wood Release chakra and therefore brimming with more chakra and hardness than a regular steel kunai having lodged deep inside. The Senju girl probably aimed to trap Mana by placing the wooden knife in her artery – a trick she herself once used, long ago. Luckily enough, she missed due to having a very unclear idea of where the magician was exactly. It was merely a flesh wound at that moment.

The real trouble was that the hostile alliances all got released from the genjutsu at the same time. Whereas Rosanna had to not only use chakra to break out of Mana's illusion but also her own Wood Style technique, which had to be pricy, the rest of them got released by Mana simply failing to maintain the high ranked illusion.

A loud and powerful booming blast came from the direction opposite to Rosanna, just as Mana was still in mid-air, having hit another branch very painfully and bounced off of it, continuing her fall. The magician remembered that noise – it was that "Power Strike" technique – that intensely powerful sphere of chakra.

As Mana fixed her falling position to prepare to possibly intercept the incoming enemy, or at least try to control where she would be hit, she saw more and more of those spheres form in the young man's palms and down on his feet. The boy used the first two spheres to propel himself at break-neck speeds right at Mana, to waste no time or give her no breathing space to evade, where now he formed four more of those incomplete spheres in both his palms and feet.

Mana realized painfully that this was it. There was only one thing she could have done – the Substitution jutsu but no object would have come in mind, not only that but she wasted too much time on the very thought of if violating her shaking principle of using someone else's techniques. Bit by bit, the racing Sunagakure genin was coming closer, there was nothing Mana could have done but brace for impact and hope not to die...

"It was a noble effort", she thought.

A booming howl absolutely overwhelmed Mana's ears, shortly rendering her completely deaf. Something was wrong, she wasn't in pain, besides her bleeding ears that gave up before giving Mana any trouble for being in pain. The "Power Strike" barrage never hit Mana. As the rotating expanded storm of Wind Release chakra cleared out somewhat, a brutal yet, in a way, absolutely awesome sight of a blonde wearing a long cape, with six mechanical puppet arms punching wildly at each continuously forming "Power Strike" her opponent threw at her met the magician's eyes.

"I see it now…" Gurker smiled, "He uses an incomplete early version of this high ranking jutsu because of the way he uses it. He does not just form one sphere, running at the enemy with it. He attacks forming entire dozens of them, using them and their unstable force naturally to complement his fighting style. It's why he needs not utter the jutsu's name until he uses it at a certain later stage"! The young man yelled out for the sole reason of feeling absolutely at awe at two genin, the cute six-puppet-armed brawler and the Sunagakure Wind Release sphere ninjutsu user continuously wailing at each other with everything they had until a blowback of exploding chakra from a more concentrated stage of "Power Strike" tossed both genin apart from one another.

Mana observed the resolution of the clash between the mysterious six-armed genin and Daseaut from the comfort of tough yet feminine arms and a familiar goofy face. That of Wakizashi Meiko who had managed to catch Mana successfully.

"You're such a meanie! Ruined my hands fending off that technique of yours"! The blonde complained, whining out loudly and slightly dipping the cool impression Mana had made of her.

"Calm down, Nanaba, your opponent, in his desperation to blow you away, wasted a lot of chakra. Work with that for now", a voicebox enhanced, almost cybernetic voice calmly exclaimed as yet more genin joined in on the battlefield. Amongst them was the mechanical armored genin, who, as Mana assumed, was the one to speak with a voicebox, Kiyomi and a very unexpected face to see.

"Sugemi", Mana muttered before Meiko carefully put her down and helped her stand up, before reaching to yank at the wooden kunai stuck in the magician's shoulder.

"Please don't, it'll be better if we remove it once we can properly treat it", Mana asked after moaning in pain from her teammate's unexpected initiative at yanking the thing out.

Sugemi's face did not look happy. While Mana felt glad that her friend had arrived with Team Hokage and that the team finally regrouped and joined in together, something told her that only more fighting would come out of her attempt to minimize the pain and suffering from all this fighting.


	322. What Stays Left Behind

Sugemi stared angrily at the entire gathering of teams, for reasons known only to him, his eyes changed from being full of cold indifference and calculative wary to complete disgust and a clearly translated desire to punch someone when the Nara's eyes wandered at the side where Team Scuti stood.

"What the fuck was that all about"? Sugemi coldly asked, staring angrily at the Hoshigakure alliance's direction, his eyes lingered on the ghastly looking Tankobaji the longest. The Nara knew better than to let his eyes slip away from this more unstable persona of Gentib for too long. "Mana shows up and suddenly you betray our alliance, is that all that it was worth to you guys, you knew fairly well that I was looking for her before we parted ways".

Relta stared at the Nara with guilt in her eyes. While she hesitated to engage Mana directly, she did nothing to stop those of her alliance that did attack her.

"Don't even bother denying it, Daidao saw everything with his goggles. You bunch taking Mana on, don't go on bullshitting me that you didn't know who she was either", Sugemi growled through his teeth.

"It is true, my googles can lock onto heat signatures, within visible distance, and even see in the dark, they are indeed handy", Daidao noted before tapping the dark tinted goggles of his with his finger.

Tankobaji reached to his chest, Sugemi's eyes followed Gentib's movements very carefully, observing the Hoshigakure genin pull hard on his attire before pulling it all off at once. A whirling cover of flames surrounded the young genin, just a lightshow from a chakra seal placed in his inner pocket. Once the lightshow concluded, Tankobaji was no more and Gentib stood in his usual clothes, his facepaint smeared all over, but otherwise his Idol persona had returned.

"It's true, we didn't do anything to protect Mana, we're sorry. It was a tough call to make – betray our alliance with Team Cephei, who wanted to avenge another team of Hoshigakure, or our alliance with you. Don't take this out on my team, they didn't have their leader amongst their ranks so I couldn't make the call", Gentib replied firmly, showing some genuine regret over not behaving in a very ally-like manner as far as Team Hawthorn was concerned, yet still determined and strong. There was no sign of breaking or subordination between the firm clashing stares of Sugemi and Gentib.

"What were you even doing right here"? Kiyomi asked of Mana.

"I was looking for you guys, I wanted to find you before this fight broke out, I needed to tell you something but… They met further away from the watchtower than I thought. I tried to circle them and just keep on moving but they spotted me", Mana explained.

"And then you took on twelve ninja at once while still recovering from being completely knocked out recently"? Meiko chuckled, teasing Mana.

"It was a question I needed answered. They were fighting in such an impractical manner. Dragging along teams and friends, risking their participations needlessly, I felt like I had to do something", Mana shrugged guiltily.

"Against twelve ninja"? Nanaba smiled at Mana from further away, the girl hid her busted up puppet arms inside her colorful wool and leather cape before walking up to the magician. "You could barely even compete against any single one of them, maybe against two of them if you're lucky. You lucked out they didn't know how to cooperate and attacked you one at a time so that they didn't get in each other's way".

"It doesn't matter how powerful they are", Mana objected, "It was a miscalculation on my part. I am taking this exam seriously because I know what it represents. Everything went just as I planned it to go but then…"

"You froze and couldn't finish what you started, as usual"? Sugemi turned around to squint shamefully at Mana.

"It's not that. I've long since moved past that fear of all violence. It's just that I planned to knock everyone out and… I only considered what elimination stands for outside of this simulation once everyone was already in the genjutsu", Mana bitterly grunted.

"Oh? You eliminating them would've meant you killed them in this mental simulation of real life you ran in your head… Still, exploiting the collective underestimation of twelve people, impressive", Daidao commended the magician before turning away in shame after seeing the eyes that looked his way, after Mana looked back at him.

"Look, you can join in as the third side here, try to take me out. This is entirely on me". Gentib spoke up again.

"Fair enough", Sugemi breathed out before his body blurred as his immensely fast movements made it nearly impossible for a less skilled ninja even to realize he had moved from his place.

"Idol: Crescent Line!" Gentib chanted out, smacking his palms together before blowing out a breath of air from his lungs, infused with chakra, as an invisible yet powerful gust of wind blasted at Sugemi's upper body, sending the young man down and rolling backwards. The Nara of Konoha bounced back on his feet, pushing his entire body off the ground and pressed his hands to his sides, extending his feet to the sides for a more widespread and balanced stance before Daidao's voice broke him out of the technique he was about to use.

"Enough, neither of our teams has a further need to involve ourselves in this pity grievance. Team Scuti betrayed our trust – leaving them to cope by themselves in here is more than a fitting consequence to those actions", the mechanical Jinchuuriki spoke.

"I guess", Sugemi placed his hands inside his pockets as his flowing in the air black hair settled down after the immensely focused chakra exiting his body at the moments leading up to him using his technique ceased. "Let's move then" he uttered before dashing away.

The rest of Team Hawthorn and Team Hokage followed, leaving the two sides to finish battling it out by themselves.

* * *

"So, Mana, what was that thing you wanted to tell us"? Kiyomi wondered after turning at the magician as the two teams advanced towards the northern gate – the exit from the Forest of Death.

"Oh… I think you're about to find out. I met the team that's after you – Team Nimbus", Mana explained. "They kind of lured me into thinking they'd be in the big fight back there. They must've thought that I'd tell you and you'd chicken out of it – rushing for the northern gate immediately. That's likely where they're waiting for you right now".

"Huh? Me, chicken out? Are they strong"? Kiyomi wondered.

"Well… Tough to say. I've only seen them messing around. One of them was a six-armed powerhouse – Spyder-Wolf, he looked pretty strong and keeping up with six arms may be troublesome up close".

"Hmph, no one's original these days", Nanaba turned her nose up like a snobby young lady.

"No, I think his four extra arms are actually natural, maybe a trait of his clan. It didn't appear like he built them", Mana shook her head, "The other two are siblings, the brother – Jon-D wields a large sword, looks like a fancy, oversized kitchen knife, honestly. It looked pretty well made and whoever made it used high-tier materials, as expected from Kumogakure blades. His sister looked more of a fast and stabbing type, she had two shorter blades. It is quite possible her fighting style is similar to Hisako-senpai", Mana noted.

"I always hated that stuck up, potty-mouthed bitch, now I'm kind of excited to take those guys on"! Kiyomi punched her palm with an ecstatic smile.

"I'd like a look at that sword", Meiko grinned rubbing the back of her head innocently. "Kumogakure swordsmanship is possibly the best in the world".

"Only because their masters of the past have been taught by the samurai of the Iron Country. No ninja will ever defeat a samurai in a fight", Daidao noted.

"I wouldn't recommend getting involved in this, Mana", Sugemi grumped out.

"Huh? It doesn't look like we'll have a choice, it's most likely they'll literally be blocking the path to the gate", the magician replied.

"Well, we'll be moving on ahead. I just chose to involve myself because I heard about your misfortune and wanted to see it by myself. I still consider you a teammate, Mana, but Daidao had a point back there – this isn't our fight", the Nara noted.

"They don't write manga about heroes that run away from a fight. Also, you'll look really bad if all you do after coming back is get yourself knocked flat by that Hoshigakure weirdo. You need a good showing to improve your feats". Mana teased her old friend.

"Letting you learn the manga tropes was the worst mistake I've ever made", Sugemi sighed. "Fine, I went so far to ensure your safety, it'd be counterproductive to let you get flattened by some asshole with six arms".

Mana knew that Sugemi was way past that whole obsession from his youth and all those silly manga tropes. What he was truly looking inside was a justification to help. He wanted to help Mana but he did not want to cross his team or what he thought was reasonable to do. It was one of those moments where the boy's principles and his heart clashed.

"Ugh, if only I still had my arms… I'd show that rip-off too"! Nanaba steamed in anger and regret of events of recent past.

"You know, you don't really need your arms to fight, Nana-chan", Daidao noted ironically, "You're the Seven-Tails Jinchuuriki, after all".

"Yeah, but if I fight him without my arms it kind of won't be the same. At that point I'm just picking on him for no reason. It should be Battle of Arms or no battle at all, I think Mana's philosophy is rubbing off on me, kind of", the cheerful blonde giggled before cocking her full of air head to the sides to some tune she had stuck in her head.

"That's not even close to my nindo". Mana sighed in disappointment.

* * *

After a while of casual paced dashing, interrupted once in a while by wild explosions and shockwaves emanating from behind, coming from the massive scuffle left behind, Meiko slowed down her pace of excited dashing to match up to Mana's pace. The magician was moving a bit slower than the rest of the Konoha alliance as she was tired, wounded and a bit on the down side.

"Is everything OK"? Meiko wondered. "You don't look excited about the fight at all, I guess that's pretty much you, but you don't look too excited about moving on either".

"It's just… I don't think I'm ready anymore. I've tested myself again and again in this exam and failed. That last fight was just how it'll be in the real world – just me in between two fighting sides and I failed to find the right answer, to calm them down and be rational. I'm thinking about quitting the exam, I was so obsessed with survival in it, so unwilling to be thrown out of Team Hokage if I lost that… I didn't think about what's coming up next. I need to grow even more still, I need to find an answer", Mana vented out uneasily.

"Yeah, you've got a massive weakness and now they'll all know it – when you're forced into a situation where the only way out is to kill someone – you fold. I've got weaknesses like that too: I've had them rubbed right up here recently", Meiko tried comforting her friend by pushing her index finger all the way up her cheek while doing so, gesturing at her face. "Everyone's got weaknesses, everyone's a different person. There may not even be a right answer to what you're looking for, but if our journey to find the Box of Ultimate Bliss taught me something it's that the treasure often blows – the journey is the toughest training. You didn't quit that quest halfway, did you? Why give up now"?

"I… I lost the wand. The one you made for me, out of Shimo's sword… I lost it", Mana cried out, grinding her teeth to resist breaking into tears.

"I mean… Yeah, you were knocked out for a long time… It's probably still around here somewhere, of course you've lost it. I've scattered most of my arsenal all over this place", Meiko laughed out.

"None of those weapons are gifts from your best friend crafted out of the last remaining memento of your old friend", Mana muttered.

"You're really an idiot, Mana", Sugemi butt in, he did not turn his head or slow down when he spoke up, the Nara just kept looking on ahead as his feet worked like a well-oiled machine. "Do you think Shimo would give a shit about his stupid sword? Do you think Meiko would give a crap about that stupid wand"?

"I mean… It was a pretty neat wand…" Meiko shrugged with a bitter face. "It's a bit of a waste to just lose it"

Mana could not help but crack a grin, seeing Meiko's face just shift and be molded by her conflicted emotions as her passion for crafting clashed with her friendly feelings towards Mana.

"You idiot, I mean who do you think Shimo would rather sacrifice – his stupid memento or his living friend. He's an idiot who lived his life trying to make women feel better, you were different though, you wasn't just a faceless woman he had an obligation to be courteous with, you were his comrade, his equal, if not his superior".

"Yeah, he kind of moved along with that whole "serve women" stuff, he just wanted to see Mana live up to her dream in the end. He was a man without a nindo, someone who was still discovering himself and Mana was someone who knew exactly who she was", Meiko shrugged recalling Shimo and all the fights Mana had along the way with the Yuki swordsman and the strong bond of friendship that even death couldn't sever, one that tied them together regardless of anything.

"That's right, he admired Mana for having one thing he never had – a sense of purpose, sense of self. People live too short in this world of ours to know who they are or what they're dying for, Shimo must've wanted to become someone who knew exactly why he lived, what he's leaving behind. He didn't want to be meaningless…" Sugemi just stopped talking for a while as it clearly was difficult for him to go on. Mana had to admit that she was barely holding it together as well.

"In a way, he wanted the same thing as I did – to change the world", Mana looked on ahead, lifting her teared up face and letting her messy raven-dark hair move aside and clear the murky and gloomy line of sight for her.

"Yeah, where you want to make people's lives matter, make everyone realize that there aren't any worthless people, Shimo wanted people to discover themselves, like he never had a chance to do", Sugemi nodded.

The party of teams continued to dash onwards in silence.

* * *

After the northern gate of Forest of Death came closer and closer – the Konoha alliance stopped in their tracks right at the last stretches before the gate. Right in front of them, sitting on a large stone was a six-armed brute, wearing a pelt of a white canine all the way to the upper half of his face. That gave the man almost a bestial and primal look, dehumanizing him. To the right of the resting Kumogakure ninja stood Jon-D and Jean-D, Team Nimbus was truly waiting for Team Hokage right by the gate to the exit.

"Yamanaka Kiyomi, we've got unfinished business", Spyder-Wolf grinned with a full mouth of white teeth that matched the row of massive fangs covering up the upper half of his face, as the bloodshot eyes of the young man stared at Kiyomi from the pierced out eye holes of the animal that once wore this large pelt as their natural suit.

"Sorry, I'm more interested in your female friend here", Kiyomi firmly shut the six-arms down by nodding with her chin at the short sword wielding, light armored Kumogakure kunoichi. "She brings up memories of someone I really don't like, a face that's very punchable".

"Huh, it appears we've got ourselves a handicapped bloodfest, six on three"! Spyder-Wolf gave every single member of Team Hawthorn and Team Hokage a mean glare.

"Well, good luck with that, Spoods", Jon-D and his sister waved the six-armed giant farewells before turning around and quickly running through the gate and onto the other side of the Forest of Death, leaving both the Konoha alliance and Spyder-Wolf confused on their feet.

"Ummm… Hey…" Spyder-Wolf just exclaimed but no allied ears were present to hear his ill worded complaint.

Mana started to boldly walk towards the six-armed genin, her boldness appeared to confuse him even more than the sudden departure of his teammates.

"Wait, what are you doing"? He muttered.

"This is pointless, you're not beating all of us, move aside", Mana calmly exclaimed.

A blindingly fast cross from his top left arm, diving down, flew at Mana's direction, the magician leaped back only to be surrounded by punches and fists from all sides. She bobbed and weaved with the best of her ability, her unique martial arts style worked its magic. The magician decided to finish it quickly with a strong tap at his elbow – dislocating it and breaking the entire arm.

Unexpected blazing pain blinded Mana's vision - something went wrong. As she whited out from a sudden onslaught of pain, still not very sure about where it came from, the magician weaved backwards before deciding to break up and rolled back. Spyder-Wolf's arm raced after her, reaching in to grab her fleeting foot and smash her to the gate, a well-aimed kunai stopped the advance of his hand mid-way. The magician didn't see who threw it, but she was thankful for the neat timing and aim of her ally.

With her arm broken and dangling pathetically Mana jumped back to the party line. The fighting style of this man was unpredictable and completely unlike anything the magician had seen before. She was used to dodging, countering and disabling people with two arms, she performed her dodges and the counter pitch perfect but the overabundance of arms present on that large lump of flesh, muscle and stolen fur broke her arm with a single lightning fast jab at the side of her elbow. Maybe he'd have not been so successful had Mana's chakra levels been full and more consistent but it wasn't like he threw his most powerful punch either.

"Everyone stays in their place, I have six-arms on me and each one of them is worth three of you weaklings at the very least. That makes all of you losers completely outnumbered"! Spyder-Wolf laughed out like a berserker standing in between a bridge passage to his castle and an entire army.

One thing was for sure – the Kumogakure brute wasn't about to make leaving the Forest of Death easy…


	323. Six Arms Are Better Than Four

"This is absurd, Sir, grant us passage"! Daidao exclaimed in annoyance, "Team Hawthorn has nothing to do with your hunt for Yamanaka Kiyomi".

Spyder-Wolf laughed out sincerely, even occupying two of his arms to wrap them around his aching belly to alleviate the pressure from inside.

"How dumb do you think I am"? The six-armed genin wondered, "You're just gonna pull a Substitution switch once I let one of you through. No, I'll body all of you right here, or as many as I can before one of you weaklings lands a good hit in that keeps me down".

What Spyder-Wolf referenced was indeed possible, with two willing cooperators, Substitution switch trick would have allowed one ninja to switch positions with another, as long as both of them were in on it and neither one of them resisted the switch, complicating the Substitution.

"Are you OK, Mana"? Meiko looked at Mana's broken arm that had a gruesome looking bump sticking out, yet not yet through the skin, somehow managing to contain the fracture.

"I'll manage, I doubt I'll be of much help though", she lamented. "That six-armed fighting style is really tough to keep up with. With so much of my evasive moves being pure muscle memory, having none of his moves recorded and a right profile drawn – I'd stand no chance against him anyways".

Meiko nodded before raising her hand up, like she was answering in class and stepping up in front of the duo of teams. She raised her fist up confidently with a grin at Wolf's general direction. "Fine then, I'll take you on", she declared confidently.

"Didn't you want a piece of him, Nana-chan"? Daidao wondered curiously looking at his teammate.

"Are you crazy? Without my arms? Such a battle would be ridiculous, the only condition I agree to fight with is that it's a six on six armed bout"! The airheaded blonde firmly stated.

"This is my responsibility too", Kiyomi sighed before stepping up besides Meiko.

"No, you're still tired and hurt after fighting Othello, sit this one out and let me handle it", Meiko objected.

"You're also not at your strongest, those wounds from the underground battle are still holding you back, your arsenal is almost emptied and your chakra can't be too high up", Kiyomi snapped back at her teammate.

"Just play Rock-Paper-Scissors or something", Spyder scratched his head, slightly tipping the fur that he wore on top of his massive well-trained body.

"Stay out of this"! Kiyomi and Meiko both yelled at the Team Nimbus member.

"Fine, fine… Just trying to help, I've got no problem taking all of you on, honestly", Spyder-Wolf shook his palms defensively in front of his chest, trying to pacify the heating up situation.

"I must say that the redhead is right", Sugemi concluded as he stepped forward, cracking his knuckles. "You're a different style of combatant, you can't take much of a beating and you've already taken more of it than anyone would bet on you taking. Sit this one out", the Nara advised.

"Awww yeah, let's do this"! Meiko's fist shot up in the sky as the blacksmith cheered on the Nara, feeling excited to measure her strength against Mana's previous taijutsu using teammate. Showing this guy up meant a great deal to Meiko and validating her own inner worth on the team.

"So are you guys finished fighting"? Spyder shrugged in confusion.

"Yeah, me and Meiko will be your opponents", Sugemi nodded before taking an offensive and quite open taijutsu stance. The time she spent studying defence against taijutsu suggested to Mana that Sugemi was using a very aggressive and offensive style, focusing on overwhelming the opponent with strikes and giving them no chance to attack instead of returning his hands for blocking after his attack concluded.

Mana wanted to tell her friend it was madness to attack Spyder-Wolf with such a style. There was no way that Sugemi would've overwhelmed someone with three times the number of arms, all of which moved precisely and lightning fast, striking with mountain shattering strength. The hit that broke Mana's arm was a desperation strike, it was not a planned strike or one with significant force behind it and yet it still broke her arm. The magician feared to even thing about how powerful a focused and intentional strike would be…

Sugemi's body fired off the ground like a kunai launched from a dispenser, bouncing off of it like he was using a spring, and winding up for a straight forward strike. As expected, Sugemi's straightforward elbow strike to Spyder-Wolf's blindspot, right on the nose where fur covered up part of the genin's vision was still blocked with a single arm, where Sugemi's other arm was pushed away while the third one threw a wicked strike to the Nara's own face, sending the genin flying back and sliding on the ground.

Meiko's body blurred and moved in behind Spyder-Wolf at that moment. Spyder's arm shot up in a right angle block to stop a predicted strike from behind, it appeared like his arms covered all blindspots and that he always had spares to use. However, Meiko didn't fall for the block, instead using her leg to hook and wrap around the right angled block, pushing her body around with a straight push kick right at Spyder-Wolf's face.

Spyder-Wolf appeared to flinch for a moment but then his face colored in a sadistic grin as all six of his arms prepared to grab Meiko in a lethal hold and tear limb from limb off her body. A metallic reeling sound signaled Meiko's plan to escape, Wolf's eyes wandered upwards seeing a feint metallic piece of string attached to a branch above.

"String Reeling Jutsu"! Meiko yelled out as she used the piece of string to zip out of the dangerous situation. As her body moved away in a blink of an eye, Sugemi was revealed to have moved in right behind her, using her body as a cover for his movements, coordinating his attack with Meiko so that once the girl's body moved away he could immediately throw in his hit without giving the enemy time to deal with it.

"Shadow Tendril Jutsu"! Sugemi yelled out as he smacked his palms together, a long black tendril moved out from his pocket, striking Wolf straight in his face, but dissolving upon impact.

"You fool, how powerful do you think your shadows will be in this limited lighting"!? Wolf taunted his enemy before Sugemi's punch right to his nose silenced him. The staggering brute slid back a good fifty meters before settling down on his knee and then picking himself back up on his feet. "So your ninjutsu was just a smokescreen to flinch me and cover up my eyes…" he commended his opponent.

"He's right though", Sugemi gritted through his teeth, "My shadows won't be too effective in this gloom, hey, Daidao"!

The mechanical genin pulled out his green glowing lantern and flung it at Sugemi, who quickly caught it and flung it at Meiko. The redhead quickly wrapped a couple of loops of string around the object of illumination and left it hanging there.

"Wait, didn't you beat a giant snake before in the Forest of Death, back when Tanshu-sensei brought us here"? Mana wondered loudly.

"Back then I was too stupid to realize that gloom weakened my shadows and that they were completely inefficient in total darkness", Sugemi grinned. "I beat it without realizing that my jutsu were being weakened".

Sugemi's face looked strangely troubled, it did not look like he was that excited to continue his battle further after this first exchange of blows. It must have been how inefficient his strikes were, his full force blows were casually being caught and shrugged aside, meanwhile every blow that Spyder-Wolf threw his way greatly affected the young Nara. He realized it by the time the first exchange finished.

Pulling two of her kunai out of her ninja pouch, Meiko prepared to coordinate her movements with Sugemi. The two have not worked together in this way, their combined attacks were slower than they could have been, they were still two separate well-trained ninja trying to work together, not one combined unit. Both she and Sugemi still observed each other's movements and took some time to adapt and coordinate a response.

With a diving kick Meiko leaped into battle, bravely, having in mind how she clearly saw Sugemi being overpowered by their opponent relatively easily. Wolf stepped aside allowing Meiko's foot to smash into the ground, sending a powerful quake throughout the surrounding area even while the blacksmith did her best to contain the force of impact. Wolf's fists quickly countered, a hook to the chin made Meiko flip in mid-air and drop her two kunai blades, before a double axe handle strike smashed her back into the ground.

Sugemi's rushing strike got caught by the free arms of Spyder, right before the Nara leaned down to sweep at Wolf's legs, causing him a great deal of pain as his sweep hit the side of his knee caps. With a powerful combination of chain strikes from his two middle arms, Sugemi got sent flying backwards. Once Wolf recovered from the pain and tried stomping and pummeling Meiko, he realized that she no longer laid by his feet and had used the small window of opportunity to escape.

"This isn't working", Meiko huffed out after the two genin picked themselves up and grouped together.

"No, it isn't. Those darned hands of his, the upper pair covers up any aerial attacks or attempts to vault over him, his central arms are covering his front while the lower two cover his lower body, rolling around him is also impossible. We're not fast enough to dash behind him without him intercepting us… Not yet", Sugemi grinned placing his arms beside him and tensing up his entire body.

"First Gate: Gate of Opening, OPEN"! He chanted out, focusing his chakra into removing the restraints on his body, allowing him to utilize the entire inner physical prowess that his body can potentially muster up. He did not necessarily need to telegraph opening the First Gate that clearly, he could have done it much faster, almost instantly in battle. However, he wanted to do it right, he could not afford make any mistakes right by northern gate.

Confidently, Sugemi leaned forward, preparing for an attack. Spyder stumbled back, hesitant to believe that after two whole fruitless exchanges his opponent would still attempt a close range attack. He was not prepared for Sugemi's awakening, however. The Nara's body darted forward in a single flash, like an arrow of light with a powerful blow that completely blinded the man and made his face bend uncomfortably inwards, tearing apart the head piece of the white fur that Wolf wore, also donning it crimson with the genin's own blood from his busted nose, lips and a cracked eyebrow.

"Amazing"! Kiyomi shouted out, she may have seen Sugemi under this technique's effect during her "wedding", however at that time the Nara didn't bother himself with correctly performing the opening of his gates so she may not have been aware of just what exactly it was that the Yamanaka saw.

"Right"? Nanaba freaked out with an excited smile.

Only Daidao and Mana were more composed about seeing Sugemi pull out the First Gate. It was tough to say exactly what Daidao was thinking as his face was concealed completely by the gas mask-like mask that covered his face but his gestures were more reminiscent of those of a troubled young man than those of an excited one.

"The First Gate", Mana muttered catching Kiyomi's attention, right when Sugemi's mad chain barrage of punches caught Wolf completely unprotected and continued to bombard the genin's face and his well-trained body with crushing power strikes that came off like speed strikes as well. From the sight and sound of the attacks it seemed like every one of hundreds and thousands of strikes delivered crushed and grinded Wolf's bones to dust and gore.

"It's said that at any given time a person is only capable of utilizing their muscles to 20% efficiency and the First Gate removes this natural limitation. It isn't a difficult technique to learn either but… It takes a special kind of person to use it", Mana spoke with a hint of worry in her voice, not only did this technique leave a sour taste in her mouth, knowing what it was like exactly, but the memories it brought with it weren't pleasant either.

"So just using the First Gate multiplies your power and speed five times"?! Kiyomi wondered, surprised by the fact that such a technique existed, but also that it was not taught more commonly. One would have thought that a relatively easy technique to learn like this with such mighty effects would have been taught in the Academy.

"That's right. But the human body isn't built to function at 100% for a long period of time. 100% can be willed into, without using the First Gate for a momentary boost of strength and speed, like when a person is enraged or using their will to empower their body to its limits. But the body imposes such limits on itself for a reason, just reaching 100% by itself fully exhausts the body, using it for more than a heartbeat approaches the territory of burning more energy than the body has. Muscles and tissue begin to break down and tear apart. It's not a technique that should be used for long", Mana looked away from the sight of Sugemi trying to hit his opponent with an overhead kick, focused and empowered with so much strength it may have pretty much served as a guillotine and broke his opponent's neck.

"That's not what worries me", Daidao rubbed the rubber-like material of his mask, still keeping his eyes at Sugemi's failed effort to finish the battle quick as Wolf managed to maneuver around the kick and with three powerful double axe handle strikes send Sugemi flying. The Nara groaned out in inhuman screams of pain as his tired and beginning to tear muscles were hit by the powerful strikes he'd have only barely withstood in his unopened state. By easing the tension of the gates, Sugemi eased his tension and used a thick branch as a vault pole so he could land by Meiko's side.

"I never really encouraged for Sugemi to use the First Gate, not in this stage. The problem is the damage it can potentially do to Sugemi's body so early on. No team wants traumas this early in the exam. We don't know when or how the next exam will take place, if he used this technique to break his body he'd be useless in the next exam in case it takes place right after this one". As Daidao explained his worries, Sugemi, brimming with a glowing, transparent glow of chakra breathed out easier and reduced the shining aura brimming from him even more.

"So that's the mastery over the First Gate he had acquired", Mana smiled seeing Sugemi restrain the explosive power of the First Gate.

"Huh? What did he do"? Kiyomi scratched her head in confusion, "Is the awakening already over"?

"No, when we were kids, Sugemi constantly strained his body past his breaking point with this technique, just with the First Gate. I can see now that he obtained perfect control over his First Gate, right now he isn't using 100% of his muscle control, he's using 75%, reducing the output to 25% whenever he draws back from his opponent for catching his breath". Mana admired the clever use of such a brutish technique, seeing it for the first time she had an impression that such a jutsu should've been labeled as a forbidden technique – a kinjutsu, however seeing her friend using it without losing his cool made her reconsider.

Just like she once reconsidered on the thought that martial arts being nothing more than the arts for suffering and murder.

"Did you see my moves, ready to join in"? Sugemi spoke to Meiko who just nodded before taking a different offensive fighting stance, one favoring her left side of the body instead of her usual right.

"That's a pretty neat jutsu", Spyder-Wolf laughed out before cracking three of his knuckles in the other three palms and taking an offensive stance himself, "I'd say I'm just about done getting assaulted by you two, I've had just about enough of this warm up fight, I've got four more people to beat up after you two, after all"! Spyder-Wolf laughed out before rushing at Meiko and Sugemi.

"Six-Armed Assault"! Spyder shouted out as the muscles on his six arms tensed up and his powerful legs launched his body horizontally right at the two opponents. In his charging position, with his six arms extended, Spyder-Wolf looked almost like a star shooting right at them.

Wolf's arms began slowing down their movements momentarily, right before shooting off in a powerful focused cross strike, all six of his arms, repeating the same rhythm again and again. Meiko covered her body up with her hands, lifting them up in the air, before placing them in a position where her palms reminded of wings of a butterfly and pushing them at Wolf's wrists, whenever his arms tried to strike Meiko down with focused power strikes. Sugemi's body lit up with First Gate chakra once more as he bumped up the speed of his body again, using all of First Gate's added bonuses to avoid his opponent's strikes. Wolf's chosen taijutsu attack was relatively slow, but Sugemi could already see it would've been immensely powerful and crushing had it connected.

Sugemi's knee pushed one of Wolf's arms upwards with a quick knee strike to the brute's elbow whereas Meiko followed the attack up with a combined strike with her knee and her elbow aimed to scissor at the weak spot of Wolf's arm, aimed right at the middle part of Spyder's arm and the back of his elbow. The brute shouted out in pain as his mad offensive ended abruptly allowing Sugemi and Meiko to counterattack.

Sugemi threw a powerful cross at the armpit under Wolf's injured arm. His fist dug in deep into the softer part of his opponent's flesh and emitted a painfully sounding churning noise from the place of impact, utilizing the upper left arm clutching at the broken middle left arm Meiko dashed up and behind her opponent with a spinning kick to the back of his head. The impact sent the genin down on his knees and confused.

"Shadow Tendril Barrage"! Sugemi yelled out, focusing the maximum output of force as he fired off his innovated Nara hijutsu at his opponent, using the light from Daidao's lantern to minimize the weakening effect of Forest of Death gloom on his shadows. The powerful blows ran rampant on Wolf's body as the Team Nimbus powerhouse struggled to block his opponent's attacks right. Wolf managed only to shrug off or block a percentage of the barrage of shadow tendrils smacking him around before one of the tendrils wrapped into a spherical shape and smacked Spyder-Wolf back, smashing him into the gate, denting the massive structure and nearly toppling it down.

The shining glow of Sugemi's First Gate faded down to just the minimal 25% muscle control glow as the strain on the young genin's body eased up. Stumbling forward the Nara nearly fell on his face, having to shove his arm in the way from falling down as the strain on his body began building up, despite using out maybe just a quarter of his actual chakra pool.

"Holy shit", a confident and masculine voice exclaimed in excitement. Meiko's and Sugemi's eyes widened in shock as they saw Spyder-Wolf's large muscular frame shake strongly and bounce off of the massive crater he left in the northern gate and back on his feet. "Okay, now we're getting somewhere…" he declared as he wiped the blood trickling down his nose and his cracked forehead, coloring his light brown spiky hair a shade of bright blood red.


	324. The Great Equalizer

Seeing Spyder-Wolf just pop back on his feet after attacks that no genin, maybe even few higher-ranking ninja could take with nothing else but a few cases of missing teeth and a nosebleed was more intimidating than any amount of trash talk the six-armed genin did.

Without offering any more words, the giant leaped forward to take out his opponents. Sugemi quickly maxed out his First Gate usage before leaping in to intercept his opponent. Knowing that Meiko's arsenal was limited and that she was at least five times slower than the First Gate user it was a smart, and a rather altruistic, decision.

A push kick of considerable stopping power blasted Sugemi back on his back. With all of his efforts and boosted physical power, the Nara managed just to contain and somewhat muffle the impact. The force of the kick tossed Sugemi rolling wildly backwards as Spyder-Wolf kicked off once more to prolong his forward rush, swinging his arms wildly and widely to hammer at his knocked down opponent repeatedly.

After taking way too much damage for his comfort, Sugemi's legs wrapped around the bottom pair of Wolf's arms before his own hands locked around the upper pair. Despite taking a couple of nasty rib shots from the still unbroken middle arm, Sugemi pushed off his legs before ramming them at Spyder's chest and flipping the large genin over himself, straight at Meiko.

With a mad battle cry, Meiko slammed her extended arm straight at Wolf's face, bodying him and driving him back first to the ground – something that proved itself troublesome to do before. The blacksmith rolled backwards and grabbed Spyder's feet, leaning back to lift the brute off the ground and throw him in the air. A powerful and lightning fast barrage of elbow strikes from the flurry of five of Wolf's functional arms cracked Meiko's head open but the blacksmith persevered and sent the brute flying with a strong roundhouse kick aimed diagonally upwards and straight at Wolf's chest.

Utilizing the moment when all air was driven out of her opponent's ribs and while the pain of shock to his ribs was very much alive, Meiko leaped up in the air, aiming to finish the job with a newly improvised taijutsu drop. The redhead locked her arms and legs around her opponent's shins and feet, dropping him from as high as the Forest of Death scenery allowed her to piledrive her opponent from.

"Anvilstone"! Meiko yelled out triumphantly as Wolf's impact to the ground sent rumbling quakes and caused small fissures to open up well beyond the point where any bystanders were observing the battle.

Carefully so that she did not get caught unprepared in a quick recovery counterattack, Meiko jumped up and dashed back to Sugemi who had turned his First Gate off and was waiting around for his ally to finish off the combination of attacks that he set the opponent up for.

A pair of Spyder-Wolf's arms erupted from the ground, grabbing hold to the edges of the sinkhole he got sent crashing through and pulling himself out. The genin was covered in bioluminescent goop and wore a strange insectoid shell on his head, replacing the ruined fur he usually wore. Must have been a local denizen of Forest of Death that found Spyder-Wolf crashing into his hunting ground but whom Spyder-Wolf quickly dispatched of.

"We did some damage", Sugemi huffed out.

"I hoped that whatever's down there would occupy him for longer, we may be slowly chipping at him but we're wearing ourselves out faster than we're kicking his ass and every time he lands a strike we have to sacrifice options or get taken out", Meiko grunted overcome with frustration. "I don't have any jutsu or weapons left that'd keep him down for good".

"This isn't working as well as I've thought, but your attack gave me an idea, we need to take him to the air. Keep him from building up momentum or using the ground support for stronger strikes", Sugemi suggested.

"I'll need you to buy me some time, in that case", Meiko glared back at the Nara.

"What? What for"? Sugemi looked back at the redhead mortified.

"I need to reseal some of my chakra into my boots, I need it for aerial movement", Meiko admitted.

Sugemi laughed out sincerely. "Oh well, I guess I'll need to use those stupid cowardly hijutsu of mine. I really dislike it but there's nothing else that buys time quite like those".

"Keep your eyes on your opponent"! Spyder-Wolf taunted his two opponents as he lunged at the two. At this point he had taken quite some damage from the combined attacks of Sugemi and Meiko, greatly slowing him down, however not only were his opponents similarly weakened, but he was also still quite damned fast. In an instant the large six-armed man slid right in between the two genin, extending his to the sides before he jumped off the ground in a mad spin of limbs everywhere.

"Wolf-Spinner", he yelled out the name of his taijutsu technique as clotheslines, hammer strikes and stiff kicks were flashing everywhere around, crashing into Meiko and Sugemi and sending them flying back. As Sugemi's eyes opened up, after wiping off the blood tricking from his forehead and cracked eyebrow right over his eyes, the Nara noticed Meiko holding her glowing bright blue hands up to her boots with a sealing hieroglyph lighting up on them. That meant that this was his cue.

Sugemi kicked off the ground, winding up his fist and roaring like a berserker charging into a warzone with nothing but a cherry blossom petal covering his sensitive parts and an axe in his right hand. Except, in his case, he may not have actually had an axe, just his bare fists. While his right hand was winded back, preparing for a strike, his left one was concealed behind the young man's back, weaving a handful of hand seals.

Right before Spyder-Wolf prepared for an answer, smacking Sugemi away with a backhand smack, the Nara stopped in his tracks before launching himself in a trajectory circular around his opponent. Shortly afterwards, a whole squad of Sugemi clones joined in on the frey.

"Clone Jutsu"! The Nara yelled out, it was no proud jutsu to declare the usage of, it was a simple Academy technique creating illusionary clones that weren't too difficult to tell from the real deal with enough skill and time. Yet Sugemi hoped that with his clones dashing madly around Spyder-Wolf in a circle he may have bought a little more time before the real him was identified.

"Take this"! The Nara yelled out as both the real deal and all the copies launched themselves at the surrounded opponent with identical right crosses.

Sugemi's punch connected to Spyder-Wolf's jaw, busting up and knocking off his improvised insectoid shell helmet, which he pulled off of a recently deceased living thing and just popped onto his head. The illusionary copies just phased through the staggering and confused brute before Sugemi once again weaved the hand seals and repeated the technique, dashing around the barely more injured than he was before Spyder, yet plenty more pissed off.

"You're gonna run out of breath before I feel any of your punches"! Wolf roared out frustrated.

* * *

Mana looked at her friend who was worrying over the battle she wanted to be a part of. Kiyomi shook on her feet like a twig in a hurricane but she did not try to interfere or launch a stray clan hijutsu, which confused Mana slightly.

"Why aren't you trying to help Meiko, you've never stricken me as the honorable kind of combatant", Mana asked when her curiosity finally tipped over the edge.

"I'm not, I just don't really have much chakra left and any jutsu I use right now risks getting me over the lifeline", the blonde smiled back at Mana.

"And yet you insisted fighting Wolf before", the magician tilted an eyebrow in surprise.

"After seeing how seriously you take this exam, yeah, it's a little inspiring. After hearing so many times about how this exam is an emulation of what soon will be our life, I am beginning to see it the same way", the Yamanaka admitted while she looked down, feeling a bit down that the battles of the recent past had tired her out so. Once her mood had elevated somewhat, however, she looked up before turning back down at Mana.

"What about you"? The Yamanaka heiress wondered, "Usually you have ideas about everything, what do you think about this fight"?

"Right now I have two ideas of how to beat Wolf, I've also seen most of his patterns and strikes and I'd be able to evade him, if my hand was healed and I had more chakra to spare. Also, that shoulder injury is really killing me right now, it's a bad place to be injured for evasive acrobatics", Mana admitted, she felt similarly ashamed admitting that she would've come a bit short had she joined into this fight. Despite hating violence and fighting she did have a certain amount of pride and desire to win when involving herself in a fight, a little bit going beyond just her need for stopping violence and protecting people, a bit more on the selfish part than Mana would've liked to admit.

"Shall I establish a mental link between us"? Kiyomi lingered on the thought, you can relay your plans to Meiko.

"Look at her eyes", Mana smiled shyly. "She's having a time of her life, I've spent plenty of time amongst people that take pleasure from fighting to know those eyes. She'd feel offended if I butt in and tipped odds even more to our favor".

"You know, if she doesn't like it – no one's forcing her to use your ideas, at least let her know of them", Kiyomi shrugged.

"Fine", Mana sighed before Kiyomi quickly established a mental link, a bit on the shoddy side with mental static and varying length of the signal and volume, saving up chakra wherever she could, but it would possibly come to Meiko's aid when she ran out of options.

* * *

Sugemi and his illusionary clones continued to dance around their opponent, distracting from Meiko recharging the seals on her boots with chakra to be used for aerial combat. Without the solid ground to bother balance and force from, a physical powerhouse would be greatly weakened which could just prove as the equalizer the duo needed to finish this fight.

"Your big boost has run out, is that why you're prancing around, trying to wear me down with your barely felt punches"? Spyder-Wolf angrily taunted Sugemi, who just continued to move forward and attempt to distract his opponent for as long as possible.

On one hand, repeating the same strategy was risky, especially one based on an Academy technique which most ninja could see through given enough time and if they were perceptive enough. However, this move has proven to be an effective time waster for now.

Spyder-Wolf's hands went through a collection of hand seals, slow and sluggish. Mana instantly saw through the weakness to the large brute but she wondered if Meiko or Sugemi had as well.

"Fire Style: Flame Spout Jutsu"! The Kumogakure genin yelled out blowing solid masses of compact flames concentrated into masses of solid heat, exploding into jets of flames that expanded, swallowing oxygen and flammable mater all around them, hot as the surface of the Sun, yet lightning fast in losing and distributing that heat and burning it all up.

Sugemi's clones got swallowed up in flames. Disappearing as the pyroclasm of superheated death itself incinerated the air that gave them shape and dissolved the light that gave them form on a particle level. Only a black, rock-hard arc of hardened molten rocks and dirt surrounded the Kumogakure taijutsu user as he observed no remaining clones in front of him. Then, as he tried moving his hand, he realized that something paralyzed him completely and his body simply would not budge.

"Shadow Possession, completed" Sugemi grumbled from behind the brute, annoyed to have needed to resort to such a cheap distraction tactic. Using his clan hijutsu in a way they were intended to be used disgusted him. He was an active hands-on hero, one the likes of which deserves stories to be told about him. Techniques like the clan hijutsu he was taught and innovated on were cheap and cowardly lot…

"Sugemi"! Mana raised her voice, knowing that asking Kiyomi to expand her mental link would be pushing against the remains of chakra she still had.

"Yeah, I know"! He shouted back, silencing Mana. "He can only use two of his arms for weaving hand seals which means three things: first – he can't perform three techniques by weaving three different sets of hand seals at the same time, second – his number of arms is the same kind of weakness as it is a strength as his brain must only be able to properly control a pair of them precisely, whereas the rest are just thrown about without much thought put into them, most importantly – he has a preferred pair of arms for performing hand seals and he didn't use it, his hand seals were too slow for the top row to be his preferred one. This only means that the one with one broken hand was his preferred pair – the middle one".

"You both figured out this much just from the way I used a single ninjutsu technique"? Spyder-Wolf grunted in frustration.

"Not just that, Mana just told me how to weaken you even more", Meiko grinned after she stood back up on her feet and clanged her boots against each other as the sealing hieroglyphs faded from being seen, at least until they'd be used again.

"He's all yours", Sugemi smiled at Meiko who just nodded and pressed two of her fingers against her heels, setting off the seals and releasing a blaze of bland blue colored base chakra. The burst of chakra sent the blacksmith propelling forward and winding up for a powerful punch. Spyder-Wolf tried to overpower the Shadow Possession technique repeatedly but it may have yet been too early to do so.

Meiko's fist dug deep into the Kumogakure genin's jaw, twisting it in a grotesque manner and at the same time overpowering the Shadow Possession technique and breaking the opponent out of it for him. The blacksmith sent her opponent hurling right at Sugemi with a single blow, with plenty of heart and strength put into it.

Like kid playing ball, Sugemi dropped on his back, extending his feet upwards to fire his opponent upwards. Wolf shouted out in pain as his large frame bent backwards in uncomfortably painful looking ways before being fired off into the air.

"Let's go, all of it"! Meiko fired herself up before unsealing all of the limited supply of chakra she managed to seal in the short time she was given, charging at her airborne opponent, utilizing the momentum that her jet boots gave her, whereas Spyder-Wolf had no ground to draw strength and balance from. Meiko punched again and again, blasting her opponent farther away before catching up to him and punching him further again. There was a specific location, rather a finding, she was looking to smash her opponent into before the chakra from her boots ran out.

With the last ounce of her strength, Meiko punched at the center of Wolf's face, sending the dazed and confused opponent crashing down into a large pond of water. Her ribs and her own jaw ached from the weakened counterattacks that the Kumogakure genin threw back at her but it was worth powering through them. Now with her chakra inside the boots being completely drained, Meiko plummeted down right beside her downed opponent.

"String Reeling Jutsu"! Sugemi's voice interrupted Meiko's worries of dropping into the same pool of water her opponent fell into as steel wire pulled hard on her abdomen, pulling her back onto a branch where her ally was standing on.

"I told the others to move on ahead and leave the forest. Let's finish up here though, I don't want any last second surprises", Sugemi muttered.

"Don't worry, Mana's equalizer will bring him down to our level. You won't need to use the gates anymore to fight him hand to hand", the blacksmith smiled, wondering why she had not thought of this before. She was in the Forest of Death – the place where everything wanted everyone and everything dead, not utilizing those natural laws for one's own gain was almost a crime against this natural economy of energy preservation.

Wolf's arm burst through and out of the water, grabbing hold of the little bridge that arced over the pond, pulling himself out and dropping onto it. Meiko sat down by the tree, clutching at her aching ribs before pointing at Spyder-Wolf and smiling at her Nara ally.

"He's all yours", she uttered.

Spyder-Wolf staggered back, avoiding a rain of kunai blades that flew at him before regaining composure and leaping back at Sugemi, still thinking he was faster and stronger than his opponent, as long as the First Gate wasn't in play. Wolf's upper right blasted the Nara right in the jaw, something that should have been a killshot, given how much focus and oomph that the Kumogakure giant put into it. Strangely his opponent just bounced back for more, as if it was nothing but a simple spring breeze blowing his way.

"Finally, grown some balls"? Spyder-Wolf laughed out as he continued to send endless barrages of punches Sugemi's way, the Nara leaned back, desperately placing blocks for each strike he could perceive. A number, which increased with each passing second allowing the Team Hawthorn member to block more and more of the six-armed blurs. "I thought you couldn't block my strikes unless you were using that flashy boost of yours"? Wolf bravely taunted his opponent after Sugemi staggered back and wiped blood off of his cracked lip.

Spyder-Wolf grinned sadistically as he prepared what surely should've been a finishing blow – a blow that'd have sent the planet itself bouncing off of her sisters like a marble had the massive amount of chakra augmentation imbued within not been perfectly contained and channeled right through his opponent.

The blow was stopped by Sugemi's lightly extended hand and got stuck in his palm.

"Impossible"! Spyder-Wolf shouted out. "I'm stronger that the two of you, faster, more durable. You'd have passed out of exhaustion before you finished me off with your weak strikes"!

"Maybe so", Sugemi lightly taunted his opponent, pulling the powerhouse in for a counter-attack and kneeing the giant into the stomach. Wolf staggered back, struggling to breathe in even once. "But those fellows all over your body can do you in almost instantly".

"Wha…" Wolf's bloodshot and rabid eyes looked all over his exposed skin, witnessing hundreds of small canine sized leeches with lamprey-like mouths sucking into his flesh and draining him of both his vital fluids and chakra as a secondary unwanted effect as his body struggled to keep the genin in fighting condition.

"You won't succeed at being a ninja by just being strong and fast, you need something that's up here too", the Nara tapped lightly at his temple before turning around and putting his hands inside his pockets. "Looking forward to not seeing you again", he teased the giant who boiled in anger and twitched realizing how fast and how much blood he was losing. All attempts to tear the leeches off only opened gruesome looking yet relatively small wounds that simple refused to coagulate.

"This… This isn't over"! Wolf roared out, flexing all of his muscles to their absolute limit as he intensified the chakra flow all over his body before leaping at Sugemi in one final charge, right before the blood and chakra loss would have made him pass out.

"Second Gate: Gate of Healing! OPEN"! Sugemi's voice echoed in the surrounding area and in an unperceivable flash, his opponent fell onto the ground, completely out cold.

"Let's go, it's best if he gets removed by the staff sooner than later", the Nara turned at Meiko, encouraging his temporary ally to move along.


	325. Out of the Forest at Last!

A pair of higher ranked Konohagakure staff ninja were standing beyond the northern gate. There was a moment when Mana's eyes had to get used to the brighter gloom of a simple Fire Country forest and the deforested areas where the roads were made. In this case, a small dirty zigzag that lead further into the main road, which headed west, towards the Land of Wind and many smaller pleasure towns in between Land of Fire and Land of Wind.

"Huh, there are no other genin around", Kiyomi wondered loudly while looking around, pondering why the area outside was so empty.

"Each team that has completed the exam and exited through the gate has done so at their own time, some of them did so days ago. It'd have been strenuous to keep all of them here just so the underdogs could hear the same thing they've heard", one of the cloaked yet unhooded ninja noted.

A long braided, brown haired kunoichi walked up to the two Jinchuuriki placing her hand on their shoulders. "You two OK"? I'll have your supervisors brought here at once", she asked.

A group of four cloaked ninja positioned themselves behind Daidao and Nanaba until their "supervisors" would arrive as the shortest baldy of the staff ninja stood out in front before listening in and muttering something to the little microphone he had positioned by the ear-set he was wearing. A raspy and unclear husk was all that could be heard from the other end so it was tough, if not impossible, to tell exactly what the conversation was about.

"Alright, Team Hokage and Team Hawthorn, you appear to have completed the exam successfully, congratulations", the baldy nodded as he addressed the handful of teams.

"This is not it just yet, Sugemi and Meiko will be joining us soon. They've been left behind to deal with some unpleasant business", Daidao's voicebox matched the unclear rasp, which came out from the bald ninja's ear-set.

"I see, then maybe it would be better to wait for at least a good twenty minutes longer before we explain what comes next", the baldy nodded.

What transpired after was an uncomfortable and awkward stance as both the staff ninja and the genin just stood around, looking at each other, before glaring back at the northern gate and wondering if Sugemi and Meiko would even be back. It barely even took five good minutes after the pause was given thought that the two walked through the gate, slightly beaten up and bruised, even more than they were before Team Hokage and Team Hawthorn were encouraged to leave them behind.

"Well, now that everyone is here", the baldy cleared his throat before addressing the squad again, "Do not worry, the next stage of the exam will not take place immediately. It was initially a thought for our consideration but once we saw more eliminations than it was predicted, with some teams eliminating plenty people they had no obligation to eliminate and the natural conditions of Training Grounds No. 44 eliminating its own fair share of contestants, it was quickly reconsidered".

Sugemi laughed out loud before rubbing the back of his head relieved, "Ha, that's great, I used the Second Gate in there so we'd have been in a pinch if I had to fight again right afterwards", he let his weariness go down to being just another joking matter.

"Did Spyder-Wolf have some unseen weapon up his sleeve that you needed to resort to such measures"? Daidao wondered, as the Nara's revelation appeared to hit a chord with the Jinchuuriki.

"Nah, I kind of did it just to look cool for the manga panel, when that episode inevitably makes it to my story"! Sugemi laughed out, rubbing his own nose in shame.

"Imbecile", Daidao crossed his hands around his chest. "It appears that me teaching you more about the effects of the Gates on your body had no effect on your mindset about using them".

"Oh, come on, Daidao, none of us are going to live forever", Nanaba smiled before leaning over to Sugemi's side, "I bet it looked pretty cool".

"It didn't look like anything to me, I could barely even see it", Meiko pouted, crossing her arms in disappointment as well as she figured she'd have offered the technique more attention had she known about its nature and the fact that it'd be used.

"By any means, would you know what the next round is going to be like"? Kiyomi wondered, addressing the staff ninja.

"I was just about to get to that, before I was interrupted", the baldy nodded before stroking his greying black beard with his fingers. "The next stage of the exam will take place in 7 days from when the last contestant leaves that forest. From what is known to us, that'll most likely be either today or tomorrow, given how far the exam has advanced up to now. You will be contacted with further details once the second stage officially ends. It'll take place in the sports hall of Konoha High."

"Hmmm… So the people who left first will have more time to recover and train in preparation", Mana realized.

"That's right, they are the top dogs, after all. Good performance needs to be rewarded with higher chance of completing the exam", the aging man agreed before proceeding, "Seeing how right now there are confirmed more than forty eight eliminations and more than half of the genin that entered this forest have been eliminated, there'll be two more stages. The specifics of the next stage will remain a secret, however. That will be all, you are now dismissed".

"Actually there's one more thing Team Hokage may want to know", the braided brown hair kunoichi interrupted. Mana's heart started jumping multiple beats, realizing that it was likely related to her knockout. She would have liked to be eliminated differently, not just be told about it right after helping her team through the gate…

"Your sensei, Lady Fifth waited here for a while wanting to congratulate you but she said she got bored just sitting around and went away, that was two days ago. You may want to know that you'll need to contact her if you wish to make a training schedule with her, she doesn't appear to have any plans nor has she left any messages for you three".

"Sounds about right", Kiyomi rubbed her temples, she was well used to Chestnut Hanasaku's inadequacy as a mentor figure and the leader of the team.

"I suppose our next course is the Konohagakure hospital then. All of us have wounds, which will require a more skilled look". Mana sighed. The emotion was not a sigh of disappointment in the team leader, more like a sigh of relief that the exam was over.

"Yeah, then we can hit a place to eat, I'm starving"! Meiko cheered out, all wounds she may have suffered in the Forest of Death appeared to fade away whenever the prospect of good food came into picture.

Just as the Team Hokage trio gathered together, said their temporary farewells to Team Hawthorn and exchanged gratitude for help and cooperation, started walking away to enter the main road, leading back to the village, Mana felt something gnawing at her chest. Something bitter and painful, something she had to shed away or else she would never feel the same ever again. It would either eat her up alive or, one day, just stop hurting altogether, changing who she was as a person fundamentally where nothing of similar note ever hurt again.

"I… I can't go on", she muttered before rushing up to the cloaked staff ninja and repeating what she said again, this time to their curious faces.

"Do you wish to withdraw from the competition"? A more muscular and rough around the edges shinobi raised an eyebrow, lacking the capacity to believe what he was hearing right now.

"No, no such thing, but I can't be allowed to continue. I want to go on but I can't – I was eliminated but you missed it", Mana shook on her feet as she admitted it, little by little, the gnawing sensation in her chest which moved further down with every passing second began to calm and fade away, the more she spoke about what troubled her.

"If we missed it – you're in the clear", the baldy cut it short.

"B-But… I got encased in crystal and… Just a bit before I ate a food pill and my chakra was slowly growing, resulting in me being knocked out but my chakra appearing to be just fine to the sensors to the south. I was knocked out", Mana explained it in more detail.

"If you weren't eliminated, you aren't eliminated now." The braided lady repeated what the baldy said before just in different words.

"There were at least two teams that used continuous medical ninjutsu techniques to keep their knocked out members from being eliminated, one of them even inquired about it after the exam. As long as their chakra signatures never hit the elimination spot – they're in the clear", the stronger looking staff ninja added.

"Ninja are supposed to go underneath the underneath. Oftentimes finding holes in the system and tricking it is more important than being straight. Don't play your luck and pull the mean fate lady by her hair, kid. You're in the clear, don't piss me off and make me repeat it", the baldy smiled kindly before switching to a more annoyed face as he turned to watch the gate for any incoming ninja that desired to complete the exam.

"Let's go, Mana, you heard what they said", Kiyomi softly uttered close to Mana's ear.

"B-But I stole things and cheated… I shouldn't be moving on ahead", Mana pouted as she felt disappointed by the fact that she wasn't eliminated or punished in any way. Less training time, restriction from using any medical facilities, anything would have been fine than nothing.

"You're trying to rank up as a ninja – killers, cheaters and thieves are the people that move on, as long as they do it with the village's blessing", Kiyomi pulled on Mana's shoulder harder, making the wound on the other side of the magician's body resonate with painful impulses that made her twitch and grunt in pain.

"Now let's go to a medical facility, then we're going to Yakiniku Q and I'm treating"! Meiko shot her fist up into the air, jumping up in excitement.

"Do you have any money, please don't tell me you had money on you but not any medical supplies"? Kiyomi suspiciously looked at the blacksmith who then shyly rubbed her snotty nose.

"Nope, I have none"! She then admitted, "Kind of figured that the prospect of me treating would make you guys more cooperative with going out to eat, then – once I tell you I don't have any money, you'd just pay up because it'd be too late".

"I can't believe Mana felt bad about something she has ever done, you're the real supervillain"! Kiyomi cringed into her fist before jumping up on Meiko's shoulders and beginning to bash at the blacksmith's head playfully.

"The Forest of Death stage is now over", was all that Mana could think about as she looked at her playfully fighting teammates and smiled innocently, feeling the looming threat of the tests yet ahead but, for the moment, still happy about how far they've all come together.

* * *

Mana had expected the Konohagakure Hospital to be more crowded than it usually was. After all, the second stage of the Chuunin Exams had just concluded so plenty teams must have needed medical attention, both extensive and otherwise. Contrary to that belief, the hospital appeared to be just as occupied as it would have been any other day. The three girls parted ways in the endless corridors of the hospital as the receptionist signed them up to different rooms for their examination.

Not too much later, a young woman wearing the standard chuunin flak jacket and a white coat entered with a bunch of files in her hand, signalling for all waiting for check-ups to enter. Before Mana got there, there were a pair of people waiting with minor injuries. One of them appeared to have a possibly broken arm, judging from the worker's uniform he must have been a builder or an interior decorator of some sorts, it was something that Mystical Palm session would have quickly solved. Then there was the token old lady, the likes of which constantly rubbed around medical establishments for the sole purpose of being bored of retirement.

It may have seemed cruel to attribute the old lady to that archetype so soon but she didn't appear to have anything too bad going on with her and she was rather talkative and cheerful. The only person she actively avoided striking a conversation with was Mana, it may have had something to do with the fact that the magician looked like she had returned from an active war zone – covered with bruises, scratches and lousy field first aid bandaging.

Once Mana's turn came, she entered the room. The young medical ninja was quick to examine her wounds, scribbling a bunch of stuff onto the sheet of paper before handing Mana a handful of documents for the rooms she had to visit. One of them was a pharmacy for the medical food pills to aid her recovery, another one had a changing shift of medical ninja perform Mystical Palm jutsu treatments meanwhile yet another one was for Diagnosis Jutsu scans as some areas of the girl's body seemed suspicious for the medical kunoichi. She apparently did not perform any medical work herself, merely used her experience to better manage the hospital's staff and grant every villager the aid they needed. After all – if a medical ninja working their Mystical Palm ran out of chakra too early when a larger disaster struck, the consequences would be severe…

Once all the healthcare business was taken care of – something that spanned well into the later evening, Mana found Meiko and Kiyomi sitting downstairs and dangling their feet lazily in the waiting room with Meiko crunching a bunch of lollipops in a, admittedly, not too optimal way to consume the candy.

"Wow, you must've been pretty busted up, huh"? The Yamanaka smiled seeing Mana descending the stairs. She was not too far off the mark, it wasn't the severity of Mana's injuries that took this long to treat but rather the number of them. The broken arm, specifically, was a rather painful treatment as healing bone was always some of the most troublesome treatments.

"I didn't think they handed out lollipops to people your age, Meiko", Mana quickly diverted the subject, feeling a bit uncomfortable talking about the fake-out medical disaster that could've been that ended up being just a false alarm. One trouble with ninja was that they could have walked for an entire day with their vital organs busted and some of them may not have even realized it until they were actually in their dying breaths. Such was not uncommon in the world of ninja, people that could endure a very varied amount of beatings, depending on how strong and competent at chakra managing they were.

"I asked the four-eyes pretty nicely and he gave me a handful of lollipops"! Meiko smiled with strangely coloured mouth.

"Well done, you", Kiyomi stroke Meiko's hair with the redhead possibly not even realizing she was being cheeked by her teammate.

"I figured you'd be the last one to finish your business here, didn't you even go say hi to Eiju"? Mana smiled, teasing her friend.

"The Quack? Nah, my heart is eternally bound to Meiko now", Kiyomi pouted before elbowing Meiko in the back, something that the blacksmith took as an invitation to throw held back punches each other's ways, something that could not and did not end in Kiyomi's favour.

"Ummm… Okay…" Mana looked at the exit awkwardly.

"So, what now? What are you guys going to do to prepare for the next stage"? Meiko wondered with Kiyomi's head still placed in a tough headlock and with the future Yamanaka heir choking out with each passing moment.

"I don't really know. These past trials my sensory abilities would have been pretty useful. We would have taken no time at all to find Hokage-sensei during the test or any team we wanted in the forest. If only I would have had polish and control over them... My skillset is not one that requires training of speed or strength, those things are irrelevant to me. Likely I'll just try and master my sensory abilities and try to sharpen one particular ninjutsu I've been working on", the magician recalled her rough use of very unrefined lightning technique back when Team Phobos of Getsugakure attacked her.

"I know what I'm going to do, I'm gonna ask Sugemi to teach me the Gates", Meiko grinned with a shy smile as somehow admitting her week training goals made her ashamed for whatever reason.

"You don't need to be taught the gates by a special person, it's not rocket science, you know", Kiyomi squinted back at her friend before realizing she had not shared anything with the team yet. "My training is a secret, I'm going to head to the Yamanaka resort to train with the clan elders. It'll probably be a huge drag but you know what they say about pressure and diamonds…"

"What"? Meiko curiously looked at her friend, wondering if perhaps almost beheading her with the headlock caused some damage to the blood flow to the Yamanaka's brain.

"I mean… I don't really remember, but it's about pressure, diamonds and it applies to the current situation rather nicely", Kiyomi pondered before shrugging.

"Hey, Mana, you planning on doing any shows in the meantime, like the magic kind"? Meiko wondered all of a sudden.

"I do, actually. I'll be pretty busy but I'll manage putting one show up halfway through the week", the magician nodded. "Why"?

"I don't know, seeing you work out there, I just kind of wanna check out your shows, see maybe I get inspired for some new techniques or gadgets", the blacksmith smiled.

"It'll be an honor performing in front of you, although if you're interested in ideas for gadgets, you may try talking to my father. I do recall you being somewhat of a fan of his"? Mana suggested.

"Oh, that's right, you're Konoha's Great Trapster's daughter. I completely forgot that over all those wish granting boxes and everyone around trying to kick the shit out of us"! Meiko remembered all of a sudden.

"Alright then, it seems that Team Hokage is all set and has its training planned ahead. Let's get out there and work our asses off"! Kiyomi cheered on as the trio of girls stood up and walked out of the Konohagakure Hospital tired as all living hells yet healthy and ready to tackle the world in front of them… In the morning, at the very least.


	326. Requiem for the Rain

Chakra sensory was a rare and an incredibly valuable ability. When Mana sat down in a meditative position and relaxed her mind, reaching out for it, she felt excited about improving her control over it. It was something unlike any other skill, one could not just been train it until they had it, it had to be born with and even those with the ability within them possessed it to various degrees. Some sensors could have sensed kilometers around themselves, identified specific chakra signatures to people they have met in their lives, other peaked at rather unimpressive ranges, being barely able to sense chakra inside one room at their peak concentration.

There was never anything particularly special about Mana, even areas where she excelled such as genjutsu and prowess of martial arts focused on evasion and counterattacking solely anyone else could just train harder and match, or even walk further than the magician. Chakra sensory was different, it was something that could've made her special, valuable to any team that had her. It was new feeling, feeling of self-worth and belonging. It was an exciting feeling.

Every morning of the week Mana spent just sitting down and accessing the chakra sensory ability until it came up easier and easier. Now she no longer had to worry about a hostile team attacking her or trying to take out her friends, that certain feeling of comfort, if made more bitter by the urgency to master the ability to a useable degree within a week, made training chakra sensory simpler.

Mana had it all along, she has always seen those weird flares, those strange spacial images inside her. She just never quite knew what all of it meant before. To her it was just a flashy visualization of some mind processes, too complicated for her to understand completely. Whenever she tried meditating those same images went first, by now Mana knew that it was the Ego stage of meditation – a visual representation of her own body, beyond laid what Mana used to call the Omnes stage – now known as the chakra sensory part.

The first couple of mornings of the week there was unrest inside her body as the wounds gathered in the Forest of Death were not that quick to heal up, once Mana's chakra level shot back up to full, however, things started looking up and she finally noticed the usual spacial serenity inside of her body. Whenever she tried expanding the horizons of her mental reach outside of that pocket little universe, she entered what she now knew was chakra sensory – the ability to perceive everything else but her own self.

There were so many tests that Mana had to do every morning, testing the reach of the ability, trying to perceive the specifics of the chakra she was seeing. Trying to access the ability more easily. Mana's mother was a good representation of smaller chakra signatures, those somewhat representative of the ordinary villagers, it was useful when knowing what to filter out and exclude, so that the image was clearer and more attention could be given to the larger signatures. Konoha was full of these small signatures after all.

Initially her own father's signature scared her, it was like she was floating completely naked in this dark void, positioned right in front of a large booming star. The size of the thing was beyond anything Mana had seen before, she had sensed something similar before, but that was earlier – when she was using sensory by accident. Now that she sharpened her ability day by day, with many more days, weeks and months of training yet ahead, she was able to make out more about what previously was just a blurry massive ball of light.

With some more touch ups, with a bit of expansion of scales and zooming out, in a way, using her sensory, Mana finally managed getting used to floating in front of this chakra signature mentally. She also started feeling comfortable enough around it to feel up what made it different from others of the same size – the ninja that passed by her home on their day to day activities. Her father's star was less round, oval and squished from the side, almost like an egg in a way. The patterns of maroon colored flames that burst all over her father's star also had their own pattern. One Mana had gotten used to and memorized.

Knowing how to memorize chakra signatures thusly made it simpler for the girl to memorize new signatures. She didn't know the names of the ninja that passed by her home daily but she was beginning to remember chakra signatures and gave them names of her own making, just to help her quickly memorize and identify chakra signatures of people she'd met before. Her reach of about 30 meters still sort of annoyed Mana. She was beginning to worry that it may have been her peak and that she may have been quite an unimpressive sensor, all things considered, something that'd have made the excitement of studying this new ability of hers all the more sour.

It could not have been her limit, as the magician soon found out, with daily bashing against the "barrier", Mana felt she was expanding it. Slowly, meter by meter every day, but it was budging. Just like muscles and jutsu, it had to be refined through training. That was just fine with Mana, training was something she could do and very much liked doing. Studying this new ability kind of felt like studying history in the Konohagakure Archive, in a way. It was a very fitting replacement for that hobby, which she was currently unable to indulge in.

One of the more important tasks for Mana's chakra sensory training was to gain access to the ability easier. She couldn't have taken the time to sit down and meditate in battle every time, even if she now no longer needed minutes on end of meditation to even reach the stage, having memorized the feelings and sensations that lead to chakra sensory almost pitch perfect. It was not as tough of a thing to do, as Mana thought it would be. Chakra sensory, apparently, was always meant to be more of a different kind of sensory ability so it was not too tough to bring it out to the forefront, still, Mana usually needed to focus quite extensively to access the ability, regardless of which way she went about reaching it. It was less than needed, less than Mana was comfortable walking to battle with and relying on.

* * *

After the mornings got spent training her chakra sensory at home, during the middays, reaching to early evenings, Mana went to train in the Training Grounds. It was really tough finding completely free of people places to train seeing how now the entire collection of Training Grounds was also occupied by genin teams from different villages sharpening their skills and improving their teamwork.

It was not like the magician was that afraid of showing off, she was an entertainer to her core so she rarely struggled just training around other people or when other genin came to train at the same training grounds. Some younger ninja, preparing for their Academy graduation exams or in their early years, commonly observed older genin train as the older genin were not yet in a whole other world but they were quite awesome to see working out and often times gave ideas for one's own improvement and training.

Several days later, just like the staff ninja watching over the Forest of Death stage said it would, a letter came. It had within some more details about the next stage. It was now known that thirty two genin out of ninety six that entered the Forest of Death, excluding the two stowaway nukenin and poor Ramen Destroyer Gwido whom they tagged along, had made it to the next stage. It somehow thinned the herds quite nicely… It also made Mana feel that gut pinch of worry because she needed to pass the next stage as well, it was only in the final stage that it was determined if one would be promoted to Chuunin. Only in the final stage and it was not victory that decided the promotion but instead the commission of highly skilled ninja composed of the host village's most skilled, respected and powerful, also honorary guests from other participating villages.

The physical training in the Training Grounds required the help of Usuzoku – Mana's rabbit summon, who, strangely, despite telling her she'd never see him again, always came out whenever she used the storage seal inside her hat. It was not easy talking him into helping Mana with her training…

"Ehhh… Ferget about it"! Usuzoku grunted, crossing his arms around his chest but not dispelling himself back home.

"You said you needed strong partners, that if the name of the Ninja Rabbits is to be out there, luring really strong ninja to re-establish the partnership web between ninja and the Ninja Rabbits you need a strong face", Mana reminded the rabbit, overcoming her impulse to break down over how cute Usuzoku's pouting face was.

"Das rite! We needs dem real ninjas, not stupid Hatchlin's like you"! Usuzoku glared with one eye angrily at Mana's direction. The magician noticed a pair of new scars over the rabbit's face, while they did interest her, she figured that it was sort of par for the course for the rabbit warrior who constantly expressed his hatred for pretty much everything living and picked fights with everything moving.

"Well, if I fail this exam, which I may very well do, if this training doesn't work out, you'd not have moved forward with that seeing how I'll remain a genin", Mana argued.

"Yer just lucky I really hate yer dumb face so I'll help freein' some space of dem tooths ya got in dere", Usuzoku squinted at Mana's direction.

"You meant sparring"?

"Ehhh… Yeah, sure…" Usuzoku shrugged.

"Well, before we start training, there's something we need to recover from the Forest of Death", Mana urged her animal partner to follow her.

And that was pretty much how Mana went about tricking Usuzoku into helping her search for her wand in the Forest of Death, as well as assist the magician every midday to early evening with the more physical aspects of her training. With Usuzoku's tracking abilities, unique perspective at searching and almost dogmatic hatred for pretty much every species the rabbit and Mana encountered, finding the wand proved to be one midday's job in the emptied Forest of Death.

Training with Usuzoku was another thing entirely. The rabbit swordsman was fast, his lower body was so tense and well-trained that it appeared that he charged instantaneously as the rabbit was behind Mana before the girl even registered her opponent having moved at all. His skills with a sword must have been neat. Usuzoku constantly belittled Mana for her hand-to-hand skills and the magician quite consistently tripped up over herself but she learned to realize something in the process. Meiko and Kouta were holding back tremendously when they trained Mana, Usuzoku did no such thing and while it hurt both Mana's face and her pride to get cut up and pummeled every day, she did ultimately enjoy the fact that she was at least facing the best of someone's abilities and learning to overcome them.

"I gotta say I'm impressed, Hatchlin'", Usuzoku grumped out one day, it was a particularly successful day where his world splitting feet hadn't yet met Mana's face and his sword had never forced Mana augment her body to prevent getting disemboweled. While Usuzoku came at Mana with full intent of killing her, it made the magician feel more respected as a ninja in her own right, someone who required Usuzoku's full skillset to be taken on. It was a liberating and inspiring feeling.

"Yeah, maybe today I won't need to see a medical ninja at all", Mana smiled, closing her eyes and feeling the chilly breeze in the air. That was before she felt an alarming sensation. It felt like an unstable wayward star of massive size, surpassing that of her father's, was heading straight her way, the magician stepped back out of instinct and not perception. She was glad she did so in a moment as Usuzoku's foot blurred right past Mana's face with a push kick that would have sent a moon hurling through space like a football.

"Dat sixth sense 'a yours is pretty handy, eh"? The grumpy rabbit noted in surprise that the magician avoided his surprise attack.

It was then that Mana realized something new about her sensory. Just like Spyder-Wolf's brain struggled to keep up with controlling all six arms efficiently, hers also must've had trouble managing six senses efficiently, it could only mean that only by shutting down one of her senses could she utilize her chakra sensory in this early relatively untrained stage. It was because Mana's eyes were closed that her chakra sensory worked like a charm, unlike it ever has before. This small instance of her chakra sensory helping her out also gave Mana ideas for more practical uses for chakra sensory.

It could have been a foolproof way of tracking movements she could not track otherwise, also of seeing what her eyes and ears failed to see. Then again, Mana had over fifteen years of experience of training her eyes, it may have been way too early to dream about her chakra sensory ever surpassing Mana's eyes.

"Still, yer sensory won't be ready by da time ye'll hafta fight", Usuzoku noted strictly, the rabbit was always brutally honest with Mana and the magician knew deep inside that her sensory won't be ready by just a bit over a week later after it was discovered.

"I have an idea that'll fix that", Mana smiled before allowing Usuzoku to return to the natural Ninja Rabbit habitat. Truth be told, she had no reason to smile about her idea, seeing how rather twisted it was. The trip to the Konohagakure Hospital that day was not an easy one, the girl found her legs halting and lingering multiple times.

* * *

"Ah, training injuries again"? The medical ninja seeing Mana's injuries, a middle aged, frail man with intensely thick glasses, wondered. "I do see a rather unpleasant overtraining experience in your record, I would've hoped it'd have taught you something". It was not even remotely the first time Mana saw that particular medical ninja that week in the afternoon check-up.

"I need you to disable my sense of smell", Mana shot directly to the point.

"Any particular reason"? The medical ninja removed and cleaned his glasses after closing the relatively small file containing Mana's medical records. "You have to understand, you are pushing yourself way too far with a recorded incident of overtraining. Then you come out with such an odd request… Your mental state has to be put into question. It'd be an easy procedure to perform, possible to reverse, still, unless there's a valid reason there's no way I'll authorize it".

"I've recently uncovered chakra sensory abilities inside me. I'm training them but they won't be ready to the degree I need them to be by the next stage of the Exams. I need to kill another sense to replace chakra sensory with it and alleviate the process for the brain to deal with. Smell is by far my least potent sense", Mana tried to put her decision into words but still the realization of how silly it all sounded had not escaped her notice.

"If that is the case, you may pick a stronger sense, like your vision, it'd instantly shock your brain into accepting sensory as the default sense. You've studied history, haven't you"? The medical ninja realized with a sly smile referencing an old practice of Kirigakure ninja administration of blinding their less potent sensors to make their access to chakra sensory easier as well as make them more accustomed and comfortable with the ability. It also made them immune to vision-based genjutsu as an added bonus.

"That'd be an overkill. Vision is integral to my taijutsu style, smell will be enough", Mana submissively looked down.

Being injected with the chemicals that were supposed to burn off Mana's nerves was profoundly painful. Despite being warned ahead of time it'd be, the magician still jumped up and began clawing at the back of her head like a madwoman. After a several seconds lasting boom of pain, followed by aches that persisted for a little bit longer, echoes of the burning feeling from before, Mana realized that there was only blandness to the sense she once took for granted.

"It is likely that chakra sensory will be automatically adjusted by your brain to compensate for the missing sense. Or, if that doesn't happen, you may need a little bit encouraging to make it work, how familiar are you with meditation"? The medical ninja asked after a whole series of questions about how Mana was feeling after the procedure.

The question honestly made the magician laugh.

"Just know that the longer you delay restoring the sense, the lesser the odds of the procedure succeeding and the percentage of your scent returning. The nerves can still be restored, recent advances in medical ninjutsu and technology are astounding, but only to a point", the ninja advised Mana but had she any doubts about going to these lengths she'd have not been allowed to even undergo the procedure. It wasn't like Mana would backtrack the progress and the sacrifice she'd made, for her – this was for good.

"I feel a little bad about this", the geeky looking medical ninja admitted, stroking the back of his messy, shoulder length, greasy, brown hair. "The Bloody Mist is a poor example to follow, it may be my license that pays the price".

"It's fine, you've helped me a great deal. I'll owe you if I rank up to chuunin", Mana smiled like she always did to her audience during the show, the carefree, bubblegum-pink smile of an entertainer. The only thing that scared Mana was her own indifference to the matter, she felt like she had conned nature itself that day to accelerate her growth. It felt nothing like she had just given up on a sense she used to have since childhood.

"I can only hope it won't affect Konoha Sorceress' magic shows", the medical ninja said for a farewell.

The world that greeted Mana outside the hospital was a strangely bland and somewhat depressing one. Droplets of rain were tumbling down from the dark and cloudy evening sky of the cold season. Mana remembered loving the rain, absolutely adoring it. The most ravishing part of it was the rainfall itself, seeing the frozen in time drops of rainfall showering everything and washing it all, coloring the surroundings in brand new, fresh colors. Another part of it, however, was the smells: nothing quite beat smelling the pines, oaks, birches and the cherry trees after a good summer downpour.

Nevermore.

 **Author's Note: And with this I'll be taking a week-long break before posting the Annual No. 2, before resuming the story, continuing on with the next stage of the Chuunin Exams. Luckily, this time, the Annual will take place within the right time-frame and there'll be no potential spoilers inside of it and it'll be a bit of a smaller self-cointained story, no alternate universes of world-ending shenanigans, you'll just have to wait and see. It'll also be around the same size as the last one so, hopefully, it'll compensate the wait!**

 **Much love to everyone in this far! :3**


	327. Tales of a Ninja Magician Annual 2

"Huh? A mission"? Mana stared for a moment at the closed, thin, blue file positioned on the Sixth's desk in front of her.

"Is there a problem, Nakotsumi Mana"? Lord Hokage's assistant, a lovely young woman, short of stature but compensating her lack of height with massive curly pile of dark hair, asked.

Mana quickly grabbed the file off the desk, swiftly flipping the four or five pages through, letting her eyes absorb the most basic information. She needed a reply, seeing as the magician was already not at the greatest of odds with the Sixth with the few encounters she had with the man, her reply needed to make sense as well.

"Well… I just hoped I'd have the week to train and prepare for the next stage of the Chuunin Exams", Mana shrugged, scolding herself for sounding so unsure of her reply. To her it made perfect sense – it was simply unfair to give her a mission and hold her back from her training, compared to the other contestants.

"It isn't a difficult mission, a D-Rank, if you caught that fact while you skimmed the file. It'll only take you one night to complete. It's also very important, despite being relatively simple. We figured we'd give it to our most handy genin asset – the Golden Child. That's what you are, isn't it? Handy", Lord Sixth sighed before explaining the mission to Mana. "That being said, you are in a position to decline the mission, due to the ongoing Chuunin Exams. It'd be troublesome for our administration to find a fitting replacement for you but…"

"It's fine, I'll do it", Mana bowed submissively before picking up the file, bowing again for a permission to leave the office and left. She needed this, a chance to please Lord Sixth and maybe earn more of his trust and respect. Judging from certain remarks in her past, his stance on Mana has softened slightly in the past, as a man with history working for a special department of ANBU, Sixth was impressed by Mana's performance fighting off the Imarizu in the whole Kiyomi's marriage affair. This could build something on top of that…

Mana had disappointed enough of her mentor figures and superiors to know how much it hurt and to earn some trust points with menial jobs like this, jobs where she did not need to compromise or choose between sacrificing her own ideals or the mission objective, was simple enough. Being the upmost authority on herself, Mana knew all too well, which one of the two she'd more likely sacrifice. She needed this, this menial job of…

"Babysitting", Mana sighed after checking the file again and sighing. "An experienced C+ Rank ninja is needed for babysitting". Yet when the magician noticed a question mark scribbled by the mission rank tab she realized that there may have been more to this baby-sitting mission than she thought there being before.

Question marks, such as that one, usually meant that the mission had an "unofficial" rank. It had a "question mark", a questionable aspect to it, which, technically, should have raised the rank of the mission but it wasn't solid enough to actually do so. All missions were graded accordingly with the universal ranking scale, agreed on by the five Feudal Lords. If a mission was graded freely, every village would simply rate all of their babysitting, and others of the sort, missions as being S-Rank simply for the bragging rights and looking better in front of the clients. "Question mark" missions were an iffy legal loophole but they were sort of an unwritten rule, not even one taught about in the Academy, Mana learned about that solely from her own job experience.

Feeling slightly intrigued, Mana rushed home to re-check her supplies and prepare for a possible combat scenario, something she didn't expect she'd need to do when she departed to answer the Administration's call in the early noon. There must've been a reason why Sixth chose a C+ Rank ninja like Mana, beyond the abilities of a genin but not yet consistently competing with the B-Rank chuunin ninja in skill, experience, knowledge and power. Mana would have been wise not to look down on this mission, it may have yet proved to be nice practical training for her after all…

After preparing and explaining the whole ordeal to her father, before the man left to buy more pain-killing herbs from the market for his arm wounds, Mana dashed through the door and rushed away to the north-eastern district of the village, one of the more illustrious and high-class districts. Various well-known public figures, heads of ninja clans, Ninja Council members, businessmen and "thieves within the law" like Hanada Katsuo lived in this district. It was nothing but fancy gardens, sophisticated lawns, mansions and smells of cherry tree rings. Obviously, the last one remained unexperienced in the present case, both because of the cold season and Mana's recently lost sense of smell.

"Oh, Konoha's Sorceress, were you invited to perform privately tonight"? A private bodyguard lifted his shades in surprise of seeing a rather well known entertainer asking for entry. Mana simply flashed her forehead protector to the brutish looking muscle and was granted entry.

"Is there anything wrong with the young master, is he in any danger"? Mana wondered, usually bodyguards would have known a less loaded with bullshit version of the story, seeing how they were down in the trenches every night.

"Not necessarily. It's not gonna be a tough job, Sorceress-chan, the brat doesn't really do anything but play his stupid game through the evenings. It's just that Tomoko-san is a pretty wealthy businessman and recently he's denied a business proposition to the one man one doesn't piss off – Hanada Katsuo. Obviously he is a criminal by reputation only and the Konoha Police Force has nothing on him so officially the mission can't be ranked any higher…"

"But the young master may need protection for a short while", Mana realized. She most of all people knew the dangers of ticking off Hanada Katsuo, she once saved his life which sort of bought her more luxury when dealing with the man than most were offered but then her team went ahead and crossed that favor off of the girl's file when Sugemi attacked the man once. It was safe to assume that there would be no reasoning with Katsuo's people, luckily, at this point, Mana was far outside their league.

"Exactly, anyways, that's your job. Just watch the kid play that game of his and keep your ears sharp and wide – it's likely we'll be taken out before you need to step in. Protecting the premises is our job and we've been doing it for a pretty long time", the bodyguard smiled confidently before showing off his strong and muscular arms.

"I'll leave you to it then, sir", Mana nodded before proceeding into the main guest room and going up the stairs to the youngster's room, just like instructed by the bodyguard during the mansion tour. She was no common babysitter and seeing how she needed not explain that to the bodyguards she was shown possible choke points, points of entry, panic rooms, introduction with all of the maids and house staff working for Tomoko – her client and pretty much every safety detail she needed to know about. Young Sayaki was now entirely in Mana's hands.

When Mana opened the door to Sayaki's room, after knocking softly on his door, the young one was working on a black scroll littered with odd patterns of glowing bright blue. The boy was so occupied with this little activity that his cheeks were spotted with and brushed with paint, so were his hands and the sleeves of his expensive and pressed and well-ironed formal white shirt.

The little one curiously tilted his oversized for his small body head and his murky green eyes stabbed with a curious glare at Mana's direction. The light brown haired young body picked himself off the ground in a very clumsy manner, fixing his black shorts and suspenders before bowing politely, stuffing his little round chin into a rather excessively sized bowtie.

"My name is Sayaki, ma'am, pleased to meet you"! He read almost like it was written on a cue card in a textbook monotone, yet it sounded genuine enough for Mana to take it that there was no malice in the boy's voice or intentions. It must simply not have been his first time being babysit by someone from outside the house staff. "Ah! I know you, you're all over those posters"! Sayaki exclaimed in surprise, which was delivered much more excitedly.

"My name is Nakotsumi Mana, young master, I also perform as a stage magician under the stage name of Konoha's Sorceress", Mana bowed introducing herself, "I'll be watching over you tonight".

"Whaaaah, you're so formal"! Sayaki blushed rubbing his little cheeks shyly, "Could you please address me by my name, Mana-san"!? He wondered.

"Very well, Sayaki-san, if that would please you", Mana nodded. "I take my job rather seriously so I do have trouble with familiarity, please take it as a sign of your assured safety and not hostility".

"I'm eight year old, please talk to me accordingly, ma'am, if possible", the little wonder just glared at Mana with his massively curious eyes before returning to his brushing at the scroll. "I hope you didn't prepare a routine or anything today, I was planning to play Yokai Mash tonight, like every night so I doubt I'll be a very responsive audience member, Mana-san".

"Ummm… Yokai Mash"? The magician tilted her head to the side curiously before taking one-step closer to see what exactly the kid was drawing on that scroll. It certainly was no sealing hieroglyphs – those were already drawn onto the scroll. The boy was signing something that from the bottom up appeared as the spelling of his name whereas the second line looked like words and numbers written in seemingly random combination, still in the process of being completed.

"Yeah, it's a dimension game, haven't you heard of it"? The eight year old yelled out excitedly like he was talking about his life's dream.

"The only games I know of are the games played by kids outside with rag balls and carved wooden weapons and those handheld "video games", I don't think I've heard of any "dimension games" though", Mana shrugged curiously after walking behind the eight year old and observing his drawing in closer detail.

"Want me to show it to you"? Sayaki exclaimed out loud.

"I'm not sure I even want you playing it just yet, let's take baby steps while I decide if it's what's best for your safety, Sayaki-san", Mana strictly crossed her arms around her chest. With her experience with inter-universal travel, the last thing she wanted was anything to do with any "dimensions".

"I suppose you'll want to come with me then"? Sayaki pondered as if something about another person playing this Yokai Mash game was some sort of a problem.

"I-I'm not entirely sure what I'm signing up for, honestly. I'd appreciate if you ran this thing down by me first, Sayaki-san", Mana insisted as her foot began to tap impatiently and she realized that she was liking this idea less and less with each passing moment. "You can begin by telling me what these "dimensional games" are and what exactly Yokai Mash is".

"Well… You know how there are these bland black and white handheld video games? Dimensional games are sort of similar to them, except they take place inside of a pocket dimension and they require limited interaction from your part, you don't control a character, you play it yourself", Sayaki explained, waving hilariously with his small and fragile child's arms.

"Pocket dimensions? Like the ones used for sealing techniques to store their content"? Mana looked up in confusion. She had seen these "video games" that Sayaki mentioned before, in fact, she brought a sample of them from Naruto and Sasuke's universe. These dimensional games must have functioned similarly… By the time Mana's eyes moved back at the young one she had to babysit while he sealed parts of his self in a pocket dimension had placed an open empty scroll, identical to the one he himself was brushing on.

"You first need to register yourself by drawing blood and signing with it", the dirty faced kid cheeked at Mana before resuming his sloppy attempt at calligraphy.

"Like the summoning contract"? Mana recalled, this dimensional game had a lot of basis in ninjutsu and sealing techniques.

From what Mana's uninitiated mind could gather, these "dimensional games" utilized a somewhat confusing concept from Sealing Ninjutsu. The world that the people perceived was only a three dimensional one, however more dimensions existed, they were simply unperceivable to the common limited senses. Just like a seemingly infinite number of different universes existed in the vast realm of the Omniverse, a seemingly infinite number of different dimensions existed in each separate universe.

Whenever a seal user utilized a storage sealing technique or needed to transport anything through space-time, they utilized these pocket dimensions. Each person possessed a different dimension of their own, which was why items and chakra sealed away never interacted with one another. Mana couldn't tell how exactly each person gained access to a different pocket dimension of their own for their sealing techniques, it was simply how it worked, one of the plenty things something the limited science of the Ninja World had not yet discovered.

This scroll that Sayaki was brushing on must've "registered" each user to the same dimension so that they weren't all sealed away in their own personal dimensions. That much Mana's mind could wrap itself around, it was no demonic ritual, if such things even existed. Realizing that she could somewhat wrap her head around the science of Yokai Mash calmed her a little bit and she quickly bit her thumb drawing blood and scribbling her name with blinding speed on the black and bright blue scroll.

"Wow, you're so fast, Mana-san"! Sayaki yelled out in surprise after seeing how fast and how easily Mana drew her blood and scribbled, with perfect precision and artistic integrity, her name onto the scroll. "You also need your "password", it's a unique symbol that you are identified by and it validates that you are the one who's joining in. I'm not quite sure why it's needed but… It's a hassle to write, I'll tell you that much", Sayaki whined as he finally completed his own password and sat down on the ground calmly. His eyes stared blankly at the wall in front of him which weirded Mana out.

"Hey, Sayaki-san"! She shouted, gently placing her hand on the boy's shoulder and moving him around a bit, yet failing to achieve anything fruitful as the boy's senseless body just kept on staring at the wall.

"Babysit the kid they said…" Mana cursed after she scribbled a hieroglyph she chose for a password onto the scroll before sitting down like Sayaki did previously.

Being sent to the Yokai Mash dimension felt similar to falling asleep, one's eyes became blurry before the entire body started falling forward, except, whereas normally the body woke up after feeling freefall, logging into Yokai Mash was completely out of Mana's control as what appeared like her "soul" seeped out of her body. For a moment, the magician could see her body sitting calmly in a meditative position, left behind staring at the wall. Then, in a flash, the procedure just completed itself resolving the transfer.

* * *

"Ha ha, you actually logged in"! Sayaki chuckled before falling down on the grass and rolling in it.

Almost instantly after her senses started feeling the environment around her, Mana felt the warm embrace of sunlight touching her cheeks gently, the soft journey of the wind caressing her hair and the bright visions of spring just outside a small village.

"Hold your horses, young master, I'm only here to bail you out if I don't like this and think it's not something you should be doing. These pocket dimensions aren't meant to store people, their conditions are varied, some of them are hotter than anything in the known universe and most of them have intense gravitational forces as the entire universe is compressed into a space about as large as a moon. They aren't places young boys should visit"! Mana freaked out as she explored this dream and her own body, trying to see if she had not accidentally lost a limb in the journey.

"You worry too much, Mana-san! My dad wouldn't have bought the company that made this game if it wasn't safe for the public. Granted, it's pretty expensive so there aren't that many people playing it but… Maybe soon enough"! Sayaki's eyes were shimmering like planets made of literal diamond in close proximity to the brightest star imaginable. The eyes that were an equivalent of the galactic disco ball.

"How is this even possible, are our bodies safe? What if you want to eat or go to the toilet? I recommend you log out immediately and maybe invite some friends over, do something safer. As a ninja with knowledge of these dimensions I cannot condone this reckless game", Mana calmly asked Sayaki.

"Relax, the scroll only seals part of you in this dimension, it keeps just enough of you back home so that the sealed off consciousness can easily log out and return. Your body back home is in a state of deep sleep and does not require food, water, rest or anything else. You could stay here for entire days on end before you'd need to return to recharge the scroll with the universal chakra batteries", Sayaki laughed out seeing Mana's horror to being trapped in an interdimensional game world. If there was any irony to be found, that a skilled illusionist feared this transcendental entertainment, it was certainly not the first thing on Mana's mind.

"So it needs to be recharged? What if it runs out and you stay here forever? There are so many things that could go wrong! How is this even possible? There are entire villages stored here and… What the hell is THAT?" Mana shrieked out pointing at a duck-like critter drinking from a pond nearby. The creature was sluggish in its appearance, bony protrusions for eyebrows yet it took a humanoid shape. Antennae and a duck's beak were also added to make this abomination even more confusing to look at.

"Can we just… Slow down, Mana-san. Please, this is a part of my life, I love this game so… Please… Give me a chance to convince you, OK"? Sayaki pleaded with Mana, grabbing her hand and placing it by his chest as he stared at her with puppy eyes and a slobbering miserable expression of a crying child. Seeing that face was a weakness Mana had never encountered before, such a person would convince her of almost anything.

A group of more of those duck-like critters burst out from the reed surrounding the pond and pulled the green slimy looking duck-creature underwater. Initially a burst of bubbles came up from all of those diving monstrosities before the water resumed its calm. Mana could identify the behavior of a surprise-attacking predator anywhere – they were predatory creatures like the crocodiles of Kumogakure and other warm swampy areas. This place was beyond dangerous!

"So… First, you wanted to know… Ummm… Oh, right, yes, the scroll needs to be recharged once in a couple of days. If it comes close to running out of chakra, it simply logs you out automatically before it goes empty. You also needn't worry about this place being dangerous, no harm can come to your physical body inside this dimension as you're existing both in this dimension and outside it, there are few exceptions of physical discomfort purely for realistic effect, that is all. Any attacks from these Yokai will simply phase right through you and leave no harm. You exist both here and back home, but your body back home can actually be touched physically, if needed. Then again, if you're getting murdered in the physical world – it's the same thing if you're here or there". Sayaki kept on explaining, counting things on his fingers and skimming through a peculiar leather bound booklet. One he held by his side, the book just appeared to materialize whenever Sayaki scribbled things into the scroll he used to transport himself here.

"I don't think it's safe for us to be doing this, I'm supposed to be protecting you from possible harm", Mana argued.

"Our outside bodies remain in a limited state of awareness, if your stress level rises even a little bit on the outside, you'll immediately be logged out", Sayaki calmed the magician down again.

Mana sighed, "You are breaking the rules of reality to play a different kind of video game…" she couldn't stop staring at her own body and the environment around her. It was no genjutsu – all the details were emulated properly, there were no missing links, this was no dream. All these buildings, natural wonders and all this nature was actually sealed here from back home.

"This world is crafted by developers, they seal different things they want to create in here, editing this dimension to their will. They cooperate with the Senju clan to create new trees to seal here, with actual architects that build these villages and real ninja that create these pools of water and Sealing Ninjutsu experts to assist them". Sayaki kept on talking as he showed Mana around with gestures, pointing at where they needed to go and dragging her hesitant body by gently yanking her hand. He was so happy, so excited that Mana broke out of her mental breakdown just to admire the happiness that this game granted this young boy.

"Okay, let's say I believe that this place is safe, still… Those things back there"? Mana shook her head, keeping her eyes on the calm dirty pond where those duck-like creatures hid themselves. Their short round bodies looked too bulky and fat for them to move that fast, their legs were almost non-existent and absorbed within the layers of fat of their bellies with only their flat long feet being visible from outside.

"Oh, those were Kappa, they are the Yokai around which Yokai Mash revolves. You're supposed to seal them inside these scrolls and carry around with you", Sayaki grinned as he showed Mana five scrolls that just materialized from thin air in his hands.

"Like Ninja Animals…" Mana wondered aloud realizing that so much of this game was just emulation of the ninja life, the supernatural, which must've astounded people unfamiliar with the completely bonkers things that ninja called their everyday life. "You know, with enough will and training, you could learn to tame real Ninja Animals. They're not very nice to beginners but they don't require existing in between two different dimensions to summon. It's still not too late to go back, invite some friends over and…"

"I have no friends…" Sayaki sniffled. "I'm not sure why but other kids laugh at me, they tell me I'm weak, tease me with their pets and bully me".

"I see…", Mana sunk deep in thought. There was no way in which she could have helped this young man at that moment. Not without changing the world and making it stop value strength over all things. It could not have been just that Sayaki was frail, short and all those other things. It was his father – the other kids knew who his father was and must have been jealous of life where strength was not needed and money could buy everything he ever wanted, without asking first if that even was Sayaki's life.

Sayaki's family was rich, by all means, that placed them as being more important than those of all those other kids. The kids were frustrated and angry at Sayaki because of that but they were too young to delve into themselves and realize that. Such social frustration was not something a few mean pointing fingers or cheerful words would change. This world was the only happiness that Sayaki got, he interacted with other players, of similar social status of his and he was powerful inside this world – he could befriend any creature in his sight, talk and trade with any person he saw because the other people played the same game and it was within their interest to do so.

"Fine, we'll play your game for as long as you want, Sayaki", Mana dropped the honorific, finally stepping over her dislike of familiarity just to show Sayaki that she was her friend and not just his baby sitter or someone obligated to play with him. Mana rarely, if ever, broke her own rules and principles, it was one of her greatest weaknesses, but when these eyes of a crying child begged her to do it – she would do it a hundred times over.

"Yes! You'll see, Mana, this game is awesome! One day video games will maybe get better and catch up to this technology, then no one will need to seal themselves in between dimensions to have fun. I know that'll happen, I'll make this world a reality even if I'll have to build it myself"! Young Sayaki declared vibrantly raising his fist into the sky.

Smiling softly, Mana knelt before the boy before taking his other hand, clutching it into a fist and placing it by his chest.

"That's your nindo then. Your Ninja Way", she uttered.

Sayaki nodded with glowing eyes and a shimmering childish smile. One of the most beautiful kinds of smiles there was.

* * *

"Come on"! Sayaki encouraged Mana to hurry up.

"What's the rush"? The magician just pouted shyly in hesitation. Just now she realized that she may have simply been too conservative and stubborn about feeling bad about Yokai Mash. It was something that made her feel almost old.

"You need to get a Yokai of your own, that's why I added the transportation to the starting town command before logging in", Sayaki grinned, brimming with hope and excitement. It almost seemed like this boy discovered life all anew inside the Yokai Mash world. Seeing him this way, in contrast to the shy and reserved state he operated outside of it was a refreshing experience, which almost made Mana relive the excitement of discovering new rules about the world around her, almost like she herself was a child.

"Wait, what"? Mana freaked out, "Oh no, I don't need a Yokai, I'll have nothing to do with emulating this cock fighting, for your information, I happen to despise needless violence"!

"Hmm?" Sayaki squinted at Mana before skipping to the pond where all the Kappa were hiding and opening his scroll. Much to Mana's shock and fear for Sayaki's well-being, four of the Kappa dove out like ravenous predators, flying straight at the boy before they froze in time and just carefully landed on their webbed feet, simply moving around in a static stance as if they were moving to a very slow and calm rhythm.

"You"! Mana wanted to yell out her worries about Sayaki getting hurt but then she remembered that no one could have gotten hurt in Yokai Mash. "Do you plan to murder these creatures just to make a point? You don't need to do that"!

"Yokai Mash isn't about fighting, also, you must play it – you'll need Yokai to pass some farther away areas, which you'll need if you plan on following me", Sayaki stared at Mana with those eyes that children usually looked at their elders that had no idea what they were talking about. "You know, for someone who supposedly hates violence, you really jumped to violent conclusions".

Mana looked away with a blush, feeling ashamed that she was put down by this boy with such accuracy and sharpness that it almost hurt. Children often were the ones with the ability to be painfully honest, yet Sayaki also had this spark of intelligence on top of that as well.

"W-Well then, what's it about"? Mana mumbled, still ashamed.

As the opened scroll in Sayaki's hands started shining with a blinding azure flashing light, the boy's glare just softened while still focused at Mana's eyes.

"It's a dance-off, silly", the little one grinned.

The light fired off from Sayaki's scroll, booming in a bolt of what appeared like azure lightning before blasting an area right in front of him. As it expanded in size and demonstrated the massive power required to unseal these "Yokai" from their scrolls, the beam started taking humanoid shape. That of a tall young woman, that wearing a white attire which miko priestesses wore when performing Shinto rituals. The curious case was that the woman had the face of a sly fox with dark grey fur yet her eyes were oddly human and oozing spirituality and innocence from the blue shine.

"Miko Kudagitsune, use the Kagura dance on all four Kappa, one at a time"! Sayaki ordered the strange humanoid and it complied, beginning to twitch initially before breaking out in a ritualistic dance as she knocked her ringed staff around at an imaginary circle altar around her, igniting floating tongues of flame, almost like she was lighting up invisible candles on the ground of which only the flaming tip was visible. Unexpectedly, a strong gust of wind picked up, blowing a shower of black cherry blossom petals at the way of the four Kappa creatures and making them stop moving and cover up their faces and bodies from the strong storm of petals pelting at them.

A peculiar case of this whole affair was that a floating table appeared besides this "Miko Kudagitsune" creature with numbers shooting up from zero, counting up an unknown number, as if estimating something. At the same time, at the diagonal upper right side of each Kappa, another table appeared displaying a number that was shooting down. After the numbers above the heads of each Kappa hit 0, they fell on their knees and punched the ground, freezing in that state for a while, before diving back down to their lairs in the pool of dirty water.

"Okay…" Mana muttered to herself. She struggled to find an answer as to if this was the weirdest day of her life, having in mind that she once travelled through different universes and faced inter-universal, eight thousand years old, hi-tech, godlike travelers, the answer should've been much clearer than it actually was.

"See, just an innocent dance-off, their Footsies got reduced to 0, meaning they lost the dance-off. They didn't even get to dance though, that's because they're the starting fodder for weak players to step their dancing skills up and get their feet loose". Sayaki smiled innocently through the whole explanation process, causing Mana to notice an innocent blush on the boy's cheeks as well. He must have realized how boastful he sounded and was a little ashamed of it in front of his new friend.

* * *

"Okay, baby steps now", Sayaki sat down on the soft and emerald-green grass of the Tatami town, the starting town of all new Yokai Mashers. "Those Kappa like to band in gangs, you may wish to challenge someone weaker and smaller than that, like the Tofu Kozo that come out in the evenings".

Mana glared at the scroll she was given by a weird priest man inside Tatami town in a complicated process where she had to listen to a bunch of different Yokai talk over one another in what Sayaki called "an event" and listen about the rich lore of Yokai Mash. While the historian inside Mana was sort of interested, she sort of blacked out after the story got to Kusaguyagi, apparently the Goddess of this world, being betrayed by her third betrothed in that one event and Mana could swear that coma and evil twins were weaved in into the story at one point.

"Hey, what are you doing"? The boy jumped back on his feet and ran up to Mana, grabbing her by the elbow and starting to drag her away from her calm attempt at reading the massive "Instructions" tome she was given.

"What"? Mana looked at the boy confused, at this point she invested so much of time into Yokai Mash that she wanted to actually at least play it with Sayaki until he had to log off and go to bed. "These look important"!

"Throw away the damned book, Mana"! Sayaki laughed out after angrily jumping in the air to swipe at the magician's book, making it dematerialize into some sort of blue glowing cubes and scatter in the wind like dandelion fluff.

"But the IVth tome of "Terms and Conditions" said it's necessary to read the rules and section 3659 said that I am responsible for not reading through the instructions and that I answer for breaking the rules", Mana pouted as she objected.

"What!? You read the "Terms and Conditions" too!?" Sayaki's jaw dropped in horror before he broke out in laughter and started rolling on the ground, his hand never dropped down from pointing and Mana and laughing at her humiliation, one Mana did not quite understand. "No one reads those, the only learning experience is actually playing the game. Experience it, instead of reading about it"!

"Ummm, okay… How though"? She squinted at the boy before her eyes opened up and realized something – Sayaki was not using the honorific when addressing her for some time now. He must have finally actually considered Mana as an actual friend and she was not even the part of Yokai Mash rich arsenal of characters or that more technical term which Sayaki used to describe them, an acronym which now evaded Mana's memory. That gave the girl hope that the little boy may just find friends in life from wider circles and that all he needed was unifying experiences and relatability.

"Just run into the Aggro-Range of a Yokai, then, when its attention is focused on you – open up the scroll", Sayaki explained.

Looking around frantically for these "Tofu Kozo" was quite easy now that Mana has acquired all of the "elements of the interface" through a tedious "event quest" which involved listening to long explanations of what they all meant and saw the names of each Yokai floating above their heads.

Finding one of them, the ghostly purple bloated child figures, carrying a plate of tofu and moaning like the unholy undead as they shuffled the outside regions of Tatami town, Mana ran up to the dressed as a rice farmer Yokai and upon meeting its gaze opened the scroll. Beaming light fired off from Mana's scroll, firing off in the air and taking shape right in front of her.

An attractive young woman, wearing celebratory kimono and with majestically well-done hair, singing melodious tunes appeared from the beam of light as she danced around, flowing freely like water yet remaining static.

"This is your Yokai, you can see her name, right? To the right is her base Mairyoku – it's sort of the scale for how awesome your Yokai's dance is", Sayaki pointed at the attractive young woman. Somehow, Mana felt like she failed to see the "monster" part of the strange Yokai she received and to her it seemed like just another attractive young lady.

"Alright, Iyaya, you've got the Mairyoku of… 3", Mana rolled her eyes after remembering a much larger number on Sayaki's Yokai scale.

"Okay, now, order it to dance, pick one of its dances from the list… Oh, wait, it appears your opponent has looser feet than you", Sayaki gasped looking first with surprise and moderate horror at the Tofu Kozo, then with pathetic pity at Mana's Yokai. That could not have been a good sign.

"What does that mean"? Mana wondered loudly after the boy did not reply for a prolonged time and continued to pity the magician for her poor choice of beginner Yokai. He appeared genuinely surprised by this experience so it did not look like he knew about weaker stats of Mana's creature.

"It means it'll perform its dance first, it'll probably also use its step-up too, it's a hidden ability that each Yokai possesses that adds to the dances they use or raise their Mairyoku together with the dancing multiplier. Some step-ups can even be used by other Yokai you possess in the middle of battle to help your dancing Yokai", the boy explained, Mana was almost impressed by how much complex terminology came out of the youth's mouth. During that age, Mana may have been studying the ways of ninjutsu, and how to kill the enemy more efficiently, however, plenty of kids still ate boogers being of that same age.

The Tofu Kozo started to slowly walk up to Mana's Iyaya, extending its hands forward and suggesting the rotten-green colored tofu it carried around with it, all while laxly hopping to its right and left feet, this counted as "dancing" only by a very strict definition of the word. As it initiated this odd "step-up", a sign with the words of "Monstrous Tofu Swindler" appeared above Kozo's head. Mana extended her hand at the direction of the name, just like she still managed to read in the "Instructions" book to request an explanation.

"Offer the other Yokai tofu which has gone bad a century ago and carries terrible poison reducing their Mairyoku greatly and diminishing their ability to dance "wide-feet" type dances"

Mana looked with a sorry look at her measly weakling of a Yokai as it turned around and tried accepting the poisonous and rotten tofu from the undead swindler boy, she almost felt bad about the massive fit of stomach problems that were about to attack her illusionary and non-existent pet monster. Maybe it was her human appearance. It was then that Tofu Kozo froze in fear and its eyes became wide whited out circles as its jaw dropped to the ground as foam started dripping from the boyish Yokai's mouth and its whole body began shaking.

The sign with flashing hieroglyphs spelling "No Way!" appeared above Iyaya's head which Mana also requested explanation on with her gesture.

"Upon being targeted by a step-up, Iyaya will reveal its face, diminishing the Mairyoku of any "male", or any of this type's sub-types, Yokai. This step-up becomes "No Way! Uh-Oh!" after Sapphire Dance Revolution"

With her disbelieving face still twitching in misery, Mana lifted it to see the reflection of Iyaya's face from the nearby pond, where the Kappa laid dormant and waiting for someone to come close enough to catch their attention. A wrinkly and abhorrent face of an old twisted man stared back at Mana, making her stomach churn.

"Okay, use the "Surprise, Traveler!" dance", Mana uttered, knowing full well that she'd regret asking Iyaya to do it. Even while she purposefully avoided looking at the pond to see just what sort of terrible grimace her abominable Yokai performed as it danced, Mana could still make out its massive, filled with warts tongue flipping about as it performed a relatively harmless and pretty native dance.

"Multiplier X10" a table above Iyaya's head stated before these words and numbers became one with its Mairyoku table, making the Mairyoku rise to 30. At the same time the Mairyoku of Tofu Kozo remained at 1, after being dropped down by Iyaya's step-up ability previously.

Circling around the tired Tofu Kozo's frame, Sayaki rushed up to Mana, laughing vibrantly as Iyaya returned to Mana's scroll and, despite it being the other Yokai that had to endure this terrible dance-off, the magician felt somehow violated by this experience.

"That was amazing, Mana, I've never seen this Yokai before"! Sayaki laughed out before grabbing Mana's hand and starting to drag her somewhere else.

"Say… Not that I regret my choice of starting Yokai but… How do players change their Yokai"? Mana wondered, clearly regretting her choice of starting Yokai.

"Oh, that's simple, each Yokai has a determined Mairyoku Standing Ovation value. Once you meet that value with your Yokai's dancing, or surpass it, you approach the defeated Yokai and ask it to join your Magic Hike by materializing a free scroll. It then is rented out and hikes with you until it is claimed by another player in Player VS Player dance-off or until you send it to reserve when another Yokai takes its place in the hike".

"Sounds like a hassle", the magician pouted before checking the Standing Ovation value, written under the SOV acronym by the submitted Yokai.

"Well, this whole game will improve, it's a work in progress. My father's sinking money into it, you know, financing like that will make this game really awesome one day, even more so than it already is"! Sayaki fell down on his back and played with the grass that shifted between his fingers of his extended arms.

"Look, little one, you seem like a really weird and weak Yokai but… That's pretty much my specialty and the only kind I can get an ovation from, your SOV appears to literally be 1, please join my Magic Hike", plenty of people she knew would've thought the name of the select five Yokai of the player's party was odd. That being said, Mana herself was quite a cheesy enough entertainer to oddly enjoy the weirded parts of the game.

Tofu Kozo jumped on its little feet and exploded into a standing ovation, Mana let it go for a bit longer than it needed to go before she found out how to materialize an empty scroll and seal the Yokai inside of it, all of which only transpired with the aid of her eight year old newly met friend.

* * *

It was truly surprising to find out how differently time was passing in this dimension. From what Mana had heard through hearsay, she knew that the handheld kind of games usually helped one pass time, which meant that it made a long period of time just fly by. Not quite something that would help with an unpleasant visit in the doctor's office, seeing how it required concentration, but still – a valid mean to one's timewasting ends.

Things were quite different in the dimensional game world. Seeing how, technically, a seemingly infinite size of the universe in which everyone lived in was compressed into a dimension the size of a single planetoid, the immense gravitational forces slowed down the passage of time astonishingly in the Yokai Mash dimension. Mana was not quite sure how come the objects present in the universe did not simply get spaghettified and crushed under their own untold mass, or how these Yokai creatures could survive these effects. She could somewhat guess that it was due to their "artificial" or "illusionary" nature as they were referred as such by the little boy she was keeping an eye on.

Entire days on end passed with Mana following Sayaki along, encountering new Yokai and improving her own Magic Hike for the sole purpose of being able to bypass the scripted events that were required to be beaten in order to progress through the game. By far Mana's least favorite part of the game was the strange section of each town where she needed to defeat other people at a specific kind of dancing competition. In the first town Sayaki traded Miko Kudagitsune for Mana's entire Magic Hike which she had gathered by that time. The magician would not agree to a different trade as she felt like it simply was not fair otherwise, even if it was not fair even with the way it transpired, seeing how all of Mana's Yokai were beginner bait.

The studio in the next town, which Mana had to pass through, was all about native dancing, meaning that the only dances that multiplied a Yokai's Mairyoku value were the native type dances. Using Miko Kudagitsune's Kagura dance made that studio just too easy as the entire Magic Hike of that studio's crew failed to match up to even one tenth of Miko Kudagitsune's Mairyoku. It had something to do with something called "power leveling", as Sayaki explained.

"Say, Sayaki, why on Earth was the Shiranui that the studio head used colored differently from the ones we've seen"? Mana wondered, "Was it the result of this "power leveling" too, if so, why was your "power leveling" stronger than the studio head's"?

"Oh, right, I haven't told you about Dance Revolutions yet…" Sayaki smacked his forehead, "Truthfully, I didn't think you'd need to worry about that, but seeing how we're power leveling you, you may have your Yokai go through a Dance Revolution pretty soon".

Mana just kept on staring at the young boy curiously. "How am I doing the "power leveling" now, also, please explain those Dance Revolutions".

"You're power leveling because you're in my party, watching my Yokai battle the hidden Yokai scattered through each starter area. Because the developers wanted to make a point for the more experienced players to return or have something to do when they help out their newbie friends, they left a bunch of hidden Yokai dancers, which you've seen me challenging all this time we've been walking around aimlessly. Since you're in my party, your Magic Hike grows in base Mairyoku equal to a percentage of the growth my Yokai go through", Sayaki tried breaking it down.

"So the players are encouraged to gang up and gather around high level players, similarly to the relationship between studio players and studio heads, because it accelerates their growth, meanwhile the strong players get an added benefit from getting to grow in power by challenging those secret Yokai"? Mana simplified what she heard loudly to herself. She had to hand it to the creators of this dimensional game – it was a very useful tactic to learn. It was not too difficult to see that the influence from the ninja helping shape this world for the developers may have rubbed off on the tactical aspects as well as the physical state of the world…

"You know, real world is a lot like that too. Except, I guess, there doesn't need to be an incentive to hanging around other people, it's rewarding all by itself". Mana wondered as she closed her eyes, trying to smell the air around her but when only a bland sniff of cold gloom hit her nose, reminding her of her recent sensory losses, she was kicked right back down to reality. Even in an imaginary world, she could not smell anything at all.

"Is it though? Other people are mean, they bully me, try to tease me with their dogs, they chase me around, and stuff. I mean, maybe if each bullying session made me feel less pain the next time, I could level up and become strong but the game of real life is stacked from the beginning. I'm sick so I can never be strong, even if I could, it's not my weakness that deters other kids, it's who I am". Sayaki pouted bitterly as he stared up at the sky, differently from the three-dimensional world, here one's eyes didn't hurt at all when staring at the sky or directly at the Sun because they weren't technically real and they didn't lead to anything but the dimensional wall, cleverly covered with clouds and a fake sky.

"That's the worst kind of injustice I've ever encountered, people hating other people for no other reason than them being born. I hate violence and hatred itself, it's a bit hypocritical but I do. But, sometimes, when I talk to other people, killers, brawlers, nasty people, I can kind of understand their point. It's interesting really, it's kind of like the "leveling up" you get from this game – you grow and improve yourself by exposing your views to those of other people, even those opposite to you. One point of view I never could get, however, was hatred of something for that person or thing being alive though", Mana looked down at the kid who just slowed down his pace. Truthfully, this whole game thing was beyond weird, she had spent way more time watching him in this dimension's time than just one night and yet…

"I'm gonna go dance-off with that Tenome, it's pretty creepy and it hangs around graveyards, you'll need some more Mairyoku if you're to win at the Dirty Dancing studio", Sayaki changed the topic as he fired off running towards the graveyard. Mana looked at the sign that laid right in front of them, right on the path they were walking on. The Tsuto-u Town was just a good five minutes of walking ahead and Mana's hike had a good 265 Mairyoku lead over anything she's ever seen around.

Yokai Mash was just Sayaki's escape, whenever real life hurt him too much, whenever painful memories pushed him to a corner he danced it off. Was it really all that harmful, all that bad? Mana truly has seen people deal with pain in much worse and more destructive ways. Real, bloody ways, ways that merely accelerated the circle of hatred instead of using the momentum of it for a positive mean, like using a flowing river to generate electricity, that kind of thing…

* * *

After Mana ran up to Sayaki, the young man was angrily yelling at a seemingly random grave. The gravestone had no name to it, just "Blind Old Geezer" carved onto it, not even a date or mean of death, no candles, flowers or other honoring accessories either. Only bags of bones, so filled with them that they fell down and let their contents scatter all over the grave, placed where usually there would be candles and flowers. Even if one didn't know an exact number or location of the grave of this Yokai, they'd still have discovered it merely by glancing at how odd this grave was.

"Come, Blind Old Geezer, have a glance at your killers' faces, come, use your true eyes", Sayaki kept yelling, then repeating it over and over, sometimes adding something similarly odd and out of place.

A hand burst from the grave, elderly, crooked and broken. All of the Yokai's fingers were twisted and busted up, it certainly did not go in peace. Another hand burst from the dirt before placing its palm against it to let the whole figure of the Yokai to reveal itself. Whatever ritual Sayaki tried to perform – it worked flawlessly. A hairless and wrinkled head burst from the ground, screaming with a muffled scream of a man with lungs full of dirt.

The Yokai was a ghostly kind, looking like a pale elderly man with empty eyeholes and an overly expressive mouth with a hanging dry tongue, likely a result of its violent death, which must have left its jaw broken and dangling grotesquely. The undead was dressed in common villager's clothes, a bit on the dirty and simple kind, even before the old man's death it couldn't have been too nice of an attire.

"Tenome, Base Mairyoku: 665" said the glowing red table above the Yokai's head as the hidden monstrosity pulled its surprisingly tall and hunched, frail body out of the ground and stretched out in all of its almost skeletal manner of twitching movements. Tenome then raised its palms, only for two large eyes to open up inside them as the hidden Yokai began to dance lazily and statically, waiting for the player who caught its attention to call his Yokai.

"You're strong, let's see, my strongest base Mairyoku Yokai is… This one"! Sayaki chuckled before opening up a scroll and unleashing a jolt of light that left a long loose haired, demonic faced woman without any eyebrows and crooked, bony protrusions in their place as well as twisted long fangs in her mouth. The woman's hair flowed loosely up and down her back, almost like she was submerged underwater.

"Hari Onago, Base Mairyoku: 710", the table above this Yokai's head stated. Mana raised her eyebrows in an expression of contained surprise. She hadn't yet seen Sayaki used a Yokai with such high base Mairyoku level, it must have been one he had convinced to join him in the later towns, judging from the rest of his Magic Hike – perhaps even as recently as his last playing session.

"I didn't know you had Yokai with a base Mairyoku level higher than that of secret bosses, all of your other ones had ones lower than the boss', it was only due to the dances you've used and your step-ups that you've surpassed their Mairyoku in the end". Mana uttered, her gut feeling, honed by participating in countless real life battles where life was hanging on a thread as well as experience in reading her friends and opponents thoughts in battle suggested something she didn't want to believe in.

"Yeah", Sayaki chuckled again, "This one's actually not too compatible with this battle but I've never seen "Vengeful Despair" archetype before nor do I know this boss' step-up".

Mana knew what the boy failed to tell her – he acquired mastery over this game not by reading information but by experience. He got beat by a certain Yokai, then, he just kept on challenging it again and again until he either overpowered it or discovered a hidden winning strategy he needed to win. He had no such experience with Tenome's archetype or its dances so he just used his highest Mairyoku possessing Yokai without considering strategy.

"I'm sorry, Sayaki", Mana's lips softly moved by themselves. The only reason why this foolish boy rushed into battle was because she brought up something that felt hurtful to him – the relationship between other kids his age and him. Even when the decision was to accompany him through the game, she kept on trying to fix him by bringing up that which he had abandoned. In a way, she was responsible for him rushing head-first into this battle to avoid confronting Mana's words.

"It's fine, as long as the step-ups…" Sayaki acted out a cheerful smile and offered Mana a thumb up before the step-ups for both Yokai activated.

"Tenome: Step-Up – "Resentful Death" – Yokai feasts on opponent's bones, changing any X20 Multiplier and higher dances to "Worthless Flapping" – a dance of X0 Multiplier"

"Hari Onago: Step-Up – "Accidental Lashes" – Yokai accidentally whips the opposing dancing Yokai for X0.75 Multiplier of their Mairyoku, if facing off against a Yokai with additional loose feet enhancing Step-Up, reduce Hari Onago's Mairyoku times the number of loose feet based Step-Ups the opposing Yokai possesses".

Mana instantly saw a problem in the compatibility of these two Yokai, it didn't take a very experienced player to see it – Hari Onago was a Yokai of later stages of the game, which meant most of its dances would have had a way higher multiplier than X20. Even her puny starting Yokai had its first dance with a multiplier of X10.

"Oh, it's fine, let's just see how it goes", Sayaki grinned, he appeared to have absolutely no idea or wish to calculate an approximate outcome of the dance-off. He just pointed his finger at Tenome and commanded it to dance the "Barbed Ends" dance, as Mana predicted, it was a X35 multiplier dance but, as Mana saw on the list of her party member's dances, it was the lowest multiplier having dance Hari Onago had.

"Hari Onago: Mairyoku Total: 0" the table above its head stated.

"Temome: Uses the "Bone Slurp" dance, Multiplier X25. Mairyoku: 16625"

Mana knew what should happened next, depending on whose feet were looser, the Yokai compared their Mairyoku and the loser received damage to their Footsies. Mana was no Footsies scientist, but she was pretty sure that even Hari Onago didn't have 16625 Footsies to spare, the most she saw a Yokai have was a bit over 8000.

"It's okay, my feet are looser, that means I can pull out this"! Sayaki pulled out a scroll from his pocket, unleashing a second Yokai. Even when Mana had no idea something like that could even have been done, that was when Sayaki's battle went completely to the crapper. As once the fiery will-o-wisp appeared from the boy's scroll its step-up automatically activated, there also were no options to control that Yokai. Mana paid close attention to this will-o-wisp's step-up:

"Ruby Hitodama: Base Mairyoku – 126, Step-Up: "Stomach Filler" – use this Yokai in the middle of a dance-off to have the other Yokai feast on Hitodama and feel too satisfied to dance. When your Yokai has looser feet - negate that dance-off. This Yokai leaves your Magic Hike after its step-up is used".

What Sayaki did not count on was that the secret boss lit up with another step-up the moment that Ruby Hitodama appeared. Mana felt completely lost – not only did she have no idea about the "Ruby" prefix to the Yokai's name but she also only half understood how or why Ruby Hitodama was even used.

"Tenome: Combined Mairyoku – 16625, Step-Up #2 "Fast Chaser" – Due to its natural affinity for chasing its unfortunate prey, Tenome always has looser feet than any Yokai without loose feet enhancing step-ups. Also, any escape or dance-off negating step-ups or actions are negated".

As the countless interacting step-ups and dances worked their magic and the complicated set of sealing jutsu that comprised the code and programming of this dimension did their thing, not only did Ruby Hitodama just disappear into thin air but also Hari Onago bumped into Tenome during their dances after which her flesh just collapsed. The Yokai just rolled around pathetically, behaving like a blobfish on land.

"I lost"… Sayaki cried out in frustration, kicking the pile of dirt under his feet. "Not only that, but Ruby Hitodama is gone as well and with nothing to gain"!

Mana knew why the boy was upset – losing meant losing a percentage of Mairyoku from the participating Yokai, also all of his other Yokai in his Magic Hike by a smaller percentage. That meant that his strongest Yokai was now weakened, or would have been if the tables did not just keep glowing suggesting that the dance-off was still going.

"Wha-What's going on"? Sayaki looked at Mana. "Hari Onago's Footsies are at 0, she's done for. Don't tell me…"

"Yep, I'm in your party, remember"? Mana smiled, "Which means that I can take a shot at him after you with it being treated as the same dance-off".

"Yeah, but you could have chosen not to do that, you stand no chance against Tenome", Sayaki uttered in disbelief that Mana would follow him into a battle like that. "You'll never win in the Dirty Dancing studio if you get your Yokai crippled here".

Without saying a word Mana walked up in front of Sayaki, in between the boy and Tenome before turning back at the boy and smiling.

"You do know that the fourth page of "Instructions" says that "Party Member" and "Aggro" are two different player statuses, right"? Mana asked the boy who laughed at the idea of reading the instructions and burrowed through this world through experience and muscling through it alone.

Sayaki just kept on staring at Mana with slightly wet eyes, he would have long since cried out in frustration but the happiness in Mana's eyes made him more confused than frustrated.

"It means that a "Party Member" can intervene into other "Party Member's" battle once, it's a rule you still haven't used because you entered the battle as "Aggro", once Tenome kicks my ass, you can dance his blind butt off again", Mana comforted the boy before revealing the scroll in her hands and unleashing her Yokai.

"Gyochu: Base Mairyoku: 1" the table above a wet puddle of blood declared.

Tenome obviously had looser feet than Mana's Yokai, one from the Tatami Town – the begginer's area of the game where only the weakest Yokai with the oddest step-ups laid dormant, easy to convince to join. Their prime purpose must have been teaching the player about counting basic Mairyoku values and making accurate judgments about which Yokai deserved the limited spot on one's Magic Hike and which ones did not.

Tenome dove right into the puddle of blood, stomping as it danced on it and scattering it away effortlessly. Mana felt the immense gravity of the dimension pull her down on her knees just for a brief moment, it was restrained, controlled, just as a mean to cause the losing player discomfort and tell them clearly that they have lost the dance-off and that their Yokai were being weakened. I t must've been the "exception for realistic effect" to the no-harm done in Yokai Mash rule which Sayaki spoke of earlier.

Upon loss, Gyochu's step-up ability activated:

"Gyochu: Combined Mairyoku: 0, Footsies: 0, Step-Up: "Intestinal Tattler" – upon being defeated in a dance-off, Gyochu infects the winning Yokai and tattles on its secrets from inside its intestines, as a result - Gyochu shall display the winning Yokai's hidden in-game information".

Mana turned back at Sayaki, still on one knee, just so her eyes were on the same level as those of the rich kid. So they could talk like friends.

"You've taught me plenty about this game, about your world, the contents of your very soul. Let me teach you something – read that information, count the multipliers, strategize and you will never lose. Because one day, mistakes like that will cost you friends, it may be just a game, it may be in real life. All I know is – when that happens – you'll never forgive yourself knowing that you haven't done everything you could've done to avoid your friends sacrificing themselvesyou're your well-being", Mana spoke honestly as images from the quest for the Box of Ultimate Bliss, the Sun Disc arena, Shimo's death flashed through her eyes waking her own eyes tear up momentarily.

Sayaki nodded firmly, wiping away his tears and running up to the massive table displaying various different weaknesses and hidden multipliers when the Yokai faced off against certain types. It was something that usually was learned about through experience, accidental discovery. This seemingly useless Yokai which Sayaki himself proclaimed as useless when Mana took it under her wing proved to have some sort of use after all. Nobody wanted to view hidden information about a Yokai AFTER losing a dance-off because that was simply impractical. Mana was many things but practical was rarely one of them…

* * *

"I can't believe that Tanome had a hidden X0.25 Mairyoku multiplier to Shinto archetype Yokai", Sayaki sadly muttered after Mana and the kid were making their way to Tsuto-u Town, wet from the rain that was pouring down.

"Well, at least you beat it", Mana nodded happily, things turned out quite fine in the end. She herself did not lose any Mairyoku from her Yokai after Tanome was beaten in a dance-off by her party member initiating dance-off after her defeat. Still, she did not get any bonus from it, neither did Sayaki as, apparently, his first loss counted to limited capacity – not granting him the reward from beating the Yokai.

"That Ruby prefix", Mana wanted to ask that for a long time.

"Oh yeah, I wanted to explain to you the Dance Revolution but things kind of went wild, didn't they"? Sayaki smiled, "You see, after being empowered multiple times, Yokai will undergo a physical transformation, certain cosmetic changes of color to their entire body or just one of their accessories. There are multiple stages of those changes: Copper – Crystal – Ruby – Sapphire – Onyx – Jade".

"Oh, I see… Sorry you had to lose a Yokai that had undergone several revolutions already", Mana sadly looked away.

"What you've done, I know that you won't be playing this game after you stop babysitting me but… You did it just because you knew what this game means to me, right"? Sayaki asked looking up at Mana, searching for her eyes but finding only the magician's messy hair covering her face up.

"I'll… I'll try making more real life friends. I'll try sacrificing my own comfort and safety like you do for others, be more in real life like I am acting in this world", the little one whined out, seemingly touched by Mana's mute positive answer to his question. "Just like you heard me out and tried opening yourself to Yokai Mash", the boy smiled.

* * *

"Well… So much for the Dirty Dancing studio", Sayaki yawned after he and Mana left a two floors tall rectangular building that was quite dirtied and rotten from the outside, just as much so as it was from the inside. To say just that much about it was to stay absolutely quiet about the building's inner state or its older than Mana neon signs that blinked in and out with darkened pink haze that was almost hypnotic.

"Say, you haven't even come close to catching up to the town where you currently need to compete in, right"? Mana wondered, feeling a bit bad about the slow progress they have been making.

"Yeah, if I am to go to bed by ten, we've got three Yokai Mash hours left, hardly enough time to reach the town I was previously in", the boy nodded before checking in the game time as well as the three dimensional world's current time.

"You won't have made any progress by the time we leave, is that OK with you"? Mana tilted the left corner of her lips upwards, regretfully predicting the situation at hand.

"It's fine, I don't play this game too competitively. I play it just for fun anyways. I was never that good, always needed to grind Mairyoku to beat those studios and you're only six studios behind from my current progress. From what I've learned watching you, I'll progress much faster and maybe get good enough to threaten some better players", Sayaki grinned with that childish hope in his smile. The childish naivete inspired hope in Mana as well.

A middle aged woman ran past Mana and Sayaki, despite looking not too different from most of artificial humans placed in the dimension to guide the players through it and serve as the service staff of the dimension, she acted just recklessly enough for Mana to recognize another real player. The woman must have been quite rich in the real world for her to be able to play the game, from what the magician recalled.

"Ma'am, what's going on"? Mana asked the woman as the mix of shock and frustration in the woman's eyes was simply too out of the ordinary and freaky to ignore.

"The Hotel "ABCD" has been occupied by a madman. Something seriously freaky is going on around the place, I think he's breaking the game, or something. He can't be an artificial human, someone should report him, or something"! The woman shouted out and ran away, not before pointing at the direction of the "ABCD" hotel.

"Yeah, I know the place, it's a very respectable establishment for players to rest up and trade Yokai for some items", Sayaki nodded, looking a bit scared himself, not due to the situation described but by the manner that the middle aged woman was acting. Just from seeing how experienced Sayaki was at the game, it was easy to forget that he was just an eight-year old kid, after all. He got scared seeing adults acting all freaky and weird.

"Let's go check it out then", Mana suggested.

"Don't get reckless, Mana. Player dance-offs work differently from dancing-off with other Yokai and artificial humans. If they're really strong they'll just recruit your Yokai to their Magic Hike after the dance-off", Sayaki reminded that rule which he had explained to Mana seemingly a lifetime ago.

"I'll have it in mind, if we see the perp's Mairyoku being insane we can always just walk away. This is just a game, no one's lives are at stake", Mana nodded cheerfully before the two slowly head out to Hotel "ABCD" together to see just what the trouble.

Hotel "ABCD" was a tall building, seemingly reaching the sky, separated in endless patterns of similar sections of well-renovated and modern looking architecture. Plenty of glass, plastic and various outdoor decoration achievements. Looking orange, white and purple when all dominant colors were taken to consideration, wearing a proud and eye-raking neon sign on the roof high up, proudly proclaiming the hotel's name, no, bleeding it all over the sky above.

"Something's wrong, artificial humans are all acting weird"! A player yelled out running away from the building. "This is creepy, I'm filing a complaint for the administration"!

"That was a player, someone at least Tsuto-u Town's level. Just how good were you, will the two of us be enough"? Mana wondered, she could see similar fears flashing through Sayaki's eyes. This was quite different from the walking in blind and learning from experience kid she had met before – Sayaki was calculating, strategizing and weighing his abilities. It was beautiful to see the kid's growth like that, as a ninja, Mana could recognize those cold strategizing thoughts right in the kid's eyes.

"I'm not too sociable, as you've seen, this game rewards being social. Leveling up in a party will always result in stronger players, that being said, I've played long enough to surpass anyone around my town, even if I achieved it through longer playtime and aiding you along while fighting secret bosses along the way. I may have leveled up more leveling with you than I did in the past two or three days by myself…" Sayaki kept mumbling to himself, his childish mind still struggled with making efficient decisions. He was afraid, trembling. For a moment Mana felt bad about teaching this child pre-emptive fear but it was a feeling of self-preservation.

"Well then, we can turn around and walk away, wait until the developers solve this, you can log on tomorrow and play again from where you're leaving off. No pressure, your call", Mana kneeled down, looking Sayaki right in the eyes after removing his lengthened hair from the boy's face.

"This man, whoever he is, he is messing with my game. A part of my life. I can't forget or leave it behind. Something that helps me when I'm sad, when other people are mean to me. That makes me… Angry", the boy uttered as irritation rose up like hot smoke escaping a boiling stew.

"Very well, then let's go dance his butt off down from there", Mana nodded as the two slowly and confidently walked into the hotel suite.

The two proceeded to walk forwards, it was a gruesome and almost sisyphean climb up, dancing-off every artificial human running at them one by one. This definitely was not normal, these poor creations acted completely out of their character to the point where Sayaki was shaken to fight them off, despite having a large Mairyoku advantage over them. It was just the human fear factor of seeing whited out eyes and that twitching body that was under something's control, forced the defy its programming as its body both tried to perform actions according to its own programming and defy it at the same time.

Mana may have increased the Mairyoku of her most active Yokai several times over just from that one long and tedious climb. It took the two several floors before they decided to try the elevator, which was broken, either way, Mana thought that the artificial humans would've stopped them at every floor regardless, trying to dance-off them to exhaustion and make them back off. As the last artificial human fell on their knees, letting Mana and Sayaki pass, the two finally reached the top floor and gained access to the roof.

Once Mana and Sayaki stepped onto the roof, they noticed that the dimension around them had changed. The dark purple, gloomy clouds whirled in a twister shape up above with lightning cracking its thunderous whips every other fifteen seconds. Air was getting a bit heavy to breathe – some amount of damage was actually being caused to the whole of this dimensions sealing integrity. Whatever seals were placed to balance these very sensitive conditions out may have slowly been being worn out.

A businessman wearing a long sleeved grey, golden lined cloak over dark purple undershirt with dark green spiky hair turned around. His eyes were quite shady and closed down in a perpetual squint that appeared to calculate and weigh heavily everything it saw. Determining the value of things or their threat level instantly before throwing what remained and had no value away. Such were the eyes of this person. He stood besides a kneeling artificial human, judging from the glow of their scrolls the two were still engaged in a dance-off even if it appeared the artificial human was passed out.

"You haven't ran away"? The man wondered, "I don't think you've noticed but you've got a child beside you. This isn't a place to be in with a child".

"You're messing up my game, Mister. Please stop", Sayaki said with a childish and shaking voice.

"I don't think I will. I've come too far and done too much to stop now", he grinned with a slimy smile of a weasel who thought he had won the roulette. Mana had seen those eyes far too often for her liking but she was curious to see how would Sayaki react to them. She had taught the kid to think things through rationally, to never rely on chance or experience. In a way, he was now confronting the opposing side of everything Sayaki was before – the boy's perfect antithesis.

"By the time you'll be stopped by force you'll have done even more and gone even farther", Mana intervened seeing Sayaki just stand there silently as the drizzle pelted at the boy's soft cheeks and his little young heart shook after each lightning crack.

"Oh, by then it'll be too late. It's really funny how no one saw this coming… I mean doesn't anyone read the instructions"? The businessman laughed out as he turned back at the collapsing dimensional hole above him. The more time passed the more the whirlwind above was forming a cyclonic construct of rotating clouds and roaring winds. The man's estimation may have been right.

"You're Meta-san, aren't you? Hiniku Meta?" Sayaki shouted back at the man, "You've visited our home before".

"That's right, I am, in a way, another businessman, just like your father", Meta smiled.

"In other words, a competitor", Mana caught on to the point. "I don't think you need any more explaining, Sayaki, initiate a dance-off immediately and disable all of his Yokai. One of his Yokai must be causing all of this, his chakra level is like that of a common man so he's destroying this dimension by the game's own rules".

"Oh? You're a ninja, little missy? That's hilarious. You'd very much like to punch my teeth out, huh? Too bad, no one can get injured while they're in-between dimensions… That whole thing", Meta spread his hands out wide, breathing in the air of the storm he had caused. He was definitely right, whenever the developers intervene, it'll be too late by the crazy time dilution going on in this dimension. "Plus, industrial sabotage is a matter for the Police Force, not ninja, don't you think"? He taunted the magician.

"I don't get it, why are you doing this, Meta-san"!? Sayaki pleaded with the man but Mana realized that there was a reason why Meta was so glad just standing there and talking – he had the luxury and the need to wait this thing out.

"He wants to destroy this dimension's rules, cause a big mess so that the game is deemed unsafe. That's when he'll buy the game from your father and continue to develop it himself", Mana quickly summarized what she had pieced together. "We've got no time to run away, we have to dance him off, now" she grunted materializing a scroll and extending it in front of Meta.

"Hmmm? Why should I dance-off with you"? Meta sung out triumphantly. "All I need to do is wait here for this place to fall apart".

"It's a step-up that's causing this, isn't it"? Mana stated before pointing at a kneeling artificial human by Meta's side, "You're breaking this dimension through dance-off and we've danced-off every single one of your artificial humans – you need to dance if you're to win. If you won't – the damage you've caused will stabilize eventually, I'm a ninja, I know a thing or two about sealing jutsu. It also doesn't look like that artificial human will function for too long, he'll soon dematerialize just like all those we've beaten back on the lower floors".

Sayaki pulled on Mana's skirt softly, asking for her attention before looking her in the eyes longingly. "I should be dancing against Meta-san. I'm more experienced and I've changed a lot, you've helped me grow stronger and become a better player", he suggested.

"This is too dangerous. He's breaking the dimensional walls apart, we have no idea what'll happen to the loser when they'll be exposed to a portion of the gravitational waves from this dimension, when their Yokai will be weakened. You may not be able to survive the experience in this calamity", Mana noted pointing at the sky and reminding the boy of the experience the losing player goes through. "You're too valuable. If he takes your Yokai – there'll be no chance in hell to stop him".

"Very well, Konoha's Sorceress, I'll take you up on your offer and dance, or rather, I'll make you dance for me", Meta grinned with a slimy smile before kicking at the face of the artificial human, throwing the thing away like a ragdoll. The businessman materialized a scroll and unleashed his own Yokai.

Mana unleashed her Miko Kudagitsune that she traded with Sayaki to be a bit more efficient at improving and so that she was able to recruit stronger Yokai than the beginners usually could.

"Crystal Miko Kudagitsune. Base Mairyoku: 12450" the table lit up above the creature's head, the Yokai was enhanced well past what Mairyoku it had before after the countless grueling battles with the weak yet numerous artificial humans. Having undergone two whole Dance Revolutions, Miko Kudagitsune now wore a cat mask that was completely made of crystal and its fur was bright and shiny now.

"Oh, this Yokai is much more powerful than anyone's would reasonably be in this town, maybe I've picked yet too advanced of a town for my business venture", Meta exclaimed in a contained and somewhat ironic and mocking surprise.

After Meta unleashed his Yokai, the powerful pulsing energies from his scroll took shape of an emerald colored dog, dressed in ceremonial garbs with extended long sleeves and a ceremonial symbol glowing in emerald green beneath the dog-Yokai's feet. Once the three-meter tall beast took its stance, fully extending its back the table above its head stated the obvious and quite horrific.

"Jade Inugami. Base Mairyoku: 1 650 000"

"Inugami! That's a Mythical Yokai, and to top it off it's in its Jade revolution"!? Sayaki shouted out in disbelief so intensely that the boy lost his voice and collapsed on the ground, shaking in fear over what will become of his favorite game and seeing a player whom he would have never matched up to in a thousand years of his pace of progress.

"What's a Mythical Yokai"? Mana asked, clearly intimidated by the seemingly cosmic tier numbers and majestic emerald glow of the beast.

"A bit late for tutorials, isn't it, Konoha's Sorceress"? Meta grinned mockingly.

"It's a one-time recruitment only Yokai obtained through an event boss dance-off. There have been several of them released so far, there's usually one of those events going on every week. There's only one of each Mythical Yokai, the only way for it to change the Magic Hike is for another player to recruit him from its original hike", Sayaki coughed out in shock and awe. For someone whose entire life rotated around this game, it must have been pretty much an actual divine revelation going on here.

"Good luck with that, young Sorceress, now, shall we dance? Jade Inugami, Emotional Waltz dance"! The businessman ordered letting his Mythical Yokai dog out.

"Jade Inugami: Combined Mairyoku – 65 985 000" the merciless table stated as the Jade Yokai came at Miko Kudagitsune, Mana bit her lip until she drew a drop of blood in desperation before submitting and ordering Miko Kudagitsune to use the Kagura dance.

"Crystal Miko Kudagitsune: Combined Mairyoku – 435 750" Mana read the cruel reality before seeing Miko Kudagitsune just getting swatted aside by the psychic emotional waves firing off in shockwaves from Jade Inugami's barks as it danced.

"Inugami. Step-Up: Mind Control – Using Inugami's psychic abilities, you may instantly recruit any Yokai with a lesser Mairyoku value and tighter feet to Inugami to your Magic Hike",

"Jade Inugami. Step-Up: Soul Drain – You may drain the Mairyoku from a Yokai with lesser Mairyoku value and tighter feet to Jade Inugami and add it to your Footsies"

"You know what? I won't do any of that pathetic babble, just crush your puny trash Yokai." Meta smiled before revealing another scroll and unleashing another Yokai, it must have possessed a similar step-up to Sayaki's Ruby Hitodama, which was used when a different Yokai was dancing-off.

"Jade Tengu: Base Mairyoku – 3 250 120" the table above the newly revealed Yokai stated.

"A-Another Mythical Yokai"!? Sayaki cried out in desperation. His hopes of saving his beloved game have already been crushed just after seeing Jade Inugami, witnessing someone like that making an appearance only deepened the emotional wounds.

"Ah, I think you've come to understand already… Yes, I control ALL of the Mythical Yokai, that is to say, I've recruited all five of them, filling up my Magic Hike with nothing but Mythical Yokai", Meta triumphantly laughed out before pointing at Jade Tengu which reminded of a forest troll in sage hermit's clothing made entirely of emeralds. "This one, however, is the key"!

"Step-Up - Time-Control: During a dance-off, use this Yokai to control in-dance time. Can be used to travel through special event temporal portals", the Jade Tengu's table stated.

Suddenly Mana felt a crushing pressure at her chest, before collapsing on the ground.

"What the…" she muttered but she could feel how desperate and muzzled her voice sounded. The gravitational forces were just crushing her chest and throat and her entire body, while the seals were still very much functional, they could only reduce and control the true gravitational pull of the dimension and not completely neutralize it, which became especially clear when the dimensional game purposefully leaked out some gravitational pull for a demonstrative effect.

"That's right, my Jade Tengu will prolong this dance-off, every time my Jade Inugami crushes your weakling Yokai, Jade Tengu will use its step-up to rewind time and crush it again. Now our dance will last as long as I need it to, not only that – the pain and pressure you feel now will grow infinitely the more time passes and the more the dimensional seals collapse. Maybe if a village sweetheart like the lovely idol Konoha's Sorceress dies in Yokai Mash, I can get the Ninja Council involved at forcing this brat's father to sell me this game"? Meta overjoyed at his clever ploy.

"How… How did you obtain all those Yokai"? Sayaki still shook in disbelief. "I know for a fact that you didn't win any of these events, I've read about other people winning them on the info boards…"

"Try wrapping your limited child's brain around it, I'll love to see you try working this all out", Meta cringed biting his finger as he enjoyed seeing Sayaki's torment. "You know, if we make a weapon that sends enemies here, it might work as a nice military contract with the Ninja Council, what do you two think. Oh boy, once I get the license for using this dimension and the Yokai Mash game, the things I'll do with it"!

"He… He used Jade Tengu", Mana huffed and choked out as she felt the gravity intensifying, it was no longer something she could just withstand without chakra augmentation as the gravitational forces probably surpassed even the crazy Mairyoku values of Meta's Magic Hike where the breaking apart Yokai Mash defied its one rules of invulnerability of a player.

"That's right, magician girl, I did. I used Tengu's step-up to travel back to in-dimension time when the various Mythical Yokai events took place and collect all of these Mythical Yokai, once I bought this one, I could obtain any other. Jade Nurarihyon could multiply the Mairyoku growth and accelerate Dance Revolutions, Jade Shuten-Doji can break apart this very world in sync with Jade Kitsune's step-up. It's all a clever and flawless plan to take over this business", Meta explained his plan with a sadistic grin. "At this point, seeing the power these Yokai grant me here, I may just have the ninja that modify the rules of this dimension change a few things over but I may just keep the game aspect – it's just too much power in my hands to throw it all out. I'll bankrupt those stupid video games with this and then, once everyone's playing this, I may as well control the world. Sure, I'll be in control of the Yokai Mash world but if everyone's playing it – what's the difference"?

"No… This isn't Yokai Mash, this isn't how those step-ups were meant to be used"! Sayaki shouted out angrily as he jumped on his feet and started slowly walking forwards.

"Who cares what they were meant for, business was always about finding loopholes and breaking things to rebuild them in your own sandbox. This whole dance mechanic though… Has to go, I'll have Yokai beat the shit out of each other, I think… Yeah, the power will just feel greater when I can physically see the weakling Yokai getting crushed", Meta kept on pushing and teasing Sayaki, that last proposition was the straw that broke the camel's back. Sayaki just roared out in rage, rushing at the older man and punching at him, clawing and kicking at him wildly but he was unable to do anything. Seeing how he had not lost the dance-off, he was not stuck in a vulnerable state like Mana was.

"I give up", Mana's gurgling declaration dominated the attention of both men, the young one and the businessman. Her surrender ended the dance-off prematurely, before Jade Tengu could prolong it. Granted, had Meta known that she had that option, he could have probably still rewinded back to a dance-off state before the surrender. It was only due to the sheer surprise factor that the stunt even worked.

"What the…" Meta muttered before Sayaki ran up to Mana and shook her chest trying to wake her up. The magician had collapsed from suffering through the immense pressure for too long so her chest was just barely moving. "You can't do that! You can only tag out to a different member of your party. Even if you log out – I'll just continue our dance-off as long as I want. A dance-off must be carried through to a conclusion"! the scorned businessman shouted

"Mana"! Sayaki cried out.

"This is your game, always was. Beat this fop and claim it", Mana softly smiled through pale lips that still betrayed the girl suffering tremendous pain. Sayaki's shaking hand reached out for the magician's hat, picked it off the rooftop before placing it onto his own head. The boy stood proudly in front of the man that wished to brutalize everything his beloved game stood for and almost killed the girl who taught him so much and actually treated him as his friend, not just her "young master".

"Huh"? Meta exclaimed in surprise that Sayaki did not try to run or otherwise trouble his plans for ruining this dimension.

"You're gonna pay, for wanting to ruin my game, the one thing that was my sanctuary all this time, that helped me when times were tough and nobody wanted to talk to me or when people bullied me and hated my guts for no particular reason. For cheating to get hold of Yokai that other people rightfully earned. Most of all – for hurting Mana", the little one yelled out from the bottom of his childish chest.

"Oh? And how will you do that?" Meta chuckled, "My Yokai are Mythical and possess game-breaking step-ups and Mairyoku all surpassing one million. How will you save your game and just how will you "make me pay", boy"?

"The way Mana taught me to fight, by being smart", Sayaki smiled, tipping the magician's hat forward so that it partly covered his eyes leaving only his smile to be seen, not his scared and crying eyes.

* * *

With a stroke of hand, holding his fingers and his hand in a hand seal-like position, Sayaki summoned an information table, which he scrolled through using his hand. Meta laughed out from the bottom of his lungs, in his head he had already won. All he had to do was just to let the kid read to his heart's content and let his Yokai dance this dimension to its inhospitable original state. All of it for his own monetary and egomaniacal gain…

"Oh, don't mind me, read, kid, read to your heart's content"! Meta smiled.

"I'm sorry if I am disappointing your expectations, if you thought I'd just run head-first into battle, or something", the kid smiled, his eyes were calm and confident, they only wavered from the walls of text to gaze at Meta for a moment before returning to resume his work.

"You know, there's a limit to how much time you've got to make a decision", Meta sadistically toyed with the boy, even if he wanted Sayaki to just stand around and read for a good twenty more minutes, he didn't want to let go of the opportunity to taunt the boy and tease him.

"We both know you'll use Jade Tengu to rewind the dimensional time until the beginning of my turn anyways. You don't want this dance-off to end", Sayaki calmly replied without even giving back the usual burning glance, which he used to offer his opponent.

"What are you doing, child, humor me, just what thoughts run through your mind, how do you intend on beating these unbalanced, utterly unfair Yokai"? Meta inquired, placing his back comfortably against a chimney to relax himself as he listened to what he thought would be little kid's delusions that'd crumble upon his first shake of their foundations.

"No, you tell me. What fun is it playing a game just to abuse its rules? To break it all the time? Why would you look at a game merely for how to utilize its most optimal components, play it in any way imaginable, even if it is not a way the game is intended to be played, only to be the strongest"? Sayaki wondered, "Have you lost your sense of entertainment? Has fun lost its meaning to you?"

"Fun? To me, utilizing my businessman's mind to crush the competitors is fun. When other people read a set of laws all they see is restrictions, what I see is an opportunity and an open challenge to live up to it. Not that a foolish child would understand, all you care about is "having fun…", Meta replied with an inspired speech before switching to a mocking tone in the end.

"I see… To answer your earlier question, I was reading through private messaging section of the Instructions", Sayaki grinned before closing the information table he had previously opened and opening up another one on the other side that was surrounded by a border that made it appear like an envelope.

"Private messages"? Meta nodded his head to the side, he could not understand what Sayaki's game was and that inevitably forced the businessman to lose his stupid mocking grin, "You cannot send a private message, all social menus are inaccessible during a dance-off. It's done this way to prevent players from getting outside help except from their party, or read through social sections during their turn, wasting everyone's time, all social functions are closed, except…"

"Administration support", Sayaki finished Meta's sentence for the businessman.

"What the… You plan on contacting administration!? That won't work, if they could've been here or changed something they'd have done so long since. No moderator or administrator counted on a game-breaking bug coming from an early town where everyone wields useless and weakling Yokai with simple and overly conditional step-ups. My plan was flawless, no administrator will stop me in time"! Meta acted confident and tried letting out a fake laugh but something in his chest felt itchy and irksome, the man started scratching and clawing at his chest erratically to ease the tension. Chinks started forming in the man's emotional armor and Sayaki had barely done a thing except talk to him.

"I'm not looking for their interference", Sayaki shook his head. "I'm looking for their expertise and knowledge about the game. Even if an admin has no options of getting here physically or if they're all logged off, if at least one of them is logged on, they will take no time at all to exchange private messages and knowing what you're doing here – they'll help me out with everything they can do to help".

"Hmph, pathetic, hiding under skirts and backs, are we"? Meta mocked the little boy opposing him. "Hid behind your father's back your whole childhood, let your babysitter do the fighting for you even though she's not even at amateur level and thirty studios short from Ranked Play. Now you're running to admins for help".

"My whole life I was mocked, rejected and bullied. My father was rich so everyone thought I just had everything handed to me, they resented me and pushed me away, all of them. It made me angry, it made me hate them and think "what's the point?". It made me play alone and never ask for help, instead, learn from experience of loss. But this game isn't made like that, it's built to encourage social interactions, partying with friends and helping out new people joining the game. Yokai are dancing-off and not fighting because they too are friendly creatures, even the scary ones. You'll never win by just buying things and building on top of them all by yourself", Sayaki proudly and bravely replied, feeling no shame in asking for help.

A notification lit up on his social tab, one that the boy quickly opened up and ran his eyes through it before smiling and closing the tab. He then fixed his hat and pulled out a scroll, waving it around like a wand before pointing it at Meta.

"Now, for my next trick, I'll make this dimensional calamity disappear", Sayaki grinned before glancing back at Mana, who was slowly starting to get back on her knees and attempted standing up. The magician looked up to the brave young boy and smiled, his confidence and playfulness inspired hope in Mana, he was already a hero, the kind, which Mana always wanted to become. This was Sayaki's world after all – he was the only one who could have been its hero.

"Don't be foo…" Meta grinned sarcastically and raised an eyebrow before being interrupted.

"Step-up chain loop. That's how you're breaking this dimension. I was wondering just how could step-ups break this very dimension apart, seemed like a security threat to me. My father would've never bought and funded such an unsafe product. The administrators told me that they believe the problem is the massive endless loop of your step-ups", the boy explained.

"Oh? Please tell me more…" Meta tried using a more mocking tone, but truthfully he was feeling uneasy and merely wanted to buy more time. Whatever time he bought would not have been enough, his Yokai could only manipulate time in-dance or through scripted portals so he couldn't dance himself more time. A man who believed in one man building his own opportunities was left at the mercy of social interactions…

"Your five Yokai, they all have additional step-ups that are usable in the midst of a dance-off, just like your Jade Tengu. You are using all of them simultaneously to clog with one another, they are immensely powerful so each one strains the chakra capacity of the seals that hold this dimension together, but you're smarter than just that. You chain those step-ups to one another in a loop by re-activating those very same step-ups as a response to the step up of the last Yokai, creating an endless, unresolving loop of step-ups, which is tearing the seals apart as they try to wrap themselves around the paradox and resolve it. You're a devilish man, Meta-san, if a paradox would be finite, the game would simply shut down, ejecting all players in the process but you've created an endless paradox which the game cannot comprehend, no matter how hard it tries". Sayaki calmly explain before opening up his scroll and unleashing his Yokai, before his opponent even showed off his own.

"Ruby Momonjii. Base Mairyoku: 26" the information above the little group of thumb-sized ogres with tiny hammers, clubs and maces stated.

"That's…" Mana whimpered in pain, "That's one of the Yokai I traded you for Miko Kudagitsune. You added it to your own current Magic Hike"?

"You're a very smart little boy, you'd make a fine businessman, a much better one than your father. What do you say? Just stand around here, dream about how successful we could be together and I'll let you become my apprentice. Oh, come, you'll never get a better internship and apprenticeship than in my company"! Meta offered.

"Send out your Yokai, if you won't, I'll force a dance-off to your active step-up using Yokai and force the loop to close. I'm letting you to match minds with me before I dance you out", Sayaki taunted the businessman who just scoffed.

"Very well, you've just signed your own death warrant, you fool. When you lose the dance-off, the gravitation will leave not a single spaghettified string of flesh out of you left"! Meta barked out as he unleashed his own Yokai.

"Jade Shuten-Doji. Base Mairyoku: 3 666 666", the table above a massive ogre demons with long bony arms and a mace the size of its entire colossal body with a large onyx skull at the end. Where the entire entity looked to resemble the demonic king of ogres, the world breaker, its texture was now completely made of green shiny jade making it appear more majestic than apocalyptic.

"Yanari. Step-Up: "Breaker of Shiny Things" – your opponent cannot switch into or use step-ups of Yokai with Dance Revolution of Sapphire or higher" the step-up of Sayaki's Yanari activated immediately.

Meta laughed out so hard that he had to hold himself together to keep himself from tumbling over himself.

"That's your Yokai's step-up? What utter idiocy, I mean sure, it sounds scary on paper, but please remember that I have no need to switch out or use any other step-ups – my Shuten-Doji will stomp your idiotic useless weakling himself and you'll lose the dance-off. Don't you get it? All of those beginner Yokai are utterly useless, just like this one"! Meta kept enjoying himself before commanding Shuten-Doji to use the "Ogre Mash" dance.

"Yanari, use the "Squeaking Roof" dance", Sayaki calmly ordered as the calculations transpired.

"Jade Shuten-Doji. Step-Up: Hell Smasher – If your combined Mairyoku is greater than that of your opponent's Yokai, boost Jade Shuten-Doji's Mairyoku to infinity", the horrific step-up of a Mythical Yokai activated.

"Yanari: Combined Mairyoku – 32" VS "Jade Shuten-Doji. Combined Mairyoku – Infinity" the two tables clashed against each other, they must have not been able to tell just yet how hopeless this match-up was. The two Yokai started dancing before Jade Shuten-Doji's massive foot lingered on top of poor Yanari, looking to stomp on the Yokai and snuff out its dancing spirit completely with its infinite dancing might.

Sayaki quickly revealed another scroll, which materialized in his hands, and opened it immediately, unleashing a Yokai he could only use in a middle of a dance-off, similarly to how Ruby Hitodama and Jade Tengu were used.

"Sapphire Iyaya. Mairyoku 1300. Step-up: "No way! Uh-Oh!" – You can use this Yokai in the middle of any dance-off to reveal Sapphire Iyaya's scary true face and force the opposing player to switch our their Yokai with another in their Magic Hike or their reserve bank, the Base Mairyoku of that Yokai gains an additional X1.5 multiplier before the dance multipliers are calculated". The empowered step-up of the first Yokai Mana obtained stated.

"Ha ha ha, you've only prolonged your death and… Wait…" Meta belatedly understood the implications of Sayaki's step-up chain.

"That's right, Yanari prevents you from using Jade or higher Yokai, except for the one you use in the dance-off, effectively shutting off any ability to switch out or use another high ranking Yokai's step-up. Together with Sapphire Iyaya – the Yokai cause a simple, finite paradox – you cannot switch, but you must. Also, because of…" Sayaki could not finish the sentence as the entire dimension around him sunk in total darkness. Mana felt her entire body getting dragged through a tunnel of air, as if she was flying at immense speeds before waking up in Tomoko's Mansion, right beside Sayaki who was leaning over Mana, worried that whatever injuries she sustained in Yokai Mash would've carried through to the home dimension as well.

"Because of Yanari's step-up, he couldn't rewind time using his Jade Tengu either", Sayaki finished the sentence before sitting down and breathing in and out as the immense pressure rolled off of his chest. He had shut down the game he intended to save using a finite paradox, just as the admins instructed him, all because he read the Instructions and studied, strategized, and wasn't afraid of asking for help when he needed it.

"Are you okay, Mana"? The boy worried.

"I think it's your bed time", Mana pouted, she still felt aches all over her body and felt blunt traumas forming in several more sensitive places but she was definitely in a better and more combat-ready state than she was inside Yokai Mash.

"Yeah… Too bad the finite paradox triggered the game to shut down. I'll need new activities to entertain me until it gets back up", Sayaki dreamily wondered before slipping out of his clothes and into PJs before hiding under a bulky cover sheet.

"I am a stage magician, as well as a ninja, remember? If you want, I can get you tickets to my show the day after tomorrow. It's pretty popular around Konoha so you may bring any new friends you meet, as long as you never stop giving people chances", Mana suggested.

"Nah, I think I'd rather earn those tickets and pay for them. I don't want no freebies", Sayaki smiled before turning onto his side and going to sleep.

A good half an hour later a bodyguard came in to check up on Mana and ask if she needed anything and if everything was alright. He also reported that thing were quiet outside and then hurried to return to his post.

"It's alright, I'm not gonna let his kid out of my sight the whole night through. No one's going to harm Sayaki-san on my watch", she said, returning to the more informal referral once the boy couldn't hear her, it just felt simpler and more right to her.

"Sayaki-san? Not "young master", so the kid's made you go all soft, huh"? The bodyguard laughed out before leaving, not waiting for a reply from Mana. The magician just wrapped her hands around her knees and tipped her hat a bit so that she got a clearer view on the sleeping boy and softly tilting cover that protected him from the almost freezing outside chill.

She had a long night ahead, but somehow, she didn't mind.

* * *

 **Author's Note: Wow, been writing this for two whole years! Thanks to everyone who kept up with the story, or at least gave it a look, whether it lead to promising to yourself that this deserves a read later on, or deciding it's not your thing and dropping it for good. Even though sometimes I do bump into blocks on the road, sometimes life gets a bit too hectic to sit down and focus on a chapter or sometimes I don't think things through or just miss a mistake during my proof-reads... On occasions such as this it kinda feels worth it.**

 **Hope I can write another Annual next year, I know not many people bother to look at them or read them to the end but it kind of just feels like writing a movie for a long running show :D**

 **The Annual ended up being WAY longer than I initially thought it'd be, almost twice longer, in fact. Proof-reading was a real bitch, writing it was actually pretty fun though. Hope you guys enjoy it! Next week it's back to the story, as usual, the break (such as it was ;D) is over!**


	328. One's Own Growth

The sounds of explosions, rumbling thuds and shockwaves emanating from ground shaking punches and steel clanging followed anyone who would have spent a day in the Konohagakure Training Grounds complex. Smells of smoke, burning, sweat and packed lunch both annoyed and caressed one's nose as they passed by a duo of old friends working out together or a team of newly graduated genin in their team survival drills.

The smell of someone's egg and bacon sandwiches tightly packed together made Meiko's stomach churn and her mouth water, the blacksmith just kept rubbing her tummy, despite having eaten maybe a good thirty minutes ago. Thirty minutes spent wandering around Training Grounds and looking for one particular person. Ever since the blacksmith saw the Eight Gates technique and heard about the fact that it was easy to pick up, she thought it was a perfect jutsu for her. Now all she needed to do was pick it up in the over seven days that she had for preparations.

After prolonged searching, so long, in fact, that Meiko considered finding Mana first and asking her to use her chakra sensory to help the blacksmith out, the redhead finally found Sugemi's team training in one of the training grounds. In the cold season the whole place was different – the ground was rougher, frozen solid, grass was rare and greyed out and the lakes looked oddly calm and waited for the surrounding weather to drop one more degree so it could freeze over.

Daidao pointed his armored arms at Sugemi and fired off a blindingly excessive cloud of smoke in his general direction, which was supposed to surround the Nara and blind him completely. Sugemi barely even resisted the smoke surrounding him. He just calmly looked around and listened in, as his teammate charged in, using the sounds of clanging armor pieces, turning gears and smoke getting pushed out to enhance the speed and strength of Daidao's strikes to aid him in tracing the direction, angle, number and velocity of his opponent's attacks for a successful evasive dodge.

"You should've joined into the attack. Sugemi is a taijutsu user, my sole efforts won't be enough to push him sufficiently for an actual work out", Daidao objected, staring angrily at Nanaba who just sat on her butt, capriciously, and pouted, firing blazing glares at the boys who were working out as if they were to blame for the reason for her ire.

"I told you! I lost my arms! I can't fight without them, I feel like I'm naked without them!" Nanaba shrieked out in a rather annoying pitch, which made Meiko rub her ears, figuring that the high-pitched screech would make them actually bleed.

"I… I don't even…" Daidao twitched for a moment trying to comprehend a single response for this utter insanity.

"You invented those arms like… Months ago, you've been fighting for over three years completely without them. You're a goddamn Jinchuuriki, to top it all off – your chakra pool surpasses that of anyone in the higher ninja ranks by at least couple of hundreds of times, or something…" Sugemi noted as he sat down, feeling annoyed about the lack of good challenge.

"Ummm… Sorry to intrude…" Meiko let Team Hawthorn know that she was present seeing how neither one of them bothered to notice her, their quarrel must've been so intense and people must've been passing by so frequently that arrival of another ninja passed completely by their radars.

"Oh… Sorry, do you have this place booked, or something"? Sugemi squinted at Meiko dismissively. "Because if you don't, we'd really like to keep on training here. We won't mind if you just train somewhere nearby".

"Uh… No, I… Wanted to ask you something", Meiko rubbed her foot in the dirt, still trying to figure out if asking Mana's past teammate for a favor was that smart of an idea. Did Masen-Z not give the blacksmith that weird idea for a potential future technique she could use? No, that technique utilized concepts that may have very well been in space, from where Meiko was staring. Imbuing weapons with that much chakra sounded like fiction to Meiko, pretty good one, yet fiction nonetheless. She needed this.

"Well"? Sugemi encouraged Meiko to shoot it with a bored expression. By then he may have realized that hoping to push his abilities by training with his teammates while everyone held back to their utmost ability to avoid injuries was foolish. He may as well have seen how deep this thing with the blacksmith went.

"Actually, I was really impressed by the Eight Gates technique you used. I'd really wish to learn it and I know it's not that difficult to learn but… I'm not that bright and I will need a teacher even for a simple technique, such as that one", Meiko asked with a very practiced and honed pleading expression. Faces like that usually worked on Mana, there was more than a solid probability it would work on one of her past teammates as well.

"Nah, sorry, I'll pass", Sugemi flipped his wrist dismissively at Meiko, before blowing out air from his mouth, through tightly pressed lips, in a manner not unlike a horse would have done it.

"B-But… I…" Meiko stopped there. She wondered if there was anything she could've offered or bargained with the Nara with. That was always Mana's way, the magician was always smart about things and always pulled perfect bargaining chips and aces – things she knew she could bargain with but also things that would please the opposing party enough to accept unfavorable conditions. A compromise that only the opposing side mistook for a compromise. There was nothing like that in Meiko's mind, nothing at all.

"I don't want to end up facing off against another gate user in the Chuunin Exams, that'd just be too boring. Plus, it's just like you said - you're not too bright. Using the Eight Gates that way would only lead to premature permanent retirement and a crippled body. Not something I need on my conscience", the Nara calmly explained, this time granting the blacksmith a bit more attention than he did before and treating her a bit more welcomingly instead of outright dismissing her request.

"Trust me, you're better off treading your own path, this imbecile keeps overdoing it and he's just on his Third Gate. One of these days it'll outright cost him a battle…" Daidao angrily glared at his teammate, even though the emotion in question was more implied as it was impossible to tell his exact feelings through the rubber mask and goggles. Then again, it seemed pretty angry, gesture-wise.

"I see. Thanks for your time", Meiko flicked her wrist before placing her hands inside her pockets and walking off saddened by lack of success but also a slightly new perspective from Daidao's words.

Would she truly succeed in the exams treading Sugemi's walked path? The boy had years of experience with the technique, she would just be picking it up. In a fight she'd be pretty much signing her loss warrant by focusing onto just the Eight Gates. She also had to agree with Sugemi's conclusions, she wasn't too bright and would be just the type of person to wreck herself by getting too emotional or too trigger-happy.

Meiko would just have to walk her own path. Become her own kind of strong and define that word in her own kind of way.

* * *

Journey to the Yamanaka Resort was not nearly as adventurous as it was when Kiyomi had travelled there recently. Frankly, it was kind of boring, not that the blonde would've needed or loved a long forgotten nemesis of hers trying to claim her head out of nowhere… By now the kunoichi had reached that level of strength where travelling alone to the resort was sort of achievable and even the minor bandits and lowlife mercs that roamed the area weren't too threatening to her.

She was not quite a clan heir just yet. It was Kiyomi's uncle who held the title of being the clan head but the title was supposed to be passed on to Kiyomi the moment she got married. Still, she held considerable influence in the clan and was pretty much little royalty, hell, she was treated as such her entire childhood, she may as well have gotten something out of it…

Once Kiyomi arrived to the Yamanaka Resort on the second day, doing her best to train and meditate a little bit on the road all throughout the first one, she did not make that big of a deal as she entered the Yamanaka Mansion and requested a meeting with her uncle. She did not quite like the man, that being said, she did not have to meet him too often, meaning that he was not quite her actual nemesis or that the kunoichi wished him his eventual passing.

Kiyomi was glad to hear that uncle picked up on her small details and agreed to meet her without a big fuss, just calmly talk to her alongside his silly assistants who went everywhere uncle went and oftentimes spoke on his behalf even. While it did kind of tick Kiyomi off, it was not that off-putting remembering how old uncle really was and oftentimes he appeared to doze off or even appear almost dead-like in the middle of conversation. Certain amount of advocacy was kind of expected at this point.

"Kiyomi-san"! both assistant girls bowed, they both had awfully exotically colored hair, one having it bright blue whereas the other one wore it gloomy green and wore Chinese style dresses with the Yamanaka symbol on them. Their apparel looked quite sophisticated and expensive but their shape looked sharp enough for them to not look completely useless in battle either. Despite the apparent strong look, there were two additional guards present in the conversation, something Kiyomi was not overly fond of either.

"Uncle", Kiyomi nodded, making the gesture appear close enough to a bow that she did not raise any lumps but far away for her pride to remain intact. "Thank you for agreeing to meet so soon… Uncle"? The blonde addressed the massive dumpling of flesh with human sized ponytail of snow-white hair, the bright Yamanaka locks appeared to grey out in an especially unique shade of white.

"We've heard you've moved forward with the Chuunin Exams, you're honoring our clan, future heiress", one of the assistants smiled deceitfully. Kiyomi wasn't sure why exactly the youngling faked the smile to such a disgustingly venomous extent, was she planning on marrying uncle, thusly prolonging the reigns' passage until her own untimely death, or was she merely trying to annoy Kiyomi for her own personal amusement.

"That is exactly why I'm here, uncle", Kiyomi addressed her slumbering giant of an uncle who appeared to only wake up to stuff his massive face, drink up with wine and then lift his weights a couple of thousands of times to compensate for the massive gain of calories but never burning it all off. No amount of weight lifting would compensate his solitary, narcoleptic lifestyle. "I wish to learn more of the Yamanaka hijutsu, something to help me honor the clan further by actually ranking up. I think I've deserved this much…"

The two assistant girls oddly looked at each other before whispering something to each other's ears. The green haired one then removed a large chained hook from behind her back, sized like an anchor and rubbed Kiyomi's uncle's back, trying to hook his flesh just to wake him up.

"Hmph… Yes, indeed…" the massive lump of flesh woke up, thundering out with his voice as his large whited out ocular orbs wandered down at Kiyomi.

"You would deserve being taught another Yamanaka hijutsu, if there were any more left to learn", Kiyomi's uncle yawned lazily, shifting the butt-cheek that had to maintain more of his bodily weight as he laid slothfully in his stony throne befitting more of a large monumental statue rather than the man in whose honor it'd be built.

"Wait, what"? Kiyomi raised her eyebrow, "This can't be true, uncle"?

"Want to bet on it, my sweet niece? I have massive gambling debts so some of your sweet dough would help cover it up", the man stroke his rugged chin, the fact that the gargantuan relative of hers even dared bet on it made Kiyomi back off a little bit. Her uncle was not a bad gambler, not by a long shot, it was just that he often fell asleep during his gambling and skipped entire matches and would've gotten robbed clean if it wasn't for his assistants.

"I won't… But I am pretty sure I've seen plenty of Yamanaka use techniques I've not heard of before. Aunt Chanbara is able to kill people with the Yamanaka hijutsu alone, that is no hijutsu I've ever heard about", Kiyomi stated her case.

"That's true, Kiyomi-san", one of uncle's assistants spoke up seeing how the massive giant nodded off asleep again, "Chanbara-sama is able to destroy people's minds from the inside using nothing else but the Yamanaka mind transfer techniques. Your uncle Bakuchi is also capable of crushing his enemies by simply transferring his mind. All of these are no Yamanaka hijutsu – they're their signature innovations on the basics".

"Innovations…" Kiyomi looked down confused. It was not something she was used to, not something that could just be mastered in one week. She had no experience innovating on anything. Her whole life she just asked for clan hijutsu to be taught to her and she got it, she was skilled at them and picked them up quickly. Due to her skill picking the hijutsu up she thought that it was all that was required of her. Innovation was completely outside her alley. Creating new techniques on the basis of the old was more of Mana's thing…

The other young lady picked up a large dislodged chunk from a column towering nearby and smashed it right to the center of the top of uncle Bakuchi's head. The massive shinobi slowly opened his eyes as if warm sunlight had softly kissed him in the cheeks.

"Hmmm… Yes, as Cho and Han already explained, you've already been taught the basic and the intermediate - all of the Yamanaka hijutsu. What separates the advanced and masterful Yamanaka clansmen from the intermediate ones, or the beginners, is their ability to innovate and create new ways to dominate their enemies while drawing from the same roots everyone came from", Bakuchi explained with a raspy and irritated voice.

Kiyomi looked down frustrated, she had just wasted a couple of days just getting here, if she was to return home empty handed she'd have wasted almost half of her allotted to training and recovery time for nothing but travelling and on the road training that could've been compared to daily warm-ups at best.

"Can't you just teach me your jutsu"? Kiyomi wandered before realizing, much to her outrage, that uncle was already asleep, having sprawled out and almost completely slipped down from his massive stone throne as he snoozed peacefully like a baby.

"If it's training you seek, Kiyomi-san, we can train you for however many days you have left. Taking care of Bakuchi-sama is basically watching a narcoleptic old man sleep whole day and we often get rusty", Cho spoke up before Han stretched out nearby before nodding in agreement.

This was not that bad of a deal. Cho and Han were competent kunoichi and while they were not exactly Yamanaka clan members themselves, having just very irrelevant percentage of blood relationship to the clan, they were capable combatants in their own right. Cho was fast, she could wield that chained anchor in a manner deceitful enough to give Meiko headache and Han was much stronger physically than she looked.

"That's not quite the deal I came here for…" Kiyomi shrugged realizing she hesitated to consider the deal for quite a long time.

"Well, we can say that your perception could still use some work, you've been giving everyone in this room weird looks, almost like you didn't trust them. Me, Han, those two guards to the left and to the right… But you forgot the rest, or did you not see them"? Cho teased Kiyomi as at least six more ninja with Konohagakure chuunin uniforms came out of the shadows. They stood in a submissive stance, not a threatening one so this must have just been a show of force.

"You sly foxes, you", Kiyomi could not help but crack a grin, "You knew why I came here so you planned this show this whole time. Was it all just to train me"?

"To our defense, serving our duty to Bakuchi-sama is a very limited part time job. We get plenty of spare time and nowhere to direct our energy. Why don't we all play together like we used to in childhood, huh, Kiyomi-san"? Han grinned, softly stroking the chunk of the pillar she had pulled out previously and used to hit Kiyomi's uncle in the vital point of his head to wake him up.

"You may have come here for Yamanaka hijutsu, but you're just fine in that front. What you lack is basic ninja arts. We can make you faster, stronger, more perceptive, remind you of your ninjutsu and genjutsu which you've forgotten over the years", Cho brandished the chained anchor blade in front of her, stroking the chain and clanging it demonstratively.

"Because make no mistake, Kiyomi-san, you'll need to use every tool in your box to survive our training. None of us want you to disappoint yourself and the clan, do we? Bakuchi-sama would be so disappointed when he woke up if he was to hear you being taken out so early…" Han added.

"We may have played together as children but, once you joined in on the rank of every pamperer in the clan, I really came to despise you two harpies. Fine, I'll take whatever chances I've got for a decent training", Kiyomi bowed even if it almost made her throw up a little to do so.

It was the most grueling and scary training week in a long while for Yamanaka Kiyomi. Those same two girls that were once her good playmates, turned into her guardians pampering and spoiling her every step of Kiyomi's path, whether the girl liked it or not, now felt like the exact opposite of who they once were. Where before the goal of these two was to turn Kiyomi into a pretty spoiled princess, now they trained her as a true future heiress of the clan. As a proud, strong and diversely skilled kunoichi.


	329. Death to Love, Birth of Strength

Meiko disappointedly trekked back to Konoha through the brief dirty path that stretched through the endless woods of Land of Fire between the Training Grounds complex and Konohagakure. While she did feel somewhat clearer about what she needed to do, the "hows" of the matter still remained a mystery. She was lightyears away from inventing her own techniques and her most innovative jutsu was a simple storage seal. The two towering pillars of Masen's chakra imbuement technique and the Eight Gates loomed atop of Meiko's head, as if a dragon over the mountain, spitting flames at her direction and taunting to come with something stronger.

"Hey, it's you again"! A slightly familiar, cutesy voice attracted Meiko's attention as the blacksmith raised her eyes up and met an unexpected pair of ninja. "You stay away from us, Teia, let's get the hell away from this girl, don't even think about challenging her again"! Little Aoi Yuki exclaimed, pointing a finger at Meiko as he hovered in the air like a weightless snowflake.

"Whoa! Just the person I wanted to see! Let's fight again!" The blond swordswoman shrieked out as she enthusiastically rushed up to Meiko and grabbed the blacksmith's hands, pulling them on her chest. The redhead could feel Galateia's heart just pounding with excitement, despite Meiko beating the young woman there was not a hint of malice in the girl's eyes, just a desire to fight it out again.

"I thought the two of you were captured, or something…" Meiko squinted pointing fingers at Aoi, by far the more reasonable of the two nukenin that traveled around together looking for people to fight.

"We were, turns out that we aren't actually wanted in the Fire Country for any actual crimes and the international relationship between Konoha and Kumogakure isn't cohesive enough for an extradition." The floating pale kid locked his arms around his chest, feeling immensely annoyed by his experience in the Konohagakure Detainment Facility and the interrogation in the Police Force headquarters.

"Tee hee, he said "cohesive"…" Galateia giggled innocently before Aoi floated above her head.

"It's not a bad word, Teia, it means the characteristic of possessing cohesive properties"! Aoi shouted out right next to Galateia's ear. The tall blonde just stared into the eyes of her angered short companion in innocent confusion.

"You know, it's a really lousy explanation to someone who isn't aware of what the word means…" Meiko grinned with a shrug.

"Whatever, anyways, it was either execute us or let us go, they had no reason to keep us detained, on top of that, Teia's been deemed hopelessly stupid and the Police Force officers thought that executing her would've been like putting down a disabled person", Aoi explained. "They tried to pin kidnapping on us but Gwido just gave them an ominous stare and told them he did it just for the kicks of it. He'll probably land into some public works for being such a badass though".

"They did tell us to leave the village, that's too bad, there were so many strong ninja just walking around", Galateia dreamily stared into the sky.

"I may begin to understand why they insisted on you leaving the village", Meiko noted before getting an idea. "Are you two heading anywhere specific"? She wondered.

"Not really, we're kind of wandering, wherever the mood takes us. Teia's mood changes all the time so as you may guess – that's all over the place", Aoi managed to complain with his answer, something that flew completely over his oblivious companion's head as a little sparrow landed on her shoulder plate to rest.

Meiko stared in hesitation, for a moment, she felt truly psyched out and thought that the blonde-haired young woman would crush the poor bird but the silly girl just kept on staring at the little thing and just giggling.

"Not yet, little one, one day you'll grow up to be a giant dragon, then I'll fight you"! She declared.

"See what I'm dealing with here"? Aoi sighed with a hint of glee in his voice, while Galateia's antics must have gotten them in loads of trouble, it didn't look like the kid hated the swordswoman or needed her that much. There was some kind of a bond between the two and that must have been the reason why they stuck around.

"Would you mind training with me? You're both nukenin so I'm sure you're used to living outside the village walls. I'm sure you can find an inn to stay in around these parts. I'll craft training equipment for us and repair your gear whenever it wears out, maybe I'll even make something for you for the road ahead", the blacksmith suggested. This was just what the redhead needed, Galateia was a spectacularly tough opponent and she probably did not know the definition of holding back – she will be just the right training partner for the week.

The blond swordswoman kept on playing with her hair as she appeared to be deep in thought.

"That does sound like a plan, which is better than what we currently have, that'd be jack squat. What do you think, Teia"? Aoi looked at his companion's approval.

"You've no idea what I just said, do you"? Meiko smiled feeling pity for the tall potential training companion of hers.

"Nope! You just said so many things, I kind of got lost, none of them really involved fighting so I lost interest", Galateia laughed out.

"You know, training would probably involve a lot of fighting", Meiko teased the nukenin.

"Sparring is a form of fighting", Aoi prompted his companion, helping her out with this fancy word.

"Glorious! If it involves fighting Meiko again, I'm all for it", Galateia grinned before getting a bit serious, the blacksmith had an itching feeling that the nukenin got excited about facing off with Meiko for the entire week straight. It was actually quite a beneficial deal for both girls.

Meiko spent the rest of the week training with Galateia in the wilderness of the Land of Fire. Every evening the blacksmith returned home to lick her wounds and repair her armor and gear whereas the duo of nukenins returned to the inn to rest, eat and drink up and prepare for the series of tough hardening battles the next day.

Facing off against Galateia was truly a limit, as well as the body, breaking experience. While the swordswoman herself may not have been able to tell initially – Meiko held herself back, she only fought using a sword, which was why she got trounced so many times. The blonde was an amazing prodigy of a swordswoman, she may have been a bit slow in everything else but as far as swordsmanship went she may have been a genius. She was reading strings and predicting next moves better than Mana did after the combined evasion training. Once the blonde started catching up to Meiko's lack of varied skills, the blacksmith had to go full out just to snuff that impression, even then Galateia sometimes bested Meiko in battle. It appeared like the nukenin was growing more skilled and powerful when facing off against that same opponent each time she dueled them. It was quite scary…

Regardless of how scary of an experience this past week was for the blacksmith – her physical strength, agility, endurance, chakra level have all improved significantly. It would have been completely foolish to ignore the leaps and bounds that her swordsmanship has improved by, Galateia oftentimes explained Meiko's mistakes just to make the blacksmith a superior opponent to her. Eventually, however, it appeared that the nukenin's interest in the redhead was beginning to dwindle. Like a child who played with their favorite toy and therefore became sick of it, Galateia was beginning to just train by herself. Even in those cases, Meiko saw how a physical monster swordswoman trained, allowing herself to train using similar methods.

Once the blacksmith trained that same way but outdid Galateia, the rivalry picked back up again and the blonde-haired kunoichi was willing to duel Meiko again. It was a remarkably silent and gruelingly physically tolling week, maybe one of the most such in the blacksmith's life but as the days approached the deadline of the next exam, Meiko was beginning to feel more and more confident about her growth. To top it all off, after Aoi warmed up to the blacksmith, as a ninjutsu using Yuki clansman he picked up Meiko's chakra control training from where Mana left it off which helped the blacksmith improve her sealing techniques and chakra control as well.

Not relying on cheap and body breaking Eight Gates to multiply her strength and speed for her, but instead training her body to be more overall balanced and capable of outlasting such a risky fighter in battle was a superior choice, Meiko knew it by now. Even if Galateia and Aoi decided to take off to Land of Lightning one day earlier than it was agreed on, the blacksmith felt confident in her abilities to pick it up from where she and Teia left off all by herself.

"It's thirty-three to thirty-three, I figured you'd have wanted to settle it once and for all", Meiko grinned as she waved goodbye to the nukenin friend she never figured she would have.

"Not now, fighting as we are now would be boring. Get stronger, learn new techniques and moves and I'll do the same. Then let's fight again. That'll make the tie-breaker more exciting and it'll give us something to look forward to", Galateia waved her farewells to Meiko as she walked off down the forest path, followed by the little Yuki clan shortie, floating by her side.

* * *

Training and the unexpected mission she was given had kept Mana so preoccupied that despite having decided on hosting one show during the week she had to prepare for the next stage of the exams, Mana still only barely found time to squeeze the show in at the very last day of the preparations. Maybe it was because of the time restraints of preparing for a magic show while actively training throughout the day, maybe it was so because of Mana's perfectionist attitude towards her shows, maybe both conditions had something to do with the timing of the show.

Once the magic show had concluded and the curtains closed, Mana sighed and rushed out of the hall and into the long service corridors behind the stage. She did not have time to change out of her less than comfortable uniform since another troupe of actors preparing to perform their play right after Mana's show occupied her little closet for the evening. It was only because of the quality and appeal of her shows that she was so spontaneously even granted time by the owner of the hall, Mr. Hiro, so her service closet was a very modest sacrifice for the ability to perform tonight.

Mana quickly moved into her coat and rushed through the corridors before noticing one of the actor troupe – a guy named Gani. As a little girl, when Mana first started performing in the hall, the magician used to have a bit of an innocent crush on the guy. It probably had plenty to do with the fact that he commonly played Shikio in most of the adaptations of his adventures. It was a well-known fact that most of young girls idolized both the character and the young actors portraying the lion-hearted legendary ninja.

"That ending was pretty loud, busy night, huh"? Gani welcomed Mana in his own way, excessive amounts of smoke went out his mouth as he spoke. The kunoichi wasn't a big fan of the way smokers smelled usually but now she had the advantage of not being able to feel it, still, the unpleasant memories of the lingering smell kept unpleasantly reminding Mana of the worse parts of the olfactory spectre.

"Hey, I'm only here for one night, heard you guys are leaving on a tour"? Mana smiled out of politeness, stopping to briefly talk to her old time colleague in the craft of entertainment.

"Yep, kind of a drag, really. I'm thinking of dumping the acting biz and moving into writing plays. Let other jackasses sweat while I get pockets full of ryo every time my property is adapted and toured with, ya know"? Gani continued to smoke, nonchalantly filling the corridor that the two in with a murky cover of smoke. While Mana couldn't really smell any of the disgusting odors that the man subjected himself to, her eyes still felt a bit itchy from the toxicity breathed out. It sort of became clearer why her little unused janitor's closet smelled of smoke so often.

"Writing isn't easy either, you know. Can't just write anything and expect it to break it big, have you tried writing something"? Mana wondered. She appeared to have stepped onto a mine as her pal gleefully pulled out a sheet of paper and showed her a sketch of a Konohagakure Police Force shinobi facing off against masked opponents with two massive kissing faces taking up space in the background. It was an impressive concept art for a writer, the magician suspected that he may have gotten one of the sketchers from the morning to early afternoon times to scribble it.

"In a world where bad guys control people's minds through tainted meat in burgers, one Police Force ninja has his hands full saving the world"! Gani enthusiastically read the pitch to Mana as if she was an executive in charge of making actual films.

"Well… Why didn't the Police Force ninja get infected then"? The magician wondered as her impressions were mostly comprised of utter confusion.

"He's vegetarian – he doesn't eat meat", Gani explained as he put out his cigarette and dumped it into the trash can, he tried looking really cool as he did it, thinking his concept was going to knock Mana out of her sandals.

"Yeah but… Burgers are just breaking through, I'm not sure those people making them will appreciate this, they have their hard times competing as it is", Mana scratched her chin.

"Egh, everyone's a critic… Anyways, do you really trust those burger-things? I mean the first burger came from a whole another universe, didn't it? Why would you trust something like that? What if the other universe tainted the burgers to wash our brains so occupying us would be easier"? Gani tried blowing Mana's mind. He was a curiously oddball of a soul, then again, he was an artist.

"Uh-huh", Mana raised an eyebrow, being the person who brought back the inter-universal package from Naruto's universe she almost felt offended by the implication.

"Look, I'm not saying they are… But what if… You know? The Police Force should look into it, never know what you're gonna find…" Gani shrugged as the two friends said their farewells and Mana left into the cold snowy streets of cold season Konohagakure.

A familiar face of a short and well-trained young boy with messy hair in a shearling jacket met Mana as she left the show. The magician always scanned the audience for familiar faces during the show but this time she found no one. Not too surprising not seeing Meiko and Kiyomi during these busy times but it appeared like only young Sayaki bothered to show up. Then again, once Mana started seriously filling the seats it became almost impossible to tell for sure who showed up and who didn't.

"Hey", Kouta mumbled out, his tone was just as confused and irritated as the magician had predicted it being. She had foreseen this talk coming a long time ago, pretty much when she did something really stupid, or something that'd look really stupid in Kouta's eyes.

"Hey. Didn't see you at the show. Just waited outside the whole time"? Mana tried somehow to soften the blows that will soon inevitably come. She had this coming, really. That pathetic circling around the topic was all she could do at this point.

"Yeah, well… I wanted to see you but I wasn't sure where I could find you. Figured you'd definitely be here in your own show. Didn't want to barge into your home with something like this", Kouta grumbled out in irritation. He was almost as bad as Mana was with hiding something, be it emotions or half-assed truths. He was livid and it was crystal-clear.

Mana looked away, she knew she was guilty and she knew she deserved everything that'd come but… She just wished that he'd hurry up and explode already. This hesitation and his inner hesitation of just blowing the lid off wasn't doing anyone any favors.

"So… You mind telling me why you betrayed my weakened team's location to a team from Sunagakure"? Kouta finally stabbed straight for Mana's heart.

"I… I did it and… I'm sorry", Mana mumbled out, just barely holding herself together. She really would've rather had this conversation any other day than the night before the next stage of the exams but as someone who really crossed her own boyfriend she had very little say in when she was to be confronted about it.

"I know you did it, Yushijin told me you did. It's not like those Sunagakure guys were very loyal to you either, they spilled the beans on you before they even got to the fighting – they wanted this on you. You're my girlfriend, Mana, at least, I thought you were, so I'm giving you a chance to explain why you did that. This isn't some stupid joke, people used to get executed for stuff like that", Kouta was beginning to sound really angry and desperate, he was just as pained and scared as he was angry. Mana didn't even have to look him in the eyes, she wouldn't have needed to smell his sweat, even if she could do that, to know it. That pain was the worst part about this whole interaction.

Mana remained silent. Honestly, she just did not want to try and excuse herself, she did what she thought was right, she acted upon her principles and it may have been the wrong thing to do by anyone else's scale but hers but… Even if it hurt her inside to admit it – she would do it again.

"Was it your principles again? Your tangled web of responsibilities and "right things to do""? Kouta angrily wondered. Mana's lips felt like they were hammered shut, her throat felt dry and short of air, as if she was actually being choked up by the guilt she felt, guilt not for what she did but for how what she did made her boyfriend feel. She could only offer a pathetic nod. Kouta threw his hands up in the air before ramming his back at the wall of a building and falling down on a thin layer of first snow.

"Being someone's girlfriend means to trust that person, also being able to trust that person to trust you. It's a bond of trust and love, one can't go without the other. You betrayed my friends, I don't know if you knew or not that I was out by that time, you probably did but… Stabbing at them is the same as stabbing right into my back. I… I don't think I can do this anymore. Being in love with someone means that your principles and rules have to come second to the common interests of the entity that you and your other form. You must be able to sacrifice your own good for that of the ones you love. Of all people, I thought you'd understand it. You weren't able to do that, Mana", Kouta started rambling calmly.

Mana just stood there locked down and crushed. Her hands trembled from the failed attempts not to cry. Sometimes being able to read people, read situations and predict what was coming was the most painful thing ever. Reading situations and events, like ninja were able to do, to the extent where it was almost knowing the future was no blessing – it was poison, a virus that rot one's own guts from inside out before making them blow up once the predicted future came to fruition. Most sadistic killers always told their victims ahead when their deaths would come, it was not for no reason at all…

Kouta stood up and placed his hands inside his pockets, his face looked calmer, even while a vein was shot out in the upper left corner of his forehead, it was slowly starting to dwindle down as the boy's eyes gained clarity.

"When I look into your eyes I see a lot of things, pain, maybe still a whole lots of love we feel for one another. The thing is that I don't see regret. We both know you're not sorry for betraying me and that's what hurts, that's what twisted the knife and cut us apart. Now I know why Shimo used to be so angry and rude with you, he just knew you all too well. I just really hope that whatever you got out of this deal with the Sand Village was worth it…" Kouta calmly explained, looking both a little lyrically happy but also still in pain over what he had to do. Having just cut his bond with Mana apart the young man calmly turned around and walked away while Mana broke down in tears onto the newly fallen snow.

Mana's crying and silent sobbing went completely ignored by the rushing people all around her, some of them bothered to look at her with irritation and disgust as her mental breakdown sort of disturbed the nice and quiet evening in the rather busy village street and fouled their own good mood. Left to deal with her pain all by lonesome in one of the busiest streets of the village, the magician shed her tears until she realized that while she still loved Kouta, crying wouldn't fill up the massive hole in her chest that him ending their relationship tore out. She weeped until she realized that for someone who saw it coming she really failed to anticipate just how efficiently crippling the blow would be.

This was over. Arguably, the most important night in her life was still ahead though.


	330. Finally, the Semi-Finals!

Standing in front of the Konoha High gym hall made Mana realize just how much the ranks of the genin still competing were trimmed. There were no more long queues or waiting for the better part of the day to get anything done. While plenty of the genin still stayed around the village just to get to see the finals, which took place right after this round, they were not allowed inside for this one, meaning they had no reason to crowd the place needlessly.

Mana sighed as she just stared at the large, modern, orange building made of three thick towers rotated around a large prismatic glass center, making an almost flower ring like of a shape with the rotating colorful towers looking like petals whereas the glass center was the ovary. While the place was certainly amazing, this just was not the day nor the mood for Mana to give it the credit it properly deserved. This whole morning she was just kind of functioning on autopilot.

Her parents really wanted to know why Mana came back home so crushed and did not talk to them. Their daughter's pain was a big deal to them and denying them the information for the sole reason of her not feeling like talking to anyone for the duration of last night just made Mana feel worse about herself. Not only did she feel guilty for ruining her relationship with a young man she very much still had feelings for but now she felt bad about just shutting down on her parents as well.

"You've come this far, going to let a door stop you"? A happy-go-lucky sounding voice speaking with a foreign, northwestern accent kicked Mana out of her little box of depression. The owner of the voice was a genin Mana had not gotten the honor of meeting in the previous stages of the exam. It was a young man with tall, brightly orange hair that laid on the boy's head vertically, like reeds on the shore of a lake, a simple, dark green shirt and baggy black pants that were part of the standard ninja uniform around the world. The boy had a slightly darker tanned skin suggesting he was from one of the warmer island countries. Only then did Mana's eyes linger down on the Getsugakure headband he wore as a belt.

"Not very talkative? Okay… We're all a bit nervous today, best of luck in there, if you consider actually walking in. Unless you face off with me, of course, in that case – worst of luck"! The tanned ginger started laughing out at his own joke so hard that he almost broke up. His large, held by his strong and broad shoulders arms reached for the handle of the door, failing to grab hold of it initially due to him cracking himself up but then finally overcoming the difficult task of walking through the door.

Mana sighed before grabbing the door, before it could shut right in front of her face and pushing her body gently through it, without pulling on the door too hard and using effort to open it wide up again. In a bit of confusion she wandered through the corridors leading to the different faculties of Konoha High before finding a sign that directed her to the gym hall. With her relationship done with and her mood as crushed as it was Mana felt almost naked walking up to the gym, seeing the light at the end of the dark hallway she was walking towards almost choked her up.

This would be it. If she failed here the world would not just explode, no one would die but… It would be it for Mana. She needed to win this, whatever difficulties came her way she needed to grit her teeth and push through. She had no team to go back to, she had no right to fail if she was to still believe in her own strength and wisdom being able to eventually change the world. Just keep walking, just keep pushing through…

Mana slowly crept through the various teams that stood lined up in a rectangular shape, surrounding a square in front of several higher-ranking ninja and an empty tall chair that, obviously, was reserved for Lord Sixth himself. It was not uncommon for the Hokage to observe the later stages of the exams as well as the teams and the team leaders of all other teams. The leaders of other countries and villages would only join in to see the finals, however.

"Mana"! Meiko's cheery voice made Mana finally peel her half-shut hazy eyes off the ground and look at her teammates standing around together with Lady Fifth – Chestnut Hanasaku behind them. Mana certainly was not in a rush, what with all of her dreamy and autopilot-like state the whole day long. Only made sense she would be the last one of her team to come, even with Meiko's tardiness when it came to procedural affairs and training in mind.

Without saying anything in return the magician just walked up to her team and joined their ranks. Trying to act natural and not drag her feet too much or seem too crushed with the last night's events. Mana was never good with the masks and the lies so it was obvious that they sniffed something being wrong.

"Is everything alright"? Kiyomi wondered, she seemed chipper and very fired up, Mana could sense her chakra having grown considerably which the magician found rather odd – from what she recalled Kiyomi did not intend to do basic body training and wanted to learn new Yamanaka hijutsu. Meiko's chakra had also grown considerably as well, the sheer size of it was impressive and both of the girls were already breathing at Mana's neck in terms of pure chakra size. An impressive feat knowing that Mana did specialized chakra boosting training in her off-time whereas these two probably just weight lifted and sparred their way there.

Just when Mana tried opening up her chakra sensory, all sorts of scary signatures began overwhelming her but utilizing her experience and training in controlling the ability the magician tunneled her sense just to wrap around Meiko and Kiyomi. If at any point she needed to broaden the horizons she could do so to include anyone else, but she made a mental note not to try and measure the higher ranking ninja as their chakra could've easily paralyzed the magician in fear. The larger sized chakra signatures were so large, in her experience, that one's mind had difficulty wrapping around them. It wasn't too difficult to imagine a chakra signature of a Jinchuuriki or a Tailed Beast sending a sensor completely insane from the sheer intensity and size of it.

"Yeah… Didn't sleep very good, that's all", Mana pinched her own thigh until she managed to force out a broken smile. Technically it was an efficient deflection tactic, the events of last evening truly did make Mana's night sleep less than of desirable quality so she wasn't lying per se. That should have helped the believability of her delivery at the very least.

"Oh, well, cheer up. Plenty of teams only have two members available. We've got all three of us. We've got such an advantage in numbers that your night sleep won't matter", Meiko tried cheering Mana up but she then got silenced by Kiyomi's sharp elbow to the gut. Even without using ninjutsu the blonde must've been a natural face reader and she went through enough boy trouble romancing Eiju for so long that she must've known those despaired eyes of Mana's.

"Oh, you wanna go"? Meiko grinned with confidence, "You wanna go now"!? the blacksmith grabbed Kiyomi's hand and tried breaking it up before the antics of Team Hokage got broken up by Lord Sixth entering the hall and settling down, surrounded by his two assistants. One of them was the cute young woman that accompanied him back when Mana received a mission whereas the other one was yet unseen to Mana young gent with a hedgehog haircut and thick glasses.

Gladly enough, Meiko did not need to be silenced and restrained. The sight of the Hokage himself making his way into the hall sort of restrained her desire to pay back the painful bump in her side. A gentle whisper at her ear made Mana's own eyes shoot wide open however.

"Nice work with that mission couple of days ago", Hanasaku's restrained voice uttered. There it was. That feeling when it seemed like she was drowning in wet cement however somehow a small hole peeked open giving Mana some hope to keep groveling through and out. Her mentor figure commending her with this small venture really did feel like the small motivation booster she needed, just what was required to stay afloat.

Shortly after settling in his big chair the main man in the room picked himself back up and walked up to the stand before extending his large hands widely to gesture him addressing the entirety of the hall.

"Genin, their mentors, welcome having made it this far in what is probably the most competitive and… Most massive in scale Chuunin Exams in quite a while. I won't lie by telling you that I know what you're feeling, I studied here at Konoha High and then moved on to working underground. I wasn't promoted in large events like this but through envelopes slipped into my room with my food. I have no idea what it is like knowing that this is the event that will make you suffer for fifteen minutes before escalating you to higher fame and recognition. What I do acknowledge, however, is your skill that was needed to get here". After giving this brief speech the man slowly crept back to his large chair and settled down meanwhile the short curly hair assistant lady of his rushed up to the stand.

"As Lord Sixth said before, you've demonstrated great skill and ingenuity, maybe even a bit of good luck sprinkled on top, getting here. However, you didn't all pass these last stages equally, some of you are in teams of three, some of you are in teams of two. This makes the competition aspect somewhat unfair and meanwhile, life isn't fair either, we want to make at least the competition aspect fairer. Therefore, until the end of the Chuunin Exams, all your teams are disbanded, each one of you is a competitor in their own right. In this competition, you may face off against your teammate and you'll be expected to beat them".

The teams around the hall rustled, raising a moderate amount of noise. Mana wanted to feel surprised or shocked but all she could find was the same unrest that she felt right when she entered the Forest of Death – the uneasy fear of facing her teammate and being forced to eliminate them, crush the dream of someone whose dreams she knew about and helped support. There was no liberation, no joyful shock of the conditions being shaken up from their grounds up. At least, at this point, she was the only person she could let down.

A jounin wearing thick, geeky glasses and a bandana, being of rather unimpressive and slim build approached the center of the gym, knowing full well that eyes of all the genin around him followed his each movement. This particular jonin was well known to Mana as he had once rescued her from the Hanada estate, what seemed like a whole lifetime ago. Curiously enough, judging from Sugemi's reaction all the way from the western parts of the gym, Mana noticed that the Nara also had experiences with this particular jonin.

The jounin then removed two scrolls he had on his back before carefully positioning them at the opposite ends of the rectangular space meant for competitive sparring and physical games. With a bright red glow, the scrolls stuck to the ground they were positioned on and begun floating, surrounded by maroon colored chakra aura emanating from them. The man then weaved a pair of hand seals before driving his palm to the floor, similarly to how the Summoning Jutsu was performed, except without actual summoning being involved.

"Earth Style: Terraforming Jutsu", the jounin chanted as the rectangular area with two scrolls floating at the opposite poles rose up a good meter in the air as the foundation of the building rose up with the wooden tiles elevating the rectangular shape into an improvised arena.

"Greetings, genin who have gotten to this point. I am Konohagakure jounin – Dorimi, the leader of Team Walnut, which, unfortunately, didn't make it this far. I shall help clear things out with the rules of this stage…" Dorimi started talking in a rather monotonous and dull tone, appearing to very clearly only have a professional interest in the matter and little to no excitement.

"Yawn, this guy's so boring", Meiko complained, actually yawning, after acknowledging how boring the terraforming jounin ninja was.

"No wonder his team got eliminated, he can't explain anything at all", Kiyomi tried to joke to elevate the team's mood, even if there was no longer any team nor was it within her interests to do so.

Dorimi went on to talk for a good twenty minutes about the establishment they were standing in – Konoha High. About its purpose to further shape ninja who have graduated the Ninja Academy into more specialized shinobi ready to tackle specific professions of the ninja world. Such as being part of the "Intelligence Division", "Village Protection Services", Konoha's recently formed "Barrier Corps", as well as a medical ninja and how it was the only such institution of its kind. It could have been all so very interesting for the foreign ninja but even Mana had to admit – it was outright boring to any local ones, Dorimi's dull, boring and uninterested tone did not really help things at all.

"Thank you, Dorimi-senpai", Lord Sixth's male assistant interrupted Dorimi's clearly completely fireless speech before politely bowing multiple times as he stepped into the recently built up and erected arena and addressed the genin, looking up from below. "Your speech was highly… Informative, however, I would like to still explain the rules of the competition before the youths are completely lost and over-informed".

Dorimi laughed innocently from his own long-winded speech and happily apologized the audience before stepping down and allowing the assistant to take over.

"Greetings, hopefully, future chuunin. I am Haiji, Lord Sixth's assistant and I shall explain the rules of this exam, as well as be the judge of this stage, in Dorimi-senpai's stead." The strict looking ninja bowed to the audience before turning sideways and pointing at the erected arena. "This is where you'll be fighting for your right to participate in the finals. Make no mistake, however, it won't be as simple as just the honorable Traditional Shinobi Kumite you are used to from your Academy days, it'll be a Tag Team match, as per the traditional exercise of improvised teamwork skills building game played here in Konoha High".

Haiji then turned around and patiently waited for a monitor to light up behind him. As the title screen of the monitor proudly declaring "Konoha's 32nd Chuunin Exams" lit up, the ninja then turned back to the audience before gesturing with his hands at the glowing monitor.

"This system will determine the Tag Teams that will compete in the semi-finals of these Chuunin Exams. They will still call you up by the names of your old teams, just for the sake of national and personal pride, as well as your own name. When called up, step up to the arena and determine if you are planning on being the active combatant or the passive one through dialogue with your selected partner." Haiji then turned at the two scrolls positioned at the opposite ends of the arena.

"These scrolls are for the passive combatants. When the passive combatant appoints himself, they must place their hand onto the sealing glyph inside the scrolls and they shall be sealed away, unable to perceive anything happening outside. Meanwhile, the active combatants will be fighting it out, following the same rules that are applied to the Traditional Shinobi Kumite – fights go on until ring out or the opponent is no longer able to fight, or until they surrender". Haiji stopped talking for a breather, letting the rules sink in for the genin who'd soon be participating in the exam.

"The twist of the exam comes in the Tag rule – at any point, any active combatant can open the scroll and unseal their passive combatant, also giving both of them three seconds to attack their opponent together. After the three seconds pass – the active combatant becomes passive and is sealed into the scroll. A team wins the exam by eliminating both their opposing competitors. Any questions"? Haiji looked across the audience waiting for the audience's questions.

"It's a trick, this unsealing rule. Unsealing requires letting your eyes down from your opponent and opening the scroll. It's a risky move." Kiyomi thought aloud, scratching her chin as she pondered on the most efficient timing to tag herself out with her partner.

A hand came up from one of the teams, a muscular and fit, tall dark-skinned young woman with short blond hair that spiked out at the front of his head raised her hand, the headband tied around her arm betrayed the young woman to be from Kumogakure.

"Yeah, what about a situation when the active combatant is knocked out, or ringed out, but the passive combatant remains sealed"? The Kumogakure kunoichi asked.

"A good question, in that case, I, as the supervisor, shall unseal them for you and they automatically become the active combatant", Haiji nodded before explaining.

For a good while, Haiji waited for more questions but it appeared like none came from the audience. At which point he turned to the monitor behind him and allowed it to activate before scrolling through a sheet of names, slowly, one by one picking out four of them and lighting up the screen with the selected names.

"Gasco Patura (Team Phobos/Getsugakure) & Dhaogu (Team Zumurrud/Sunagakure) VS Armasar Fulgertun (Team Iocaste/Getsugakure) & Neph-T (Team Alto/Kumogakure)"

Mana's heart stopped for a moment. She had a very bad vibe about Team Phobos and she has had first-hand experience in witnessing their tendencies to cross into the weird side and be a bit unhinged. The towering sensor, whom Mana had a bad feeling about all this time, later to be revealed as just her sensory abilities going haywire when encountering another sensor, stepped out of the line of his mysterious and dangerous team. Team Phobos were cloaked, as usual for them, the fronts of their cloaks were decorated with a large white crescent moon shape that made the trio stand out amongst all other genin but also sort of served like larger headbands for the team.

"Weren't those guys the weirdos that hurt you while you were looking for a medical ninja, Mana"? Kiyomi turned at the magician who continued to observe Gasco walk past her, momentarily looking at her with a stone cold face.

"Your sensory abilities have improved tremendously in such a short time", he muttered looking straight into Mana's eyes with his scary paled out, almost white, ocular orbs, before resuming his slow crawl to the arena and leaping onto its grounds with a single restrained bound.

"Maybe he'll be more restrained when facing someone from his own village"? Mana spoke up, hopefully. "They have displayed some nationalist tendencies before".

A silent young boy with a bit excessive love of eye shadow and ragged baggy clothes, that made him look like a desert traveler, stood up from his seated on the wood position and walked up to the arena, much faster than his partner and leaped up onto the stage as well. His dark purple hair made the blurry, lightning fast, moves of the boy appear like a dark purple flash.

"That Steinck guy told us about this Dhaog in the Forest, hasn't he"? Meiko wondered as she stretched out and relaxed, ready to observe the tag battle that was about to break out in great anticipation and excitement.

"Yeah, maybe seeing him do his thing will help us clear up his ability since Steinck wasn't too clear on that", Kiyomi nodded with a confident smile. Observing these battles closely was very useful, as it would serve as valuable experience for the future. One would have been wise to reveal as little of their abilities as possible, or else risk exposing their strategies and fighting style to the opponent, which they would end up facing in the finals.

"Alright! I get to go first"! The curious darker skinned ginger boy whom Mana met before entering Konoha High earlier raised his fist into the air. His name must've been "Armasar Fulgertun" since he was the one from Getsugakure. Mana calmly observed the broad-shouldered and fit young man run off and excitedly leap into the ring.

The spiky haired blond dark skinned young lady from before stretched out before stepping into the ring in a much more reserved manner, instead choosing to carefully jump up and use her unaugmented physical abilities to pull herself the short distance up onto the ring. She was the Neph-T of Kumogakure.

"Would it be alright with you if I was the passive combatant"? Dhaogu of the Sand Village inquired Gasco calmly. "I very much intend to not use my ability until the finals".

The hooded man then removed the cloak on his shoulders and tossed it aside, revealing his tall and muscular state and a black vest encrusted with gold colored rings that held it together from revealing the by far most buffed up chest amongst the genin present in the ring. The darker skinned, matching Armasar's complexion, bald head lit up with popping out veins as he took a fighting stance.

"Very well, it makes no difference to me. I planned on beating both of them by myself anyways", the creepy bald sensor man grunted out.

"That's a mean amount of trash talk, Gasco, you sure you can back it up"!? Armasar grinned excitedly as he shadowboxed all around the arena, moving at impressive speeds from one part to another.

"Not against you, ginger, I'm itching to sear something"! Neph-T, Armasar's partner grinned in a disturbing and almost sadistic looking way. Just that smile alone creeped Mana out and made her temporarily divert all of herself to the present situation and not her own inner turmoil. This young woman has undoubtedly tortured and killed people in her life.

"Well, well… You seem really fired up, you've never really met anyone from Team Phobos though, be careful and soften him up for me then", Armasar smiled before opening the scroll and getting sealed inside. The Getsugakure ninja's actions were mirrored by Dhaogu on the other side of the arena. After the maroon colored shimmer emitting sealing process concluded, there were only Neph-T and Gasco Patura left at the opposing sides of the arena.

Haiji lifted his hand up, without even bothering to request the two to follow the proper kumite procedure as neither of them looked like they wanted anything other but to utterly annihilate their opponent.

"Let the first round of the semi-finals of the Chuunin Exams begin"! he declared swiping his hand down and signaling the beginning of the next stage of the exams and the start of the first tag battle.


	331. Let the Boxer Beware

Neph-T, the significantly smaller of the two combatants present in the arena stared boldly at her opponent who towered in front of her, in height and in bulk. To an uninitiated eye, such a match up would've appeared completely unfair, but once the fundamental principles of martial arts came into play, oftentimes the larger opponent was on the lower end of the table. Not to mention the complete table flipping element of chakra also being in play, the fundamental force of nature that could have been utilized for various techniques and body augmentation.

Neph-T darted off, charging straight at her opponent. It was an even bolder and more shocking method of assault – a smaller opponent just mindlessly rushing at their opponent. Gasco responded with a slow, yet powerful, downwards hook that shook the very ground beneath the feet of the two and emitted a thunderous cracking sound. Neph-T blitzed with a sideways vault, moving behind her opponent before her arms pulled forward revealing an object she had pulled from her tool pouch in mid rush – a roll of bandages.

"That was amazing"! Meiko yelled out in surprise, she wasn't alone – the entire hall watching the battle rustled in awe of how masterfully the girl kept her tool concealed and how skillfully she utilized the size of her opponent's own arm to conceal her act of pulling the bandages out. Even Lord Sixth shifted his seat in excitement.

As the dark-skinned girl yanked on the bandages, they tightly wrapped around Gasco's arm and locked it behind the towering man. It was a temporary augmentation of strength, also it would've only worked for a brief heartbeat, just before Gasco recovers and reads the situation and utilizes his own strength against the girl. That would be something she would have no way of competing against.

Neph-T leaped in the air with a sharp and swift kick right to the center of the man's back. Judging from how awkwardly and grotesquely Gasco's back turned – it was a mighty and well-aimed kick that dealt some damage and really tickled some nerves. Gasco yanked on the bandage, having finally mustered enough strength to put some of his own initiatives in. His recovery speed was near instantaneous, and it seemed like getting a crushing blow planted into his spine and the excruciating pain of it was nothing of note for the giant.

Gasco threw a sharp and straight punch, the howling sound of the fist crushing air was something to awe at. Instead of getting pulled in for a crippling blow, Neph-T used a kunai to cut her string of bandages and then quickly cartwheeled back, effectively switching places with her opponent, from where they started and blocking Gasco off from the scroll that'd unseal his partner, but also blocking herself from hers.

"That's confident, maybe too confident", Kiyomi pouted her lips before turning at Mana. "Hey, you're a sensor, right? Is there anything we can't see going on"?

"I can't tell that much, I can just compare their chakra sizes and confirm that they're actually there. If we were under genjutsu I'd be able to tell you where the real enemy is. In this case, my abilities are not very useful, I'm afraid", Mana shyly admitted. As a briefly trained martial artist she was able to tell that these two were just starting out – poking each other and keeping good eighty percent of their potential in their defensive and evasive maneuvers.

"That Gasco seems like a real powerhouse. Many people would've been broken in half by a kick like that and he just bounced back effortlessly". Meiko grinned in excitement. Mana had never noticed the concept of fighting being so exciting for her friend, maybe something happened during this last week that made her appreciate it more?

"It's not his natural strength. It's his sensory, it completely shames my own. He knew where Neph-T's kick would land and he augmented just that specific area of his body, without wasting an ounce of chakra on unnecessary patches of flesh. Normally a ninja would augment their entire back in such a situation, wasting chakra and greatly raising the risk of something going wrong, like them losing their chakra manipulation, yet Gasco didn't waste a single ounce of his energy", Mana admired her total superior in sensory prowess. It looked like to Gasco Patura sensory was as natural as moving his arms and legs, like having eyes in every chakra pore of his body.

To the magician, it barely seemed even possible – to sense such exquisite shapes of one's opponent. All the magician could see was dazzling and shimmering stars, sometimes the nature of one's chakra changed the shade of the flames that one's signature burned in, but it always had that blazing round shape. Gasco must've been seeing things differently, his signatures were sharpened, as crystal clear and precise as an art examined through a scientific microscope. Seeing feats like that in her peers made Mana wonder just what exactly was she doing in this building. Team Hokage was supposed to be overqualified for this exam…

Quickly and with well-trained precision, Neph-T wrapped the dangling strings of bandage still clutched in her arm around her right arm before taking an offensive stance. An incredibly peculiar one at that and one that made Mana's eyes widen in confusion. The girl simply lowered her hands and extended her body out straight, leaving herself completely open, it was then that her feet began hopping and carrying her gracefully across the arena, forcing Gasco to move or risk being attacked from behind.

What was even odder – Gasco took the gamble, choosing to remain in place and simply continue staring at the short opponent he was facing with strict and emotionless eyes that displayed little to no pain being present in his back. It wasn't a sign of invulnerability as much as it was his fearsome pain tolerance when Mana focused and closed her eyes she could feel it – Gasco's star burning overtime and shining brightly, much more intensely than Neph's was shimmering.

Neph-T moved in on the offensive again, leaping in with a crushing uppercut using her bandaged right, aimed straight at her opponent's back of the head – blows like this could knock out or kill instantly. Gasco turned around with a back elbow – the precision and angle of that counter! Once again Mana was left completely washed away by how much Gasco could see without even looking. This would have been it – Gasco had more powerful, longer arms, he was going straight for the dead center of Neph's forehead, a kill shot or an incapacitating strike in its own accord. Neph-T had invested too much into her momentum to strike with full force, she had no chance of redirecting herself into an efficient dodge.

A full attention demanding, deafening thud followed by dust gathering and window shattering shockwave – Gasco's elbow was stopped by Neph-T's extended palm, relaxed and pillowing the strike like a shield of flesh.

"The strength of that girl"! Someone in the audience yelled out.

Mana could not help it, she looked at the trio from which Neph-T entered the stage – Team Alto. The chubby, shades-wearing shorty of the team stood there with his hands crossed on his chest, smiling smugly whereas the third one – a shaved bald in streaks with just long thorny patches of his red hair remaining young man just observed the battle in a calm and reserved manner. From what she could recall, her informants in the Forest of Death recommended avoiding Team Alto in the same manner as one would be wary of Team Phobos. This was truly a clash of monsters in the arena…

Neph-T grinned before repeating her uppercut, now with her opponent's hand entrapped, knocking Gasco's head back before it quickly returned to its primary position. Once again, the pitch perfect augmentation control of the genin allowed him to bounce back and counter immediately as he was hit in the face. Gasco continued to press on an offensive, throwing a quick and powerful combination of chain strikes, all of them caught and shielded against by Neph-T's "shield arm" whereas her bandaged arm continued to bombard the giant's face and ribs with thundering mighty strikes.

"Thunderstorm Fist"! Gasco shouted out, nonchalantly inserting a ninjutsu enhancement technique into his combination but at that point, his opponent was too caught up with her own success and the relentless barrage of defending and counterattacking.

An odd thunder-like sound followed by a blinding flash of light that momentarily made the vision of anyone who kept close attention to the fight blurry and floating. Once Mana's vision return she witnessed Neph-T's defensive arm being busted up as if knives had penetrated it from inside in multiple areas and squirting blood.

"Did anyone see what happened"? Mana muttered.

"Yeah, probably that guy from Neph-T's team with shades…" Kiyomi grunted feeling equally taken aback by how oddly Gasco tricked his opponent into a fake sense of security.

Everything in this fight was played into his advantage pitch perfectly – the two members of teams that were described as monstrous prodigies to be feared guaranteed that his opponent would be prideful and not tag out, fixed on winning the fight by herself just to prove a point of who the true monsters were. Then the plentiful successful strikes would make her believe that she was strong enough to block Gasco's strikes and quick enough to capitalize without punishment from her opponent's part. Just when it looked like Gasco was just swinging to get hit again and approaching the point when he could hit no longer – in a single flash of lightning chakra infused ninjutsu and taijutsu technique combination his opponent's shield arm was busted and disabled and Neph-T was slowly bleeding out.

Neph was clearly peeved. She was erratically biting her lip and clutching her fist, even her busted up hand's fist which only made her bleed out faster. It looked like the Kumogakure kunoichi simply had no time to realize she was bleeding out before she slowly turned and approached the scroll.

"What's she doing? She'll get killed"! Kiyomi wondered loudly.

"No, by now she's realized just what kind of ninja Gasco is. She knows that he is a minimalist and will take as long as he needs to, suffer through as much pain as he needs to – but he'll get things done. He'll let her tag out", Mana nodded remembering her own experience being attacked by Team Phobos in the Forest of Death. Those three not only appeared to know everything she was thinking, but they were also in control physically and were not afraid to taunt the enemy with psychological stunts like letting them switch like this.

In a maroon colored flash of light, Armasar was once again dragged out. He looked at his teammate with the world's clearest "I told you so" expression, wearing a strangely smug and not quite so at the same time grin. The kind of smile of an older brother who lets their sibling make their own mistakes but then always comes in to fix those mistakes and pull their siblings out of trouble at the same time.

The two traded looks, Neph-T's eyes lingered on Armasar and Gasco but Armasar just shook his head and pointed his chin at Neph's busted arm and the bandages she had on her right arm. The meaning of the exchange was crystal-clear – Armasar must have known enough about Team Phobos to know that attacking together for the three seconds they were granted was useless with Neph's busted arm. The ginger of Getsugakure took a leaning back raised and swinging fists fighting position and prepared to clash against the Team Phobos member himself.

"Come to think of it, didn't Steinck describe Neph-T as using two swords"? Kiyomi suddenly recalled.

"It was probably a fake-out fighting style", Mana nodded, "She likely is skilled with two swords but it isn't her prime choice of weaponry. She is simply too good with throwing fists for this to be her fake-out. Some people will go to great lengths to conceal their fighting style until they are forced to reveal it".

"I think that Steinck mentioned something about "rubber-armor" or something… That sounds like a more physical ability, doesn't it? More fitting for a taijutsu user than a swordsman as well", Meiko observed without moving her eyes off the arena.

"So how did the lady do, did she give you a couple of bumps"? Armasar teased his fellow Getsugakure ninja who didn't look like he was going to give in to the red haired fellow's attempts to brighten up the mood.

"What are you doing here, Armasar? We both know you can't fight without getting up close to me. You've seen how that ends, you know what happened to the girl as well. Switch back out", Gasco engaged in an actual attempt of reasoning, greatly surprising anyone who at this point believed the man to be some sort of a monster.

"Aww, you care…" Armasar grinned as he bobbed around, shadow boxing to stretch out his numb limbs and get ready for an immensely painful clash that was yet to come. "Never took you for the reasonable type, and you know me too – I'm plenty things but reasonable…"

Armasar dashed onwards with his left winded back and ready for a good cross. Gasco placed a vertical block absorbing the force of impact, yet once his taijutsu using opponent withdrew his punch, Mana noticed black bruises on Gasco's arm. "I am not", the red-haired boy finished his sentence.

"You idiot"! Gasco roared out as he answered Armasar's call for fists with less than a kind response. Armasar's fists delivered a pair of crosses straight to Gasco's ribs as the giant responded to a straight cross to Armasar's face, turning the young man's jaw aside in a painful looking manner. However, instead of letting the force of momentum blast him away Armasar persevered and threw another couple of lightning fast chain hits at his opponent's blocks in return.

"They're trading blows, fist to fist…" Meiko noted. This engagement was significantly less skillful and mind blowing as the previous clash of Neph-T against Gasco seeing how Armasar's entire fighting plan was just to run in and wail his fists around madly, hoping that his opponent would pass out faster than he did.

"He's counting on Gasco being somewhat worn out from the previous fight", Kiyomi added, "It's a gamble".

"This boy is not at all bothered about protecting himself. A single jutsu like Gasco used previously could kill him, all Gasco needs is one punch to connect", Mana shook her head in disbelief and horror at how little Armasar must've thought about his own life to just fling himself at an opponent he knew was so much stronger than him.

"Yeah, the ginger's pretty lucky that Gasco isn't using that thing he did before", Meiko grinned.

"He must have his own reasons", Mana sunk deep into thought, worried about the red haired boy's life and health. Being hit by that lightning eruption technique so close in would mean the end of his career if not his life. Maybe a higher ranked ninja could take such a hit without injury or incapacitation but not a genin.

"You're holding back"! Armasar roared as he threw another focused cross at Gasco's jaw, aiming to put all of his momentum, all of his built up and drawn force and balance into it to smack his opponent off his feet.

"You know very well why"! Gasco roared back at his comrade, having lost all of his cool and returning the favor. Both young men ended up socking each other in the jaw and stumbling back, struggling to keep their balance. Where Armasar managed to break his fall by forcing his hand forward and stopping himself from tumbling over, Gasco hit the ground looking to be out cold.

"I can't believe it, his gamble paid off". Mana muttered to herself as she felt her heart burning up, she wasn't completely sure if it was excitement from being reminded about the value of martial arts and the old man's teachings in the Sun Disc arena or if it was all consuming anger at the young man's disregard for his own life, gambling it all on a strategy as foolish and risky as this one.

"Y-You imbecile"! Gasco shouted out from the top of his lungs, the cold and emotionless, calculating stare was now no more, Gasco was looking to maim, crush and destroy now. "You're a Getsugakure ninja, just like me. Ours is a small ninja village yet a proud and strong one. We have no right to throw away our lives like this! Our village cannot afford this"!

Wiping the blood off his lips and feeling the swollen jaw and his busted eyebrow, Gasco stood up, his eyes were blazing at Armasar, looking to scorch him alive.

"Switch out"! Mana shouted out, she knew that the other teams would think her mad or that she'd seem like she wasn't all there, interfering into a match like this. If what Gasco told before was right and boxing was all that Armasar could really do and Gasco only needed to connect a punch to execute his "Thunderstorm Fist" and destroy his opponent, there was no hope or use in Armasar staying in. He was committing suicide.

Armasar stared at Mana curiously, wondering why this weird girl from before would care this much about his choice to fight this meaningless battle, a couple of moments later he switched his attention back at his now risen opponent before taking his odd leaned back and fists swinging stance. Armasar's own body was seeded with bruises and blunt force traumas all over, on a lesser extent than the body of his opponent but it was clear that Gasco's power strikes hit home even without the addition of "Thunderstorm Fist".

"So, finally gonna use it"? Armasar wiped his nose, smiling in excitement.

"Don't get your hopes up", Gasco slapped his opponent back verbally, "The power to channel lightning chakra so intense, that it passes from your own fist through whatever surface you touch, creating slicing outbursts of lightning that erupt from point of contact. That's Thunderstorm Fist. Your main strategy is to engage your opponent up close if I want to incapacitate you and not cripple you, I need to just keep you back in long distance…"

Gasco raised his fist up as if he was aiming to strike using a hammer fist strike, but instead, his fist began glowing faintly, before sparks and jolts of lightning covered it like a boxing glove. Crackling and shining visibly outside his arm. Then, unexpectedly, instead of charging at Armasar, Gasco brought his fist down and punched the ground diagonally downwards. The arena beneath the feet of the two shook, rumbled and quaked, cracked and fissured as the fissures lit up with lightning bright glow and slicing crescent moon shaped lightning projectiles jolted off at Armasar's direction.

"Thunderstorm Fist"! Gasco yelled out.

Mana's heart, still worried over the young brawler's life, and angry for his complete disregard of it, skipped a beat watching four, ground-splitting lightning chakra projectiles homing in on Armasar, who still struggled to keep a firm, both feet on the ground, fighting stance…


	332. Exam Photo Finish

A smoking and rumbling blast erupted from the point of impact where the combination of ninjutsu and taijutsu in a projectile shape hit Armasar. Before she covered her face up, because it was more efficient and rational than augmenting her body and wasting chakra, Mana's skilled eyes did notice the ginger boy weaving a hand seal successfully. She hoped that he would have substituted out of the wave of projectiles in time but something made her doubt Armasar's success, he may not have had much time to sufficiently focus on possible objects for a substitution nor had items to substitute with.

Once the smoke, dust and the annoying aftereffects of crackling sparks of lightning that persisted in the air, electrifying the atmosphere, cleared, a sight of injured and bracing Armasar met the audience. Mana groaned to herself worryingly, the recklessness of this young man made her both relate and despise this young man. Areas of ruptured and lacerated flesh ran all over the boy's body, as the lightning projectiles appeared to have shattered into hundreds of smaller cutting lightning edges.

"My God", Mana exclaimed in horror.

"Wait a second… What's that"? Meiko pointed at Armasar's shaking frame, still static in the same pose of defensive block. The detail that interested the redhead so even forced her out of her comfortable relaxation and made Meiko take a few steps towards the arena just to get a closer view, not because she couldn't make out the detail but because it was so unbelievable.

The area under Armasar's flesh looked padded with a gooey liquid substance, instead of blood from under the lacerations all over his body only goops of water fell out before imploding into more liquid drops and wetting all over the ruptured ground beneath Armasar's feet. The boy grunted in pain after the persisting lightning in the air still shocked his body painfully, making him break his defensive stance and tumble forward.

"Hmph, so you used that to soften my blows before", Gasco straightened out and cracked his neck and knuckles before stretching himself out, before beginning to plan and prepare for the next outbreak of fists flying and genin doing their best to knock each other out. "I wondered if you'd use it, given that I use Lightning Release ninjutsu enhancing my taijutsu", he added.

"Yeah… I encased myself in it while I was sealed, didn't waste any time", Armasar grinned cheerfully before scratching his itchy nose.

"What is that"? Kiyomi scratched her head in confusion.

"It looks like… Water under his skin", Meiko curiously and quite rudely pointed at Armasar. The rest of the teams were discussing this odd technique as well so, as usual, exchanges of blows and techniques were followed by genin discussing what they have just seen and exchanging information of possible weaknesses of such strategies. It was because of audience like this that it may have been wise to hide one's real combat abilities for as long as possible…

"He coated himself with layers of chakra infused water under his skin to pad blows. It's a similar strategy to using layers of fat to protect oneself, he must've fine-tuned the substance to redistribute blunt force, making himself a perfect close distance brawler", Mana noted. "While he did take some damage from Thunderstorm Fist, it didn't come from inside his body, like it did for Neph-T, it came from underground, meaning the jutsu had lost part of its force. It still must've hurt like hell".

"Yeah, the guy definitely has pain tolerance to spare", Meiko laughed out before relaxing again as the room died out. The audience was waiting for what next the two young men had in mind.

"Your no-guard confirmed hit close range strategy, added to your water armor, may be effective against a slightly worn me. That being said, you're still forgetting one thing – you'll never walk up close enough to utilize it", Gasco coldly stated the fact before he raised his hand up in the air and once again channeled lightning through his fist, preparing to punch the ground again and send another wave of lightning projectiles rumbling through the ground. A ruthless jutsu aimed to cut up and shock his opponent even more.

"Thunderstorm Fist"! Gasco shouted out as he punched the ground with his enlightened fist unleashing the crescent shaped lightning projectiles all around him. Once again, a dust-raising, deafening explosion rumbled around the arena.

Moments passed after the technique seemingly detonated and the rubble raised by it was beginning to clear. A blond and black flash blurred from out of nowhere, appearing behind Gasco and surprising the towering brawler. The Getsugakure giant swiftly turned around, grabbing two chokuto blades in his hands. With a small squirt of blood dripping and trickling down his hand and his arm coming from a shallow wound on Gasco's hands, that was all the damage that Neph-T had inflicted.

"Useless"! Gasco taunted the kunoichi, tightening his grip and augmenting the narrow areas of his hand that were required to break the chunks of steel he held in his hands into hundreds of steel shards.

"Bendigo Fisticuffs"! Armasar yelled out, as the smoke completely cleared, revealing the ginger fighter having moved in right behind Gasco in the exact moment when the giant turned back to defend against Neph-T. The ginger threw a wild combination of strikes at Gasco's back, punching without stop, without mercy, without any semblance of any mental limits or restraint. The horrifying look at Armasar's whited out eyes as he delivered the punching combination made Mana shiver, it was like the young man dropped any semblance of humanity when he delivered those punches.

Gasco stood there, stumbling forward and backward, before his dazed and confused eyes regained clarity and he jabbed at Neph-T's direction, completely ignoring the ginger brawler throwing punches right behind him. Just when Armasar had concluded his combination of blows the maroon flash of sealing technique of the tag scrolls enveloped the boy and sealed him, completing the tag. Being shaken by Gasco's powerful blows, Neph-T trembled and tumbled over before pushing her body up to perform a kick at Gasco's gut. After suffering the pain for just a moment and shoving the girl's foot away, the Getsugakure giant backhanded the Kumogakure kunoichi aside sending a splash of blood splattering over the arena floor – a petrifying sign that augmentations have failed the kunoichi and she had taken some damage.

"Wow, they're moving and making decisions so fast, I'm kinda getting lost here", Meiko spoke up quietly, her voice was quite affected by the rather gruesome sight in the arena.

"And to think that Armasar timed the tag at the right moment, concealing the maroon flash in the light of the lightning projectile exploding, coordinating his three seconds with his teammate to perfection like that", Kiyomi sighed feeling bad for the poor Kumogakure kunoichi who appeared to be too proud to give up. Usually, a failure of augmentations such as this one signaled that a fighter was beginning to feel the exhaustion of the battle and further augmentations could lead to further failures or loss of chakra control, temporarily and otherwise.

"Gasco is just on a whole other level. I could barely even see Armasar's punches and Gasco perfectly augmented his body in each and every spot targeted for a punch, completely neutralizing the force of Armasar's taijutsu technique", Mana looked down at her twitching thighs and trembling hands. From what she could tell, solely from the chakra signatures, Gasco's chakra was the smallest out of the Team Phobos trio and yet he was such a fearsome ninja…

Neph-T stood back on her feet, tripping over herself and trembling, she wiped the blood trickling from her nose and her cracked lip before bravely meeting the cruel and emotionless eyes of her opponent who just kept standing there, having an answer for everything that his opponents threw his way. Her previously busted hand rose up in the air, now patched up using bandages that she carried with her, a tirade of sighs echoed through the audience. Who could have blamed the girl for quitting, really?

"Yes, contestant Neph-T, do you surrender"? The Hokage's assistant overseeing the exam fights asked for a clarification.

"I do not. I want to ask, how tight is this building really? Can you maybe have a barrier ninja erect a barrier around it"? Neph-T asked, her voice clearly betrayed that she was in a significant amount of pain.

"I don't think that's up to the rules. Ring outs are very much a way of elimination, if you can use barrier ninjutsu, please use it, if you deem it necessary. That being said, we cannot do anything of the sort", the assistant shook his head firmly.

"But my true fighting style is quite taxing on the surroundings when used indoors. It may raise the temperature several thousands of times over, I'm sure that the audience won't feel very comfortable in these conditions, plus the whole building may melt away", Neph-T grumbled in frustration.

"I assure you, this building has withstood sterner stuff than you. This gym was built with combat drills of Konoha High students in mind, plenty of them moved on to becoming medical ninja and even working for the ANBU, your worries are pointless", the assistant shrugged. "As for endangering the audience, if your technique lacks control, it shall not be permitted. A real ninja contains their destructive effects to where cataclysmic, world-ending jutsu barely even look stronger than a pocket bomb. A technique lacking such control is incomplete and shouldn't be used until perfected in training".

The mentor of Team Alto raised his hand, adding his own input into the brief interruption of the battle. The tall, simply dressed man had managed to conceal himself in the surrounding teams, avoiding Mana's gaze when she glared at the curious Kumogakure team earlier. Given the man's shut-in stance and the strange angle that he wore his red beret on his head at, making it conceal most of his face, it was not too tough to justify.

"Excuse Neph-T, instructor, she is able to restrain the effects of her heat emitting fighting style, she'd be a poor ninja if she wasn't able to do so", the man calmly explained before turning at his pupil. "Girl, this isn't the time or the place for your games, you have your opponent in front of you, no need to open your jaws any wider", he said to her.

"What does that all mean"? Meiko looked at her teammates in confusion, "Why would Neph-T lie about the range of her ability like that? Is it another diversion from the details of her fighting style"?

"Not necessarily, I think it's much more disgusting than that – she wanted to attack all of us as well. Didn't you hear what her mentor said? She was trying to deceive the instructor about the true nature of her ability so that when she killed an innocent bystander with it, she'd be innocent because the use of her jutsu was justified", Kiyomi grunted expressing great amount of disgust at Neph-T's attitude. Judging from the anger reflected in the blonde's eyes she'd have enjoyed switching places with Gasco in that arena.

Mana looked down, if Kiyomi's guess was true and Neph-T was simply a sadistic savage trying to kill people for no reason, just to eliminate future competition in the middle of an exam, that would've made the extent of sadistic premeditation of such caliber almost too baffling for her to understand.

The way in which these ninja fought was completely different from the mindset Mana harbored. Neph-T was concealing as much of her abilities as she could, just so her future opponents wouldn't have a chance analyzing them, she also secretly plotted to kill weaker bystanders by indirectly attacking them if she was forced to pull this jutsu out at any point. That may have been disgusting and immoral but it was how a true ninja thought, it was how Mana was expected to think out there in the field.

Neph-T hunched over as her body began to sweat profusely, washing away the blood trickling from her wounds and making them look like they were bleeding more intensely than they actually were. Then, Mana was beginning to feel it, an intense, dominating presence of heat that made it barely possible to breathe. It was not a rise in temperature to the extent that the Kumogakure kunoichi previously described, it was controlled to an extent, however, it was still something that'd kill an ordinary human bystander instantly.

"Hmmm"? Gasco emitted a strange sound of curiosity as he glared at Neph-T with an odd look of interest that quickly changed his cold and calculated ordinary look. "I see what you're trying to do, it's a very original way of molding chakra but… You are just needlessly stressing your body like that", he warned his opponent.

"That's because I'm not done yet, jackass"! Neph-T yelled out, she was clearly struggling like she was holding weight above her head that she could barely even lift. With so much heat being thrown out from her body, the inner burning feeling was absolutely unbearable. "As sensei said, I can build an armor around my heated body to protect the surroundings before I really go wild", she grinned before weaving a bunch of hand seals.

As the girl's clothes singed away, a dark and immensely hard and heat proof layer of dark material covered her body like a suit of armor. The exposed areas of Neph-T's body began brightening rapidly like they were covering something intolerably hot. At this point, the kunoichi was just a star with a layer of skin and narrow strips of flesh dragged over it. Neph-T's glow was too bright for Mana to even look at her directly, even if the armor she had enveloped over herself and her own skin dimmed the unsurpassable shine.

"I see", Gasco closed his eyes before raising his fist in the air and letting lightning chakra envelop it. "You've developed a ninjutsu that begins, develops and dies inside your body, secreting heat through your chakra pores as an aftereffect. That armor appears to be a variation of the Transformation Jutsu, needless to say – much higher rank. I assume the rise in temperature of your body, and around it, as well as the energy produced in such a process inside your own body is the goal of this jutsu".

"You idiot, you won't dare puncture the armored layer now. If I'm busted open, it won't be blood that'll come out, it'll be a burst of radiation and heat more intense than any weakling around can take"! Neph-T smirked, as her mouth opened blinding light seeped through, just like the shimmer leaking through her eyes.

Without saying a word, Gasco winded up his fist and charged at his opponent. Mana didn't even risk augmenting her body to even bother looking at what was transpiring in the arena. From brief looks at Kiyomi and Meiko, the two girls were staring right at the source of all that light.

"Thunderstorm Fist"! Gasco shouted out as he unleashed his fist, charged with Lightning Release chakra, aiming to unleash those same crescent shaped projectiles from inside his opponent, skewering her from inside, like he did before.

"White Nova"! Neph-T shouted as she answered Gasco's gamble with an augmented to the brim and intensified punch of her own. As more and more chakra built up in Neph's arm, the dark layer of hardened skin that covered and protected the people around Neph-T peeled off, revealing the burst of energy contained inside Neph's body.

After the resulting explosion and flash of light cleared out, Mana finally dared to look. She was surprised by the fact that she barely had to augment herself to survive the aftereffects of the clash between the two, that was how in tune their chakra control was and how precisely they channeled their prodigious skills solely through their opponent.

The sight that was revealed, to the magician after she finally dared to look was a sad one. Neph's body laid sprawled out on the floor, covered up in her mentor's white coat as her own clothes got singed off. The whole arena that was erected by Dorimi previously was completely totaled and laid in smoldering piles of rock all over the place. Gasco was kneeling and holding his own burns and bruises as he was definitely brought down to his knees and was having trouble standing back up.

"Both contestants: Gasco Patura of Getsugakure and Neph-T of Kumogakure have been eliminated via ring out, for the sole reason of the fact that there is no more ring left to compete in", the overseer of the semi-finals ruled after pointing at both competitors. From where Team Phobos was initially observing the battle, Gasco's male teammate – Doma, ran up to him and helped him back to his trio.

"It's fine, you'll be back into the finals once that Dhaogu guy wins the match for you, you did well", Mana could make out the one with the fiery temper explaining to his clearly injured and a bit dazed teammate. While Doma was right and Gasco would only be eliminated from the whole exam in the case of Dhaogu losing the tag match for the whole team, the thing that surprised Mana the most was how soft and friendly the trio she feared was with the members of their own team.

She had so often thought of Team Phobos as some inhuman monsters, quite frankly, their abilities certainly qualified them as such. They were masters of their strange unseen jutsu and excelled at their fighting styles. Gasco's "Perfect Augmentation" defense only proved Mana her point further, but there was a very soft hint of humanity inside those three, whenever other ninja of their village were concerned. Gasco clearly held back from seriously crippling Armasar for life, Doma was clearly less crazy and more leader-like when comforting his own team and the trio did appear to have this warm bond of kinship between each other.

The overseer then slowly walked up to the center of the has-been arena and weaved a bunch of hand seals before extending his hands to the sides, making sealing glyphs light up in the air in round circles where his palms were positioned.

"Remote Unsealing Jutsu"! he chanted but then was interrupted by Armasar's team mentor, yelling something out unintelligibly.

"Won't you repair the arena? What's the point of unsealing them both like this? They'll just be ringed out as well"! The well-built and plenty scarred jounin expressed his outrage.

"A part of being a good ninja is being able to defeat your opponent without making a ruckus. Big and flashy techniques like this, even if they are controlled, will be useless on an assassination mission. Consider this penalty for wrecking the arena, it will only be repaired for the next match", the instructor firmly stated before resuming his remote unsealing and setting off the seals, making them light up with maroon flashes.

As the bright flashes of light took shape in the air, Armasar simply landed on the arena floor, Dhaogu however quickly weaved a hand seal, right after realizing that he was a good meter in mid-air and about to touch the floor – it was very much an instinctual desperation move. Sand began seeping from Dhaogu's sleeves, boots, and his baggy pants.

"Water Style: Paradise Oil"! Dhaogu chanted as he spat out blobs of liquid goo that looked mostly like sunflower oil, covering the sand and giving it an odd gold-like color. As the sand rushing from the boy's boots slipped them off, Dhaogu's naked feet softly touched the gooey mush of gold colored sand and his own secreted oil before slipping on it, in a comedic fashion, and tumbling over on his back and down off his golden cloud of oiled sand.

The audience just observed the oddball's antics for a while in silence, trying to wrap their minds around what had just happened.

"Well, I suppose, technically, Dhaogu's back and head hit the floor a bit later than Armasar's, the winners are Gasco Patura of Getsugakure and Dhaogu of Sunagakure"! the overseer declared pointing at the poor frail Sunagakure boy who was struggling to scratch his aching from the fall head and keep his squirting tears inside his eyes.

"We'll now declare the next match, before leaving on a break, we'll erect the arena again and make some slight adjustments in the meantime", the instructor turned at the big screen, that appeared to still be functioning, as it must've been built to withstand harsher conditions.

The names on the screen shifted around and rolled one over the other before the screen became static with a random collection of names:

"Wakizashi Meiko (Team Hokage/Konohagakure) & Deiji Daidao (Team Hawthorn/Konohagakure) VS Sugemi Nara (Team Hawthorn/Konohagakure) & Gentib de Vitt (Team Scuti/Hoshigakure)"


	333. Groove That Cannot Be Contained

"I bet this place has a really nice canteen", Meiko sighed.

"You've got a really important match up ahead and all you can think about is eating, go figure", Kiyomi tried to lecture the blacksmith who then turned around and shook her head frustrated.

"Nah, I'm not gonna eat right before a battle. That's asking for an accident", the redhead grumbled out.

Mana could not really believe that Meiko ended up fighting Sugemi. These battles were supposed to be matched up completely randomly and yet it kind of felt like a cruel twist of fate. Of all the different teams and villages participating in the exam, two teams from Konohagakure had to clash, as well as two members of Mana's past teams.

"So how are you feeling"? Mana tried shaking the gloomy thoughts away by talking to her friend, realizing she has been awfully quiet since the battle was declared.

"Hee hee, I'm kinda excited, really. I mean I asked Sugemi to train me before and he refused. Now I'll be able to show him just how strong I've gotten without his help", the blacksmith raised her fist up looking mighty competitive.

"What kind of training did you do? Both of your chakra signatures are significantly larger", Mana wondered loudly. She did not even need to elaborate on what she has been doing for training, her training plans pretty much came true and, except for her loss of smell, it all went without a hitch. Just the fact that Mana could even easily sense and compare Meiko's and Kiyomi's signatures like that should've told them that her sensory abilities were finally awakened fully and the magician was beginning to control them.

"I trained with Galateia and Aoi. I think she's already over me, we've been fighting over and over again, nonstop", Meiko grinned.

"I see, emptying your chakra supplies again and again would've slowly increased your overall pool, just like contracting a muscle again and again makes it grow. Also, just like a muscle needs food and nutrients for growth, you needed physical and spiritual growth to feed your chakra's growth", Mana realized, mumbling to herself.

"Yeah, well… Our scuffles were nothing if not physical, plus, fighting alongside a maniac like Teia kind of made me appreciate competition differently too, maybe that constituted as spiritual growth"? Meiko shrugged as she calmly rubbed her back against the wall. She tried to look calm but it was clear that the blacksmith was not entirely at peace.

It could not just have been that, Meiko fighting continuously on edge, always pushed to her limits must have made her innovate, create new fighting styles and techniques to overcome the difficulties of training which must have increased her spirituality sufficiently to satisfy and match the physical aspect increase and greatly enlarge her chakra signature in general. Had her training been any less balanced, such an increase would not have been possible.

"What about you, Kiyomi, did you learn any hidden clan techniques, like you intended to"? Mana turned at Kiyomi. Meiko just snickered unexpectedly.

"Nah, she's been training with her uncle's servants because her old man's been too busy sleeping", the redhead snorted mockingly.

Mana could see a vein twitching on Kiyomi's forehead but she restrained herself from physical actions.

"I'll have you know that the two servants I trained with were purposefully pushing my physicality and my spirituality to their limits every day. Whereas you stumbled into a spurt of growth by accident, I was lead there through skill and experience", Kiyomi explained, finding a way to bite back at her friend. "Anyways, what's with all the curiosity", she wondered.

"I'm just worried, that's all", Mana looked back at the open door of the hall. Seeing that last battle scared her tremendously. These were no ordinary Chuunin Exams, every step of the way, every surviving member proved themselves to be prodigious monsters of their respective villages. While before Mana thought that it was just a pair or trio of ninja who was truly outside her league, the more she observed, the more worried for her own well-being, also that of her friends she was.

"Hmm? Well, aren't you able to compare my chakra signature to that of Sugemi's? Haven't you seen both of us fight? You should be willing to make a pretty educated guess of what'd happen if we crashed against each other…" Meiko grinned, from her oddly curious face the magician could tell that the redhead very much wanted some manner of encouragement.

This was something that worried Mana, the kind of Meiko that she'd see in that battle. When the blacksmith was all herself, confident, excited and fired up, determined to fight for what she's fighting for at that moment – she was unstoppable. Truly a physical and stamina monster to match Team Phobos and all other monsters. A member of her team to scare other genin with. However, over the time searching for the Box of Ultimate Bliss, the magician had seen a very different Meiko as well. Hints of her showed even during the exam, desperate, self-loathing and sad.

"Judging from what I can tell, you've got it in the bag"! Mana cheered on Meiko, even though it was nothing more but a lie. She had never seen anyone successfully clash with Sugemi's Eight Gates techniques up close and that would be the range where Meiko will try to keep the brawl in. It was a fifty-fifty gamble, really and Mana knew it. Before her training Meiko would have come up short, now – plenty of things were still in the air.

Kiyomi's odd stare caught Mana's lie. Had Meiko not been absolutely clueless, she would have been able to do so as well.

"Plus, if anything does go wrong, you still have Daidao to pull you out, right, he's a Jinchuuriki, after all"! Kiyomi added more encouragement on top, Mana wasn't sure why the Yamanaka would do so, but Mana's intentions must've been successfully picked up by Kiyomi who also must've witnessed Meiko's self-roasting tendencies on one occasion or another.

And so, the moment of battle had successfully been reached. The wandering and resting, discussing the battle they've just seen ninja quickly gathered into the Konoha High gym hall witnessing a barrier having been erected over the newly rebuilt arena. Seeing how this went against everything that previously said by the overseer, plenty of mentors raised even plentier amounts of ruckus.

"Please, settle down, everybody", Lord Sixth spoke up, instantly easing the rising tensions and encouraging everyone to take their places and settle down as once the man spoke up, everyone else fell silent.

"As you see, we've easily rebuilt the arena. That's Dorimi-senpai's specialty, after all"! The overseer cheerfully gave the bandanna-wearing jounin a thumb up. "However, we've also discussed something with the Village Protection Services' recently established Barrier Corps division. They seem to have understood our troubles and agreed to erect a unique barrier, one you see right here".

Mana looked up, examining the rectangular shape surrounding the arena and admiring the glowing glyphs and complicated symbols glowing on its bright purple walls. She did not know much about barriers, but there was something to be admired in the ability to erect protective walls to protect people dear to you. If there ever was a specialty she'd be choosing as a ninja, it'd certainly be that of a Barrier Ninja.

The overseer quickly went over a handful of hand seals before breathing in so deep that his chest greatly inflated. "Fire Style: Blaze"! The Sixth's assistant shouted out as he breathed out a mass of fire hurling at the upper corner of the barrier walls. The mass of flames exploded upon impact in a moderate and rather puny blast as it was a simple technique most Fire Release users could have learned in a handful of days. Not a single breath of smoke nor a tongue of flames escaped the protective hold of the barrier.

"Yeah, we know how barriers work", Chestnut Hanasaku spoke up looking with a bored expression at the unharmed barrier. "I'm sure that the problems everyone had with the barrier were concerned with ring outs", she added.

"Were they now"? Lord Sixth's assistant triumphantly sung out as he jumped out and completely phased through the barrier as he passed through. Hanasaku smiled seeing the amusingly complex nature of the barrier that was erected.

"As all of you are aware, the arts of Barrier Ninjutsu and Sealing Ninjutsu are intertwined. Sealing glyphs serve as commands of how a Barrier should behave, with enough commands, complex behavioral patterns can be created. Therefore, this barrier shall protect the audience from powerful aftereffects of jutsu used by competitors, however, it will not interfere with intents of winning via ring out", the overseer of the exam demonstratively gestured in awe towards the barrier.

"Hmmm, impressive", a female mentor of one of the teams noted, "I was certainly worried that after enough clashes like that last bout, my team would be exhausted just observing and surviving being in the audience of such battles. But how powerful this barrier truly is"?

"It is true that giving barriers more and more commands makes them weaker, that being said, this barrier was designed with higher echelon chuunin rank ninja in mind. It is safe to say that even the most powerful of your students will not as much as leave a dent on it. The White Nova nintaijutsu we've seen before was truly impressive, compacting the amount of chakra present in a massive dying star by emulating similar conditions inside one's own body. This barrier, however, could withstand a blast billions of times stronger and less properly channeled than that", the overseer explained.

Meiko punched her own palm and made her way onto the stage, without saying anything to her friends behind her or her mentor who just followed her student with a supportive glare. Further to the eastern point of the room, Daidao and Sugemi both casually walked off from their trio and casually made their way onto the arena, turning to different poles of the structure and walking there back to back.

As the three gathered Konoha ninja stared at each other, Meiko standing beside her teammate, they began looking around for Gentib, the member of Team Scuti who appeared to have survived and advanced to the next stage in the big genin brawl right before the end of the Forest of Death stage. Seconds, even a pair of minutes had passed but Gentib was nowhere to be seen, his mentor and his other competing teammate – Gorm just blushed and hid from mean public eyes staring at them, shrugging lazily with any questions about the genin's location.

A popping sound made everyone turn towards the door, confetti and white and golden ribbons began floating from the exit in a highly coordinated manner, being guided by a weak wind current before a handful of flash and smoke bombs exploded. These were custom made, weakened and muzzled, no doubt. The flash bomb was mostly just for a flashy effect whereas the smoke bomb spread very non-intrusive and stinging one's nostrils smoke.

Gentib slid out from the corridor on his knees like a massive rockstar before rolling forward and springing off the ground high up in the air, only to land right in the center of the arena in a flashy stance. The genin was dressed in a bright silver disco jacket, wore stylish shades and had his hair spiked in front of him, his jeans were completely tattered and he barely looked like ready for combat.

"You can see that guy's a real entertainer, you planning on doing something like that"? Kiyomi cheeked Mana, trying to just tease her but seeing the magician's composed and worried face she eased up and just calmly watched the ensuing shenanigans on the arena.

"Contestant Gentib, are you ready"? The overseer stuttered, confused and taken aback by this whole show of dramatic flare.

"You know it, daddy-o", Gentib stood up and swiped his shades off before throwing them aside, the shades landed in the hands of a very confused and flustered young lady who just jumped after realizing she caught the shades and dropped them. "Name's Takemito – the Flashy Silver Idol"!

"Whoa, you got a face like the Bloody Mist banner, longhair, you need to check into a community joy ride or else we're both getting the Kirigakure sunset", Takemito pointed his indexes at Sugemi in a showy manner before moonwalking his way to the scroll, I'm too straight outta fridge to hang around those two cubes, I'm outta here, daddy-o"!

As he continued to baffle Sugemi with his odd manner of speech and a completely changed personality from his Tankobaji persona or his default self, Takemito pulled on the scroll and in a flash of maroon light he was gone. Leaving Sugemi with a gaping jaw, still trying to express his disdain of working with a double crosser from the likes of Team Scuti.

"Okay, I'm not even going near that guy", Meiko pointed at the levitating, glowing with chakra scroll. "Is it OK if I go first"? She inquired her temporary tag partner.

"More than fine, honestly. You've seen me trying to match up with Sugemi already, even without the Gates, I'm a poor match up for him physically, it'd be better if you wear him out for me, I can finish things off". Daidao nodded before slowly walking up to the scroll and pulling on it, as the scroll opened, the young man got enveloped with a maroon light and sealed off inside.

Meiko and Sugemi continued to stare each other down long past the moment when the overseer declared the beginning of the second match. Neither one wanted to make the first move and show a card from the hand they were playing. Granted, in Meiko's case it was less a result of careful planning and more like the excitement of it all that rooted her in place.

"So have you found a better training partner than me? Have they taught you anything useful"? Sugemi inquired as he fixed his wristbands and placed his hands in a hand seal weaving position, in front of his chest.

"You'll just have to come at me and find out"? Meiko teased her opponent, taking a purely offensive fighting stance, Mana found such a stance to be awfully brave, edging on the verge of being stupid, but, then again, the blacksmith was not fighting the magician, someone who was well versed in countering highly aggressive taijutsu offensives.

"Yeah"? Sugemi smiled, changing his stance into a one hand on his tool pouch, one focused on physical defense, adapting to Meiko's stance. "Just what kind of trap are you luring me in, I wonder? What foul villain tactics will you use to make conflict worthy of a golden chapter in my heroic manga"?

"Do I look like the type to scheme? I'm just gonna punch you until someone outranking me tells me to stop punching you", Meiko didn't cease smiling, letting her powerful legs kick her body off in a lightning fast rushing dash straight at Sugemi. It was a gambling approach, usually, physical fighters may have wanted to scope their opponent more than this before matching speed and power with them, trading fists. Else they risked getting completely outmatched in a rush they themselves initiated, clashing with a totally unfamiliar style.

In Meiko's case, it was a gamble, the blacksmith just tossed caution to the wind, running at her opponent, caring little about if they were stronger than her and just by how much. If she could not take on Sugemi without his gates, she'd be completely overmatched clashing with him even in his First Gate. This careless thinking had gotten Meiko this far, the redhead figured it would keep carrying her further.

"My kind of girl"! Sugemi yelled out in excitement before launching his own body forward as a response to Meiko's offensive, thrusting his own forearm onwards to clash with his opponent.

Meiko's backup hand weaved a hand seal, moving her hands to her shins and opening up a chakra storage seal, unleashing a powerful jet of chakra erupting in the form of blue flames that boosted her speed and precision. A boost in velocity will boost her force, something that Meiko learned from experience when coming up short against Galateia's force during training. She did not understand the physics behind it, she just knew it happened and that was enough for her!

"Shadow Tendril Jutsu"! Sugemi shouted out as the hand resting inside his ninja pouch formed a one handed seal, firing off a strong, long ranging dark tendril from inside the pocket of his gi. The flames bursting from Meiko's shoes intensified, firing her lower body upwards and forcing the girl's body to flip over and avoid the flying tendril's hit. It disturbed the force boost, worry sparked in the girl's heart about the success of the clash.

As her upper body kept moving she slammed her forearm against Sugemi's, both competitors winced in pain that the shock of impact force caused to their bodies. It appeared that Meiko was first to recover, reaching for her elbow and her chest and setting off seals located on those parts of armor.

"C Rank Seal: Release"! Meiko commanded as her seals unsealed a two-edged short sword and a buckler shield as the chakra output in her boots intensified on the right side making the blacksmith spin rapidly to add momentum to the strike of her sword.

Previously she would have unsealed her sword in the beginning that was before she obtained the experience of clashing with Galateia using countless different weapons. Not knowing just what weapon she would use made the opponent confused, it made them make gambles and try out safer yet weaker guards and stances. Had Sugemi known that she would be coming with this specific sword he'd have read her possible moves, found a way to gain an advantage.

The instance when Meiko felt her sword slipping through something like a hot steel wire went through butter she realized something was wrong. Then the cloud of smoke hit her in the face and she realized that it was a Substitution Jutsu. Feeling a sharp pain of a blow from above bringing her down made Meiko desperate, she raised the buckler up to defend against Sugemi's downwards vertical leg drop and pushed him off of her.

Quickly the blacksmith got back on her feet with a graceful roll and took a fighting stance using the same combination of weapons. Meiko allowed herself the luxury of her eyes wandering down and witnessing a stone tile of the arena laying split in two, the object of Sugemi's Substitution Jutsu, something he must've noticed and focused on way before the battle.

"Is that it"? Sugemi grinned as he warmed himself up some more, cracking knuckles, "If this is all you've got, I'll make minced meat out of you the moment I turn the gates on, maybe I should save it for when I really need it, spare myself the strain"? he taunted, trying to apply psychological pressure.

Mana's heart skipped a beat, psychological warfare could've been awfully effective against Meiko. If only he hit a softer spot, that could've crumbled Meiko's whole tough suit of armor, made a loser out of the competitor inside of her. The magician's eyes opened wide, shocked that Meiko answered her opponent with a grin.

"Right back at you. If you felt like using Substitution Jutsu so early, maybe I don't need to pull out my new jutsu just now"? The blacksmith teased her opponent back with more confidence than Mana remembered her friend having. There was no mistake, this was no Art of Tree Climbing failing Meiko, this was the Meiko than tangoed with a powerful pirate all over the Earth's mantle. This was the best possible Meiko.

Substitution placed a strain on the user's body, made it difficult, next to impossible to use it for a while after it was used. That meant Meiko had a chance, Sugemi just lost a powerful ace, also handed one to Meiko, giving her an idea what to use in her own substitution. She could win, this time Mana did not need to doubt herself as she lied, she honestly believed her friend could win…


	334. The Paradox of Meiko's Ship

Sugemi threw himself at Meiko in a wild dash, it appeared that he had noticed Meiko's lack of affinity for planning ahead. The blacksmith was purely a running at the enemy type ninja and the Nara clearly loved that. Lack of distinct planning from Meiko's part allowed Sugemi to just stop overthinking and cut loose. See just how far everything he had acquired up to now guided by pure instinct could carry him.

The Nara threw quick three jabs at Meiko, the blacksmith leaned back, answering with swift blocks before pressing her own advantage with her blade. The flurry of fists and knee strikes, shield shoves, sword thrusts and slashes was impressive, their speed would've been troublesome even for someone extremely defensive and evasive, like Mana, to deal with and they never invested enough force into any of their strikes for an opponent to find any openings, always perfectly returning to guard. Sugemi slid out of the brief clash with a bleeding cheek and an aching side, a result of a pair of skipped handle blows and swipes.

The blacksmith pressed her offensive on, rushing at her fleeing, on the defensive opponent and trying to exploit her opportunity and his stumble. The blacksmith threw a chain of weak sword thrusts at Sugemi's face, the Nara had to brace himself and weave around the attacks. As a taijutsu user himself, he knew that jabs, whether thrown with a sword, or using fists, were usually a setup for something greater. That was why he managed to entrap Meiko's turned sideways, extended leg, when the redhead tried kicking her opponent down, and throw her in the air.

"These two are going at it like crazy"! Kiyomi's cheeks shined in excitement before the blonde energetically cheered for her teammate. The Yamanaka's eyes were oddly fired up following Meiko, a combination of a very quaint sort of worry and the blazing desire for one's favorite to come out of the trouble on top.

"Yeah", Mana admitted wondering if the two had some sort of training she wasn't aware of together as it may have been the first time she noticed such a fond stare in Kiyomi's eyes.

"Atta girl, Meiko! She's holding her own, no, she's on top"! Kiyomi shouted out once Meiko successfully brushed aside a flurry of Sugemi's strikes and the two began exchanging fists and swipes at breakneck speed and enough brute force to deafen the audience with every blow in the tirade of sonic booms they have emitted. That barrier was paying off big time…

"She pretty much has to be. If she can't pressure Sugemi like this, she'll never survive his Gates", Mana looked away from the battle worryingly, she had seen just how powerful the Eight Gates can make Sugemi. It was a desperation technique but it could rarely, if ever, be matched, only survived.

"Shadow Spin-Top"! Sugemi shouted out as he weaved hand seals with his free hand, using the shadows coming from the shades of his own uniform to reach for the ground and provide support, whereas the Nara himself used that support beam of solid shadows to flip overhead and spin using one hand, delivering a crushing barrage of kicks aimed at Meiko. The buckler in Meiko's hands shattered to pieces, blown away by the force, the girl managed to control her fall down, landing on her feet and her hands.

"Dammit, it's busted again…" Meiko cursed looking a bit crushed over the falling splinter sized chunks of solid steel that used to be her trusty blocking and redirection tool.

"That's right, get angry over that old thing, come at me seriously", Sugemi taunted his opponent who lifted her scorching gaze at the Nara before looking back at Kiyomi and Mana and smiling. Slowly she turned around and began walking towards the scroll, likely intending to tag out.

"Don't think I'll let you"! Sugemi shouted out desperately, charging at the blacksmith with a divekick, butting in between the redhead and the scroll, before throwing a wild barrage of jabs her way that seriously threw Meiko off her guard and sent her tumbling and flying back, heading right at the edge of the arena.

"No"! Kiyomi screamed out when Meiko disappeared over the edge, from that angle only the officials and the Hokage himself would've seen the fate of the redhead, much to the blonde's relief, however, huffing and whining like a wounded dog, Meiko crawled back onto the arena, having hung on by the last tip of her fingers. Mana breathed out as the pressure from skipping a pair of breaths over her friend's troubles made her blush and her vision begin to feel a bit hazy.

"It's been a while since I fought someone like you, someone mindless and just looking to punch things. I'm gonna see this brawl to the end"! Sugemi claimed raising his fist up to his face in a threatening manner. "I won't let the momentum of my life's manga slow down because of a strategizing fool clashing with… Whatever show Gentib has decided to put for us".

Wiping the blood off of her cracked lip Meiko threw her one-handed short sword around in her sword hand before rushing out at the opponent. This must've been what Sugemi had wanted but to Mana such an approach seemed awfully odd. She's just been kicked around after lowering her guard, what use could there have been to just drop her plans of a tag and continue brawling? Why foster the thoughts of tagging at all, in that case?

"My God…" Mana sighed, "Meiko's planning something, she's thinking in the middle of a battle".

Kiyomi looked at the magician in confusion, "Meiko's planning? Now there's something to fear", she cheeked.

Just as Mana had predicted, the blacksmith was not just about to throw blind strikes at her opponent. Right when Sugemi prepared himself to defend against Meiko's attacks, she gently shoved the handle of her sword with her sword hand, switching her sword hand and throwing a blinding barrage of thrusts at the enemy using the shield hand.

"That was a clever ploy, fighting with one hand this whole time, then switching her sword hand, revealing matching if not greater mastery of the blade with the other hand. I can see such a trick fooling that dumb nukenin broad", Kiyomi cheerfully met Meiko's successful pressure on Sugemi.

But even that ploy didn't appear to be all, Meiko's previously used sword hand was used to focus into a shoulder charge while her sword holding arm thrust the sword into the arena ground, freeing the hand for hand seals. What remained was a contest of speed, if Meiko had practiced her hand seals enough to manage to push her jutsu through before Sugemi intercepted her endless misdirections with an actual counterattack.

It appeared that she was not, before Meiko's hand seals were concluded, Sugemi's fist dug deep into the softer parts of the blacksmith's abdomen, making her white out and fly backward from the combined force of the impact.

"This isn't fighting like you, that's why you're failing. You're still trying to be someone else, someone you're not. You're not trying to move me by force, you're trying to think strategically, conserve chakra and stamina, something that'll never work because you're not built for it", Sugemi scolded the blacksmith before winding back his fist and weaving hand seals using his free arm.

"Shadow Tendril Jutsu"! he shouted out throwing his fist out and ordering his shadow to form a tendril-shaped form before whipping at Meiko's direction, while she was still stunned and struggling to breathe from having all air and guts almost completely beaten out of her.

Meiko kept on forming her hand seals, resetting the combination instead of grabbing the sword sticking from the ground right beside her and running at the enemy. Mana closed her eyes and gasped from the loud thud of Sugemi's ninjutsu whipping the blacksmith straight in the gut, where the armor was still just a thick layer of leather under the blacksmith's tracksuit and where the redhead was already badly hurt.

"Weapon Transformation Jutsu"! Meiko shouted out, forcing herself through the pain. The sword in her hand, grabbed after she was already struck and concluded her combination of hand seals poofed in smoke, greatly surprising Sugemi, who took a pair of stumbling steps back before getting tied up with thick, glowing with chakra steel chain, which the sword transformed into using Meiko's new jutsu.

"So that's what she was trying to do, that's her new jutsu she spoke of", Kiyomi muttered, still a bit shocked by Meiko's tenacity and guts to take a free hit just to complete her hand seals and tie her opponent down. "But if she needed a chain, why not just unseal it"? The Yamanaka wondered.

"Because Meiko doesn't have the chain sealed in her armor", Mana realized, "It's a "Weapon Transformation" technique, meaning that as long as she has one of her weapons, she has all of them. That'd be the only explanation why she'd choose the longer to perform and much more advanced ninjutsu over simply unsealing her weapon".

Meiko charged at her opponent, throwing a crushing headbutt straight to his forehead with such ferocity and intensity that the foreheads of both competitors split open and erupted with rapid bleeding, dyeing their faces red in moments and mixing in with the sweat of their energetic scuffle. Sugemi appeared to have lost consciousness for just a moment as he got violently knocked down, still enveloped in chains. Meiko clutched her bleeding forehead as she yelled out in pain and stumbled to the tag scroll.

"To answer your question from before, there are three things I've learned when you rejected my request to train with you. First, being to think on my feet in battle, as well as a bunch of tricks I've used during my training. Second, the Weapon Transformation Jutsu and third – basic weapon imbuement with chakra skills, which is why you won't break out from these chains easily", Meiko declared triumphantly before pulling on the scroll.

In a maroon glowing flash, both Meiko and Daidao leaped at Sugemi with their most powerful and open power strikes. It wouldn't have taken much to knock Sugemi out cold in his current state.

"He already used Substitution, no way he can use it again so soon"! Kiyomi cheered on for Meiko as the blacksmith's victory over the Nara appeared to have come a bit prematurely.

"Shadow Tendril Jutsu"! Sugemi shouted out desperately, using just his one hand to weave hand seals and force the shadow tendrils to yank him violently off the ground and towards his own tag scroll.

The Nara's teeth caught onto the edges of the scroll, opening it up completely, something that stopped Sugemi's rapid momentum that'd have lead him to fly out of the arena completely had the Nara timed it wrong. The maroon colored flash of light signaled the unsealing of the wild and unpredictable Takemito. The duo didn't have to wait too long, as the wild and groovy one rushed right at them at untraceable speeds before grabbing their faces and shoving them down as he passed through them.

"Yo, this is gonna be a total gas"! Takemito shouted out, all fired up as still writhing in pain Meiko got sealed into the scroll with still tied up Sugemi following not too much later.

"You have not the slightest idea how ironically right you are", Daidao jumped back on his feet, raising his fist up and letting jets of steam fire out from little pipes and pumps around it.

"Hmmm… I wonder why Meiko would change her entire plan and tag out before taking care of Sugemi", Kiyomi sighed in both relief and slight disappointment as she was just promised more worries in the future. "Wasn't that their entire fight plan"?

"It was, yet oddly Daidao looked fairly content with Meiko tagging into him", Mana scratched her chin.

"Either way, I'm sure Meiko will be tagged out again once again after Gent… I mean Takemito tags out", Kiyomi shrugged.

It wasn't only Meiko's uncharacteristically scheming behavior that troubled the magician. Sugemi's plan was equally as odd, he had a strange reluctance to use his First Gate, the least straining of his desperation techniques. Perhaps there was a causality between the two – Meiko noticed Sugemi's changed attitude and the newly gained ability to pace himself. That made her reevaluate her presence fighting him – she was her teams out to his Gates, if she used her stamina out fighting gateless Sugemi it would all be over for the duo…

Takemito hopped on the tips of his toes before cartwheeling straight at his geared opponent. The boy's movements were immensely odd and unlike the grotesquely brutal and offensive fiery dance of Tankobaji that Mana saw in the Forest of Death, yet she could recognize the face as being mostly the same. Just the facial mimics were different, less brutal and more confident, even to the point of arrogance.

Daidao extended his arms forward, letting heated steam blast from his armor straight at the opponent. Now Mana noticed why Daidao didn't want to face Sugemi, it certainly wasn't because Daidao was necessarily outmatched, it was because the fighting style was simply incompatible against the sort of opponent Sugemi was. The eyes of the magician followed the swift and acrobatic Takemito as he leaped around, cartwheeling and rolling, narrowly avoiding the jets of steam that failed to keep up with him. It may have looked like Daidao pressured Takemito, as a long range ninja, however nothing could have been further from the truth – Takemito was completely safe.

The bouncing groove machine finally moved in close enough for a cartwheeling kick that sent Daidao kneeling to the ground, clutching the top of his head where he was hit. Swift as lightning, Takemito jumped up and stomped on the back of the head of his kneeling opponent, stamping and grinding his face into the ground. As Daidao quickly rolled aside, avoiding another stomp from connecting, Mana saw the cracks in his helmet and mask, even his red tinted goggles.

"Who knew you'd be all show and no go, daddy-o, come on, tag me the badass skirt from before, she looked like she could swing", Takemito taunted his opponent with a hand gesture that demanded his opponent to come at him.

Pulling on a handle on his shoulder, Daidao made certain pieces of his steam armor crank. A single hand seal set off a burst of heated steam from his lower legs, throwing the gearhead forward with a right hand cross. To add even more force to it, the steam vents around Daidao's fists were revealed to have been the pieces that turned around, now blasting steam right behind the young man and accelerating his punch.

"Erupting Propulsion Fist"! Daidao shouted out, his cybernetically enhanced voice strained from the tension of holding his body together in the massive internal pressure of the overflowing with boiling steam armor.

Takemito darted off downwards with an elastic and fast ducking motion, throwing a sweeping kick, his movements were so dance-like and filled with rhythm of an non-existent, melodic tune that they were flowing like water, yet with enough skill, Mana was sure she'd be able to read them eventually. The rhythmic nature of the taijutsu fighting style made it immensely easy to predict past the first couple of overwhelming and surprising bursts of speed and strength. Daidao tumbled over and fell flat on his face, his armor cracked and shrieked some more as the steel plates loosened and began dragging against itself.

"Idol: Ray Burst Guillotine" Takemito yelled out as his chest inflated at the same time as he jumped up and extended his right leg forward. As the young man breathed out, a whirlwind of Wind Release chakra surrounded his foot before being driven down on his opponent's neck.

An ear bursting metallic thud emanated through the arena making most of the bystanders cover their ears. It was foolish to doubt the fact that Daidao's armor was fairly effective at preventing the young man's body to break and his bones to be grinded to dust from similar inhumanly powerful hits but his armor was beginning to fall apart, plate by plate.

Daidao slowly picked himself up, tearing his neckpiece off as it was bent and crushed his windpipe, slowly strangling him by just trying to fulfil its function. It was safe to say that the Jinchuuriki was in a pinch. It made Mana wonder just how much tapping into the Tailed Beast's chakra was he permitted before he entered the exam. Given that multiple Jinchuuriki were taking part in the exam, the magician was fair to assume that there were multiple people in this arena capable of suppressing an overly ambitious and youthful Jinchuuriki tapping into too much power and losing control. Still, to her it seemed like a natural out to the immense mismatch of fighting styles.

"Is he holding back"? Kiyomi wondered, "What's going on, he's gonna drag our girl down"! she expressed frustration by shaking her fist at the battered and slowed down Jinchuuriki.

"It's tough to say just how much he's holding himself back. I'm afraid to even look at his chakra signature, I'd probably lose my mind doing that, even chakra of chuunin are sometimes hard to wrap my head around and they make my chest pound really fast and get adrenaline pumping by how vast they are", Mana looked down, feeling a bit sad about her own inadequacy and limitations at chakra sensory that few more advanced sensors had.

"Huh, so you could have a heart attack just by sniffing someone really strong? That's insane", Kiyomi settled down somewhat, watching Daidao straighten himself out and prepare for his own answer to Takemito's unusual fighting style.

"Burn some rubber, candyass, I'm getting a five finger discount on this here battle", Takemito jumped around on his feet just to warm himself up some more. Mana would've called showing off his moves any more than he already has risky – at this point she'd be reading the young man's jumpy moves like a book and she'd be able to nail his joints and pop them with her eyes closed. All it'd have taken for Daidao was a single instance of a lucky shot with his boiling steam or enhanced taijutsu power strikes.

"I won't even try making out what that means, but it appears to me you are disappointed…" Daidao wiped the dripping blood that squeezed out through the tears and chinks in his steampunk looking armor. The young man looked to the side at his mentor and his fellow Jinchuuriki who were watching him with a bit of worry and irritation, Mana let her eyes follow the elder and scarred mentor who just closed his eyes submissively and nodded.

"Well then, I guess I'll just have to lose a little bit of control", Daidao extended his hands to the side as they inflated from an outburst of steam before the excess got fired out through the cracks and tears in his armor. The young man bent forward on all fours yet it did not look like the Jinchuuriki had borrowed this quadrupedal position – it looked strangely natural and his own. Red chakra began leaking through the holes in his armor and evaporating in the air, just like his steam did previously. His red tinted goggles burst revealing ferocious and primal glowing green eyes of something more massive, more powerful lurking inside the boy.

"Yeah, I know, you don't like this one little bit, Kok… I mean… Fiver, it's a good thing you owe me a favor for those poachers I've killed for you", the man started rambling to himself like a madman. Even if this sharing of control and explosion of chakra and physical force meant that Meiko was more likely to win, Mana didn't like this one little bit. She had bad memories having met a way different in both power and malice Tailed Beast herself, bad experiences were tough to shake off…


	335. Assuming Shared Control!

"W-What's wrong with that guy", Kiyomi uttered before taking half a step back in disbelief. The radiating aura and chakra of the Tailed Beast made the girl move back precautionary, on an instinctual level and completely obliviously to her own movements.

"He must've leaked out some of the Tailed Beast's power", Mana continued to stare in certain disdain and pity at the leaning forward on all fours Daidao, the young man kept dragging his right arm across the arena floor like a horse preparing to charge.

"It's so… Freaky, even I can feel it, he's partially… Someone else. Like he's possessed or something", Kiyomi grunted, jumping forward in frustration. By then she must've realized the instinctual fear that took over her and lashed out to compensate for the show of weakness. Judging from what Mana had seen all around her, pretty much everyone, no matter their rank or strength level reacted similarly. Eyes and body full of fear, then came anger and hatred for the being inspiring said fear.

"Tailed Beasts are essentially chakra itself, they're entities made of chakra and living embodiments of it. Letting some of its chakra to leak out means letting part of its consciousness take you over, their essence is inseparable from chakra", Mana muttered as she looked at Daidao with different eyes, realizing just how much rage was present in the eyes of people around her.

These people didn't hate Daidao and his like for something they did, they hated them for something the Jinchuuriki were – containment for the Tailed Beasts who were unequaled monsters in power. If all of the Tailed Beasts were put together in one spot, one would have essentially all of the chakra in the world in one room and chakra was the essential natural force that tied the universe together. In that manner, Tailed Beasts are forces of nature, indestructible and unkillable, forcing mankind to toughen up and deal with it differently than destroying it.

And, if Mana knew mankind, it was stingy about things it couldn't destroy, if needed.

"Wow, what a freak, just who should I root for now? I kinda want Meiko to win but that'd mean this freak would advance as well", Kiyomi sneered at the leaking with unnatural Tailed Beast chakra Jinchuuriki who still struggled to maintain his humanity and control himself right, now having two consciousness on the steering wheel.

Without acknowledging the hateful eyes staring all around him, Daidao darted forward like an arrow. Moving on all fours naturally, like it was his natural state. Just as the Five Tails' Jinchuuriki approached his opponent it froze in place. The awesome speed of Daidao had shocked Takemito who appeared to snap out from his persona just for a moment and looked at his opponent with eyes that were taking him completely seriously.

Like a trapped wild animal, Daidao began leaping around wildly, bouncing off of the very edge of the arena just to get to the other side and bounce off again. At this point the Jinchuuriki was just thrashing and rampaging around, still trying to share control with the entity inside of him right.

"Hey…" Takemito raised his hand up, trying to talk to his opponent when enraged Daidao appeared right in front of his face with a blunt force upwards hook. When the Jinchuuriki punched diagonally upwards, the leaking snow-white chakra of his Tailed Beast formed a bubbling square construct around his fist that looked like a hoof. Takemito cartwheeled aside, the suddenness at which he had to perform the dodge made the genin trip up and tumble over on his back.

The Jinchuuriki charged forward, aiming to stomp at Takemito just like he had been stomping Daidao around before but Takemito's feet shot upwards, throwing his opponent high up in the air before the boy's entire body threw itself up in pursuit. Takemito threw fist after fist, overwhelming his confused and struggling to maintain a consistent defense opponent and pummeling Daidao ruthlessly before flipping over in mid-air and smacking the overflowing with Tailed Beast chakra Jinchuuriki down to the ground.

"This doesn't make any sense, a Jinchuuriki should be more powerful and faster than any genin. Why is Genti… I mean Takemito still in complete control of the fight", Hanasaku finally broke her streak of silence as she had finally gotten invested in the fight of younglings happening in front of her.

"He's not, not entirely", Kiyomi shook her head, "He's hitting Daidao a lot, but that doesn't give him the advantage. Daidao is confused, it's easy to see that the entity partially in control doesn't want to fight, it doesn't want to be in control and just wants to stay hidden. The damned thing moves similarly to Mana, I've learned to see a reluctance to fight by now".

Mana looked away, disliking the implication that she and a Tailed Beast had anything in common. She didn't know this "Fiver" or whatever name Daidao almost referred it to but she had met a Tailed Beast before, a being that answered to Mana's kindness with intent to kill her and her friends. In the end, Mana still freed it but only because she thought of it as being more right than the alternative. Could the Tailed Beasts really be THAT different from one another?

"Come on, Fiver"! Daidao screamed out in both rage and pain as he effortlessly stood up from the beating he just took. Mana observed in shock as the boy's scratches and wounds began covering up as they lit up with an almost majestic white glow. "I'm gonna grant you more and more control, if you don't stop resisting and fight", the boy taunted the beast inside of him.

"This is cruel", Mana cried out.

"Huh? Yeah, it kind of is, why should Gentib be forced to fight against a freak of nature like that? Tailed Beasts should be banned from being used, it's unfair advantage", Kiyomi nodded in agreement.

"They are banned, to a certain extent. Surrendering complete control and using the Chakra Cloak mode to manifest tails is forbidden. Just tapping into the beast's supply of chakra without losing control is permitted", Hanasaku sighed.

"No, it's cruel to force Five Tails to fight like this. It just wants to sleep peacefully inside Daidao. I don't like it, I don't like Tailed Beasts but… No one should be forced to fight, not even for their partners or friends. The importance of someone choosing to fight is the free choice to fight for something", Mana looked down as she could no longer observe the barbaric struggle for control of Daidao's body with the Jinchuuriki forcing the beast inside him who wanted nothing to do with anything to fight.

Takemito looked at the audience. As he saw their rising tensions over the situation, he nodded and charged off ahead. Jumping in the air and performing his flashiest and most powerful jumping cartwheels and kicks, pulling out all stops as he continued to pummel the Jinchuuriki but every blow was simply shrugged off as the young man's best efforts failed to out damage the natural regenerative abilities that leaking Five Tails' chakra granted.

At that point, Mana could notice the weariness in Takemito's performance. The high-flying and acrobatic fighting style was beginning to lose its flare as the young man in control failed to catch and maintain his breath. At that instance, Daidao simply disappeared from Mana's sight before reappearing seemingly instantly right before his opponent with Daidao's head diving deep into Takemito's gut, driving all the air out of the young man.

"Atta girl, we agreed on this, remember? I help the animals and the green for you – you fight in this exam for me, remember"? Daidao grunted through his teeth as his face was beginning to take more primal. Bony features became more apparent as his cheekbones stuck out and became more profound, his chin appeared to elongate as the mask of the Jinchuuriki began to completely tear apart, revealing the boy's brown hair as they stuck out and flowed upwards from the intense stream of chakra leaking out of his body.

Takemito lunged forward, jumping in the air and trying to dropkick his opponent right in the face. After the young man's feet connected to Daidao's face, damaging his already torn and tattered mask even more, the youth kicked off in the air and weaved some hand seals.

"Idol: Babcock Stream"! he yelled out placing his arms in front of him as he blew out an intense air pressure from his lungs. The immensely powerful Wind Release ninjutsu stream enveloped Daidao completely, since the blast of wind was completely transparent and the barrier completely protected the audience, Mana could see Daidao's steampunk armor tearing away from the youth's body in pieces before his flesh and skin just barely didn't meet the same fate. Cut up and crushed by the incredible air pressure, Daidao collapsed on the ground momentarily before the leaking Tailed Beast chakra intensified again and allowed the young man to pick himself back up.

"His body isn't healing anymore", Mana noticed.

"Yeah, they must've noticed that the beast is acquiring too much control. Since neither Daidao nor the Five Tails want that, they settled down on the amount of chakra he is drawing out. It appears this is Daidao's limit before he starts manifesting tails", Hanasaku noted, she must have fought a Jinchuuriki, or several, at some point in her life since such on point knowledge was very uncharacteristic for the Fifth Hokage.

Many in the audience could not even see Daidao move. All they could hear was another battered shout from Takemito as Daidao's head tackled the young man, sending him sliding back the arena, flipping over in an arc and leaving a dirty trail of blood as he slid back from all of his bruises.

Takemito spun his legs in a circle to pick up momentum and get him back on his feet, spinning his lower body like a windmill. Just as the more idol-like persona of Gentib got up on his feet, his eyes instantly noticed his airborne opponent closing in with a closed palm strike. The acrobatic Hoshigakure ninja leaped back, successfully avoiding a crushing thrust of air pressure emanating from the hoof shaped chakra construct shaped around Daidao's palm strike.

Gentib's Idol persona gained speed and momentum, charging at the place where his opponent would inevitably land and hopping in the air, rotating his lower body in a vault-like manner for a double windmill kick. It was a move of massive weight and setup required, investing a lot of force and momentum but it must've packed considerable force and knockout potential. With Daidao being airborne, it was tough to imagine just how could the Jinchuuriki avoid the gruesome duo of kicks.

With a bone snapping sound, the windmill kicks connected, the entire grisly scene froze in time, seemingly, as Daidao's head cocked down so low that it almost looked like the young man would crush his face against his own chest and whatever armor remained. Then, with a loud popping sound and a puff of smoke, the Jinchuuriki was gone. Only his own tag scroll remained floating in mid-air.

"Horn Breaking"! A triumphant wild shout of the Jinchuuriki echoed through the arena as Daidao seemingly blasted out of nowhere at his opponent from behind, having just replaced himself with Takemito's own tag scroll and rushing at the dual persona user with a tackle from behind.

Takemito kicked the scroll with his foot, catching the wooden base of it with his arm and spinning around, trying to utilize the rather heavy scroll as a swinging blunt weapon at his blind charging opponent before realizing that the charging Jinchuuriki had whizzed right past him – the attack was just a fake-out.

As Takemito tried turning back to the front and dealing with a full frontal assault of the shared consciousness entity he was dealing with, a powerful tackle hit him right in the face. Mana covered her eyes right before the hit took place, such a hit could've ended pretty sadly and the sound of impact was unbelievably gruesome, filled with deafening thuds, emanating forceful shockwaves that forced the barrier to light up all over and bone twisting and snapping sounds.

Takemito floated up in the air weightlessly, but after the full force of the impact played out, making him blast at the other side of the arena from the force of impact, the boy just stopped in mid-air and got snapped back to the initial location of impact. It appeared that right after the tackle had connected, Daidao managed to grab hold of the edge of the tag scroll, meanwhile, the rest of the scroll was in Takemito's hands and as the tackled young man got thrown back, rather violently so, the scroll unraveled and the unsealing process initiated.

"What the…" Kiyomi muttered incoherently as many of the audience members rustled in a manner, not unlike that of the future Yamanaka heiress.

Mana was forced to blow all of the accumulated air out of her chest as she had barely found a peaceful moment to breathe properly. Now the Jinchuuriki had decided to force a tag into Sugemi, someone that the monstrous two-in-one genin initially tried to avoid.

"Why on Earth…" the magician found herself muttering as well as to her the combined decision of forcing a tag was confusing. Maybe either the Five Tails, or its host, thought that Sugemi was still tied up and unable to defend himself, which would lead to an easier ring out? Then again, Takemito could have either gotten ringed out or come really close to it just from the overwhelming impact of the tackle that bloodied his face.

"I think, with Five Tails' help, Daidao finally realized why Meiko tagged him out. Now he's trying to fulfill that function until he can't fight anymore", Hanasaku leaned back to the wall, her content face betrayed just how much the past Hokage was enjoying this match.

"Why Meiko tagged him out"? Mana wondered out loud, the escalating tensions of the match made her forget all about her more down to Earth problems like her lack of confidence in her readiness for the next stage as well as her relationship problems that have disheartened her whole day.

In a maroon flash, Sugemi got busted out of the sealing scroll, no longer covered in Meiko's chains. He initially intended on commencing a double assault on his opponent but then he noticed Takemito's busted face and his badly wounded state. It didn't appear like Takemito was in danger of dying or passing out, but his facial injuries and the profuse bleeding needed some quick first aid.

"What's the meaning of this, Daidao"? Sugemi sneered at his friend, as Takemito got sealed away with the allotted seconds passing, who just dragged his clenched fist across the crushed and damaged arena floor like a horse or a bull signaling an impending charge. The human part of the young man's mind was slowly beginning to make way for the more primal and force of nature part of his dual identity, Daidao must've known the rulings against submitting too much of his conscious to the Tailed Beast which was why he rushed thusly.

"Finally grown some balls to take me on"? Sugemi further taunted the genin with a brave and wide-open stance of his hands wide open and his chest and face completely exposed.

"No, that's what Meiko asked to let her do", Daidao growled.

"Huh? Then go ahead, switch out", the Nara encouraged his teammate by playfully waving his hand in the direction of the Jinchuuriki's tag scroll.

"She's the only one strong enough to beat you when you're using the Gates, Fiver told me that must've meant that we're supposed to kick your ass until you bust them out"! Daidao struggled to keep his voice from a flat out roar, growling and grunting as he spoke. Despite the illusionary conflict of consciousness, there was none – the fast and precise movements of the Jinchuuriki betrayed total unity and agreement with the beast inside of him.

Faking out a notion of speaking something, Sugemi quickly jumped to action, throwing a kunai to the side. Daidao jumped at his teammate with a winded up palm strike, focusing an immense amount of his borrowed chakra into another massive "hoof" strike to blow his friend away. Then, in a moment of truth, the Jinchuuriki froze in place. Shaking as he tried to overpower the shadows tying him down, Daidao looked aside, noticing Sugemi's shadows moving to the shadow of the kunai he had thrown further aside, before being channeled through it in an almost static angle and moving from the side right around his own.

"Shadow Possession Jutsu"! Sugemi chanted out as even his own impressive body struggled to keep his shaking and raging friend contained. The shadow that tied around Daidao kept backing out before reaching out and tying around the Jinchuuriki's body again.

"I see what you're trying to do. The moment I activate my Gates I'm on a timer. Even if I deactivate them, I'll still be weakened and strained continuously until the end of the match. You're trying to force me into the timer for Meiko to outlast because she's not strong enough to both force me into it and take me out once the clock starts ticking", Sugemi mumbled. "Scheming and strategizing like this… Such a bother. Then again, maybe it'll make a nice heel plot for my manga, increase the tensions for the main protagonist to overcome"?

Sugemi quickly let go of his opponent, suddenly and on his own terms, as the still rampaging and shaking Jinchuuriki stumbled over the sudden freedom of movement, the Nara charged up to his friend, weaving hand seals with one hand to unleash his innovated Nara clan hijutsu.

"Shadow Tendril Jutsu"! He shouted as the shadows formed a whip-like construct outside of his pocket, whipping the Jinchuuriki straight at the face, before Sugemi turned around and repositioned himself and his weight, unleashing another hijutsu attack, just as suddenly and skillfully.

"Shadow Tendril Barrage"! Sugemi roared out as several more tendrils slithered out from his pockets before branching out into several more tendrils halfway and the whole formation began rapidly smacking about at Daidao's general direction. Preparing for a finishing blow, Sugemi switched his hand seal weaving hands before turning around again, just to be greeted with Daidao's bloodshot eyes and his shattered armor finally being completely shed away with the leather straps still hanging awkwardly from the boy's pants.

It was a contest of agility and minds, also the jutsu that each young man had prepared for his opponent. Sugemi knew that he couldn't waste any more stamina or chakra. Meiko was going to make him have his hands full, he had to settle this with this exchange or he'll really need to clutch it out afterwards…

"Horn Breaking"! Daidao roared out with a bestial undertone to his voice, almost like another female sounding entity was speaking alongside him.

"Shadow Tendril Heart"! Sugemi shouted out as the tendrils slithering out from under his uniform all wrapped into one, almost round, more oval in shape construct in his palms and the Nara thrust it right at his charging friend.

Even if the barrier protected the audience around it from needing to risk their chakra control and their bodies any more than absolutely necessary in the arena, the resulting blast and howling sounds of Daidao's body charging through the erupting heart of shadow tendrils made the audience cover themselves and turn away. Upon being hit the heart of shadow tendrils burst open in a wild storm of swatting and whipping constructs of shadows. The intense light show and sounds made it impossible to follow until the resolution became clear.


	336. Long Past Reason

After the tremendously destructive after effects settled down, initially, it became difficult to tell just what had happened. Sugemi was kneeling and breathing heavily as sweat profusely sprayed onto the cracked and a bit wrecked arena floor, it took a natural progression of sight to the right before Mana noticed Daidao being slammed into the wall, right beside the team she stood to the left to. Slowly, the Jinchuuriki weighed down from the crack he had made only to be caught by Jean-D, the ruthless Kumogakure ninja Mana had met in the Forest of Death, who stood to the right to the team nearby which Daidao slammed into the wall to.

It didn't appear like the Kumogakure kunoichi had much fondness for the Jinchuuriki as she just gently dropped him to the floor from a bit shorter height, feeling a tad bit lazy to bend all the way to the floor. Shaking in strain and exhaustion, Sugemi straightened out and struggled to keep an upright fighting stance, his eyes wandered back to the tag scroll before he looked back at the exam overseer who was making his way to unseal Meiko. The Nara chose to take a fighting stance and wait for the blacksmith to hit the field.

"Contestant Deiji Daidao - ring out"! the overseer ruled before enveloping the tag scroll where Meiko was sealed.

It all happened in a flash of dark brownish light, the blacksmith appeared right in front of the scroll before looking back and noticing Daidao sprawled out and calmly passed out outside the arena. Mana wondered just how her friend would feel realizing that so much pressure was on her shoulders. Would she despair, rush things and burn through her chakra or push past her limits and work herself to passing out? Or would she rise to the occasion and…

"Who's that"? Meiko pointed at the injured and almost completely unarmored comrade of hers, "Where did Daidao go, I thought I was supposed to have his assistance in a team attack for three whole seconds"? The blacksmith pondered loudly making everyone around her laugh out.

"That young man right there is your teammate, you have never seen him without his armor, I assume"? The overseer smiled while politely explaining.

"Oh…" Meiko noted, processing the news for a moment before her face exploded in a horrified expression, "Whaaaa! You mean I'm the last one left"!? She yelled out in shock.

"That is correct, competitor Daidao failed to eliminate any other genin, even with a remarkable performance and control over his… Ability", the overseer nodded before leaving through the barrier.

Meiko looked at Sugemi curiously as the fight was resumed. She pointed her finger at him rudely, "Hey, what's wrong with you, don't you wanna tag"? she wondered.

"Figured you'd be running your mouth, during the yapping time I got plenty of breathers", Sugemi grunted, lying through his teeth, before leaping in at Meiko with a rush of fists and kicks. Meiko gently pushed Sugemi's blows away before responding with a painfully looking punch right back, in both of the boy's jaws, his forehead, his lower abdomen, an elbow to both of his sides and a jumping knee strike to blow him completely flying away.

"Wow, you've really worn yourself out. Might wanna pull out your gates just about now", Meiko taunted her opponent as her movements were rather casual and it didn't appear like defending and replying demanded much effort from her side. Even if Daidao was eliminated, her plan appeared to have been set into motion and possibly have worked.

"You know what? Nah, I'm good, come on, pull out your weapons again, let's go at it like I always wanted us to", Sugemi suggested as he wiped the trickling blood off of his forehead and nose. The crack on his forehead looked especially nasty.

"Sorry, my sword and shield were the only weapons I've brought with me, well, except for the ninja kit. I figured since I had all of my arsenal in any weapon, I only needed my default pair", Meiko grinned, guiltily rubbing the back of her head in apology to both herself and Daidao.

"Well, I suppose expecting Meiko to completely change over a week was a bit naïve", Kiyomi squinted at her friend while whispering to Mana who just narrowly pushed the ends of her lips upwards in a minuscule smile. Leave it to Meiko's shenanigans to brighten her mood…

"Whatever, I left your chain, which is to say - your sword, in another dimension. That means that you're empty. Even better that way", Sugemi nodded before resuming his fighting stance. Mana wondered just what could he have had in mind, now that Daidao was knocked out, the magician tapped into her sensory which she previously purposefully left muted just to realize something shocking.

"He had wasted at least half of his usable chakra", she muttered horrified, recalling the state of her friend's stellar chakra signature representation before, compared to his current one.

"Well, not that tough to believe… He used like… Three jutsu in a combination before", Kiyomi nodded in confirmation, as if just to herself. "This means he'll be using augmentations more sparingly, worried to do it wrong. He'll take more damage, he'll hit slower and weaker, Meiko can do this"!

"Not necessarily", Mana noted, "Sugemi always had an amazing amount of natural strength, he may not have very much to spare for augmentations but he may not need that much in the first place".

Sugemi kicked off the ground, rushing at Meiko, before leaping up and spinning his body around in a triple spinning kick combination.

"Leaf Whirlwind" he yelled out, attacking Meiko with a common Konohagakure taijutsu technique. The blacksmith leaned back to avoid both of the first two kicks before grabbing Sugemi's leg with her own trapping lock and slamming the young man over her head and into the ground. Rushing chain punches, Meiko relentlessly kept up her counter offense, initially, Sugemi managed to deflect a pair of punches but then he had to dive down with a sweeping kick to disrupt Meiko's combo before it overwhelmed him.

"Leaf Gale", the Nara shouted out as knocked Meiko off her feet with a rotating kick, before switching the kicking side and throwing another spinning kick to send the blacksmith rolling aside as she was beginning to apply some pressure and push him towards the edge of the arena.

Sugemi was hyperventilating and had significant trouble to regain his composure, compared to Meiko's rather cheerful and relaxed straightening out and getting back up. The redhead grinned once more as her hand moved inside her ninja pouch and pulled out a kunai knife, wielding it in her right like a common combat knife in a reverse grip.

Mana leaned her head to the left, had she been in Sugemi's shoes she'd have been very suspicious of such a textbook reverse grip. While it betrayed none of Meiko's knife-fighting style as it could've been used both for slashes and thrusts meant to stab, it also was a textbook Ninja Academy knife fighting style and therefore it was too simple for this level of competition by its very nature. There was more in this than the blacksmith let on to.

Meiko darted off at her opponent, swiping and slashing wildly but rather slowly. Just as expected, Sugemi easily saw through such a primitive style and trapped her wrist, making it near impossible for her to damage him without either switching her knife hand or…

As the Nara threw a rapid combination of blows of his own, Meiko forced through her own collection of hand seals. "Weapon Transformation Jutsu", she grunted through pain and sweat as the kunai in her hand transformed into a long polearm, a combination of naginata and a simple spear as it had a straightened out double blade tip as long as a shorter wakizashi blade.

"Take this"! Meiko roared out triumphantly as her siege of bladework relentlessly blurred in silver flashes at Sugemi's direction, while Mana's hear stopped in worry over her friend's life and health, the Nara quickly leaned down before throwing a strong bear-grip strike diagonally up and breaking the weapon easily and kicking Meiko aside with a strong roundhouse kick.

"Nice try, I'm smart enough to figure out that your transformation technique doesn't mystically grant stronger properties to your weapon. Your lacking quality generic store shelf weapons will only have the endurance of that same category of tools, no matter what shape they take". Sugemi firmly declared tightly pressing his lips together as he extended his fist at Meiko, as if challenging her to try out his new cool stance and see what fighting style and moves he'd pull out next.

Meiko snickered like a little brat, enjoying a flashy balloon show. "This is fun, too bad I'll be kicking your ass, unless you bring out your gates", she threatened the Nara with what Mana perceived to be a truthful, yet a little goofy, tone.

"She's become quite a bit like Galateia, hasn't she", Mana muttered to herself bitterly. She had to hand it to the blond nukenin, the magician was jealous of the blonde's ability to tap into Meiko's interests and completely affect and alter the blacksmith's entire personality in just a week of sparring together. Meiko was really precious to Mana and something the magician kind of wanted to have a similar effect on Meiko, then again, the blacksmith did declare a certain distaste for killing of her own, something Mana undoubtedly had an influence in.

"Yeah, except tighter muscles and messier hairdo", Kiyomi cringed out, realizing what Mana was saying, "Seeing Meiko like this after training will make it really bitter to kill Galateia when I next meet her. It's easy to see that the broad's mood had a cheerful influence on Meiko."

"Kill her"? Mana turned at her friend with a bit of horror in her eyes.

"Yeah, I mean, did you forget? My Aku-Soku-Zan?" Kiyomi raised an eyebrow back at Mana.

"No, I just… I guess I thought you lightened up a bit about that conviction", Mana turned away a bit saddened by the realization that, while she considered Kiyomi a close friend, there were gapping differences in ideology between the two that may just end up needing to be settled one day. Some of Mana's most horrible experiences were similar settlements of ideology and the thought of ever fighting with Kiyomi over one matter or another made her anxious.

Meiko continued to stand there with a cheerful, if not a little cocky expression. Sugemi tried to take her stares for longer than a moment but he found himself unable to do so for too long. The more the two stared each other down with Sugemi trying to visualize every different approach and technique he had, the more of those options got shot down as, compared with what he had seen Meiko do so far, the Nara found his opponent capable of shooting any of his options down.

As seconds went and gone in complete silence, Sugemi darted off at Meiko, jumping off the ground right before her face and preparing to throw a simple jumping punch, using his hind leg for some extra momentum to make the punch stronger as he kicked it back in the air. This was some kind of a trick, it had to be. By now the Nara had seen that Meiko was in much better condition compared to him and quite able to match and return what was thrown her way…

"First Gate: Gate of Opening, OPEN"! Sugemi yelled out as transparent shimmer erupted from his body, his natural chakra circulation system was working overtime to keep up with his body's strength and speed increasing five times over, which meant that all of the servicing processes had to intensify five times as well.

As Sugemi's fist shot much faster than the blacksmith had predicted it to go initially, having not predicted the gates coming at all, Meiko received a full brunt of the punch and got slammed into the ground quite strongly. She should have felt quite grateful that most of the force was focused on her face, causing only her upper body to slam down while her lower body just arced awkwardly causing the redhead's body to bend in an uncomfortable and painful looking manner but remain at a relatively same position inside the arena.

Sugemi jumped up in the air, throwing his feet at Meiko rapidly and using them for quick, stomping kicks while he used the force of gravity itself to his advantage. The intensity of the First Gate being open only multiplied his speed and power further as large holes were crushed open where the young Nara's kicks grinded through the stone.

Meiko lifted her hands up and over her head as she pushed her body up and activated the chakra jets on her boots, which she usually used for jetpacking purposes. Her improvised chakra jet kick was blocked by Sugemi but the force of it threw the genin spiraling away, not with enough velocity to throw him out, unfortunately.

The blacksmith grinned as she wiped the blood off her cracked lip, only to be replaced relatively soon by a new drop, and then another one. A punch like that was lucky not to have pummeled all of her teeth out even if Meiko's mouth was bleeding at a rather alarming rate. It betrayed to the audience, as well as her opponent, that her chakra augmentations were either withheld or staggering due to troublesome chakra resources remaining but Mana knew that Meiko was doing leaps and bounds better chakra-wise compared to Sugemi.

She had all the reason in the world to feel good about this recent exchange – she's survived the initial explosion of speed and power of Sugemi's First Gate. That meant that she could have continued to do her best and just outlast her opponent since now that Sugemi had crossed the threshold there were only two options – burn out using the First Gate or walk the risky path further and up the ante.

"Shadow Push Jutsu"! Sugemi slammed his palms together before extending one forward as a massive shadow blob materialized behind him before rushing at Meiko, shaped as a large palm.

The blacksmith screamed out in pain, Mana could make out red droplets flying in the air, as the redhead got smacked backwards and blasted off, heading towards the other end of the arena. Her chakra may have still been in a relatively good standing but her physical state was already approaching critical, any further damage could have knocked Meiko out for good.

It was no longer healthy for her friend to continue this fight. Yet the blacksmith persevered, bending her legs and clutching her body for a massive inertia force flow as she activated her jet boots to help her dash back at her opponent. Sugemi's eyes jarred wide, he had all the reason in the world to be surprised, even as her armor fell apart from her own body, even as new and new bruises opened up and his blows finally cracked all the way to the bloody flesh of the kunoichi she kept coming. Surviving him was her job…

Sugemi kicked vertically upwards making Meiko fly up in the air after her body bent uncomfortably back. Mana couldn't keep herself from jumping and gasping out in horror, Meiko soared upwards all the way to the ceiling before once again changing her position and flying back at her opponent.

This was no longer about winning, Meiko must've understood this. Somewhere, deep inside she must've been smart enough to know there was no way she could win this at this point. This was just all about her pride, her wish to upstage the youth who had dismissed her before, do what was her role in this battle, even if her teammate was no longer conscious enough to acknowledge Meiko serving her part.

Sugemi slammed his hands together before extending his palm upwards. "Shadow Push Jutsu"! he grunted as his chakra was slowly beginning to approach critical levels. He was in an exactly reverse situation to Meiko – his physicals were relatively alright but his chakra was beginning to cross into the red zone, soon he'll risk either using his life reserves that were required to sustain one's life, or he'll have to stop using ninjutsu techniques in general.

Meiko thrusted her fist forward, skydiving straight at the massive blob of shadows hand coming at her and overwhelming her eyes in its size, her jet boots blazed on, helping her direct her crashing fist-dive. A deafening thud followed by a particularly odd slurping sound followed as Sugemi's large shadowy palm begun to quiver and shift mass and balance erratically, like an air balloon on top of which an unwanted skydiver had just landed before bursting to pieces letting Meiko punch her way through.

"Sugemi's body, it's no longer shining", Kiyomi pointed at the Nara letting Mana realize how Meiko could bust through and hit her opponent successfully instead of getting completely overwhelmed. It was Sugemi's muscle control again, he wasn't utilizing all of his 100% potential increase in order to reserve chakra which he must've realized he was running out of. Mana looked around, seeing all of the higher ranking mentors and instructors ready to interfere at any moment and stop the two youths as both of them were long past the reasonable limits of how long they should keep struggling.

Meiko rolled erratically, as gracefully as a bag of potatoes, getting back on her feet. Sugemi got up on his knees, as Meiko stumbled at him, she used the momentum of her stumble to try and clock him a good one.

"Second Gate: Gate of Healing! OPEN"! Sugemi shouted out overflowing with the transparent shine of chakra firing off from his pores as he leaped at Meiko with a tackle. Meiko screamed out in pain as the shoulder of her opponent dug in deep at her abdomen, carrying her back like a bull trying to skewer a nasty visitor of his quarters.

Screaming pain, Meiko slammed her feet at the stone floor, getting past multiple layers of rock and damaging her legs to the point where she exposed several bones before fracturing them. The gruesome gesture managed to stop Sugemi in his tracks, however and the duo got stuck in a standstill. As the two genin stumbled over one another, falling onto their knees, still embracing their opponent, Meiko kneed Sugemi in the stomach a couple of times making the Nara throw up a fair amount of blood as her own open fracture was leaking quite some of her own.

"Third Gate: Gate of Life! OPEN"! Sugemi screamed out in desperation as his muscles tensed up so tremendously that the increased blood flow turned the youth's skin crimson red.

"Nara Hijutsu Secret Technique: Shadow Yggdrasil"! Sugemi pressed on as he pushed Meiko on her back before shadowy fist constructs appeared from all over of his shadow, branching out from one massive fist into a tree-like shape where instead of branches there were fist shaped at the end tendrils, all coiling and branching at Meiko to finish her off.

Meiko clutched in and placed blocks in front of her face, feeling shadowy fists overwhelming her and breaking her shoulders, her ribs and churning her organs inside. The adrenaline and the wish to push through made her do so, tumble over and crawl through a storm of shadowy fists that weakened with each passing second before falling apart, her efforts were unsuccessful as the fists kept throwing and pushing her backwards. Sugemi's chakra finally hit the danger zone. Mana saw the eyes of the Nara white out as he just weightlessly slammed his face into the busted rock of the arena, his chakra shortage forced him to pass out and end his hidden technique prematurely before it could do most of its damage.

"Contestant Sugemi, unable to battle"! The overseer ruled before raising his other hand, "Contestant Meiko, ring out. The team of Gentib de Vitt and Sugemi Nara wins the match"!

Meiko laughed out with blood as she could no longer open her eyes and turn her head to check if she was really sprawled out on the ring out floor or still in the arena. Not that she had any strength left to argue any further. As the adrenaline in her body slowly began to settle down and her heart stopped trying to crawl out of its busted ribcage, the redhead blacksmith passed out due to injuries.

"I pushed through…" these were her last laughing through pain whimpers, right before a peaceful slumber and getting carried off into the Konoha High infirmary by Chestnut Hanasaku and another jounin mentoring one of the Kumogakure teams.


	337. Decency

"Before you leave on a short break, so that everyone who needs it can get medical help and evaluate what they've just seen, let's see who the participants of the next match shall be", the overseer said and turned to the large monitor with flashing letters.

For the third time that day, letters rolled around, forming random names on the list of genin that have still not been examined in this stage before the names scattered and were replaced by others. Eventually, the board settled on the teams that were supposed to clash inside the sealed off arena next: "Stea Tesprea (Team Phobos/Getsugakure) & Erumo Budoki (Team Fir/Konohagakure) VS Kei-J (Team Stratus/Kumogakure) & Juhi Aburame (Team Pine/Konohagakure)"

"Another person from Team Phobos, huh"? Kiyomi wondered rhetorically before slowly advancing towards the exit. Ninja may have been tremendously fast in combat, but as far as leaving a hall in a calm and orderly manner was concerned – they may as well have been turtle-paced.

Mana sunk deep in thought about what she could remember about the silver haired competitor from Getsugakure. Her eyes were really bright and kind and Mana couldn't recall any semblances of malice or attempt to seriously injure or hurt anyone in her. She also was always the voice of reason for her more patriotic and rash teammates, as evidenced by Team Hokage's first meeting of the three right before signing up for the Chuunin Exams.

Either way, even if Stea was a kinder and more reserved member of Team Phobos she still was considerably powerful. Mana still got the shivers whenever she recalled the dominating and chilling manner in which Team Phobos dispatched of an Iwagakure trio back in the Forest of Death and, while Stea did not look overly excited about that battle, she still completely overwhelmed her opponents back then with an ability Mana still could not completely understand.

"Wow, you're really moody today, don't worry, I'm sure Meiko will be fine", Kiyomi placed a hand on Mana's shoulder as the two rushed to the infirmary to see if their friend was OK. Her wounds were quite gruesome but this was not a field of battle and medical attention was just a couple of floors away. Despite her most genuine intentions to calm Mana's racing pulse, the blonde was significantly worried herself as the tone of her voice betrayed.

"I'm thinking about the next battle. I'm kind of glad that Kouta's teammate found herself teamed up with someone from Team Phobos, those guys are strong, means she'll have as high chances of proceeding as possible", Mana tried coming clean about her inner turmoil, Meiko's injuries were only a part of that hurricane of emotions.

"You need to really stop worrying over your quarrels with those guys. You've been all like on a carpet of needles whole day. You made a choice, you've tried your best to make it right with them. If they want to hold it against you – that's on them", Kiyomi grinded her teeth in irritation as the two burst into the infirmary.

Luckily, for them there were no complex surgeries being performed, Meiko was out cold and a medical ninja was carefully treating her legs using Mystical Palm. Whereas previously Meiko's legs were shreds of bone and flesh, now they were just swollen and beaten lumps quite resembling human legs. The medical ninja still was to get to Meiko's other injuries.

"Meiko"! Kiyomi shouted out as she ran up to her teammate. "What are you doing to her? What are you doing now? What is this jutsu? What are those tools"? The Yamanaka continued to pester the medical ninja like a nagging wife much to the male nurse's irritation.

"I'm sorry about her, are we interrupting something important"? Mana asked a fellow female nurse who was just standing about and observing the procedure, ready to step in if the male nurse ran out of chakra or tired out. While the medical ninja working here were qualified professionals, they were not exactly the cream of the crop enough to heal people in the field of battle or in the Konohagakure Hospital.

"No, that's quite alright, she's your teammate, I assume"? The female nurse smiled before gently trying to drag Kiyomi a bit further from where she pestered the male nurse invested into Meiko's treatment, her lack of success in that venture forced her to be a bit more forceful with the Yamanaka, until the blonde finally budged. "It may be for the better if you give Chinso-senpai some space though" she politely smiled at the Yamanaka heiress.

The female nurse lead the two girls outside to have a calm conversation about what they have come to understand about the blacksmith's condition.

"She's going to be just fine. She's within our capacity to help, she doesn't require the transfer to Konohagakure Hospital. She's got plenty of reserve chakra in her body, it's naturally accelerating her metabolism and fueling her own regenerative properties, with our own Mystical Palm sessions we are confident we can get her up to fighting condition soon enough, provided she stays out of combat and lets us and her own metabolism do the job", the pleasant nurse lady reported.

"I'm not sure she even needs the fighting condition, she lost. Maybe one of us needs to be here in case she wakes up and tries something stupid"? Mana wondered with a gloomy tone.

"Oh, come on, Meiko is smarter than… Yeah, on second thought, I think this might not be such a bad idea", Kiyomi scratched her chin.

"Don't worry, she won't be back soon. We've considered forcefully waking her up but our machinery can monitor her condition quite fine while she's out. This place has the second most advanced medical facilities after Konohagakure Hospital, after all", the lady nurse replied, "Even if your friend does come about, she'll do it in a couple of days if not for the duration of a week. Her injuries aren't life threatening, but she's still had the better half of her bones broken and her internal organs are pretty banged up. There's no need staying here for any of you, I'd recommend just carrying about with your exam business and checking on your friend after it is over".

After this brief rundown of Meiko's condition, the nurse lady entered the room again to observe and assist the blacksmith's treatment. As the magician turned around, Mana was surprised to see a familiar silver flash in the rather murky waiting room beside the infirmary – Stea of Team Phobos was standing right beside her.

"What do you want"!? Kiyomi growled as a warning of her rising desire to vent out her aggression.

"I just felt a bit worried about your friend's condition. It was quite a bloody and gut churning battle that she just had", the silver haired lady nodded her head to the side, undoing the facial shroud that she wore right beneath her eyes, instead of donning the hood that dangled uselessly under her long and rich silver locks. Looking at Stea's hair was like looking at pale moonlight itself, it would have been easy to miss her shining green eyes over it.

From the looks of it, Kiyomi was stepping up to say something pretty antagonistic but Mana pulled on her friend's sleeve gently and stepped in front of her and in between the tall Getsugakure woman.

"Meiko will be quite fine, she is wounded pretty severely, but it isn't something immediate medical attention can't help with. You'd be wise to focus on your battle up ahead", Mana calmly reported, swallowing her own sadness, swallowing any hints of fear of the woman or the trio that she belonged to or the fights still left up ahead. Just now she wanted to look professional, she wanted to look strong and tell this kunoichi what she wanted to hear.

"Oh, I see, that is good to hear. I was ready to offer my services if they were needed but I am glad to see she will be OK, thank you for calming me, Mana", the silver haired kunoichi bowed her head with a pleasant smile before turning and slowly walking away.

"Wait", Mana stopped Stea halfway, "You know my name? I could assume you obtained it after seeing me in the Forest, thinking you'd have to clash with me again at some point. Why bother memorizing it after the Forest stage though"?

"Because I'm a polite and decent human being"? Stea grinned as she turned halfway around to face Mana from a bit further away, "Also, I was not the one to memorize your name, it was Gasco. He was quite impressed by your growth and what you had to sacrifice for it, your smell, was it"?

Mana bit her lip almost to the point where she could taste blood in her mouth. Not only were Team Phobos members absolutely fearsome to face in battle, but they also had the control of every conversation, apparently.

"Oh, please don't fret over it. You are simply walking pathways that Gasco was exploring nearly ten years ago, of course he guessed correctly that the only way to grow your sensory abilities so fast was to sacrifice another sense. He saw you responding to him and talking verbally, that eliminated the option of hearing, you're clearly not blind – it wasn't sight either. Touch is too important for a ninja to sacrifice and taste is not important enough to warrant your level of increase", Stea calmly explained her friend's thought process before turning around to keep walking away, she turned back before she could walk off, however.

"You know, it is rare for a ninja from another village to deserve Gasco or Doma's respect. Even though I've beaten them both in battle before, Gasco has never admired me the way he admires your devotion to serving your village", Stea excitedly exclaimed before putting her face shroud back on and walking back to the arena hall.

"We should head back too, the fight will be starting soon", Kiyomi quietly muttered.

If only Stea knew that it was not for serving her village that Mana sacrificed a part of her senses to increase her chakra sensory by leaps and bounds. It was because she had no other option but to do so, it was the only way not to fall behind and drown, her way to just keeping swimming ahead and not letting her head go underwater. Even if Meiko did the same, her controlled growth just was not enough. Deep down Mana worried that even her sacrifice may have been in vain.

She wasn't as fast as Sugemi, she wasn't as strong as Meiko, probably not as smart and experienced as Kiyomi. She knew too little about all of those competitors to imagine a matchup where she could actually help her team come out on top. What burned even hotter was the realization that this exam had to count, there could be no other options, she had no team to return to. Mana was this close to doing something really stupid like asking Gasco to tutor her during the breaks in between the battles. She was both sad and apathetic towards her own life due to a painful break-up and screaming in pain over her own imagined incompetence. The two switched with each other over time, again and again, making Mana ask for the other to finally return to torment her because the one that was simply was too good at its job.

* * *

The teams gathered back inside the gym hall, ready to sit through yet another battle, hopefully just as blazing with the fire of youth and desire to show off one's own determination, but, also, not nearly as gruesome and bloody as the last one. As Mana and Kiyomi settled into their old spots, right in front of Chestnut Hanasaku who didn't appear to have even left the gym in the first place, the magician noticed another familiar face approaching her. Dark purple flowing locks and an overabundance of denim on a well-toned and incredibly handsome young man's body.

"I saw you talking with Team Phobos before. I hope you didn't sell any more secrets or anything"? Yushijin, Kouta's teammate, grunted out. "What are we supposed to be on the lookout for? Will Team Phobos know our abilities? Names, weaknesses? Told them anything else"?

"Honestly, you should be glad if I did. Stea is on Erumo's team, remember"? Mana mumbled, clearly clutching at the deep verbal stab at her heart that this meeting made her suffer. "If you absolutely must know, I told her about Meiko's condition because she was interested in it".

"Right, because you're such great buddies and all…" Yushijin nearly restrained an instinct to curse in front of a handful of higher ranked ninja.

"No, because Stea's a decent human being and gives a shit, unlike some people who can't see past their own, really well buffed, if I may say so, chest" Kiyomi interrupted.

"Whatever… It'd take an absolute idiot to promote you after that stunt, it'd take an even bigger one to work with you after what you pulled", Yushijin growled out as he walked off to cool his head off.

"I'm never going to be allowed to get over this, am I"? Mana tried to smile but actually could not, had she wanted to burst into tears, however, she would have been very easily been able to do so. "Well, I guess I knew what I was getting into", she decided.

"Look, I'm not going to lie that I wouldn't normally take their side or consider what you did a stab in the back. I will not justify what you did, because I criticized you back then and still think what you did was irresponsible and wrong. Just… Don't let them get to you and mess up your future too. It's your choice, may as well own up to it, plus, their way of confronting you is really assholey"

Mana sighed, as she observed Stea entering the arena. She walked in a slow yet dominant manner, demanding attention and taking it by force, whether one wanted it or not. It was an impressive feat given that most of her body was concealed with only her eyes being completely visible from under the impressive black cloak with the white crescent moon motif decorating it. Once the Getsugakure kunoichi stepped onto the arena, slowly and carefully taking the small steps on the side that no one yet seemed to even notice, she calmly removed the hood and stroke her hand carefully over her silver locks. Also, removing the facial shroud that covered her face as well.

Erumo Budoki, the female teammate of Kouta's, rushed onto the stage right after her teammate so calmly strut onto it. The gray haired braided kunoichi appeared to possess great energy and cheerfulness in her movements as she even took her time to give some poses to her friends from the Academy and Yushijin who encouraged her to do her best from down where he was standing. She also shared an enthusiastic nod with her one-time tag teammate, seemingly surprising herself that Stea even played along with her routine.

"Wow, people are really eating her up, huh. Guess she was really popular in her class", Kiyomi scratched her temple trying to remember if she ever met Erumo in the Academy but visibly struggling to do so. "I mean, her team came out on top even after being betrayed, that's a pretty fame building story all by itself".

"Do you think what Yushijin said was true? That no one will agree to work with me in the future?" Mana wondered.

"I mean… I don't really know. I think he's really making too big of a deal out of it. I used to get angry at you and your weird decisions all the time too. Then I saw the conviction in your eyes when you made them. You felt absolutely adamant about them being the right thing to do and… I just feel that I can't be angry at someone who feels that way about the things they do, maybe it's just because we've been friends for so long", Kiyomi shrugged. "I mean, you wouldn't have told anyone about them if that meant their deaths. It was just a strategy for a survival game, a drill. People will come to understand it eventually. Don't just assume that because everyone is so cheerful towards someone you kicked in the butt, they automatically despise you".

A familiar looking dark skinned and punky haired young man with a modified Kumogakure headband stepped out from the crowd of ninja before acrobatically leaping in the air and dive-kicking at the arena floor, landing gracefully on his feet and standing up off of his knees before eyeing his two kunoichi opponents. The young man was getting to the place where he wanted to be mentally in order to fight at his best. Team Hokage was quite familiar with this young man – Kei-J was one of the two Kumogakure ninja that completed the Forest of Death stage at record time, about at the same time that Meiko recovered from her first bout with Galateia. The two teams met and had a pleasant chat as they weren't obligated to fight, it was from his Team that Team Hokage even found out about the information exchanges that were transpiring amongst all the teams.

A red haired young lady wearing a sleeveless long winter jacket decorated with furs at the collars and sleeves and wearing red tinted diver's goggles on her eyes and a strange bow tie tying her red messy hair rushed clumsily onto the arena, tripping up a couple of times as well. Mana knew Juhi from the Academy days, the two exchanged a couple of talks once in a while but they were rather neutral towards each other. While Juhi was a pleasant person to know, she was rather clumsy and not overly fond of social situations, something that did not make her nearly as popular as Erumo seemingly was with her peers.

Both duos spoke for a while about who should've been the main combatant from the start. Mana couldn't quite make out what the teams were whispering to each other but it appeared that Erumo had managed to convince Stea that she should be first. While initially it seemed odd, given the aura of tremendous confidence that Team Phobos possessed, Mana could recall Stea being rather hesitant to fight, similarly to the way she herself was. Maybe that was why Erumo was given the freedom to fight it out to her heart's extent.

Kei-J tried energetically to convince Juhi of something but it appeared that the young Aburame girl was just as difficult socially as Mana could remember her being. In the end, she herself nearly ripped the tag scroll apart trying to figure out how exactly it worked and which side she needed to pull on. Blushing and embarrassed the overseer helped the Aburame to get sealed inside properly and so the third match of the day could begin.


	338. Konoha's New Great Trapster!

Just as the overseer's signal to begin the match echoed through the gym, Kei-J leaped in the air an impressive distance with a jumping spinning dive-kick aimed straight at Erumo. The high-flying genin didn't hit his mark, however, instead, he simply disappeared in a cloud of dark smoke, emanating from a simple smoke bomb that most ninja carried in their arsenal.

From what little the audience could see inside the smoking cloud that the Kumogakure competitor found himself in, it was evident that the young man struggled to read Erumo's future movements. He flailed around, trying to predict where his opponent's next attack would come from and just what kind of an attack it would be. He did not know Erumo's abilities as his team had finished the exam early on, the advantage of having been near the last teams that left the Forest of Death was that there was enough time to know pretty much everyone a little bit better than not at all.

Smoke bombs were not a usually employed strategy. It was easy to understand why Kei-J was so confused and continued to look for a follow-up attack that simply did not come. Very few higher ranking ninja even had enough grasp of strategy in their minds to utilize tools like the smoke bombs, the more tools one had within their reach – the tougher to come up with an efficient way to use them all. That was where patterns came into play, Erumo must have been a very specific kind of ninja, her use of smoke was not random – she needed it for something.

"What is this foolishness"? Kei-J impatiently raised his fist and shook it in thin air. "Referee, disqualify her at once, she isn't engaging me"! He demanded.

"Not fighting isn't against the rules. There is not a time limit to completing a match either. Continue the fight", the overseer grumpily overruled the Kumogakure genin's objection.

If he was not so hot-headed and looking to directly engage his opponent, perhaps Kei-J would have noticed that his opponent had slipped into the Cloak of Invisibility technique, using her green jacket to cover herself up partially. Even from a lower angle, she would have been completely disguised had it not been for Mana's higher than usual degree of perception, given her prowess in weaving illusions herself.

It was tough to say just what exactly the kunoichi was doing, just crawling around the arena, covered up and disguised to appear just like the floor but she was not moving randomly – there were a purpose and planning involved in her movements. Finally, having had enough of his opponent just completely having escaped his perception, Kei-J weaved a handful of hand seals before pulling out a bunch of larger than the normal bunch shuriken from inside his cape, the shuriken were folded as a singular blade but. upon a trigger on them being pressed, they unfolded into a more familiar shape.

"Lightning Style: Minefield Trigger"! Kei-J shouted out as he flung the bunch of large shuriken at random locations around the arena, trying to base them at around each corner of the arena. As the shuriken landed on the floor, they fired out a powerful stream of lightning chakra upwards, the electric discharge around them must've been considerable as well.

After the rumbling lightning streams calmed down, there was nothing to be seen being damaged. Mana tried not to focus her eyes on the location of Erumo too much either, had she done so, an accidental glare at her direction could've betrayed the trapster's location and the magician was already on shaky grounds with Team Fir as it was.

"Hey, calm down, man"! A shout came from where Kei-J's team was standing. Mana could remember the voice, it was Roh-D, the large and broad shouldered teammate of Kei-J. "She's just hiding from you, calm down and start scanning your surroundings".

The overseer glared at the large genin assisting his friend verbally in irritation but he decided not to take any action and just let the fight play out. Kei-J nodded at his friend before breathing in and out and pulling out a little bar of steel from his ninja pouch, upon pressing a trigger on the bar, it extended into a steel staff. The steel must've been high-quality chakra conductive steel as the genin focused his chakra through it and soon crackling blue lightning sparks started running down the weapon as if it was being electrified.

It was an early stage of chakra imbuement into weapons, far surpassing the primary invisible stage but not yet honed and perfected to where the chakra clearly formed a visible weapon shaped coat of its signature shimmer around the object. Such a weapon could have easily busted through anything that was not using chakra imbuement and would have matched Audra steel in potency but not yet matching true chakra imbuement. A single perfectly imbued weapon would have cut through this staff like a kitchen knife cut through a cucumber.

With an energetic grunt, Kei-J thrust the staff vertically at the ground, sending electric ripples of sparking shockwaves all around the arena, missing not a single tile and not a single corner and shaking the entire structure. That would have done it, Mana could only wonder just how much chakra was used in such a stunt as it couldn't have been an easy sacrifice to make for seeing one's opponent. From what she could roughly estimate, Kei-J's signature was already missing a sizable chunk of the flaring star it once was.

The technique was fairly effective, however, as Erumo leaped into the air, the invisibility cloak she formed slipped off her shoulders and returned to its visible state as the generic Ninja Academy jutsu was canceled by the user, the jacket floated around weightlessly before settling down on the rocky floor of the arena. The cheerful young lady rubbed her nose in laughter before showing a "Peace" gesture at her opponent and taunting him with a more nasty gesture.

"That was a close call, but I've managed to complete my preparations", she smiled at her opponent first, before glaring back at Mana. The magician's eyebrows bent down turning her face sour as she just couldn't understand the purpose of that glare. Was Erumo just trying to psyche Mana? Why would she take the fight on hand so lightly?

Kei-J closed down his staff back into the chunk of steel it was before it was extended and pocketed it, then he unveiled his sleeve, revealing a sealing glyph on it and he activated the seal, unsealing a long twin bladed sword-staff before charging at his opponent. Mana was really tempted to yell something out at the girl who was just dauntingly staring back at her while standing in front of a charging opponent with her chest left completely exposed to an attack and her head turned away.

That was when Kei-J tripped over and fell face-flat onto the arena floor, smashing his head so loudly and painfully that most of the audience actually flinched from the sound and the unexpected nature of the fall. Only a secondary inspection revealed a thin string of steel wire being extended through the corners, a trap that went completely unnoticed and underappreciated before the opponent was completely laying flat on his face.

Erumo kneeled to touch another string wire and channel chakra through it, setting off another seal on the other side of the arena. A sealing glyph that lit up only once it was set off, remaining completely disguised and camouflaged with the floor it laid on before Erumo activated it. A massive steel ball with large bumps on the sides poofed in a cloud of smoke right above the center of the arena before the gravity did the rest of the work and the thing slammed onto the temporarily stunned and entrapped opponent.

Luckily for him, Kei-J managed to at least somewhat recover from having his face planted into the mat nose-first and dive out of the way, getting only a shockwave of the hundreds of tons weighing bumpy sphere throwing him away and testing the integrity of his joints and ligaments. The fall aside also earned him a couple of painful bumps and bruises but the boy managed to stop himself with his feet just in time before he approached dangerously close to the edge of the arena and risked a ring out.

"She's so cocky, she's gonna eat that arrogance eventually", Kiyomi angrily locked her hands around her chest. She must've gotten some nasty Uchiha vibes from this completely normal and unaffiliated with any ninja clans girl and she absolutely hated it.

"No, it's not cockiness, it's honors being paid", Mana muttered when she realized the fighting style of this young lady fully.

"Honors? To whom"? The Yamanaka heiress squinted at Mana like the magician had completely lost her mind over her recently afflicted sadness.

"To my father, this is a similar style to the one he used in combat. Entrapping his opponents and disabling them. She's not as good as my father used to be. If she had been – this fight would have already been over. She's a little bit of my father and me, a showoff and a trapster", Mana admitted while looking down. She wondered if her father knew what Mana did to earn the scorn of Team Fir and saw this girl honor his fighting style thusly, would he consider Erumo a better daughter than Mana turned out to be…

"So? She's fighting just like your father used to, what of it"? Kiyomi grunted as she raised her nose up.

"She's rubbing it into my face, it's a way to get back at me. She's trying to show me that I'm a disappointment to my village, him and that she can do what I was supposed to much better than I can. It's a dance of spite." Mana muttered out. Even if it was childish and silly, she could not believe how deeply the stab went. Maybe it was just a matter of poor timing, after all, she had just parted ways with a youth she genuinely had feelings for yesterday and just got a face full of what caused her to fail Mana's beloved not even five minutes ago.

Mana gave the overseer a brief glare, undoubtedly the fighting style didn't escape his mind either. Her father was sort of a B-tier sensation, a chuunin ranked average man with a memorable gimmick to the way he fought his enemies. He may not have been overly powerful but he sure as hell made his mark by being memorable. It was clear from the nostalgic smirk on the higher-ranking ninja's face that the sentiment and the tributes did not escape his sight. The same probably went with everyone else too.

The massive ball of solid steel poofed away in a cloud of smoke, as suddenly as it had appeared, returning to whatever sealing dimension it was temporarily called from. Kei-J began to slowly pick himself back up on his feet, after wiping the blood off of couple of bruises he had gathered, the genin picked his double bladed sword-staff and charged at his opponent again, throwing a pair of odd looking, ring with two blades attached at three sides, shuriken-like tools at her as a distraction.

A blade blurred in Erumo's hand, flashing with the almost silver-like colors as the young woman deflected two of the tools with careful swipes of her blades, avoiding the third one to the point where it only shallowly scratched her long head biceps, spilling a few droplets of blood. As the sword-staff wielding genin moved in, Erumo worked on her hand seals bravely. It was a bold call to not attempt to defend herself and instead work on hand seals. After weaving a pair of them, another seal activated firing off a piece of string from the ground where another one up in the air unsealed a massive rocky chunk that stuck itself inside the loop of wire and swung right at Kei-J's direction.

The stone smashed Kei-J straight into a wall outside the arena, completely bypassing the barrier and making the audience around gasp in shock. That was when the seemingly lifeless and crushed boy's body poofed in smoke and got substituted with Erumo's own jacket which the girl had slipped out of once she had leaped in the air. The jacket plummeted outside the arena, making retrieval of it and another attempt at hiding that same way rather complicated.

After a moment of catching his breath and realizing how close he was from getting eliminated, Kei-J glared aside, noticing that Erumo was making rude gestures his way and touching her tag scroll.

"Really got you in a pinch, didn't I"? She showed the young man her tongue before yanking on the tag scroll and unsealing her teammate for a quick tag out, now that her opponent was distracted. As the maroon flash cleared out, Stea graciously took her place by her teammate, giving the energetic young trapster complimentary glares.

"I assume you've setup your traps, support ninja"? Stea calmly and composedly inquired.

"Sure, I went and used out a pair of them though, got caught on the opposite side and needed to reach you", Erumo shyly rubbed her nose, feeling a bit embarrassed by her newbie mistake.

"That's just bad positioning", Stea politely smiled allowing her teammate to get sealed inside the tag scroll as she calmly looked at the briefly worn out and lightly injured opponent.

"Well then, are you going to try and beat me, or will I have to lead the waltz"? Stea taunted the young man who just grinded his teeth and jumped on his feet, before looking aside at his teammate and his female team mentor and stopping in his tracks.

"Ladies first", Kei-J managed to pull out a pleasant and confident smile, not having himself rush into another trap. Clearly, Stea couldn't use any of Erumo's traps, but her own ability, equally as fearsome, was still a complete mystery to Kei-J and so the young man resorted to calmly scoping the young woman's abilities out.

"Very well, I shall then move in", Stea closed her eyes as her black robe flashed and fluttered due to her lightning fast movements. The young woman moved in behind her opponent, throwing a pair of quick and precise kicks Kei-J's taijutsu prowess simply outclassed her completely. Mana's eyes widened both by how skilled Kei-J was at close range combat and by how bold Stea's approach was, given her lackluster hand-to-hand potential. The mysterious Getsugakure kunoichi was barely as good as Mana was at offensive taijutsu, which would've counted as a failing area in the handbooks of many aspiring ninja.

As swift kicks and sharp elbow strikes overwhelmed the rather improperly dressed for her manner of attack woman, she gurgled some nasty sounding sounds which made Mana even more confused – was she not augmenting her body to weaken at least some of the damage she took by this odd approach? Kei-J raised his twin bladed weapon above his head and spun it rapidly, blitzing with his blades in many angles and countless different altitude and varied strength and speed slashes. Even Mana would have found such variety difficult to evade unharmed.

The blade staff pierced through the black cloak of Stea like a hot knife through butter. Cutting the young woman apart to pieces in the process, or so it initially seemed by it only cut through a floating piece of clothing as the wearer of said attire had slipped out of it and moved back. In that way, efficiently disengaging from her incredibly bold offensive and leaving only her cumbersome and very puffy cloak to get shredded into small raggedy chunks of cloth.

"Why would the Getsugakure chick engage so hot-headedly if she sucks so badly at taijutsu, seems to me like she's asking to get cut", Kiyomi nodded firmly to herself, imagining herself scolding Stea as if the young woman was her student or something.

"I think that's the point", Mana lingered on that thought before looking very carefully at the young Getsugakure kunoichi who wiped the blood running down her lip and cracked eyebrow and felt her busted innards that kept on bleeding internally and must've caused quite a painful moving around experience. "I've never seen her true ability, by the time I arrived to observe Team Phobos battle, she had already dispatched of her opponent unfazed and challenged him to attack her, as if she wanted to get hurt. Then the third member of her team – Doma took the hit for her".

"Hmm? Sounds to me like just a very devoted teammate", Kiyomi observed before resuming her curious glare at the briefly slowed down pace of the battle in the arena.

"That's what I thought back then. Then I saw Doma's strange ability, somehow he empowered his own ninjutsu through the damage he took something called a Damage Seal. I wonder if Stea's ability isn't a similar one to that of her teammate's. Usually, most villages have common patterns amongst the abilities of their ninja: Kumogakure has more swordsmen, Sungakure has more puppeteers etc", Mana theorized after witnessing Kei-J charge at his opponent with his twirling sword-staff in hand, ready to cut up the real deal this time.

Stea gracefully moved aside from the first couple of combinations but she must've seen the problem instantly, it didn't take great skill in weaponry combat to see it – there were no blind spots in Kei-J's attacks to counterattack in. A staff or a sword-staff was a perfect weapon for the young man as it doubled down on his incredibly aggressive pressure-based style of combat. He is going to wear his less skilled opponent down and eventually he will either find an open spot for a finishing thrust, or a slash or create one.

The Getsugakure kunoichi gracefully sprung forward, trying to disengage but Mana noticed a string reeling device shining, as the lighting of the gym reflected off of the steel hidden under the bandages wrapped around Kei-J's wrists. The young man fired off a kunai on a steel string device that etched into the rocky floor and pulled on the wire, pulling himself in for a powerful jump kick. Stea grunted out in pain as the young man's boot dug deep into her ribs and his sword staff added a several of deep cuts at randomly cut spots all over her body. The force of the kick and the added sword-staff attack sent Stea rolling back, dangerously close to the edge of the arena and over the edge.

"Hey, hey"! Doma shouted out wildly from the other side of the arena as the woman in a tight black silk dress and plenty of bronze, copper and iron jewelry disappeared off the edge.

Normally, Mana would've counted this as a part of Stea's strategy, but now that even her own team got worried over the young lady's safety and further participation, even her own heart skipped a couple of beats. She didn't want to admit it but… She didn't want Stea to lose, in all honesty. The magician had no idea of the kind of person that the Getsugakure kunoichi really was but so far she stroke the impression of a kind and noble soul. Needless to mention, that the two shared their general distaste for fighting even if circumstances forced them into it so often, there was a sense of relatability to the kunoichi of the Moon.

"Wow! What a use of the Art of Tree Climbing"! Even the high-ranking overseer whistled out in surprise after seeing Stea's body straightened out like a board horizontally and completely over the edge, sticking to the arena side merely by the tip of her finger that was glowing blue, suggesting an intense flow of chakra at that point. With a gracious flick of her wrist and hand, Stea flipped back into the arena and dusted off her black dress.

"A nice attack. Shall we continue then"? She smiled.


	339. Switcheroo After Switcheroo

The muscle of Kei-J's hand twitched, it was a telegraphing signal that the exceptionally skilled weaponry and hand-to-hand user shall resume his relentless and, so far, tremendously successful assault. The Kumogakure genin shot his hand up, unleashing a handful of his custom made, larger than normal triple bladed shuriken at his opponent. Stea moved aside to avoid the attack but a sound of tearing silk suggested that she did not escape the shuriken completely unharmed. At that moment Kei-J's free hand moved into a hand seal position.

"String Reeling Jutsu"! He chanted out as strings of steel wire lit up in the air, as the light it reflected danced on its metallic texture, tied around the shuriken he had just previously tossed. As an additional method of assault, the genin threw another handful of shuriken with his hand seal weaving, free hand as well, while his other hand used the wire to reel his fired shuriken back at his opponent from behind her.

Stea's pain ridden shouts filled the hall making the audience feel uncomfortable as she managed to bend her body in a manner where the shuriken, both coming and passing from behind, managed to miss her, yet still left their marks on her body. Both the highly elastic manner of her gymnastic dodge and the injuries she had gathered from this improvised shuriken assault, in addition to the internal injuries already present in her body from the previous battle, made it difficult for Stea to keep going.

"She's seriously injured already", Kiyomi noted, "If she was holding something back, wouldn't you think she'd have shown it at this point? She'd have to be some sick bitch not to feel pressed to the wall right now".

Mana remained silent. Had she been in Kei-J's place, knowing what she knew currently, she would be more scared than she would be being in Stea's. The magician felt equally baffled by a highly self-sacrificial manner of Stea's fighting style. She just kept getting hurt more and more, it was not like her attacks were inefficient, she barely even showed any incentive to attack, to begin with.

Stea's hands weighed down from clutching at the wounds on her shoulders, biceps, her abdomen as well. She coughed up some blood from her mouth, Mana noticed the extent of injuries that were acquired. These were injuries caused due to lack of any chakra augmentations, Stea's chakra signature felt just as massive as it was when she started the match – she had not even begun spending it. Every damaging blow or cut she took with her body and physical endurance alone. It was easy to notice a fighting style which Mana herself used to incorporate into hers for so long, until so recently.

"I'd advise you to surrender", Kei-J firmly stated as he took an offensive stance, picking back up his sword-staff and preparing to attack his opponent with more of his relentless and, seemingly, flawless and immensely aggressive weaponry style. "Haven't you suffered enough already"?

"Suffering"? Stea grunted out through the pain of her inner bleeding injuries as her hands quickly flashed through a bunch of hand seals. "What would a native of a Great Ninja Country know of suffering"? She asked as her hands lit up with emerald green glow so intense that it transcended anything Mana had seen before, the intensity of the green glow went into a bland indigo colored glow at the end making the Mystical Palm Jutsu she perform appear almost a little majestic and divine visually.

"Have you seen parents cannibalizing their own children because the village hasn't got enough income to feed its villagers?" Stea's voice cleared up as she kept on healing herself, regenerating almost momentarily in her opponent's eyes. Had the speed of her regeneration not been so rapid, Kei-J may have considered trying to interrupt her but seeing what he saw just made him freeze in place.

"Have you seen your village leader address his people, in the midst of a war, and commit suicide in front of their eyes right after telling them it's not all hopeless"? Stea angrily asked her opponent as she straightened her hunched back out and moved her hands away from clutching at her injuries and back into an offensive pose.

"It's over", Mana stated.

"Yeah", Kiyomi nodded.

Both girls had realized something absolutely terrifying about Stea just now. They've pieced her fighting style together in just what little Mana had shared about seeing Team Phobos in the Forest of Death and seeing Stea's Mystical Palm Jutsu transcend anything that a kunoichi of her rank could show.

The Getsugakure kunoichi was empowering her own ninjutsu and medical ninjutsu she used by using parts of the damage she stored inside the damage seals. Doma of Team Phobos must've had a similar ability, but he was unable to use medical ninjutsu and was therefore limited in his potential damage seal ability, after all, a damage seal user still took damage to their body from whatever part of the damage they took they sealed away. Not only would Stea's ninjutsu and sealing potential grow with time she spent getting injured, but she'd be able to heal herself more efficiently as well while keeping all the damage she had stored inside her seal.

"Do you know any shortcomings, ways to beat this ability"? Kiyomi turned to Mana who just shrugged with scared and saddened eyes.

"There's something we don't know. Maybe a time limit, maybe a storage limit… Other than that…" Mana wondered in the dark.

"No genin can use Mystical Palms to heal this much so fast", Kei-J still stumbled in even more dark himself.

Stea's body weightlessly hung in the air as she relaxed her muscles, letting go of her balance while she fell forward before instantly tensing up her lower body and shooting off at the direction of her opponent. Kei-J twirled his sword-staff around, trying to catch Stea in a couple of cheaper blows but the Getsugakure genin avoided the handful of slashes before punching with all her might right at the center of the staff, cracking it in two as her punch smashed at Kei-J's chest, sending him flying back at neck-breaking speed.

"Contestant Kei-J – ring out", the overseer ruled seeing the Kumogakure genin whizz past the barrier and smash into the wall beside it. He may have had enough prowess to recover had his senses not been temporarily punched out of him by the unexpected burst of speed and power of the Getsugakure genin.

"Look at me", Stea loudly declared, "Do I look like any lesser ninja than you Great Ninja Country elites? Yet, in times of disarray, no client willingly comes to a village such as ours, they choose to ask for one of the Great Ninja Countries for help instead. Things are even worse in times of peace. I despise violence and conflict so it sickens me to wish for war, just so the children in our village can eat".

"You tell them"! Doma loudly chanted, raising his fist up in the air as he cheered his teammate on, "We're gonna become chuunin, then jonin, then we're gonna steal the bread from all you pompous assholes! We're gonna steal it back"!

"My intents are not as violent as those of my teammate", Stea shook her head calmly after the entire audience shook in an uneasy rumbling. "I merely wish to show my abilities on the grand stage of the Chuunin Exams finals, so that more people saw the power that us small and poor villages have been forced to obtain in order to survive. While Doma may not believe in a bright future, I do believe that just being seen would be enough to be acknowledged and change our village's situation at least a little bit"!

Overseer let the audience sit in calm silence for a while before walking up to the tag scroll and unsealing the clumsy Aburame girl from it. Stea placed her hand on her own tag scroll and unraveled it almost at the same time as the overseer, tagging out into her teammate.

"Huh"? Juhi curiously muttered seeing the oddity of her teammate getting dragged away and helped to stand back up from outside the arena while both of her opponents stood right in front of her.

"I know you are a support ninja and therefore a front line, one on one battle scenario isn't your comfort zone, Erumo. However I would like to rest for a while, please let us switch", Stea politely requested as the two girls switched places and the Getsugakure young woman got absorbed in her tag partner's place.

"Hmmm? You think Stea's actually tired"? Kiyomi wondered, "Could it be her weakness"?

"I'm not sure", Mana shook her head, "I don't think she's actually tired, I think that she's just feeling bad about beating Kei-J like that and that she just wanted to switch, and that's all. However, her chakra has certainly decreased visibly after that Chakra Enhanced Strength punch. There may not be a limit to her potential growth using the damage seal, but she uses chakra for her techniques just like all of us do, that may be her only limit and weakness".

"Such as it is", Kiyomi sighed, "We also use chakra for our techniques, so does everyone else".

Seemingly ignoring Kiyomi's concerns completely, Mana could not help the feeling that Stea may not have even been of the typical ninja mentality like the others. She may have been just someone who wanted to help her village shake off the horrors of famine and economic difficulties and enrolled into the Ninja Academy. Stea did not look like someone seeking fame for the sake of fame itself, more so, she sought fame to expose the problems she fought for.

"Stea is just like me", Mana muttered under her own nose, alerting Kiyomi, "She's just like me, except she's actually strong enough to change the world around her. She's just one step away from actually doing it. All she needs is to look good in the finals for all the potential influential clients".

"Is that why you can't expose her weaknesses? You feel bad for her, or you're already on her side"? Kiyomi wondered.

"Not really. She's probably still hiding plenty. I'm not even sure she's shown her ace jutsu yet. If she enhances her offensive abilities using the damage she's storing as well, she's shown very little of her offensive capabilities of exploiting it. Her hand-to-hand skills aren't the greatest either. She can't possibly be relying on her enhanced strength alone to end her battles". Mana shook her head gently.

Aburame Juhi, meanwhile, extended her hands wide after forming one hand seal. It was similar to all of the Aburame clan's Parasitic Insect jutsu uses Mana had seen or read about, yet when Juhi extended her hands no insects were seen. Usually, there were entire swarms of black insect clouds aiming to overwhelm the opponent with their chakra devouring properties meanwhile now it looked like Juhi was just cosplaying as an Aburame.

"Huh? Are you having performance issues"? Erumo curiously and innocently wondered, taunting her opponent as well. As a trap-using support ninja, Erumo despised the close and personal type of fights so she wished to stay back and just weave her traps. Her abilities got rendered useless by inactive or not overly aggressive opponents that refused to engage her in battle so certain ability to irritate one's opponent was useful for such a ninja.

What an odd innovation on the Aburame Parasitic Insect jutsu. Juhi could not have been using nano-sized insects in her rank. That was for advanced users that were capable of handling and commanding these types of Parasitic Insects, no genin could've done that so her innovation on the clan ability must've laid elsewhere.

"Parasitic Insect Jutsu: Grip"! Juhi calmly chanted out as she weaved her hand seal again, commanding, seemingly, a non-existent army of insects to move in on the opponent. Even Erumo took a couple of worried steps back, the enemy she couldn't see scared her more than a casual Parasitic Insect Jutsu would have.

Out of nowhere, a cloud of black, crawling minuscule insectoids wrapped around Erumo. The audience rustled uneasily, the creepy crawlies appeared out of the blue and in such massive quantities that they completely blacked the girl they covered out up to her neck, burrowing her under where the pressure of the insects must've been suffocating from inside. That was the least of Erumo's troubles, if these insects started leeching off her chakra – she'd be emptied almost instantly.

"Where did these insects come from"!? Erumo grunted as she tried to overpower the swarm, a fruitless effort.

"These are my custom bred species of the Parasitic Insects. They have most in common with a simple Constructor Ant of the Kumogakure savannas." Juhi explained. "Their Constructor Ant properties allow them to form complicated shapes and move in from underground. Most Parasitic Insects fly at their opponent, I find restricting the ground as being more effective".

"Jeez, never get an Aburame talking about their insects". Kiyomi scratched her temples. Her frustration didn't appear to be completely based on some sort of freaky fear of insects but it didn't look like a topic that the blonde would've loved to speak about. Mana had to admit that she shared that sentiment and found insects equally creepy.

"It was a clever strategy though. She commanded her ants to spread out and move in on her opponent, not in a swarm, but separately which rendered them almost completely invisible unless one knows what they're looking for. Once the limited arena space was completely dominated by insects – she snapped the trap shut", Mana smiled a little. While Juhi was a pretty awkward girl and assumed that most people wanted to talk about her insects way too often than they actually did, she was quite clever.

"I see, thanks for letting me know"! Erumo grinned at her opponent after the entire clutch of insects lit up in flames, the ants appeared to be even less resistant to flame than their more common generic counterpart. They also didn't look like they felt any pain or heat at all as they simply stood still and chose to burn to a crisp as Erumo shook their crispy corpses off and dove out of the flames, using very limited chakra augmentation to protect herself from the low ranking flame trap she had set.

"Not bad", Juhi bitterly admitted.

"A weak flame trap was the first trap I set when I realized we'd be facing you", Erumo gave herself the thumb up before pulling out a kunai and wrapping some string wire around it. She must've had a limited supply of traps left remaining and setting up new ones in plain sight would've been quite difficult, not to mention very inefficient. Her kunai and steel wire combination could have functioned as a makeshift grappling hook when used in tandem with the String Reeling jutsu.

"It was a brave way of obtaining information about my abilities, however", Juhi placed her hands up commanding her insects to move in again. "Just how much chakra did you sacrifice in captivity to obtain that information"?

The ants once again scurried from underground and the sides of the arena, forming a human palm and trying to crush the trapster, effectively burying her under a sea of chakra eating insects. Erumo gracefully leaped away but she underestimated the splashing effect of the ants smashing against the arena floor as quite a handful of insects landed on her, beginning to scatter all over her body, looking for spots where they could feast on the trapster's chakra unnoticed for prolonged periods of time.

"Crap"! Erumo shouted out as she did her best to remove the leeching insects quickly by jumping around erratically and trying to shake the ants out of the girl's clothes and off her skin. Having spent so much time in the Forest of Death, Erumo had a clear idea of the danger of a leeching insect being allowed to suck on her chakra or blood for a prolonged period of time unnoticed.

"Wow, she's lost a large chunk of chakra already", Mana muttered in surprise by how simple yet effective Juhi's offensive strategy was in a limited area. "She's dangerous, chakra is the only wall Stea can hit as well. Juhi may not just be out of the exam yet".

Erumo slung her innovated grappling hook to the ceiling of the gym, pulling herself up in the air by using brute force. It seemed quite a risky strategy, given the limited maneuverability in mid-air, yet the trapster just kept on using the grappling hook to zip herself away, using it to root herself to the ground when she ran into the danger of a possible ring out. It may have given her a possible aerial space to move in, which helped her evasive measures tremendously, but Erumo lacked a proper offensive strategy, a common weakness of most supporting role ninja.

"Parasitic Insect: Twin-Mace"! Juhi shouted out, ordering the ants to form two horizontally aimed massive mace shapes that smashed from both sides, aiming at Erumo. The trapster pulled out a tag from her ninja kit just before the insect maces slammed her between them. When the maces collapsed into just messy piles of parasitic ants, however, they appeared to have been only feasting on a log.

Juhi picked up the tag that got left in the place together with the log, the tag appeared to be a sealing tag, similar to the explosive tags that ninja used in conjunction with kunai to create projectile explosives. However, this tag carried on it the symbols of "Substitution Jutsu", symbolling that the Konoha kunoichi carried around sealing tags not of explosive nature, but instead with the generic Academy techniques sealed inside of them, in case she was herself trapped and unable to use them otherwise.

A loud and ground shaking rumble alerted the entire audience, there was restraint in the detonated explosives, they also had quite a curious placement, an entire bucket load of dirt fell out from the basis of the arena as the whole northern part of the structure crumbled into just specks of dirt.

"Contestant Juhi, ring… No, wait"! The overseer already wanted to rule the possible ring out but then he noticed that a bridge of ants, connected from the still standing southern part of the arena held the Aburame in the air and prevented her from falling down together with the collapsing northern arena.

"Tsk", Erumo angrily grunted as she landed on the southern edge of the arena and lamented the vastly diminished space of the arena for her to lay traps on.

"This must've been your last trap, Erumo", Juhi smiled with relief. "There is no way you'd have detonated entire chunks of arena without it being your last resort".

"Sorry, I am not Erumo", Erumo smiled when the shape poofed in a cloud of smoke revealing Yushijin, the trapster's teammate standing in the girl's place.

A deafening thud made the confused audience members cover up their eyes after Erumo swung in from above, driving both of her feet at her opponent and trying her best to ring her out. Juhi's injured shape got slung at immense speeds outside the arena and smashing into the side wall, way past the barrier.

"Ummm… I'm gonna need some explanation here before I can make my ruling", the overseer scratched the back of his head. "How come an audience member is standing in the ring, transformed into contestant Erumo"?

"I used Substitution Jutsu to replace myself with an audience member before pulling myself up, during the messy affair of the arena falling apart. You see, the Substitution Jutsu can be used to replace one with people, but only willing participants, therefore I had to use my teammate for this. He didn't interfere with the match either, I used this sealing tag with the Transformation Jutsu already sealed into it. I just slapped it onto Yushijin's chest when I replaced myself and forced the transformation", Erumo cheerfully explained.

"Oh… That's… Highly unconventional, you've clearly premeditated this strategy if you've made those tags", the overseer scratched his neck lazily. "Alright, as long as contestant Yushijin clears the arena grounds, I'll allow this move, seeing how it's highly unlikely that any other genin premeditated and made such a tool themselves".

The overseer looked back at Lord Sixth who just lazily nodded in approval of the ruling, as a past Black Ops member, the Hokage was quite likely to look at similar dirty stunts more leniently. It was something Mana decided to remember for a possible clutch situation in the future. Looking a bit confused by the complicated switcheroo trick, but also happy for his teammate, Yushijin leaped off of the arena and outside the barrier.

"Contestant Juhi, ring…" the overseer raised his hand for a ruling before he noticed that the Juhi that was kicked out had just collapsed into a mass of insects and scurried away, revealing it to have only been an Insect Clone.

The arena ground of the southern, still remaining arena wing rippled, revealing the insect user pulling off a Cloak of Invisibility Jutsu off of her formed using her sleeveless long winter jacket, the Aburame quickly shoved her hands forward commanding her insects to move in according to her orders.

"Parasitic Insect: Shove"! She grunted out as the insects gathered into a shape of a vertical pushing palm and darted off, shoved by the other ants positioned under and from behind of the construct. Erumo braced herself for impact as the limited arena space gave her very limited options for moving around…


	340. Pest Control

The massive palm made of nothing but cross-bred Aburame Parasitic Insects slammed into Erumo, enveloping the kunoichi with swarms upon swarms of insects before the concentrated construct of insects pushed her out of the palm and sent the trapster flying back.

Erumo recovered very near to the edge of the arena, pulling out one paper tag from her ninja kit and catching it in her mouth while she pulled a kunai knife with the other hand and drove it into the arena surface she was sliding over to slow down her momentum as much as she could. Once the Konoha kunoichi weaved a hand seal and set off the "Art of Tree Climbing" sealing tag her feet stuck more firmly to the sides of the edge of the half-busted arena.

Breathing heavily and bleeding from the numerous bruises she has accumulated, Erumo climbed back onto the edge of the arena, just barely managing to save herself from getting ringed out. Mana could not help but tap into her sensory abilities to see just how much fighting spirit was still blazing inside the young kunoichi.

"I'm not sure why Erumo worked so hard to stay in the match", Mana sighed, "She's got about half of her usable chakra remaining and her body isn't in the greatest of shapes. She's got virtually no capability of setting new traps with her opponent constantly on her feet. It would've been much better for her to surrender and let Stea take care of the rest".

"No, Erumo is really smart. Knowing that she's just a trap-setting support ninja who doesn't like active combat made everyone look down on her but she's pretty amazing", Kiyomi grinned with her right side of the lips.

"She's stalling, Mana", Hanasaku butt in, "You see, it's obvious now that Erumo had lost, that being said, she's trying to see just how much more she can tire out her opponent before passing the baton to her teammate. That's pretty smart"!

Erumo dashed to the right corner of what still remained of the arena, diving on her knees and focusing her chakra onto her palms, something that was required of her when she wanted to set seals with more of her traps sealed inside. She had tremendously limited time to set any traps, she was covered with those pesky bugs that were too numerous and troublesome to remove entirely at this point. It was not too difficult to see that Erumo's movements had become number and slower, as her chakra pool lowered from its peak, her body displayed more and more physical signs of exhaustion.

"Parasitic Insect: Pillar"! Juhi yelled out as a towering pillar of insects crawled on top of one another, surrounding Erumo and closing her inside the improvised structure of insects.

Mana was beginning to feel a little worried for the well-being of Kouta's friend before a powerful blast helped the girl free herself through the weaker structural side of the pillar of insects. Armed with kunai in her hands and in her teeth, Erumo decided to stop gunning for setting traps in the middle of a battle and decided to double down on her berserker strategy. The trapster leaped straight at her opponent, aiming to test her capabilities for close range combat.

A little string of Juhi's hair scattered across the arena as the Aburame narrowly evaded the barrage of swipes and thrusts aimed at her before preparing to launch a counterattack herself.

"Parasitic Insect: Gloves"! she yelled out forming two much smaller than before fist constructs that fit right around her own fists and could've been used at a closer distance. Juhi certainly was merely moderate at close distance combat but at least she had tools to dabble in it if forced to.

While the added insect formation gloves added some oomph to the genin's physical blows, it also slowed them down somewhat as Juhi's physical strength struggled a little to adapt to the increased weight around her wrists. When one punched as fast as most ninja did and as often, in as varied ways, even the slightest weight imbalance could've tipped the scales more to one's opponent's advantage.

Both of these two kunoichi were absolutely amazing. Erumo with her throw-all-caution away type self-sacrificial strategy aimed merely at wearing her opponent down and more skill at close range than she had any right at possessing. A significant amount of training must've been put into honing these skills as support ninja usually lacked the capability of doing anything more than withdraw from the front lines quickly and efficiently.

On the other hand, Juhi managed to perfectly command and control her insects like they were an extension of her own body. The bond between the socially awkward Aburame and her insects surpassed the Summoning Jutsu or the bond between any Inuzuka that Mana had met and their canine. She also managed to keep her insects in check from feasting on her own chakra when they were all over her own skin in full combat mode. That could not have been easy to accomplish and required fundamental trust in one's partner, discipline, and control from both sides of the partnership.

Erumo slashed a couple of more daring combinations of kunai swipes. This was just the moment for a counter attack that Juhi had been waiting for. The Aburame leaned under the chest-aimed swipe and smacked both of her "gloved" fists into the arena floor with enough restraint to barely even shake its foundation but waking up her insects to scatter in a mad crawling formation that scattered across the greatly diminished arena grounds.

Forced into a hasty retreat, Erumo dashed back before rubbing and shaking off as many of the ants as she possibly could. Mana could feel the trapster's chakra signature dwindling, whereas just so recently it was still halfway full, now it was already approaching critical zone. On top of that, Erumo's rush caused her body to take more damage. The trapster collapsed on her knees, clutching at her chest and ribs. The magician focused so hard on observing Erumo's chakra signature that she had not considered that Erumo's body might have caved in first.

As noble as Erumo's sacrificial strategy was, Mana wasn't impressed with Juhi's decrease in chakra or the lack of any significant damage on her body. Was all the pain and chakra loss really worth such a miniscule decrease, it was quite clear that Juhi may have at least noticed the more reckless approach of her opponent and paced herself a little better in the face of it.

"Parasitic Insect: Trap Pit"! Juhi yelled out as she smacked her hands together, forcing the parasitic ants to band up from their scattered formation right from under Erumo, there was only one possible move that'd have postponed the inevitable end of the match a skip further – to leap backwards and use her improvised grappling hook to stick to the ceiling. She'd have dangled helplessly straight above the ring out territory, leaving her wide open for finishing blows, but at least it'd have been something else than just giving in. That was just what Erumo tried to do but her tired body was simply too slow. The black swarm of parasitic chakra devourers crawled all over her feet and up to her knees, trapping her lower body completely in place as they worked their magic.

A strong gust of wind blasted the gathered insects away as the overseer of the exam caught the collapsing and unconscious Erumo, the ninja interfered right after he received a faint gesture from the bunch of ninja protecting Lord Sixth. One of them must have been a sensor and relayed the important information that Erumo's chakra crossed far over the critical zone. At this point, she needed medical pills to accelerate her natural chakra restoration processes or she risked losing the ability of chakra manipulation.

"That was dangerous", Kiyomi sighed in relief, Erumo's noble strategy got the Yamanaka heiress quite invested in the fight and made the trapster a clear favorite in the blonde's mind.

"Yeah, she's lucky to have passed out and gotten rescued before that line was crossed", Mana looked down as resisting to the painful stream of memories from when she lost her own chakra manipulation was beginning to seem quite impossible.

The overseer then rushed to the tag scroll and unsealed Stea back onto the battlefield. While both combatants had seen combat previously, Juhi was slightly more worn out chakra-wise, not to mention the amount of damage that the Getsugakure genin had already managed to store in her damage seals.

"Not to sound too mean, but I kind of hope that Stea is pushed to reveal all of the hidden cards she still has. Opponents like that are too dangerous to have any cards still concealed", Kiyomi noted.

"Erumo's strategy was reckless", Mana grunted, still feeling a bit uneasy after seeing the extents to which Team Fir was willing to go to advance to the next stage, "She should've just tagged out and shared intel on her opponent's abilities, now Stea is entering onto a completely mysterious to her battlefield".

"You, of all people, should be the last one to point fingers and call people reckless", Kiyomi quite accurately and in a verily low-blowing manner cheeker her friend.

Still, judging from Stea's composure, it did not appear like the Getsugakure kunoichi cared very much about what kind of abilities her opponent may have possessed. Her eyes merely traced Juhi's relatively tamely injured body being carried off through the door, Stea was smart, she should've figured out that it was loss of chakra that did her tag partner in by just that one glance alone. Anyone who had seen Meiko's match would have known what a ninja beaten into unconsciousness looked like…

Stea darted off, heading straight for the left corner of the arena, launching a pair of kunai at her opponent as a distraction. This was a textbook scoping approach, it would've been instantly been clear to any ninja that has worked at least one day in the field what the purpose of such an elementary behavior was. The Getsugakure kunoichi went straight for that priceless information.

The kunai bounced off of the piling parasitic ants that erected themselves in an extended horizontally hand position, using its "fingers" to deflect the kunai whereas the clutching of the insect fist would've served as a makeshift tomb for the young Getsugakure ninja.

"It's tough to see what's going on inside that squirming thing", Kiyomi squinted her eyes, trying to see something inside the messy mass of insects.

"Yeah, I wonder how Stea will adapt to this fighting style", Mana wondered finally finding enough will inside herself to keep her eyes fixed firmly onto the battle instead of getting distracted occasionally by her own inner turmoil.

"Yeah, it's interesting to see how will her damage seals deal with attacks that devour one's chakra as well", Kiyomi grinned.

"It's not just that. I believe that the amount of damage Stea seals away matters to her, meaning that the more damaging the attack she stores inside the seal, the more potent her own long-term strategies become. Aburame insects are not overly dangerous in terms of the physical damage they deal, they're more of a chakra draining hazard. The Aburame are not favorable opponents for damage seal users, it seems", Mana replied.

With a thunderous roar, Stea punched her way through the insects using the Chakra Enhanced Strength technique that most medical ninja were able to use to a certain extent. To be able to overpower even the swarming tactics of the Aburame insects and punch through and outside their enclosing construct must have required significant force, it was an alarming sign as far as judging Stea's growth of potential strength was concerned.

"Parasitic Insect: Mace"! Juhi shouted out, appearing from the other side of the closed and now busted insect hand. As commanded, the Aburame insects quickly reshaped themselves into a giant mace before slamming from above straight at Stea, who had very little space to move in, given the amount of arena that kept crumbling to the floor every passing moment. A powerful shockwave emanated from the clashing forces when Stea raised her hands to block the smashing construct with her hands. It was less than the cleverest of strategies…

Open skin contact with the insects meant that they were free to keep draining the Getsugakure kunoichi of chakra continuously. Whereas firstly, Stea could match the strength of the tremendously large construct and even overpower it somewhat, as moments went on, she found herself quickly getting drained of her Enhanced Strength as the constant chakra drainage made it impossible for her to sustain the jutsu.

With a decisive and cracking thud, the mace smashed on top of Stea, making her completely disappear in the ocean of parasitic ants as the construct dissolved. A mighty blast from below signaled that Stea wasn't quite at the point of giving up as the bugs got blasted out of her way as if the kunoichi had detonated an explosive from underneath, as she dived up in the air, jumping all the way to the ceiling and sticking to it, using the Art of Tree Climbing jutsu.

"So she's come to the same conclusions as Erumo had", Kiyomi crossed her arms over her chest. "It's weird. I previously thought that Stea would have this easily in the bag but… Juhi may just pull it through. I always thought she was a bit creepy, what with all the insects but… You know what, she's kinda cool".

Once again, Stea's hand lit up with the emerald-indigo glow as she ran her hands over the aching areas of her body, using the Mystical Palm jutsu to heal herself quickly, at least giving herself what was supposed to be the elementary battlefield treatment.

"Look at that, she's completely healed herself, not a single scratch or speck on dirt on her body"! Someone from the genin watching the battle exclaimed in complete shock. Mana had to hand it to the person – they were quite right with that assessment. Stea went from moderately banged up and numerous inner injuries, evidenced by black blunt force traumas all over her body, to looking completely refreshed and even cleaning her skin pristinely clean.

"But her chakra dipped below Juhi's for the first time", Mana noticed measuring the signatures of the two combatants. Seeing how she, a moderately amateur sensor could tell such a detail, the difference must have been considerable enough to tell the two apart.

"I can't reach you up there, it'll take too long for my insects to stack that high, could you please kindly come down, or at least swing a bit lower than the actual ceiling, like Erumo"? Juhi asked making the audience glare at her in confusion. This must've been one of the cases where Juhi's lack of social interactions kicked her in the shin – she just validated all of Stea's theories about her ability for a question that had an invisible chance of a positive answer.

The parasitic ants were highly intelligent and minuscule crawlers, capable of lightning quick coordination and amazing swarming strategies as well as a great variety of shapes they could collectively take with enough training. Their main weakness was gravity – they needed to stack on top of each other to reach taller places.

"No", Stea firmly denied the request of her opponent.

"I see, that is unfortunate", Juhi nodded.

Mana noticed a pair of boys peeking up Stea's dress as her tight silk struggled itself to keep providing the cover that clothes were supposed to provide. For some reason their reaction in the middle of battle greatly amused her, whereas normally it'd have been a cause for a bit of outrage. To tempt their dirty thoughts even more, Stea moved the hanging part of her dress aside for a brief moment just to reach inside her ninja pouch and pull out a handful of kunai and explosive tags, making a handful of explosive kunai on the spot.

"Parasitic Insect: Spikes"! Juhi chanted as she slammed her hands together, extending them at her opponent right afterward. Mana noticed a significant dip in the girl's chakra, evening their signatures up somewhat, which meant that the jutsu she used was quite a powerful one. However, once the swarms of insects shaped elongated spikes that shot out at the high-hanging opponent at a moderate pace, Mana realized, that it must have been one of few jutsu that simply permitted the insects of reaching that high within an acceptable timeframe.

Stea remained in her place, throwing her quickly combined kunai with explosive tags right at her opponent before she weaved a bunch of hand seals.

"Multi-Kunai Jutsu"! She declared after the hand seals were complete, in a loud banging noise and a large cloud of smoke, the thrown explosive kunai multiplied several times over. Clashing with the spikes of the Aburame girl. Juhi braced for impact as she realized that her insect spikes got blasted away and that a part of the explosive barrage was coming to her.

Mana had realized the point of Stea's attack too late, as the barrage of explosions decimated the arena completely, leaving it just a handful of intact stones, whereas the other tiles got turned into dirt and dust afterward. It looked like Juhi took a while to realize she was slipping down as well, but the insects formed a large landing pad for her to fall onto.

"Hey, overseer! This has to count as a ring out, has it not? I mean she's practically touching the ground, by extension"! Doma, the more in-your-face and hotheaded patriot of Getsugakure and a teammate of Stea's, objected.

"We've permitted a substitution with an audience member earlier, didn't we? As long as no part of the genin touches the actual floor, or the side walls, it does not count as a ring out", the overseer ruled, raising his hand to shut down the boy's objection.

"I give up"! Juhi vibrantly declared with a raised right hand.

"Are you sure"? The overseer glared at her confused.

"Yes, I may have a protection from a ring out currently, however, I'll need a constant input of chakra to keep myself on my insects. Needless to say, I have no way of effectively attacking my opponent up there so it's just a race against time. I do not wish to waste the audience's time or needlessly kill any more of my partners", Juhi bowed gracefully before jumping off of the insectoid platform. Stea landed on the floor with a quick dive from up above, softening her landing with a pulse of chakra from her feet that made it look like time itself slowed down upon her landing while the pulse merely cushioned the fall.

"It's a commendable decision", Stea bowed her head at her opponent before dusting off her dress and rejoining her team.

"Very well, let's determine the next pair of examinees to battle it out, before we leave for a short break and we can fix the arena", the overseer sighed before turning at the screen that began scrolling through random letters and names before settling on the two tag teams to fight it out in the next match:

"Jean-D (Team Nimbus/Kumogakure) & Gorm Cleiti (Team Scuti/Hoshigakure) VS Buhakim (Team Pahlavi/Sunagakure) & Kres-T (Team Alto/Kumogakure)"


	341. Questions That Hurt to be Axed

"So… Team Alto is going to be in the next match, huh"? Kiyomi sighed, voicing her thoughts out loud. Frankly, it was something that first caught Mana's attention as well after the next match up was announced.

"Yeah, Quill B claimed that he had a qualm with Team Alto and wanted to take Kres-T's life for killing his friend. I've seen Quill B among the genin in the audience so things might get a bit heated up", Mana agreed.

The two girls found themselves calmly waiting outside of the infirmary where they were told that Meiko was still in the same condition she was left in after her match and was being moved to Konoha Hospital. Her moving, based on what the girls were told, was not due to changes in the blacksmith's condition, but merely because more and more injured genin needed medical attention and Konoha High was ill-roomed and staffed to deal with the demand.

"Yeah, but… Can you really blame Team Alto and call them monsters, ones like Team Phobos? More so, why are we calling Team Phobos monsters to begin with"? Kiyomi uncomfortably shrugged, it was becoming clear that she knew how Mana would react to these questions but she wanted them raised regardless.

"We don't call, or consider Team Phobos monsters, really. Not in terms of their humanity. They are referred to as such because of their monstrous skill gap, compared to the rest of the genin. In a way, we were supposed to always be monsters as well. We are still overtrained and overly experienced for this exam, remember"? Mana replied, feeling equally as uncomfortable because she sensed where Kiyomi wanted to turn this topic to and she did not want to argue with her good friend about that, at least not now.

"Alright, but I mean… Why are we supposed to dislike them? Team Phobos are nothing but really patriotic folk. I cannot ever blame someone like that. They love their village and want all that is best for it. They're willing to do whatever is necessary just to make it one of the Greats, not even for monetary or economic reasons but just so it doesn't go through famine again", Kiyomi wondered.

"Yeah, but they aren't all just one kind of people. Just because Stea doesn't like violence and doesn't like kicking her love for her village to the extreme, doesn't mean her teammates don't. Gasco and Doma advocate taking of another's life just for the sake of that person being weak and a detriment to their village's military strength. I've seen it with my own eyes, you can't ever place your heart and moral support behind people like that", Mana objected passively. It wasn't that she lacked passion for her arguments, it was just that the pressure of all that has happened recently was sinking her head beneath the surface and it took all of her flailings just to stay relatively afloat.

"Yeah, but then why are we supposed to treat like Kres-T did something wrong? From what Quill B told us, he killed a traitor, a ninja who planned on leaving their village, becoming nukenin. There is no greater honor for a ninja than killing someone with such traitorous intentions, it is Quill B who truly is out of line, wishing to kill a fellow ninja for the sole reason of him killing a traitor", Kiyomi became more passionate and less uncomfortable with her arguing with each passing moment.

Somewhere deep inside she must have felt a bit misguided to voice these thoughts at first but now that she had let them out, they quite nicely aligned to her own ideals – Aku-Soku-Zan. The ancient code that demanded the complete annihilation of any evil one saw at their sights. It wasn't even pure Aku-Soku-Zan that fueled Kiyomi, a true follower of that code would've slaughtered Mana with no hesitation for stealing supplies from another, they'd have gone on killing other killers without any qualms about it. The two sides of the same idea: the pure Aku-Soku-Zan and its modernized version were tearing Kiyomi from inside, Mana could feel it.

"Life is life. No life is to be thrown away meaninglessly. I don't care if that life belongs to a traitor or not. I'll stand behind a man wanting justice for a death of his friend but I will not let Quill B kill Kres-T if they ever meet in combat either", Mana firmly stood by her stance, "That, after all, is still, and always will be my Ninja Way".

"Well then, you better get ready and prepare to fight more battles than you need to", Kiyomi brightened up, her tone was soft and almost motherly. Almost like she displayed a very worried care for Mana's health.

"What do you mean"? The magician wondered.

"Look at it, the man you hate is about to fight in a grueling tag match. When is the best chance to slip a knife between their ribs than after such a match – when your hated enemy is tired and injured"? Kiyomi calmly explained as she stood up and followed the stream of flooding genin back into the gym hall.

Mana sat there dazed and lightly shocked for a while. What Kiyomi said was so true that it had to be an accurate read on the situation. It was one, which Mana had to take to mind but what was she supposed to do? She could not afford to waste any chakra or her own health, she will need all of it for the exam and she has been hammering again and again into her own mind about how important this exam was for her.

"Save a life of a killer? Win my match, what should I do"? Mana whispered to herself. It was not really a conflict, the moment the question was raised she knew which she had to do but the realization of what she would be giving up on in return plagued her immensely. She was about to give up on her image as a great ninja, the possible inspiration to the people around her that'd have helped her live up to the ideal way of changing the world – inspiring people to change through example. Still quivering like an autumnal leaf, Mana stood up and walked into the gym hall, even as the weak and plagued winter sun shined through the windows, the magician felt the darkness wrapping around her head and her throat, smothering her and driving fear and uncertainty into her heart.

* * *

A restrained clanging piqued Mana's interest once she took her place by Kiyomi's side and in front of her sensei. The female member of Team Nimbus – Jean-D, a spitting image of her brother, was making her way to the arena. This time, the armored kunoichi didn't wear her face rag on her face, instead, she used it as a scarf of sorts and let it just fall and wave loosely behind her back, partly wrapping around the twin knives she had sheathed behind her and knocking about on her hips.

"These are the Team Nimbus that wanted to claim me as their target back in Forest of Death, right"? Kiyomi asked.

"Yeah, they're also quite strong. I've met a pair of ninja, well… They kidnapped me… Anyways, these guys managed to scare their powerhouse member like a little kid. They're no joking matter", Mana worryingly confirmed. The more powerful the enemy, the more troubled she had reason to be as the odds of Quill B being tempted to attempt and assassinate Kres-T would have been greater.

"No joke, didn't that one guy from their team take both Meiko and Sugemi to beat"? Kiyomi confidently smiled, she was right to be smiling and to feel relieved, now that Team Nimbus had no business or quarrel with her.

"Hey, look, that's another one of those Team Scuti guys, those traitorous assholes that tried to hurt you after having a truce agreement with Sugemi's team", Kiyomi pointed at a brown haired young boy with a black top making his way hastily onto the arena and taking his place by the side of his female armored teammate. The shiny face paint on the boy's face was by far the most eye-scratching feature that simply demanded attention whenever one looked at Gorm Cleiti.

Then, Mana noticed another familiar face calmly making his way onto the arena – Buhakim of Team Pahlavi. The golden haired, dark skinned young man obsessed with some strange moral code he called "Uber-Spirituality" and his odd style of puppetry techniques. While he did act in a very comedic and joke-inviting manner, his skill and puppets were considerable and his reserved and cool-headed mindset had to be commended and revered as well.

An athletically looking young man, wearing sleeveless baggy clothes separated from Team Alto and calmly made his way to the arena. Even by Kumogakure's relatively exotic standards, the youth was in the league of his own. Wearing two odd bracelets with axe-handles attached to them, shaved bald except for the five sharp sticking out spikes of hair that were dyed red, with a face that could've been honestly imagined quite easily from the uneasy history Kres-T was described as having with Quill B, at least as far as psychotic first impressions were concerned.

Jean-D and Gorm discussed something between themselves. Initially it appeared like they both had differing opinions about who should've lead the match, after something very short and emotional that Gorm said, however, Jean reluctantly agreed with a nod and warmed herself up, drawing two long knives and playing with them skillfully in her grip. Gorm went up to the tag scroll and got sealed inside.

On the other side, however, Buhakim and Kres-T stood completely silent, refusing even to talk to one another, that being said, once the overseer insisted that one of them finally agreed to be sealed inside the scroll, Buhakim, without any objections from his tag partner, strolled at a slow turtle's pace to the scroll. The boy's strut was almost mocking to the overseer's attempt to proceed with the matches optimally and in a rule-abiding manner, and sealed himself inside the scroll. Not only did Kres-T not object to this, he appeared excited and glad that his partner didn't want any of the battle ahead.

"Look at those eyes, tell me honestly that you believe this young man to be a just follower of his village's code and not a sociopathic murderer, glad to have an excuse to kill someone, and I'll start supporting your side immediately", Mana taunted Kiyomi's previous hesitance to believe in the cruel words said about Team Alto.

"Can't judge a person about how much they've allowed this world of ours to get to them. Aren't you all about judging someone by their actions, not their degree of crazy"? Kiyomi returned the sentiment.

The battle started without any additional encouragement from the overseer, the moment when the higher ranking ninja cleared the way for the combatants to begin, they charged at each other, thirsty for blood yet careful in their approach. Even when their shouts and grunts sounded primal and scary with how animalistic they were, inviting hidden instinctual fears of the more basic parts of our nature, their moves were cold and calculated. Scoping out their opponent's skill, carefully poking and backing out, nothing more, nothing less.

Finally Jean-D found herself brave enough to slightly overextend with a double assault – using her left kick for a jumping kick and her knife for a slash. Kres-T swiped his axe blades attached to his bracelets in an X shaped swipe, aiming to disarm his opponent with her brave assault and then injure or open her up for a finishing stroke.

Jean-D grunted out in pain as the overwhelming force and hold-nothing-back sadistic approach to fighting of her larger opponent triumphed, smashing the knives out of her hands through brute force while Kres simply powered through the kicks, choosing to take a little bit of damage just to potentially end the battle quickly.

Kres-T soared high and dived low, aiming to injure his opponent but Jean-D was simply too agile, even when disarmed, being completely able to both avoid his axe swipes and deliver a pair of good quick kicks and palm strikes to his face in return. Kres only noticed too late that he had pressured his opponent too much, pushing her all the way back to her own tag scroll. It wasn't difficult to notice the moment of hesitation in the young man's eyes, the conflict of whether he should sate his bloodlust for Jean's blood, or if he should back up a bit and wait out the inevitable tag.

The more sadistic side of Kres-T won, the young man swiped his axe downwards, leaning the swipe in angle a bit to the left to cover more space, Jean-D read him like a book, waiting his attack out before opening the scroll. In a maroon colored flash Gorm appeared from the scroll and, together, both teammates relentlessly overwhelmed their opponent, fists flew from every direction, kicks aimed at Kres-T's joints and his vital spots did all the damage they could do in the mere three seconds that were given. A quick glance to Jean's knives revealed that the young woman found her moment even to retrieve her primary weapons during the brief time of physical advantage she had obtained.

Blood was trickling down at an alarming rate and quantities from Kres-T's nose, cracked and swollen lip, busted eyebrows and random bruises he had obtained from Jean and Gorm pummeling him, with the duo being two highly physical and athletic combatants of their respective teams. Nevertheless, Kres-T remained on his feet. Even though the relentless opponents downed him a couple of times during the ceaseless barrage of fists and kicks. Just the very scent of his own blood must have sent the young man to a psychotic frenzy even bigger than the one he had before. Whereas previously it looked like he had some sort of a choice in his fighting style, now his sadistic side dictated it completely.

Kres-T's arms moved onto his hips, this alarmed Gorm but he was not yet familiar enough with his opponent to rush straight into interrupting his every action. He didn't know the extent of his opponent's speed, the nature of his jutsu, various skills and abilities, how fast his hand seals were and a great number of other things. Rushing this way, without knowing that sort of information lead into rushing straight into a trap.

The young man removed a pair of black orbs, similar to the smoke and flash bombs that most ninja carried in their kits, except these ones had streaks of glowing red steaming inside, visible through what appeared to be glassy parts of the orb's surface.

With a cruel grin, Kres-T lobbed the two spheres straight at Gorm, forcing the Team Scuti genin to get on the defensive and evade the bombs with great agility and acrobatics. It did appear like the boy was putting in effort in evading these explosives. Once evaded, the bombs hit the barrier and the force of impact detonated them, forcing Gorm to struggle to even stay on his feet. It was not difficult to imagine a more skillful and relentless barrage of similar explosives landing their mark a pair of times though.

By then Gorm must have realized that while he had more than a chance fighting Kres-T hand-to-hand, or hand-to-axe, with these various explosives in his kit, Kres had the option of controlling the battle from long range. With agile back vaults the Hoshigakure genin moved in to his tag scroll. Despite Kres-T's charge, attempting to disrupt the tag, Gorm switched out again, unsealing Jean-D.

However, this time, it did not appear like the two were in a rush to attack their opponent again. As three seconds passed quietly, in a maroon flash, Gorm got sealed away and Jean-D calmly stood in a fighting stance wielding both of her long knives.

"They exchanged information", Mana muttered to herself.

"That's clever", Kiyomi nodded.

"It's all about decisions, this stage. Will you choose to attack, but leave your teammate in the dark, risking a potential screw-up down the road for a little bit of a temporary advantage and damage, or do you share intel with them and play the long but steady game", Mana realized now. "It's like each team learns something with each passing match and change their approach".

Jean-D rushed onwards, slashing with her knife, rolling aside to avoid the quick bomb thrown her way, before getting inside knife-fighting distance as she stabbed downwards, using her knife with a dagger grip. Even as her knife was deflected, the young woman chose to proceed with her stabbing motion and stab into the ground. Not hard enough to damage her knives, yet still strongly and willfully enough to be seen and noted.

Jean deflected Kres-T's axe slashes with her remaining arm while she stabbed at him again. Kres raised his block upwards to interrupt the daring thrust but then he felt sharp pain below – where the previous knife stab hit the ground. After seeing his blood trickling on the ground, coming from a shallow cut on his thigh, a place where he was not even attacked in, Kres-T roared in rage and slammed a flash bomb into the ground, forcing a temporary cooldown of both combatants.

"What was that"? Kiyomi wondered, "Did you even see that? You've trained in defensive martial arts so your perception should be better"

"Yeah. Her other hand was nowhere near that thigh, also her thrusting knife appeared to blur and shorten right as it was thrusted forward, right when it was about to hit Kres-T's block", Mana confirmed Kiyomi's confusion about the exchange of attacks. "I'm not sure what this was, one thing's clear – she's not just a knife-fighter, there's some ninjutsu or genjutsu involved and it had something to do with that pointless thrust at the ground before".

A muffled and conserved laughter echoed through the Konoha High gym hall before transitioning into a full-on psychotic fit of laughter. Kres-T appeared to have been having a time of his life here as he was letting go of his composure and, seemingly, his sanity itself.

His laughter continued to spread through the gym hall and creep out the audience, before the psychotic Kumogakure genin took a slow step forward, transitioning into a slow walk towards his opponent.


	342. Drawbacks of Recklessness

"I bet you're wondering what's so funny, eh"? Kres-T finally spoke up, interrupting the awkward yet brief standstill between him and his opponent.

"Not really, more like admiring the degree to which you're taking your refusal to cooperate with your tag partner", Jean-D replied before lunging at her opponent. For the Kumogakure kunoichi this was it – she saw her opponent getting tricked with her hidden technique. She smelled blood, both figuratively and literally.

The kunoichi danced with her knives without stopping, inserting quick kicks into the equation to both disorient and fill the rhythm of her attacks with new notes and beats so that it didn't become too stale and predictable. Mana curiously turned her head aside and looked at Jean's brother, wondering if he employed a similar fighting style. Something stroke her as immensely odd about Jean-D, namely her affinity for useless moves.

Then again, oddly enough, Kres-T was playing along, employing seemingly pointless parries and dodges into his own routine, as if he was fighting both the Kumogakure kunoichi and an invisible ghost of some kind. Both contestants utilized so many unnecessary moves in their arsenal that one was left to wonder if they were lacking the very fundamentals of close range combat or if the observer was not quite on their level and simply oblivious to what was going on.

Kres-T's hand shot forward, locking firmly onto Jean-D's scarf and pulling her in for a strong elbow strike. The kunoichi grunted as she forced herself out of her neck accessory and desperately worked on moving backwards, she then was gifted with a strong jumping knee strike, which, while blocked with her arms, was strong enough to throw her off balance and force the kunoichi to stagger back instead of gracefully sliding back into a gracious fighting position.

"See? I figured out your trick, you're done for now"! Kres-T grinned with a full-teeth smile which kind of made Mana feel bad about staying oblivious to what was happening, given that Kres-T didn't appear to be the most perceptive and intelligent of combatants.

"What's he talking about"? Mana wondered, finally giving in to the pressure and realizing that outing herself as unable to fully perceive everything that transpired between the two genin in the arena was worth learning something new.

"I'm not quite sure…" Kiyomi shrugged.

"He's talking about her Dimensional Blade technique", Hanasaku enlightened both girls, something that surprised both of them as their sensei wasn't really the kind to overthink any battle. Usually her complete excess of power, speed and endurance warranted an automatic advantage in any battle, enough so that she had survived to this day, even though not all of her battles may have been victorious.

Given that both of the girls just stared at the woman in confusion, Hanasaku sighed and elaborated. "I once fought a man in Kumogakure who possessed a similar technique, he stood in the way of my objective as both of our villages had issued us conflicting mission objectives. After a long fight and tiring out of hitting me with his dimensional techniques he withdrew".

"Yeah but… How does it work"? Mana wondered.

"It's fairly simple, the user just opens up one seal, then opens up another. They attack the first seal, the hit comes out through the other hole", Hanasaku explained, oversimplifying things, as always. She looked pretty content explaining it that way too…

"There's nothing simple about it", Kiyomi angrily squinted at her sensei, "You're talking about Space-Time Ninjutsu here, Hanasaku-sensei. One of the most elaborated and complicated jutsu to pull off".

"Not if one is transporting a very simple projectile through a very limited space and in a very short time", Mana pouted her lips as she often did when deep in thought. "If someone was skilled enough in Ninja Arts ninjutsu, and with grueling training, one could, in theory, pull it off on something as short as a kunai or a shuriken, all the previous limitations in mind".

"As I said, push the stabby end on one end, it comes out through the other", Hanasaku grinned with a goofy smile.

Jean-D quickly vaulted back to her tag scroll, aiming to pull on it hard to pull out her teammate, before she could do it, however, Kres-T was already holding her chest plate, having blitzed to the young woman and read her intent perfectly. With his opponent in hand, Kres-T leaped into the air as he began punching her face repeatedly, trying to force his way through her augmentations and draw blood.

Before Jean-D's face could have been turned to a mushy sludge of smashed bone, blood and brain matter, however, the young woman disappeared in a cloud of smoke with only her scarf remaining in the brute's hand, she meanwhile proceeded with her previous plan to unseal her tag partner.

Gorm appeared in a maroon flash and the two once again attempted to exchange information, despite Kres-T's explosive attempts at disrupting their communication with a pair of explosives from his pouch, the two successfully avoided the blasts and appeared to exchange some info before Jean-D got sealed in again.

"It appears I have no choice then…" Gorm closed his eyes and flexed his body out before tensing up all of his muscles at once. Just in time for Kres-T's landing and a bloodthirsty charge for his head. "Mysterious Peacock Method"! The young ninja shouted out as a purple glowing mass began leaking out of his body. It was no simple shine or shimmer, it was no aura, it was an actual material manifestation of some peculiar form of energy and, from the look on Kiyomi's face, even the non-sensors could perceive it clear as day.

Kres-T froze in mid charge and took a pair of reserved leaps backwards, blowing up a pair of smoke bombs in his way so that his opponent wouldn't speed-blitz him right after setting off his strange purple glow technique.

The purple shimmering mass coming out from, and enveloping, Gorm's entire body formed numerous tail-like endings behind him that spread widely like feathers of a peacock – something that must have given the jutsu its name. The consistency of the glowing mass must have been really intense as it was ruffling the boy's clothes and slowly burning them up.

"It's like… Radiation", Mana muttered to herself.

"Radiation"? Kiyomi wondered, feeling equally as confused as the magician was, without a doubt, therefore grasping at weird sounding straws that may have helped her better understand the technique.

"It's a strange phenomenon, a particular way in which energy moves through space or bodies. I've read about it in a book in the archives when I was researching more about Hanasaku-sensei's quantum branch of her abilities", Mana explained.

"That's not very nice", Hanasaku playfully winked at the magician.

"What kind of chakra is it"? Kiyomi wondered.

"It's not… Technically chakra. It can be chakra, but essentially, anything that moves in a specific kind of way can be radioactive, even chakra. It is possible but… Most of the times I've read about it, radiation is observed in space and space bodies like stars, meteors and the like", Mana still struggled to believe what she was seeing in front of her own very eyes.

She was not the only one who was confused about this. The shape that this strange chakra molding method took was oddly similar to the appearance that a Tailed Beast took when they took on Tailed Beast Chakra Cloak and started manifesting tails – when they completely lost control over their Tailed Beasts. If the number of Gorm's "tails" formed behind him had not surpassed the number of most tails a Tailed Beast, namely, the Nine Tails, was known to have by a good handful, the outrage would have been significantly greater.

"Peacock Method: Beast"! Gorm yelled out as if he was combatting excruciating pain in every cell of his body each passing second he manifested this odd technique. The odd purple glowing chakra around the boy's body took shape of a bestial entity and rushed at the Kumogakure genin.

"Don't make me laugh"! The young man grunted out and took it into the air, moving his axe hands behind his back and reaching for his pouch. With a single careless movement of his hand the Kumogakure bombardier had unleashed a massive dark purple cloud all over the arena, one that the barrier didn't fail to shield the audience from, using the murky cover to escape the projectile of radioactive chakra coming his way.

"Is that… Poison"? Gorm's voice thundered through the murky depths of a cloud, which took the color with the universally acknowledged color of all poisons. "I give up a little bit of my life every time I use this technique, do I look like I'm afraid of a little bit of poison"!?

Following that bold declaration, loud bangs, shockwaves and rumbles, clangs and cracking sounds echoed throughout the arena. Once in a while, the loud roars of pain or forceful grunts could've been heard from inside.

"So his chakra is radioactive then", Mana uttered in disbelief of the extents to which Gorm was willing to go to become strong.

"Is that bad"? Kiyomi wondered. "Can he really kill himself using that, how much worse than the Eight Gates can it get"?

"You've no idea. Radiation literally attacks our bodies on a cellular level. We may be able to protect ourselves from it using chakra manipulation of greater intensity but Gorm himself would not be able to do so. He'd be constantly exposed to whatever intensity of radioactive chakra he's putting out, completely tearing apart the chemical bonds in his body and destroying every single system bit by bit", Mana explained horrified by the boy's resolve.

After a short wild of wild clashing and the two highly physical fighters rampaging all over the arena, the dark purple smoke cleared out somewhat. Shockingly, Gorm was trading blows with his opponent completely hairless, his head and the exposed parts of his skin were glowing with purple shimmering lacerations as if his entire body was tearing apart and his own flesh was slipping off the boy's bones. The radiation appeared to singe the user's flesh, but instead of turning it to charcoal, it turned it into whatever glowing radioactive rock remained of the rotten parts of Gorm's flesh.

With a wild laughter, due to the enjoyment of the destruction of his opponent's body, Kres-T tossed a handful more of his explosives at Gorm, who just powered through them as the radiation, while quickly killing his own body while active, did appear to provide the boy with some degree of protection against strong attacks.

"Peacock Method: Destroy"! Gorm shouted out, throwing a strong cross fist forward as the feathers behind his back stiffened up and rounded out their ends before launching themselves at the boy's opponent before unifying into a single large feather that knocked Kres-T back. Most of the blunt force got absorbed by Kres' block by crossing his arms together in front of where Gorm's technique hit him. The axes of the Kumogakure genin shattered to smallest steel chunks upon impact as the force they had absorbed through the block was so great that it caused them to simply blow up. The chunks scattered all over the arena, some of them ripping into Gorm's flesh.

Kres-T breathed in wildly, clawing at his chest, as it appeared he had significant trouble doing so, before laughing out wildly once more. The brute moves his hands towards his hip, reaching in for his ninja pouch but it did not look like Gorm was going to let his opponent do anything of the sort.

Gorm's glowing body blitzed in a single flash, right up to his opponent, throwing a strong cross at his left cheek. Kres-T flew backward, bouncing off the ground like a flat little pebble skillfully thrown to bounce across the lake surface. Weightlessly, like a sack of vegetables, the broken and injured Kres-T fell out of the ring, raising a large chunk of dust as he did so. Before the overseer could rule out the brute's elimination, however, the Kumogakure ninja revealed himself to have substituted with a bunch of his broken axe chunks that scattered after being broken off his bracelets.

Gorm turned his face at his opponent, who was kneeling and wheezing by his side before preparing to charge at him again, aiming to use all of his Peacock Method time optimally, for pummeling his opponent into the ground. The boy could feel it – he could feel his every single cell being torn apart and popped inside of him but he could also see his opponent caving in already. Kres-T has already used his Substitution Jutsu, he had very few defensive options as he was so used to being the most powerful ninja on the field that he did not bother dabbling too much in those.

"Turn that off and switch out"! Mana shouted out as she jumped towards the arena. She felt a firm grip of her sensei wrapping around her waist and pulling her back. "Stop poisoning yourself, you're going to die"! She shouted again wondering if the young man could not feel just how quickly his own life was being consumed.

"He can't switch out. Not until he wins", Hanasaku whispered in Mana's ear as she carefully placed the magician down and kept her hands on the girl's shoulders just in case she tried something again. "The jutsu may be killing him but if he turns it off – his body will collapse. He won't be able to activate it again, probably. He means to use it as long as he can, while his body is rushing with adrenaline and he can still move".

Kres-T laughed off again, getting back on his feet and making a dirty gesture at his opponent's expense. "Hey, asshole, I left you a little present", he chuckled out before pointing at the floor under Gorm's feet. A little green orb was rolling about, like a little marble that children played with sometimes. Right when Gorm looked down, the orb burst, releasing a cloud of dark purple gas across the battlefield again – another dosage of the poison Kres-T used.

Stumbling and tripping over himself, Gorm crawled out from the cloud, scratching his nose, throat and eyes as the poison burned through them, together with the radiation treatment he appointed himself. Gorm's left hand was twitching and hanging stiffly by his side, his jaw got completely paralyzed and was snapping open and shut like that of a cartoon skeleton in cereal commercials. There weren't enough studies being done about the effects of radiation on the human body, Mana couldn't be sure if this was Kres-T's poison, or Gorm's own Peacock Method causing these effects.

"I can't afford… Can't afford to lose"! Gorm roared out as he quickly picked himself up and rushed at his opponent like a madman. Now it became apparent that he was racing with time, racing with death, even, possibly. "Peacock Method: Wrap"! the youth shouted out as his radioactive coat extended into tendril-like ropes that shot forward, aiming to subdue and gift his opponent with some of the inhuman pain and radiation sickness that Gorm was going through.

Kres coughed up as the ropes lifted him in the air, tying around his neck and slowly beginning to choke him out as they burned into his flesh with intense heat and something else. Something sinister, that didn't hurt but penetrated deep inside his body… Something the Kumogakure brute, crazy as he was, had enough reason to focus all of his chakra augmentations to protect from.

"Peacock Method: Destroy"! Gorm roared out, as profuse amounts of blood trickled down from deep inside his own body out from his mouth. The purple glow, the searing marks of the radiation killing him from inside began creeping farther across his body, his clothes were beginning to fall apart string by string as the marks on his flesh became wider and more intense.

The glowing concentrated mass of chakra feathers punched straight into Kres-T's chest, throwing the man flying wildly back, as the previously cast technique kept him hanging by his neck in place. Kres-T's neck extended in a very disturbing manner as he continued to struggle to breathe or efficiently fight back the constricting radioactive chakra binds that restrained him and hung him. Mana took a horrified step back, realizing that Gorm was willing to literally hang his opponent if it meant winning before his time ran out. At that moment, Hanasaku's grip on her shoulders slightly tightened before loosening up again, once the woman realized that Mana wasn't about to do anything stupid and was just shaken by the battle she was seeing.

Suddenly, the grip around Kres-T's neck loosened, letting the brute go to fall on his face and his knees to cough up and try to wheeze some air in. It did not look like Gorm was in any condition to utilize this moment of his opponent's weakness, however. He was going through something extremely grotesque and horrifying, something that multiple members of the audience turned away from and chose rather not to witness.

The boy's neck area swelled up, massively increasing its size, to the point where it appeared like it was balloon being blown up. The glow around Gorm's body began to weaken before completely disappearing. The boy's fighting pose disappeared with his stature changing into a hunched and weighed down pose of weakness and fatigue. His right hand began twitching just like his left one while the boy's eyes rolled back and whited out. Blood began spilling in profuse quantities through every orifice of the boy's body before the bald and pathetic shape of what looked like a healthy young man before the battle collapsed on the floor.

It did not appear that the young man was going to be let go of his part of the bargain, which he had to pay up due to overusing this peculiar and exotic technique. His entire body began seizing up, shaking and twitching as he continued throwing up blood while on the ground. At that point every single medical ninja in the audience rushed out to the boy's aid, without caring much of the ongoing match. The more aggressive and younger medical ninja withdrew to let the higher ranking and more mature ninja examine the boy. It did not take them long to awkwardly back up, shaking their heads and wiping sweat off their faces.

Gorm Cleiti was dead.


	343. The Uber-Spiritual Low-Blow

Mana blinked a pair of times in rapid succession, failing to comprehend what had just happened right in front of her own eyes. The body of a young man, not that much different from her, no ninja clan, no special background or advanced bloodline, had just fallen apart.

The magician's eyes started to water, she wriggled in Hanasaku's gentle but unreleasing hold before the woman pulled Mana back and started calming her down. It looked like the medical ninja in the arena were a little bit baffled by failing to prevent this death as well. While no one's life was guaranteed in such an event, such a guarantee was simply impossible, a village that managed to host peaceful and simple Chuunin Exams would have had plenty of bragging rights and the aura of control about them.

"When you gamble with your own life, this sometimes happens. He knew the odds and the risks and he chose every element of this outcome", Hanasaku softly mumbled to Mana, trying to prevent her from doing something that'd disturb the confusion that the higher ranking ninja buzzing in the ring raised. Needless to say, Gorm's body was quickly removed. Even as the medical staff carried it away, it continued to fall apart as the youth's flesh itself appeared to be as cohesive as a lump of jelly.

"So can we continue the match? Unless someone has the world-changing resurrection jutsu hidden away, death means elimination, right"? Kres-T managed to overpower his struggle to breathe and exhaustion and his distressed face quickly changed to that of a triumphant sadist as the young man grinned at the overseer of the exam.

"Well… Let's see what his teammate has to say", the overseer rubbed his sweaty forehead before using his remote sealing technique to unseal Jean-D from the scroll. Upon the girl's shape materializing, the young woman looked around before her eyes lit up by the cruel realization, her own image of the transpiring events based solely on Gorm's disappearance and multiple massive blood pools around the arena.

"Examinee, your teammate has unfortunately passed in the middle of the match. Sadly, we can't offer you anything else but to either surrender or resume the match, treating his death as elimination", the overseer quickly ran the situation down by the girl.

"Hmph, why are you even bothering to ask, of course, I'll keep going. It's just my luck to lose the draw and get a fragile teammate", Jean-D angrily distressed before pulling her knives out and preparing to continue the match.

"What the hell"!? A loud objection echoed from the western side of the audience surrounding the arena. Gentib, the only advancing member of Gorm's team stepped forward aggressively. "You're Gorm's partner for the match. Can't you at least be bothered to acknowledge his sacrifice? He knew that he needed to eliminate his opponent to win and he did everything he could, placing his life on the line to get you both to the next stage"! The boy growled through his teeth.

"Of course he knew it, I told him that. He claimed he had a way around his opponent's bombs and that he was the safer bet for fighting him and I trusted him. If he died here, he'd have never become a Chuunin. A Chuunin understands the meaning of the words "shortens your lifespan" and knows their own limits", Jean-D calmly replied without even offering as much as an apologetic look at the grieving teammate.

"That's the spirit…" Kres-T coughed up, "They don't get it, but we do"!

"Don't get me wrong, Gentib, or whatever persona you're wearing now is called, your teammate was quite useful, he appears to have weakened his opponent enough for me to have what it takes to tip him over. And yet he still refuses to tag out, interesting", the knife fighter smiled in excitement.

"Will they at least declare Mysterious Peacock Method a kinjutsu now"? Mana muttered sadly, "Will Gorm's death at least save lives of the people who'd have used this technique in the future"?

"I'd like to tell you so but… I'm afraid you know Hoshigakure's political situation better than I do", Hanasaku honestly smiled at her sad student.

Mana did not know all that much about Hoshigakure's political situation, to be entirely honest. She was not quite sure if the village even had a singular leader, in a way that Konoha had the Hokage and the other villages had their leaders. Its rough location on a map was all that Mana knew about the place, it was too small to even be mentioned on most maps, with Hoshigakure being only marked on the most precise ones. The village was as small as a crater of a centuries old meteor that leveled a large area of the forest.

Jean-D blitzed at her opponent, aiming to press on whatever pressure Gorm's beatdown allowed her team of, currently, one get. She was not direct enough though, the girl still was wary of her opponent's considerable physical strength and explosive tools so she danced around him. In Mana's opinion, she would have been much more successful had she pressed her opponent directly and just relentlessly kept on attacking with everything she had. Then again, it was entirely possible that Jean-D was merely thinking of the other battle she still had ahead…

Kres-T grunted sadistically as he drove an orange bomb sphere into the ground, enveloping the area in flames. Covering himself head to toe in the blazing wall but also both blasting and slightly singing his opponent up as Jean-D got tossed aside by the shrieking shockwave emanated from the explosion and then took a couple of moments to remove all remnants of flames on her.

That proved to be a mistake as Kres-T simply dove out of the flames and clotheslined the young woman to the ground, before turning around and trying to crush her beneath his feet. It appeared that he actually wanted to be covered in flames that appeared to turn his skin boiling red but his chakra augmentations held quite well. It was clearly something he had done before, an alternative fighting style.

"He must be short of his bombs by now", Kiyomi noted, "That's why he's employing this new strategy".

Mana wanted to commend her teammate on figuring something like that out but she just didn't find the resolve in her to even breathe in deep enough to gather the amount of oxygen needed to do so. It was like seeing Gorm's death right in front of her was just another blow right to her gut that kept the magician from getting up from all the previous ones she had. As the equal scuffle continued in the arena, the magician's eyes wandered off onto a particularly angry young Kumogakure swordsman, Quill-B.

Even if he did not plan to do anything before, even if Mana wanted to believe in the best in people, she would have been lying to herself if she had told herself that she did not see it. Seeing the man who killed his friend, probably in an extremely sadistic and brutal way, given his fighting style, claim another life, albeit indirectly, must have been unbearable to him as the young swordsman was brimming with rage. There was no doubt – he's about to try something.

"Sensei", Mana turned away from the battle and spoke directly to her team's mentor, "There's something I need to warn you about".

"Warn"? Hanasaku raised an eyebrow.

"Yeah, that young man over there, the one with the dark Kumogakure complexion, orange hair and four short swords on his back. He's admitted to us that he has a grievance with Kres-T. Given what had just happened and the extent of Kres-T's injuries…" Mana explained what has been troubling her for a while.

"You're afraid that he'll be trying something"? Hanasaku concluded. "Don't worry, this place is well staffed to handle infiltration or outright assault. Still, if it'll calm you down and make you focus on your own upcoming match, I'll alert some people to be extra careful".

Mana thankfully nodded. It genuinely felt like a rock off her chest. She may have felt a strange connection to the matter and a desire to keep standing watch around where Kres-T would be lead to rest but the people working here were outranking Mana by a long margin and had infinitely more experience than she did. There was nothing that the magician could do that these people couldn't do better.

"I can't believe you'd worry over a scumbag like him. I'd feel really tempted to kill him myself if our paths crossed in the field", Kiyomi coldly raised her nose up as she continued to carefully observe the clash of genin transpiring in the arena.

"Frankly, I'm a bit proud of Mana. She's grown a lot from the kid who just followed her bloodthirsty teammate into a prison with hopes of extracting him herself", Hanasaku commended Mana with a pleasant smile. It was something that Mana didn't actually expect, given the recent bad history between her and her mentor. Actually being acknowledged for something was almost equally as satisfying as disappointing one's mentor was crushing.

A loud, masculine roar distracted Mana and forced her to stick her eyes onto the battle transpiring in the arena. Blood trickled from multiple stabbing wounds all over Kres-T's body, it was clear that by now Kres-T had slowed down, lost his axe bracelets and gathered an impressive array of inner and outer injuries. At any moment, the Kumogakure's explosive powerhouse looked a one powerful jutsu away from utter defeat.

Soon Mana figured out the secret to Jean's impressive progress in the fight – she fundamentally changed her fighting style while still using the same Dimensional Blade technique. Instead of using it purely offensively, trying to catch her opponent unprepared and confuse him, she observed his own movements and countered using her Dimensional Blade. It was a genius strategy, using his flaming, showy and destructive fighting style put Kres-T into a time limit, that meant he had to be aggressive which was for Jean-D to capitalize on. The fight was on her terms.

"Why doesn't he switch? He's about to lose", Mana wondered loudly.

"It's all in his eyes. Can't you see? In the beginning, he contemplated switching out multiple times, his gaze wandered to his scroll but he shut himself down every time. Now they're fixed on Jean-D, imagining thousands of ways he could tear her apart and brutalize her, they're madman's eyes and he no longer thinks like we do. It's disgusting to even try to get into his head", Kiyomi sighed. She appeared to very much agree with Mana's conclusion.

"I don't know, I think I sort of get it", Mana muttered. "He's weighing tagging out against something he likes, something he lost himself in. It's the same as me weighing backing from a fight where lives are at risk or you backing from a fight where a nasty criminal is involved. He views the bloody gamble the same way, he may know somewhere deep in his mind that the odds of his bloody desires coming to life are slim but… He just can't help it".

"Only you could empathize with a psycho killer like that", Kiyomi noted before sinking in her own thoughts. She may have realized that with the way Mana put it, she herself may have understood Kres' motivations a bit better, still, her eyes betrayed Kiyomi to still be the same, unwavering in her strict beliefs.

"Dimensional Blade: Flower of Daggers"! Jean-D chanted out as she threw her knife backward, making it disappear halfway into thin air. Kres-T bent his body backward as if a sharp pain had crippled him completely before the tip of the knife thrown away appeared from multiple angles and places of the young man's body simultaneously.

The overseer rushed into the arena, interfering with the match to check on the young man's condition. Just as he entered, the high-ranking ninja unraveled a scroll from the chest pocket of his chuunin vest that unsealed a large mass of water, which put out the flames enveloping Kres-T's body and beginning to actually burn him, now that his consciousness had faded away. The overseer appeared somewhat relieved after a brief inspection, the flames that enveloped Kris' body must've completely cauterized his wounds so it wasn't a completely self-destructive and reckless instinct as many have initially believed, but a clever strategy to use against a knife fighter. Shallow burns were after all very much treatable.

"Get him to the infirmary", the overseer ruled as the several present staff ninja rushed to the young man and carried him away.

"Contestant Kres-T is unable to continue the match", the overseer ruled before unsealing Buhakim from Team Pahlavi out of his scroll. The golden haired youth appeared somewhat confused about what it had taken so long for him to get to come out of the scroll. Strangely enough, he did not appear to be at all concerned or stricken by the elimination of his partner as he followed the staff ninja carrying his partner away with his eyes.

Mana's eyes almost instinctively glared at Quill B, who first just followed Kres-T being carried away with his eyes, then he muttered something to Ripper Inaba – his other not yet eliminated teammate, and his mentor before running off. Mana wanted to look at Chestnut Hanasaku questioningly but it appeared that the woman had personally taken it upon herself to see this to the end, she no longer was standing nearby the two kunoichi.

"Huh? When did she slip away, that's pretty impressive, actually"! Kiyomi praised her mentor's ability to slip away undetected. "Anyways, didn't you see this Buhakim guy in action once? You think he can take Jean-D down"?

"It depends. I think it might depend on what Jean-D still has up her sleeves. We've seen genin possess multiple fighting styles and countless techniques in their arsenal whereas Jean only relies on this one. She'll need something more to win this one", Mana gave her best shot at predicting the outcome.

"I'm not sure about that. Have you noticed that Jean-D did not need to speak the name of her technique or weave any hand seals to use it? That means she has intimate knowledge of the jutsu she uses, the kind of knowledge and mastery that only a lifetime of training can bring. It's unlikely that she has anything else under her belt", the Yamanaka heiress voiced her thoughts.

That insight was a very sharp one. Mana had herself invented a good dozen of weak and barely useful ninjutsu techniques just to graduate from the Academy under special conditions. Even if she used some of those ninjutsu techniques to this day, she had not mastered a single one to the degree needed to use them without needing to speak their names or weave any hand seals. Jean-D must have spent all of her time polishing her skills with knives and that one jutsu, otherwise, such mastery over this fighting style would have been impossible.

"You appear to be wounded and a little bit worn out at this point. Yet the amount of blood and hair present in the arena doesn't match your injuries or those of my partner", Buhakim unexpectedly spoke up in a calm and reserved manner, "It wouldn't be very uber-spiritual of me to not offer you a peaceful resolution. It is quite evident that your partner has been eliminated and you're left alone. Ring yourself out and spare yourself the…"

Before the sentence could be finished, Jean-D threw her knife at the opponent. Buhakim leaned aside before the young woman launched her other knife at him as well. By the time that Buhakim noticed the other knife disappearing in thin air it was too late as the second knife buzzed through his cheek and his thigh, opening up small cuts on them. Jean-D then rushed forward at her opponent with a sharp elbow strike, while using her free limbs to collect her knives from up close to where they landed.

Buhakim gently deflected his opponent's ruthless strikes with his palm, all the way while keeping his second palm extended in a praying position before shoving it forward at her crotch area while falling to his knees. After his opponent leaned forward to writhe in pain, Buhakim kneed the young woman in the face, sending her sliding back with her knives still in hands.

"Spiritual my ass…" Jean-D writhed in pain before slowly trying to regain her composure, "That was a cheap shot"!

"I am no monk", Buhakim spoke up, slightly opening his squinted eyes, "I am a ninja, therefore my uber-spirituality is not a path to restrict myself for spiritual experience. It is to make others think that I am behaving spiritually, when, in fact, I am not. It is the only spirituality that matters"!

"He really made it sound like it's a very noble thing, but he just hit a girl in the crotch", Kiyomi squinted at the Sunagakure puppeteer.

"What's with those scrolls on your back, anyway"? Jean-D grunted out after finally managing to get back on her feet and somewhat resume her fighting stance.

Without replying, Buhakim reached behind his back and removed a pin that held the scrolls together before tossing them up in the air. At this point Jean-D knew better than to blindly charge at her opponent, she took this moment of her opponent setting his figures up to play for a moment she could use to catch her breath and regain as much stamina as she could. The scrolls opened up in mid-air before Buhakim slapped his palms together into a praying position.

"Ninja Style: Śrāvakayāna, Pratyekabuddhayāna", Buhakim chanted out in a prayer-like tone as seemingly complete junk scattered from the scrolls where they were sealed in. The long fingers of the praying false-monk extended as the strings of a puppetry user lit up brightly with chakra that was being channeled through them. Upon receiving chakra signals the seemingly useless hunk of junk began shaping together into somewhat more cohesive shapes.

"Śrāvakayāna", the puppet-using youth chanted out as one of the puppets took the shape of a grotesque molding of bodies and limbs with over twenty arms and legs sticking out all over the puppet and way too many heads for comfortable looking. Several of its mouths shut firmly to keep the ragged red cloth that covered some of its parts up in place. "The Vehicle of Disciples", the youth mumbled to himself.

"Pratyekabuddhayāna", Buhakim continued to pray as the second puppet stuck itself together, taking the shape of a ship's wheel with arms for handles and an obsidian eye at the center. The remarkable feature of this puppet was that it apparently only took one string to control. "The Solitary Awakening", the youth concluded his prayer.

Something dense in the air suggested that this match was about to be concluded. It only made watching it from aside that much more difficult…


	344. The Six Perfections

The second, wheel-shaped puppet, to which Buhakim referred to as "the Solitary Awakening" began emitting odd sounds. In a way, they were rather displeasing for they reminded of the stomach growling sounds or one's own innards shifting inside one's own body in a case of bowel unrest. The central parts of each of the puppet's arm handle popped open, releasing a handful of strings, likely chakra conductive ones, like the ones used in the puppetry technique.

"Puppetry Technique: Solitary Awakening"! Buhakim muttered out, humming his words through his teeth like a prayer as the countless strands of wire were launched at Jean-D's general direction.

The skilled kunoichi fought the advancing strings off rather valiantly, her movements were swift and precise and she struck with the full knowledge that the puppetry strings could not be cut unless chakra imbuement of higher concentration was used. Eventually, it became evident that the wired offensive was simply too overwhelming and wide ranged for it to be avoided, then something incredible happened – the knives of Jean-D lit up with blueish base chakra colored flares, visible even to non-sensors. Apparently, Jean-D had the ability to imbue her knives with chakra.

With a swift X-shaped slash with both of her long knives, Jean-D cut through the puppetry wires, separating the chakra channeling coming from the Solitary Awakening and making the separated surrounding wire collapse on the floor around the girl like flabby wet noodles. Jean-D sighed easier before charging at her opponent with a strong slash at the puppeteer a crimson line opened up on Buhakim's chest with a weak spray of blood following right after, slightly tainting the spiritual and composed look of the golden haired youth.

"Puppetry Technique: Vehicle of Disciples"! Buhakim chanted out in prayer again as his fingers moved at an incredible speed. Even to Mana, someone who focused on quick sleight of hand tricks as a part of her living, Buhakim's fingers appeared blurry and difficult to follow. That must have been the skill of a well-trained puppeteer…

The grotesque molded shape of multiple faceless bodies stuck together began erratically flipping and rolling around, striking with all of its limbs at the same time. Whereas normally such a wild attack would have been somewhat easy to read, creating a profile of such an abomination of nature would have been impossible. It was just a mad combination of blank faces, arms, and legs.

Slowly, one by one, Jean-D danced around the puppet, slashing and cutting at it as she found herself too overwhelmed by the highly unorthodox fighting style of the puppet to properly focus on rushing down the puppeteer. Anyone, who graduated the Ninja Academy, would have remembered that engaging the puppets and playing the puppeteer's game was the worst mistake one could have made against the puppeteer. As satisfying as the idea of destroying one's precious tools of combat and leaving them defenseless was, it was simply an inefficient way of combat as most puppeteers had entire arsenals of puppets in reserve, also the Puppetry Jutsu cost much less to maintain than pretty much anything one would've used to destroy these puppets, even if its strain on the user slowly increased as time of use went on.

Something odd happened in the middle of the ceaseless string of strikes, Jean-D got hit out of the blue, when just a moment later she appeared to have total control. Again and again, she continued to skip strikes before letting up and getting pummeled ceaselessly by the grotesque abomination of artistic liberties. Luckily enough, the kunoichi still had enough in her lungs to manage a quick evasive action that put some space in between her and the puppeteer.

"Dimensional Blade"! Jean-D shouted out as she thrust her knife into thin air, still lighted up with base chakra flare of blue.

A knife with all of its channeled chakra flow intact pierced Buhakim's chest from behind, making the young man's body bend backward in a grisly manner as his body collapsed lifelessly like a sack of potatoes before puffing into a cloud of smoke. The flashy show revealed that the object impaled through a dimensional rift was not Buhakim himself but his Solitary Awakening puppet.

"Puppet Replacement Jutsu"! Buhakim chanted out in prayer as the Solitary Awakening dropped a couple of pieces before spinning wildly and locking the knife in place, inside the dimensional rift.

A loud and popping clang echoed throughout the hall signaling the immensely powerful reaction from the knife stuck in between dimensions snapping in half. Whereas normally a chakra channeled tool would be nearly indestructible, save by impacts of more intensely channeled tool, with the blade being stuck in between two dimensions and the Dimensional Blade jutsu only being able to keep the invisible rift open for moments at best, this limitation was overcome by the Uber Spiritual One.

"Uber Spiritual Puppetry Technique: Enlightenment Mind"! Buhakim chanted out in prayer as the cracked and breaking apart wheel of Solitary Awakening once again sent its strings at the now weakened and partly disarmed kunoichi opponent.

The kunoichi roared out loud from the depths of her chest, gripping the handle of her last remaining knife in two hands and raising it above her head as if she was wielding a two-handed sword.

"Dimensional Slash"! she shouted out as she kept up her chakra channeling, despite, as Mana could sense, it taking more and more of her chakra as time went on, similarly to how Mana's own Flower Petal Sanctuary jutsu continued to increase in strain over time.

The strings sent by the Solitary Awakening parted ways as the base chakra projectile fired off from the powerful swing of Jean-D's knife split them apart before disappearing half way, leaving the string mass split in the middle in a V-shaped formation.

The Vehicle of Disciples puppet moved in from behind Buhakim, to block an incoming projectile that had traveled through another dimensional rift to appear back in its original dimension, but behind Buhakim. By now the puppeteer was able to read his opponent's intents and moves somewhat, partly due to the ever increasing desperation of Jean's strategies since her drastically shrinking chakra pool made her attempt and solve the battle as quickly as possible.

As blood sprayed wildly from Buhakim's back, the eyes of the young man opened wide in shock. He remained turned, with his back open to the projectile attack, sending his puppet to block it and thinking that'd be enough, had he turned around he'd have witnessed the Vehicle of Disciples being split in two and shattered by the immensely powerful chakra channeling sword fighting and ninjutsu combination.

Buhakim fell flat right on his face as his simple clothes dyed blood red on his back side as well. Jean-D huffed heavily as her forehead began to sweat profusely and black circles and bags started to form around and under her eyes – typical telltale signs of chakra shortage. She must've been slowly approaching the limit she actually required for sustained life and any other jutsu may have lead to her just passing out at this point.

"That was reckless of you, sister. It was my jutsu you just revealed with your cheap imitation", Jon-D angrily crossed his arms over his chest, grumbling. "I mean what am I going to do now during my match"?

"It's not my fault your ace technique is so basic I can imitate it with a little practice", the knife fighting kunoichi pouted her lips before wiping the sweat from her forehead with her backhand. "Plus, that useless dead weight teammate of mine has made my situation very desperate here, I'm being pushed to my limits. I was not very lucky in my draws, I am afraid".

Mana's eyes almost instantly wandered to Gentib who continued to angrily grind his teeth and attempt to incinerate the young woman with his stare alone. She had to admit, she had taken Jean-D and her brother for better people than demeaning dead partners that literally gave up their lives for the Chuunin Exams. Still, in a way, the magician got Jean-D's point. Both Buhakim and Kres-T were amazing genin in their own right, some of the favorites to advance to the final exam. Jean-D, while a powerful competitor in her own right, was certainly unlucky in that regard…

"Examinee Buhakim is still able to fight, please finish the match", the overseer ruled after checking Buhakim's vitals. The Uber Spiritual one rose on his feet, failing to even reach the deep cut in his back that had taken him down unexpectedly and undoubtedly cost him a whole lot of chakra in chakra augmentation efforts to not get cut in two himself.

"Oh, come on"! Jean-D grumbled, "What in the Hell can you still do? One of your puppets is sliced in two, the other one is falling apart as we speak".

"There is one thing…" Buhakim shook his head as he also appeared to have been in a lot of pain from his injuries. "The most Uber Spiritual manifestation of my puppets."

"I thought the whole point of your Uber Spirituality thing was that it's a sham"? Jean-D wondered, feeling quite glad in an opportunity to catch her breath and run her mouth for a short while.

"That's right. However, just like with all of my Uber Spirituality rulings, this one has a faux-spiritual explanation. My ultimate puppet – Bodhisattva is a combination of Vehicle of Disciples and Solitary Awakening, awakened further to the next and final level through an Enlightened Mind", Buhakim explained, as he did, he was giving more and more time to his opponent to gather herself together.

"The names of your puppetry arts…" Jean-D noticed.

"That's right. A spiritual person would say that I merely believe that before I use the Bodhisattva, I intend to play out all of my puppetry arts. Like a spiritual ritual of a sinner's prayer. Truth be told, I just need my puppets in pieces before they can be molded together", Buhakim smiled innocently before lifting his right hand up, with the puppetry strings still attached, yet lacking their blue base chakra glow.

"Why is he giving her time to recover"? Mana began getting irked, deep inside she began rooting for Buhakim as she didn't want someone as disrespectful to human life as Jean-D getting a shot at becoming a chuunin.

"Because he needs it himself, it's a compromise, haven't you faced puppet users before"? Kiyomi explained.

"I mean… I may have, I can't remember any off the top of my head though. I only know the basics about the Puppetry Technique from the Academy", Mana admitted a bit shyly.

"They've both used techniques that begin draining chakra at increasing rates with time. At some time, these techniques need to be halted so that the chakra flow can repair itself and the technique's strain returns to normal. They both need some time to get themselves together and use their respective techniques with the much more economic starting chakra strain and not the procedurally increasing one". Kiyomi must have felt really proud of herself, having found one area where she was more experienced than Mana in and where she could actually sound like a smartass and not be smartass'ed at.

"I see", Mana scratched her chin, trying to memorize as much about this flaw of the Puppetry Technique as she could. It was a much more practical thing to know compared to the common knowledge from the Academy she was equipped with.

"Hanasaku-sensei and my last team spent some time in Sunagakure on a mission once, we fought several puppeteers there. That's where this experience comes from", Kiyomi rubbed her nose proudly.

Buhakim's strings lit up with chakra flares again as his Puppetry Technique initiated again. Giving life to the crushed and plenty damaged puppets he controlled and making the bits and pieces raise in the air and reconfigure. Instead of the puppets repairing themselves, they were becoming something else altogether with both puppets shattering into the pieces they started as and reconfiguring again with the parts of the destroyed puppet merging with the verily damaged one.

"Ninja Style: Bodhisattva", Buhakim prayed out as the puppets combined into a new shape, one of a large faceless humanoid, towering so large that he didn't even fit into the arena and had to bend its upper body forwards as additional parts began flowing from the scrolls that were used to unseal Vehicle of Disciples and Solitary Awakening before. The newly built puppet had multiple faceless heads stacked on top of one another, each smaller than the other, unlike the previously more abstract shapes, this one had precisely six arms and two crossed over legs as the only way it could properly fit into the hall was if it sat in a meditative position.

Jean-D, overwhelmed by the most powerful and the final puppet in her opponent's arsenal, reactivated her own chakra channeling through her one remaining knife. Mana could sense that she didn't have that much chakra left and the only way she could've tricked her opponent like she did before was if her Dimensional Slash derivative jutsu could cut through this odd, massive puppet.

"Dimensional Slash"! Jean-D grunted out, risking her remaining chakra on a technique she merely imitated from sight, wielding her last remaining knife in two hands and swinging upwards, aiming the off-shooting chakra crescent-shaped projectile at one of the faceless heads of the puppet.

"She's aiming at the control bar"! Kiyomi shouted out, realizing this odd trajectory of the strike.

Buhakim moved his hands around, manipulating the strings in his hands all of whom lead up to an area of the largest faceless heads on Bodhisattva's body.

"Puppetry Technique: Six Perfections"! Buhakim prayed out before shifting his hands around again. The massive six arms of his puppet began slowly cranking and moving, throwing splinters and wood chips with each movement as the puppet must not have been perfectly polished and used that often.

The hands, each of which had a different hieroglyph symbol on the palm, each of which had a different virtue listed on it: generosity, morality, patience, vigor, contemplation, insight, moved to work, mainly, to intercept the crescent-shaped chakra slash projectile.

Right before the slashing projectile would have split the massive structure comprised of faceless heads of decreasing sizes, it simply faded away, only to burst from the underground and aim straight at Buhakim's upper body. Jean-D's last resort followed the typical Academy teachings – attack the puppeteer, not the puppet, since the puppeteers were frail and defenseless when they were occupied with controlling their puppets.

A powerful explosion echoed throughout the hall, contained within the barrier placed around the arena, yet the raging shockwaves, dust and rubble made seeing anything but the edges of Bodhisattva's massive body impossible.

"So she wasn't going for the control bar, she went for the puppeteer, pretty predictable", Kiyomi sighed, "I guess if she placed that many dormant seals around during her clash with Kres-T, she can't be blamed for wanting to utilize all of them…"

"What's this control bar you're talking about"? Mana wondered.

"You see, some puppets are too complex to be controlled by the puppeteer's hands alone. The strings would be too long and numerous and they would tangle too much, the puppet may be too massive. That's why more skilled puppeteers place a control bar inside their puppets with strings inside of it, they don't control the puppet itself, they merely control the control bar that controls the puppet remotely. It usually only takes one conductive string to fully control a control bar so more complex puppets may have entire control bars for each of their limbs alone", Kiyomi grinned, once again feeling proud of her experience fighting puppeteers.

"So Bodhisattva's control bar is in its head"? Mana asked without hoping to get a clear answer just yet. "I wonder what lead Jean-D to that conclusion".

Once the smoke and rubble cleared out, Bodhisattva sat completely unharmed with Buhakim squeezed tightly in between its two hands, whereas the other four were resting where the arena once stood. Jean-D was kneeling on the now destroyed area of the arena, sneering at the massive puppet and hyperventilating from the exhaustion as Buhakim peeked through the spaces between Bodhisattva's fingers at his opponent.

"Contestant Jean-D – ring out. Your team is eliminated", the overseer ruled as Bodhisattva poofed into a rain of parts. Before they could scatter senselessly around the hall and possibly annoy or injure someone, the Uber Spiritual One bit his thumb, drawing blood from it and dragged the blood across both of his scrolls initiating a vacuuming wave that drew all of the parts back into his scrolls.

"I bet Buhakim didn't count on having to use Bodhisattva", Kiyomi grinned, "Now that we've seen him, we can begin planning on taking that thing out".

"My father's a really skilled engineer. Maybe if I gave him the sketch of the thing he'd give me possible optimal locations for a control bar to be located. If I assume correctly, if you take that thing out – the whole puppet stops working, right"? Mana wondered to which the Yamanaka heiress just nodded in agreement.

"Alright, let's announce the next match before going into a break, this one will take full fifteen minutes, the whole arena will have to be rebuilt from scratch and we'll consider adding some improvements to its integrity", the overseer sighed before raising his hand, pointing at the screen. Even if he did appear a bit frustrated, no one looked more frustrated than Dorimi – the jounin in charge of rebuilding and making the arena out of scratch.

A whole mess of names shifted through the screen before it settled onto two teams, one of the names looked eerily familiar to Mana before her mind completely comprehended all four names announced to be competing next:

"Roh-D (Team Stratus/Kumogakure) & Nakotsumi Mana (Team Hokage/Konohagakure) VS Jon-D (Team Nimbus/Kumogakure) & Oto-B (Team Alto/Kumogakure)"

"You're next, huh"? Kiyomi softly stated the obvious. "Your opponents look… Strong, don't you think"?

Saying so was an understatement. Jon-D, without a doubt, would have had everything to prove after both of his teammates were already eliminated. Team Alto was described as monsters on par with Team Phobos by a source of intelligence in the Forest of Death as well. Both Team Nimbus and Team Alto were amongst the more fearsome teams that have dominated and trounced their way through the Forest of Death whereas Team Hokage somehow stumbled their way through with Mana still feeling as if she had somehow cheated by being allowed to continue in that one instance of her getting encased in crystal.

What laid ahead may have been the scariest and the most difficult trial yet in Mana's ninja career and her entire life. Even worse yet, she'll have to walk with that feeling of butterflies in her stomach and neck breaking long and cold fingers of fear creeping up for fifteen more minutes before the test even starts…


	345. Into the Maroon Light

Mana gave off a breathy sigh. Her hands could not stop trembling, her abdomen kept burning up. The magician could remember feeling less intimidated when her life was literally at stake. Maybe because in those difficult times there was simply no time to feel worried, it was always just do or die. Now, meanwhile, the magician was left to wonder, keep thinking everything through to the point of overthinking. Her own personal issues did not help things, Mana was still really anxious and down about her break up and Meiko getting badly injured.

"It's going to be alright", Kiyomi smiled in encouragement after patting Mana's shoulder to which the magician just backed up like the eye of a snail after being poked. "You're the most resourceful person I know and being resourceful is what being a ninja is all about"!

It was true that Mana already knew the tiniest bits and pieces about her opponents, due to Jean-D's desperate grasping at straws, the magician already knew of Jon-D's signature technique. From his frustration, after it was revealed, she could put together that beside that jutsu, the young swordsman had little else to focus or rely on. In that, way he was very much like his sister, an incredible master of one thing only.

Team Alto was so much more difficult to comprehend. From what Mana had seen about Oto-B, he was the small and plumpy little man with a massive hi-tech looking backpack that may have contained just about anything. The first guess of the magician would've been that it contained a puppet, but puppetry was a rare craft in Kumogakure – the native land of the world's greatest swordsmen and crude but effective grappling style of wrestling martial arts, also – the Nimble Style of taijutsu that greatly contrasted Konoha's Strong Style.

"See? You're overthinking it, this isn't some sort of the end of the world scenario. If you fail now, if you see it's too difficult, you can always just back down and try next year in another country. No one will blame you, this year's exams are crazy with the insane teams and ninja competing"! Kiyomi tried consoling Mana differently. She must have still been oblivious to the falling out that Mana and Hanasaku had just before the exam.

"You wouldn't quit", Mana mumbled out.

"I mean… Yeah! That's because I've been a genin for what seems like eternity. I'm stuck here and I feel like I've been ready to move up for ages. No matter who I end up facing, I won't stop until I prove it to everyone"! Kiyomi grinned raising her fist into the air energetically. "But you're not supposed to be anyone else. I know you used to look up to me as someone you could be but you don't owe it to anyone to be anyone else but yourself".

"I owe it to me to be better than that", Mana replied before looking Kiyomi in the eyes. "I owe it to everyone in Konoha, and everyone in the whole world to become the person that'll be great and amazing enough to change the world through example. Someone who will appreciate all life, and be so skilled, that everyone else will follow them and learn to appreciate life for themselves. A person who fails the Chuunin Exams is not such a person, a person who gives up before they do everything they can is not such a person. This exam is life or death to me, just like it was for Gorm Cleiti, if I fail, nothing else matters".

Kiyomi looked away trying to get into Mana's shoes but she appeared to struggle to do so. Just about at that time, Erumo Budoki from Team Fir stumbled around with the help of her teammate Yushijin, as the girl, now adorning a pair of bandage stripes and plasters, passed by Mana and Kiyomi, the new Konoha's Trapster gave Mana a nasty gesture before the two walked past them.

"I know you are used to being cheered on, what with all of your Konoha Sorceress gig you have and all, but don't be surprised if you won't have any home spiritual support advantage, besides me, of course", Kiyomi grunted, feeling that Erumo's attitude towards Mana would be somewhat reflected onto the others of these past few Ninja Academy generations. Given how popular Erumo's gimmick and antics were. Before now, pretty much every Konoha examinee had a significant amount of rumbling and incoherent support from their fellow villagers, similarly for most other villages. The Yamanaka wanted the magician to not feel too surprised if that was not the case with her, given her choices in the Forest of Death.

"I know this isn't one of my magic shows. This audience is completely different from the common Konoha villagers. Some of them think I'm just playing ninja, some of them may hate how I'm using ninjutsu for entertainment and stage magic. Some of them may hate my nindo, think I'm childish or hate my choices and the way I think. I've already been an underdog once, I've already been hated and discriminated once. It won't be anything new to me", Mana sighed before recalling her time in the Sun Disc arena back in Wind Country.

Angry and clearly rushing steps that sounded almost like infuriated stomping attracted the attention of Mana and Kiyomi to such an extent, that, for a moment, Mana forgot all of her worrying and fears before the match.

"It was you, wasn't it"? Quill B shouted out, rushing up to Mana and shoving a finger up in her face, the young man looked like he was combating the instinct to punch the magician in the face with each passing moment.

"Actually, I gave her the idea that you may want to try something funny. Mana just dealt with it in her own way which, she thought, would prevent as much conflict as possible. Frankly, it appears, she was right", Kiyomi shrugged trying to step in between Mana and Quill B.

The Kumogakure swordsman shoved Kiyomi aside and grabbed Mana by her collar before raising her up by it and winding up his fist. He was clearly referring to the fact that the protection of the injured youth he wanted dead now included Lady Fifth herself, something completely beyond even the most unreasonable and bloodthirsty fool to attempt to bypass or piss off.

"I thought you understood! Back in the Forest of Death, the way you handled things. The way you cared about the efficiency of elimination and all that! I thought you were different!" The swordsman shouted out, alarming everyone in the corridor but, so far, no one bothered to interfere. It was the same economy of effort and resources that lead to passiveness in the Forest of Death, that same guiding principle, that lead to such a reaction. Mana could've very easily gotten her neck snapped and very few people would've bothered doing much other than reporting it.

"But you aren't different from everyone else, are you! You did not even have the guts to protect that scumbag yourself! You cried to your superiors and told them to protect him"! Quill B shouted out, "Because you're afraid! You're weak and you're nothing but a coward"!

"Yo, your disappearance was so bizarre, I've been looking for you, there you are! Come on, Quill, stop being miserable, the magician's involvement simply isn't reasonable"! Inaba, Quill B's teammate from Team Cirrus, ran up to the furious teammate and tried defusing the situation.

"Of course he's not being reasonable", Mana muttered, "He's grieving a loss, suffering people are the least reasonable people there are".

Quill B pulled Mana in almost up to his face, just so that she could see the pain and grief coursing through his eyes and the entire face.

"Dammit, girl, you're making me curse. Your words are just making it all worse"! Inaba helped Kiyomi pull the scorned swordsman away from Mana, letting the magician slump down on her knees before getting back up.

"If you asked me, I'm on neither of your sides. Kres-T killed a traitor to his village, if you killed him right now, like a coward, while he was down, you'd have been even worse of a scumbag than you and Mana can possibly see him as being", Kiyomi threw haphazardly at the direction of the Cirrus duo.

"You're right. It wouldn't be right if I killed him while he's injured or passed out, or whatever… Your friend may be crude, but at least she's the one making the most sense", Quill B calmed down somewhat, his friend helped him stand back up after he stumbled back at a wall in an expression of pain. Before the two could walk away, he turned at Mana curiously. "You will still stand in my way, as long as you are able to, right"? He asked.

"As long as your plan is to kill him, yes", Mana calmly nodded before fixing her clothes.

"I guess that makes you his accomplice then, just another person I'll have to overcome and kill in my way of vengeance", Quill B exclaimed coldly before turning away and walking off with his friend who appeared to be freaking out at the swordsman the whole way to the hall.

"Wow, that guy is both intense and crazy", Kiyomi whistled out.

"He's in pain. I cannot hold him accountable for the things he says in that state. If our paths will ever cross, I'll just have to shoulder his hatred and vengeful thoughts and hope I can help him that way" Mana sighed.

"I mean… I'm technically on your side, I think, I wouldn't let him kill a righteous man whose sole crime is fulfilling his duty and killing a traitor, but… Doesn't that mean you'll be shielding a killer, someone who did a thing you despise almost to ridiculous degrees"? Kiyomi raised an eyebrow.

"I will be, yes", Mana affirmed.

"That's an awful amount of scumbags and killers you've protected so far from people wanting to give them what's coming for them. I'm not implying anything but…" Kiyomi shrugged before encouraging the magician to make her way to the hall.

"I'm not justifying the actions of people I protect. I do not care who it is that I protect from death. I do believe that those people need to face justice for their actions but death is no form of any justice I believe in. Death is an escape from justice in my book. If it ever comes to me standing in between Quill B and Kres-T, I'll be the one making sure that Quill B's desire for justice is met, not him", Mana argued.

"Except even if you protect that guy, no justice will ever come to him. Killing a traitor is no crime in any of the ninja villages – he's perfectly justified, he'll even be honored for it", Kiyomi poked a hole in Mana's beliefs, the magician felt that hole very painfully.

"I've seen a man who was renowned for his carnage and murderous ways protect a fragile young civilian from harm for years, in search for redemption. Had it not been for that man, that young lady would've been in a lot of trouble, likely not even alive at this point. In that way, I believe that not even a life of a killer somehow transcends necessity, even those lives of people I hate or I don't think are right. Punishment may not find Kres-T now, or ever, but maybe, someday, he'll do something he is meant to do and make someone else's life better", Mana looked away, feeling a bit uncomfortable about not having a precise answer for her friend's and superior's posed problem. It has become a habit between the two to discuss their clashing beliefs and yet this may have been the first time that Mana felt unsure about her stance and position in some way.

"Ummm… Either way, what the hell are we talking about!? This isn't what you should be troubling yourself with! Think about the match"! Kiyomi suddenly broke into a supportive smile and began encouraging the magician after seeing that she was beginning to get to Mana to some ideological level.

* * *

"Alright, I assume everyone's ready to start"? The overseer glanced the slightly thinned out audience over. The matches were already halfway over and therefore almost half of the observing audience had already left the hall, whether having their injuries treated in the infirmary facilities or just resting. These tag matches proved to be taxing even on the greatest of favorites to rank up, perhaps more so on them, for they had plenty of things to prove and often had most trouble cooperating with their tag partners.

"Just do your best, it'll all be just fine"! Kiyomi patted Mana's shoulder in encouragement, the magician breathed in and out before stepping out and preparing herself for the unknown. The audience rustled for a while after Mana walked out from the thinned out mix of the audience and into the clear before stepping gracefully and slowly onto the arena.

Much to Mana's surprise, she heard several familiar Academy classmates' voices cheering on her, suggesting that her thoughts of herself as the most hated person in Konoha were plentily exaggerated. Even Yushijin and Erumo nodded at Mana, while still scowling at her with rather displeased, grudge holding eyes.

With the first examinee of the following match having officially made their way onto the arena, the tall, buff and bald Kumogakure genin separated from his similarly thinned out team composition, currently composed of only him and his mentor figure – a tall red-haired young woman with the typical Kumogakure uniform. Almost at the same time, Mana's opponents also took their steps onto the arena with Jon-D nodding at his own team mentor and jumping onto the stage before stroking his wild hair and sizing Mana up with his gaze.

Jon-D was a tremendously attractive young man, of similar build to his sister, skin about as dark as Mana's, which was a couple of shades less tanned than the Kumogakure standard. His hair had very clearly experienced rather sophisticated attention and grooming as from that feature alone he would've reminded to the neutral observer more of a member of a boy band than a shinobi assassin. The massive hilt hanging from behind his shoulder made Mana wonder how someone looking as unimpressive in terms of his physicality could wield a sword of such size without needing to waste too much stamina and chakra on augmentations. His armor was also oddly white and didn't look used at all. Either he was more of a show-off than a combatant, or he simply rarely, if ever, got tagged by his enemies.

Roh-D of Kumogakure then rushed onto the arena, jumping high up in the air before landing right beside Mana and giving the girl his enthusiastic thumb up of excitement.

"Hey, we've met before, right? Looking forward to working with you"! He vibrantly spoke up

"Likewise, you were one of the first teams to complete the Forest stage, I'm honored to team up with someone like you and I hope to learn much from this experience", Mana bowed her head respectfully. A gesture that appeared to greatly confuse her partner as he started rubbing his cheeks and nose awkwardly and stuttering something incomprehensibly.

In a very sluggish and fumbling manner, the fourth combatant took his place onto the arena – Oto-B of Team Alto, the final member of the much revered and feared team, which Team Hokage was lucky to never encounter first hand inside the Forest of Death. The abilities and fighting style of the plump one were an absolute mystery – the intel that Mana could recall from the Forest of Death only referred to the man's exceptional strategizing and observation ability and not his actual fighting style. The youth looked very unimpressive up close – curly bright hair, short and round stature, shorter even than Mana who was a rather frail figure in most comparisons. Early yet quite timed and developed facial hair covered the youth's face, whereas Jon-D was quite the groomer, Oto-B could have used some of his partner's excess on himself…

"We didn't have the chance to receive any intelligence on you guys, or our opponents in the Forest. I'd be glad to know a bit about your abilities, or any immediate heads up about our opponents, decide who's going first and all that", Roh-D muttered, entering the quick whispering stage of the pre-combat break that most teams went through. Oddly enough, it didn't appear that Oto-B and Jon-D were going through any similar discussions as Oto-B simply refused to even look at the direction of his teammate.

"I'm a genjutsu and ninjutsu user, I can defend myself at close range but I'm not much use offensively at close range", Mana did her best to quickly describe her abilities to her partner. "This match-up is bad for me – I don't know much about either of these two which means I won't have a profile of their fighting style in my head. That might lead to some skipped blows and early injuries".

"Huh, we're a pretty sweet team. I can brawl pretty decently up close, whereas Kei-J was more of a technical martial artist, I was always the more brutish and bulky one. I can both take hits from those guys and dish it out, don't worry about that! My mid-range abilities rely on Wind and Lightning Release ninjutsu and these babies", Roh slipped his sleeve aside to reveal to Mana some odd looking tubes and holes that were covering his arms and appeared to be surgically placed.

"These look like holes on a reed pipe", Mana whispered.

"Well, that's the gist of it", Roh-D grinned, feeling glad that his partner caught on so fast to the nature of his surgical enhancements. "They release sound waves that enhance my Wind Release jutsu as well as serve as a tunnel of my Lightning Release".

"It seems your abilities are much more sophisticated and defined than mine", Mana commended her teammate who once again got flustered over being praised before raising a fist up Mana's face and smiling confidently.

"Don't worry, Mana, I can wear them out and serve as your sacrificial lead. All you need to do is finish them off afterward"! Roh-D bravely declared before stepping up and raising his fist up to the overseer's question about if the examinees were ready to go.

Mana tried to object, she wanted to ask to be a sacrificial lead herself seeing how she perceived Roh-D to simply be a more rounded up and versatile ninja. Sacrificial leads needed to wear their opponents and gather information on their abilities, do as much of wild swinging damage as they could before being taken out, also set up any battlefield conditions that their partners could have used. With her genjutsu and disruption tactics, Mana could've served that role much better and she felt like she was less useful to the finishing touches of the battle overall.

"Is there a problem, examinee"? The overseer raised an eyebrow looking at Mana's hesitance to follow Jon-D's example and step up to the tag scroll and get sealed inside.

"I guess not…" Mana sighed before slowly creeping up to it and opening the scroll. A blinding burst of bright maroon light enveloped her entire essence, the magician's body got dragged out and getting spaghettified, loud, howling sounds followed that unbearable sensation of being dragged through space-time and outside her very own dimension into somewhere else, somewhere wilder…

Mana's match had officially begun.


	346. A Rollicking Good Start

Mana snapped out of the overwhelming sensations of being sealed inside the tag scroll after the attraction sucking her inside of it ceased. First of all, the magician examined her own body, feeling sure that such phenomenon would've surely torn her apart. Even if she saw plenty of ninja get sealed multiple times, the sensations were so odd that she couldn't help but still check the integrity of her own body and make sure she was completely intact.

Neither there were injuries on her body from all the oddities, that the sealing process made her go through, nor did Mana feel any weaker from being forced to augment her body. In fact, she could not even remember using augmentations for a mere moment. There was certainly a fair amount of time dilution in the process as at some point the sealing had begun to feel slightly frustrating to go through with the endless sensation of falling inside a roaring and spinning tunnel of flashing lights with nothing but void below her starting to bore Mana instead of scaring her. The creator of the tag scroll must have modeled it with seals that protected the transported person perfectly from the inhuman conditions that other dimensions may have possessed.

Only after making sure that both her physical form and her stamina were both in perfect condition did Mana notice the odd dimension she was floating weightlessly in. Deep below her, farther even than her augmented superhuman ninja perception could scope, was nothing but whirling clouds of gas and crackling lightning – a violent expression of the massive chakra present inside this dimension. Above her laid the same sight, the same thing to be said of wide and far around her. Nothing but crimson red skies with lighter tone gas whirling around in a never-ending storm. The area where Mana was stored in was protected, however, in a bubble of unknown and invisible chakra that held the stormy conditions of the dimension as well as the outrages of its energy further.

"If the time dilution was so sensible just being sealed, just how long will I have to wait until I am unsealed"? Mana wondered to herself. "It may take a couple of minutes outside, but it may feel like hours waiting here".

All this senseless waiting frustrated Mana to no end. It was not because she was an impatient person – far from it. There may not have been a more patient and reserved genin inside that entire hall back in her home dimension. It was because of the innate fear that she felt, the nervousness before the big fight. She had to wait and tolerate it for fifteen minutes before the match, now she may sit here feeling nervous and eating herself alive, thinking all the thoughts imaginable for hours… Not that it could've been helped or anything. It was just the way she was supposed to behave. All just a part of the test…

"It won't be any different if I get promoted, really", Mana tried to reason with her own gut that was booming and squirming with butterflies trying to sprout through the magician's own flesh and fly into freedom. "I'll be sitting in ambushes or collecting information for hours, in missions far more important to me and the village. Better get used to it now".

Feeling rather reasonable with her own bodily reactions, Mana simply crossed her legs before taking a meditative position and closing her eyes. One advantage of meditation was its ability to calm Mana down and give her complete awareness of her body as well as the limited capabilities of affecting her mood or bodily conditions. It did not take much time for an experienced meditator such as Mana to calm herself down through meditation.

"I could still make out Jon-D being the one to get sealed inside the scroll. That means I am much more likely to get to face him. That's good. I know what he can do, I know the abilities he will rely on. Oto-B, however, is a complete mystery. I should only need to deal with him if Roh-D deems him an unfair match-up, choosing to tag out instead, or in the unfortunate eventuality that he loses without eliminating anyone. Such outcome is unlikely, yet possible", the magician began running through streams of thought, she found that thinking and strategizing, trying to predict what exactly it was that she would have to face helped her stay calm the best.

Mana may have been a patient person but even she had to admit that she was beginning to grow bored, then again, it could have simply been the adrenaline in her blood slowing things down a crawl. That was when the familiar tunnel of light and intensely whirling gas opened up and sucked her in, once again, the same way out as it was on her way in, the magician blitzed through the shrieking gas tunnel with nothing but total blackness in sight before an overwhelming influx of light nearly blinded her completely. Her body was unsealed back from the scroll in a beam of maroon light.

Right as the magician realized what had happened, she saw the ugly and busted open mug of Oto-B grinning nastily up in her face, peculiar sounds of dirt shifting through someone's feet behind her. The audience surrounding Mana witnessed eight sharp steel scythes attached to countless steel bars with a wire running inside of them, each part of the unique construction folded and extended to their user's command, wrapping around the magician and enclosing her in their lethal grip. On the other side, right as Oto-B forced his eight scythes apart, ripping the girl's body to bloody shreds, Jon-D delivered a crushing sword slash aimed at Mana's middle body, aiming to slice her clean in two.

It was not blood from Mana's shredded body that rained and splattered all over the arena, but illusionary flower petals, after the magician managed to slip out of certain death on two fronts. As the words "Flower Petal Escape" softly echoed around the hall, Mana's body gathered itself together slightly further from the two assailants. She could've attempted to exploit her successful genjutsu and escape, but she wasn't sure which one of her assailants would soon be sealed inside the tag scroll, something that'd give the second an easy escape from her attack, which inevitably would divert too much of her attention to the wrong target. She also needed more time to assess the situation – examine the state of the arena and the ultimate fate of her partner.

Oto-B lit up in a maroon light, shortly after, his dematerializing form got sucked into the tag scroll in the shape of a crimson laser beam before disappearing completely. So it was Jon-D who was switched into. A quick look around helped Mana put two on top of two – Roh-D was being carried away in a busted up state, not too dissimilar to the one Oto-B was in suggesting quite a brutal battle has transpired between the two, that meant that he was eliminated. The state of Oto-B was pathetic, he was injured and bleeding all over, his long overcoat was in tatters and he was a pair of good blows away from passing out. The innate slowness of the genin, caused by the pain all over his body, the lack of physical conditioning on his own part and the injuries helped Mana escape in time.

It was a clever plan on Oto-B's behalf – to use his sealing tag right after Mana was beginning to be unsealed. That caused his three seconds of a coordinated attack to kick in right after the magician entered the battlefield and had Mana not gotten used to the oddity of being tagged in and out, as well as the ridiculous injuries of Oto-B, she would have joined the body count of the Chuunin Exams.

Jon-D leaned his body to the ground, spreading his legs out wide and bending them at the knees, his hands moved to the back, reaching for his massive blade. This wasn't very good, Mana was used to evading unarmed taijutsu attacks and excelled at it, evading a skilled swordsman would've meant that all Mana had to rely on was the training with Meiko en route to the Wind Country. The magician breathed in and out, calming herself down – her team was losing, Roh-D got eliminated already but… It was not over yet.

Jon-D blitzed in a bright and brown flash, his tanned skin, shiny armor and bright colored hair, that gained an almost bright pink hue while on the move, caused an amalgam of those dominant colors to flash about as the swordsman rampaged all over the arena. He was not trying to cut Mana down, a painful blow to her chin that sent the magician tumbling towards a hole in the arena, wide enough to tumble into and get ringed out, testified that much. He was just trying to utilize his insane speed and ring the magician out. Another skipped blow made Mana fly off and aside, she managed to get back on her feet just before she tumbled into another hole, another strong kick to the back… He was just toying with her at this point. The origin of those holes must've been a curious story in of itself!

Mana wasn't planning to just play around.

The magician quickly moved into weaving hand seals, biting her finger and drawing blood from her thumb before attempting to push it into her hat, to use her modified version of the Summoning Jutsu. Time appeared to have stopped still as a painful shock to the right side of her chest smacked her out of summoning Usuzoku successfully. Before Mana could process the fact that the massive sword of her opponent actually went through her body a whole third of its length, her body instinctively began pouring chakra into keeping Mana alive and upright. A superhuman version of the more human desire to survive. A rude kick to her chest helped Jon-D to pull out the massive sword from Mana's chest and sent the magician down.

"Those ruthless attacks! Are they trying to kill her"? Someone in the audience rustled uneasily. Mana didn't previously realize just how much all of those constant little dialogues between all those genin teams could've been heard inside the arena. Or maybe it was just her own body in whack augmenting itself in areas she didn't ask it to.

"No, I think he missed her vitals", someone in the audience replied, voicing Mana's own thoughts. Hers, however, were much more hectic due to recently being impaled through by a sword about as large as Jon-D was himself. She was injured far too early into a fight for this wound to be disabling or fight ending but… It placed her on a very strict and vital timer. The chakra sustaining her will not be running forever. She needed to settle this and Oto-B as fast as possible…

"Did you know what I was going for"? Jon-D stopped moving rapidly all across the ravaged and hole filled arena and took a more defensive two handed sword wielding stance. Despite the inhuman size of his blade, the wielder was not by any means slow. If Mana used all of her perception, all of her foresight, it was enough, just barely enough to track the youth's moves.

"Not really, I only noticed after getting injured", Mana grunted in pain, even when there was a massive wound on her side of a large sword going right through her one third of its length, she still had enough chakra to breathe and fight back with that injury. Instinct yelled at Mana to rush at her enemy, use all of her allotted time to ring him out or trick him into her mercy. That would've been a mistake – she needed a better plan than to just rush at a much faster and stronger competitor with such a grievous injury.

The plan that Jon-D was referring to was a massive hole right behind Mana. Had her body undergone all of the chakra augmentations that a ninja would've normally went through while being attempted to be impaled on such a weapon, she'd have been pushed backwards with tremendous force, as the sword's tip failed to penetrate her augmented flesh much farther than the skin, and possibly tumbled in, causing her to be ringed out. Had it not been for Mana's incredible worry over using chakra augmentation, given birth by her burns using it overzealously in the past, and careful weighing of each situation before applying augmentations, that thrust would've pushed her out like a marble hit by a flick.

"Reckless idiots like you are why my sister's been eliminated. I will actually take some pleasure in taking you out", Jon-D shouted out in a fit of anger as he lifted his sword above his head, channeling chakra through it, just like his sister did before him, except on a much more massive scale and intensity. There was no comparison between a Dimensional Slash of a long knife and a massive sword that Jon-D wielded.

"Dimensional Slash"! Jon-D shouted out, swinging his oversized sword downward and smashing it into the arena floor beneath his feet, the overflowing chakra that was being channeled through the blade shot off in a tremendous crescent shaped projectile straight at Mana's direction.

Right as it would've hit the magician head-on, splitting her in two, without a doubt, the projectile faded away, before reappearing to her side. Mana took a strong leap backwards as she let her magician's hat roll down off of her head and into her grip. Mana weaved a hand seal with her free hand and pushed it into the hat, unsealing the wand she had retrieved from the Forest of Death during the week she had to train.

The projectile faded away once again, confusing Mana. It disappeared and reappeared again, like a mysterious figure in a hall of mirrors as it materialized and then got sealed away again, setting off every seal of the Dimensional Blade fighting style that the young swordsman had setup in his blurry blitz earlier.

"Mana"! Kiyomi's scream echoed as the projectile shot right from below the magician, piercing the floor beneath her feet and cutting her in two completely. The separated two pieces of Mana then dissolved into flower petals that didn't appear to confuse Jon-D that much as he quickly resumed a defensive stance, his eyes constantly scurried left to right, scanning the environment around him and wondering just where would his opponent next attack from.

A deafening clang echoed through the Konoha High gym hall, much to the audience's and Jon-D's shock the oversized sword he held firmly in his hands got split in two. Mana shifted her weight from her upper body, from the powerful sledgehammer motion, which she used to swing her Audra steel wand to smash through her opponent's blade, into a strong right kick that would have forced him into one of the eight different tunnels from underground that riddled the arena.

Jon-D locked his hands around Mana's foot and swung her around before releasing her to properly resume his position as all he managed to do in response to her unexpected siege of his defenses was to drop the useless handle part of his sword that he still held in his hands.

Mana coughed up a moderate amount of blood, her head shook in pain as the girl peeled it off the ground and as she moved her wild raven black hair out of the way the gruesome sight of her own blood trail smudged onto the arena floor met her eyes. This was an alarming sign that her chakra that sustained her fighting shape and even possibly her consciousness and her life was beginning to fail to do its job properly and was beginning to leak some blood out, more of it than it should've, anyways.

"That stupid sister of mine… You've noticed it when she used it, right"? Jon-D spat to the side before wiping his nose and removing the rag that he adorned to cover up the lower part of his face. Mana must have made him sweat enough for breathing with that thing on to become rather uncomfortable.

"Yeah… For a handful of moments after you use it, you can't channel chakra through it", Mana wanted to smile but the bloody taste in her mouth made her wish to contain that thought and hide it away lest her entertainment turned into a more gruesome and bloody sight. Something she did not really want.

"Still, I wasn't expecting you to both possess a high-tier enough weapon and the needed skill to channel chakra through tools yourself", Jon-D commended Mana before taking a martial arts stance, this was Mana's area, she could read that basic stance when woken from a deep slumber late at night.

"I don't, this wand is made out of Audra alloy", Mana grumped out before biting her thumb and beginning to weave hand seals using her free arm. Hoping that now that she knew exactly how fast her opponent was, now that she disabled his main and most lethal weapon, now she would be able to complete the set of hand seals. It was surprising that she couldn't before, Mana used to take pride in her hand seal speed for so long that she had never considered that there'd be someone fast enough to still exploit that moment of slipping attention…

Jon-D blitzed into action. Pressing his hands and folding them by his sides, preparing to unleash a chain barrage of punches at Mana's undefended and already injured body. Before he could even move up to her, falling just that much short of length, now that his sword was laying broken in half by where he previously stood, a shiny silver flash made the audience rustle uneasily before a splatter of blood colored the already messy and incredibly bloody arena tiles – this time it was Jon-D's own fluids from a wound in his abdomen caused by a long sword, wielded by a deceitfully cute rabbit warrior.

"What de hell"? Usuzoku's annoyed grumble came out from the cloud of smoke and the dark blueish violet light shining from inside of Mana's hat. "Can't ye do anythin' without mah help"?

That was when Usuzoku moved his cute snout back at Mana to give her an angry glare but his eyes instead shot open wide in surprise of Mana's condition. The magician was clutching at a wound on her chest that not even both of her hands could cover up completely. Blood switched from being perfectly contained to leaking out in handfuls before once again being contained by the diverted chakra flow.

"Sorry, I didn't want Ninja Rabbits to remain only be contracted by a lousy genin, Zoku-chan", Mana smiled kindly through a pale face as it was clear that her timer was approaching the dangerous zone of the scale. "Although, now that I think of it, are summons banned in the exams"? She then suddenly realized before looking questioningly at the overseer.

"If you can pull them off, no", the overseer shook his head. "It's a rare sight in the Chuunin Exams so we didn't bother setting any rules for it".

"Well den, I'll have ta pull both of our weights, won't I"? Usuzoku gave Mana a thumb up, "As much as I hate yer guts, I'd hate lettin' ya disappoint mah proud species even more"!

The rabbit swordsman pulled out his blade before pointing it at Jon-D's direction. "Ye just sit back and see what ye can do about that wound, Hatchling" he confidently grinned.


	347. One of Those Days

After instructing Mana to deal with her injury Usuzoku simply dashed off at Jon-D without saying anything more or sparing anything else than a single blink of an eye to worry about her. As Usuzoku danced around Jon-D's feeble attempts to predict the rabbit's location before kicking and headbutting the young man off his feet with each missed shot, Mana realized that this was not quite the rabbit she had come to know.

Usuzoku did not need any convincing, despite claiming that Mana would never reach the level needed to summon and fight alongside him, whenever the magician called for the Ninja Rabbits, he always came out to her aid. Just one sighting of his summoner having difficulties staying on her feet and bleeding out sent the rabbit into a cold outrage as he continued to toy with his opponent, kicking him around with his larger than half his entire body combined feet or slamming his sword handle at the back of Jon-D's head.

Mana slipped out of the blazer that was part of her uniform and pulled a sharp steel tipped card out of her sleeve before slicing the cloth apart into strands she'd use for tourniquet later on, after placing the card back into the pouch on her thigh. Mana pulled out another card with a rooster mosaic drawn on it before channeling a minuscule bit of her chakra through it and placing it on her gaping wound. Wild tongues of super heated flames erupted from the card, not the type of card to be used offensively, except for showy entertainment – flashy sparks, nothing more. The magician screamed out loud in pain as the flames enveloped her wound and her clothes, momentarily crawling over her entire body, her hair and aiming to cover her whole but dying out before the heat even properly registered in the girl's brain. By the time the fiery coat covered Mana, the flame was already snuffed out.

"Holy shit, yer one crazy gal, Hatchling, 'ere I am tryin' hard for ya an' yer settin' yerself aflame"! Usuzoku chuckled madly after backing out of holding off and toying with his lesser ranked opponent.

"It's gonna look nasty and need treatment, even with it, it'll stay with me for life but… Scar tissue like that doesn't bleed", Mana grinned through a pale face that would've reminded one of a ghastly apparition more than a healthy human girl.

"If it did, my father would've already been dead", Mana sadly looked down, thinking to herself.

Jon-D drew out a kunai and dashed at Usuzoku. A normal mass-produced kunai knife was made of too shoddy of materials to have chakra channeled through it, it snapped quite easily from the slightest chakra-based resistance due to the chakra over matter principle so Usuzoku was right to not feel overly threatened and move in to intercept his opponent. Right before Usuzoku's claymore would have stopped Jon-D's puny knife and snapped it easily, Jon-D gently flicked the knife to his other hand before swiping at Usuzoku's right eye and leaving a shallow cut across the rabbit's face while his free hand gripped Zoku's wrist and stopped the incoming blade that way.

"Zoku-chan"! Mana shouted out in worry over her partner's well-being.

"Shut up, damn ya, I don' need no worryin' from some stupid Hatchling"! Usuzoku grunted, "I hate yer guts and I'd rather we'd find someone else so ya could just die"!

Mana's hands went through a bunch of hand seals, much slower than she used to be able to do before the large blood loss but still remarkably fast for her rank.

"Lightning Style: Magic Skewer" Mana chanted out as Lightning Release chakra poured out from her palms before forming six rod-like shapes in the air surrounding the two clashing weaponry-users and driving themselves into the ground around Jon-D. The swift swordsman leaped aside, gracefully dancing around each and every rod before releasing the kunai as a projectile incoming at a very dangerous trajectory. Mana leaned aside but her vision was getting a bit murky, the kunai scratched her in the cheek much more deeply than she would have liked it to.

Usuzoku launched himself in pursuit after the young man, he found himself in trouble navigating around the large holes all over the arena. Seeing how he was not technically Mana, he couldn't get ringed out, either way, those holes were still troublesome enough to trip him over, if he wasn't careful.

"Multi-Shuriken Technique"! Jon-D yelled out after stopping his back dashing to empty his ninja pouch supply of shuriken at Usuzoku so that he could halt the rabbit's pursuit and injure him. Despite getting some brief close calls, the dark pink rabbit easily deflected the blurry and whizzing stream of shuriken using his sword.

"It's not true, though, is it"? Mana smiled at the rabbit who sheathed his sword and leaned to the ground, preparing his awesomely powerful feet to propel his body at breakneck speed, even by ninja standards, at his opponent.

"Rabbit Art: Double-Draw"! Usuzoku shouted out before letting his feet kick his body off as he dashed past Jon-D's quivering shape. After the rabbit landed firmly on his feet, his sword in hand, he confidently sheathed his sword before his opponent's body erupted into an X-shaped stream of blood showers. That turned out to be just for show, however, as what previously looked to be Jon-D was revealed to be just a substituted upper piece of his large, kitchen knife shaped sword.

"What do ye mean"? Usuzoku straightened his back before glaring at Mana as Jon-D rolled aside before weaving a handful of hand seals.

"Multi-Kunai Technique"! The Kumogakure youth shouted out, emptying the kunai supply at Usuzoku as well, it looked like something of great weight troubled the rabbit as Usuzoku failed to deflect a couple of whizzing by ninja tools that cut him shallowly. Mana better settled this relationship between the two once and for all before denying it dragged Usuzoku down and lead to him getting injured.

"You told me that when I called, someone else would answer. You told me that I'm way below the rank where you'd consider me a worthy partner and yet… Every time I call – you answer. I think that there are plenty of other Ninja Rabbits capable of fighting alongside me, ones weaker and slower than you, more fitting my rank. I think that you actually do like me, I think that you actually do trust me and consider me more than just a nuisance or temporary holder of the contract"! Mana declared boldly.

Usuzoku's gaze widened in surprise before squinting in anger and turning away. He glared away to process something for a while before turning back at the magician.

"So yer gonna help me or what"? He casually asked her, "If yer gonna be my partner, ye better drag yer own weight behind me, at least two leaps behind"!

Mana nodded, smiling. The tone in Usuzoku's voice was crystal clear - he no longer had to lie to Mana, lie to himself, keep thinking about how to trick everyone and himself about his true relationship with the magician and the fact that the Ninja Rabbits needed her as much as she needed them. The fact that after the stunt Mana pulled saving the Rabbit Contract scroll he respected her enough to lend his sword to her aid and pull her out of the mess she constantly made of things. Usuzoku's mind was now clear and free to make him into the rabbit rogue he always was before he met Mana.

After releasing a powerful battle cry, Jon-D dashed straight at Mana, winding his broken sword behind his back and channeling chakra through whatever remained of his broken blade.

"Dimensional Slash"! The Kumogakure genin shouted out before cutting at Mana his blade didn't meet the soft resistance of human flesh, however, it met a firm resistance of an opposing claymore blade in a thunderous clash before Mana, rather clumsily, leaped over Usuzoku, and still feeling dizzy from the blood loss, kicked at Jon-D's teeth.

"Spear Kick"! She yelled out, feeling confident and proud of the combination and the newly defined bond between her and Usuzoku.

However, before her sandal could even fullu connect to the boy's jaw and transfer the force of the impact and grind him to the arena ground, the broken blade of the Kumogakure swordsman cried out in pain, unable to properly channel and contain the chakra channeled through it, instead of unleashing a tremendously sharp cutting projectile, it merely blew Mana and Usuzoku away.

Mana struggled to get up. Her head kept screaming and buzzing, the dizziness in her head and the constant shaking feeling, feeling almost like she was on a ship sailing through the stormy seas, made her nauseous. The only thought that the more she writhed in pain and injury, the more chances she gave her opponent to stab through her exposed back.

"Rabbit Art: Block Breaker"! Usuzoku's voice echoed in Mana's ears as she lifted her head up and bothered to move the messy and sticky hair out of her way to see her partner do his best to buy her time.

Jon-D screamed out in pain, dropping his sword and grabbing his broken dominant hand before Usuzoku sheathed his sword and began kicking the genin about lightly, before finishing the attack with a powerful jump kick to the jaw.

"My… Hand"! Jon-D writhed on the ground, about as pitifully as Mana did moments earlier, however his condition was not due to previously sustained injuries, dizziness or blood loss. It was because of shattered pride as a swordsman. "You filthy animal, using a man-made tool"!

"Tsk, if I'm just a filthy animal, what does that make ye? An arsehole dat went ahead and got himself beat by one"! Usuzoku taunted his whining opponent before jumping up in the air and dropkicking his opponent flying towards a possible ring out before Usuzoku quickly leaped back to his feet and casually began hopping towards Mana, aiming to help her back up.

"Contestant Jon-D – ring out"! The overseer ruled making Usuzoku confidently grin to himself and how his smug refusal to see his opponent fall out the ring paid off and earned him some cool points with the audience.

"So, what's yer plan fer dat last basterd"! Usuzoku grunted after, with his slight aid, Mana got back on her feet.

"I'm going to talk to him", Mana smiled.

The overseer placed his palm in the general direction of Oto-B's tag scroll as his hand lit up with a slightly visible bland blue glow of base chakra color. Using his Remote Sealing technique, the higher ranking ninja unsealed Jon-D's partner, still in his pitiful bleeding and hunched over condition with his odd scythe contraptions still dangling bent up and busted up on his back. He looked like an insect, squished but not enough to kill it, with its long limbs crooked and broken.

"Well, dis guy 'ere has seen bedder days", Usuzoku tilted his snout up confidently.

Mana concentrated and reached out to her opponent's chakra signature just to confirm her thoughts a second time before she attempted this plan of hers. As expected, the genin had a visible lack of chakra, what little remained got spent up just keeping him upright. He did not have much time to lick his wounds in an active battlefield either.

"A Summon? Of all the lousy, miserable…" the battered genin started grumbling before Mana gently stepped up in front of Usuzoku.

"Give up, it's over. I can sense your chakra signature, you have one good technique left in you. You've already seen the capability of my illusions, the question remains, will your one technique be able to beat me or will I just disperse into flower petals and finish you off"? Mana boldly asked, temporarily she allowed small bits and pieces of her remaining chakra pool to accelerate its flow, augmenting the stance and perception of her body, moving past the blurry vision, the dizziness and the unconquerable pull of the gravity that allured her to succumb flat right on her face.

"Why would I ever surrender, you lousy tart"? Oto-B grumbled again, his scythes rose up as Mana admired the intricate mechanisms making those blades move, extend and retract. He was like a blobby arrogant insect where instead of legs there were steel rods, interconnected with wire, tipped with large scythe blades at the end.

"Save yerself de beating while Hatchlin's feelin' merciful"! Usuzoku grabbed the hilt of his sword and pulled it out halfway threateningly.

"The thing is, you pathetic hussy, that I can see you looking a bit bruised and broken yourself. Almost half of your chest looks like a molten stump and your raggedy clothes are soaked with blood, that's an impalement wound you've molded up, right? Just how much does it hurt? I bet it hurts a whole lot", Oto-B shouted out after placing his hands in a hand seal position commanding his intricate scythe contraptions to overflow with chakra channeled through them and shoot right for where Mana was standing.

Slowly, the magician started walking forward, leaning aside and gently yet precisely avoiding the attacks that could not have come at her in a more predictable straight trajectory. They probably would have missed her even if they were allowed to come some further – such was the extent of Mana's injury. Oto-B took a pair of scared and trembling steps backward when Mana walked up right to his face, he continued to try and stab her on his rushing scythe blades but he kept on missing.

"W-what are you doing, you poon? H-How are you doing this"? Oto-B freaked out, continuing to stumble backward. Mana slapped him with an open hand, she didn't augment her slap, not because she wanted a more effective mocking tool but because she was afraid to overexert herself, using ninjutsu carried no similar drawbacks to augmentation, which the magician already had a bad history with using. She was not really doing anything to avoid those strikes, the blood rushing into Oto-B's eyes was simply obstructing the view, not to mention the beating he must have taken in the back-and-forth with Roh-D making his head all dizzy and spinning. He had far too little chakra left to risk augmentation.

"Didn't you see my face on all those posters? I'm the Konoha's Sorceress, I do stage magic for fun, I escape death traps for a living and fool eyes for entertainment", Mana bluffed. It was about time she picked one or two things out from late Tanshu-sensei's book and learned to look as piss-pants intimidating when she spoke as he used to. Obviously, she could not be Red Dog Tanshu, still, if her cuteness and young age got in the way of outright intimidation, she could've added them in and made something new out of it.

Oto-B jumped back on his feet, he thrust his blades at where Mana was standing aiming to skewer the ground. Mana jumped back but felt a sharp impulse burning up on her shoulder. She could not even feel blood trickling down her shoulder, her entire right part of the body felt numb from the wound cauterizing trick she used earlier.

"You're just a poony witch. I am Oto-B from Team Alto and in Team Alto we don't throw fights away meaninglessly. If you lose and get killed off, you weren't worthy of survival in the first place. My Team's honor hinges on my victory"! Oto-B kept shouting madly as he swung his blades around in a blinding barrage of strikes that didn't even look very accurate or having much aim put behind them, that was what made them rather dangerous as they were completely unpredictable.

"Hatchlin' what the feck are ya doin', defend yerself"! Usuzoku's desperate voice made Mana snap out from the fearful delirium of the dancing blades before she noticed his point – her entire body was covered with cuts and lacerations as she must have been tagged at least a good dozen of times with various depths of cut. The rushing adrenaline and her numbed nerve endings made her completely oblivious to hits that came to that area of her body and Oto-B exploited it.

"Pathetic"! Oto-B huffed before erupting into a battle cry. "A loser like you stands no chance of finishing off Team Alto"!

"I see…" Mana looked down in disappointment. She then gave Usuzoku a narrow look surprising the rabbit.

"So yer gonna use dat jutsu then"? He mumbled to himself in a barely audible fashion.

"Shut up"! Oto-B screamed out, pain and anger were making him blind, pride and arrogance were making him oblivious of his chances of winning this match and just what the extents of his injuries and remaining chakra were. His conscious decision to keep on fighting was a danger to his own life. Mana had to take him down.

"You said I still had enough chakra for one "good technique", right? Take it then"! Oto-B shouted wildly as his scythes cut into the arena floor, descending underground. The entire arena began to shake as the already ruined and damaged floor was beginning to crumble and shift. That must have been what caused those holes in the first place – Oto-B's scythes burrowing and attacking from underground.

Mana let her hands work on hand seals freely, completely unwavering by the rushing incoming attacks that brought only death and dismemberment. Oto-B seemed completely unworried by the magician's calmness as he commanded the first wave of his scythe assaults to emerge from underground and begin slowly cutting her apart. After Mana's body was shredded to at least six pieces Oto-B must've realized that this was going way too easy, it was then that Mana's flesh turned into a streaming jet of flower petals that floated away before fading like the illusionary images that they were.

"Where are you, quim"! Oto-B croaked as he began swinging all eight of his emerging scythe tendrils around the arena.

"Stop running yer mouth, ye dick, I'm yer opponent now"! Usuzoku roared as he drew his long sword and charged at Oto-B forcing the genin to re-shift the positioning of his scythes to block the rabbit's charge. With powerful swings, Usuzoku cut through two tendrils, leaving the third one ruined and beyond use but still technically intact, in the strictest manner of speech. Oto-B's fleeting enhanced perception barely registered Usuzoku's face blur right up in his face but instead of a sword piercing his body in its whole, the rabbit poofed away in smoke, using the Substitution Jutsu and replacing himself with Mana, a willing participant, who appeared in the rabbit's place and put her hand onto Oto-B's forehead. Something was different about the magician however, lightning sparks were crackling and running up her down her body, almost like she was leaking massive amounts of Lightning Release chakra and emanating lightning shocks around her.

"Lighting Style: Magician's Touch"! Mana chanted as brief sparks of Lightning Release chakra crackling around her body intensified and the charge rushed right into Oto-B's head, where Mana's body came into contact with his. With his eyes whited out and rolled back and his mouth foamy from the shock of Lightning Release jutsu he was hit by, Oto-B collapsed on the ground and started convulsing.

Mana nodded with a smile at Usuzoku. This rabbit had seen the magician fail again and again to perfect this B-Rank jutsu she had first thought up during her time chasing the Box of Ultimate Bliss and used in its imperfect stages in both the Forest of Death and her short trip to the Naruto and Sasuke's universe. Magician's Touch – a taser-like concept, a taijutsu countering Lightning Release ninjutsu that lets a short surge of Lightning Release chakra to run through her body that was strong enough to temporarily boost her own resistance to Nature Transformation techniques and shock anyone touching her.

"Hmph, contestant Oto-B is clearly unable to continue. This match is over"! The overseer's final ruling made all the fear and all the petrifying sensations in Mana's heart all crumble and burn up at the same time as the magician collapsed on her butt and started just breathing heavily, unable to believe what had just happened.

She won!


	348. Things Pretty Heads Needn't Worry About

After an affirming nod, Usuzoku disappeared in a cloud of smoke, returning to wherever Mana summoned him from. He really was not one for long-winded speeches, sentiments or after-brawl congratulations, knowing that, Mana let him go without anything but a grateful nod back. She knew so little about these ninja rabbits but she was beginning to rely on them more and more. Knowing how every sentiment needed a faked justification of the upkeeping a cool façade variety, as well as Usuzoku's prowess at close range combat, maybe a trip to the ninja rabbit home, masked as training, was due sometime in the future…

Seeing how Mana had trouble comfortably and easily walking downstage, the staff rushed to her aid, helping her get down from the wreckage of the arena. Kiyomi also ran to Mana's aid, congratulating the magician so often and so energetically that the details of each separate congratulation slipped the magician's notice. Given how dizzy and nauseous Mana felt and the innate weakness that would've claimed her if the fight continued ten to fifteen minutes longer, it wasn't something to feel particularly surprised about.

"That was amazing, Mana"! Was one of the calmer congratulations that Mana still managed to hear en route to the infirmary. One of the staff members overseeing the orderly procession of the Chuunin Exams stopped Kiyomi and told her something in a demanding tone that, judging from her face, greatly annoyed the Yamanaka but, with a displeased expression and arms tightly wrapped around her chest, she stayed behind.

"A B-Rank jutsu as well as the Summoning Technique, that's quite advanced for a genin"! One of the assisting staffers helping Mana to get to the infirmary spoke to her. It was just little talk to keep her mind busy and inform the staffers that she was still conscious and that her motor and communication, as well as sensory skills, were intact.

"I may have taken this exam later than most genin. I thought I was overtrained and overqualified, all of us in Team Hokage did", Mana mumbled in return just to calm the staffers down somewhat and help them do their job.

"What was that variation on the Summoning Jutsu though? You pulled your partner out of the hat"? Another staffer expressed surprise and admiration, judging by their tone.

"Leave it to Konoha's Sorceress to make a big show out of it"! The first one replied before Mana could muster up a response and calm her nauseating impulses. She may not have been concussed, comparing to Hisako's violent reaction to concussion all the way back, but something pretty bad must've been going on there.

"I don't like using jutsu I didn't invent, that being said, space-time ninjutsu like the Summoning Jutsu are a bit outside my reach to innovate on. I'd tell you more but a good stage magician never reveals her secrets", Mana tried to smile warmly to the staffers that did their job admirably while still finding kindness within them to take a step or two beyond just the duties of their job. She had no such principles though. She just felt a bit too dizzy to talk about storage seals and combinations of jutsu and chakra control efficiency at that moment.

A different duo of medical ninja greeted Mana in the infirmary. A female senior medical ninja with a young male assistant. The senior medical ninja quickly scanned through Mana's injuries with the Diagnosis Jutsu looking fairly worried about what she saw.

"This one's beyond our capabilities. She is in no danger though, now that the fight is over. I'll give her the basic active battlefield type Mystical Palm treatment, then we'll transfer her to Konoha Hospital", the senior medical kunoichi mentioned to her assistant who wrote it all down into the log of the exam notes. She then started listing a bunch of Mana's injuries to be written down and added to the girl's medical history once she was actually admitted to the Konohagakure Hospital.

"These cuts look fairly careless, did you lose"? The middle aged senior medical kunoichi wondered as she pointed at the lacerations gifted to Mana by Oto-B's scythe contraptions.

"No, I… I'm not sure how those happened. I was easily dodging these one time and then… Next thing I know, my body is cut up like that", Mana grunted in pain as the medical lady tried judging the wounds and deciding if they were minor enough to just be sewn up and healed naturally or if chakra needed to be used. There it was again… The economy of life and death. Mana saw it in the woman's eyes, the eyes of a skilled medical ninja, there was a certain worth to Mana's life and the woman was comparing that worth to the worth of the chakra she still had remaining.

"Do you need food pills"? The medical ninja snapped out of her deep thought process.

"Ummm… No, I'm fairly certain I still have a bit more than half of my chakra pool remaining", Mana curiously took the time to communicate with her own body.

"More than half"!? The medical superior raised an eyebrow, "You shouldn't be lying to the medical ninja, girl. Pride be damned…"

"If that's how the winner looks like, I'd hate to see the other guy. Probably got rushed to the hospital immediately", the younger male assistant smiled at Mana, he looked a bit more inclined to believe Mana's statement.

"It's the truth, I am training my chakra pool through meditation and specific physical exercise. I'm training both the spiritual and the physical sides. I'd say, at this point, there were two or three people in the entire gym hall with higher signatures than mine, Jinchuuriki excluded", Mana explained before the woman began patching Mana's bleeding cuts up.

"Hmmm, impressive… I know what caused those cuts, girl. I have seen it with my own eyes. People with extreme pain tolerance, powering through injury to the point where they become so obsessed with something they do not notice the fact that they are standing as nothing more than a crispy skeleton with their vitals exposed. There's a reason why pain management medical techniques are considered forbidden and it's kept to spiritual meditation and medication, herbs and pills. Pain is necessary, it's an alert mechanism and your body doesn't like being ignored", the woman gave Mana a lecture about pain, as adults tended to do, the ratio of lecturing was proportionately higher in the medical profession as well.

"I know… But", Mana tried to argue – a fatal mistake.

"But? There is no but, girl. What is more important than your own health? Didn't a young man just collapse dead in this very same exam? It used to be a pretty often practice to kill other competitors but even now when it isn't… You young folk are so obsessed with getting as high as you can as fast as you can that you completely ignore your own bodies and health", she kept on lecturing. At this point, Mana resorted to just nodding and taking the woman's words to heart. She did have more experience than the magician did, after all. Technically, Mana had no right to speak against her, not even a reasonable case to make against her arguments.

The door to the infirmary burst open with Kiyomi slowly creeping in. Something was wrong in her mind, she clearly had a package that she pushed deeper down as she sat closer to Mana and smiled like a big sister would.

"So, how are you doing"? She asked.

"Fi…" Mana was about to reply.

"Don't you even finish that word. Tell your friend, why won't you? Tell her the cost you paid going as far as you did. Honestly, none of you youngsters will make it past twenty naturally, even if some bastard doesn't kill you before that", the medical kunoichi interrupted Mana, the magician felt like the reasonable response would've been to be a bit offended by the woman's rudeness but… She kind of found the bluntness of the woman hilarious.

"Well, I got cut up pretty badly, my chest will probably stay scarred like this for life but… One step closer to the next rank", Mana smiled.

"I mean, it probably won't look this bad. We can restore the damaged nerves so you'll be feeling that pain in no time, I'm sure you can't wait", the assistant butt into the conversation with a joke, putting his notes and documents he put into Mana's file aside. "There are plenty of scar treatments that really show promise cosmetically as well".

Mana did recall just how much years of systematic medical ninjutsu visits to the Konoha Hospital helped her father's arms. Those were almost completely charred up when the man was first brought to the hospital whereas now they were just looking slightly scarred and pale. Still, there was always an extent of injury and scarring which went a bit beyond even those treatments and Mana did not feel like the kind of girl who would sit around the village for years, visiting the hospital just to remove the scars she could easily hide from her audience.

"It's fine, nobody will fall for you for your chest anyway, it'll be because of your smile and cucumber cheeks"! Kiyomi grinned with a manner of monkey-like smile that was more akin to Meiko's as she pulled on Mana's cheek teasingly. The magician fought back valiantly with a storm of playful slaps causing Kiyomi's pinching forces to retreat from their foolish venture of pinching the magician's cheeks.

"That was one impressive jutsu you used at the end, something like that doesn't just come up within one week. You've likely been practicing it for a while, how come you've never used it? It'd have helped us so much"! Kiyomi jealously laughed out, commending Mana on a great addition to her arsenal of techniques.

"Yeah, I had the concept in mind since the training in the Sun Disc arena in the Wind Country. Still, it was far too early to use it until now. I don't like to use that word but… It was kind of useless until just a few days ago. It's a defensive very close range technique transferred through touch so I had to polish it to the point where I wouldn't need any hand seals or excessive concentration to pull it off. It only reached that state very recently, even though I was forced to use it a couple of times in its imperfect state", Mana calmly explained.

"Well, we've done about as much as we can. You'll be moved to the Konoha Hospital now", the senior medical ninja informed the two teammates with a softened tone as even her strict heart was crumbling in front of the sisterly bond between the two genin girls.

"Yeah, I think I feel pulsing pain in my chest now…" Mana clutched her messy and stinky, molten flesh wound.

"Well, you did cauterize it with… I'm not even honestly sure what", the woman shrugged, "Humans usually don't just melt like this, I'm not sure just what that temperature you've exposed yourself to was and how much you've lowered your own defenses to cauterize the wound. That's for smarter heads than mine to figure out and deal with. You want a lollipop"?

"I'm a big girl already", Mana pouted, answering the woman's kind stare. After a pair of moments of pouting, the magician swiped the candy from the woman's clutches before stumbling to the wheelchair and letting the medical assistant remove her from the infirmary and begin rolling her down to the door, from where she'd be taken to the hospital.

"You look really… Down. What did those guys tell you after the match"? Mana wondered giving Kiyomi a warm look, one that invited the Yamanaka to share her feelings but didn't presume to be entitled to be shared anything with.

"They… Just asked me to wait and see the next match, you know, they didn't want the next possible competitor wandering around oblivious to the fact they'll need to compete in fifteen minutes", Kiyomi shook her palms at Mana with an attempt to defuse the magician's worries.

"That doesn't sound like something that'd claim the competitive spirit of Yamanaka Kiyomi, the poster child of the entire Yamanaka clan elite, trained by the greatest of the Yamanaka Resort", Mana noted.

"Yeah, that doesn't… I'm fighting next", Kiyomi shrugged.

"Really? Against whom? Partnered with whom"? Mana's curiosity made her jump up to the point where she inconvenienced the medical assistant transporting her.

"Oh, no one important. Don't worry, my partner is… Well, you haven't met him in the Forest, you were encased in crystal by that point, he's really strong. He'll be of great assistance, I'm sure"! Kiyomi quickly attempted to defuse the situation once again. Still feeling a little bit uneasy, Mana let herself get taken to the door, from where she was picked up by a duo of medical ninja with easy carrying seats attached to their backs.

* * *

After the party of medical ninja carrying Mana and a pair of other injured examinees left to Konohagakure Hospital, Kiyomi sighed heavily before placing her hands on her hips and slowly turning around and beginning a tedious and worrisome walk to the gym hall.

In retrospect, maybe Mana would've wanted to know that Kiyomi got the bad end of the draw and ended up needing to face a team that included Doma Nacasa of Team Phobos, the third member of the team Mana was so worried about. From what Kiyomi could gather from the bits and pieces Mana let her know, also, the biggest asshole out of the three, or at least, the most vocal one.

Then again, everything had to be translated from the original angle it came from – Mana's angle. Kiyomi didn't particularly feel any animosity towards a young man so enthusiastic about serving the best interests of his own village. Even if that placed him directly on a crash course against her, the Yamanaka could respect that. What else did matter besides the village? The Feudal Lord, maybe. The entire country, possibly…

Either way, sometimes Mana's moral principles really made things too murky to understand. The girl had a moral code and a way to see the world. That was respectable enough. It was just that this code was not too mature. She involved so many different variables and needless worries, problems of all sorts and sizes and degrees of ridiculous. This exam was somehow vitally important to her, for whatever reason, a dumb moral principle and her own self-drawn image of some childish "hero" she tried to become.

"Then again, maybe that sort of devotion to the exam is admirable in of itself", Kiyomi smiled while thinking to herself as she entered the gym hall and walked up to the completely empty corner that was previously occupied by her team. Now it felt so… Empty. Mana was probably already being rushed to get her treatment, Kiyomi wouldn't be surprised if Hanasaku-sensei just up and left after shutting down Quill B's hopes of killing Kres-T, feeling bored by the exam at this point. The woman did get bored rather quickly by things she had to see over and over again…

"Meiko", Kiyomi left the most worrisome for the end. Every time that the blonde thought about the grisly vision of the blacksmith charging in to face off against someone using the Third Gate and its bloody consequences it made her shiver. Kiyomi's care for Meiko was different compared to the worries she felt for Mana, burning hot to an almost illogical degree and choking up.

Kiyomi had to be snapped out from her daydreaming by a nearby standing Konohagakure ninja. Blushed, after apologizing with a bow of her head she ran up onto the stage and joined her partner – Jekleifer Kaguya from Team Corundum, someone who went from being a short-term opposing force to becoming a partner she would have to count on. There was simply no other way, her opponents were too strong to just power through by her lonesome.

"You just turn around and walk aside. I'll take care of those two all by myself easily"! The towering Zahafbit of Team Pahlavi bravely declared after raising his fist all the way up and shoving it up in Doma's face. Clearly looking annoyed by the idiotic confidence of his teammate, yet choosing not to clash with it just yet, Doma withdrew and calmly approached the tag scroll.

"Do you know this Zahafbit's abilities and fighting style"? Jekleifer wondered, feeling too familiar with Kiyomi and Team Hokage to go through the formal introductions.

"Sorry, I can recall Mana mentioning running into this guy's team, she probably knew it but… I forgot to ask her", Kiyomi played with her hair like a spoiled brat, clearly, she did not just "forget". She just did not want to talk to Mana about the opponents she'd be facing and be forced to either lie to a friend who was like Kiyomi's little sister at times or confess about having to face Doma Nacasa of Team Phobos and then make Mana worry all throughout her stay in the hospital. Something like that could not have been good for one's health…

"Well then, how shall we play it? As I recall you were the leader of your team, weren't you"? Jekleifer raised an eyebrow, clearly looking disappointed by Kiyomi's act, choosing to take it for granted.

"If memory serves, your abilities are actively hurting you too. However, yours is still one of the most powerful bloodlines in this hall. I say I wear both of those guys down, not switch. I let them eliminate me while I let them switch, again and again, then, when they're both weakened and treating the fight as already theirs – you do what you do best", Kiyomi pitched her idea in an uneasy mumble.

"I may have underestimated you before. If anything, your maturity and mind are matching that of a chuunin already", Jekleifer nodded submissively before walking back to the tag scroll and placing his left hand on it, waiting for when preparations would be completed and the fight could've started again on the newly rebuilt arena.

After both seconds tagged out and got sealed up in the sealing dimension, Kiyomi rubbed her itchy nose in nervousness as she was eyeing her opponent.

"I bet you say that to all the girls", she mumbled to herself just to keep her spirits up before a tough and purposefully a bit suicidal battle.


	349. Flaws of Apex-ness

Kiyomi carefully observed her opponent. Without a doubt he'd have noticed her last name when the match was announced, even if he was numb-skulled enough not to have recorded that, Kiyomi's ridiculously flashy blond hair and her bright blue eyes were a dead giveaway of her Yamanaka bloodline. He will know what she is capable of, he will know that one missed hijutsu will lead to a loss and he will be careful.

"Or he could just go right ahead and try the Summoning Jutsu", Kiyomi ironically thought to herself as she saw her opponent reaching in for that very thing.

Kiyomi dashed in. Feeling grateful for all the close range training and overall improvement to her non-ninjutsu related fighting skills during the week of training. She could feel how lightly her each movement made her, the air picking up and rustling her hair and her clothes, pressing them tightly against her skin and the back of her head as she blitzed in, smacking her left elbow to the wrist of Zahafbit's right arm and stopping his hand seal mid-way.

A strong smack to the side of his neck, the towering summoner appeared to white out blank from that blow alone but the blonde simply couldn't risk him waking up from the dizziness and punish her bold close range advances with anything he still had to show. Another barrage of quick chops to the exposed neck and a push kick to the side of his knee before another palm strike straight to his nose, just as he recovered and tried to get back up and respond. That last strike may have been borrowed from Mana's arsenal but the magician was not anywhere near to be able to see it and call Kiyomi out on it. All the sparring they did in the Yamanaka resort seemed to be mutually beneficial.

Zahafbit shot his hands up, palms to the ground and pushed his body back into a rather impressive back vault. Kiyomi just informed the young man that she will not just let him do whatever and that he had to play it smarter if he was to pull off his Summoning Jutsu. Blood still dripped from the thumb he bit into, that may have been dangerous, as he would now take even less time to complete his string of seals…

The young brute reached in for his collar, pulling on his long cloak and removing it with a single motion. Kiyomi followed his movements carefully before realizing what he was doing, once again, the Yamanaka moved in to counter the tricky attempt to hide behind the casual act of removing one's clothes for lighter and unrestricted movement.

Kiyomi's arms grabbed the large wrists of the summoning ninja and kept him from completing their strings, for a brief moment the two toyed around with the floating cloak. Zahafbit attempted to wrap it around Kiyomi's head before delivering a barrage of cheap blows while she was blinded, Kiyomi attempted to tie her opponent's hands in it, restraining his ability to weave hand seals.

The blonde delivered a softening push kick that made Zahafbit flinch for just long enough for her to jump onto his shoulders and wrap the long torn cloth around his wrist before she dived down, wrapping another string around the man's throat and putting him into a neck and hand lock.

Kiyomi tightened the lock, again, then again. She was ready to struggle down there for the whole half an hour needed to choke out an ordinary lower ranked ninja to the verge of passing out. Zahafbit grunted in pain as Kiyomi controlled and was continuously wearing out both his wrist and his throat, which effectively provided air and therefore the source of strength for his entire body.

With a strong roar, Zahafbit used his other arm to help him tear his cloak apart before reaching in for Kiyomi's own throat. The brutish genin lifted Kiyomi up and despite the girl's rapid attempts to smack at the soft spots on his wrist, managed to slam her around a couple of times before kicking her rolling away.

"Those kicks were strong", Kiyomi coughed up, feeling the faint taste of blood in her mouth. "I shouldn't take too many of those or try matching strength with him or I'll be in trouble".

She was lucky that instead of keeping up the tug of war with Kiyomi's physical strength, the genin reached in to tear the cloth. Had Zahafbit gotten the other free hand on her earlier, with the cloth still being a factor, she would have ended up in an even stickier close range situation.

Kiyomi grinned, feeling a strand of her hair shiny blond hair irritatingly rubbing against her fingers. She may have needed to approach this big guy up close one more time. It was a gamble but one with a very pleasant possible payoff, if things went her way.

The Yamanaka heiress relaxed, letting her body completely go numb before flexing all of the muscles requiring for a charge forward in one quick flex, maximizing her movement speed. Her discus elbow missed the large youth entirely as her hand brushed only against floating torn coat of Zahafbit.

"Substitution"! She instantly realized as the large genin used his torn clothes for substitution just to give him a brief time advantage to squeeze his hand seals into.

"Summoning Jutsu"! Zahafbit triumphantly declared as each of his past failures lead to a successful summoning technique return – his first failure helped him draw the blood from his thumb, his second one provided him with an object for substitution and briefly weakened Kiyomi.

A towering red and yellow patterned spider with striped black and golden legs spread out wide and holding his entire frame by supporting his body while using the out of the arena walls of the gym hall for support. Kiyomi wondered why this kaiju-esque monstrosity would ever be one's summon of choice in such a small and tight arena.

Zahafbit's massive spider lowered its diamond shaped belly lower, placing it down against the out of ring floor as a large eye opened up on the lower part of its abdomen. The bulky genin once again initiated a bold attempt at completing a string of hand seals.

Kiyomi placed her hands in the specific Yamanaka hand seal position. She had the advantage, her opponent may have started performing hand seals faster and had a slightly superior hand seal weaving speed but she only needed to perform one.

"Mind Body Disturbance"! Kiyomi shouted out, finally unleashing her risky roll of a dice. She wouldn't be sending her consciousness away like it was in the case of her weaker jutsu, but, as a B-Rank hijutsu, this version cost significantly more chakra to perform so it was a risky move all in of itself.

Zahafbit's body blurred and moved sideways, it was a nice read, as irritated and shocked Kiyomi was from being read so easily by her opponent, she had to admit that much. The spider resting behind Zahafbit shook as if overtaken by chills, feeling foreign chakra entering its primitive nervous system, the arachnid raised its front legs as a warning but it was all in vain.

"Genjutsu: Speyeder"! Zahafbit grinned after completing his interrupted string of hand seals. The colossal eye located on the abdomen of the arachnid opened up and lit up in quite a light show. A bright green flash began seeping into Kiyomi's eyes and a creeping up feeling of falling and the ground collapsing beneath her feet began to overtake all of the other thoughts. Kiyomi was slipping away into unconsciousness, feeling that sensation of helplessness extended over what seemed like an eternity.

"Release"! A commanding voice roared out in the darkness. For a brief moment, Kiyomi wondered whose voice it was. Then, just as her sight, smell and other senses began returning, she began feeling her own chakra pulsing and racing its way through her network and the control over her own body and mind returning as well, the Yamanaka heiress realized that it was her own body and mind that issued a command.

A tremendous shock of pain and gravity shock hit Kiyomi right in the knees, the girl bent down, managing to grab hold of her knees with her hands just barely in time before planting her face all over the arena. The chakra strain of cancelling that genjutsu was tremendous, twice the cost of any jutsu Kiyomi had ever performed which meant that it must've been a high ranking illusion, to dispel it one had to match the amount of alien chakra inserted into their system and then some so Kiyomi tired herself out quite worryingly right there.

"Hmmm. That's impressive", Zahafbit grumbled, looking both sorry and a little bit impressed. It was not an emotion this youth showed often as his face looked weird caught in that weird expression. "To identify that you were under an illusion and then have the chakra needed to break out of it…"

"Next time, when you're trying to surprise someone with genjutsu, don't name your genjutsu starting with Genjutsu", Kiyomi snapped back at her opponent. Truth be told, she herself had basic knowledge and skill in genjutsu, she just never really applied herself in that area since before meeting Mana she kind of had to compensate and perform other roles in her past team. After meeting Mana, such skill would have been irrelevant as Mana was an innovator and a genius in the field. Kiyomi spread her specializations all too wide to be able to match someone as focused on improving that one field as the stage magician was.

The Yamanaka heiress could not let Zahafbit perform that jutsu again, under no circumstances! It took such a massive toll on Kiyomi's chakra pool even right now, at the beginning of the battle to dispel this illusion. By using her most potent Yamanaka hijutsu, then dispelling Zahafbit's illusion, Kiyomi wasted nearly half of her chakra already. She needed to pull all the stops. No hijutsu, no matter the strain or the risk, was riskier than letting that illusion hit Kiyomi again!

He used that spider to initiate the genjutsu and yet… Kiyomi had invaded its nervous system with her Mind Body Disturbance. It was supposed to have been under her complete control and attacked Zahafbit by smashing him with its massive front legs and spitting web, poison, acid, or whatever it was that dripped from its detestable mouth right at its master.

Then again… It was a spider whose mind Kiyomi had invaded. It was no insect but an arachnid, yet it may have just had too primitive of a nervous system to be assaulted through illusions or mental ninjutsu. Kiyomi could vaguely remember hearing that observation from Mana during their training together and seeing refusal to target such feeble targets for illusions by some other genjutsu users. So it was Zahafbit himself, and only him, that needed to be hit by hijutsu. That could have been troublesome!

Zahafbit's hands once again started rushing through hand seals, aiming to initiate his illusion. At least he was a one trick pony, had he had more summons to aid him or more techniques to quickly identify and counter, he'd have been a fairly troublesome opponent.

Kiyomi reached out for her ninja pouch the moment that Zahafbit's arms weaved the first hand seal, she threw a quick pair of kunai knives at her opponent to interrupt his movement and hand seals before she could plan further ahead. Kiyomi's ninja tools got easily swatted aside, that left a shallow cut on the back of Zahafbit's palm but he managed to outwit Kiyomi's attempt to exploit Zahafbit's blockhead nature. Had the genin simply leaped aside again, using his impressive speed and reading Kiyomi's moves, he would have let the Yamanaka hit his spider right in the abdomen eye, disabling its ability to use Speyeder.

"Genjutsu:…" time seemed to slow down when those fateful words left Zahafbit's mouth, Kiyomi's entire body was overflowing with adrenaline and raced to perform the actions she had started before those fearsome words were spoken. The Yamanaka had launched a handful of explosive tags in the air and had begun weaving hand seals for a little ninjutsu of her own. Now it was just a race of time, her own ninjutsu, against the time it would take for Zahafbit to finish that sentence and for Speyeder to set in and overwhelm Kiyomi's mind completely.

"Genjutsu: Speyeder" Zahafbit shouted out.

"Earth Style: Travelling Rock Pillar" Kiyomi responded, racing with her opponent, not too long after.

The blinding emerald glow once again blasted its salad shine onto Kiyomi's eyes, after the initial needle-like poke of pain to her ocular receptors, soon the illusion completely hypnotized the Yamanaka. Just as the blonde felt at ease and about to fall into a comfortable and warm sleep, a powerful blast of both the fiery blaze sight, bitter smoke smell and the ear-sieging shockwave noise variety made her snap out of it. Making the girl shake her head in a desperate attempt of shaking off the lingering smolders of the illusion still in her network.

A painful pulse emanated through Kiyomi's temples, making the Yamanaka rub them worryingly as her entire body felt an intensified tenfold pull of the gravitational forces. The answer was one of the two: either the forces of physics just decided to challenge the girl and change the gravitational pull of her world, or it was merely a way for her own body to relay the information of how strained she was.

Kiyomi tumbled onto her knees, her arm muscles tensed up as she clearly struggled to keep her body standing. She had seen similar signs of fatigue in others. So far she had only the shortness of breath, muscle pain and general feeling of exhaustion. There was no failure in chakra augmentations, failure of chakra control or the black bags under her eyes or bloodshot rings around them. And yet… It was still so difficult to just stand up and keep going.

"It's just a matter of time…" Zahafbit grunted, moving away from his body-shielding pose and trying to look confident in front of his opponent. "You've clearly hit the nail in the head in attempting to settle this – you know that one successful use of Speyeder signals your loss but you can't avoid it forever".

He was talking. That was good. That meant he needed to talk, he needed to stall for time. Those bruises and tears of open flesh and bone all over his muscles betrayed just how much damage he had taken. Sure, it was just grazes and bruises, but it was something. It looked painful and on top of that, it showed something very interesting to Kiyomi…

"So that's what it's like. To know, to see your limits but choose to move past them. To try at the very least…" Kiyomi thought to herself, choosing to completely ignore her opponent's deceitful web of tempting her to end this test. "You two have hit this wall so often, you move past it with such ease that you make it look easy but… It isn't, is it"?

Zahafbit looked back at his spider, the massive arachnid danced with its front legs aggressively shaking the whole arena and cracking several tiles, bumping through several holes in them. The guy may have been a pretty cocky prick, but he did display certain care for the spider, even going so much as to not move away from an upcoming barrage of rising ground pillars carrying explosive tags stuck onto them – one of Kiyomi's more classic combinations.

"You look like you're beginning to hit a wall there. If you try to dispel the illusion now – you may really begin to choke yourself out then. It's always a risk, approaching your limits, not knowing how far you can truly go before you pass out", Zahafbit tried, again and again, to intimidate Kiyomi into surrendering. He talked some mean game. Maybe, three or five years ago Kiyomi would've bought it too…

"You're right", Kiyomi finally gathered enough strength, enough will to keep going and stood back on just one knee. "I just saw a young lady, very dear to me, push herself to her very limits. Past them even. Sacrifice her own body even if it meant that she may as well never walk again! All not to win, not to rank up, but to just prove she's where she belongs to be, to prove someone else wrong and punch them in the face".

"How closely have you been observing the fight of that magician, really"? Zahafbit taunted Kiyomi with a shrug, trying to mock how her recounting of Mana's fight barely even matched the truth.

"I'm not talking about Mana"! Kiyomi shouted out, "Although she also has things to teach me, even though she keeps treating me as if I'm her older sister. She's someone who always counts on the outcome she wants, betting it all and going all in on it, not accepting any other outcomes".

"What of it? Those two are crippled and passed out right now, hardly very fitting role models", Zahafbit shook his head, mocking her friends again. Somehow, Kiyomi was strangely calm about it.

"True, but I wish to be a chuunin, a squad leader. Truth be told, I have played this role in our team for a short while now. Do you really think that after seeing my teammates, those I have lead, give their absolute best and more, I'll accept anything less from myself"!? Kiyomi finally lost her cool. Still, this was no blind anger, this was hype and it most certainly was not blind.

"Suit yourself, as far as my Speyeder goes, it only takes one to knock you out", Zahafbit grumbled as he placed his hands in a preparation stance of hand seal weaving.

"Oh, but one is all you have, isn't it"? Kiyomi smiled, her eyes may have been sunken under her unruly blond hair but her hyped grin was evident from all the way under it.

"What? How much do you underestimate my training to suggest I am only capable of three shots at a B-Rank genjutsu"? Zahafbit grinned, it was a vain and scared smile though, Kiyomi could see it now.

"I'm not talking about you", Kiyomi slowly lifted her arm up, her finger was pointing at the repulsive head of the spider, snapping its large jaws above the arena, due to its size looking too clunky to be able to reach the Yamanaka with them. "I'm talking about your arachnid".

Zahafbit shut his mouth, his smile was changed by a desperate expression of a young vain man grinding his teeth in rage.

"It's a creature of nature, it hunts using that illusion. Why would it have enough chakra for a second, leave alone third shot, if one is all it takes for any prey, small or large, to fall asleep", Kiyomi suggested.

"That's what you're basing your final strategy on? Presumption?" Zahafbit bellowed.

"Oh, no! It wasn't my mind putting it together that told that to me, it was you looking at your partner with such fear after the second shot. You've never done two in a row, have you? You're wondering if you can pull it off, you're treading new grounds threatening me with a third one", Kiyomi concluded.

"No! I just care about my partner, that's all"! Zahafbit lied.

"Huh? An ass like you couldn't help but care only about yourself. The only reason you care about that spider is the same reason a jock cares about their geek pet. The geek gets them through Projectile Trajectory classes", Kiyomi pouted her lips. "You've never once even referred to the damned thing by its real name, can you even remember it at this point"?

"So come, fire away with your third and final shot. Let's settle this already, I have your partner to beat up still", Kiyomi punched her other hand with her knuckle menacingly. Just this time, just this once, it was Zahafbit, the one who usually acted like the apex predator of genin, who looked sweaty and afraid. People who won through one shot jutsu usually couldn't handle the tension of betting everything they had. They felt so often like they had so much else they were holding back, that the very prospect of pulling all of that out petrified them.


	350. The Premature Conclusion

Zahafbit put his hands together, preparing to execute the third strike of his Speyeder illusion. His face was sweating, similarly to Kiyomi's. His hands were slow and heavy, compared to how they moved before. It was not tough to see that the strain of using both the Summoning Jutsu to call for such a giant creature as well as repeatedly bashing his head against the wall with a B-Rank illusion was weighing on him as well, not to the same extent as it was on the spider itself, however.

"Genjutsu: Speyeder"! Zahafbit shouted out, slower, in a more husky and tired tone and with an odd expression on his face. The expression that a rat had when wandering into a maze, knowing that it'd likely result in its death or it getting lost but still wanting that cheese and counting on that slim chance of the fact that maybe the unfortunate will not be happening.

Kiyomi made three quick hand seals with her hands once the illusion of her opponent was concluded and Zahafbit was locked down in just standing still and controlling the stream of chakra that was transformed into light and transmitted through the target's body.

"Transformation Jutsu"! Kiyomi chanted casually, wasting a minuscule speck of chakra on a technique taught to Academy Students.

After a poof of smoke covered the girl, before quickly dissipating, Zahafbit opened his jaw wide. He may have expected Kiyomi on once again counting on overcoming his illusion through dispelling it, something that'd have cost her tremendous effort and even more of her already sliced in half and depleted even further chakra pool.

He may have suspected an attempt by Kiyomi to launch ninja tools at him or the spider, to attempt one of her Yamanaka hijutsu and try to hit it this time. One thing he did not expect was for his opponent to transform into a large anchor and just nonchalantly wait out the emerald glow of the illusion, due to her anchor'y nature being unable to see the emerald light, therefore - harmless to the light-based illusion. Kiyomi waited, while still transformed, for a couple of moments before returning to her original form.

Zahafbit's hands weighed down, swinging weightlessly. His head sunk to the bottom of where his muscular neck allowed it to go. As the youth's handy giant spider dissipated into smoke, leaving large marks and grazes over where it had scratched into the walls and the arena floor to stand upright, he felt completely defeated.

"It's just a matter of time", Kiyomi grinned confidently. "You look like you're beginning to hit the wall there", the blonde teased her opponent with his own words again.

"Transformation Jutsu", Zahafbit chuckled bitterly to himself, "Transformation Jutsu"! He shouted out before he lashed out, rushing at Kiyomi with impending physical attacks. He was smarter than to throw the fight away.

This fighting mode defied and eliminated surrender as a viable option. It may have been reasonable to surrender in a one on one match when there was no hope of beating one's opponent and it was apparent. In this match, one had to maximize the strain that their fight placed on their opponent, surrendering would have wasted potential battle damage and exhaustion that fighting placed on someone. Too much depended on one's refusal to surrender in such a match…

Kiyomi gracefully stepped aside from a powerful downwards cross intended to punch the breath out of her body so that Zahafbit could properly work on her face. The blonde responded with a pair of quick chops and palm strikes where she found the most offensively gaping openings. It did not hit hard, but it annoyed her opponent more and an enraged opponent was easier to read.

Kiyomi kicked her opponent straight in the gut, bending him over and letting her flip over her front and lock her legs around Zahafbit's throat in a reverse choke hold. As she hung downward, tightly wrapping her thighs around her opponent's face, she could freely overwhelm the tired brute with strikes.

That was what she did. Kiyomi just continued to punch, after one hand fired off into a punch, the next one was cocked back and ready to strike again. A barrage of blindingly fast chain punches, unaugmented, just pure physical strength and the fruit of Kiyomi's training with her uncle's assistants. This was the scenario she was preparing herself for – her hijutsu were too slow or predictable, all she had to rely on was her taijutsu.

Zahafbit roared out loudly, gripping hold of Kiyomi in a lightning fast bear hug and forcing her to scream out in pain as her legs got painfully caught out of place and diagonally locked in the bear hug. The genin gained momentum and speed, rushing forward and diving outside of the barrier – heading straight for the ring out. Kiyomi kept on pummeling her opponent's body but Zahafbit was approaching dangerously close to that final diving leap outside. He was too close even for Kiyomi's hijutsu to connect. She only had time for a pair of hand seals now!

"I'll eliminate us both!" Zahafbit huffed out loud, taking a strong tackling leap outside the arena and landing in a body slam that almost dislocated and broke Kiyomi's legs straight outside the arena.

"Contestant Zahafbit, ring out", the overseer ruled.

"What the fuck? I tackled her outside of the ring"! Zahafbit objected after pulling his hands off of Kiyomi and then looking at her again. Blood was seeping from the kunoichi's thighs, hands and her cheek as steel wire was cutting into her body.

"Stwing Weeling Jutfu" she wheezed, still biting into the steel wire. Much to his shock, Zahafbit realized that Kiyomi wasn't really touching the floor outside the ring but hanging by a literal bunch of threads, like a puppet, on steel wire attached to his own tag scroll that was floating immobile through an unclear ninjutsu technique used by the exam staff.

"String Reeling Jutsu! You dare mock me with Academy Techniques again"!? Zahafbit snorted in pure rage before throwing a powerful downwards hook and smashing Kiyomi into the ground, tearing all of the steel strings apart.

"Contestant Zahafbit's team is disqualified for attacking an examinee after elimination. The winning team – Jekleifer Kaguya from Team Corundum, Iwagakure and Yamanaka Kiyomi from Team Hokage, Konohagakure", the overseer ruled.

"W-Wait"! Zahafbit tried to argue but a whole mess came up as he did. Kiyomi rolled on the ground, writhing in pain as her gums and several loose teeth bled profusely and made her spit up blood from time to time. She would not have minded a little bit of help, truthfully, and it felt like a whole eternity until that help came.

"Doma will be really pissed that he got eliminated due to his teammate losing his shit", Gasco Patura of Team Phobos thundered out with his husky voice as staff members helped Kiyomi get up and get to the infirmary and the party passed Team Phobos by.

"True, but it's a little funny, don't you think. The second most powerful genin in the building getting eliminated this way", Stea chuckled to herself before answering Kiyomi's worried glare with a calming and cheerful glance of her own.

* * *

Mana sighed, looking through the hospital window. The day was turning into the night outside as corrupting gloom claimed more and more of the daily light in the sky. By now, the semi-finals of the Chuunin Exams must have been already over and yet she had not heard anything that transpired there. Obviously, the finals would be made into a big deal, with the big breakthrough of television as of late, and movie theatres it would be broadcasted pretty wide. Much more would gather to see it live…

How did Kiyomi do, just what is Meiko's current condition… So many questions plagued the magician and yet… There were other troubles, ones of the more emotional kind plaguing her internally. Kouta did not come. Sure, he was not allowed to be present in the hall during the semi-finals as he was not an examinee anymore but he was allowed in the hospital. Several other Konoha genin present in the hospital received a lot of attention, not from their team but from their past classmates in the Academy and other people who held them dear.

In a way, Mana felt like a foreigner in her own village. Sure, as Konoha's Sorceress, a stage magician, she could gather full halls of people and entertain them pretty well but… As a ninja, she seemed to be either completely unseen or outright disliked due to her Ninja Way or just the way she did things.

Maybe this was a sign, a sign that it was enough. A sign that she wasn't quite ninja material and should've devoted her life just to entertain people on stage? Then again, she did win her match. If she could have advanced onwards, lead her own squads of ninja into missions and even eventually become jounin and saved lives while doing it… Wasn't it her responsibility to walk that cold and gloomy road to its very end?

"Yo"! A familiar rugged face, speaking with an oddly familiar Kumogakure dialect entered the ward. Eiju had changed plenty, his hair had been groomed to be tidier and was combed backward. He had a butter colored stubble and was dressed more formally, which in ninja terms was to say more casually, compared to the more militaristic outfits of most medical ninja who were ready to be called on into extreme impromptu missions at any time.

"Hey, Eiju", Mana smiled softly, "You feeling OK? You look… Tired".

"Well, you're the one in the literal hospital bed with a pretty wicked scar on your chest, love, I know a losing battle of "compare the scars" when I see one", Eiju played it off, as he was known to do, before popping some pills out of his front white jacket pocket.

"Since you're visiting this late, it must mean Kiyomi was sent here too. That means her battle went awry. Is she OK"? Mana sat up worryingly.

"Wow, I forgot when talking to you became… Just standing in the doorway and letting you read me. I could've taken this long because it's been a pretty pissy day what with all those teens almost killing themselves in handfuls"! Eiju sighed before dropping onto shoddy hospital chair and handling it to better fit his confident and cool sitting pose.

Mana kept on staring at a figure from her past awkwardly, with almost scolding eyes that she herself used to get as a child when her mother scolded her.

"Yeah, she's been here. Apart from some missing teeth and several of tears and lacerations on her hands and feet from steel wire – she is just peachy, won the match by herself by having the other bloke break the rules or something. Taking her away from that redhead's ward was a hassle though…" Eiju looked through the window, Mana imagined that her friend must have been glad that the ward was dark and that the magician could not see him look embarrassed after being figured out.

"Meiko's ward? What's the matter? Is everything alright with her"? Mana jumped up and tried to get back up on her feet. It was not a difficult feat since she had gone through plenty of Mystical Palm sessions that day and drank way too many pain numbing herbs teas.

"Wait, you didn't know? Well… That's gonna be a doozy to explain. The redhead's fine, won't be walking for a week or four but... Kiyomi...", Eiju smacked himself in the forehead before stroking his hand up his rich hairline and messing it all up. Not that the young man appeared to care as his workday was pretty much over already. "You see, when a girl loves another girl very very much… Ugh… No, wait…"

"Wait… Kiyomi is in…" Mana blinked a couple of times rapidly. "How does that even…"

Eiju whinnied his erratic laughter out. He was eating Mana's inexperience and childish naivete up. "You know, for an advocate of love for life and an opponent to violence, you sure beat a lot of people up and are quick to judge love", he coughed out, still laughing.

"No, no" Mana shook her palms wildly, with a face as surprised as it was confused, now it was her who felt glad that only the starry sky and the third quarter moon lit up her ward as the lights in the outside corridors were slowly going out, one by one. "I mean… It's fine, I just… Didn't think about it that way… Kiyomi and Meiko, that is".

"Well, what do you know, traveled around the world and still hasn't seen shit. Weren't you visiting Otogakure that one time? That place is the queer capital of the world, well, they don't call it that… I mean… I do, everyone gets pretty pissed when I do so... Then again, people do get pissed when you tell the truth, whatever, I'm just mumbling at this point", Eiju mocked Mana's lack of experience again, something that was becoming a habit of their interactions as, for some reason, whenever they met, they'd always have a short talk of those matters.

"Fair warning though, love, don't call her out on it, or anything. She'll clock you in the face. Learned that one the painful, personal way", Eiju rubbed his right cheek. "Anyways, I recall us talking about some bloke that time, how's that going? Surprised he isn't kneeling by your bed, singing praises like it's your deathbed, which it isn't"! It looked that Eiju felt really obligated to affirm that last part after Mana's blank and pale face after he mentioned it.

"Oh, uh… He broke it apart. I hurt him too much", Mana mumbled under her own nose, just loud enough for her friend to hear, it may have still been a wound spraying fountains of blood but the magician didn't want to repeat those words again so she had to force it out in a way that she'd be properly heard the first time.

"Oh, wow, people usually don't use those personal blame taking mannerisms in those kinds of things. They say "it didn't work out" or shite like that, even if it's all their fault entirely", Eiju rubbed his nose awkwardly, realizing he hit a sensitive nail in the head.

"Speaking from personal experience"? Kiyomi mumbled in the doorway, sounding quite scornful at the blond doctor who jumped back on his feet, fixed his tie and quickly rushed out of the ward, after offering quick farewells to both girls.

"Oh… I thought you'd have left home", Mana mumbled out.

"Yeah, but I have a feeling that sensei of ours hadn't come to visit you today", Kiyomi sighed before entering Mana's ward and sitting down where Eiju was sitting recently.

"I don't think if you noticed but she doesn't like me all that much. Call me paranoid, but I think it has something to do with me risking the life of her favorite student in that forced wedding situation in the Land of Waves", Mana sighed remembering another painful wound still bleeding in her heart after all this time.

"That's not what I meant. She was supposed to brief you about how the semi-finals went and about the finals five weeks from now", Kiyomi replied with irritation, initially Mana felt like her friend was just in a foul mood but it appeared that her ire was not aimed at the magician but rather at the neglectful sensei of theirs.

"Oh… So how did your fight go"? Mana tried to make this situation a bit less of a formal briefing and more like two friends talking on a cold season evening.

"Not as brutal as that punching contest of your crazy partner's but… We won", Kiyomi waved her hand at it.

"I'm pretty sure, when things go like Eiju described them going, the scientific term is "you won"", Mana smiled. "I heard something about Roh-D's battle being a bit wild, was it really that brutal"?

"Girl, you've no goddamn idea! Both Oto-B and Roh-D spent their substitutions early on and had to play safe, right? Except they didn't, they just leaped at each other and started doing their thing, without bothering to defend themselves. Roh-D kept punching, hammering and blasting that chubby bastard but somehow the fatso persevered and after just lobbing scythe combination after scythe combination came out on top. It was beyond brutal"! Kiyomi shook her head as her mind sank back into the awe she was observing those two just standing in front of each other and throwing wild punches and scythe slashes at their opponent.

"OK, so what about the Chuunin Exams, how did the semi finals go, what about the finals"? Mana finally let her friend proceed with what she wanted to tell her in the first place.

"Oh, so after you left, I was partnered with Jekleifer Kaguya, you won't know him, I beat this Zahafbit guy, one sided battle, absolutely no chance for him, trounced him completely. It was so sick that the overseer disqualified his whole team so then your home girl eliminated Doma Nacasa from Team Phobos without even confronting him", Kiyomi grinned with great confidence while giving Mana a thumb up.

"Uh-huh… I am feeling like you're slightly overselling your epic achievements but… For the sake of getting this done, please proceed, eliminating Doma is impressive though, even if it's the first time I hear about you facing Doma", Mana nodded before realizing the weight of the secret that Kiyomi withheld from her. The magician could put it together that it was "for her own sake" and so that Mana would not worry, still, she would've loved to know that Kiyomi would be fighting Doma Nacasa of Team Phobos in her next match back then…

"Okay, so then… Let's see… Tanko Shigin from the Ninja Academy days teamed up with Nanaba from Sugemi's team. Nanaba still hadn't fixed her arms but Shigin completely crushed both Quill B and Ripper Inaba teamed up together with his complete invincibility to actual damage ability. Inaba eliminated Shigin with a genjutsu which he cast using his stupid rhymes as a sound channel but Nana managed to finish the match by that point", Kiyomi recounted.

"Ummm… Okay, I don't remember Shigin being so strong, I think he was always kind of bullied and made fun of in the Academy", Mana scratched her chin before realizing that she may just end up facing him in the finals, "We may need to figure out how that ability of his works, it does sound powerful".

"So, then, in the final match, Yushijin – Kouta's hot as shit teammate teamed up with this Vinda bitch who used some sort of acidic water and burnt both Tolkre Guren, the guy who encased you in crystal back in the Forest of Death, and this Salnisa girl from Sunagakure who threw knives at people using her fan to create wind currents for them to fly through. They were both really badly burnt but I think they're OK now, chakra based acid is very easily removed and its wounds are much more manageable than chakra based fire", Kiyomi sighed after finishing to sum up the matches that Mana had missed.

"Okay, that's some pretty powerful examinees that proceeded to the finals. What are the match-ups"? Mana asked, feeling her heart pumping and breaking out of her chest, in moments like that she almost did not want to know.

"Oh… Ummm… Well…" Kiyomi was clearly quite uncomfortable to tell Mana the exact match up.

"I mean… You came here to tell me, right. If I don't know, it'll just be worse off for…" Mana tried to reason with her hesitant friend before Kiyomi just clenched her fists and shouted out, completely shutting Mana up for good.

"Stea Tesprea from Team Phobos, that's who you'll be facing in five weeks"!


	351. Silence Before the Tempest

The next morning both Mana and Kiyomi went to see Meiko. Mana had not had the chance to see her friend while she was awake since the Chuunin Exams. The blacksmith appeared to be in a very odd mood that happened to change from time to time from one side of the radical emotional spectrum to another. When Mana and Kiyomi first entered the ward, the blacksmith was just blankly staring through the window. A moment later, she was stuffing her face with some chicken and rice like she had not a care in the world…

"So I lost, huh"? Meiko wheezed out with a husky tone.

"Yeah, but you did really well", Mana tried consoling her friend's doubts.

"You pushed yourself way too far though, Meiko. The medical ninja told me you may not walk for up to a whole week and even when you stand back up, it might take a couple of months until you're up on your feet and fighting like you used to", Kiyomi expressed her worries, pressing Meiko. This may have been the wrong approach in all the wrong ways. Then again, given what Mana heard last night this may have been understandable…

"I… I just tried being like you two. This Salnisa girl that had her acid burns treated here earlier told me you two plowed through your opponents all by yourself", Meiko gloomily jumbled some words up.

Mana sighed, "Look, the difference between ninja ranks is tremendous. A young genin is merely just a kid out of the Academy, by the time they become chuunin they're a legitimate threat to their entire world. Jounin are stronger than chuunin proportionately, Sannin and Kage level ninja blow even those amazing ninja away. It is said that a ninja who opens all Eight Gates is capable of competing with and beating a Kage level ninja, no matter their rank. The person you faced was someone who opened three out of the eight gates, still, that person didn't beat you – it was a draw between you two. You have nothing to be ashamed of".

Meiko just glared at Mana with wet shimmering eyes before jumping back to her food. The fact that she felt hungry again and wasn't just rolling around in her bed feeling pity for herself was something that relieved Mana greatly.

"So, these Team Phobos guys… Kiyomi told me yesterday you'll be facing that chick from that team, right? Got any plans yet?" Meiko wondered with a mouth full of rice before she got a chicken bone in her throat and, in a very messy manner, coughed it out.

"It's nothing, I'll think of something. I've got full five weeks for that, it's an exciting challenge really – I know her fighting style, now all I need to do is break through it", Mana dismissed her friend's worries. As simple and naïve Meiko was, even she knew that Mana's match-up five weeks from now was trouble. By confronting it and encouraging the magician to do the same she displayed more maturity than Mana did, who until now has pushed the grim thoughts of the upcoming match deeper down.

* * *

Once Mana returned home, her father turned to the door, his eyes blanked out before he jumped up on his feet and began pointing at Mana like he had seen a ghost. For a moment, the magician felt a bit confused and raised an eyebrow.

"Who's this intruder in hospital-borrowed clothes"!? The man shouted out, "Someone call the Police Force"!

Mana's eyes softened before her little pouty lips turned into a warm smile.

"Very funny, dad".

"So, you're just going to disappear again then? Where are you headed off to now? Another country, another planet, another universe or dimension? I sure hope that place has mail"! Mana's father cheeked the magician again after turning off the wooden box he had for a television in this household and sitting down at the other end of the armchair.

"So you've heard", Mana closed her eyes, she kind of wanted to surprise her parents by relaying the news about her successful Chuunin Exams.

"Oh, yeah, plenty of my old comrades are working on keeping that whole thing running. They told me the whole thing, about how amazing my girl was, beating both opponents alongside her trusty rabbit pal… "Rabbit pal" was what I asked myself because I had no idea my little girl was hanging around with rabbits", father said.

Mana breathed in and out before dropping onto the armchair, closing her eyes and realizing that she was home. Nothing but the assignment five weeks from now…

"So, look, I know that they don't really let all the microbe sharing thing happen in the hospital…" father began a topic that was about to get really painful.

"Kouta broke it off with me", Mana sighed, pressing her hand against her closed eyes so that she did not erupt into a fit of tears. She did not want to talk about it but, honestly, she should have told her parents immediately after it happened. This was on her postponing doing what had to be done.

"Oh… That's odd. Oh well, that's his loss", father cut it silent for a while until it got awkward. "Don't worry, me and your mother cut it off multiple times, once for a seemingly unrepairable reason. In fact, ours was a relationship born out of some of the least functional properties there are so don't model yours after ours. What I'm trying to say is… Just don't think this is the end of the world".

"Dad… I've seen a colossal pirate man literally try to crush the world in between his hands, I kind of know what the end of the world looks like", Mana was glad to be able to successfully change the topic. "I think I'm going to go get a shower".

"Oh, that's not working, I sort of broke it with my clunky insensitive lumps of flesh and… Well… I'm not in any capacity to fix it", father looked at his scarred hands that were shaking just from the brief contact with open air and truly did not look fit for any sort of delicate labor.

"Oh… Well, I'll think of something. It's cold season, the lakes and rivers in the edge of the village are completely empty", Mana sighed.

"No, no… I think I found a pretty helpful concoction of herbs for my hands. This asthmatic and frail young bald man is selling them under the counter, he works night shifts on Wednesdays", father sighed. "So just wait until evening for all your showering needs, I'll be fixing plumbing like in my old days soon".

"I don't know, if that guy is that promising of a healer, he'd do something about his asthma, frailness, and baldness", Mana pouted, it was just her way of softly objecting about her father buying some unheard of medicine from some odd-looking men.

"Look, kid, I worked plenty of shifts watching the Konoha gates in my days. I also patrolled the village and with the regulations and the security in place, he couldn't sell anything less than stellar in quality and, therefore, sky-high in price in this village", father came back at the magician with a fairly solid argument. Smuggling something inside the village with all the barriers and Village Protection Services officers patrolling the streets would be too difficult for a reasonable profit to be made out of it.

* * *

A couple of days passed with Mana doing nothing in particular but recovering from after her grueling match in the semi-finals. By that time, the magician was preparing to train and was beginning to come up with a plan of doing so in a remarkable and efficient way. That was when she found out that Meiko was being released from the hospital, still unable to walk around but otherwise having completely recovered.

After the ordinary morning rituals, Mana rushed to the hospital to see her friend getting released and being sent back home. It was impossible to miss the blacksmith's parents waiting, especially the girl's father who, despite being a pretty massive brute all by himself, also had a very distinctive wheeled contraption with him.

Once Meiko was lead downstairs by some medical ninja and driven to her parents and all the soft and mushy family reunion rituals finished, the blacksmith was quickly repositioned from the hospital's wheelchair into that made by Meiko's father.

"You know, this isn't really necessary", the medical ninja objected, "We are borrowing those to our patients that require them for the short duration of their need".

"Nonsense", Meiko's father rumbled with an authoritative tone in his odd northern dialect and speech pattern, "Daughter wheels around in my wheels, if trouble happens she drives away in under 1267 kilometers per hour using chakra storage seals in exhaust pipes"!

"Awesome"! Meiko shrieked out like a material girl having found the perfect outfit. "Look how smooth the metal-work is! Look how crude the handles are, just imagine how much I can strengthen my upper body using these rough handles at full speed"!

"Meiko is the only person excited to drive around in a wheelchair", Kiyomi rubbed her temples in gentle irritation.

"True, that's why we love her", Mana smiled looking at her friend performing sick and menacing to the passers-by tricks with her hi-speed wheelchair before circling the block and stopping just in time in front of her family and friends.

* * *

At some point, Mana had to confront that whole finals of the Chuunin Exams thing. With the lightning-fast speed of her recovery, she only had a couple of days as an excuse to keep pushing it away. The tremendous challenge of figuring out a way to confront and defeat her opponent was just too big for the magician's head not to start spinning every time she thought of it.

Mana sat down by her desk and began scribbling on a piece of paper. Writing down every jutsu she knew, starting from her starting dozen of almost useless light show tricks to her most recent powerful additions. She then stroke out any damaging moves because they would only be storage for her opponent to use. Mana still wondered just what kind of jutsu Stea's ultimate technique she did not get to use in her battle was, likely it'd have been something highly offensive since from what Mana had seen, the mysterious kunoichi lacked such a technique.

It was not tough to figure out that this ultimate technique of Stea's used the damage stored in her seals in some way. In the most predictable case – it would have been a big blast of some sort, increasing in power the more damage she stored, and with her healing capabilities in mind, Stea had the potential to store a seemingly infinite amount of damage.

"Chakra is a possible weakness", Mana spoke to herself, chewing on her pencil, deep in thought, "Stea's signature dipped significantly in her last fight. If I hit her with an illusion, she'll be forced to dispel it which will cost additional chakra, pushing her to the limit. No, that's stupid…"

Mana was no fool. She wasn't going to fall for such a simple mistake – clearly, Stea will find out from Gasco about Mana's tremendous chakra signature and know about her own shortcomings. The Getsugakure kunoichi was fairly intelligent to have studied and learned medical ninjutsu effectively at her age. She'll put two on top of two and will see through Mana's training focus if this would indeed be it, she'd improve herself in that area in five weeks, no doubt.

Figuring that one was the only one training during these five weeks was one of the most elementary mistakes to make…

Moreover, even if Mana does force Stea on the defensive chakra-wise, she will still need to drive her opponent to heal a couple of times for that to happen. That will just give the starry-eyed opponent of hers additional damage storage. Not to mention the stupid loophole Mana hadn't noticed – what shall she do after Stea falls under a genjutsu? It's not like Mana can force someone to surrender, controlling their mind, like Kiyomi can, nor can she just kill her opponent while they're down like Hisako would've. All Mana could do was to beat on her opponent which meant kept fattening her damage storage.

This was hopeless…

"But then… What about… No… What was that guy's name, the one who died using Mysterious Peacock"? Mana thought to herself before sighing and changing her clothes quickly. She just could not keep on working now that the brave sacrifice of the young man was on her mind, she needed to vent her head, to read up on his country and, maybe find out what she always wanted to – if his sacrifice meant something.

No, that was not enough, Mana needed to relax, all those things: break-up with Kouta, Meiko's injury, her opponent in the finals, the death of that poor youth… It all kept stacking up. She needed to cool off and there was only one way Mana could cool off – magic. She will go to Hiro's Hall, ask Mr. Hiro to get a spot to perform this evening and magic the shit out of her problems.

Mana may have been a martial artist, more exactly – had formal martial arts training, but she didn't have a warrior's heart. Fighting didn't calm her down, it only made it all worse. Performing on stage was the passion that never ceased to entertain both her audience and Mana herself. There was nothing more calming and pleasing than seeing a child's eyes upon laying his eyes on magic trick…

Quickly, using the rooftops, poles and wires – the standard ninja method of travel in Konoha, Mana dashed to Hiro's Hall and met up with Mr. Hiro, arranging an impromptu magic show. He didn't want to host it initially – Mana was a big earner, she deserved a week-long advertising and promotion before each show. Such an erratic show will barely gather half the audience she usually gathered and Hiro could only fit Mana into a late evening hour. None of those things mattered, as long as Mana could perform on stage that day and clear her head.

Then the magician rushed to the Konoha southern gate and read the posters on the info board. Apart from loads and stacks of posters about missing people, a problem to worry about for another time, one that plagued the village for quite a while, as Mana could recall, there was a big flashy poster advertising the Chuunin Exams and the match ups:

1\. Roh-D from Kumogakure V.S. Aozora Yushijin from Konohagakure

2\. Dhaogu from Sunagakure V.S. Gasco Patura from Getsugakure

3\. Buhakim from Sunagakure V.S. Nanaba Aomyaku from Konohagakure

4\. Nara Sugemi from Konohagakure V.S. Vinda Calkem from Getsugakure

5\. Yamanaka Kiyomi from Konohagakure V.S. Tanko Shigin from Konohagakure

6\. Erumo Budoki from Konohagakure V.S. Jekleifer Kaguya from Konohagakure

7\. Gentib de Vitt from Hoshigakure V.S. Kres-T from Kumogakure

8\. Nakotsumi Mana from Konohagakure V.S. Stea Tesprea from Getsugakure

Mana's match was last. that meant it would have been the main draw of the event. It was no surprise that it was positioned in a flashy background and there were more separate posters with Mana's and Stea's faces for promotional material against each other. The magician had spent enough time around show business to know how to promote a big event. So if Mana royally flops on her face, it will be on the grandest stage in her village and failing the hype of everyone gathered there from every village and corner of the world. Having no heart-crushing pressure on one's chest seemed to be a luxury these days…

It was not like Kiyomi had things that much better – she'll be facing the unspoken about monster in Shigin. He was always very faintly whispered about in the Forest of Death, his invincibility ability was continuously scared with like some sort of boogeyman for ninja. But, it wasn't until the semi-finals of the Chuunin Exams that the ability truly was comprehended by the competitors. Mana only wished to have been able to see it first-hand, must have been quite impressive.

With mixed thoughts, but having finally seen the final match-ups table, Mana rushed to the Konoha Archives to read up a little bit. As expected, there was little to nothing to research about these "damage seals", however, they weren't the prime interest that drew the magician into the archives. It was the political standing of Hoshigakure that did.

From what she could've figured out from a bunch of old de-classified intelligence gathering mission debriefings, Hoshigakure was founded in a crater of a large meteor strike, right on top of the irradiated soil. Apparently, a shard of that meteor had fallen off in mid-air and fallen further west to the village, later located by the villagers of the newly established village. The ninja that spied on Hoshigakure reported that the meteorite shard found there was valued for its radioactive properties and that plenty of ninja, with authorization from the local authority, calling themselves the Hoshikage, could train and meditate in the presence of the stone.

If that was true, it may have explained why the users of this Mysterious Peacock Method jutsu were able to tap into radioactive chakra. However, it also greatly crushed Mana internally. The Hoshikage was not loyal or acknowledged as a leader by most other villages or any Feudal Lord. The only reasons why the village was not swept away in the first place, despite being located in Fire Lord's property, was because the irradiated land was fairly useless to the Lord and not worth the squabble.

All that this information meant was that poor Gorm Cleiti died for nothing. His death may have alerted the officials of the other countries that the Mysterious Peacock Method had a weakness but what it did not do was have any meaning to it. No village will bargain with a renegade leader of an unrecognized land to ban the only technique that keeps them on the map. It was the diplomatic disaster to even try. Gorm Cleiti died to no avail and so will more and more youths with bright pink dreams of standing in front of strange space rock to gain its powers…

Mana pushed her chair back before she weightlessly slumped in it and laid seemingly lifeless for a while. All she wanted to know was if Gorm's death will possibly save some lives in the future, which now she found out that it won't. This was the last thing she needed on her consciousness when already struggling to think straight and prepare for the biggest match of her life.

Gorm's death was entirely pointless unless someone makes it mean something…


	352. The New Plan

Feeling a little bit down, after the revelations that the research about Hoshigakure lead her to, Mana rushed to the Hiro's Hall where she was supposed to perform in a very erratically put together magic show. Despite her rush, the magician's eyes did notice a couple of posters stuck on info boards and building walls with her face on it, desperately trying to capture some eyes and do some tragic, non-advertised show course correction.

The hall had an awkwardly smoky and stuffy feeling about it, something that was not its usual feature. Mr. Hiro liked to keep his properties classy, obviously, as long as it cost as little as possible. Mana tried remembering if Mr. Hiro mentioned something about what was supposed to happen in this hour instead of her show but nothing came up. The magician did not want to infringe on anyone's time and she was a big enough earner for Hiro, when she did actually perform, for the man to move his performers around just for her.

This show was no silly and unlikely miracle, the hall was not filled, not anywhere nearly so. It appeared that only the people in whose lives sleep took a tertiary, supporting role, as well as those who just happened to accidentally stumble into the reserved and smoky light show of Mana's impromptu show showed up. Mr. Hiro will not praise her too much, but he was still making a profit, which, given the state of his hall currently, would not be happening if he screened some late-night movie.

Mana's show was hardly anything to write home about as well, not her finest work, coming, obviously, because of the erratic nature of the performance, lack of overdrawn weeklong preparations and long-term planning. She did not use any fancy metallic death traps of anything like that. It was just cold, calculated magic. It was some good as shit magic, but it was completely devoid of emotion or Mana's usual love for the craft.

If there was emotion behind Mana's performance, it was rage. Desperation and rage. Anxiety for the unknowns in the future that was more mature than most gave it credit for, desperation and rage. Mana forced her magic, not in a way that the tricks looked forced or that she was easy to see-through, in a way that an angry martial artist threw punches. The punches were quick, strong, lethal and ruthless, more than capable to do their job and then some… Nevertheless, dark and somber emotions still fueled them, which influenced the "art" part in martial arts.

After Mana finished and bowed to the audience. She received very reserved but consistent claps. There could have been more than forty people watching the show, most of them displayed some sort of a warm reaction but this audience was different from what Mana was used to. These were the people who ruled and thrived in the night, both because the day was too bright for their goals and desires and because some of them simply liked the night better because it was the time when everyone else was asleep and needn't be their problem.

Mana decided not to even go back to her little closet to change and just go back home in her uniform. She felt tired but also quite satisfied. This emotionally fully loaded show kind of helped her do what needed to be done – clear her mind for a good forty-nine minutes and just let go of everything that was holding by her foot tightly and dragging her underwater.

"Not bad, kid. I promised an after-show meeting on the poster, figured I needed something special for this shitty case. Hope it's not a problem"? Mr. Hiro mumbled, as he counted up and handed to the magician her much more modest than the usual fee, in his childish-like tone. It was tough to say if he was angry at Mana from just his eyes, they were always squinted shut and rarely ever let anything but a little bit of light in.

"No, it's fine. I'm sorry, Mr. Hiro, I just… Really needed this, I know nobody came…" Mana apologized because she figured it was in order for her.

"What? Come on, kid, I'm still making money when, otherwise, this place would be only occupied by moths. If you want to see more faces, plan something a bit further ahead, you've got the chops to fill these halls, don't forget that"! Mr. Hiro nodded erratically a pair of times slapping his round belly according to some gloomy music tune that was filling the air in between the shows.

"Right. Better make it to that after-show then", Mana bowed her head and rushed off back to the stage.

She really could have filled this hall. She could have gone from high hundreds to even thousands, over stuffing this hall with people and selling out all of her weekly tickets easily. She used to be that good… Then, all those things happened, she just up and gone off and around the world, then, this whole Chuunin Exams thing happened. Mana had always thought that balancing these two parts of her life was natural for her, maybe it wasn't as easy as she had thought…

Mana sat behind a small desk, talking for a while with any curious fan and giving out small merchandise to all who wanted it. This whole merchandising thing was actually Mana's idea, well, technically, it was someone else's idea in the Naruto's universe. After seeing Boruto walk around with an "action figure" of a movie character from his universe way back during her short trip there, Mana brought some of that back home.

 _"That was quite nostalgic, Sorceress"!_

 _"I liked it, very refreshing to see your show again"!_

 _"This is hokey and your old show was way better"!_

 _"I don't even know why people go see your shows, these movie things are the future"!_

 _"I keep wondering how you did that thing with the cards and the swords and the… I don't think I'll sleep tonight, keeps bugging me, as expected from Konoha's Sorceress"_

 _"I almost missed this show, such strange advertising model, I never miss a show"!_

Mana engaged with each and every fan, or someone who waited for fifteen minutes after a show they disliked just to tell her they hated the show. Honestly, those people she liked the most. Obviously, the criticism like "it's boring" or "magic is shit, movies are better", or "give up" didn't help but many people did express some interesting thoughts. There were even folks that claimed that they usually disliked Mana's shows but her new, aggressive style really drew them in, those very same people advised her to innovate and incorporate something of today's show into her more cheery and child-friendly usual approach to magic.

A middle-aged man with greasy hair and shaking hands approached Mana's table and pulled out a kunai knife. He did not charge at the magician or throw it, the youth just stood there, shaking like a leaf.

"Damn it, I didn't think I dropped anything, how did this slip through my clumsy fingers", Mana smiled and grabbed the blade out of the man's hands faster than his eyes could comprehend. Had he been a real ninja he would still have had troubles following Mana's wrists move, while the magician was no speed demon, her wrists were leagues beyond what most genin her age could muster up.

"It… It was mine. I… I thought of cutting myself with it", the man admitted. Quickly, Mana's neck stretched out, after seeing that only a very minuscule minority remained in the hall, and those few that did showed no interest in approaching or talking to her, she looked at the young man again.

"In my show"? Mana grunted, she wanted to be softer, she wanted to be more understanding and she knew that her tone was not what she wanted it to be. It was no way that a hero spoke to a depressed person but… She may not have been having a day nearly as bad as this youth, hers was still pretty heavy.

"No... Maybe, initially I thought of doing it just somewhere in an alleyway, where no one could find me, then I saw the poster... I'm usually good at staying unnoticed, I'd have laid dead for weeks before anyone would've found me, I bet", the young man huffed out heavily, as he kept on speaking, weight slightly shifted deep in his chest and it was reflected in his clearing out voice.

"Would've made an awesome ninja then", Mana smiled before standing up and taking her coat off of her chair, then, quickly slipping into it. "Come on, let's go for a walk".

"I… Yeah, I guess I could use it", the man ruffled his messy, shoulder-length, greasy hair. "Not gonna get to enjoy the stuffy air for long".

"Look, I'm not going to let you kill yourself, not while I'm there to stop you. Obviously, I am not going to just follow you around your whole life so if you will it – you can always go through with it some other time. I just… We both had pretty rough days, I feel, so may as well breathe some fresh air and relax, you know"? Mana tried calming the overly passionate youth before he tried something she would have to stop him from doing.

"It's not that, I reconsidered. You can leave me alone, just like Mikise did. I'll play along, go to prison and all that", the young man tried shaking Mana's company off. Frankly, it offended the magician a little that even a recently suicidal man did not want to walk to the village center with her.

"Look, you just showed me that you thought my show was a fitting place to commit suicide in. You owe me an apology, you know. Not to mention a blow to my confidence after refusing my offer so soon after I was left alone by someone I love myself", Mana energetically objected but did not make any forceful gestures. The youth played along and just followed Mana around with his hands in his pockets.

"I-I didn't think your show… Okay, I did think it'd be a fitting place but…" he tried apologizing for it like it was something that needed an actual apology.

"It's okay, I was just kidding, you weren't yourself when you made that decision", Mana shut him down in a bit softer tone.

The previously suicidal companion of Mana's scratched his chin as he walked awkwardly beside the magician. He did not appear to care where they were heading to and was, similarly to Mana, just breathing the fresh night's air and enjoying the never dying neon lights illuminating posters and informing the passersby of just what sort of establishment they were wandering past.

"I must admit though, I sort of imagined that the show of Konoha's Sorceress would attract more of an audience. You are certainly capable of it, most of the locals know your face which is rare for a non-ninja", he said after a moment of awkward silence.

"I actually am a ninja, I am aware that my gig as a stage magician has made me rather well-known but rarely does anyone acknowledge anything I've done as a ninja", Mana hummed out with a calm tone, matching the longing mood of the cold night. "I am well aware that my advertising strategy was horrendous tonight. That being said, I do not care to do things in a way that would make me successful, I just do things the way I want to do them. I am a magician because I love performing on stage, not because it'll make me successful and noticed. It's something I have got to do, because I feel like it".

"You are acknowledged though, everyone knows who you are, at least in Konoha", the man mumbled in a strangely humming tone.

"Wait a second, you did want me to fill that hall, right? You wanted it to be full so that you could kill yourself surrounded by people"? Mana turned at her companion in horror.

"That doesn't make any sense", the man coughed out. He was caught, Mana knew it, it was impeccably important for a ninja to be able to read people.

"It makes all of the sense. You said it before – you feel lonely, ignored by the people around you and neglected. You imagine this world to be neglectful towards you and out to get you by making you feel lonely and depriving you of that crucial need for human interaction. You're like a kid, I swear…" Mana shook her head. She tried not to sound judgmental, at least from her own subjective perspective she thought she succeeded.

"How is killing yourself because everyone can't even be bothered to even hate you properly childish"? The man rubbed his cold hands.

"Because it's the way children behave. They believe that the world is out to get them and they are interested in proving that theory. Like a child, you wanted your frustration and anxiety to be justified by killing yourself in a full audience, surrounded by people who just can't be bothered to care about your life – the most important thing there is. I know that much, I am, after all, still a child, as people sometimes let me know", Mana scolded the man.

"You really think my life is that important"? The man raised an eyebrow.

"Everyone's is. No one is unnecessary. nothing is pointless. That is my Nindo, my Ninja Way", Mana smiled before flicking her long dark hair off of her face.

"Teens", the man mumbled after another awkward pause.

"What"?

"Teens do that, not children. Children can't understand the world around them sufficiently to suspect that it's nothing but an evil cabal they had no part in building out to get them. It's usually the shock of transition from a childish point of view to the better understanding that causes this shock", the man clarified his point.

"That's way too smart for me, I am, after all, still a teen, often called childishly", Mana rubbed her forehead, both to alleviate the pain of trying to comprehend the man's words and to warm up her chilly forehead.

"Sorry, I worked in the Konoha Police Force, I was the guy talking to deviant teens", the man softly apologized.

"Worked"? Mana wondered.

"Painful divorce. My wife lied about me beating and raping her in front of the Civilian Tribunal so that she could divorce me", the man admitted, clearly suffering a great deal to recall it.

"Divorce"? Mana slowly spelled the word out, trying to recall what the term meant. "Sorry, not big on the laws that govern civilians".

"Oh, it's… Basically, it's a way to cancel out a marriage, the only way you can divorce is if you prove your husband committed an act of violence against you or that is a threat to his partner's health and life", the man explained. Mana did not feel too happy about forcing the man to explain the parts of his life that completely flipped the table on him but she needed to know.

"I see. It does sound a bit cruel", Mana poked her chin with her index finger trying to come up with something encouraging to tell the man.

"Wanna know how she "proved" the act of violence"? Mana's companion took the initiative. It appeared that the unconfronted anger, that the man still had in his heart, fueled a rant, which, Mana thought, should have helped. "She told the arbiters about it. It was her word against mine".

"Ummm… That doesn't sound right", Mana mumbled, she did not feel too brave making this statement. As she told the man before, she had little to no understanding of how Tribunals and laws really worked. All she was trained to do was fight and do what she was told, it was as simple as that.

"It's not… Sorry… Forgot how young you are and… The whole ninja thing", the man ruffled his hair and rubbed his cheeks again to revitalize them with rushing blood as they were beginning to get numb from the cold, not too long later, Mana did the same.

"Look, what happened to you was cruel, you mentioned something about prison in your future, that's messed up. You could kill yourself, hell, I am sure plenty of people in similar shoes to yours have already done so… Or… You could pick yourself up and take this chance for a fresh start, leaving everything behind, do what I do when I get struck down. Just get back up, cover up your wounds and realize you're going on stronger than you went down", Mana spoke until the cold in the air was beginning to make her throat a bit itchy.

"That makes no sense at all. How can you get back stronger after getting punched down? Don't your injuries make you weaker"? The man raised an eyebrow.

"That's… That's a very good point", Mana pouted. She recalled the many times when Meiko managed to lift her spirits up with words. If only the magician could find that perfect, honest and uplifting thing to say… Sadly, it appeared, she could not even do that most simple thing heroes do.

"Nah, don't worry, I told you already, that damned cards and swords trick will keep me awake at night too. Literally made me rethink my life", the man laughed out before placing his hands inside his pockets, breathing in and out, letting a powerful stream of vapor out from his husky sigh. "Figured I'd try some of that village propaganda bullshit they feed you ninja guys", he shrugged.

"You're stopping here"? Mana raised her eyebrows.

"Yeah, told you that Mikise took my house and kids, got nowhere to go", the man sniffled a pair of times.

"Oh… You could sleep at my place. I mean… All rooms are occupied but the guest room has an armchair you could drop on", Mana suggested.

"Hell no, that sounds awfully awkward and uncomfortable. Plus, I was a parent yesterday too, I know how I'd react if my little girl brought back a hobo", the man sniffled with a smile that Mana just could not understand.

With smiling lips, Mana shuffled around the pockets of her coat before pulling a bunch of folded bills and handed them to the surprised vagabond.

"This is what I've earned this evening. It will not build you a new life, not even close. It should cover up the cost for a room tonight, maybe even dinner, if you are not into lavish seafood. Just promise me you'll…"

"Yeah…" the man nodded before Mana could finish that sentence and walked away into the gentle mist of the approaching winter. "Did I just… Help someone"? She wondered to herself long after the man had walked away and she was left all by herself in the village center.

* * *

Half an hour later Mana quietly returned back home, trying not to disturb anyone who was sleeping. Her mother usually got up pretty early to open up and manage her little café throughout the whole workday so she was probably already asleep. Father was watching that wooden flashy box again, rubbing his scarred arms. The pain must've been keeping him awake again.

"Hey, kid, how's the show"? He asked with slight irritation in his voice, Mana knew it was the pain.

"Someone actually came, didn't thought they would. How did you know"? She wondered.

"Saw a poster near the herb shop", he nonchalantly replied.

"I… I think I'm going to lose in the Chuunin Exams and retire", Mana spoke up after walking up to her father and sitting down by his side.


	353. Date Night

"Lose your match and retire, are you sure"? Mana's father looked at his daughter in confusion. To him, this announcement must have come out of nowhere.

"Yeah. I saw today that I can help much more people as a performer on stage. Ever since I became a ninja all I've done was fail. I've failed Shimo, I wasn't there to help Sugemi in a tough moment, I wasn't strong enough to stand with Tanshu-sensei and help him survive that Kage Summit… I could sit here listing all the people I've let down and failed to save for days. Today I've seen how being a simple stage magician can help people, instead of foolishly dreaming of power strong enough to save the entire world. I've been told many times in the Academy and outside that I'm being childish with my dreams, maybe it's about time I take note of those remarks", Mana fired up.

The magician was afraid by how tough her conviction was. Her heart was ready to denounce what she had worked for over a decade to build and give it all up, just to push all of her chips on another passion of hers, one that usually worked alongside the first but now got neglected for too long.

"Okay", father nodded and rested his head back on a cushion, extending his legs and resting his scarred and shaking in pain hands on his hips.

"Okay"? Mana raised an eyebrow. She expected her father to argue, even worse than that, Kiyomi and Meiko will probably outright try to punch her back into the path of a ninja.

"What do you expect me to tell you? My life is never going to be the same because I was a ninja and walked that path to its end, do you truly want me to bully my daughter into taking the path that took away my arms, my night sleep and part of my sanity? All that will satisfy me and your mother is if you're happy", the man huffed out. "Unless… You want to be talked out of it"?

"No"! Mana firmly crossed her hands, "Although... I can't just quit the Chuunin Exams now, if I put up a good fight, Stea may still get promoted. It'd be really rude of me to back out and ruin her chance at getting promoted and saving her village".

"Her village"? Father asked the magician to elaborate.

"Yeah, she once said something about that… Her village is really poor and struggles with basic resources, they're in dire need of higher ranking and more famous ninja to attract more clients", Mana nodded. "Frankly, I'd feel bad about beating her even if I tried".

"It's not about that", father coughed, "Promotion in the Chuunin Exams has nothing to do with winning or losing, remember. It's all about impressing the Ninja Council".

"I know that, dad", Mana nodded before looking through the kitchen window further away into a wilting apple tree in the yard.

"Okay, if that's what you want to do, go ahead. You're making a fair fee from your shows, you'll be capable of living a pretty lavish life that way and we won't have to worry about some cosmic size pirate crushing our daughter alongside with the entire planet every week", father mumbled it out in a slurry manner. He was getting really sleepy so Mana just smiled, covered him with a blanket and quietly tip-tapped into her own room to call it a day.

* * *

Two weeks had passed, marking halfway of the preparation time for the final match, something that came completely unnoticed to Mana. The girl had been working double time on her shows, putting on a magic show every other day while working on said magic show during the days off.

Mana had to admit she was happier than she was in a long time. She had reconnected with her parents as her father helped her work on props with his amazing insight into engineering them. He even helped her make a couple of after taking some of those miraculous herb mixtures he spoke with Mana about before. Initially the magician was worried about her father taking unknown mixtures without consulting a medical professional but seeing him happy and tinkering like that swatted those worries away.

Mother's smile was equally invaluable and a treasure to see. It required no higher intellect to sum up her thoughts whenever the woman returned tired from a busy day of managing her own respectable establishment and doing business work to a happy and functional family, working together towards something beautiful. Could Mana really have been blamed for letting this pink childish dream to lull her in?

Hiro's Hall was getting filled and even overfilled each and every show. For the first time in a while, Mana was performing in a prime time spot and it was not just a one-time thing. She was holding and owning that spot consistently. Obviously, things could have been a bit better – Kiyomi and Meiko could have come to see the show, at least occasionally, but Meiko was still busy recovering and Kiyomi was most likely away training hard in preparation for her match.

One evening, while walking out from yet another successful show, Mana accidentally noticed a scene transpiring. A circle of people surrounded something that attracted their attention, the fact that it did implied that it was either something wondrous or something terrible.

"You motherfucker! You have some nerve showing your face in public after the stunt you pulled"! A familiar and, frankly, terrifyingly so voice reached Mana's curious ears. Mana's heart froze over just hearing Doma Nacasa's voice after managing to keep her ninja and her stage magic worlds apart.

"Me? What the fuck is your problem? Konoha's Sorceress' show is the place to relax, you're here too, aren't you"? Another slightly familiar voice from Mana's past echoed out, this one was a little more obscure and the magician couldn't exactly remember the name of the young man who owned it. She had to gently rub shoulders against the crowd to get to the center of it to identify the tall and muscular figure with a purple mohawk donning head.

"Sure, but at least I'm not a fucking embarrassment to my village! I was never beaten in battle, just eliminated by a pitiful excuse of a partner"! Doma grunted winding up a punch.

As the Getsugakure genin's arm extended, a firm and down-pulling grip of a lightning fast wrist met it in a split-lightning moment, before the magician's leg extended upwards and descended down after a gentle leap up resulting in a powerful axe kick, which Doma only had one hand to defend from. While Doma placed his block up just right and blocked Mana's smashing kick to the back of his head, it still visibly dealt some damage to both his head and the blocking hand.

"Cut it out", Mana firmly demanded of the two genin.

Doma's eyes appeared to try and incinerate the magician with a furious blazing ocular flare unlike anything else. Mana's glance momentarily wandered onto Stea who quietly consulted Gasco, who stood right beside her. These two didn't look that willing to interfere, it looked like they rarely did, whenever Doma ran his mouth into another fight.

"Hey, what do you think you're doing, I don't need your help", Zahafbit's voice thundered behind Mana who placed her body in between the two feuding genin.

Even now the magician could hear slithering whispers about the feat she just pulled, it infuriated her to no end, exposing her audience who longed for nothing else but entertainment to this kind of violence and rudeness. All she wanted was to perform onstage, rethink her life but it appeared that there were people willing to drag her back down and try mix those two worlds of Mana's together. That was something Mana could not forgive.

"I'm sorry, Zahafbit, this must've been really uncomfortable for you after a difficult time at the Chuunin Exams. I hope you don't let this experience define your opinion of Konoha and that you and your dear ones choose to visit it sometime again", Mana smiled back at the less than polite brute.

Gasco approached Doma in slight confusion before whispering something in the young man's ear. After hearing the whisper out the Getsugakure genin raised his eyebrows in surprise and exclaimed something unintelligible back to the large brute. Gasco walked back to Stea who had by then joined into the crowd that circled the violently escalating situation outside Hiro's Hall.

"Gasco says that your chakra signature hasn't increased at all since the semi-finals, neither, he says, has your sensory abilities", Doma exclaimed in confusion. "The fact that you're wasting time on some magic shows, instead of your training, confuses me".

"So what if I do spend more time performing on stage than training"? Mana asked.

"You cocky bitch, ninja like you, a waste of their village's money and time, I cannot stand the most in this world"! Doma grunted aggressively before checking his wrist and taking a fighting pose. "I'm gonna take you on and show Stea just what kind of training you've been doing before your match in the finals. Then she's gonna mop the floor with you in front of your beloved village"!

"There's no need for that", Mana placed her hands behind her back and straightened her back in a pacifyingly passive pose. "My chakra or my sensory abilities have not grown at all because I have not done any training at all for two weeks".

"Tsk", Doma clicked with his tongue angrily as he composed himself and placed his hands inside his pockets. This youth may have been a loose cannon and quite explosively violent and rude towards ninja he deemed "a waste" but he was smarter than to start an all-out brawl in the middle of the village. "You've done it now, you've gone and pissed me off".

"Frankly, I don't particularly care about how you feel about it. Cut this fighting out already", Mana threw back at him as she turned around and considered walking away herself.

"Oh no, I'm not letting it go like that. Fight me, seriously, one on one, in the Training Grounds No. 28 in two hours", Doma calmly and confidently challenged the magician.

"I won't. I thought I told you already, I'm quitting this ninja business and doubling down on being a stage magician", Mana replied without turning back, nodding slightly towards Zahafbit, who was still shaking in his boots, whether of fear or of anger that he wasn't included in this conversation at all.

"You don't get to back out, you wasteful bitch"! Doma grunted out loud, taking an aggressive step forward, "If you don't fight me, or if you half-ass it, I'll kill that mohawk bastard. If you take me on, win or lose, that'll be the end of my problem with him, you won't have to bother me killing him anymore or causing problems".

"Fine", Mana threw back carelessly. Doma was strong, he was basically as strong as Stea herself, except he had no ability to heal and recover from the damage he took and stored into his seals. From what Mana could remember, he had powerful ninjutsu in his arsenal as well to worry about. They would be made even more powerful by his damage seals too.

* * *

Two hours was basically no time at all, barely enough time for Mana to change out of her magician's uniform into her modified for combat version. Check and recheck the storage seals inside her hat, stretch out and figure out her strategy. She wasn't counting very hard on winning, all she had to do was stand back and wear Doma out until he ran out of chakra. Make him swing his fists blindly without landing a single blow. Mana had faced more skilled opponents up close with great success.

Training Grounds No. 28 was a short trek away past the village gates. It was a hundred and fifty meters in radius wasteland, surrounded by rocky cliffs. All erected artificially. Maintained and repaired daily by Earth Release users. It made for a pretty easy and danger-free C-Rank mission for them.

Mana was surprised to find Zahafbit sitting around by one of those tall rocks, nonchalantly whistling a tune to himself. Upon being given the magician's confused glare, the Sunagakure ninja just shrugged.

"This battle concerns my fate too, I'm just here to check that you're not being screwed over and tag teamed all of a sudden", the genin claimed. He was not a complete non-factor, Zahafbit was, after all, a genjutsu user which meant he had a very handy skillset which damage seal users had little to no defense against. While Mana had faith in Team Phobos' moral compass, Zahafbit was a fair countermeasure against dirty play.

"Hmph, you showed up", Doma grumbled with his hands crossed over his chest.

"I thought that much was clear", Mana raised an eyebrow, wondering what exactly did she do wrong by this young man this time.

"So you're a waste of your village resources and you're brave… What a pitiful combination. Just how much manpower is wasted healing your reckless weakling ass"? Doma grunted before taking an offensive fighting pose and thusly letting the magician know that his question was rhetorical.

"I don't quite understand your gripe with me or Zahafbit", Mana answered, taking a neutral defensive stance, "Zahafbit came farther in the Chuunin Exam than most, I have completed plenty of missions successfully and have been a fairly handy asset to my village as well. Neither one of us is a detriment to our village's military force or a waste of their resources".

"I didn't invite you here to talk things over nor do I have a duty to make my position make sense to you"! Doma shouted out before launching himself at Mana. The Team Phobos member was fast, as it was to be expected, his speed and strength were at the very least above the average, his technique was painfully average. He was clearly not a taijutsu focused ninja but his fighting style mirrored Stea's – get hurt in close distance and trick your opponent into a false sense of security, then overwhelm them with damage seal enhanced jutsu.

Mana carefully avoided most of the wild swipes and kicks thrown her way. She may have skipped a blow or two but they weren't strong enough to throw off her defensive rhythm. Doma's martial arts style was odd, it wasn't any martial art Mana had seen or studied. It was like the young man had simply watched an Inuzuka clansman fight up close and then decided to copy their moves with a very raw understanding of that style. That raw and unpolished manner was what threw Mana off and made her tagged a pair of times.

Wiping her lip and noticing no blood on them, Mana just resumed her defensive stance. She was about to sum up her opponent's style, then he would land not a single strike on her from that point on. After that, he will get frustrated, start lobbing random jutsu her direction.

"You know, if you're just here to get the shit beaten out of you, you may as well stop wriggling and weaseling out of my punches", Doma grunted before throwing another similar series of punches and kicks. He was luring Mana into countering, he wanted Mana to exploit his lacking style. He was the real weasel. Mana tapped the young man's feet and wrists lightly, deflecting every strike he threw before butting her hip against his and pushing him tumbling over and rolling back to where he charged her at.

It was clear that Doma was beginning to lose it. Doma grunted out before flipping out and pulling two kunai out from under his long hooded cloak and charging at Mana with them. The magician leaned aside from every swipe, every flip and slash thrown her way before angrily stomping on the genin's foot making something churn and crack painfully. That opened the youth up for a barrage of kicks all over his face and body.

With a loud poof and a cloud of smoke, it appeared that Mana had been damaging the genin's cloak, which Doma had substituted with. She had suspected that much, there was no way that Doma would let Mana crush his foot normally, he may have used the damage but he also valued being able to walk. He fought so much differently than Stea, he evaluated the damage he would take and store, whereas Stea just took it all in and healed it up later.

Mana quickly turned around to catch a knife that would have penetrated her from behind before breaking Doma's wrist and forcing him to drop it. She then grabbed Doma's other wrist and pummeled the youth's chest with a barrage of palm strikes to force him to slide back and let go of the second kunai before letting both knives clang down on the ground.

"You bitch, I told you, no half-assing it"! Doma roared out. He was furious, Mana had placed him in an uncomfortable situation – he was stuck strategy wise. He couldn't get damaged to store enough damage into his seals and his ninjutsu would've wasted too much chakra to be worth using as they were, without being empowered. He was completely out of options.

"No, this is the strategy I plan to use against Stea, isn't that what this fight is all about? I doubt you'd be as pitiful as to hold a grudge against Zahafbit so long", Mana shook her head. She was careful not to put too much force into those palm strikes, make them just dull enough to push her opponent away and drop his weapon but not aim to crack any ribs.

"Y-You're just playing your stupid games"! Doma shouted out before jumping high up in the air. He definitely used a bunch of chakra to aid him in that jump, Mana could feel a pulse of it all over the ground beneath her feet. The young man spread his frail arms aside as kunai began flocking from the pockets of his vest and his ninja pouch, floating in mid-air around the young man.

"Ninja Style: Assault Blade"! Doma shouted out as he moved his hand as an order for the blades to flock and assault the magician down below. Mana carefully and gracefully danced around the raining knives, avoiding each and every one of them. She was trained to be faster and better than this. Finally, she had pushed Doma to him being forced to use his ninjutsu in their base, weakened state to bail him out of the deadlock. Still, something was wrong, this attack was far too basic.

"String Reeling Jutsu"! Doma chanted out, in mid-fall as he pulled on steel wire that became visible only once he began channeling chakra through it and changed the direction of the blades he had unleashed on Mana. A disgusting fleshy noise and the noise of blood splattering over the wasteland dirt echoed as Doma raised up the scattered blades that have missed their mark and brought them back for a new dance.


	354. Mana's Gamble

The blood that splattered over the wasteland dust rose up, together with the lifeless body of a stage magician girl, skewered by knives, joints broken and twisted by steel wire. Together the gruesome sight transformed into crimson rose, white apple and pink cherry petals and scattered across, dancing gracefully wherever the wind carried them.

"Finally you're fighting for keeps", Doma grumbled to himself sarcastically after landing firmly on his feet and preparing for the petals to reassemble into the magician's shape. He had seen this illusion before, the genin had full knowledge that Mana could reappear anywhere instantly. Her stealthy walk while disguised by the genjutsu was near untraceable while her spirit remained calm.

Just like that, Mana had revealed her strongest defensive escape technique. The girl scolded herself internally for showing it off any more than she already has. If she showed it a couple more times, both Doma and Stea would have figured out that its chakra cost grew progressively with each use.

Mana appeared from behind Doma, the genin had anticipated such bold approach and successfully deflected a bunch of crippling kicks, packed with chakra augmentations that would have shattered his body and while they would have loaded up his damage seals, they would have also made his body too battered for that stacked damage to be of any use. The magician was persistent, however. She managed to force in one good kick right in Doma's abdomen before leaping into the air and shifting the weight to make it into a push kick.

"Lightning Style: Magician's Touch"! Mana shouted out as she felt the strain of focusing so much Lightning Release chakra in her body and augmenting it to withstand the charge running through her body before being channeled right into her opponent's hurt her rusty network and muscles. A strong lightning pulse fired off and out Doma's body, running over his chakra network and interrupting all sorts of bodily functions before sending the Getsugakure genin rolling aside and smashing into the mountainous structure farther away, shattering it into bits from the force of impact.

Her chakra control was lacking. This was dangerous, even after all this time this jutsu was difficult to pull off. Of course, it was, not only Mana pulled out a B-Rank technique, but also she did it on a high enough level where she neither took additional time to focus and channel her chakra nor perform any hand seals. It was a dangerous method of using ninjutsu, even ones she trained with for as long as she did with the Magician's Touch.

A flash of lightning emanated from the messy rubble of rock and dust, splitting the larger pieces of debris that covered Doma up once the mountainous structure collapsed. Overloaded with the force of chakra coming from the strikes, the rock just exploded into smaller pebbles after being cut into pieces instead of just falling apart. Looking excited, Doma burst from the rubble and landed in front of the magician.

"So that's your strategy…", he mumbled.

"You, of all people, can't blame me", Mana huffed forcing her strained body to straighten up and stop betraying her moment of weakness. "I'm being efficient, am I not"?

Yes, she was technically storing Doma's seals with damage by attacking him but that was inevitable. She needed to inflict damage to beat him, that was the essence of battle. Mana's answer was the way she damaged him – hit him with all of her strongest techniques, aiming to take him out quickly. Risking both missing her most costly and powerful jutsu and running out of chakra in the process, it was the most gambling strategy one could've employed. Still, odds were tipped slightly to Mana's favor once one remembered her larger than usual chakra pool.

"Efficient"? Doma cried out with a hurt voice, it must have played a note deep somewhere, so much so that the young man did not exploit a visible momentary weakness after Mana had just used her Magician's Touch with less than completely optimal success. "What do you know of efficiency"? He asked longingly as his eyes looked down.

* * *

Little Doma laid quietly in his room. Holding his roaring stomach, wrapped in a fetal position on the wooden floor, he had no bed to cry on. The material possessions went away first of all – bargained away for food. That was when everyone was still chipper and optimistic. When everyone thought this famine was just a little bump on a long and prosperous road, little did they know that famine was the road in its entirety…

Jewelry, furniture, comfort items, later on even the plumbing got disassembled and pawned into the metal shop for the coins that shit covered aluminum in it was worth. Then came the real desperation… By the time caravan drivers started eating their horses in the middle of the street it became clear that all stops were pulled, nothing was sacred anymore. It was survival of the fittest.

Sister was wasteful. Last week she threw away a can of rotten, moldy… It was tough to say what it was at this point, with one rotten olive remaining somewhere in the bottom. Father brought it from someone's garbage bin, he said that the owners of the house must have been dead inside or else the can would not have ended up there in the first place. Doma and sister used to look for food earlier, they were smaller, burned fewer calories that way – it was the less wasteful way.

After Jinuya, Doma's friend, got cannibalized while looking for food by a family whose territory he stumbled into, father took over that duty. It was a bit more wasteful but for kids to be outside all by themselves it was profoundly dangerous at this point. Sister was wasteful last week but father was nice, he only ate sister's arm. Most parents had long since eaten their children at this point. Was there ever to be an end to this hunger?

Mommy used to be a ninja, she said that it was all hopeless. No one was hiring them anymore, no civilian wanted anything else but food and no ninja had enough energy left in them to do anything but eat for themselves. Even their supernatural metabolisms did not hold too well. Mommy did not need to eat for months once she ate one time, still, as her chakra was running low, these impressive stretches shortened with each passing dinner.

Sister was wasteful again yesterday. For someone so small, for someone with just one arm she ate just as much as father. That did not look right. Father and mother will probably eat sister soon, too wasteful. Doma looked at a burst purple balloon that he cradled and played with in his hand, his one and only friend. Frankly, only because it was rubbery and didn't taste too well, Doma would never eat it, it would never feel the need to eat Doma. The balloon slipped off of the boy's skeletal fingers but Doma lacked the strength to pick it off the ground.

"Doma won't eat sister, balloon", the boy mumbled, he felt bad, not the stomach pain, that was a part of Doma at this point. It was the different kind of stomach pain, one that just eating fingernails and dog droppings didn't help with. "Doma knows it's wrong but… Doma feels like eating sister would be more wrong, balloon".

"What am I talking about"? Doma wanted to bang his head against the wooden floor but couldn't, lifting his head off the boards would have required more strength than the boy had to give. "You can't hear me, balloon, you've long since burst".

Something loud rumbled below, people started shouting. Doma turned his head in a way that lifted his right ear off the floor so that he could hear the mumblings below. These boards were trashy, the palm leaves that were inserted in between layers of boards were long since pulled out and eaten.

"Is anyone in this house a ninja, boy"? Someone loudly asked, mother was crying, father could not be heard.

"Yeah, this woman. The boy on the upper floor also has an above average chakra level, this woman must've trained him to make him more resistant to famine", a loud still breaking voice of a male teen reached Doma's weak ears.

"You have cannibalized your own daughter. We understand, it is too common occurrence for me to judge you these days but ninja are too valuable. Ninja are the only hope to make money, money is the only hope to make food now that the Eight Tails had scared all the fish away from our shores…" the shaking masculine voice posturized while mother wept. The door to Doma's door opened. Doma had no power left to resist the tall bald young man in a leather vest who picked him off the floor and flipped over his shoulders.

Mother and father laid by sister's bloody body. They were crushed, they both knew what they were doing but somehow this old man seeing them do it, even if he displayed a surprising amount of understanding and tolerance for their difficult time, made them remember their humanity that was long lost in this perpetual struggle for survival.

"Please… Take our Doma…" mother begged. Her voice had returned to resembling the old days somewhat, the days when food was not necessarily plentiful but at least not nearly as luxurious. "I will never be able to live with what we've done once this is all over but… He's different. He still has a clear conscience…".

"I understand", a short and balding elder nodded, "Let's go, Gasco, let's feed this boy and start his training. We are one ninja short from a real ninja team".

"This boy is weak, are you sure you want to waste as little food as we have on revitalizing him"? Gasco looked coldly at the old man, who just nodded in determination before giving the barely lively Doma a warm look.

"Maybe, just maybe we can complete a B-Rank mission, at least one would buy us enough food to revitalize several more teams for a month. If we completed an A-Rank… This whole famine could be over", the old man dreamed looking away longingly. Doma felt the wind caressing his cheeks, he felt the stench of death all around him but his eyes were too weak to open and face the world he now called reality.

"That's wishful, old man, just who will request for an A-Rank mission of a near-dead village"? Gasco scolded his elder with a lifeless look. This strong teen must have done quite terrifying things to survive and thrive this long, to even be able to walk at this point. "Also why would we bargain with the other villages for food? Didn't we get to this point by offering them our food just so our village was excluded from their wars, back when food was plentiful"?

"It's true… What a pitiful paradox this world of ours is. The ninja are the ones who can survive the longest with the least amount of food. But the ninja cannot work and make profit if there are no weakling civilians requesting missions. That is why the ninja we train must be carefully weighed, it all needs to be calculated and weighed… Gains against the costs…" the old man postured again, speaking seemingly to no one.

"You hear that, pipsqueak"? Gasco shook Doma, just that one shake made the boy's joints and fragile body hurt all over, "If you're weak and useless – we'll let you off on your own. Let's hope your mother taught you some good stuff".

* * *

"He just spaced out", Mana noticed her opponent's attention slipping away. During that time her cramped and fatigued muscles got revitalized by the chakra constantly, still richly flowing through her network. "This is the time to hit him with everything".

The magician's hands flowed through hand seals, even if she had only neglected training for a couple of weeks, Mana could see her wrists feeling rusty and working a tad slow already. This will not do, she cannot just attack him from the front this way. She needed a distraction…

"Magical Entrance Jutsu"! Mana chanted out as a flock of sparks erupted from under her, shooting blindly up in the air before exploding into a burst of light. It was the flashy light show that the magician used during her magic shows for a flashy entrance, it got the audience all fired up and ready for some magic to follow.

Doma covered his face and looked away, as expected, in a battle ninja's perception was at its peak. So eager to follow every move, every flash of light, every slightest change in the battlefield conditions that a blinding flash of light would've completely crippled them. Mana's distraction was especially effective, it appeared, as Doma began clawing his teary eyes.

"What the fuck is this? It's not a real jutsu!" he grunted, he must have meant the fact that it did no actual physical damage to his body, therefore he stored none of it in his complex damage seals.

"No, but this is"! Mana shouted out as she took a chakra molding stance, channeling her chakra for a moment before forming a handful of hand seals and whistling a gentle tune.

"Genjutsu: Sweet Lullaby"! Mana sung out in the melodious tune she was whistling and humming in which forced her impaired opponent clutch at his mid section and tumble over on the ground, writhing in all of his bodily sensations getting overloaded. His body was being overrun with so much pleasurable impulses that even dispelling the illusion was impossible until a few moments after they began – this bought Mana even more time.

Mana's tired and numb feeling wrists went through a collection of hand seals again, "Lightning Style: Magic Skewer Jutsu"! she grunted out before extending her palm outward, towards her writhing opponent. The moment when Mana's flow of chakra got disrupted by the offensive ninjutsu, the genjutsu she had used to cripple her opponent before faded, but most effects of it persisted for a longer time, pleasure such as that ignited by Mana's illusion did not disappear so fast.

A mass of crackling Lightning Release chakra formed above Doma's writhing body before forming six rod-shaped forms and charging down at the ground, the name of this jutsu was deceitful as it didn't really "skewer" anything. Upon hitting their target, the bolts of lightning simply discharged and shocked their target or, if they missed, just casually dispersed all over the surrounding area due to them being grounded.

Doma yelled out in pain as the rods of lightning all hit him at the same time, shocking his body. The jutsu was relatively weak, it increased in power from the way it was initially, when Mana invented it as a graduating Academy Student, but it was still weaker than even other ninjutsu of its rank. Still, the shock of its effects not only damaged her opponent's muscles, his heart and his will to keep fighting, but it also temporarily paralyzed him in shock, it allowed the magician to continue her combination of attacks.

Doma shook his hazy and pulsing with pain head and rubbed his teary and tired eyes before noticing that his opponent was charging straight at him. Somehow he managed to get together just enough force in his numbed and shocked body to charge back at her, he had more physical strength, he knew that! In that fateful moment when Doma was supposed to tackle his opponent to the ground, and in the lucky occurrence of having her below him and in his hands, pummel her until he thought it'd be enough, the young man simple phased through his opponent like she was some sort of an apparition.

"You fool, she's a clone! How can you get fooled by an Academy Technique"!? Gasco roared out, looking about as surprised as his fighting friend was when he missed his spearing charge.

"Don't bother, his eyes were too tired and teary from that light show before to notice that she's not ruffling any grass or that the dust carried by the wind pass right through her. She's weak, that Mana, but she's clever", Stea smiled peacefully seeing the real Mana charge in from behind her disoriented opponent and place her hand right on top of Doma's face.

"Lightning Style: Magician's Touch"! Mana roared out as her body was beginning to feel extremely fatigued, not due to shortage of chakra, but because of the strain which she wasn't used to due to skipping out on training for so long. A pulse of lightning passed through Mana's body before violently shaking Doma and blasting him backwards, head first, as he flipped over and over again, flying back past the same pile of rubble he had hit before and through the fence that signaled the end of the Training Grounds.

"That was my all…" Mana huffed, she risked a lot just exploding with techniques and damage left and right. By now she must've stored a dangerous amount of damage inside her opponent's seals. She didn't dump all of her chakra, not nearly so into these jutsu but she certainly was straining her body in terms of stamina of just attacking relentlessly over and over.

The sky turned hazy, it was the middle of the night already when the two started fighting but the sky used to be clear. Now, murky clouds covered it all up, Mana looked up in disbelief. Such effects could only be created through immensely powerful jutsu or very lacking chakra control. Could it have been that Doma could not control his own jutsu? And here Mana went through all that strenuous effort to channel all of the force of her jutsu just from her into her opponent, without letting any leak out and destroy her surroundings.

Trees started flying apart, ground itself had begun to crack and split into fissures beneath Mana's feet as a flash of massive lightning, shaped as a thirty-meter tall fin of an underground shark devastated all in its path towards Mana. The magician clutched herself for impact, she'd rather get hit by that and get seriously injured than reveal to Stea the weakness of her Petal Sanctuary Escape.

"Gasco", Stea softly asked her teammate who just grumbled unintelligibly.

The brute jumped in front of Mana, winding back his strongest punch. The heat from the incoming, ground-splitting colossal ninjutsu blast singed off the brute's hood and burnt up his cloak revealing the pulsing veins all over his massive muscles as the Getsugakure genin threw his clashing punch.

"Thunderstorm Fist"! He roared out as his fist clashed with Doma's wild attack. For a while Gasco struggled with Doma's jutsu before getting blasted back and thrown away wildly by the jutsu's immense force. However, surpassing Gasco's Thunderstorm Fist and knocking the brute flying appeared to be all that Doma's technique had in it.

"What the fuck"! An infuriated Doma shouted out as he leaped from the devastated parts of the forest outside the Training Grounds and back onto the battlefield. "Why did Gasco interfere"?

"I thought you got ringed out, also, you attacked her dirty", Stea replied calmly.

"What? We're not going to let no ring out decide this! We're settling this for good"! Doma yelled out, "Also, how am I playing dirty"?

"Your jutsu was slow, I could've dodged it any time", Mana chose to reply instead of Stea. "But it was also fired off in rage, without control. It was devastating to everything it touched and if I had dodged it – it'd have headed towards the edge of the village".

Doma grunted in annoyance, realizing that Mana decided to stand in front of his technique and take it just so the village wall and the small settlements by the edge of the village were not blown away. He was very short tempered and he could get a bit mean but… Mana saw that Doma did not want to hurt any innocent villagers by the guilty and embarrassed expression he carried.

"That jutsu… It would have seriously injured me, I'd have been in no condition to keep fighting. I fired everything I had at you, the whole combination and you stood back up, if that is the extent of the damage stored in your seals, that they would empower a simple C-Rank jutsu that way… I have no hope of beating you", Mana admitted. "There's no point in continuing this fight, I did everything I could, threw everything at you and it was for nothing, I concede".

Crushed in her defeat, and after Doma showed her just how pointless all of her strategies were in front of even someone weaker than Stea, Mana turned away and started her walk of shame and defeat back to the village. Somewhere, amidst all of that destruction, Zahafbit had also found a moment to slip away, realizing that Mana's defeat was imminent at that point.

"Please wait, I have one more plead to make with you", Stea gently placed her hand on Mana's shoulder, preventing her from leaving


	355. Stea's Plea

Mana saw Stea's eyes linger on and waver. It hit the magician as a little bit odd as she had always taken the young woman as mentally mature and spiritually strong. It was very much unlike Stea to roll something on and around her tongue before speaking it out.

"Your strategy was solid. You didn't waste any time loading the damage seal, you found an opening then exploded on Doma with everything you had – you could have beaten him like that", she uttered.

"I could have but I didn't. My best was not yet enough to keep him down for good, my gamble did not pay off. In the past I used to hold back tremendously in fear for my opponent's life, I would like to say that that was why Doma won but… That was not the case. I no longer disrespect my opponents like that", Mana replied.

"This fighting style of yours, the way you think, how you analyze other people's fighting styles and match the cards in your hand just right… Your flashy techniques… I believe you can beat me if you got stronger, much stronger", Stea admitted, "Not only that, you can beat me in a flashy and impressive enough manner to promote us both. My skills are leagues above those of the other genin but unless I can put up a satisfying match, it will be for naught. Please…"

Mana could not believe what she was seeing shimmering in Stea's eyes. Crystal, wet and genuine tears. This was a pleading cry of a sky soaring dragon. One that required descending beneath the clouds to devour a cow but needed help to do so. Stea was so immensely skilled that in order to impress the Ninja Council and show off all her skills she needed a powerful enough opponent to challenge her, someone to rise to her level.

"I can't do it, Stea. Two and a half weeks have already passed. I cannot match your pace in just half the time I had before. Whatever talent you see in me, it simply is not there. I was always the unimpressive one, really", Mana politely smiled, squirming uncomfortably out of Stea's gentle grip.

"I thought you were a hero. Those things you said in your show, things about human life being magical and wondrous, do they mean nothing to you really"!? Stea shouted out in desperation. "The famine in my village is no longer what it used to be, people do catch what little fish that have returned to our shores, now that the Eight Tails isn't scaring them away, but instead of dying in a month from hunger, they die in three to six months of malnutrition. I need your help to save their lives for good, please"! Stea cried out falling on her knees, Mana turned around, feeling awfully uncomfortable in the position she's been placed in.

She had denounced this life, she had decided to convincingly to leave it all behind and just perform on stage. It looked like this one last time, this one last time she'd need to fight before leaving it all behind but there never was "just one last time". It's a deceitful and despicable trap, just like with "killing just this one time", it's never just "that one time". If Mana agreed, if she promised Stea to beat her the way that Stea wanted to be beaten, not only would Mana accept an unbelievable responsibility on her shoulders to virtually redefine her in just two and a half weeks but she'd also be a hypocrite, she'd end up agreeing to such proposals again and again, every single time after "that one last time".

This won't be just "this one time". Unless she proves here and now that she's quit for good, there'll be another time and another one. She needed to make a statement here and now, just tell Stea now, just shut down her childish hopes of settling her village's problems all by herself. That was not how the world worked!

"Okay. I will beat you in two and a half weeks. I'll match your pace and get both of us promoted. I'll help you save your village", Mana replied with a shaking voice.

Stea's eyes brightened like two newly born stars, like sparks of superheated iron being molded under the gentle care of a skilled blacksmith. The young woman jumped up to her feet and ran up to Mana, grabbing her hand and pressing it against her own chest, caressing it with her cheeks like the magician had just promised something tangible. Something that was possible, which it was not.

"Thank you, Mana"! Stea kept repeating, in various voices, tones, with both shaking and determined mannerisms. "Thank you, Mana"! She just could not stop.

"What have I done"? Mana kept scolding herself mentally, "I can't match Stea in two years, what can I possibly do in two and a half weeks? My best now wasn't nearly able to match Doma Nacasa, someone who wasn't able to flip the table while keeping all the good cards in his hand with refreshing his body anew. I'll get slaughtered, I'll disappoint her…"

Worst of all was – now she felt like she would be disappointing the whole of Getsugakure as well. With a single powerful leap, using a copied, similar chakra control technique to that she saw Doma use, also using her "Mystical Wings" jutsu to boost her up halfway, she leaped atop one of the mountainous structures in the banged up Training Grounds.

Mana's cold and shaking hands wrapped around her sweaty, dark hair, letting them sift through her fingers as she covered up her face. She wanted to just squish her stupid head for accepting Stea's plea. Something was wrong… A powerful chakra signature was moving in, Mana moved her hands away and saw Gasco Patura land nearby her and standing by her side. Maybe he was smarter? Maybe he knew what Mana had just signed up for and…

"It was an incredible thing you've just agreed to", the thunderous-voiced giant gently smashed Mana's hopes of being proven having just acted unreasonably.

"Was it? I could sense how much chakra Doma still had after my attacks, he was less than halfway done after everything I threw his way. If I don't finish Stea off in one quick swoop, if at least 1% of her stamina and will to fight remains – she'll stand up and heal up, becoming thousandfold stronger for the duration of our battle making her undefeatable and me a failure", Mana explained things the way she saw them to the giant.

"Hmph, after spending so much time as a sensor, I'd have hoped you'd be able to tell the difference between chakra and one's ability to keep fighting, their life force. Chakra, stamina, life force, all of these are different and you are only seeing just one of them. Regardless, you've advanced remarkably in just one week, in between the Forest of Death where you were just a toy for us to play with to the point where someone like Stea sees promise in you. Your sensory abilities have jumped a whole year ahead in just five days. I can't say if you'll be able to do what you've promised to do but you've jumped at the chance to help someone, no matter if you're strong enough yet to do it. In the end, isn't that what heroes are"? Gasco sighed before sitting by Mana's side.

"Maybe, but is it really that great - jumping into action when you're not strong enough to help? Won't you just make things worse if you do that?" Mana voiced her fears of disappointing the young woman she just promised to save her village to.

"I didn't say being a hero was all that great. Heroes died first in the famine, you know. Anyone who didn't do horrific things did, it was a social contract of ours to leave what we did behind us, it was a difficult time, leave it all behind and move on", Gasco looked longingly at the endless forests as far as the eye could see, just naked trees soughing.

"Can you? Can you just move on after doing something as terrible as promising someone to save their home and failing"?

"Obviously not. Neighbors promised to forgive and forget the fact that they may have cannibalized each other's children who were just looking for food, that they ate and killed things and people they shared feelings for. That whole sense morality went away for the sake of survival but don't think for a second that they were truly left behind. Memory is a cruel thing. You've taken up responsibility on your shoulders, it won't be ignored or forgotten but that only means you're an adult now. You should be proud of yourself because being a hero may be worth rabbit's piss but being a mature adult is a worthy and remarkable thing" Gasco spoke more words now in this one dialogue than Mana had heard him ever say before.

"Rabbit's… Piss…" Mana mumbled under her nose. A crazy idea was beginning to dawn in her head...

"Oh, it's just a manner of speech, an expression we have in…" Gasco tried shrugging it off.

"Tell me", Mana interrupted him, "Tell me about your home, tell me about the worst it got. I need to know what lays on my shoulders. I need to know the people I'll be returning to the ways I denounced for".

* * *

A gloomy fog haunted Getsugakure in the prime of the great famine that appeared to not linger and budge for one single moment. A little party of heroically minded individuals who had not lost their hope for both surviving and maintaining their humanity wandered the village streets, knocking on each door of every little gloomy house they could get to over the streets littered with dead bodies. The ghastly expressions of the emotions they had in their final moments and their endless misery forever ingrained on their faces.

"Why do we bother", one of the teens asked with a feeble voice. "We can shelter enough corpses by just picking them off the streets. Why take them off people's hands"?

With this hopeless sentiment, the young teen left the party, running off whether to the direction of his home or just trying to see how long he would survive outside the weakened and dying village's walls. A place where bandits and mercenaries roamed, avoiding the village like the plague, likely considering disease to be the reason of the quickly dropping population, decrease in caravan activity and the foul stench of death from miles away.

After yet another door fit the description of either not opening the door or refusing to surrender their dead bodies to the social activists taking them off their hands, an elderly man sighed.

"What's the point, they either can't deal with the fact their dear ones are dead or they plan on cannibalizing their dead ones instead of surrendering them to us for a burial", with those loudly exclaimed thoughts, the old man left the party and wandered off.

"Tsk, this is fucking ridiculous", the large yet quickly rotting away man pulling the cart of the dead grumbled. "As if I got enough strength to both survive by my own and bury some dead meat. Eating them before they're too bad and suffering through the symptoms may be better off than just burying them"!

Just like that yet another social activist declared a mutiny to his own social activism and left the party. Eventually, only two remained, a young silver haired girl, like a twinkling little star, and a young man, similarly plagued by his hunger and clearly decently worn and damaged in his battle against certain death. Both too young and too naïve to give up, both pushing onwards on the noble but pointless goal to bury everyone who died properly.

"We don't have their names", the young man mumbled.

"You giving up too"? Little Stea hopelessly looked at her friend with sad eyes.

"Only over my dead body", the youth shook his head, filled with great determination. "Just noting the fact that the gravestones won't be what I'd like them to be".

"That expression stopped being funny…" Stea worryingly replied, "You don't look too good lately".

The young man stopped pushing the cart with piled dead bodies to roll up his shirt and slap at his painfully swollen stomach. "Look how well I'm doing, my stomach's full of something" he laughed out.

"Something's full of something else, alright", Stea let her worries down to a laugh. She knew her friend would never show weakness in front of her. That was just the kind of kinship these two felt for each other. Now just keep pushing this cart, just keep moving. These poor people deserved it…

Stea did not talk to her friend, they just kept pushing the cart, doing what they had to do. The boy kept on making short breaks to run behind a house, or another, even when he was pushing the cart, he kept spitting blood to the side from his dried out and cracked lips and bleeding gums. Stea thought he just needed a break, granted, she was also glad to find an excuse to rest a bit herself every time her friend ran off holding his abdomen like a mad man.

"Valor"? Stea called out her friend's name but only the wind carrying the ever-present foul stench of death answered. Worried, the girl ran off, following the direction where her friend last ran off to when she still saw him.

Stea quickly vaulted over the small wooden fence before noticing it was unlocked and could have simply been opened. That was the most likely way that her friend got into the yard in the first place. The girl looked around in worry, she saw some puddle of stinky substance at the corner of the house but, honestly, even if it was what she thought it to be, it couldn't overpower the usual smell of death in the air so it was impossible to identify. Given how much rotten and bad food starving people ate, Stea could only guess what the likely contents of that puddle were.

"This doesn't make any sense, if something bad had happened to him there'd be blood", the girl looked around trying to see some remains of her friend. Maybe he just got away, finally feeling sick of this whole pointless affair, but that wasn't really Valor. Valor was Stea's soulmate, he was the knight that gave her strength to keep making her feelings surface into reality.

Even if she fully knew how dangerous it was, Stea knocked on the back door of the house of the yard where Valor had disappeared. If the locals had not seen Valor, that could only have meant that he did actually leave her. Strangely, the back door was unlocked and opened up immediately after Stea knocked on its palm tree frame. This was stupid, it was dangerous… Stea wandered inside.

"Excuse me", she muttered out before repeating it loudly so that her presence did not surprise the masters of the house. If she was invading their home, temporarily, with good reason, she was better off letting them know she was looking for someone.

"You shouldn't have followed", a weak and husky voice came from the guest room, a man collapsed and barely breathing, sprawled out in an armchair jumbled out before Stea ran in the direction of his voice, the heart in her chest kept thumping to the point where it felt it would soon be busting out of the cavity that housed it.

"My friend, he disappeared, have you seen him"? Stea asked the weak and dying man trying to step up in front of him as he didn't bother to turn at her, maybe he was too weak to even do so. "We can bury your dead too, do you have any"?

"Me and my brother... We are ninja, we only need to eat a little bit once in a month or so, the smallest chunk of food suffices. You shouldn't have come here, we don't need you", the weakened man kept repeating the last part again and again.

"Y-You…" Stea mumbled out.

"He was already halfway gone by the time we…" the man could not finish what he was saying. Something was wrong, all the feelings tumbling inside of Stea, all the anger, all the thoughts and despair of the unfair world around her, all of it erupted at once in a bright white blaze, as bright and hot as the flame of the hottest stars and as compact as the room she was located in. There were no remains of the man in front of her, not anymore, the pressure of her chakra splattered him around the room but the heat and intensity of it instantly evaporated his remains.

"B-Brother, what was that"? a voice thundered from above, the man descended from the second floor only to freeze in motion, witnessing the devastation that the awakening and the sudden eruption of the thousands of different malicious feelings and thoughts inside this young girl's mind had brought.

"D-Don't come any closer"! Stea screamed out, she was no longer acting of her own conscious mind. It was pure instinct. She realized by now that these two had attacked and kidnapped her friend for food, one corpse would have likely sustained them for a while, given their background. They did not even need the whole thing but they were ninja, killing was what they knew best.

Stea couldn't even see the man move. She just felt sharp pain in her chest. Her eyes wandered down, thinking of a thousand things: why didn't the power she had before manifest again and help her, why didn't she move, more so – when will this nightmare they were living in ever end? One thing the girl knew for sure, as she looked down to affirm the man's butcher knife piercing her heart, she would not be there to see the end of this nightmare…

Two fingers were holding the blade right by her heart, twitching slightly as blood trickled from them, the tip of the blade had penetrated the girl's skin slightly but the rest of the blade was stopped.

"I… I didn't see you", Stea muttered out before falling on her knees and covering up her head. It was the final impulse of a collapsing mind.

"I am a ninja, dear girl, just like you have the potential to be. If you did see me before I intended you to – I'd be very bad at my job", the old man smiled as his rich moustache line moved upwards, his eyes brimmed with confidence and dreamy hope, just like Stea's used to before she wandered into this home.

"Shit, old geezer, you're crazy fast, got here entire seconds before us"! A bratty voice rumbled from behind Stea before the front door and the front wall of the house fell apart, revealing a little brat and an older, more muscular and cool-looking young adult. Whereas the eyes of the little boy were overflowing with emotions, rage, excitement, annoyance, all at once, changing every second, the eyes of the brutish looking bald-headed youth by his side were boring and calm. Just how many resident nightmares like this had these eyes seen?

A flashy dance of clanging blades, invisible to Stea's broken, teary and blanked out eyes erupted all over the house: the kitchen, the second floor, then the guest room before the old man slumped on his knees, covered in cuts and bruises and the other ninja fell violently crashing through the kitchen appliances and through the kitchen wall, all the way outside. Deader than the dead get.

"You're so amazing, girl, Gasco could sense you from all the way back! We did not even intend on looking in this neighborhood this week! Why didn't you fight back yourself, with your chakra level you'd have blasted them away easily"!? The brat kept on prancing about the broken Stea asking his series of questions.

"Idiot, look at her, it's clear that she can't control her latent talent. She's untrained, just sheer chakra signature size isn't everything. Old man, you wasted too much chakra on this trash. You didn't need to use your damage seals on the likes of him", the baldy just angrily grunted, closing his eyes and smugly walking away from the battlefield, as if everything that interested him had already been resolved.

"Nonsense. These two may have been too weak for me to need to use my ability but… They were ninja after all, not just any ninja, deep inside they regretted the actions they had to take in order to survive. That is why they wanted no witnesses – shame", the old man closed his eyes before gently helping Stea get back up on her feet.

"Who are you people"? Stea cried out, still shocked about the table where the game she played was located on being flipped over, fundamentally changing its rules, and making it difficult to put the pieces back together.

"We're the last hope this village has of overcoming this shitshow, wanna help"!? The brat gave Stea the thumb up before wiping his snot off of his nose and laughing out in embarrassment. "You're pretty strong yourself, we could really use your help"!


	356. The Legacy Ace

Young Stea and Doma were trading fists. It's barely been a handful of months after she was picked up by the old man and since her training started but she was matching up to Doma almost flawlessly. The girl disliked all of this fighting, it somehow felt like she was using all of her talent in all the wrong ways, instead of directing it at ending the starvation, she was just throwing fists randomly at people she could call family.

"She's not bad", Gasco breathed out forcefully, observing the two kids duking it out at impressive for their age and rather short time of training speed. "Still, I don't quite understand how she beat that first ninja. Her signature went from that of a normal human to outright monstrous, had I not sensed the second one's signature evaporating, we'd have never known he was even there – she completely disintegrated him".

"She's a talented kid. The one in a million kind. Every person has the capacity in them to be an average ninja, only a few handful can achieve the tallest heights there are without making excessive sacrifices. Stea is one of those talented kids", the old man nodded his head a couple of times before continuing to follow the two kids as they blitzed around the dojo. "One should never underestimate the power of emotion in molding chakra, it was because of her boiling feelings that her already tremendous latent chakra potential grew temporarily to the unbelievable heights that it did".

"She isn't fighting seriously, her mind isn't behind this", Gasco mockingly grunted after Stea got punched in the cheek and then kicked down hard enough to devastate the old master's floor. The girl appeared from the muddy depths below the house, the sludgy layers that required most houses to be elevated with wooden or stone platforms or be built in a manner that would make the whole house rise with each passing wave of muddy waters.

"That was a simple right cross, I thought she'd see it. Guess I'm just that good"! Doma laughed out childishly stroking his own itchy nose in both embarrassment and childish pride in his accomplishment.

"I'm sorry, master Haldus… I just… Can't focus", Stea wiped her muddy eyes so that she could open her eyelids without getting excessive handfuls of mud in them.

"Something on your mind"? old Haldus wondered. "You didn't seem to have this problem when I trained you in the basics – you were one of the most focused and reserved students I've ever taught".

"I just… Can't lose the thought that… I'm wasting my time here", Stea rubbed the back of her head shyly. She was not a bold enough girl, not like Doma at all, she had trouble relaying her honest thoughts to authority figures and figures did not get any more authoritative than old master Haldus.

"Oh, is that the case"? The old master closed his eyes in consideration.

"I mean… All we've been doing so far is fight each other over and over again, train more and more and that's fine and all but… The village has not gotten any better. Yes, the rampant murders have stopped, but only because the people lack the energy to even kill each other for survival anymore." Stea was becoming bolder and bolder with each passing sentence she was allowed to utter. This was her chance to make an impression on her old master and she had to utilize it.

"And what do you suggest we do"? Haldus asked curiously.

"Well… It's no mystery that plenty of people wanted to escape Getsugakure when things got rough. They would not get far because of the bandits that are circling the village further to the shores of the island. Even if they made it to the beaches, the pirates would pick apart what little is left of their party while they're making their way to the continent…" Stea vibrantly explained, she was not wrong either.

"So instead of wasting your time working towards the strength required to embark on a high-rank mission, you'd use it to fight pirates and bandits with our limited food and resources so that the people could leave our village instead of bringing it back from its pitiful state? You'd rather make them surrender all that was built on this island, all that was lost making the international community acknowledge Getsugakure as a village worth of their recognition"? Haldus strictly scolded his student.

"I'd rather give them another option than to sit tight waiting for death", Stea sadly mumbled out.

"If you focus towards eliminating bandits and pirates, you'd be betting all of your resources to do it. You would be giving up on the dream to bring our village back by doing that. Then you would give a starving and dying person a choice between sitting down in their home without any hope of its return or to settle in another location. What do you think they would choose? It's a willing decision to give up on one's home", Haldus strictly cut Stea's proposition down.

"P-People are dying by hundreds every day", Stea quietly wept out after a brief silent pause.

"And do you think that no one will die when their caravans are attacked by bandits and mercenaries? Do you assume that starving villagers will make a great army to fight rampaging pirates with? Do you perhaps theorize that you can take on the Eight Tails if it ever decided to smash a ship full of starving families with a single swipe of its abyssal tentacle"? Haldus replied with a softer voice, "You must understand, my students, that from this point on, your decisions affect everyone around you. It's survival or extinction for us".

"Hmph, don't fuck around with us, old man", Gasco smiled calmly, "We know why we've received no help from the Ninja Villages that "acknowledged" us. Usually, they'd be all up and running to flaunt their wealth and bullshit altruism by flinging food our way, proud to show off their power by busting pirate clans and bandit rings in the archipelago surrounding our village. It's because of the fact that our administration, or what remains of it, denies the very existence of this famine internationally".

leaped up to Gasco, grabbing him by the youth's collar, having to jump up to get a strong grasp, instead of pulling the tall baldhead down to his eye level, he just awkwardly kicked around as he hung there angrily throwing a fit.

"You bastard, you gonna bad mouth our village now"!? Doma grunted, trying to throw a lazy punch or two by letting go of his teammate.

"No, neither will I defend its administration with my life" Gasco sneered at the little snot before forcefully tossing him over his shoulder and slamming him to the ground. He did so restraining his superhuman force to the extent where the floor shook and cracked but did not bust open and sink the poor brat under half a meter of shit, mud and decomposing organic materials accumulated below the dojo.

A flash of black blurred across the room, Gasco grunted in pain and shock as the sound of blood splattering over the walls followed his pale and shocked expression of pain. Stea and Doma just stared completely dazzled by what had just transpired as a figure wielding a bloodied tanto in a black bodysuit, wearing his Getsugakure headband proudly landed behind the tall fallen baldhead.

"Damn it, I was too late", Haldus lamented as he had jumped in to aid his student a microsecond after the appearance of the attacker became known to him but it was much too late by then. This attacker was too much for their starved and fatigued over their long-term training selves.

"So that's what old Haldus is doing these days", the attacked caressed his bruised shoulder – the place where he was tackled by the old man, which prevented a lethal blow to be struck on the unsuspecting Gasco. "Gathering his little army of kiddies for a coup, planning on going on unauthorized missions"?

"Not a coup, you idiot, saving this village"! Haldus grunted angrily, scolding his younger and faster comrade. "The Getsukage denies this famine even as he himself starves to death, saving this village will never be achieved working in accordance with the administration"!

"You should've never abandoned the headband, old fool", the assailant raised his tanto up as Gasco's blood still dripped from it, "Can you sleep at night knowing you left Lord Getsukage deal with all the bandits and homicidal, treasonous villagers all by himself, without your trusty ability at his employ"?

"Is that why you're here"? Haldus angrily roared before launching himself at his opponent. The old man had seen how fast his assailant was, likely a high-tier chuunin if not low-tier jounin rank. In his current old and starving state, Haldus was no match for such a challenger, he'd need to foolishly risk his life so that his damage seals got charged to their peak if he was to defeat this threat.

Sparks and loud metallic clangs emanated through the dojo, Stea grabbed Gasco and dragged his unconscious body outside. She had assumed that Doma would follow her after but a quick glance back after Gasco was safely positioned outside revealed that it was not so.

Hearing a loud cry of desperation, Stea rushed back into the house witnessing a gruesome scene of old Haldus being stabbed from behind through his heart, while shielding Doma who foolishly attempted to aid his old master in combat. Haldus coughed up and vomited a whole bunch of blood over the shocked and mentally crushed, shaking like a twig body of his little student. He collapsed on the ground with a smile, attempting to stroke the boy's hair and calm him down but his life force gave way.

"Did the old geezer not truly show you your place in the feeding chain? That was his fatal mistake", the assailant wiped the blood on his tanto before pointing it at Stea.

The silver haired girl shook in anger and fear, the two emotions whirled in a typhoon that was soon calmed down by a pulsing sense of despair – even if she summoned all of her latent ability, all of her chakra – she'd never stand a chance against someone who had penetrated through old Haldus' augmentations with one strike. She knew that much… As much as she didn't want to admit it – the killer was right, sensei never did tell them just how powerless they were compared to people truly considered strong. It'd be fifty years in their current pace before they'd be able to fight this man here and these were fifty years that the trio didn't have.

They were all as good as dead. Stea fell on her knees, crushed and giving into despair, just like she did before, just like she did back at that house. If only… If only she was braver, if only she was calmer and didn't fear this much.

"D-Don't cry…" Haldus' voice reached Stea's crushed mind, making the girl and Doma both turn at their fallen sensei.

The assassin just looked back at the fallen master but decided that while he was not dead, it was, at this point, too late to save him.

"Will you kill my students too"? Haldus asked the man, coughing and choking on his own blood while he spoke.

"I normally wouldn't personally care about them, really… I was under orders to watch you and gather intelligence about your intentions. If you were planning a coup, I was supposed to snuff it out completely. I suppose that'd include killing these kids…" the assassin expressed his irritation, he clearly was looking for a way out of not having to kill these kids, now that he saw just how powerless they were.

"And what if you lie? Isn't that what we ninja do best"? Haldus coughed up more blood, his final moments were approaching but he spent them negotiating the lives of his students.

"Go on. I'll feel no better if I kill slobbering and despairing kids, I prefer my night sleep smooth and lengthy, like most", the assassin sighed.

"Bring them back to Getsukage, tell them you found them practicing and that they're unrelated to me", Haldus begged.

The assassin drew his tanto again and swiped it aside before preparing to charge at one of the kids. "They'll never believe something as stupid as this…" he grunted.

"Wait"! Haldus roared spitting blood out like an erupting volcano. The man was pale like a wraith by that point. "They may not believe you but… They'll take them in once they see their ability anyways – the Damage Seal".

"W-What? You taught them that? How!?" The assassin froze in fear.

"I haven't, it's not something that can just be taught. It took me thirty three years to master completely but it can be transferred through a Curse Seal", Haldus pleaded.

"Tsk. Even if they'll suspect who trained these kids, the temptation of employing a pair of damage seal users will be too great... Fine, but make it quick. I'm not dragging that knocked out fucker's ass back here. These days chakra is more precious than it used to be", the assassin shrugged.

"Gasco can defend himself without the seals, I don't have the time to have him dragged back here. Quick, take off your clothes and kneel with your backs to me"! Haldus commanded as his fingers lit up with bright green flames like each one of them was a matchstick sparked up and lit aflame.

Stea cried but she did not scream or grunt in pain while the flesh on her back was being painted on. She could even imagine how terrible Doma must've felt right now, this pain of the Curse Seal floating through his body and clashing with his chakra network, fighting for compliance. That evening she was gifted the complicated dark red circle littered with complicated sealing glyphs and surrounded by artistic looking "rays" of the Sun etched on her and Doma's backs.

That evening Stea lost the only family she could even remember. The only family that did not try to devour her for food to survive. She did not even get to say farewell, the old man was already dead by the time the Curse Seal was transferred and she turned around to hug him goodbye…

* * *

Mana sat on the edge of the same hill where she heard out Gasco's relatively lacking in descriptions, details and emotion tales of his home village. From the impression that has stricken Mana, she wouldn't go as far as to say that the tallest of Team Phobos didn't care about the famine and poor economic situation of his village, it was that he was not one for words in general. Had she wanted sentiments, she would have asked Stea to tell her about it, had she longed for needless outrage at every tiny bit, she would have asked Doma to tell her about his village.

After the lacking in length and details tale, Team Phobos had decided to move back to the village, without saying anything but implying that the magician was welcome to return in their company but Mana chose to stay and think her options through. She had never picked up smoking, it appeared to be a very vain and useless habit to her but this brooding reminded her of the several plays and movies she had seen where such moments were translated as "smoking moments".

There was one straw she still had to grasp at, things were not completely useless. In one or two days of just training around in the training grounds she could regain what little of her form she had lost and eliminate any remains of combat rust. In a week or two, she could learn the basics of a new technique, maybe, but basics were nowhere near enough. She could just train her physical shape but it would be to no avail – Mana was never a physical combatant to begin with and physicality was exactly the opposite type of combat that was rewarded against opponents like Doma and Stea.

She could've meditated and worn herself out daily to greatly improve her chakra pool again, if her past experiences were to be trusted, Mana estimated she could make her chakra pool grow about twenty five percent of its current state in two weeks if she focused on it heavily and nothing else. That would be a whole bag of useless – she did not even spend half of her chakra pool in this battle, chakra pool was not a problem nor did it automatically equal combat potency.

She could have created new, longer strings of techniques. Tried to create a combo of jutsu that, once initiated would achieve greater results than the one she tried against Doma. That may have been foolish as most of her techniques were useless in terms of combat damage and sheer power, but it was the most reasonable out of all of the piss-poor asylum of options she had.

Mana sighed and jumped off the cliff, releasing a feint pulse of chakra upon landing on the ground to soften her landing. At this point such simple chakra control tricks came off almost naturally… Naturally… The magician walked up to her holed up and battle ravaged magician's hat before weaving a bunch of hand seals with the hand that wasn't occupied holding it before placing her hand inside of it and pulling Usuzoku out of it. Mana let her rabbit partner just tumble on the ground after the basics of pulling were completed, almost like a big, pink, potty mouthed baby.

"Well dis ain't surprisin' at all", the rabbit grumbled before patting his leather armor and fixing his shoulder pads and angrily glaring right into Mana's eyes and seeing the gloom and seriousness in them, realizing this was no time for their usual fooling around gig.

"I need your help, Zoku-chan", Mana firmly cut down. The rabbit warrior did not even object her cute honorific or the manner in which she addressed him. Something had changed between the two in the brief while they have been working together and even more in the last battle they fought alongside one another.

"You need help trainin', rite? Big whoop, dat's what I've been countin' on after dat last battle. Took ye a while to start trainin' though…", Usuzoku stated seriously, the rabbit did not raise his voice, knock and kick around or object. He felt the weight in Mana's voice and act accordingly.

"It's not just that. Just training together won't be enough", Mana shook her head before stroking her wild dark hair and rubbing her hand down her bruised forehead and tired eyes. "I promised the strongest genin in the Chuunin Exams I'd beat her. At the moment there is an entire world of difference between us, she uses an ability that just doesn't feel natural for a genin to possess and I can't for the life of me figure it out. I've given up on even trying before today".

"Eh, come on, what could be so scary dat not even Hatchlin' an' the Great and Noble Rabbit Warrior can't stop"? Usuzoku waved his large paw at Mana before looking at the unwavering gloom in her face, after that moment Mana could almost see the rabbit's ears turn flabby and sink to the ground and his face shift into cold and emotionless stony expression. "Dat bad, huh"?

"Can you reverse-summon me to the rabbit homeland? I'll need to train with the Ninja Rabbits for this, I know I may not be ready, but… That I don't deserve it but… You know me, I wouldn't ask this of you if I…" Mana tried reasoning with Usuzoku.

"Will that be enough to win"? Usuzoku interrupted what he must've seen as pathetic and hopeless whining, he had no tongue nor the ears for it. He respected Mana more than he let her know, more than to let her beg him something like that and reveal all of the desperation she felt.

"Honestly, I'm not sure. But it's the highest hitting card in my hand…" Mana shrugged, "If that will turn out to not be enough, nothing I could've done in those two and a half week would be".

"When do you need it? I may need to arrange some things…" Usuzoku grumbled, rubbing his neck. "Right now"?

"Let me let my parents know, cancel all of my shows and all that…" Mana turned away, her voice shook in gratitude. She knew that Usuzoku let the Ninja Rabbits seem like a bigger deal than they actually were – a ninja animal species verging on extinction that nobody else wanted a contract with. It meant the world for her that he was willing to risk that illusion bursting for the sake of her well-being.

"Awight, I'll have ye reverse-summoned tomorrow at three past midday, be ready", Usuzoku nodded before disappearing in a cloud of smoke and a loud, high-pitched poof.


	357. Return to the Seventh Circle

„Seriously"? Mother raged on after Mana explained her plan of spending the next two and a half weeks in a distant, unknown land, training with a bunch of talking, highly socially developed and intensely opinionated in many matters rabbits.

"I mean… Technically we had expected this before, dear", father shrugged, Mana may have forgotten her mother's oddly fiery temper but the man undoubtedly remembered it and tried pacifying the situation by reminding the woman that they'd expected Mana to leave somewhere unnatural to train.

"Yeah, that was before she got back to sound mind and almost turned her life around"! Mother yelled out. While her fury always kind of crept Mana out, she could understand mother's point, in more restrained and tempered words, at least… The magician had been leaving home so often that she may as well have not lived there anymore. "If you just followed your plan along you could've removed all the ryo from your account, bought yourself a mansion and settled somewhere more peaceful in weeks from now"!

The woman broke down in her own unique way – dropping on the sofa and angrily rubbing her temples and playing with her exotically unruly and dark colored hair. Most women in mother's shoes broke down in tears, Mana's mother chose to boil and simmer instead of erupting.

"I have a separate bank account"? Mana mumbled out confused before shaking the odd slip-up off since it had little to nothing to do with the situation. "Anyways, it's something I have to do. My opponent in the Chuunin Exams is fighting for a very noble cause, the only sure-way path of helping her is beating her in a very specific way, one that'd impress the council and allow her to show off all of her skills."

"That's what you always say. "Something I have to do"", father replied before sitting down by mother and keeping a watch on her so that she didn't remember her old more rampage-prone fiery ways. "You don't have to do anything, this is not one of your missions. The only objective in life is that which you set for yourself. You do realize that right? The way you've been living these past two and a half weeks – you were happy, you can't fool anyone trying to deny it".

"I was happy", Mana nodded before picking up her sizeable bag and flipping it over her shoulders. The bag could have weighed like another human being all by itself, not to mention the steel tools and supplies she has been carrying and a bunch of scrolls with training equipment. "I love magic, I love entertaining people and seeing them smile. I love making them forget the world they live in, if only just for a second. The world that can erupt with war, natural catastrophes or get destroyed if some sicko doesn't control their own power for one careless moment and no one could stop them. The world that can end at any second. A terrifying world".

It was too late to reconsider now. She had canceled all her shows in the morning, disappointing Mr. Hiro and her audience yet again. She had postponed this talk with her parents to the point where it was almost too late to leave. It was too late the moment she took Stea up on her plea and decided to help her and her village out.

"Most of all, I loved seeing you two happy. Your smiles made me happy as well. But if I don't do this, if I know for the rest of my days that I didn't do everything I could have done to save this many starving people… I'll never be happy again, that'll only result in a perpetual circle of mutual sadness for everyone", Mana didn't want to say anything more, she rushed away from home in a hurry because farewells made her tear up, always and consistently, yet somehow if she didn't say her farewells it was almost deceiving in a way. At the very least, it helped.

The sky was beginning to sink in its darkest. It tended to do that in winter. Mana looked up in the sky, feeling snowflakes grazing her cheeks and landing on them only to melt and mix into the girl's tears. A crushing pressure locked up around her, Mana could feel her body tense up in shock and automatically attempt to augment her body to compensate for her body being dragged through an interdimensional tunnel in order to instantaneously transport her to wherever she was reverse-summoned from.

Smoke began seeping into her nose and mouth in the most sensitive moment when the uncomfortable gravitational pressure ceased and Mana could feel her legs standing firmly in some sort of a cave, her head still woozy and her chest prayed for one bit of air.

"What is dat? Tears? What's de matter with yah? Grow up, for feck's sake"! Usuzoku's familiar grumble made Mana realize that her journey had already ended but she couldn't quite put her finger on where exactly she was.

"I think you messed up your reverse-summoning, Zoku-chan", Mana blinked a couple of times rapidly if only to affirm that what she suspected was true. "I'm blind".

A wave of laughter echoed in the room, making Mana grasp her ears, the sound began coming in more sensitively and it irritated her to no end. She was not even attempting to enhance her perception, it just naturally traveled more intensely.

"You are not blind, Nakotsumi Mana", a grumbling elderly voice of someone other than Usuzoku echoed through the strange room she was in. "The Ninja Rabbit Cave System is sunken in complete darkness because we're underground. Very, very deep underground".

Mana could feel it, the searing heat of the room she was standing in. The heat was so immense that it felt like if the magician shoveled some more of the stone and minerals beneath her feet she'd hit the outer core of the planet itself. Initially, the magician had attributed this to the bad performance of the Summoning Jutsu, now it all made sense. The magician adjusted her chakra network to enhance her perception and to allow her to withstand the seemingly unbearable heat better.

"Dat's why it may ave not been da best idea to come ere", Usuzoku growled apologetically, "If ye can't deal with da darkness and da…"

"No. This is great. Constant strain, always having to mind how I'm managing my chakra or else I'll break my network again, but if I'm not doing that – I'll die on the spot. This is just the kind of place I need", Mana shook her head, she wondered if her partners could see it. Then a loud cringe left her mouth, once her enhanced vision noticed the cotton-like puffiness of Usuzoku's fur. The warrior rabbit looked around in confusion as to what could've set his partner off to laugh so hard before looking at his own body and realizing the truth.

"Don't laugh"! He growled out. "Seriously, don't ya laugh at dis"!

Mana couldn't keep it in, the white and puffy cotton-candy like substance of the rabbit's fluffy skin made her bend over in laughter as her abdomen got locked up in pain. From now on, for two and a half weeks, she would have to mind it – the upkeep of her chakra augmentations, visual – to see, endurance – to not get fried instantly by this heat, surpassing anything that Mana had felt or seen before. When she is laughing, when she is sleeping, when she is tired after immense training. It will quite literally be an incarnation of hell but it was what was needed.

"Dammit, it's normal! It's what happens to our furs in winter"! Usuzoku shouted out, jumping in to brawl with Mana, to abuse her limited perception but the magician tumbled aside lazily, avoiding the rabbit's tackle and his attempts to kick her in the face.

"We've been told you are a genin, Mana, are you sure you can handle this heat? If your augmentations fail, if your focus is broken for one second or if your network breaks apart – you'll die instantly here. This place barely has breathable oxygen and its conditions are inhuman even for most lower ranking ninja", the familiar elderly voice feared for Mana's well-being.

"Don't worry, I've already had my network broken once, I won't let it happen again", Mana confidently shook her head before stretching out and realizing that the nearly non-existent oxygen has already turned into a problem.

"This… Doesn't encourage me one bit", the elderly rabbit chuckled, he was white and fluffy, similar to Usuzoku but Mana could not perceive his eyes as much as she invested into her perception augmentations. It was a short while before the magician realized that the elderly rabbit had none and that his eyes were covered up by excessive fur growths on his forehead and his massive moustache-like locks under his nose.

"It will be fine", a feminine voice of a rabbit to Mana's back-right replied to the elder's worries, "She can use the escape to surface really quick, Kusagakure is not that dangerous of a territory to be in"

"So the cave system is somewhere in Kusagakure"? Mana wondered.

"True, but our cave system is intricate. Even our own zealous young get lost in it sometime, we don't even know how a human girl will receive it. It's the size of a small country, after all", the rabbit elder shook his head worryingly.

"Small country"? Mana exclaimed in surprise, "No need to worry then, it'd take me a whole day to memorize it all. I'd rather spend that time training. If I die – that'll be a rather unfortunate and abrupt end of that".

"I can see why you like this reckless girl, she's just like you", the elder rabbit played with his moustache-fluffs of fur in disapproval, not all rabbits must have been as aggressive and rough-headed as Usuzoku, in fact, right now Mana saw not a single rabbit behaving in a manner in which Zoku was behaving around her. They sounded and looked like quite tranquil and peace loving species. That was quite glad to see… Mana was beginning to fall in love with the Ninja Rabbits a little bit more the more time she spent with them and they seemed very fitting for a contract she chose.

"Shuddup, old geezer, I dun like 'er at all, she ain't anythin' like me either"! Usuzoku angrily barked out crossing his arms over his chest in objection.

* * *

"Dis is gon' be a real pain in de ass", Usuzoku grumbled as Mana and him were making their way down a rocky, spiraling downwards tunnel that lead to the main cave that qualified as the "outside" of the entire cave system.

"It better be", Mana smiled cheeking her rabbit partner, "I need to be within an inch of death every day or else it won't be enough. Even if the training goes perfectly it may not work out at all".

"So wats yer plan"? Usuzoku wondered, "You just want to train with me to improve your physical condition? You want to live in the constant total darkness and in almost three thousand degrees of heat for two and a half weeks to improve your chakra control and help you learn to deal with similar situations in the future. That it? Do you have any spectacular techniques you wish to learn here?"

"No", Mana shook her head, "That'd take too much time, even if I did pick up a jutsu or two in here, I would never master them sufficiently to use them fast enough and easily enough for them to matter. What I want is to perfect myself to a full one hundred."

"Perfect yerself"? Usuzoku raised an eyebrow, Mana was impressed she could tell in total darkness.

"Yeah, most ninja tap into their latent potential with a jutsu, reach fifteen percent or so of that potential before the jutsu becomes obsolete in their eyes. They move on, find more powerful techniques leaving gaps in their forms. I do not seek to reach out for new heights, I'm going to master the ground I'm standing on. I'm going to master every jutsu I know, I'm going to master every skill I know to their peaks. I'll become Perfect Mana, if you will".

"Not to burst yer bubble, Hatchling, yer jutsu suck", Usuzoku sighed as the two left into the large yard of caves. Mana looked around in confusion, focusing more and more chakra into her augmentations to see the edges of this massive cave but it was tough to do so. Even more, the edges she could see lead to smaller tunnels that inevitably must have lead to more massive miniature cities like this.

"They are meant for specific means, also, if this works, they won't suck after we're done with them. This cave is massive. Just how many Ninja Rabbits are there"? Mana gasped after finishing explaining her crazy idea for training.

"Not as many as ye'd think. Dis whole place is the most occupied cave, there used to be two hundred thousand of us – we multiply pretty fast, our love heats up as fast as it goes out. Wars and abandonment caused us to relocate and every time we relocated in history we left massive empty systems just like this one behind. That's why we said the whole system spreads through the whole country", Usuzoku explained before leading Mana to a hollowed out mineral orb. "You can put yer things here, dis is where ye'll be settlin' down for a while".

"Is this your place"? Mana looked around, looking a bit surprised by how simplistic, yet at the same time very intricate these housings were. This entire cave system was nothing but a massive spherical gap filled with smaller hollowed out spheres of rock and dirt where rabbits settled in. "I was wondering, just how many rabbits that can fight are here? Maybe we could employ someone stronger than you for help. The signatures around this cave don't seem too impressive".

"We 'ave… Loads a dem really, amazing warriors all over da place. Ten thousand million a rabbits with sharpened teeth, ready ta tear into yer flesh an' soft choky furs dat're lookin' ta suffocate yer stupid face" Usuzoku mumbled out before Mana asked him to repeat more loudly and clearly but he just shook his hands angrily at her face.

"You don't have anyone else, do you"? Mana longingly asked in a manner that was more confirming in total horror than asking.

"Look, things 'aven't been goin' too well for us Ninja Rabbits ere, wars with Ninja Mongooses, getting almost wiped out by da Ninja Snakes who, coincidentally, also share affinity for caves, which caused us to dig deeper and deeper…" Usuzoku mumbled out with a sad voice. "Dere was no one from the peoples ere, or anywhere else, to help us out, not dat we needed it, we're all fine warriors, strongest dere are! De strongest, I tell ya"!

Mana reached out and placed her hand onto the rabbit's fluffy white head before stroking it. For a moment it appeared like Usuzoku's eyes were trying to make Mana blow up spontaneously where she stood but then he just lowered his ears in a submissive and demeaning manner and just looked away.

"That's fine, Zoku-chan, I'm here now. I won't forget this, whenever you're up to bullying some mongooses or taking your territory back from the snakes, I'll be here", Mana smiled.

"Are ye smilin' cause sometimes I honestly can't tell, its cause yer so stupid and your face is dumb", Usuzoku's voice trembled, he couldn't see because he was tearing up. "Anyways, don't tread south more dan two systems back, dat's where dat terrorist madman Usujitsa is blowin' stuff up. Nobody knows wat his deal is, if you hear stupid gigglin' and see his mindless, white, rampagin' face, just run north and deeper down into the tunnel".

"I'm not sure if I could tell him apart, honestly, you are all white to me, really", Mana shrugged apologetically.

"Why I oughta"! Usuzoku leaped right at her again trying to kick Mana's head off of her shoulders. The power in his thighs, in the leap at her and his speed was incredible. However, Mana was slowly growing more accustomed to the dark. She could almost hear pebbles being grinded into dust beneath his feet, the entire ground pulsing in shocks as the force in Usuzoku's feet was being transferred through it. That minuscule growth was just enough for Mana to avoid decapitation by a rabbit's massive feet.

Mana spent entire hours launching weak jutsu she learned as a child at Usuzoku, feeling how they worked, what purposes they had and getting more used to them than she already was. Using one needed to feel like flicking her fingers. Her useless starter dozen, or so she used to categorize them. They were not weapons, they were tools, each doing something useful but very specific for her: Mystical Wings let her generate wind currents to, sort of, fly a limited distance up, the rest had similar very contrived purposes and uses but were useless in any other situation.

All of that had to change. Every single technique she crafted as a child reading the basics of ninjutsu from a massive books that weighed more than she did had to be perfected and polished to where Mana could call upon them instantly and execute them perfectly. Not only that, they should've been elevated to a status of perfection in both speed and power. Just like Mana had improved the speed and maximum altitude of her Mystical Wings Jutsu over time, each of her starter dozen had to be polished and, honestly, that was the easy part.

Weak jutsu like that were easy to polish and improve. Mana was a kid when she made those jutsu, she used plenty of unnecessary hand seals when making them, she knew much less than she knows now and she had little to no experience on the field of battle, somewhere in her heart she had hoped to have none even when she changed the world… The tough part would be to improve her most recent jutsu, ones she invented and polished as a genin surpassing some chuunin in skill already. That will require literally bashing her head against the wall of her limits to do and, seeing the progress she made in a single afternoon, Mana was not feeling all too hopeful about it.

* * *

"Say, Zoku-chan", Mana whispered laying on a tough platform of minerals which substituted bed for the rabbits. The magician could hear Usuzoku putting layers upon layers of softened sand and dirt inside his rocky "bed" as if it was a bath being filled with water for comfort. Mana would rather sleep on the polished, literal diamond-hard minerals than sleep on actual dirt. "Is that elder guy in charge of the community"?

"Yeh, dere used to be dis other 'uge guy. I don' even remember his name anymore…"

"I'm fairly certain it's Usu-something", Mana interrupted her partner.

Usuzoku just painfully grunted something to himself before resuming his answer, "Anyways, he was dis uge guy. Like, a hundred a meters tall, he was de last a de ancient rabbits. Dey used to all be like dat…"

"So that's why your halls are so huge…" Mana mumbled to herself, "And he just left"?

"Ye, musta gotten sick a it all… Doubt he's even alive rite now, he's a big guy, if he as much as stepped on somethin' da whole Kusagakure would hear it", Usuzoku flipped over, face away from Mana. "De old geezer Usugiji was in charge ever since".

"Insane white rabbit terrorists, kaiju-rabbits… You guys would really be amazingly powerful if you all worked together", Mana sighed as she dreamily looked at the total darkness of the ceiling above her. She did a lacking job today, Usuzoku was afraid to let Mana get too worn up or damaged. He talked a lot of mean talk but deep inside his heart was as fluffy as his winter fur…

"Ye, yer de one ta talk…" Usuzoku grumbled half sneezing already. He was more right to reply this way to a human than he knew…


	358. The Beginning of the End of the Road

Konoha was rustling. The time for the finals of the Chuunin Exams has come. Both the local villagers and the foreign visitors, both those arriving for a pleasurable event of young ninja competing for higher ranks and guests of honor who came here for political reasons were buzzing all over the village.

Those of the villagers who still held idealistic attitudes towards the world would have found this common relaxing sense of enjoyment truly beautiful. For the first time in a while, villagers of every village and country around the world have gathered in one place just to feast their eyes at a combat extravaganza that only came around once in a couple of years or so.

Whereas the earlier stages of the Chuunin Exams have been shrouded in secret and closed off from the public eye, the trials of the finalists – the strongest of the strongest, fastest of the fastest, the cleverest and the most skilled of all other examinees were open for all to see and gaze at. For one day and one day only, all politics, feuds and battles, both in the open battlefield and political, got swept aside.

Even the newly elected Mizukage from Kirigakure that has recently regained its autonomy was marching across the village with his following party of ninja, who were both his protectors and his intent to later feast his ocular orbs at the magnificence of children or less successful young adults attempting to enter the rank of ninja maturity. Even those who did not know the man's high status from rumors of the papers would have noticed his massive height, undercut hair and immensely rich mustache line as well as his fine silk attire.

Wherever the visitors came from, wherever they were wandering about, all of their paths lead up to the north-western part of the village and the Chuunin Arena where the finals took place. Seeing how the main event of the day was about to start in an hour or so, the place was already filling up with clouds of people and was only about to become more hectic.

"Meiko!" Kiyomi shouted out, waving her hand towards a familiar blue-green tracksuit wearing blacksmith who now appeared to be walking on her own two feet rather firmly and looked back in her cheerful original shape.

"Yo!" Meiko replied with a cheerful nod before running up to Kiyomi, where the Yamanaka heiress took care in gently working her way through the crowd, Meiko was like a rampaging elephant in a forest. Plenty of people got brushed aside and were about to object before they saw the size and the build of the blacksmith girl who had just shoved them aside and swallowed their objections or even went as far as to blame themselves and apologize for getting in the way of the careless rampaging bull of a girl.

"I see you've recovered", Kiyomi smiled, her hair had grown much longer and more unruly, it was not tough to see that the young lady of the Yamanaka clan was occupied with her training to take much care in personal hygiene and grooming except for the most necessary emergency procedures last night before the match.

"You bet. I'm not sure if I should be fighting but…" Meiko pouted her lips around at various sides before frantically looking around. "I wonder where Mana is, she's gonna be fighting today, right?"

"You know her, she probably won't be showing up until right before the match, not with this many people to pester her. She's a celebrity after all", Kiyomi shrugged, feeling pretty wise about having predicted her friend's thoughts so sharply.

"Yeah, that would have actually been pretty smart", Mana's voice ringed right from behind Kiyomi making the blonde jump up and turn around at the speed of lightning. She hadn't even sensed the pressure from her friend sneaking up, granted, Kiyomi was no sensor but most ninja possessed an innate ability to sense danger to a limited degree and Mana projected none of it.

"What the hell happened to you!?" Meiko exclaimed before covering her abdomen in laughter. The magician barely reminded of her old self – covered in burns, swollen red skin and a cloth bound around the girl's eyes, her hair looked so incredibly messy that it appeared to hold branches with actual bird nests sticking out from them. Mana reminded more of a crazy hobo than her normal self.

"Oh, my eyes are really sensitive to light right now. I really hope they'll recover by the time I have to fight", Mana laughed out innocently like it was no big deal. Kiyomi's eyes twitched in surprise after she noticed the magician's skin slowly beginning to pale back to its original tanned shade in speeds that were almost traceable to the human eye, almost like she was regenerating right in front of her from severe skin burns.

"You're on food pills, aren't you?" Kiyomi muttered.

"Yeah, I've spent a lot of time training today, had to catch up on a lot of time I've wasted. Then it dawned on me that I may not be able to return here and I lost it", Mana laughed out again, as her head tilted up, Kiyomi got a glimpse of her friend's lifeless eyes under the cloth. It made the heiress' heart tremble in wonder just what kind of torment did the magician go through in her training. Despite the fact that Mana's eyes appeared lifeless, the magician had noticed Kiyomi concern with her eyes turning to meet those of her friend's.

"Return here? From where?" Kiyomi wondered just where did Mana get such intense burns. They were weak enough to suggest that Mana used active chakra augmentation to prevent getting completely melted away but they were consistent and present enough to suggest intense temperatures unlike any that can be found around the world.

"Oh, I was the in Rabbit Caves in Kusagakure. Zoku-chan reverse-summoned me there", Mana casually explained as the girl began making their way through to the arena and flashed their Ninja Registration IDs to the chuunin acting as guards.

"You're not on the list as an examinee", one of them sighed addressing Meiko, you'll have to join the main queue right there.

Meiko sighed, "I knew it and yet still I tried. I have no regrets!" she exclaimed loudly before skipping to the main line as if the concept of standing around for an excessively prolonged amount of time excited her.

"I thought summoned contracts can return to their original location at any time", Kiyomi curiously wondered.

"Yeah, I thought so too, it appears there's a time limit to how long one can spend in any given location. Then they need to be summoned again if they want to return. Usuzoku sent one of the messenger rabbits to Hokage-sensei but…" Mana tried explaining.

"That's not a very good idea", Kiyomi sighed.

"Right?" Mana shrugged, "She completely forgot she had to summon me using a Reinforcements Scroll today so I had to dash all the way back from Kusagakure. Didn't take me long but I wasted a whole bunch of chakra and had to blast through a whole bunch of trees. Had it not been for my chakra sensory I'd have never gotten home right, when you move at those speeds you can barely even see things".

Kiyomi sighed, then the magician noticed that something dawned on her, likely the fact that Mana just dashed from the other side of the world in a course corrective dash that couldn't have taken her that long to complete. Given how stopping to correct her course and avoid more sensitive obstacles were the only stops she must've made – the magician likely could've completed that dash in mere moments.

"So, then you reconnected with Kouta?" Kiyomi's cheeks blushed slightly, Mana was impressed, she sensed the elevated body temperature of her friend and heard her heartbeat rise, had she still had her sense of smell she'd have likely been able to smell the sweat and hormones emitted from her body but that was long since dead.

"What do you mean?" Mana wondered before tightening her blindfold as her eyes were beginning to water. She did not even need her eyesight for anything other than the match – by now she had learned to rest her eyes and rely on other senses such as chakra sensory, hearing and touch. Right now touch was especially strong, given Mana's sensitive slightly burnt skin that was still regenerating slowly.

"Didn't you know?" Kiyomi wondered, "He completed his internship and spends time working in the hospital now".

"Oh, I thought…" Mana mumbled something softly before turning away, her senses became all jumbled up and it suddenly became difficult to tell things apart so she slowed down and reached out for the walls around her to help her guide her way to the preparations room. "I thought he was going to follow his father's footsteps".

"I don't know about that", Kiyomi shrugged, "He used to be your boyfriend, didn't he? It's been one and a half month since you last talked, you should really catch up with him".

By that time Kiyomi had realized that Mana needed some help and helped guide her temporarily blinded teammate to the preparations room and helped her fix her hair from all the branches and wood chips that the magician had gathered. By the time Mana's senses got back into perceiving her surrounding accurately the magician noticed an odd increase in her teammate's heartbeat. She must have been considering something intensely, it wasn't healthy for her to worry about anything but the upcoming matches.

"Actually, Eiju hooked me up with some of his own pills. I figured he'd be conning the pharmacy for some of his own medication, given his habits, I blackmailed him into prescribing me some blue medical food pills to help me recover", Mana explained where she got the food pills she used to slowly recover her fatigue, chakra loss and bodily injuries.

"Let's just hope they finish working until your match comes up", Kiyomi worryingly exclaimed.

"They might. Say, when I told you about how I got back to the village, your heartbeat escalated but not in a way that would have made you scared. You have gotten much stronger that you were before, didn't you? I need to know, Stea is still by far the strongest genin in the building so I need to know how you'd rate my results" Mana asked straight.

"I haven't seen your results yet, all I see before me now is a broken and fatigued version of you. You returning back home on foot so soon is impressive but it's not completely outside my reach either", Kiyomi shrugged, her heart was calm, her chakra signature rustled like a calm flame as well. "Granted, I'd have likely never tried it, too wasteful and reckless in general to travel so fast".

* * *

Not even twenty minutes later more genin started gathering in the preparations room. Seeing how the kunoichi had a separate room from their male peers, a more select roster of ninja had begun gathering around. The first one to enter after Kiyomi and Mana was Vinda Calkem, the ruthless with a hint of crazy, dark punky haired and clothed kunoichi from Team Iocaste of Getsugakure.

The girl was a relatively short and frail looking one, if one ignored her more wild hairstyle and constant smug and sadistic grin that she walked around adoring, she'd have looked quite similar to Mana if the magician had adopted a more wild style of hair and clothes. Granted, Kiyomi knew that the two had little to do with each other internally. Where one disliked inflicting too much pain and damage in combat, the other took great pride and enjoyment in her destructive and corrosive abilities and blamed the damage she did on her opponent's own recklessness in accepting to fight her.

Seeing how neither Kiyomi nor Mana had any previous interactions with the sadistic young lady from Getsugakure she completely ignored the two girls, save for sparing a moment to lick her lips and smile when gazing at Mana's condition. It appeared to Kiyomi that this was a very cruel and rude way to act around people one didn't even know or have any grudges against. Then again, she was the one who showered a bunch of opposing opponents in acid until they ran out of chakra to neutralize its effects and the fight needed to be stopped so that the medical team could neutralize its effects for them.

Kiyomi glared at Mana who appeared to completely ignore the raven-haired punk as she changed into her dark sleeveless shirt and standard military trousers of the Getsugakure uniform. The Yamanaka wondered if that was because Mana could not see the cruel looks that the girl was giving the magician or because her friend simply did not care all that much about it.

A handful of moments after Vinda changed and started warming up and stretching out, Nanaba found her way to the preparation room, followed by Stea Tesprea. Both girls noticed Kiyomi and Mana warming up, Kiyomi by actually performing stretching exercises and shadowboxing whereas Mana just sat hunched over on the bench and stared blankly at the door.

"Heeeeey!" Nanaba shrieked out in a manner of affection and friendliness that, honestly, Kiyomi had assumed the two had not reached yet. Apparently, Nana thought differently herself.

"Greetings, you two", Stea nodded. Kiyomi looked at Mana worryingly, wondering if the magician actually had time to interact with the Getsugakure's favorite, seeing how otherwise there would be no reason for the kunoichi to even bother talking to them.

"Phew! I finally had my puppet arms fixed, that saga of the Chuunin Exams is officially over, I'm back at full strength"! Nanaba cheered on herself before posing a bunch of times like a caricature of the colorful superheroes in rice cereal commercials on TV or one of those more exotic wrestlers from Kumogakure.

"Mana… Are you going to be OK? Did something go wrong?" Stea instantly grabbed the bull by the horns. Something Nanaba completely ignored, proceeding to small talk instead.

"Oh, don't worry. I've given it my all during training, I'm on food pills and it should all go away in time", Mana raised her head up to look over at Stea's location, something that convinced the Getsugakure kunoichi that even blindfolded and suffering from some burns the magician was not completely powerless.

"You don't look like you had much sleep, honey! What happened! You really have been taking your training seriously, haven't you!" Nanaba shouted out in surprise before pointing at Mana in horror. This girl was a wild tornado of emotion and lack of subtlety, not too much different from a certain someone both Team Hokage kunoichi knew which appeared to entertain both of them at once.

"That's because I haven't slept, well, not completely, for the duration of the two and a half weeks", Mana shrugged.

"Wait, what!?" Kiyomi whistled in surprise before asking in shock.

"You see, it appeared that if I was to completely fall into a deep sleep, my augmentations could have gone down which would have meant I'd have been exposed to the entirety of the inhuman conditions of the Rabbit Caves. That is why I did not technically sleep. I meditated to rest instead. It did some of the job but…" Mana explained making Kiyomi feel uneasy.

It was true that, technically, Kiyomi trained extensively in the Yamanaka Resort. She continued her training with her uncle's assistants while simultaneously attempting to innovate on the Yamanaka clan hijutsu to finally take the next step that most of the more advanced ninja of her clan had taken. She had advanced forward by leaps and bounds, she was a totally different ninja now compared to the way she was before the Chuunin Exams but…

Hearing every bit of detail about Mana's training made Kiyomi curious about just how effective her training was. It also made her feel uneasy as if somehow, there could have been more she could have done. As if, somehow, she was the only one who slacked off and everyone around her was in this crazy new world, completely unknown to her and that, in just twenty more minutes, all of it would be made painfully clear to her. Suddenly, deep inside Kiyomi's own mind, everyone around her began looking so massive and mocking.

With a self-calming sigh, Kiyomi shoved those dark thoughts down. She did not slack off, she trained her ass off both before the semi-finals and during the last five weeks. She has transcended the line between just an average Yamanaka clansman and a pride of her clan by successfully innovating on her clan hijutsu. She was someone who eliminated both of her opponents in the semi-finals all by herself, the second one being one of the strongest genin in the Exams. Who cared if it was all due of a technicality, she was Kiyomi, the badass!

Someone banged loudly at the door, the sound of their boots walking away suggested that the person wasn't looking to gain entry into the preparation room but was looking to warn the kunoichi that the preparations were complete.

"That's odd", Mana softly spoke up. "I didn't sense Erumo around. She did proceed to the finals, didn't she"?

"Oh, she's messing around near the observational platform already, she came prepared", Nanaba waved her hand at Mana before standing up and stretching out. "Let's go, everybody"!

"We've trained for five whole weeks for this, it's about time", Kiyomi threw a pair of rapid-fire blows in the air before following Nanaba to the door.

"Mana, I hope that your training fatigue and wounds recover until the time of our match. Luckily, we fight last. Know that even if you don't regain your eyesight and don't fully recover, I will not hold back one bit"! Stea declared. Mana could hear and sense the seriousness emanating from the girl's entire body. Once the magician opened her eyes for a brief moment she could see the confident shapes of the figure of her opponent, illuminated by the light on the ceiling, standing tall in front of her, coldly looking at her.

"I know", Mana stood up and closed her eyes as they were beginning to itch and water from the influx of light flowing into them even through the blindfold. "You better not. I nearly killed myself training and cashed in some massive favors so that you show off everything you got and get promoted. I wouldn't accept anything less than that".


	359. Sounds of Limestone

A fresh influx of air blew in the direction of the girls who have gathered in the front observation platform that was positioned right beneath the audience, which in terms laid beneath the VIP areas where all the important political figures were placed. Kiyomi warily looked around, moving her mind away from the upcoming battles to wonder if it was that safe to host all of the political elite that have decided to come and enjoy the festivity.

That moment was when she noticed rows upon rows of uniformed ninja posted in between the vertical rows of steps that lead to in and out of the arena. Konoha spared no expense at security and extravagance of the whole thing. Except for that one unexpected accidental death in the semi-finals, the whole event was going without as much as a hitch. Given the insane security, as well as the personal security details of all of those big cheeses of politics, attacking such an event would have been an equivalent of declaring war upon multiple ninja villages at once.

"You should see it", Kiyomi turned and pouted her lips at Mana's direction. "This whole place is rocking. As someone who loves entertaining people, you'd appreciate it".

"I… This isn't good", Mana gasped for air. "I can't use my sensory here".

Kiyomi looked at her friend with concern, so did Stea, for some reason this Getsugakure girl had an investment of some sort in Mana's ability to compete properly. One that the Yamanaka could only understand halfway, obviously, a good match consisted of two strong contestants so Stea may have been interested in Mana being as strong as possible for optimal chances of being promoted but… The eyes of the young woman were more invested than just that. These two were kindred souls with similar goals in mind.

"She can't sense anything", Kiyomi explained to Stea who kept switching her gazes between the magician and back at the blonde.

"Oh, don't worry, it's because of the all the ninja around. Each single one could throw the emotions of an unseasoned chakra sensor into overdrive. Multiple Kage are attending the event, their sensors should suppress the chakra signatures once the matches begin", Stea sighed more easily after finding out the reason behind Mana's worries.

"Where are all the boys"? Nanaba voiced her inquiry in a more complaining tone than an asking one.

"Right there, on the opposite side, silly", Vinda pointed extending her hand forward and pointing at another dark blue platform hosting a party of male competitors on the other side of the arena.

A uniformed ninja stepped out into the middle of the arena, modeled after a typical training grounds battlefield with sandy wasteland patches, a patch of grass transitioning into a small, crystal clear pond and surrounded by lines of trees that would've simulated a forest environment. To the northeast, there were large rocks placed on a more rocky wasteland patch of land. Such refined battlefield manipulation must've been created by Dorimi, just like the arena was during the semi-finals. That jounin was unmatched in creating and shifting battlefield conditions to better suit his needs.

"Villages of Konohagakure and honored guests, welcome to the final stage of the Konohagakure hosted Chuunin Exams! This year's competition was fierce, we've had to filter through almost a hundred competitors in the Forest of Death stage alone. The genin that will be competing today are the best of the best all of our villages have to offer and, quite literally, the future of our ninja world." The overseer of the exams, a strict faced man with rapidly balding head and wrinkly yet thick and fleshy face declared.

A roaring wave of applause followed, drowning out the overseer of the finals and forcing him to stand silently. Kiyomi gave her friend a worried glare and noticed that Mana had covered up her ears in desperately tried shutting down the noise. To her hearing was immensely important and much more sensitive, hearing something like this must have totally overwhelmed her senses yet again. The magician was evidently not having the best of days leading up to one of the most important brawls in her life.

"The genin gathered here will compete in one round of one on one competitions in pre-decided matches. There are no rules, the only ways to lose are to be knocked out and unable to fight, removed from the battlefield or killed." The man continued his explanation of the few rules that even applied at this point. "In the end of the day, the Ninja Council comprised of members from all competing villages will decide on which genin will get promoted. The world of the ninja is a crazy one, it is entirely possible that one of you youths will pull out an unexpected jutsu and surprise us and our ancient rigid rules, as you've already done several times this year. Then I, Oke Ebamoto, shall rule if you've broken any rules and a battle is to be ended or not".

Overseer Oke stopped talking as if to allow the audience to express their applauses but the arena fell dead silent. Then, catching up too late to the cue, several hundreds of the audience members started to awkwardly clap their hands before a handful of more joined in.

"Hmph, they outright went on and said it there, we can kill anyone we want!?" Vinda barked out extending her hand forward and letting a weak stream of water rotate down her skin. The stream dripped and sprayed off her fingers down to the ground, as the water touched the ground it began sizzling and letting out a faint vapor but it did not corrode the floor, likely due to the tough materials it was made of.

"It's a trap", Stea calmly stated, "Killing someone is the first way to get the Ninja Council to not vote in favor of you. Killing people used to be all the rage back in the times of war, when such abilities could've been used to show off and flaunt village's strength. Now it would cost the village hosting the killing ninja some diplomacy points so even the council of your own village would not vote for you".

"Am I the only one impressed we can even hear him?" Nanaba pressed her lips forward in curiosity.

"It's all in the limestone materials from which the arena is made of. The materials suppress the sounds of background noise and filter what needs to be heard, way in the back the materials reflect the sound waves back at the back row enhancing the noises from the arena", Mana explained. This was a basic Konohagakure history fun fact which she looked glad to share with a girl she was not entirely sure when she had befriended to the point of such a casual conversation.

"Now, let's begin this astonishing noon with the first match of the day, between Roh-D of Kumogakure and Aozora Yushijin from Konohagakure. Examinee Roh-D was one of the first genin to leave the Forest of Death, alongside his teammate Kei-J, he also put up easily the most brutal and breathtaking match in the semi-finals against his fellow Kumogakure ninja, surprising even the seasoned veterans with its sheer brutality".

Kiyomi glared at the right side of the arena and at the dark corridor from which Roh-D's powerful and broad shouldered figure appeared, walking out into the open, this time completely uncloaked and ready to fight without holding anything back. The finals were when all the genin pulled out any stops and fought utilizing their true fighting styles and using any abilities they may have wanted kept secret earlier on. The bold and uncloaked, battle ready outfit of the dark-skinned powerhouse from Kumogakure reflected that.

The audience erupted into a relatively calm and restrained wave of applause. It was obvious that not too many Konoha villagers applauded for this impressively put together young man. Despite the foreign factor, multiple villagers chose to applaud the young man only for his impressive physical shape, exotic looking tubes sticking out from the bottom part of his arms and his described achievements.

"Looks like you'll miss yet another match of this guy", Kiyomi bit Mana playfully, reminding the magician of the brutal match between Roh-D and Oto-B she already missed when she was sealed off during their tag match in the semi-finals. Now she'll miss the match due to her eyes needing to get used to sunlight again.

"I may just be tracking this match more closely than most of you", Mana calmly stated. Kiyomi wondered just what that could have meant when both Mana's eyesight and her chakra sensory were somewhat closed down, not to mention her ears constantly being sieged by the relentlessly loud applause of the filled arena.

"This impressive youth will be facing off against our own Aozora Yushijin! This young man may not belong to any clan but he still proved to be an impressive ninja with an unmatched ability in genjutsu!" The overseer explained in quite limited detail. Seeing the lack of interest from the crowd, as if still waiting for a reason to cheer on their home-grown shinobi, the man continued, "Somehow, throughout this entire exam there has not been an occasion when this young man was pressed to the wall or injured. Despite revealing his abilities relatively early on, no ninja yet were able to crack it"!

Aozora Yushijin walked out from the left entrance to the arena with a sleeveless denim jacket, his hands and shoulders covered up by subtle yet finely crafted armor plates instead, his claymore sword hanging on his back and almost dragging on the ground. The dark purple hair of the youth had grown even more unruly, falling well past his shoulders and down his back and over his chest. It was not tough to tell that the physical shape of the young man had improved significantly as well with his shoulders looking somewhat broader, his chest much beefier in size and his eyes looking wild and ruthless, firing off sparks at his opponent before the match even started.

"They really did a crappy job introducing him. He's a dangerous competitor, one of the most capable to say the least", Mana said.

"And one of the best looking", Kiyomi sighed before leaning over the rails and relaxing in preparation to observe this insane match.

"He managed to pull off time perception manipulation in his illusions – easily the most advanced of genjutsu concepts that even very few jounin manage to grasp", Mana bitterly explained, "His genjutsu talent rivals if not dwarfs that of mine".

"Pffft, genjutsu is lame anyways, why would anyone specialize in a ninja art that doesn't even do any lasting damage"? Vinda Calkem raised an eyebrow attempting to laugh Mana off.

"I don't think you understand what Mana was saying – Yushijin can make you believe that no time had passed at all, when in fact a full hour had passed and you were cut down multiple times over with that sword of his. It's a dangerous ability", Stea explained, looking a bit irritated by the ignorance of her native.

"Well, there's no way his ability is that advanced. He can likely just manipulate very short periods of time perception, I'd say that the style of using such an illusion would matter – if he uses it without uttering its name, without using any hand seals, the time perception he can manipulate would be shorter, if he does use those cumbersome elements – it'd be longer". Mana speculated based on her own experience with the art of illusions.

* * *

Right after the overseer signaled the beginning of the match, both combatants lunged at each other with Yushijin's hand moving behind his back and grabbing the hilt of his blade whereas the Kumogakure ninja prepared for a more brutal physical assault. In less than a single moment, both rushing forces collided, erupted into a barrage of spark emitting clashes of massive power.

"Can you tell what's happening"? Kiyomi wondered looking at Mana, who stood as calmly while observing the match as she did before it. Given her composure and emotional stillness, it was tough to say if the magician was confused or if she had a way of perceiving and reading the battle in her own ways.

"Most of it. Their speed isn't translated through sound but I can hear how often they clash. I can't really sense their chakra though, I've suppressed my sensory because the overwhelming dread from the VIP area doesn't let me concentrate and keeps sending me into an anxiety attack", Mana calmly reported.

These were particularly early moments of the match, both examinees spent considerable time poking and observing their opponent, measuring their abilities and fighting style as well as how well they could deal with pressure. It was all vital information to these two. Then Kiyomi noticed a small breakthrough in the relatively equally matched bout.

Roh-D's hand shot forward, locking onto Yushijin's long hair before swinging the young man around his body and tossing him wildly to crash down below. The ground shook beneath the feet of the girls making Mana almost tumble over, only being able to hear the after effects of what was happening made it difficult to react to such outrageous expressions of one's strength. The audience gripped to their seats and covered up their faces. Fortunately, none of the debris flying out from under the crash zone hit anyone, instead hitting a round barrier surrounding the fighting area and tumbling back down.

This time the audience was not comprised of powerful ninja, they needed to be properly protected so proper barriers were integral to hosting such an event.

Yushijin stood back on his feet before sheathing his large sword and dusting off his shoulders. Kiyomi, purely for scientific and observatory reasons, observed the boy's suffered damage closely but she couldn't really see any – his augmentation game was on point, augmenting him just a tiny bit, to where it was almost no risk and the rest was all natural endurance of a strong, well-trained body.

Roh-D extended his buff arm forward as the wind howled in the surrounding area, streams of blue chakra began rotating around each pipe emanating that ghastly howling noise from each pipe separately before the jutsu was ready and the youth's hand beefed up even more, overflowing with an internal pressure of sound waves being infused with chakra.

"Sonic Polka"! The Kumogakure genin roared out, his voice pressed and distorted by the effort he put and the pain and pressure that such an unnatural jutsu, requiring surgical body manipulation, required.

A compressed barrage of sound blast waves colored greenish blue and slightly visible as a distortion of air coiled like arcing projectile waves and homing onto their target.

"Where are you firing"? Yushijin's mocking voice emanated throughout the entire arena due to both natural and architectural, artificial enhancements of the materials, perfectly designed to augment and transmit any amounts of noise coming in from inside the arena making it unnecessary to use any voiceboxes or additional voice augmentation.

The Konohagakure genin was charging in from aside, a place where he began dashing off to long before Roh-D's jutsu was fired but for some reason the Kumogakure genin insisted on firing it at the same location. It confused Kiyomi somewhat initially but then she remembered what exactly Yushijin was capable of doing – now that she saw time perception manipulation live, she felt a bit easier knowing that she won't be fighting this youth today. Even if her opponent was just as considerable.

"Isn't Yushijin great"? Erumo cheered on her teammate while sneaking up to the girls from behind. Everyone turned around to check on the entering examinee but Mana remained strangely fixated on the battle, as Kiyomi noticed. Could the magician have heard or otherwise sensed the girl coming or did she simply ignore the girl who was not on best terms with her normally?

Yushijin swung his sword, using his blunt side to smack Roh-D away and send him flying and crashing through a row of trees and right into the side of the arena's walls.

"You know how to beat him, don't you"? Mana calmly mumbled out.

"Maybe, in theory, Yushijin told me that, technically, so do you. He holds your genjutsu skill in high regard, for whatever reason", Erumo shrugged.

"How did you know?" Nanaba exclaimed in shock.

"Kiyomi, do you know of a way to beat any given illusion of mine? Do you have a jutsu to bypass my chakra sensory?" Mana wondered, turning at the Yamanaka heiress with that odd, blindfolded look of hers.

"I mean, I did dabble in chakra suppression techniques in the Yamanaka Resort, where I trained. It was just for fun and I started focusing on countering the abilities of my real opponent", Kiyomi nodded. "I am myself fairly well trained in genjutsu, it used to be my semi-specialty but I stopped improving in that department once Mana joined my team".

"Teammates have a natural, subconscious need of coming up with abilities that make them able to beat their own teammates. Maybe it is a sense of rivalry. Maybe each one of us is just so impressed with the abilities and growth of our peers that, for whatever reason, we indulge in momentary distractions for a counter to our best friends' abilities, just in case", Mana turned her blinded face back into the arena.

"Meh, all of you genjutsu users are weird, praising each other for the weirdest things and obsessing with achievements of the other, when none of you get any stronger really, none of you develop stronger abilities", Erumo grinned before joining Mana closer to the railings. Kiyomi had not seen these two being anything other than confrontational before but now they appeared to be almost chummy.

"My jutsu is literally a sound wave, enhanced by chakra. These tubes are merely for a superior way to direct that immense pressure at you. And yet you managed to easily dodge them", Roh-D grunted as he stood from the rubble and dusted off his own clothes and chest. "This confirms what I've heard about you. I didn't have the honor to see your battle but, I've obtained information on your ability otherwise".

"And yet you casually engaged me in battle as if not knowing of it"? Yushijin raised an eyebrow.

"Oh, this exchange told me plenty. Not many people in this world are able to dodge sound, seeing how fast you were against me, then – how much distance you covered using your illusion to start dodging earlier and mess with my time perception I've realized the limits of your ability". Roh-D grinned confidently before wiping his own nose and hopping on his nimble feet just to make sure his body was completely fine and just a little bruised. "Still, why didn't you just cut at me, why use the blunt part of the sword"?

"The more area you augment, the more chakra you waste. I didn't harbor any illusions of cutting you so early on, I'd be a fool to hope that way. At this point my goal is to kick your chakra network to a state of stress where you'd be unwilling to augment anymore", Yushijin calmly explained before taking an offensive sword-fighting stance.

"They're clashing with words", Stea noted, "It's just as much of a scoping battlefield as clashing with fists. You reveal a bit about yourself and judge from the way your opponent reacts to it about what kind of a person they are. These two are no longer fighting like genin. This is the way we need to fight if we are to impress the Ninja Council".


	360. Control of Our Own Time

Yushijin charged at his opponent, sword sheathed behind his back, hands clenched by his side and ready to shoot off into a barrage of straight punches. Roh-D extended his hands once more, aiming to derail his opponent's charge by firing a pair of weak and compressed sound wave blasts in his direction but the resonating airwaves only hit thin air.

This time, however, Roh-D was not about to get caught unprepared. He moved differently, placing generalized defensive moves and swatting his pesky opponent away before he should have been able to even see him move. Roh-D was getting into Yushijin's head by predicting where it would be most alluring to attack him from. Kiyomi took a brief moment to glance at Mana. The Yamanaka could recall hearing about Mana receiving some amazing martial arts training during her trip to Wind Country, just how much more would she have been able to read from these moves if she could have seen them?

An impressive dance of Yushijin's fists bouncing off of the tough and surgically altered body of his opponent continued on. After getting a few of nasty smacks across the face, packing enough wallop to throw him to another country had he not properly defended against them, Yushijin appeared to alter his tactics. Make more fake-outs before finding a softer spot in Roh-D's back and giving it a good, slow and packed with all the force he could gather, cross.

That was Yushijin's chance, the long-haired swordsman gripped the handle of his blade, drawing it lightning fast before smacking right at the top of his opponent's head, likely to stun him shortly so that he could prolong the opening that he had created and cut his opponent a pair more times, than he would have normally been able to.

A loud poof echoed throughout the arena with the modified limestone carrying the haunting sound all the way to the end of the audience rows and up to the VIP skyboxes. Roh-D chose to substitute himself with a stone piece that had been dislodged from the wall when he hit it earlier, after being smacked by Yushijin's blunt side of his sword. By the time Yushijin noticed the substitution taking place, he was already invested into the slash that would've split his opponent in two, his sword cut through the stone piece cleanly before the genin sheathed it back as lightning-fast as he had drawn it from its sheath before.

* * *

"So Roh-D used his Substitution first", Kiyomi whistled in surprise, the noise that escaped her pressed lips got completely drowned out in the applause of the audience that found its place in between two series of engagements between the genin. It was a serious statement in a battle – Substitution caused focus, stamina and could not have been used for a while after being once used due to the strain it caused. Meanwhile, the option still remained for Yushijin.

"That was pretty good", Vinda chuckled, "The Kumogakure bastard almost got cut into pieces. He pretty much had to use that Substitution".

"Yeah, Roh-D's plan was pretty impressive – he purposefully left clean openings, knowing that Yushijin would exploit them after toying with his time perception. That way Roh-D always knew where he'd be attacked and, given him scoping Yushijin's timer earlier, when", Erumo grinned, "Of course, it didn't matter once Yushijin read what Roh-D was doing and stopped letting his opponent dictate the pace of the battle".

Kiyomi looked at the girls who appeared to be impressed by the battle transpiring beneath them in the arena. Only Mana was curiously glancing at the VIP skybox for some reason, completely ignoring the battle below or refraining herself from making any comments.

"Something wrong? Did they suppress their chakra?" Kiyomi wondered.

"No. I don't think they intend to… That places me and Gasco at a disadvantage", Mana replied, brushing the question aside like it wasn't important or anywhere close the reason why she was staring at that point blankly.

"Actually, it won't trouble Gasco one bit. He's a much more seasoned sensor, the only way to beat his sensory would be to suppress one's signature to make it disappear, not let it blaze freely", Stea corrected Mana, validating her worst fears – that she still had plenty of improvement to do in terms of her chakra sensory. Chakra signatures as large of those of jounin, or abnormal ones, still made her freak out and caused massive anxiety, just like they did when she first awakened the ability.

* * *

"I think I just about know what you're capable of, I'll be picking up the pace, try to keep up", Yushijin taunted his opponent. Getting into the head of one's enemy was just as important as finding openings in their stances or defenses, often one directly lead to the other.

"Genjutsu: Last Resort!" The genin grunted out, pressing his hands together into a position of a hand seal and clearly chanting out the name of his technique – a sign of maximum effort being placed into casting the illusion. If Mana's guess was correct, that meant that the effects would have been at their maximum as well.

Yushijin dashed right up to the soundwave blasting genin and unsheathed his sword, letting it dance freely all over his opponent's body while Roh-D just stood there blanked out and stared at a blind point in space and time, stuck in the moment where time perception was halted completely in his mind. It may have only been for a handful of heartbeats but a ninja capable of cutting through a bolt of lightning would've accomplished a great many strokes or cuts in that excessive frame of time.

"It's horrible", Kiyomi blankly stated, as Roh-D's time perception appeared to return to normal and the large brute collapsed on his knees, bursting with blood spraying injuries all over his chest, shoulders, sides, upper arm, forearm and his thighs. It appeared that an entire masterpiece was drawn over the Kumogakure genin's body with a sword instead of a brush.

"He made a mistake of assuming that the limit of the illusion he was shown earlier was the limit of Yushijin's ability. That's why no ninja worth their rank uses all of their most powerful jutsu to the peak of their ability right from the get-go – there is a time and a place for one's ace techniques", Erumo nodded with great pride in her teammate's abilities.

Kiyomi noticed the eyes of the Konoha's New Great Trapster wander off at Mana's direction, without a doubt awaiting praises from the magician and her complete capitulation as the most skilled genjutsu user in her generation. To the great shock of the trapster, Mana was still looking at the VIP skybox blankly, her eyes may have been blindfolded but the girl's ears were twitching, like those of a rabbit listening in for a stalking hunter would have.

"Hey! You're missing Yushijin's fight, he respects you a great deal, you know! You'd be wise to respect him enough and observe his battle, oh, wait, you can't…" Erumo tried to bite Mana but even Vinda, who appeared to be the craziest and sadistic person on that platform glared at the trapster with strict eyes that betrayed that even the Getsugakure sadist thought that was too much.

"How are the VIPs reacting to the fight?" Mana asked boldly, completely ignoring Erumo's attempts to poke fun at her.

Kiyomi looked at the skybox and looked at the Hokage smiling and applauding Yushijin's flawless attacks together with the audience. "Ummm, they're pretty impressed, I'd say", the Yamanaka replied.

"I see, do you guys feel Yushijin's genjutsu effects?" the magician kept asking.

"No, it kind of looks boring, honestly, Roh-D just freezes in place and stops moving", Kiyomi shrugged.

"Hmm… So, it is fair to assume that he is capable of including select targets into his illusion, as far away as that skybox over there. He does conserve chakra by excluding targets he doesn't care about impressing but showing off to the Ninja Council is important so he specifically included them, as well as his opponent", Mana scratched her chin before tilting her blindfold and rubbing her watery and itchy eyes with her knuckles, then reapplying the blindfold.

"Very perceptive of you", Stea smiled. "Do you think this young man would beat you with this ability? Because if he would… I'd be disappointed".

"What!?" Erumo flipped out after one of her peers appeared to ignore the impressive display of her teammate while another one claimed that it was nothing too impressive or worth her time.

"No, it's a relatively simple ability to beat. And, given by how masterfully Yushijin wields it – it's the only capable jutsu he has. Given his age, he would not have had enough time to master another jutsu after mastering this one to this extent, given how astronomical the concept is to grasp for a genin in the first place", Mana shook her head, "The illusion has a natural weakness, after breaking it using it, Yushijin would run out of tricks to show".

"So he's like Zahafbit? A one trick pony?" Kiyomi wondered, feeling proud of her teammate's implied skill and ability to piss off Erumo, whose sung praises for her teammate were beginning to get on the Yamanaka's nerves as well.

"Not completely, Yushijin's trick is a very versatile one and a much more impressive one but… Essentially, in a manner of speech, yes. This jutsu comprises most of what he can do, besides, I'd assume, impressive swordplay", Mana shrugged.

* * *

Overseer Oka approached the fallen genin and examined his wounds. Before the official could make a hasty decision, Roh-D grunted loudly as his mind and body got jump started back into action. Granted, the action was severely limited as due to the ravaging numerous injuries he could only get back on one knee.

Roh-D lifted his large arm up while pressing the other one to his chest, while blood still dripped from his extended hand, forced outwards by the tremendous effort it took for Roh-D to fight so soon after being struck down with such ferocity and efficiency.

"Sonic Khorumi!" Roh wheezed out as the surgically implanted air pipes began absorbing the passing airwaves inside the youth's muscles where they Roh-D infused them with chakra and channeled further through the central pipe right at the center of Roh-D's palm. The infused with chakra soundwaves fired off in a shape of a powerful beam of a blueish, base chakra hue.

Yushijin swiped his hand back and closer to his ninja pouch before placing his other one to his chest in a hand seal position. It appeared odd to Kiyomi, who was keeping close attention to the exchange that after whiffing with a similar attack fired even less openly Roh-D would attempt to blast his opponent with something like this. It appeared that the most likely outcome of this manner of an attack had transpired when Yushijin carefully dashed aside before preparing a powerful dash with a sword strike that would have put his opponent down more convincingly.

Right as Yushijin's powerful frame moved close enough for a rough slash of his sword, enhanced by the momentum and power of it leaving its sheath and its massive size, Roh-D's arm moved in position again, aiming right at Yushijin's face.

"Sonic Khorumi!" The Kumogakure genin grunted, easier this time, as a tenfold stronger and wider covering concentrated soundwave left the genin's arm, overwhelming Yushijin's body with tremendous sonic force and blasting him backward with grievous injuries. That was before the lifeless body poofed away, replaced by a chunk of fallen wood that the weaker beam before had downed.

Yushijin exclaimed something unintelligible in pain and frustration after he stood back on his feet and in a flashy manner repositioned his sword to a more defensive stance. Without a doubt, the Konoha genin had already considered his opponent eliminated, now it appeared that, somehow, he had managed to bypass his Last Resort and managed to attack during a time that he should have considered frozen.

Given how Yushijin required a brief break to put his body back into fighting shape after a strenuous and impromptu Substitution Jutsu, and Roh-D required a moment to get back up and keep struggling on in this immensely important fight, both combatants just glared at each other with respect and adoration for each other's resolve and abilities.

* * *

"How could he have beaten Yushijin's ability?" Erumo flipped out before her expression changed from anger into a rather cruel and broken acceptance. Acceptance that her teammate who she had idolized as almost invincible for so long was just like everybody else – a young man with weaknesses and the ability to be outsmarted and outplayed.

"However he did it, it was wasteful to fire off two same ninjutsu shots of such power", Kiyomi noted, she would've never wasted so much chakra as to fake-out her opponent with one costly ninjutsu, only to blast him again with the same technique.

"That was the same jutsu, really?" Mana asked for clarification. To her both blasts must have sounded differently, given their great difference in power and intensity.

"Yes, he appeared to refer to it by the same name", Stea nodded.

"That's incredible, that means that he doesn't forget the ability to use his ninjutsu in its earliest stages. Without a doubt this first weak blast was meant to displace his opponent and lull Yushijin into a false sense of security, the second one was the real one", Mana commended the Kumogakure genin.

"Isn't it wasteful to use the same jutsu twice just to hit it once?" Kiyomi wondered.

"Maybe it would be, that's why Roh-D's prowess and control are impressive, he used his ninjutsu in two different stages of his life. The first one must have been the version from when he was still learning the ropes of his ability, the second one was the real one – the chakra he spent on those techniques also would differ wildly", Mana explained with awe and strange bitterness. Almost like a more healthy expression of jealousy. Kiyomi used a similar tone in the Academy when she was describing a problem halfway to the teacher and realized she had solved it wrong but still needed to finish reading it.

"But how did he break Yushijin's ability?" Erumo pressed her lips together as her eyes longingly looked ahead at the two combatants, one appeared relatively chipper yet too wounded to fight at full power, the other one had barely received a scratch up to now but used out plenty of chakra and lacked in stamina what he had in great physical condition.

"A simple Dispel", Mana mumbled. "That's all it would take to break out. Obviously Dispel has its own weaknesses and it may take some time to learn how to dispel a time perception manipulation technique but, in theory, it would break it".

"That's a pretty weak-sauce jutsu then", Vinda shrugged before moving up to the rails and leaning over to observe the fight more closely. "If it can just be dispelled like that, why didn't Roh-D do it from the get-go?"

"He probably tried, to dispel a genjutsu you must first understand and convince your entire body in spirit and mind that you are under it. Very few bother to train their bodies to use that simple technique with enough efficiency to successfully pull it off the first time they try. Often enough, you need to take in and survive an illusion to learn how to quickly dispel it and adapt to it. Yushijin's ability is so amazing that it took that many tries before Roh-D could even dispel it", Mana explained.

* * *

"Running out of juice yet?" Roh-D taunted his opponent, noticing that Yushijin must have already crossed the halfway point of his chakra that he could use. From the start, he was using that illusion of his left and right, aiding him in most clashes and exchanges, worried that he would not survive a battle that got as brutal as the bout between Roh-D and Oto-B in the semi-finals.

"You better hurry up and do what you have to do. You're literally losing your own juices every passing moment", Yushijin calmly replied before switching his defensive sword-fighting stance to a higher placed, thrust oriented response.

"Point taken", Roh-D shouted out as he lifted his hands up into the air, the tubes on his arms began soaking in the air and preparing for another technique. Yushijin appeared to have chosen to not use his ability, wait and scope his opponent out. Now that he was figured out and his genjutsu was broken for the first time in this exam, he had to use it more sparingly and more cleverly.

"Sonic Barynya!" Roh-D shouted out as he drove his extended palms into the ground, a loud shrieking pulse echoed through the arena, followed by a powerful shockwave that forced even the barriers placed around the arena into action.

"It's that combo he used against Oto-B!" Kiyomi loudly exclaimed.

The peculiar underground usage of sound waves forced the entire arena to rumble and shake. That kept Yushijin firmly stuck to the ground, as he couldn't muster up the force to jump up and away from the unstable ground. The nauseating quake forced the genin to just flop and stumble around, tumbling over his knees and struggling to regain his standing stature.

After locking his opponent down and in place, Roh-D extended his monstrously inflated from overflowing sound waves arm and began drawing in even more air from the surroundings. Whatever he intended to use against his opponent was huge enough to be reasonably assumed to be his most powerful soundwave jutsu. Kiyomi had seen this particular combination against Oto-B, after it was used successfully was when the battle turned particularly bloody and uncontrollable, with both competitors just throwing jutsu at each other wildly, without concerns for their own safety. There was a chance this battle could end up the same…

"Sonic Butoh!" Roh-D roared out as the flesh on his strained and inflated muscles began tearing, pouring down even more blood all over the lacerations acquired in the duration of the entire battle. The soundwave that left Roh-D's palm was a massive beam that dwarfed his previous Khorumi technique entirely. Creating a large tunneling crater and rising a good three or four meters in radius with a shrieking calamity of devastation the very noise of which triggered the barriers around the arena to light up like mid-winter streamers and neon lights in late evenings.


	361. Ode to Brutality

As the dust and the destruction of Roh-D's most powerful sonic technique began settling down, a chilling sound of a battlecry broke out. From a cloud of rubble, sand and floating blades of frosty winter grass, a masculine figure with bleeding years, eyes and nose, tattered denim jacket and the shirt underneath and covered with bruises and intense tears all over his body dived out. The eyes of the desperate young man were brimming with determination and the desire to embrace the brutality of battle without anything being held back.

From the beginning of this match, Aozora Yushijin attempted to play this fight his own way, in his own field, by his own rules: impress the council, instead of fighting, avoid fighting on Roh-D's brutal terms instead of just fighting, show off his impressive technique which took him his current lifetime to polish and refine instead of fighting. No more. Now just fighting remained. Yushijin wished to bring the brutality, that Roh-D craved in his battles and shove it down his opponent's throat.

Yushijin swung his sword around, silver blitzes flashed wherever the massive chunk of polished and sharpened steel buzzed past his opponent's flesh before a loud clang emanated a shock downwards the blade and past its handle, continuing to pulse down and seep into Yushijin's bones as the blade got entrapped into the surgically implanted pipes of Roh-D.

The Konohagakure genin grunted in pain and let go of his sword, jumping back as his temporarily disabled hands made him unable to properly defend himself if a response came. And come it did. Roh-D lowered his hands and the air howled in the shape of sound waves getting forcefully sucked into the pipes on the genin's arms before exhaling all that air outside, bashing it against the ground beneath Roh-D's feet and throwing the genin wildly at his opponent, feet forward.

"Sonic Missile Kick!" The surgically enhanced genin roared out, throwing a flying kick that drew influence from the moveset Cloud Wrestling Federation's many talented and acrobatic performers.

Yushijin ducked under the kick, shooting his palms down and deep into the dirt while he threw his knees up, smashing them right into his opponent's back and making his yell out in pain. By this point the chakra augmentations of both combatants were slowly fleeting away, still holding, but more and more blood spraying and bone churning tragic melodies played after each strike and kick.

Right as Roh-D's body flew upwards, thrown by the tremendous force of Yushijin's kick, the Konoha genin shoved his body upwards with a soaring sky-high kick of his own, just to throw his opponent even higher into the air. Before Yushijin's feet connected with Roh-D's spine, playing it with all the subtlety of a wrecking ball playing the piano, the Kumogakure genin turned around rapidly with a swift back elbow strike that smashed his opponent back down into the dirt.

The audience was going mad, this was just the match they wanted to see, two combatants moving at break-neck speeds, stopping just for a brief moment right before they hit their opponent just to accumulate and focus their awesome power and momentum into a more awesome strike. This was just the kind of battle that Roh-D fought against Oto-B in the semifinals, those who have seen it knew that much.

Roh-D released a quick burst of soundwaves out of his pipes, jetting his body down at his opponent who managed to get back to his sword. The dark-skinned powerhouse extended his hand, attempting to grab the face of his opponent and grind it into the ground before firing off his sound jets again to drag his face across the arena. It was such a clearly telegraphed move that Yushijin countered it perfectly, twirling around the large and brimming with youthful vigor appendage of his opponent and throwing a swift slash upwards.

Blood splattered across the sandy ground as Yushijin's sword managed to get past Roh-D's skin and dig shallowly into the genin's flesh. The built up force and momentum of the blade spiraled the brawler up in the air, and Yushijin leaped after his opponent in a mad chase.

Roh-D extended his hands at the chasing opponent firing off his "Sonic Polka" technique again, sending rapid and loose sound wave projectiles to distract and lightly damage his opponent and give the genin time to recuperate but his opponent simply was no longer where Roh-D last saw him to be.

Yushijin's image flashed up to Roh-D's shocked face, who, too late, realized that Yushijin's illusion had duped him again. The silver blurs of Yushijin's blade danced their triumphant and erratic dance all over Roh-D's body while the caught off-guard genin did his best to use his surgically altered arms to defend from his opponent blade with a notable lack of success.

"Fire Style: Flame Bomb!" Yushijin shouted out as he expelled all of the remaining air from his lungs, infused with Fire Release chakra in close proximity to his injured and blacking out opponent, which immediately detonated the man-sized flame bullet.

Covered with a coat of flames, like a falling star, Roh-D crashed down on the ground, leaving a small crater and almost covering himself entirely in dirt as Yushijin landed a handful of meters farther from his opponent, bashing his knees into the ground and driving his sword into the dirt to keep himself from falling down. The Konohagakure genin was breathing heavily and it was not difficult to see how much this last attack demanded of him.

* * *

"To execute a Fire Release jutsu so close to a sword attack, with so few hand seals. It appears that Yushijin had surprised our expectations", Stea commended the young man who was doing his best to get back on his feet as his opponent laid lifeless and the overseer approached him to check on the vitals and the remaining will and ability to fight of the fallen genin.

"He held his breath inside his lungs this whole time, to attack so rapidly with a blade without breathing, then using that oxygen for a Fire Release jutsu so seamlessly… It's a combination technique all in of itself", Kiyomi noted.

"Fire Release is pretty rare and tough to work with. I always secretly hoped that I'd possess the Fire Release affinity but… Water Release is all I got", Vinda crossed her arms over her chest in a fit of jealousy and adoration of the impressive display of competition inside the arena.

"It's pretty common in the Fire Country and Konohagakure. Most villagers possess some genetic background of it and it's actually the most common Nature amongst our villagers. It's either the primary or the secondary Nature of everyone around", Mana sighed.

"And yet…" Kiyomi cheeked the magician by butting her with her elbow fondly.

"I'm glad I do not possess the talent for it. It's a very destructive nature and brings nothing but pain and blazes wherever it goes. Plus, technically, my roots are from all over the Ninja World. My ancestors didn't confine themselves to a single village so my genetical background is a mash of a bit of everything", Mana calmly stated.

"So you're basically a ninja mutt?" Erumo teased the magician.

"Yes, unlike the highly esteemed Budoki clan, my ancestors accomplished nothing of value", Mana smiled with tips of her lips teasing the lack of a clan background from Erumo's own part when she went out of her way to attack the bloodlines of others. Kiyomi could not help but break into a chuckle over it.

* * *

"It's okay, I can go on", Roh-D hurled out with an alarming amount of blood coming out from his smashed insides and his shallowly striped and streaked body. "The flames cauterized most of my wounds! I can go on!"

Yushijin looked quite amazed at his opponent's ability to shrug off pain. This surgically altered body of his must have had something to do with the amazing endurance of the genin but the Konohagakure examinee looked like he could feel how close he was of putting his opponent down for good.

"Your vitals are at a very alarming state. If you get hit again like that – you may die. Any hit you take from this point on threatens your life", overseer Oke tried to argue with and inform the darkly skinned genin but it was all in vain as he was pretty much brushed aside like a troublesome insect. It appeared that the youth would have rather died than admitted failure and that he has come this far only to fail.

"Come on! Was that the best you've got!?" Roh-D teased his opponent, who finally managed to force his body stumbling straight and pulled his sword out of the ground. Taking his sweet time to sheathe it and prepare for yet another round – one that was certainly the last one for both combatants were severely short on chakra and maybe had one or two more jutsu in them.

"I've shown you my best long ago, so have you", Yushijin closed his eyes to calm and steady his breathing. Roh-D kicked off the ground and darted off at his opponent in a mad dash as his body could no longer withstand the tremendous pressure of sound waves being used to flow throughout his body and jet him around like a madman.

Roh-D threw a powerful cross but Yushijin leaned down and grabbed his opponent's arm over his shoulder, attempting to drag Roh-D over him and slam him into the ground one or two good times to keep him down for good. Surprisingly enough, the Konoha examinee found out that attempting to move his opponent was in vain as Roh-D remained where he stood even after his most hearty yanks.

A thunderous punch sent Yushijin flying and rolling backward before the youth managed to push his body off the ground and get back on his knees to meet his opponent's madly brutal offensive. Yushijin leaned aside, avoiding another power strike only to smack the side of his arm into Roh-D's carotid but even that did not look like it would keep the powerhouse down.

Roh-D collapsed on his knees as well, deceitfully spitting some of his coughed up blood right at Yushijin's face and confusing him momentarily. The first that greeted Yushijin's eyes when he wiped the blood off of his face and out of his eyes was a glowing palm of his opponent about to unload a burst of sound waves right at his face.

"Sonic Khorumi!" Roh-D roared out.

After a brief moment of silence, the Kumogakure genin fell down and on his face, while Yushijin re-sheathed his sword, standing upright, right behind his opponent. The back of Roh-D bled out profusely as the lacking chakra resources made even the more erratic and instinctual bodily augmentations fail.

Overseer Oke rushed up to Roh-D to check his vitals.

"Don't bother, I couldn't take him getting back up and back up again so I paralyzed him all the way down his waist by cutting into his spine. He quite literally couldn't get up, even if he has the will and the guts to do so", Yushijin coldly stated.

* * *

"Well, it appears that's that", Stea smiled with satisfaction, having just seen an incredible show from two of her peers.

"Did you see that? Yushijin's the best there is!" Erumo cheered on her teammate, jumping onto the rails and madly throwing her fist up into the air and yelling her lungs out. "Even if he can get a little bit scary when he gets serious", she added, quivering for a brief moment.

"Hmmm, I wonder why Roh-D didn't break out of Last Resort again, was he that short on chakra?" Kiyomi wondered out loud.

"Possibly, or Yushijin once again surprised us. His technique supposedly allows him to manipulate the time perception of his opponents, yet he had always used it the same way – make them believe that the time has stopped completely. What he could have done, was make Roh-D believe that more time has passed than it actually has, manipulate how fast he appeared to be moving, anything of that nature. His opponent would have had to learn how to break out of each of these all over again, especially if they felt confident enough to think they nailed down Last Resort already. What Yushijin could have used could have been different enough from Last Resort that it was its own separate jutsu, given that he had five weeks to prepare, such innovation on his talents would not be outside the realm of possibility", Mana mumbled before slapping her own cheeks. She was checking just how much had her skin condition improved over the duration of this one match, Kiyomi could sense the innate worry in her friend's heart.

"Your skin has healed a great deal – the color looks normal, well, what's normal for you", Kiyomi teased her friend playfully.

"That bastard", Vinda laughed out before grinning with a monkey-like full teeth smile. "He didn't help this trick either, he refrained from using Last Resort too much after it was "broken", just to trick his opponent into thinking he had him pinned down, right before he pulled out that improved version".

"True", Mana nodded before pulling up her blindfold and crying out in pain before slipping it back down, it appeared her eyes still had a long way to heal before they could face even the gentle and chilly winter sunlight. "But Yushijin will not advance his rank, most likely".

"What do you mean, he was amazing!?" Erumo flipped out, almost jumping in to punch Mana in the face.

"He was more amazing than the Ninja Council realizes. Very few ninja specialize in illusions, it's a tricky and very unrewarding craft to work with – as all of you have pointed out already. It's unlikely that anyone in that skybox even understood what exactly Yushijin had pulled off and just how impressive it was. In the end of the day – that's what it is all about, not winning or losing, not just looking good but making them understand how good you are as well", Mana explained with frustration.

And Kiyomi understood it – it looked like everything that day was stacking up against Mana: her training resulted in massive injuries due to overtraining that may not even finish up healing before her match, due to the VIP area hosting immensely powerful ninja she was unable to use her sensory and had to keep it suppressed in order to avoid anxiety attacks, now she just found out that illusions – the core of her skill set may have been completely useless as very few ninja understood just how intricate and complex they were to work with.

It appeared that with the finals of the Chuunin Exams the village administration was less interested in repairing the arena or doing casual maintenance. Right after both examinees left, or were taken out through the passageways they entered the arena through, they were immediately replaced by the competitors in the next match – Dhaogu and Gasco Patura.

"It's a bit unfortunate how things ended up with Roh-D, isn't it?" Stea sighed, calmly observing her mighty teammate walking out into the arena and facing his opponent, whose main strength in this competition was the mostly maintained mystery surrounding his abilities. Dhaogu only briefly flashed them to avoid getting ringed out at the very last moment during the semi-finals whereas Gasco had shown his off plenty. If Gasco was anyone else, he would have been at a great disadvantage as five whole weeks of preparation time and training would have let any ninja to crazy heights against an opponent they knew so much about.

"I disagree", Mana shook her head, Kiyomi turned at her friend with such disbelief that it seemed that her friend had been switched out with a psychopath – Yushijin's actions seemed very ruthless and cold. Even Erumo was shocked to see Mana on Yushijin's side.

"You don't think paralyzing Roh-D from the waist down was an excessive attack?" Stea wondered.

"Yushijin saw his opponent's iron willpower. Roh-D was going to keep going until his final moment. It is unclear what his surgical alterations are or if he obtained new ones during this time but… They clearly had an impact on his ability to survive damage that would have knocked out anyone else. Roh-D, in the heat of battle, was not a clear judge of consequences of his own actions. I consider paralysis a more welcome outcome to accidentally killing Roh-D any day of the week", Mana explained while her blindfolded face blankly stared at an unclear point in the audience.

"Damn, you're pretty alright", Vinda grinned, just barely restraining the impulse to smack the magician's back playfully. Figuring that with her injuries and pathetic bodily state it would have actually done her harm.

"Death is a cruel end, but sometimes it is better than certain kinds of life", Stea objected. "Take it from someone who's seen plenty of lives spiraling down to its most grotesque elements".

"I disagree. As someone who defeats your opponent, one is stronger than the loser. That grants them the responsibility to protect and watch over them, not destroy them, whatever state they may be in. A broken man can still become a hero, a broken man can still inspire other misguided people, people like they themselves used to be. Destruction is only fitting for useless things and no human life is truly useless", Mana calmly replied to her opponent.

"I will enjoy settling our debate in the arena. We will let the fortune choose the winning side of the argument", Stea smiled as she looked on at her teammate, looking supremely confident in his victory. She looked with verily different eyes compared to those that Erumo looked at Yushijin with.

Erumo cheered on her friend, she was, in a way worried for him. As someone who saw a beloved person facing off against truly terrifying odds, Kiyomi knew that feeling. The feeling of trust in one's beloved but also worry over their well-being. Stea had none of that in her eyes. She looked at Gasco as if he was doing a casual chore, like taking the trash out. She clearly felt fondness or some sort of tolerance of her friend and teammate but she felt no worry over his safety nor did she worry to attempt and support him.

"Our match shall settle nothing of the sort. Truth is not by the side of one who pummels the other side to the point of no return. Are you so worried over your arguments that you need to bet them against a physically broken, weaker opponent to feel more confident in them?" Mana smiled. I, that smile Kiyomi saw something, certainty, will, what was not there when Kiyomi spoke to Mana about her convictions herself during the semi-finals.

Mana had grown, she had grown so much… If there was only such a thing as fortune, only it knew just what exactly was stirring in that mature beyond her years mind of hers. Kiyomi could only worry, not unlike she worried over Meiko five weeks ago, that Mana's injuries regenerate sufficiently before the hour of the fateful match.


	362. The Thunderstorm Net

It took a while for the audience to stop rustling and focus down on the two contestants that were about to clash. Overseer Oke cleared his throat before presenting both combatants to the audience and the Ninja Council that must have been blown away by the last battle, if a little confused by the erratic ending, given their lack of intricate knowledge of the illusionary arts.

Almost like it was his intention to create these conditions, the drizzling snowflakes intensified their downfall, quickly sinking the sandy and grassy arena in a layer of white, creamy cover of snow.

"For the next match – Gasco Patura against Dhaogu!" Overseer Oke declared, raising his hand in the air and letting the audience pay their respects to both examinees about to clash.

"The first contestant – Gasco Patura of Team Phobos from Getsugakure is one of the fearsome trio that has decimated all competition. He actually won his tag team match in the semi-finals all by himself and is one of the most refined sensors amongst the genin", Oke gestured with his hand at the still hooded with his dark purple coat covered with silver colored smoke motifs genin. It occurred to Kiyomi, as she admired the tall and broad shouldered man, or someone who come from a poor country, Team Phobos certainly had plenty of matching hoods and cloaks to wear.

"His opponent – Dhaogu of Team Zumurrud from Sunagakure! A young man who has managed to keep his abilities and his fighting style mostly hidden throughout the entire Chuunin Exam managing to grant himself a cloak of mystery and a massive advantage in this fight!" Oke hyped the young Dhaogu up, the short, like a gothic ball of rags looking youth just carelessly flexed his feeble muscles.

Once Oke ruled the beginning of the match deadly silence took over the snowy arena that was beginning to remind of the snowy fields of Snow Country, deceitfully covered with snow, concealing grasslands and frozen lakes that spanned entire kilometers alike. Both examinees were hesitant to make the first move as neither one of them was too into aggressive attacking.

Then, in one blur it all began – Gasco just moved in a blur right behind his opponent, reaching in to wrap his hands around the little boy's throat. Kiyomi noticed Mana reaching for her own throat at that moment, subconsciously. She must have had unpleasant memories related to that move or one of a similar nature.

Sand began streaming from Dhaogu's sleeveless top and the boy's baggy pants, forming jets and whip-like tendrils that whipped at Gasco's general direction, just fast and precise enough to tear up the cloak of the Getsugakure genin and leave red whiplashes all over his chest and side. When packed together those streams of sand must have packed a significant wallop.

Yet Gasco did not relent, right after returning to a combat mentality, he snapped back into a relentless and vicious physical assault, attempting to overwhelm his physically shorter opponent with rapid-fire yet considerably powerful blows. The result of the youth's naturally impressive stature and considerable physical training, without a doubt, aimed to help him connect his "Thunderstorm Fist" from an up close and personal distance.

Gasco's assault was impressive, the sounds and the shockwaves sent from his punches blasted away the snow around him and swatted away the falling snowflakes in a visually appealing manner of devastating after effects of his blows. The style didn't appear like anything fancy, just a firm punching focused self-taught martial art aimed at strong balance using neat footwork and lightning fast punching when one punch fired off, the other one was already winded up and ready for firing.

Yet each and every one of Gasco's attacks only hit a powerful mass of sand accumulated and placed in between Dhaogu and his opponent. Sand was naturally shock absorbent, it appeared, as the awesome force behind Gasco's strikes got distributed evenly across the entire blob of chakra infused sand and gently controlled with fluid motions that allowed Dhaogu to easily block the physical attacks of his opponent with fluidity and relative ease.

* * *

"Hmmm, interesting. It looks like Gasco's improvements are not just physical. He's thinking quite differently as well", Mana declared.

"That's right, Gasco has improved a great deal over these five weeks, sometimes I wonder now who is stronger between him and Doma, whereas before there used to be no such hesitation of declaring the winner", Stea smiled. "He worked on innovating on his Thunderstorm Fist and has achieved one impressive feat that has lead him to improving his fighting style in multiple different ways. One improvement opened so many doors…"

"I don't know, to me, he seems rather boring. Why does he keep trying to punch his way through that sand? He's not making any progress?" Kiyomi turned her lips sideways in doubt of Gasco's battlefield strategizing.

"True, he's pressuring his opponent though. He, without a doubt, knows that Lightning Release nullifies Earth Release jutsu, he was the one who pointed it out during our clash in the Forest of Death. Still, he is keeping his Thunderstorm Fist back until Dhaogu tires and lowers his sand, he isn't about to waste it on just nullifying the sand when it can just be raised up again". Mana grinned, even given her blindfold, she would've heard the impressive booms and the splashes of water of snow that reached into the audience and even up to the genin platform. It was impressive that she could tell the churning sound that the pressured sand particles made and identified just what was going on though…

* * *

Dhaogu shoved his palm forward with his fingers bent up, aiming at the direction where he had predicted Gasco to come from. Streams of sand separated from the big blob that surrounded and helped the Sunagakure genin in his defensive ventures and smacked Gasco's large frame about, completely blowing away his cloak and revealing quite large blunt force injuries over Gasco's body.

Even with these quite successful blows landing where they were sent, Dhaogu was not about to stop, he commanded the separated streams of sand to circle his opponent. Smashing into Gasco's back and then pushing onward, then the remaining blob of sand in front of the young boy hardened and shaped into spikes, making the intent of the offensive streams of sand clear – to crash Gasco right into the hardened spike wall of Dhaogu's sand.

Just as it appeared that the wall of spikes impaled Gasco in a most gruesome manner, that made the entire audience shake and cheer at the same time, with a poof of smoke the Getsugakure genin substituted with a large chunk of his cloak. It was a quite unexpected turn out to see Gasco use his Substitution Jutsu first, paying with the considerable strain of stamina so early on in the battle. Then again, Substitutions were usually performed early in the battle, as the textbooks of ninja theory advised, so that the strain cooled down before the end of it and the ninja had enough stamina left to perform another substitution later on.

The mass of sand quickly swallowed up the cloak before pressing it so hard inside that nothing remained of it. A show of frustration as in this snowy and filling up with snow continuously field of battle an object such as rags of clothes were useful to be used for one's own Substitution. The snow considerably obscured the details of the surroundings and made it troublesome to focus on anything but the blinding white wherever the eye was trodden.

Gasco breathed in and out a couple of times to calm himself down before snapping his fingers a pair of times and carefully circling his opponent in preparation for the next attack. These two were staring each other down like two ronin preparing to draw their swords just when the sun disappeared in the horizon. Kiyomi found Gasco's refusal to use his signature jutsu quite interesting if a little silly. Given how much this guy and his team terrified Mana this whole time, Kiyomi would've been afraid of him just because she had no idea what Gasco's plan was. There was absolutely supposed to be some sort of a plan.

Dhaogu extended his arm forward, commanding his sand to come in low, forming multiple long tendrils that aimed to wrap around Gasco's thigh and keep him firmly in place. He was planning something of his own, without a doubt. Gasco danced gracefully, dashing back and around the endless stream of growing sand appendages but their sheer speed, unstable and unpredictable manner of movement and numbers overwhelmed him and one managed to wrap around his foot whereas a pair more tightly covered up his arms.

With another gesture command, the Sunagakure genin sent his entire sand mass reserve floating up and above Gasco, shaping into a horizontal spiked wall threateningly dangling above the genin's head.

"Give up", Dhaogu mumbled out as if it would have been just a formality he had to offer instead of a genuine concern. Despite the emotionless ness of his delivery, he still showed more care for his opponent's life than most would have. After Gasco did not offer an answer, the frail youth waved his hands down in a wavelike motion signaling to his floating mass of sand to crash into his opponent.

The crashing sound was mighty, sending waves of sand aside. Doing so easily like the snow was just chunks of paper and mixing the white and innocent puffy cotton layer of snow with the light brown hue of sand that created a muddy mush all around. A small amount of crimson trickled into the mix making the color of the dirt in the arena seem even messier. Battlefields were rarely beautiful…

The audience settled down in silence, discussing with their closest neighbor if they may have just witnessed an actual murder but with a powerful burst of chakra, blasting through the colossal layer of sand that appeared to no longer possess the bond with Dhaogu's chakra that kept it cohesive and submissive to the boy's commands their fears were thrown away. Gasco's indigo vest was torn up and the metal rings that kept the vest on the boy's chest were bent and ground into smallest pieces by the immense pressure of the sand that crashed onto Gasco.

The large Getsugakure genin wiped the blood off his nose and cracked lip before placing his fist back and preparing an attack of his own.

"Thunderstorm Fist!" He roared out as he sent his fist crashing down into the mushy ground, channeling his technique into a crescent shaped projectile, traveling through the ground and under and rushing at his opponent from farther away.

Dhaogu leaped away from the large projectile before responding with a barrage of ninja tools, even managing to mix in an explosive kunai into the mix, trying to deceive his opponent's eyes. Then, unexpectedly to everyone on the observer's platform, Gasco turned around before repurposing all of his momentum into another crushing fist.

"Thunderstorm Fist!" He repeated his technique once again with such casualty and ease that made all of the watching genin quiver uneasily. The follow-up attack blasted through all of the tools and detonated the explosive tagged kunai before nonchalantly continuing its journey to bust up the opponent of its user. Before Dhaogu could even begin to evade this second projectile, Gasco smashed the ground again with his other hand, also overflowing with the crackle of Lightning Release chakra and sending a third Thunderstorm Fist projectile.

"Water Style: Raging Wave!" Dhaogu yelled out before spitting out a mighty wave of water that gushed from his mouth downwards. Using the backward momentum of the rushing water, Dhaogu leaped up in the air, above and over the rushing twin projectiles as they smashed against each other and detonated one another in an impressive thunderous vortex crackle that provided quite a show for the audience.

* * *

"So is that what your mate did for improvement? Learn to spam his crazy-dangerous jutsu? Cause I kinda could have done something like that…" Nanaba chuckled. It was not all that surprising that she would not have made a big deal out of this as she downplayed pretty much everything she did or that transpired around her.

"Oh, he elevated that jutsu to whole new heights. He's just waiting for the right chance to show it off. The main area of his focus was extending the range of his jutsu and learning to channel it in different mid-to-long distance ways", Stea grinned.

"Let's pretend like using the same jutsu three times in a row in a combination like that isn't impressive all by itself, shall we?" Kiyomi thought to herself as she observed the two combatants staring each other down. Now it sort of became clearer to her as to why Gasco didn't use his Thunderstorm Fist before – all he would have achieved was that the sand defense of his opponent would've been destroyed.

Given how Dhaogu's sand manipulation is a jutsu of some sort all in of itself, that meant that he spent chakra with each passing moment just to maintain it and keep it active. Therefore, Gasco would've spent a whole bunch of chakra on just disabling something that was wearing his opponent out. Given how nimble and evasive Dhaogu already was, it may be a good idea to wear him out a little bit before finishing him off. Gasco was clearly thinking on his feet, this way even if he lost the battle he'd have been promoted. He was not thinking like a brash child throwing a fist tantrum in the battlefield, he was thinking like a ninja with an objective and a handful of sub-objectives that were required to fulfill that objective.

"Dhaogu is a really talented ninja if that was the roaring of water that I have heard", Mana suddenly interrupted the chatty girls' observatory platform. "Back in Sunagakure I was told that manipulating sand is an advanced ability that combines both Wind Release and Earth Release. This jutsu that Dhaogu used means he can use three elemental natures at once. That is the absolute limit that any ninja can master in a lifetime and he knows the basics of them already at his age".

"The Sand Release advanced bloodline is just a carbon copy of One Tail's ability anyway. Probably not even as strong", Nanaba squinted her eyes at the muddy arena that was slowly beginning to drown in a thin layer of white snow again. As a Jinchuuriki herself, it sort of made some sense that she'd know of all the unique abilities that other Jinchuuriki possessed.

* * *

"You're having difficulty breathing, don't you?" Gasco interrupted the moment of peaceful breathing and staring down with a loud question, he made sure that even the VIP areas would hear it. "Using your Sand Release in a middle of a snowfall with the air staying so humid is difficult, isn't it? Your chakra dips more than it should every time you order it around".

It was no accident or mistake that Gasco revealed what his sensory told him – he wanted Dhaogu to know why he was running out of breath when normally he wouldn't be. Even more importantly, he wanted the Ninja Council to hear his chain of thought, how much he perceived and noticed and how it affected his strategy. If they knew how he could analyze the battlefield and after they see his next move – they'll all be blown away. Gasco may as well cash his promotion in right after leaving this pit.

"Water Style: Paradise Oil!" Dhaogu chanted as he commanded his sand to manifest at the same time. A yellowish and transparent, oily liquid burst from the boy's mouth in the shape of bubbly orbs, enveloping his sand and covering it in an oily substance that made the sand look almost golden, as well as changing its consistency to a more sludgy one.

Without uttering another word, the boy sent the oiled up golden colored sludge rushing in jets at Gasco's direction while keeping the reserve shaped like a shield in front of him. The Getsugakure brute leaped back, quickly manifesting Thunderstorm Fists to neutralize the approaching oily sands that fell on the ground lifelessly in a shape of wet sand after being as much as touched by Gasco's jutsu.

The creepy baldy treated this exchange of blows like he'd have treated an actual clash of fists, smacking and redirecting each jet with a careful Thunderstorm Fist jab and, in that way, disabling the technique. His watchful eye noticed a certain twitchy reaction in the user of the oily jutsu, at which point he changed his approach and began heavy evasive action, attempting to evade as much of the offensive siege of oily sand as he could. His best attempt was to gain distance that not only carried a hidden possible gain of moving past the effective range of Dhaogu's sand, which there did not appear to be, as Gasco just found out, but also helped him by giving the youth more time to react to the boy's attacks.

Gasco grunted unintelligibly when he noticed something quite scary – a mass of oiled up sand resting on his back and branching out in veins of sand, wrapping around his arms and legs before enveloping the covered areas in sand completely. The Getsugakure brute could feel it – his body parts getting affected as the oily substance hardened his body wherever it managed to get to. Even at this point he could barely move his body in meaningful ways or get away too fast without breaking his spine as that was where the most of the jutsu's effect was based in – Dhaogu meant to disable him completely, just like Yushijin had done in the earlier match.

"You're caught in my jutsu. This is why I didn't want it to be revealed before it was absolutely necessary – it's an ace jutsu that can win me any match. It hardens around the parts it touches and encrusts them in its hard, rocky material. If you stress the affected areas or if I hit them hard – they will shatter alongside with your body. Surrender", Dhaogu demanded without any assertiveness at all. His eyes looked more tired than triumphant really.

"That so?" Gasco smiled "Have you noticed, I wonder?"

Given his opponent's confusion, the bald giant continued.

"The environment around you, have you noticed? The falling snowflakes? This battle was doomed for you from the very beginning, I was waiting for you to pull out your oil jutsu from the semifinals because I needed to find out something", Gasco explained before lightly lifting up his arm by the elbow, something that caused pressure and pain to the creepy baldy but didn't break off his arm completely.

"Thunderstorm Fist!" He roared out as he channeled the Thunderstorm Fist over his hand and overloaded the chakra channel, maxing the jutsu out. The cranked up chakra output made small lightning sparks crackle around, reaching up and around even to the surrounding barriers. The small lightning sparks began catching each falling snowflake, before firing off to the next, creating an intricate glowing net of Lightning Release chakra as the other branching off crackles traveled through the snow mixed with the mud.

In desperation, Dhaogu coated his body with his oiled up sand but that appeared to be a mistake. Once the intricate net of Lightning Release chakra reached him, it enveloped the young man completely, charging up his oily armor to the point where it outright exploded around his body and sent the young man unconscious and face-down on the ground. The massive injuries and lightning flowers all over the boy's body suggested that his chakra augmentations could do little to help his case.

The hardened substance over Gasco's body collapsed into yellow powder dust, the bits that made it into his flesh stayed in his bloodstream, it would likely be eventually removed from his body in one way or another.

This match was over.


	363. Dust to Dust

Even after the match had ended, it did not appear that Gasco was willing to leave the arena. His choice of actions after overseer Oke ruled his victory was surprising to everyone except, it seemed, Stea. The tall powerhouse walked up to his knocked out opponent and just watched him strictly from up above. Then, slowly and calmly, he bent over and picked the young boy up with one hand wrapped around the youth's head, holding the powerless opponent in front of him.

Kiyomi looked at Mana uneasily. This would have normally been a cue for her to do something stupid that would have lead to her getting disqualified. And yet… The magician stood still, lips pressed together, head firmly fixed on one point she couldn't really see in an unwilling instinct that took over when all of her remaining senses were fixed on something else.

Could Mana even tell what was transpiring? What was she thinking? Kiyomi's knuckles pressed tightly, she settled firmly on stopping Mana if she as much as twitched at that direction. It was her duty as the girl's friend to stop her from ruining a journey this long, perilous and one that cost as much to them both as this one did. And yet… The magician just kept on standing calmly.

Gasco's fingers pressed against Dhaogu's temples, he must have considered crushing the boy's head like a grape in between his fingers and he certainly had the strength for it. Had the young Sunagakure genin not been knocked out he'd have been in a lot of pain.

"So pathetic and merciful, asking your opponent to surrender when you believe you have the upper hand. Unfit for service. And yet… Strong enough to be of some use to your village. The potential for developing a Bloodline Selection in the future too. Yes, killing you would be an injustice to your village", Gasco settled as his hand went frail, letting the boy slip from his grasp and slam to the ground weightlessly as the giant turned around and walked away.

Kiyomi breathed out easier. She looked at Mana with a faint smile, "I thought you'd do something stupid, honestly".

"Why? It was obvious that Gasco would not kill Dhaogu", Mana wondered, "Gasco and Doma only kill people they think are wasting their village's time and money with their service as ninja, people they deem a disgrace to the ninja name and reputation. Dhaogu has three active Elemental Natures, which means he may develop an Advanced Bloodline or a Bloodline Selection in the future. Such a man cannot possibly be unworthy of life in their eyes".

"Yeah but… How can you tell what they're thinking, they're just so… Crazy", Kiyomi sighed easier before looking at the large screen that displayed the next match-up. "No offense", the Yamanaka quickly shut Stea down as the Getsugakure kunoichi gave her an off-handed glare after the remark that the blonde made.

"There's a method to any madness. I understand theirs well enough to be able to read it", Mana calmly replied.

"I hope you haven't filed me up with those two in that mind of yours", Stea smiled giving Mana a challenging glance.

"I haven't, your different way of thinking is what makes you more dangerous than your team", the magician admitted.

"Well, girls, I guess I'm next!" Nanaba shrieked out in excitement before running off and turning down the staircase that lead to a long corridor leading up to the arena. She may have heard a couple of good luck wishes before she disappeared or she may not have wanted or been able to hear them, given how excited and fast she was.

On the other side, the familiar frail desert dweller in Buhakim stepped out. The Uber-Spiritual One already had his grotesquely strange looking puppets unsealed and screwed together, wearing them around his body as accessories as the one with many limbs, the one Buhakim called Śrāvakayāna, laid wrapped around his body like an overly clingy lover. Meanwhile, the more abstract shape of a ship wheel covered with fists, Pratyekabuddhayāna, laid behind his back imitating the spiritual enlightenment present on religious art glowing behind important figures.

"He doesn't plan on fooling around", Kiyomi noted recalling how slowly the puppeteer usually unveiled his puppets, almost like it was a religious ritual of sorts, which, of course, it wasn't. The whole point of his Uber-Spirituality was about breaking the stereotypes behind deeply religious people.

"For the next match, you've got our own Nanaba Aomyaku from Konoha's Team Hawthorn. A curious girl who loves her puppet arms deeply and advanced through the semi-finals through sheer luck as her beloved arms were busted during the Forest of Death stage!" Overseer Oke tried hyping Nanaba up but he sort of came out a bit short. Kiyomi found it rather odd how the official did not reveal her status as a Jinchuuriki of the Seven Tails to the audience or list any of the people she's beaten in the Chuunin Exams to hype her up at all.

It was almost like the village wanted the girl's status and anything impressive and noteworthy about her to remain a complete secret…

"She will be facing off against the self-proclaimed Uber-Spiritual guru – Buhakim of Sunagakure from Team Pahlavi. Someone who has been in plenty of intense battle royal style clashes in the Forest of Death and managed to impress us with his massive amalgam puppet in the semi-finals!" Oke hyped Nana's opponent up a bit better. Still, judging from the audience's reaction they did not overly enjoy the prospect of watching a puppeteer fight or feel nearly as invested in into this match as the previous couple.

"Whenever any of you two feel ready, you can begin the third match of the Chuunin Exams finals!" Oke cheered out pumping his fist into the air wildly before taking a strong and hearty leap backwards so that his involvement did not factor in any way into the proceeding match.

Not overly surprisingly, the battle did not just erupt from the moment it had officially begun. Buhakim prepared his puppets for battle by having the many-limbed abomination unscrew its tight grip around him and positioning it in front of him while the other one remained firmly attached to his upper back, protecting him from that front.

Nanaba stood there with her head sunken down, hair falling over her face, fists clenched and shaking by her sides. Kiyomi was surprised to see the energetic and normally cheerful girl tear up a little as she revealed by throwing the flowing hair off her face.

"Promise me, promise me that you'll help me make this battle one that will stand out! They must see us!" She firmly ordered her opponent.

"The path of Uber-Spirituality is not one of the meaningless aesthetics. It's one of hustling towards victory while acting religious, no matter how dirty the means one must take!" Buhakim declared by sending his offensive amalgam of appendages into battle. Normally such a monstrous freak of artistry would have overwhelmed any close range combatant, merely by its sheer number of blurring fists and feet as well as the highly disturbing and unnaturally twitchy manner of movement.

However, Nanaba matched the overly zealous expression of the artistic freedom with the impressive mechanical arms that were completely repaired from the end of the Forest of Death stage. Even as Śrāvakayāna turned and twisted its many joints to achieve impossible striking angles and directions, Nanaba calmly matched the offensive pressure with her own mechanical wonders.

"You must promise me!" She strictly shouted out before pressing on her own offensive barrage of whizzing flashes that could have only been called blows by a manner of speech as their overwhelming number and speed defied the likes which it would have been clumped with had the category been assigned to it. "We will not be invisible!" The girl declared.

"I have been invisible my entire life! I will make them see us!" Nanaba roughed out, wheezing from her lungs as she continued to pressure the handy puppet, her lack of focus on where and how often she was striking instead of the emotions that lead to her accepting the Tailed Beast being sealed inside her made the blonde skip a good pair of blows.

"Puppetry Technique: Vehicle of Disciples!" Buhakim chanted out as his abominable puppet had made quite a painfully clear opening by succeeding to bombard the opposing girl with strikes where she opened herself up due to her emotional outburst.

Buhakim's fingers appeared to completely disappear into thin air as they moved so swiftly and flawlessly, controlling the many-limbed puppet and ordering it to flip and roll abrasively and in a grotesque manner which only this thing could move in, striking and slamming its limbs where the puppeteer's limited flashing fingers could not be bothered to properly wind them up.

Nanaba slid back, still on her feet even after the painful and seemingly endless combination of hammer strikes, punches and kicks that she received from the Vehicle of Disciples puppet. The girl flashed through a handful of hand seals before breathing in deeply. The motion from her opponent to reposition the Solitary Awakening puppet to in front of him in order to shield him from an upcoming technique revealed that even Buhakim knew and respected the fact that a big technique was coming.

"Scale Powder!" Nanaba coughed out as a flow of fine powder blew out from her mouth, shining so brightly that the flash triggered the protective barriers and despite the light being filtered very selectively, it still forced Buhakim to cover up his eyes and writhe around in pain. Even the people watching in the audience covered their eyes up as they began watering excessively to the extent where even closing their eyes or trying to rub the stress out of them did not help.

Mana grabbed her eyes lightning fast, taking a pair of steps back before beginning to outright scream and claw at her temples in pain that the bright flash of light, even as little of it as it passed through her blindfold caused.

"Quickly, go inside the corridor!" Kiyomi jumped up to Mana, covering her friend up with her body and leading the magician into a darker corridor outside to recover. It did not appear like her eyes were in any better condition than they were in when this whole thing started, even if magician's skin had regained its healthy darker hue that it usually had.

"Wow, that powder thing was really bright, wasn't it? Like a little star was stored inside each dust particle..." Kiyomi tried to calm her friend down as Mana cried in pain, sitting by the cold and damp wall in the middle of a dimly lit corridor. The Yamanaka heiress tried to smile and gently tap her friend's shoulder but… She was worried deep inside. So far, the training that her friend did appeared to only be hindering her. Just how could Mana hope to face the strongest genin in the bunch with these eyes and with her sensory shut down to prevent anxiety attacks.

Looking at Mana the way she was now, her hair flowing wildly and more unruly than they've ever been as a haircut was long due for the magician, her skin having just barely recently regained its normal color and all the swelling having just recently disappeared, her senses of sight and smell robbed of her in order to catch up to the insane demands of the Chuunin Exams that were supposed to be just a cakewalk… Kiyomi's heart wimpered for a moment, seeing a young soul broken so much and going through so much physical suffering at her age.

Just how long before their bodies will have nothing more to give? Just what kind of price they pay each time something like this happens and they have to compromise with their own bodies just to keep on breaking them when normally they'd be able to bend be broken no longer?

Buhakim was writhing on his knees, his puppets dangled lifelessly and got dragged around with the puppeteer as he wandered around the stage with his blinded eyes. Nanaba leaped in for a focused cross from the central right of her mechanical arms, aiming to punch her way through the enemy. As the gut wrenching punch connected, sending shivers through the audience who were just recovering from the last flashy show just from how gruesome the sound it made was, another sound followed it – that of a loud bang.

Instead of Buhakim erupting into a fit of vomiting blood that burst through from his innards due to excessive internal bleeding, his body was replaced with the Solitary Awakening and busted into smallest bits and pieces. In his blinded rampage, the puppeteer sent his Vehicle of Disciples chasing off after the blond Jinchuuriki but with a pair of careful and graceful dashes, the girl avoided the overly expressive artistic liberty personified in one creation.

Nana's hands once again blurred in hand seals and her chest inflated from the tremendous amount of air in her lungs before it all got expelled at once.

"Honey Dust!" she wheezed out through a bright cloud of sunflower-yellow powder that covered the entire arena, making the snowy battlefield dye brilliant yellow.

"Puppetry Technique: Vehi…" Buhakim tried to order his puppet to dance again before noticing its twitchy and unresponsive movements. The Vehicle of Disciples was stuck in its initial pose and wouldn't do anything other but twitch meaninglessly.

"Don't you just hate my Honey Dust? It's coarse and rough and irritating and it gets everywhere, even in between your puppet's countless joints and gears!" Nanaba cheeked her opponent with a playful wink at the audience. As Buhakim desperately tried to walk away from his rampaging opponent and regain his composure, Nanaba moved in and with a sledgehammer strike of her hands crushed the overrun with coarse and annoying powder puppet.

Buhakim stumbled about, trying to perceive where his opponent would come from. The Uber-Spiritual One was scratching his skin to blood as the Honey Dust was causing it to swell and itch, his eyes were still watering and bleeding from the flash of light that Scale Powder caused. He was surprised to see his opponent just calmly standing about and waiting for something.

"Now, come on, fuse your puppets together! Hit me with your strongest shot!" Nanaba commanded, almost bullying her opponent into action.

Mana, with Kiyomi's aid, managed to return to the observation platform. After the returning girls were greeted by the others with a brief welcoming look, Kiyomi just smiled, trying to downplay Mana's painful reaction to Scale Dust's filtered flash. "What did we miss?" She jokingly asked.

"Not much, that cheery girl bashed the shit out of the puppets but she's waiting around", Vinda yawned.

"Oddly enough, Nanaba keeps asking Buhakim to use his Bodhisattva. Something like this will cost her her promotion. No way will the Council be happy with such carelessness and arrogance", Stea noted.

"She's not arrogant or careless, she's using Ukemi" Kiyomi wondered before letting go of Mana after the magician gestured that she will be fine and rushing up to the edge of the platform to get a better look and listen onto the arena.

"Ukemi?" Mana asked. "How is she minimizing her damage by asking to receive more of it?"

"I'm not talking about Ukemi in martial arts, I mean it in professional wrestling terms. She's asking to be hit with Buhakim's hardest and best looking spots to entertain the audience. Without a doubt she intends on taking the shot head-on, she knows deep inside that some of the audience wants her blood." Kiyomi explained.

Buhakim wiped the blood off of his eyes, leaving a grisly stain over his face and then placing his hands together in a praying position. Invisible strings lit up with chakra flares as the lifeless pieces of his puppets came back to life, twitching and rolling around like pieces of a crushed body before rolling together and reconfiguring into a tall, epic shape.

"Ninja Style: Bodhisattva!" Buhakim prayed out as the destroyed Vehicle of Disciples and Solitary Awakening became something else entirely. A large humanoid shape without a face. Taller than the entire arena as its head could have likely be seen from outside of the arena and people just passing by at the same district. A pair of more faceless faces attached to the sides of the epically proportioned puppet as twelve arms rose up from the back and assumed praying position and three legs crossed together, putting the Bodhisattva into a meditative pose.

This Bodhisattva was both larger and differently configured than the one in the semi-finals! This one had twice the number of arms, which implied a great increase in the puppeteer's skill.

"There it is, the Icon of Uber-Spirituality, the Bodhisattva!" Buhakim shouted out through the shocked and awe stricken cheers from the audience. It appeared that Buhakim had caught on to Nanaba's game and purposefully had the puppet strike impressive poses and prolonged his attack until the audience had gotten used to seeing this massive faceless humanoid towering the arena.

"Puppetry Technique: Solitary Awakened Perfection!" Buhakim prayed before moving his hand forward in a special hand seal position, which ordered the towering puppet to raise its hand up. As the massively proportioned arm rose and winded up for a palm strike, the entire arm lit up in blue chakra flare before the towering palm slammed at where Nanaba was last seen standing, crushing the area to bits.

The tremendous force of Bodhisattva caused such a massive shockwave that it blasted away all of the snow that had gathered and layered across the arena, causing violent whirlwinds of powerful gusts that scattered Nana's Honey Dust and changed the brilliantly yellow battlefield into a more rocky and devastated one. Just like before, the protective barriers that were usually invisible, placed around the arena lit up to protect the civilians in the audience but the sheer sound and the spectacle of it made the crowd jump on to their feet.

As the devastation began settling down once more, revealing the remains of the Bodhisattva's wrath, the chakra flare around the puppet's arm faded away.

"No way!" Kiyomi shrieked out in complete disbelief. The other girls, except for Mana, who was still to sense what was transpiring in a meaningful way, joined in on the emotional outburst of the Yamanaka.

Nanaba's feminine figure quivered under the pressure of the Bodhisattva's palm before a mad battlecry and a burst of crimson chakra cloak from her body gave her the physical power needed to overpower the Bodhisattva and lift its heavy arm. Nanaba was not content with just lifting it up, the girl's hands wrapped around the edges of the humongous palm and twisted it sideways, throwing the entire puppet aside and crashing at the audience. Only the protective barriers prevented a massive calamity with thousands of casualties and the destruction of half the arena but the shocked audience got to see Bodhisattva's faceless heads from up too close for comfort.

In just five minutes, the girl who wanted to stop being invisible, the young soul who just wanted to be noticed and in the center of attention so that she could be seen captured the hearts and admiration of Konohagakure and its honored guests.


	364. Spiritual Outrage

Buhakim's hands erratically moved around, doing the youth's best to get the partially downed giant Bodhisattva back on its feet and ready for battle. Nanaba grinned with energy and vigor before spreading her feet wide and leaning her body down, preparing for a powerful leap. The intensity of the chakra flowing through her body scattered the remnants of dust scattered on the ground and the fallen snow, as well as creating a violent vortex that blasted away the continuously falling snow as well.

"Fire Style: Shooting Star!" Nanaba chanted out, weaving her hand seals before breathing out a turbulent jet of flames, the stream of blazes formed a man-sized fireball with sharp angles, somewhat resembling a cartoonish star shape.

"Puppetry Technique: Solitary Perfection!" Buhakim ordered his puppet, before it could fully recover with three hands being occupied with pushing the puppet off of the barrier it slammed into. Lazily the puppet shot forward its palm, driving it right into the star-shaped fireball and pushing it right back at Nanaba. The size of the puppet's arm was too great for Nanaba to dodge, given how she had dashed at the puppet right after blasting it with the fireball, aiming to attack it physically as well.

This time the jutsu actually appeared to hurt Nanaba as her heart-freezing scream echoed through the audience and her limp, partially blazing body fired out of the resulting explosion and slammed into the arena wall.

"Puppetry Technique: Solitary Awakened Perfection!" Buhakim once again commanded Bodhisattva to attack the weightlessly dangling, stuck in the hole in the wall she herself left Nanaba. The upper right arm of the puppet lit up with blue chakra flare as it slammed its palm right to where Nana was stuck in. An explosion of blue flame vortexes and smoke erupted taxing the protective barriers to once again work overtime in order to protect the awestruck audience.

A loud popping sound made Buhakim's eyes widen in shock. Ripples and cracks started splitting all across the arm that slammed the downed girl deeper into the wall as splinters and larger chunks of wood and metal began blasting off of the splitting appendage of the Bodhisattva. As the pulsing reactive force of Nanaba struggling against the Bodhisattva reached the colossal faces of the puppet, the entire structure got violently jerked and tossed backwards, falling on its bottom and opening up completely.

Kiyomi had expected to see Nanaba leap out from the rubble of the crushed wall and fire away at the puppet, continue the endless streak of brutal madness that these two have created but it appeared that the Jinchuuriki girl couldn't quite do that. Wiping the blood off of her busted lip and nose, trying to open up her swollen right eye, the vibrant blonde stumbled out of the rubble, rolling large chunks of it aside of her.

* * *

"She's fighting the puppet", Mana noted. Usually it would have been advisable to target the puppeteer, especially once the puppet was brushed aside, as it was twice already in the resulting brawl.

"She wants it to look good, she wants to destroy the puppet and see the audience's reaction to it. She wants to be seen and acknowledged", Kiyomi sighed.

"I can sort of relate to that, but that will cost her the promotion. Being acknowledged by the Council of professionals and being visually appealing to capture your audience are two different things. A true ninja is supposed to be the opposite of an entertainer", Mana shook her head.

"What do you know of her thoughts?" Stea sneered at Mana, it appeared that even the magician herself was surprised by the rather passive aggressive reaction from her opponent. "You have been an entertainer for the most of your life, from what I've heard. These people loved you since even before you stood on the stage, they spoke something about cardboard boxes and flowery dresses during your show. That feeling you have during your shows is the desire to selfishly indulge in that love you already captured, Nanaba wants to be acknowledged for the first time. She feels invisible and wants that to end. These two sensations are fundamentally different."

"What an idiot!" Vinda scoffed before leaning over the rail to observe the battle more clearly, seeing how Mana stepped off of it and moved back a bit. "She's the fucking Jinchuuriki, if she wants to be seen, just blow fucking shit up…"

"That wouldn't be her", Mana realized. "That would be the Tailed Beast inside of her. Nanaba wants to be acknowledged for what she is herself, not for what she has been made into".

After seeing Stea's more reserved nod, Kiyomi finally understood the tragic irony of Nanaba's life. The girl had no clan, no famous background or remarkable abilities. So far she barely showed anything but crafty mechanical arm engineering and Fire Release – literally the most common of the Chakra Nature types found in Konohagakure.

The girl must have accepted the Tailed Beast being sealed inside her because she wanted to be something more. Because she tried and failed to be acknowledged but all it did was cause the schism between her and everyone else to split even deeper. Her status as a Jinchuuriki was kept secret from the ordinary civilians so she could not truly show herself off to them, meanwhile those that did know of her special case were afraid of her because of what lurked inside of her. Some others yet were jealous of the power she held…

That was even if Nanaba had any choice on the matter of the Seven Tails being sealed inside her. Sometimes the Tailed Beasts were being sealed into actual babies so that the secret could be kept from them as well, with the possibility of it being revealed when it is most necessary and useful to the village. Even if the toddler did know the secret, by a freak accident or someone spilling the beans, they would still grow up without any biases. Biases which have formed around the Tailed Beasts and treat their power differently from those who have grown up without their Jinchuuriki status and accepted it later in their lives.

* * *

A crimson aura burst through from Nanaba's pores, creating an off-putting image of a wild girl who appeared to have been evaporating her own blood, when in fact it was merely some of the Tailed Beast's power letting loose. One's personality and dominant emotions had a feedback on one's chakra, how intense it was, sometimes its properties even. Seeing how most Tailed Beasts were forces of nature, their chakra always had a corrupting influence.

Releasing some of the inner demons always started out great. The first slip of the Tailed Beast's chakra only granted some extra chakra, enhanced one's physical strength, speed and empowered one's techniques. The more this exchange happened over the short period of time – the more the user would have been corrupted by the beast inside. Overseer Oke appeared to be watching Nanaba very carefully for overly corrupting influence, his face betrayed a clear distaste for the reliance on the Tailed Beast's chakra by the young lady contestant.

Nanaba charged at the massive puppet, jumping off of the ground like a human-arrow with a winded up flesh fist and six mechanical ones prepared to fire off behind her back.

"Puppetry Technique: Dual Awakened Perfections!" Buhakim huffed out, as his arms continued to dance gracefully, controlling the colossal puppet. Bodhisattva lifted up two of its top row arms before locking them up in a sledgehammer slam position, then driving them down as they fired up with blue chakra flares.

Nanaba's downfall was telegraphed by the lightning-fast blue pillar of chakra that started at the point of impact and ended resonating in pulsing shockwaves across the arena ground leaving nothing but the ravaged ground where she busted down into. The shockwave from this one slam caused the entire arena below to shatter and left only a messy pile of rocks and rubble from what was previously a stage of combat designed to incorporate multiple stages from all around the world.

It took a couple of moments before the bland blue glow that shocked and emanated from under the rubble stopped glowing. With her jumpsuit partially tattered and her skin covered with bruises and beatings, Nanaba leaped out from where she was crushed into. The swollen eye, cracked lip, and a busted nose were no longer bleeding – the regeneration that the Jinchuuriki granted its host when they allowed the beast's chakra to leak out was quite impressive.

But something was wrong – Nanaba's eyes were whited out completely and a layer of red, wispy chakra was completely enveloping and surrounding her. The civilians in the audience may have looked rather confused and thought that this was just some sort of odd technique they have never heard of but most ninja present and observing the match shifted in their seats uneasily.

Nanaba Aomyaku had entered the Initial Jinchuuriki Form, she had not yet surrendered her will or control of her body to the Tailed Beast but she was quite close to that point. Right now it was tough to say how much chakra that Nanaba leaked out from her body was hers and how much of it was the Seven Tails'.

* * *

"You're fairly skilled in lore and history of the Ninja World, what kind of personality does the Seven Tails have?" Kiyomi turned at Mana uneasily, wondering if these protective barriers could even withstand the power of something as wild and scary as a Tailed Beast. Given how worn out they already were, that was unlikely.

"Well, it's tough to say," Mana shook her head, "There are speculations and several historical recounts of Seven Tails having rather cheerful and go-lucky, fun-loving personality. Given Nanaba's own nature, these two would be compatible if that was the case which would make them more willing to work together and a more efficient weapon. That must have been why the village sealed the Beast into someone of an unimpressive background like Nanaba. It would make sense that it would be the most likely personality of the Beast."

"Hmph, you brainy types are always speculating and wondering. Never a clear-cut answer…" Vinda sneered at Mana mockingly, with a sadistic smile, without doubt imagining melting the girl's flesh off her bones.

"Personalities of someone as unstable as the Tailed Beasts differ. In our journey to the Wind Country we have met a worn out and starved to near death Nine Tails. There was no method or malice in its eyes, just its beastly nature and the desire to escape and destroy its shackles. Even Seven Tails could turn destructive if it is unhappy about being imprisoned or if it hates its host. They aren't math equations, they are beasts with personalities and feelings."

"It is said that the Tailed Beasts together comprise the 98 percent of the universe's chakra. All the people living now and the endless universe itself only share the remaining 2 percent. Given that knowledge, even a playful and happy Tailed Beast sounds absolutely terrifying", Stea smiled bitterly, it was a smile, which was meant to acknowledge the fragility of her own existence when the girl remembered the insane universe she lived in.

Kiyomi caught a glimpse of Mana's objecting face, she had something to say to Stea's quoted claim of the Tailed Beasts' properties but for whatever reason decided not to do so. Perhaps too many painful memories laid in the story that the magician wanted to tell with her objection... If anyone had a bitter memory to accompany every one of their experiences and stories, Mana would have been that person.

* * *

"Puppetry Technique: Vehicle of Three Awakened Perfections!" Buhakim roared out, throwing both of his arms forward. Following his command, the massive faceless icon of Uber-Spirituality winded up for a ruthless assault using three of its arms.

Answering her opponent's call for battle, Nanaba emitted her own fearsome battle cry and kicked off the ground, once again sending her body on a collision course with the massive Bodhisattva and preparing her mechanical arms for a vicious rampage she would unleash to tear down the puppet's body.

Just as the flaring with blue chakra flames three arms began pummeling at the aerial shape of the Jinchuuriki girl, Nanaba answered with her own assault. Her own awakened borrowed power matched, if not outdid a little, Bodhisattva's innovated offensive, compared to the limited pool that the Bodhisattva possessed in the semi-finals. As the fists of the massive puppet and Nanaba clashed, even more cracks began emanating through Bodhisattva's arms and even more spear-sized splinters and scrap shot out from its overstressed body.

"Fire Style: Spirited Shooting Star!" Nana shouted out with an inhuman, wild voice. Certain fearsome undertones were present in her voice, almost like an actual demon more ancient and terrible than the world everyone shared was speaking through her. The girl breathed out another large tongue of flames, still in mid-air, before shouting loudly behind her. The concussive force of her shout instantly lit up the protective barriers and propelled the girl forward in the moment of lost momentum.

Nanaba drove her arm forward to grab the star-shaped fireball she had fired at her opponent and to drive it into its face using her own hand. Before she could do that, the girl failed to notice the darkening skies and all-consuming shadows of the Bodhisattva's slapping palm before it was too late. Detonating the Shooting Star and smacking the girl back down under the rubble, the Bodhisattva quickly shut Nanaba's hearty streak of vicious attacks down.

"Puppetry Technique: Six Perfections!" Buhakim pressed his arms by his side and tensed his body up, preparing to a great physical strain that performing this technique would have required of him. The Bodhisattva extended its main set of arms, the ones that had a hieroglyph of a different virtue inscribed on their palms before slamming them all at the pile of rocks and rubble where Nanaba flew and got buried under after being slapped down.

Before the hands could crush and grind all the debris into dust with the intense pressure and force of impact, it appeared to meet an invisible force of resistance. That was before a fearsome sound emanated through the stage, forcing everyone to close their ears as it was both intimidating and heart-piercing by how loud it was. Not just loud: wild, uncontrollable, angry… It was not the Tailed Beast that was corrupting Nanaba, it was Nanaba's own desire to be acknowledged and witnessed and the frustration of failing to achieve the goals she had set for herself that corrupted the playful seven-tailed demon inside her.

The resulting shockwave threw the six virtuous arms of Bodhisattva aside from the sheer force of it. Once again the protective barriers dyed the lower central part of the arena bright purple. Buhakim stumbled back before gripping his pain-ridden chest with his right hand before extending his left forward, shifting his fingers and doing his best to work the Bodhisattva's control panel to command it to press onward.

"Puppetry Technique: Six Perfections!" Buhakim roared out, using its six remaining, undamaged and unaffected by Nanaba's shockwave generating and ground leveling battlecry arms to repeat the six-armed assault on the downed Jinchuuriki.

A fiery star-shaped fireball, supersized compared to the previous size of fireballs unleashed by Nanaba burst from underground with the glowing crimson and completely enveloped by a chakra cloak of red, boiling aura Jinchuuriki driving her hand into it and pushing it onwards. Numerous explosions rippled through the additional six arms of the Bodhisattva while the six arms that were used for the second Six Perfections exploded into shatters as the fireball ripped right through them. The Spirited Shooting Star then blasted the epic puppet straight into its central faceless orb, sending it crashing back until it slammed into the protective barrier where it would've normally crushed through an entire side of the arena killing thousands in the audience.

Kiyomi took a moment to look at the audience, even she – a trained and fairly hardened in battle ninja was leaning down and covering herself from each of the resulting shockwaves and in complete disbelief at all times of the awesome clashing powers in the arena. She could only imagine the horror in the eyes of a simple civilian who only gets to chance of experiencing such awesome clashes between what must seem to them as gods themselves during such events.

The audience was rustling alright, but those were no longer the screams of acknowledgment and entertainment. Even behind the protective barriers the audience was completely scared shitless for their own safety and screaming in discomfort and petrifying fear. Kiyomi's wavering eyes moved up to follow the events transpiring in the completely totaled arena. Seeing the amount of devastation and lack of control in the match made the Yamanaka wonder just how was continuing the event after this match possible.

Nanaba did not even look to be at all worn after that last attack, just as her shrouded in the crimson chakra cloak feet hit the first solid chunk of rubble, she kicked off, completely smashing it to bits in the process, and charged at Buhakim himself this time. Nanaba may have no longer been in control, it used to be her firm objective to total the Bodhisattva, the Seven Tails may have willed to end this battle quicker so that this madness finally stopped…

Buhakim shouted out in pain, at this point, it appeared, even merely moving his arms was beginning to burn up his fatigued muscles. He was suffering from extreme chakra shortage and it became clear almost immediately after his first response to the upcoming deadly attack. The Bodhisattva merely froze in place before beginning to collapse into small pieces of Solitary Awakening's and Vehicle of Disciple's wreckage that it was constructed from. Buhakim fell on his knees as he began sweating profusely on the remains of the totaled arena.

Before the Uber-Spiritual One could even accept or realize his incoming demise, however, a giant black tub, decorated with horned skulls and covered with rings full of spikes crashed on top of Nanaba, following a loud and authoritative voice of Overseer Oke.

"Ninja Style: Parliament of Obsidian!" he chanted out.

Loud bangs and roaring noises emanated from under the dark tub but not even in its worsened state could Nanaba budge the tub one bit. It appeared that light itself was bent as it traveled around the tub, distorting its view whenever one tried to lay their eyes on it. The pressure inside could've been unbearable, or it could've been completely normal and this jutsu was just a restraining mechanism, which would've made Oke perfect for overseeing a similar event.

Buhakim mumbled something unintelligibly before Overseer Oke gestured at his direction. "Examinee Buhakim is declared the victor. Examinee Nanaba is disqualified for breaking the rules. The Chuunin Exams will undergo a twenty-five-minute intermission so that the arena may be repaired and the protective barriers - examined".

* * *

"Disqualification? That doesn't make any goddamn sense!" Vinda flipped out, she appeared to be just about the only person around admiring the devastation that the clash between the two had created.

"It does not", Stea did not look happy to agree with her much more erratic and hotheaded peer. "The overseer did not see the necessity to interfere even when Gasco was about to kill his opponent. Killing is also supposedly allowed by the rules. It is painfully obvious that this had everything to do with Nanaba's Jinchuuriki abilities leaking out. The rich and powerful Konoha is protecting some skeletons in its closet, as usual".

"Did you hear what Buhakim said when he collapsed?" Mana mumbled to herself in a melancholic tone, seemingly ignoring Stea's demeaning remark aimed at her village and at the same time interrupting Kiyomi who was about to object to it as well. "He said he couldn't control chakra, he kept repeating it was unfair, that he still had chakra left…"

"You think he broke his network through reckless augmentation?" Kiyomi wondered, fully knowing Mana's own painful history with this mistake.

"Probably", the magician shrugged. "Most likely", she lowered her head sadly.


	365. Live and Let Live

The party of girls in the observatory area slowly proceeded outside and through a staircase that eventually lead them to bump into all of the audience members who, similarly to the girls, have decided to leave their seats and roam around. There were plenty of vendors offering their goods and services just outside the arena and they were about to have an unexpected field day.

One thing that almost instantly captivated Kiyomi's attention, besides Mana's continuous attempt to remove her blindfold, which resulted only in painful grunts and more tears before her tightening it back, was the head of Gasco towering above the rustling crowd. That meant that the boys had also chosen to leave their observatory on the opposite side and walk off their slightly sore from standing around feet as well as refresh their heads.

Kiyomi was surprised by how quickly, and rather rudely, Erumo shoveled the other girls away to run up to her teammate and congratulate him on his victory. Frankly, the Yamanaka had forgotten that the trapster was with them in the observatory to begin with, given how silent she's been throughout the whole last match. The blonde just sighed in frustration before looking around for more familiar faces. She expected to see Meiko shrieking about how crazy the battles were or at least complaining about how she fell asleep halfway through overseer Oke's hype talks.

Mana also shared Kiyomi's healthy curiosity about where this crazy shuffling of the crowd would take them. She was clearly looking uncomfortable by all the noise and stuffy air that must have troubled even her dead nose, untainted oxygen must have been a universal need. Gently moving his teammate aside, Yushijin approached Mana and Kiyomi, something that greatly confused the two, even if Kiyomi would have appreciated Yushijin's symmetrical and angled in all the right ways facial features any day for as long as she would need to.

"So, how did I do?" He sighed, looking both at Mana and Kiyomi.

"You're asking us?" Kiyomi coughed out.

"Well, I do recall you being somewhat competent in genjutsu in the Academy, meanwhile Mana is a little short of a prodigy in the field currently", Yushijin shrugged.

"Don't look at me, I've been ditching my focus on the illusionary arts for a while. It's kind of hard to stand out in the team when Mana spends so much time and effort on it", the Yamanaka shrugged, looking at Mana, the girl still looked uneasy around the two and looked like she'd rather drill right underground like some drill-wielding mole to avoid talking to them. Although, it could have just been the crowded and uncomfortable space causing this behavior in the magician.

"You were nothing less than amazing", Mana nodded, for a moment Erumo's eyes glittered like two little proud diamonds before shifting back to their spiteful initial state.

"That's not what you told everyone while watching the match, two-face!" The trapster scoffed at the magician. "Then again, why am I getting surprised by that kind of behavior, from you of all people…"

Yushijin lifted two fingers, just an inch short from pressing them against Erumo's lips in an attempt to silence his friend. He must have seen Mana's lingering thoughts, which she chose not to express initially. Now that she was "cornered", the magician realized that she kind of had to.

"To be entirely honest, I don't think you'll get promoted. Your skill was so intricate and your work and focus on a pair of jutsu instead of an entire arsenal of techniques was so fruitful that it is quite likely there were only one or two members of the Council that successfully read your movements, even if you did your best to include the Council into your illusionary arts". Mana mumbled it all out. Kiyomi felt bad for her friend having to get cornered by people who didn't quite like her and must have just tried to validate their twisted and skewed views of her.

"I see…" Yushijin closed his eyes with a bitter smile. It may have been full of foul tasting feelings but it was genuine and did not look malicious or like any of his distaste was directed at Mana. Quite the opposite, it felt more like the context of his bitterness was entirely pointing at mental self-immolation.

The four gently worked their way outside the arena, moving through a loud and a rather obnoxious crowd of civilians who expressed opinions of the spectrum so broad and in such numbers that it was difficult to even the trained ninja to filter specific ones out. It would have been much more reliable to read audience's reactions in the arena instead of listening to this cacophony of masses.

"You did not give a team from another village intel on our team's location out of spite or malice, did you?" Yushijin asked out of the blue, surprising everyone but Mana. Truthfully, it was tough to say just what the magician was thinking or how exactly she reacted to the youth's question seeing how she covered up her eyes.

"No. I did so out of a conflict of ideology with a certain lost friend. I made a choice, fully knowing the consequences of each of the possible choices I could have made at that moment. If you feel like I deserve your spite forever, I have accepted that outcome as what I had to gain from that choice outweighed that", Mana answered as the first cold breezes of fresh winter air met the nostrils of the ninja.

"You predicted that Kouta might react the way he did?" Yushijin raised an eyebrow.

"I knew he'd be really mad and that he'd have problems trusting me, the way things turned out was always a possible outcome of those results", Mana lowered her head making her face sink under the long and greasy mess of raven dark hair.

Yushijin snickered for a second before restraining his emotions and shifting back to his cold face again. In that moment, Kiyomi realized how much this youth reminded her of an Uchiha, it would be very difficult to enjoy the aesthetically pleasing sight of this young athletic man after this link was once made and will forever stay in her mind…

"That is not at all how I would have imagined you think. No offense, but from how Kouta used to be in love with you, imagining you mirroring those feelings completely… It's tough for someone to just cut it all loose for their Ninja Way. Sure, everyone says they are ready to do it, never give up, become the Hokage, greatest in something… Whatever their objective in life is… Everyone always stands by their word when it's easy, few do so when it's like it usually is", Yushijin observed.

Mana remained silent. It was not usually something that befits her. The Mana that Kiyomi knew would have probably talked her way into something stupid and then solved that stupid situation with the most stupid decision she just made up, ignoring those that are available to her. The silence extended for so long that Kiyomi and Erumo even shared uncomfortable glances at each other as if encouraging the other to kill it.

"Hey! There you two are!"

Meiko's cheerful as always voice did the deed for any of the two. Yushijin quickly extended his hand for a shake and after Mana accepted it just as quickly, Team Fir just walked off to their own ways. The redhead ran up to her friends, maneuvering around the numerous people in ways that would have made one question the fact that her legs were just bloody stumps just a bit over a month ago.

"How crazy was that last fight!?" The redhead yelled out, loud enough to embarrass Kiyomi in front of the passing by civilians and discomfort Mana.

Just a step away from the two, Meiko froze on her feet and freaked out, jumping back and tumbling over a bunch of people. All of whom decided to express their grievances with the blacksmith girl but upon gazing their eyes on her physical shape decided it against their best interests even in a village of such medical excellence where Meiko could now freely walk and successfully dropkick people.

Mana and paled out in her freakout Meiko shared a long and uncomfortable staredown, even if Meiko was staring at and Mana was staring through a dirty blindfold.

"Oh… It's just Mana, I kind of forgot she looked like a crazy swamp witch lady now", Meiko snickered innocently while shamefully stroking the back of her head and bowing it in front of the magician as if she could see the blacksmith doing it.

"I looked even worse when we met, you know", Mana looked away, crossing her hands on her chest, visibly a little bit flustered over being taken for an undead malevolent spirit from a swamp. The magician may have been slightly butthurt, but she was right – her skin and swellings significantly improved over the duration of the three matches.

"Seeing Nana flip out like that kinda reminded me of the time we met the Nine Tails, remember?" Meiko laughed out cheerfully, walking alongside the two teammates all relaxed-like.

"We all almost died, several times even before we even got to the beast's lair. Hard to forget", Mana replied.

"If that Daidao guy went as far as Nanaba did, maybe Meiko would be in the finals now", Kiyomi pressed her lips together in an almost cute pout.

"We all lucked out with the opponents we got", Mana bluntly exclaimed with a hint of fear behind her voice. "Those Jinchuuriki folk are in a completely different league to us or anyone in the Exams. I've never seen something quite like Nanaba's fight, she just got hit and bounced right back, freely letting the Seven Tails corrupt her just so she could fight longer. Her chakra and stamina appeared almost infinite, they are opponents that do not seem to tire, care much for injuries or ever run into chakra shortage problems. We should be glad that Daidao showed as much restraint as he did".

"You didn't see Nanaba's fight", Meiko flicked Mana's forehead before slowly removing the magician's blindfold and dangling it in front of her face, "This thing obstructed your view".

The ends of Mana's lips twisted upward and her cheekbones shot out, the magician grabbed the blindfold with almost pitch-point precision before wrapping it around her closed eyes. After her eyes were safely protected from even the most limited winter sunlight of this gloomy gray day the magician burst into laughter.

* * *

About twenty-five minutes later, just as scheduled, the matches were ready to continue with the arena being completely restored to its initial state. The snowfall was still getting in the way and ceaselessly covering the field with thin layers of white but it was not something that the officials could or wanted to do something about. They have seen Gasco utilize this element in a clever way already and wanted to see what the other competitors may think up of with this unusual for the matches condition in play.

The large screens hanging at the top of each corridor entrance displayed the names of the next contestants: Nara Sugemi and Vinda Calkem. This matchup explained why the sadistic young lady hadn't joined the other girls in the observatory area after the break.

Even if it took the matches twenty-five minutes to resume, the finals were actually halted for a bit longer than that as the flow of people returning to their seats took longer than expected to clear up. It was not until at least ten minutes extra that everyone returned to their seats and the arena was filled enough to where the officials chose to continue the match by having overseer Oke strut out and declare the next match.

"For the next match, we have Vinda Calkem – an impressive young kunoichi that blew us all away in the semi-finals with the advanced ability of Water Release, managing to eliminate both a competent Sunagakure competitor and a prime physical condition Guren clansman all by herself!" Oke pointed at Vinda who was entering the arena from the right before arrogantly crossing her arms on her chest and sneering at the opposite side of the arena and a corridor sunken in total darkness.

"She will be facing Nara Sugemi, a provider of a supremely brutal and impressively physical match where he showed off all of his taijutsu prowess and a unique spin on Nara clan techniques!" The crowd turned left to witness the other competitor enter. Sugemi had changed a lot since the semi-finals. His hair was a lot longer and still completely unrestrained, something that most Nara used to bother with. His physical condition also appeared to have improved as the young man had easily gained large amounts of weight through sheer physical training. Not to mention his raggedy vagabond-like clothing.

Almost immediately after overseer Oke finished talking Kiyomi could hear the audience below mumbling to each other dismissively about Sugemi's introduction. Even mere civilians seemingly have heard of the profound intelligence of the Nara clansmen and their proficiency at amazingly entertaining and efficient strategies. Hearing that Sugemi was a physical combatant above all else made them speak of him in a dismissive tone, almost like he was a reject or a failure already.

"People in Konoha are deeply bound by tradition and very unwelcoming of change, it seems", Mana muttered, given her sensory training she must have also overheard more than she would have like from the civilians below. Kiyomi had almost forgotten that Sugemi was once Mana's teammate and still a good friend. In fact, even if Sugemi suggested that there was once a falling out between her old team, he still quite obviously cared for her. He was the one to gather Team Hawthorn and Team Hokage together to rescue the magician after all…

Just as the match was declared having begun, the Nara charged at his opponent almost instantly. The speed at which he closed the distance between the two was remarkable and easily dwarfing the speed at which he was fighting Meiko in his base, unmodified by the Gates, state during the semi-finals. In fact, he may have matched his previous First Gate speed just the way he was now.

A strong barrage of kicks overwhelmed Vinda, stiff and painfully sounding, they bombarded everywhere from the girl's head to her chest and abdomen, then - her knees. A loud poof, not unlike that which the Substitution Jutsu leaves emanated through the arena but this was no Substitution even if Vinda evaporated in a cloud of white smoke, similar to how a Substitution unveiled itself. It was an advanced clone jutsu that Vinda had used. One that left a corporeal clone.

That was not it, one small detail caught Sugemi's eye – a seemingly harmless paper figurine floating right in the middle of the white cloud. The youth's eyes twitched in shock when it realized that this sphere was no cloned ninja tool but instead an origami water bomb. The lantern-like shape burst in mid-air, splashing its contents all over Sugemi who grunted in pain before stumbling back. Loud and skin crawling sizzling noises could have been audible coming from the young man but with a single flare of chakra the harmful effects of the acidic contents of the water bomb were disabled from causing too much harm.

"Not bad, huh?" A voice echoed from somewhere inside the arena. "I let my Shadow Clone enter the arena instead of me and you fell right for it… Did your little heart shutter when you realized you may melt away? Did you feel the chills crawling down your body when my special Water Release acid covered you, waiting for the pain to kick in and stressing to counter its effects?"

Sugemi smiled from under his long helm of sweaty hair. The smile transcended into a composed snicker and then into a full out laughter. It looked like the entertainment of her opponent shut Vinda up for good.

"You mean to tell me you were so stupid as to split your chakra in half before the match even started? Just to coat me in your stupid acid once? I barely broke a sweat neutralizing it, it'll take more than this for me to register this as even a try", Sugemi verbally assaulted his opponent.

His verbal attack revealed itself to be quite effective as sizzling shuriken shapes made of acidic liquid flew straight at Sugemi from an unclear point behind the trees standing at the south-western part of the arena.

"Water Style: Acid Shuriken!" Vinda yelled out after Sugemi covered himself up and allowed the shuriken constructs to hit him in the back, sizzling his dogi away into nothingness and revealing the scarred and iron-thick back of the Nara.

After a twitch, Sugemi's body flared up in blue chakra flames to counter the corrosive effects of Vinda's acid before the Nara turned his head sideways just at the location where the shuriken came at him from. Sugemi's blood-freezing eyes would have been enough to make anyone freak out and switch locations.

"Shadow Possession Jutsu!" Sugemi yelled out pressing his hands together into the position of the signature Nara hand seal, which all of their clan hijutsu required, and sitting down on one knee as a long tendril extended from his shadow, reaching up all the way into the dark embrace of the artificial patch of snowy forests where Vinda was hiding.

Without offering as much as a word, Sugemi leaped straight at the little patch of snowy forest forcing the kunoichi caught in his jutsu to mimic his movements and leap straight at him. Sugemi did not release his technique until it would have been too late for his opponent, in mid-air jumping punch position, to alter too much of her movement and the two ended up trading punches.

Vinda's lifeless body got violently yanked back at the trees, downing the whole row of them at once as while Sugemi got decked in the cheek as well, the difference between the strength of the two was simply too great.

* * *

"Something's different about Sugemi", Mana noted. "The Sugemi I used to know would have never considered that the entire forest is sunken in shade in this lousy winter weather, which molds with the shadow of anyone hiding in there, meaning he only had to touch the shadow of the forest to connect with his Shadow Possession".

"Look at those burns on his back", Kiyomi uttered in disbelief how recklessly Sugemi was fighting. "He let himself get hit twice just to land that one blow…"


	366. The Swood Acid Trap

Sugemi crouched down on one knee, placing his hands together in the Nara hijutsu hand seal position. Deciding to press on his advantage, he mumbled out the name of his "Shadow Tendril Jutsu" sending an elongated shadowy line across the thin layer of snow and toward the broken collection of thinly grown together trees.

Emerging from the large clump of shadows, which Sugemi once again utilized for his Nara clan hijutsu, the shadowy tendrils smacked Vinda around, from one to another before the final one wrapped around the girl's neck, swung around and slammed her hard into the ground. The slam was so strong that the resulting shock lifted the downed trees lightly up in the air while shaking those that Vinda's flight after she was punched had not cut down just yet.

The kunoichi picked herself up and dashed her way outside the small patch of artificial forest and into the opening, where the limited sunlight would have been enough to make it more difficult for Sugemi's hijutsu to connect properly and would have required a direct contact with her shadow to be set off. Her hands moved at a respectable pace while they worked on hand seals.

"Water Style: Acid Shower!" she yelled out with frustration and deep-seated pain that she tried to hide away but the battle damage she had sustained spoke louder than her intent on hiding it. The girl spat out a direct, powerful stream of water right at Sugemi who simply disappeared into thin air before the acid could cover him head to toe.

Using his superior speed and physical strength, the Nara moved in for a beatdown, delivering a combination of powerful straight punches as his blurry body moved up close to his opponent. After a powerful uppercut and a spinning kick right to Vinda's back while the girl was still airborne following her being knocked up by the uppercut, the Getsugakure native was sent dragging across the battlefield and eating dirt again. Sugemi's ruthlessness and complete silence was alarming and, frankly, a bit scary.

* * *

"This is a complete curb stomp, he didn't even use his gates yet…" Kiyomi pouted, she felt a little bit glad that the outspoken and rather sadistic girl got shut down and up by Mana's ex-teammate but still, the match barely even seemed entertaining.

"I don't think you're reading this quite right. Sugemi is not using his gates for a very smart reason – the strain on his body", Stea interrupted. "Didn't you see how the second splash of acid did more damage than the first? That's because there's more to Vinda's Water Release ability than meets the eye and Sugemi instantly picked up on it – each successive neutralization of her acid requires more effort and chakra. Her acid is corrosive in more ways than one, it corrodes his bodily and spiritual defenses just like it does his flesh".

"So if he used his gates, that looked pretty painful and tiresome to him back in the semi-finals, he'd have an even harder time neutralizing Vinda's acid? She locked down his most powerful ability like that…" Erumo exclaimed in wonder.

"This must have been the focus of her training during these five weeks. Seems a bit too lucky of an ability for her Water Release to have developed given the occasion for it to be otherwise", Mana concluded.

"So what kind of Advanced Bloodline even is Acid Release?" Erumo asked, "Water and Fire Releases combined, water and lightning?"

"It's not an Advanced Bloodline at all nor is it a clan ability". Kiyomi shook her head. "A part of manipulating an elemental nature is being able to control its properties. Acid Release is an actual Advanced Bloodline – a combination of Earth and Water Releases but the acid that Vinda uses is merely an advanced manipulation of Water Release, which is why it is so easily nullified by even opponents of matching or lesser skill".

* * *

Covered in bruises, donning a cracked lip and an eyebrow and with the right half of her attire tattered, Vinda tumbled back up on her feet. It was quite interesting how neither of these two had used the Substitution Jutsu quite yet, knowing of how explosively lethal their respective opponent's abilities were and that there will undoubtedly be more useful times to play that card.

Vinda grinned sadistically before making a move, reaching in for her ninja pouch. Sugemi did not appear to be in a mood to let that ninja tool façade set off, he immediately darted off, using all of his impressive superhuman speed to make it to his opponent. Before he could, however, Vinda's other arm slipped out a kunai knife, held separately and outside her ninja pouch and swiped at Sugemi, leaving a cut on his chest and very narrowly missing the one eye that carried no previously acquired scars.

Now, with a blood red dyed kunai blade in one hand and a handful of them in the other, the kunoichi dashed sideways before unleashing them at split intervals and timings, aiming to catch her opponent unprepared and knock him out of the peaceful fighting on his terms rhythm. Sugemi easily evaded each and every kunai, as his impressive speed and composure after being tagged once helped him do. Pulling his own kunai outside the pouch by his side, he even managed to deflect a whole handful of them on his mad dash towards his opponent and plant it into her abdomen.

For a moment the girl's body jerked and twitched in pain before poofing away, having replaced herself with a piece of wood from the trashed trees from before. Using her newly acquired position beside the trees, Vinda took a powerful leap into the air, whereas Sugemi, having realized he got his shoddy mass-produced kunai stuck into Senju-grown wood, let go of the tool and moved back to return to a stance where he'd be able to defend himself.

The airborne kunoichi sent a kunai with a small parcel attached to the other end, where usually explosive tags were located before the thing popped, letting a mass of marbles wrapped in explosive tags roll out and detonate all at once in a chain of explosions. With the range and spread of the blasts being too wide for him to dodge properly, Sugemi covered himself up to protect his most sensitive spots like exposed wounds and his eyes from the resulting blasts.

"Water Style: Water Assault Jutsu!" Vinda shouted out as the small pond of freezing cold water formed a tendril of water, which smacked Vinda to throw her even higher up into the air and help her maintain her airborne position. The unusual manner in which the kunoichi used an offensive Water Release jutsu on herself, instead of commanding the appendage of water smack at the enemy confused Sugemi, that much was evident from his expression.

As she was diving higher up in the air, the Getsugakure kunoichi went through another collection of hand seals before breathing in deep so intensely that her chest inflated.

"Water Style: Acid Shower!" Vinda roared out as she spat out the intense stream of an acid shower from above, aiming to wash her opponent away with this spraying acid hose.

Sugemi prepared to evade the straightforward attack before he noticed that the entire arena was filled with knee-deep craters from when Vinda calculated all the explosive spheres scattered all across. The riddled with craters battlefield was almost impossible to properly navigate with powerful super-fast dashes and required a more slow and subtle approach so that one didn't trip up or sprain an ankle or bust a knee open.

The shower of acid covered Sugemi head to bottom but with a loud popping sound, the young man telegraphed his desperation escape using the Substitution Jutsu to replace him with another piece of wood from the broken down trees from before, letting the wood completely melt away.

Vinda turned her head aside, controlling the stream and keeping propulsion of her acidic stream that kept her afloat and airborne. Sugemi grunted and prepared for the difficult task of evading the continuous stream but then he realized that the girl was no longer even aiming at him. He kept on frantically looking around before, much to his horror, he realized – she was filling the craters with her acid, creating a bunch of small acidic ponds all over the place.

"String Reeling Jutsu!" Vinda yelled out with a slightly winded voice as she used steel wire to reel herself on an unlikely trajectory and onto one of few remaining standing trees in the arena, landing on the thickest top branch that could support her weight.

"You aimed so intensely and still you missed?" Sugemi shouted out, taunting his opponent. He wanted, no, he needed to get her talking. He needed to get her taunting until he could figure out her plan. It could not have been as simple as to create this intricate speed-limiting battlefield. It required too much chakra for that, she probably wasted half of what she had after using that Shadow Clone Jutsu just setting all of this up – it had to be her ace move. Not some big bad amazing jutsu – a strategy of some sorts…

"Nope, I hit all the marks I needed to!" Vinda grinned sadistically before reaching in for her ninja pouch and removing a handful of identical looking cyan colored scrolls.

Whatever Vinda was planning, Sugemi did not wish to allow her to proceed with it unimpeded. He had to at least try to intercept her jutsu, at least try to keep her moving and too busy defending her life to complete her plan! Problem was that there was too little he could do. The ravaged battlefield would have impeded his movement speed and his hand seals would have been too slow to interrupt her…

"Water Release: Great Gunshot!" Vinda shouted out triumphantly before flipping the scrolls up in the air and pulling on their tips at the same time using steel wire attached to their ends. As the scrolls unrolled, a giant pressurized water bullet fired off from all of them together.

Sugemi prepared to carefully scope the bullets' trajectories and avoid them if needed but… Neither one of them was aimed at him, that would have meant that there could have only been one possible target – the acid pools.

Upon impact, the water bullets caused a violent reaction. Almost instantly, the temperature rose up drastically to the point where it felt like the pools of water were boiling and heating up the entire arena. The pools of water began splashing about and foaming, releasing corrosive vapor and raging about. Rising tides of violently vibrant acidic waves came crashing down from all sides, in addition to the boiling temperature air surrounding the arena and the corrosive mist, the resulting combination was completely unavoidable.

* * *

Kiyomi's heart whimpered after she heard Mana's desperate scream. It was so unexpected, almost like the magician did not see the reaction coming before it was absolutely too late, similarly to how it would have been for Sugemi as well. For someone so brutal and destructive, Vinda sure had a clever combination under her sleeve. It took a pretty clever and twisted mind to surprise Mana this way.

* * *

A powerful ripple of air pushed the air away from Sugemi's surroundings, blasting away the corrosive vapors and holding the foaming and crashing waves of acidic waters away with sheer chakra pressure. A bright green pillar rose up from Sugemi and emanated all the way to the protective barriers that lit up to contain Sugemi's chakra pressure inside the arena, just as it protected the audience from Vinda's ace exothermic reaction combination.

Sugemi's body was twitching, veins shot out all over his body as he tilted his face up and let his eyes scan the surroundings, looking for his opponent. The creepy ocular orbs of the young man were completely missing irises or pupils, white as the snow that was coming down.

Vinda leaped aside from the branch she was situated on, a small splash of acid fell down on her arm forcing her to move backward. She had performed this combo before, she knew that this distance was safe and she should not have been affected. That only meant that her opponent used something to survive Vinda melting him away.

Slowly, perfectly controlling his stressed and overly strained body, Sugemi moved his hands behind him before putting his palms open and up front, like he was preparing to perform a palm slap before his shadowy tendril began wrapping around the pillar of chakra he was emitting which was keeping the acid away from consuming him.

"Gate of Life: Shadow Push Jutsu!" Sugemi shouted out before shoving both of his palms up front, letting the massive shadow tendril form a shadowy blob and rush at his opponent in the shape of a giant palm. The range of his selected jutsu was tremendously too short for the distance it needed to cover so it was no surprise that the palm just froze suddenly, having made a good half of the distance.

Sugemi's attack was no empty effort, his palm, thrust forward, had pushed and redirected the flow of the acid and generated a massive crashing wave, about to drown Vinda in a tsunami of her own medicine. Oddly enough, just as Sugemi finished his jutsu, his Third Gate faded away just as suddenly as it had appeared, making him also drown in the lingering small pools of acid.

With a powerful burst of chakra, Sugemi neutralized the lingering effects of the acid he was drowning in after the wave had moved away and smashed at the side of the arena where Vinda was in. Shaking in pain from the multiple patches of burnt skin where his chakra augmentations and attempts to neutralize the acid had not done as stellar of a job as the Nara had wanted it to, with hands lowered down and his body hunched over, Sugemi observed the wave of acid washing Vinda away. Then, as it smashed her against the protective barrier before settling down and spilling back into the craters.

"The match is over!" overseer Oke raised his hand, emerging from a tub of obsidian and moving the demonic skull and spikes decorated lid off of where he hid for safety.

Within an instant medical ninja in cloaks swarmed the battlefield, using Art of Tree Climbing to balance on the surface of the acid they pressed their hands against its surface to neutralize it all and extract Vinda from one of the pools. The girl was covered in severe burns and it became evident that she ran out of chakra to use to neutralize all of the overflowing acid, which she was literally drowning in. One of the medical ninja quickly pressed his hand against her chest, emitting a pulse of chakra that neutralized the present corrosive effects of her Water Release before quickly covering up the almost completely naked, as most of her clothes got corroded completely, and burnt up girl with one of their cloaks and moving her to the infirmary.

* * *

"There's no way they'll let us fight in this arena…" Kiyomi sighed. "There will definitely be another break." She nodded as if affirming herself.

"Do you think Vinda will be OK?" Mana wondered, "Those burns looked really bad."

"The wounds of her opponents in the semi-finals were much worse. I've seen them completely recovered within a week or so with minor scars, she'll be fine", Stea calmed the magician down before looking up at the screen telegraphing the beginning of the next match. "Although, it appears you've been wrong in that assessment, Kiyomi. They will let us fight in this battlefield."

"Yamanaka Kiyomi V.S. Tanko Shigin" glowed on the screen, telling the contestants to make their way down the corridor and enter the arena.

"Be careful, don't fall into one of those pools. There are better things to spend your chakra on", Mana warned her friend with an encouraging smile to which the Yamanaka just gulped and nodded.

Here and now was the time to show off what all of this time and these entire exams had lead up to. Now she had to show off all of her training in creative enough ways to impress the council. More so, as the de facto leader of her team, she had to display and prove her strategic mind being just what the mind of a chuunin needed to be: calculating, capable of cleverly managing a team of ninja and utilizing their strengths and exploiting their enemy's weaknesses.

The blonde turned away and began slowly walking towards the corridor that lead to the arena entrance. Mana gently pressed her hand against Kiyomi's shoulder making the Yamanaka turn around and look at her blindfolded friend.

"I wish I could see you fight clearly. Good luck, I'm sure you'll do great", Mana smiled.

Kiyomi lightly wrapped her fingers around Mana's hand, clenching it into a fist before bumping it with her own. The blonde then turned around and boldly rushed to the corridor while staff ninja wearing Konoha chuunin vests performed menial maintenance job and quickly repurpose the battlefield into a version of its previous self, riddled with pools of acid.

As the Konoha kunoichi made her way downstairs she noticed a curious sight – the dumb, square-shaped face looking at her through those small, round eyes and thick dark brown eyebrows and rubbing its spiky brown hair.

"It looks like both of us took the same side of the entrance", Shigin laughed out loud with his silly, nothing kept back laughter. As if something like that was worth laughing at. "Let's enter the arena together, side by side, all epic-like!" he cheered, lifting his fist up into the air, almost hitting the lamp that illuminated the place.

"Whatever", Kiyomi closed her eyes and took a deep breath in. She knew what Shigin was capable of, she was preparing for his curious ability for five weeks and it would be shameful of her to lose. Together, shoulder to shoulder, the two genin left the corridor and entered into the gloomy light of the arena. Only at that moment did Kiyomi notice all the eyes watching her, the Ninja Council, the villagers, Mana and the other girls, the boys, most importantly – Meiko.

It would be shameful of her to fail here. She'd rather burn up where she stood than revealed to the world that the future heiress of the famous and noble Yamanaka clan could not properly prepare for a powerful opponent in five whole weeks! Her life as she knew it would be over! Kiyomi's eyes wandered up and to the right, meeting a faint shape she perceived as Mana. The magician was always ready to bet her whole life, her ideals and her reputation on a roll of a dice just like Kiyomi did now. How did she do it?

No, this will not be a roll of a dice, chance will have nothing to do with this fight. That was how Mana did it – she realized that. She realized that there was no place for chance, she was either prepared for her trial or it all could have gone to hell because no other outcome truly mattered!

"Bring it, Shigin!" the Yamanaka heiress thought to herself while she took another deep breath and calmed her racing heart down.


	367. No Surrender!

"For the next match we have – Yamanaka Kiyomi, a young lady of the Yamanaka clan – one of the most honored and well-known ninja clans of our village. She validates her clan's reputation in all the right ways, controlling and toying with the minds of her enemies both using her feared clan techniques and without them. Her feats include manipulating her opponent into disqualifying their entire tag team, resulting in her winning the match all by herself without even needing to resort to her famous clan techniques!" Overseer Oke continued to hype Kiyomi up.

Kiyomi wanted to have more tangible and amazing feats attributed to her name. Her clan background demanded her having eliminated a whole bunch of people, passing the paper test all by herself and carrying her entire team on her shoulders as well as being the prodigy ninja everyone feared of facing the most. Sadly, her ability to piss people off appeared to be the only thing worth mentioning, the only thing of mention that she has accomplished. She was no prodigy, just a hustler, squiggling and crawling her way onto barely surviving this long.

"Her opponent is the freak of nature, one of few known survivors of the mysterious disappearances that have been plaguing our village. Tanko Shigin used to be the most unimpressive ninja, now, as his sensei put it – "If there is a way to injure this young man, we have not discovered it"." Oke gestured at Shigin who just lazily picked his nose before shyly chuckling after he was caught in the act and pinched the boogers away.

The audience ate him up. Why would they not have? For one – he was the underdog, everyone always cheered for the good for nothing loser when they faced off against the elite because it was the ultimate fantasy for those people in the audience. A much more sensitive reason was that he survived. So many people just disappearing without any rhyme or reason, this one not only returned but also brought back amazing abilities which inspired hope that one's own beloved ones could also make such a miraculous return from the unknown.

"Do you remember anything from what happened when you were gone?" Kiyomi quietly asked her opponent before Oke walked back and prepared to declare the beginning of the match.

"Not really. All I can remember is our mission going wrong, everyone thought I was already gone so they left me behind to lure the enemy away. From what they told me when they returned to pick my body up – I was gone. Ain't it crazy!?" Shigin laughed out as goofily as he could. "Now I got all these amazing abilities, maybe that's what's happening to everyone disappearing, they're gonna return eventually just like me?"

"He comes back completely invulnerable one day and they say that I'm the favorite and he's the underdog. Othello G was right – audiences really are crazy." Kiyomi thought to herself minding her opponent's crazy unbelievable story of obtaining his invulnerability. Granted, she had only heard of it so it may have been just a story. It would have been a very ninja thing to do to make up a story of being invulnerable but too many people who had no reason to lie also went along with it. He had to be invulnerable and no one had any explanation of just how he pulled that off, or rather, what even happened to him while he was making the disappearance without a trace statistics…

Immediately, once the match started, Kiyomi moved her hand for her back ninja pouch, removing a prepared handful of explosives before weaving hand seals. She needed to scope out and witness this invulnerability first hand before she made any big moves for her victory. She needed to see if the invulnerability was biological and passive or if an additional technique needed to be used, if it was based on the toughness of his body or a regenerative technique.

"Earth Style: Travelling Rock Pillar!" the blonde yelled out as a pillar of stone and dirt shot from underground, making the floating tiny explosive tags stick onto it and voyage at the opponent, splitting the ground beneath. Without even bothering to attempt to dodge the jutsu, Tanko waved his hands around playfully, as if he was warming up as the stone pillar smacked him right in the chest and his chin, throwing him up in the air and detonating all of the explosive tags right up in his face.

Kiyomi waited for the smoke to clear up, but, apparently, Tanko did not, as he charged out from the open with a lively punch. Kiyomi raised her hands up for a block, as expected, her well-trained arms that have blocked blows from opponents hundreds of thousands of times stronger than this punch cushioned the blow while the blonde delivered quick and sharp jabs at the tall doofus' joints, scoping if his bones were par for the invulnerability course. She needed to know it all – if her opponent had any vitals to be hit, if his joints could break and his tendons could snap.

So far, the answer was frustratingly negative as Kiyomi's two fingers merely dipped into the fleshy skin of her opponent without hitting any bone or inner resistance. Quickly, the Team Hokage leader flipped back into safety and outside the close-range distance. It did not look like her opponent was willing to let her go, however, as having just giggled at her attempts to hurt him, Shigin bounced like his heels were made of jelly strings right after Kiyomi, throwing flappy smacks and kicks using his wrists and feet. Her clothes and elbow managed to slightly dip into one of the acid pools which annoyed and distracted the girl for just long enough, requiring additional chakra for the environmental hazard to be neutralized. Shigin was all up in her face once she was done, even if it only took half of a moment.

This was so bad! No damage he took did anything other than amuse him, the worst of all was that now he trapped Kiyomi into a ceaseless dance of him trying to chase her down and hit her. Eventually, her defenses would lower, even if she was superior to him in terms of taijutsu skill, it would not matter if she could not fight back. From close range, she could not even rely on her hijutsu…

A flabby kick made Kiyomi cough up with blood as she rolled back and stretched out in the frozen dirt and snow. Her opponent leaped up in the air, not satisfied with just this much damage as he threw his feet forward in a barrage of similarly stringy and flappy stomps. Kiyomi tried to shield her head and whatever areas the stomps targeted but her opponent's strikes were just too quick – it was like the boy's body didn't weigh absolutely anything and the air around him offered no resistance. Like his blows were launched from a slingshot…

After Shigin's stamping combination satisfied him, the goofy young man just landed besides Kiyomi before kicking her aside in the gut. Worn out by Shigin's endless attacks, the blonde covered up her face and skipped a very light but quick flappy smack of the opponent's foot right at her abdomen that lifted her body up in the air and sent her tumbling back. Once again she slid over the surface of another pool of acid, splashing some of it all over herself and having to stress her chakra network to fix the acid before it even took effect. Not only did it strain Kiyomi's chakra network, but thinking and reacting so fast pelted at her mind as well.

Even after this, her opponent did not let up, he pressed on, charging at Kiyomi and forcing the Yamanaka to fight for her space to breathe. It was like this goofball did not even had lungs to draw breath in and like he functioned completely by some miracle of nature alone. The Yamanaka heiress delivered a fast and deafeningly loud slap before detonating the explosive tag that was in her palm, sending both her and her opponent tumbling back from the concussive force.

Feeling the ache all around her body and her ribs just burning up, Kiyomi quickly hustled her way back on her feet before raising her hands up. She wanted to find out if her opponent was truly invulnerable and how it worked, she had achieved one of those things. Understanding something that smarter people than her failed to do would have absolutely killed her, she needed to work this fight through instinct and gamble her victory. That was the only way she could have possibly won.

The ends of Kiyomi's lips lightly twisted upward, she was the absolute worst opponent for Shigin. She, similarly to Mana, did not even attempt to match her opponent's speed or power. Kiyomi was a different category of ninja entirely and a physical fight was her backup plan, unlike the most ninja. She had obtained plenty of knowledge of her opponent in these painful exchanges of blows. Kiyomi knew how her opponent fought now, he arrogantly placed his trust in his invincibility and that would be his downfall.

The Yamanaka threw her hand back, stroking through her rich and thick bright locks before working through a collection of hand seals. Her opponent charged at her again but, at that point, it was too late, her ninjutsu was ready.

Shigin charged through an empty cloud of dust, trying to wail his stringy flaps he called blows all around but to no avail as his opponent appeared to have disappeared completely.

"Earth Style: Submarine Voyage!" Kiyomi yelled out delivering a powerful strike from underground, it was like whatever Shigin's flesh was made of wrapped around Kiyomi's punch, as if his each cell moved away and shifted around her attack and her punch just punched a handful of hit resistant rubber. Still, her intent was not to punch her opponent into submission…

Shigin's powerful spin kick smacked Kiyomi right in the face, sending her sliding back, after the girl moved away her hands from cover she saw her relentless stamina monster of an opponent right up in her face again. This time she was ready, the girl lifted two of her fingers up in a hand seal position.

"Yamanaka Hair-Trap!" she chanted out as her opponent's eyes shot out wide and his body tumbled lifelessly on the ground, locked firmly in the winding up for a punch position that he held before being completely stunned and frozen in place. Like a fallen statue…

"Impressed?" Kiyomi winked at her writhing and wheezing opponent, she remembered Yushijin's mistake and she would not make the same one – she needed to make sure that the Ninja Council knew exactly how badass she was and how successful her training with her clan elders and servants was. "It's the famous Yamanaka Hair-Trap, you're now completely at my mercy and this is no illusion – you're completely frozen in place".

Shigin chuckled, "Oh yeah? We're both trapped here, there is nothing you can do to me in this state, or any other, that will hurt me!"

"You see, normally I would have required a string of hair to connect me to you, using that hair to channel my chakra, similarly to the Nara clan hijutsu and how it needs shadows to connect", Kiyomi continued her victory speech, ignoring her opponent's taunts. "However, I have gone far past that, as you can see by my rich and untrimmed amounts of flowing hair… All I need to set this jutsu off now is for one hair of mine to be present on your body, your shoulders, your hands, your clothes, it doesn't matter."

"T-That underground punch…" Shigin grunted as while he clearly could not feel pain, the experience of being brought down to his knees and completely frozen in place was a humiliating one, without a doubt.

"That's right, it's when I planted my hair I have carefully removed beforehand on to your damaged clothes. In addition, your previous assessment was incorrect as well – I do have a handful of ways to defeat you, ways without directly hurting you. I am a Yamanaka, the natural counter to an invulnerable ninja like you!" Kiyomi declared before placing her hands forward. Now, with her opponent completely frozen in place, she was free to enter and take over his mind as she saw fit – her victory was all but assured from this point on.

"Mind Body Switch Jutsu!" Kiyomi yelled out as a loud and ghastly howl followed her apparition-like mind leaving her own body and ramming into that of her opponent's. Once Kiyomi's mind left her body, the hold that she had on her enemy faded but the fraction of a moment of freedom was not enough for the stunned and still confused invulnerable genin to move out of the way of his opponent's jutsu, let alone concentrate on something hard enough to substitute with it.

Shigin's face hit the dirt, the young man began screaming in pain and scratching at his own temples but his elusive jelly skin eluded damage, instead of allowing the fingers to leave temporary grooves that soon filled up with whatever liquid filled his body from inside. Kiyomi's collapsed body suddenly sprung to live and crawled backward in fear.

"What are you!? What's wrong with your mind?" She kept on muttering. The boy's mind was completely messed up. Controlling it or even treading its grounds was like to read hieroglyphs of an alien language scribbled on each grain of sand in a beach. Shigin had no mind to grasp control over, it was like his entire body was composed of miniature organisms, parasites with each one carrying a mind of its own. As someone who has fought a mercenary that has replaced most of his body with technology, this young man was the least alive and soul possessing ninja Kiyomi had ever faced.

"I guess you can't control my mind, huh?" Shigin chuckled like an idiot before taking an offensive stance and preparing to charge at Kiyomi. There it was – his unavoidable and ceaseless barrage of attacks!

Shigin charged out at Kiyomi, throwing fists left and right. Kiyomi dashed back, pushing his rubbery flaps away or trying to trap them before the young man forced the Yamanaka to let go or manipulated his body in the strangest ways. He was no rubber man, Shigin was more of a slug – whenever one mass of his body elongated, the others needed to reduce proportionately but when he swung his body around it certainly seemed like he was swinging rubbery fists.

Shigin was wrong, his mind was not invincible, as his body was, it was merely very complicated. His was the being summed up of millions if not billions of organisms all living in one body. What he did not know was that these minds were remarkably simple and incredibly alike one to another. The only reason why Kiyomi had failed before was because she was not prepared and used to controlling such a weird mind. This granted her a degree of surprise before her next attack. The blonde kicked Shigin right in the groin after using her foot to push the flesh around his groin and thighs away from it, as if she intended to hit the boy's core all the way from that embarrassing vital area. As expected there was no response…

"Give up, you can't hurt me!" Shigin laughed confidently while rubbing his nose.

Kiyomi's hands laid raised and extended in the Yamanaka hijutsu hand seal position and right up at Shigin's face once he opened his eyes from his cocky expression.

"Mind Clone Switch!" Kiyomi yelled out, preparing for the massive strain of splitting her mind into billions of smallest parts. Had Shigin hosted the minds of more than a dozen or two of different minds, it may have been outside Kiyomi's immediate ability to occupy all of them but given how lacking in personality and anything but elementary hive mind these souls were – she could do it. The Yamanaka heiress knew she could!

Shigin's hand raised up in the air. The boy's head was sunken to the ground and the raised arm was the only body part displaying some sort of signs of life.

"I surrender!" He declared firmly and willingly.

"W-What are you doing, examinee?" Overseer Oke stumbled backward before squinting at Shigin's direction.

"What do you mean?" Shigin freaked out in a manner more akin to Kiyomi's mannerisms than the goofy and laid-back nature of the invulnerable one. "I'm giving up, Yamanaka Kiyomi is the greatest kunoichi of all time, needless to say, the prettiest as well! She has smitten me with her untold skill and beauty and I therefore surrender!"

"Where did you get the idea that surrender was a valid way of ending the match?" Overseer Oke sighed, "Plus, you can cut it out with the theatrics, I can clearly see your body limply laid out on your knees right there, examinee Kiyomi."

"Drats! It has never occurred to me!" Shigin, still hosting Kiyomi's mind, freaked out. Then, the young man just snapped back and started darting for the corridor before dashing his way through the labyrinth of the arena's tunnels and corridors to the outside area.

Kiyomi's consciousness returned back to her mind as she stumbled forward but her hand managed to stop her fall before she could plant her face into the snowy dirt. The young Yamanaka pushed herself back on her feet before gesturing overseer Oke a peace sign before turning at the Ninja Council's observatory area.

A deafening battlecry made the audience cover their ears as a blob of flesh and skin split the skies and smashed itself right onto one of the acid pools before crawling out of it and straightening himself out. Shigin took a fighting stance one more but overseer Oke placed his hand in his way to stop him.

"Now that's better. I did say that a plausible way to win a match was battlefield removal and technically Shigin did leave the arena." The overseer ruled, raising his hand up in the air.

"Wait, that doesn't make any sense! I came back, didn't I!?" Shigin began arguing but Oke's mind did not budge.

"No, even if you only lost for a brief moment, before removing the loss condition, technically, you still lost the match." Oke argued before gesturing for Shigin to remove himself from the arena. As she was declared the winner, Kiyomi leaped up and down in joy.

She did it – she justified all those hopes and all that pressure, she validated all that training she did for five grueling weeks and even if her originally concocted plan to force a surrender out of her opponent did not quite work out – it all turned out just fine in the end.

Irradiating with glee, Kiyomi jumped and cheerfully skipped back to the corridors where Mana and Meiko were waiting for her, ever since the Yamanaka's victory was declared. The blacksmith extended her hand for Kiyomi but this moment was too happy to restrain herself like that – Kiyomi just jumped into the redhead's embrace, shoving her chest all over the blacksmith's face and almost bullying the blacksmith into manhandling her down and off of her. She was so happy!

A rough voice cleared his throat, the three girls turned to the mysterious young man standing by the corner and awkwardly pressing a pair of shades by his chest and Kiyomi decided to grab hold of Meiko's hand, beginning to drag the confused and vocally complaining of her teammate's behavior blacksmith aside.

"Mana, we need to talk", Kouta uttered revealing to the still recovering and confused magician just who this raspy and tired voice belonged to.


	368. Shades of the Trapped Bones

"Kouta?" Mana uttered, still doubting if she heard it right. The young man she still had feelings for and whom she had a particularly spiritually eviscerating break-up with.

"Yeah, I'm going to reach for your blindfold now, don't punch me in the face please." He shyly asked the magician as Mana felt the tight pressure on her temples and her hair loosen, she closed her eyes but that did not prevent from her eyes exploding into a flood of tears and sparks of painful itching and irritation. Then something plastic and light touched Mana's nose and the unpleasant sensations lightened up somewhat.

"You can open your eyes now", Mana could hear Kouta take a couple of steps back after he said that. Uneasily and slowly, the magician let her eyes open up just for a moment before closing them again, then repeating this process a couple of times before she could open them up a bit easier as the irritation was no longer as prevalent as it used to be whenever the magician tried opening them up before.

Kouta had put the shades he was carrying around on Mana.

"Wow, thanks, that's much better, I can almost see like this", the kunoichi turned around a couple of times, examining everything around her as closely as her dark and shady glasses allowed her. It has been a while since she could see this clearly… Just the sweet spot of where she missed being able to see but have not yet forgotten how amazing it was. The vision of ninja rabbits was really amazing if they did not suffer any of these symptoms. Then again, most of the rabbits that left the caves were adults, they younglings most likely underwent training to prevent just this same kind of outcome from happening.

"Do you have everything you need? I can still make a run for supplies…" Kouta wondered.

"What is this?" Mana calmly confronted him. "What are you doing exactly? Your own teammate is up next. You should be encouraging her."

"Have you even seen Erumo? She needs no encouragement, she was the only out of the three of us that never struggled with self-confidence." Kouta rubbed the back of his head, "Plus… Shit, I told her I wouldn't tell you this but… Those two kind of forced me to come see you."

"Wow. Okay…" Mana lowered her head before turning back and heading for the staircase that lead back up to the girls' observatory. Over the five months, she spent training in the rabbit caves she could navigate steps and stuffy, hard caves in total darkness. Now, with these shades, it'd be a cakewalk. She could probably put up a respectable effort against Stea with them…

"No, wait, it's… Not like that." Kouta reached out to stop Mana from leaving. "I kind of… I wanted to tell myself that I had no baggage from before but… They opened my eyes. I was so adamant to finish my shift in the hospital before coming here and yet I went out of my way to get those glasses for you. You see, the problem was that you kept changing in between two extremes, complete illumination or total darkness and you need to ease your eyes up…"

"You're babbling", Mana cut her beloved one down.

"Sorry. I guess I wasn't exactly without baggage. I guess I always thought I'd have no problem thinking of you as a friend but…" Kouta tried putting something cohesive together but he was too shy and too unfocused in his own feelings to say anything within a respectable timeframe.

"That's impossible?" Mana suggested a possible conclusion for him to draw.

"Right. No matter how cool I think I am, how completely devoid of bad karma between us I think I am… I can't ignore what happened. I don't hate you, I don't blame you, strangely, neither do Erumo and Yushijin but… I just can't think of you as just my friend. That's why I kept on avoiding you. I should have been there in the semi-finals, I should have known better than to let you tackle it all alone after having your feelings crushed. I need to clean that house." Kouta finally began making sense.

"Why are you telling me all of that? Yeah, it hurt having to compete being completely broken inside but I never waited for any apology from you. You're still my friend, right?" Mana hopefully wondered.

"I'm… I'm leaving the hospital, I'll enroll into Konoha High to become an ANBU, like my father." Kouta put his fingers around his eyes, he had difficulty admitting this to Mana.

"You'll become a killer?" Mana repurposed Kouta's words into something blunter and to the point.

Mana tried but she could not take it as anything but a slap in her face and a stab in the back while she was flinching over it. A young man she loved decided to break up with her and, because he could not handle it himself, go against his nature to destroy it and become a killer.

"I finished my medical ninja studies. That path is still open to me but I need to work on my nature. I need to learn to control my feelings and ANBU is the way of doing that." Kouta firmly replied, such stubbornness and firm grip onto something was not usually Kouta's way. He was quite shy and usually very submissive to debate, this was one of the few issues he really felt firmly about and it did not look like he was ready to change that.

Usually, Mana did not pry into people's choices and their souls. She was someone who swore to never take lives but she tended to overlook other people taking lives because she thought that was their way, their choice to make. She dreamed of being the kind of hero that would inspire and convince everyone to make those choices for themselves and refuse taking lives all of their own free will but… This… She could not let this go.

"Don't… Please. You're a kind and strong young man. To squash your nature is not the same as to control it. Don't let them make you into just a mindless tool", Mana could her pleading in her own voice. She did not care about pride or similar things but she never resorted to something of this nature. She never pleaded people to reconsider, even if she tried to make them reconsider she always tried reasoning. Pleading seemed so… Petty, so pointless.

Kouta stood his ground and just looked back at Mana's dark, reflective, plastic gaze. His pressed together lips quivered as if he was about to break but his eyes were tough, eyes of a fighter who has decided what he would be fighting for.

"I thought you'd react differently, I thought you'd eventually come to see the things my way. Weren't you the one who helped me embrace my Juugo legacy?" Kouta replied with just as much wavering and uncertainty, even if his eyes were firm about having decided to study for eventually making it to ANBU.

The path was still long for him: years to study specialized ANBU skills and jutsu, techniques of stealth and murder, then emotional and mental tempering to make him into a perfect tool for his village to send away and have dirty work done. He would still need to rank up a couple of times before he actually made the list but…

"Really? You truly thought that I would approve of you striving to burn down orphanages and kill people for the village? I guess then you never knew me at all", Mana snapped. A vocal part of her own mind instantly demanded that she apologized but some other part of her, a more devious one just ordered to keep on attacking. To let everything out and test the boy's hardness and preparedness for ANBU life truly.

Mana ran away.

She could not do either. She knew that she was in the wrong, at least she thought she was. Nothing really made sense, like it usually did, when Kouta was involved. She wavered and questioned the very fundamentals of what she believed. She crossed every line she swore she would never cross when he was looking at her… She pleaded him and tried to convince him to change his mind in all the ways she would never do usually. This was the man she loved declaring that he wanted to drown his life in blood and build his home of bones of the people he killed. He told HER that, of all people, right in her face…

For the whichever time, as far as heartbreaks with Kouta were concerned, Mana slammed her back against the wall halfway to the observatory and slid down on her bottom, crying. Letting tears run freely was so easy. It was almost like all the built up pain and stress in her troubled eyes had finally found a way to be released.

For the second time in a row, Kouta broke her heart right before some of the most important moments to come in her life. If the magician did not know any better, she would think he did it on purpose…

* * *

"So, what did I miss?" Mana sniffed while returning back to the observatory platform. In her worst daydreams, these couple of remaining battles would have unexpectedly concluded and she was about to go next. Of all times, now she was in no mood or preparation to fight in one of the most important battles of her life, especially one where lives of so many people may have theoretically, in a very detached manner, been on the line.

"Not much, they just gathered in the arena and the hyping up has already concluded. Erumo and Jekleifer had already clashed a pair of times and used their substitutions already…" Kiyomi briefed Mana quickly and efficiently. Luckily enough, none of the girls appeared to even notice Mana's shades that have effectively hidden the signs of her emotional disarray. The magician wanted to talk about this with her friends the least, at least at the moment.

"String Reeling Jutsu!" Erumo yelled out letting the screeching sound of dragging steel wire drag her out of danger, like a clutch zip-line. Mana could barely see the specifics as the shades skipped a very limited amount of light and with the winter days being rather gloomy as they were. However, she did make out the surprise and shock of the audience and noticed how quickly the string reeling pulled Erumo out of the incredibly dangerous and fast clash with Jekleifer Kaguya from Iwagakure.

Regardless of how fast and efficiently the technique was pulled off, as if a significant amount of focus was placed on this jutsu used in a defensive zip-lining manner during the five week training, the more impressive feat was how little the zipping appeared to wear on Erumo.

For someone with such a limited and mostly supportive role in her team, focusing on setups and clever trapping of her opponents, as opposed to directly confronting them, Erumo was doing remarkably well, having survived this long against a Kaguya clansman.

Jekleifer worked on approaching his opponent physically, wielding erupting shoulder to elbow long swords made of his own immensely tough and sharp bones as only his clan bloodline permitted him to fight. Erumo appeared to be prepared for just such an outcome, the young lady was removing a small scroll from her ninja pouch even before her opponent went after her, as if she knew just how he'd go on attacking her.

With a loud grunt, signifying the strain that the sudden unsealing of her ninja tool caused, Erumo unsealed a large umbrella in a horizontal, spinning position. In an instant the umbrella opened up, firing a shower of senbon needles at the kunoichi's opponent. This was not her main manner of attack, clearly, one would have been quite foolish to rely solely on something like this…

Jekleifer covered himself with a quickly put together block. Regardless of his careless defense, loud clanging sounds echoed when the storm of senbon attempted to tear through the Kaguya's flesh as they hit the bone plates quickly grown underneath Jekleifer's skin. Despite the senbon having little to no effect and being just a minor distraction, it was evident that it was all that Erumo wanted them to be.

"Multi Bomb Jutsu!" The kunoichi smacked her hands together about the same instant that the umbrella was beginning to run out of smoke. She was putting a lot of chakra into these jutsu, just to survive, just to keep her opponent away but it could not have been any other way. She was frail, slow and rather physically average whereas her opponent was a force of nature in terms of physicality, unpredictable techniques and skill of wielding his bone weapons. She was a little bee, trying to sting the elephant in front of her enough times to make him back off… Such was the difference in their power.

The visibly straining ninjutsu that Erumo used appeared to multiply the amount of the marble-shaped bombs she had used by a large amount. Mana could recall Shimo using a similar jutsu way back, it barely multiplied the number of kunai he used a handful of times. This was an entire swarm of little marbles, all buzzing right at Jekleifer's face.

For a brief moment Mana thought the kunoichi mad for multiplying the her explosives this way. She'd hurt herself, she'd obliterate what little remains of the arena and create one large acid pool she herself would have significant trouble navigating. Then another thought popped into Mana's mind, just fast enough to theorize about what Erumo was doing before it happened but too late for her to have been able to do something about it if she had been down there in the battlefield, facing off against the trapster herself.

Instead of what the audience expecting – that being an endless chain of devastating explosions erupting, the bombs that Erumo multiplied all popped releasing blinding, black clouds of smoke, covering the entire arena in darkness, with only the protective barriers containing the widespread dark reaches of irritating smoke.

It was not that tough to imagine why the girl who strived to shove it down Mana's throat that she was about to follow the steps of the magician's father, employing traps in her arsenal instead of confronting her opponent face-to-face like the magician and most other ninja did used such a tactic. Neither of the girls in the observatory questioned it either.

Still, once the black tar of smoke cleared out, both the people in the audience, the observatories and Jekleifer himself looked impressed. The arena looked pristine clean and almost like Erumo had restored it and covered the place with bright sand and little blades of tidily cut grass.

"So you have setup your traps, support ninja?" Jekleifer grinned with a reserved expression of content.

"Yeah, I don't foster that much hopes of winning this match but it is like Oke-san said – I am a support ninja and that's what the Ninja Council expects of me. No one would demand the same standards from support ninja as they do from powerhouses like you, nor would they of medical ninja. The Council sees how well each of us fulfill our own roles instead of blindly throwing us into the same basket." Erumo smiled before taunting her opponent with a hand gesture, "Come now, take a step."

"As you wish", Jekleifer quickly opened his eyes, revealing a ferocious glare as he charged forward. "Dance of the Tulip!" he roared out in both pain and physical strain as his chakra aided his body in forming new bones as well as breaking the old ones and having them burst in a bloody and disturbing fashion from under his biceps. It would have resulted in an impressive high-stance combination of strikes.

In a quick swoop, Jekleifer disappeared underground, collapsing into a concealed pool of acid that appeared to be covered up with a strange cloth, one that was colored similarly to its surroundings, conveying an illusion that it was solid ground. A clever spin on the usual Cloak of Invisibility jutsu, where instead of concealing oneself, Erumo chose to cover up a previously created trap instead. Also it was a relatively clever way to utilize the remains of the environmental destruction left behind after Vinda's match.

Jekleifer burst from under the acid pool, overflowing with bursting chakra aimed at dispelling the corrosive effects, covered in patches of singed off flesh that only revealed plates of bone, completely unharmed by the acid residing under it. The hair of the young man had also broken loose as the ties that bind it had corroded away, together with his top and part of his lower clothes.

"What's the matter? Hesitant to move?" Erumo taunted her opponent before swiping her kunai at the side, severing a piece of wire that set off another one of her traps – a part of broken wood fired off by a sealing tag that emanated a pulse of chakra upon being set-off by the cut wire setting off the lighter placed below it.

Jekleifer blitzed like lightning, remaining in place and slicing through the flying cut down tree, shredding it to smallest chips and pieces before placing his hands forward.

"Ten-Finger Drilling Bullets!" Jekleifer roared out in pain as the bones in his fingers burst through from the tips and fired off like bullets aimed at his opponent. Erumo was clearly unprepared for a long-range attack of such manner. There was her mistake, at least the way Mana could see it, she was too busy preparing for this match herself that she neglected trying to predict how her opponent would be preparing for his match as well. After all, the five weeks to train were meant for both combatants, not just her.

A wide-spread arc of blood splattered all over the ground, shot from both Erumo's shoulder, her arms, legs and lower body where the bone shred through her flesh and left her body, breaking bones where it met it, leaving gruesome entry and exit wounds. The kunoichi stumbled before falling down and planting her face into the ground as a small pool of blood started accumulating from her wounds.


	369. For How Long Will One Try?

Just as overseer Oke began stepping in closer, aiming to check on Erumo's condition, the girl squirmed and began slowly getting herself together. Her shaking arms pushed her body off the ground, then, began stroking the crimson marks over her body, in an attempt to wipe the bloodstains over her skin, clothes as hair.

It did not appear like the Kaguya Shikotsumyaku ability was very prone to submitting to chakra augmentation based defenses. Usually, breaking through the flesh of a ninja who was not overly worn out in combat would have been hard, requiring a significant difference in power or a miscalculation on the victim's part. There could have been no doubt that Erumo did not underestimate Jekleifer for a moment. This clean injury was proof of how penetrative and powerful the Kaguya bloodline was.

"It appears your opponent can still fight", overseer Oke turned at Jekleifer who nodded coldly, as if displaying his approval over Oke's permission to continue the battle and agreeing to his conclusions.

"Don't tire yourself out, feel free to stay down", Jekleifer taunted his opponent who forced a grin on her pale and smeared with bloody stains face.

"Same applies to you", she said inviting a moderate amount of surprise on Jekleifer's face. The trapster appeared to have noticed what Mana had seen as well – Jekleifer was actively damaging himself with each of his techniques. He may have been able to create bone but surfacing it and removing it through his flesh still spilled blood and was tremendously painful, mentally wearing the youth down a bit by bit.

The Kaguya clansman extended his palm forward, before pointing his fingers at the kunoichi he was facing off against. He intended to repeat the jutsu he had just used. That may have been the wise thing to do. If he took as much as a step forward, he was subjecting himself to risk to the traps that Erumo had set up. Hanging back and firing at his opponent, chipping down at her vitality, chakra, and willpower to keep going was the safe bet.

"Ten-Finger Drilling Bullets!" Jekleifer grunted out loud. Erumo's fingers twitched, revealing a string of steel wire being tied around them.

"String Reeling Jutsu!" she chanted out before zipping away from danger and into the north-western part of the arena. "Wanna try this again?" she grinned, such confidence must have completely blown any mystery about if Erumo had a hunch about the strain the Kaguya bloodline jutsu had on Jekleifer to the Kaguya genin. Slowly, Jekleifer lowered his hand. He had landed a lucky blow. He would not land another of the same manner. Jekleifer needed to look for new opportunities…

The golden-haired Kaguya stretched out his tired and crimson-stains-wearing muscles, mentally preparing for something immensely painful. Mana could see unrest in Erumo's eyes. There was little she could do offensively – attacking the Kaguya was pointless due to his ability to form bone plates under his skin to soften blows and create bones from his body, which would have skewered one if they tried attacking him physically. This youth was a defensive fortress as much as he was a devastating spear.

"Don't turn your eyes from me!" Erumo yelled out pulling on another wire of string and unleashing a strong current of wind from a sealing tag stuck to one of the downed trees, that picked up and scattered a swarm of explosive tags all around the Kaguya. With an easy hand seal shape of her one hand, Erumo activated the tags and made them all detonate.

This really did hurt Jekleifer. The body of the young man was covered with nasty tears of where chunks of flesh were torn from his body and where bone plates covered him up, protecting his organs and his vital parts and preventing the damage from spreading too deep into his body. Still, the explosive trap had left its impact.

"You are an impressive kunoichi, for that reason I gave you time to impress the Ninja Council", Jekleifer huffed out in a tired and ridden with pain voice. The pain tolerance of this young man was out of this world – he suffered dozens of explosives detonating right up in his face while he created bone plates where there were none, burrowing under his skin like an opponent's blade, like an insertion of a foreign object. "However, that time is now past."

Jekleifer slammed his hands onto the ground, the skin on his flesh began twitching and shifting, as if something solid was wrangling and burrowing deep under it. The young man ground his teeth together in pain, but he did not shout, nor did he fall down. He stood tall.

"Dance of the Seedling Fern!" The Kaguya shouted out in searing pain. Judging from the red shade of the blushed skin that the golden-haired genin had, the pain was just about to cause him to go unconscious. Mana struggled to even imagine the amount of pain this youth must have gone through at that moment.

A rising forest of colossal bones tore its way from underground, creating a whole new battlefield, one of towering incredibly hard bones standing tall as pillars while pools of acid gathered at the very bottom. Jekleifer fell to his knees before crawling up onto one of his bone towers, once the gathering acid began submerging his feet and rise up to his knees. Using the Art of Tree Climbing, Jekleifer slowly made his way upward the bone pillar.

Zipping from the backside of Jekleifer's bone pillar, Erumo swung in with a swinging kick aimed at the Kaguya's side. However, what she hit was not the weakened and trickling with blood flesh, Erumo's ambitious feet got impaled through with bones protruding from Jekleifer's ribs. The trapster screamed out in pain before her opponent lazily fired a kick of his own, aiming to kick her aside.

Erumo's body got tossed aside by the force of the impact, she flew back before hitting the bone pillar with the back of her head and body and tumbling down into the acid rivers below. Still hanging to the bone protrusion by the skin of his feet, breathing heavily from the loss of chakra, stamina and the astonishing pain resonating all over his body, Jekleifer took a glance back to check on his opponent.

A strong blue flare below signaled to him that the young kunoichi had managed to get herself out of the pooling acid before it did too much damage however she would not approach him head-on again. Judging from how relatively okay she looked when she tried to swing kick him, she managed to zip away and avoid the destructive rise of the bone forest unscathed.

Erumo's effort was noteworthy. Still, she was desperate. Initially, it was clear that her goal was just to mess with Jekleifer until the Kaguya managed to put her down but… Something changed. At some point, the Konoha girl had seen a chance for victory, something completely unbelievable to her and now she changed every bit of her previous strategy to grasp that chance of fortune's smile.

The problem was that she did not get this far through willpower and desperation. It was all fruit of her preparation and careful planning of each and every move. Taking into consideration every single manner of strike, slash and bone technique that Jekleifer had shown to anyone, questioning people and gathering information during these five weeks, most likely. Now that her traps got completely devastated by the drastic shift of the battlefield… It was tough to accurately weigh Erumo's chances. She no longer had the benefit of planning and preparation, her carefully laid plans have no ended.

Yet, on the other hand, the mettle of a ninja was tested best in just such conditions – when one was required to go beyond their comfort zone and improvise a little. Something distinctive caught Mana's shades-covered eyes – it was the body of weightless Erumo plummeting from one of the tall bone towers. Now that she had regained the ability to see, Mana's eyes hungered for activity and caught on to every little detail out there.

Overseer Oke rushed in from the bottom parts of one of the bone pillars to swoop in and catch the falling genin before examining her wounds. He raised his arm up with a gesture pointing at Jekleifer.

"The match is over. Examinee Erumo Budoki of Konoha can no longer contain the bleeding using her chakra augmentations and cannot continue this match." He declared with his voice echoing thunderously across the arena.

"That was rather clever of her", Stea smiled, it was a kind smile, it was evident that the Getsugakure genin had obtained an uncanny amount of respect for the Konoha's new trapster. "To purposefully stop resisting the bleeding so that she could get eliminated now that she has shown everything she had to offer."

"What do you mean? She could have continued the fight, she was just about to wear her opponent down. It was a clash of willpower and attrition, she could have had this!" Mana vibrantly objected. She had not noticed how much she related to Erumo in this battle, so many times she had been the underdog, fighting people of elite clan backgrounds, of higher ranks. Fighting battles where only her ingenuity and unorthodox skillset could have carried her through and kept her alive.

"Have you not noticed that Erumo was doing nothing but suffering needlessly? She had ran out of ninja tools, of steel wire and her traps got devastated by that massive forest of bones. She was low on chakra and bleeding out slowly. That chipped at what little reserves she had. In battlefield conditions, a ninja would withdraw at this point and that was exactly what Erumo did – she let go, stopped resisting so that she didn't need to get pummeled and skewered by Jekleifer's bones anymore. She protected her body, her future. She had done everything she could do and more, it was enough." Stea explained calmly.

"She was so close, she could have kept pressing on. Even if that meant getting cut by those bones, even if that meant bleeding some more. Even if it meant more pain – she was almost there! Her opponent could have collapsed from cutting his own body just as easily." Mana did not want to believe that. It was one of few fundamental disagreements that she and Stea had, despite their similarities. Mana was the push beyond her limits type, whereas Stea advocated survival to fight another day.

"I can see you've pushed yourself too hard and for too long in your training. And what have you achieved exactly? Blinded yourself in more ways than one? Weakened yourself to where a victory against a crippled opponent such as you will bring more shame than respect to my name? A skilled combatant knows their limits and plays around them, just like Erumo has done. She is quite likely to earn her promotion for this." Stea explained, slightly firing up to match Mana's own slipping temper.

"I mean… Sometimes I would appreciate if you didn't push yourself so hard, Mana. Don't forget what happened when you decided to face Hisako one on one, or that needlessly violent bloodfest against the Imarizu leader…" Kiyomi tried to intervene without raising too many flags. Mana pouted her lips and crossed her arms on her chest before turning and walking away. could not believe it, that Kiyomi, of all people, would take Stea's side in this. With just one more match left until her turn to fight comes… She needed the support of her friends, she needed any kind of support she could get. She tried so hard to shine brightly, to be the symbol of good will and peace that could inspire people to change and what has she changed truly? Her past boyfriend decided to become a cold-blooded killer, her friend, someone who was like an older sister to Mana, took the side of Stea in an argument…

The magician could not believe it, that Kiyomi, of all people, would take Stea's side in this. With just one more match left until her turn to fight comes… She needed the support of her friends, she needed any kind of support she could get. She tried so hard to shine brightly, to be the symbol of goodwill and peace that could inspire people to change and what has she changed truly? Her past boyfriend decided to become a cold-blooded killer, her friend, someone who was like an older sister to Mana, took the side of Stea in an argument…

"Hey, are you okay?" Kiyomi carefully approached Mana in the sunken in shade corridor before placing a hand on the magician's shoulder. The blonde may not have seen the tears coming from Mana's eyes but she must have heard her weird and wet sniffling. "I mean… I don't think that argument was that big of a deal, honestly. Sometimes… It's just that sometimes you do push yourself too hard, it would be nice for you to not hurt the people that love you like that, that's all what we meant."

"It's… Not that…" Mana whimpered out, possibly revealing pretty conclusively that she was crying. She should not have been crying. She was supposed to be stronger than this. She was supposed to become perfect, Perfect Mana was what she called herself jokingly all this time. The training was amazing, she achieved great heights and accomplished everything she wanted to and more but… No amount of sparring, no amount of meditation will ever prepare for life. No matter how heavy of a stone Mana would lift above her head, Kouta will still aspire to become a cold-hearted assassin.

"Sometimes I'm not sure about what's right and what's wrong." Mana admitted, wiping her tears and slipping the shades back on after the on and off lights had decided to work with half power, lingering, but stay on. "It used to be so easy… Just help anyone who asks for it, fight back anyone who tries to hurt people. Do whatever the village tells you, that's what's supposed to be right. Now… Kouta decides to train for ANBU, how am I supposed to react?"

"Wait, what? That's what it was all about? I honestly thought you two would be getting back together. Frankly, I think that whole trust thing that made you guys fall out was a bit overblown. The Forest of Death just a survival game, anyways…" Kiyomi sat by Mana's side before pressing Mana's head against her shoulder. "Plus, I know why you'd feel betrayed by him but… Being an ANBU is a great honor for a ninja, one of the highest things you can aspire for in our profession."

"That's the point. I feel like I'm wrong but… I don't want him to kill, I don't want him to destroy and suppress who he is. I know it's not up to me, I know it's selfish but…" Mana wiped her tears again.

"Being selfish doesn't always mean being wrong." Kiyomi playfully teased the magician by shaking her head like she'd tease a little puppy by shaking their head while placing her hand on the top of its head. "You want what's best for him. There's nothing wrong in that. It's just that you two have conflicting opinions about that. All you can hope for is that when you let him know your stance on things he'll… Reconsider his own stance. You're not a criminal, you're not some super-villain just because you question yourself and think what you're doing is wrong – that's just life. If you're not asking any questions about everything that you do – that's when you're treading dangerous ground. Stop getting worked up about things and start getting ready, you're the showstopper of the evening, remember?" Kiyomi smiled. At least Mana thought she did. It was tough to say in this limited lighting with wet and slippery shades hanging loosely on her nose.

Mana picked herself up and got back on her feet. The two girls returned to the observatory. Over the span of the finals, the place had thinned out significantly. Erumo was injured, although nowhere near as she would have been had she pushed even father, it was likely she'd be somewhat recovered by late tonight, Vinda was severely burned by her own acid and looking at weeks until she would completely recover, Nanaba was taken somewhere by the staff. Her state was a complete mystery at the moment.

Standing atop one of the bone pillars, using the Art of Tree Climbing to keep his feet perfectly stuck to the edge and keeping perfect balance on it, overseer Oke declared the beginning of the next to last match of the finals – Gentib de Vitt from Team Scuti of Hoshigakure against Kres-T from Team Alto of Kumogakure.

"Talk about rough matches…" Kiyomi noted, Stea nodded by her side with a reserved yet content expression. She may have harbored similar beliefs to Mana deep inside but she did appear moderately curious as to which one of these two young men would defeat the other, even if the history between these two suggested that neither one of them would allow the other to be beaten by anything other than complete humiliation and absolute brutality.

"These two have a very complicated history! Gentib de Vitt of Hoshigakure is known for his intriguing personalities, all of which have subtly different fighting styles and use different sides of his Fire Release and Wind Release arsenal. These two have unresolved business due to the fact that one of this year's fatalities, Gentib's teammate Gorm Cleiti, came as an indirect result of Kres-T pushing him to that point. This will be a very personal bout, made even more complicated by the odd battlefield they will end up clashing in!" Oke spread his hands wide as if encouraging the audience to explore and feast their eyes on the lingering forest of near-unbreakable bones with foaming rivers of acid below.

"They appear to focus heavily upon the personal struggle between these two", Mana stepped up to the edge of the observatory. "Oke-san did not even mention anything related to their arsenals or combat achievements."

"He is a showman", Kiyomi shrugged indifferently, "He did note the two most alluring aspects of this clash: Gentib's different personalities and the personal history between these two."

"He did not even skew the scales at all, that is quite professional of him. He may have mentioned Gentib's abilities while leaving out what exactly Kres-T could do, however, he was aware that both of them had seen each other fight." Stea smiled.

A whirlwind of searing crimson flames erupted from the entrance, arcing up to one of the bone pillars and smashing into it so hard that the flames appeared to splash aside like water being spilled from a bucket at rock-hard wall. The protective barriers managed to contain Gentib's fiery entrance, but the flare and sparking shimmers of the rampaging blaze persisted in the air, captivating the audience and getting them instantly on Gentib's side as the boy was an entertainer, if nothing else.

Atop the completely undamaged bone tower stood Gentib de Vitt, in his Tankobaji persona, red kimono, white haori, clashing, blood red and snow-white face paint and the ridiculous red and spiky wig included. He even still carried around that oversized rod that he had during the great clash of genin teams in the Forest of Death but left behind during the semi-finals.

Kres-T, however, had a much more subtle entrance, jumping off from one of the audience's observatory platforms before landing on a side of one of the towering bones and running all the way up top and smugly sneering at his opponent. Waiting impatiently for his time to beat the crap out of him.

With the overseer Oke's signal to begin, Kres got it.


	370. Beast of Molten Fangs

The competing genin did not wait long after the beginning of the match was declared to start their courses to crash collision. Just before the end of the sentence that left Oke's mouth stopped resonating in everybody's minds completely, Tankobaji darted off like a javelin, wielding the iron staff with both of his hands and growling like a wild animal.

Kres-T crossed his wrists in a manner that entrapped Tankobaji's iron staff, making it get stuck in between the two axe handles that laid sharpened and maintained at the sides of Kres-T's bracelets. A loud clang ringed as the iron rings attached to the staff kept on moving out of inertia whereas the staff had fully stopped. With a pair of strong motions, fueled from both his shoulders, strong arms and his beefy chest, Kres-T attempted to break the staff and had it been something made of shoddier stuff he would have undoubtedly succeeded.

In this case, he did nothing else but waste his well-earned time to counterattack.

Without telegraphing his movements or letting out as much as a warning, Tankobaji let go of his iron staff and leaped onto it, using the time that Kres-T took to return to fighting position and prepare for a counter to his own gain. Unfortunately, to the ferocious persona, Kres-T read his moves completely and entrapped the young man's leg between his arms before swinging and tossing him aside, making him smash into one of the bone towers.

With a ferocious and sadistic yell of a psycho who had sniffed weakness and blood of his opponent, Kres-T attempted to drive his flying knee right into his opponent, kneeling him in between his stiffened by chakra augmentations knee and notoriously difficult to break Kaguya bone pillar, crushing and grinding his opponent's bones and innards with such a strike. Tankobaji was ready for this attack, however, using his tight grip he pulled his lower body up and wrapped his thighs around the sides of the bone pillar, appearing almost like a spider lurking for his prey before launching himself with a vicious tackle at his opponent who had missed his mark.

The two continued to plummet down as Tankobaji forced the thighs of his opponent up on his shoulders and wrapped his own legs around the upper body of Kres-T, sending both of them spinning and crashing into the rivers of acid below. A mighty roaring whirlpool of acid burst into motion together with stone, dirt as well as rubble from the sheer force of impact. These two appeared to hold nothing back, the ferociousness of the Tankobaji persona matched the psychotic brutality and the thirst for blood that Kres-T displayed blow for blow and even found chances to return it with some bonus.

A splash of acid followed by a blue flare of chakra neutralizing its persisting effects followed in a short while, signaling that both combatants had hit the bottom of the acid pools and jumped out from its corrosive waters, using the bottom of the rivers for support for their wild leaps. Kres-T utilized the String Reeling Jutsu to zip-line himself to a nearby tower, having the steel wire wrap around the narrower parts of the bone pillar while he zipped himself to its surface, sticking to it with the Art of Tree Climbing.

Tankobaji, on the other hand, simply burst from under the acid's surface surrounded by his hellish flames, using the same showy jutsu that he used for his entrance, the blazing vortex arced in the middle, placing him right in the middle of another bone tower where Tankobaji used a matching method of remaining stuck to it with his feet as his opponent did.

The reason why the primal persona of Gentib took longer than his piledriver'ed opponent to surface was revealed once an audience member glared at the iron rod decorated with clanging iron rings that the bestial genin held in his grasp. The spiky crimson wig, however, had slipped off Tankobaji's head revealing the youth's natural, much shorter than the wig he had adorned, brown spikes.

"Good… You've had enough brain in that head of yours to adorn this persona for me, the brutal one, your strongest one, from what I've heard. That's the only way you'd stand a chance against me, after all!" Kres-T smiled.

* * *

"He's wrong though." Mana noted. "Gentib isn't taking this seriously at all, after all, he's still playing his persona game. Each one of his personas uses a different part of his own arsenal, doesn't it? That means he is still dividing his arsenal on purpose and not fighting his best."

"Not necessarily", Kiyomi shrugged, "There's power in simplicity. There's confusion in complexity. If you have five different ways to do something, you'll take time to think things through, you'll hesitate and in a brutal brawl like this it might be lethal."

"I think you underestimate these personas, Mana", Stea sighed, "They are not just flashy entertainment for the audience, they are entirely different personalities, a different mindset with which Gentib views the world, can't you see?"

Stea's words made the magician note something of interest to her – from what she remembered during the brief encounter with the persona in the Forest of Death, Tankobaji was all instinct and no forethought. The persona did not speak, while when Gentib was in the other persona, sometimes it would have been preferable that he refused to speak. Perhaps there was more sense to it than Mana thought initially. Only a persona that did not speak or think things through too hard and acted on pure instinct and rage was fitting to fight someone as intimately and painfully linked to Gentib as Kres-T.

Had Gentib been himself, fought the Kumogakure genin with his full arsenal and full emotional and strategic baggage at his disposal he would have faced a young man who was partially responsible for his friend's unfortunate passing. There could have been no way that Gentib would have managed to fight right under those conditions.

Tankobaji roared out as if to vent the built up rage and the pain from his early exchange of blows before making his hand, that which he made free from having to hold his iron staff, weave a bunch of hand seals before clenching it into a fist. The fist lit up with the searing heat that first started as superheated vapor before bursting into actual flames flowing through the youth's pores like sweat would have normally done.

As the overflowing chakra continued to channel through Tankobaji's fist, the construct of flaming fist continued to build up and grow in size and power. Kres-T moved his hand behind him, reaching in for the pouch on his hip before filling his hand with a good grip of small purple marbles, which he proceeded to fling wildly at Tankobaji's direction. Once the handful became short of explosive marbles he removed some more again from his pouch, trying to pin his bestial opponent down before blowing him back down.

With previously unseen, animal-like agility and ferocity, Tankobaji acrobatically maneuvered around the explosive barrage of spheres flying his way, using the cover of the bone towers when him being pinned down made it impossible to completely evade disturbance in the channeling process. Then, out of the blue, Tankobaji leaped out from behind one of the bone pillars and dived down in a flipping arc, aiming to land where his opponent was and deliver the gut-wrenching strike from his channeled Fire Style punching technique.

"Too slow!" Kres-T almost singed out of pent-up sadistic glee as he drove the final bomb he had kept, having played possum this entire time that he had run out of bombs and waited for his opponent to move in close. The little explosive marble detonated right up in Tankobaji's face, blowing the upper body of the poor genin right off clean.

"Wait, where's your staff?" The sadistic explosive expert mumbled to himself, having noticed that Tankobaji was rushing to him without his iron staff, a tool which he showed placing great importance for. With a loud poof and the disappearance of the bestial genin in a smoke cloud, the substitution with the iron staff was revealed as the iron rod swung wildly, having been tossed away by the explosive force of the detonation of the bomb at point-blank.

"Tankobaji: Belphegor!" Tankobaji roared out with a rising fiery punch from his blazing construct, flying up from below, where he substituted with his hidden staff from. The back of Kres-T bent uncomfortably and in an angle that invited the audience to clench in their seats and turn away before the gruesome result of forceful impact was hidden away from them by a powerful firestorm that resulted from the successful punch.

Kres-T darted upward, tossed and toyed with by the forces of resulting shockwaves, bashing lifelessly against the protective barrier as the speed at which he was moving proved dangerous to the audience and the integrity of the arena itself making the genin get treated as a projectile by the barriers. A moment later, gravity did its work, sending the Kumogakure examinee tumbling back down.

The audience jumped up to their feet in shock when the bloodied and burnt up hand suddenly grabbed the tip of the bone pillar, breaking Kres-T's fall and the sadistic grin once again colored the face of the ax-wielding Kumogakure ninja. With brute force alone, the injured ninja pulled himself up and stood up on the very tip of the bone pillar, using what seemed like impeccable balance for his state of injury to balance on it. The young man clenched for his wounds and blood was trickling relentlessly from his mouth, suggesting rather heavy internal damage.

Without uttering as much as a word, the brute removed his ax bracelets and tossed them aside. Not without care, thusly so that they caught onto the other bone pillars, rotating and clinging on them like horseshoes around nails in a popular game for shepherds in the Kumogakure wastelands.

"Who do you think you're fooling?!" Kres-T roared out, it was not only pain speaking from the bottom of his chest. It was certain excitement as well. "You dropped your staff when you hid behind the bones to fool me and substitute with it when you needed it. That's not how brutal and mindless animal thinks. That's all your stupid personas are – charades! You're still thinking, you're still feeling deep down!"

"Come, think of your dead jerkoff friend as you choke on the gas he choked on before death!" Kres-T roared out before revealing that the hand he was clenching his wounds with was full of dark purple spheres that he scattered wildly to fall below and burst into thick clouds of poison gas.

The audience covered up their faces in fear, plenty of them wondered momentarily if the protective barriers would hold, if they would protect them from the noxious and toxic gases that Kres-T used to sink the entire lower to middle layers of the arena in a complete, purple shade. This formula was a new one, thicker, almost like it carried more mass and density to it, almost like it was sludgy to an extent, it was as much poison gas as a smashed apple was apple juice.

"Idol: Shooting Hubble!" Tankobaji's voice echoed from somewhere deep inside the corrosive and irritant toxic hell as a powerful concussive windblast split the clouds of gas apart, greatly weakening them in. Kres-T covered his face up, just this minimal protective measure was enough, at the distance he was standing in, to not receive what little of the concussive force came at him.

"Calm your swing, daddy-o," Takemito smiled from below, still in full Tankobaji make-up and outfit, "You're losing your groove".

The genin on both observatories, those that were not using the lucrative services of the local infirmary all collectively shouted out in disbelief. Gentib was changing the rules of his game, switching his persona on the fly, or rather mashing them together as he saw fit as he could have easily used the Transformation Jutsu to change his appearance, but he did not. It was clearly a statement of sorts.

Kres-T grunted before moving his hands away from obstructing his vision. He removed what he still had left of his explosive bombs and began using them to rain destruction from above. Gentib, with whatever persona occupied his mind, leaped aside attempting to evade the relentless raining outrage of his opponent but he met a wall of poison he was unwilling to dive into, getting hit by multiple explosives head on and sent tumbling down into the acid river.

"There you are!" Kres-T shouted out diving like a bird of prey after a measly rat from atop of the bone pillar, catching his opponent by his real hair before sticking his feet to the bone tower and beginning to beat down on the weakened and injured Gentib as he saw fit. "Revealed in your hypocrisy, defying the rules you set for yourself, the way you fight. Abandoning your personas just for the sake of not getting hurt!"

At some point, it was becoming uncomfortable to watch as Kres-T's rampage continued. Both young men began spewing an alarming amount of blood accumulated from extensive internal injuries, Gentib's face had swollen immensely and become near unrecognizable from the amount of surface-deep acid burns, the much more severe explosion caused injuries and seemingly endless pummeling he had received up close. Kres-T even playfully nudged his opponent's face into the closing down clouds of poison gas that were beginning to surround the two brawlers.

Kres-T grabbed Gentib's head firmly, pressing hard on the genin's temples as he toyed around with his opponent's body, smashing it against nearby bone towers and dipping him into the poison fog while cleverly retreating further from it himself to where only his opponent got submerged at his most desperate for air moments.

"You cannot abandon your petty, stupid self and surrender to that dumb persona, can you?" Kres-T looked down at his properly pummeled opponent whom he so easily held in his hand and could have let go and lost in the foaming acid pools below whenever he pleased. "You want to lose yourself in the battle but your jerkoff dead friend keeps the real you surfacing up, is that it? You just can't forget good old Gorm, can you?" Kres-T kept on teasing his seemingly powerless opponent before Gentib's strong fingers dug into his wrist which he held the boy's head with.

"Are you writing a book, actor?" Gentib smiled, at least as much as it was possible to tell from his swollen and beaten expression. Before the iron grip forced his head to be freed from Kres-T's grip as his fingers dug into some sensitive nerves. "You've been a big tickle, daddy! Now I'm gonna cut your gas though."

A quick combination of blows aimed at various sensitive vitals confused Kres-T with its unexpected nature. The Kumogakure brute desperately leaped back to run away both the enclosing gas clouds and the out of nowhere rising second wind of his opponent.

"Idol: Babcock Stream!" the battle-worn yet still intimidating nonetheless voice of Gentib reached Kres-T right before a powerful wind pressure enveloped Kres-T and started sending him flying wildly upward, towards the tips of the bone pillars. Gentib's hands raced with hand seals so that his opponent did not finish this trip.

"Tankobaji: Chantico!" Gentib's voice took the former ferocious and almost bestial tone for Tankobaji momentarily as the entire body of the young man got enveloped in flames that he breathed out before he dashed at his opponent, aiming to reach the still enveloped in the gust of Babcock Stream Kres-T. The aim was clearly to use the highly volatile reactive nature of both Wind and Fire Releases to finish off his opponent, overwhelming any possible leftover chakra he had to invest into his augmentation and to show the amount of power that would break a ninja had they tried to augment themselves to tank it all in.

The result of the collision of the two techniques, both the Tankobaji's fiery Chantico tackle and the resonating gusts of Babcock Stream was a devastating blast of white light. The flare was so intense that it matched the blinding powder that Nanaba used earlier despite it being only the aftereffect of the combined techniques. What remained of the forest of bones and rivers of acid was revealed not when the white flare faded but when the audience emboldened to confront the results of the match.

It was almost like the forest of bones had melted away, it was still unclear what the bones were made of as it resulted in the pools of acid, which had evaporated completely in the blast, become filled with an odd black and blaze colored sludge that awkwardly rustled with weak flames on its surface in the place of the acid, meanwhile only small sharp charcoal stumps remained of the once astonishing pillars of white.

Slowly and with increasing boldness overseer Oke stepped into the protective barrier, firmly laying his eyes on the standing on his two own feet Gentib and his passed out opponent. Gentib rushed up to the tall Kumogakure brute and carefully nudged him with his foot so that the giant did not slip into the fiery sludge of the molten Kaguya bone material before looking at his unconscious opponent from his upright position.

"You were right, you know", he mumbled out, barely audible to the audience and, more importantly, to the Ninja Council area. "The only way I could have matched you up close was if I embraced my brutal Tankobaji persona. However, I found a better way. By confronting what happened with Gorm, I managed to move past his death and forgive you and Jean-D for the role you played in it. You did not care much if he lived or died, you were disrespectful after his passing and, I could see it then, you enjoyed knowing that he died. Fighting with that burning inside me would have been unbearable so I managed to become the better man and move on, forgive everything that burnt me up. Only because of that forgiveness could I embrace all of my personas at once, instead of facing you as just Tankobaji. Your only mistake was assuming had not moved past my friend's passing and enjoyed the rage, the power that my desire for revenge may have given me for a cheap yet empty thrill of payback. No, I moved on, that's what true ninja are and what they do."

Gentib left his opponent downed at that, his victory was confirmed and officially declared as he walked away and approached the edge of the protective barrier, stepping into the corridor and disappearing there.

"Yeah… We're probably going to fix this place before we proceed to the final match of this year's Chuunin Exams!" What began with a confused and unsure mumble ended up with a declaration full of hype and intention to inspire it in the audience. Oke comically jumped around trying to wipe the easily flammable sludge that kept getting stuck on his feet and coughing on the toxic and nauseous air of the evaporated Vinda's acid before a pair of staff ninja rushed in to begin cleaning the air inside the barriers and fixing the arena.

"The flash of light after the two jutsu collided… You did not display anywhere nearly as painful reaction to the light as you did before. Good. Perhaps you will keep your promise after all…" Stea politely smiled while avoiding looking at Mana as she spoke to her before turning around and heading toward the maze of corridors. She still had some time left as the arena was being repaired so it was unlikely that she was heading straight to the final destination. Either way, Mana was better to worry about her own matters if she was to keep that promise she suffered and worked for so long to be able to keep.


	371. A Game of Chess of the Lunar Variety

Mana was warming up in the preparation room during the short break while the arena was being repaired. It was nothing much, her body was mostly recovered from the stress and the damage of the intensive training as the finals served as a nice time-out for the food pills she took before to take effect and fully work its magic. Kiyomi was sitting nearby, nervously observing Mana's preparations.

"So you've recovered?" The Yamanaka asked once again.

"I think so", Mana shrugged, breaking the warm-up for just a second before resuming it. "I won't be able to rely on my chakra sensory due to massive chakra signatures in the Ninja Council but other than that I feel great".

"And you're sure you can win?" Kiyomi raised an eyebrow.

"You're the one who fought someone who was literally invincible. Don't worry, it doesn't matter what I think now, what I am worried about. What matters is that I've done everything in my power to prepare and that, whatever happens, I'll have no regrets after this." Mana finally finished stretching her neck out and after checking the hidden pockets in her vest finally finished the last, rather spontaneous check-ups and warm-up.

"Alright, good luck out there. You've done crazy stuff in the past focusing on what you're doing it for. Just keep thinking about your dream and keep going for it." Kiyomi assuredly placed her hand on Mana's shoulder in encouragement before walking together with the magician to where the corridors crossed. One path lead to the staircase going up to the right observatory used by female contestants that day, the other one lead straight to the corridors leading up to the arena entrance.

As she said the momentary farewells to her friend, the magician kept on thinking of the fact that her dream has actually changed throughout this exam. For the longest time, she saw this exam as an opportunity to prove herself as having the potential to become the legendary hero who would change the world. It was as abstract as abstract dreams got, just something to prove to herself that she had the guts to go that desired distance.

After meeting and getting to know Stea, Mana's dream changed. This was no longer about Mana's own promotion or proving anything to anyone. After accepting her own retirement when the five weeks of training began, Mana had no problem moving past just having things to prove. Now it was about being a translator, a worthy challenger to Stea's inhuman skills that would match her in a way that she could show off herself in the right way to the Council. Mana sighed as she looked onto the gloomy and repaired arena and saw the buzzing audience with the corners of her eyes.

She was the ordinary girl, telling an angel which way to fly down to so that the people on the ground could see the angel the way the girl did and begin believing in her. In a way, both Mana and Stea were on the same side in this, both of them were fighting for the people in Getsugakure and the chance for a better life.

After remembering that, Mana bravely stepped out through the entrance, waving her hands aside and allowing her "Magical Entrance Jutsu", just a little of sparks and dazzle for the visual appeal, she used to start off her magic shows go off without hand seals or words. Only now did Mana realize the full ramifications of this match, she was exposing herself to this audience as a ninja now, granted, she was exposed as a ninja this whole time, certainly after her name was announced for the final match but… After seeing her here they will all have no other choice but to believe that she was more than just a pretty face playing ninja.

The worlds of Mana the Konoha's Sorceress and Mana the Konohagakure kunoichi will forever be intertwined. There will no longer be any divide between them, ironically, just as Mana wanted to snuff one of these worlds out for the other…

"Take these shades off, stop embarrassing yourself", Stea playfully teased the magician now that the two ended up facing each other with overseer Oke standing by their side, preparing to address the audience. God, Stea was a bit taller than Mana, the magician had not noticed that before.

"So you know…" Mana smiled as she slipped the shades off and played with them by waving them around before pulling off a disappearing act with them as the girl slipped them into her back pocket for future use.

"Gasco told me not to underestimate you, he said that your chakra has grown a little bit in the two weeks you've spent training and that you've mostly recovered." Stea grinned.

"Mostly? I'm completely recovered." Mana pressed her lips together playfully.

"Really? A pity that your training was so inefficient then… Gasco was worried that your chakra signature barely grew in size this time." Stea locked her arms on her chest.

"There is more to training than just raising your chakra reserves. Don't worry, I'll show it to you in a moment." Mana calmly replied before overseer Oke stepped in between the two and raised his hands up, addressing the audience.

"Ladies and gentlemen of the audience and the honorable Ninja Council, and so we've arrived at this point! The final match of the finale of this year's Chuunin Exams! What a wild ride it was! Something tells me that these two will give us a show that will sum it all for you just nicely…" Oke, a showman, as usual, began hyping the two chillingly calm examinees who continued to boldly stare each other down.

Mana did not like this one bit. This may have been a battle just for fun, nothing of the sort of battles she had experienced, nothing like the deathmatches of the Sun Disc arena but… Her peaceful nature did not relent. She was worried, she was frustrated about this battle being a certainty lodged in her path. Still, she was an entertainer, she needed to sell the kind of battle that the audience and Council wanted to see. She needed to look full of herself, she needed to look bloodthirsty and ready to go.

Some part of Mana was ready to go. Some part of her wanted this over with, that part was quite burning up to make her preparations come to fruition and then have her be done with this.

"For the final match of the day, we have Nakotsumi Mana, famous around the village as Konoha's Sorceress, the stage magician! Most of us have seen what she can do onstage but few of her fans have seen her unorthodox tactics in the arena! As someone who was trained by both Red Dog Tanshu and Lady Fifth herself and has beaten both of her opponents in the semi-finals, Mana has deserved to stand here and face her opponent…" overseer Oke turned for Stea's side.

"Stea Tesprea from Team Phobos of Getsugakure. A fearsome trio of ninja that has left a path of devastation wherever they trodden. Not a single member of their team has officially been bested by any contestant, they've left the Forest of Death effortlessly and went plowed through the semi-finals without as much as being issued a proper challenge. The only fallen member of their team was eliminated due to disqualification!"

The audience appeared to eat that hype speech up. Something about Stea's aura as undefeated monster granted her more of a connection with the audience. It was an odd thing for Mana to hear and a little painful, given how many of the people there were fans of her magic shows. The thought of her just playing ninja using dirty magic tricks must have rooted itself quite strongly, things needed to be done about that.

With overseer Oke raising and lowering his hands, the match officially began. This was no honorable kumite, given the rule alterations so there were no formal rituals like bowing or ceremonial hand seals being made. Right after the man withdrew himself from the dangerous distance the two kunoichi went at it.

With a slick, silky sound, knives slid out from under the shroud that Stea wore around her face and shoulders, concealing the upper part of her body except for her flowing silver hair. Like that the young kunoichi attacked the magician, sloppily, but that was the point. Stea begged to be injured, attacking well enough to test her opponent and make them sweat a little, but possibly to be overcome.

Mana noticed that her opponent had gotten better at that part – whereas in the semi-finals it was painfully obvious that her intentions were to be hurt and just how much she held back during her attack, now – she made that illusion disappear. Had the magician now known intimately of her opponent's fighting style she would have possibly been fooled for one exchange or a pair of them.

Stea's knives slashed right through Mana's throat, sending the gurgling magician down on her knees before slamming on the floor face-first. The Getsugakure kunoichi took a large leap back as her confused eyes began scanning the environment. The audience jumped off their seats as well.

What confused Stea mostly was that she saw Mana performing absolutely no hand seals. The kunoichi was ready to confront the magician's impressive hand seal speed but she could never believe that the magician managed to perform them so fast that her eyes were so utterly and completely fooled. This was impossible.

This was no substitution either – by the time when Stea's mind reached that conclusion, the corpse that kept on gurgling and choking on her own blood would have soon been replaced and switched out. Stea clearly saw that this was a trick, there could have been no way that the magician would have gotten killed so soon and so easily but it was evident that the specifics of the trick Mana had pulled still eluded her.

In a slow and delicate manner, Stea's hand moved towards the side of her head and removed one-half of the veil that covered her face. As the silks slipped off of her face, her lips were revealed to be in an upwards crescent of a smile.

"I know what you're doing", Stea exclaimed. "It's a pretty clever tactic, had you used it five weeks before, it may have worked. Granted, it is so obvious I'm quite disappointed you're even trying it now."

Mana remained calm, standing right in front of Stea as her opponent struggled to see the real magician. All that the audience and the Getsugakure genin saw was the perfectly emulated corpse, it was a common trick Mana used in her magic shows as a fake-out and sometimes in combat. When the magician still needed to utter the technique's name, she called it the "Fancy Trick Jutsu".

"You're counting on me continuously dispelling your low ranking illusions as you keep stacking them up and, in that manner, wasting my chakra so that I cannot indulge any of it for my high-costing fighting style, which, otherwise, you still cannot defeat", Stea closed her eyes, she was deceitfully calm, almost like she knew exactly where the real Mana was standing but the magician knew it was just a mind-game. Stea had no idea, all smells, sounds and sights of the real Mana were hidden once the illusion set off, all she could perceive was the dying illusion, thusly was her mind convinced, thusly it wanted to believe that Stea had won this easily. Even if the better parts of logic advised against this.

"Problem is that you will need to attack me eventually and I know that pain dispels illusions as well. I have no problem bleeding a little and letting you dispel your own illusion for me", Stea triumphantly lowered her defenses.

Mana bit her lower lip in anger. Stea was playing dirty, didn't she want to put up an entertaining match and to be promoted? Why was she consciously slowing the match down like this and forcing Mana into purposefully making mistakes just so she could win?

Maybe the magician could strike a vital point hard enough to instantly knock Stea out. No. Mana's opponent was smarter than that, she thought this through ahead of time – if Mana tried she risked bumping into even the most elementary chakra augmentations that would work like armor against strikes. Mana would need to augment her own strike to penetrate the augmentations, chakra over matter, and all that.

Problem was, that if Mana augmented her strikes, she would disrupt her own chakra flow and reveal herself by canceling the precisely balanced flow needed to maintain the genjutsu. Stea certainly read up on the illusionary arts. That much was for sure. Very few ninja bothered to study an art that did not directly attack or cause damage to the opponent, Stea was much wiser than to underestimate genjutsu like that.

"Well? Aren't you going to attack?" Stea taunted Mana again forcing the magician into a position she wanted no part in. With a light wave of her palm, Mana canceled the illusion, by applying another one in its place.

Stea looked around, her eyes shot open in horror as she saw her worst fears surround and cover her from her toes up. The girl took a few cowardly steps back before tumbling on the ground and starting to scream.

Mana had spent the better part of these past two and a half weeks polishing her weakest links, making them as natural to her as a wave of her hand but she had never counted on such a simple illusion ending up to be so effective. Just what could the girl have been seeing? Once the lingering thought of a particularly scary possibility unveiled itself in the magician's mind, Mana reached out to end the illusion herself.

It was too cruel to force the girl to see that. Usually, people saw rats, spiders or similar creepy things that weirded them out but someone like Stea had much more terrifying horrors in mind. Much bloodier and darker sights to return to. It was too cruel to subject her to that again but… Mana's hand stopped halfway to canceling the illusion before lowering lifelessly.

It had to be done. Mana had spent quite a sizeable percentage of her chakra already to no avail. She needed to force Stea to tap out to this horror and dispel the illusion herself. No matter what horrific past horrors haunted her, it didn't matter how many starving friends wrapped their bony fingers around Stea's throat. The decision to leave that illusion needed to be hers. Guru Ayushi and Lady Fifth taught the kunoichi to respect her opponents at least that much.

Stea was not someone to underestimate and dispel illusions for.

Screaming in pain and panic, Stea weaved a hand seal and screamed out "Dispel" before fumbling back on her feet. Her eyes pulsing in fury and her long and delicate fingers bent like the paws of wildcat aiming to claw the eyes of her prey outright.

"How dare you?" She mumbled. Uncertainty dawned in Mana's heart after these words. Had she gone too far? She did not know just what sights this illusion would show, she had no control of that but had she thought about it for one moment longer she could have at least made an educated and a quite correct guess. What else than the lives of her friends who succumbed to hunger and the worst parts of humanity could have haunted this young lady?

"You needed a reminder of what you're fighting for. You were sinking yourself into a tar pit with that slow and dirty approach. I won't allow you to fail the people you care about", Mana firmly stated. She felt like a monster inside. She's struggled so much with telling right from wrong recently… What if… What if she was wrong right now, yet again, just like with Kouta.

"Don't you dare!" Stea screamed out, jumping at Mana with previously unseen ferocity. Mana gently hopped aside, avoiding the anger-driven and careless attacks of her opponent and once again waving her hand. A powerful burst of light burst from the sandy ground beneath the feet of the two girls as illusionary clones of Mana appeared from the light.

Mana merely jumped aside, observing as Stea realized her wrath and the beastly thirst for Mana's blood on those clones. Every time one of the clones created by the magician's "Many-Faced Jutsu" was hit, she burst into light instead of blood and every time one was killed, four more took her place. It was an ultimate jutsu for toying with someone's mind, someone's as vicious and thoughtless as this enraged Stea was.

It was obvious that Stea knew these clones appearing from the source of light on the ground were just illusions. Why would she not instantly realize that? But, even knowing that, the Getsugakure kunoichi continued to spill out her violent intentions onto them, wearing herself out slowly. The intricate and impressive murderous feats and maneuvers she performed on these clones were almost impressive, Stea definitely had a lot of suppressed feelings about it.

Seeing weariness in her opponent's muscles, her newly found difficulties breathing, Mana tipped her magician's hat forward, letting it tumble down her shoulder right into her hand before pushing her hand into it. A bright purple light lit up as the seals of her father's activated allowing Mana to tap into their storage and pull out the Audra wand of Meiko's making out.

Waving the wand around, Mana set off another genjutsu onto Stea's undispelled chain. The Getsugakure kunoichi lazily observed illusionary decorative swords popping above her and thrusting at the ground, aiming to skewer her. She may have initially taken it for a game, but once her body showed her that while the damage dealt to her by these swords was not real, the pain very much was, Stea began taking the jutsu much more seriously.

The Getsugakure kunoichi tumbled on her knees, huffing and wheezing in front of Mana. There was worry in the magician's heart – her opponent refused to dispel the illusions and therefore hadn't wasted that much chakra whereas Mana was very much doing so, creating elaborate yet easy to execute chains of illusions that'd have greatly cost her before these two weeks, yet came off relatively easy after the training in the Rabbit Caves.

Something was off with Stea, Mana could see it. The kunoichi had one of her eyes closed and sweat ran down her face, she looked tired if a little delirious from the complicated assault on her mind that transpired with her refusing to spend chakra dispelling these illusions before they did their worst. Most of them were relatively harmless, visual or one-sense based C or D rank illusions but… They stacked up to quite nasty combinations when used one after another.

Then, Mana finally realized what Stea was reaching out for. An efficient lockdown of Mana's illusions. One so crazy and so reckless that very few would even think up of such a strategy, needless to say, attempt it. While illusions did not directly damage one's body, they did do a number on one's mind. Continuous strain under the illusions could have completely torn one's mind apart resulting in madness or even a comatose shut down of one's body.

Could Stea's fatigue and current symptoms be early prophets of that? Could this have been Stea's game all along? To play dirty and guilt trip Mana into refusing to use her genjutsu once things really got dangerous and the mental damage that Stea suffered was too much. If it was, Stea was certainly using dirtiest tricks to win, however… Given that such a strategy required research on her opponent's personality… It just may have been crazy enough to work and secure Stea a promotion!


	372. Mutual Insanity Society

The more time Mana spent figuring out her options, the less she liked the situation she was in. It felt almost like Stea had planned on being in this highly disadvantageous position the whole time, almost like she preferred it. With each consecutive illusion Mana would use, the damage inflicted upon the mental health of her opponent would keep on corroding until… One of few worse scenarios would occur.

"Polymorphy Jutsu!" Mana chanted out, requiring to utter the name of her illusion yet having mastered the illusion to the point where a wave of her palm was enough to initiate the illusion and no hand seals were required.

Stea's body became locked down, momentarily the veins on her forehead began shooting out as if the mother of all migraines had locked her up before the rustling silver locks hid the hideous signs of tremendous mental strain inflicted to her psyche. The girl fell on all fours, shaking and rustling like a little possum. Mana raised her arms up, attempting to intimidate the little "critter" that Stea saw herself transformed into but instead of scurrying outside the battlefield, the kunoichi fell on her back and rolled her hands and feet up in front of her.

"A possum, huh?" Mana mumbled to herself, smacking her forehead since the trick she intended to use did not work, given Stea's illusionary transformation. A rat would have scurried away, a rabbit would have hopped off without looking back, away meaning outside the battlefield. A possum would have played dead until at least parts of Stea's psyche would return.

This was indeed a problem, given the damage already inflicted upon Stea's mind up to now, Mana had a limited handful of illusions she could use before she drove her opponent mad completely or made her go comatose. She would be of no help to her villagers in that state, nor would she get promoted and the Getsugakure villagers were the entire reason Mana even fought this battle.

And yet, seeing Stea play possum before bits and pieces of her human mind returned and her weak genjutsu began timing out, bit by bit, Mana noticed something interesting. A lot of what exact animal one saw themselves transformed into when under the effects of Polymorphy Jutsu depended on the animal on their mind. Their behavior also was influenced by what the victim knew of the animal in question.

The fact that Stea transformed into a possum and played dead when threatened could have been a coincidence, but it also could have meant that the idiom may have run its course in the mind of the Getsugakure kunoichi. In that case, she was well aware of what was happening with her body and purposefully heading the battle that direction.

With a wave of her wand, Mana canceled the illusion herself. There was no use continuing it, given that the magician could not have exploited the opening she was given without storing damage in Stea's seals. She was locked on a crash course – each illusion she weaved continued to damage her opponent's mind and head her towards potential madness or total collapse. Soon physical battle, something that meant certain defeat, would have been all Mana had to do.

"You're doing this on purpose, aren't you?" Mana asked with bitterness and desperation. "That headache, the fever, the symptoms of dawning madness don't matter to you then?"

Stea laughed out, through pain, through tremendously disadvantageous to her battle, she laughed still.

"I know who you are, Nakotsumi Mana. I know my enemy, I know that you have the chakra and mastery over those illusions to wave them around the whole day but you won't, once things will get dangerous – you'll lock yourself down and fight the battle on my terms. It will be a losing battle, make no mistake." Stea grunted as she returned to her feet. "You could have killed me while I was under your illusions but you didn't, because that's who you are. There are no risks involved for me fighting this way because I know you."

Firestorms began raging inside Mana's gut, firestorms of anger, worry and betrayal. Her opponent did not care about putting up a good battle for both kunoichi, Stea could not have cared less if Mana looked good in front of the council and she had the options to fight such a battle. Instead, Stea took the safest, most ninja path out – play dirty all the way to the end and gamble with her nindo.

"Does it make you mad?" Stea calmly asked Mana. Why would she care? Previously Mana made Stea mad because angry opponents were easy to read. Perhaps Stea purposefully played Mana attempting to infuriate her?

"You're playing dice with your nindo, what if I make a mistake, what if your mind is weaker than I give it credit for and you slip into madness or coma? You won't be able to help all those people then!" Mana responded, as much as she tried, she could not hide her feelings at all. She blazed in anger and desperation. For the first time in a while, she had no idea how she should fight. She was completely confused.

Stea was not just a powerful kunoichi. She was madly intelligent too. She completely crushed Mana's mind with that approach, broke any strategies that Mana prepared for the battle and to the magician this was a whole new experience. She was used to having a plan for everything, yes, occasionally they went wrong, often those plans ended before the battle did but at that point, she was always better off ahead. Now, it seemed like Stea broke Mana from the first few steps of the battle.

"Isn't that exactly what you are doing every time you gamble with your life in the field?" Stea replied with a crushing blow. "How exactly do you plan on changing the world around you if you keep on standing on a narrower ledge every passing day? Don't you now see how mindless your "all or nothing", "limit breaking" approach is?"

Mana smiled. Her eyes were closed, her raven dark hair streamed over her face and thrown about by the cold winter breeze of an approaching evening. This was not the kind of battle this audience was used to seeing. They have seen plenty of those battles already. This one was as much about breaking your opponent mentally as it was about actually winning because pushing your opponent into fighting the battle on one's own terms literally meant one's victory.

"It makes you powerful, doesn't it?" The magician finally explained the stream of thoughts that served as the source of her smile. "This gambling approach, putting everything on the line. You have adopted it and you are winning. Bit by bit, you're forcing me into fighting the battle that means my own defeat. But I have changed you, did I not? Now, when you become a chuunin, you will be the kind of ninja I inspired you to be, the ninja that forced me to fight you on your terms, the better ninja."

Stea could not reply with anything but silence. This was possibly the first time that the magician found out Stea's true state of mind and began pushing back her impositions. Mana's training was more than just physical. Suffering heat, pain and lack of oxygen as deep underground as deep underground went, the magician had plenty of time to think her reasons and inspirations through and temper her resolve.

"Plus, I wouldn't go as far as to say that you know me… You take me for some naïve, good, little girl. The only reservations I have concern killing, anything else is fair game…" Mana bluffed, waving her wand again and setting off the only thing in her arsenal that even remotely pissed her opponent off and actually got deep to her heart.

Stea's eyes darted around as whatever horrors of her past that terrified her before, brought to life by the magician's illusions, resumed. Her hands moved backward as if they were being bent that way and broken. The gaze of the petrified girl raced all around her, like she was literally drowning in her own worst nightmares. Mana could only imagine the ghastly sights of starving people, on the verge of death, wrapping their long and fragile fingers all over Stea's body. The nightmares must have been properly asphyxiating as well, seeing how not much more than lowly gasps for air escaped the girl's throat.

This was no act before, the girl was properly terrified of facing these horrors and it only was about to get worse, given her creeping about madness, fatigue, migraines, and fever in mind.

"Valor…" the girl gasped as if she was begging almost. "Valor…" it came out again.

Mana placed her hand on her mouth, she felt like the emotional nausea was about to turn to very much real spasms of the stomach variety as she ceased the illusion. She should have let it go on, by all means, she should have. But… Seeing her opponent literally begging for the determination required to persevere the illusions just broke the magician. She was not nearly as ruthless as she thought she was.

Mana took a defensive fighting stance, one comprised of many fighting styles she had learned in the Sun Disc arena. A very crude and default stance that would have allowed to defend against very basic attacks of any style but masterful of none. Still, it would have done the deed of helping the magician draw a fighting style profile of her opponent and, eventually, she would be untouchable.

Not that it mattered… Mana caved in to her own morals, she was preparing to fight Stea the way she always fought, the way she always dominated and defeated her opponents.

"You're quite bad at reading people", Stea rushed at Mana, giving the magician a long and stiff kick but only cutting through the air with her elegant and graceful movements as Mana moved about with quick hops that allowed her to avoid her opponent's kicks with the minimal breaking of her stance.

"You mean you were bluffing!?" Mana shouted out in shock as her mind just blanked out, her leg moved by itself, delivering a strong kick into Stea's abdomen and sending her opponent sliding and tumbling back before she fell on her knees.

"Did you really think that the sights of people dying of starvation, breaking my arms and legs, strangling me and blaming me for their deaths have any effect on me anymore? It's a foolish thought, given how those horrors defined the better part of my life and the woman I am now, don't you think?" Stea grunted as she wiped the little trickle of blood that spouted out from her gut after Mana's kick.

The young woman was quite content with herself, she finally received payment to feed her damage seals. The starvation would finally cease, the figurative one quite literally, the literal one being a work in progress…

"I know it did affect you", Mana confidently raised her desperate face and faced Stea's glare with that same flare of strength and noble defiance. "My genjutsu does not show people things that are meaningless to them. People do not beg for valor when faced with useless nightmares".

"Is that who you think Valor was?" Stea mumbled in confusion, keeping her words mostly to herself and Mana, as they were a bit too quiet for the limestone to channel them properly for the audience to hear.

"Who?" Mana wondered to herself, raising a doubtful eyebrow.

The Getsugakure genin stood calmly, channeling her chakra, most likely. Mana could almost feel the pressure oozing from her, just how much did that simple slipped out kick store in those seals of her? The magician closed her eyes, her teeth ground against each other. She needed to know, she needed to feel Stea's chakra fluctuations in order to properly fight her but… If only she could filter, restrain her chakra sensory somewhat.

* * *

"I'll enroll into Konoha High to become an ANBU, like my father", Kouta's voice ringed in Mana's ears. That fool, he is no killer, he's a sweet and kind person. He will need to completely crush everything human about him if he is to become an ANBU, he will have to become everything he used to despise about his father's heritage to succeed… If only Mana could have made him see that.

Mana kept on suppressing her chakra sensory, without her eyes, without her sensory, there was nothing but complete darkness all around. A vague, mirage-like shape resonated through Mana's mind before a beam of darkness pierced its chest, pulling it deep into the darkness' grasp. Shimo… There was nothing Mana could have done but… Maybe if she did anything, what ended up happening would have been different?

Mana's chakra reached out, her sensory enveloped like a scroll, releasing its contents upon the world in a wide, uncontrollable flood. The magician tried to tunnel it, restrain it like Gasco was able to do, focus it into one point only, ignoring the massive signatures that made her so anxious.

* * *

A frightening surge of intense fear sunk its fangs into Mana's chest making the magician's eyes white out. Shocked by the sudden change in the state of her opponent, Stea took a pair of careful steps back, wondering if this was another technique in her opponent's arsenal but the pathetic whimpering and the overwhelming fear that Mana's body irradiated tipped the true reason of the magician's change off. The Getsugakure kunoichi had seen her teammate struggle with similar difficulties a long time before.

"You fool!" Stea yelled out charging in with a chop aimed at the magician's neck. Her body emanated with the flowing supercharged chakra sourced from the what little damage she had stored inside her seals, empowering the young Getsugakure woman. Mana's neck bent awkwardly once the chop of her opponent smacked into it like a sword aiming to behead the girl. While the magician's spine held firmly and did not allow the gruesome outcome to come to pass, it was unclear just what the difference between the attacking might of chakra augmentations and the defensive force was.

"You can't just attempt something like that on the most important battlefield of your life! You're just a brat, you're nothing special… There are no chosen one of no prophecies, like all those characters from your Konoha movies, no one believes you stand a chance, you're just… Just you!" Stea continued to scold Mana's foolish and desperate attempt to control her sensory right then and there, on the battlefield.

The young woman continued to chop at her opponent, smacking Mana at her temples, her neck, her chest and her various joints before turning around with a backhanded slap that sent Mana tumbling down and back on the dirt. Stea's own hand was shaking. Her forehead was sweaty and blushed from the fever of the moderate brain damage she had sustained early on in the battle, her speed was clearly affected by that but she still hit strong.

Yet it was not Stea who felt like she was going crazy. Mana curled on the ground before fumbling back on her knees, she tried to fight back the feelings of slipping control, the overwhelming fear of dying or passing out on the spot, the urging desire to escape the arena she was fighting in, where all those scary gigantic chakra signatures were located.

"What the…" Stea mumbled to herself, seeing the symptoms of Mana's sensory overload-induced anxiety not fading. The Getsugakure genin was clever enough to realize what that meant – Mana was learning to deal with the anxiety of sensing a humongous chakra signature using the cold turkey method.

The Getsugakure kunoichi stretched her legs out wide, bending them at the knees and bringing her balance center lower to the ground. Her right hand moved back while she forced her left elbow forward before lunging at the magician with a blindingly furious and swift barrage of chops, so fast that it would have appeared she had adapted various knife-fighting styles into a hand-to-hand martial art of her own.

Mana screamed out in pain as she could barely even count the amount of blindingly fast and deceptive chops that attacked her all over her body, and that was just one of Stea's arms, the second one kept on the winded back with an extended palm, ready to shoot out and help the kunoichi defend herself. Soon, Stea's long and slender legs joined into the offensive as with a powerful jump kick straight to Mana's cheek the magician was sent down again, then, with a powerful flipping leg slam she was attacked once more while down. Stea immediately settled her flowing wildly dress upon landing down on her own two feet with elegance and grace.

Stea watched the magician struggle with newfound respect. It was clear that the Getsugakure genin had empathy for Mana's situation – her genjutsu was completely disabled due to magician's own morals and the very reason she was fighting in the first place. Then there was that foolish persistence to keep her chakra sensory free, instead of suppressing her. Even if it was suppressed, what exactly were Mana's options anyways? To fight Stea and fuel her damage seals, even more, make her medical ninjutsu and taijutsu attacks more powerful? That was no answer.

One was clear, however, to Stea, to Mana, to the Ninja Council. By witnessing how Stea effectively locked down Mana's options and read the magician's character like an open book, the Konohagakure kunoichi had shown off her opponent in the best of colors. Perhaps it was gratitude for that very thing that prevented Stea from continuously kicking and stomping Mana while she kept writhing on the ground, dealing with her own racing heart and dizziness, not to mention the internal bleeding from all of Stea's attacks and dizziness from important blood vessels getting chopped pretty strong and damaged.

"Get up…" Stea mumbled quietly, Mana could barely hear the voice of the young woman in the darkness and the blur of dizziness that violently kept her eyes shut and her body trembling like a leaf. "You will get promoted, you will show them your fighting spirit, I will repay your favor, so get up."

Pale and huffing heavily due to the anxiety of the massive chakra signatures present above in the Ninja Council lodge, Mana fumbled back up on her feet. Her knees shook like an aspen in turbulent, stormy winds.

Nothing but darkness all around her. Little, bright specks of space dust surrounded her by dozens of thousands, then, massive quasars and blazars, star giants unlike any that Mana has read about floated right beside her. The magician felt like she would go mad if she would as much as turn her head to feast her eyes at them. Kouta and Shimo floated right beside her, one continued to sever his bonds with Mana before fading away, only to return to repeat the cycle and the other kept getting skewered by the darkness surrounding Mana.

Pain. More of it all over her body, Mana kept on burning up inside while it was freezing on the outside. Just where was all this pain coming from? The sight of dirt met Mana's opening eyes for a moment before her eyes whited out again, cold snowflakes gently rubbed against the girl's cheeks but it didn't help Mana's tired bumping heart or the internal fever.

* * *

She was in an endless void of oblivion… Mana grabbed her own throat, ripping her collar open and tossing the bowtie that tied around her neck flowing aside in the cold winter breeze, it faded away in the darkness just like Shimo's dying body. Even as she continued to choke, a powerful blow to her abdomen sent Mana crouching over and falling on her knees. Where was this pain coming from? What was going on? Was she going mad?

Again, something fast and hard smacked her across her cheek, almost ripping her jaw apart and sending her flying past the mirage of Shimo's dying body, right as it faded away in agony. She needed to float away, leave all this behind. No. She's been taking this fear of being exposed to all the chakra around her for so long, she had nothing to shut it all down for. She had no other options but to open her eyes right, or not at all.

Mana's hand slowly raised up, catching some invisible, silky limb and stopping it in its path. A feminine figure slowly formed out of stardust thrown off by all the massive phenomena nearby, the magician focused on the feminine shape before a powerful palm strike sent her tumbling back. A warm, wet feeling of blood busting out from her nose broke Mana out of the anxiety induced sensation of fear.

She could see her, no, she could feel her. Stea. The Getsugakure genin was standing with her elbow pointing forward and her other hand winded up, her palm placed in a defensive vertical state while her legs were spread out wide. The vast darkness of space faded, the stardust took thousands of shapes, those of people while Mana restrained her sensory, reducing its range instead of tunneling it, Stea was right to a point, she was no prodigy so she had to fight cleverly and differently instead of try to talent her way out of every problem. Even reducing her sensory range came through tremendous difficulties, tunneling with full range intact? That was still a little bit outside her reach.

"Welcome back, I kind of missed you." Stea smiled with a playful tease as Mana took a small handful of snow off the ground, using it to wipe the blood off her face and hands as her chakra augmentations did what they could to temporarily prevent her nose busting out in crimson showers again. It would not need to do so for long, soon the blood would stop all by its own.


	373. Mana Pushes Back!

"Was it worth it?" Stea breathed out, forcing air through her throat and nostrils before throwing her body forward at Mana. Swiping her palms in the manner of chopping motions, as if her palms were knives and Stea danced in a complicated martial arts style.

The magician put her hands up, she was not used to seeing such completely innovative fighting styles. It was by no means a deep style or a difficult one to master, or understand, yet it was one of Stea's own making nonetheless. Hits continued to slip past the magician's staunch, sluggish and generalized defenses, a result of still persisting dizziness of recently very crippling anxiety she felt so very recently. Whenever a chop hit her in the liver, her sides or her joints, exposed areas of the magician's neck, it was like being cut by a sword that inflicted all of the pain but none of the actual damage of a sword strike.

With every skipped blow, Mana's entire nervous system lit up like the sky in the Snow Country did during aurora borealis. It was like all of the magician's pain receptors went off at the same time, branching out in a system, a river of pain from the source of Stea's impact. There was no time to comprehend the manner of attack and focus on each individual strike when they sieged Mana's sloppy defenses by hundreds of thousands each second.

"Was it worth betting all of your chips on chakra sensory and losing everything? This battle, your future, your team!?" Stea kept on pushing on. Mana knew what the girl was doing – her opponent attempted to piss Mana off, try and make her fire up, bring about the second wind of the Konoha's Sorceress to make this battle appear like less of a one-sided beating.

Mana was not that kind of person. She was not a pent up bottle of emotion looking for a verbal or any other reason to lash out with all of her built up might. She was different. Words did not build her up, words did not inspire her to blaze hotter and strike harder, they tore her down because each word registered, each word passed through Mana's mind and each one of them was paid and given Mana's utmost attention.

Throwing up a mouthful of blood, Mana collapsed on her knees. Stea's martial art style was simple, it was one of the eight varieties of Land of Wind knife-fighting. It was basic, the foundations for this style could have been found in any library, leave alone Konoha's extensive Archive building. It was polished somewhat, the second arm laid entirely winded back for defense, that was clever. Many desert knife-fighters used it sloppily for balance or just left it dangling, some of them used it as a reserve attacking hand, always attacking with fifty percent efficiency. Stea also had her legs spread as widely as her long silken dress allowed her to spread them without tearing – a strong balance was also a weakness of Land of Wind knife-fighters.

"I had to", Mana responded, wiping off the remaining blood that leaked out from her damaged liver off her lips. "Tracking just your pressure was about as accurate as relying on dreams to tell your future. I am not playing cards, I needed more certainty and clarity."

Mana's eyes lingered sadly across the arena, the audience did not look excited. They looked appalled. Most civilians thought they were a bloodthirsty bunch. That was only because they have never seen a truly bloody battle. There must have been some mercy and decency hidden deep underneath even the most violent soul. That hopeful observation gave Mana the strength to get back on her feet. Her knees and elbows had gotten grazed quite nastily by a number of times she'd been forced down on them.

Stea dashed off again, using the same form, that was just careless. Mana easily danced around the same strikes leaving her opponent looking like a fool. Still, that would lead to little actual success. The magician could not effectively counterattack, disabling half of what her own taijutsu-style was supposed to achieve. Every counterattack would have only made her opponent stronger, both as far as her jutsu and her medical techniques were concerned.

A blindingly fast combat roll. Stea had changed the adapted and modified form of knife-fighting. That was clever, the prodigy must have had suspicions about Mana's highly defensive style as being more of an analytical nature so she did not approach the magician by any completely textbook simple styles, she invented her own. A lesser one and more basic, but comprised of very unpredictable forms and spots and a variety of elements that required experiencing them first to read them right.

An upwards thrust of Stea's palm split the air around it, aimed at Mana's throat, such a strike would have knocked the magician out cold, if not killed her by crushing her windpipe completely. Breathing would have been impossible until medical attention was received. An adapted thrust of Kirigakure style knife-fighting, using her palm instead of a knife… She was a reader, not a practician. Mana had enough perception and agility left in her to hop back, avoiding certain humiliating defeat.

"What's the matter? You're fighting sloppy, even now that you're back in your body, your mind is still solving problems far away from this battlefield." Stea closed her eyes, looking offended that Mana was not entirely in the here and now, it was true, her attention has been slipping in and out, moving away to face the sights she saw in the prison of her own mind before being forced back.

"I'm sorry," Mana placed her extended palm on her chest, as a gesture of apology. "It's just that the anxiety that overtook me made me confront things that tend to make me anxious in the first place. You hit hard, fast and with purpose but… I have no fears of dying here so it does not scare me nearly as much."

"So that's it then?" Stea grunted out before charging at Mana with an entirely different form, this time, both of her arms were stiff and extended wide, the young woman attacked using the sides of her palms, her elbows, both front and the back, and her shoulders like the most common forms of staff fighting would have allowed their user to do.

Mana's hands rose up, bent at the elbows as she carefully applied just the right amount of force and speed to redirect the wide swinging attacks of her opponent. Arms made a poor substitute for an actual staff for they lacked the middle part. That was such an obvious weakness that the magician wondered for a second if she was being lured into a trap before throwing a cautious palm strike that stopped right up and in front of Stea's shocked face. In surprise and intimidation, the Getsugakure kunoichi flipped back a pair of time to gain distance and use her gracefully moving feet to keep her opponent from pursuing her.

"What is your battle plan exactly?" Stea carefully moved around just to keep moving, there was another reason for it, the young woman attempted to hide her suspicions that Mana was up to something and her thighs were shaking a little. Her conscious mind kept on convincing the genin that there could have been nothing that Mana could have used but… Stea clearly gave Mana enough credit not to submit to such confidence.

"Right? We both know I won't cross the line and leave you with brain damage so using genjutsu is impossible for me. Any physical attacks I use will only empower your own abilities through the damage seals so I am effectively disabled here", Mana confidently extended her arms, the magician saw her opponent's surprise when Stea realized that Mana was acting and explaining her problems for the audience. Since Stea had seen Mana's show, she knew where Mana would turn the speech to next. It was time for the "But…" part.

"But there is one more, absolutely insane and reckless, suicidal even, option." Mana raised one finger up playfully teasing the audience, the Ninja Council, her opponent and, also challenging Stea to figure it out at the same time.

"You can't possibly mean..." Stea broke her stance out of the absolute bafflement of the crazy strategy she just realized Mana chose.

"That's right, it was absolutely integral for me to regain my chakra sensory just so I could even consider trying it", Mana bowed with a smile, dusting off the snow and dirt off her knees and her skirt before clenching a raised fist and extending one finger. "Now that I have regained a limited access to my chakra sensory, with limited range, I can tell that you have, so far, used one-third of your chakra. Even given your conscious efforts not to combat my illusions, just that lashing out at my clones cost you more stamina and chakra than it would have taken to dispel that illusion".

"You can't attempt to fight me directly, that will charge my seals up to where you'll be completely outmatched, remember your fight with Doma!" Stea objected. She wanted a cool fight, she wanted the fight to look flashy for the audience and the Council. Maybe she did not yet realize that if Mana was to make a calculated gamble that way, she'd make the singlehandedly most flashy and over the top battle this audience had seen that day.

"It's always the same with most ninja. All they are looking at are the new heights: more power, more speed, stronger jutsu, larger chakra signatures and denser bones. By reaching out to these new heights, very few ask the question if they are truly ready for them, just because they can reach them. That is why I made sure, in these past two and a half weeks, to perfect my current state, my old jutsu. I do not like gambling but… I will bet that I now have the ability to drain you out of chakra before you can beat me with that monstrous ability of yours." Mana boldly declared.

"Very well", Stea once again took the offensive stance of her chop-fighting martial art. "I will take you up on that bet".

Blood trickled down Mana's thumb as her teeth dug into it hard enough to draw some of it out. The magician's hands raced for hand seals, Stea did not even attempt to interrupt it, why would she? She was so absolutely sure that she could beat Mana before passing out due to a shortage of chakra.

"Summoning Jutsu!" the magician yelled out, pushing her hand down into her hat before forcefully yanking Usuzoku out of it. Given how large her partner was, Mana was lucky to be able to call her partner out through her father's seals in the first place.

"I didn't expect ta be out 'ere", the rabbit warrior voiced his disgruntlement almost immediately after Mana's version of the Summoning Jutsu concluded. He was right to not have expected to be called upon, Mana's original plans did not include the rabbit being called on.

"I'm doubling down on this. Just hit her as hard as you can, as often as you can. I'll be doing the same." Mana grinned at her partner, it was possibly the first time of them working together that she saw the rabbit do an almost dirty grin.

"Dat I can do!" he nodded before using his oversized feet to dash forward at Mana's opponent. The rabbit's large sword danced gracefully and with purpose, it was fast and successful.

Still, as Mana rushed to her wand that had slipped off and got lost nearby the little decorative forest erected in the arena, she noticed that Stea took some of the blows on purpose. She got tagged by almost each and every one of Zoku's attacks, just shallowly enough to graze her flesh but none of the attacks that would have cleaved her into pieces connected right. She was quite impressive to be able to control the amount of damage she received so tactfully.

The Getsugakure genin flew back and hit the wall, just above the entrance to the arena before flipping back elegantly and sticking to the wall with her feet and racing across the circular ring of blocks that surrounded the arena, while being relentlessly chased by seemingly gone rabid Usuzoku.

Finally, the magician's fingers tightly wrapped around the wand of Audra alloy before Mana could join in on the ceaseless offensive. Just as the magician rushed to close in on the perfect range, she noticed a pair of cleverly placed hits landing on Usuzoku as well. These two were dancing almost as equals… No, Zoku was slightly better, even if Stea wanted to get hit. Carefully, Mana took aim at Stea. It was tough pinning the two down when they were racing and jumping across the entire place.

"Magical Shock Jutsu!" Mana chanted out, extending her wand forward as she needed no more seals to perform a technique as familiar to her as one of her starting dozen. All she needed to weave this one properly was a conducting object like a well-crafted kunai or her Audra alloy wand.

A white-blue beam of lightning chakra fired off from the point of Mana's wand, darting off towards nothing, but where her opponent would soon end up at. Suffering to regain chakra sensory was the right call – it helped the magician aim more clearly as her eyes were not always capable of following the two.

Stea kicked off of the wall, turning and flipping around to avoid Mana's jutsu that only managed to hit the wall of where her opponent would have been, had she continued to engage in combat with Usuzoku.

"Not so fast!" the rabbit warrior grunted out, appearing right above the acrobatic Getsugakure kunoichi, with his sword raised high up and ready to strike down. Zoku's feet were so amazingly strong that he could perform incredibly fast dashes at breakneck speeds, tough to follow even for more experienced ninja, leaving the likes of Mana and Stea in the dust.

Instead of the petrifying fleshy sound of a young woman getting cleaved cleanly in half, a loud popping sound following a strong puff of smoke materializing out of nowhere followed. As the smoke cleared out, it became evident that Usuzoku had cleaved not Stea herself, but her previously discarded shroud she used to substitute with.

"That was great, Zoku-chan!" Mana commended her partner who perfectly followed off her whiffed move. Had Stea still been strained from having substituted earlier in the battle, she would have ended up getting filleted.

"Figured ye'd have not forced 'er ta waste 'er Substitution yet. May as well go fer de kill and let loose just fer a moment dere…" the rabbit grinned, his fluffy white fur curved very oddly around his highly spherical cheeks that turned in a very awkward manner due to him feeling somewhat uneasy about getting praised in such a cutesy manner.

Stea's arms lit up with lights of salad green as they moved past the multiple bloody cuts all over her body and the scratches across her face from her unsuccessful attempt to compete with Usuzoku at close distance using nothing but her martial arts.

"She's wastin' chakra ta heal?" Usuzoku gripped his sword tighter, feeling uneasy about his opponent using chakra for something considered a rather higher tier of ninjutsu techniques in terms of complexity and control.

"It will cost her chakra but less so long-term than maintaining chakra augmentations to prevent all of those wounds from bleeding too much. She's being very strategic about it, actually", Mana huffed in unease seeing her opponent managing chakra a bit better than she had normally expected Stea to do it.

Stea re-entered her fighting pose once the quick patch-up work was completed. She barely wasted any time or effort to completely heal herself back. She left little to no openings to exploit and the jutsu was of the lightning-quick, blink and you will miss it variety.

"Just like dat, she's back to a chipper state!" Usuzoku grunted with great irritation.

"Do not get discouraged my cute, winter-furred friend. We are not trying to beat her to a pulp, remember?" Mana smiled, normally she'd have been just as irritated as Zoku to see her opponent just flash green and completely regenerate all the damage she took in the course of the battle. However, with her chakra sensory in a working capacity, she sensed the toll it took on Stea's resources to accomplish this fresh regeneration.

While the Getsugakure genin used a very crude and weakened version of the Mystical Palm Jutsu, it was empowered by the damage stored in Stea's seals just enough to completely heal her up. Even if she had seen this ability before, Mana could not help but admire just how amazing her opponent was.

"Well, I'm goin' at it!" Zoku grumbled before dashing forward again.

"Godspeed…" Mana whispered to herself, seeing her partner darting off and assaulting her opponent, whizzing past her before changing direction and flashing past her again, then repeating the process. Slashing the Getsugakure genin with a sword strike with each passing dash like a samurai of the old tales.

"Go-Fish!" Usuzoku grunted, finishing his oddly named sword fighting technique with a mean hip-forward dash. A sizzling sound alerted the ninja animal. It was one sound, that was quite familiar to someone who had seen as much combat as Usuzok0u had throughout the years. The rabbit threw his sword up in a mad swing before the explosive tag cleverly placed on his blade detonated. It was quite impressive of Stea to avoid all of Usuzoku's attacks like that.

"Magic Spark Barrage!" Mana chanted out, having used Usuzoku's opening provided to her to move in behind her opponent before pointing forward with her wand and channeling more of her lightning chakra into a barrage of lightning spark projectiles, fist-sized spheres that buzzed and crackled with electricity in their journey at and all around the magician's opponent.

Using her palm, Stea swatted the spheres aside, Mana's eye managed to notice the Lightning Release chakra crackling around the genin's hand. It must have been at least halfway decent in mastery to manage to swat Mana's jutsu aside like that, the speed at which the genin deflected the attacks was similarly impressive. Then again, Mana has had enough chances to get impressed by the speed of Stea's smacks before, when they ran rampant all over her own body.

"On your toes, I see…" Mana smiled.

"Hmph, you've tricked me, I thought that this jutsu possessed a similar paralyzing effect to the previous one. It would have been pretty dangerous getting temporarily stunned with a sword-wielding rabbit right beside me…" Stea sighed uneasily. Encasing her palm in enough Lightning Release chakra of enough intensity to deflect Mana's jutsu must have costed even more chakra than the magician spent using the jutsu in the first place.

"It's in the name and the job description", Mana smiled, teasing her opponent. As the hand she used to wave her wand around and channel the chakra through it went a little weary, the magician realized that she should not underestimate the chakra she herself spent either. Hers was one of the highest signatures across the finalists, that being said, she used it much more often than most of them as well.

Mana needed to make sure that every bit of chakra she spent summoned equal or greater spending from the side of her opponent as well.


	374. The Decisive Strike

"I'll move, you follow", Mana exclaimed so that Usuzoku who was right beside her could hear. The rabbit only nodded with excitement.

With an azure colored blur of the wand, Mana's next effortless hand motion was revealed. Lightning Release chakra surged from the elbow part of her arm before channeling through the wand and firing off in multiple directions in the shape of long and thin lightning noodles.

Stea did not budge one bit. That was the correct reaction to Mana's "Magic Skewer Jutsu". The lightning surges formed rod shapes before thrusting at Stea's direction, aiming to shock the young woman as they skewered the ground she stood on before getting grounded by it. The body of the Getsugakure genin jerked violently as the mastered low-ranking Lightning Release jutsu surged through her body, the pain of the shock forcing her to lower her guard forcefully but not yet drop down.

Luckily, a dropped guard was all that Usuzoku wanted, leaving only a spiraling horizontally vortex of snowflakes and dirt, the rabbit dashed at his opponent with his sword in hand.

"Block Breaker!" he yelled out swinging his massive sword at an upward-diagonal direction from the bottom down, leaving a wide furrow where the sword's tip dragged across the arena floor.

The white and puffy, cotton fur of Usuzoku was dyed blood-red, the body of the young woman lifted off the ground from the force of the slash flying in an arc upwards before landing further onwards, right next to the entrance to the arena. The crowd observed this in such graveyard-like silence that everyone could hear the tatters of Stea's dress blowing about on her way slamming down.

Usuzoku took a strong leap back, quickly moving into Mana's guard as the magician was clutching at her pain-ridden ribs, jaw, and liver.

"She took it all…" Mana mumbled out.

"Was it wrong, with dis kind 'a opponent ya can't tell, ey?" Usuzoku winked at Mana.

"She could have coated her palms in whatever she used before. She's shown her Lightning Release ability off before. She was fast enough to dash back and minimize the damage from your blade…" Mana shook her head, observing her opponent in a certain glare of respect and intimidation as the young woman stood up, covering up the giant, bloody gash extending all the way from her right thigh to her left shoulder in a failing manner with just one hand.

"So is hitting 'er good or is it bad? Who is ta be hit 'ere?" Usuzoku pouted with irritation. Mana had to resist the temptation to focus on that cute pouting in anger face and let her attention waver from her opponent's side for even a moment.

"It is good, she's just doubling down on my bet. She chooses to get hit so that she could store more damage." Mana nodded in approval. The magician knew that if she was to blatantly praise her partner she'd make him lose attention to his childish flutters and blushes.

"Is this how you feel now? You poor thing…" Stea taunted Mana. The magician raised an eyebrow, what was her opponent implying? That the level of their suffered damage was anywhere near the same? She was right to some extent, Mana was not someone who could take plenty of punishment and she has taken more of it than she'd like. "I imagine you wish you could do this…" Stea blinked with a tease at Mana's direction before her hands lit up bright green again.

"Ye ain't doin' dat again!" Usuzoku forced the words out before leaping with all of his tremendous speed straight at the Getsugakure kunoichi, without waiting for Mana's follow-up or distraction. That was foolish but the magician could do little but scold her silly, hot-headed partner by trying to reach out to him. She was too slow for that…

A ground-shaking slam forced blood out through Mana's ears as the entire ground beneath her feet shifted, a massive pulse emanating from the epicenter of that impact fired off like a hellish cone that reached out as high up as the protective barriers allowed it. The sheer violence of the impact sent the layers of dirt and snow peeling back like the skin of a carved orange, throwing Mana rolling on her bottom backwards as a result.

The heat was intense, matching that of the rabbit caves easily, if not surpassing it, the force should have totaled the entire arena. Mana felt worried about the well-being of her partner and the audience as she genuinely doubted that anyone in the Barrier Corps had any idea just how powerful of a force her opponent could expel. What if no one was ready for this kind of impact? What if it broke through?

Mana wanted to raise her head up and open her eyes. The sky had turned gloomy and dark a short while before with the early sunset of the winter but it was still uncharacteristically dark. Something burrowed inside her nose as the magician girl drew breath, was it… Dirt? Anxiety kicked back into Mana's heart as she began burying herself up from under layers upon layers of dirt and shifting rock before the cold winter air finally greeted her nose and allowed her to cough the dirt in her nose out properly.

Stea still breathed heavily with her fist firmly placed onto the massive crater she had left of the arena. All of the water from the little creeks, all of the wood that was raised by the Senju clansmen in a commendable terra-forming effort… All of it gone. Just a dirt and sand covered hole remained.

"Zoku-chan…" Mana expressed her worry with a whimper, expecting to hear an energetic response but… Her partner must have sustained too much damage and got forcefully de-summoned back to the Rabbit Caves. For Stea to incapacitate a B-Rank summon with just one punch like that… She must have gathered a considerable amount of damage in those seals of hers.

"Still think you can take me out before anything of this nature happens to you?" Stea raised her world-breaking fist in a demonstrative gesture, placing it right up to her face and forcing a smile to color her sweaty and bloody face.

"It was clever to trick Usuzoku into thinking you were about to heal yourself, when in fact you used the medical ninjutsu of another side of the spectrum entirely." Mana wheezed out, she had to admit to herself, as dire as the implication was, even she did not notice Stea's chakra glow changing from salad green to bright blue, the signature color of the Chakra Enhanced Strength technique used by the medical ninja.

"I figured he was hot-headed during our clash, tricking him was a piece of cake." Stea entered her fighting pose again.

This was bad! Mana had never seen a damage seal user storing this much damage in their seals. Now, knowing just what kind of wallop Stea could pack with each one of her smacks, Mana was legitimately a bit afraid of her opponent's quick-chop style.

With a bright blue glow of her hand, Stea dashed right back at Mana, waves of dirt and ground moved from her way, revealing a glowing protective barrier on the underneath as well. Now, with her mind completely focused and all external worries rooted out like weeds in a well-maintained garden. Mana danced around her opponent, utilizing all of the observations she had previously learned about Stea's style.

That was right. All of the anxiety-inducing thoughts about Kouta and his decision, all of the regrets and grief of Shimo's death, all of the fears of her life and career as a ninja in the Team Hokage being over after this exam, no, this fight… Root out all of it! Tear them out, no matter how much it all hurt or how much it will bleed on the inside, if Mana did not – she'd die on the spot.

Nausea pulsed creeping up the girl's stomach as she moved far too fast for what her injuries allowed. Keep it down. Push the pain back, persevere! Just keep moving around, keep dodging, keep weaving like it was a fancy knife-fighter that Mana was facing, like she was back at Sun Disc, fighting for her life again with the old man watching her every move!

"Spear Kick!" Mana roared out, letting her pain, her anxiety fuel that kick as she leaped up and kicked right at Stea's widely extended leg, right in the middle of it, at the side of the knee. Transitioning from a kick into a leg-driving stomp and forcing it as far as it went! Transforming all of the built up chakra augmentations in that kick into additions to her mass and just driving it down!

Stea screamed out in pain as her right leg snapped, the spray of blood was too overpowering to let the sticking out bone show. Suddenly, the girl's hand moved down to her knee, while the other one grabbed at the large gash covering all of her body that she failed to heal while she was focusing on tricking Usuzoku.

The green glow of bursting and overflowing chakra from Stea's Mystical Palm jutsu was blinding. It even forced Mana to take a few steps back, before retreating further for good, in fear of her opponent transitioning from healing back to smashing as fast as she did before. Even with her vastly empowered healing ninjutsu, Stea failed to heal all of her damage – bruises and little, relentlessly bleeding scratches covered all over her body. Still, the massive open fracture of her knee and the giant sword gash were both gone completely, replaced with insignificant, vastly reduced versions of their former selves.

"Still around one-third of your chakra left? It's gonna get a whole lot worse before any rays of light shine through, huh?" the magician thought to herself, observing Stea's heavy breathing and profuse sweating. Mana had no doubt that she was wearing her opponent out but… Could she really weather this cosmic scale storm before Stea passes out?

"If I let her keep on attacking like this, I won't be able to take in all of the pain, I'll slip up and I'll have to reveal that jutsu. If that happens – the whole fight will turn murky for me. I won't be able to read her moves anymore, not as clearly. I need to read her, one slip up will be all it will take", Mana closed her eyes, concentrating on her surrounding, hearing every pebble roll down the wreckage of stone and limestone around. Hearing the wind scattering dust around in messy clouds and gusts.

"That means I cannot let her attack again. I need to take initiative and pressure her into spending some more chakra. I need her to heal, to make healing a must, anything less she will shrug off. She's conserving chakra more than I gave her credit for." Mana realized opening her eyes and glancing all over the wreckage of the arena. A detail of a dusty, torn up magician's hat laying about further away made the girl smile. It's been a while since she used that combo, at least since the Forest of Death.

"I'll have to break a couple of my own rules, I guess, but it cannot be helped." Mana realized as she slowly raised her hand up. Stea was hesitant to respond, she was tired, that was good. Both of the girls were worn out and injured, Stea was not used to fighting injured and decently worn out as she was always showing off how quickly she could heal herself back up. Mana may not have been the most enduring combatant but she was used to taking a bit of punishment, knowing how quickly it all accumulated. She was used to fighting at the very end of the line because she always pushed herself to that point where most gave up.

This was her turn to attack. Anything else will mean her certain loss!

"Substitution Jutsu!" Mana yelled out as a pair of shades appeared from her bruised and dirty sleeve, the pair that she had effectively made disappear in the beginning of the battle. With a loud puff of smoke and a powerful popping sound, Mana replaced the pair of shades in the girl's hand with her tattered hat.

The Konohagakure kunoichi rubbed the tip of her Audra alloy wand across the edges of the hat before placing the wand back into the seals and pulling out a box of steel-tipped cards. With lively energy, Mana flung the box right at Stea, the Getsugakure kunoichi leaned aside, letting the box whizz right by her. Mana saw it – Stea noticed the seals and almost sprained something performing a valiant combat roll to avoid an explosion of steel-tipped shrapnel cards right in her face.

Much to Stea's surprise, as she gathered herself up off the ground, nothing of the sort transpired. Mana continued to pull out steel-tipped card boxes of different colors, mosaic variations, and weight out of her hat before flinging it rapidly at her opponent, like some unique sort of shurikenjutsu. Stea leaped aside from each projectile with bountiful ease and interest in this curious manner of attack. Had these boxes hit her in the face, they'd probably just leave the Getsugakure ninja with certain discomfort, not actually injure her.

The more rapidly Mana began throwing her boxes at Stea, the less accurate she became. At some point, her opponent just stood there and let the inaccurate projectiles just whizz past her, scattering all over the battlefield. Stea's eyes were growing a bit gleeful. She thought she was resting whereas Mana was desperately wasting her stamina and her chakra, she was not entirely wrong, finishing this combination would require a decent chunk of Mana's remaining chakra but… It was key for her planned victory.

Instead of pulling out another box of cards, Mana pulled her Audra alloy wand back out, letting Lightning Release chakra surge down her elbow, her hand and through the wand before the orb at the tip lit up with a charging surge of it.

"Magic Spark Jutsu!" Mana yelled out as the wand fired off a mostly annoying rather than powerful barrage of lightning sparks at her opponent. The reach and range was quite wide, vastly improved over the time Mana spent honing her old childhood techniques instead of focusing on new ones. Certainly outside the realm of dodging possibility for both of the injured kunoichi duking it out.

Stea covered her face and shifted her blocks all over her body, protecting from the painful and irritating, if nothing else, lightning sparks that made her stumble back, just to avoid the buzzing flock of sparks that kept intensifying as the technique went on. Using her free from wand-wielding and chakra channeling hand, Mana pointed her extended palm at all the scattered card boxes detonating them to set all of their seals off.

With that signal, all hell broke loose. Some of the cards unleashed spouts of water, some of them fired off jolts of electricity, some of them launched small fireballs where the others simply blew up whereas others did the same but emitting confetti and streamers instead of an actual explosion. With all of this havoc joined together, the combination concluded with a massive, stage rumbling blast.

The audience jumped up on their feet, responding to Mana's newly discovered and highly aggressive attacking style. So far she has only avoided the attacks of her opponent and responded to them, leaving the attacking to her summon or just resorting to quick jabs if only to keep her opponent on guard.

Smoke and quite a lot of heat emanated from Stea's seemingly lifeless body. The Getsugakure kunoichi laid sprawled out, covered in burns and flesh wounds, at places her flesh was torn out of her body resulting in rather gruesome looking injuries. Her impressive and complicated dress comprised of jewelry and fancy embroidering was now just a rag of cloth that did its best to cover up the girl's body in places where the outfit was not singed or blown off. Stea's eyes were closed and her mouth laid open as if she was dead but Mana knew that, after healing herself with that much damage stored in her seals empowering the medical ninjutsu, Stea would not get knocked out or killed by even Mana's most powerful shots. Still, as the awkward pause of staring at her downed opponent went on, even the magician's confident heart began trembling uneasy.

Then, with a pain-ridden cough and intense wheezing, trying to force the blood rushing into her lungs from her caved chest Stea calmed Mana down by sitting back up.

There it was… Stea's hand lighting up so brightly with the signature emerald shimmer of the Mystical Palm jutsu that Mana had to close her eyes for a moment as her opponent patched herself back up. Attacking Stea through this intense flash of light would have been close to impossible. Not with any hopes for accuracy, at least. After just a single flash of light, as quick as a ray of sun that traveled showering Mother Earth with its warm embrace, it was done – Stea had completely refreshed herself, save from a couple of grazes of her skin and cheeks at places.

The difficulty breathing, the rings around the girl's eyes were unmistakable. Mana knew these symptoms all too well, Stea was slowly creeping up to the very edge of her limits, as conservative as she was through this battle: saving chakra on dispelling illusions, only healing when absolutely necessary and only using low ranking healing ninjutsu… The damage seals were inherently meant for more experienced and powerful ninja, they were not an earned ability, she had clearly obtained them by some supernatural means.

"It's impressive, outright. I can't believe it that you managed to push me to the very end, just like you promised." Stea chuckled with a smile. "There are so many details about my damage seals that I have managed to keep secret, just because nobody ever pushed me to where I needed to reveal them."

Mana's eyes peeled open, the end of that thought could have flipped the tables completely on her.

"For example, I'm not sure if you know it but…" Stea started.

"There is another jutsu that you have in your arsenal, one that you kept secret this whole time." Mana finished her opponent's sentence, it may as well have been a mercy – Stea was struggling to speak as it was.

"So you knew…"

"Ever since your match in the semi-finals, your arsenal seemed… Incomplete. Planning around it was truly tricky as I could only imagine what it could be. I thought it was a highly offensive ability as your arsenal of techniques missed something of that sort." Mana admitted.

"That is correct. Although, honestly, I don't want to use that ability right now. You see, the damage I store in the seals is present in another sealing dimension. You will have no way of avoiding that jutsu and, given how much damage I have stored…" Stea tried to explain. "You may actually die".

Mana grinned confidently before spreading her hands out. "We both know what will happen once you use it. You were not the only one avoiding a certain jutsu – I avoided the use of a certain illusion of my own just to trick your mind into forgetting about it."

Stea gasped in surprise before bursting into a reserved chuckle. The Getsugakure genin placed her hands together in a strange and exotic looking hand seal position. "Damage Seal: Release!" she chanted out in confidence and a sort of bitter acceptance of what was to follow.

Mana's body twitched as blades of invisible force, as numerous as the stars that began appearing in the winter sky shredded her body into tiniest chunks of flesh, all of whom transformed into rose petals upon the technique's conclusion. Carried by a gentle yet cold winter breeze, the shower of petals gathered behind Stea and reshaped into Mana.

"Flower Petal Sanctuary", Mana muttered to herself upon taking her old shape.

Having run out of chakra to a rather dangerous extent, Stea fell down on her knees, her eyes closed peacefully as the girl finished her faint whereas Mana just fell down on her knees, clutching at her pain-ridden sides and abdomen but very much conscious.

"Examinee Stea Tesprea has lost consciousness! The winner of this match is Konohagakure's own – Nakotsumi Mana. Ladies and Gentlemen, the honored members of the Ninja Council, this concludes the finals of the Chuunin Exams!" Overseer Oke declared, from high up, still sticking onto the round walls of the arena as he addressed the audience.


	375. Falling Towards the Finish Line

Tumbling and panting deep, drenched in bloody stench breaths, Mana slowly made her way to the inner corridors outside the arena before placing her back against the wall and sliding down on her bottom. Nausea and dizziness made her press her cold and paled hands against her forehead and the pressure against the magician's eyeballs demanded that she gently caressed the bags that were beginning to form on her face.

Even when Mana prepared for every causality, even when she analyzed every movement and matched her opponent on the field in both the physical and the mental plains… She just barely pulled it off. Winning was not necessary, just going the full distance would have been fine. It was only at the final moments of the battle that Mana saw that opportunity, the golden canary buzzing by as both girls plummeted to the ground at the speed of terminal velocity.

Something powerful wrapped around Mana, the magician's eyebrows telegraphed her aggravation with the rude approach but the forceful limbs of her best friend ruthlessly lifted her off the ground and spun her around.

"You crazy bastard, you suicidal maniac!" Meiko kept on screaming right up at Mana's ear. It was something, which did not help her sensitive and vulnerable state. "You pulled it off!"

"You did it, Mana!" Kiyomi gently placed her hand on Meiko's shoulder as a signal that the redheaded blacksmith was wise to stop crushing her vulnerable strength with the might that could have juiced the very world like a bag of curd.

"Excuse me, girls! Please, let us take care of your friends. You can see her in the resting room tonight, or tomorrow, during visitor hours!" The medical staff intervened, placing Mana's weightless and floaty feeling body on stretchers.

A young woman ran down a scan of Mana using the Diagnosis Jutsu. "She's relatively stable. She's not critical but the internal injuries will build up to a critical state soon. Take her to the infirmary, then to the resting wing of the hospital!" She ordered while the other medical ninja firmly nodded and rolled Mana off.

The girl's mind kept turning on and off, here she was watching the lights of the Chuunin Exams arena, here she was glaring in curiosity at the dark winter night sky. There were no more stars, grim clouds had accumulated to a large shroud that covered the entire thing, it would probably rain throughout the night… Here she was watching the lights of the Konoha hospital buzzing by, here she was watching kind and masked faces leaning over her and feeling the warm, emerald light shining over her. The refreshing feeling of cold water surrounded her, chilling her just enough to counteract the warmth of the Mystical Palm Jutsu and make the chill feel invigorating and almost soothing.

She won, not only that – Mana pushed Stea enough so that the young woman could reveal and show off all of her abilities, all of her battlefield strength, all of her supporting care and capacity to help her comrades on the battlefield conditions. There could have been no chance in hell that the Council would not promote Stea to chuunin after that clash of the two. The rest was all in the hands of the Getsugakure kunoichi, the well-being of her people, the ability to provide it and create it with her own hands and make the future of her village better than the one she grew up in.

To end the horrors she was forced to confront under Mana's illusions…

"You did good, kid. You're pretty young. You did pretty good though, I've never seen a recent transfer patch someone up as easily and quickly", Mana heard the praises nearby her. She opened her eyes and looked at the direction of the acclaims that were being given out.

"Thank you, ma'am. Mana and I have had plenty of experience together, I know her body inside and out which is why I have asked to perform the procedure on my final day working here." Kouta bowed his head in respect and gratitude for the kudos that he was being given. "I know the patient's system inside and out, I've healed her a thousand times, perhaps I am even being literal with this statement, ma'am".

"Well, it's not like she was in any immediate danger… Still, you did good, it will be sad to lose promising hands like yours", the medical kunoichi cheered on Kouta again before walking off to continue her shift.

Mana looked around, beside her laid Stea who looked completely healed and was sleeping peacefully. On the other side, there was a bald and incredibly pale young woman. The magician took a pair of sniffs before recalling that the smells would no longer tell her anything, she was fairly sure that the patient on the upper left was Vinda though.

After all, the acid ninjutsu user was the only one in a condition severe enough to require skin treatment as radical as the one her father had received – a complete refreshment of it to where her skin looked completely new, like the kunoichi had only been born yesterday. She was lucky that her acid was not of high enough rank or not an actual Advanced Bloodline, in which case the career of the young woman would have been over, just like that of Mana's father was.

"Don't stretch around too much, some phantom pain in your gut may still persist overnight", Kouta smiled, Mana had not noticed that her friend witnessed her being awake and had walked up to her.

"Thanks for helping me again", Mana thanked with an amount of cheer and gratitude that she herself was surprised. It was like there was no longer any bad blood or awkwardness between the two, just phantom pain and great memories of the old times like Kouta had said.

"That was an amazing fight. If my father had seen it, you'd be pretty much family to him…" Kouta smiled, pulling in a chair and dropping onto it like a sack of vegetables. It was late, he has healed Mana up after his shift. He must have been quite drained after that crazy day.

"I don't know, wasn't exactly his type of fight, was it? We weren't just fighting, it's like we were… Dancing, you know? It felt more like one of those rap battles from Kumogakure. We were matching minds as much as our fists." Mana blushed, so she wrapped her cheeks in the covers before realizing that it was far too dark for her friend to tell.

Kouta did not reply initially, he just smiled while the two shared a look together. Just enough light from the corridors outside made way through the glass for Mana to look right at her friend's eyes and for the two to connect with each other like old friends who have been through many hells and made their way through mounts of both salt and chocolate.

"You're gonna get promoted, definitely." Kouta gave Mana a thumb up, closing his eyes all of a sudden with that gesture. He must have felt the slowly forming awkwardness that was beginning to seep out from them just building bridges with their eyes.

"It does not matter. I'm quitting anyway. I only fought Stea because she asked me to. Because I wanted to help." Mana moved the covers off her cheeks as she felt too hot. "You know… When I was out there and Stea kept on attacking, I felt really weak. I felt weaker than I should have been, all sorts of attacks kept slipping past me and… I got really scared. It was because of us that used to be, I was scared of what will become and what has already become of us and that fear fueled the fear of failure. It was a perpetual cycle of fear that just kept wrapping around my throat and snuffing me out."

Mana stopped talking because she had predicted that Kouta would stop her, that he would get sensitive or interrupt her. Get angry, anything. Anything other than reestablishing the encouraging and friendly glare, reconnecting the bond they previously shared. Maybe she did not know Kouta as much as she previously thought, after all the sensitive moments the two shared, after all the walls of their own building they tore down for each other…

"Then, I just… Ripped it all out. It bleeds, it bleeds really hard." Mana pressed her fist against her chest, questioning if Kouta understood her feelings with just her eyes. Kouta's eyes were not goofy or confused, he knew what Mana was talking about, she could see it.

"That's too bad. I wish I could say that stopping your bleeding is what I will do but… That's not who I want to be anymore. Although… I'm bleeding too, just a little, I think." Kouta rubbed the back of his head, messing his hair up again. Mana sat up, pouting in pain that burnt up in her gut but continuing the motion after pushing through it. The magician stroke the hair of her friend, fixing it with a couple of motions and settled back down. Kouta grinned with a full-teeth smile before standing up and yawning.

"Don't leave too early tomorrow. There's this guy who's feeling like a broken mess, I told him to see you. I know how much you like helping people and… You're quite capable of helping him out. If you're going to change the world, may as well do it one broken guy at a time." Kouta waved Mana farewell with a mutual sendoff before disappearing in the dimly lit corridors of the Konohagakure Hospital.

Soon enough, the Sandman had claimed Mana as the next target of his magical sleep-inducing sand shooting practice.

* * *

Cold air whizzed past Mana's face, making her ears pop and crack and wildly blowing about her hair. Upon opening her eyes, the magician noticed that she was floating, or rather, spiraling down with no bottom to be seen. The more time Mana spent looking around her, the more familiar faces she noticed. All around her, other examinees of the Chuunin Exams were falling in no particular order or altitude.

This made absolutely no sense. Just as Mana blasted through one layer of clouds, hoping to see the ground below, all she saw was more oblivion of blue and puffier clouds below. Some of the clouds were dark and heavy, others were soft and loose like cotton. Mana changed her position to see what was falling behind her, she wanted to see where she was falling from. Sadly, all she could see up above were the plummeting examinees, both conscious and lifeless.

Down below her, Kouta was going down at much greater velocity, Mana tried to somehow make herself arrow down faster than her friend but she failed to do so. After cracking apart another layer of clouds, the magician finally saw the solid ground. All of them were plummeting heading straight for a strange village street. This was no street that Mana was familiar with and it had buildings both familiar to her and ones the likes of which she had only seen in pictures. Several of them were only remembered from Mana's short time in a different universe.

Much to Mana's vocal despair, Kouta's body smashed into the ground, followed by gruesome bone snapping sounds and showers of blood, the examinees beside the young man continued to bash one by one at the ground. Some of them fell impaled on the large antennae or the pointy structures present on the rooftops of the buildings in the street they crashing down to.

Mana screamed out, covering her face right before hitting the ground, just a moment behind her waking up peacefully sleeping in her hospital bed.

* * *

A new rainy day was upon Konohagakure with the festivities of yesterday continuously sinking into the massive bog of the past, soon to be forgotten and replaced by other days just like that. Meaningless to all but the people that laid their lives on the line that day.

"You're awake…" Stea stated. It was not even a question. The young woman was laying in her bed with her eyes still clapping weak. When Mana had no luxury of receiving medical food pills, back during a mission in the Forest of Death, when she first experienced a shortage of chakra, she was laid out much longer than it took Stea to recover. "So, how did the strongest genin of our generation sleep?"

"We both know you've made up that title", Mana politely shook away the honor of taking the praise and the honorary name she was being given. "Combat is more than just a ladder, one person being stronger than another. It's all about compatibility of fighting styles and choices they make in combat. Had I faced anyone else but you yesterday, or had things gone even slightly differently I'd have soundly lost that match."

Mana sat up, feeling better than she had felt in a while. It was wondrous what just one day of professional medical attention and medical food pills could give her. Kouta's hands really did know her body and soul all too well, she had recovered flawlessly.

"Where's Vinda?" The magician blinked a pair of times, noticing an empty bed where yesterday there was another young woman, resting after nothing less than miraculous recovery from grievous injuries.

"Besides a case of acid melting her hair right off and a whole new baby-soft case of skin on her flesh, she's good to go. Everyone's leaving the village today, the Ninja Council had already made their decisions last night and sent them to the respective leaders of each village." Stea explained as she also sat back up and walked up to the ward window, only for Mana to shortly follow.

Rows upon rows of foreigners were clogging the streets in this rainy and snowy day that was making the mud on the streets into a mushy mess that was only lacking the color to perfectly emulate what remains of a massive battlefield would have looked like after a war was finished being waged there.

"It will be tough adapting to the much emptier streets. I had somewhat grown fond of the foreigners buzzing about and having a good time during the Exams." Mana admitted.

"Still the pink-shades idealist we first met on our way to sign-ups, huh?" Stea laughed out in a reserved manner.

"It would be tough loving people and wishing the best for them all if I wasn't", Mana answered Stea's question before the two past opponents turned at each other and bumped their arms, fist to the elbow.

"Maybe we'll meet sometime…" Stea said her farewells as Mana began walking up to the ward door, she did not have many possessions with her, save for her uniform, her hat and her weaponry and tools.

"Definitely, your village will be in a much better place by then, I trust their fate in your hands then", Mana nodded before walking off. She still had to meet someone, as per Kouta's request, but she did not quite know whom or how exactly she could help that person.

"Yo!" a loud exclamation stopped the magician in her tracks right as she left the ward with the intention of finding Kouta, or someone who knew what he was talking about yesterday.

A familiar young man with an affinity for mocking spiritual people through his path of "Uber-Spirituality" approached the magician. Just by looking at the dull and greyed out eyes of the young man, Mana could tell that he had his chakra control taken away by an accident with chakra augmentation. It was a dangerous power that genin had no business using. They were too skilled for their own good to be wielding it this young.

"I'm glad you kidnapped me in the Forest of Death, you know what I look like now…" Mana smiled for Buhakim.

"Nice match yesterday, I'll shave my own hair and eat it if you don't get promoted." The youth congratulated the magician while rubbing his exposed elbow and his bare foot across the floor.

"I would not like to stack that up on what happened to you for my life, don't worry. You were not too bad out there yourself, fighting a Jinchuuriki must have been quite petrifying." Mana tried to encourage the young man as the two walked further from the wards and across the hospital halls.

"It was something alright, nothing ever wore that girl… That thing out. I broke myself just trying to make her sweat a little." Buhakim growled quietly, like a wounded animal. "Even if I would have ended up getting promoted, what's the use of it now?"

"Don't say that. Plenty of inexperienced ninja overdo it, most of them don't do so to the extent to cripple them for life. Their control returns to them eventually with very few exceptions." Mana tried inspiring some hope to the young man, just like so many tried instilling her when Mana was the one feeling broken.

With a pair of uneasy, deep breaths, the magician realized that it was not enough. No matter how much people tried telling her that what she was going through was just temporary, it felt like they were downplaying the weight and importance of that torture of feeling lost of useless to the world. Those were two feelings that carried the most weight of all with them… What Buhakim needed was a new purpose, a drive to ignite the flame that had gone out.

"You know, even people without chakra control can still lead others. It's not always your strength on the battlefield that makes the difference, if it did, I'd have lost yesterday. What you have on your hands here is a unique chance to make Uber-Spirituality into something more than just a mockery of what makes people spirited and willful. You have an opportunity to decide what it truly is, most people do not get such opportunities. Once you achieve that, once you find that drive, I can personally attest that your power will too return."

Buhakim looked on ahead before turning back. He was thinking about something quite hard and looking at the floor before turning back with soulful eyes.

"Thank you, I was told yesterday that you knew plenty about this and you speak like someone who does. I guess Uber-Spirituality really did leave me, together with my power, and all I need to do is find it again." Buhakim declared. "Vehicle of Disciples, Solitary Awakening and Bodhisattva are all just puppets, they can be rebuilt, once the Uber-Spirituality that makes them move is recovered, they will live again!"

Mana nodded her head with a genuine desire to encourage the determination she saw burning in Buhakim's eyes to blaze on. Maybe he would go on and pass along that very same flame of determination along to someone else, tying all of those who are lost in a bond of fire that burns hot and wills them to go on. Keep moving, no matter how grave their losses because any fallen temple can be rebuilt as long as the priest finds faith inside of them to place the first stone on the foundation…

It did not really matter if Mana got promoted or not in the end. She had changed the lives of a handful of people already, people that would go on to pass on that Will of Fire along to the people they meet along the way. These were her first bold steps.

First bold steps towards changing the world!


	376. Past The Broken Bonds

Mana pushed a greasy dumpling around the wooden board with her chopsticks. Her cheek was feeling numb to the point where the magician wondered if the imprint of her fist could actually stay engraved in her flesh after such long period of time she spent resting her face on it. Mana was not quite a believer in the old spinster tales but… She switched her hand from a fist to a palm, just in case.

"That's odd, you usually love dumplings, is the filling bland?" Mother raised an eyebrow, she had long finished eating and had only briefly entered the kitchen to pick up a coat she left resting on the chair.

"I still love dumplings, it's just… I'm thinking that's all", Mana wanted to jump up, acting like she did not hear her mother coming ever since she ran upstairs to get dressed and was now occupied with minor blitz-chores to occupy the five minutes she had until she planned to leave the home for work.

Mother clacked to the guest room with elegance, before placing her coat in the wardrobe and returning to the kitchen. She fixed her skirt and her blazer before settling down and pressing her cold hand to Mana's forehead.

"I'm not sick, mom", Mana growled. She had to admit though, feeling her mother close after spending so much time away from her and in the big and mysterious world, or in the caves of total darkness and scorching heat did feel cushy and intimate.

"Oh, yeah, big ninja girl… You know, your father actually got sick more than other people. Sickness is an immunity reaction, you know, a supercharged immunity means monstrous flu", she teased Mana while glancing at the clock with just the side of her eyes.

Mana quickly stuffed her face with the final dumpling, not because she wanted to, as evidenced by how cold and unacceptable the little piece of her meal tasted and how difficult it was to keep down. The magician just barely fought off the instinct to sip some of the soy sauce down just to wet her palette a little and help it down.

"Don't worry, you were amazing out there, you'll get promoted. Or do you not want that anymore? It's tough to tell with you…" mother teased. The lack of time remaining for family matters made her approach the matter in a much blunter manner than she'd have usually done it.

"I was not the last one to complain about me resuming my training…" Mana snapped back at her mother. Almost right after the sparrow had left the nest, she felt a bit rude for the manner it came out and wanted to apologize but… Somehow, the timing for apologies seemed wrong. What was wrong with her? Why did she keep offending people she loved like that recently? Or was it longer than just recently? What if she spent more time being blunt like this than she did how she wanted to behave?

Did that mean Mana was blunt like that, no longer what she was raised and taught to be?

"I just wanted you to be happy like all parents do. If being a chuunin, like your father, will make you happy, so be it. Granted, I have trouble imagining you playing a role in snuffing people out and spying for the village. This is where things get serious, you know…" mother jumped up and fixed her clothes again.

Mana did not reply, after one final look at the clock, mother began slowly collecting her immediate possessions, like her handbag and the like, and leave. Somehow this felt… Wrong.

"Mom", Mana raised her voice up, mother's scarcely blushed face appeared in an odd angle from a side of the kitchen doorframe. "How is the café doing?"

"Just great, with the influx of foreigners we really made a huge profit. Maybe one day you can just actually retire and I can keep you two safe and strictly under my supervision, a girl can dream…" mother's eyes eased to a degree of devotion and a spice of affection before the woman ran off.

Knowing what Mana knew about mother's history with the village and her family it was not tough to understand why mother felt like she felt. She did not want Mana serving Konohagakure, the village that played a hand in the extinction of her "people". If there even was a "people" as the Wandering Ninja were more of a social group than a "family". To her, Mana being a tool in the village's disposal would have felt too close to a complete subjugation and surrender from her part.

Getting into mother's shoes was elementary to a degree it was scary. Had Mana lost her entire family due to the decision of an establishment, the last thing she'd like in her life was to marry a member of that establishment and then have her child serve that establishment. It just felt so… Prideless and submissive. Two things, Mana knew, her mother was not.

With a deep sigh, Mana stood up and washed the wooden board under a running stream of water, followed by washing her tools and running up to get ready. Her preparations were interrupted by a loud bang on her door, in her mad dash Mana ended up leaving the house without her hat or all of her equipment, she didn't completely finish getting dressed, leaving all of her more detailed and fancy accessories laying on the bed untied, as they were placed by Mana earlier.

"That was a heck of a match". Hanasaku commended Mana. There were no hints of anything negative or somehow belittling, then again, the magician doubted someone as blunt and simple-minded as Chestnut Hanasaku even had the capacity to bite verbally as elegantly and subtly as many of her friends and enemies could. If her sensei disliked anything she barely even cared about it to keep watching, she either punched that thing until it disappeared or just left the room.

"Oh, so you watched it that long?" Mana felt both impressed and humbled simultaneously. "I had thought someone of your caliber would have gotten bored and left… Wait, you weren't in the Ninja Council, were you?"

"No, Ninja Council requires more than just strength. It's as much about perception and analysis as it is about the experience. Strength is only optional with that group…" Hanasaku shrugged.

"You're early, that's unlike you, Hokage-sensei", Mana felt a bit uneasy about calling Chestnut Hanasaku "sensei" again, she always did after the woman voiced her displeasure with Mana's involvement in Team Hokage but more recently, the chestnut-head appeared to have no problem with that word or any of its implications.

"I just… Wanted to get something straight, before Kiyomi joins us", Hanasaku sighed.

That was so unlike her! Even if this was the basis of social scheming, such elementary social strategizing could have only come from her experience as the Fifth Hokage. Mana was almost curious as to what exactly was so important that the Lady Fifth wanted her to know but keep secret from Kiyomi.

"Your performance was impressive, you beat someone much stronger than you, that's pretty cool. Thing is… I may respect you but…"

"You don't trust me, still", Mana completed the sentence for her mentor. Judging from how Kiyomi described being trained and participating in missions with this woman in the roster, she would have been in for a whole lot of that, if the course stayed the same.

"Yeah, I'll give you more recommendations than I can count to, it may not be that many but… Kiyomi and I go way back, we're more than just student and mentor, we're basically family. I've not had bonds like that since… Little Bro and Misu".

"It's okay, really. I plan on quitting anyway, focus on my magic shows." Mana mumbled out captured by shyness and embarrassment teamed up in one nasty group of feelings.

Mana looked up to Hanasaku. Lady Fifth was definitely a respected mentor of Mana's, an example of what a remarkable kunoichi was, even with all of her simple human flaws. Being told by such a person that they distrusted Mana and, given all that happened and how long ago it did happen, that they may never trust her again was discouraging and crippling.

"Oh, that's too bad. I think you could have become a truly amazing ninja if you kept going." Hanasaku replied with surprising honesty and straightness. The anger and resentment that the woman first looked at Mana with, when the magician woke up in the hospital after fighting the Imarizu was gone without a trace. Just a hole and the shattered shards of trust remained.

"For all it's worth, I do respect you, Hokage-sensei, I think you'll be the best for Meiko and Kiyomi and the future generations. I could not have asked for a better mentor during that tough time of having lost Tanshu-sensei. I'm glad to have had the chance to meet you", Mana tried to speak with the same carelessness for the consequences and implications that it may summon and honesty that was present in Hanasaku's voice whenever she spoke.

"Are you implying that Kiyomi won't get promoted?" Hanasaku winked at Mana with a teasing question.

"Not at all," Mana shook her head with gentleness, she was clearly misunderstood in what she intended to say. "I just know that it does not matter if she does end up getting promoted, or not, you two will always remain sisters for life."

"Oh, you seem to have gotten the hang of our bond", Hanasaku looked away to greet the approaching Yamanaka teammate with a warm smile.

How could Mana not get the hang of it? After all, she once wanted to share that very same bond with her teammates. When she felt alone, when she felt far from home. She wanted to look at Lady Fifth as she looked at her mother, she wanted to look at Kiyomi like she would have looked at an older sister, if she had one, an epitome of beauty, strength, and wisdom. She wanted to look at Meiko as both her best friend and her sibling too…

It did not appear too much to want back then but… Maybe it was. Maybe those bonds were occupied and in order to obtain them, Mana would have had to sever old ones and step in between their ruins. That was simply not the kind of person Mana was, or ever aspired to be. She would rather spend her life a wanderer, sad and alone, as long as she could see other people all bonded and happy, while she wandered on, from one family to another, doomed to never find a place of her own.

"Hey, Kiyomi! Got a good feeling for us…" Mana grinned with a teary smile as she raised her fist for a bump.

"Awww, you little softy, of course you do, after the match you had…" Kiyomi hugged Mana, leaving her extended fist hanging before it withered away into a soft and weightless mess of fingers and hand-flesh.

* * *

Kiyomi, Mana and Hanasaku were the last three to arrive at the Hokage's office. By that time, all of the other Konoha genin and their mentors were already grouped up in his office and waiting for Team Hokage so that the hearing of the Ninja Council's decision could officially begin.

This was the first time Mana had seen all of the participating Konohagakure genin lined up like this. Naturally, none of the genin who did not qualify for the finals were present, even if the number of jounin was greater than the total number of teams, meaning that even if their team did not qualify, the mentoring jounin were still required to participate.

Dorimi and Shibari, the duo that saved Mana, Shimo and Sugemi were present but standing the whole office apart. Another young woman with dark flowing hair, red knee-long bodysuit, and the Konoha flak jacket was present, as was an athletic looking jounin with broad shoulders and rich hairline both on his face and on his scalp. The only Konoha finalist Mana could not see in the office was Nanaba Aomyaku – given her hearty performance in the Exams, it was surprising to not see here to at least hear her case out. Her letting so much of Seven Tails' influence slip out must have really ticked the Administration off the wrong way…

"Well, I suppose we can begin now", Lord Sixth noted, seeing Hanasaku enter the office and carelessly nod her chin at his direction. Technically the Team Hokage trio weren't really late so there should not have been any irritation caused. The tension Mana felt in the air must have just been the worry planted deep in the hearts of every genin present there.

"Alright, I'm not gonna hold you here for long. Going to go straight to the point as most of you already know why you're here. There are much more important things I have to tend to today", Lord Sixth stretched his tired neck out before sifting through handfuls of papers and files on his tables. "Once you hear the decision of the Ninja Council – it is final. The roster of the Council was a secret to all except the Council members and assembling them again for a complaining procedure would be incredibly hard, which is why, starting from the Second Hokage, complaint procedures were shafted when Chuunin Exams and the Ninja Council are concerned."

"For someone who is trying to get straight into the heart of things you're wasting a lot of time", Hanasaku sneered at her superior with a bored pair of eyes.

"Not all of us wish the cacophony of whining children on our schedules, not all of us have the tolerance, or the number of tables to express our frustrations on, Lady Fifth. Some of us would rather word things in too much detail to avoid having that fiasco of yours on their hands." Lord Sixth responded. There was no bitterness or frustration in his voice. The man was absolutely cold and calculated.

"Now, Aozora Yushijin, please step forward", the Sixth instructed, Kouta's teammate did as requested, bowing his head and body halfway as he approached the Hokage.

"The Council was impressed with your show. Perhaps it could have been the fact that there was a noted genjutsu specialist amongst them but they were able to clearly see your talent in the field. For that reason, your value as an infiltrator and a saboteur would be of great use to the village higher-ups. You are promoted to the rank of chuunin."

The assistant of Lord Sixth pulled out a green flak jacket from a stack in a box and a tanto blade, handing them over to the humble genin who bowed again as he took the accessories of his promotion over from the assistant with courteous politeness

That was a great shock to Mana. Not because she did not consider Yushijin worth being promoted, he definitely displayed an impressive amount of knowledge and raw talent in the genjutsu field, possibly surpassing Mana in that regard. He also performed a fine fake-out at just the right time to pull off his victory. Still, the magician realized, with some unease nagging at her chest, that she underestimated the perceptive abilities of the Ninja Council and just how much they could see.

"Nara Sugemi, please come forward", Lord Sixth requested with Sugemi following the request except without the overly formal bowing that Yushijin did in front of the Sixth. Sugemi's eyes were different, they were just as cold and apathetic as those of Lord Sixth when he looked the young Nara right in the eyes.

"The Council noted your amazing hand-to-hand skills but they were expecting something entirely different from a Nara clan member. You appear to lack the strategic insight common amongst your peers and appear to still focus your approach on brute force, only resorting to strategy when brute force does not cut it for you. Because of that choice in fighting style, the Council advised not to promote you to the rank of chuunin. I have also noticed that you have not completed an actual mission in quite a while, choosing to stay in the Eden containment facility instead. You are free to choose between continuing your containment with an indefinite suspension of your license until the day you choose to return to active duty, or return to active duty as of today and end your stay at Eden."

"In that case, I would stay in Eden, if it is all the same to Lord Sixth…" Sugemi replied without his face as much as twitching. It was not like Mana did not see the shadow of disappointment cover up the face of her friend but it was not a literal shadow, more of a bad aura surrounding him while his face remained cold and distant. Some would say, a face of a true shinobi.

"Very well, I will suspend your license, please be advised that it will be terminated within three years of you choosing not to fix that situation and you will require to take the Academy graduation exam again if you will wish to return to active duty in that case." Lord Sixth glared at Sugemi, trying to instill some fear or at least respect for the ninja profession in the young man's heart but the rock that was Sugemi at that point stood adamant.

"Sugemi…" Mana whimpered to herself, almost breaking the strict line-up by stepping forward towards her friend. With nothing but a soothing look right at her eyes, Sugemi left the office after being addressed.

She could not believe that her friend would throw his ninja license away like that. As if his ninja status, his rank as an advanced genin with countless missions in his record and powerful techniques in his arsenal meant absolutely nothing to him. What would he do, where would he go? Why did he wish to return to Eden this much? Why would he choose that place over Konoha, over her? Was he that close with Nanaba and Daidao? Did all those days together in Team Oak mean nothing to him since he was ready to just throw it all away and leave it all behind?

"I know it's tough but please don't do something rash", Kiyomi's whisper reached the magician's ears breaking her out of a desperate and sad train of thought.

There may have just been plenty of surprises in the hearing of the Ninja Council's decision, as Mana have come to learn from the first two decisions.


	377. Countdown to a Better Future

"Tanko Shigin, please come forward", Lord Sixth proceeded with the hearing procedure. The genin of a goofy face, brown spiky hair and a dopey smile that he barely ever dropped stepped forward. He moved with energy and great confidence in his abilities, his invincibility must have had such an effect on how the young man approached life. Then again, Mana could barely imagine living like that. When nothing threatened her at all, life seemed pointless and dull.

"You've shown absolutely nothing of interest to the council. Your curious ability is intriguing but as a ninja your mindset is entirely missing the mark of what the Council was looking for when promoting people. Almost unilaterally, the Council chose to keep you in the rank of genin", Lord Sixth read this rather derogatory report with the kind of indifference that made these sharp words register in a dull and toothless manner. Even if this man publically made fun of someone, as long as he delivered his tirade in that tone – the person would be none the wiser.

"I understand and agree completely!" Shigin laughed out, making Mana raise an eyebrow in an uncomfortable expression. This youth really did act and appear like an idiot. Maybe it was for the best that he had come to acquire this ability of his, that will make him losing his head somewhere impossible.

It appeared that the Sixth entirely seconded Mana's thoughts, even if he was not quite aware of them as he also gave the young man a curious and surprised glare. He had expected the youth to erupt into a forceful, bordering violent, attempt to convince him otherwise but nothing of the sort had happened and the Sixth looked to be checking if he had heard and seen things right.

"Very well, Erumo Budoki, please step forward." Lord Sixth proceeded as the young lady took a worried step forward. Mana could sense the sweat coming off of Erumo's body, she could almost hear the intense heartbeat. There was a wedge between the two. Mana was not overly fond of the girl's constant attempts to bite her and Erumo had shown to be outright hateful towards Mana but, at that moment, the magician sort of felt bad for the genin in the same manner she felt bad for a classmate in the Academy when they were called up to answer a tough question in front of the class.

"The skills you have demonstrated were impressive. The Council noted that as a support-type ninja you have done remarkably well against one of the more powerful ninja in the finalist roster. Those skills deserved praise but they were troubled to see you effectively surrender to your opponent when you felt you have shown enough. A true ninja must be ready to give up their life on the line, not just impress some objective criteria of their own design before giving up, there was a reason why surrender, as a rule, was ruled out. Even if it came through great pain and consideration, the Council chose to keep you in the rank of genin due to your approach in battle." Lord Sixth finished reading the file before closing it and placing it in another pile.

Erumo's dedication and inner fortitude were admirable as the young woman, clearly weeping, bowed to the Sixth before taking a step back. Waiting a short while before she stepped behind the line of genin to wipe her tears, choosing to hide them under her thick, hue of almond hair. The magician sighed in unease, wondering if she should maybe try and mend things with Erumo, it was painfully clear that the girl needed some company.

"Nakotsumi Mana, please step up", Lord Sixth exclaimed, for a moment Mana jumped up in fear, the tone of the Sixth implied he was repeating the request so she just shuffled forward with a careless leap before bowing her body to an extremely submissive degree.

"The Ninja Council was confused by your public status as an entertainer and first saw it as a conflict of profession. That being said, one particular member raised an interesting case that it could perhaps be utilized in infiltrating other countries effectively. While this idea seeded unease amongst the Council, their prime purpose is seeing ninja as potential chuunin and not focus on judging them as threats to their own national security", Lord Sixth began.

Mana's feet shifted in unease. Standing in front of her peers while she was being judged was an agitating experience, to say the least. She also could freely imagine the discomfort of the Ninja Council considering her a possible security threat. Seeing how the identities of the Ninja Council were a secret, for the most part, there must have been non-disclosure of information clauses somewhere playing a part. Why else would these men and women feel so uneasy about Mana's infiltration potential as a star entertainer? They could just warn their superiors ahead of time about her eliminating the threat…

"In any case, the match you and your opponent put up was stupendous in terms of skill, strategy and devotion to both your respective nindo. I can only speak for you, not your opponent, but the Council was particularly impressed with your ability to use summons and easily considered there being no point in keeping you at your lowly rank any longer – you are promoted to the rank of chuunin." Lord Sixth looked at Mana.

For a moment the two ninja shared an awkwardly long glare, the lips of Lord Sixth shifted around, making his thick moustache brush around in a rather entertaining manner as he wondered if he should say something to escalate this along. For as long as it lasted, the man chose to just let Mana experience the joy of being promoted.

Mana bowed, repeating the angle and the intensity of her previous bow before approaching the Sixth's assistant and taking the chuunin flak jacket and the ceremonial tanto off of his hands. She bowed her head to the administration servant as she did so before moving back to the lines of the genin without turning her back to the Sixth of his table and chair. Mana was adamant on behaving herself as courteous as possible.

After the uneasy start between Mana and Lord Sixth, she saw the congratulating glare that the man gave her as a sign that he admitted possibly have misjudged her, or, at the very least, a shift in the possible usefulness of the girl in his eyes. As a past Black Ops, the man clearly valued possible assets for infiltration missions such as intelligence gathering tasks and assassinations. Granted, given Mana's psychological profile and nindo in the file, as someone who wanted his assassination actually done, no leader in their right mind would have assigned her with such a mission.

"Yamanaka Kiyomi, please come forward", Lord Sixth looked at the gold-headed Yamanaka heiress who took a confident step forward. The eyes of Kiyomi were probably the least wavering and the most mature alongside all of the genin, granted, she was one of the most experienced alongside them.

"The Council found your match with Tanko Shigin rather underwhelming. Perhaps it was a case of mismatched opponents… Given your clan heritage, the Council had expected you to make short work of your opponent but you failed your attempt at beating your opponent mentally multiple times. While the Council did see some impressive and innovative techniques and experience out there, the performance you gave did not fit what they wanted to see from an esteemed Yamanaka when facing a favorable opponent." Lord Sixth intended to just keep reading before something he did not want nor expect happened.

"Excuse me?" Kiyomi objected. "The only reason I failed to take over his mind was because his mind was like none other I've scoped before. It was like controlling millions of feeble minds at once."

"That's right", Shigin chuckled like a hillbilly, "Sometimes when I concentrate really hard, the voices in my head just all start buzzin'!"

With a cold glare of a man who had ended more lives in his day than one could fit a file cabinet of a reasonable size, Lord Sixth silenced both of the two with just a glare. Mana could feel the Killing Intent seeping off of him like crazy, nothing like Tanshu-sensei used to have but the fact that he possessed it to a sensible extent in the first place terrified her. She had to use every long dug up trick in the book on controlling her emotions to not get completely paralyzed in fear and the man was not even looking at Mana to begin with.

"For the listed reasons, whether the Council had all of the information on the matter, or not, the Ninja Council chose not to promote Yamanaka Kiyomi to the rank of chuunin." Lord Sixth breathed out easier once the reading and the hearing was complete. With a comforting glance, Mana looked at Kiyomi's shaking fists and her barely controlled from crying face.

"Promote her, right now" Mana was almost blown off her feet from a tremendous pressure of chakra erupting from right beside her. The magician just barely managed to tuck away her chakra sensory before her heart exploded to a bloody pulp from the world's most intense and early stroke. Chestnut Hanasaku was about to go postal right by Mana's side and the woman looked blood-serious.

"I can't do that, Hanasaku", Lord Sixth sighed, for someone who was the focus of ire of the most powerful woman in the world whose strength defied all logic or common sense, he was behaving remarkably calm. "That is why I knew that starting bit was integral – I figured something like this would happen".

"Hanasaku-san, you're behaving a little bit unreasonable here…" Dorimi tried to disarm the heated situation with a friendly smile but he just froze in mid-step closer when Hanasaku looked at him.

"Kiyomi was one of the most powerful genin in those Chuunin Exams, certainly the most experienced. She barely has failed a single mission while completing missions a genin should not be even taking a part in." Hanasaku was heating up again as her blazing eyes switched back on Lord Sixth.

"Surely you don't intend to count missions you yourself overs…" the Hokage's assistant tried to speak up before his own windpipe was also paralyzed by a single glare of a woman who usually never behaved in this manner.

"The members of the Ninja Council that rule over promotions are to remain secret at all times. You can just promote Kiyomi and no one will dare reveal anything or question her rank." Hanasaku glared back at Lord Sixth.

"You know I cannot do that. This isn't the Establishment Period, we don't just make-up ninja ranks here. The only cases where we promote ninja to the rank of chuunin are once they are promoted in the Chuunin Exams or, in very select few cases, after a notable display of extraordinary skill and judgment. Even in the latter case, the procedure is much more complicated than slapping a mark on the file." Sixth answered all of Hanasaku's heated assaults with calm and collected, if a little irritated, manner. "I do acknowledge the injustice of the Council not possibly having all the information, granted, making that information known to the Council was part of the test, as many genin have shown."

"Promote her or I'll leave", Hanasaku took a firm step forward, the assistant or the jounin would have stepped in but they were too frozen to make a move. Anyone who has seen Chestnut Hanasaku play around on the battlefield would have been wise to stay out of her way when she was pissed, there was a certain level that no numbers could have beaten, a level that required an equal threat to defeat it and there were few, if any, equals to Chestnut Hanasaku in the world.

"Hey, Hanasaku-sensei… What are you saying? Stop…" Kiyomi began course correction, stepping up to Hanasaku and grabbing her elbow, trying to pull the woman back but no matter how hard Kiyomi yanked her, the woman did not budge one millimeter.

"Are you threatening me, the appointed by the Fire Lord and our Council leader of our village, with what you think with your weak mind treason is? You are a Sannin, you can leave whenever you want, Zairyo is barely ever even here, to begin with." Lord Sixth dismissed the woman's threats without a spice of care.

"Can you afford me leaving? Can anyone you control even stop me if you ever wanted me stopped? What will happen to you and your Fire Feudal Lord when the other villages find out that Konoha has no more Sannin watching over it? Unless you count Zairyo as a Sannin, he's the Sannin of the entire world and you know it…" Hanasaku kept on digging the hole of rebellion deeper. By the point she was finished, the woman was staring at the man's face so close they were inches from touching their noses.

"You speak of very interesting times, Hanasaku. Times of shadow games and conflict but you forget whom you are speaking to. I grew up and refined my skills serving the village in those same times. I was killing people behind the enemy lines and preventing wars before even Howoku's time. I would enjoy nothing more than for those shadow games to return once again", the Sixth replied with probably the most honesty he had used in his voice since forever. This time, for sure, he was speaking from his heart. "You were Hokage because there was no one to take the seat, you were disgracing this chair every moment your bottom was warming it up for me. As a Sannin, you've paid your dues already so feel free to walk out the gate, I will even come wave you good riddance. Your student stays a genin for at least one more year."

The atmosphere in the office was so heated that Mana could almost hear it screaming in her ears in a phantom moan for the tension to stop.

Hanasaku just shrugged, in an instant, the pent-up anger and pressure emanating from her disappeared, just as fast as it has come to be. "Oh well, I tried, I guess you'll have to try next year, Kiyomi." The woman relented, looking at her protégé with sorry and soft eyes. It was like the banshee of physical obliteration that just inhibited her body was gone in a blink of an eye.

Kiyomi just nodded with a heavy gulp. The rest of the jounin breathed out easier while the genin only began to comprehend what had just happened. It was not tough to see that Hanasaku and Lord Sixth did not like each other, their backgrounds, or the way they behaved as Kage. Still, neither one of them outright hated the other and crossed the line of firing verbal arrows and angry glares from the other side. It appeared to have worked best this way until now.

The Sixth's assistant cleared out his dry throat and fixed his tilted headband that was beginning to slip off his head. "I-If no one else has any objections, you are free to leave. Business as usual from now on…" he announced as Sixth settled back in his chair by finally pressing his back against it.

"A-Actually there's something else I wanted to discuss. It doesn't have anything to do with the Chuunin Exams so… Maybe I can…" Mana politely requested some time with Lord Sixth. The assistant nodded and encouraged that the rest left the office at their own pace with a lazy gesture.

"Speak, Mana", Lord Sixth exclaimed with a tired tone. For a moment, the magician was stunned that the man referred to her with her proper name and did not use either her stage name or the name she was called in the Council – "The Golden Child" which she acquired through sheer luck of being tremendously useful to the village in a couple of affairs. Whereas the Council referred to her thusly due to her remarkable usefulness in the aforementioned affairs, Lord Sixth referred to her that way in a rather demeaning manner.

"I'd actually like to discuss my retirement." Mana wondered in a timid manner. She was relatively familiar with the laws that governed her own village but the complicated red tape procedures still were not entirely clear to her. It would have been much easier to be scoffed at by a man who barely liked her, to begin with than it would have been to research this matter properly with countless laws and revisions to be researched.

"If you abandon your duty before the rank of chuunin, it's considered a unilateral termination of your service to the village. It can be done in a manner that does not leave you in criminal responsibility but you would wave farewell to any social welfare you'd receive when actually retiring." Lord Sixth answered with a raspy voice, while he began working on some paperwork residing on his table.

Mana blinked a pair of time, she hesitated to point out that the Sixth Hokage appeared to identify the case of her relationship with the village wrong but then his assistant intervened.

"The reason why Lord Sixth referred to your case as being "abandoning your duty before the rank of chuunin", is because you have not yet served the mandatory six months as a Konohagakure chuunin. Therefore, you are a chuunin by the letter of the law but not in this particular case, and this particular case alone, treated as such." The man explained.

"Six months, huh?" Mana wondered, rubbing her elbow shyly. Had she known she would have considered if she even desired the social welfare and a proper sendoff or if she was fine being released in a more disgraceful, unceremonial manner.

"Look, Mana, your father is retired with an injury and receiving a rather shy pension for it due to his average rank. Your mother may be a bit more successful with her business venture and, honestly, I've no idea how well your entertainment business pays. My point is – just sit tight for your mandatory six months. As a chuunin you'll no longer be obliged to wash dishes in the name of the village. You may not even see action during those six months at all if nothing deserving your rank comes up. My advice is – do it right and do it by the book, retire honorably with the appropriate welfare. You never know what might happen in the future." The Sixth Hokage advised the magician with a much softer tone.

The big chair was literally changing people from their core outward. Chestnut Hanasaku became a much smarter and more sensible woman after what little time she served as the Fifth Hokage. Sixth also appeared to act and talk like a village leader who could see when which face was more appropriate to wear when he has spent the entirety of his life living in the shadows and snuffing out the wrong people before they even knew whom they have wronged.

Mana bowed in a static angle, as politely as she could, before leaving the Sixth's office with a better sense of purpose in her chest. Before her future seemed kind of murky but now she had a date for her service, she had a limit to look up to and there was a way of leaving that life of violence behind honorably, without shaming her veteran father or well-respected mother. That was indeed the ideal way.


	378. The Last Ride Together

**Author's Note: I noticed that I called the blade handed out to chuunin as "chokuto" before. That is actually wrong and it is technically a "tanto" given its specifications. I'm sorry about that and I fixed all of the mentions of the reward I could find in the previous chapters. If you find some that irritate you, please let me know and I will fix it. Once again, sorry for that :D**

* * *

Holding the chuunin flak jacket and the small tanto blade pressed to her chest, Mana carefully descended the Administration stairs and left the building. A wave of curious stares offering brief congratulations rose up from a seldom administration clerk ninja before they returned to their busywork.

"There she is!" Meiko's loud exclamation reached the magician's ears right after she left the building, making her focus on the gathering of what used to be the Team Hokage. Mana's second official genin squad and quite a fateful one as it lead to her acquiring her promotion. Her victory was just as much the victory of Kiyomi and Meiko as well, even if the two were not rewarded in a manner Mana was.

From this point on, it would be just Mana managing a quickly put together squad of genin or observing their work with her watchful eye. She was not quite skilled enough to get her own squad of genin, that would have had to wait until she officially became jounin. If Lord Sixth did not keep anything hidden, she'd never even get to see a day of the dangerous chuunin work before she can retire and focus on her magic shows.

"What were you talking to Lord Douche about?" Kiyomi pouted her lips. If not from the content of her words, judging from her face, she clearly disliked the village leader who oversaw the administrative duties for the Fire Lord just so his royal highness need not interrupt his highly important game of shogi and lavish aristocratic life.

"Nothing much, just wanted some things cleared up. Why are you guys still here?" Mana wondered out loud, letting her eyes track the entire roster of Team Hokage, Chestnut Hanasaku included stand around the Konohagakure Administration building as if waiting for something.

"We've been waiting for you, dummy, seeing how you've moved up the ladder, we won't let you leave us without a proper sendoff!" Meiko raised her fist up with great energy and vigor in her eyes.

Mana's eyes lingered on Hanasaku who just looked at her with soft and motherly eyes, the woman wondered if right now she should even have involved herself in these team matters, given how difficult taking the lack of Kiyomi's promotion was for the woman. The magician wondered if perhaps her team leader would have wanted to spend a day with her protégé alone, instead of spending it with someone she voiced having troubles of trust with.

"That's right, maybe whatever made you impress the big cheese in the VIP areas will rub off onto these two if we have a relaxing day while those guys in the Administration struggle with the aftermath of the Chuunin Exams", Hanasaku smiled while maintaining an eye contact with Mana. Something the magician knew would have been impossible if the woman still felt any resentment towards Mana at all. Chestnut Hanasaku was simply too simple-minded to act one way and think another.

"I see, alright then, I would just like to return home and place all this stuff back, if it's okay with you guys, I mean, if not, you can just go ahea…" Mana tried giving her friends an option to ditch her but Kiyomi pulled the magician in by her elbow. That was rather odd of her to do, usually the manhandling and the more aggressive side of friendship was more of Meiko's forte.

"Who do you think you're kidding? Sure, go put all of your baggage back home and let's go out for a girl's day out! We haven't had that in… I think… Ever", Kiyomi curiously rubbed her cheek and her chin with her long and elegant fingers.

Mana's lips couldn't help but turn a bit to the upward side as she nodded, feeling rather pleased with the prospect of spending a nice day cooling down with her friends before resuming her training for six more months, just in case she'd need to put those skills to use at one point or another.

Due to Meiko's request, Mana gave her flak jacket and tanto for Meiko's inspection. The blacksmith examined the jacket first, spreading it out and poking around it, inside and out. She went full one eye closed and tongue sticking out inspection mode, which was always amusing to witness.

"I guess this jacket could offer better protection than what you usually wear. It looks like it has tiny bits of chakra weaved inside every thread, which could cushion a nasty blow or stop some projectiles without chakra imbuement." The redhead shrugged before handing the magician the jacket back, only for Mana to carefully fold it into the roll she received it in.

"I'm not sure if there's any point in wearing it, I've grown somewhat accustomed to my magician's uniform, really." Mana sighed, "My style was always not getting hit in the first place".

"Could've fooled me", Kiyomi teased the magician by poking her in the kidney area with her thumb making Mana jump up in alarm. She completely let her guard down around her team, honestly, what use could there have been to try and keep it up with Chestnut Hanasaku strolling beside them.

"This blade's not half bad. It looks to me like it could do some damage to an inexperienced opponent, elementary chakra resistance would shatter it, most likely, though. With a little tampering, I could make this baby into something to be proud of!" Meiko whistled out before juggling the short sword around making Mana freak out after the blacksmith tossed the unsheathed blade her way and catch it in its sheath through a mixture of luck and skill.

"It's not really meant for combat. Only support-type ninja actually use it offensively, to most it is more a ceremonial tool. Seppuku and some executions are performed with these, you know. By giving this, the Hokage gives you the honor of leaving this world without dishonoring your family name, this ceremonial blade informs you that an honorable suicide ritual is an option for you know – you have some honor to lose." Mana politely explained the meaning of the ceremonial aspect of the blade that the chuunin was given. While Meiko was a beast of a swordsman and an amazing prodigy of crafting tools, she appeared to think that the village was just handing out shoddy tools just for the sake of it like welfare.

"So… What's next for you guys? I don't mean today, I mean in terms of your service…" the ninja magician raised an uneasy topic straight out of the gate.

"Eh, Chuunin Exams were supposed to be a piece of cake, right? This year was just really difficult, compared to the other years, that means all we'll have to do is get a third stand-in member and drag his or her sorry butt into stardom", Meiko rocketed her fist up the sky, even lifting her feet off the ground in her joyous proclamation of this plan.

"Pretty much", Kiyomi nodded, looking a bit sour due to what had just happened in the office but it did not look like she was discouraged or depressed or anything, just a tad bitter. "Not sure where the next one's gonna be but we're sure as hell not waiting until the party comes back to Konoha, we're chasing after it and grabbing the bull right by the horns".

Meiko and Kiyomi bumped their fists with Meiko running full hype-mode and Kiyomi looking somewhat reserved but both girls adamant about their future. Ironically, their failure in the exams may have only made them more determined to press on forward, whereas Mana's success made her more resolute about quitting.

"You guys going to come in?" Mana invited her team to visit but the three shook her heads. Mana and Meiko shook theirs in sync, starting and ending almost at the same time, whereas Chestnut Hanasaku looked like her eyes were wandering and floating somewhere in the horizon of endless woodland and took a while to catch on to the fact she was included.

"Little Bro Tanshu was a bit familiar with your father, me - not so much. It would feel a bit awkward…" the woman quickly sowed together a reply due to sheer necessity. "We'll just wait outside."

* * *

Mana was not surprised one bit to see her father home, his daily replenishing of his miraculous over the counter pain herbs was completed and while the daughter was not entirely approving of the manner in which her dad was dealing with his pain, she did acknowledge how he was more chipper during the day and slept much easier when his hands did not relive getting fried to a crisp every passing evening and night.

"Well, what do you know!" Father exclaimed in joy as he spread his arms out wide. Mana blinked a pair of times before throwing the tanto and the flak jacket aside and running in her father's arms. A bit too late she realized that it was careless of her as the man may have been in pain and unable to answer her hug but the rather strong pressure at her back informed her otherwise.

"I made it, dad!" Mana shrieked out after placing her face and teary eyes against her father's shoulder so that the sound of her excited screams could be muffled somewhat. After she parted herself from her father, the magician's eyes calmed somewhat.

"I'll still have to spend six months on active duty before I can retire, with welfare and all. I was not sure if we needed it but… Mother works hard to support us and sometimes missions take me really long to complete so the payment, while great, is not quite stable. The magic shows can also always go wrong, you know." Mana kept on talking before father broke into laughter.

"You don't have to justify welfare, kid. Retire properly, by all means. You'll get the bare minimum of recognition for your service but it is better than nothing. At least you will be remembered for something by someone. You'll have left a record that will not need to be shamefully skimmed through, something your successors will add on to." Father calmly replied with happiness gleaming from his gestures and face.

"And before we can talk about my "successors", I'm off!" Mana jumped up with her cheeks bleeding red before bursting out the door.

She did not even get to hear what father told her on her way out. Could have been something important but it most likely was just something fathers said before a fun night out with one's sisters in arms. This iteration of Team Hokage may not have rustled any feathers, it did not appear that any of its members will be quite Sannin material, leave alone Kage. Mana will retire eventually, Meiko will achieve great things but, given her skill set and mindset, likely not epic. Kiyomi's fate was leading her clan as a clan head, very few clan heads became Kage due to a possible conflict of interests and their devotion to clan affairs made devotion to missions and service complicated.

Still, these three were Mana's team. The treasured part of her life she would always remember!

* * *

"So, what are our plans?" Mana enlivened the colorless waiting party by letting her friends know she was done with the brief visit home.

Hanasaku looked at the watch on her wrist and up into the sky. "Well, right now we've got about nine hours until everything except nightly establishments closes down", she uttered.

Kiyomi smiled as she rubbed the heel of her sandal into the dirt before raising her hand. "We should split the day amongst every one of us. That would help us remember each other by who we are by sharing a part of our soul with everyone else. Let's each select one thing we want to do and then we must all do that thing for two hours."

Hanasaku snapped her fingers, "Right, that just about covers you three".

"Actually, it covers all four of us", Mana curiously glared at the distant eyes of her mentor who laughed out in an apologetic and embarrassed manner before fixing herself.

"Right, right, anyway, I don't really feel like making you three do anything. You guys just split the day into three hours for each of you then", the woman insisted.

"Yeah, Mana was the one who got promoted so she should pick first!" Meiko heartily declared.

Mana pondered what she wanted to do with all of her friends together but, actually, she could not for the life of her put her finger on it. There were things she wanted to do, sure, but they all seemed either too specific and niche to her exactly or they were too bland. The last thing that Mana wanted was to bore her team on her last day in it.

"If you guys don't mind, I'd like to skip my turn. I would appreciate being last, maybe?" the girl squirmed in discomfort. Kiyomi and Meiko looked at Mana with some objection in their eyes but then Kiyomi's eyes changed into a more understanding glare of an older sibling.

"Very well, I shall then accept the responsibility of telling all of you what to do!" She declared after sighing in disappointment. Judging by the devilish horns that Mana could almost make out on Kiyomi's head and her outright impish face when she uttered those words, Kiyomi's activity would have a hidden agenda or be something pretty nasty. Not that Mana would have objected to pretty much anything that the blonde could have suggested.

"We will go shopping for clothes!" Kiyomi declared. "But just like that time when Hanasaku-sensei trained all of us, we won't just be buying clothes for ourselves, we'll be buying clothes for each other."

"Okay…" Mana shrugged. So far, this seemed rather tame, given Kiyomi's devilish mimic when she thought up of the idea.

"I dunno…" Meiko squinted, moving her face right up Kiyomi's as if a wild animal trying to sniff fear seeping out of their prey. "Seems kind of shifty to me".

"Too bad, you don't have a say in the matter!" Kiyomi pressed two of her fingers right up to Meiko's lips. "Meiko will buy clothes for Mana, Mana will buy clothes for me, I will buy clothes for Meiko, what could go wrong!?"

"Just because I don't know what you are up to yet, doesn't mean it's a good idea." Meiko kept on forcing air out of her nostrils like a raging bull, desperately trying to figure out the prank that Kiyomi would attempt with this.

"Oh, come on, it's either this or gardening in the garden in my estate. I trust none of you would like that, as tempting as it is to employ all of you to slave for me for three whole hours!" Kiyomi ground her teeth in a triumphant smile before glaring at Hanasaku. "Sensei can be the ref for what goes and what doesn't".

"Well, last time I got swindled into gardening for Kiyomi I got in trouble with the Yamanaka clan for messing up their treasured garden and almost sinking her estate in a sinkhole. I second the shopping." Hanasaku nodded with a clearly faked expression of a wise adult. She was most likely just as clueless as Meiko in terms of what exactly Kiyomi's game was.

"Alright! Shopping it is!" Kiyomi jumped up with a missile containing a fistful of joy fired off into the sky.

* * *

"I can't believe this…" Meiko walked like a gingerbread man or a depressed penguin, shifting her feet around with her shoulders raised up wearing an actual multi-colored circus tuxedo with stars and stripes, a giant cylinder hat and an oversized rainbow bowtie. "You've bamboozled us all!"

"I don't see why you're complaining, Mana did agree to switch clothes with you afterward." Kiyomi pressed her lips together before letting them tremble like those of a child ready to cry over a stolen candy did. The young Yamanaka lady had a giant bump on the side of her head, something that would have come up after something hit it with all the might of a crashing rogue planet. "I had a dream… A dream to see Meiko in a frilly dress and you two smashed it into pieces…"

"You technically did see her in a dress." Mana crossed her hands over her chest, wearing the sunflower-yellow dress with a matching sweater that Kiyomi had chosen for Meiko. "We only switched after the shopping was done out of the respect for Hokage-sensei's decision. You're honestly the last person that should complain after suggesting a bathing suit for Meiko to begin with."

"Plus, you definitely saw more than you should have seen after the second dozen of peeks into my cabin clocked in", Meiko raised her shaking and covered in pulsing veins fist.

"That is true, it sounded a little bit too cruel to let Meiko walk around in that in the middle of winter, even if the snowing has stopped somewhat." Hanasaku shrugged with her hands in her pockets.

"I'm just more confused as to why Meiko bought me a circus tuxedo…" Mana's face soured once the more immediate quarrel went out the window.

"I dunno, you kinda always dress like a fancy little man, magicians should be bright and colorful and flashy, kind of like the circus. Also, you should tell more jokes when onstage.", Meiko shrugged. "Plus, they did not really have any armor which would have been my first choice."

"That's because it's a clothing store, Meiko. It's not a blacksmith workshop", Kiyomi showed her interest her tongue while making a nasty grimace at her direction. She had all the reason to tease her friends and feel lucky, after all, Mana had selected a rather nice outfit for her in the same vein to what she usually wore. "You just wait, I'll get you in a dress for good when Team Hokage gets Mana's replacement and we do this bonding day again!"

Mana looked down at the dirty streets covered with patches of snow. The weak rays of the winter Sun broke through partially from time to time providing some warmth and illumination and making the village, still recovering from the festivities of the Chuunin Exams, look all the brighter and hopeful while spearheaded straight into the unknown of the future.

"My replacement…" she thought. The magician recalled feeling so uneasy after finding out she was a replacement member in the Team Hokage, replacing two friends that Kiyomi had already made in her previous years of service. She felt so uneasy and unwanted, uncertain if she could fulfill the expectations of her friends and fill that role. She kind of felt bad for the poor genin that would wriggle their feeble shoulders into this team, just like she had done before.

Will that replacement member feel like an unwanted intruder? Mana certainly hoped that he or she would not. It was not one of the better ways to feel. Or maybe they will be unsure of their place due to the extent of their abilities and mastery over the ninja arts like Meiko used to be? Such thoughts were probably quite hopeless, given that Mana didn't even know who her replacement would be.

It could have even been one of the genin from the newly restructured old Konoha teams, it was doubtful that a newbie from the Academy could ever hope to keep up with Meiko and Kiyomi, even if their current attires did not quite match their skill.


	379. Expensive New Experiences

"So, Mana, you feel like calling it now?" Kiyomi looked at the magician, leaning over to her side.

The question pulled her out from deep inside her thoughts. That in itself took a moment for Mana to recover from. After having realized that she left her friend hanging on a thread awkwardly, Mana smiled and shrugged, her face irradiated apologetic innocence as she did.

"Sorry, maybe Hokage-sensei actually wants to take my place?" Mana glared at the team leader again, she was well aware that Hanasaku had opted to not involve herself in the game of her students, instead choosing to preside over it, but she had secretly hoped that seeing Meiko and Kiyomi in their usual antics would cheer the woman up and help her get in the mood.

"Nah, the only thing I'm up for is a visit to the Shushu-ya. You guys may be emancipated but I'm not dragging a bunch of teens into a pub to get wasted", Hanasaku chuckled, pressing her fists against her sides and spreading her arms out in an almost heroic pose. Only Chestnut Hanasaku could speak about wanting to get a drink in a heroic pose.

"You wouldn't happen to have a date with someone, sensei, would you?" Kiyomi poked Hanasaku's back with an elbow. The Yamanaka did have a point, due to its mostly adult-focused clientele, Shushu-ya was a popular dating spot, particularly for couples who were well past the first date stage.

"What are you talking about!?" Hanasaku chuckled throwing a lazy smack, aimed across Kiyomi's back. Wisely enough, the Yamanaka dodged it just in time. After spending so much time with the woman, Kiyomi was a fair judge of how unpredictable the strength of the Sannin was.

"It's Meiko's turn, in that case. I guess it's Yakiniku-Q for us", Mana sighed while looked at Meiko who was just grinning with a dumb face while watching Kiyomi and Hanasaku talk about the team mentor's secrets.

"How do you know that?" Meiko objected before pouting and blowing out her cheeks as she was deep in thought, trying to prove Mana wrong by coming up with a superior alternate place to spend her allotted time in. After a short while, the blacksmith folded her hand and breathed out a heavy cloud of dust, air and frustration, one she had held pressed inside her lungs for quite some time. "Fine… It's Yakininku-Q".

The trio that accompanied Meiko laughed out together. Mana found her eyes warmly growing fond of the time she was spending with her friends. She loved by how easily she had read Meiko, why would she not? After all, the two things that the redhead loved most of all were constructing and eating and she had not done that last one in quite a while. Most ninja could be without food for an extreme amount of time, Meiko was just of the kind that chose not to be.

Yakiniku-Q was decently crowded, as usual. Mana exhaled in frustration after remembering the smells of meat, all the exotic sauces and spices from all around the world being prepared in the widest array of ways, the aroma of flowers, cooked vegetables, and smoky cheese circulating in the air and softly caressing one's nose with a lover's touch. Now the only thing pulling on her nostrils was the nihility of stuffy air inside, a costly, yet the least so, price for her improved sensory abilities.

It was at empty moments of lowness like this that Mana enjoyed recalling the fact that she was by far nowhere near to being a food consumption aficionado, she just liked preparing it. What actually did aid her in pushing away the vile price she had paid for power was seeing Meiko drooling all over her flashy circus tuxedo and continuously tumbling over her large boots and losing her cylinder in the process while she made her way to the table.

* * *

"Ewww! What's that?" Meiko shriveled when observing the sticky crawfish in Mana's plate, the poor thing looked like a zombified yet still remarkably fishy version of itself. Looking quite dead with pale and empty white eyes but retaining its dark, lake-green color while its shell appeared to behave more like a dry potato and crumble upon the first poke of one's utensil.

"It's shellfish prepared in the acid of the slugs of the Shikkotsu Forest." Mana smiled before she raised the exceptionally dead carcass of the crawfish and slurped the oozy remains from inside its crumbly shell, leaving the remains to collapse into dust that, Mana knew from bitter experience from her youth, tasted like wet sand.

"Is it good? It looks really atrocious, which means it must be good!" Meiko sobbed like a child looking at Mana gulping the slimy mass down her throat and closing her eyes to appreciate the taste. Despite it sliding down her throat rather heavily, the delicacy was a long requiem of what Mana once used to taste when consuming it.

"It is. I consider the acid of ninja slugs to be the best marinate solution." Mana grinned. It was a deceitful smile, the painfully absent sense of smell also came with an unpleasant side effect of robbing the magician of more than two-thirds of her taste reception. Things tasted severely different to her from that day on, only the most profound tastes ever registered on her scale whereas everything she used to love as a child and young teen tasted like cardboard.

Eating no longer felt like an enjoyable experience, as little of it as Mana did, it was more a mandatory ritual of self-preservation that brought the magician no pleasure whatsoever. At least when she tasted something as vile-smelling and exotic as shellfish prepared in this special solution she could feel remnants of what the food would have tasted like had she retained her senses intact.

"Wow, Mana, I never took you for a savant of food…" Kiyomi looked at Mana with concern. The magician pushed the plate off her side suggesting that this one crawfish was as much as she could handle. Meiko looked at Mana's emptied plate, with only the dust of the crumbled crawfish shell residing in it and whined out.

"I want it!"

Sensing opportunity for profit, the waitress appeared by Meiko's side almost immediately. Mana had to give Yakiniku-Q credit, this time the establishment was far better equipped and staffed to handle Meiko's legendary appetite and capricious eating tendencies.

"I want that! That molten crawfish thing!" Meiko declared by shooting her fist up into the sky.

"It will cost you, ma'am, we are getting our shellfish and marinate solution from the Shushu-ya and preparing them or reselling them here." The waitress nodded her head, warning Meiko that what she was about to order was quite expensive and to be eaten in smaller quantities.

"I'll have to agree, don't overdo it. The taste is also quite overpowering so, even if you manage to stuff it all down after the multiple helpings of barbecue you've had, your appetite will fade away after the first few contacts of your tongue with the goopy flesh of the shellfish." Mana seconded.

"Whatever, I want all of it! Mana makes it sound so appetizing!" Meiko pouted her lips, smacking the table with surprising restraint as the thing did not as much as flip over, let alone break, as was usually the state of affairs with Chestnut Hanasaku or her more physically gifted student.

"Very well…" the waitress sighed before disappearing gracefully, dancing around the crowded tables like a swan before reaching the kitchen.

"That's not what I meant at all!" Mana objected, barely managing to keep down her instinct to erupt into laughter as Meiko once again completely took her warning the wrong way. "The acid of the ninja slugs is very potent, the most powerful slugs can melt away even B-Rank ninja in mere milliseconds with the solution, it is also overflowing with chakra stored in the slime of their fat bodies. Granted, the solution used here is not the offensive type acid but a largely neutralized mixture but…"

"Ugh, stop it Mana! I can't take it. I wanna try it even more now!" Meiko pressed her large hand against Mana's face, shutting not just Mana's mouth but covering over two thirds of her face.

"This can only end in disaster." Kiyomi shook her head.

* * *

While the magician seconded the worries of her high-blooded friend, she had to admit that she would enjoy future visits to Yakiniku-Q after finding out that they were making Shushu-ya's more exotic menu items available in their menus as well, albeit with a bonus to the price as greasy as their barbecue. Shushu-ya had a reputation as an adult-oriented restaurant which lead to kids that enjoyed liquor sweets or the more exotic recipes that Shushu-ya offered having difficulties treating themselves.

"Ugh, I wish I had not eaten so much of it… The taste was so authoritative and the dish was so stuffing!" Meiko shrieked out before lavishly sprawling out in the seat making Kiyomi turn aside before realizing that Meiko's newly redefined boundaries of personal space were much to her liking, after which case, she playfully acted offended but began moving in closer to her friend bit by bit.

"There…" the waitress provided the check with a devilish smile.

"I don't suppose Mana's preferred activity of the evening is washing the dishes for a thousand years." Chestnut Hanasaku tsked after looking at the cost of what the great red-haired demon of consumption had just devoured.

"For this price, I'd have to do missions for my entire lifetime and then my grandchildren would still be indebted…" Mana exclaimed in shock after glaring at the small sheet of paper that was now by far the largest roadblock in her team's path.

"Meiko, you gorgeous idiot!" Kiyomi smacked the blacksmith at the back of her head before rubbing and dragging the sharper parts of her fist all over Meiko's scalp but the redhead refused to defend herself from this righteous punishment. "After we pay this up, I won't be able to look at a plate for my entire life! We are genin, we may end up having to wash dishes for the next foreseeable year! We're so dead!"

Mana rubbed her forehead. This felt like the time that she had to do something. She could recall once spending her time during a training holiday at the Yakiniku-Q outside tables after Tanshu-sensei had left for the Kage Summit but before she had found out the terrible outcome of it. She knew that one of the waitresses that worked here was a fan of her shows. She did not know what to do with the two clashing facts of the debt and the tremendous love for magic that the staff of Yakiniku-Q had but… Something had to be done.

If nothing else worked, well, nothing quite united parting friends like mandatory menial labor.

"Ma'am, we have a big problem with…" Mana started talking, she was far too embarrassed to admit the problem and the surrounding noises of people interacting casually collided into a cacophony that completely muzzled her speech.

"Wakizashi Meiko's table, right?" The woman sighed in unease. The feeling in the woman's eyes was not horror, it was more akin to slight irritation, almost like this was not the first time that Meiko caused the establishment logistical and financial issues. The fact that the woman knew Meiko's name only added to that assessment. "The price of the Shikkotsu shellfish is too much?"

Mana's lips turned to the side, the child in her chest kept trying to pull at her strings and try to lie, wriggle about and deny any responsibility. Luckily, Mana had paid her inner child no mind for the longest time now.

"Uhm… Yes, unfortunately. Even if one of us was allowed home to get more money, I doubt that any of us, even Hokage-sensei, would be able to get this much money. I'm not sure if you know but… I do magic shows downtown, maybe I could perform here to attract more customers or give your restaurant exclusive rights to ads or something?" Mana rubbed the back of her head, ruffling her wild black hair erratically.

"I'm… Really not the person you'd need to talk to about this sort of thing, I'm just serving here", the waitress appeared to be getting just as uneasy. This was a good sign, even if she was not important enough, Mana's suggestion was alluring enough, which meant her brand was strong enough, for the woman to not dismiss the opportunity outright.

"Ladies, I have accidentally overhead your conversation." A formally dressed, tall and well-aged man stepped in. "I may have a solution that will satisfy both of you."

Mana did not like this. If this man was just a kind soul, he had no idea what type of sum he is walking into, that will just make this situation less and less stable. If he was rich enough to cover Team Hokage's debt, he'd likely ask for something just as heavy in return. An unfitting outcome to the Team Hokage's last ride together.

"Are you planning to cover Sorceress-san's debt?" The waitress sighed in ease. She clearly liked this development, her eyes also appeared to be familiar with the man as they looked at him with similar closeness as the woman looked at Meiko with. This one must have been a regular in this place, but to what end?

"Well… Not really but… In a manner of speech, I suppose." The man countered. Mana knew that face, that subtle twisting tongue, it was the tongue of a man who had something to hide. She had met enough of those in the years she's worked as a ninja, most of her co-workers were just this type of people, it was a trait of occupational excellence so it really could not have been helped.

"Wait a second, Sir, do you work for Hanada Katsuo?" Mana stepped in. The last thing she wanted was to be somehow indebted to that vile man again after cutting all ties with him so effectively.

"Ummm… Well, this is not the correct question, in a manner of speech, I, of course, do. But… In this case, it isn't quite relevant as to why I am here." The man began wriggling again, like a worm. And yet… His stature, his speech and tone were oddly not worm-like, Mana could read that the man was being very foreclosing and merely caught by a barrage of wrong questions. In that case…

"Before I ask you to explain yourself, please tell me one thing. You do not have ties with the mysterious nukenin who is, for some reason, interested in me and may be related to the disappearances around the village?"

"That one I can shut down very firmly. I do not know what you are talking about, my business is strictly related to other legal and physical persons residing their interests solely inside the walls of Konohagakure." The man looked relieved to have finally gotten the chance to speak clearly, without revealing things he could not reveal or otherwise incriminating himself.

"Ugh… I'm wasting my work hours here. Could you please explain if you're paying for Sorceress-san, or not?" The frustrated waitress tapped her foot impatiently.

"Oh, well… Technically, she will be paying the debt herself but… Oh… Just… Forward the debt to this account please." The incredibly well-spoken old timer handed the young waitress a sheet of paper.

"Sir, are you aware that forwarding transactions will be charged with an…" the woman tried informing the man of some extra payments but the man just gently silenced her.

"Yes, please, you will find that the debt and whatever service tax you apply will not even scratch the surface of this account. I apologize for interrupting, but you said you were in a hurry to settle this matter, young ma'am." The man explained.

"Whatever…" the waitress just waved the sheet of paper above her head before disappearing into the kitchen.

"What was that all about, whose account was that?" Mana raised a curious eyebrow.

"Oh, excuse me, young lady, I am merely a manager of finances for a specific client I cannot disclose the identity of. I believe this case to be within both my liberty at controlling my client's finances and my duty to work for her best interests. As of the owner of this account, you will come to know the answer to that question in due time." The man smiled before bowing his head, almost like he implied some moderate amount of subordination to Mana. This gesture confused the magician a little.

"Well, I suppose I am lucky that you like barbecue as much as you do and happened to overhear this conversation." Mana looked at the man with a sharp glare. Her tone was slow but distrustful. She was being courteous with the man as well as grateful but his secrecy rubbed her off in all the wrong ways, even if it appeared to be duty-bound and professional type secrecy, not a conspiracy-type malicious one.

"I am afraid you misunderstand, young lady, this establishment merely hosts another one of my clients whose finances I manage. This was no suspicious accident that I overhead this conversation, so please, rest your mind at ease." The man tried to calm Mana down. "You may return to your very hasty friends now if you wish."

"Well, anyway, thank you, Sir for the… I'm not sure if I should call it a favor or just doing your job. I hope I find out whose account it was soon then. I can't stand mysteries." Mana managed to both be grateful and warn the man all at the same time. The magician almost felt proud of how much subtext she managed to stuff into just one handful of dull toned sentences.

"Oh, it's just my duty, young lady. For your sake, I hope you don't find that out for a long time to come. Have the best of what's left of this day." The manager of the finances of the mysterious someone nodded their head letting Mana just nod in gratitude again and return to her confused team.

* * *

"It was really kind of that guy to pay off our debt!" Meiko whistled into the air as the girls wandered the village streets that have already begun to grow dim.

"Gee, I wonder whose fault it was that we got into that pickle, to begin with?" Kiyomi squinted at Meiko's side, the redhead just laughed with innocence and apology in her eyes, yet her extended palms tried shaking off any remnants of responsibility.

"I blame Mana, personally. Her description was what hyped me to try it!" Meiko joked.

"Is everything okay, Mana?" Hanasaku leaned up to Mana's side, noticing that the magician was walking rather quiet and tuned out of the conversation.

"It's just… With the Chuunin Exams, I have come to forget just how many questions the world around me made me ask. So many secrets all around me, so many people doing so many things for reasons that are a mystery to me and I don't like it." Mana replied, still feeling a bit suspicious of what happened in Yakiniku-Q.

"Hmph, you're just like one of my brothers. I could never understand them, really. Meiko, on the other hand, I get perfectly – both of us don't care who is doing what and for what reasons. If we don't like them – we pound them. Things we don't understand don't worry us, but people like you are much different. Things you don't understand are things that make you worry the most." Hanasaku rubbed Mana's head, messing the magician's hair but Mana did not mind. This was the first time that the woman ever treated her like an equal student of hers to the rest of the Team Hokage. Perhaps there was no better time for that than Team Hokage's last day together.

"Tanshu-sensei was like that?" Mana wondered.

"Oh, not Little Bro. Misu of the Vapor was like that. Always bothered what other people knew, what other people were thinking. Always working in the shadows so that his family and friends could live easy and did not need to worry about those things." Hanasaku recalled.

This revelation shocked Mana to the core. The magician's nose sunk down to the ground and tears started accumulating in the girl's eyes. Being able to relate to the killer of her mentor was not something she ever hoped to achieve. Seeing the magician's distress and how Mana tried to hide her tears, Hanasaku stopped without as much as a warning.

"Well, it's been a fun and busy day. I'm afraid we'll have to cut it short." She said.

"What? But Mana still didn't have a turn!" Meiko objected. "She was the one that pulled us out of trouble in Yakiniku-Q, it's so unfair!"

"Mana… What's wrong?" Kiyomi saw Mana's tears despite her attempts to hide them away to the best of her ability. The magician was never the best at hiding and sneaking things behind people's backs, this made her success as a ninja all the more surprising.

"It's… Nothing, I just really did not look forward to saying goodbye." Mana made something up. Then again, she was not lying that badly. Had her eyes been dry by the time they parted ways, they would have surely been running in rivers once that time came.

"I see. We aren't walking separate paths forever, you know. We'll just be working separately for a while until we can catch up to your rank, that's it." Kiyomi tried easing the pain of separation a bit more.

Mana's feet could no longer feel the ground beneath her feet after the magician tried wiping the tears out of her eyes she noticed that the strong pressure around her arms did not let her do even that much. Meiko had hugged her and lifted her up and off the ground.

"If someone, at any point, makes you cry like this. You tell us. We'll kick their ass for sure!" Mana could somewhat make out Meiko's smile through the tears.

"Well. I guess we're off then. Shit, I think Hanasaku-sensei just did this to get to spend more time in Shushu-ya." Kiyomi spoke, her voice was shaking too. She tried to be the big sister but it was clear that her eyes were about to water too.

The girls bumped their fists against each other before separating and walking their separate ways. This entire day Mana felt like she was not a part of the Team Hokage family, Meiko and Kiyomi just seemed to be so close, tied by more bonds than just casual friendship and kinship of comrades. Chestnut Hanasaku will probably never completely trust Mana but…

Only walking away from a true family ever hurt this much!


	380. Destination - Shukuba!

The sky-wide blue and purple bruise was beginning to fade away, giving in to the fountain of bloody sunlight that squirted from the horizon before stabilizing into a shape of a burning sphere. The gaseous cotton was like a canvas for illustrations of Mother Nature as she performed another masterpiece. The jury was still out about if it would bring a downfall of frost on the land or if something different would define the color palette of the ground beneath Mother Nature's aerial masterpieces.

Mana had little time to observe the shifting and breaching dawn, her attention was solely focused on a white rabbit of a cottony fur, just like the clouds above her head, except the rabbit's white was yet to be tainted by dirt and blood. Usuzoku was a mighty opponent, once he may have been even mightier, like when the two had first met, she could not have ever dreamed of matching the rabbit in skill and speed.

Now the matters were entirely different. Even as Usuzoku brought his best, Mana was quite able to, for the most part, avoid getting demolished. Just for the sake of preserving chakra for the day and not to needlessly risk breaking her system again, crippling herself potentially for life, Mana asked Usuzoku to use a bokken instead of his massive and quite deadly cleaving blade.

That was not to say that getting hit with a hardened wooden sword swung by someone much faster and about as strong as a B-Rank ninja did not hurt or did not carry the potential of leaving calamitous injuries. Yet being hit in the face by wood, as much force as it carried behind it, was much easier to treat afterward than getting dismembered or cleaved in half.

Mana danced around Usuzoku's quick barrage of hits but she was getting tagged. Every single impact burnt the surrounding area while it temporarily made the point of impact completely numb, only to return with tenfold the searing sensation and a nasty bump afterward. As she was getting hit more and more, continuing to dance around Zoku's attacks was getting progressively harder, just like in the arena with Stea.

Except this fight was nothing like that time. This was just a game, a pointless sparring session meant to just keep Mana's skills sharp. Despite her being about on the same level as her summoned rabbit partner, she was holding back significantly as her goal was not to fight the rabbit. It was to push herself to her mental limits and then sharpen her willpower. She needed to get hurt, to get cornered and then accept that pain, learn to deal and live with it.

"String Reeling Jutsu!" Usuzoku yelled out, the frightening sound of steel wire shrieking like a scorned apparition as it tightly pressed against Mana's wrist, digging into her flesh and breaking her skin but failing to leave anything but a nasty skin-deep cut due to the magician's chakra resistance. Good, her reaction was on point, she managed to toughen up a limb that was previously lacking any augments faster than the pain of it getting hit cruised through her neurons.

"Double-Draw!" Usuzoku yelled out, using his massive rabbit feet to dash near-instantaneously up to Mana as he drew his blade, driving it against her locked up by steel wire arm at her elbow and her armpit. One hit – a drawing slash with his bokken aimed to break her hand by the elbow, re-sheathe, draw again and thrust it towards her armpit to disable the opponent completely.

Mana's body burst into flower petals, scurrying away from harm before reassembling her bodily shape farther away. She was not proud of having to dodge the attack this way, the magician intended not to use this jutsu during training. Had the opponent been anyone else, had they been a microsecond slower… She could have relied on her stage magician cred to pull her out from the binds. She could have surprised the opponent by being free before they even prepared to exploit the bound state of their opponent.

"Yer holdin' back. Dis ain't even fun!" Usuzoku grumbled, sheathing his sword before raising his cute, pink, little nose in the air like a pouty little curmudgeon that he was.

"This is not about fun. I need to be cornered, I have no interest in an even battle. This is not a contest of which one of us is better." Mana stretched out her tired neck before grunting in pain as she caressed a couple of painful bruises where Usuzoku's bokken made through her defenses. She had to hand it, Usuzoku was even faster without that massive blade, not that something as petty as an eight-kilogram sword would drag the rabbit down any, he just fought differently and the wood was much more difficult to keep up with in partial darkness of early winter mornings.

"Dat's still me, by the way!" Usuzoku opened one of his eyes, attempting a sudden-death glare on Mana but the magician was so close to him by the time he had opened his eyes up that the rabbit lost his balance and began stumbling back, only to be saved by Mana's sudden finger pincers pulling on his soft and furry cheeks.

"As long as it lets you sleep easier", the magician smiled.

"I am, I'm tellin' ye! What's the deal about you getting yer crapper kicked, anyway!?" The grumbler did his usual thing.

"That's the way it usually is. I fight differently to most ninja. I have morals and goals holding me back. For that reason, I either need to become stronger than anyone else or learn to fight from the position of a hopeless underdog." Mana winked as she took her coat from a damp little stump of wood where it was placed for the duration of the training session.

"Fightin' without tryin' ta kill can't be dat hard…" Usuzoku raised an eyebrow.

"It slows you down. Every time I dodge an attack, I see dozens of openings for strikes. Neck, thighs, liver, kidneys, so many pressure points and arteries. In that fraction of a moment, you need to weigh in which strikes will be lethal and which ones will just hurt really much, hopefully, enough to shake your opponent off any dreams of keeping it up. The old man from Sun Disc kept trying to slip in lethal attacks in his training, hoping I would not notice. I guess he figured that once I actually had blood on my hands it would be easier to draw it again and embrace that, he might have even been right. Once blood is drawn, you cannot return to the place you were before."

"Heh, dis handicap sounds fun, I'll try it next time…" Usuzoku ground his voice soothingly, fighting was about the only thing that made him do so. Something about being able to fight really well-made people really fond of it and excited about new opportunities of testing their mettle.

"Anyway, I'm off home. Still haven't checked the mail today, left earlier than the mailman dropped by." Mana wrapped herself in her coat, "Got about fifteen more minutes of a magic show to plan out too."

"What, ain't gonna run to yer boyfriend to get all kissy-huggy askin' him to lick yer wounds?" Usuzoku cut pretty deep. Letting him get as close to Mana as the magician did make him catch on to a pair of things that were like exposed nerves to her, used to be anyway, before Mana tore them out.

"You don't hit hard enough for that. I'll walk it off." The magician replied with something that was just as likely to make Usuzoku flip the table and jump at her.

"What was dat!? Dat's it! Next time I'm kickin' yer ass real hard! I'm serious, don't ye mess around da next time, ye'll die!" Usuzoku began grumbling before returning to the rabbit caves, leaving just a puffy cloud of dust and smoke that got carried away by the chilly winter winds in a breeze.

* * *

Mana did not expect to get summoned to the Administration this early after having the talk with Lord Sixth. It has only been a couple of days and she was already about to be sent off on another mission, in a rather peaceful period, when the villages were cooling down after the rather turbulent Chuunin Exams, no less.

One thing that will take a lot of time for Mana to get used to was being addressed with respectful honorific of "-san" which she barely ever heard added to her name before. Being a chuunin did grant certain status and warranted respect. A chuunin was a full-fledged ninja, not only by name but by the contents of their character, experience, and skill. Most ninja did not ever surpass that rank and were still regarded quite highly, chuunin was the standard rank of ninja.

That being said, the gap between a chuunin and what laid further beyond was also much wider. If the gap between a genin, a C-Rank ninja, and a chuunin was a world of skill, power, and speed, the gap between a chuunin and a jounin would have been the entire universe in comparison. When genin just started out, their heads were full of something else, Mana could even recall feeling somewhat hopeful when she and the rest of Team Oak were being tried out by Tanshu-sensei…

Something made silly people feel as if they knew a real lot, whereas when a ninja grew more experienced, they were made more and more humbled.

The last person waiting for meet the Hokage in the waiting room had left with the assistant glaring at Mana and briefly thanking her for coming. Sitting down on this chair and waiting for Lord Sixth to call her up all by her lonesome felt so insanely awkward and unnatural. It was almost as if she had messed something up and was awaiting punishment, this was how unnatural being issued a solo mission was.

"Lord Sixth!" Mana bowed in the respectful and submissive way. She had considered a kneeling greeting, having decided to play this ninja game to the best of her knowledge and abilities for as long as it still lasted, but she was not sure if the Sixth invited her to receive orders or for another matter entirely.

"You look injured. Is everything OK?" The assistant of Lord Sixth raised the issue by pointing out numerous dark bruises that showed even on Mana's darker than most of Konoha villagers skin tone.

"I was just training. It's nothing but a couple of bruises and I am ready to do my duty." Mana quickly brushed the matter aside.

"That's a good answer." Lord Sixth praised the magician, something that she was not quite used to hearing from the man, reminiscing their first meeting, one would have been quite foolish to prophesize the two developing a respectful professional relationship. "I have a mission for you."

Mana kneeled on one knee as Lord Sixth placed a file on the edge of the table for her to pick up once she stood back up. This manner of etiquette was ancient, genin barely ever observed it, even some older ninja saw themselves beyond these trivialities but Mana, as someone decently read up on historical matters, loved the traditional way ninja received their orders.

"The mission is not too difficult, that's why I'm sending you all by yourself. It's a B-Rank assignment because you will be handling some secret information and you'll see some sensitive numbers on the documents you'll be looking at out there." Lord Sixth began briefing Mana in the traditional way, while the Hokage deposited the mission file for the ninja to see, it was polite of them to also provide a brief summary of the assignment as well. It was just a proper answer to Mana's highly traditional reception of orders, quite likely.

Mana picked up the mission file and pressed a one-handed seal to its edge, unsealing the elementary seal used to seal up information that did not belong being feasted on by too many curious eyes.

"It requires clearance to handle secret information, I did not yet undergo that evaluation," Mana noted pressing her finger on the mission requirements.

"We went ahead and submitted your file for the clearance already. It's a trivial and quick procedure. All you need to bother about is the mission." Hokage's assistant bowed his head, looking quite proud of himself, it was more than likely that he was the one who pulled those strings.

"You look disappointed, is there a problem? Anything that might impact the mission?" Lord Sixth raised a suspectful eyebrow.

"Not at all, it is just not the kind of mission I thought I may see as a chuunin." Mana admitted out of the duty of being completely honest with her superior, more than the desire to complain.

"These type of missions are ALL chuunin see. You showed remarkable intelligence in the Exams, do not dirty up that impression. You will be making decisions that will impact Fire Lord's finances, this is beyond important because your failure will reflect on me and the village as well. You are long past just washing dishes and manual paperwork in Konoha Police Force." Lord Sixth disciplined Mana.

"Understood!" The magician relented.

"Dismissed." Lord Hokage noted a while after he had already returned to his paperwork and moved his mind forward and past the mission he had just handed out.

Mana pressed her hand seal against the mission file, sealing it up again. Seeing this mission made her feel divided. Something she could not have predicted when she got out of bed this morning was that she was handed an immensely important assignment – it was a village issued mission, likely a matter that rose from the direct orders from the Fire Lord himself. Apparently, Shukuba Town, a small pleasure town in the Fire Country a little bit down the path outside the village had a possible finance leak problem.

The kunoichi quickly dropped by home to gather her tools and examine her father's seal as well as her uniform and any seals present on it for preparedness. She then quickly scribbled something for her parents, something her father would see first, given how he did not spend more than a couple of hours shopping for his herbs and ointments and health drinks. In addition, Mana added the official summon letter by the note, just to show her parents she was not running off and doing something reckless like the time with the Box of Ultimate Bliss.

The reason why the magician despised the sight of this mission was that she hated economy, finances, and money matters. That was why her mother managed her show funds and mission pay separately even past the point when Mana got emancipated as a kunoichi of Konohagakure. The fact that she'd have to sniff about drawers and lockers of old files trying to find the leak or a possible laundering scheme which explained where the Fire Lord's money went, made the magician feel dirtier than washing the dishes at Ichiraku Ramen.

The gate guards stopped Mana, not because of any particular reason but just because they felt jumpy. Stopping random people leaving and entering must have been the new modus operandi for those two. They had to justify their salaries and going above and beyond in the line of work more now than at any other point. With all those mysterious disappearances, the village authority and the commoners sneered at and expected of them to do their duty in stellar ways.

After being informed that she was on official Konohagakure business and shown the file, the contents of which they did not even think of checking, after all, Mana was now an equal ninja to them, not just a newbie, the duo backed off and even went as far as to wish her a safe and relaxing trip.

One never thought about safety while en route to any place inside the Fire Country until they actually went past the massive village gate and left the safety of all the barrier and protective seals behind. Now it was only Mana, her wits, and skill, against the rest of the world. A single well-timed and executed raid by bandits or mercenaries could have ended her career early, just like it happened to father, every mission, even such as trivial and petty as matters of Fire Lord's financial aid could have resulted in Mana losing her life.

She had never previously thought about that, she has never experienced being forced into life-threatening situations on official village business. Sure, her life was threatened from time to time, the magician faced off against her fair share of deadly threats and enemies she had no rational right of surviving against but it was always her call. Never, in the magician's recent memory, was she shoved in between being labeled a traitor or a failure or death in the line of duty.

The Fire Country woods looked so peaceful and white. It would be tough to see steel wire or other traps in this blinding frost, the Sun bouncing off the snow and solid ice, poking at Mana's eyes was doing more than just caressing her cheeks with all the warmth that one could have gotten in this season. It was also adding to the danger of traveling these roads all alone.

Her logical mind kept telling the magician that the likelihood of being attacked on the road in between Konoha and Shukuba Town was reasonably slim. Even those few bandits that would have hung around these well-traveled and protected parts would have been bandits of desperation, not professionals. People who could have actually used that Fire Lord's money, people whose lives were broken by a couple of bad life decisions or bad dice rolls, sometimes even completely without their role to play in the collapse of their very own totality.

One could not have helped but thought of the possible dangers lurking outside when traveling the lonely and dead-silent woods, even in the early morning. Of how worried Mana's parents will inevitably be when they find the Administration's summon papers on the table in the living room and will eventually realize the cause of the summon when Mana won't come home in the evening.

It was all a matter of welfare. The Fire Lord felt very charitable and generous supplying welfare for various matters, ranging from monetary support to the more severe and public cases of life hitting someone in their country too hard to a public venture like a big play or event being put up to entertain the villagers or townsfolk of the Fire Country. All her life Mana had taken welfare for a good thing, a monetary version of what she wanted actual people to be like.

The kunoichi had a bad feeling that her idealistic view on the matter may actually change the deeper she investigates this matter of hers, possibly even shaking the very core of her understanding of how it worked and what it was used for… That was, of course, if some lowly bandit did not hit a well-placed shot with a kunai while Mana's defenses were down and end it all prematurely…

The next destination was Shukuba Town!


	381. The Governor

Shukuba was one of those odd towns that just started suddenly. One brief moment one was traveling through a blinding growth, completely consumed by the shadows of the forest and swarmed by the myriad of wildlife that lived there, then a small building popped into the view.

Each building spreading the outlier of the pleasure town by a little bit more was surrounded by yards and patches of trees and what could best be described as hopeful attempts at controlling the overgrowth around them. As Mana kept treading onward, the wood to signs of civilization ratio was beginning to increase. Such oddity made telling if she was in the town or not a bit murky, the case with Shukuba was completely unlike that with Konoha or any other ninja village, where a massive gate clearly showed the territory of the village and one could feel safe and infiltrated after entering it.

If anything, this odd, no walls or barriers state of the growing pleasure town suggested that the place was thriving. It was growing and the buildings that symbolized that growth could by no means be described as tumors of the town, these were more like luscious and flowing locks of hair that made someone already gorgeous that much more irresistible.

Mana shook her head, she could not believe how shallow the metaphors she was drawing in her head were. Tearing the part of the wounds, scattered over the girl's heart, that was defined by her being in love with Kouta must have bled harder than she had predicted it to. Such was the nature of matters rooted out before one could address them and deal with them properly.

At long last, the concentration of buildings and people, young and old, rich and less so, convinced Mana that she was closing into the heart of the small pleasure town. That meant that setting her mission plan in motion was in order. Did Mana even have one? One thing was dreaming about big missions, traveling around, seeing the world and bravely fighting for what one believed in. Another one completely was being pulled out from one's life, being told what to do and expected to get that objective done impeccably, without failure.

The magician kept walking around the squares and narrower streets, mingling with the crowds of the happy people who were glad to visit restaurants, pubs and other establishments littered throughout the town. It was not like expecting the information just fall into her hands was Mana's plan, she knew it would not be that easy. Then again, if it was a big issue or a topic of interest for the locals it would not have been completely outside the realm of possibility.

No. Mana merely trod the village streets, absorbing the views and the local merchants into her system. She was walking in circles but surely she walked so convincingly that she could not have been mistaken for a love-struck teen without a firm grip on what she wanted to do for her time in the Shukuba pleasure town.

"Konoha's Sorceress" this brutal combination of words struck fear into Mana's heart. She did not want to walk out or reveal her presence to the locals until it was her adamant and well thought out decision to do so. If someone with more intel than a common townsperson had caught a whiff of that information they'd figure out that a ninja of Konoha was sniffing about the place and while that was nothing special, Mana did not want to reveal her presence until she was one hundred percent sure it was good for the mission objective.

What a failure! Even with her desperate tries to evade the unseen threat of her fans recognizing her, Mana was surrounded by them. Had they been enemies out to hunt her down, had it been a part of her mission objective to infiltrate the pleasure town and hunt for intelligence in secret, she'd have failed that mission, if not paid for that failure with her life. Mana had no choice, she played and interacted with her audience, so that she could slip into a shadier alleyway for a good plan of action.

Everyone who came up got what they came for, from those who were content with just yelling greetings at Mana and commending her for a glorious battle during the Chuunin Exams or being able to create such a wondrous atmosphere during her magic shows to people wondering when she'd perform in Shukuba. The masses were so huge, people just kept swarming like ants having caught a whiff of potential food to serve their nest. Where one curious bystander in the middle of the square was happy that the famous Konoha's Sorceress winked and waved their way, three or four more took that person's place.

"Now, now! Please don't wear out our guest!" A deep and fairly warm voice, strengthened by being released from inside the mouth of someone of a very bulky in a chunky way kind of build. Before Mana could pinpoint the direction from which the authoritative voice came, a broad and flabby hand tapped on her shoulder before pulling her towards a man of the aforementioned bulky frame.

Honestly, had it not been for something in the appearance of this man, maybe his balding head, orange-pink hair that lightly occupied the sides of the man's attic, maybe his very grandpa-like sweater with large nacre buttons or his thick moustache that wiggled like a troubled caterpillar with each huff the man's giant nostrils made, Mana would have felt uneasy about being manhandled this way. In the current case, however, she was willing to allow the man to do so, for the sole purpose of getting out of this disastrous beginning of her mission.

"Greetings, Konoha's Sorceress, I am Kokkappa Sho, the governor of this fine pleasure town! Please, allow me to take you into the administration building so that we can get away from all of this noise." The man introduced himself before dragging Mana away from the crowd, his hand still wrapped around her and pressing her tightly to his side.

Of all the things that could have gone wrong, she could have, at the very least, not gotten recognized by one of the Shukuba authority figures, judging from his title, the very tallest one at that. Just then, with her ashamed and embarrassed cheeks glaring red light as she tried to hide her face away while the massive frame of Shukuba's governor attempted to aid her from removing herself from the crowd, did Mana realize that she had taken so many ill-fated fears of just such a thing from much wiser people for granted for far too long.

Then again, perhaps this was for the better – either way, whether it was by stealth or deceit, her paths would have ended up bringing her to the Shukuba administration. Was that place not the den of the vipers that spat venom onto the paperwork that made Fire Lord's funding disappear? Perhaps she could still not only salvage the situation but make it even better than it would have been had Mana not been recognized instantly by hundreds of people…

As the wide door of rich and well-worked redwood slammed behind the backs of Mana and the town's governor, the bulky man just breathed in and out easier before removing the hand off of Mana's shoulder and frame before smacking his wide belly and wiping the sweat off of his forehead.

"What a crowd, huh? Perhaps you should have been wiser than traveling alone, in the middle of the day, right in the most pulsing veins of our fine town, Sorceress-san?" that damned honorific was like a kitchen knife being dragged across a plate, emitting the auditory equivalent of how baby's hundred-year-old diaper would have smelled.

"I apologize, Sho-san," Mana bowed, "I am young and a bit inexperienced in matters outside my own village. I was not aware of how wide the word of my shows had spread or the ramifications of my trip."

"Well…" Sho tapped his warm hand on his sweaty forehead a couple of times, clearly looking confused by the politeness and non-confrontational nature of the young lady in front of him. "I mean… We were all once young, we've all made mistakes, if something like this is as bad as it gets, you are truly blessed!"

As Sho gestured for Mana to follow him and as he proceeded through the first floor corridor and into a small office that transitioned to a much larger office complex on the second, third, and who else knew how many more floors, the magician attempted to dodge the curious stares from the public servants glaring at her general direction.

"Excuse me, Sho-san, but is there a reason for me to follow you into your office?" Mana expressed her curiosity as an attempt to poke at the situation to see how it responded, maybe even to find out if her status as a ninja and her objective was known to the large man who was kind enough to help her out. After all, the miraculous rescue and the assault of her fans may not have been a coincidence.

"Oh? No, not at all. I simply suggest that Konoha Sorceress-san rests in my office and has some tea while the people outside thin out and your appearance becomes less of a novelty of the day. That is unless, of course, you have other places to be, other business to attend to, or merely dislike the mere mention of my company?" The man poked back. While his manner of speech and the words that came from his mouth were beyond polite, even addressing Mana in a mostly forgotten third person manner that could only have been found in historical movies, plays, and books, the magician could sense that this was just as much of a piss into a viper den, looking for any snakes to come out, as her inquiry was.

"No, not at all, I'd be honored by Sho-san's company!" Mana replied in the same manner, feeling a little elevated deep down to be able to politely poke the man. While his façade was quite friendly, his words welcoming and the meaning behind them relatively harmless, the magician felt it would have been wise to remember that he was just another politician, not just that – one of a high status. That meant he may have been well into whatever was going on with Shukuba's funds and his hands may have been dirty, or even bloody, with the filth sinking so deep that it touched the man's bone and could not have possibly been soaped off.

"Perfect then! I'd feel overjoyed to share some of my newly acquired Gyokuro tea!" the plumpy sung out like a coloratura soprano.

Mana only dreamed to be well versed in tea enough to identify the brand. She could have only imagined how much the tea that the man drank could have told her. It could have been a sign that the man meant well, or it could have been a hallucinogen, for all she knew, or a massive warning sign of another nature.

After being lead into the expensive office, that made the Hokage's own little quarter look like a broom closet after the water was put to boil in an electric device of some sort, the magician was encouraged to sit down. This was her chance to acquire some information, at the same time, Mana had enough people reading skills to realize that the kind uncle look of the Shukuba governor was also merely a front.

"I never realized Shukuba had a governor!" Mana acted out excitement. She did not really have to act that much so her pathetic lying skills did not need to be put to the test – she was legitimately interested in the political state of the pleasure town which was so dependent on Konoha's protection and the monetary investments of Fire Lord himself.

Sho cleared his throat. He looked a bit on the edge, he did not call Mana's bluff and attempt to check her prior knowledge about Shukuba's political state, she'd have flunked that as when she was doing reading the magician focused mostly on places far and wide and periods long gone. A place like Shukuba that resided right on her nose evaded her attention and interest, for the most part.

"Ah… Well… Yes… Not many people know, that is… Of course, because it is a recent development. The title is a descendant of my decree, hmmm, yes. Administrator just sounds so strict and official. Governor is more… Human, I took it." Sho rubbed the back of his rapidly balding head. He was like a dirty politician reporting about his dirt to a tyrannical dictator, sweating and jumping from point to point.

"Ah, so the title is just a change in name alone…" Mana breathed out. "Sounds a bit like a waste of public funds, I'd imagine a change of title for the sake of change alone would cost money and work hours to have plenty of documentation changed. So many laws and rules, so many communication issues with neighboring and foreign towns and villages." She attempted to sound more on the pondering side instead of accusatory. At the same time, she was luring out information about the exact implications of the title change, maybe a more clear motivation behind it.

"You're a very clever girl for your age. That being said, the change is not just an empty change of words. I'd say it is more of a spiritual change as well. Over time I have granted the governor one or two higher shots to call in the matters of Shukuba politics." Sho admitted. That was shocking to hear, not that he was gradually building up his own authority behind the Hokage's back, more that he was willing to admit it over accusations of wasting public funds. That meant that the latter was the thing that he feared investigated more, it was a common bargaining tactic – throw a painfully extracted but essentially unimportant bone to the dogs below to save those that kept your heart in place.

Something was definitely off and Mana needed to see some paperwork…

"And what about young Sorceress-san? Why would you travel to Shukuba so freshly after your big fight, it appears the bruises you wear are still quite fresh…" Sho pointed at the small patches that Mana applied over her black bruises that Usuzoku so kindly provided her by kicking the shit out of her during training.

Mana thought for a moment, she had made up a version of lies but she wondered if it was solid enough and would hold up to scrutiny. No time for that. She needed to say something, a badly weaved lie was better than all of this silence.

"Oh, I'm just scoping out opportunities for magic shows in the future. I cannot believe I have never performed here, or at least I can't remember if I have…" Mana quickly spat out the version she had made during her trip. It was a solid lie but… The execution clearly made Sho see right through her, this was bad. He may have suspected something now, especially after Mana outed herself as a ninja so publically and on such a grand stage as the Chuunin Exams finals.

"Well, Shukuba town would be honored to host your shows!" Sho slapped his massive hands together in ecstasy. "You will find that we have plenty of experience with show business and we treat our stars well. I have to tell you upfront, I am not responsible for you deciding to leave Konoha and host your shows here until the end of your career!"

The man took some time to laugh at his own jest, Mana joined him but her laughter felt forced and uneasy. This was not entirely bad, he clearly suspected something but he very subtly suggested Mana to join in on whatever was going on here. It may have been wise for Mana to feed him something, just a scent of a carrot to lead the stumbling lost pig to the wrong path…

"Oh? I consider retiring from this whole ninja business altogether so you have given me much to consider, Sho-san!" Mana emulated the overjoyed mood of her conversant beat to beat. This may have been one of her better acting jobs, the magician was finding out that she was getting better and better at this lie-but-not-really-lie thing. Lying was easy when one merely told the complete truth in ways that one's conversant took the wrong way. That was the only kind of lie Mana could tell convincingly, after all.

This nicely weaved deception appeared to have softened the suspicions of Mana being up to tearing down this intricately put together house of cards. House of cooked books, more likely. The magician had suspected for quite some time that had she just waltzed up to Sho, revealed her credentials and mission objective and demanded the right papers she would have been shown a bunch of accounting farce. This more subtle and secretive approach was much more fitting, even if Mana was irradiating inexperience and screwing up at times with certain angles. She would get better, eventually.

"What did you mean exactly with that whole experience with show business thing? Sho-san's voice sounded quite confident with that statement, excited even. I've been at Tanzaku once and…" Mana tried to poke deeper.

"Bah, Tanzaku… Those fools know nothing of managing a pleasure town. Gambling where ninja have a clear edge at robbing the town blind? What sort of money making strategy is that?" Sho appeared to get a bit passionate about the subject as he took a sip of his blazing hot tea before handing a cup to Mana.

The magician just looked at the bubbling and greenish brew that steaming so intensely that it may have as well cooked something else entirely if something else entirely was placed on top of the cup and allowed to simmer. She just sighed. All she wanted to achieve was to poke at Shukuba's experience with show business and exploit a possible hole where the money may have been laundered to. Now she'd have to listen to old man's rants and ramblings about Tanzaku to no end… At least she was not exposed completely, Sho was too passionate about his rant to read Mana's face and think about her possible motives.

Talking to people was harder than Mana had anticipated…


	382. Yak Milky Way

The meeting with the governor of Shukuba town could have gone better. Mana spent no time hesitating before admitting that to herself upon reflection. She could have picked up on a possible further lead to investigate, she could not have mentioned the name "Tanzaku" to the man and furthered the brief talk into a downward spiral of a rant about the place.

Then again, it could have also gone much worse. The way it had gone now, Mana salvaged her presence in Shukuba becoming tomorrow's morning news. In addition, she managed to convince Sho that the magician was not here to tumble whatever house of cards he had built here and was willing to join it by adding her own tower by the side. Granted, that was verily false.

While the magician's theory about a town-wide conspiracy of money laundering was only fed more biscuits, she needed a more solid lead to look into. Perhaps she could have lingered about the place, concealed herself amongst the civil servants and waited until Sho left his office, entered it and performed a quick scan of the man's drawers. For that to happen, the magician needed to have fewer doubts about her ability to remain stealthy, also, the possibility of a satisfying reward for the massive risk was minuscule – Sho may have been a goof but he was no idiot who kept his "uncooked" books in his drawer.

Mana played an innocent and spoiled little show business idol by playfully inquiring one of the public workers about the location of a bathroom. If she was to gain any leads, they would come from down below. If the leads did lead to Sho's office, in that case, the previous plan will be the current work in progress. Avoiding high risk for an improbable reward until absolutely necessary was a praiseworthy course of action.

After she safely concealed herself in the ladies' room, the magician weaved a hand seal, concentrating hard on a different shape she was planning to take.

"Transformation Jutsu!" she mumbled emitting a large cloud of smoke from the stall as well as a loud popping sound that signaled the transformation being completed. Mana disliked using generic jutsu or jutsu she did not invent herself but this time was one of dire need. She could not afford getting recognized and throwing the town square out of whack again. A more controlled and calm crowd was much more to Mana's liking as a working environment, easier to read, easier to single out people who may have provided her with information.

Mana left the stall and examined her new shape in the mirror. She was lucky that nobody was in the bathroom or the magician would have had to blush and explain the awkward sounds and smoke coming off of her stall. Luckily enough, the natural ninjutsu after-effects were quick to completely dissipate, unlike actual smoke, and left little to no trail. It would have taken a chakra sensor to identify after-effects of a distinct ninjutsu signature.

The transformation was a massive success. Mana had made herself grow a good half-a-meter, changed the color of her hair and made them short and curly. She also made her body more feminine and more complete, imagining Kiyomi's shape in her mind as something that she needed, as, otherwise, the magician would have been a tad bit inexperienced with the proportions. She did not change her uniform, however, changing clothes and maintaining that change using Transformation required a bit more chakra and Mana decided to be stingy with it, just in case…

Maybe it was fear of her network breaking down again, maybe it was paranoia of men in black watching her every step, one of assassins with hidden weapons looking to snuff the magician's curiosity out to protect some imagined wild conspiracy. Either way, this new Mana looked like someone she was comfortable working with. For a brief moment, the magician even wondered why Meiko could ever screw such a simple jutsu up when she pulled off much more complex feats of chakra manipulation that were not ninjutsu in nature.

Unseen by the public servants, Mana slipped out from the ladies' room and innocently trekked downstairs before leaving the building. It was a good thing that Mana had memorized how it looked like and where it was, something told her that this building would be quite useful to her in the future. She, in her new shape, may need to visit again just yet.

When she first set foot in Shukuba, Mana had thought about approaching a vendor owner with requests of information. One of the hundreds that thrived in Tanzaku town, gambling the ordinary townsfolk and passers-by out of their money with games and entertainment, before losing it all to ninja who excelled at those same games. Now, given the governor's distaste for the place, Mana knew better, she returned back to the square and while her slightly unusual attire and attractive makeshift shape attracted multiple curious glares, she did not stand out nearly as much as she used to in her original shape.

The girl kept working her eyes overtime, looking far and wide for popular spots of attraction and, curiously enough, an ice cream vendor had caught her attention. For a little wagon selling milky sweets, it was doing surprisingly well in terms of public attraction. This ice cream man looked like a person who knew and saw a great many things.

Mana had plenty of time to stare out and observe the ice cream man. He was very clearly not from around this town. Likely an immigrant looking for a comfortable place to do business, one who stayed, apparently, as he often interacted with locals and their children, oftentimes even using names and their popular fancies for particular flavors. Finally, Mana's turn had come…

"Take pick, ma'am", the man spread his large and quite thick arms out, almost reaching across his entire wagon with their width. From far away Mana had not noticed how large the man was. That accent too… Just like Meiko's father's, he was likely from the more southern parts of Kumogakure or the Land of Snow, made sense why a man living on the edge of the two would know a thing or two about ice cream.

"Ugh, I just don't know what to pick…" Mana playfully placed a finger to her luscious lips, just as she had seen fellow actresses do during plays when they took the roles of attractive or ambitious women.

"They all winners, trust me! Yak milk not make losers, ma'am, I guarantee it!" The man laughed out before beginning to show off different flavors to Mana.

"Yak milk? Whatever happens, don't taste that goddamn ice cream!" Mana screamed out desperately in her own mind as she just toyed around with the man nodding and acting surprised when seeing a new flavor. The magician was quite surprised by how patient the back of the line was with her antics. It obviously helped that three or four people standing behind her were male and didn't mind the artificial distraction.

After Mana dismissed every flavor for various extremely idiotic and verily made up reasons, the man just sighed. "You're not from here, right, ma'am?" the towering ice cream man wondered.

"Just passing by. I'm a stage magician you see, looking for a place to perform in." Mana recounted the made up story about a made-up person she became.

"Well, this place might be too close to Konoha, may want to move further, maybe all the way to Wind Country?" The man walked back to some room at the back of the wagon to pull out more samples of ice cream he had for sale. Some kids in the back, who were previously beginning to grow impatient, now ran up to Mana and asked to see some magic tricks. Likely, they knew all about the Konoha's Sorceress and wanted to see the next best thing. Mana could have used a defusing mechanism for another demographic in the crowd so she showed them a pair of tricks until the ice cream man returned.

"Awww, boo, Wind Country is so mean, sand gets everywhere in my clothes and my magic set. It ruins my cards every time I shuffle, rubs the pretty pictures off." Mana playfully rubbed her eyes, leaning over the counter. "Although that Konoha's Sorceress does seem to be killing the industry by leaving no place for competition."

"So I've heard. You talked to governor about start-up?" The ice cream man wondered.

"Start-up?" Mana raised an eyebrow, dropping the airhead act for a moment.

"Yes, entertainers come flocking in Shukuba for start-up. Few get seen by governor but very good conditions. Magic may be bad business, try movies." The ice cream man pointed at some idiotic poster, made so by the fact that it featured an alien spaceship crashing down through the Hokage mountain and some young and busty actress snugging it out with what appeared like a green-skinned alien.

"I see, thank you... You know, maybe I am not in the mood for ice cream after all. Thank you for your help though!" Mana thanked the ice cream man leaving a handful of ryo that would have paid for a cone of ice cream before walking off. She could hear a bunch of displeased women chattering about how ungrateful and rude Mana was holding the line like that only to leave but if that was the worst of the fallout from Mana acquiring this information about "start-ups", that would be just golden!

With a little bit more chipper in her steps than it would have been advisable when on an assignment with an objective to blend in, the magician rushed back to the Administration building. She was curious to see if "start-up" was some sort of a trigger word for the Shukuba governor. She was beginning to get a bad feeling about where these Fire Lord's funds were going, bad being a very subjective and dependent on one's point of view kind of claim.

Almost like a child, afraid to check under their bed after hearing a sound at night, Mana was a bit reluctant to let the wild conspiracy theories in her head take a solid shape. She needed more evidence, more leads, something more solid before she could point fingers. Her objective was to find the leak in the way the Shukuba funds were managed, a single sheet of paper validating her suspicions would have been enough.

Problem was, Sho was unlikely to keep records of these "start-ups" if they truly were the leak. Even if they were, the paperwork was likely cooked in a way that made them seem inconspicuous upon inspection. Finding proof of this leak may have just been the most problematic aspect of Mana's assignment. The magician felt like she was expected to bring tapes that a murderer kept of all his murders, which felt illogical at best.

"Hello, I'd like to speak to the governor, please." Mana used her soothing and playful voice again, unfortunately to her, the reception was handled by a female secretary and as much imaginary credit as the magician attributed to her flawless transformation, this time she'd have to actually work for any credit to be added to that account.

"Please sit down right there, he'll call you up when he's ready, ma'am." The receptionist smiled at Mana with cutesy and confidence that matched that of Mana's, but with beauty that was much more natural and down to Earth.

And so the wait began. The magician saw people coming and going, apparently, all of them had "appointments" or were "emergency meetings", as explained by the receptionist the whose sass was beginning to ruffle Mana's feathers. Before that torturous afternoon, Mana had considered herself a patient and very composed person. She was not afraid to sit patiently and wait for all she knew, sadly, it had appeared that the bureaucracy of this place had broken her.

Mana sighed and decided to try something desperate, this was completely not her style. Stealth and the typical ninja activities were not technically Mana's forte and the magician had very poor grades for the lightness of her feet in Academy. What else could have been expected from a girl who had joined the Academy out of responsibility to use her abilities to help people and change the world instead of actual talent for the craft?

After the receptionist disappeared for a coffee break, or something of that sort, moving for a brief moment into a small room behind the chair from which this crow oversaw her domain of the Administration reception, Mana stood up and moved her increased in volume hips around. Moving in this changed shape required a bit of getting used to, just another disadvantage for the madness Mana was about to attempt.

When the receptionist returned to her post, she found that the curly haired blonde in a magician's uniform was no longer waiting in the saggy and deceitfully soft armchair where the woman was last sighted. She could not have possibly made a big deal out of it for the poor thing had been waiting for hours until her breaking point. Somewhere in the record that the receptionist kept in her head, the woman had attributed the curly haired one a surprising amount of points for perseverance.

There were people all over the place. Wandering the corridors, sitting in cubicles that looked just as recently renovated and just as deluxe as those that Konoha's civil servants had. What was extremely vexing, despite the irony of it, was that nowhere was this inequality reflected upon the lower layers of society. Even the lowly townsfolk looked happy and content, lullabied to a sweet slumber by the entertainment, good food and luxuries of their home.

Reflections on the junk district and trashy neighborhoods of her own village residing at the western and eastern edges of the village haunted Mana as she quietly danced the waltz of the ninja step. Moving surprisingly light on her feet and unnoticed by the weary and bored eyes of the administration workers. The zombified looks on their pale faces suggested that none of them truly wanted to spot Mana.

With resounding success, the magician had made her way to the round staircase she had walked with the governor all the way to the top floor. The magician listened in to the steps and casual conversations that were supposed to keep the staffers intrigued in the second part of their busy workday. If these office rats did not feel like squirrels running in spinning wheels, they had a poor way of showing it or could deceive their beholder better than Mana ever could…

The magician slipped off her jacket before slipping to the wall and weaving a hand seal. With the help of the Cloak of Invisibility Jutsu, she had perfectly camouflaged to the boring glass wall that rotated all the way to the top. Despite a pair of difficult and close brushes with being discovered, like someone's hand accidentally slamming against the magician's face as they tried using the glass wall for support in their descent, Mana had moved past the busy staircase and onto the top floor.

Quickly, the kunoichi slipped her cloak of invisibility off and slipped her arms into its sleeves again. She ended up crossing the principle of general distaste for generic jutsu twice that day. The very thought of it made Mana feel uneasy and ashamed. It was a similar feeling to how one felt when they consumed something fatty or plenty of somethings past their dinnertime. Maybe that was the reason why Mana was so careless with the flowing motion of her jacket and how it ended up smacking against some office plant and knocking it over.

With her cheeks dyed red as a bell pepper, Mana looked at a young office worker holding a multiple men's worth of paperwork in his arms. The man came up to the embarrassed magician before placing the paperwork on the windowsill before examining the wreckage.

"Don't worry about it, ma'am, this is just a little teaspoon of nature's green to spruce up the boring environment, I'm sure someone will offer a sample their personal flora for replacement. Where were you headed, exactly?" The man inquired.

"I was supposed to see the governor. I have an appointment." Mana lied.

It was painfully evident that the man was about to have none of it. And yet he was standing still, thoughts shifting through his eyes as they rolled about, shifting from Mana's changed shape to the busted plant on the floor. Leading curious sightseers outside of the top floor was clearly outside this one's job description as he made it painfully obvious.

"I don't think you do, ma'am, please leave this floor or I'll be forced to inform a security officer." The clerk was being a good sport.

Mana could take this guy out and cover him with her jacket, crossing her principles in more than one way. Just a quick, restrained and precise blow to his gut could knock the wind out, a fluid motion into a "Cloak of Invisibility Jutsu" and it would be done. No one without a significant ability at superhuman perception could even register it before it was already done… She could see the governor right now.

No. That was what everyone meant when they pointed fingers at Mana and laughed. Every time she claimed she'd change the world, every time she talked big about being kind and not hurting or killing anyone. Situations like this were what everyone had in mind, everyone expected Mana to cross every principle in her book for the sake of success. She was already halfway to proving them right. The magician bowed her head submissively before turning to the staircase.

As she was considering leaving, thousands of possible thoughts of infiltrating the governor's office ran through her head. From scaling the walls of the Administration building to using her Mystical Wings Jutsu to control her descent from the roof. One dumbed than the other… How many people would see her scaling the walls? Could she move fast enough to evade sight yet restrain her speed enough to make a quick stop at the top floor? Why would the governor even offer his time to someone who entered their office through the top floor?

Maybe there was one more thing she could try… Right as her body hid from plain sight in the staircase, Mana weaved a hand seal, dispelling her Transformation. If the governor would not sacrifice an hour of his day for the Konoha's Sorceress, this venture would indeed be hopeless. Just for the sake of fending off association between Mana and her transformation, the magician had transformed again, this time only changing her clothes.

A handful of security officers and the young civil servant from before rushed into the staircase, taking the smoke and odd noises as a sign of fire, instead of that, seeing only Mana.

"Sorry about that, I bumped into a very clumsy woman on my way up here." The magician smiled. It would take her best act and a little bit of good luck to talk her way into the governor's office.

"And I'll tell you what I told that woman, this place is off-limits to civilians!" The ticked off office worker was having none of it.

"Wait, isn't this Konoha's Sorceress?" One of the security guards raised an eyebrow.

"Sorceress or not, she's civilian and this is an off-limits floor." The persistent office worker ranted.

While Mana severely hated his guts at that time, she had to admit that he was very devoted to his job. With public servants this dedicated to their duty to serve their people, it was tough to imagine why this town would be suffering a case of Fire Lord's fund laundering.

With the official sources being walled off as if Sho was beginning to suspect something, Mana was forced into a different course of action, a more indirect and improvisational one, yet one with much greater chance of proof. She could have played a big ninja girl with this security, pointed out the close ties between Konoha and Shukuba and barged into Sho's office. Still, all it would have lead to was the utter destruction of her facade as a peaceful entertainer looking to join in on the money laundering and seeing a whole bunch of clearly cooked accounting books.

She needed to see the lights of the Shukuba pleasure town, examine some cameras and not be afraid of a little action to find where the movies were taking their funding from. Once she had something solid, she can force her way into the governor's office and stop relying on his mercy and will to see her.

Mana was different from the other ninja, she'd do this thing her own way, without killing anyone or violating anymore of her principles. She needed to stop trying to be and act like someone she was not and embrace who she actually was.


	383. Discretion of Justice

Tanzaku town was not an overly sizable township. It was not too difficult to locate a district cluttered by a large concentration of rusty metal warehouses and concrete paved streets yet still residing around charming enough scenery to be considered as an on-location movie shooting paradise.

The whole town was a good thirty-minute trek long, to begin with. After talking with one or two locals and using the incredibly useful skill of using one's eyes, Mana managed to locate the district that looked as ugly as it was insecure about its repulsiveness. Using movie posters and even pictures of finer looking folk to distract from its rough essence.

"Aliens… It had to be darned aliens." Mana sighed, letting her sickened head to sink down and the light yet chilly winter drizzle soak her raven hair. Somewhere in an open warehouse covered with cheap cardboard and squinting and otherwise uncomfortably grimacing crew, a story of a forbidden love between a green-skin tentacle monster with one eye to perceive the beauty of its lover and a thirty-year-old woman in a schoolgirl uniform was being conceived.

It was not that Mana was afraid of aliens. The phobia that made her chill up from the core moving to the surface was always reserved to ghosts. Ghosts were much more final, ghosts did not sleep or eat, they could not have been reasoned with and they were absolutely brain-dead dumb. They did think that the best way of spending their eternity post-mortem was to mess around with their mortal victims by moving objects across their homes, after all. How would you reason with that? How would you try explaining to such a being that they were being ridiculous? To someone who considered turning your tap on in the middle of the night a good way of exacting revenge?

You simply cannot, because it could not be done. Ghosts were the epitome of horror and the whole alien trend was just a natural progression towards something different. Something more physical and armed with more tentacles. Mana was never about having any of their shit. Whereas ghosts were scary because they were incoherent in terms of their motivation and course of action, aliens were just moronic.

What was she even thinking to achieve by just waltzing into this warehouse? Hiding from the drizzle that was beginning to soak the magician from inside out, for one. Why would the people in charge ever talk to her, leave alone expose their dastardly deeds, if there were any to be exposed? Mana usually enjoyed the rain but this drizzle was not much to her fancy, it was baring everything cold and wet about the rain but it had none of the rain's natural Mother Nature kind of charm.

Movie making business looked to be quite loud, for something that started out as a silent slideshow of pictures that beat a local gallery by offering the luxury of changing the pictures for the beholder's static, couch-potato kind of needs, it involved plenty of people yelling at each other.

It was also so… Hectic, reeking of cheap. These cardboard cutouts of characters, these lazy yet shallow, attractive yet rotten personalities attempting to portray the intimacy of one's own mortality or having one's sexual freedom controlled by a one-eyed cardboard cutout with more tentacles than the script of this movie appeared to have pages.

This was pathetic, aliens were just basis for the first impression, the production was deplorable enough for Mana to just twirl around the scurrying staff and ask the director whatever questions she had. If she asked the man about being in the movie and the man wasted as much as a second on this foolhardy request, it would be the most forethought this production had seen before being decided to be given birth in the first place.

"Excuse me, who are you? We are shooting a picture here, young lady, please leave these premises."

Someone asked Mana nicely, but not before placing their hand on her shoulder. This entire place was bustling with so many microscopic chakra signatures that the magician had not even noticed that she was being noticed. In a town of few to none ninja, this may have been a problem. Sensing people in such a busy hotbed was similar to trying to count atoms with a naked eye.

"I need to talk to the person in charge about being in this movie." Mana tried her best, granted, her best was quite absurd when judging from an objective point of view, but the objective scale of the quality standard was not the norm when this tentaclicious disaster was involved.

"Very funny, girl! Hey, I need help with this!" The whoever of whichever movie yelled out at his coworkers as their attempts to move the magician out of place by yanking at her elbow had proven themselves to be verily laughable.

"Why is this minor in this facility? We have nude scenes shooting in five minutes!" The second of the movie shooting crew that was impressive for its size, if only for the reason that so many people could have been so deluded as to consider this picture a good idea, yelled out, trying to move Mana as well.

"Can you at least tell me the name of the director?" Mana asked as her eyes wandered on each chair of the more important crewmembers having a name in sticker form placed on them, yet lacking their respective position in the production. Just another testament to how mismanaged this whole deal was.

"Tokuse Bonda, please leave now!" one of the people that had noticed Mana enter their glorified tin den insisted before noticing that neither of them had the magician in their grasp, to begin with, and that Mana had simply disappeared from their sights as if she was never there at all.

"Bonda-san, I want to talk to you about your motion picture." Mana boldly declared as she had approached the director's chair fast enough to just instantaneously appear to the limited perception of the director's mind. Something that made the man flip out and almost fumble out of his chair.

The appearance of Tokuse Bonda really did not remind the magician of how she had always imagined artists she thought were responsible for making movies to look. She was not sure if this was ground for suspicion of merely a false projection she had failed to justify, her mind leaned more for towards the former. He was a slim and quite boringly dressed bald-headed and sickly, moderately aged man.

"W-What the hell are you talking about, unless you have governor's permit I won't show you anything!" the man fixed his shaky position in his overly comfortable and expensive for his merit and artistic integrity chair.

"Yeah, I don't think that will happen. I am Nakotsumi Mana from Konoha, you may know me better by my stage name – Konoha's Sorceress and I want to get involved in the whole start-up business." Mana wondered if the man identified her right as he was treating her as some sort of Shukuba Security Force officer in charge of investigating his picture. Not that his production was not a crime against humanity and art in general…

"Oh… I mean… Just go to his office and mention the magic word - "start-up" to his receptionist. He obviously won't waste his time with any appointments otherwise." Bonda breathed out easier, Mana wondered if the man was an imbecile or if her attire legitimately gave him grounds to suspect her being a Shukuba Security official. Either way, his jumpy reaction to the possible danger of Security Force attention suggested Mana was looking the right direction to say the least.

So "start-up" really was a trigger word of the sort. Mana now realized why someone who looked so excited about the magician performing in his town was as excited as he was and yet refused to see her. Apparently, the word served not only as an alleged description of everything that was wrong with this town but also was the only way of ever being welcomed into Sho's office without kicking its door down and leaving a trail of unconscious bodies behind, not quite Mana's way.

"If you told me more about your picture and the whole start-up gig in general, maybe I'd agree to show up in your movie. You could use some star-power, right?" Mana grinned, she was just barely managing to restrain her childish embarrassment when in presence of artistic liberties of that specific variety, seeing the ladies in the warehouse shedding an alarming amount of clothes and being rubbed with coal and dirt as if they had survived a point-blank explosion in a comic book strip world.

"We have plenty of star power!" Bonda pouted his lips like a capricious heir to fortune who was being told that their piano skills could use some work before meeting Mana's mocking gaze and folding like a sweaty cheater in a game of poker when gangsters joined the table.

"Yeah, who?" Mana gambled by trying to look like she knew some names in the movie industry, she did not. Despite her lack of convincing lying skills, she guessed right, when she deduced that this bum was a poor judge of acting quality and a director by name only. This whole production set reeked of fund laundering of the most pathetic lack of skill in disguising it variety. The picture of the answer to the questions Lord Sixth raised was beginning to take shape in Mana's mind.

"Fair point…" Bonda wheezed out.

Just as the magician had thought she had Tokuse Bonda playing her game, just when he was about to spill everything about the start-ups, a formally dressed and official looking duo approached the director's chair. For a moment the duo confused Mana, they seemed to evade the hectic and hostile reception newcomers were granted upon entry into the loosely secured territory but when the magician noticed the dark flak jackets zipped up under their suits, she realized what was going on.

She may have sensed a buzzing swarm of low-signatures incoming. By all means, she could have, had it not been for how low their signatures were, had it not been by how invested Mana was in pursuit of her leak and how deep in thought she was trying to say the right words at the right time and analyze her conversant. Even if she was a sensor, sensing a handful of people rushing into such an already crowded place was the same as counting fruit flies from a kilometer away.

The wolves of justice of the Shukuba town had beaten her to the punch. The situation had escalated even more as she could not afford either option – engaging the Shukuba Security would have complicated her stay immensely as she would have found herself complicating the relationship between Konohagakure and the pleasure town that served as almost a legal person vassal to the great ninja village.

On the other hand, she needed to hear what Bonda had to tell her before it was spilled to the Shukuba Security, or even at the same time, the point was – Mana needed that information.

"Shukuba Security, Mr. Bonda, please come with us." A blond haired woman informed the uneasy director who looked just as confused as Mana was inside.

Why would the Security come for this guy, was this not a town-wide scheme? More so, why now? Surely, there have been countless other directors laundering Fire Lord's funding to make a shameful excuse of movies and flush the rest of the funds down their own pockets and the pockets of anyone involved in this scheme.

"I-I don't understand, have I broken any laws? I am shooting a movie here, the governor knows about this and approved of this production himself!" Bonda writhed like a slug who has found himself dropped out of the bucket into a field of salt.

"The perp rolled around the butter of corruption and everlasting decay that has come to envelop this town. Ironically enough, someone who would normally denounce any ties to their schemes and filthy little plots, now wrapped around them with all of their long and scaly hides." The second security officer, a relatively aged man wearing a somewhat loose and untidy shirt with messily tied tie began spouting what appeared to be strictly inner monologue out loud.

Witnessing Mana's confused look at the rambling security officer, the female officer shook her head.

"Don't mind my colleague. We're taking you in for an up to seventy-two hour period, even if you are not officially a suspect yet, as is within our competence as Shukuba Security officers." The woman reached out and broke the director's arms behind his back, making the man wriggle uncomfortably as he was forced to turn on his chair. As the magician's eyes wandered through the crowd, she saw a handful of better-armed and geared officers making similar arrests across the warehouse.

She had to come out, there was simply no other way. The situation was slipping from her hands and if she was to get any answers she had to get them here. Whether it was from Bonda or these two clowns.

"This is bullshit, I tell you, Okasune-san, I thought you were a woman of justice, a hero of the town. Making unlawful arrests like this, Sorceress, make sure to tell the Hokage when you return just what madness is transpiring here!" Bonda squealed and looked adamant about not stopping to do so.

For some reason, Mana's status, once it was revealed to the so called "woman of justice" and "hero of the town", looked quite troubling as she quickly transferred the locked up director to the care of other, better-geared officers before approaching Mana.

"Just what is your involvement with this picture, Konoha's Sorceress?" Officer Okasune attempted to intimidate Mana by using a strict and accusatory tone. Frankly, by all means, this psychological pressure should have worked. This Okasune woman had an aura of confidence and strength about her and the magician would have had no trouble believing that she had made plenty arrests and achieved great success in this town just by Bonda's word alone.

The question was, why was she pursuing a money launderer with such ferocity? Was this truly the right type of procedure for such an arrest? Mana did not know the Konohagakure penal procedures nor ones of Shukuba well enough to confidently doubt Okasune's use of discretion. Right or wrong was a fifty-fifty call in Mana's mind.

The magician crossed her arms under her chest. "I'm a Konohagakure kunoichi investigating a leak of Fire Lord's funding by Hokage's orders."

"That is an odd place to be investigating it." Okasune backed off a little, "May I see some proof?"

"I am not at liberty to show you my mission file, it contains confidential information, all I can show you is my ID." Mana parried Okasune's ocular thrusts aimed at her side.

"The brat claimed to be a Konohagakure ninja investigating the leak herself. If this thing attracted the attention of the big cheese in the big chair, that would have explained why a slayer of the dragon named organized crime and exorcist of the demon named serial murders – Kita Okasune herself decided to investigate a financial crime for once and switch her usual routine as the woman of action for a cup of coffee and a pile of paperwork. That is if the kid truly was who she declared herself to be. The call was Okasune's, as usual…" The oddball male officer kept rambling to himself.

"I think your partner misses the point of the inner part in inner monologue," Mana noted just to ease the tension as Okasune was staring at her ID in a manner that attempted to incinerate the document with her eyes. Even if she did try such a thing, Mana could tell that Okasune's chakra signature was lightyears behind the level needed to accomplish such a thing.

"We get that a lot, Nakotsumi Mana. Itemi does write very detailed and impeccable reports making him an invaluable officer." Kita Okasune sighed as she handed Mana her ID back. The Security officer was really displeased by Mana's presence her for whatever reason. That was when Mana noticed something suspicious, she had spent enough time around a monster of Killing Intent such as Uzumaki Tanshu, she was too well tuned to detect it or avoid its petrifying grasp upon one's throat and heart to miss out on it rearing its ugly head.

Mana's body blurred and disappeared as far as the perception of Okasune Kita and her oddball partner was concerned. The kunoichi appeared right in front of a well-equipped and armored for war Security officer, grabbing the barrel of his massive kunai dispenser and lifting it up fast enough so that the stream of forty kunai fired at the blinding speed of three thousand meters per second did not instantly fill Bonda's body with steel.

Mana was sure that murdering suspects immediately after arresting them for a seventy-two hour period was not textbook Security procedure. Of that much, she was fully certain. Finally, something provided clarity, the man tried fighting back but Mana had disassembled his skewer automaton before he as much as reached for its trigger again. She had seen its like wielded by the Syndicate during her brief run-in with the gang and the weaponry trigger a whole bunch of bad memories.

With a light push of her palm, slamming into the officer's helmet and gas mask, the magician brought the officer down with enough force to shake up his very murderous and misbehaving brain enough so that he would be unable to stand back up for a while.

"Shit, get on him, now!" Okasune commanded with authority in her voice, upon being "encouraged" by their superior, the other officers scurried around Mana and the downed officer and assaulted their murderous colleague, locking him up just like Bonda was locked up previously.

Both arrested people were lead up to two separate caravans with a bunch of masked, geared up and armed Security officers joining them in their trip.

"In a blink of an eye, rather at the speed of cracking atoms, the kid who liked cosplaying as a waitress in spare time revealed herself to be everything she told us she was, and more, if the manner in which she took one of Shukuba's finest was to be paid attention to. I would have liked to commend the beauty and grace inside her movements, I would have liked to commend her great grasp of martial arts, restraint in using her inhuman force and speed, the unimaginable ability to realize that a person whom most would have entrusted their security to was now ready to fill someone's body with kunai knives with such speed that it would have shredded it to fleshy, unrecognizable bits." The male officer kept on rambling as Okasune and he approached Mana.

"Damn, what the hell was that all about…" Kita Okasune scratched her chin in confusion as she appeared to have been caught unprepared by the measures that her own men were prepared to take in this scenario.

Was she trustworthy? It was still not completely outside the realm of possibility that Okasune specifically instructed her men to shred her perp on sight, it was still very much possible that her arrest was unlawful in the first place and Mana, for the first time ever, came up with a unique regret of not carrying a local lawbook in her neat magician hat.

Then again, Okasune could have just been an innocent town hero who decided to cash in an easy arrest and caught unprepared by conspiracies beyond her comprehension. What made matters even more complicated was the fact that Mana knew specifically why a Security officer would attempt to silence the "start-upper". Just as the "start-uppers" exploited financial leaks of Fire Lord's attempt at commendable welfare supporting local artists, the dirty officer was worried that the leakster was about to leak something else entirely, something Mana very much desired and needed to make a return home.

"I'm going with you two to the Security HQ." Mana calmly stated. "There are things I still need to find out before I call it mission complete."

"Young lady, after what I've just seen, we may need you there…" Okasune admitted, relenting to Mana's demands.

While the road to exposing the leak was a bumpy one, Mana appeared to have revealed herself just in the right time and to the right people to possibly maximize the utility of her status for her case. The day was still at its peak, but at least that part of her mission was a massive victory…

* * *

 **Author's Note: Hey, so I recently found out via a Private Message that my fanfiction was ripped apart on Fanfiction Contempt Theater. It was actually done a long time ago but I would have never found out at all had I not been told. You can find it on Too Idiots & Suthner Youtube, I'm pretty sure they do streaming too. They critique fanfiction, from what I've seen, since these guys technically exposed my story to the bigger webs, it's only good sportsmanship to return the favor. Check them out, maybe you'll like their thing. If you only want to see them rip my story apart, I think it's in episode 12. Check those guys out, if you have time to spare and it sounds interesting.**

 **On another note, I'll probably be leaving one or two notes because someone asked for a little more author interaction. I don't know, maybe I'll just leave one or two Easter eggs and/or sources of inspiration or something like that. I'll see how it goes.**


	384. Pleasure Town Perils

"The day was not getting any younger. There were no worries about staying here overnight, we only had seventy-two hours to hold the guy after all. I had no problems slurping down a cup of chili noodles, the chili and black pepper scorched my entire mouth, just as the need to book this guy and bust this case was grilling all of our collective asses." Itemi, the male security officer and one-half of the pair that arrested Bonda earlier, was busy doing his thing.

By now Mana had gotten used to his inner narration being heard by anyone located in the same room as him. True to his vocalized internal monologue the guy was downing a cup of something that had an effluvium of garbage coming off of it with an intensity that perfectly contrasted the bored tone at which Itemi delivered his vocalized inner thoughts to the outside world.

"The magician girl kept staring at me. Wanting, craving to get into the interrogation room and get the information she came here for. Okasune had made sure to keep her within quite the distance from the perp, even if she kept the girl around. I knew where she was coming from, the kid was pretty useful. Muscle and an alarm detector all packed into one and delivered to us in a tightly wrapped package. Nothing could have passed by her, it seemed." Itemi kept talking to himself as his eyes ran down a pile of files, the fact that Mana was sitting directly in front of him either evaded the man's comprehension or was simply irrelevant to him.

"You know, you raise a valid point. All I need is to hear what the guy has to say. Once I confirm my suspicions I can return to Konoha and get out of your and Okasune-san's way." Mana tried to strike up a dialogue with the man. Not necessarily because she thought it possibly resulting in something useful, merely because two dialoguing people sitting right in front of each other made the world seem saner than letting Itemi go on.

"She tried sending her fleet, riding the stormy waves at my shore. She did not know that Itemi Manin was a wall and that none of her figurative sailors would return to their families – my composure was an iron rock, to persevere and weather the storm was my objective. Let Okasune do her thing. She was the best at it. Act intrigued by paperwork, chow down the noodles, stonewall the magician girl the best I can until Okasune finished another miracle arrest." The man mumbled to himself.

"Wait, who's that woman?" Mana pointed at a tall, raven-haired woman of darker skin, possibly Land of Wind complexion, wearing a red leather jacket and a short black dress underneath.

"When the kid first pointed me in the direction of my fate I thought it to be just an attempt to distract me. The more I thought about it from that point on, the more foolish it seemed. The brat needed no distractions, she could have just blitzed to the interrogation room and we'd all be none the wiser, no one could have stopped her. That was when I turned to see the hottest piece of femme fatale knockout I'd ever seen, it was the type of woman that literally changes your life. The fire of this western hotness and Okasune's ice were about to clash as the gorgeous goddess strut into the interrogation room unimpeded."

"Oh for the love of…" Mana slammed the table she was banging her fingers at for a while now as she jumped on her feet and walked into the interrogation room, a bunch of officers tried to halt her progress towards the room, perfectly executing Okasune's orders to keep the magician out. It was not like they ever had hopes of touching Mana to begin with, with gentle bobs and weaves the magician evaded their grasp, dancing around them and evading them like a skilled swordsman evades drops of rain in an autumnal downpour.

"Oh, come on, is no one watching the door?" Okasune grunted seeing Mana enter the room right after whoever that other woman was.

"I just need a confession, after that, I'm out of this town. That's all I need." Mana pleaded with the woman. If she was anything of what she was described as being: a wolf of justice, a hero of the town, she'd understand.

"Yeah, you and me both, missy." Okasune bit her thumb nervously as the woman in red unbuttoned her jacket and sat down by the side of Bonda, placing it on the chair behind her.

"Konoha's Sorceress has permission to be here. As per the treaty signed by the Fourth Hokage and Shukuba administrator, the Shukuba security and Konohagakure ninja cooperate where Shukuba's criminal, civil or administrative law crosses with the objectives of Konoha ninja." The woman ruffled her long and curly hair, flaring her dark blue eyes at the Shukuba Security officer, infuriating her.

"The treaty does not go into detail of how much liberty exactly do Konoha ninja have in terms of criminal procedure. The fact that Konoha's Sorceress is here, to begin with, is "cooperation" enough." Okasune slammed her hands against the steel table, lowering her face up to the face of the mysterious western woman. The eyes of the Shukuba Security officer shimmered not just with rage, they were outright hateful towards the other lady, just who on Earth was she?

"Well, as pleasing as it would be for me to educate you in the matters of international law, officer Okasune, I'd like to request that you release Tokuse Bonda immediately as his arrest is entirely unlawful." The woman requested, her calm and triumphant face showed the entire Security HQ that she held all the aces in her hand and she was not afraid to alert the world of it.

Itemi entered the interrogation room. When Okasune's eyes sparked hellfire at his direction for failing to contain Mana in the outside area of the interrogation room, the man just shrugged, shaking it off. It appeared that sometimes the man was capable of silence. Maybe it was just the sheer pressure of the presence of the western woman in the interrogation room that uneased the aged man and caused him to break out of his usual routine, just like a stammering man could sing clearly when they were pronouncing their words accompanied by a melody.

"I find it extremely suspicious that a woman associated with Yokotomo Donyoku involves herself in this case not even one hour past Bonda's arrest." Okasune growled like a dog about to lunge. Something about this situation was seriously setting the hero of Shukuba off the wrong way, she knew something Mana did not, something that clearly terrified her and it was abundantly clear to the magician that the officer was not about to let the magician in on it.

"It does not matter what you find suspicious, officer Okasune, you arrested Tokase Bonda on the grounds of a possible detainment without cause for seventy-two hours, for the sole reason of identifying the man in question and recording his ID in any relevant case documents. Has Tokuse Bonda provided any identification?" the westerner looked at Bonda with a questioning glare.

"I did, ma'am, the first thing I did, honestly! Okasune-san just won't back off my tail, however. I'm just an innocent artist trying to create some art, this is a very soul crushing experience, I think I'll come down with depression or something." Bonda wiped the sweat off his face. If this man provided his ID the first thing when delivered to the Security HQ, he was better versed in local laws than Mana, which in itself was shady enough. There was no better master of laws back in Konoha, nor a shadier man back home than Hanada Katsuo, Mana made sure to remember that for the future.

"Well then, why is this man not released yet then? This whole depression thing and the delay on the movie's production sounds to me like an application to the governor for compensation of damages waiting to happen, Okasune-san. Your first, if I am not mistaken. Perhaps it would be more tact to just release this man and not stain your stellar record?" This lady revealed herself to be incredibly well versed in the local laws.

The situation unwinding in the interrogation room was pinning more and more pictures and connecting more and more rubber bands on the conspiracy board inside Mana's head. She needed to slow it all down, catch up to all that she had found out up to now.

First of all, the leak of Fire Lord's funds is due to governor Sho's abusive executive decrees and treaties with the Fire Lord that support local artists with massive welfare payments that result in absolute disgraces to the artistic world and bucketloads of money laundered down the drain. That much was crystal clear, it also pretty much fulfilled Mana's mission objective.

Regardless, this case was much dimmer lit than that. Why did Okasune Kita, an officer with a flawless arrest record, someone regarded as a hero of her town and so well-received by her coworkers and the general audience, as proven by everyone Mana meets singing her praises, book in such a shoddy and, apparently, unlawful arrest? More so, just who was this woman, who was this Yokotomo Donyoku person associated with her, according to Okasune? Why did some completely unrelated officer try to murder Tokuse Bonda violently in the middle of his arrest, was this man connected with this western lawyer woman and this Donyoku or was he his own player?

This was six leagues above Mana's comprehension, she had most of what she came here for but this mystery kept pulling the magician in. Like the imaginary scent of an attractive female cat that drew in a male cat in one of those weekend cartoons and newspaper strips, drew them levitating above the ground towards the core of their affection, this mystery drew Mana in as well, in a manner not unlike those male cats were drawn in by.

Much to her frustration, Okasune had to allow Bonda to leave with the western woman. The sweat on the officer's forehead, the messy bangs falling over her face and constantly gritting teeth telegraphed her mood quite nicely. One did not have to be that much of a people's person to know exactly how the woman felt. Then, in a moment of levity, the woman just sighed and swallowed all of her anger before tumbling onto the same chair where Bonda was sitting just now.

* * *

"Why did you do that? Why did you arrest Bonda unlawfully, knowing quite well that he'd be released like this?" Mana confronted the woman, that may not have been the right approach, Okasune was nervous to the verge of breaking down just a moment ago, her current emotional serenity could have been a façade.

"Never mind that, it does not matter now." Okasune sighed, breathing out a huff so light that it reminded of a breath that a person who has been tortured for ages let out upon the sweet release of death embracing them. "You have everything you need. I'll give you everything we have on the leak, the Hokage won't demand as much evidence as the local tribunals. As long as the leaks stop, it's a mission complete for you, isn't it?"

Mana nodded in unease. She was not sure what troubled her more, the fact that Okasune was so deceitfully calm right after losing a man she pursued and pressed on so hard or that the magician did not want to leave this town just yet.

"Actually, I will stick around this place for a bit longer. I'll send a pidgeon to Konoha Aviary with my report and the files you give me." Mana declared.

"That was surprising. Did the kid think we were in on the leak or did she think we've missed something? Either way, I was not sure how to take it. Regardless the reason for her decision to stick around, it was negatively reflecting on our work in the brat's mind. That made me simmer, we may not have been able to quite breathe the amount of fire this kid's been used to spitting but we were every bit as devoted as she was. Who was I kidding? Half of this HQ would have sold justice out for a cup of bitter and dark coffee straight out of the jungles of southern Fire Country. Maybe that was it, the fact that Okasune and I weren't the same and yet this kid filed all of us together, the paperclip of her words sticking its sharp end straight through my chest and bleeding me out…"

Mana waited for a while for Itemi's vocalized inner monologue to cease, she actually felt a bit surprised by how well the man could control his breathing and the emotion he put into his words. It was like he was quoting it all for some sort of audio diary recording or something…

"I don't recommend jumping on the leak bandwagon, not right after you exposed it to your superiors. You'll get suspended if not demanded a seppuku." Okasune waved her hand indifferently. Wrapping her long fingers around her tired face and rubbing her eyes to fight off the weariness.

"It's not that. Bonda was almost killed today for reasons that I still do not fully understand. I have a feeling that these leaks are the least of this town's worries. Living in this town is dangerous and I'm going to change that. As a ninja I have a responsibility to use my greater power to protect those without it, change the world and make all life worth something in the eyes of the people that inherit it. That is my nindo, my ninja way." Mana declared.

She was going above and beyond her mission objective. This was no longer about the mission, this was Mana's own decision and her own actions. She no longer would have the official back-up of her superiors to use, no more mission objectives, international treaties to wave around. No more legal or procedural corners she could cut. Whatever happened here, she'd be responsible for it. Just a single word from Lord Sixth and she'd have to trek home and receive new mission objectives, leaving this behind.

Redemption was a common motive all over Mana's life, she met plenty of people in look of redeeming themselves when she was looking for the Box of Ultimate Bliss. In a way, Itemi and Okasune were attempting to redeem the reputation of this entire Security HQ, if Itemi's inner reflections made public were to be trusted. This would be the redemption of Mana as a kunoichi. Once more she would try helping people the way she wanted to as a ninja, using the skills she had learned and putting the fruits of her lifelong training to labor.

"I guess she was a good kid. Hopelessly naïve, would it take a day, a fortnight maybe, in this town before all that naivety was shredded to bits by high pressure blade firing cannons of cynicism, before her rose glasses were busted up by the bat of sarcasm, before she began drowning a blabbermouth ratty colleague in alcohol and decided to sell her soul on a roll of a dice or a draw of a card in the gambling house. Seeing stuff like that would never stop feeling crushing." Itemi lit a cigarette, despite his bleak predictions for Mana's goal here in Shukuba, he breathed out a mouthful of smoke through a reserved grin.

"Itemi's right, you are a good kid, Sorceress. I wish more stars would be like you. I wish you good luck in whatever you're looking to find here." Okasune nodded with a hopeful smile. "As for me, the workday is officially over. I'm off to drown my sorrows back home. How about it, Itemi, wanna raise a glass for another one that got away, to another day of justice well-served and tax money well-spent?"

"She asked me knowing full-well that I have changed my poison from sake to cigarettes. The old fox knew that liquor was pulling me in every time I lit a smoke of what I considered a lesser evil. If I started again I could never stop. Once more I'd give in reports soaked in rings of sake glass where I slammed them down right on my worktable. Was she just checking if my defenses were still up, like a cruel classmate that punches you in the gut in the gym shower just to teach you a cruel lesson that life will never fail to keep punching you and your abdomen needs to be tensed up at all times? Women… Who knew what they were thinking truly…" Itemi kept doing his thing. His rambling was being a bit less comprehensive as he held his cigarette tightly pressed in between the rows of his yellow teeth.

"Before I end this day, I'd like to talk to the officer that tried to kill Bonda", Mana voiced her intention, expecting to hear some more information about where the man was being held and a possible way she could do that.

"Doubt that's possible", Okasune raised her palm to interrupt a pain-ridden monologue that Itemi was about to go into again. "The guy's been taken to an arrest home already, it's a facility of much higher security and after tomorrow's tribunal hearing he'll be transferred right to prison, I'm afraid. The best time to do that would be first thing tomorrow morning, before the hearing."

Mana noted that information. Okasune did have a point, talking to a prisoner post-tribunal hearing would be immensely difficult for a Konoha ninja who had no official business of being in town. Mana's attention for today would have been best served drafting the report and the message and making sure that it is sent out and delivered by the end of today's workday in Konoha Aviary. That was not such a likely thing to happen but in terms of work progress it was better to shoot for the impossible and then deal with the best reality could offer.

"Do you have a place to go?" Okasune stopped halfway through the door of the interrogation room, with Mana standing up and following to woman, intending to use the worktable of either Okasune or Itemi to draft up the message and include the files that the hero of Shukuba promised her and Itemi was already out gathering.

"No." Mana shook her head. "I figured I'd find a hostel or something like that later. I need to focus on my report first."

"I see, well, I'm sure you'll find something, you're a bright kid. Good luck with your future ventures." Okasune playfully paid Mana respects with two of her fingers pressed to her temple before departing with a hopeful smile. There was a scent of acceptance of Mana was not quite sure what in the woman's voice.

Her reply was so odd, given her personality and what the magician came to learn about Kita Okasune, she had expected to be offered to sleep over at the officer's place. Granted, Mana would have most likely refused that suggestion either way, feeling a bit too embarrassed about such a thing, but the fact that the woman simply shrugged it off with such indifference troubled the magician for some reason.

The first day in Shukuba had proven to be nothing like Mana expected it to be or could wrap her brain around.

* * *

 **Author's Note: Clearly this arc's been just a big tribute to my love of noir movies. Granted, I'm not a great and mighty writer, one that would be able to weave a flawless narrative, mix in multiple complex plotlines and create timeless characters in a gritty and realistic world filled with nihilistic inner monologues etc. When I do homages for the things I like, as this whole story is nothing more but me writing about things I like, things I'd like to read myself if I was** **reader, I sometimes feel like a girl trying on mom's dresses when she leaves to work :D**

 **I know that so far the whole Shukuba arc has been quite slow and uneventful, not really what people are looking in a Naruto fanfiction as its all just one big confusing mess. Partly because I wanted it to be overwhelming and confusing with threads and questions of varied importance just stacking on top of one another. Part of it is, of course, the fact that I'm still growing as a writer and learning to balance multiple ongoing plot threads... Anyway, I promise that by the end it will all make much more sense (I hope :D), in fact, after the next chapter, those who revisit Mana's clash with the Syndicate back in Fire Country and Otogakure way back may be able to piece most of the puzzle together as some of what's to come has been foreshadowed back then.**

 **When I think about it, this whole story up to now has been nothing but foreshadowing, numbers shuffled into a deck of four aces, in what was supposed to be a full-ace deck :D**


	385. Drowning

The streetlights had gone out for the morning. It was not something of great significance, not quite a life or death type alert. Regardless of that fact, Mana opened her eyes and stood up from the bench in the middle of the town square where she was residing the whole night, meditating. It may have been a tad too early to declare an end to the night, given that the sky would still be dark for hours, but the magician was finished with that town square.

It was not that Mana could not have paid for a shabby roof over her head and a bedbug-ridden place to rest her head on for a single laydown. She just found herself conflicted and at a bizarre case of inner strife. There was something about this town, something about that last day that, not all by themselves necessarily, but in a peculiar combo of the two prevented the magician of even thinking about sleeping.

It was as if this entire town leaked out some strange incense of malice at night. At this point, the magician was not sure, if she was imagining it or if the mysterious, town-size mass of reek of bloody murder was real. One part of Mana told her that she could not have caught a whiff of anything – there was no logical reason for her to worry, nothing solid, anyways, she could not have been sensing anything at all.

But then… Even civilians sometimes had bad hunches that were justified. History was full of stories of people who sensed something bad in the air around them and did not depart on trips that would have been fateful to them. In theory, if a great combination of chakra signatures of outright wicked, twisted, beyond redemption scumbags all gathered in one place, Mana, as a sensor could sense their inner natures impacting their chakra signatures.

The problem was – Mana did not quite know for sure how dark and corrupted chakra signatures felt, only had it told and described to her. What was to say this wasn't just her making stuff up. The report was out, her mission was over, and yet… Mana stayed in Shukuba, rotting in its reek and letting it soak her in its corruption, making her shake from her very core.

Indeed, Shukuba was different at night compared to the happy-go-lucky ball of cheers, carnivals and ice cream vendors it was during the day.

* * *

With a yawn, Mana entered the Security HQ, looking to meet with Itemi and Okasune. It felt odd referring to one with their first name, while Mana always thought of the other referring with their last name. It was just that whereas Itemi was so goofy and weird and officer Okasune described as such a big and deserved servant of her town that an honorable referral seemed to be in order.

"The kid waltzed in like she owned the place, the sentiment present not in her strut, hell, she was basically dragging her feet behind her. It was just that she came back even though she had no reason to. No one in their right mind ever took a one-two Shukuba beatdown and came back for more with a bloody smile. Rough night? I asked her." Itemi did his thing.

"Not really, I found it quite productive training my chakra capacity through the night. I've spent some yesterday while I was sneaking around, figured some meditation and chakra node stimulation was in order while it was recovering." Mana yawned again. It was unlike a kunoichi to get tired this easily. Ninja were used to taking multiple sleepless nights with their chakra augmentations sustaining their systems. Maybe there was more to this "Shukuba beatdown" than the magician heeded.

"Right… Chakra… That was that spiritual thing ninja had. I had no idea how would one even go about training such a thing, figured that with the unjust world we live in, you'd live with what you're born with." Itemi shrugged as he sipped a cup of something very aromatic.

"Not quite. It's not only spiritual either. Chakra is both physical and spiritual in nature, only by training both parts of one's body can it be made to grow efficiently." Mana replied feeling oddly honored that Itemi was genuinely interested in ninja. Given how most of her interactions with the civilians was about her profession as a stage magician, talking about this to someone who had not undergone the ninja training felt very exciting.

"Huh. Spiritual mumbo jumbo, I guess momma was right, I could have never made a ninja. I was always more of a lift a bunch of weights – punch someone in the face as hard as the weights you've been lifting let you kind of guy. Okasune may have been pretty intrigued by this shit, she was into the whole spiritual way of life kind a books. Speaking of the big starlet, where the hell was she? I kept nervously looking around, figuring that maybe during one of my smoking breaks I missed her coming to work. Figuring… Yeah right… Hoping, more like it".

Itemi's growling outer monologues were making Mana's sleepless night feel that much more draining but the officer raised a pretty solid point. Officer Okasune didn't appear to be present in the office, the magician tried to figure out if anything on her table was moved the slightest since the three left the HQ yesterday. Even if a hint of a migraine and general snooze was plotting against Mana's skills and memory, she could easily see that nothing was even remotely moved.

That could have waited. Mana's interview with an attempted murderer could not have.

"Can we see that officer as soon as possible? Okasune-san promised she'd let me do that this morning and this is on a schedule." Mana looked at Itemi who just raised his eyebrows before sipping from his cup again and putting a bunch of shiny accessories in the pockets of his jacket before zipping it up and standing up.

"Sure thing, I answered the kid. For all the talk she gave about healthy spirituality and all that shit, she was as obsessed as the best of us, or rather, those that let their obsessions drag them under. The healthy ones could move on, wave their hands and feet and surface before they breathed too much of that filth in, the rest were stuck, staring at the surface with bloodshot eyes while the swampy yuck filled their dead lungs. Speaking of filthy lungs…" Itemi cracked a spark, lighting up a smoke as he waved for Mana to follow.

"Okasune was a big girl, she could take care of herself was what I kept telling myself. Still, it wasn't like her to miss the early hours of work. Back when we were both young interns her office window was always open in the morning even when the janitors arrived at the place first."

Mana had expected Itemi to be much more vocal during the brief drive of a caravan that took the two of them to the local arrest facility. Maybe it was his nervousness and worry over his partner and friend but the man was just staring lifelessly through the half-open glass, occasionally letting the smoke from his simmering puff leave the caravan through the window.

It was not until the duo stood on the first step of the stairs leading up to the arrest house of Shukuba that the man remembered to talk, given what Mana had learned of him up to now, him not talking was the same as him forgetting to feel which creeped her out.

"Shukuba arrest house. A processing facility for beat meat before it's sourced, evaluated by a pretty well-fed butcher and sent to an appropriate home. Tough shit, these deviants weren't even decent enough to be categorized as meat, meat fed some people after the butcher identified and worked his magic with it. As the case was with the deplorable, usually the people had to feed them."

"I disagree, Itemi-san. I view prisons as a sort of reformation facility and welfare of supporting them as an investment for the future, once the prisoners leave and are reformed." Mana stated with a smile.

"The kid remained hopeful as usual. The hypocrisy in her sprayed like blood from someone stabbed in the alleyway for their fancy pair of shoes. She's spent one day in Shukuba and she already had bags under her eyes. A week later, she may have been the one running around with carnage in her eyes, killing people because they had fancier looking cardboard boxes to sleep in." Itemi mumbled as the two approached the door of the arrest house with the officer removing his smoke and tossing it away.

A short while after the door closed behind the two, Mana ran out from inside the arrest house to step a pair of times on the cigarette before trying to enter again but, still feeling uneasy about it, picking it up and throwing it into the trash just a few meters away.

By the time Mana found Itemi inside the facility, he was already working on some kind of a deal with a security officer that looked about halfway geared compared to the task force sent to arrest Tokuse Bonda yesterday. The girl just stood behind the two talking men, rubbing her shoe uneasily against the floor until she was called up.

"Okasune-san referred to some "Yokotomo Donyoku" fellow yesterday when speaking to that woman. Who is he?" Mana wondered. She meant nothing by it, just something to kill some time and, maybe, make the overall picture at least a little bit clearer.

"The smoke-police asked a silly question about a nobody. Someone who played one too many scavenger hunts and accidentally found a treasure in someone's backyard. Yokotomo Donyoku had nothing to do with anything so it felt interesting why the brat was so interested in him. Then again, it must have been overwhelming just jumping onboard a moving train and expecting to know which way the coal on it was going."

Mana and Itemi got lead into a room with the officer, the man looked about as rough as a man who spent most of yesterday arrested would look. That was a pity as the officer was pretty young and, Mana could tell, quite attractive.

"Why'd you do it?" Mana jumped to the point. The sleepless night, that worked her like a rider worked a mare they rode overnight, despite her better willfulness of admitting it, was her reason for doing it.

"Just following orders." The man shrugged his shoulders, tossing his hands as high up as his binds allowed him. Mana squinted suspiciously, what did that mean?

"Just following orders my ass. We all got the same set of orders, Okasune was running the whole operation. There could have been no way that she ordered some ambitious schmuck, straight out of Security boot camp with high marks and shoot-for-the-top attitude to just shred a guy in the middle of the op." Itemi raged, moving in on the guy and grabbing him by the hair, attempting to slam his face into the table before Mana stopped the man by placing her hand on his shoulder, having moved up from behind him right after he charged up to the poor man.

"Are you implying that Okasune-san ordered you to kill Bonda? Why would she do that?" Mana wanted some more clarification if she was to buy this man's version. Still, at the very least his side of the story deserved to be heard.

"I dunno, one morning she just whispered it into my ear. Had to do it, she's always been pretty indifferent and cold. She played me like a jack thrown out onto a field of kings. I've been wanting her affection, as much as a pleasant wink that the mere suggestion of what she desired just flung me that way. It stopped mattering what the thing she asked me to do was, it had to be done." The deviant kept talking, he was clearly crushed by the whole experience. So much even that Mana was beginning to believe parts of what he was saying.

Itemi did not look like about to buy into it, the Security officer grabbed the man's head and smashed it against the table, leaving a good, bowl-deep dent in it while the nose of the ex-officer spilled with red all over.

"I couldn't believe what the guy was saying. Kita, a treasured friend, an old-time colleague was sleeping around with this loser? No way. Wasn't having any of that. My fist pounded and pounded on his face, like a hammer trying to call some sort of sick sense upon the world, if any of that sense was the master of the mansion of rational mind I was knocking on, it would have come and opened the door. It took the brat a while to stop me, she must have gotten worried about the asshole getting killed."

Mana did take longer than she should have. She should not have had Itemi laying hands on the guy to begin with. The whole thing with Okasune being thrown into the line of fire and how little sense it made, but how convincingly the story was weaved and told, made Mana submerge down under. She couldn't swim any longer, the dirt, the blood and, most importantly, the irrationality of its mysteries and lack of any progress towards them moving forward made the magician sink slowly to the bottom as her lungs were beginning to fill with the filth.

Like a saving grace, a hand of some Security officer pulled Mana and Itemi out of the interrogation room before beginning to yell at them. While the magician felt grateful that she was moved from that gruesome scene but the words of the officer just rang through her ears like shellshock. There may not have been a shell to be shocked by, the real shells would have still been to come when the dust settles and the two have to make any sense out of everything that remains.

"There can't be any doubt, he told us what he believed. I could tell that much, I can stand by my word." Mana ruffled her hair before sitting down on a nearby bench and wrapping her fingers around her head as if trying to squeeze a single rational thought out of it.

"The girl was freaking out. No wonder, she was trying to sift through more quicksand with her fingers than she could possibly even imagine existing. She wanted to be the rational problem solver but at the moment she was just breaking down. Just a bother. Then again, given it's Kita we're talking about – I was afraid that so was I. The moment the Security officer in me awakened from the voluntary breakdown, I would have had to confront the painful truth."

"You mean, you believe Okasune-san could have been in on it?" Mana looked up.

"The kid was talking hogwash. Her mission was over, this was long past just the Fire Lord's goddamn money. This was about the integrity of the last good woman in Shukuba and how quickly its foundation was crumbling. No, Kita was not in on it. She could not have been in on it, she'd have had nothing to gain from killing the self-righteous fop, good, old-fashioned Security dirt, however… Yeah. I understood it perfectly now, not because of the lack of trying to forget it all and stumble in the dark like the little magician girl was."

Mana was not quite sure what Itemi was talking about, she could put some pieces together. So the officer believed that Okasune may have had some dirt on her hands and, somehow, this action was supposed to keep that dirt hidden? It was a shoddy explanation at best.

"We need to visit Okasune-san's apartment." Mana may not have known exactly what was running through Itemi's brilliant mind but she knew at least that much. She'd catch up to the man eventually, he had an incredible ability to be unable to keep something like this hidden.

"The kid was right, of course, I lit another smoke. Shit, for this I may as well start drinking again. Before Kita's record got dirtied by the footsteps of someone with boots just as shitty as Kita's final days were, I needed to set the record straight. A fucking brilliant bitch irony was – for once in her life when Kita was looking for redemption, she was about to be caught red-handed for all the skeletons in the drawer of the great Shukuba hero. Had she kept rubbing hands with the boneheads - she'd have been just fine. Just another gold star in her starry ledger."

The duo rushed back into the carriage with Itemi tipping the coachman with Okasune's location. As the carriage was passing by a small lantern where a dark blue pidgeon was sitting, Itemi whistled and the bird caught up with him, settling on the leathery arm of its summoner.

The man attached something he had just scribbled with an off-hand while it was not holding his cigarette before letting the bird take flight.

"What was that?" Mana inquired.

"The kid was completely oblivious to the procedure, hell, she was oblivious to what Kita was up to until yesterday. Should she have been let in on it? Shit… Kita liked the brat, she looked at the Sorceress with that kind of hopeful eyes that I and her got when we were training to become Shukuba Security. Where in the hell did those eyes go? Where in the hell did those times go?"

"That's not a viable answer to that question." Mana insisted. The bad feeling in her heart that was ever-present through the night and kept her awake persisted, not only that, it was slowly growing as it pulsed like a tumor in her gut.

Before Itemi could explain, the carriage stopped and he threw himself outside, rushing to Okasune's door and slamming it down. Shukuba Security appeared to possess a moderate amount of physical aspect training, it would explain how Itemi managed to hurt that ex-officer back there that badly that fast and how he so effortlessly blasted the door out.

Laying in the pool of her blood, Okasune laid sprawled out on the floor. While Mana covered her mouth and took a couple of moments to let this sight sit with her, Itemi did not appear nearly as surprised. This entire way here, he was expecting to see something like this. Secretly hoping that nothing like this would have happened but…

This was the reality. Just a beginning of another workday in Shukuba.


	386. Murders Most Foul

After the initial shock of seeing Shukuba's hero laying down murdered and in the pool of her blood, Mana's eyes started racing across the room, trying to figure out who could have done this. There could have been no mistake, Okasune was capable as much as she was intelligent, even given the recent incriminating information that Itemi and Mana got. She would not have just been caught off guard by just anyone.

"There it was. The one of a kind moment that shatters the stained glass window of your life and begins violently breaking down any walls that separate the isolated rooms of your mind's palace. My friend, colleague, and sister-in-arms laid dead, her essence stolen from her violently right after she did the unthinkable - tried to do the right thing. I needed to know the whos and whys, but I just… Kid, I need to know I can trust to involve you in this, give me a rundown of what happened here before the Security forensics do, then I'll let you work with me on solving this."

"Are you serious? A life was taken, there's no time to fool around. We need to work together on this. Work this out by pooling our efforts, not playing games." Mana snapped back at the officer. Itemi's eyes looked dead-serious.

Despite noticing a whole bunch of details all over the place, they just didn't connect. How was Mana supposed to know just what kind of wound the opening on Okasune's chest was? The blood splatter patterns, while distinctive also told Mana nothing. Only one detail of note, one thing Mana has been trained in as a ninja – tracing.

"She was killed by a woman." Mana uttered before covering her face. Staring at Okasune's dead body was just too painful. Initially came the self-blame, Mana did sense something off in the air, there were signs, Okasune felt so worried over Mana yet wanted to remain so distant, almost like she knew she was going to die.

"A woman? What was the kid talking about? I could see a whole bunch of clues, but I could not see any distinctive feminine tracks amongst the blood stains on the floor. Maybe she was making it up? She was desperate to work this case and she did mean well but… Good intentions don't matter. A nice fellow can go fuck themselves for all I care, it's how good you are at what you do that makes it or breaks it in life and right now, the kid was tanking her assignment hard."

"Look, I'm not as well versed in investigations like you. But look at the spaces between these blood stains, they're left by a woman's step, the spaces between the tracks and smears are not wide enough to be those of a man. She was also not as tall or bulky as a man as the front of her tracks are much more defined, meaning the angle of her step made her lean more on the front of her foot, like she was used to wear more feminine footwear."

"The kid may have had a point, ninja could have been trained to track someone, whether someone they had to kill or just someone to capture. I guess we used a whole different way of tracking, reading papers, vouchers, receipts and tracking where the money goes, not the actual footprints. I needed a drink. This looked up to be a pretty long week…"

"Itemi-san, you need my help. I won't leave you, whether you like it or not. It's clear that if you look in deeper, you'll end up the same way as Okasune-san. I cannot allow that." Mana's resolution was iron-hard. She locked her hands below her chest and tapped her heel to the floor.

"The kid was stubborn but delusional. She may have had the force to play some sick marble game with worlds themselves and the speed to move between countries in mere moments but in this town and case she was limited to what her mind could tell her and her mind was that of a child. I won't waste my time training her in this business, people with the skillset of mine and Kita's and the mindset of the Sorceress had a nasty tendency to end up dead and I've had way too much blood soaking my consciousness."

Itemi stepped outside, Mana closed her eyes and tried making a split-second decision. To follow her ass of a… Whatever Itemi was to Mana at this moment, or to try and work out this murder scene and play Itemi's game. It all depended on the girl's confidence to convince the man that he was wrong dismissing her like that but, being confronted by her failure as an advocate and protector of life, Mana had very little of that left to go around.

Mana tried, again and again, to work out what had happened here, read into every detail she could. Obviously, she knew not to mess around the scene too much and touch anything but as long as she did not change anything the forensics should have been able to work their magic out anyways, this state of the scene of the murder was enough for Itemi to figure his version out, was it not?

This was pointless, Mana could not tell if the gaping laceration on the center of Okasune's chest was a stab wound of a blade piercing her heart or if it was delivered by a kunai dispenser of a lower firing power, she had seen the Syndicate wearing smaller handheld versions of those death-firing tubes after all. The blood splatter also told Mana nothing, mainly because she could not quite tell if the splatter was supposed to tell her the manner of weapon that was used, the position of the victim when she was attacked or something else entirely.

"Konoha's Sorceress!? What are you doing here?" A young female with chin-length brown hair gasped. "You would not happen to be related to this murder, would you!?" She pointed at the magician in an accusatory and a strangely triumphant manner.

"Don't mind Burgoniya, she's trying to move up the ranks and out of forensics. The Sorceress has nothing to do with the murder, it was her and Itemi that sent the message, to begin with, remember?" Another forensics officer gently lead the quirky investigator towards the body as the forensics officers swarmed Okasune's apartment.

Mana waited outside the place for the forensics to do their thing. She hated herself for being so weak, not quite literally so but just about in all the ways that mattered. Whenever she looked at a dead body she felt strength leave her body, her usually brilliant mind suddenly started racing and firing self-inflammatory arrows right at the magician's own heart, hurting herself in ways only she knew she could have.

Itemi may have been halfway around the town now. He could have been foolishly confronting the people he held responsible and getting himself killed in the process. He was not at his best either, his lifelong colleague has just been murdered and he found out about it just moments after finding out the woman was hiding plenty away from him. Of course, he wanted to wall himself off from the rest of the world, not let anyone else in and just do the dirty deed he had in his mind.

Mana could barely believe how easily Itemi bought what the ex-officer told him. Sure, she had no way of affirming that he was lying and, at the very least, as far as she could tell, the man was believing what he was talking about most genuinely. Mana could have listened in on his heartbeat by enhancing her perception and she'd have not noticed a deceitful skip of a beat, just the usual tragedy in the man's voice of being betrayed by a woman who used him and whom he loved absolutely. Regardless of that, Itemi clearly treasured Okasune and yet he barely ever faltered before accepting the truth of her shady businesses. Just how many times did he have to make such a realization before that it came so naturally to him?

The magician stopped the one young lady she knew alongside the forensics, she needed to know what had happened in the place so she could find Itemi and convince him to let them help each other out. They were both weak, both in different ways but victory could only have been found in ways they were each strong separately and the ways that separate strength could have been used to help each other out.

"Ma'am, I need to know what happened in there." Mana pleaded with the woman.

"Absolutely not! This is Shukuba Security business!" she looked angered merely by the fact that Mana even suggested being told something.

"I am a Konohagakure ninja, Konohagakure and Shukuba have international cooperation treaties, do they not?" the magician tried recalling the conversation between Okasune and the westerner yesterday. "We are under obligation to help each other."

"Only if you are here on Konohagakure business and not your own, Sorceress-san!" the woman stomped the ground angrily before moving past the magician and leaving her sadly glaring down and back at the body that was being taken away now, together with Mana's last hopes of convincing Itemi to work with her on this.

Maybe she could have forced her way into Itemi's vengeful rampage, trying to figure out who was to blame and bringing those people to justice. Regardless, the investigation where Mana was forcefully tagging along would be more toxic and, possibly, even less successful than if Itemi was acting all by himself.

Damn, now it all made sense, Okasune's determination to arrest Bonda yesterday and her quiet acceptance of her own mortality when she was proved unable to do so. Okasune must have known she did not have the time to do the investigation right, she must have known something, something that made this leak business spread farther and wider than originally believed. The money laundering could have only been the peak of an iceberg of corruption that enveloped and spread its roots under Shukuba's foundation.

Even if she knew all this, Mana had no idea where to begin looking for those roots. Her only link between the underlying criminal element of the town and the Shukuba Security was the western woman that came to bail Bonda out yesterday. The magician had no idea who the woman was, no name, only hints at a profession but the fact that there was no intricate elongated dialogue between Okasune and the westerner clearing that up suggested that the woman was familiar to the Security officer from before.

If there was a person X, the man or woman underneath this town-wide bog of filth and they were connected to the leak of Fire Lord's funds and Okasune, that connection could have only been established through that woman. She was the linking element and Mana suspected that she may have not only linked the person X with Shukuba Security but also with every single element of his criminal activity.

Person X, if he existed, was just like the Fire Lord, except his fire was that of corruption, manipulation and building up a treasury for himself from the misery of other people. All of the smaller managers of his individual criminal elements were like his vassals, all buzzing with their own activity, all resonating back to him through the western woman.

Knowing that Mana needed to find the person X, and she knew one of the deviant vassals of his, as well as knew of the westerner woman, all she needed to do was add the two elements she knew together to find out the third. It was simple math.

The solution to the magician's problem annoyed her to no end. For the third time in this blasted town she'd have to perform a technique she did not invent herself and it was a rule that the magician did not overly enjoy crossing, even if it was one with much lighter standards and not as adamant as Mana's other rules. The magician disappeared in an alleyway, placing her hands together in a hand seal position.

"Transformation Jutsu!" she chanted out, transforming her body into what she could recall the western woman looking like. Now all she needed to do was squeeze Sho and see what vile fluids leaked out from his bursting puss. Wearing this shape, she would have little to no problem reaching the man's listening ears.

Wearing her new face, Mana entered the Shukuba Administration building and approached the receptionist, just like before she requested to see the governor of Shukuba, the woman smiled and played the good receptionist, encouraging the magician to sit down and wait, just like before.

"I'd like to see him about a prospect for a new start-up." Mana let the bait out into the pond. Within seconds, the fish burst from the abyss, devouring it whole and the receptionist jumped up from her seat, leading the magician into a room behind her, pulling out a file adding to it a form, which she quickly filled and handed the fake westerner.

Sho didn't look too excited to see Mana, or, more exactly, the face of the woman she was wearing. The man wriggled like a worm, turning to his side with each step, forward or backward as if he was waiting to be stabbed and was weaseling out of it. With each gesture of his face, each little movement or gesture he was emanating fear. Just who was this westerner? She was somehow involved, that much was made crystal clear.

"My employer was not overly fond to hear about yesterday's arrest. He was even less fond of seeing a Konohagakure kunoichi mingling with Shukuba Security." Mana approached the matter from a neutral corner, she did not know just what the relationship between the westerner and Sho was, or what both of them had to do with the person X. All she knew was that her theory was being given more air to breathe with each passing second.

"Ummm… Your employer? That's not what you usually call him. More so, I have nothing to do with that. Show yourself, Sorceress!" Sho declared unexpectedly.

Biting her lip in frustration of being discovered, Mana canceled the transformation, appearing before the governor in her original shape. It may have been wiser to approach Sho when she had more information about the working relationship between the leak-folk and person X, regardless, with just an exchange of a few words, Mana was assured that a person X existed.

"Interesting, you knew who the woman was, you did not deny the existence of a third party, the party that's calling the shots. How did you find me out?" Mana wondered.

"When the presence of a ninja is involved, even the slightest tip off the mark is a reason to worry about even the most obvious of things. Deceiving my eyes is the most basic party trick of your kind." Sho fixed his sweating and messy collar.

"Yeah. Repeating other people's tricks is usually not my thing for that same reason. Your case has reached the Hokage by now. He knows all about it, the leak business is through. I wonder how else you can be useful to whoever is in charge? We both know what people like that do with things that aren't useful to them." Mana tried playing up to the man's fears. She needed to pick up on every detail, that was how she'd earn Itemi's trust back.

"I'm useful in more ways to… Someone who may or may not exist. You're presuming too much, Konoha's Sorceress, not only that, you've played your hand now – before too soon every lowlife in the town will know who you are and why you're here." Sho sang a whole different tune and in a much more shallow tone.

"Good, it will save me the trouble of rooting all of them out, they'll save me a lot of time by coming to me." Mana winked. The Syndicate has been a moderate trouble for Mana when she was a civilian, back when her only strength was a decent ability to fight. Their mightiest weapons would barely make it through Mana's skin. The only reason this hidden society of deviants were still uncaged was that the magician had trouble finding and getting her hands on them. She was no Security officer, that much was for sure, that was why Itemi's experience was so invaluable for her to learn.

"Really? Well, the ability to find new ways of hurting people they are inconvenienced by is what separates bad people from the worst." Sho removed the howling kettle from its stand before filling his cup with tea.

"That is what will do the worst in. Right now a really pissed Shukuba Security officer is ready to flip the town over, shuffle dirt with the feathers of the heavens for the sake of the person he has lost." Mana shrugged, trying to act like she did not care about the downfall of such a conflict. "Just think about what such a massive clash will do to your reputation as a governor, on the other hand, you could just give me one word, the name of the western woman in the red jacket or the name of whoever employs her."

"Massive clash?" Sho laughed out, spitting the small sip of tea he had ingested back into his glass cup. "Officer Itemi is just one man. Men have a nasty tendency to get shredded to fleshy bits when high-velocity blades are involved. This city is built on people that disappeared from its history or were edited out. You have no more official cover here, your business here is done and you are seriously overstaying your welcome here, I tell you this as the governor of Shukuba – stay out of this and leave."

Mana's eyes tried incinerating the round man where he sat sipping on his tea, unfortunately, for all the many powers she did possess, the ability to do that was beyond her reach, at least for now. She hated this face-swapping, sunken to his chin into manure bastard. Then again, she was the one to talk. It was her third face she tried to wear when talking to this man this week…

"I dropped by the Aviary on my way here." Mana smiled, letting her wild dark hair slip down to cover up her eyes to the point where her face sunk in the afternoon shade as her hand rose up, waving an envelope in clear view of the confused governor. "It's from Lord Sixth, he says he has no more business with me and that my mission of finding the leak is completed."

"Good, congratulations. I hope you'll understand if no one sheds a tear when you leave and if your face will be remembered around these parts, making it impossible for you to conduct future ninja-related activity here. Not that you were too good, to begin with…" Sho sneered at the magician.

"The second half of the letter says "…as per your request to stay in Shukuba due to your personal business, related to your nindo, proceed at your discretion." The angle of Mana's smile sharpened. As the magician used her free hand to brush aside her unruly locks, she saw Sho's face turn pale. "I will give you a strong suggestion as to what "my discretion" entails. I will root out the filth from under your city, even if it will leave wounds in its foundation. I will pull as hard as I need to, whether I end up flipping this city over to expose the most sensitive nerves of whatever's sleeping underneath."

A loud gulp was heard coming from Sho's side. He understood what Mana meant, she was not going to cause a revolution all by herself, that would be a scandal inside the Fire Lord's domain. It would cause unwanted tension between Konohagakure and Shukuba that the Feudal Lord did not need. However, Sho could see that if Mana was to merely expose what was transpiring behind the curtains – he'd end up the sacrifice to a revolution of the people. He knew the only way to possibly stay in his high-position seat.

"I don't know the woman's name, I've only heard of her. She's a part of the Diamond Hand. It's what the people underneath call themselves. I'm sure you're familiar with Okasune-san, she's been arresting the competition of the Diamond Hand's for years now, one by one, leaving the Diamond Hand the ruling criminal element in this town. She was given freebies by the Diamond Hand as well, people no longer useful to them. She was their legal executioner, making her a heroine in the eyes of the town and completely under their control. They could have squeezed its air supply just as easily as they have allowed the hero spirit of the town to breathe." Sho wheezed out, by telling the magician this much he had crossed some sort of a line.

"I'd ask the Shukuba Security for protection if I were you…" Mana nodded in gratitude. This information was not overly useful in terms of what she could or could not do with it but it was something to come to Itemi with. At the very least she could coordinate her actions with a specialist in this case.

"There's no use for it. At this po, nt it isn't clear who is fed by the Diamond Hand and who hasn't been approached by them yet." Sho sighed before turning his chair around. "Go, though. Act at your own discretion as you were told to. I have wondered if the Diamond Hand would be as fond of me as they have been up to now. One does not come into favor with people like them without making preparations for the worst case scenario. For a short while, I can evade their wrath."

"They won't avoid mine." Mana sighed before bowing her head for the man she had decided to pay respect to once more before leaving Shukuba Administration and feeling the cold and heavy rain pelting at her outside as the afternoon sky turned murky grey.


	387. Anarchistic Takeover

The winter night moon spread its gleam, as bleak as the skin of a dead man, the light it lustered across the misty Shukuba streets just as cold as the blood that moved through the cadaver's veins. Every vital intake of breath required a sniff to follow it up. More and more often people chose to breathe inside the collars of their own outer layers of clothing to warm up the air they were sucking in.

A short woman of dark complexion and refined eye-lines, lush eyelashes, and overpowering make-up pressed her heels across the frozen dirt passageway of a more resolute district of Shukuba. One comprised of modern metal sarcophagi that surrounded a large lake, where much of what was not meant to be found upon inspections was dumped, when a watchful eye, less willing to compromise, came to scope about the place. There was always certain scoping about to be done there.

The woman stopped in the limelight of an ancient lantern to light up a smoke, her right hand threw her rich and wild dark hair backward as she set the end of her cigarette blazing. A dark shadow whizzed past the woman, temporarily covering up the light gleaming above her, like a shadow of a hawk swooping down to grab its prey. Loud, metallic thuds and fleshy tearing sounds accompanied the impressive flight and flip of the shade that finally stopped moving fast enough to be given shape by the human eye.

The woman in red reactively jerked to the blades that skewered her frame before collapsing on the ground. Itemi stood back up, scratching the back of his head and his neck as his impressive skydiving trick did not leave him completely unscathed. The man removed a bottle of pills from his back pocket before swallowing them down his dried out throat through vocal and rather gruesome-sounding struggle.

"I knew I'd lure you out here by taking this shape. You've covered your tracks quite nicely, not even Shukuba Security knows what you're up to, they are considering you rogue." The voice of a young girl echoed eerily through the officer's ears, the echo of her voice sounded so dreamy and mind-shattering that the man had to take a couple of stumbling steps back to preserve his balance. Helping him to deal with the mental pressure of genjutsu, Mana dispelled the illusion, letting the body of the westerner woman that Itemi had just gunned down fade like a mirage from his view as the image of Mana appeared into his view in a similar manner. A combination of the Transformation Jutsu and her own Fancy Trick genjutsu technique working in a combination helped Mana feel a bit easier about once again using a jutsu of a foreign invention.

"I'd figured it was too easy…" Itemi grumbled before pulling out his handheld kunai dispenser and firing a bunch of blades at Mana's direction.

The magician effortlessly grabbed the first blade that was approaching her out of the air, disrupting its trajectory and using it to deflect the rest, protecting herself against the entire series of high-velocity kunai projectiles fired her way. She did not expect such a violent reaction from the man, then again, he was going on a rogue rampage across the town and he did warn her multiple times to get out of his way. More so, he must have realized that such an attack would not harm Mana too much even if the magician let it all connect.

"For a man who is not a ninja or can mold his chakra, your speed is quite impressive. I'd say you are well in-tune with the physical aspect of your chakra." Mana smiled as she let go of the heated kunai she still held in her grasp once the man had emptied his dispenser in her direction.

"I told the kid to get out of my way. She may have been a monster in all ways but the ones that actually mattered but she was no master detective. There was a thought in my mind to just direct her at my enemies and watch them burn but… This was something I had to do by myself. As a depressed ex-alcoholic, disillusioned with the world, I needed it to stop the dreams and the constant voices. Which ones were mine, which ones were those I attributed to the people I've killed? I could no longer tell… I needed sleep, so did she but… Pills and smokes were all the joy that was left."

"I know how Okasune-san died." Mana closed her eyes. "She was clearly prepared to leave to work. Her kunai dispenser laid by her side, meaning she had pulled it at some point but dropped it, likely due to the shock of sudden pain. It was not a quick death. She was about to leave but the marking on the wall parallel to the door suggests that a noise of kunai being fired in that direction surprised her, causing her to pull out her dispenser and inspect her own home. While the stab wound in the center of her chest was what killed her, it did not go all the way through and yet the pool of blood behind her was considerable – she was stabbed in the back first, disarming her and dropping her on the ground while the assailant – the western woman, most likely, enjoyed her kill. It was personal, just Diamond Hand taking care of business." Mana needed to take a breath.

Explaining the final moments of Okasune-san was much easier when the sign of Mana's failure was not staring her right in the eyes. It was almost like being in the company of someone the magician had failed to protect sapped all of her strength away, made her mind just turn on and off erratically, firing strands of useless thoughts that did not connect to anything.

"I see someone's read the forensics report… The specifics of how the kid described Kita's final moments were too detailed for an uninitiated eye. It was like she knew too well where to look, which details were important and which ones weren't. A complete newbie would have gotten some things right but they'd have also mentioned a whole buttload of hogwash that was irrelevant to the case. The brat was singing it all like she had it memorized. All on point, too good even for the little magician. I'd be pissed that she was cheating if I wasn't so impressed she managed to sneak around Security HQ to read it all..." Itemi concluded as he sheathed his weapon after preparing it for firing again by loading it with another belt of kunai. "Who's the Diamond Hand, I wondered, that was one secret that the crime scene could not have tipped me off on and none of the people I've silenced that day would have, for all they knew, they were already dead either way."

"I did sneak around the Security HQ, I needed to see if they had any idea where you were, also, figured intel on Okasune-san's death would make you more talkative. The Diamond Hand bit was something I got out of the governor Sho-san. The town's under a secret shutdown, the governor is going to hiding and every executive and legislative work is put on hold." Mana sighed.

"That meant that no one was truly in charge. All the public institutions, like the Shukuba Security, officially powerless. Maybe it was for the better, I couldn't be sure that the Head of Security wasn't also in the pocket of… The Diamond Hand. I was the only trustworthy one, I guess the kid was too. After all, there was no other point for her to be here at this point." Itemi scratched his chin as he monologued.

"We need to work with the Shukuba Security, Itemi-san. You need to check back in, take your orders and do this by the book. We cannot fight both the Security and the Diamond Hand at the same time." Mana tried to reason with the man.

"Shukuba Security may have been the Diamond Hand, for all we knew. Telling the wheat from the chaff would have been too much trouble, too much focus put on things that didn't matter. If Kita was in Diamond Hand's pocket, so could have been literally everyone else. No one was clean, no one was trustworthy until proven otherwise and I wasn't about to play lethal roulette with a bunch of dirty Security officers." Itemi spat aside before turning to the small passageway leading back into the town through a narrow forest path. Mana felt inclined to follow.

"It was a smart trap to parade around the town wearing the woman's face, kid. I couldn't help but commend her. Goddamn it, she read me like a book, maybe I was getting too old. Kita knew she was, look where that got her. She knew she had no time to hit the Diamond Hand, she knew that with the first action she was not specifically instructed to do she'd be shredded. Every passing day at work she was surrounded by her potential supervisors of the lethal kind, every one of whom could have put a blade through her head just while casually passing by if she did not dance to the melody of bastards." Itemi kept rambling to himself. Mana's lips couldn't help but crack a small grin.

It was not that the magician found Okasune's highly tense and deceitfully lethal work environment funny or that there was comedy in the woman's tragedy of any kind. It was just that she's been parading around the town disguised as the westerner for hours and couldn't hear Itemi following her despite him constantly rambling all kind of stuff to himself out loud. A couple of times she could sense remnants of killing intent, a very overpowering, passionate kind. Now that Mana knew the context behind the ex-officer's attempt to murder Bonda on the movie set, the fact that she picked him up made so much more sense.

"Even though Okasune-san spent her entire life as a puppet hero, I can't help but respect her. Anyone who has sunken so deep and has the willpower to make it all right deserves it." Mana dreamily looked up at the moon.

"She knew that the only thing she could do before she was killed was hit the Diamond Hand right at where it hurt – their money. The Diamond Hand were like vampires, leeching off Fire Lord's treasury to build up their own strength. By cutting the leeches off of blood she'd have delivered the only kind of blow she was strong enough to deliver. She even went as far as to play that poor chump and slip him the idea to off Bonda… That's because the moment she'd have actually tried to build up a case – she'd be killed before even one legitimate piece of evidence was collected." Itemi grunted.

"I admired the serenity in Okasune-san's eyes when Bonda-san was released. I thought that those were the eyes of a woman who was accepting her mistakes, accepting she was wrong and willing to punish Bonda-san justly. I guess Okasune-san knew already she was not going to last that long, she accepted it and went out serenely because she knew that she would go out trying to make it all right." Mana looked down, her throat constricted by sadness. "She was no hero, even when she tried to fix everything she did so by manipulating people and resorting to murder but… While I do not approve or agree with her actions, I can at least understand and respect her reasons, somewhat."

"Listening to the kid honoring Kita by my side, talking about the woman like she knew her, felt odd. It was like two good friends remembering a common acquaintance but… The kid barely even knew her. And yet… She managed to take in just the stuff that mattered. I remembered Okasune's final words to the kid, it felt like a passing the torch kind of moment. In her last meeting with the kid, she recognized the enthusiasm and the genuine desire to help people that she herself used to have at some point, before the lines turned blurry, before the clean and bloody money smudged against the other pile, turning all of them smudged and making it impossible to tell which pile was which."

"We need to find the westerner, Itemi-san. She's the only lead we have." Mana turned at the rogue Security officer.

"It's like you're reading my mind." The man smiled. "Don't go around ruining that by telling me some bullshit like that you won't let me kill anyone…"

"That's not for me to decide. I realize that the ideals I hold are extreme and that they are not what other people uphold. For that reason, and several others, I do not enforce my nindo, I will change the world and make people stop killing each other by making them decide that with their own free will." Mana shrugged. She wasn't sure if that kind of attitude didn't make her the worst kind of hypocrite but it was just the way she had decided to do things. She had worked alongside some of the most talented fighters and killers and had she confronted and preached to each of them every time they fought – she'd have achieved nothing.

Let alone, if she achieved world peace through exacting force, whether physical or legal, like Lord Fourth did, she'd only be crushing everything she ever stood for. The world wouldn't really change, no one would truly change, they'd just bury those killing intentions deep down under, letting them spread their roots and grow in the shadows before they would blow up in Mana's face. Too many times the magician had seen Fourth's endless peace treaties be brought up in the negative light not to become disillusioned by them.

"While the kid may have been pretty on-point as to decide to gun for the woman in red, she was a little bit hopeful about actually knowing where she was or how to get to her." Itemi scratched his head.

"We will not be gunning for the woman in red just yet. Before we do that, we'll deal with Shukuba Security and your rogue status." Mana insisted. "We can't just cut off a root off of a tree and hope it to die. We need to separate the tree from its foundation first before we can fully focus on unearthing the roots."

"I sighed uneasily. I knew the girl was right but… That was not your most successful metaphor, I told her, trying to drown my disdain of what she suggested in some levity. Drowning my problems, whether in levity or alcohol, has always been my preferred solution…" Itemi rambled on. "Her plan was for me to submit and work with the Shukuba Security, mine was to send them to go fuck themselves. If we were to work together, a more coordinated solution needed to be found. That may have sounded generous of me, but I liked old man Chontai, he was a pretty nice boss, all things considered, and, had it not been absolutely obvious, I'd have never believed him to be dirty. I guess that's the painful part of a dirty Security office."

* * *

The Shukuba Security HQ was slowly clearing out. The only officers present were the ones staying to work overtime, whether with cases they have not done enough in through the day or with, as Itemi explained to on their way there, shady businesses like making evidence disappear overnight during an unexpected electrical outage.

The lingering Security officers batted only curious eyes when Mana entered the HQ and slowly walked up to the northern wing of the building, heading straight for the office of Shukuba Head of Security. The man was sipping on something dark as he worked on a bunch of files stacked on his table. Upon the magician's entry, he gave her a bemused look.

"A bit late for work, isn't it?" The man wondered. For a Head of Security he was relatively short, well-aged and reminded more of a sickly man than a powerhouse that could contain a criminal in this crazy world Mana lived in. Still, she was a living testament that looks were deceiving.

Without uttering a word, Mana walked up to the window and opened it up, after she moved back, Itemi leaped in before fixing his clothes and confronting the Head of Security. The little man was sandwiched between Mana and the rogue officer.

"W-What are you doing here? We're looking for you, you know? You've gone rogue, you've been suspended, you'll be lucky to avoid prosecution!" The man objected

"Shukuba Security is going to close down. Everyone is going to be suspended unless stated otherwise." Mana cut it short. "Shukuba Security is in dire need of a "reboot" of sorts."

"Chontai started laughing, could I really blame him? What the kid said, without the context, sounded like speech of a madman. One of those idiots with cooking paper wrapped around their heads in the shadier alleyways of Shukuba, thinking they were blocking mind control waves that the Yamanaka spread to take control of the world. While it felt a bit triumphant, I always hated that moment when those happy smiles faded. Too many bad memories associated with the core concept…" Itemi rambled off topic. The chief was undoubtedly used to the ramblings of his subordinate as he paid the man no mind.

"The governor is in hiding. Behind the scenes the town is in disarray. There's no more administration to speak of, it's all a farce with no actual power. Sho-san decided that'd be for the better until the Diamond Hand are rooted out." Mana calmly explained why she had every right to make such demands.

"Poor Chontai leaned and squirmed after a single mention of the words "Diamond Hand", like a demon hiding from a praying priest. Of course, he was on their payroll. He was the only official in this town that was worth having in one's pocket. If the Head of Security was not getting paid by you – what's the point of buying anyone else?" Itemi noted, seeing the chief's reaction to Mana uttering the name of the criminal organization lurking underground.

"Your last executive decision will be to call for a meeting. Every single Shukuba Security officer. Here. Tomorrow. Itemi-san will build a task force out of the people he trusts. The others are free to honor their allegiances to the Diamond Hand or get out of our way." Mana finished naming her demands and the plan that she and Itemi worked out.

This may have seemed like a distraction, spending so much time doing something as trivial as job interviews and task force gathering but… If the end result will be clearly drawn lines, a full trust between Security officers, that assurance that one's own comrade was nothing else but that and that one won't be pierced by a blade from behind, fired by their own best friend in the moment of greatest need, it will be worth it.

Even if Itemi did not entirely agree, even if he would have rather waged a two-person war against the world, Mana wanted clarity amongst who was fighting whom, even if that gave the Diamond Hand time to regroup and plan ahead. Without a doubt, they knew all about what was going on by now.

Mana expected the little elderly man to fight her more. Surprisingly enough, the man sat down and scribbled up the executive order right then and there. When the magician looked into the man's eyes she was the same thing she incorrectly identified in Okasune's eyes last evening – regret.

"Even if I can support my family and retire in dignity, it won't be worth it if I cannot sleep calmly at night." The chief sighed before handing the order.

"Just like that the river has been crossed. As old man Chontai handed us the order he had written up right here and now, I wondered just how many more officers were looking for an excuse to defy the Diamond Hand for the sake of a clear mind. For the sake of fighting what they have always wanted to fight. I couldn't help but look back at the kid and wonder, what if she's been right all along to enlist the Shukuba Security. What if behind all of her naivety, childish mistakes and idealistic glasses she saw us all for what we were – like-minded children who have at some point lost their way and burnt down the bridges. Now dreamily watching from the other side at the poor and bare but beautiful shiny grasslands they have left behind while they were breathing the choking corruption of the city air."

For once Itemi's outer monologues actually left an impact on everyone in the room. All three of the people present turned their eyes away from one another, the fight up ahead will be a tough one, likely not all of the Shukuba Security will be so wishful for redemption and plenty will choose the wrong side. Before it is all over friends will have to fire on friends, people may die and for the sake of public order all of this underground war must remain under the civilian radar. As a Konoha kunoichi, Mana would have certainly preferred it that way…

* * *

 **Author's Note: Sorry I haven't been leaving any notes lately. Besides the references and inspirations behind certain characters, I didn't really have much to comment on. I'm not even sure that people like to read them yet :D**

 **I know that the whole Shukuba storyline has started somewhat slowly, Naruto never really delved too deep into just how its world worked because it was too busy stuffing new retcons into just how Sharingan worked every once in a while. I guess the boring details wouldn't have been very "Shonen" of it but I've always been a sucker for that kind of detail like how would a society police itself in a world of ninja and how would non-ninja establishments protect themselves in such a crazy world. I really had a lot of fun thinking about all the different ways that such a society would work, how criminals would behave and act in a world of superpowered people like ninja/samurai/pirates etc... That is why so far the story has been just a slow murder mystery with a lot of procedural junk and slow sneaking around (even then, I had to make sure to get Mana caught a couple of times because I've established she's just as good at sneaking about as the minimal standard for ninja is).**

 **Before everything really starts to get crazy and the action picks back up, I just wanted to have some fun exploring the society of a non-ninja settlement in a ninja world**


	388. The Curious Case of Oribu Panther

The next workday took almost no time at all before turning hectic. From tackling the complaints from disgruntled Security officers who have now found themselves suspended indefinitely until the licenses of those who were verified and approved for the clash with the Diamond Hand were unsuspended and joined the taskforce, to the elementary difficulties of building such a taskforce, to begin with.

The old Security chief was a massive help, lending his great experience in managing the force and giving insight into the experience, personalities, skillset, and history of the people Mana and Itemi were going through. The magician had never imagined Itemi to be this skilled with managing paperwork, skimming through towers upon towers of files, instantly identifying cooked documents or "freebie" arrests with a pair of glares on the files.

Okasune-san was right, whatever the man took away from the force by being a rambling machine of little to no ability to keep something to himself, the officer was amazing at writing detailed and textbook-right reports or identifying when reports were either rushed or otherwise tampered with.

"You know, all those men and women we've suspended will now join the Diamond Hand's ranks, most likely." Chief Chontai cleared his throat, raising a valid yet long discussed between Mana and Itemi point.

"Yeah, that's kind of the plan. We'll draw clear lines, let everyone choose instead of having to worry about being backstabbed all the time in a game of who's who." Mana sighed.

"The kid was not entirely truthful to what she was thinking. This was just an idea she cooked up, a plan. Somewhere inside she still worried about it, wondered if the plan was too cold and calculated to be put to use when human lives were at stake. Sometimes I wondered if this kid ever planned around civilian lives before. If she knew what a powerful internal factor it was or how it could derail a perfectly good plan." Itemi kept on rambling to himself as his eyes ran down another file.

"You know, if the enemy force is too powerful, if there is no hope for victory, even the most idealistic and hopeful will tip to the Diamond Hand's side. Not because they agree with them but because they want to survive." Chontai scratched the back of his neck.

"The old man was tired, hell, I was tired. The girl had not slept for a pair of days either. She looked much better now than she looked yesterday, she must have been getting back into shape. That was the only explanation, still, even given her supernatural body and mind, she'll begin getting weary eventually and it didn't look like she had anything to seek solace in." Itemi pulled out another smoke before lighting it up. It was a massive fire hazard but whereas earlier in the night Mana stopped the officer from doing it, now she had grown accustomed and somewhat numbed to it.

"You should move your family and hide. As a defector, they will come after you. Even if the dirty and scorned officers have not already leaked the information of your involvement – they soon will." Mana looked softly at the old man.

"Do you truly think that I was as foolish as to bring up a child in this world, given my status and circumstances? My wife has accepted the consequences of being involved with me long ago, she's been nagging me about being secretive and grumpy for too long. If anything, she'll be glad to hear about the fact that I pissed some thug badly enough for us to be targeted." Chontai laughed out. His laugh was not genuine, there was a hint of bitter in it.

"So instead of bringing up a child who could potentially face danger because of their relation to you, you'd rather derive them from life completely?" Mana asked quietly, almost like leaving the question out in the air, like she herself was still trying to determine what her stance on such a decision was.

"It's not deriving a child of life if they haven't been born. You cannot derive from life something hypothetical. Just by living your life you're deriving thousands of children of life. It was a sick way of thinking about it but, then again, the magician girl was just a child. That train of thought gave me an idea…" Itemi decided as he flung his smoke aside, letting it spread its black and blazy powder across some downed paperwork. Mana hurried from her chair to pick it up and properly dispose of it, something she's found herself doing quite often recently.

If anything, it was a battle of wills. Mana was almost sure of it that she was being tested, smokes represented Itemi's abandonment of what he once stood for, what he once embodied when he started working in Shukuba Security and he was merely testing to see just for how long Mana would stick to the old ways of fixing everything she saw out of order. There was actually no reasonable way for Mana to win this clash of wills for it was perpetual but there was a painful way to lose – let the discarded paperwork light up in flames after she missed just one careless act.

"Tracking all this history, conducting all those interviews will give us shit. I knew that. Chontai secretly knew that. The kid may not have known that yet but she'd have found out. Waste of time – all of it. That being said, it was not all hopeless, there was a way to mold together Sorceress' idea for reforming the Shukuba Security and the way reality operated. We'd employ the newbies. People of no history, no loose ends to track. Anyone skilled enough to graduate could have done the job, their freshness and move-the-world attitude were just what we needed in this…" Itemi concluded.

"That's a great idea. Where are you going?" Mana's face changed from ecstatic to irritated in just one moment. Itemi was standing and getting dressed for leaving.

"I needed to pick up my herb potions. Before this whole fight was done, I'd be shot at, stabbed at and whatever other sick methods of execution and torture the Diamond Hand employs. It was a sick fight, so sick that we needed people who had no idea about how sick it was to fight it. That told me everything I needed to know. The potion seller arrived in the late morning, just a few steps shy of the main square. Next stop after Konoha, then to gather intel for the rookie squad…" Itemi kept rambling to himself but his ramblings sort of put the general picture together quite nicely.

"There's no use in stopping him. Itemi, fill her up for the whole squad!" Chontai yelled at the man who just flipped his hands up in the air before leaving the door to slam. He then unwillingly tackled the rising storm of confused and outright infuriated Security officers before redirecting them to the chief's office.

Herb potions that arrived in the early mornings in Konoha before moving to Shukuba for some late morning sales… Mana felt an unpleasant rush of memories from home, could those potions have been the pain-numbing herb concoctions that her father has been using? Chief Chontai looked like he knew about them and even encouraged Itemi to pick them up for the whole squad.

"What are those potions Itemi was talking about?" Mana asked with unease.

"Oh, it's just… This miracle drink from Konoha, or somewhere close. Renders you completely painless for a while before filling you with a pleasant, numbing sensation for hours on end that sort of counteracts pain that is yet to come. It's probably meant more for recovering veterans or elderly people with knee pains but… Nothing better to power through having high-velocity blades shred your flesh multiple times." Chontai shook his head before helping Mana gather a bunch of files about younger and less experienced officers.

"Don't you have medical ninja working here? They could patch you right up after injury. They work really fast and they don't just mask the pain – they deal with the problem." Mana wondered.

"Not anymore. Not unless Konoha sends some here on a mission or something. They sometimes do, it makes for fine practice for the inexperienced ones just... They haven't for a while now." Chontai shook his head. He then handed Mana a file, the magician felt a bit confused about it before looking at it more closely and getting the old man's point. The file was of the ex-officer who was seduced and played by Okasune. He was pretty young too. Mana needed even less experienced people in her squad.

As the magician went on through the files, gathering a handful that actually fit all the criteria, she realized just how dire the odds were. There could have been less than a couple of dozens of files there. Chontai saw Mana's lingering eyes and tried consoling her but he just couldn't find the right words. Seeing just how many people were even eligible for consideration, Mana felt like she was sending these poor people for slaughter.

"You know, maybe this whole reformation idea was a bad idea after all. Maybe I'm better off doing it all alone. I mean…" Mana placed the file she held tightly in her hand, slamming it onto the small pile.

"Oh, are you invulnerable?" Chontai raised an eyebrow.

"Well, I can withstand something as trivial as dispenser fire for a while, even easier I can avoid it. Even if I'm attacked when I'm unaware, my body will instinctively react to it for the cost of a more strenuous drain and pressure on my chakra network… I'd rate my chances quite high against the likes of common thugs." Mana breathed in and out heavily, glaring at the small pile of files comparing them to the towers upon towers of personal files and reports positioned on the floor because the table ran out of room.

"Eventually even the most fortitudinous of men and women are brought down. Do not underestimate the enemy. They are too numerous for that, too influential. In addition, people with gifts like yours are not nearly as difficult to come by as you think. I'm sure that the leader of the Diamond Hand surrounds himself with people who'd be more than a challenge even for you, Sorceress-san. Mercenaries, rogue ninja, wandering samurai or disgraced pirates hiding out where the navy of no country or crew of none of their peers would be looking for them – solid ground. Diamond Hand has influence, money, and power. That means they have the access to all of them." Chontai wisely warned her.

Even if there were a couple of dozens of suitable candidates to begin the selection from after the secondary selection was finished only eleven young officers remained. After that, there was the unpleasant matter of confronting the rookie eleven and explaining the situation to them.

"I'll send out the messenger hawks." Mana sighed after the roster was settled on and all that was left to do was to draft the summons.

Mana had never drafted an official document in her life. Amongst most other things she has never done and yet would have to learn to do if she was to help this town rid of its shadowy oppressors and make it what its pleasure town façade made it out to be.

"You don't have to go all the way to the Aviary, we have a local facility for that. It'd be a hassle to go there every time someone wanted to send something…" Chontai pointed before relaying the directions to Mana. "I think the building's clear by now. You seem to have a handle on things. I'm off, best of luck to you and your rookie squad."

"My rookie squad?" Mana repeated uneasily, questioning the chief's choice of words.

"But of course, you are a chuunin, are you not? You better get used to managing a squad." Chontai laughed out.

"B-But Itemi-san is more experienced, he knows all the procedures better. He'd be better suited to lead the rookies."

"That is not true. Itemi may be more experienced but he is ridding responsibility wherever he is confronted by it. He'd rather walk around and do his own thing, gather intelligence, shoot up smaller criminal dens instead of taking people in, draft a mean report up all by himself. You may not know a thing or two, but that is why you have a squad, is it not?" Chontai nodded at Mana before standing up unceremoniously and heading for the door.

Before Mana could even find an argument to object the man with, he was gone. The magician contemplated what she had started. She'd have gone nowhere if Shukuba did not want to get rid of the Diamond Hand itself. If the governor did not wish to aid her, if Chontai did not wish to clear his name before retirement so that his night sleep was more peaceful in his final days, if Itemi did not burn with passion to avenge his friend. She'd have been labeled and forced out of the town. Even the Hokage did not object her intent and actions.

In that case was it Mana's own decision and actions to rid the town of the Diamond Hand or was she just a tool, just a useful opportunity that everyone superior to her is exploiting to their own ends? Whatever the case, the Diamond Hand cost human lives with every day of their existence. They stay hidden and unseen, exposing themselves only to leave bodies that are written off by their agents. Whether Mana was the actor or the agent, in this case, it was only her Ninja Way to tear down the Diamond Hand.

The office was awfully quiet. Mana stood up and went through the same door the chief had left through, looking around the mess of paperwork left by the outraged Shukuba Security. Many of those that were employed must have rushed to their Diamond Hand contacts, offering their services, without a doubt. Still, without an actual access to the Security, they'd be mostly useless to the syndicate of criminals, as good as the amount of muscle they carried with them. As good as a spare pair of arms and legs…

As the hawks soared into the sky like arrows launched upward, or like salutes of explosive spheres launched from a kunai dispenser at a formal funeral, Mana's hopes and fears all left skyward with them. Just how many of these rookies would report back? They had all the reasons not to – for a significant portion of their lives they were trained to join the Shukuba Security and now they were told that the establishment no longer existed. Then they were called up by a foreigner to wage some war, outside the procedures they so closely studied, lead not by a fellow officer they knew or could trust but a ninja – the very definition of a trickster and deceiver.

* * *

It may have been useful to find Itemi, whatever he was doing, he could have used Mana watching his back. Still, it was not like the magician could once again transform into someone he hated with hopes of luring him out. At this point she'd just be wandering around, looking for trouble. For that reason, Mana stayed indoors, studying the files of the rookies, again and again, their physical capabilities, their mental preparation etc.

That was when the unexpected happened – a knock came to the heavy wooden door of the chief's office before it opened. A shaken and frail looking, yet well-dressed, man entered and lifted his top hat to Mana, given how the magician was also hatted with a similar garment she wondered if, maybe, she needed to follow up that gesture but that intent somehow timed out by the man offering the first words of this curious meeting.

"Ehm… Is this really the Shukuba Security? I am here to report a foul lawlessness in our fine establishment of a town and there appears to be not a single representative of law inside." The man spoke up in a very formal and highfalutin manner. Must have been a local big cheese, fears of possible contact with a Diamond Hand agent lit up inside Mana's gut almost instantly.

"Yes, this is the… Well, Shukuba Security has been disbanded for a complete re-staffing. I'm not sure that's an actual word but it relays the idea. We probably will not have an active force until at least tomorrow morning." Mana rubbed the back of her neck in unease. Duty called, someone needed to answer it and Mana was literally the only person for the job.

"Curses, I have no idea what to do with this curious predicament. If I cannot rely on our finest lawmen to shield me from transgressions most foul that hangs over my head on a delicate thread, how am I to behave? Next morn may just be too late." The man looked quite distressed by this news, perhaps more than even a decent actor would be able to convey.

"Well, it would most likely be fitting if you sat down right there, breathe in and out and tell me what's the trouble. I am keeping this chair occupied until buttocks better than mine show up to take my place." Mana tried imitating the man's manner of speech but it did not work nearly as well as she had envisioned it in her mind.

"Not that I do not value your proposition, young lady but… I am well aware of your prominence and the cause of it. I do not believe that a… On second thought, mayhaps a stage magician would be the best person to ask the favor from." The snob was quite conflicted with himself, it seemed.

"I don't like to brag but there is a reason why I was left to safeguard this chair for the while, Sir. Please tell me what brought you here." Mana encouraged the man to go on as the possibility of any kind of criminal activity peeking from the corner and showing the yet unformed Shukuba Security where to aim their dispensers and watchful gazes at sounded exciting and very fortunate.

"Well… My name, for you may not be aware of this, is Oribu Fuun, my mother – Oribu Toun was a famous theatre actress and personality. She had accumulated somewhat of a fortune, you see." The man finally relented.

Mana just kept on nodding while trying not to let her multiple sleepless nights get to her, she was quite an admirer of history but she could not have cared less about aristocrats and fortunes that people made. The magician was not the best at managing or counting money, making this entire Shukuba affair very unsuitable for her, yet remarkably less so than an assassination would have been…

"Her remarkable jewel necklace, a relic of my family, is still residing deep in my estate, on the outskirts of Shukuba. I verily appreciate the countryside, you see. Do not take me for some pompous and airheaded fool, young lady, I very much appreciate and protect my dearest matriarch's legacy but…" The man appeared to get a bit stuck on his explanation.

"It was stolen?" Mana raised an eyebrow. While she did not feel very confident about her ability or interest to solve a case of theft or the relation to the Diamond Hand of the entire affair as it was too "on the nose" and obvious for the shadowy criminal syndicate to be related to it, theft was very much something Shukuba Security would trouble themselves with.

It was Mana's responsibility, therefore, to occupy herself with things that Shukuba Security would have occupied themselves with because she was the one that robbed this town of their, Security force. A bit on the corrupt side, albeit a notable one nonetheless.

"Well… No. The burglar… That crook, thankfully, did not complete the… Big job. They have successfully disabled multiple of my guards and several of my security measures, bypassing some very intricate traps in the process, very impressive… Yes… But the necklace still remains, I can affirm it is the real deal and not a switched fake. In fact, the very final room where it is contained has not a single trap or security measure tampered with. To make matters worse… Or better, depends on the point of view entirely, nothing appears to be missing at all. I've had my servants do the full inventory check this morning, something they are quite bitter about at the moment."

The man stopped talking to bemuse himself with the prospect of the difficult and menial labor of his servants. It was perhaps less menial than the man realized as he had provided Mana with many useful clues about his case. While the man must have handed the assignment to check the full inventory of his mansion out of spite and for the sheer reason of the fact that he could do so, the fact that he did was very useful to Mana.

"Very well…" the girl smiled, "I shall accompany you to the place of… Incomplete crime and examine the clues. I will do everything I can to give you same results, or, hopefully, more than Shukuba Security would have given you had they not been disbanded. Also, I'd appreciate if you kept the fact of the Security being disbanded a hush-hush type of matter".

"Very good, off we go. And do not worry, Konoha's Sorceress, I do not interact too often with the townsfolk. My days are best spent hunting and entertaining myself in mother's garden and the deforested fields that I own with sport and games." The man assured Mana before standing up and readying himself for departure. "I even arrived here with my own personal carriage so our journey will be most swift and as comfortable as it can get!"

And that was how Mana got entangled in the case of not-really-missing jewel necklace and a mysterious not-quite-yet burglar.


	389. Security Blanket

"So forgive me if I ask you, Konoha's Sorceress, but why are you in Shukuba, exactly? I've heard plenty of rumors about it a couple of days ago from my servants." Fuun wondered as he had finally grown bored of staring through the window. Mana was fine occupying her time with some small talk and forgetting all the awkwardness that traveling in the same carriage as this aristocrat made her feel.

"Just had some business here. Now that it is done, I'm working with the Shukuba Security for a brief while on something I'd rather not discuss." Mana shrugged the attempt at poking deeper into her business.

Honestly, it did not feel like Fuun was quite out of the involvement with Diamond Hand accusation woods yet. He was potentially a victim of an attempted crime, however, the crime was so random and, apparently, unskilled that Mana could not have possibly connected it to the hidden criminal syndicate. She could have easily seen Fuun as an agent of Diamond Hand though, covering himself up with a made-up crime just to get in close to Mana. Make her drop her defenses…

Fuun himself sent out a weak chakra signature, similar to that of a common man, perhaps a tiny bit larger. It was not abnormal, the man could have been fairly intelligent or had a very spiritual connection to a certain passion, elevating the spiritual aspect of his chakra above the average. Given how the man was fairly prosperous and looked cheerful it was definitely highly likely that he enjoyed fine arts or something of the sort.

"Ah, yes. The ninja thing… I've heard you've been involved in those Chuunin Exams, quite the worldwide attraction, weren't they? Sadly, I missed out on them. I don't leave my estate too much. Just the kind of person I am, even coming to the Shukuba Security for help was quite an adventurous trip for me, you see!" The man thundered through the entire carriage with his deafening laughter. Had it not been due to slight suspicions Mana had, she would have maybe found the cheer of this man rather enjoyable and contagious.

"I do plan to one day broaden my horizons as a stage magician, Shukuba could be one of the locations I'll visit with a tour." Mana tried smiling for the man as it was rather unfair of her to sulk and keep observing the surroundings for assassins or possible ambushes.

"Oh, that would be splendid! I've heard so much from so many acquaintances of your talents, you see. They make a monthly pilgrimage to your shows and enjoy them tremendously. I'd simply cherish the chance to see something that inspires that sort of glee in my companions." The man clapped his hands before shifting about in his seat rather erratically. It attracted Mana's attention and kept it.

It turned out to be just a false alarm as the man was simply overly excited to see his own estate come into the view from the thinning out collection of lowly establishments and new construction jobs that were expanding the territory of the pleasure town well into the Land of Fire forests.

The Oribu family resided in a much larger establishment than Mana had imagined it to be. A good five or six floors worth of a tower of classic architecture of constant renovation of its exterior while at the same time maintaining the classic look. A true heritage of the Settlement Period, or at least perfectly emulating it. While architecture was a part of history that Mana was less passionate about, a small fire simmered in her chest regardless of it.

Fuun lead Mana around, showing off the multiple security measures he had taken to protect his late mother's treasured memento. A great deal of decently trained guards laid outside, the magician could see that some of them were recently patched up and looked quite rowdy. Upon the most basic of inquiries, they responded to have slight headaches after being knocked out.

"They may not look like a lot, Sorceress, but I assure you they are well trained and in quite numerous quantities. Trustworthy not only for the protection of my mother's legacy but also the estate and my own life!" Fuun looked quite confident in the abilities of his own guards. That was not something Mana had expected of the man as she had taken him for someone much shallower. She'd figured that he'd go around blaming them and maybe even having fired the people responsible for protecting his home despite their relative success of keeping the necklace where it belongs. Looks and first impressions were quite deceiving in this case.

"On the contrary, their quick defeat does not make me doubt their competence. It makes me worry about the competence of the thief." Mana revealed her thoughts as she was beginning to view Fuun as someone trustworthy and more intelligent than initial impressions made one believe.

"What do you mean? Could this have been a rogue ninja?" Fuun gasped in an almost comical and effeminate manner. Very unfitting for a man of frail yet masculine proportions and looks.

"I am almost completely certain that it was. The symptoms of your guards suggest that they were taken out by a chop to the back of the neck after completely blitzing them. I suspect even the involvement of the Shadow of the Dancing Leaf technique." Mana scratched her chin after observing the wonky and sluggish manner at which the very bulky and intimidating looking guards moved.

"Shadow of the Dancing Leaf? What do you mean, how could someone take out such strong men with just one chop?" Fuun gasped again.

"It is a technique commonly used by Konoha's Strong Fist martial arts users. Utilizing amazing mastery of the physical aspects of one's chakra, the user moves behind their opponent in lethal silence and speed beyond comparison. Combined with a strong and controlled chop to a vital point – it's an instant knockout combination." Mana explained to the surprised aristocrat.

"So this is all done by a Konohagakure ninja then!?" Fuun flipped out, had his fears been validated it would have certainly been a worrying predicament. With the Shukuba Security being non-functional and the most important government institutions disbanded there'd be little way of reaching the Hokage's ear and work out a decent investigation of the matter. It could take entire weeks to reach the man's listening ear and get a mission going, in that time the skilled ninja would undoubtedly snag the necklace.

"Not necessarily. This is Fire Country, after all, that means that the Strong Fist is a rather widespread martial art amongst both ninja, mercenaries, and rogues. I do not think it was a work of a Konoha ninja on a mission." Mana calmed the man down before they entered into the main hall where the necklace was held.

The marvel of jewelry artisanship laid unveiled, behind a thick and translucent material where an observer of any intentions could admire its emerald, diamond, ruby, topaz and obsidian lusters but not touch their source. Mana questioned her host with a curious glare if it was safe to approach the jewelry to which the man nodded and encouraged the magician to proceed as she saw fit.

Mana stroke her hand through the air, just barely keeping it from touching the column of enforced glass. This protection alone would have costed more than most jewelry, glass alone was quite expensive, let alone a custom work of weaving chakra into it to make it impenetrable to anything but forces with higher chakra concentration than was weaved into the material upon its conception. The glass itself also appeared to be completely conductive to chakra, making it fitting for imbuement of entire coats of chakra on top. A useless measure as no one in this estate knew how to even do it or could have done it even if they did know the specifics.

"I'm not sure how much chakra is weaved into this glass, it is indeed high craftsmanship, regardless of that, I still cannot see a ninja skilled enough to perform a Shadow of Leaf Dance failing to breach it." Mana mumbled to herself as she curiously examined the protective case, like a child admiring a fully uniformed ninja model in a museum. She sort of wondered just how loudly would Meiko shriek had she been here to see this.

"Well, that is still not all..." Fuun cleared his throat before opening up a section of what appeared to be a large cupboard and pulling on a horn of a rhinoceros that was found inside with fancy cutlery and porcelain sets found all around the odd switch mechanism.

Right after the horn was pressed, Mana could hear the painfully familiar screeching sound of reeling steel wire all around her as the lights in the room dimmed. The electric lanterns went out, windows opened for a brief moment to let in gusts of wind to blow out the candles and then shutters slammed down to sink the room in darkness.

"Was that a fake rhino head in your cupboard, with the horn serving as the security switch?" Mana's voice echoed in the dark.

"Yes, acquiring it was a hassle, I had to remove the back of the cupboard and wreck my wall just to fit it in there. The wall is remarkably reinforced forcing me to acquire a special set of tools just to deal with such materials. It cost me almost as much as this house, but I really wanted the head of a rhino in my cupboard, you see." Fuun explained with more vitality in his voice than someone describing spending a mansion-worth of money on renovations reasonably should have had.

Even if the magician could not see or hear anything, bringing up painful flashbacks from her training in the Rabbit Caves, she knew the purpose of this trap. All around her were steel wires that would have triggered some sort of security measure and, possibly, a painful demise for her.

A loud clang shortly intervened, the windows opened up again before the glass slamming shut instead of the shutters that covered them when the security of the room was still on. The steel wires screeched again as the trap dismantled itself making the room safe for use or crossing again.

"The other rooms have similar protective measures that are engaged at night: steel wires that set off deadly nerve gas and shuts the perpetrator in rooms of reinforced walls, flame traps and bottomless pits with spikes below, not to mention those most gruesome buzzing blade things." Fuun sighed, likely feeling a bit regretful about how close all of his security measures came from being completely useless.

"That is interesting." Mana moved down the stairs and closer to her host, thinking what she had seen through carefully. "That means that the burglar knew about the security measures, they chose to specifically enter through the main front gate which was protected by guards so that they did not need to work through multiple floors of your security arrangements meant for more sneaky and lighter feet."

"That means that the burglar considers my men less of a threat than steel wire traps…" Fuun shrunk and collapsed like a deflated balloon. Signature to him, this outburst of depression was as short-timed as his eruptions of joy.

"Regardless, I find it very odd that someone skilled enough to speedblitz and take out this many guards so quietly was worried enough about such simple traps so that they retreated. It is likely that they may have found out something they have not prepared for and merely withdrew until a more convenient time when the specific tool is in their arsenal. Have you checked the jewel necklace and made sure it is not a replacement, faking a failed burglary?" Mana reflected her thoughts.

"Indeed. It was one of the first things I did, advised by my men, you see", Fuun nodded. "I must insist that you move my mother's memento to the Shukuba Security HQ and take personal responsibility for protecting it. I think it will be safer there than to have it lay here, a place where the burglar has already scoped out."

That was a curious and very heavy request. Indeed it would have been foolish to just leave the necklace as was but the Shukuba Security actually had infinitely worse security to its facilities, resorting to simple safes and locked doors as security precautions of choice. On one hand, the present security measures have already scared the burglar away, on another – the burglar knew exactly what they needed for a successful burglary now and there was not enough time for a complete security and staff overhaul.

"Shukuba Security is disbanded and has publically funded security measures. Its security is nothing compared to yours, Fuun-san." Mana tried to object. While she did want to help the man, feeling personally responsible for assisting in the collapse of Shukuba Security, the magician felt like her time was best spent planning the upcoming clash with the Diamond Hand and not watching the immeasurably luxurious necklace. Once again, the magician's general disinterest in riches and money matters played its inner part.

"It has a security measure I cannot obtain - you, Sorceress-san." Fuun bowed his head making the magician blush slightly after being addressed with an honorific she was not quite yet fully used to hearing, especially from the aristocratic circles which Mana imagined to be airheaded and arrogant.

"I can stay here, if it would not trouble you. That way you would not need to move the necklace and I could be here in case the burglar returns." Mana tried to make the man get the hint that she was not overly fond of babysitting his riches. It was a bit insensitive of her, especially given how she kind of screwed the man over with her obsession of stopping the Diamond Hand, but it was just the way she felt, even if she was not overly fond of her own character.

"I am well aware of the scale of two ninja clashing, I would rather not have to renovate my entire mansion, you see." Fuun shook his head and hands in a sprightly manner. "Plus, if the Shukuba Security measures are as undeserving of my mother's memento as you claim, it will serve as a fine bait for the deviant. I am quite a hunter myself and I therefore appreciate the application of such tactics in the hunt of hooligans as well, you see!"

Mana sighed as a sign of capitulation. It appeared that she would have to babysit this necklace until the morning came and the replies from the rookie squad came flooding in. Speaking of that, Mana was not fully sure which she would have appreciated more, the colts accepting their call of duty or dismissing Mana's pleads for help entirely. In the second case, even if her pride would have been stabbed in the chest and hung to bleed out, she would at the very least have been only endangering her own life. The kind of risks she preferred and was used to.

Fuun was even kind enough to request that Mana was driven back with the same carriage. Even if she'd have taken one tenth of the time returning to the Shukuba Security HQ all by herself even at the most leisurely of paces. By the time that the magician had returned with the necklace wrapped into an unimpressive little package and gently placed it into a safe alongside with files that Mana had not even read through or seen that the old Shukuba Security had been working with, the winter sky had grown dim.

* * *

Having no sleep for so long seemed so profoundly odd. The magician's feet dangled in the air as she occasionally moved them away from where they were positioned on the chair only to spin her chair around and keep staring right at the safe where the necklace was being kept. It all just felt like a single long day, had it not been for the perpetual switch between light and darkness, would Mana have even noticed that she's not slept for days on end?

Her supernatural metabolism let her make a lesser deal out of it than the magician normally would have been making, still, Mana could feel her chakra network buzzing in unease, like an old, barely functional electric panel. Controlling her chakra accurately, moving with her usual precision would have been impossible. The magician was lucky not to have snoozed on the job to begin with.

"So you've come…" Mana spoke up quietly, like there was someone present in the room, someone sleeping, someone she did not wish to wake.

"You've noticed…" a feminine voice noted with the same amount of rhetoric which was present in the magician's statement.

"I've sensed you from a while away, it was actually quite amusing feeling you try and avoid my attention." Mana turned the chair around and stood up to face the burglar. "I have little time or interest in this so I do plan to make this quick."

"Oh…" the woman in black leather that made her look rather elastic and stealthy and flashy red with white streaks hair that completely smashed that impression into pieces at the same time groaned. "But I planned this so long, moving my pieces on the board. It is at the very least very anti-climactic to just kill you and take the necklace like that."

"I figured you wanted it moved here. There was no way someone of your skill would not be able to maneuver around some invisible wire traps and breach that protective glass." Mana slowly walked in front of the table that was blocking her way to the woman. The burglar did not take a single step backward, she was confident in her ability to beat Mana, that was because she could not sense the magician's chakra signature and had not yet seen her fight. Because Mana was a complete mystery for the burglar whereas Mana both sensed the woman well and has seen what she could do by reading her movements inside the house she was robbing.

"Awww, I feel like you're not all here. And here I thought you were so adamant about defeating the Diamond Hand..." the burglar grinned, she knew full well about the reaction she'd invite from Mana by bringing that name up.

"You're... From the Diamond Hand?" Mana's eyes widened in surprise. Maybe the underestimation was mutual, for she may have read pretty much everything in this burglar's plan except the most important part - her involvement with the organization.

It seemed that the first battle in the war against the Diamond Hand would erupt earlier than Mana had anticipated. Before one of the sides was even completely formed yet.


	390. Songs of Diamond

This mysterious burglar being a part of the Diamond Ring was something Mana could not have predicted. Everything about her crime seemed so sloppy and too on the nose to be applied to someone of such secrecy and proficiency in the art of crime that the Diamond Hand displayed. That changed all plans, Mana needed to first make this woman leak information. Fortunately enough, she was almost begging to tell the magician all about her amazing plan and how, the burglar thought, she had played the kunoichi.

"Alright, you've got my attention. Speak", Mana said.

"Awww, come on. I like to dance while I sing." A reply came not too soon and not too long after.

The burglar moved fast, she certainly had some kind of training and while she may not have known what chakra was or how it worked, someone had explained to her how to make herself stronger by training it. Mana heard the tension on the floor beneath her feet, back in the Rabbit Caves she had learned to fight in complete darkness by picking up on just such details while suffocating on blazing air and occasional noxious gas leaks.

The woman was trying her thing – use the Shadow of the Dancing Leaf to move in behind Mana and then knock her out with a single strike to a vital on the back of her neck. Cutting off the flow of blood as well as the flow of chakra around that area and disrupting the entire network for a good while, depending on the strength of the strike and the augmentation resistance to the impact.

While Mana was struck with a sour case of a surprise that her opponent had mastered the Shadow of the Dancing Leaf to the extent where she did not need to even utter the name of the technique anymore, the burglar was slow and predictable. With a controlled motion, purposefully restricting her speed to an irrelevant fraction of it so that her opponent was not scared off from the attack before it concluded, Mana locked her arm around that of her opponent's at the elbow before snapping the burglar's arm to break backwards.

Where usually the blood-chilling screams of pain followed such a counter, accompanied with the unnerving racket of snapping bones and blood of an open fracture being splattered across the surrounding walls, the limb of the burglar merely bent backward like an elastic sandbag. With a strong yank, the burglar had pulled her arm out of Mana's lock before her fleeing body was cornered by the wall where the safe was located in.

The cruel irony was that while the object inside the safe was seemingly everything that the woman had wanted, she could not leave with it even if Mana gave her enough time to extract it without going through the stage magician.

Those arms were something Mana had not seen, something that surprised her but not enough to break the magician's composure or cost her anything too pricey. "I hope you sing better than you dance." Mana taunted her opponent, she had no doubts that the burglar had already hammered into her skull just how outmatched she was and that she would have been completely crippled by a single exchange of blows had she not possessed those weird enhancements.

"Well, well… Maybe I have been a bit too ambitious, planning to both kill you off and loot the necklace right from your cold dead hands." The burglar-lady exclaimed in unease.

"Those were body augmentations, weren't they? Where did you get them?" Mana pressed on with the questions. Her opponent was unusual in terms of her physical condition but the magician saw no problem in holding her here and keeping her occupied while the woman talked.

"Why? Jealous? I can introduce you to my guy in Otogakure." The playful tone of the woman's voice echoed from around the room as she had leaped up and stuck to the walls. Initially, it had appeared that she was using the Art of Tree Climbing to stick to the hard surfaces but an odd clang noise reached Mana's ears making the magician suspect a sharp weapon attached to both the hands and feet of the highly elastic woman to be at play.

The clacking noise rang all around Mana, the woman tried to confuse the magician with her speed and crawling prowess, scaling around the walls and the ceiling, transitioning from the floor and the top of the room while wasting no time at all. Almost like a swift spider hunting its prey. Except Mana was no helpless prey.

In a lazy motion, the magician thrust her palm down, shifting her weight and body in a vault forward while her feet drove right in the back of the chin of the diving assailant. Mana could feel the woman's neck dragging and snapping back, an impact like that should have paralyzed her for life and yet the elastic burglar just rolled back on her feet. That blasted clacking steel claws noise told Mana that much, it then proceeded to betray the woman further as she started scaling the walls again until she hid in a corner, hanging stuck to it and observing Mana from what she thought as a safe retreat.

"So you're a part of the Diamond Hand then? What sort of part? Just a hired hand or a footman?" Mana closed her eyes to try and focus on her sensory and the noises that she heard as keeping them open in an almost completely sunken in darkness room was wasteful.

"We have a structure. The each… Department is called the "Fingers of the Diamond Hand", with each commander serving as a Ring of their Finger. I am the Ring of the Thumb." The woman bragged while Mana worked trying to pick up the slightest noise of her crawling. Curiously enough, there were no clacking sounds until it was too late.

It was like this Ring of the Thumb woman was completely lacking any joints or restrictions of movement. Whatever her weaponry was, she had disabled it which had confused Mana in the beginning, before the magician had caught on with the fact but by that time it was too late. The burglar had wrapped her body tightly around Mana's body like a constrictor but instead of continuing to apply pressure, that dreaded metallic clang ringed, telegraphic that she had triggered her weaponry again.

Sharp metallic hooks shot out wherever the impossibly elastic burglar had her hands and feet around Mana while the criminal leaped off of the magician's body. The four hooks attached to her palms and her feet made sure to leave dragging marks as they moved towards the magician's neck, looking to cut her throat open. She moved both like a bird of prey, a snake and an arachnid at the same time.

Mana gripped the front and the sides of her throat, somehow managing to encompass all three shallow cuts around her neck and felt the weak pressure of blood trickling down her fingers that tried to contain the cuts. Naturally, Mana's chakra augmentations had kicked in, leaving her much inferior physically and spiritually opponent no chance of tearing Mana's throat open lethally, as she may have intended, but she still had left some narrow cuts across it.

The fighting style of this burglar was so unusual, her elasticity made her moves so unpredictable that Mana may have had some trouble keeping up with her even if she was fighting seriously. Now she was just toying with the burglar for the sake of any information she could muster. The reason why fighting this woman normally would have been difficult was because this burglar was no fighter, she ran and hid before she saw her opponent leave her an opening, then, she focused all of her augmentations into one quick crawl or a swoop, wrapping her body all around her prey as she sunk the hooks into them. Had Mana not completely outmatched her opponent, this one attack may have even been lethal.

Still, for now, this annoying hit-and-run style was very useful for Mana's goal of fishing for information. The burglar thought she had Mana cornered and that there was no way for the magician to utilize her natural advantages as a well-trained ninja of Konohagakure and not slightly tutored on ninjutsu, surgically enhanced burglar.

"I see… A whole Ring? In that case, there are four more of you. I don't see you five sharing the leadership over the organization so one of you is calling the shots over the other Rings – a Ringleader." Mana stated, needing or waiting for no verification. Her suspicions of a person X were confirmed just like that. "I'd imagine that woman from two days ago was a Ring as well?"

"Huh? Oh, the Index Ring? Yeah, she's actually the leader of the Index Finger, the assassins of our syndicate." The burglar ran her mouth. That was good, she was opening up more and more, likely proportionately to how her odds of leaving Mana dying and drowning in her own blood increased in her mind.

The Thumb Ring tried her luck attacking again, this time Mana knew not to solely rely on her hearing and the clacking of the woman's steel, crooked nails. The magician danced around her assailant's attacks and silly attempts to grab hold of her again, Mana's hands locked around her own back, not because she didn't want to counterattack her opponent but because she did not wish to grant her opponent extra spaces to wrap herself around.

Mana could feel the sharp pain rise up in her neck and the warm feeling of several drops of blood trickling down the shallow cuts and down to her collar. It may have been wise not to keep this going any longer. She had already thrown out the hint that the magician had more in her than she had initially shown to her opponent.

"When Okasune-san saw that other woman, the Index Ring, she said something interesting about this Yokotomo Donyoku guy. I think I'll look into him after I capture you." Mana threw a bait out to lure her opponent into a preemptive strike.

"You're deluded if you think you can escape here alive to try that!" the Thumb Ring shouted out, she was clearly smelling the blood in the air, however, she should have known that attacking when she was being lulled into it was a bad strategy. Her hands and feet wrapped around Mana's body, pressing tightly.

"I may not be able to cut deep enough into your neck but I can easily suffocate you to death, crushing you more and more with every breath that leaves your chest." She declared triumphantly as if it was something that changed the entire mechanic of the battle.

"Lightning Style: Magician's Touch!" Mana huffed out as lightning sparks crackled and ran up and down her body, exuding powerful lightning shocks from her body.

Stunned and overwhelmed by the Lightning Release technique, the Thumb Ring fell to the ground, her eyes white as the pale moon that occasionally peaked its sharp crescent forms from the murky clouds in the sky above. Using a bit higher rank technique on the woman burglar may have been slightly excessive but Mana needed an efficient way of disabling her. Deciding what to do with her now was much more complicated: she was elastic enough to escape through bars or handcuffs and she could have been able to use the Rope Escape Jutsu that even Academy Students could have used.

* * *

It took hours after the Ring's muscles stopped shuddering for any signs of life to kick in. This entire time Mana just calmly observed the woman from her seat, carefully sensing her chakra signature to avoid being duped. A skilled ninja could have easily slipped away, leaving a fake body with an illusion similar to Mana's own Fancy Trick jutsu while she silently removed the necklace from the safe currently behind Mana.

Not too far away from dawn, the Ring's eyes started fluttering and the space under her eyes twitched, suggesting that she was beginning to snap back and would awaken shortly. This woman would have served as a fair challenge to Mana before she lost her chakra control, facing someone this much weaker to her yet still so remarkably strong was a relatively fresh experience. Magician's Touch was never intended to be an ace technique, just a powerful surge of electricity, powerful enough to restrain trained ninja temporarily and yet… Both times it was used it knocked out the opponent.

"Speak. What does the Diamond Hand want with the necklace?" Mana inquired in a strict tone upon the first opening of the Ring's eyes.

After grunting over her aching head for a while, the woman started chuckling. She may have been relatively weak compared to the ninja Mana had faced in the Chuunin Exams but she was not dangerous because of her chakra level or her overall strength, the burglar's most dangerous trait was her unorthodox but effective fighting style that would have bought her several seconds even if Mana fought seriously before.

"How's your neck? I guess you'll have to postpone some shows now, that or rebrand yourself as the Wonderful Fish Girl." The woman tried taunting Mana. Her words did bite a little, she at the very least could get into someone's mind effectively by analyzing who their conversant was and what such a person would be afraid of. More importantly, she declared her intention of not telling Mana anything.

The thing that was the scariest of all was that the first idea that popped into Mana's mind was torture. She could have easily tortured the information out of the woman, whether by using Hisako's blade-to-the-gums method or a more illusionary, fear-based mental torture. She could even wear on the woman's brain with illusions like Mana did in her match with Stea.

No. Even if that method would have granted Mana the information she needed to save lives, the magician had already reached the conclusion that she's been straying from her code and looking sideways for too long up to now. She would do this thing her way or no way at all, in which case, she'd accept the consequences as they came.

"And here I thought you were itching to tell me everything, brag about how wonderfully you've played everyone. I assume your "plan" duped the other Rings as well? I can only imagine how they'll reward your betrayal and failure, given Okasune-san's fate." Mana, fortunately for her, was also a dabbler in the arts of biting someone where it hurt. She had to be, when torture and other methods of effective interrogation were out the window, talking her enemies into talking back was her only way of obtaining intel.

"Then I was fairly certain that you were already dead. No one has any qualms about telling dead people secrets." The Ring grunted as she picked herself off the ground and rammed her back against the radiator. Mana was at the very least kind enough to push the woman's unconscious body closer to it before the wait started as the winter's bite was the sharpest in these night-to-morning hours.

"Your only chance at survival is me. The faster I take your colleagues down, the faster you are safe from their wrath and you are only prolonging that by staying silent." Mana tried reason once again. Honestly, she was not sure what she'd have to try if that failed.

"Tsk… You think you're so cool and strong… The Index Ring is much faster and stronger than me. She's also not just light shows and smoke like you, pure business. Even if you took her on one on one, you'd probably die." It became evident that the Ring was aware of her butt-on-fire situation, regardless, she was still on the fence about the success rate of cooperating with Mana as opposed to running away and using all of her skillset as a trained burglar to hide from the Diamond Hand's retribution.

"I don't think you're evaluating this situation right. You are currently severely weakened as your nerves are overloaded with the shock you've just received. Your moves will feel numb and lazy for quite a while, meanwhile, I've clearly shown you I am faster even than your best showings. Even if you are not tied up, as inefficient as that would be, you are going nowhere from this office. Your running and hiding skills could not be any less relevant here so I am your only hope." Mana laid the situation out as she saw it.

The Ring, with her full face now visible and uncovered by the black mask that covered the lower half of her face before, pouted and bit her lip, considering her options. At the very least she had to see and appreciate the fact that Mana was truthful and honest about it.

"The Diamond Hand just needed the necklace for money. You've cut off a pretty important supply of it by hitting us at the movie business, there's a reason why Okasune tried to hit us there before her departure – it's because it was a very powerful hit. The Pinky Ring – the guy behind the financial crimes and the leader of the Pinky Finger is working overtime already to compensate for the loss of money." The burglar explained.

"I see, so you've screwed your team in a quite powerful way by deciding to abandon your assignment."

"That's right. In my defense, I thought that I could take care of two of our problems that way – kill you and take the necklace off of you after it was transferred here. I wasn't certain if the snob would even think up of transferring it to your protection, even if he hadn't – I'd have just completed the job the next night so it would have been no harm done either way." The woman was becoming quite talkative and quite useful. Mana's sensory began stretching out in an attempt to scope out her surroundings so that some annoying assassination attempt, just like all those irritating scenes in the crime movies her father liked, wouldn't interrupt this precious moment.

Movies appeared to be quite stupid as there was nothing within Mana's sensory range that could pose even a remote threat. The magician felt confident in her ability to stop a more powerful long-range kunai dispenser blade before it reached her conversant, frankly, the woman was powerful enough to survive such an attack in the first place.

At long last, she will know everything about the Diamond Hand. A strong breakthrough was at hand, it was just about the only thing Mana could smell these days.

* * *

 **Author's Note: The name of the "Diamond Hand" is initially based on an old Soviet movie - "Diamond Arm", although not completely, it's a bit more complicated than that. You see, due to that movie, plenty of post-soviet countries have adopted the idiom of sorts that a "Diamond Arm" is someone mysterious, with a lot of power sitting behind all the conspiracies and someone who in the end will have everything to gain from everything bad that's being described. They're the untouchable schemer of sorts. You could call Lex Luthor the "Diamond Arm" of the Superman mythos, at least until he is found out and identified. I suppose it is not due to that movie itself, but due to the strong imprint it left on the language and creativity of the people who have seen it that I adopted and slightly modified the name.**

 **Whereas the movie is called "Diamond Arm", because diamonds are being stored and hidden in the arm of the main character of that movie, the organization is called "Diamond Hand", because just like the antagonist of that movie, the main honcho of the "Diamond Hand" is a rich and powerful observant and puppeteer of everything transpiring around him while the only way he is known to the readership is through limited glimpses onto their activities. The antagonist of the "Diamond Arm" is revealed only at the very end of the movie, whereas during most of it he is only seen as a frail hand covered with luxurious rings, which strongly inspired the whole "Diamond Hand" organizational structure.**

 **Leaving small bits of inspiration and rambling about such stuff is why I started leaving these Author's Notes, to begin with (also because someone asked me on PMs to do something of the sort, like work on a Databook on the universe of sorts or something similar). Hope you guys like them!**

 **Once again, much love 3**

 **Thanks for reading**


	391. One Man War

"The bizarre symbolism of tunnels was not lost on me. The whole life and death thing, I tried to brush it all away. Acknowledge the existence of these thoughts while I calmly keep walking on and under an arching bridge that formed a long tunnel underneath. After sundown, it did not look nearly as afterlife-like, more like the center of the void, like a black hole, almost. More like what I imagined dying to be like."

"I couldn't see Mika waiting but I knew he was there. We've arranged a meeting because I needed information. He needed to meet me even more than I needed him so I was completely certain he'd show. Seeing this cone of oblivion stretching out in front of me made me grip my kunai dispenser tighter to my side and wonder if it was a good idea to pull it out and hold it even tighter."

"Mika was undercover for some time. We had some in the Security like that, how many of them were trustworthy and didn't get drowned in that swamp of shitshow they encountered on a daily basis was beyond me. How many of them did things that they were not allowed to do and incriminated themselves forcing them to cut ties was known only to old man Chontai."

"I had to dive myself deep into it. Remind me of what Kita's last moments must have been like. I lied to myself that she was afraid, I had to. I lied to myself that she begged for someone to be there because that was what would have motivated me to take the step and let myself get drowned out by the darkness of the tunnel. Kita was better than that. She knew what was coming and accepted it but I'd be better off not thinking about that."

"Walking forward in all of that gloom was next to impossible. It was so dark that telling straight from the left was as fun as bumping my shoulder or elbow against the mossy stone was. There was one little light, one that I created, my raft in the sea of shadows. The light from my match soon went out as the smoky smell of tar filled the air. As my smoke smoldered it spread a pleasant sparkle that was enough to calm my aged chest."

"You still talking to yourself, Itemi?"

"Mika addressed me from the dark. The bastard must have been as scared of the dark as I was. No one ever stopped fearing the dark, the contents of that fear changed, sure, but standing all alone with nothing but pitch black to each side as far as the eye could see could not ever be not scary. I was almost tempted to snap back at him, take a stab at his weight the last time I saw him but I was not nearly amused enough to partake in this childish nonsense."

"Fair enough, what's with all the noise coming from your end?"

"My contact was worried about the whiffs he got coming from the Shukuba Security, rightly so. The Security was his salvation if ever things undercover got too hot, if ever he got what he went down for. It was quite lucky that Shukuba Security getting dismantled kept its head down at the rumor level, it won't stay that way for long. The kid was better off rushing along with her little war."

"Wait, what? Shukuba Security has been dismantled?"

"It's not like it made any difference to Mika. His operation was not authorized nor was it by the book, he went undercover hard, so under the cover that not even his superiors knew he was doing it. Mika smelled the filth reeking off of Security for a while, he was a lot like the magician brat that way, including his actions. Regardless, I needed him doing his thing until this war thing of ours was done. If he had one way of escaping the burning building it would be when it is all crumbling down around him and the people there too busy trying not to die to throw hellfire at his fleeting feet."

"Fair enough. I have something for you. Have in mind that once this goes out, it'll be on. Whoever is in charge of the Diamond Hand, they'll be kicking you in the nuts, you'll have their full attention."

"It was a fair warning. Up until now, the Diamond Arm may have been curious about the state of Shukuba Security, wondering why so many of their lapdogs came running back at them begging for work and cover from the rising storm. I suppose all this curiosity had to grow into a full-on rage at some point, whatever the contents of the storm were we'd have to weather it."

"There's going to be a good old heist tonight. Three to four hours from now, they're going to hit the vault. One group coming in through the sewers, another one using the evacuation tunnels. Whoever came up with the plan behind this is afraid that once the Security gets a whiff of the thing, they'll all see the sewers coming so the whole pack will retreat through the evac tunnels with all their loot."

"Some sick sense of irony. The evacuation tunnels were supposed to be used for civilians to withdraw from the town's premises during times of war or another extraordinary occasion of such caliber. In a way, the evac tunnels will be used for evacuation but not the kind of evacuation they were built for. This info was useful, good old Mika paid off big time. If this was a Diamond Hand op, which it should have been, after the movies were hit and exposed to Konoha they must have felt a shortage of money, there was a fair chance of bumping into someone important and finding some space for a kunai to fit inside their face."

"So that's how you guys are doing it now, huh? No more laws, no procedure? Sounds a bit scary…"

"Sit tight, Mika, was all I could tell him. Whatever hole he scurried into, whatever peaceful corner of his crime den he ran off to and whatever lowlifes he surrounded himself with for protection would have had to do for a short while. After the Diamond Hand went down, the Shukuba Security would have to slowly be reformed. During that time Shukuba will remember where every man stood when they were needed."

"Yeah, right back at you…"

* * *

"Three to four hours was ample time to go back and pick up the kid. I don't know if it was my lack of sleep disturbing my judgment or maybe I was just too pissed. I wanted to do this alone. Kita faced whoever came for her alone, attacked from behind. The kid sounded like a decent person, she'd not like what I had in mind for dogs that were capable of doing something like that."

"My mind tuned out as I walked the squishy mud roads of Shukuba, slowly transitioning into the occasionally pleasant and occasionally irritating stone roads. My body was working almost on an autopilot as my mind worked on other things. It couldn't have been a good sign that I could barely control the contents of my own mind. I reached for my belt, the dozens of bottles all placed around my waste. They did wonders for pain but maybe they could help some for lack of good night's sleep too?"

"My hand slipped down, even if this was legitimate medicine, which was a big if, it probably had rules about being used too often. I had a feeling that if I went in all by my lonesome I'd end up gulping down a bottle or two of those to numb one or two blades sticking out of me. That was just how my job was, I knew it, I always knew it. Maybe that's why for a decent while I kept the arrests for Kita and stuck to paperwork…"

"Nah, the kid stayed out of this. She talked a nice and tolerant game but I couldn't risk involving her. She said she was fine with murder as long as it wasn't her doing it but I didn't buy it. So far she was really honest, no one was completely genuine, she had to be full of shit about something and this was not something I could allow myself to gamble on. They killed Kita, they lead to the collapse of the entire Shukuba Security and possibly even the collapse of the whole damned town. I'm going to kill every last one of them I see. The kid can stay above all of that and pick up the pieces."

* * *

"Hey, so since when are we doing hit jobs like this?"

"Yeah, sounds more like the Syndicate's forte, don't it?"

"Heh, I wonder what even happened to those assholes. One day they just stopped being a giant pain in our asses…"

"Just a pair of steps into the sewer and I could already hear the sound of filth rubbing off on my shoes. I was lucky enough not to step right into it and lean to a nearby wall, listen in around the corner for all it was worth. It was not like they were talking about anything useful so I moved my kunai dispenser out of my holster and pressed it to my chest, mentally readying myself. I wasn't afraid, I was enraged and a furious hand shook just as much as a terrified one."

"Ey, who the fuck is speaking?"

"What the fuck?"

"I jumped out and put a kunai through each of their eyes. These were just some smalltime shit stains. Not worth any more steel, before this night was done, I may as well have run dry of blades to put into these scumbags. It would be best off if I checked what they had, just in case. Each one of them had a handheld, standard choice for Shukuba Security. Well well… Someone must have been smuggling some inventory on the side. That kid may have been onto something, just ending the whole damned thing all at once."

"There were more and more voices all around the sewer. They were leading me to where I was supposed to go. I guess I was lucky that our sewer was not as small and compact as the Konohagakure sewer. My time interning there before Security days left me less than impressed with how they treated the flow of their royal shits. Our establishments were pretty fancy, all things considered, nice stone walls, lights on the side, was it always that well designed for rats scurrying around or was it a more recent development? I guess Diamond Hand has a union…"

"Just like I guessed, it wouldn't all be quite a smooth sailing. I missed the head of some lowlife and my stinginess towards ammunition cost me. They pulled their dispensers and opened fire back at me before I could raise my hand up again and fix my mistake of not putting those two fast enough. I took a quick roll behind a nearby wall, I didn't plan on wearing this jacket anywhere else anyways…"

"I gave them a pair of quick blades back, judging from the clanging sounds they hit something hard and stony, likely bounced back. They were built pretty durable this way, couldn't believe that ninja used these things to stab at each other like kunai were some goddamn kitchen knives. A handful of blades bounced right off the wall dangerously close to my ear. Nothing like the impending death by high-velocity blades shredding through your flesh to wake a sleepy head up."

"My heart was pounding, I leaped out and dived under all of the dirt and shit. Had to close my eyes and think about something else entirely. I needed to rush, else a bunch of dirtbags from farther ahead will come back and give these assholes a hand at putting me down. I fired a bunch of blind ones from underwater. Doing my best to open my burning and itchy eyes as fast as I could I leaped out from underwater, having swum behind those two bastards. The time it took for them to turn away was just about enough for me to calm my sore and full of shitty water eyes."

"This time I was not about to take any chances or waste any more blades but one. I pulled one from the side of the dispenser and ran in on close distance. The blade slid right in under the shitstain's ribcage and I turned him sideways to block the barrage of invitations to hell coming my way. Kicking the bastard I just stabbed was probably the most pleasant thing I felt whole week. Surpassed maybe by stabbing his pal right in the eye up close and personal and watching him disappear into the same river of shit that I was forced to swim around in so recently."

"Pain and stars in my eyes lit up almost simultaneously. Maybe I was a bit too ambitious with my approach, got too blind. The asshole grazed me with a pair of blade shots that cut me clean in the sides. Just pissed me off more, honestly, but the infection would do more than just piss me off in a short while. Was not looking forward to that part but I had a job to do. Shit… I forgot to loot the blades from those bastards, either way, the last pair handed me more than I was bringing into this anyways. It would have to do."

"My sleepy head blacked out completely. It was all nothing but one big vortex of blood, blade-fire, clangs and fleshy sounds. By the time I realized I was past the sewers I was standing in front of the ladder up to the lower sections of the Shukuba vault surrounded by dead bodies and with good four kunai sticking out of me and making me leak myself out. Grunting, I downed one of the potions I had bought that afternoon. The pain disappeared but not the wounds…"

"Regardless, the absence of pain that looking like a pin-cushion made one feel was a welcome addition to what my life has become. I picked up one of the larger kunai dispensers off of one of the corpses lying beside me, the bastard took a nasty blade right through the side of his face and was most definitely not about to use that. I heard a loud rabble being roused up in the vault, the evac crew must have arrived."

"These dispensers that the last bunch carried were all just like what Syndicate used to carry around in their prime. Four times bigger than the handhelds that the Security used, one guy with one of those would have scared the entire squad of Security away with one of those. No cover would have protected from the speed and shredding power of one of those. Could the Syndicate and the Diamond Hand have reached some sort of agreement? That would be a new one, but also about as welcome as a blade in my foot."

"Whenever the assholes back in the Security HQ used to tell fancy lies about their biggest arrests, how they plowed through thousands of criminals without getting as much as a speck of dirt on their cheeks, they left out the fun details, like climbing the ladder with just one hand while the other one struggled to keep hold on the demonic machine of murder that I was carrying with me."

"Another problem was once I finished scaling up the ladder and bumped my head into the round cover that separated the lower sections of the vault from the service sewer entrance. I had no arms to spare for this shit, I bumped my head hard against it, raising my foot one step higher just so I could kick up better and ram my shoulder into it as well. Seeing how these assholes were expected to get into the vault through here, I figured it'd be left unlocked and so it was."

A good handful of bastards sat around the service room where the entrance lead to, I was not quite whom they intended to see and their weapons were nice and placed on their side. I was simply faster at taking them out, I was the first at raising a real lot of noise too. However much of these guys were present in the vault, they were quite likely to all swarm down my way now. Those Syndicate type dispensers were way too loud for what I had in mind."

"Like clockwork the scumbags started bursting through the door, I was still using the service ladder hole for cover as the steel of the walls of the most secure facility in the entire Shukuba was just about the only kind of thing that could stop a shredding, high-velocity kunai in its path without leaving me even fuller of holes. The bastards were plentiful, all crammed around one doorway, desperate to get in and kill the only thing between them and a whole lot of money. I was nothing else if not patient…"

"Making my way up the steps over a pile of dead bodies was tougher than I thought it'd be. I also ran out of the kunai belts used to keep this machine of murder running so I had to dump it. Not too long ago I was swimming through shit and piss, now I was plowing and swimming through blood and dead bodies in an almost too literal manner."

"What the fuck? Who is that man? He's not part of the plan, kill him!"

"The piece of shit yelling that at me was a small guy, looking more like an accountant than a criminal. I wondered if I had just hit the jackpot and saw the man behind this brilliant plan to make the town's finances into those of Diamond Hand's own in a more official manner that it was a custom for those guys. It was time for yet another fight. I crouched behind a cover, not because it would have protected me too well, just to hide my position from the endless streams of blades coming my way."

With quick rolls from behind where I was hiding, I took out a good handful of them. Got those blades that were stuck in me stuck even deeper too, I could feel the pressure of the blades and the warm spray of blood running down my body but no pain. The magic of the potion seller's mightiest potions, without a doubt. After a couple of close-calls, I disabled another four or five with a bold dive from my cover."

The little round-faced, glasses wearing and half-bald weasel shrieked in horror and ordered his goon-squad to hit the road. I wasn't about to let them do that so I ran after but the suppressing barrage of fire was too hard. I felt the intense pushback from a couple of more blades sinking into my shoulder and bringing be on my back. Yeah… It was safe to say that I wasn't going to give those assholes any chase. The full extent of my senses returned to me slowly. The world stopped blacking in and out, that must have been the adrenaline kicking in, pushing away the general sleepiness."

"The sight of the decently emptied Shukuba vault was even more painful than the sight of my front side being riddled with blades and me laying on my back, slowly bleeding out."

* * *

 **Author's Note: Wow, this was a bit experimental, wasn't it? :D**

 **Sorry if you didn't like the difference in perspective and writing, it's just something I wanted to try while telling something I would have normally told either way. On Wednesday's chapter, it's back to basics 3**


	392. Meet the Youngbloods

Early in the morning, Mana noticed a quick shifting of the shadows on the other side of the office. She was so focused on observing her new captive Finger of the Diamond Hand or looking out for potential assassins that a handful of civilian-level chakra signatures completely evaded her attention. At this point the weariness that Mana felt made her mind a tad slower and her minds blurrier. More and more did she catch her train of thought riding on non-sequiturs.

By now the Diamond Hand must have realized that something bad had happened to one of their Fingers. At least Mana presumed this much. If there truly was someone sent to keep the magician's new guest from talking too much, they'd have seen that the woman was being too calm around a self-declared enemy of the Diamond Hand.

"You going to invite them in? Maybe scattering the boys in black and blue was a hasty choice?" the burglar teased Mana. Her tongue stabbed through a bit deeper than the girl wanted it to be able to get. While the office was shut down, it didn't stop from some more ambitious people seeking out Mana's own attention. At some point, the magician may face the ire of groups upon groups of disgruntled people who were unable to rely on the Shukuba Security anymore.

"Stay here," Mana told the burglar, the magician respected the woman's intelligence enough not to have to warn her excessively about how much of a kick in her own groin it'd be for her to try anything funny now.

The shadows that were moving about an empty and rundown office of Shukuba Security belonged to the rookie squad that Mana called out to. From her first sight, she just about realized that it would not be a pleasant work environment, less than half of the calls she sent out were answered and even the four that did answer the summons looked disgruntled and more ready to laugh at Mana's face than face the threat in front of them seriously.

"In here, please." Was all that Mana could muster up to say at the time, her mind raced for ways she could win these four over. Even if her own mind kept switching between her need of a squad and the attempts to soothe herself, however this meeting went, she had to try to get these four on her side regardless on her own stance on things.

The four walked in erratically but then lined up in an orderly fashion, standing like soldiers hearing the speech of their general before riding into battle, except Mana didn't feel like much of a general at all. How could she convincingly plead to these four if she barely believed in her need for their aid herself. This was much bigger than her, she had to at the very least reach out, if she got rejected, the decision on how to act would be made for her.

"Four people? Well, at least you've got the numbers on the Diamond Hand." The Ring of Thumb chuckled to herself. Clearly, she had doubts about the ability of these four to apprehend the other Rings of the Diamond Hand. A sentiment that carried some weight, seeing how Thumb had encountered the other Rings and knew of their strengths and weaknesses and their identities. The burglar had no reason to lie or to build up the power and influence of her organization needlessly, she was a target of their wrath after all and survival must have been her core interest.

"Who is this woman?" one of the four rookies, a short yet athletic and very attractive young man with long dark hair tied behind his back wondered. His tone did not suggest respect or subordination but it was not mocking either. He sounded more on the open to suggestion side, very much on the verge of being won over. That was, of course, if Mana's people reading and listening skills weren't doing her in.

"She's one of the people spreading corruption and holding this town hostage – a Ring of the Diamond Hand." Mana answered the question honestly and with brevity, hoping that was the type of answer that the young man was looking for.

"W-Why isn't she locked up? All of the local arrest facilities are being unmanned, there is not a soul in the office, your aviary box is unattended to and there is a small crowd outside trying to reach you." The other rookie – a young woman whom Mana had already met before, the girl from forensics named Burgoniya who was less than willing to cooperate earlier. All of that spite and disbelief in Mana's abilities and actions were soaking into her speech.

"I'm… Short on hands currently. The reason why Thumb is unrestrained is that she found herself on the wrong side of her own organization's favor by stepping out of line and failing her superiors. We both think that she is living on borrowed time which is why it is beneficial for her to cooperate." Mana tried not to escalate the situation or lie. The fear and unease of screwing everything up was leaking into her tone and voice, how could she have missed a gathering of an entire crowd? It was true that they must have been a fair distance away – outside the building and they couldn't have been sizable enough to stand out of the usual movement of civilians outside the Security walls, while Mana was constantly on the lookout for threats with chakra signatures millions of times surpassing that of the crowd of civilians. Could have been any one of these, could have been all of those combined.

"That and the fact that I can escape any restraints, I'm just that good…" Thumb chuckled again, she was not helping Mana's impression in front of these rookies.

"So you're saying that you called out to us to do your dirty work like work on the local containment facilities, handle the paperwork, answer the mail and… Soothe irritated crowds of bemused people?" the fourth recruit, a ginger young woman of attractive looks and rather frail for a Security officer build exclaimed in discontent.

"I mean, it's not exactly different from what you'd be doing normally, given that you're a youngblood…" the first recruit grinned with half of his face. "Then again, maybe the people would be less on the edge if they did not have to find out about the collapse of the Security from their fleeing government official."

Mana stroke over her tired face with her palm, running it down her hair before pushing it back as it was beginning to flow over it uncontrollably. She spent so much time here sitting on her ass and watching a woman she could not contain but could not entirely trust yet either that she missed out on the shutdown of the entire administration and the Security Force slipping out into the open.

"You must have really pissed the Diamond Hand off if they hit you that low, well done, kid!" Thumb clapped her hands together with a playful and sarcastic cheer aimed at Mana's direction, suggesting that the Diamond Hand had finally had enough of Mana and hit her back where it hurt her just as badly – by turning the public against her while doing nothing illegal. They just exposed something Mana did not want reaching the public's attention until after she was done apprehending the Diamond Hand.

"This is absolutely pathetic. I'm out of here…" Burgoniya grunted before turning around and heading toward the door out of the chief's office.

"Wait, please. Look, I'm not doing this for no reason at all or just to promote myself or because the Hokage has ordered me to shut down the local institutions as a gross abuse of power. I did what I did because I saw the Diamond Hand taking lives, both literally and taking them hostage. I saw them treating human lives as inferior to their influence and riches. Treating life that way goes against everything I stand and live for and I cannot stand for it." Mana jumped off the seat, stopping the rookie in her tracks.

"I worked in forensics for a while, I had gathered experience for a position as an investigator in Security and the very next day – you dissolve the whole thing." Burgoniya gave Mana a spiteful glare, "Not the governor, not chief Chontai himself did that, a goddamn stage magician from Konoha decided to topple my livelihood."

"This… Diamond Hand… I assume it is some sort of a crime syndicate then?" the first recruit wondered out loud. "Correct me if I am wrong but this is exactly the opposite of a situation when you scatter the town's Security Force."

"I'm in", the red-haired young woman who stood fourth in the formation of rookies declared, pressing her fist to her chest and bowing her upper body. This came as a shock to Mana who was beginning to sense like being beaten down from all fronts and was starting to feel more and more hopeless.

"Wait, didn't you just start a family? You should be the first one to leave this foolishness behind, Toiya." Burgoniya switched the target of her ire from Mana to the young woman who decided to answer Mana's plea.

"That is exactly why I will work with Sorceress-san. Because of my family, because I want Shukuba to be a town where my family can live safely and peacefully. What happened to Okasune-san was terrible, her reputation being dragged through the dirt in the public one day after she lost her life. I disagree with Sorceress-san's methods but I, Toiya Kazama, will fight the Diamond Hand under her supervision." The red-haired woman declared.

"I am grateful for that trust. I will do my best not to fail it. However, please know that you are signing up for more than you know. Once this war with the Diamond Hand is over, it will be up to you to reform the Security Force as well. I am not a local, I shall have no role to play in Shukuba's reformation after the Diamond Hand's defeat." Mana nodded at the young woman who had signed herself up on the magician's side.

"Wait, isn't this woman an important figure in this Diamond Hand? How come you didn't ask her about the leader of the organization already? You could have known all of their identities and eliminated them already…" the recruit with the ponytail pondered. His voice was youthful and very soothing but the contents of his words appeared to continuously expose Mana's failures.

"She will not talk about that, I tried asking her about that. Also, I will not kill a single person in this war, just so we're clear on that." Mana found herself rubbing the tip of her foot against the floor, a thoughtless tick when she was ashamed.

"Why won't you talk about it, did your life not wager on that?" the ponytail recruit identified in his file as Sora Kanoji threw his hands up in the air. His brief and controlled outrage was well placed and Mana realized that she may have poked around the Thumb's resistance to mention names a bit too feebly.

"It's not that I won't, I cannot…" Thumb poked her tongue out, revealing a hieroglyph present, "The Middle Finger had hired some bigshot rogue seal-master to place one of these babies on anyone worth a shit in the Diamond Hand. Not even being able to tell anyone my own name is a bit of a bother, as you may imagine. Names of the Fingers are a big no-no. I'm not going to give up my life for it, saving my life is exactly why I'm playing on the other team, to begin with, boy."

Mana had seen similar seals, not quite like this one specifically, but seals placed on one's tongue. They limited the speech on certain matters and, as one started treading secretive roads, the seal began restricting the spokesperson's breath before killing the person if they told something they were forbidden by the seal to say. Konohagakure sometimes still employed this method of protection of information but only for the most secretive of matters, cases of national security or secrets the exposure of which would have threatened the lives of people or undermined the basic values Konoha stood for. The seals were removed immediately after they overstayed their immediate need.

Protection of such matter was too extreme a measure even for the highly secretive ninja, it would have had to be a rogue ninja who had applied such a seal without any hesitation as limiting one's speech in such a way would have been a taboo for any seal-master worth their title. Even more, a seal-master capable of placing such seals leaking to the black market was something the Hokage would like to hear about as well. Mana would have had to use the Aviary, not even the local one as local birds may have been identified and intercepted, especially when the Diamond Hand was this pissed off.

That left the matter of why exactly they were so ticked off at Mana and why right now. What had Mana done to earn their utmost attention right now. Had it been because of the governor or the shutdown of the Security Force, they would have exposed her to the public yesterday, maybe even earlier. An uneasy flame simmered in Mana's chest that whatever Itemi was doing behind her back had something to do with it.

"Well, this may be completely stupid and not what I signed up for at all but… I've trained for so long, went through years of internship in Tanzaku and all that… Turning down this would leave me jobless and that would be very wasteful. I, Sora Kanoji, will help you out, Sorceress, I guess…" Sora shrugged with hands in his pockets. While he did maintain formation, his posture and stance completely disregarded any Security regulations, that was to say, those Mana knew of. While this one agreed to work with her, he may not be entirely under her command.

Mana nodded in acknowledgment and gratitude regardless.

"You have been awfully quiet", the magician addressed the third recruit, a two and a half meter giant with a physically fit build and facial scars splitting his strictly regulation abiding buzz-cut in three places. For a young recruit, this third rookie looked like he was an experienced veteran.

"What is there to say?" he rubbed his nose, a telltale sign of feelings of some sort rustling inside his gut, it could have been a sign of both honesty due to social shyness or nervousness over his lies. The way Mana saw it, had the youth been lying, he'd have been better at it. "The person who busted Syndicate in Otogakure and a fellow survivor of their torture asks me to fight by their side. I was on your side before you even spoke up."

"Wait, what?" Burgoniya raised an eyebrow.

"I was interning in Otogakure for the last six months. The town's been overrun with Syndicate for four of them, the Police Force there was basically a non-existent charade. They surveyed information back to Syndicate sources and the criminals dealt with their competition accordingly. I did not play by those rules." The giant unbuttoned his uniform and lifted up his black shirt underneath, revealing a body riddled with scars all over his hardened muscles. "At some point my torturer got afraid that I'd not relent. They started scaring me about how good his torture supposedly was, how only one person managed to sit through it all without a peep. At the time I thought I was delirious, Konoha's Sorceress, a stage magician surviving torture?"

"The Chuunin Exams…" Sora suddenly interrupted the story with a snap of his fingers.

"That's right, after I saw Sorceress' name on the posters, I realized that this was no delirious dream. Konoha's Sorceress and her cohorts kicked the Syndicate's ass so hard over just one night that they shortly lost their power all over the region. Now she's here, in my hometown, ready to kick more asses. It does not get any more in, so to describe the manner in which I am in this. I, Shira Hayafu, will fight the Diamond Hand."

For a while now Mana has been plagued by this same feeling she could not shake off after telling on Kouta's team's location to Team Dunyazad during the Chuunin Exams. The feeling that she's been doing everything so wrong, and that she was so delusional that she could not even see how wrong she was tackling everything around her. This was the first time since the end of the Chuunin Exams that Mana had heard her being praised as a kunoichi and not as a stage magician.

Usually, her magic was the object of praise and success whereas Mana's work as a ninja got labeled with bemusement and mockery from everyone she met. People thought her being naïve and childish due to her dream, they mocked her for being a known stage magician and she's struggled being taken seriously due to her double occupation. This was probably the first time that Mana had managed to shake the foundations of her unease, just this once she was able to look at the events in Otogakure and what was going on here with a different light. It was a really good feeling.

"Well, as much as I dislike all of this. I will not go back to being an overpaid oracle reading bloodstains and body positions at forensics. All of this may be stupid, but it's the only option I have. I, Burgoniya Hogofuse, shall work with you." Just like that, the most skeptical of the four had also agreed to work with Mana.

"What are your orders, ma'am?" Shira inquired while tensing his body in a very official-looking pose, driving a knife over Mana's ears with the official way he addressed her.

"Please man the containment facilities. I am going to address that small crowd outside and assure the public that the Security Force is operational, I'll do my best to turn Diamond Hand's social assault at us back on them. I will need you here while I send a message to Lord Sixth about something and address the public. You will hear their complaints out and do whatever Security Force usually does, you must maintain the illusion that the Shukuba Security is functional, if with a slightly limited capacity." Mana sighed realizing the weight of the position she was now in.

In a way, she was not leading these people, not in a way a chuunin, which she was, should lead a squad of ninja. It was not even that these four weren't ninja, it was that Mana was afraid to take command and order them around as she would have thought fit if she was marking answers on a sheet of paper on a test. While her choice of assignments was somewhat sound, she was just shaking off responsibility while she was about to tackle it all by herself, just like she was afraid she'd do…

"Wait, containment facilities? Honey, I'm going with you. If Index ever decides to show her face around here, she'll redecorate this place with their blood before they even realize she's here, no offense, guys. I'm not leaving your side…" Thumb crossed her arms over her chest.

And so, at the end of the day, despite her most extreme attempts to not place herself in the situation where she'd constantly have to look behind her back and fear betrayal, Mana had ended up in just such a situation. The magician leaned in over Thumb's ear, having to slightly step up on her toes to do it.

"I know you can't mention any names, but your reaction when I mentioned the name of Yokotomo Donyoku told me everything. Itemi knows that name as well, even if you do end up betraying me, just know that the name is out there and it's all your fault." Mana played her highest card just to ensure Thumb's cooperation for a slightly longer amount of time she usually would have had it.

Even if Thumb was playing Mana, by showing the kind of violent and offensive reaction to the name before, the magician ensured that if she was ever betrayed, she could also place Thumb under lethal fire by telling whoever in charge of the Diamond Hand was that the name became known to her and the reformed Security Force due to Thumb's disobedient actions.


	393. Public Relations

Before Mana had even left to confront the small crowd of people she could feel a slight disruption in the rhythm in which the chakra signatures outside used to move. Given how minuscule the signatures were and how used she got to feeling various numbers of them just bustling about outside the Security building, Mana had reconciled with the fact that she completely missed the crowd, given how she was looking for a signature which was an entire planet, compared to the ants of these civilians. One often missed an unnatural behavior of ants when looking at the stars…

The magician left through the door, but not before giving her team of rookies a confirming glare back. Seeing the four take up on the given assignments, as lowly as they were. These guys were good people: Sora was a bit of the handsome douchebag type, Shira had seen plenty of pain in his life and held his feelings and thoughts inside too much, Burgoniya had a nasty and rebellious temper and Toiya would have betrayed the squad if that meant protecting her newly built family due to her conflict of interest but… None of them deserved what the Diamond Hand were willing to dish out to their enemies.

"You know, The Middle Finger will keep on stacking troubles on top if you don't keep moving and just stand around." Thumb objected with a whiny voice. Mana dismissed her with a gesture before walking out the door.

"So the Middle Finger is the one in charge then? Is Yokotomo Donyoku the Middle Finger?" Mana wondered.

"I feel like you know full well I can't answer that question but you asked it regardless…" the burglar objected.

"I figured maybe as long as you didn't say any names, you could answer yes and no questions. The seal on your tongue looks different to the silence seals villages use. I've seen some pictures in history books, your hieroglyph is different and the seal is weaker. It probably has some loopholes we don't know about." Mana shrugged.

"And you're just willing to risk my life to find out those loopholes? You're so cruel…" Thumb teased Mana with her playfully sarcastic whining.

The crowd outside was not even what could have been qualified as a public outrage. There were a good thirty people standing around the Security HQ, just talking and occasionally yelling out something of the demanding nature at the closed Security door. The crowd got collectively shocked when Mana and Thumb opened the door to greet them as they must not have expected any attention from the officials at all at this rate.

"My name is Nakotsumi Mana, I came out here to answer all your questions and, hopefully, ease your minds somewhat." Mana bowed to the people politely, standing on top of the staircase that lead into the Security offices. It was a good thing that she was used to performing in front of crowds hundreds of times larger than this, she may just need to lie, as bad as she was at that and as much as Mana hated that option, for the sake of maintaining the public order.

"How come we can't see the Security?"

"I heard that the Governor has run away, is that true?"

"Is our town shut down? Are we just fishes in a barrel? What if mercenaries and criminals invade us, do we have any defenses working?"

These and countless more questions flew from every corner. It was once she heard the thirty people fling well over a hundred questions in her general direction that Mana understood just what she has signed up for. Frankly, in that moment, as much as Mana loved standing in front of people and easing their worries, she'd have preferred having given this assignment to someone better spoken and wittier, like Sora, and taking up the task entrusted to him for herself.

"Yeah, okay, I guess this is not happening, how about I just tell you everything I know, while I have your most pressing concerns in mind?" Mana shouted out with a slightly raised voice to silence the crowd somewhat as sixty curious eyes penetrated her with glares willing to dissect everything she said, just waiting for her to trip up. It was not that much different than the first few times Mana performed on stage. When new performers started out it was quite common for the villagers to dissect their performances and judge the value of the money they paid for seeing them with completely different sets of eyes compared to old and established wolves of the stage.

"Shukuba is not shut down. It is just suffering from a backlash of a grievous corruption ring. Plenty of public figures, entertainers and Security officers were involved in it. I did not want it to become public to avoid a state of public outrage but it appears that the criminal organization named the Diamond Hand wants to play it differently, I am ready to play this game by their rules. I will bring this out to the public if that's the way they want to play this." Mana felt the slowly creeping up anger, it was affecting her words and strategy significantly, she tried to control it and push it down.

Thumb grabbed Mana by her shoulder and shook it.

"What the hell are you doing? Calling the Diamond Hand out?" The woman hissed into Mana's ear.

"Why are you talking to us? Why can't we speak to the Security or see the governor about this?" Someone in the audience yelled out.

"Who told you that you can't? Shukuba Security is currently short-staffed but operational. The clean-handed officers are willing to accept your complaints and do their job. As far as the governor is concerned, he may have fled from the town, but you can talk to him at about the same percentage of success as you could when he was actually here…" Mana nodded in the direction of the public addresser. Her speech soothed somewhat when the Diamond Hand was not the main subject and cause of what she had to talk about. She even made the audience break into a few controlled laughs by acknowledging how inaccessible the governor was, somewhat she had herself learned when trying to reach him.

"As far as why I am speaking to you is concerned, I am a kunoichi of Konohagakure and I am cooperating with the local Security force with the orders of Lord Sixth Hokage, in order to defeat the Diamond Hand and free your town. I assure you that Konoha will play no part in your reformation after the criminal ring is busted, we will not impose on your political rights in any way." Mana did not have to work too hard to make her speech believable. Her complete disinterest in political and monetary matters must have leaked out like water from a busted dam.

"Would you stop saying their name already?" Thumb kept objecting quietly to Mana's ear.

"What about the incident in Shukuba's vault, what comments does the Security force have about that?" Someone spoke up from the public. Just when Mana felt like she was almost freed from this and ready to tackle the task at hand.

"What are they talking about?" Mana turned at Thumb with a whisper, the female burglar just shrugged.

"I'm… I'm afraid I am not entirely aware of which accident you are addressing." Mana whimpered in embarrassment. Being someone who liked to over-prepare for every event in her life, there was nothing that drove the breath out of her lungs and made her voice tremble like an aspen during autumnal winds than being oblivious to something important so close to her.

"There was a big blade fight in Shukuba vault. Most of the town's funds are reportedly gone and a barely alive body of a Security officer was found riddled with blades inside. Rumors say that more than two-thirds of the budget of the town has been emptied." Mana gathered from the audience, one member adding on to another's recollection. Some fixing the finer details of something the other said.

"Itemi…" Mana whispered to herself, her lips paled realizing that by giving someone so despaired and disillusioned so much freedom to do as he pleased she may have driven a kunai into her own foot. Mana's voice just froze in her chest. She wanted to talk, to try and explain something, give the audience anything that would sound the least bit affirming but her throat just dried out and her heart pounded heavily in her chest with fear for the officer's life and blame for giving him this much freedom.

"No comment…" Thumb smiled like a mischievous child whom everyone knew to blame for a busted priceless vase but who was not quite caught in the act and therefore stubbornly denied any responsibility. The woman dragged Mana away by her elbow before the magician could completely collapse in front of the audience. After a brief while of confusion and bemusement, the gathering thinned out as some of them entered the Security HQ while the others just left to do their thing, being somewhat reaffirmed that the sky above their head was shattered but not yet falling on top of their heads.

"No comment?" Mana wheezed, taking far too long to regain the ability to speak. Whenever lives were at stake, whenever the magician felt like there was any way she could have blamed herself for a failure of any kind, she just froze and collapsed. She may have grown stronger, older and wiser but… Some things never changed.

"That's what Security says, instead of saying anything, you should learn that phrase, it's quite useful…" Thumb gave Mana a thumb up before letting go of the magician's elbow and tilting her chin and shrugging her shoulders.

"So… Where to next?" She wondered.

"I… I must see Itemi-san…" Mana's eyes changed, she could feel that much, the wetness in her eyes, the sorrowful look… She probably no longer looked in charge, her calls and her decisions had almost cost someone their life and they definitely cost this town most of the budget kept in the vault.

Itemi was an adult, more so, he was significantly more experienced than Mana at this crime-busting business, even if he kept himself occupied with paperwork more than anything else recently. He was not someone who would have listened even if Mana had told him to stick by her side, nothing useful would have come if Mana restricted him by force either. Still, just like most things in life, the magician couldn't help but feel responsible for not being there and not helping him, even if her mind, one more creative and imaginative than most, failed to find a plausible way for her to have done so.

"What's wrong?" Thumb stopped and looked back after Mana stopped in her tracks and looked back for just a brief moment. In that instance, the magician's eyes changed from those filled with regret and sinking in despair to those of a ninja, ready for combat, analytical and goal oriented. That change lasted for just an insignificant fraction of a second, too frail in the flow of time for anyone but the most perceptive and quick on their feet and minds to notice.

"Nothing, let's keep moving." Mana lowered her head and stuffed her hands into the pockets of her jacket, hunching over and continuing the trek to the Shukuba hospital.

Compared to the relatively hi-tech and colorful Konohagakure hospital, where modern décor, colorful renovations and technological marvels adapted to serve the medical needs of the ninja village reigned, Shukuba hospital was a grey and dreary, depressing hole. Cracked tiles, rotten wallpapers and the stuffiness of air that made Mana wonder just what sort of reek she'd be picking up on if she still had her ability to smell. If she ever ended up placed in such an establishment, the magician would be thankful to never wake up and just stay asleep as just catching rare glimpses of what the inside of wards looked like, what with the barred windows and such, she couldn't imagine feeling any semblance of hope for recovery in such a building.

This is where people could have only been brought to suffer and die. The corruption of the Diamond Hand now just made Mana feel even more infuriated.

There was almost no security and no one asked any questions when Mana asked to see Itemi. This almost made the magician feel outraged but if she voiced a single qualm with this place to anyone, she had no reason to single this one out. She'd have to go on a rant that would continue for weeks upon months to no end or a possible thing to gain.

"Wow, they just let you in, no questions asked, we'll be lucky if the Diamond Hand hadn't already gotten to your pal here." Thumb grinned.

"Would they do such a thing?" Mana looked back at her companion of questionable allegiances.

"I mean… Not unless he really pissed them off. The Diamond Hand was always more about control and getting rich off of someone else's account. Murder and racketeering always came as a final resort or a capital punishment. Very few of the Rings are actually bad people, this just the only way they see to get ahead." Thumb looked around, likely getting tackled by similar depressing thoughts about the place that Mana had.

The lack of any manner of medical ninjutsu healing was evident. People walked around in casts, bandages that were so soaked in blood and medication that the fluids dripped on the ground leaving repulsive looking trails testifying on where and when someone was going. Mana could not even begin to imagine how long these people would have to suffer such treatments and recovery without the aid of medical ninjutsu and only natural and scientific healing methods.

"All this must look really shocking, huh?" Thumb noticed Mana's creeped out eyes and trembling lips, her pale expression. Not surprising given how Mana didn't attempt to cover it up in any way whatsoever.

"I mean… It's obviously depressing and makes me want to do something. Becoming a medical ninja is something I always wanted as a student but… I lacked the skill for it. My grades were average, my chakra control was average, I was rejected both times I applied for Konoha High before graduation." Mana walled herself off by wrapping herself in her arms, walking across people that looked and grunted like the walking dead was seriously freaking her out and she had seen some quite messed up stuff in her short life.

"That's not what I meant. I'm not blaming you for not being able to change this. I'm just saying… You know how that scarred giant fellow showed off his scars and said something about how you survived an even more gruesome version of that torture? Well, it's just that you have no scars to show for it. You've been having it easy back in Konoha, compared to this, huh?" Thumb voiced her thoughts, Mana was not sure if this was supposed to be teasing, as it was always the case with Thumb, or if it had some even deeper hidden meaning of some kind.

"I have plenty of scars to show. Not everything can be removed with medical ninjutsu. Chakra over matter and all that. My father was burnt by something so dense with chakra that even medical ninjutsu could not treat the nerve damage. Even I carry some nasty scars down there, I just am in no rush of removing them because they don't get in my way, as ninja or a stage magician." Mana replied she had no idea why she came off as so defensive as there didn't appear to be an assault of any nature to defend against.

Itemi looked strangely calm and peaceful, laying in his room, halfway covered up with hospital sheets, his lower body wrapped in a sarcophagus of bandages with red stains dyeing it in several places. Thumb pinched her nose, suggesting to Mana that the stench of medication was especially powerful in this room.

"Eye for an eye, huh?" Thumb spoke up in a high-pitched and distorted voice, similar to that of a piglet. One that would have normally made Mana laugh if the circumstances were not so sorrowful.

"What do you mean?" Mana looked at her companion.

"Well, that's just the way the Diamond Hand seems to operate, it's a psychological play, I think. It's not a rule or anything, more like a coincidence of Middle Finger's decisions. Okasune hit the Diamond Hand where it hurt – she got killed, Itemi hit the Diamond Hand by attempting to stop their attempt to recover financially, he got put down. Because he failed, his punishment was less severe." Thumb somberly explained her point.

Mana seemed to understand Thumb's point. It was a psychological play. The Diamond Hand seemed to ignore you when you were no one of importance to them. Whenever you hit them in any way, they hit back just as hard, making any sort of attempt at defeating them look fruitful. If Shukuba Security ever tackled the Diamond Hand, the syndicate would hit them back in places where it would hurt them proportionately to the degree in which Security attacked the Diamond Hand. It's a crushing psychological play when subjected to it one couldn't help but feel the hopelessness of fighting back.

It was not even close to how different criminal organizations operated. It had its own specific taste to it. When you crossed the Syndicate in any way, they may have just killed you, if they needed something – they tortured it out of you. It was dead simple, they operated in a very cold, logical and efficient manner that lacked any moral semblance to it. The Diamond Hand was not cold, was not efficient. It was the perfect mirror, the perfect contrast to what its opposing force was. It was psychological and it played games. It did not beat their competition by being better or stronger than their opposition, it beat them by making their competition get worse, get sloppy and question their every action.

"Itemi-san…" Mana's lips whimpered out, just barely breathing out enough air to ruffle the stuffy air in the ward. That was enough. Mana was prancing around the matter for too long. She tried to do this rightfully and by the book for too long. She had a clue rolling about in her hand and she was hesitant to exploit it, getting involved by distraction after a distraction. No more. No one else will suffer because Mana wasn't willing enough to be a bulldozer when she needed to be.

"Hey, where are you going? You just saw your friend, don't you wanna stay around some more?" Thumb raised an eyebrow after seeing Mana just jump up and head for the door.

"No. I'm going to pay Yokotomo Donyoku a visit, I'm going to expose him as whichever ring of the Diamond Hand he is, then I'll tear everything the Diamond Hand calls their own down. I'll give them no quarter to counterattack from, I'll just keep pressing them until they break. I won't let this happen to anyone else, not the rookie squad, not you, not a single person in that audience or this town." Mana muttered out from a position of blinding rage, but still not blinding enough for her to yell in the middle of a hospital.


	394. Obsession

Thumb burst through the hospital door, not the one that Mana and the burglar had entered through but one that lead to a small alleyway leading to an important vein of the city, pulsing with movement and inhabitants.

"I don't think it's such a good idea. You can't just burst into the place and start punching people." The tone of the woman was different from before. She was no longer teasing or being playful, Thumb was genuinely concerned. Whom for exactly Mana couldn't be sure. Her buzzing and tired mind couldn't be sure of anything lately. The pulsing veins in the side of her head demanded chakra input to remain functioning properly but Mana was purposefully denying them it. Was it Mana's instinctual phobia of needless augmentations or some other reason that made the girl behave this way, she could not entirely remember.

"I've tried anything but that. Yes, if I do this right and if I do this how I always do things, I shall succeed. But when I do things how I've always been doing them, other people suffer. Good people." Mana tried shutting the woman down. The searing pain in her mind did not let her put together a better answer so she went with the outer layer of the feelings that bubbled inside of her chest.

"You cannot do this alone, that's why you've put together the team, isn't it? Where will you even find… That man?" Thumb almost broke her taboo in fear of Mana doing something either very smart or very stupid.

"I have my ways." Mana cut it down again.

"Oh, please. You won't torture anyone, of all people I know that the best. Stop lying to yourself. All you're going to do is get yourself killed or hospitalized in there." Thumb persisted. "I know how powerful the other Rings are, most importantly, how cunning they are. You can't do this alone."

"You don't know anything about me. You've only seen the shell of what I can do, only what I've allowed you to see." Mana turned back at Thumb, meeting her panicking gaze with a contrasting one of her own. The magician may have been delusional to think so, she acknowledged that much even in her hazy mental state, but she was beginning to think that it was not her or the youngbloods that the burglar woman was protecting by being this cautious. "You insisted on coming with me. I know you're afraid to head to the den of your predators but it was your call to follow me around whole day. You are more than welcome to head back to the Security building."

"Why are we standing about? How will you even know where to find that man?" Thumb placed her hand on Mana's shoulder.

"I'll ask them." The magician replied leaving the last part ominous, a pair of moments after she left it hanging in the air, the little capillary leading into the busy town street filled with people of questionable intentions. Some were all muscle, some looked all grace and speed yet all of them were entirely composed of murder and violence in varied ratios of the two.

"Who are they? Do you think they're after me?" Thumb took a couple of cautious steps back.

"I don't know nor do I care. They've been following us for a while, since Heiho Square at the very least. I could sense them but they were too minor a concern to stop our progress then." Mana turned against the handful of thugs rushing into the alleyway so she could stand against them face to face.

One by one, the bandits spread out to both sides, letting a tall and intimidating figure approach through the middle. One with the smallest chakra signature of them all, strangely. It was a tall and incredibly well-trained physically individual. He wore nothing but a tank top underneath an unzipped military vest that was supposed to keep away an injury from simple swords, kunai, and shuriken at bay. The vest was far too short for the man, which was why it was worn so loosely and was in a constant state of tension, moments away from tearing.

"Is this one of the Rings?" Mana looked back at Thumb.

"Are you fucking kidding me right now?" Thumb flipped out on Mana.

"You told me you were a Ring. That means that yes or no Ring-related questions are a loophole in your Taboo Seal." Mana explained with a calm and calculated face.

"Not even a gasp?" the muscular man with the Kumogakure military vest spread his massive arms wide, adopting a mocking grin on his ugly and scarred mug. He apparently expected Mana to recognize him but the magician couldn't really put a finger on his shaved brick-shaped head and his face that looked like it was flattened by a titanium wall when the man hit it face-first while traveling at great velocity.

"Unless you are a Ring of the Diamond Hand, I do not care who you are. Unless you have information about them, get out of my way." Mana shoved air out of from her chest as anger was making her breathing highly irregular. The old man in the Sun Disc arena would have been quite disappointed with her breathing had he seen her now.

"Those fuckers? They only sent the woman who directed me your way, my only association with them is that they gave me men and a goal which both of us could agree on – snapping your little body like a twig!" the giant almost roared out, spraying an alarming amount of bodily fluids from his mouth as he did so.

"I think he harbors some kind of grudge against you… The woman he is speaking of could be the Index Ring though." Thumb noted the obvious.

"I do not care," Mana exclaimed, still brimming with anger for what happened to Itemi, for the misfortune of it all and the betrayal of someone she considered a friend to go off on a raid all by himself, before starting to slowly walk towards the gang of armed men lead by this mysterious titan of physicality. "Seeing how you don't know anything, move."

Seeing how none of the sixteen men that the gigantic mystery-man brought with him planned to move, instead deciding to twitch and display all the signs and gestures of an incoming attack. Each one of them was taken down in a split-instant, collapsing before their bodies could complete the first motion of their attacks.

The man in the middle was left with a twitching right eye, watching Mana approaching him. The magician did not attack him because she was actually quite curious, not about his origins or why he was so fixed on killing Mana, maybe that would be of interest to her if she was in a better mental place. What interested the kunoichi was what exactly the man would do, would he surrender some useful information in hopes that Mana would not harm him or if he would remain adamant about his strange quest for vengeance.

"Y-You ruined my life, you little bitch!" the man roared out, charging forward. He was either very mindless or very skilled in hand to hand, compensating the difference of chakra Mana had on him to augment her abilities with would have been profoundly difficult, next to impossible even.

With careful leans back, a very flawed dodging motion admittedly, Mana leaned away from the massive arms that aimed to punch all that was soft inside Mana's body out of her. The manner of her evasion was mocking to anyone who knew a bit about martial arts. Leaning backward or sideways only invited a very simple counter but, at the same time, it was a very psychologically vexing dodge, the equivalent of a verbal abuse in martial arts form.

"I do not remember you. Had I done something of the sort, I'm sure I would have remembered it." Mana closed her eyes. She decided to calm her nerves, her current boiling state would have lead to her accidentally killing this weakling of a man. He was a mere civilian in prime physical condition, the very human peak of strength and endurance. It must have taken an entire lifetime of grueling training for this man to acquire this shape, he would have been an amazing ninja had he had a semblance of spiritual training to balance his physicality.

"You little bitch, you left me impaled on a moose horn! Captured by a little magician girl, I was the laughing stock of the entire prison! I was given six years for my crimes but I had to swallow my pride, to almost beg to be placed in Jigoku, that way I only had to suffer one-third of that punishment." As the man continued to express years-worth of suppressed feelings Mana was beginning to remember the man.

How did he expect her to recognize him? Last time she saw this man he was wearing full mercenary military gear, admittedly, he had this same armored vest but his face was almost completely concealed behind a gas mask, not only that, he had a quite rich head of greasy hair back then. Granted, remembering this man did calm Mana's heart a bit for his identity had some sentimental value for Mana.

"It was a deer horn from a deer trophy." Mana fixed the man's mistake. Given how much blood he was losing and that he was impaled through the back, he may not have seen the exact animal that had foiled him. "And I am afraid you are giving me too much credit. I did not ruin your life. You decided to capture Hanada Katsuo and beat his life out of him, threaten his family and children, also a room full of innocent children who just came to wish their friend a happy birthday as well."

The once leader of a mercenary gang did not wish to listen to Mana's words at all. He continued to throw fists without a moment to hesitate or to stop at the magician's direction, using them as both thrust punching weapons and hammering the ground beneath his feet in an attempt to mash the magician to the dirt. A rather symbolic gesture given his searing hatred for the girl. Neither of the mercenary's fists landed on their desired target. Mana was like a mirage of a spectacular oasis to a man stranded in a desert, alluring yet untouchable.

"You had a choice, you could have left this hateful cause of yours behind, move along with your life as you have left your hatred for Hanada-san behind, in pursuit of my life. Instead, you chose to keep on subjecting yourself to that flame, to keep simmering in a pot of hellfire. All this time passed and you haven't moved on because of it. All because of choices you made. If you want to hate me, if you wish to kill me that is fine, just don't lie to both of us that I have anything to do with the wreck your made of your life." Mana kept on taunting her opponent.

Even if this clash did not even begin resembling a fight, in the meaning that the opposing forces were nowhere near equal in this case, Mana did feel a semblance of worry. This man was completely normal in terms of his chakra signature, the physical aspects of his chakra were peaked but that was not the correct path to strength. She would need to hit him at some point but Mana felt a slight hint of worry that she was in no state to properly control the force of her strike so that it isn't ineffective or doesn't outright kill him.

If she hit this man too weak, the hit would just bounce off without any use. If the hit was to be too strong, she would completely demolish this man beyond any point of reasonable dignity for his remains. It was once Mana caught a glimpse of the sweaty and grimacing pure, unadulterated hatred face of her opponent that she got an idea of what she would do.

"That's right, I suffered profoundly in Jigoku, bested by a little girl, I was the laughingstock amongst the world's most dangerous people. I had to swallow my pride, my dignity and any semblance of self-worth! All that left was hate!" the man smashed the ground beneath his feet, shattering the rock tiles and pavement and raising broken off pillars of dirt and shattered stone from underground while his arms burst with blood. Mana vaulted over the man, scaling his massive, veiny chest like a wall before flipping over the man's head but instead of exploiting any of his openings she just took a graceful hop back to get some distance.

"You think you've become strong after lifting some weights and sparring with some blockheads, after picking up scraps from truly strong men but they saw you for what you truly were this whole time. You were weak because you abandoned your spirituality, you've abandoned your humanity because you needed space to stuff all that hatred somewhere. Those men in Jigoku used you for entertainment, Index used you just for fun, directing you my way just to see what will happen." Mana's voice softened. Even if she was exploiting the man's anger and hatred for a plan on stopping Bakku for good, she felt that realization soothing the anger and hatred inside her own heart too.

"You really think pissing this guy off is a good idea?" Thumb intervened, just narrowly avoiding a wild backhand swing from Bakku coming her way.

Bakku had clearly picked up some moves in Jigoku, some self-taught criminals taught him basic forms of Strong Fist, clearly. The most ironic part was that by surrendering to the basic principles of the Strong Fist – dominating physicality and brutal destruction and breaking of all bones in one's opponent Bakku made Mana an insurmountable wall to overcome. The very core principles of Mana's evasive style were designed to evade such styles, the magician needed no time or draw no profiles to understand Bakku's fighting style. No form of pure Strong Fist would ever lay a finger on her.

"Why? He is just a toy, always was. Hanada Katsuo toyed with him and his men back home, the prisoners in Jigoku toyed with him so that they could laugh after seeing a worm train to fly so it could hunt down hawks, Index played with this man just for chaos' own sake. Whether he dies and she loses nothing or I die and she gains something – to the Diamond Hand Bakku is nothing but a toy." Mana replied while she danced around her sweating and wheezing opponent who desperately tried to realize all of the sick dreams he had of breaking the little girl that, in his mind, caused his life to crash down and burn.

It was then that Mana saw her chance when Bakku extended his hands with an attempt to block off Mana's escape. The magician extended just one finger, placing it lightly to Bakku's chest as lightning crackled down her body.

"Lightning Style: Magician's Touch", Mana calmly whispered.

Bakku's body began jerking wildly as he fell to his knees in an instant, collapsing without a sign of life, pulse or any hints of consciousness. Mana had to step aside just so the collapsing giant did not fall right on top of her. A moment of deadly silence reigned in, Mana closed her eyes and placed her hands inside of her coat pockets. Just as that happened, a bunch of men and women in white coats started flooding the alleyway outside of the hospital backdoor, likely having observed the entire thing. While they did pick up the downed giant, Mana and Thumb had already disappeared into the busy street further down the alleyway.

"That was mean of you. To belittle a man so much and crush his dreams before you killed him." Thumb spoke up, her tone was no longer mocking or playful, it was serious and a little respectful even.

"I did not kill him. He suffered a cardiac arrest right outside a hospital. It is dangerous, it might result in death but this facility has the technology needed to treat it. Itemi-san survived getting riddled with kunai blades, didn't he?" Mana bitterly replied. The suggestion that she would have intentionally killed a man she felt so bad for was quite sickening but she did not blame Thumb for that. The burglar did not know Mana's dislike of ending life.

"So… You just shocked him and he had a cardiac attack?" Thumb raised an eyebrow. "For someone trained to kill, that was awfully inventive of you to keep him alive like that."

"His training was that did him in. I barely had to supply a spark. Did you not see his pitiful state?" Mana looked away, feeling her eyes moisten.

"Oh yeah! The guy looked like he could lift a building over his head with his right arm, what a pathetic fellow…" Thumb's cheekiness and sarcasm returned about at the same time that the blood in her pale cheeks did.

"Don't laugh. I was taught my entire life that strength was acquired through rigorous improvement of one's body and mind, both spiritual and physical selves must grow in harmony in order for a person to grow strong. Bakku-san had ignored his spiritual side, trained himself to the point where his body was on the verge of breaking down already. He was wheezing and sweating, his facial muscles were twitching and contracting irregularly, he was a wreck while in complete physical prime. The spark was just a catalyst for the cries of help from his already dying heart." Mana mumbled as she snuffled with her running nose, luckily she was in cold enough environment to leave everyone fooled about the source of those sounds.

"You mean his heart was messed up or something? Well, a cardiac arrest won't help that. My grandpa had one of those after a heart attack, he couldn't do anything strenu… That was your intention, wasn't it?" Thumb pushed Mana playfully before shaking the girl by her shoulder.

"Yes. It is more than likely that he will never be able to fight or train his body again without suffering another attack to his damaged heart. He could keep on fostering his hatred and choose death, in that case, I'll have failed him truly. But there is still a chance that he will change his ways now that the other option is sure to kill him." Mana explained, wiping her tears and working up a smile for her companion.

"That's pretty kind of you, for someone so determined to end your life as painfully as possible…" Thumb smiled back.

"Not true. Bakku-san helped me see what reveling in hatred and wish of immediate payback does to someone. How it can undo all training and all the growth someone had accumulated throughout their life. I just… Wanted to help him, that's all." Mana looked on ahead, only for her stare to freeze and widen in disbelief of the youth standing right in front of her.

"You've done enough here, Mana. I'm here to bring you back." Aozora Yushijin, Kouta's ex-teammate from back in the Chuunin Exams, was standing right in front of Mana, staring her right in the eyes with determined and driven eyes.


	395. Rivalry Pressure

Confusion, uncertainty and a batch of other things ran down Mana's head when she saw a fellow Konoha ninja present in front of her, looking to be in full combat preparedness and ready to bring her back. Did Lord Sixth not grant her full permission to act upon her discretion, she did send him a quick intel report together with the last message sent out with a hawk, could that have been it?

"Why are you here?" Mana asked just to push the inevitable pressure of making a decision a little bit further, just stall for time until she figured what to do next. It would have been quite dangerous to attempt and engage Yushijin all by herself, even if Thumb was by her side, she was an unreliable ally at best.

"I already told you, I am on a mission authorized by Lord Sixth to bring you back," Yushijin replied with a bit of edge to his tone, he clearly noticed Mana's attempts to bargain for time and did not appreciate it. If she was to get this situation under control Mana needed to work it smarter, although… She was so tired, sleepless and beginning to grow hungry and thirsty to the point where her chakra network was starting to strain itself lightly just to keep her going like this.

"I thought I had Sixth's full permission to act in Shukuba's best interest until the criminal organization was disbanded. Was my intelligence flawed or forged?" Mana continued to inquire, at this point she didn't even abandon the possibility that her fellow Konoha ninja was a transformation, someone wearing his shape and robes, then again, who in this pleasure town could have known enough about her to know not only about Yushijin but also about the unpleasant sense of guilt that Mana felt towards Team Fir?

"I don't know. Lord Sixth was looking for people to bring you back, I volunteered." Yushijin grinned with half of his face, his grin was brimming with confidence, he felt almost excited to confront Mana this way. His stance, the confidence in his face, this had to be Yushijin, he felt excited about the opportunity to get to fight Mana officially.

"That is interesting, I cannot seem to sense your presence even when you're in front of me." Mana bent her head to the side in curiosity, extending her sensory abilities to their absolute peak and yet failing to pick up anything but the chakra of a civilian irradiating from Yushijin. She would have long since dismissed her colleague had it not been for this one curious detail.

Yushijin pressed his hands together in a hand seal position, releasing whatever technique he was using. As he did so, a chakra signature started flowing freely like it had just toppled a massive dam and was about to drown Mana's senses, attempting to overwhelm them completely. Fortunately enough, it was not nearly powerful enough to do so, even given Mana's novice mastery of her sensory at that moment. Yushijin's unleashed chakra signature was still a bit below Mana's, regardless, it was impressive for someone his age and rank to have his signature at these heights for Mana did engage in special chakra level training almost regularly with her meditation and exercises of chakra control and flow.

"I guess this new jutsu I've learned has something to do with why I was selected." Yushijin's pride could not keep his grin contained. "Now leave this village behind and come home."

"Answer me this, before I answer your request, was your mission treating me as a potential rogue ninja? Does Lord Sixth treat me as someone who has abandoned the village?" Mana wondered.

This was an important question, the answer to it determined the rest of Mana's life, possibly. If the magician was treated as a rogue ninja – that meant that Mana's reports back to the village had never really reached the Konoha Aviary and were intercepted, which caused this miscommunication. If Lord Sixth considered not Mana's status, but her actions, dangerous, that would have been a different matter entirely.

"No, you are not considered a possible rogue ninja. As far as Lord Sixth briefed me, you have not left the village, as far as loyalty goes. I am under orders to bring you back alive." Yushijin replied. His face was an iron wall when it needed to be and a pitch black fog of mist when it was appropriate, Mana couldn't tell if he was telling the truth or lying. Yushijin had grown very good at keeping a cold and emotionless face when he wanted to… It was even a little bit commendable, really.

"Well then…" Mana turned her nose and face down, pocketing her hands inside her coat and calmly walking forward. From what her sensory could tell her, as the magician's eyes remained closed, Thumb was trembling in her boots a little and refused to move. Mana almost felt a little bit offended that despite being confronted by a ninja of relatively same or similar skill, Yushijin clearly intimidated the woman far more than Mana did. "This is pointless."

Yushijin swung his sword at Mana's back, aiming to leave a wide and deep enough gash to cut her down immediately if she was cocky enough to lower her defenses. The magician crouched down, she had expected the youth to react this way from the beginning, his pride would not take being antagonized and belittled this way. Just like that, she had Yushijin played… That would tip the scales to her favor whereas in an even battlefield they would have been relatively equal.

"Can't you see this, you idiot? Lord Sixth just sent you for the show." Mana spoke up as she stood back on her feet and gently gained some distance from her colleague. While the first strike attacking her exposed back was easy to read, the rest of his attacks would at the very least deserve being seen and analyzed by Mana visually as she would have stood no hope against Yushijin if she looked down on his tremendous skill.

Talking was beneficial to Mana when Yushijin was busy talking or enjoying this clash with Mana he would not be nearly putting in as much forethought and sheer fighting ability in his attacks as he would be distracted.

"For show? I figured there was something off about him sending just one chuunin to apprehend and bring back another chuunin but… I did not want to believe it." Yushijin exposed his blade again, taking a fighting stance, by that time their standing about became visible to common civilians who would have missed the duo moving around when Yushijin first attacked.

"Why? Why did you go so far to come here for me to begin with? Didn't you volunteer for this mission?" Mana wondered as that idea still confused her. "Are you still mad at me for what happened in the Forest of Death?"

"Tsk, not that old thing again…" Yushijin showed his teeth. First, in discontent and then again as a property of his enthusiastic grin. "I just wanted a reason to face you and find out truly which one of us was better."

Yushijin attacked with simple sword strikes, his swordsmanship was competent but nothing Mana could not easily evade given her advanced focus on that subject. She had less experience evading a blade than she had evading punches and kicks but beside a much greater skill needed in space management and the lack of ability to trap the blade with her bare hands alone it did not provide an ample challenge to her.

The townsfolk around the two began freaking out. They were not panicking yet, just retreating into corners where they thought the fight was unlikely to move into. This may have been why Yushijin was so limited in his offensive arsenal, for now, he was buying time for the townsfolk to move away and give them space. Not that the two needed that much. Had they remained moving, they could have likely kept on fighting around the civilians, moving fast enough to not even be noticed until they slowed down or bumped into an unfortunate passer-by.

"A reason?" Mana wondered out loud. "What do you mean by that?"

"This whole time when I improved my genjutsu skills, sensei kept on comparing me to you in terms of improvement and promise in the field. I was naturally curious, I never intended to compete with you but when the comparison was drawn… I just can't help it." Yushijin smiled. "I even went as far as to learn a way to suppress my chakra signature from being sensed just so I could fight you better."

"That was foolish, by suppressing your chakra you also depower yourself. When your chakra is suppressed you cannot augment your abilities at all." Mana replied, crossing her hands over her chest as Yushijin's eyes finally noticed the villagers having cleared out somewhat, giving him ample space to attack Mana seriously.

There it was… The magician sensed an invasion, a burst of foreign chakra flowing into her system from her abdomen, moving upward. It was a more advanced method of genjutsu use to the one Mana used, the one she borrowed and mastered from the insects lurking in the deep caves of the Wind Country. One taught to young ninja in the Academy and one Mana knew about all too well, both as a genjutsu user and a chakra sensor.

Yushijin's body froze in place, alongside with a complete stop of every environmental factor around. Horror and bemusement paused in the eyes of the villagers hiding all around, a drizzle of snowflakes impeded and stuck in their place, floating in the air. Time itself appeared to have frozen. It was Yushijin. He was messing with her time perception, such a dangerous ability. Even when she knew all about him from seeing Yushijin fight, Mana still could not stop admiring the youth who had mastered it. She'd like to learn all about temporal perception manipulation from Yushijin if he wasn't so proud of his skill and so adamant about proving his superiority over her.

"Dispel" Mana concentrated on the word, letting a burst of her own chakra blast the foreign invader chakra off through her body's pores in the shape of thin light needles. The girl bent her body back to the point where it almost hurt her back, in a quick and life-saving vault backward that helped her avoid a devastatingly focused and strong slash at her upper body section.

This could have been dangerous. From what Mana recalled, Yushijin did not need to weave any signs or utter the name of his genjutsu as long as he used it on very weak percentage of its full potential. She already just barely avoided having her body cut in two with the usual dispelling method. Had she not mastered every basic technique she had known in the Rabbit Caves before the finals of the Chuunin Exams – she would have been finished.

"I think I understand," Mana spoke up, she needed time to think of a different way she could use to evade a stronger version of this illusion. Maybe if she augmented her endurance she could make these devastating slashes of Yushijin's great-sword more shallow, maybe where it just slightly cut into her flesh but even that was just a temporary solution. "I'm not a very combat-friendly person." She admitted.

"That's right." Yushijin nodded, slightly lowering the tip of his sword but staying in stance. "If I just came up to you, you'd have told me to get lost or just half-assed our battle and lost on purpose just to keep me off your back. I want to fight you seriously, I want to really know who's better. Especially now." He grinned again.

"Now?" Mana felt curious.

"After the Chuunin Exams, I wanted to face you even more. You and I were the only genin of our village that got promoted. Everyone kept talking about how you and Stea stole the show back then… Don't you feel even a bit curious?" Yushijin winked before raising the tip of his blade and preparing to attack again.

"Not really. I understand your feelings, I've met plenty people in my life who would feel similarly but… I just don't really care about which one of us is better. I think there is much we could learn from one another but fighting just to know which one of us is stronger seems stupid to me." Mana admitted with a shrug. She did not want to continue this fight, not only because of the way she felt internally but also because of her fatigue, hunger, and thirst. Chakra was a combination of both physical and mental and her weary had dimmed both to the point where Mana doubted she could even summon her best at will.

Yushijin stopped in place again. His illusion was so treacherous, Mana had no idea but her gut to rely on by just how much he would mess up her perception of time. He could have as much as doubled the amount of time she thought had passed or froze and to her, it would have looked all the same as before. Yushijin's sword slipped through Mana's gentle frame, splitting her into two pieces and making the collapsing two parts of her body spray a profuse amount of blood.

Before Thumb's gasp and disgusted grunt even concluded, the blood and gruesomely split parts of Mana's body turned into flower petals and dispersed all around before beginning to form right behind Yushijin.

"So cocky!" Yushijin yelled out as he threw an unexpected kick behind him, before Mana's frame even completely reassembled itself. The kick, which felt like the strongest thing to ever hit Mana, sent the magician tumbling back, hitting her right atop of her chest and just narrowly too low to hit her in the neck where it'd have crushed her air supply, leaving her powerless and gasping for air for quite a while.

Grunting in pain and fatigue, Mana stood back up before she noticed that both her opponent and the environment around them was frozen in time momentarily. A blade thrust right through Mana's chest, completely impaling her on it as she could not properly time her counterattack due to Yushijin's illusion continuously messing with her time perception. He was using it so often, starting it up and ending it that even when it was over, returning to the normal perception became increasingly more difficult after each of his use of the illusion. Mana's body once again dispersed into a shower of flower petals, she could feel chakra leaving her body like blood being drained out of her through a pipe.

"Seriously?" Yushijin grunted, this time throwing a wild swing of his massive great-sword behind him, this time it was met by Mana's wand, extracted from the seal inside her hat as the magician felt she could not risk escalating multiplying the additional cost of her Flower Petal Sanctuary even more. She used it three times in a row just now and just by doing that, she made each successive use feel almost twice as draining. The Konoha swordsman slammed his shoulder into his blade, shifting the weight to his left leg before forcing Mana off her feet and flying back. She was lucky that her wand was made from just about the sternest stuff there was.

"Goddamn it!" Yushijin cursed, looking at his blunted up and damaged sword. "Just what is that fairy-stick made of?"

Mana grunted in pain and exhaustion as she pulled herself off the ground. She was not ready for this fight, not now, not here. Her opponent was slowly unraveling his abilities to a higher and higher extent and she could not afford to let him step into the serious territory without risking serious injury or death. How would she destroy the Diamond Hand then? The blood-chilling thought of the insurmountable wall that beating both the Rings of the Diamond Hand and Yushijin here brought gave Mana another idea.

"You'll need to fix your sword. Also, I've seen your Fire Style jutsu in the arena during the finals. You'll need a way bigger and more secure space than this to fight in." Mana tried working up some magic.

"Alright, what are you suggesting?" Yushijin grumbled, clearly looking unhappy that the fight he was waiting for such a while was being postponed.

"The Shukuba Museum", Thumb intervened into the conversation, within a fraction of the moment, her face began paling and she grabbed her throat as if she was beginning to feel short of breath. For a second there Mana feared that her Taboo Seals would have set off for some reason but after the woman stopped talking for a while her airway seemed to open up again.

"That seems like the least likely place to be able to let loose in…" Yushijin complained.

Mana felt like Thumb was up to something clever but her own mind could not yet grasp the connection. She curiously stared at the burglar, trying to piece everything together so she could free Thumb from explaining herself. If Thumb spoke about the museum some more, that would have triggered an even more dangerous reaction from her Taboo Seal.

Then she remembered what Itemi had told her about Yokotomo Donyoku, the man was someone who came into his public status as a rich man after finding a treasure in someone's backyard and keeping part of it. Likely he expanded on that fortune through numerous income sources from his criminal activities but… A man like that of a great sense of where to look for treasure and a desire to unearth it, someone who went public with the treasure and was known for it… Of course, he gave it to the museum, he was someone of profound artistic sense. It was possible that Thumb was suggesting that the museum was a place where Mana could find Yokotomo Donyoku.

"Yeah, let's fight in the museum. Shukuba's museum is very unlike other museums that you know. It is entirely privately owned and very well protected, I feel." Mana explained as much as she could put together herself. Thumb had stumbled on the idea to use Yushijin in the fight against the Diamond Hand, leashed on the promise that he could then fight Mana. The woman saw that the magician could not have cared less about the winner so she saw no problem suggesting Mana gambling on that "rivalry" by mixing the Diamond Hand into the occasion.

"Whatever, you still haven't explained about why you said Lord Sixth sensed me "just for show"," Yushijin squinted his right eye in confusion, as he could not stop examining his blunted and damaged blade.

"I'll explain it later." Mana tried to dismiss the matter.

"No, you'll explain it right now or I won't let you out from my sight…" Yushijin objected.


	396. Follow the Money

The glares of Mana and Yushijin were pushing against each other, firing off an amount of mental and emotional sparks not too different from the number of physical ones they had let out when their weapons clashed not too long ago.

"Lord Sixth approves of my actions, he's told me as much when I messaged him before. He has no reason not to. The Diamond Hand, in other words, the organization I am fighting against here is draining Shukuba of its last drops of blood. They operate in the Fire Country. The Fire Lord would be quite happy if the Diamond Hand stopped leeching his own resources and slowly turned his domain into a desolate crime den." Mana began hesitantly explaining her train of thought to her colleague. Something she did not entirely wish to spend time doing but it appeared that Yushijin would not back off unless she let him know exactly what his role in this all was.

"But if the Feudal Lord himself would be content with the completion of your objective here, why would the Hokage call you back? He is the one who has everything to gain, the Feudal Lord does not even know your name, to him you're just a tool, the only one to gain his praise would be Sixth himself." Yushijin flexed his weary shoulder after sheathing his sword back and putting his cloak back on to protect him from the pelting snow.

"Exactly, Sixth is a Black Ops man, he knows the ins and outs of what he has to gain but also of what he has to lose if I fail here. All he will have to talk about with the Fire Lord, in that case, is a dead kunoichi in Fire Lord's backyard doing hell knows what and dissolving the political state of one of the pleasure towns with nothing to show for it. It would be a sign of his weakness and that he is unfit to remain in the big seat for too long. He is a man of strength, he continuously flaunted that against Hokage-sensei when the two met, his competence is a matter of great pride to him." Mana elaborated, hoping that Yushijin would catch on to what she was saying.

Even if the eyes of the handsome Konoha ninja were confused, clearly seeing the contradiction of his mission objective and presence here to the Lord Sixth's better interest, he still was not perceptive enough to put the picture together. This was typical of boys in Mana's eyes, too fixed on figuring out who was stronger than whom and planning complex schemes to face their preferred opponents in the field of battle instead of figuring out why the fights needed to be fought in the first place. So lazy and hesitant to look one pace up from where their eyes were at just because they enjoyed the view.

"You are Lord Sixth's way out of an apology to the Fire Lord, Yushijin. By sending you here he can show something that denies his inaction, he ensures that whether I win or fail here, whether my reputation is mixed with dirt or elevated, he has nothing to lose because he can always reasonably deny his involvement in the matter. If I topple the Diamond Hand – Lord Sixth will take all the credit the Fire Lord has to dish out, if I die in the process – he'll just point out how he tried to retrieve me by sending you here and that'll be that." Mana pointed it out.

"I can't believe I was played like that. The Hokage doesn't even need me to complete my mission in that case…" Yushijin looked down, looking a tad bit disappointed.

"That's who Lord Sixth is. These are the games that shaped him as a man behind the curtains where he once lurked. He is a politician, maybe because of that he is the best man for the seat he is in right now." Mana shrugged. "Repair your sword and meet me tomorrow at midday in the museum. I'll give you your fight and you can go home, with me or without me."

Yushijin looked Mana in the eyes, something was in the process of being snowballed down the hill in his mind but he looked hesitant to word those thoughts. Perhaps he was still hesitant to let Mana out of his sight, maybe he wanted to suggest his own aid in apprehending the Diamond Hand before they settled things. Whatever the case was, the young man decided against speaking up and simply nodded before walking off.

"It's cute, you know…" Thumb teased Mana by poking her with her elbow.

"What is?" the magician wondered, following her peer as he walked away and faded in the falling snow.

"How much time he spent thinking about you. He caught you unprepared with that illusionary thing when he kicked you, right? He did not just see you, he felt you, he knew what you were thinking at that moment and that was why he caught you." Thumb sighed dreamily, Mana blushed, not liking the woman's tone one bit.

"He saw me fight once. He noticed a pattern of how I moved after dissolving my illusionary body, that is all." Mana dismissed it. Thumb had a point. While using specific illusions, the user's real body became concealed, often emulated and recreated in an illusionary shape, such was the case with Flower Petal Sanctuary too. Mana's illusionary body got injured and dissolved into another illusion of a shower of flower petals while the real body remained hidden to all who were under her illusion. And yet Yushijin knew exactly where to attack not once but twice without any chakra sensory abilities and with his very brain being fooled, not just his chakra network as was the case with normal genjutsu.

Either Mana's movements were too predictable, or the young man really did get into her head at that moment.

"So what now? You still storm the museum, all alone or will you actually enlist this boy's help tomorrow?" Thumb grinned.

"I begin to wonder if sieging the entire establishment is the right idea. I have no doubt that Yokotomo Donyoku surrounds himself with the other Rings, both for the security those orientated into combat provide and the convenience of administrating them all in one place. It is quite likely I will find them all there." Mana sighed, closing her eyes and trying to will her weary mind into thinking straight.

"Although it would not make sense to keep the nerdy types around there, right?" Thumb teased Mana. The magician opened her eyes and fired her ocular arrows at her companion who was giving off these same annoying smartass glares back. She knew something, the "nerdy type" of Rings apparently was not residing in the museum for whatever reason.

"We go back to the Shukuba Security, we'll find out where Yokotomo keeps his newly stolen money and we'll hit that. I suppose we'll be catching the weasel who did this to Itemi-san after all." Mana smiled faintly.

* * *

The Shukuba Security was already in turmoil. Civilians buzzing about where they were being heard and even more buzz generated by those waiting in queues to still be heard by someone with a free set of hands and ears. The institution was pathetically understaffed and all because of a call Mana made. Confronting this only made nausea that was wrestling with the rabid hunger in Mana's gut slowly gain the upper hand by bodyslamming its competition down under.

"Shira, when you're done with this, please come to the chief's office." Mana murmured to the ear of the gentle and scarred giant.

"You mean your office, ma'am?" he let out rhetorically. Despite his utter devotion to the cause of beating the Diamond Hand and complete trust in Mana and her abilities, he was probably the one getting under Mana's skin the most.

"Gonna try and work this out with a yes-man?" Thumb teased Mana as well when her input was the least appreciated. Then again, that was how teasing usually worked. Had it come when Mana was in her best moods it would not have served its purpose.

"Can you please not? I am this close to snapping…" Mana rubbed her tired eyes after collapsing into chief Chontai's chair. Her voice betrayed her weariness and a difficult state of perpetual questioning of her every action. At this point the magician cared too little about what would happen to her and if Thumb would stab her in the back eventually to even try and change how she appeared to those around her.

"Hey, my life literally hangs on your ability to catch all of them. You're close to doing it too. Just get yourself together and pull it through!" Thumb objected.

"Yeah but… I have no idea how to find the stolen money or how to catch… Whichever Ring is in charge of financial crimes in the Diamond Hand." Mana slammed her head on the table, covering it up with her hands and pushing it down further.

"There is a reason why The Middle Ring built the Diamond Hand this way, you know. Each Ring knows one area of criminal activity better than anyone else the Middle Ring had access to. Only by pooling their collective knowledge can the Diamond Hand operate. You have a bunch of rookies eager to prove themselves, how about you get all of them together and find something out?" Thumb replied, her tone was not soft because soft would not have cut it. Her tongue was like a whip, sharp, cold and iron, wearing a hook at the end that dug deep under Mana's flesh and exposed all the nerves as it peeled the skin and the muscle off on its way out.

"Yeah… Let's do that." Mana calmly composed herself and got herself together, preparing for the next attack on the Diamond Hand.

A good fifteen minutes ago, Thumb had left Mana to put herself back onto her emotional saddle and prepare to do the work she decided to accomplish here. Something that was too important for Mana to just collapse under the pressure and to the immense fatigue now. While the burglar had returned with the information that she has informed every member of the reformed Shukuba Security, only Shira had shown up in the Mana's office as requested.

Mana knew what this meant. It was a sign of defiance. A sign of lack of trust. Also, a sign of the rookies finally realizing what it was Mana asked them to do. One thing was to declare that one was ready to topple a cabal of criminals, a whole thing entirely was to do the work of an entire Security Force with just four people. They were pissed, scorned by the fact that Mana left doing hells knew what while they were busy with a bunch of documents and busywork.

"I think that the others are too busy, ma'am. Maybe we should start already…" Shira spoke up with a firm and thunderously low-pitched voice. Despite his great respect for Mana, his voice or tone did not shake or question his actions or words for a moment. Mana could only dream of having this much confidence in what she was doing. It seemed as of late that everything around her was just falling apart not only on her own head but on heads of everyone in the same room.

He was right – the youngbloods may have agreed to work together to beat the Diamond Hand but they defied Mana. They did not trust her just like Itemi didn't when he ran off to fight them alone. Why was it that the criminals rarely ever had trouble working together? It was only due to Thumb's ambition and her own defiance that Mana even came to capturing one of the Five Rings.

"Yeah, I guess it's only fair enough. The Shukuba vault was hit hard, the town's funds are all but drained and in the Diamond Hand's possession. That is our first priority. The Diamond Hand believes that money is power, it appears that both the village and the Security shares that belief so we need to get it back." Mana raised the issue she decided to focus on.

"That will be difficult, ma'am. Officer Itemi appeared to have acted in brutally lethal force, there was not a single survivor we could interrogate or detain in the incident. All that was left was bodies. I would not advise asking Burgoniya about what those bodies could tell, she is on the verge of going postal right now. She's self-appointed herself as the head of forensics again." Shira reported.

Of course, she'd be the worst she's ever been. From the very beginning, Burgoniya distrusted Mana if not hated her guts. It was not tough to see why Mana was not even a Security officer with proper training. In the woman's eyes, she was just an entertainer, a pompous stage magician with delusions of grandeur and the illusion of power to stop all crime in the town. The woman had spent her entire life growing and training to leave forensics and become something more and once she had gathered that experience – Mana just flipped the table and Burgoniya had to do all of her despised work all by herself. Had Mana not known better, she would be expecting the colleague to try and murder her for how much of her misfortune and stress was directly brought up by Mana.

"I see, is there any way to find that money without interrogating anyone involved in taking it? Any public way of tracking it?" Mana asked, knowing full well what the answer would be like. It was not like the Diamond Hand lacked brainpower needed to not just shake a bag of money the size of two-thirds of the entire budget of a pleasure town to buy something.

"Highly unlikely." Shira shook his head adamantly without breaking the stance.

"Not entirely true…" Thumb scratched her elbow uneasily, knowing she'd tread some suffocating grounds and possibly risk getting strangled by the seals her ex-employers left for a while. "Most public money is marked with a pheromone that Aburame insects are capable of tracing. In cases such as this, that means they could be traced."

"If your accomplices are as smart as an average thug they'll know to remove those pheromones." Shira voiced his doubts.

"True, but a lot of pheromones means a need for a lot of removal substance, right? Could we not track the substance that is meant to remove the traces of the pheromone?" Thumb suggested. The woman was giving off vital information, vital enough that Mana suddenly started to doubt that Thumb was out to betray her and it definitely started to appear like she was being genuinely interested in bringing the Diamond Hand down.

"It will be difficult. We do not know if the Diamond Hand will buy it from a black market dealer or a local one." Shira replied.

"I don't think they will be using local dealers. As alluring and ironic as paying the town with their own money sounds, it would be a dead giveaway for anyone smart enough to look. They'll use black market dealers for sure." Mana massaged her temples.

"Then you are in luck that I know them all, sister." Thumb grinned. "I usually bought gadgets from black market dealers in contact with the Diamond Hand."

"I don't know about that." Mana sighed. "It's been almost twenty-four hours since you have not reported back. Probably double that since you started working against the Diamond Hand's interests by failing to steal the necklace on purpose. By now they know you are compromised if they know to not use local dealers, they'll know enough to avoid anything we can retrieve from you." Mana pointed out.

"They would most likely assume that you have been tortured and all information has been extracted from you. Ninja are unmatched in knowing when to use torture and when to use more psychological interrogation methods for maximum effectiveness and the Diamond Hand will know that." Shira voiced his thoughts.

"True, but Mana-chan is such a sweetie, she wouldn't hurt a fly…" Thumb teased Mana again by sending her an air kiss.

"Well, the Diamond Hand does not know that." Mana stone-walled the yet another attempt by the burglar to get under her skin. By this moment the magician was almost certain that the woman was not looking to betray her, a traitor, the way Mana was taught, would do everything in their power to stay under the radar, not try and poke the person they're about to betray with every chance they get. "They would be smart to assume I am just about as ruthless and effective as any ninja of my rank."

"That means we require to locate a black-market dealer who is not a casual acquaintance of Ms. Thumb. It will be a difficult task, it is likely that such a transaction would have already taken place or will take place shortly. It is highly unlikely that we will catch the Diamond Hand red-handed." Shira pondered.

Mana sighed and stood up, taking her coat and slipping into it. "Very well then, you two see what you can work out."

It was evident in Thumb's face that she hated the idea of staying in the Security with the rookies who already had too much on their hands to babysit her from would-be assassins. Especially now that Mana affirmed her fears that her status as a captured agent was already a given in the eyes of her ex-employers.

"Where are you heading to?" Shira wondered.

"First I'll need to enter the den of the dragon and talk to Burgoniya, after I am inevitably rejected by her and feeling as trashed mentally as I have ever felt, I'll be off to the Aviary with my plan B. I'll message some of the Aburame clansmen I may know from my Academy days, maybe they'll know ways of tracing the chemical used to delete the trace of their pheromone. They're pretty impressive and crafty and nature is a handy mistress, I'm sure they'll have a bug for that." Mana sighed before approaching Thumb and leaning up to her while standing up on her toes to reach the woman's ear.

"I had expected more of a fight from you about this. You sure you are OK staying here and helping Shira?" Mana wondered quietly.

"I saw what a wreck you were before. I figured you needed more of my shit the least right now. I was mistaken before when I thought all of this could go comfortably, it seems that it will get worse for us before it gets better for people we don't know…" the burglar closed her eyes submissively.

"Guess that is why you're the adult here…" Mana tried to work up a smile before the trio parted ways after entering the chaotic soup of the Security offices in the peak of their activity, approaching the end of the workday.


	397. Educated Guesswork

Telling Shira and Thumb that she'd message some Aburame she knew was easier to brag about than to actually do. Mana may have been quite a popular stage magician but, as a kunoichi, she had few favors to cash in and was not all that popular. The popularity that a known entertainer gathered was quite different to the intimate bond of friendship and mutual trust that ninja shared. A popular actor could not within reason just call for one of the people who knew them to go out for lunch or ask for their help, these were different things entirely.

Mana's exhausted mind could only muster up a pair of Aburame known to her. She may as well have sent one message to the clan district in general, just to see if someone was up for helping their colleague out. Given how Mana's entire going rogue was a charade of sorts it would not be completely impossible for her to receive help from the clan but due to such a factor existing at all the chances of it were as slim as they got.

The name of Aburame Juhi was one of the names that came up. Mana had known the cheerful kunoichi from Team Pine since Academy, albeit quite to a limited extent. The two had talked about vague topics just to maintain the sense of common fondness that many children shared at that age but it had never gone beyond that. Juhi was quite popular due to her very vigorous attitude and personality, she was not stuck up or vain, in fact, very few Aburame were. She was the second least reliable source of help.

The man whose help was by far the most plausible, even if the most did not mean all that much, in this case, was Aburame Yanagi. The man whom Mana met when she traveled to the Eden prison complex to retrieve Sugemi during the whole Kiyomi's kidnapping upheaval. Recalling all that it seemed like it was years if not entire decades ago but it could not have been farther than a pair of months back… The man would certainly recall the Konohagakure girl who involved him in a war between the Black Ops of Kumogakure and Kirigakure.

Mana did not ask for much, she did not have any leverage nor was it within reason or her personal principles to do so. All she wanted was some information about the Aburame pheromones used to trace money, the ways it could be removed and if the chemicals used in the removal could have been traced by some breed of insect or other methods. While the hawks may have been intercepted mid-trip, Mana did her best to describe the reason why she needed this help and what was at stake to the point if not slightly less in detail. The trip between Shukuba and Konoha would have taken five hours for a civilian to walk, far less for a caravan, a ninja or a speeding messenger hawk so Mana would not have to wait too long before replies came back.

After that came the difficult part… Asking Burgoniya for help or any possible tips about tracing a chemical used in the removal of money tracing pheromones. This felt the most difficult part of her role in this investigation for entirely different reason most people disliked talking to people who hated their guts. Most of the time, people felt this way because people hated being criticized or felt like such toxic discussions had nothing productive to bring. There was a reason why Konoha took pride in the comradery between their ninja.

Mana hated these conversations because hearing what angry and hateful people had to say only enforced the bad things and fears she already felt about herself, they validated those thoughts by proving to her that it wasn't just all in her head. Proving that people on the outside felt that way as well and that it wasn't just Mana being quirky, the exact opposite of what Mana often told Meiko whenever the blacksmith used to get discouraged about her own weaknesses.

When Mana entered the small wing of the building used for forensics, as limited as the department was in its size and usefulness, Burgoniya was conversing with a strange elderly woman of dark complexion, likely a result of dirt and not an actual tan, and odd fashion choices all around.

"Burgoniya, I need some help with the investigation," Mana spoke up, knowing full well the minefield she was walking into.

"Your energy radiates death and gloom, young lady, begone from these premises!" the dirty and messy woman flipped out, throwing her hands around madly in a desperate attempt to "accidentally" claw Mana in the cheek or to poke her eye out.

"On this, we agree, Gofuri-san," Burgoniya sighed.

Lazily evading a flurry of clawing motions from the woman and after restraining her hands by the woman's wrists Mana glared at the poor thing trying to figure out why she was inside the forensics wing. A place of science where outsiders were especially unwelcome with the term being used in an especially liberal definition included even other officers at times. It was easier to attempt and make sense of things all by herself than to try and ask Burgoniya directly.

"She senses aura and weird energies." Burgoniya noted, butting at and then eventually poking the woman with the back end of her pen that was usually located pressed in between her teeth.

"There's no such thing." Mana murmured. She was quite aware that Burgoniya brought this woman in just for the sake of this mock conversation and to play some sort of a sick joke on Mana, even if she was aware of the humiliating trap she was walking into, she did so nonetheless.

"It's about as reasonable as expecting one woman to spearhead the whole forensics lab, a wing that's already one step away from communicating with fucking ghosts." Burgoniya blew at the brown locks that fell on her face as she rushed to some calculations on a notebook she was making, likely having figured out the answer while making fun of Mana at the same time.

"No one asked you to do this, you took this up all by yourself, you know. I'm sure that other officers would appreciate your help with their workload while you leave the lab unhandled for just a short while." Mana tried to be about as nice with the forensics intermediate as her slightly past puberty mind that was beginning to feel the results of being severely deprived of sleep would allow.

"And yet it's the only thing I'm adequate at. You can go now, Gofuri-san, your use here is done." Burgoniya sighed while addressing the crazy old woman who left the forensics wing wailing her hands about.

Mana approached the messy table of the extremely passive-aggressive youngblood only to be greeted by countless same pictures, some of them having a ruler placed inside of it next to some object, quite accurate and impressive in artistic quality and realism sketches of dead bodies, various crime scenes and pitch perfectly recreated blood splatter drawings with intricate angles and geographical calculations that looked pretty much like hieroglyphics of an ancient language from afar. The closer Mana approached them, the more impressed she was by the scientific language and fluidity at which Burgoniya expressed her thoughts in mathematical form.

"Well, it does seem like you're doing some impressive work here," Mana noted, noting the countless stored pictures being analyzed as well as boxes of what seemed to be random objects, possibly evidence, being examined, as well as the highly impressive and fluid mathematical calculations on all of Burgoniya's sketches. Mana was no mathematical genius but she at the very least felt fluent enough to appreciate just how great Burgoniya was at her job.

"It's nothing short of educated guesswork. Hasn't it occurred to you why the forensics offices and the labs are so small wherever you go? Police Force or Security, whatever you call it, everywhere forensics is just what you give young and enthusiastic rookies to kill their spirit. You spend countless hours calculating the angles and distance of footprints, taking pictures of locations in both scorching heat, chilling frost, and downpouring rain as it washes away your clues and evidence mercilessly and all you can do is make a good guess." Burgoniya collapsed in a screeching chair with certain familiarity and comfort to the defective piece of furniture.

"The reason why I knew "aura" and "energies" that the old woman was reading was all hogwash is because I am a chakra sensor myself. I suppose it would be great if criminals left some sort of a trace at the scene of a crime, an essence of themselves that you could pick up and identify. Sort of like sensors identify chakra signatures?" Mana tried to appeal to Burgoniya's dreams and her likes. It did feel nauseating that even when she had noble purposes of befriending the young woman Mana used washed up Academy psychological tricks.

"Yeah… I think I've read in an article once about a forensics expert in Kirigakure who is of Hozuki clan descent, capable of ingesting blood samples and identifying people like that. I suppose reading people's "chakras" or "auras" or "kenki" or whatever, lifting some kind of rock-solid proof of someone's involvement in the scene of the crime would be pretty neat, would definitely make me feel less useless… What a load of bullshit," Burgoniya pushed a pile of papers and files so that they would topple over and scatter all over her miniature little closet of a lab. "What is it that you need?"

"We're after the stolen vault money." Mana scratched the back of her head while looking away from the inquiring and rather uncomfortable glare of the Security officer.

"Smart, you do know tomorrow's the tenth, right?" Burgoniya turned back at the toppled files, resorting to picking up what she had scattered in a moment of anguish and despair.

"The tenth?" Mana raised an eyebrow. The magician wondered if the woman meant the tenth day of the month, on her way to the labs Mana did catch a glimpse of the hanging paper calendars located all over the place in separate cubicles.

"Yeah, I guess it's hard to understand for a ninja, who gets paid for a job well done, but ordinary people get paid by the month. Tomorrow's the most common payday, it is modeled after the public model. Public institutions pay their servants the tenth of each month so a lot of business owners copied that without much forethought." Burgoniya explained.

This was really bad! The pleasure town was missing most of its resources and it was all controlled by the Diamond Hands. It was a hostage situation that even someone as generally disinterested in money as Mana could understand. Approaching the payday, people would be getting a bit on the edge and pushing their financial limits. Using the funds they now held hostage, the Diamond Hand could pretty much come out into the light and turn the entire pleasure town against anyone else, money, in this case, was the scepter of power. It would be Otogakure all over again…

"May have played into their hand by dissolving the Security Force, huh?" Burgoniya chuckled mockingly as she focused her attention on calculating something based on measurements and angles of a blood trace she had sketched and photographed.

"No, they just answered my actions with ones of their own, making my attempt at fixing this place work for them. They will do the same no matter what we do, it is how they act." Mana sighed. "The money is traced with Aburame pheromones. We think that the pheromones will be or are already removed, is there any way of tracing these chemicals to where the money is held?"

"Sure, for an Aburame. All sorts of insects are attracted to weird smelling trace removal chemicals, not even any specific ones. Chemicals like the ones that remove pheromones smell unique to them and insects do not have the brainpower to tell the difference between weird and what they like. They'll check it out regardless. Either get an Aburame here and have one use some of their creepy crawlies or catch the black market dealer that sold the chemicals and put a knife in between the socket and the kneecap." Burgoniya replied with disinterest.

Mana rubbed her tired eyes and her pulsing with pain and pressure temples, the dim light in the lab coming from extremely focused beams of light that Burgoniya used on her many tables made the magician a bit sleepy. A single focused application of chakra augmentation would have made it all go away but Mana was burnt one too many times by it. She did not want to do it unless absolutely necessary. Then again, if she would even know absolutely necessary if it came tolling bells was still unknown.

"The workday's coming to an end. You'll have to accept the town hating your guts tomorrow so sleep up, you'll need plenty of strength to plow through the bullshit coming at you." The brown haired forensics expert looked up at Mana with a hint of empathy in her eyes. In that one hint Mana noticed something. Something warm and friendly if one was okay with stretching the definition of that something out. More like empathetic pity.

"I'm not going to let the hard work of Shukuba's townsfolk go unrewarded. My workday does not end until the Diamond Head is toppled, this entire week just feels like… One big workday." Mana sighed before noticing the door opening up and Sora with Toiya peeking in. Their uniforms were slightly torn up with Sora's being almost completely riddled with cuts, some of which still bleeding and both of their faces shining with bruises and cuts.

"Boss brat, you'll like to see something…" Sora addressed Mana with his own hint of both submission and respect as well as belittlement.

"Do you have your hands full?" Mana looked at Burgoniya with curiosity.

"When you scattered the Security Force there were six active cases being investigated. This is twice of what is usually the norm for the start of a month and they are quite old, I suspect they were being frozen deliberately so… Kind of." Burgoniya shrugged.

"Alright then, I won't bother you with that, I trust you know what is best for the lab." Mana nodded and followed Toiya and Sora to where she was being called.

The two Security officers lead Mana through old but quite well-maintained wings and corridors of the Shukuba Security into the containment facilities, a place where people were being held before or shortly after being questioned and sent away into a specialized containment facility, kind of like Konoha's own Police Force's establishment did as well. One cell, in particular, stood out as it housed a middle age man with similar cuts and bruises that Sora and Toiya had on them.

"I'd appreciate someone telling me why I'm here…" Mana rubbed her elbow in unease as the silence of the injured Security Force kind of put her on edge.

"We're afraid your hawks did not leave the Shukuba woods," Toiya answered with lingering anxiety. "Whatever your latest message contained, the hawks were shot down by these two. The second one's already awaiting interrogation."

"We received reports from interested townsfolk of messenger hawks being shot down, we've got a pretty strong and active nature preservation movement who are mostly a big pain in the ass due to the town spreading farther and farther into the woods. Just this once, I guess, they did us a favor. Currently, all of our Security hawks are down so we will need to use the town's own Aviary for a while, at least until the four newly hatched ones can be trained." Sora explained.

"Sadly, we did not manage to detain them before they shot down your hawks…" Toiya added as the trio finally reached the steel door with barrier seal placed in the center of the interrogation room. "Had they not been focused on taking down your hawks, they'd have likely killed us. These guys are quite well-trained fighters."

"It's the Diamond Hand. They're putting a squeeze on us. With the town funds being missing, we won't be able to use the Aviary until the workers are paid. Then the mighty and kind Diamond Hand will waltz in on white stallions and pay them and just like that they'll have the communications of the town in their hands too." Mana mumbled out almost to herself entirely.

"Well, it's good that these guys kicked our asses so hard then – we know they're Diamond Hand, now all you need to do is to put a squeeze on them like your folk can do. Cut their gums, threaten their kneecaps, break and cut fingers… No wrong answers, really…" Sora shrugged before nodding at the shut door where one of the hawk-slayers was awaiting interrogation.

Mana sighed and was allowed into the room by the Security officers. When an authorized and recognized by the seal officer pressed on the sealing tag, the seal lowered the glowing barrier around the thick door allowing one entry or exit. The only shining beacon that gave Mana hope now was that she knew she wasn't lost anymore. Whatever she does, however this interrogation goes, she would not resort to torture and that strangely made things more clear for her, it actually inspired her even though it should have been a massive disadvantage in her case.

The poacher sat with his hands locked up and sealed, as well as his legs. His expression was tough but not completely devoid of emotion. He was no stone wall, that was to say he was by no means afraid of torture or a little of Shukuba Security trademarked rough-housing. He was expecting it, embracing it even. What his face emanated was confidence and a certain degree of smugness. He was feeling triumphant as all he had to do was sit here and get tortured until the dawn, then a little bit more until the entire town goes out of whack and his superiors gain control over it. Until the Diamond Hand becomes the new administration.

"Alright then… Let's begin." Mana smiled, her face shining with relaxation and clarity, with the fear of the darkness she may sink to in order to save this town being completely vanquished in her mind, for the first time, she could match the confidence of her enemy when she was staring it face to face.


	398. Interview With A Poacher

"Chimo, Okyuri. Three-seven-seven-two-four-three. Self-employment license." The slightly scratched up and bruised man mumbled out to Mana shortly after her entry and settling down with the intention to see what she could find out from this hawk-slayer.

Mana pouted her lips before shifting them to the right side of her face while her eyes squinted instinctually. She was confused by the man's choice of words so she hesitated to answer anything, instead choosing to look back at the door she entered through.

It did not instantly register to the magician that Shukuba law enforcement appeared to have a thing for identities. That was, technically, what she was offered by the man and it did not appear like he was offering anything else. Seeing Mana's confusion, the man repeated his routine a couple of times before shutting up and lowering his head as if he was preparing to go to sleep in his tight and uncomfortable position.

"He identified himself, gave me some vague number and then his occupation." Mana thought to herself before standing up and leaving the room.

"What's he doing?" She lifted an eyebrow at Sora and Toiyo. She was surprised that these two decided to stick around instead of preparing to end their workday. It could not have been much farther away before Mana would have no moral reason to ask them to stay with her for any longer and their own moral compass would be the only thing binding them.

"He's giving you his name, registry number in the registry of legal and natural persons and his occupation, in other words – where he can be found during the day by law enforcement if the need arises," Sora explained with a bland face, he appeared really bummed by hearing this information being supplied for whatever reason.

"It's what he has to tell us by regulations that govern the Security procedure. Anything beyond that he is under no obligation to say. Someone in the Diamond Hand taught him to deal with clear-minded officers…" Toiya sighed, running her hand up her sweaty and bruised forehead and down her shoulder-length ginger hair.

"Which is why having you around is so comfy, go poke him some more, preferably literally…" Sora jested following Mana back into the interrogation room with his eyes.

The magician settled back down into the chair opposite to the detained poacher, for a short while she stared right at him with serenity and complete calm but then the magician approached the man and leaned up to reach for his lower body.

The man did not waver. He did not as much as move his eyes to follow Mana's hands, he just defiantly stared right at the girl's face as her hands, strong enough to punch out the very matter he is made of right out of him, moved down, close to the area behind him where his heart slowly pounded blood all across the body. The sheet of metal that protected the man's back in the shape of the chair would have been no barrier at all for Mana's hand to bust right through the man's chest from behind. The magician weaved a hand seal with her other hand. Even knowing the full range of incredibly painful ways someone like Mana could have made silence difficult to maintain, the poacher was defiant to the very end of the loud clanging sound.

The sound that signaled the breach of the protective seal and the steel of the man's cuffs.

Without saying a word or receiving one from the man in return, Mana slowly walked back to her chair and sat down comfortably. She may be held up in this room for a while now.

Rubbing his hurt hands and feeling what little chakra he had running in him, as usual, mostly comprised of the physical aspect of it, the man glared back at Mana with bemusement. Delve as deep as Mana did, she saw no gratitude or desire to cooperate whatsoever.

"You're fucked. All I have to do is stay silent until the morning, maybe around twenty-four hours until the townsfolk really get riled up. You lost." The man finally said something that was not his name, registration number or occupation or the combination of the three in any particular order.

And yet, he was not cooperating, he merely felt that by giving leeway and giving some space in this rope pulling contest, Mana somehow made him feel less in control than he would have felt had he been tightly bound with whatever manifestation of his physical chakra suppressed by the seals. He tried compensating that feeling of lost control by showing dominance, he was assuring himself as much as he tried to assure Mana. It was cute, really…

"Yep. Doesn't mean you have to stay silent though. This may end up being a long night after all," Mana smiled, settling herself down more comfortably in her chair.

It had appeared that the man did decide to sit tight and stay silent, at least for as long as he could muster it. The man's eyes and the previously cocky stare turned into a confused one as he hid his eyes from contacting Mana's glare. He may have been trying to protect himself from the easiest way of projecting genjutsu or Mana may have been overthinking it a bit. He may have just been avoiding her attempts at profiling him.

This short exchange of words was very much like a clash in the arena, just like Mana could read and predict the more likely attacks and styles coming from her opponent, to profile them from just the first few strikes, she began to wrap her mind around this poacher as well. He was strong physically. He was quite intelligent and decently invested in by the Diamond Hand if he was taught the basic legal Security trip-up routine. Yet he was no ring, he was not smart enough to be a more physical leader of a Diamond Finger nor was he smart and spiritually prepared to be the head of a more intelligence-based division.

Still, he was quite aware of the recent proceedings in the organization and the town. Whichever Ring the thieves of Shukuba budget answered to, whichever Finger they belonged to – he was a part of that Finger, at the very least. The man thought he was not giving Mana anything but he gave her plenty even through defiance. His skill in deflecting Security questioning taught her more than incoherent and deceitful answers would have ever done.

"You guys really did me in…" Mana complained, rubbing her tired eyes, running her hand down her messy raven hair after removing her hat and placing it on the steel table. "Jeez, the whole town's going to be after me by tomorrow evening. I have both Konoha ninja and Diamond Hand sent assassins after my head, I haven't slept in a while, eaten or drank anything and it would not be too wise for me to start doing those things now…"

The man looked at Mana, breaking his streak of defiant evasion of her eyes. He was not empathetic to her situation at all. Here she was, a teenage girl describing her all too adult problems and telling him that actual assassins of both her side and the enemy side were after her neck and the man did not as much as blink. That, once again, was a sign and something to record in the profile of hers. Just like the one emotion which Mana did see – pride. The man was fairly gleeful and proud, seeing Mana exposing her weaknesses like that, lowering her guard and luring him to get his licks in.

Even if he was being read, even if he gave information with the mere fact of him refusing to give her none, the man was not stupid enough to attack Mana while her eyes were turned away. He was no ordinary grunt or an idiot incapable of thinking one step ahead of his current actions. He had some sort of a plan, he was a someone in his Diamond Finger for sure. That was good, it was possible that Mana did slightly disrupt the Finger's operations by catching this man, albeit not very likely.

"Yeah well… Don't count on living far past tomorrow." The man grinned, his eyes staring at the floor but his smile escaping his control. It was something deeper, instinctual, something the magician lured out by hooking the shark that the man was on the live bait of her beating heart.

"That is quite alright with me. I will be arresting the Middle Finger tomorrow morning anyway, I've told the young man after me that he can face me tomorrow morning in the museum." Mana shrugged. "As long as Shukuba is peaceful again, as long as the Diamond Hand is shattered and the Middle Finger arrested – dying is fine with me."

"The museum…" the man raised his head up, he was struck under the belt by that. "Middle Finger… There is no Middle Finger, only the Middle Ring. Only Thumb calls him like that, so I guess she spilled the beans after all…"

"Oh, yeah, her seals were protecting some information but she gave me enough. You can hold up until tomorrow evening all you like. Tomorrow morning is what I'm waiting for myself. Want me to grab you a donut or some tea?" Mana kindly nodded her head before jumping to her feet vibrantly. Once again, the cracks in the unbreakable façade of this poacher revealed something interesting – he knew who the Rings were and was to some degree having business with them, enough to hear about them interacting with one another.

"Sure…" Chimo grumbled, feeling a tad bit weaker with his authority and understanding of what was going on and a whole much more confused about Mana's interrogation methods. It must have certainly been completely different from what he was taught ninja interrogation methods were like.

* * *

Whatever confusion Chimo felt before was only inflated further when Mana returned with two boxes of rice balls neatly wrapped and seasoned in one hand a plate with a handful of teacups positioned on it.

"This looks suits you. Fits your waitress getup perfectly." The poacher mocked Mana with smugness and disdain, something that he pushed in front of his disorientation of where this interrogation was going.

"It's a magician's uniform." Mana smiled, acknowledging she was being mocked but playing it off like she took it as a bit of friendly teasing.

"Whatever you say…" the man grabbed a rice ball and began stuffing his face with as much of them as he could, still expecting the magician to use food as some sort of leverage or completely accepting the fact that she would pull them from his grasp once she thought he had taken a liking to them.

"I mean, I was the first stage magician that I know of, I get to decide what stage magicians look like." Mana smiled. She liked it that Chimo tried to make it personal. Without his knowledge, he was acknowledging Mana's existence and delving into her for details he could fling back at her. That meant that the possibility of a connection of some sort, voluntary or otherwise, was much more likely now that he was not completely walling off.

"I'm really grateful that you spoke to me a little." Mana smiled with gratitude after taking a small bite of a rice ball and warming her hands by placing them on the cup of tea. "You've actually given me more leeway than my colleagues. I don't think they will ever get over the kid layer."

The man coughed on his rice ball all of a sudden before he managed to get his things in order and properly swallow the massive bite he took. "It's not like I did this for your sake, it's how we're taught, that is all. Silence attracts the attention of the interrogator, meaningless words – less so."

"I see." Mana pouted her lips, looking a bit disappointed with the man's answer even while she was anything but on the inside. She was trying to guilt trip the man into feeling a bit bad. Working together with Uzumaki Tanshu since the early days, she realized instantly that she would go nowhere trying to be intimidating because she simply was not. She lacked the "cool" factor, the age and the certain stature required of intimidating people. Initially the magician had dismissed herself and burnt herself on the inside but, later on, she realized that it only meant she had to use different methods for the same purposes.

"I have a friend who'd laugh his butt off of your words. He is a manga nut and with my brief research into the medium I discovered that certain romantic interest, females mostly, speak similarly to you in that case." Mana smiled letting her genuine enjoyment of talking to the man surface a little.

"A weird girl has weird friends, go figure." Chimo closed his eyes and wrapped his arms around his chest, likely taking for granted his freedom to do so when in the pale and bland interrogation room. "I'll tell you something interesting if you tell me something interesting in return." He suggested out of the blue.

Mana was well aware of the man's profile and type. He would not have abided by Mana's rules of conversation and played her friend if he would not have had something handy for the Diamond Hand to gain in return.

"I like this game, I'll take you up on it." Mana cheerfully nodded. Already she was the warmest and cozy with this poacher, who was just acting friendly for his own gain, than she was during her whole stay in Shukuba.

"Your methods are very different from how we were taught to respond to interrogation. You are not violent, you barely actually ask me anything and you do not appear to have any torture tools on you." Chimo noted, "Is our information on ninja interrogation methods incorrect or are you a unique case?"

Of course, he wanted to know this. It would have been of profound use for the Diamond Hand to know something like this given that they were about to walk into the open public as the overlords of Shukuba by simply holding the town hostage economically.

"You will believe my answer? You warm my heart, Chimo-san!" Mana smiled.

"You didn't lie about how much intelligence Thumb give you, you didn't do that bullshit approach about acting like you know everything and you've already loads of evidence against me and my superiors…" the poacher smugly rubbed his nose with his index finger, feeling quite confident and happy with himself. It appeared that compliments were fairly effective with this person as they were of much use opening him up in the beginning as well.

"True enough, then again, if my version was that I had ample evidence of your guilt and merely needed some silly confession or something, I would not have spoken with you in the first place, don't you think? I dislike lying, I detest sloppiness similarly." Mana shrugged back at her interviewee.

"To tell you the truth… I am not entirely sure. I believe that most ninja would have subscribed the typical torture methods you are so well prepared for. If you were captured in Konoha the intelligence division would have cracked your mind into shatters and exposed everything inside within moments. Someone of your chakra size and strength would not pose a challenge even to an initiate interrogator." Mana admitted, giving this man more than it would have been reasonable and more than it was needed to answer his question.

It was like drafting a contract with an enterprise in a way. Mana gave this man more than he asked for but just about as much as she was willing to give, just to enforce the illusion of either her inadequacy, which was a more likely way he would take it, given his profile, or her childish naivete and gullibility.

"I was instructed by the leader of the Pinky Finger, the Pinky Ring to take out your hawks. I do not believe he was under any orders to take them out, he looked pretty sweaty and upset, he's paranoid about everything lately. I guess both of us have a very inhospitable work environment, huh, kid?" the poacher shrugged before finishing his tea and letting its refreshing, minty taste wash down his rice balls.

"That is more than I needed." Mana relaxed in her chair, thanking the man with just her eyes alone. She had no problem admitting that much to him, clearly, he would see it as a type of belittlement, a claim that she had triumphed him in this interrogation game but it was not what Mana meant entirely. She was really grateful and feeling glad that her method worked even better than something detestable like torture would have.

"You think you can find him or the money on just what I gave you?" Chimo raised an eyebrow.

Even if she had finally finished her interrogation officially, Mana felt like staying in the room and talking to the man for a while. Who knew, this may have been the last human interaction of complete neutrality she would encounter for a while or even in her life, if it for whatever reason was cut shorter than Mana had planned it to be.

* * *

"We… We have nothing." Shira rubbed the back of his neck in aggravation and profound disappointment of his own abilities when Mana entered the pitch black and empty office complex of the Shukuba Security long after Toiya had left home to her family, Sora left to lick his wounds and even Burgoniya had shut down her lab.

"Sorry, kid. We went through all black market dealers I knew about and none of them were as much as sighted in the entire Fire Country. We checked the pharmacies and chemical factories too, worked our asses off but we have no idea where the chemicals were sold from or how to effectively track them to the money." Thumb looked a bit frustrated as well, she wanted to help Mana because keeping Mana happy meant the magician was at the peak of her interest to keep Thumb alive.

At least that was how Thumb herself saw Mana's mental state. Truthfully, Mana did not care just how helpful or "useful" any of the youngbloods or Thumb were. She'd protect their lives with her own on the line purely out of sheer principles of her life she subscribed to. Just her inherent moral roots, nothing more.

"That is fine, say, you've heard about any Pinky Ring?" Mana smiled.

"Of course!" Thumb smacked her own hand with her fist thrown in a hammering motion. "It makes sense that he would take up my Finger after I am gone. He's in charge of the…"

"Financial crimes," Mana mumbled, interrupting Thumb just because of her own paranoid fear that Thumb's taboo seals would trigger for no reason. "Financial to thievery and burglary seems a pretty qualified and reasonable jump indeed. Know where we can find him?"

"Can I tell you?" Thumb wondered, pressing her trembling hand to her throat.

"There did not appear to be a reaction when you spoke of the museum. I'd assume so." Mana nodded.

"Great, we can siege his home and take him in if your efforts proved more fruitful." Shira nodded. "The Diamond Hand appears to value their monetary strength most of all, they will be really pissed." The youth appeared to be enjoying this prospect remarkably.

"Not quite, I have a really weird feeling in my gut, I'd appreciate if you'd called on anyone you can trust in the force to put a squad together and head somewhere else…" Mana shook her head.


	399. Maximum Alonenessness

It was the calm time of the night. The time when even the depressed and the wicked, the likes that were the least likely to find solace in the activity of sleeping were already asleep. Whether it be willfully or otherwise, it was the kind of sleep for those people that they would not even remember having in the morning, whether it lead to them looking into the source of the problem or addressing the ills of the soul that lead to it was a different story entirely.

With a silent clank, unlikely to be heard even by the family pet if they had one, Thumb screwed her hooked claw-like blades into the locks, beating the simple ancient lock of the mansion that the two women found themselves in. The mansion that apparently housed the Pinky Ring, leader of the Pinky and, apparently, Thumb Fingers.

After the door opened, Mana and Thumb disappeared from the realms of the human perception, blitzing past the rooms and past any feeble attempts to protect the estate. Steel wire about as thickly positioned as the raindrops during a violent storm were still a poor defense against Mana's inhuman and surpassing even the ninja range of evasive skills. Thumb danced around like a cat let out to play after a long-term of house imprisonment. Clinging to the walls and swiping her hands and feet around madly, cutting the steel wires in her way, oddly with enough finesse and soft, feminine touch to her impressive speed that the swipes did not trigger the security traps attached to the wire.

The two met together near the same room, one where a middle-aged woman was peacefully sleeping in a half-empty bed, clearly meant to bed two people. As Thumb mockingly chuckled and pointed her long and slender finger with a sharp hook attached to the end of it at Mana, the magician entered the master bedroom and turned on the light, waking up the woman bedded inside, or at least so Mana thought initially.

There was no struggle in the woman's awakening, one moment she was looking on the window, longingly positioned on her side and observing the gentle snowfall outside, the other she was up and staring at the two invaders of her home fort. Oddly enough, not only was the woman not asleep, she was also not at all worried by the presence of a young magician girl and one of her husband's known associates from his less than honorable craft.

"Trouble sleeping?" Thumb grinned with her crimson lips, making an almost creepily delighted smile as she bent her upper body closer to the woman. Strangely, the wife was not any more intimidated by Thumb's imposing approach than she was by the very fact of the two having found their way inside.

"My consciousness is not the reason for my insomnia." The woman defiantly stood up to face Thumb's playful stature with dignity. "I am worried."

"Heh, it seems like your gut instinct was right after all!" Thumb turned back at Mana, laughing out loud as she addressed the magician. The burglar found something about the fact that Mana had guessed correctly that Pinky would be skipping town tonight but did not trust her gut feeling enough to be present in the party sent to apprehend him there inherently hilarious.

"When I found out that the Pinky Ring was being paranoid about his job performance, I figured he'd try to flee the town." Mana sighed, feeling like a complete fool that she did not go on her gut instinct, instead of sending a small squad of people Shira trusted together with the Security officer to the path that lead out of Shukuba and into Konoha.

"This whole affair with the town budget. It was messier than the Middle Ring had wanted it to be. Muriya always thought his life would be in danger…" the woman bit her index finger, clearly she was working through a lot of distressful emotions.

"And he left his family behind?" Mana raised a doubtful eyebrow. "I think I noticed two children sleeping right at the end of that corridor, what sort of man would just leave his family behind like this?"

"The biggest kind of pussy you ever met, like you would not believe!" Thumb grinned with a hint of sarcasm and a healthy attempt to dirty Pinky's personality a little.

"Don't you dare!" Pinky's wife shouted out. "Muriya may not be the brawny type, but he knew full well he would not be fleeing to a happy and successful life away. There is no escaping the Diamond Hand, he had counted on at the very least distracting their wrath from back home."

"Lovey-dovey, totally skipped town on her…" Thumb whispered, leaning up to Mana's left ear.

"Please, keep him safe…" the woman pleaded, pressing her hand up to her chest before running up to Mana and almost falling to her exposed by her nightgown knees. Tears were streaming down her cheeks, as they have been for the better part of the night, whatever kind of personality this Muriya "Pinky Ring" guy was, his wife clearly loved him unconditionally.

"Well, luckily enough, people with enough guts and devotion to work overnight for no bonus pay or reward are likely booking him in right now. Seeing how Muriya-san is fleeing from the Diamond Hand, it is unlikely that he was surrounded by goons or anything. He is as good as caught as we speak. That being said, we will be arresting you and your children, ma'am, for twenty-four hours to determine your identity. You will be held in the Shukuba Security detainment facility, if you wish you can take some comfort sheets and hygiene items." Mana sighed before addressing the woman.

The wife appeared to get flustered and agitated but after a brief while she caught on to Mana's intention.

"Twenty-four hours?" the woman muttered.

"Yeah, by that point I will have torn the Diamond Hand's hideout to the ground with my bare hands." Mana smiled at the woman with warm and affection, encouraging her to gather her children and follow the two to the safer location for them. If someone of the Index Finger decided to assassinate this family and send their parts for Muriya to fret over in Konoha, Mana would much rather hold them closer to herself and within her sensory range.

* * *

Shira and a bunch of muscle-heads with mean looking physical preparation but warm and cuddly faces were congratulating each other on a job well done by the time Mana and the whole tail came back to the Shukuba Security late that night. By now the magician had given up completely on any semblance of peaceful sleep or as much as getting some rest before she headed out for the museum. At least before she left she would know that a family was reunited and being protected for all it was worth.

"I assume all went well?" Mana asked Shira directly after his friends, under her request, lead the woman and her children closer to where Muriya was being held and preparing the accommodations as comfortable as reasonably possible.

"Even better than well, he told us where he hid the money and even told us what chemicals he used for removing the traces." Shira bowed his head to Mana making her blush a little as she was not used to being addressed as a superior still.

"That was… Quick." The magician rubbed the back of her neck.

"Yeah, I do not think that man is very resistant to torture, just me entering the room made him spill everything. It took… No effort at all, ma'am." Shira reported.

"Good, so you can retrieve the money then?" Mana wondered.

"Not really, his description is a bit vague and it is too concealed to have a formal address. He also said that he would not leave the containment facility under any circumstances, even threatening him with torture did not work, as entertaining as it was to watch…" Shira bowed his head while replying again.

"That is not a problem, send a man to Burgoniya's place. One with a bonier head as she will be likely to throw punches their way, ask her to assist with locating that chemical and have Muriya assist her in tracking the money if needed." Mana rubbed her tired eyes with a somewhat delighted expression. It was a while since her desperate attempts to just smash her head at a figurative rock wall, which only kept getting colored with the magician's blood with each impact made the wall as much as crack to pieces.

"Yes, ma'am! Will be done by the morning!" Shira nodded before rushing off and initiating a conversation with one of his trusted brothers in arms.

With a little bit of luck, the contract workers and public servants alike will be paid rightly without the Diamond Hand's intervention and temptations. While initially it seemed a little dire, having given such a narrow time limit to herself and asking Yushijin to meet her in the museum so early with so much still needing to be done, as the case unraveled, little by little, Mana may have just had the Diamond Hand toppled by the time Yushijin even arrived at the museum. In which case she would have no reservations about pulling a prank on him and simply returning home with him peacefully, without the fight he desired so much…

Seeing that Muriya and his family were appropriately housed and making sure that the money retrieval operation was set in motion took more time from Mana than initially expected. By the time that the magician finished checking on Pinky's family, Burgoniya had arrived at the office, exhausted and ticked off that she was being called for outside her working hours.

"There's been a breakthrough with the stolen money. Can you trace any of these chemicals?" Mana handed the young woman a sheet of paper on which Muriya had scribbled a bunch of chemicals he had bought.

"Shit, he memorized all of that? It's so convenient that it is almost suspicious." Burgoniya yawned before speaking up in a grumpy voice.

"Not really, Pinky's pretty resourceful. He's one of the recording and memorizing, responsible types. The obsession with which he categorizes and records things is remarkable if not a bit irritating." Thumb waved her hand indifferently at the curious Security officer.

"So, you have Pinky caught as well. It appears you have the same number of Rings in your control as the leader of the Diamond Hand does…" Burgoniya sighed. "Anyways, yeah, Shirukaphol is a strong cleansing substance with a very overpowering seaweed scent, any canine can pick it up and track it without much training."

"I suppose that makes having to work for your pay take a literal sense," Thumb teased the Security officers who just gave her an annoyed glare and continued to work towards the operation of retrieving the stolen money. Even if they retrieved it as swiftly as possible, it would still take quite a while before the wheel of bureaucracy turns sufficiently enough to make the pay money work and fixes all the built-up gaps in the town's budget. Shukuba may still get rowdy and bleed a little before it all gets better…

"You're coming with us?" Buroniya raised an eyebrow, after stroking the head of an old and very indifferent towards everything around it hound. The canine was acquired from an old man who owned a dog shelter and was quite willing to help out the Security officers even at this late time of night. "Does that mean we have a reason to be worried? Will anyone try to blow us up or cut us down before we can even see them coming?"

"No, I have some business of my own. While you will be retrieving the money, I will be attacking the Diamond Hand head-on. I suppose I shall be your distraction and guarantee that you will be safe." Mana sighed before doing her best to fire herself up before this bold attack that she was about to commence.

"What if any of the Rings see us coming and are watching the place for Security officers? Won't we get slaughtered without you?" Burgoniya wondered now that the option was on the table.

"We are Shukuba Security, the danger of death is always there, whether it is death in a blade-fight or death by being disintegrated by a fireball of a rogue ninja," Shira grumbled out looking a bit bothered by Burgoniya's desire to ensure the safety of the Security squad sent to retrieve the money, even if it affected the whole operation.

"If I notice one of the Rings are missing or find anything of the sort out, I will be there within moments, no matter how much chakra I will have to spend to rush to you or how much I will risk my network's integrity enforcing such augmentations. Human lives are still my priority, it always is." Mana tried calming down the forensics officer who appeared to be working through the same kind of emotions that many of young ninja had.

No matter how brave one was, or rather how brave they said to themselves they were, they would always feel that same feeling when things really went wrong on the field. That cruel realization that one's entire life, one's dreams, and aspirations could have all ended there. That horrendous, asphyxiating emotion that made one realize that while they may have thought they were ready for anything, they may have gotten themselves in something way above their heads.

"Don't worry, Burgoniya-san, after this you can always return to forensics. However your experience and expertise in reading the environment and locating key clues would be invaluable in locating the warehouse faster, also, I think the doggo has taken a liking to you…" Mana smiled before looking at the hound who has gotten up on its feet for a short while after seeing the hustle and bustle of the Security officers before realizing it was a false alarm and slumping its flesh and fat down, right beside Burgoniya's feet.

"Do you really have to be attacking the Diamond Hand now?" Thumb raised a doubtful eyebrow. She was really interested in keeping Mana as close as possible for as long as possible so that she would maximize her chances of saving her own behind if her ex-employers actually sent people after her.

"Sadly, yes. We told Yushijin that he is to meet me at the museum at midday. That means that by that time I need to be done there. In my current state of fatigue, I cannot beat him so I will have to go with him when he calls me out on having lied to him." Mana sighed with the all too familiar feeling of bees swarming and buzzing all over in her gut.

"I see… I still do not believe you should confront both the Index and Ring Rings. Hell, I'd have told you even Index Ring alone would give you ample trouble. You should wait for little cutiepants to come for you before tricking him into helping you with them." Thumb looked away as she spoke, Mana found that very funny, for whatever reason.

"When we first met you tried to kill me. Not just because that was a life or death decision, you edited your entire plan and defied orders of a man whose orders are not defied without consequence to kill me. It is strange to see you worry about my life now, that is all." Mana explained the source of her laughter to the burglar when she turned at the magician, surprised to hear giggling from the girl.

It was evident that Thumb tried to desperately browse for a logical and selfish reason she could have wanted to keep Mana alive and well but she then just shut her mouth and shared a smile with the magician.

"I should hope that you kick their asses. If you do I shall have to worry about them coming after me no more." The burglar nodded before turning to the Security squad and suggesting joining their efforts at locating the stolen money. They had every reason to distrust her, she was quite significantly stronger than all of them combined, faster and had a specific craving for money and material possessions that would have made allying with such a woman incredibly dangerous but… The Security squad accepted the woman's help regardless.

Seeing that, Mana could not help but think that if she was to die in that museum, at least she'd have died remembering a sight of young Security officers with loads of potential accepting a genuine offer of a hand from a criminal in need of slight attitude adjustment and reforming. At least she'd die believing in redemption before even those beliefs were inevitably shattered by the world around her. She'd die with some of her beliefs still intact.

* * *

Men in black bodysuits and mercenary-type armored jackets were protecting the yard and scouting the town for potential threats. Scoping the place through the optical equipment attached to their kunai dispensers, some of them observing the town from very comfortable vantage points that were provided by the tall and sophisticated museum.

"The magician bitch, she's here!" one of them yelled out, moving his eye away from the optic sight for just a moment after catching a glimpse of a young girl in magician's uniform just casually bouncing on top of the gate and letting everyone see her coming.

Before even those who saw the magician emerge as suddenly as she did, just phasing into the plain view, could fire a single blade at her direction, the girl moved her hand upward and revealed a yellow colored card resting in her hand with a glowing hieroglyph. A blinding flash of light, just like the one present in the typical light bombs found in a ninja kit of any genin, enveloped the yard and the balconies of the museum where the well-armed mercenaries were already waiting for Mana.

Before any of the mercenaries could recover from the irritation and the watering eyes, Mana had dispatched of every man she could hear or sense within her sensory range. One advantage of being a sensor was that she did not need to rely on her eyes to find enemies. Smoke bombs or light bombs, sealed into her cards were now fair game.

Some of the men in the upper floors did not wait around to recover, they actively tried to flee which was an odd strategy when being sieged. Usually, in their situation any grunt would have been expected to man their kunai dispensers until they could no longer do so. Luckily enough, Mana managed to subdue all seventeen men present and watching the yard before they could flee or recover. Like clockwork, a scary chakra signature lit up in the shape of a powerful and as fast as its shape lightning blast heading her way, forcing the magician to flip backwards and off the building she was scaling only to gently land in the center of the yard and open her eyes to meet the Rings who have come out from hiding to play with her.

"Usually, strategists let their footmen wear the enemy down before letting their stronger figures attack," Mana shouted at the all too familiar woman in a red leather jacket and an oddball fellow in a tight leather bodysuit cut in a way that exposed his chest from the abdomen up and a ridiculous-looking shaved sides with a long strand of hair running back down hairdo.

"Middle Ring values his men and would rather not waste them by blindly throwing them at a Konoha ninja." The woman replied before unbuttoning her jacket and reaching for a mysterious weapon held inside.

"You've been a pain in our ass for a while, it was very thoughtful of you to present yourself like that for a good, crisp fry…" the oddball gent lifted his arm up, revealing sealing glyphs crackling with lightning on his palms. He was likely the user of that incredibly fast and dangerous Lightning Release jutsu before, just as fast as natural lightning, used without hand seals or words… Dangerous did not even begin to describe it.

Thumb was right to be worried, these two were bound to make Mana have her hands completely full…


End file.
